I had been toying with the idea of making a cake for Eva’s teatime snack since she loves grazing – normal toddler behaviour. Since I had some cream cheese, I decided to make a wonderfully creamy cake that is packed with some calcium goodness. After spending a good twenty minutes searching for the right recipe, I came across one that looked pretty promising. I didn’t want to make a huge cake – we are not really big cake fans and with the moving coming soon, I didn’t want too much in the freezer – so I halved the recipe and made some adjustments.

The outcome is very yummy – Eva couldn’t wait to try it out and she kept asking for more. While Nil and her are okay with it, I would definitely cut back on the amount of sugar used – I used a little less than the 1.5 cups required but it looks like I can get it down to 1 cup. Otherwise, everything else is good. The cake isn’t as browned as in the original recipe as I didn’t want to burn it in between my food poisoning-related toilet trips and power naps. So I moved the rack nearer to the bottom heating element to allow the bottom bit to cook a little bit more – hence difference in the density between the top and bottom of the cake. Still, it makes for a very moist “light” cake.

I’d love to try this recipe out again but this time with things like nuts and dried fruits like cranberry, apricots or even fresh fruit like blueberry. It should be great as muffins too! YUM!

Cream cheese pound cake
Adapted from Cream Cheese Pound Cake recipe here

Ingredients

170 gms unsalted butter, at room temperature
125 gms cream cheese, at room temperature
Slightly less than 1 1/2 cups brown sugar
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups cake flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 160°C and line a 7 inch round pan with baking paper. Alternately, you can use a loaf pan.
2. Remove three eggs from the fridge and place aside – eggs should be used at room temperature and not fresh out of the fridge. Do the same with the butter and cream cheese – they should be slightly soft to the touch when ready.
3. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Set aside.
4. In a separate bowl, mix the cream cheese, butter, vanilla extract and sugar on medium speed until smooth or for 5 minutes before adding in the eggs one by one. Mix well.
5. Gradually add in the flour – if you can, mix by hand to avoid gluten formation. This will give you a nice fluffy cake.
6. When ready, pour the batter into the pan and lightly shake it to even out the top. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until the top is golden brown and the insides cooked – test using a toothpick (it should come out clean if cooked).
7. Serve as is warm or with some coffee/tea. Freeze the remaining leftovers and if need, rebake covered to warm up or warm up in the microwave (in a microwaveable container).

My grandfather loved to eat this snack and there was a lady at the morning markets near my house who makes these with turnip or yam. Delish to boot! Unfortunately – as with everything that the older generation makes – when the lady decided to retire to focus on her failing health, I lost access to one of the best chai kueh I’ve ever tasted. Everything else that I tried lacked something – the filling was either too peppery, too salty, there wasn’t enough garlic, the skin wasn’t chewy enough, the list is endless but one thing was for sure, it wasn’t the same.

So I gave up my search for this snack and decided to try and make my own. It was hard in Switzerland as I couldn’t find the right flour – you need wheat starch flour which isn’t the same as regular white flour. It was only upon arriving that I decided that I would try my hand at making this dish. It wasn’t immediate as I was quite busy – as you may already know – with heaps of stuff. It didn’t help that I spent some of my free time on trivial stuff like looking for costumes (work-related) and so forth. Heh.

While the filling is satisfactory, the skin still needs more work to give it that extra chewy texture. And of course, the size and pleating wasn’t exactly what I had in mind. So I might just give this another go again. This just goes to show that cooking requires regular practice!

Vegetable dumplings (Chai Kueh)

Ingredients

(A) Filling
1 smallish turnip/jicama/sengkuang – shred finely
1 medium carrot – shred finely
50-80 gms dried prawns
5-6 cloves garlic – finely diced
1 tbsp oyster sauce
Soy sauce and pepper to taste
Oil for frying

(B) Skin
165 gms wheat starch (tang mein hoon)
85 gms tapioca starch
420 ml BOILING water
5 tbsp oil

