A little christmas spirit for dinner

Healthy Dessert - Honey Lemon Jelly

As you guys might have know from my previous posts that I strongly believe in the benefit of drinking honey.  So, have been trying to get my baby girl to drink honey water the past one week as she was having a running nose and cough.  But, unlike SMALL FAN, Baby FAN doesn't seems to like to drink honey water as it is.  So I thought of making a light dessert that uses honey as the ingredient for her.  Stumble upon someone making honey and lemon gelatin, so I thought I give it a try and modify it according to my taste.  It was a hit with Baby FAN, now she will ask to eat more of the jelly thingy....Another successful, healthy snack to share with all. She now got the benefit of honey and the additional vitamin C from the lemon.  Here's the recipe:

Honey Lemon Jelly

 

Ingredients & Directions

•  Juice of 1 freshly squeezed lemon
• 3 tbs of honey (you can add more if you like it sweeter or less if you like it more sour)
• 4 level tsp of gelatin powder 
• 1/4 cup of hot boiling water
• 13/4 of cool boiled water

1. Dissolve gelatin in the hot boiling water.  Then add in the cool boiled water and mix well, make sure all the gelatin has dissolved.
2. Pour in the lemon juice and honey.  Stir and mix well.
3. Pour mixture into individual jelly cups.  Makes about 5 to 6 small cups.  
4. Put into the refrigerator and let the gelatin set.  Takes at least 3 or 4 hours.
5. Served and enjoy!
   

Mini Cup Cakes

A friend of my asked me for a recipe for cupcakes so that she can make with her daugther.  Here's one that I tried some time ago but forgot to post.  The recipe is super simple.

Mini Cup Cakes

• 50g soft margarine
• 50g sugar
• 50g self-raising flour
• 1 egg

1. Preheat oven to 180 deg celsius.  Place 26 paper mini muffin cases on a large baking sheet or for my case, I made a slightly bigger one and use 12 cases instead.
2. Put all the ingredients for the cake into a mixing bowl and beat together well until smooth.
3. Divide the mixture among the cases and cook for 8 to 10 minutes until well risen and golden.  Depending on your oven, you might need to cook longer for bigger muffin, poke a toothpick into the cake and if it comes out clean, it's done.
4. Transfer cakes to a wire rack and leave to cool completely. Then decorate as you please.

You can used my birthday cupcake icing recipe to make the icing or you use this simple recipe that I used in the cupcakes in my pictures above.  I simply mix Icing Sugar with Milk until I achieve the right consistency I want. Alternatively, you can buy the icing from Phoon Huat, they sell lots of different type of icing and decorations at the shop.  Enjoy!

Chocolate Cheesecake Truffles

I wanted to bake a chocolate cheesecake for my hubby's birthday and found this recipe at allrecipes.com and thought it seems simple enough to do.  I half the original recipes as I just wanted a small cake that is not too much for the family.  I think I might have overbaked the cheesecake as it was rather hard and dense when we cut it.  Hubby say it was a little too rich for him.  I also think so too.  Well, after trying cheesecake made with condensed milk, yoghurt and whipped cream, I think I still like the cheesecake that is made with whipped cream best, it has the right consistency and texture that I like.  Now that I have tried out different type of cheesecake, my next target is to make chocolate cake (non-cheesecake).



Oh, I also tried making a ganache for the toppings of the cake and I must say it tasted really really good.  Will use this recipe for my other cakes again. Well, here's the recipe for the cheesecake and ganache:


Ingredients & Directions

For the Cheesecake 

• 150 grm Digestive Biscuits (the original recipe called for 18 OREO Chocolate Sandwich Cookies for a 9 inch pan) finely crushed
  
• 60 grm butter, melted (the original recipe was 2 tablespoons butter)
  
• 1.5 (8 ounce per packet) packages PHILADELPHIA Cream Cheese, softened
• 1/2 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
• 1 teaspoons vanilla
• 1/2 (12 ounce) package BAKER'S Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chunks, melted, slightly cooled (I use vanhouten dark eating chocolate instead)
  
• 1/4 cup coffee-flavored liqueur (optional) - I skipped this as I don't have any
  
• 2 eggs

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F if using silver 6-inch springform pan (or to 275 degrees F if using dark nonstick 9-inch springform pan). Mix cookie crumbs and butter; press firmly onto bottom of pan. Set aside.
2. Beat cream cheese, sweetened condensed milk and vanilla in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until well blended. Add chocolate; mix well. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing on low speed after each addition just until blended. Pour over crust.
3. Bake 1 hour 5 min. to 1 hour 10 min. or until center is almost set. Run knife or metal spatula around rim of pan to loosen cake; cool before removing rim of pan. Refrigerate at least 4 hours or overnight. Store leftover cheesecake in refrigerator. 

For the Ganache

• 1 cups semisweet chocolate chips (I used vanhouten eating chocolate instead)
  
• 1 cups heavy cream
• 1 teaspoons vanilla extract

1. Place chocolate chips in a large bowl, or in the bowl of a stand mixer. Pour the cream into a saucepan, and bring to a boil. As soon as the cream boils up to the top of the pan, quickly remove it from the heat, and pour it over the chips. Let stand for a minute or two, then stir with a whisk, or use the paddle attachment for the mixer, to mix until smooth. Be sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl occasionally. Stir in the vanilla until well blended. Place a piece of plastic wrap directly on the surface, and allow to cool at room temperature, or in the refrigerator.

Living the Natural Way

Recently I seemed to be in the mood for natural product as I have such successful story with honey.  I just have to share it here.  I have started giving my SMALL FAN 1 tsp of honey every night before he sleep.  Heard from a honey seller that honey actually helps promote good sleep, but in any case, the purpose of my giving SMALL FAN the honey is for his sinus.  SMALL FAN used to have such bad sinus that he cough every night and day and sometime even vomit due to the mucus that was stuck in his throat.  We have brought him to pediatrician, to chinese sinsei and spend thousand of dollar on his medication but it just doesn't seems to work, he visit the doctor almost every few weeks.  So one day while searching for a cure I stumble upon this miracle honey from the website http://www.earthclinic.com/  and decided to give it at try.  (Crossing my hand) I proud to say that my SMALL FAN has not seen any doctor for almost 3 months now and I never heard a cough from him anymore except for ocassionally when his throat get too dry.  One side effect I found out from this is that beside sinus honey is also very good for fever.  I have tried it on myself and SMALL FAN and on both ocassion our fever breaks after 2 days of consuming honey.  My Baby FAN is now down with high fever so I'm trying to get her to drink honey water to see if it helps.  Introduced to my mum, she always have this persistant dry cough every few weeks, but ever since she started during honey, I hardly hear her cough anymore. Beside honey I also found many natural way of healing from earthclinic, here'a few that I tried and seems to work, so do give it a try better than paying loads of money for chemcially processed medication.

