Honey Chicken

Ramadhan came and went, we celebrated Eid more than a week ago. I am knee deep in packing boxes as we prepare for our move in 2 weeks..frantic!

Sabrina turned 19 yesterday, time flies and they grow up too fast. It was only yesterday I stayed up nights watching the Lion King with her because she couldnt sleep, turned out my mum has been letting her have long afternoon naps..lol. No complains from me, I love spending time with my little munchkin.

Ok back to the recipe now. My kids are my inspiration to cook and here is a dish that for a long time I would not attempt despite it being my kids favourite. Only because I get mine cheap and delicious from a Chinese restaurant in town run by a lovely Malaysian lady, unfortunately they had closed down a year ago.

So I am now without a place to get my Honey Chicken fix, until recently a friend on FB posted a simple "how-to-cook-honey-chicken" recipe..so simple I thought I might give this a go.

My first attempt was for Iftar, cooking "blind" without the ability to taste or smell...just followed the recipe to a tee. I was quite nervous, I may ruin the dish, but thanks to a tried and tested recipe, it was a personal triumph! Thanks Maizura Ishak, I am forever indebted to you for this smashing recipe and I hope you dont mind me sharing it on my blog, ( I have adapted the recipe with measurements)

So here we go:

Ingredients:

250 gm chicken breast, diced (1 inch cube) cleaned and drained

1 cup rice flour

1/2 cup all purpose(plain) flour

salt & white pepper to taste.

1 tbsp ginger paste

Oil for frying

Coating:

3 tbsp Honey

1 tbsp oyster sauce

Sesame seeds

Method:

Marinade chicken in salt & pepper & ginger paste for 20 minutes (you can leave this overnight for a stonger flavour)

Mix the 2 flour with water to form a thick batter ( 1/2 to 3/4 water will do the trick), if batter is too runny, just add more plain flour. Add salt & pepper to this mix as well.

Heat oil in a deep wok until smoky ( I used coconut oil because it has a high heat point, so its the best oil for deep frying). Dip 1 chicken piece in batter and drop slowly into the hot oil, repeat until your enough pieces fit in your wok with oil covering all pieces. You dont want to end up with too many chicken pieces and too little oil.

Turn once and fry until golden brown. Put aside on absorbent paper and start on the glazing.

Add honey and oyster sauce in a clean pan and heat on medium heat until mix becomes bubbly. Add the chicken pieces and take off the heat. Sprinkle sesame seed and serve with rice.

Bismillah and enjoy!

Easy Butter Cake Recipe 

An easy butter cake recipe is good to have not only for the no-fuss, easy way to make it but for the versality of this recipe. It can be adapted to make cupcakes or just add lemon or orange zest and you will have an amazingly fluffy and buttery cake for tea.

On any given day, you will more often than not have these basic ingredients in the pantry, for those not wanting to use sugar, replace the 1 cup of sugar with 3/4 cup natvia or any sugar substitute of your choice (natvia is the best tasting and its 100% natural non aspartame product)


Ingredients:

2 eggs
125 butter (softened)
1 cup sugar
2 cups self raising flour
*2/3 (150 ml)cups milk
1tsp vanilla

Method:

Preheat oven to 170-180 C
Grease and line base of a 9 in (20cm) pan with greaseproof paper
Combine all in a bowl of your electric mixer
Mix on low until all ingredients are blended well and then on high for 3 minutes
Bake for 35-40 minutes

*Note: when mixing for an orange cake, replace 1/3 cup milk with juice from an orange and fold in orange zest just before pouring mix in the pan.

You can vary this cake with lemon zest/juice and ice with icing of your choice. Also can be used for cupcake recipes, for medium cupcakes (12 cup tin) bake at 200C for 15 mins.

No Egg Easy Chocolate Cake

My quest for an easy chocolate cake may be over when I stumbled on this no egg, no butter recipe! Alhamdulillah! The recipe is easy and the result did not disappoint, the cake is moist. I did reduce the sugar from 2 cups to 1.5 cups only because I dont like overly sweet desserts and I was planning on adding bananas on my slice, so that will lend the required amount of sweetnes. And best of all there is no need to use the electric mixer, just a bit of elbow grease will do the trick :)

I am happy to share this with those who may have allergies to eggs or dairy. This recipe calls for vegetable oil but I ended using my favourite; coconut oil. You may experiment with oilve oil too, that should work as I have baked with oilve oil and it does not influence the taste at all. 

Apparently the coffee granules enhances the chocolate flavour and no, the coffee taste is not recflected in the final product, not that it would be a bad thing in my book.

Chocolate Cake
Adapted from Cuisine at Home

3 cups all-purpose flour
1.5 cups sugar or 2 cups if you like it sweet
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon table salt
2 cups hot water
3/4 cup coconut oil or ant vegetable oil
2 Tablespoons white vinegar
1 Tablespoon instant coffee granules
1 Tablespoon vanilla extract


Preheat oven to 350^o F with rack in the center.  Spray two 8" round cake pans with nonstick spray.  MIx dry ingredients (except the coffee) together in a mixing bowl, sifting everything to remove lumps.

