Crunchy peanut butter cookies

Ingredients

8 tbsp plain flour
2 tbsp caster sugar (I used icing sugar instead for better texture)
2 tbsp crunchy peanut butter
1 free-range egg yolk
50g/1¾oz butter, softened
icing sugar, for dusting

Method

Mix everything into a bowl. Mix with hand. Shape with dusting of flour. Bake 10 mins in preheated oven of 180 C.

Tobey was the main chef this time around. He's getting a hang of listening to the ingredients being read out and adding them into the mixing bowl accordingly. I mixed them with hand. He then shaped and sprinkled them with sugar strands (instead of icing sugar).

He decided to shape them to various sizes

Once it's baked and cooled, out came the coloured icing tubes for more decorating

Finally the taste test- "Mmm Nice, my make cookie nice"
(he then asked to save a few pieces for daddy)

Yam Pau

I didn't make this ..hahahahah (as if I can). It's from the Chinese supermarket frozen section. I am a total convert. Move aside Red Bean and Lotus. Make way for Yam Pau. Yummy!

Chinese Steamed Sponge Cake

Stumbled upon this super baking blog and tried one of her recipes today. Chinese Steamed Sponge Cake is SK's all-time favourite. Everytime we were back in Malaysia, he would go to SS2 Medan Selera and buy tonnes of them.

Ingredients:
250 gm top flour
250 gm caster sugar
2 tbsp milk powder
6 large eggs
60 gm corn oil

Method :
Sift flour and milk powder together.

Beat the eggs and sugar together till light pale in color and the ribbon stage. (If you lift the beaters up and do a figure of eight on the batter, the figure of 8 must be visible for about 3 secs. before disappearing).

Gradually fold in the flour mixture and oil and batter till well mix using a spatula.

Pour batter into a 8" square baking pan lined with greaseproof paper.

Cover the top with aluminium foil.

Steam on high heat for 30 mins and check if skewer comes out clean.
If not steam for another 5 to 10 mins.

Both SK and Tobey loved it (it's a very very satisfying feeling to see Tobey stuffing his face with what I baked). I was generally quite happy with it a tad bit disappointed as it didn't came out as fluffy as I hoped for. After reading the comments on the blog, it's confirmed that's because I used normal self-raising flour and not "Top" flour. Maybe next time I'll add additional baking powder and cover the cake tin with a looser foil lid so that the cake can rise more.

Noodle reading

After a long day out, we were both dead tired

Me: can you fry-up those leftover noodle for dinner?
SK: Sure, tell me how.
Me: Just fry garlic, throw in some cabbage and prawns, fry-fry, then add the noodle with a round of dark soya and light soya. 5 mins job. Then we can rest.
SK: Ok.

30minutes later, this was the result

It tasted so darn good. Instead of just cabbage, he thinly cut carrots, capcicums, AND cabbage.
This plate of noodle says alot about my dear husband. He's unlike me, he's unable to do it the easy way.

Siew Pau

I tried a recipe on Sukye's blog today

Oil Dough

• 340g plain flour
• 220g shortening / lard - used butter

Water Doug

• 550g plain flour
• 150g caster sugar
  
• 160ml vegetable oil
• 240ml iced water
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 tsp golden syrup - Substituted with vanilla extract as well
  

Glaze

• 2 egg yolks

Method:

1. Process the oil dough ingredients in a food processor. Scale it into 20 gm balls.
2. Process the water dough ingredients in food processor. Scale it into 40 gm balls.
3. Wrap oil dough inside water dough.
4. Roll it flat. Then roll it up like swiss roll. Repeat this 3 times.
5. Repeat step 4 with all the pieces of dough.
6. Cut each piece of dough into 2.
7. Roll out each pieces and put in filling.
8. Preheat oven to 190 C and bake 10 mins
9. Remove from oven, glaze with egg yolk and bake another 20 mins.

For the filling:

• 300 gm Char Siew, finely diced - I used cubed pork shoulder and added 1 tbsp of Lee Kum Kee's Spare Rib sauce.
• 3 tbsp sugar
  
• 1 tbsp flour
• 3/4 cup water - 1 cup = 240ml, so do your own calculation
• 1 1/2 tbsp oyster sauce
• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 1 tsp dark soy sauce - omitted this one, didn't have any
• 4 chopped shallots
• 1/2 cup green peas - I substituted with potatoes instead as I didn't have any peas in my freezer
  
• 2 tbsp oil

The Steps:

1. Saute shallot in oil.
2. Add flour, cook until browned.
3. Add Char Siew.
4. Add water, all sauces and sugar.
5. Cook until gluey.
6. Add green peas.
7. Cool it before wrapping the Pau.