• Fever - mix 1 teaspoon of honey with 1 cup of luke warm or cold water and drink it as regularly as you can until the fever breaks
• Cough and Phelgm or sore throat - mix 2 teaspoons Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV) with 1 tsp honey in half 1 cup of warm water and drink it 2 to 3 times a day.  (I love this concoction, always work for me whenever I have a cough or sore throat).  For those of you who can't stand the smell of ACV you can try using lemon juice to replace the ACV it works as well, my mum love this concoction, whenever she feels that she is coming up with a flu or cough she will drink this and so far she has been really healthy and seldom here her reporting sick.
• Sinus - 1 teaspoon of honey in half 1 cup of lukewarm water and drink it before you sleep. My SMALL FAN got his sinus cure this way.  I think the honey drink also keep him from getting sick easily.
• Dandruff - mix 1/2 ACV with  1/2 water in an application bottle or any container you can find,  mix them up well. Then apply this concoction to the scalp of your hair after shampooing. Leave the ACV on the hair for about 5 to 10 minutes than rinse it clean with warm water and dry your hair. I always have dandruff problem so recently decided to try out a more gentler way of getting rid of it instead of the strong dandruff shampoo.  Found this remedy in the earthclinc website and tried it out. After the 1st day, my head don't itch as much anymore, after 3rd day I can visible notice less dandruff.  Beside getting rid of dandruff, I also notice that my hair is softer and shinier, as if I have put conditioner on my hair.  Am going to continue this remedy for a while and see if I can totally get rid of my dandruff. 
• Reduce grey hair -  Mix 1 tablespoon of molasses with 1 cup of warm water and drink it every morning. As the molasses got quite a strong taste, I actually mix it with milk instead, Here's what I did, I mixed 1 tablespoon molasses with some warm water to dissolve it, then top of the cup with cold milk, it actually tasted like latte so it's easier to swollow. I'm currently drinking this every morning, it supposed to help get rid of grey hair which I have lots and lots of.  But I think it will take a while for the effect to be seen.  But here's what other people say that molasses can help, it's a good source of iron so it's very good for lady who is suffering from heavy mensus, it's also said to get rid of fibriod and also help with breast cancer.  But most of all, a lot of people has mentioned that drinking molasses give them increase energy so they dont't feel that tire.  I personally felt that I do feel slightly let tire in the day after drinking this concoction for 3 days.  

Beside such health remedy, I am now also looking out for natural household cleaning product.  My baby girl always dirty her clothes ever since she started eating solid food and want to feed herself. I tried bleaching her clothes but it sometimes distroy the coloured one.  Found this remedy from this website: p://frugalliving.about.com/od/cleaningtipsandrecipes/qt/Natural_Bleach.htm 

• Natural bleach - squeeze some lemon juice on the stain and rubbed some salt on it, then put the clothes under the sun for a few hours, then wash as normal.  Wa lah....nice clean clothes. 

Will be continuing to research on natural living and update my post along the way.  For now, toast to great health for all.

Kiwi Cheesecake

Have been experimenting with Cheesecakes recently and stumble upon this recipe from my son's school's calender. A stawberry cheesecake using gelatin and cream cheese instead of whipping cream. The result turn out quite well except for the jelly top as I think I added too much green colouring so it lost it's transparency and so the kiwi that was layered in between didn't come out. However as for the taste I personally felt that it was too light for me, I still prefer the whipped cream version creamier and reacher.


Here's the recipe.

Kiwi Cheesecake



Ingredients and Directions
Base
- 150g digestive biscuits
- 60g butter

Filing
- Gelatin Powder 11/4 tsp
- Boiling Water 120ml
- Kiwi Puree (2 kiwis cooked in 1 tbs lemon juice and sugar to taste)
- Cream Cheese 125g
- Sugar 35g
- Vanilla Essence 1/4 tsp
- Fresh Kiwi (I slice the kiwi into round thin slices and uses about 4 slices to decorate)

Topping
- Gelatine powder 11/2 tsp
- Water 180ml
- Sugar 3 tsp
- Food colouring

Base
1. Melt butter and mix with the crushed biscuits. Press mixture onto the base of the tray. Refrigerate the tray for 15 minutes or until required. Prick the bae with a skewer before pouring the filling onto the tray.

Filling
2. Place gelatin powder in a bowl. Por boiling water over the powder and stir until the gelatine has dissolved, about 10 minutes.
3. Beat the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla essence until creamy. Gradually addd the gelatine syprup into the mixture and beat until the mixture is smooth.
4. Scouped out 1 tbs of the kiwi puree and put aside. Pour the rest of the kiwi into the cream cheese mixture and blend until evenly distributed.
5.Pour mixtue onto the prepared crust. Press the kiwis onto the cheese mixture, partially submerge the kiwi in the cheese mixture. Refrigerate for about 2 hours or until firm.

Topping
6. Dissolve gelatin powder and sugar in boiling water until the gelatine has dissolved. Add green colouring. Add in the prepared kiwi puree.
7. Cool the gelatin syrup completely before pouring over the cheese filling. Refrigerate the dessert until ready to serve.

Creamcheese Muffins

Baby FAN prefers savoury food to sweet stuff, so have been experimenting with savoury food that is portable and I can prepare ahead of time. While searching the net, found this recipe from allrecipes.com where they use cream cheese as the main ingredients for the muffin. So decided to give it a try. They muffins turn out beautifully and it actually tasted quite good. But....sigh...my baby girl doesn't seems to like the texture of muffins and cakes, so take a bite and spit it out...sigh....As for my boy, he just ate the cream cheese toppings while my husband says he don't like muffins even though it tasted quite nice....sigh...I think I have to give up making muffins as it always ended up in my tummy or the dustbin. In any case, for those of you who loves muffins, do give this a try, the smell was heavnly when I baked it and it actually tasted quite nice, I personally quite like it as a contrast to the normal sweet type.

Creamcheese Muffins
(original recipes at http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Breakfast-in-a-Muffin/Detail.aspx)



Ingredients and Directions
- 1 cup whole wheat flour
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 4 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup milk
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil
- 2 eggs, divided
- 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
- 1/4 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
- 1/4 teaspoon seasoned salt (I opmitted the salt as the cream cheese and cheddar cheese is salty enough for me already)
- 4 bacon strips, cooked and crumbled(I replaced it with 2 pieces of chicken ham instead to make it a healthier version)

1.In a large bowl, combine first five ingredients. Combine milk, oil and 1 egg; stir into dry ingredients just until moistened. Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups half full. In a mixing bowl, beat cream cheese and second egg. Add cheddar cheese and seasoned salt; mix well. Stir in ham or bacon. Spoon 2 tablespoons in the center of each muffin. Bake at 425 degrees F for 15-20 minutes or until muffins test done. Serve warm.

