Was never missing. Was never away. Just procastinating. Its me, im talking about.

This is my very first entry in 2006 and surely is a very late one. This is an entry of soya bean pudding with longan. Initially, the plan was mango pudding but i couldnt get any ripe mango. Alright it was a sponstaneous decision to make mango pudding and went straight to Giant with dearest Sweesan at night. mmm....no fancy mangoes so plan switched to Soyabean instead.

Very simple. Buy any jelly powder, follow the instruction and substitute soyabean instead of plain water. Add longan in the pudding.

Also, cartoonise the paper cups. Would definitely cheer the guinea pigs who are going to eat your pudding. Look at what i've done:

And i especially like the third cup from left. Is it left? mmm...yes, left! The one who long eyelashes and carries a shy look.

Anyway, the cups are not edible. What's edible is in the cup. Like this.

Its really very simple. Check it out! And its quite yummy. A good treat for late night supper when you're starving from hunger during online hours.

i made this for jazzmint's daughter,faythe's birthday it's a chocolate banana cake.. decorated with chocolate ganache into a monkey face...

Happy Birthday Faythe

These tarts... it's quite easy actually. it's just milk, cream and eggs...!! if u dont wanna make the puff pastry.. then u can just go get some ready made puff pastry from the supermarket or something ..

Portuguese Egg Tarts Recipe
Ingredients..
500g ready made puff pastry

Filling
200g whipping cream
300g milk
80g sugar
3 eggs
3 egg yolks
1/4 tsp vanilla essence

Method..
1. roll our the pastry to a rectangular shape about 3mm thick. roll it up like a swiss roll. chill until firm.
2. divide the pastry into 25g portions, flatten the pastry and roll it into about 3mm thickness. press onto the tart moulds.
3. filling: cook whipping cream and mil until 70c.stir in sugar and cook until sugar dissolves. add  into the beaten eggs and egg yolks. mix until well blended. lastly add in the vanilla essence. set aside to cool.
4. pour the filling into the pasrty tarts from step 2. then bake at 220Cfor 20-25mins.

* these pastry doughs are so pampared..need to rest..need to chill..ish..

cut the dough to abt 25g each ... looks like mini mantou

the egg mixture

then line the dough into the mould.. and pour in the egg mixture (duh)

when it's in the oven.. the dough's starting to bloat..

ha.. does it looks like a peach tart or something.. hehe..

tada!!!

the second batch.. wasnt that neatly done..

eat eat eat... yummmy

the amount of stuff use are crazy..it doesnt look thatmuch in quantity..but at the end of it..we made more than 2 dozen portugese egg tarts...wild...enough to distribute to your neighbours..haha..

after trying ourhands at making this..realized that e should probably avoid eating too much of egg tarts..jus look at the ingredients used and it spells calories..haha..

cheers..

Puff Pastry actually is quite easy to do. it's just that one have to wait for a long long long time before one can actually use the pastry. and sometimes one might just crack some where in the middle..but its all worth while..

Puff Pastry Recipe
Ingredients...
A
400g flour
50g butter
1/8 tsp salt
220g water
B
300g pastry margarine

Method
1. mix A to form a smooth dough. let it rest for 15mins.
2. roll out the dough in cross shape wih the centre thicker and the 4 limbs thinner.
3. place the pastry margarine onto the centre of the dough(thick area). wrap it up.
4. roll out the dough into a 10mm thickness (in a long rectangular shape)and fold once (fold in 1/3 of the rectangular front, and 1/3 from the back). let it rest for 15mins.
5. turn the dough 90degrees and repeat step 4 four more times,
roll out the dough into a 3mm thickness and cut into required size.
*weighs 1kg

take a look at the pic..which shows you our adventurous journey..

Apple Strudel Recipe
Ingredients..
500g ready made puff pastry

Filling
4 granny smith apples
100g sugar
100g water
60g sultanas
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Method
1. roll out the puff pastry to 3mm thickness. cut one piece (8x32cm) as the base and one (12x32cm) as the top. for the top portion, fold the pastry into half lengthwise. use sharp knife and make vertical cuts on the folded edge at 1.5cm intervals.
2. filling: peel and core apples, cut them into slices. cook them in sugar and water until soft. drain the liquid and set aside to cool. add in ground cinnamon and sultanas. mix until well blended.
3. place the based onto a greased pan. place the filling at the centre leaving 1.5cm on both sides.
4. lay the slitted pastry over the filling to one side and unfold it to cover the filling completely.
5. press the sides with fork. egg wash the top.
6. bake at 200c for 30mins or until golden brown at the bottom rack of the oven.

ok.. so after waiting for about almost an hour.. we can finally use the pastry.. no wonder people just buy those ready made ones in supermarket. anyway...

after that .. we cooked the apples with raisins.. and cinnamon..