Method

1. Prepare the vegetables by finely slicing them into thin stripes. You could use a food processer or grated BUT the effect is not the same. It doesn’t give the dumpling filling the right texture.
2. Fry the garlic in some oil until golden brown and fragrant. Remove half for use later. Using the remaining half, fry the dried prawns until fragrant before adding in the turnip and carrots. Add in the oyster sauce, soy sauce and some pepper to taste together with about 50ml of water (or more if necessary).
3. Fry until the vegetables are soft and then turn the fire down to a simmer to dry up the sauce. It’s crucial that the filling is not too wet. Once ready, turn off the heat and place aside to cool.
4. In a separate bowl, add boiling water to the wheat starch and tapioca flour. The temperature of the water is important as hot boiling water is needed to make the dough translucent. Stir immediately until the mixture comes together. Allow to cool and rest for 10 minutes.
5. Once the dough is ready, knead on a lightly oiled surface while gradually adding five tablespoons of oil. The dough should be smooth yet stretchable when it is ready. The longer you knead, the better the texture will be upon steaming.
6. Divide the dough into small portions and roll them out into flat circles. Fill each piece with about 1 to 2 tablespoons of the filling. Fold the edges and pleat them. Lightly oil them with the garlic oil that was set aside earlier and place the dumpling onto a lightly oiled steaming dish.
7. Steam on high heat for 10-12 minutes or until the skin is translucent. Remove and serve cool on its own or with some chilli sauce.

After three days of salads with a slice of bread on the side as well as half a bowl of mushroom soup (this kind of diet will definitely keep the Plano cosmetic dentist at bay!), I was hankering for something more substantial but not rice. Rice is slowly beginning to bore me, especially the Asian way of serving rice – with side dishes. I miss risottos and paella, and although there is the humble fried rice, there is the issue of cooking it with way too much oil. Gah.

I had some leftover mushroom soup (thanks to Campbell) and some capsicum (one of our favourite vegetables) plus some yummy smoked pork belly in the fridge and I thought, why not whip up something with some pasta? Hence the dish above. If you’re worried about the overpowering taste of mushroom, there isn’t any. Instead the sauce is subtly flavoured by the smoked pork with a tinge of sweetness in the capsicum. The overall result was a very thick, smokey ham-pepper-mushroom concoction which begs to be eaten! And it’s quick to whip up too!

Ham, capsicum & mushroom cream pasta

Ingredients

A handful of smoked pork belly
1 medium-large yellow capsicum
Half a can of Campbell mushroom soup
Some pasta
Pepper to taste

Method

1. In a pot, bring some water and a teaspoon of salt to boil before adding in the pasta to cook.
2. In a non-stick wok or pan, dry fry the smoked pork (the fat from the pork is sufficient) for a few minutes until fragrant and slightly crisp before adding in the capsicum. Stir fry for a few minutes to slightly soften the capsicum (they won’t be mush) and then proceed to add in the soup with about 50ml of water, depending on how thick you want your sauce to be.*
3. Season the sauce with some pepper – no salt is necessary as the soup base is already salty – and put aside when cooked. Reduce if necessary.
4. When the pasta is done, drain and toss into the sauce while it’s still hot/warm. Dish immediately and serve warm on its own or with a sprinkle of cheese (parmesan, cheddar, etc – it’s a personal choice).

* This is not an exact science and don’t worry if you add a little bit more water than you intended to. Just cook the sauce longer to reduce it.

I’m not a really big fan of cincaluk, fresh shrimp preserved in brine and sugar before being allowed to ferment, because of its rather overpowering smell and tendency to explode when shaken (a result of its gassy content). However, it’s AWESOME when cooked, particularly with pork and plenty of chillies! This is a Nyonya dish and although my mum isn’t Nyonya, my grandmother was and my mum managed to learn how to make this dish AND cook it regularly as I was growing up. I remember the tangy yet sweet and seafood flavour infused with the pork, and those chillies…just yummy!

For this recipe, I missed out on the tamarind – something which happens when you’re hungry and trying to cook dinner without starving in the process! – but the outcome was still quite delish although that true to the actual recipe itself. I also used pork belly, the only cut of pork meat I have in my freezer/fridge (you may want to bulk up on those best weight loss pills as pork belly is usually fatty!) but my mum makes this dish using lean meat, loin meat to be exact, but feel free to experiment with other cuts, including the ribs.

Stir Fried Pork with Cincaluk

Ingredients

About 400 gms of pork meat
1-2 tbsp cincaluk
3 cloves garlic
3 small-medium sized shallots
1 green chilli
1 red chilli
Light soy sauce
A sprinkle of brown sugar
Oil for stir-frying

* Don’t forget to add in some 1-2 tbsp of tamarind juice (taken from water mixed in with some tamarind pulp) if you want a bit of sour tangy to the dish.

Method

1. Prepare the meat, chilli, garlic, and shallots by finely slicing them.
2. In a non-stick wok or pan, fry the garlic and shallots on medium-high heat until fragrant before adding in the cincaluk and chillies. Fry until aromatic.
3. Add in slices of pork and fry until brown. If you’re adding in tamarind, do it after the meat is cooked.
4. Add in some sugar, and if necessary, light soy sauce (taste first before adding in the soy sauce). Stir fry until evenly mixed. If you need the dish to be a little bit wet, feel free to add in some water – about 1-2 tablespoons. If it’s too wet, cook it a little longer so that the sauce will thicken.
5. When ready, dish and serve warm with some rice or other dishes or eat on its own.