Bow Tie Pasta Salad

Was shopping with my little girl at Carrefour and when saw that they sell BOW TIE pasta and I just have to buy it. Saw the use of Bow Tie pasta in many of the kids cooking recipes so I just have to buy and try it. Have been looking around for it in NTUC Fairprice and Giant but just can't find it. So, today, I could a Bow Tie Pasta Salad for the kids and they love it. My Baby Girl actually ate the whole plate herself without me feeding her and my boy was playing and eat the pasta, he was imagining the pasta as a butterfly, a bat, a fish etc...I'm so gald it was a hit, even my hubby. I cook quite a large pot and was thinking maybe I can serve this for lunch tomorrow but ended up my hubby just gobble up everything, he say it was so appetising. YES! This is definitely a keeper, here's the recipe, roughly as I just add the ingredient based on what I have and tasted.

BOw Tie Pasta


Ingredients and Directions
- Bow Tie pasta
- Broccoli
- Cauliflower
- Carrot
- Bacon Bits
- Pesto Sauce
- Sugar
- Olive Oil
- a pinch of salt to taste
- raisin (optional, I added it because my kids love raisins)

1. Boil a pot of water, put in a pinch of salt and a few drops of olive oil. Pour in the pasta and carrots and boil until the pasta is almost done.
2. Put in the cauliflower and boil for another 10 minutes before putting in the broccoli. Cook until vegetables are tender and pasta is al denta. Drain pasta and vegetable and left aside.
3. In a bowl, mix pesto with a generous portion of olive oil, add lemon, sugar and salt to taste.
4. Pour suce over pasta and vegetables and mix until evenly coated. Serve.

Beef Meatball

Baby Fan now likes to eat meet, but real meat pieces seems too hard for her to chew, so I was constantly looking out for mince meet recipe. Stumble upon this super easy beef meatball, I served it to tomato based spaghetti and the kids love it.



Beef Meat Balls

• Mince Beef
• Mashed Potatoes or Rolled Oats

1. Preheat oven to 200 deg celsius.
   
2. Mixed Mince Beef with mashed potatoes, roll mixture into balls.
3. Baked in the oven for 15 to 20 minutes or until beef is cooked through.
   

Gingerbread Man Bread with Chicken Salad

SMALL FAN do not need to go to school today as it was a holiday in lieu of Youth Day. So with the 2 kids at home, I thought I made a simple and light lunch instead. So decided to make a chicken salad and served it with wholemeal bread. I used a cookie cutter to cut out the shape of a gingerbread man for my boy and teddy bear for my girl and SMALL FAN loves it.

Here's the recipe :

• 1 chicken breast, boned and skinned
• 1/4 onion
• 1/2 carrot
• 1/3 cup stock
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1/2 tbsp plain flour
• 2 tbsp frozen corn
• 3 slices of wholemeal bread
• 1 red apple

For the dressing

• 2 tbsp natural yogurt
• 2 tbsp mayonnaise
• salt and pepper to taste

1. Rinse chicken breast and palce in apan with the chopped onion and carrot with the stock. COver and cook for 15 minutes until chicken is cooked through.
2. Cut chicken breast into small dice.
3. Strain the stock into a bowl, finely chop the carrot and remove and discard the onion.
4. Melt 1 tbsp butter in a small pan and stir in the flour. Gradually stir in the strained stock and bring to boil, stirring continuously, until the sauce is thcik and smooth. Add the finely diced chicken, carrot and corn.
5. Used cookie cutter and cut the wholemeal bread into the shape you want. Spread both sides of the sqaures with the remaining butter.
6. Toast the bread until crispy and golden brown all over.
7. Core and chop apples.
8. To make the salad dressing, blend yogurt, mayonnaise, salt and pepper in a bowl. Add in the chicken, carrot and corn mixture and the chopped apples and mix well.
9. Serve salad in a plate with 2 pieces of wholemeal bread toast.
   

Healthy Potato Salad

My Baby FAN loves potato salad, but I was worried about the high sodium and MSG content in normal salad cream, so decided that I made the salad cream myself using yoghurt instead. It tasted quite nice and really healthy...kudos, a definite stable for my family. I made this for a potluck dinner and everyone seems to enjoy it without knowing that there is no salad cream involved.

Potato Salad

Ingredients & Directions

• 2 Potatoes (boiled until tender, then cut into bite size pieces)
  
• 10 Quail Eggs (or normal eggs) (boiled and cut into half)
• 1/2 onion (chopped into fine pieces)
  
• 2 tbs of plain yoghurt
• 1 or 2 tsp of honey (depending on your taste, if you like it sweeter, add more honey)
• 1/2 tsp of salt (again, depending on your taste)
• a pinch of pepper
• Bacon bits (optional)
  

1. Mixed the yoghurt, honey, salt and pepper together, play around with the honey, salt and pepper until you get the taste you wanted, if you want it sweeter, add more honey, if you want it saltier, more salt, want it spicier, more pepper, want it more sourish, add more yoghurt.
2. Mix the yoghurt mixture together with the potatoes, eggs and onion. Chilled salad in fridge for about 1 hour.
   
3. Sprinkle with bacon bits and served.
   

Molten Chocolate Cake

Have always wanted to try this recipe as the photos from Allrecipes.com always looks so yummy. But always hesitated as I can't imagine eating all these cakes by myself. So last Saturday, I finally get the chance to bake it and bring it to my friend's place for a potluck dinner. The cake turns out wonderfully, but as I baked it in advance and by the time I brought it over to my friend's house, the cake has lost it's liquid center and has harden to a soft mouse stage instead, but it still tasted pretty good. Definitely going to try making it again cause it's so easy, I get my boy to help me out and we finish making it in 15 minutes and it was ready to eat in another 7 minutes. YUM YUM!



Molten Chocolate Cake
(original recipe here)




Ingredient & Directions

• 6 ounces Cadbury Old Gold Dark Chocolate
  
• 10 tablespoons butter
• 1 powdered sugar
  
• 1/2 cup flour
• 3 whole eggs
• 3 egg yolks

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Grease 6 (6-oz.) custard cups or souffle dishes. (I used 12 mini muffins cup instead). Place on baking sheet.
2. Microwave chocolate and butter in large microwaveable bowl on MEDIUM (50%) for 2 min. or until butter is melted (I actually cook the butter and chocolate in a stove under low heat instead). Stir with wire whisk until chocolate is completely melted. Add powdered sugar and flour; mix well. Add whole eggs and egg yolks; beat until well blended. Divide batter evenly into prepared custard cups.
3. Bake 14 to 15 min. or until cakes are firm around the edges but soft in the centers. (as I used a small cup, I only baked it for like 7 minutes) Let stand 1 min. Run small knife around cakes to loosen. Carefully invert cakes onto dessert dishes. Sprinkle lightly with additional powdered sugar and garnish with raspberries, if desired. Serve immediately.