Mel cutting the pastry..

scooping the apple n rasins n cinammon.. yeah!!!

before going into the oven..it looks a bit... flat and wide.. haha

it's starting to baloon up.. no, i mean.. kembang..

yay !! fresh from oven!

nicee...

hmm..we should have done this for christmas..it so suits the mood..hehe..

personal note: i guess the amount of pastry margarine could be reduced..the pastry was alil soft..

prologue.

Melisa suggested (out of the blue) that she wanted to bake something. and Swee, needs to try making the Monkey cake (coming soon) for her customer.. so.. we decided to get together again for a Kitchen War 2. this time, no cookies or smoothies, we made 2 types of pastry and 1 chocolate sponge cake.. and a omelette...

swee then went over to mel's house n pick her up to the bakery supplier. it was actually quite a spontaneous trip. we didnt know what to bake at first, but thru our discussion in the car, we decided to try out something with puff pastry. Mel has not made it before, neither swee.. one of the ingredients to make puff pastry is the pastry margarine. yes, we've not heard of it before. surprisingly, we found it in the bakery supplier (they're suppose to have it anyway...) then we went over to Giant to get some granny smith apples and eggs ... cause's we're making Apple Strudel and Portuguese Egg Tarts.. YES !! YUMMMYYY ...

Recipes tomorrow.

while making the mango cream tart on new year's day..there was extra mango puree that should not go to waste as always. so, we (me, deb  and may) put a couple of things together into the blender..and came up with a fine tasting juice which also happpens to be rather beneficial..or at least we think so..

what is it??

ingredients..
..mango puree
..crushed ice
..some milk and orange juice (amount based on preference)
method..
1. blend mango puree and crushed ice in blender till smooth.
2. add in desired amount of milk and orange juice into mixture and blend till well combined.
3. tada..ready to be serve.

looks like a commercial pic..but it aint..

up till today..we've yet to give a name to our juice..haha..so any suggestion..

just alil background info on how we ended up blending all this elements together..lets just say theres 2 peeps among us who were having constipation..but this drink is really effective..just shortly after consumption..we were running to the loo already..

NOTE: we did not have "cirit birit"..just a pleasant trip to the loo..finally..

if u r facing the same situation..i guess theres not much harm in trying this..haha

it was yet another pretty spontaneous baking session..on the 1st morning in 2006..we are so "semangat"

the 3 of us..me..may and deb..gathered at my kitchen with still sleepy eyes..to try out another pastry recipe called Mango Cream Tart..

we were having more fun poking jokes at each other rather than paying full concentration in creating a beautiful tart..so as expected..some messy situations are lining up ahead of us..

Ingredients..
1 portion of Sweet Pastry B

Filling..
..A
150g milk
100g mango puree
..B
2 egg yolks
40g sugar
1 tbsp cornflour
..C
1 tbsp gelatine
2 tbsp water
..D
100g whip topping cream, whipped
..E
100g mango diced

Method..
1. roll out the pastry btw 2 sheets of plastic wrap to 3mm thickness. line the pie mould with rolled pastry. prick the pastry with fork and leave it to chill for 20mins.
2. line the pastry shell with foil or greaseproof paper and fil it up to the rim with baking beans, bake at 190C for 15mins. remove the foil and beans, then bake for another 10mins. leave it to cool.
3. cook A intil it boils. then add in B and mix well until well blended. continue to cook at low fire until it thickens.
4. premix C and put it over the double boiler until melted. add it into the above mixture and mix until well blended.
5. cool the mixture over ice water until cold and it starts to thicken on the side. add in D and mix until well combined. add in E and mix until well incorporated.
6. pour the mixture on the baked tart pastry. put it in the fridge until set and firm. decorate with diced mango.

the pastry

we decided to use the big pie mould..so that we'll have lesser work and it would be done faster..hehe..good thing the pastry turned out fine and tasty..

the mango cream tart should look like this..

at the end of the session..we forgot to take a pic of our end product..but it doesnt look at all like the pic..haha..so at least im leaving a good impression for you to look at..

our mishaps..
..i couldnt find gelatine...so i bought agar-agar powder instead...so maybe the texture was abit off because of this..
..we didn't realize that we had to whip the whip cream earlier..so there was delay in getting the filling done..
..there were several other avoidable delays which we commit..maybe we are just having to much fun with each other..haha..so the overall process took longer than expected..
..mangoes i bought turned out to be sour..

turns out...the filling of our mango cream pie was not up to expectation..but when left in the fridge overnight..the taste improve alil..maybe i should try this recipe again..just to see if it would be any better..haha..

in the midst of the whole kitchen havoc..we managed to create a new drink and also did another recipe with the remaining pastry..details in another post soon..hehe..