Steamed Fruit Cake

The Malay festives is here! Wishing all Muslim visitors "Selamat Hari Raya and Maaf Zahir Batin".

I noticed lately that a lot of supermarts & hypermarts are stocked with loafs of fruit cakes. From what i understand is during the fasting month, all Muslims will break their fast with some thing sweet, hence the dates and fruit cakes bazaar.

I have a lovely Muslim colleague who made fruit cakes for sale. According to her, she actually steamed the cake for 4 hrs!!! How tedious! And she said the water must be boiling hot prior steaming the cake and each addition of water into the steaming wok/pot must be boiling hot. That is why, buying homemade fruit cake can actually cost a bomb...

I have tasted my colleague's steamed fruit cake and was totally amazed by the moist texture...the kind of melt-in-mouth. I'm not a fruit cake fan, maybe because most of the time, the cakes i bought are kinda dry in texture and the culprit behind it could be the baking process.

But because I am totally swept away by the yummy steamed fruit cake, I decided to give it a try on steaming a fruit cake. I found this lovely recipe from thestar.kuali...a truly superb recipe. However, i ran out of sultanas, and here's what i substitued with : cherries, prunes & organic raisins. Although the time needed to steam the fruit is only half the time my colleague does, but it seemed darn long to me. I practically stood in front of the stove for the last 30 minutes, couldn't wait to dig in the fruit cake.

Oh my god. I love it! Truly amazing recipe by Amy Beh. My dad luvs it too (he's an ardent fan of fruit cake...:S) but he said if i could cut down the amount of sugar used, the cake would have been perfect. So peeps, take note ya if you don't have the sweet tooth.

Recipe Extracted from Kuali. com

Ingredients
200g butter
180g castor sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
200g mixed fruits

Sifted
265g plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
70g castor sugar
60ml water

Method
To prepare caramel:Cook sugar in a saucepan until the sugar turns golden brown. Remove saucepan from the heat and pour in water. Stir to dissolve the sugar until a caramel is formed. Set aside to cool completely. Cream butter and sugar until light and creamy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add in the essence. Fold in sifted dry ingredients and add in mixed fruits. Add the caramel to mix. Turn batter into prepared cake pan and cover the top with a piece of aluminium foil. Steam over rapid boiling water for two hours or until cake is cooked through when tested with a wooden skewer.

Multigrain Bread

Actually, this is my second attempt. The first was a week before i decided to give this recipe a second try....haha....know why i failed my first loaf? It was hard as rock!!!!!!! Aiyayai!!! I suspect it's because i did not add any bread improver to the recipe. Though the bread rose well, but heck, it was like rock! There's a Chinese proverb to it "taeng sei kao" (throw dead dog....direct translation from Cantonese)..which means the bread was hard enough to kill dog when the bread is thrown to it. Haha!

Okay...my second attempt was wonderful! The aroma...the height of the bread....the softness...ooo...i just luv it. Oh my god, my bread consumption disorder is back again...u know, once you get started, you'll be addicted. I tried to make the bread interesting by adding some freshly blended pandan juice. My mom had two plants of Pandan Leaves...thus making it easy to make whatever dessert that requires Pandan. Here's the recipe....all thanks to my idol....AGNES CHANG :)

Ingredients:

• 400g bread flour
• 100g whole meal flour
• 1.5 tsp of bread improver
• 1/4 tsp of salt
• 30g of butter
• 30g of sugar (DB substituted with molasses)
• 350ml of milk (DB used unsweetened soy milk)
• 1 1/4 tsp of yeast
• 100g of multigrains (DB gathered multigrains, wheat bran, instant oats to 100g)
• 2 tsp of pandan juice (optional...not part of the recipe)

Method :
There's the conventional method illustrated by Agnes in her baking book. However, what i did was gathered all the recipes and throw them in my breadmaker's bucket. Press the button Whole Wheat...wait for 3.25hrs...and...Tadaa!!! Yummy freshly baked bread ready to be served!!!

I had mine generously spread with Golden Churn butter and peanut butter. Next slice, i had it generously spread with Garlic Spread....*heavens*...

What's your favourite way to eat your toast/bread?

R.I.P. My Friend

It was on Sunday, close to midnight, i received an unexpected message from my good friend, L. It is quite rare to have her sending me a message this late, i somewhat felt uncomfortable at that moment too.

There, the message content was to inform me about the memorial service held for a good friend of mine, LBS on the following morning. LBS passed away earlier in the evening after a long battle with cancer. He was truly a fighter and like my other friends said, LBS proved the doctors wrong for the past 20+ years.

LBS, though you have left us, but the memories of our friendship together will etch forever in our hearts. We will always keep you in our prayer and may you rest in peace.

Me and LBS have been good friends since primary 1. We sat next to each other and we remained as classmates until we finished our SPM. We grew up together and he has always been the 'Tai Kor' to us for he was always the class rep. throughout our schooling years. He was a good friend, a good listener, a good tutor, a good son and truly a man with a loving heart.