Gingerbread Man Bread

SMALL FAN has been asking me bake cake with him and he was hoping to make some Gingerbread Man Cookies. However as the weather here was quite hot and cookies was too heaty to eat during this period, I decided to make him some Gingerbread Man Bread instead. It was a little messy as the dough turns out to be quite sticky, I think I never knead it long enough although I was perspiring all over after kneading the bread. SMALL FAN helped me to put the raisins. Here's the finish product.

GingerBread Man Bread/ Tortise Bread

Ingredients & Directions

• 1 (.25 ounce) package instant yeast
• 1 tablespoon white sugar
• 1/2 cup warm water (110 degrees F)
• 1/2 cup hot milk
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 egg
• 3 cups all-purpose flour (to increase the nutritional value of the bread - I added 1 tbs of soy flour, 1 tbs of wheat germ, 1 tbs of formula milk powder, 1/2 a cup of whole wheat flour and top up the rest with unbleached flour)
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 tablespoon raisins for decorating

1. In a small mixing bowl, dissolve yeast and sugar in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.
2. Heat the milk in a small saucepan until it bubbles, then remove from heat. Add the butter and stir until melted; let cool until lukewarm.
3. In a large mixing bowl, combine the yeast mixture with the cooled milk, butter, egg, 2 cups flour and salt; beat well to combine. Add the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, stirring well after each addition. When the dough has pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and supple, about 8 minutes. Cover dough and let rest for 10 minutes.
4. Divide dough into seven pieces. One round 2 inches in diameter, five rounds 1 inch in diameter and the remainder in one large round.
5. Place the large round on a lightly greased cookie sheet and flatten slightly. Shape four of the 1 inch rounds into 'feet' and one into a 'tail' for the turtle. Shape the two inch round into a 'head' for the turtle Attach each piece by flattening the end which attaches to the body, wetting it slightly with water and pinching it under the turtle's 'body'. Press raisins into the turtle's head for 'eyes'. For the Gingerbread Man, shape five 1 inch rounds for the feet and hands, and head and one 2 inch rounds for the body. Attach each piece by flattening the end and wetting it slightly with water. Press raisins into the eyes and buttons.
   
6. Cover the turtle/gingerbread man with as damp cloth and let rise for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).
7. With a sharp knife, make crisscross cuts in the turtle's body to make the 'shell'. Finally, use a scissors to make a cut for the turtle's mouth. Bake at 400 degrees F (200 degrees C) for 20 to 25 minutes, or until golden brown.

Miracle Honey

Baby FAN developed a viral fever the past 2 weeks which lasted for almost 7 days...poor girl was really getting skinny. Her fever went up to 39.3 and we have to bring her to KKH for a blood test just to make sure she has not contacted H1N1 or other disease. On day 3 of her fever, I also developed fever. I started researching for natural fever cure and found it in www.earthclinic.com. So I quickly made a whole big bottle of honey and lemon water and just drank it like plain water. The honey works like miracle, my fever never went beyond 37.5 deg celsius and the fever went down on the second day and never came back. Then I started developing cough, so I started drinking Apple Cider Vinegar with Honey 3 times a day and my cough subsided in 3 days. Poor Baby FAN has runny nose and cough til today. I didn't dare to give her too much ACV & Honey as I wasn't sure if her small intestine could take it, but I'm giving her like half a teaspoon each day now, hopefully she will recover soon. By the way, with all these diseases in the house, my SMALL FAN seems to be doing fine and growing strong. I was thinking it could be due to the 2 teaspoons of honey mix with water that I gave him everyday. His persistent sinus cough has also seems to be under control now. So I guess Honey is just a wonderful miracle drug. 3 cheers to the bees for making such a wonderful product!

Baby Frittas

Tried making this Frittas for Baby FAN but I think because I don't have sun dried tomatoes, so I used fresh tomatoes instead and the frittas doesn't turn out as well and Baby FAN don't really like it. Will probably tried it again next when I get my hand on sun dried tomatoes.

Baby Frittatas (Makes 12 Baby Frittatas)

(original recipe here)

Ingredients & Directions

• 3 Large Eggs
• 2 Tbsp Milk
• 2 Tbsp Parmesan, grated
• 1/4 Cup Asparagus, diced
• 3 Sun Dried Tomatoes, packed in oil and diced (I don't have sun dried tomatoes so I used 2 fresh tomatoes, chopped it up and toasted it in the oven with olive oil instead)
  

1. Preheat the oven 375 degrees.
2. Spray or grease mini muffin tins with oil or butter.
3. Whisk the eggs and milk together. Add the cheese, tomatoes and
vegetables.
4. Add a heaping tablespoon of egg/vegetable mixture to each muffin cup.
5. Bake for 12-14 minutes.
6. Cool and serve.

Mini Vegetarian Quiche

Another wonderful recipe from Weelicious. My baby girl loves it and the best is that this quiche is so versatile. I have tried replacing the zucchini with the following ingredients like cod fish with mushrooms; salmon; beef and mushrooms and it works out quite well as well. Try it.

Mini Vegetarian Quiches (Makes 12 Mini Quiche)

(original recipe here)

Ingredients & Directions

• 2 Large Eggs
• 1/3 Cup Cheddar Cheese, shredded
• 1 Zucchini, diced or shredded
• 1/2 Cup Spinach(I used 2 cube of spinach puree instead)
• 1/4 Cup Cottage Cheese
• 1/4 Cup Whole Milk

1. Preheat over to 325 degrees.
2. Place all the ingredients in a food processor or blender and pulse until throughly combined and vegetables are in small pieces.
3. Spray or grease mini muffin tins with oil or butter. (I used those muffin cups instead so I don't need to wash up the tins later hi hi)
4. Pour a tablespoon of mixture into each muffin cup. It should fill each cup about 3/4 way to the top.
5. Bake for 25 minutes or until golden and cooked through.
6. Cool and serve.

Good Tips to fight mosquitoes

My hubby sent me an email recently on how you can get rid of mosquitoes the cheap way. The answer is Listerine. According to the mail, just pour Listerine in a spray bottle and spray around the places that have mosquitoes.

Here's the comments from the mail:
"I tried this on my deck and around all of my doors. It works - in fact, it killed them instantly. I bought my family bottle from Target and it cost me $1.89. It really doesn't take much and it is a big bottle, too; so it is not as expensive to use as the can of Bug-spray you buy that doesn't last 30 minutes. So, try this,please. It will last a couple of days. Don't spray directly on a wood door (like your front door), but spray around the frame. Spray around the window frames, and even inside the dog house.Now these are Good repellant for Mosquitos!!!"

By the way, I also found out some DIY ways to get rid of insects like cockroach and fruit flies. This is what I did.