I halved the recipe above hoping to get 28 paus but I ended up with only 12! And the dough was too thick. Why? Because I forgotten to cut each piece of dough into 2!!!!!! (I think it's my cold that has been causing my blurriness *excuses* *excuses*)

The end result was tasty, but the filling was abit too watery. Most probably because I omitted the peas. So during baking, some of them managed to ooze out of the dough causing them to look messy.

SK came back and ate one and said "Hmmm nice BISCUIT dear".

Lamb Stew

Lamb shoulders were on price reduction in my local Tesco. So I've decided to try this recipe.

Recipe:
Half a lamb shoulder
one leek
3 carrots
3 tomatoes
3 stalks of celery
5 medium red onions
half a bulb of garlic (skin on cut across in half )
1 cinnamon stick
2 star anise
1 teaspoon of cumin seeds
2 stock cubes
1 teaspoon of black pepper corn
2 teaspoon of salt
3 dried bay leaves

Add lamb, roughly chopped vege, and spices into pot. Cover with hot water. Bring to boil and simmer on low fire for 3 hours until meat is falling off the bone. Nice eaten with rice or on it's own.

End product

Sticky Pan Fried Lemon Chicken

After salivating over Tsu Lin's Pan Fried Mango Chicken dish. I came up with a pan fried chicken dish of my own- Sticky Pan Fried Lemon Chicken. It's so easy as it's all done on the same pan :P

Recipe:

1)Marinate chicken pieces( I used 2 skinless thighs and 2 drumsticks with skin on) with salt, white pepper and cornflour.

2)Pan fry them till brown on all sides

3)Add slices of 1 lemon, 3 garlic cloves and 3 tablespoon of sugar .

4) Switch to low fire. As the sugar melt, keep turning the chicken ensuring they are well coated with the sticky sauce.

5)As the sauce thicken, add 2 teaspoon of light soya sauce and 1 teaspoon of rice wine and stir till the chicken is cooked.

Tasted not too bad (I liked it), will probably use brown sugar instead of white and add a cinnamon stick in the pan next time.

City Break

Since both our birthdays are looming, we decided to take a last minute overnight trip to Birmingham. We chose this hotel as we got a good deal on it. I am very picky about hotels. From experience, hotels in Europe always fell short on standard compared to the ones in Asia. Even if it's freezing outside, a hotel that is worth the money MUST have good and silent air-conditioning. With city trips, opening up windows for fresh air also meaning letting traffic noise pollution in. Anyway, this one is perfect and it provided us a restful and quiet retreat even when it's smack right in he middle of the city centre.

Tobey loved the changed of surrounding.

He's definitely not afraid of height at this point in time. Kept pointing to the cars at the roundabout below.

Here's my little boy looking adorable for mommy.

We started of our day with Dim Sum with BIL at our usual Birmingham chinese haunt Wing Wah. Tobey only took TWO scoops of the lunch I made for him! But I let it go to teething. He eventually ate two bear biscuits.


After that, we brought Tobey to the National Sea Life Centre. We made use of a Buy-One-Get-One-Free Voucher from Tesco and only paid £15.50 for 2 adults and a toddler. It was educational..really, both for Tobey and for us. Who knows a Barracuda is the next most dangerous predatory fish after the Shark.

One of the many aquariums with colourful fishes

We tried our hardest to scare the puffer fish just to see it double in size, but it remained calm..hehe.

SK and Tobey, string-ray spotting

This is the Sting-Ray section. Not very clear from the pic, but string-rays were popping their heads up at the surface of the water above. The caretaker actually told the visitors to not touch them as they are capable to bite fingers off! When you look at the bottom of string-ray, you can actually see a pair of eyes and a smiley mouth. I found that so cute.

Here's the Jelly fish room. Tobey found it awesome when his beloved muslin started to glow.

Then we also visited the Otters, Turtles, Sea horse and a mirror maze area.

