Tosei or Dosa

I’m writing this post with my phone.
Malaysia is currently under  Movement Control Order for Covid19. Stuck at home, can’t dine out, we yearn for food that we love eating out. My kids have Tosei once every fortnight and they love it.

So I plucked up my courage and tried making this at home.
Many recipes online require raw rice , like idli rice. It’s not something I can get easily in Malaysia and most recipes don’t provide exact water amount. Vague instructions like ‘just enough’, ‘not too thick not too thin’ doesn’t help the noob like me who has never ever seen it made from scratch. Eyeballing takes experience, like real life experience seeing and feeling the batter.

I messaged one of my readers , Thenmathy on Facebook, and she guided me from purchasing to fermenting... I’m grateful for her help.

So here is my version of Tosei, that will remove the guessing game.

Cream Cheese Souffle Pancake *With Video

It's been a while since I wrote something on this blog.

For those of you who are with me on Facebook, I am still posting my current kitchen adventures.
I am also on Instagram and I'm also planning to make more videos since the internet speed at home has greatly improved.

Few years back, for me to upload one 5 minute video, took me more than 1 hour! It was really a torture, making sure connection didn't break or I would have to start all over again, the waiting, the upload and the processing before the video was complete on Youtube. Now all this is history. I'm done uploading a 10 minute video in 5-10 minutes.

Coconut Pancakes

My mom used to make this quite often whenever she had extra coconut milk from our weekly kaya making sessions. But since she doesn't use measurements, they always come out different. LOL.

The version I made today is inspired by a popular backpacker's cafe in Tanah Rata, Cameron Highlands, called T Cafe (now renamed to Lord's Cafe). I read online (prior to my trip) that it was one of the most popular items on the menu, and so I ordered it. It arrived as one large round thin pancake, at least 10 inches big at 2-3mm thick. When I tasted it... it was a soft thin pancake that reminded me of Mom's coconut pancake but it had a nice hint of lime. Sprinkled on top was toasted coconut. That piece of thin pancake wasn't cheap and 1 slice didn't make me feel even 1/8 full.

Rava Dosa - AFF Indian Subcontinent #4

I have only eaten this once at a local mamak eatery and I love the texture of the semolina in it. Locally, they pronounce it as Rawa Thosai (toh-say)

It's not the same as the usual dosa (thosai) that is slightly sourish made with rice and gram. This dosa is not fermented and hence, doesn't have that tang that one might usually equate with dosa. The batter only needs 1 hour of waiting time, so that the semolina can absorb some moisture and the flour will form some gluten.

Lemonade Scones - Scones #1

I think most of us do have the issue of having leftover whipping cream after baking a cake and not knowing what to do with it.

I had some extra cream from a cake and was thinking of making scones with cream. So, I googled for "lemon cream scones". When I saw this recipe,I got interested. The gas in the soft drink provides aeration and the sugar in it... just replaces the sugar that we put in. The cream just takes place of the milk and butter.
The lemonade....the lemonade......will the flavour shine through?

Unfortunately I can't detect the flavour of the drink I used. Too subtle.
But it's ok. I enjoyed the crisp crust with a soft fluffy center.
My kids enjoyed it with whipped cream and homemade strawberry jam.

Take note that you need to use cold lemonade from a freshly opened can. Bottled ones are not recommended as they are less gassy than canned ones. And cold ones release less gas when you form the dough, and will only release more gas upon contact with heat during baking.

