Homemade Kaya

 This is the amount of the kaya I got from 3 eggs. 

I have been wanting to make kaya for a long time but the thought of the tedious preparation time always puts me off.  It is so easy for us to just buy a small plastic container for only about RM3-RM6  depending on the quality.  Anyway I finally did it yesterday but it only took me less than an hour as I made a very small portion.  3 large eggs, santan from one coconut (I bought 2 packets of those ready squeezed santan from the market) and 240gm sugar which is too sweet. Being too lazy to extract the juice from the pandan leaves, I just put in 8 pieces into the kaya and remove them when it is ready.   Have to lessen the sugar the next round as I find it too sweet.   I made my kaya in a double boiler.  I didn't steam the kaya though.

I feel my kaya needs improvement even though my friend and colleagues say otherwise.  It doesn't have the eggy taste which I like. 

The basic estimation of the ingredients I got from my f riend  would be:-

10 eggs
1 kati sugar (600 gm)
Santan (coconut milk) from 3 coconuts
Juice from pandan leaves (screwpine leaves)

Method

1)     Combine the eggs and sugar and stir with a whisk until sugar dissolves.
2)     Sieve the above into a pot.  Add in the pandan juice.
3)     Cook the kaya over a pot of hot water and keep stirring all the time until it thickens to the consistency
        that you prefer. That would take approximately 2 hours.
4)    Cover the kaya and steam for 2 hours.

Claypot Yam Chicken

It has been quite a while I have not blogged as I have not been trying anything new. So this time I will put in this simple dish given by my friend Kem Fong.  It is quite easy to make and tasty too.

Claypot Yam Chicken

Some chicken pieces -  rub in a bit of salt. (1/3 of a chicken)
Yam - cut into pieces  (1/3 of a yam)
1 tsp of dried shrimps  - washed
2 stalks spring onions - wash and cut into 2 " length
3 clove garlic - diced
2 cubes red bean curd (lam yue) - mashed and add into a bowl of water
A bit of Shao Shing wine (optional)

Method:

1)    Heat up 2 tabsp of oil in the claypot and fry the yam pieces.  Dish out.
2)    Put in the garlic for while followed by the  chicken pieces.  Let chicken turn brown a bit in the claypot. 
3)    Add in the dried shrimps and stir together with the chicken for a few minutes.
       Put in the wine if you are using.
4)    Place the yam pieces on top of  the chicken and pour the red bean curd liquid into the claypot.  Cover
       and cook the chicken for about 20 minutes or until done.  Lastly add in the spring onions and put back
       cover.  Off the fire.

Mooncakes - Agar-agar/Konyaku

These agar2/konyaku mooncakes are complimentary from a good friend, Poon Kim Lan who sells them once a year  when the mooncake festival comes on the 15th day of  August in the Chinese calendar.  I have to blog about them because they are not only delicious but pretty.  These are not just ordinary agar2 mooncakes and come in many flavours, 12 if I am not mistaken.  I feel that she is  very innovative  in coming out with  all these beautiful flavours. The flavours that I have chosen are apple with a cake/cookie centre, yam, mango, red date with medlar seeds (kei chi), dragon fruit and cendol.  The rest of the flavours are  passion fruit, sour plum, kiwi, and chocolate.   The passion fruit and the kiwi flavours are even better and I regretted not choosing them after having tasted the mini ones at home. 

Durians

Durians! The  King of fruits.  Our line dance teacher gave us each a few durians from her sister's durian orchard.  How nice of her.    Though the durians were small they were very delicious and the seeds were so small.  Thanks Kelly.  The durians shown here are the D24 species.  There was another species of the more orangy type and they were even more yummy.  Couldn't take any photos as my daughter has taken my camera.

For those who are more interested in various types of durians, go to   www.durian.com  to find out more.

Hummingbird Cake

Baked this lovely Hummingbird Cake last weekend complete with creamcheese topping.  Is it because humming birds like to eat pineapple and bananas that it is thus called hummingbird cake!  It is a very easy cake to make.   Feedback from friends and colleagues gave this cake a thumbs up.  I have not tasted it yet due to a bout of diarrhoea.

This recipe from a magazine is given by my sister-in-law ,Wan Yee.

Here is the recipe to share.  I believe we can also use grated carrots in place of the mashed bananas.  I will give it a try next time.

Hummingbird Cake

　
3 eggs
1 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup rice bran or grape seed oil (I use corn oil)
440g can crushed pineapple, drained of juice
2 mashed bananas
1/2 cup desiccated coconut
1 1/3 cups self-raising flour
Pinch of salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon

Cream cheese icing
250g cream cheese, at room temperature
1/2 cup icing sugar

Finely grated zest and juice of half a lemon (I omitted this as I didn't have any
lemon at the time of baking this cake)

Method

1. Heat oven to 160°C fan bake. Grease and line the base of a 22cm round cake tin with nonstick baking paper.

2. Place the eggs and sugar in a bowl and beat until pale and creamy, then beat in the oil. Stir in the drained pineapple (but not the juice), mashed bananas and coconut.

3. Sift flour, salt and cinnamon over egg mixture and stir to combine. Spread mixture into prepared tin and bake for 65 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. Remove cake to cool completely.

4. To make cream cheese icing, beat cream cheese until smooth then beat in icing sugar, lemon zest and juice. Spread over cooled cake and decorate, as desired.

Enjoy!

Sweet Green pea (Mung bean) soup

Made a pot of sweet green pea soup. As my husbund doesn't like it, I took the whole pot to share with my colleagues.  Of course my colleagues are always happy that I bring food to the office.  The ingredients are more or less estimated.

Recipe

300 gm (about 2 cups) green pea (mung bean)
2 tabsp of glutinous rice
130gm of  of gula melaka and extra sugar to taste
1 packet of fresh santan (coconut milk) if you can find  -  I used the packet one bought from the supermarket
2100 ml water
a pinch of salt


Wash the green pea, glutinous rice and put them  into the slow cooker with the water. Turn to high.  Boil for at least 5 hours.
Add in the gula melaka and sugar to taste. Mix  in santan and salt and it is ready.

Note:  You can alway use just the normal sugar and the green pea soup will be more green in colour instead of brownish.  In this case, you replace the glutinous rice with  a small packet of sago and can omit the santan.

Blueberry Muffins

I have always love the good old butter cake.   Rather than spend the whole day watching telly, I made some muffins.  This is actually the normal poundcake recipe and I added some blueberry jam that I found in the fridge.  The texture is quite soft as I added in an extra egg and more milk. I  reduce the sugar content of about 30gm.  Will be taking some to the office tomorrow.