We ended Tobey's sea life introductory session with some souvenirs. Mr. Crab can crawl sideways when it's winded up. Tobey kept running away from it. Ms. Fish feels very real and can be stretched in all direction without breaking.

After that we walked around more and went back to the Hotel for a rest. Then we went for dinner in Chinatown.
By end of the dinner, it was way past his bedtime and he was getting really cranky at the restaurant (as you can see from the pic above).

So did we went down for a drink in the bar when he's finally sleeping on the bed in the darkened room? Hell no! We both read quietly in front of the only light source in the room, coming from the bathroom! Cheers to parenthood!

Ayam Masak Merah

I am a lazy cook. Weekday dinners usually consist of boring recycled, tried and tested recipes. But occasionally, I'll have to play some "good wife" card, by doing something new. Today is one of them.

Usually when I crave this dish, I turn to my old friend Brahim (Ahem) but after looking at this recipe and inspired by this blog. I've decided to give it a go. The difference is that, I added 1cm cube of belacan bakar, used 3 chili padies and 2 teaspoon of grounded chili flakes instead of red chilies (I don't have them in the fridge) and blended my tomatoes instead of grinding them. Not too bad. Hubby liked it (although he can't taste much because of his cold), so will try to recreate this more often.

The Baked Fish

Another elaborated fish dish for Tobey. Although this looks much simpler, it took me 1 hour! Woohoo! This dish consists of 3 parts;

1) The Fish

I used 2 chunks of frozen boneless and skinless cod (for 2 meals). Seasoned them with dried Italian herbs and topped with chopped garlic. Wrapped them in foil and baked for 30 mins at 220c.

When it's baked

2) The Mash

Boiled 2 medium sized potatoes, one carrot and a little sweet potatoes. Added olive oil, margarine and a little grated cheese and mashed. This time It's being mashed till smooth as I feel it goes better with the rest of the dish.

3) The Vege

Stir-fried a bunch of spinach with chopped garlic till all wilted.

AND put them together to pose for a pic ..he he...

The Fish Pie

After waiting for 6 weeks, my driving test got postponed till 2 weeks later because my examiner was ill. To help with the excruciating wait, I've decided to fill my time with elaborate activities. Today I made Organic Fish Pie for Tobey's lunch. It took me 45 minutes.

Here's how I've done it.

1) Cut carrots, broccoli and baby spinach leaves to toddler bite size chunks and boil them (in that order as carrots takes forever to be soft)
2) Quarter 2 medium sized potatoes and one small portion of sweet potato. Boil till soft. Roughly mashed.
3) Make cheese sauce by stirring a knob of butter with 2 tbsp of plain flour. Alternately, add skimmed-milk and grated 30g of medium cheddar cheese whilst stirring. Keep stirring until sauce is smooth and in the correct consistency.
4) Add boneless and skinless fresh cod fish (cut into 2cm sq chunks, around 6 of them) to the sauce and stir till fish is cooked.
5) Add cooked veges from step 1 and stir.
6) Scoop onto bowls and scatter mashed potatoes on top.

He ate all his lunch without any hesitation. And that made me really happy.

One happy customer

Tobey's 1st Birthday (Part 2-The actual day)

Today (10th June 2008), we celebrated our son's first year of life with the customary candle blowing and cake cutting.

A year ago...

Credits to digifree

Today...

Happy 1st Birthday Sunshine,
You bring so much meaning and joy to our lives, no words can describe,
How can words do justice when around you all we want to do is burst into smiles,
Your love so pure, unconditional and fine, brings tears of joy to our eyes...

We love waking up to you calling out to us,
We love seeing you play, dance and laugh,
We love how you rub your sleepy eyes on your muslin and how you smell after your sleep,
We love your kisses, hugs and how generous you are with them...

You are 1 year old today,
It's been amazing seeing you grow,
Our one and only hope, is that you continue to grow into a healthy and happy boy,
We will be there alongside you.

We will love you unconditionally and will always do.

Tobey's 1st Birthday (Part 1- The Party)

The party was a success. It was held on the 8th June, 2 days before his real birthday (there's where part 2 comes along). Other than Tobey being abit grumpy (not used to having so many friends at one time in his home), everything more or less went as planned. It was buzzing yet relaxing and the weather was fantastic. We thoroughly enjoyed it.