Lemonade Scones
Adapted from: foodinaminute 

260gm Self Raising Flour (better to use 300gm)
150gm cold lemonade soft drink (Sprite or 7up, weigh it as gas will make volume measurement difficult)
150gm cold whipping cream (35% fat)
1/2 tsp salt

1. Preheat oven to 200 (fan)/220C.  Prepare a baking tray lined with baking paper
2. Pour lemonade and cream into one cup. No need to stir.
3. Mix flour with salt and make a well in the center.
4. Pour the lemonade cream mixture into the center.
5. Use chopsticks or 2 dinner knifes to combine the ingredients. As long as the flour look moistened, stop mixing. It may still look lumpy and very sticky.
6. Sprinkle 2 Tbsp of flour onto the table.Scrape the dough onto the floured surface. Sprinkle very generously with more flour.*
7. Form the dough (pat with hands and use a scraper to straighten the sides) into a 1 inch thick rectangle. Flour a dough scraper, and cut it into 6-8 squares, according to your preference. Flour the scraper before each cut.
8. Transfer the cut dough onto the baking tray and bake for 10-12 minutes, or until the scones look beautifully golden.

*I used almost 1 cup of flour just to dust.

Dulce De Leche French Toast, 2 versions - DDL Week # 2

Someone went to Brazil and got me 2 tubs of Brazillian DDL.
After I tasted this, I understood why they use so much more DDL in their recipes of which I find to be so sweet. These from Brazil is less sweet compared to homemade ones. I can be more liberal with it when I'm using this original stuff.

Lean Pork, Oyster and Peanut Porridge - Rice Week # 1

I came across this porridge at Cheah’s blog. Before I saw her post on this, I’ve already planned to cook mussel, lean pork and peanut porridge for Sunday breakfast. But then, as I saw hers, I can’t help but go and buy myself some dried oysters instead of using mussels. And I was totally intrigued by the fact she added in oatmeal to her porridge. Is that her method to balance up the amount of cholesterol from the oysters? Hahaha, I don’t know, but that really got me interested.

Steamed Banana Buns - Steamed Buns # 1

I love these buns. When they were steaming, they smelled so good. But Mike hated it. Mike only likes Sweet Potato Buns. He even hates my kids’ favourite glorious pumpkin buns. He said this smell like our kids’ s***

Chinese Chives and Dried Krill Fritters - Seafood Week #1

I am a teacher. Still am. I am just on leave. I have not resigned. I teach Living Skills in school, or Kemahiran Hidup as called locally. In Living Skills, there are 4 electives to be chosen, something like a minor thingy, namely home econs, technical studies, agriculture and accounts.

When I was teaching in PESS, I was given 1 class with home econs as an elective in the subject.
The class was split to 2 for the subject and the other teacher sharing the class with me was Meldylocks. Home Econs consist of sewing and cooking basically, but the school didn’t encourage cooking. Yes!!! You heard me. So, it was all talk and chalk. Both of us were like “Huh??”How can cooking class be just talk and chalk?

I have taught Home Science for 2 years in Selancar and there will be cooking lessons for every chapter. I have never encountered a situation like such. Our subject form supervisor in PESS told us, there was no budget, and that she was told by the subject supervisor that we just explain, no need to do practical work. Meldylocks and I just couldn’t bring ourselves to teach this way. In the end, we used our own money and bought some ingredients to teach our students about “Batter”. This is the recipe that I made with them to demo “thick batter”. It was a nice experience with the students and I left the school the next year and came to where I am now. Ex 1-Teratai of 2007, if you happen to read this, I was happy to conduct those lessons with you gals.

Jicama and Krill Fritters (cucur udang geragau)
Source: Wendyywy

1 cup all purpose flour
½ cup water
1 egg
1/3 tsp salt
¾ cup dried krill, 虾皮
½ cup chopped Chinese chives
½ cup grated jicama (sengkuang)

Pouring chilli sauce

Every 2 part of chilli sauce, mix with 1 part water.

Make as much as u need.

1. Put dried krill in a sieve and rinse under running water for few seconds. Drain.
2. Mix water, and egg together. Pour into flour and salt, and mix until well combined
3. Put in rinsed krill, grated jicama and chopped chives and mix.
4. Heat some oil for deep frying.
5. Put in ½ tablespoon of batter and deep fry until golden. Repeat until batter is finished.
6. Serve with pouring chilli sauce.

