Polo Bun

Had been thinking of trying the made Polo Bun one day after having seem the recipe at the Famous Cuisine Magazine. It seem quite simple and Brunei dun have nice Polo Bun. So since am not working yesterday so decide to made it as will need some time for the dough to double in size.

However, when i mix the dough it was not as smooth looking as what had been shown in the book so start to feel a bit uneasy as hubby was putting a lot of expectation on the Polo Bun. After adding in the butter, it look more unlike the picture shown as it was very oily. Since it was quite difficult to mix with the philip hand held mixer I decided that maybe I better put my hand to work and start to mix the dough with my hand.

After it double in size have to divide it into small dough and wait for another 10 min. Then the next challenge came on how to put the butter filling on top. Maybe it was my first time to made bread, I was also finding it hard to made the small dough into nice round ball. But after a while it was ok. But hubby say since we are trying it out no need to bake all first so I just baked 9 pieces of the dough.

As was busy with my two sons, so when i put in the 1st batch of the dough I forgot to put glaze it with egg. And when it was done, it didn't look like the Polo Bun as there was no crack on the top and it look quite hard. Was already disappointed with the look already. But when hubby try it he say it was nice.. then only i also try it and find that eventhough it look hard but was soft inside and the topping was nice.

So start to put the 2nd batch to bake, but since I just left the dough to double in size and did not put the topping, it was harder to put the topping. So i put quite a thick layer of the topping and this time i remember to glaze it with an egg.. And wa..la.. it look and taste nicer.. coz the first batch i didn't put enough of the topping therefore there was not much of the topping to crack and with no egg glaze it didn't shine nicely.

It was a really good learning for me. ha ha.. So next time will put a thicker layer of the topping and remember to glaze it with an egg.

Egg Tart

Egg tart is one of my husband favourite food. Whenever he go Kota Kinabalu he will sure try to buy some nice egg tart from there. He claimed that the egg tart from one of the stall in Centrepoint is the best egg tart he ever had with a crispy crust and the watery of the egg custard.


Had been telling my husband that I'll try and made it but had never attempted on this little project ha ha.. It all started with my sister-in-law who had been trying to made egg tart in preparation for puasa. She was thinking of selling this egg tart during the puasa period as usually there are a lots of stall to sell food during this period. The egg tart they did tasted quite nice and so I asked for the recipe.


SO I used the reciped shared by my sister-in-law but changed the crust to puff pastry as that's what my husband required. To cut short the process, I just used the store bought puff pastry. The first batch turn out quite good but the 2nd batch I made some of the egg custard flooded the pastry and therefore the egg tart didn't turn out fluffy like the rest. Also I think either I overbaked or the temperature of the oven was too high so the custard strink in size once it cool down.


It was a good try though, never knew that making a egg tart was so hard ha ha.. Hubby enjoyed his breakfast on thursday morning ha ha.. Asked me to try and made it again..

Curry puff

Suddenly have this idea in my mind to prepare curry puff for wednesday morning breakfast. Yes eventhough have to be at work at 8.30 sharp but with a little preparation a day ahead it was much easier.

Since I have recently bought some ready made puff pastry - introduced by my sister-in-law, thought I will just need to prepare the ingredient a day ahead. I'm not a good cook and dun really know how to made the curry puff ingredient so just asked my mother-in-law's maid to help cook the ingredient. I actually got a lot of these filling recipe but sometime the serving is so big and I get a lots of left over which I usually forget and left to waste. So this time I just ask her to use 2 potato and 1 chicken breast for the filling. Instead of my trying to made the ingredient, I was thinking since she know how to cook better made her an expert first then ask her to teach me.. smart and easy ya...

Anyway I also woke up early on wednesday as Ee was up early and wanna to play. It was my first time to use this type of store bought puff pastry so was trying to figure out which are the easiest way to made it - coz the one I bought is a small square size puff pastry which come in 10 pieces per pack. So I had to roll it out into a rectangle shape then put in the ingredient.. it looked a big like a apple puff pastry..

Well overall, it taste nice but if the puff pastry was more fluffy it would be better. I guess maybe i had rolled it flat therefore it's not so fluffy at all ha ha.. mayb i should try to do a triangle shape one next time.. Hubby was happy and ate quite a few pieces.

Orange Chiffon Cake

Had been quite sometimes since I spend some time in the kitchen to do my own things. Having two small baby at home really occupied a lot of my times. Of course, I love the times spend with them ha ha..

So today when I reach home around 5 plus, I decided to bake a simple orange chiffon cakes which I have never tried before. Plan to have it for tomorrow's breakfast as well to brush up my chiffon making skill coz they say once you stop then you'll forget all the technique in making a good cakes as the more experienced you are then the better the cake you made..

The Chiffon cake is a conversion from the pandan chiffon cake that I had made before. The texture is still nice and soft but I think I had put on a little too much sugar. I should have reduced if the orange juice added was sweet. But overall it's still a good soft yummy cake.

Ingredient:

(A)

5 egg yolks

80g Sugar

(B)

100g Orange Juice

1 tsp Orange Paste

50g Corn Oil

(C)

75g Plain Flour

35g Corn Flour

1/2 tsp Baking Powder

(D)

5 egg whites

60g Sugar

1/4tsp Cream of Tartar

Method : 23cm Chiffon Mould

Preheat oven at 170 degree C

Part A:

1. Whisk (A) till the egg yolks turn creamy pale

2. Add in (B) to step 1 and mix well

3. Then fold in (C) and mix well

Part B:

1. Whisk (D) at max speed until stiff

2. Add in 1/3 meringue into Part A mixture and mix well

3. Pour this mixture back to the balance meringue and fold well till the mixture is smooth

4. Pour into a clean & grease free 23 mould and bake for 50 min or till cooked.

5. Invert cooked cake to cool. Remove from mould once cake is completely cool

Happy trying..