• To get rid of Cockroach - I bought lemon grass from the market and just throw one or two on those places that attract cockroach.
  
• To get rid of fruit flies - I take one lemon grass and grind it in a food processor then I cook it in about 3 cups of water and leave it to cool, after that I pour the mixture into a spray bottles and spray it on the fruits like banana that attracts fruit flies and it works! So try it, it such a cheap and earth friendly way to get rid of insects.

Pizzary Muffins

Baby FAN has been really really picky with her food these few days, she simply refuse to eat anything that is normal like rice, porridge, noodles and potatoes. She just wants to eat food that she can picks up with her fingers like biscuits and yogurt. So tried my hand at making some mini muffins for her to try, hope she likes it.

Pizzazzy Pizza Muffins
(adapted from Super Baby Food Book)

Ingredients & Directions

• 1 3/4 cups Flour (I combine 2 tbs of wheat germ, 2 tbs of formula milk powder and top up the rest with unbleached flour)
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tbs fresh or dry oregano (as I only have the italian seasoning, I used that instead)
• 1 beaten egg
• 1/2 cup of homemade tomato sauce (I used 2 tbs of maggi tomato ketchup instead)
• 1 cup yogurt
• 1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

1. Preheat oven to 200 del celsius.
2. Combine all the dry ingredients in a large bowl and all the wet ingredients in another bowl.
3. Mix wet ingredients into dry.
4. Pour into greased muffin tins and bake for 20 to 25 minutes.

Mango Chocolate Swirl Cheesecake

It's my sis's birthday, so decided to try making a nice cake for her. But I thought a normal chocolate cake was quite boring since she could have bought it anywhere, so decided to trying making something unique and of my own creation and I came up with this Mango Chocolate Swirl Cheesecake. Of course, I don't just come out with the recipe without consulting the website. Found this Mango Cheesecake recipe from My-Cheesecake-Recipes.com and decided to give it a try and added some chocolate to make it more interesting. I frosted the cake with the chocolate butter frosting used in my previous Chocolate Birthday Cheesecake. Made an angel as my sis likes angel, but think it still look a little childish and not as elegant as I have wanted. Well, here's the finished product.

Mango Chocolate Swirl Cheesecake

Ingredients

Base

• 125g plain sweet biscuits
• 60g butter, melted

Filling

• 250g cream cheese, softened
• 1/3 cup caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 fresh mango
• 200g tub mango yoghurt (I used normal plain yogurt as I can't find mango yogurt)

Chocolate Swirl

• 80g dark chocolate
  

Directions

For the base

1. Crush biscuits in a food processor or with the end of a rolling pin.
2. Add melted butter and stir well to combine.
   
3. Press into the base of a 20cm springform cake tin. Refrigerate until set.

For the Filling

1. Beat cream cheese until smooth.
   
2. Add sugar and beat well.
   
3. Add eggs and vanilla, again beating well.
   
4. Chop half of the mango in to small pieces and fold into cheese mixture together with the yogurt.
   
5. Reserved 1/3 of the mixture for the chocolate swirl. Pour the rest into the chilled base.

For the Chocolate Swirl

1. Melt chocolate and mix it into the reserved cheese mixture.
2. Pour mixture into a piping bag. Then pipe the chocolate mixture into the cheese filling using a circular motion. Then used a chocolate stick and swirl the chocolate mixture into the cheese mixture.
3. Bake the mixture at 180 degrees celsius for 20 to 25 minutes or until firm. Allow to cool in oven with door slightly ajar. Refrigerate when completely cool.

Cheese Wafers

Was searching the web for some interesting breakfast and finger food that I can make for Baby FAN when I stumble upon this site which provided a lot of interesting and healthy food for kids, check it out, it's really cool...Weelicious

Tried making the Cheese wafers and it tasted really great, I was munching at it while putting it in the container, it has a crispy outer like a biscuit yet rather chewy and soft like wafer in the inside. Best of all it's so easy to make.

Cheese Wafers
(original recipe here)

Ingredients & Directions

• 150 grams of Cheddar Cheese
• 3 Tbsp Butter
• 1/2 Cup Flour plus additional for sprinkling
• 2 tbs of milk powder (optional, healthy extras that I added)
  
• 2 tbs of wheat germ (optional, healthy extras that I added)
  

1. Combine all the ingredients and form into a dough
2. Remove all the dough to a piece of parchment or waxed paper and shape into a thick flat circle. Cover with waxed paper and refrigerate for one hour or overnight.
3. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
4. Open waxed paper and roll out dough on it into a 1/4 inch-thick piece.
5. Take small cookie cutters and cut out into shapes.
6. Place on a cookie sheet (preferably lined with a silpat or parchment paper) and bake for 12-15 minutes. Let cool on sheet for 2 minutes before removing.
7. Serve.

Easy Claypot Rice - without the claypot

Hubby wanted me to cook a one-dish meal for him, he got tire of eating 3 dish meal. So decided to try my hand at making claypot rice. Tried to combine the recipe from this 2 site: Lily's Wai Sek hong for the ingredients and seasoning and Rasa Malaysia for the instructions of cooking the rice without the claypot. Here's my finish product:

Claypot Rice

Ingredients

• 2 cups rice, washed and drained
• 2 cups chicken stock (I dissolve 1/4 cube of maggi chicken stock cube in 2 cup of water for the stock)
  
• 2 chicken drumsticks cut into pieces
  
• 5 Chinese mushrooms, soaked, cut into half
• 2 Chinese sausage, sliced
• 1 ½ cm thick salted fish, sliced thinly, fried till crispy (As I'm cooking for the kids, so tried to make it last salty for them by omitting the salted fish)
  
• 11/2 tbsp black soya sauce
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 2 cup of chopped vegetables (I used Cai Xin)
  

Marinade for the chicken:

• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 2 tbsp oyster sauce
• 1 tbsp dark soy sauce
• 1 tbsp Chinese cooking wine
• 1 tsp of ginger juice (grated a knob of ginger and squeeze)
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• ½ tsp pepper
• ½ tsp sugar
• ½ tbsp corn flour

Garnishing:

• Spring onion chopped

Directions

1. Chop the chicken drumsticks into pieces.
2. Add the chicken and mushrooms with the marinade and mix well. Marinate for an hour in the fridge.
3. Rinse and cook the rice with the chicken stock in the rice cooker.
4. At the same time, heat up a wok with some cooking oil. Add in the chicken and shitake mushrooms. Quickly stir-fry the chicken until half-cooked. Add in the chopped scallions. Dish out and set aside.
5. Deep fry the salted fish and set aside. (I omitted this step)
   
6. Add the chicken and chopped vegetables into the rice cooker when the rice is almost dry (about 7-8 minutes) and continue to cook till rice is completely cooked.
7. Sprinkle salted fish (if adding), pour in the black soya sauce and olive oil and mix in to combine. Leave the rice cooker on “Stay Warm” for 15 - 20 mintues till rice is dry and fluffy.
8. Before serving, sprinkle with spring onions.
   