Steamed Pumpkin Muffins

For mothers out there, pregnancy is a wonderful experience. The changes that one goes thru thoughout the pregnancy is sometimes weird and unanticipated.

I've heard of people eating toothpaste, eating shoe polish or some find clay to be tasty. Disgusting, right? But I've only heard about such incidences where those people actually consume a limited diet, and they might be malnourished in some way and the body makes then comsume something that in nature contains the nutrient that the mother so needed. I've never heard of funny stories from people who lived in town, or consumes a veriety of food and never impoverished.

In one of the schools I worked in before, the school cleaner once chatted with me, about how she survived all her pregnancies craving for toothpaste, consuming only cream crackers with chilli paste and drinking only tap water for 9 months!! The rest are all, yucks to her. And she was the one who told me stories about people who eat funny stuff, and those people are relatives of hers.  Hard to believe? But I guess it could be true. Just that we are too privileged to be in contact with people who are never deprived of proper food.

When I was pregs with Lydia, from week 5 onwards, I was binging. Eating meals, not snacks every 3 hours. I gained 4 kg in just 2 weeks. Mike looked at me in horror, to see the way that I'm eating.I told him, I can't help it, my tummy is growling furiously.  But when week 7 came by, my appetite dropped drastically. I could eat nothing except fruits. Food made from rice were the worse. From congee to vermicelli, they all smell yucks! I could look at a burger, just look. I don't feel like picking it up. And if I pick it up, I won't feel like biting. And if I finally bit into it, I don't feel like chewing. After chewing, I don't want to swallow it. The whole eating process is just a torture to me. But if I see fruits, I can eat and eat. I dropped 7 kg throughout this difficult period. Which was 3 kg less compared to pre pregnancy. If I wasn't binging during early pregnancy, I'd lose even more.

Actually that time, my hormones were all crazy and I was having bad constipation. Constipation during pregnancy is due to the increment of progesterone. It's the way that my body reacted and helped me to overcome the problem that I was facing by rejected all foods except fruits. Taking in whatever that is needed to help the mother. When the constipation stopped at week 14, my appetite came back, in a snap! Even now, I totally believe in listening to my body. Eat when it tells u to, and don't eat when it doesn't tell u to. So, if I crave, there's no excuse for not eating. That's one pretty good excuse. Hahahaha!

This time, the pregnancy affected not my appetite, but my kitchen mojo. It hit me so bad that I don't want to wash my cup. I didn't want to touch the sink, didn't want to cook anything at all. I didn't bake anything out of fun, but only out of neccesity. I was craving for something with coconut milk, so I made and oil-less pandan chiffon. It was Mike's birthday and  I made him Chocolate Enigma Cake. With the extra cream from the cake, I baked another cake (I'll post that within this week) And I did a sponsored post with a health product that I've promised way before my pregnancy. I didn't cook a proper meal for almost 4 months!! We were eating out daily. Now that I'm at week 22, I'm pretty much the old me now. Not all there, but almost. Still not cooking 3 dishes 1 soup, but one plate meals mostly, like noodles, pasta, fried rice, and congee mostly. Won't call them one pot meals as cooking rice uses one pot and frying uses another wok. LOL.

Funny right? Hard to believe? I was still posting daily, right? hahaha! What you are seeing were usually posts so stale that they were made months ago. Haha! I still have lots of back logs to last me til I move in March.

So now, if you think that this bun in me is a sausage roll, which explained the different pregnancy experience, nah!!! Even Lydia and Lyanne weren't the same. Being pregs with Lyanne was a breeze. I loved food, especially white plain rice during the first 3 months, whereas I hated rice when I had Lydia. Both were burgers, and yet, different. Even now, both girls are very different. One is lingustic, the other technical and artistic. Haha.

Enough pregs talk, let's food talk.
This is the first thing I made, right after I got back my mojo at week 16. And I attempted this recipe twice.