You will always be remembered my dear friend..

Blog Award

Wah seh! Never know i would actually receive an award from a fellow blogger....well...if u notice the side bar of my blog...scroll all the way down on the left...yea...number of visitors....a pathetic figure...haha...but anyway, success doesn't come overnight rite?

Thanks to Jen Jen for being such a thoughtful friend...although i don't really know the meaning of this award, but a million thanks and appreciation for remembering me :)

Aiya JenJen, I'm just an avid baker like you...keke...glad to know i actually inspired you to look out for more recipes to try...kekeke...my fellow friends will be laughing at me (ya ya...bet they gasping now...what?? Samantha an inspiration?) Coz all the while I'm actually more like a 'clown' friend rather than a inspiring friend...okay...in short in the loudest among my friends

Anyway...thanks a lot Jen!! Hugs and Kisses for you!!

Here it goes....and i shall pass on the award to :

TheCookingMomster who is my dearest cousin and also a great cook

Jessie who is my bestest bestest and ter-best friend in my life

Gimmy Yap...my joker handsome cousin

HealthFreakMommy.....oooh..i learn a lot of parenting stuff from this hot mama

Till then....adios & Have a great day everyone!!

Blossom Chinese Cake

A new cake species ar?

Haha....it's non other that our very famous "Fatt Koe". I'm just trying to make it sound sophisticated...okay i know it's not.

The last time i tried to make a fatt koe...it didn't blossom that well...in the end, it looks more an ordinary steam cake rather that a smiling chinese blossom cake. I was demotivated.

Came Tuesday (19/8/08), flipped through The Star newspaper and i saw this recipe. Don't know why, i was so eager to try out the recipe. Guess what??? I DID IT!!!!! The moment i uncovered the steamer, all cakes were blossomed and smiled at me!

The only down side of my fatt koe is the color. My colleague asked me if it's yam fatt koe (no...it's not yam...it's just the blue+red coloring). My senior manager asked me if the cake is expired....hence the color (*slaps head*)

Minutes later, they were enjoying the fatt koe albeit the poor first impression of the fatt koe.

Thank YOu So Much AMY BEH!!!

Bento Craze In? ya?

Hi FOlks!!

To all avid mama/girlfriends/wives Internet surfers our there, bet you guys realised the bento craze is a hit right now! Yaya...i'm not exceptional! Been secretly surfing around for a cute bento box...or perhaps a sexy bento box (if there is) recently....so that i can make some bento lunch for my bb to bring to office. Haha...wondering if he'll get mad at me for making him embarrassed....a macho guy holding a lil bento box? haha...but hey, I'm pouring in all my efforts to make him a decent lunch...he can't be mad at me rite?

Anyway, snap off my rantings. Back to bento...actually just want to share with you guys...found this cute bento website...nope...i'm not promoting this website cuz i don't even know who is the owner...i just thought the bento boxes are cute and pretty cheap. I have eyed on the thermal insulated bento box and will blog about the purchase process after i have successfully purchased 1. For the time being.....visit HERE!!!!!hehehhee....fun fun fun!!

'Min Xin' Kueh

Aunty C : What is this? Looks like fried kueh with pork oil....
Me : *slaps head* NOla aunty....it's kueh made by mee suah
Aunty C : Ha? Sure boh????
Me : Yala...bluff u for what? Got Gold ar?
Aunty C : Eh...quite nice la!

Looks like 'chee yau kou' (pork oil kueh) meh??

Hey hey everybody? How was Merdeka Day? Got the patriotic semangat or not? As for me, usual lor...just another manic Sunday...wish it were Saturday..ok ok...ter-into a classic song pulak. Anyway, Saturday night, after our kai kai adventure at Sunway Pyramid, i defrosted some minced pork and a small packet of shelled prawns on the wet kitchen's counter. After watching a DVD with bb, off i went to the wet kitchen and chop chop chop a whole bulb of garlic and also minced the prawn. Then heat up a non stick pan with a drizzle of oil...dump in the garlic and fry till fragrant. Slowly add in the minced pork and prawn and stir fry till cooked. Then add in some water seasoned with soy sauce, sesame oil and pepper to the meat mixture and let it simmer for a minute. Add in mee suah and stir thoroughly till the mixture appear soggy. Turn off the heat. Transfer the mee suah mixture into a lightly oiled pan and let it cool overnight.

The next day, cut the cooled mee suah into cubes/oblong/round/whatever shapes you want. Dip the cut mee suah into a beaten egg mixture and pan fry each of them till golden brown. Absorb the excess oil with a kitchen's towel and garnish the mee suah kueh with some spring onion (i ran out of them...oppps) Serve hot with your favorite sauce!!!

Ingredients :

• 50g of minced pork
• 50g of minced prawn
• 1 whole bulb of garlic
• 2 bowls of water
• 8 pieces of mee suah
• some sesame oil, soy sauce and pepper for seasoning