Elderflower Jelly with Summer Fruits

This time round, it's cooking for a friend's birthday BBQ and the weatherman says its HOT, HOT, HOT!! So time for something light and refreshing and what could be more refreshing than nicely chilled jelly with fresh fruits in it? However, after rumaging through my larder, I found that I've run out of my 'ready made' jelly mix. Deep breath and dive into Google to search for jelly recipes. Since its for a friend and her guests, I choose failproof Jamie's recipe but in a moment of bravery decided to make some tweaks to make it suitable for kids. So a quick 5 minutes for make it and pop it into the fridge, with all fingers crossed, I went to bed. The next morning, as early as 6am I was up to check if they had set and tasted fine. I can safely report that my 6am Jelly breakfast tasted sublime :)

Elderflower and Promegranate

All packed and ready to impress

Belacan fried chicken

It's our last pilates class and we planned to have a potluck lunch after the class, so once again my head is spinning trying to think of something to cook. Since this group is not keen on spicy food as well as there will be kids, it had to be something without chilli. The day before the potluck, I was at the supermarket, wandering the aisles for inspiration. I ended up with chicken wings and some odds and ends and no ideas! 

There's a saying that when you are stuck for answers to sleep on it. Sleep on it I did, and I got up half an hour before the alarm clock wnet off with belacan chicken in my head! Problem solved, I had chicken wings and the other ingredients were staples in my storecupboard...err, I did have to do a run to the shops for oil though..but to cut a long story short, I happily contributed my belacan fried chicken wings to the potluck and even the 5 year old girl loved it, and I was then christened the 'fried chicken wing auntie'!



Dried Prawn Sambal Buns

When the ladies agreed to a picnic, it was time to get cooking but because it was a picnic I had to think of something that was easily portable and won't require too many eating utensils. Since I was baking bread again recently, I decided to go with buns filled with something.... the something took a long time to materialise, at one point it was sambal ikan bilis, another, it was chicken curry then it was sambal udang kering (dried prawns). These 3 were going round and round in my head. I had no clue where I'd stashed the ikan bilis and was not up to rumaging around my larder, so that was out. I was too lazy to get to town to buy dried prawns so that was 50/50 ... chicken curry, I can get all ingredients from the local super market so it was looking like a winner. However, come the day before the picnic, I found myself going in and out of asian grocery stores hunting for dried prawns...it is was to be sambal udang kering!

6:00 am goes the alarm on picnic day and I was up and the dough of the bun got going in no time. Next the sambal, with the help of my processer, in goes all the ingredients, a couple of whizzies later, all was fried up and ready for the buns... all was going like clockwork except for the fact that it turned out to be quite a cold morning so the dough was taking its time to rise...oh oh! The buns were baked down to the wire, car engine was already revving when they were still in the oven! Needless to say, we made it to the picnic and had a lovely time!



The buns on display

Makan Makan

Cinnamon buns

This particular baking is done in memory of my grandmother who passed away this month at the age of 94. I remember the days when she used to look after me, she would go to the market in the mornings and come back with a few of these buns. These are treats for herself. The recipe used is Japanese sweet dough with the addition of raisins and honey, just the way Amah used to like it!

Penang Loh Bak

Loh Bak is pork rolls wrapped in bean curd skin (tao puih). Although found in most food courts, when I think of Loh Bak, what comes to mind is always the long stretch of temporary stalls set up next to the chinese opera theater (which by the way is also temporary). These stalls normally carry the same combination of food, the rice porridge stall, the 'sik koh thng' stall, the mua chi stall and of course the stall that sells Loh Bak (normally served tapas style with fried bean curd, prawn fritters, century egg and a few other things). I have wanted to make these for a long time, a lonely packet of bean curd skin sat in my larder will bear testament to how long! Finally the incentive came via an invitation to a potluck at a fellow Penangite's house. I'm happy to report that everyone thought they tasted yummy and none but 2 morsels out of the 10 rolls I made was leftover.

Pandan layer cake

Pandan layer cake for Melissa, well, figuratively speaking it is for Melissa as she will not get to taste it! I'm trying out this recipe for my cousin who wants to make this cake for her daughter's birthday. The bake bit was a bit of a dissapointment as it was rather dry, this I was told by a friend is due to the fact that the recipe did not contain any butter. The custard required a bit of patience to make as I used really low heat and it required constant stirring. All in all when the layers were put in and the cake chilled, the dryness of the cake was not noticeable and it was not too bad.

Italian meatballs

After a bout of un-mentionable illness in the house, one which required a strict diet of cream crackers and water (yes, you know what I'm referring to), I found myself with a load of cream crackers to spare. I then came across Jamie Oliver's Meatball recipe which used crushed cream crackers instead of breadcrumbs. The meatballs turned out great and guess what, no cream crackers leftover, hooray!!

Vinegar Fish (Ikan Masak Cuka)

Come lunch time today, the rumblings of my tummy signals fish. The choice of the day then is vinegar fish. This is another of the numerous dishes that my late grandmother used to cook, crispy fried fish in yellow tangy sweet, sour and spicy sauce. With fingers crossed that the mackerel found here is not vastly different from the spanish mackerel from home, into the car I jumped and off to purchase my fish.

The verdict, the mackerel worked perfectly fine and the lunch I had was comfortingly filled with memories of my late grandmother.