Hanim Cooks!

Bread and Butter Pudding.

When you need easy comfort food, bake this. You can never make any mistakes with the recipe. It’s one of the dessert that I first learned to bake using my mom’s Betty Crocker recipe book published back in the 70’s (and we still have it, though tattered). Enjoy!

• 8 slices bread
• 2 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp ground cinnamon
• 3 eggs
• 2/3 cups granulated sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 2 1/2 cups milk, scalded*
• 1/2 cup raisin
• Pinch of salt

Heat oven to 175 degree celsius. Butter a medium sized casserole. 

Toast the bread, spread butter and sprinkle a bit of sugar and cinnamon. Cut into squares and arrange the bread in the casserole, butter side up. Sprinkle raisins.

In a bowl, beat egg together with salt, sugar and vanilla. Stir in milk and pour over bread.

Place casserole in a pan of very hot water about an inch deep. Cover casserole lightly with aluminium foil, bake for 25 minutes. Remove foil and continue baking for another 30 minutes or until toothpick/knife inserted from edge of casserole comes clean. Cover with foil if tops get too browned. 

Alternative: Replace bread with croissant and raisins with chocolate chip for a different twist to the original recipe. 

*Scaled milk means heating the milk just before it reaches boiling point.

Poached Pear in Cranberry Juice with Vanilla Cream.

I was running on the treadmill at the gym when I felt the sudden urge to make this. So I ran faster so I can finish faster and dash to the supermarket to get the ingredients. I did make a pit-stop and had Japanese food for dinner; I was hungry and light headed from all that rushing.

Poached pear is a typical dessert option for cold winter nights as it is typically served warm. Poaching maximizes the pear’s natural sweetness and the spices enhances the taste; truly decadent. 

Anyway, the recipe is very easy. Normally the recipe calls for port wine; I opt to use cranberry juice instead. Another alternative are orange or pomegranate juice.

You’ll like it, trust me.

Tomato Couscous.

Had tomato couscous for lunch yesterday (and again today because I have some leftovers).

Couscous is filling, as filling as eating rice but has lesser calorie and carbohydrate with higher protein content. Plus, it is faster to cook and I’m all about fast and easy meals.

Here’s the recipe. Couscous is a typical Middle Eastern cuisine but I find that it goes well with Indian curries - korma, rogan josh, palak paneer, etc. I’m assuming it’s because the recipe calls for similar ingredients and spices.

P.S. It’s finally Friday. So far work is (almost) non-existence, I hope I don’t speak to soon. 

Breakfast Smoothie.

So there’s banana, skim milk, strawberries, honey and oatmeal. Blitz it all in a blender with some crush ice and a bit of water to dilute it - healthy and fast breakfast, to go.

Ought to last your for at least 3 hours, just in time for morning snack. 

Deep Fried Squid.

I discovered something new (thank you Nigella). Instead of using all-purpose flour, this recipe calls for semolina flour and corn flour.

The result? Crunchier deep fried squid.

If you don’t have a deep fryer (which I don’t), use a sauce pan and fill about 1/2 way up with oil. Make sure that it is hot before frying so that the squid don’t stick to one another, and the pan. To know if it is hot enough, drop in a small cube of bread; the oil should sizzles up fiercely. Lower down the heat slightly to ensure that the squids don’t burn; fry until it turns golden brown.

Try have it with anchovy mayo. What I would do is mix 1 teaspoon of anchovy paste with 4 tablespoon of good quality mayo. Don’t worry, anchovy haters will be non the wiser. I like to have it with home made aioli too. Or you can have have it with plain old ketchup *yawn*

Took me about 15 minutes to cook this dish.

Peach And Cream Puffs.

It’s not difficult to please people around you; just make this peach and cream puffs. All you need to do is assemble the puff pastry sheet, cream cheese, sliced peaches, whipped cream and top it off with another layer of puff pastry sheet.

It’s amazing how something so simple can taste delicious.

Roasted Eggplant And Red Pepper Dip.

I tried this recipe last night and I absolutely love it. Since I didn’t have red pepper, I used green pepper instead. I suggest you not to because the color will not look as vibrant. This is especially important if you want to serve it at dinner parties - no one wants to eat something that look like a lump of stale food.

Also, I up the amount of tomato puree, I used about 1/4 cup of it and I sprinkle about 1 tbsp sugar to make it less tangy. Had it with tortilla this morning for breakfast.