Combine water, oil, vinegar, instant coffee and vanilla in a large measuring cup.  Add to the dry ingredients and whisk just until combined - a few lumps are okay.  Divide batter among pans (3 cups in each), then bake until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 30-35 minutes.

Remove and leave to cool on a cooling rack for 20 minutes while you work on the ganache.

You will need:

4 oz semi sweet chocolate (by weight)

1/2 cup heavy whipping cream

Warm the cream in a saucepan and while thats heating, add the choc chips in a glass bowl. When the cream is heated through add to the bowl and mix until all the chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth. Allow to thicken and cool. (Note: you can whip this mixture and use for a filling or frosting) . You dont need to add bananas or any fruit when you assemble the cake, but if you did, make sure you slice your bananas about the same size.

Spread the ganache on top of the first layer and top the second cake on. Top with more ganache and let run on the sides. Allow to set in the fridge for 30 minutes. If your ganache is too runny, you can add a tbs of icing sugar at a time until the texture is more manageable.

Chocolate Coconut Dates

Chocolate Coconut Dates

In our quest to free ourselves from sugar dependency, we try to substitute our sugar laden lives with healthier alternatives. I love this particular one because these bites are quick and easy to make. It only took me 10 minutes to prepare.

It's main ingredients are dates, nuts and coconut flakes. Not only it is healthy, but they are tasty and a hit with the kids.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup dates (you can pre-soak in water to soften then drain)
• 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut flakes
• 1/4 cup almonds or macadamia nuts
• 2 tbs. unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 tsp. coconut oil
• dash sea salt

Directions:

1. In a food processor add all of your ingredients.
2. Pulse your ingredients until well blended. About 2-3 minutes. They will be a bit chunky still.
3. Roll your mixture into balls.
4. Lastly dust with coconut flakes
5. Refrigerate to store.

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Pandan Cake

Pandan (Screwpine Leaves) Cake

It has been called the Asian Vanilla, the green leaves of the screwpine emits a sweet flavour, mostly used in Asian desserts or even some savoury dishes. It grows in a low bush in tropical and subtropical weather ( here's more on pandan  on wikipedia).

Most households in Malaysia will have a pandan bush as it grows almost unassisted without much fuss.

The Malays use them to flavour their Nasi Lemak, Sweets and the perennial favourite the KEK Pandan or Pandan Cake.

In case you do not have access to pandan leaves you may used pandan flavouring.

Ingredients

250 gms butter (softened to room temp)

150 gms castor sugar

4 eggs

60 ml coconut cream with a pinch of salt

10-15 pandan leaves blended with 1/2 cup water (strained and discard pulp)

2-3 drops green coloring

30g coconut flakes

240 gm self raising flour

1 tsp vanilla essence

Method

Oil/butter then place baking paper on a 9 inch baking pan. Pre heat oven to 

170 C.

Beat butter and sugar until creamy. Add eggs one by one and mix well each 

time. Add vanilla essence, coconut flakes and green colouring.

Add pandan juice to the coconut cream. 

Fold in flour and the coconut cream alternately mixing well each time.  Pour 

into pan and bake for 1 hour or until toothpick inserted in the centre comes 

out clean.

Dust with icing sugar for decoration.

Cream puffs

Cream Puffs aka Profiterole

I have a long-standing fear of choux pastry but today I conquered that fear, alhamdulillah. My cream puffs turned out beautifully, puffy and light and when I cut through the baked shell, there is an actual crater ready to receive the custard filling.

There are many variations of this popular dessert, especially when it comes to the filling. One can fill these puffs with Chantilly cream, vanilla custard of plain vanilla ice-cream.

Recipe for choux pastry:

1 cup water

1 cup flour

1/2 cup butter (115g) 

1/4 tsp salt

4 eggs

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C).
2. In a large pot, bring water and butter to a rolling boil. Stir in flour and salt until the mixture forms a ball. Transfer the dough to a large mixing bowl. Using a wooden spoon or stand mixer, beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each. Drop by tablespoonfuls onto an ungreased baking sheet.
3. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven, until golden brown. Centers should be dry.
4. When the shells are cool, either split and fill them with the pudding mixture, or use a pastry bag to pipe the pudding into the shells.

Filling:

If you are pressed for time just use any instant pudding mix or vanilla ice cream. For today's recipe we will try the chantilly cream

300ml heavy cream
1/2 cup natvia or 100 g icing sugar
1 vanilla bean
Whip in a mixing bowl and use a piping bag to pipe into the shells.

For the Chocolate Sauce

1. 1 tablespoon butter
2. 1/2 pound semisweet chocolate, cut in chunks 
3. 1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
4. 2 tbsp honey
5. 1/2 cup skim milk

Combine the milk and butter in a small heavy bottomed sauced pan over medium heat. Heat the mixture until bubbles appear around the sides of the pot, but do not allow the milk to boil.  Mix in the chocolate and vanilla; remove from the heat and stir until the chocolate melts and the sauce is smooth and add honey. 

Drizzle on your cream puffs and serve. Alternatively you can use icing sugar to drizzle on the puffs.