Curry Potato Prata

Hubby was complaining that I had been trying out on a lot of cakes, ice cream even scone recipes but not on any of his favourite food. One of which is curry puff. So since I was free in the afternoon so i quickly went and took out all the ingredients required for this Curry Potato Puff.

I take the easy route where I got my maid to cook the ingredient since I dun really know how to cook curry ha ha.. So after she had cooked the ingredient which I watch and learn so that I can cook up the ingredient myself next time, I just did put the ingredient in the dough and bake it. Baking just took around 30 mins of the time.

Hubby say it was a good try and should be named potato prata instead of curry potato prata coz it was not spicy enough for him. I did put chicken into the recipe but coz the potato was more so I named it curry potato prata. I thought the shape was not so fanstantic but hubby say it was nice wrapped up and he save money rathered than going out for tea.

English Scone for breakfast

Recently had start to enjoy the so called "English Scone" for tea and it seem tat my son like it too. But the price for a good scone here is around B$1.60 which is quite expensive (equivalent to a loaf of bread) ha ha.. so when i saw the recipe from Happy Home Baker, I decide to give it a try.

It was quite simple to made and you just need few ingredient to made such a delicious scone. The scone look hard on the outside but was very soft in the inside. And it taste just like the scone that I always have in Fleur dyn lys. Hubby who was not a fan of scone also think that it was nice when we have it the next day for breakfast. So a very thank you to Happy Home Baker for the kind contribution of her scone recipe. I have attached the ingredients as below if you would like to try. It is a definite keeper for me and will made more of this lovely scones for breakfast or even tea again.

Ingredients:
(makes 7)

250g cake flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
one pinch of salt
50g cold unsalted butter (cut into small pieces)
30g caster sugar
1 egg plus enough fresh milk to make up 140ml

Method:


1. Lightly beat the egg and add enough fresh milk to make up 140ml of liquid.

2. In a large mixing bowl, sift together the flour and baking powder. Add in salt and sugar and whisk the dry ingredients together. With finger tips rub the COLD butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. (It is important that the butter be cold so when it is cut into the flour mixture it becomes small, flour-coated crumbs. Due to our hot weather and my warm hands, I use a fork to work the butter into the dry ingredients. If the butter starts to melt away during this process, stop and place the mixture in the freezer for 10-15mins to prevent the butter from melting further. Continue the process when the mixture is well chilled.)

3. Keep the mixing bowl (with the flour-butter mixture) in the fridge for at least 30 mins.

4. Remove bowl from fridge. Add the egg & milk mixture and stir until just combined. The mixture will be sticky, moist and lumpy. Gather up the mixture and place it on a lightly floured surface and give it a few light kneading (not more than 10 seconds) so that it comes together to form a dough. Do Not over work the dough. (Only mix the dough until it comes together. Too much kneading will cause gluten to develop, and the resulting biscuits will turn hard and chewy. Mix only until the ingredients come together into a combined mass.)

5. Place dough in a plastic bag or cover it with cling wrap. Keep dough in fridge for about 30mins. (The objective here is to keep the dough cold to prevent the butter from melting so that there will be little bits of dispersed butter in the dough. During baking, the heat will cause these tiny bits of butter to melt into the dough and leaves pockets and layers in the biscuits for them to rise nicely. If the butter melts or softens before baking, the resulting biscuits will be hard and flat.)

6. On a lightly floured surface, dust your hands and the dough with some flour and pat out into 1 inch thickness (avoid using too much flour). Cut out the dough with a lightly floured 2.5-inch biscuit cutter (I use a drinking glass instead). In order for the biscuits to rise evenly, press the cutter directly down and lift it straight up without twisting. Dip the cutter into some flour after each cut. Gather scraps together and repeat until all the dough is used.

7. Place cut biscuits on baking sheet (lined with parchment paper). For soft-sided biscuits, place them close together on the baking sheet so that the sides are touching. For crisp-sided ones, place them 1 inch apart, these will not rise as high as biscuits that are baked close together. Brush the tops with some milk.

8. Bake at preheated oven at 200degC for about 13 - 15 minutes or until the tops are golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center of the biscuit comes out clean. The texture of the interior should be light and soft. Remove from oven and place on a wire rack. Serve warm.

Green Tea Ice Cream

I am a Ice cream lover and have always thought of wanting to made my own ice cream as the nice ice cream is always very expensive. SO recently i came across a ice cream book which seem very easy and simple to made. This book was by this lady call Kelly Tang and her book name is "The Cold Tempation dessert".

SO last friday I put up the effort to try out this 'Green Tea Ice Cream' since i still got a lot of the non-dairy whip cream leftover in the fridge. The recipe is very simple and straightforward and one good thing abt it is that you don't need a ice cream maker. I do have one but have not use it since I failed to made ice cream with it. And I always thought making ice cream is very difficult and you must have a ice cream maker to made ice cream at home. Now I can made ice cream at home with only a hand mixer. ha ha..

It took me less than an hour to get everything done and got the ice cream ready to freeze overnight in the freezer. On Saturday afternoon, I try the ice cream. My comment with this recipe is that the texture is smooth but I find that the recipe is too sweet for my liking and it's too creamy for me. Eventhough the recipe didn't turn out as wat I would like but i think I have more confident in making ice cream at home. The recipe will need more altering meaning I will be making more of this ice cream at home till I get it to fit my taste. So dear husband of mine, pls get ready to have more tasting of the Green tea Ice Cream and thanks dear for helping to take the nice picture of the Ice Cream I made.. ha ha..