Makes about 1 1/2 cup worth of finger licking dip.

fattiesdelight:

Roasted Eggplant and Red Pepper Dip

(via fattiesdelight)

Party Cheese Twists.

This has got to be one of the easiest and cheapest finger food you can prepare. Perfect for parties, though I normally make it so I can stuff my face silly when I haven’t got anything else to eat at home.

You’ll need:

1. Store bought puff pastry sheet (I always have extra’s from making pies)

2. Plain flour for dusting

3. Grated Parmesan cheese

4. Salt

5. Cayenne pepper

6. Dried oregano (parsley works well too)

All you do is roll out the pastry thinly, on a lightly floured surface, to a 9 inch (23 cm) square. Then trim the edges of the pastry and brush the whole lot with beaten egg. After that, sprinkle with the Parmesan, cayenne and a little salt, then press this down into the pastry with your fingers, and now cut the square into ½ inch (1 cm) strips.

Now hold the end of each strip and twist them round and round, before pressing the ends on to the baking tray (you can chill the twists at this stage if you don’t want to cook them straight away). Then pop them into the oven to bake for 8 minutes, or until the twists are puffed and golden brown.

English (sort of) Breakfast.

Your day will be awesome if you start it off with this.

Simple, easy and most of all, satisfying. Also known as full breakfast (they don’t call it full for no reason).

1. Cut a tomato into wedges. Coat with olive oil, salt and pepper. Bake for 10 minutes.

2. In the mean time, fry or bake some potato wedges.

3. In another frying pan, heat 2 tbsp of butter, fry mushrooms and season with salt and pepper. Add a 2 tbsp of cream and chopped parsley to add to the taste. Cook until mushroom just softens.

4. Crack a couple of eggs; beat in a bowl. Season with salt, add a dash of milk and 1 tbsp of butter. Do not over cook. No one likes tough scrambled eggs.

5. Heat a can of baked beans.

6. Toast a couple of breads.

7. Arrange all in a plate.

Have it with a glass of orange juice, tea or coffee.

All smiles.

Looks delicious. Will MUST try this.

Nutella Mug Cake

4 tbsp self rising flour
4 tbsp white granulated sugar
1 egg
3 tbsp cocoa powder
3 tbsp Nutella
3 tbsp milk
3 tbsp vegetable oil

1. Combine all ingredients in a large coffee mug. Whisk well with a fork until smooth. Microwave on high for 1 1/2 – 3 minutes (time depends on microwave wattage. Mine took 1 /2 minutes).

2. Top with whipped cream and chocolate syrup.

Note: Depending on the wattage of your microwave, you may have to increase cooking time.

prettyfoods:

Nutella Mug Cake (via The Family Kitchen)

Stuffed Tomatoes.

It was a lazy Sunday, I was at home alone, bored. Keyword: lazy, alone, bored. Oh, I was also hungry.

So I opened the fridge and found some left over rice and half-used veggies. And I decided to make stuffed tomatoes. There’s no hard and fast rule to this recipe. I just mush in anything that I think fits my taste bud. But if you want to follow my recipe, well this is what I did:

Trim the tops off tomatoes and scoop out the seeds.

Mix corn kernels, cooked  rice, tuna, parsley, olive oil, red onions, chopped green/yellow/red  peppers and lemon juice. Salt and pepper to taste.

Stuff this mixture into the hollow tomatoes and arrange them nicely on a baking tray.

Top with some mozzarella cheese and grill in the oven at 180 degree Celsius for about 15 minutes.

That was my lunch. Great as appetizer.

Ceviche.

Also spelled cebiche or seviche, is a seafood dish popular in the coastal regions of the Americas, especially Central and South America. Ceviche is usually accompanied by side dishes that complement its flavors such as sweet potato, lettuce, corn or avocado. As the dish is not cooked with heat (yes, raw), it must be prepared fresh to avoid the potential for food poisoning.

I was introduced to this dish by this globe trotting friend. He gave me the gist of the ingredients, here is the refined version of the recipe, of course.

Dulce De Leche is the most common name for milk caramel in Spanish. Originally made as both a thick jam and a caramel candy, it is prepared by slowly heating sweetened milk to create a product that derives its taste from caramelised sugar.

Having this around is extremely handy. Why? You can use it for toppings for almost anything - ice cream, cakes, cupcakes, pancakes, waffles, cookies, pastries, donuts, puddings.. You get the gist..

You have got to try the recipe. I swear it is idiot proof.

Oh by the way, it’s pronounced as dool-say-dee-lay-shay.