Prawns are wonderful. Never mind that they are bottom feeders and people think they are filled with tons of junk. Nil and I simply love prawns – doesn’t matter if they come to us boiled with a slice of lemon or stir fried or in curries. Prawns are yummy!

BUT getting to the flesh can be tedious if you hate peeling prawns to bits. Then there is the preparation – if you want to eat the flesh without having to peel it, you need to shell it before you cook it. They leave a stench on your fingers and anything that comes into contact with it, including my stroller basket. (I wouldn’t and cannot imagine parents with preppy strollers like this Bob stroller putting in prawns in their stroller basket so it must be just me/Nil!). My Swiss-Italian housemate used to think that I was nuts shelling my own prawns back in Australia when you can buy them shelled. They cost more and I was a stingy poker back then when it came to food. Besides, you can do more with unshelled prawns – pan fries, boiled, grilled and so forth instead of the regular add-in-veg or fried rice with shelled ones!

It takes a certain kind of skill to pick out fresh prawns from not-so-fresh ones – I’m still working on it although I got most of it down to pat, I think. Choose prawns with a firm texture, hard shell and not slippery. Sometimes I’m too busy thinking about other stuff to buy and get one or two which aren’t fresh but no biggie. Often, they are still edible; they just don’t taste as good as fresh ones – not-so-fresh prawns when cooked are often mushy, and their flesh sort of splits or falls apart easily.

When storing prawns, the old school style has always been to fill a container with some water and sugar, toss the prawns in immediately upon returning home and freeze it. For shelled prawns, sprinkle some sugar over and freeze. Sugar is used to maintain the firmness and enhance the sweetness in the flesh. Both methods have worked well in my favour; I find it great when prices are low and I want to stock up on prawns.

When cooking prawns, look out for the characteristic pink colour throughout the prawn. It should be even – this means even the tail and head has to be pink. Half-cooked prawns can result in you having a rendezvous with the toilet – not recommended at all. Having said that, don’t overcook your prawns – they will end up dry and tough. You want something juicy yet fully cooked.

How to cook whole prawns? Well, there are many ways – with butter, garlic, cereals, on the grill with/without marinate, boiled, curries and flavoured sauces, and Nil’s favourite style – with plenty of tamarind pulp. Note that with this dish, the more “burnt” the prawn is, the better the flavour so don’t worry about having to watch out for your prawn and use plenty of high heat. A non-stick pan will work best in this instance.

Pan fried tamarind prawns

Ingredients

500 gms medium to large prawns
100 gms of tamarind pulp – more if you like it stronger
Light soy sauce
Some water

Method

1. Remove the sharp bits on the prawns head and tail as well as the whiskers and rinse before marinating the prawns with the tamarind pulp and soy sauce.
2. Leave to sit in the fridge for at least one hour or more if you want a stronger flavour.
3. When ready, put a non-stick pan on medium-high heat and wait till the pan is smoking hot before placing the prawns in on one side. Flip over when the flesh is pink and the shell is slightly charred. Remove when both sides are fully cooked and slightly charred. Repeat until all the prawns are cooked.
4. When the last batch of prawns are ready but still in the pan, pour the marinate into the pan (still on medium-high heat) with the previously cooked prawns.
5. Add in about 50ml of water and stir until the sauce thickens or is nearly dry, leaving a coat on each prawn. If you like more sauce, then you don’t have to reduce a lot of the sauce. If you don’t like the sauce, then cook it for longer.
6. When ready, dish and serve warm with some rice or other dishes or eat on its own.

On lazy days or days when I just have no idea what to cook, I dig out various cuts of chicken and prepare them with just soy sauce and some garlic. My favourites have always been to use the following cuts either mixed in or separately: chicken feet (YUM!), drumnets or wings. Nil doesn’t really fancy the feet so I do those mostly for lunch plus that part is pretty cheap. I often get about 20 or so feet for around SGD2 or less. The outcome is still very yummy!

In fact, you can use just about any cut of meat or type with this dish. Some people make it with pork belly; others with pork ears (YUM as well!) and so forth. I love it with huge amounts of garlic but discovered of lately that the key in the sauce is the quality of the soy sauce used. I tried to cook this dish with a soy sauce that had less salt (and indirectly less flavour) and found it wanting in so many ways.

For the taste, it should be sweet yet tinged with meat flavours; savoury would be the key word we’re looking for. The sauce is fab on its own or with some soft white rice and even noodles or pasta! Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go lick my fingers and try not to get any sauce while I’m working on some exposed acne treatment systems.