Quick Bread Stick

Another finger food recipe that I manage to find in my Super Baby Food book. Baby FAN seems to like it alot, she can eat 2 at a go, rest for a while then eat another one. I served this for her as afternoon snack yummy...even my mum says it tasted quite good.

Quick Bread Stick

Ingredients & Directions
(makes 16 sticks)

• 1 cup of Super Flour (which includes 2 tbs of baby formula milk powder, 1 tbs of wheatgerm and top up with unbleached flour)
• 1/2 cup oat
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• a pinch of salt to taste
• some Italian herbs seasoning mix
  
• 1 beaten egg
• 4 tbs melted better or oil
• 1/4 cup water

1. Mix the dry ingredients and the wet ingredients separately.
   
2. Make a well in the dry ingredients and mix in the wet ingredients until you form a dough. Add water if the dough is too dry and add flour if the dough is too wet.
3. Keep dividing dough until you have 16 balls. Roll into sticks about 1/2 inch in diameter.
4. After shaping, wel them in a mixture of one beated egg mixed with 2 tbs water and roll them in sesame seeds or wheat germ.
5. Place on greased baking sheet and bake in pre-heated oven (about 180 deg celsius) for 20 minutes until crisp and golden browned.
6. Store in air-tight container.
   

Chocolate Birthday Cheesecake

Always wanted to make a cake and decorate it with frosting. So today, decided to make one to celebrate my birthday. Instead of making a cake, I thought of making something light and I stumble upon this chocolate 3 layer cheese cake from Happy Homebaking made with yoghurt and decided to give it a try. I run out of cream cheese so wasn't able to used the exact amount called for in the recipe, so I think that's why the cake came up to be a little too soft and tasted more like chocolate moouse rather then chocolate cheesecake and I think I added too little sugar as well as the sour taste of the yoghurt was a little too strong and covered the taste of the chocolate. Luckily, I was able to find this chocolate buttercream frosting which tasted really really yummy. So all in all I quite like this cake and I think I almost ate the entire one myself as my husband and kid don't really fancy the sourish taste. Here's my final product:

Chocolate Cheese Cake

Ingredient and Directions

The Cheesecake
(makes one 6 inch cheesecake)

for the base:
100g digestive biscuits, crushed into fine crumbs
60g butter, melted

for filling:
250g cream cheese, soften at room temperature
80g caster sugar
200g non-fat plain yogurt
2 teaspoons gelatin powder
3 tablespoon water
80g white chocolate, melted

Method:

1. Mix biscuit crumbs; melted butter together and press firmly with the help of a spoon onto the base of a 6 inch round pan. Chill for 30 minutes.


2. Place gelatin powder and water in a bowl. Heat a pot filled with some water until just simmering and place the bowl inside the pot. Dissolve gelatin and water in the bowl. Keep warm.


3. With a whisk, beat cream cheese till soft. Add in sugar and whisk until smooth and creamy.


4. Add in yogurt and continue to beat till smooth. Blend in gelatin solution and mix well.


5. Divide cheese mixture into 2 equal portions.Pour half into the biscuit base and spread evenly. Chill in the fridge for a while.
   


6. For the 2nd portion, stir in mixture of 80g melted dark chocolate Spread over the 1st layer. Chill for 3 to 4 hours before serving.

The Chocolate Frosting
(original recipe here)

• 6 tablespoons butter, softened
• Cocoa powder, see below
• 2 2/3 cups powdered sugar
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. For light chocolate frosting use 1/3 cup cocoa powder For medium chocolate frosting use 1/2 cup cocoa powder for dark chocolate frosting use 3/4 cup cocoa powder.
2. In mixer bowl cream the butter. Add the cocoa and powdered sugar alternately with milk. Beat to spreading consistency adding more milk if needed. Blend in vanilla.

Lollipop Cookies

Was trying to find some interesting cake to bake to celebrate my mother's day, but ended finding this interesting play dough cookies. Was trying to get my boy to help making but ended up having to stop him from destroying my creation. It's actually quite easy to make and quite tasty. Really happy with the result.


Fun Cookie Suckers (or Playdough Cookies or Lollipop Cookies)
(original recipe here)

Ingredients and Directions

• 3/4 cup butter, softened
• 3 ounces cream cheese
• 1 cup white sugar (I used about just slightly more then 1/2 a cup and it's sweet enough)
  
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour (I used unbleached flour and replaced 3/4 of the flour with wholemeal flour and 2 tbs of wheat germ just to add in some healthy stuff into the cookies)
  
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• assorted colors of paste food coloring
• 24 lollipop sticks (as I don't have lollipop stick, I used those disposable chopsticks instead, but think it's a tad too long)
  

1. In a bowl cream butter, cream cheese and sugar until fluffy. Add egg and vanilla; beat until smooth
2. In a medium bowl combine flour, baking powder and salt. Add dry ingredients to the creamed mixture. Stir till soft dough forms. Divide dough into fourths. Tint each with a different food color. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill for 2 hours.
3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Working with each color, shape dough into 3/4 inch balls. For each cookie place 1 pink, 1 green, 1 blue and 1 orange ball together to make 1 large rainbow colored ball. Shape into a 12 inch long roll (like a snake); starting at one end, coil roll to make a 2 3/4 inch round cookie. Place cookies 3 inches apart on lightly greased baking sheet. Carefully insert lollipop sticks into bottoms of cookie
4. Bake cookies for 8 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool and store in an airtight container.

Snail Pretzel

Suddenly in the mood to bake some bread, so decided to make some milk pretzel from my earlier post. Half way through making the pretzel shape, decided to make it into a snail shape instead, so here's the final product.

Easy Sweet Potato Snack

Here's a really simple snack, healthy and nice. yum

Easy Sweet Potato Snack

Ingredients & Directions

• One Sweet Potato
• Olive Oil
• Salt to taste

1. Preheat oven to 230 deg cel.
2. Cut potato into 1 inch strips, then coat it generously with olive oil and sprinkle some sea salt to taste.
3. Place potato in oven and baked for about 15 to 20 minutes or until potato is crispy outside and tender instead. Serve warm or cool. Enjoy.

Potato & Egg Salad

Baby FAN seems to be going into the fuzzy eater phase. She simply refuse to open her mouth for her porridge or puree. So feeding her becomes a struggle nowsadays. So decided that instead of forcing her to eat her puree, maybe I should just step back a little and think about what else I can cook for her to make her eat willingly. Baby FAN now loves to pick up her own food and eat, maybe I can try making some food that can be eaten with hands. The easiest I can think of is Potato and Egg Salad. Well, I glad I did that, it was a hit, my Baby Girl everything. Am going to try out more finger food stuff. Well, here's the recipe:

Potato and Egg Salad

Ingredients & Directions

• 1 potato
• 1 egg
• 1 cube of spinach puree
• 1 tbs of evaporated milk
• a pinch of salt and pepper

1. Wash potato and boil it in a pot of boiling water until soft.
2. Wash egg, place egg in a pot and bring it to boil, then switch off the heat and let the egg simmer for 15 minutes.
3. Thaw or warm up the spinach puree.
   