First attempt flopped bad time. Simply because I read in one of the comments that aunty Yochana said the baking powder has to be double action baking powder, whereas the recipe itself called for only baking powder. My first attempt used DABP and weirdly the muffin was super dense and tasted sourish. I’ve encountered this when I simply substituted regular baking powder with DABP and my baking results were always less than acceptable.

So, with some pumpkin left, immediately I did my 2nd attempt with just regular baking powder. The results were wonderful, all smiling happily and they were all soft and fluffy. I’m now wondering how the taste will be with coconut milk… maybe next time.

Steamed Pumpkin Muffins

Adapted from Aunty Yochana

Yields12 steamed muffins (I used egg tart pans)

125gm steamed pumpkin flesh

1 egg

120gm sugar

100gm evaporated milk or coconut milk

30gm corn oil

180gm cake flour

20gm rice flour

1.5tsp baking powder

1. Prepare your steamer and bring the water to a boil

2. Put steamed pumpkin flesh, egg, sugar, milk and oil in blender and whizz for 30 seconds.

3. Sift cake flour, rice flour and baking powder into a mixing bowl.

4. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and pour the blended ingredients into the well. Mix until well combined.

5. Spoon into lined steaming cups and steam on high heat for 15 minutes. It will bloom by itself, no need to make a cross with oil.

Verdict:

I love this. My kids love this. My hubby the pumpkin hater said nothing. But please don't ask me if this taste like Fatt Gou, I have no idea. I've never eaten a proper fatt gou in my life, except once, a very very dry yucky one. The muffin stays soft the next day, not as soft as fresh from the steamer, but acceptable even when cold.

See Lydia's thumb????

LOL

Wonderfully Soft Bread

I tried making this 2 years ago during the early times of blogging…. And guess how long it took to proof?
4 hours for first proofing and another 4 after shaping!!!! Crazy right????
I guess my yeast went on holiday. It was a hot and humid night and I don’t know what happened to my yeast.

This time, the first proofing took 2 hours, 2nd proofing was 1 hour.

The name speaks for itself. Wonderfully soft bread. But once you look at the ingredients, you’ll know why it’s so soft. With that amount of coffee creamer and egg yolks… hehehehe, it’s just soft, just like having bread softeners added in. I made this cos I have 3 yolks left from my buttercream, so I used 2 here in the dough and another for the egg wash. So, if you have a few extra yolks and don’t know what to do with it, this will be a good choice.

The dough actually feels rather oily… even it’s just 40gm butter. My previous sweet bread and buns used 100gm butter for slightly more flour, but it’s less oily compared to this. Maybe due to the yolks and creamer. Again, which is why it’s so soft.

If you don’t want to do TangZhong method or use bread softeners, maybe this will be another choice for you. I don’t know which is worse, so much creamer or little bit of bread softener. Which is the less of two evils, I have know idea. I don’ t really like creamers, after I knew they were made from palm kernel oil and non dairy whipping cream is as well.

Wonderfully Soft Bread inspired from Do What I Like who adapted from Cilinbaby

(A)
310gm bread flour
60gm cake flour
40gm coffee creamer (coffeemate)
70gm sugar
2 tsp instant yeast

(B)
115gm milk
1 egg
2 egg yolks

(C )
1/3 tsp salt
40gm butter

(D)
½ egg mixed with 1 tsp water


1. Combine (A) together. Mix it around to combine.
2. Combine (B), pour into (A) and knead to form a dough.
3. Put (C ) into the dough and knead until a smooth dough forms. (I gave this a 15 min knead by hand)
4. Cover the dough and let it proof until it doubles in size (Mine took 2 hours)
5. Punch down and knead for 1 minute.
6. Divide dough into 50 or 60gm pieces each.
7. Wrap each piece of dough with preferred fillings (I used sausages and cheese)
8. Let dough proof until double again and brush with (D). Bake in a preheated oven at 170 /190C for 15 minutes or until golden.