Dark soy sauce chicken

Ingredients

Some chicken pieces
Dark soy sauce
Light soy sauce
Garlic
Water
Sugar

Method

1. Fill the wok with about 250ml of water or more, depending on the amount of chicken you’re using – just ensure that you cover at least 3/4 of the pile of meat.
2. Once the water boils, added in some cloves of garlic – how much depends on your tastebuds. Remember to wash them as you’d be using unpeeled garlic.
3. Allow the water to boil with the garlic for a few minutes before adding in your meat. Turn down the heat to simmer and cover.
4. Once the meat is cooked, add in a dash of light and dark soya sauce plus sugar. Don’t forget to taste the sauce – it should be savoury, not too salty or sweet.
5. Remove the wok, turn up the heat slightly so that it’s still simmering but not boiling and stir occasionally to get an even dark colour on the meat. Leave to cook until the sauce is reduced to a few tablespoons or more (how much, again, depends on you).
6. When ready, dish and serve warm with some rice/noodles/pasta or other dishes.

Kacang botol or more uncommonly known as winged bean (its English known counterpart here is “four angle bean”) is one of my favourite vegetable and is often used in stir fries with plenty of chilli but is more commonly used in Malay cuisine as an ulam or Malay salad where raw vegetables, chosen for their medicinal (and nutritional) properties, are eaten with sambal belacan. It is high in Vitamin A, C and several others, and is often cooked in the same way as other leafy greens. Great for when you’re on a diet – no need to resort to things like phentermine!

One of the more popular ways of cooking this is with sambal and prawns although I too like it with some garlic and dried prawns. The key to yummy sambal-based dishes is not to overdose with the salt, keep the “meat” (prawns, fish, etc) fresh and add in a pinch (or two) of sugar – at least that’s how I prefer my sambal dishes. And oh, not too much on the oil either.

Sambal kacang botol with prawns

Ingredients

A good amount of winged beans
200 gms of fresh prawns – shelled save the tail
Sambal belachan*
Salt, pepper and sugar to taste
Oil – for stir frying

Method

1. Wash the beans and slice them diagonally before putting them aside.
2. Heat up your wok to medium-high heat and add some oil before tossing in the sambal. Fry them until fragrant.
3. Add in the fresh prawns and stir fry until the prawns turn pink. Then toss in the vegetable and add in a few tablespoons of water if necessary. Cover the wok for about one minute
4. Remove the wok and stir fry. Season with salt, sugar and pepper to taste. You’ll know the vegetables are cooked when they are bright green. Dish and serve warm with some rice and other dishes.

* For the recipe for sambal belachan, please refer to this link.

I love simple vegetable dishes. Maybe because I’m such a lazy bum when it comes to cooking these days. I’m always pressed for time and ever since Eva hit 5.5 months, she has been going through these separation anxiety moments whereby she’d want to keep me in her line of sight otherwise the poor dear will start fussing. So my days of ratatouille and stews have been really limited to when Nil is around – thankgawd he can calm her down *keeps fingers crossed*, otherwise I’d be a total goner!

Snow pea shoots are one of my favourite vegetables – the other is the yummy bean sprout. These young and tender shoots are the tips of the vines of the snow pea plant. It can be served raw, blanched or stir fried and even used in soups but the most common way of serving this vegetable is to quickly stir fry it with some garlic, which is what I do as well. But this time, I thought I’d give it a twist and serve it up with some dried prawns.

I might be more adventurous and add some seafood in the next time or mix other vegetables in as well but for now, this ingredient just got jazzed up quite nicely! The recipe is very simple, quick and fast. One tip is to have your shoots still soaking in the water while you fry your dried prawns on medium-high heat. When it’s time to add in the shoots, make sure that your wok is hot so that it cooks the vegetables the instant it hits the surface of the wok. You’ll need to work super fast as well – think of your body as an extension of Ferrari parts – as cooking these shoots for too long will make them ultra mushy and limpy – not good!

Snow pea shoots with dried prawns

Ingredients

A good amount of snow pea shoots
Handful of dried prawns
Soy sauce
Pepper to taste
Some oil

Method

1. Wash your shoots in some water and leave them soaking in the final change of water while you prepare your wok.
2. Heat up your wok to medium-high heat and add some oil before tossing in the dried prawns. Fry them until fragrant.
3. Quickly toss in the shoots and cover the lid for 1 minute. Remove the lid, stir fry and add in a dash of soy sauce. Pepper is optional.
4. You’ll know the vegetable is ready when it is bright green and has “shrunk” to half its original size. Turn off the heat, dish immediately and serve hot with a serving of rice and other dishes.