4. Peel and cut potato and egg into bite size cube.
5. Mix the potato, egg, spinach, evaporate milk, salt and pepper together and served.

Verdict: Baby FAN loves it, here's a vid of her happily chomping away.

Homemade Milo and Banana Ice Cream

SMALL FAN loves Milo Ice Cream, he says that he can eat ice cream and drink milo at the same time. So instead of buying him some more commercial ice cream, was thinking of making it myself. After all, how hard can milo ice cream be? Just Milo and cream loh... Well, knowing me, will always want to make the food I cook more nutritious, so decided to add banana into the ice cream. So tried searching the web for Banana Ice Cream recipe that doesn't require me to buy an ice cream maker and stumble upon this site: Ireland Ice Cream. A cool site so, I took his Banana Ice Cream with Chocolate Shaving recipe and modified it. Wa la...here's my final product:

Homemade Milo and Banana Ice Cream
(original recipe here)

Ingredients & Directions:

• 50g sugar
• 2 egg yolks
• 120 ml cream
• 100 ml milk
• 2 tsp fresh lemon juice
• 4 small ripe bananas (I used "pang jiou")
  
• 4 tbs of Milo
  

1. Combine the bananas with the lemon juice and blend or mash until smooth.
2. Place in a small saucepan, add one tablespoon sugar, and cook over low heat, stirring all the time.
3. Don’t over-cook. Once it has warmed, it should release a strong banana aroma, and that’s enough!
4. Beat the rest of the sugar and egg yolks together until thick and pale yellow.
5. Bring the milk to a low simmer in a small saucepan, add in milo and mix. Remove from the heat.
6. Beat the milk into the eggs and sugar in a slow stream.
7. Pour the mixture back into the pan and place over low heat.
8. Stir continuously until the custard thickens slightly (around 65-70C) and just coats the back of a spoon. Don’t over-heat, though, because at around 76C you will scramble the eggs!
9. Immediately remove from the heat.
10. Mix in the bananas.
11. Transfer the custard into a small container, cover, and refrigerate until cool (5C). 12. Whip the cream until it has doubled in volume (you should have soft peaks - don’t over-whip).
12. Fold the cream (gently stir) into the custard.
13. Pour mixture into a freezer proof container and freeze for 2 hours.
    
14. Then take the ice cream out and break up the ice crystal, then place it back to the freezer. Repeat this process twice.
15. Place it in the freezer, and continue to freeze until it is solid.

Verdict: The product turns out quite nice and really tasted like ice cream, the only thing with it is that I think I added too much banana, so the banana taste was really strong. Next time, I think I will cut down the banana 2 or 3 instead of 4.

My son and hubby don't like the taste of banana in the ice cream, so I made another version without the banana and I also cut down the sugar as I find the previous one too sweet. So here's the no banana version:

Milo Ice Cream

Ingredients & Directions:

• 2 tsp sugar to taste
  
• 2 egg yolks
• 120 ml cream
• 100 ml milk
• 4 tbs of Milo
  

1. Beat the egg yolks until thick and pale yellow.
2. Bring the milk to a low simmer in a small saucepan, add in milo and sugar to taste. Remove from the heat.
3. Beat the milk into the eggs in a slow stream.
4. Pour the mixture back into the pan and place over low heat.
5. Stir continuously until the custard thickens slightly (around 65-70C) and just coats the back of a spoon. Don’t over-heat, though, because at around 76C you will scramble the eggs!
6. Immediately remove from the heat.
7. Transfer the custard into a small container, cover, and refrigerate until cool (5C). 12. Whip the cream until it has doubled in volume (you should have soft peaks - don’t over-whip).
8. Fold the cream (gently stir) into the custard.
9. Pour mixture into a freezer proof container and freeze for 2 hours.
   
10. Then take the ice cream out and break up the ice crystal, then place it back to the freezer. Repeat this process twice.
11. Place it in the freezer, and continue to freeze until it is solid.

Steamed Pumpkin Kueh

I always have a lot of remaining pumpkin that I don't know what to do with it. So decided to try making Steamed Pumpkin Kueh so that I can let Baby FAN eat it for her snack. Can't really find a good recipe on the net but I do manage to find quite a few on Steamed Yam Cake, so decided to use the recipe for Steamed Yam cake and modified it a little for the pumpkin. Here's the recipe:

Steamed Pumpkin Kueh
(original recipe from Rose's Kitchen Blog)

Ingredients:

• 250g pumpkin (skinned, cut into cube)
• 250g rice flour
• 1 tbsp tapioca flour
• 800ml water
• 3 dried mushrooms (soaked & diced)
• 75g pork (diced)
• 50g dried chay po (soaked, chopped)
• 50g shallots (sliced)
• 2 Tbsp cooking oil

Seasoning:

• 1/2 tsp light soya sauce
• 1/2 tsp sesame oil
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 1/2 tsp sugar
• a pinch of five-spice powder (optional)

Garnishing:

• 1/2 stalks spring onions (diced)
• Fried shallot crisps
• 1 tbsp sesame seeds

Method:

1. Mix rice flour and tapioca flour with 350ml water. Strain mixture and set aside for 15 minutes.
2. Heat 2 tbsp oil in wok, fry the sliced shallots until golden brown. Remove and set aside for garnishing.
3. In the same oil, stir-fry the chopped chay po until aromatic.
   
4. Add pork and mushrooms and stir-fry for a while. Add in the pumpkin cubes, seasoning and some water and let simmer for a while. Dish up and set aside.
5. Boil the remaining 350ml of water with 1 tsp salt. When water is boiling, turn off heat immediately. Add in the mixture from (4) and the flour solution and keep on stirring till mixture becomes thick. Pour batter into a greased 23cm steaming tray.
6. Steam mixture over high heat for 30 minutes or until cooked.
7. Garnish with chopped spring onions. Sprinkle with lightly toasted sesame seeds and fried shallot crisps.
8. When cold, cut into serving pieces and serve with chilli sauce.