And to show you some of their "stuffing the bread into their mouth" pics. Actually Lyanne was trying to chomp away every piece with cheese topping.

Why is Lydia's face like that??? See below

Noodle Pancake

Another recipe taught to me by Ainur, my Malay Minang housemate back in JB. I wonder when will I do a version of her masak lemak cili api.

She told me her mom always makes this for breakfast when she was still schooling. You can put anything you like in it, no rules!!! Just one rule, be patient when you do this. No high heat, if not the center won’t be cooked when the base is golden. And when you slowly cook it, the pancake will be very crispy.

Noodles Pancake Recipe
2 packs Instant noodles of choice
100gm bacon or sausage
1 small carrot, grated
2 sprigs of spring onion, sliced
4 eggs
2 slices of cheddar cheese, chopped
1 pack of noodle seasonings(from the pack)
Cooking oil or butter

1. Boil a saucepan of water and cook noodles until they just loosen up, no need to be soft. Drain. Snip noodles to shorter lengths (just chop the noodles a few times, or use scissors and snip snip snip)
2. In a pan, fry bacon on medium heat until golden. Dish up.
3. Divide bacon, carrot and spring onions into 2 parts.
4. Combine one piece of noodle with half the bacon, carrots and spring onion. Put in chopped cheese, ½ tsp of seasoning and 2 eggs. Mix it all around.
5. Heat pan and put in oil or butter.
6. Pour the noodle mixture into pan and cook on medium low heat. Cover the lid.
7. When the egg in the middle looks cooked and the sides are golden, flip noodle pancake and cover and cook again until golden.
8. Repeat step 4-7 with the other piece of noodle
9. Serve warm with sweet chili sauce or any other sauces you prefer. I could just eat it like that.

Nantucket Blend Granola Bars

There's another 10 days to the closing date for Sponge Pancake giveaway contest. So far response has been very cold. With just 4 entries.

I was hoping to see lots of creativity flowing in from fellow readers, but so far I've only seen 4 versions... sigh..... Is it really that difficult?


How to enter:
1. Prepare sponge pancakes with creativity (but please abide by the rules). You can submit more than one entry. One variation per entry.
2. Blog about it, and send in the link via comments section here, or
3. If you don't own a blog, take pics, do a simple write up in Microsoft Word, especially on the recipe and email me at wendyinkk[@]yahoo.[com] (remove the brackets when you type the email address), I'll help you post them here in this post.
4. Open to readers with Malaysian or Singaporean address. If you are overseas, and will be back here for a trip, can enter with any suitable local address.

Rules, Just make sure
1. Your pancake is a version that I've never attempted before
2. Your pancake is not cut more than once (except for photography purposes to show the inside)
3. It is cooked over the stove, no baking, no steaming
4. Recipe goes by the ratio of 1 egg: 1 Tbsp sugar : 1 Tbsp flour, with additional ingredients for flavouring allowed


Prizes:
1. One Candy and Deep Frying thermometer for Most Creative entry (I'll be judging)
2. One Cake Leveler for a lucky entry (draw lots)


Closing date: 2 Dec 2010, 12pm GMT+8

******************************************************************************



Back to the post......

Ooh… I still have quite a lot of mixed fruit and nut from the Nantucket Blend that my MIL got me. What’s the next best way to finish them up other than making granola :p

Well, I still can’t finish it, I think I’ll do a cake with the balance, since I’ve done cookie and now breakfast bars…. Wait, gimme some time.