Here's several pics of the party

my cupcakes which I slaved hours doing the night before...actually the time consuming bit was the "number one cake" (icing so many corners was not fun and after all that hubby and I messed up the surface icing! We shall no attempt baking and icing after a long tiring day) which we'll use on the actual birthday tomorrow...
Tobey got so many nice gifts (Thanks again everyone!!!)..but this definitely caught his eyes

He's more like the mechanic to the bike for now, checking the seat, testing the horn, drop test it to the sides, making sure the gear works...but no riding solo on it...he needs us to guide him when he's zooming with bike.

All his gifts in one pic...

More on part 2. Now I am off to play with all the new toys with Tobey :)

Cupcakes

With Tobey's 1st birthday party looming nearer, I've decided to learn to make some simple cupcakes, in hope that I can actually make some edible and presentable ones for the party itself.

"Splurged"(hehe...credit crunch time OK) or invested in several key items, like a good muffin pan £2.25 and the real Vanilla Extract that cost me £4.25! Vanilla "flavour" only cost 40p, but I believe in having one luxurious ingredient to lift the taste. These items can be used more than several times, so it was worth it.

Used this recipe for the cakes. It turned out quite lovely. Sk liked it. As to keep to the credit crunch spirit, I've decided to make my own butter icing (edible by baby, rather than the raw egg white icing ). Basically just beating butter and icing sugar with a few drops of vanilla extract and some water to reach piping consistency. A few drops of those food colouring goes a loooong way.

Here's the end result

Cost: less than 20p each in total
Best part: I've enjoyed the whole 1 hour process other than the...
Worst part: Washing up
What I've learned: I am crap at icing piping
What I would do differently for the party: is to not pipe too much butter icing onto one cupcake (to avoid overdosing Tobey's guests with sugar) and also make fresh cream icing as well for the sake of variety (if time permits of course).

Chili Prawn

Thanks to Mae Pranom Brand- Chili Gravy for Fried Fish...a sauce that actually gives you want you expected of it.

Curry mee

instant one of course...but soon, very soon I can have the real thing in M'sia. Can't wait!

Homemade Seafood pasta

Ahhh...mussels, not allowed during my pregnancy and confinement duration. It's nice to regain the freedom to indulge in all types of food, without worrying about issues such as mercury content or the effect of certain food to my baby. Bliss!

New management

Our fav hangout cheap & cheerful spicy food place, The Trill of the Grill (located at the top of The Drapery road, Northampton) has been taken over by a new management and operating under a very 'muslim' sounding name ...


It reminds me of KFC's logo. Fine. We went in anyway but delighted to find that the cooks are the same people with different coloured uniform. There were several new clumsy waitresses though. One even dropped one of those cast iron dish right beside me. Scared the living daylight out of me. And another one only brought our drinks to us after we enquired about it after 10 mins. She still got the nerve to ask me to repeat my drinks order! *&$%! If not for my hubby holding me back, I would have told her how incompetent she sounded. Well, she shouldn't be messing with a hungry pregnant woman. (Same goes for this Argos teller we met today who spoke to us in her bloody 'chavy' English as if it's completely acceptable and gave me this look that spelled "stupid yellow people" when I asked her to repeat herself..grrrrrr! You'll understand my frustration better if you're 8 months pregnant and not so loving it anymore)

We ordered
Massala fish (~£5) :

This was as good as we remembered it to be. Full of flavour and fish was fresh. It went really well with our naan bread.

Lamb curry (~£5) : Noticed that the cutlets of lamb used was of a cheaper cut. Hence, caused the dish to be more oily that what we usually get.

And...

Baby spring chicken (~£4): I hate hate hate the name of this dish. Why must the word baby be in it. Still feeling really bad from eating it :(

Overall, still a nice place to eat but would much prefer the previous name which is cooler sounding. Of course, after returning from this restaurant, all item of clothing worn has to be washed, as the result of being smoked by the open grill.

Thought I should record this visit as it could be our last visit to this restaurant, as it's not baby friendly at all. Must spend the next couple of weeks visiting new haunts that has high chairs or stroller friendly.

Prawn noodle

It was rather bland one, but ok for a cold winter day. My blender broke down on me halfway through cooking. But we got it replaced eventually.

Healthy Breakfast

This is what I call maternal instinct...kicking in even before the little boy arrives. By the way, I baked that marble cake :P