Natural Remedy for Cough and Sinus

SMALL FAN have been coughing for a while every time he sleeps. I think it's due to his sinus. Lucky for him, he seems to be able to fall back to sleep after coughing but it's so heart wrenching to hear him cough. So tried searching the net for some natural remedy to cure his sinus and stumble upon this website, Earth Clinic. A really really cool website that contain posting of different people using natural food to cure their illness. For example, using Apple Cider Vinegar for Hairloss, Apple Cider Vinegar for cough and sinus, and even for reducing blood pressure, using Honey for pimples and many more. I'm going to try out the Apple Cider remedy for SMALL FAN and see if it works. Here's the recipe:

Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV) Remedy for Cough & Sinus

• 1 tbs ACV (use pure ACV rather then those artificial ones if possible)
  
• 1/2 cup warm water
• 1/2 tbs honey (try to use pure honey)

1. Mix all ingredient together and drink it for twice a day until symptoms gets better or cure. The ACV is suppose to help loosen the phelgm.
   

Apple Cider for General Health

• 2 tsp ACV
• 1 cup of warm water (8 oz)
• Some honey to taste

1. Mix all ingredients together and drink it every morning before you eat. It's suppose to detox the body.

Well, going to buy a good ACV and try out the ACV for General health recipe myself and see if it works...hi hi....

Steam Egg Tofu

As Baby FAN don't drink milk, I have to constantly think of calcium rich stuff for her, here's one simple one which I serve her as snack in the afternoon. Enjoy.

Steam Egg Tofu

Ingredients & Directions

• Half a package of Egg Tofu
• A handful of Wolfberries
• Some Japanese Seaweed Seasoning

1. Cut tofu into about 1.5 cm thick and place it in a steamer or a metal plate.
2. Wash the wolfberries and put a few of top of each piece of tofu.
3. Then sprinkle some Japanese Seaweed Seasoning on top and steam the tofu in a steamer for about 10 to 15 minutes. If you don't have a steamer like me, I use the rice cooker steamer instead.
4. Let the tofu cool slightly before serving.

Verdict: My Baby FAN loves it...yum yum...she finished the entire plate.

Salmon Onigiri

Got this inspiration from Happy Home Baking when she made Salmon Onigiri for her kids. Ok, her's was definitely more professional looking then mine.


Kid's Meal

Adult's Meal

Ingredients & Directions

• Pearl Rice (1.5 cup)
  
• 1 salmon fillet (about 200g)
• 2 tsp Japanese Seaweed Seasoning (I used Yamaiso Sarukani Kassen)
• 2 tsp Japanese Seasoned Soysauce (I used Unagin No Tare)
• Pinch of Salt
• Pinch of Sugar
• Japanese Mayonese
• A few green peas
• Dried Shaved Bonito (I used Hana Kaisoo)
• Pork Floss
  

1. Cook pearl rice with equal portion of water in a rice cooker, add a pinch of salt and sugar. Leave rice to cool slightly
2. Clean salmon, cut into cubes, then stir fry it with the Japanese Soysauce until cooked through. Then flake the salmon.
3. Cooked a few Green peas in boiling water and leave it to cool.
   
4. Mix salmon to the rice and add some Seaweed Seasoning to taste.
   
5. Put rice mixture into rice shaper until half full, put some pork floss and mayonese in the middle. Then cover it with more rice to form into a tight ball and shape accordingly.
   
6. To decorate the rice ball, put some cook green peas to make the eyes of the bear and seaweed for the mouth.
7. For the kids portion, I actually put some mayonese and pork floss on the bottom of the plate and then put the rice ball on top.
8. For the adult portion, I simply squeeze some mayonese on top of the rice ball, then sprinkle the dried bonito on top.

Verdict: I must say I like it a lot, tasted yummy although my boy don't really like it, he got put off by the green peas and the black spot (caused by the Japanese Seaweed) on the rice...sigh...Not sure I will make it again though...maybe when there is special occasion.

Fruit Smoothies Recipes

Have be trying to wean my baby girl off breast milk ever since she hit 9 months. But just can't seems to get her to drink formula milk. Tried all sort of brands, even goat's milk and soy milk but she just don't like it. So, tried giving her full cow's milk when she hit 1 year old but she don't seems to like it. So I tried yoghurt and she loves it. Well, don't think I can ever serve her yoghurt for 3 meals a day, so I thought maybe I can try making smoothies for her. Tried making banana smoothie as recommended by some baby food guide but it taste really yucky and my baby girl just spit it out. Also, the problem with banana based smoothies is that it will turn brown quite fast and it really doesn't look too appetising. So I search the net and stumble upon this page of smoothie recipes from nickjr.com. Tried it for my baby girl and wa lah...she gobble up half and cup at one go...yappie... this is a great achieve as I normally only manage to get her to drink the most 1 oz of formula milk each day. Here's the winning recipe:

Peaches and Cream Smoothie

• 3 frozen peaches or fresh peaches
• 1/2 cup peach yoghurt (I used 1 cup of yoplait apricot yoghurt instead)
• 1/4 cup of fresh fullcream milk
• 1/2 cup of baby apple juice

1. Blend all ingredient together and served cold. Yummy....

Check out more yummy smoothie recipes here

Birthday Cupcakes

It's my Baby FAN's birthday, decided to do something different this time round. Instead of ordering a really large cake, decided to make some cupcakes (using the chocolate oatmeal cupcakes recipes from my previous post) and then get the kids (basically all my nieces and nephews) to decorate. I think they enjoy decorating the cakes, although I think I should have made more as they kept asking to decorate more cakes, but I was only able to allocate them 2 each even though I made 2 batches (about 22 cakes).

After they decorated the cakes, I get them to post and take a picture so that I can frame it up and give it to them as a token or party gift to bring home. I made the frame using hard A4 paper and bought some nice wooden clips from popular, then pasted the back with magnets, wa lah...a nice fridge magnet photo. All in all, think this idea was really neat and meaningful, so proud of myself...ha ha...

Here's how the finish product looks like:

Photo frame with SMALL FAN and the cupcakes he made.

Here's the recipes for the icing that I used, the icing turns out really tasty and it can hold quite well. I was worried it will melt in our hot weather, but surprising, it was still holding well after 3 hours out in the open. I made 2 batches of the icing, one I keep it white, while the other one I tinted it with red food colouring a day before. Then I left it in the fridge and about 3 hours before the event start, I thaw it and rewhipped the cream, then put it in pipping bag ready for the kids to decorate. I also bought some decorative items from Phoon Huat for the kids to use to decorate their cakes.

Buttercream Icing
(adapted from allrecipes.com)

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 cups icing sugar
• 2 tablespoons milk (I only added 1 tablespoons to make it thicker as I worried that it will be too watery for the kids to work with)
  
• 3 drops food coloring, or as needed (optional)

Directions

1. Cream room temperature butter with a hand mixer, the paddle attachment of a stand mixer, or a wooden spoon until smooth and fluffy. Gradually beat in confectioners' sugar until fully incorporated. Beat in vanilla extract.
2. Pour in milk and beat for an additional 3-4 minutes. Add food coloring, if using, and beat for thirty seconds until smooth or until desired color is reached.