Nantucket Blend Granola Bars
Recipe adapted from 2 recipes: Anna Olsen and Ina Garten

2 cup rolled oats (I used quick cooking)
1 cup nuts and seeds, lightly toasted and chopped (any nuts or seeds that you like), this time I used almonds and pistachios
1 cup dried fruits (any fruit you like), a mix of cranberries and raisins
½ cup sweetened coconut flakes (angel flakes), lightly toasted
½ tsp salt

100gm soft brown sugar
50gm honey
80gm butter
2 tsp vanilla
1 egg, beaten

1. Preheat the oven at 160/180C. fully line a 10 inch square pan (a 9 inch square will be fine too), with overlapping sides
2. Mix oats, chopped nuts, dried fruits, toasted coconut and salt together.
3. In a small saucepan, heat butter, honey, brown sugar and vanilla until melted.
4. Pour(3) into (2) and mix.
5. Mix in beaten egg.
6. Pour everything into prepared pan and level the surface. Press the surface (maybe with a flat bottom glass or a layer cake press)
7. Bake for 30 minutes, cool in pan for 20 minutes and put the whole thing into the fridge to chill for 2 hours.
8. After chilling, lift granola out from pan with the overlapping paper and cut into bars.

And I wrapped them up... so that one can just take a piece and eat, anytime :)

Hakka Beetroot XiBan 甜菜根客家喜粄

When I saw a kuih called ki ka ku on Sonia's blog, I was totally intrigued. Then later I found that it was actually a traditional hakka steamed chewy bun called 喜粄, "Xi Ban", translated as "Dough of Joy"

I tried making this with some adaptations from Sonia's recipe

Hakka Beetroot XiBan
Recipe adapted from Sonia

250g Glutinous rice flour
300g All purpose flour
150g Caster sugar  (you may increase, if you want sweeter)
50g Shortening
1 ½ tsp Yeast
300g Beetroot infused Water (boil some peeled beetroot chunks in 350ml water for 15 mins, just use the water), use more if needed
Banana leaves (soften in hot water, cut into round shape)

1. Mix all ingredients in a mixing bowl, knead until soft and smooth.
2. Divide dough to equal portion (about 40g), shape into small round ball. Grease your hand with some cooking oil, place small round ball on the banana leaf, and flatten the dough by pressing your palm on the dough ball.
3. Cover with cling film and rest for 1hour
4. Steam over hot boiling water for 15mins or until cooked

Verdict:
Frankly speaking, this bun looks like a regular bun when torn, but it's chewy like a mochi. My husband didn't quite like it as it was too chewy for him, but it was fine for me. Colour wise, I was rather dissapointed when it turned into a peachy hue instead of remaining pink. And I steamed the buns in 3 batches, as my wok can only accomodate 9 at a time. And all 3 batches came out with different colours. You can see 3 out my 4 buns in the pics comes in different hues. The next day, the bun was crumbly without steaming, something like a scone. So, I'd say this bun is best eaten on the day it is made.

I did another recipe, with a much longer fermentation period, watch out for the post :)

Butter Bread Pudding

I've got a french loaf sitting the the freezer for so long, I've forgotten when did I buy that.
So, to get rid of it, I made this beautiful butter bread pudding. A classic english pudding.

I didn't really plan to make this, so the currants were't well soaked and were a bit burnt. So please soak this in the custard for a while and pour them in together with the custard.

Overall, I quite like it, the sugary crust was delicious.

Butter Bread Pudding (serves 1-2, depends on who much one can eat)
Few slices of French loaf, about ¼ of a stick
Some butter softened for spreading
150ml milk
75ml whipping cream
1 egg
Few drops vanilla extract
3 tsp sugar
2 Tbsp currants or raisins

1. Spread butter over bread slices. Oh please be generous.
2. Arrange bread slices into a lightly buttered baking dish.
3. Sprinkle raisins or currants over.
4. Combine milk, whipping cream, vanilla and egg.
5. Pour ¾ of it over arranged bread. Sprinkle sugar over bread.
6. Let the bread soak for few minutes before pouring the rest of the egg mxture.
7. Bake in a preheated oven of 160C in a waterbath  for 40-45 minutes  or until a knife inserted comes out clean.

Let the bread soak and soak, then pour the balance of the custard in