Apple Pie – 1st Try

This is my first time trying baking an Apple Pie. What’s the result? Haha, its an edible yet unpresentable apple pie. I guess is because my pie crust is too thick, both on top and below. In order to make it edible, you know what I did? I flipped the whole apple pie upside down and bake it again, resulting in the upper crust smash into pieces. Omg. Since its my first try, I rather make it edible than presentable.

The second time I gonna make it, I better learn my lesson. Lol. Thinner crust. Oh yah and smaller cubes of apples. My first try was thick slices of apples which I find it alright but my “testers” all recommend me to make it smaller.

I will put my recipe here since I will still follow the measurements given. You can twist a little bit after knowing my problems, like smaller cubes of apples, thick crust ==> either use a bigger pan size or reduce the amount of flour. By the way, the size of my pie pan is 6″, which explains the overloaded crust.

Recipe of Apple Pie

Ingredients: Pastry: 532g plain flour 3/4 teaspoon salt 150g unsalted butter 118g vegetable shortening 2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar Filling: 177g sugar 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg powder 2 to 3 teaspoons tapioca flour or cornstarch 1/4 teaspoon salt 3 big apples (sliced) 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice 30ml unsalted butter 1 tablespoon sugar Preparations: Combine the flour and salt in a big mixing bowl. Cut the butter into smaller pieces and add it into the mixing bowl gradually. Following, add the vegetable shortening and apple cider vinegar. Keep mixing until the dough gathers into a ball. Divide the dough into half, separate it by putting into different bowl or wrap it separately. Put it into fridge for 30 minutes. Preheat the oven. While the dough is chilling in the fridge, we prepare the filling. Peel and sliced the apples. Add in all the ingredients for the filling into another mixing bowl. After 30 minutes, take out the dough. Spread the pie pan with oil. Spread one portion of the dough into the pie pan, well spread. Add in the ingredients. The other half of the dough, use a roller to make it round and flat first. Cover it above the apple mixtures. Do a nice closing for the apple pie. Bake the pie at 200 degrees for 50 minutes. Observe it while it is baking. Tips: For the filling, make sure the tapioca flour is well mixed, otherwise you will be able to taste “glue” in your apple pie. Finishing: Cut the apple pie into smaller pieces. Scoop one slice out and served.

When baking the apple pie, there are alot of small details to take note of. Continue reading my blog for my successful apple pie. =)

Loh Mai Kai (Chicken in Glutinous Rice)

Cooked Loh Mai Kai

Loh Mai Kai, as the name goes, it is the favourite food of Cantonese or rather they are the one that found this chicken in glutinous rice.

Glutinous rice is a starch food when cooked, it becomes sticky and it can be very filling when you eat half the normal rice intake. You may even feel bloated eating glutinous rice. What I usually do to stop bloating is to drink some chinese tea. It is not an immediate effect of stopping bloating but it does helps to make you feel more comfortable.

Loh Mai Kai is similar to dumplings that is wrapped in banana leaves. In fact, you may be more creative too by adding in chesnuts. You can mix your vegetarian char siew with honey so that it tastes sweet and appetizing. Otherwise, you can have your creation by having dumplings wrapped in disposable bowls instead of banana leaves. However, your “dumplings” will lack of the smell of the banana leaves that lends the dumplings a unique fragrance and flavor.

The color of the rice depends on individual, it can be black or white. Usually with a mixture of oyster sauce, dark soy sauce and soy sauce paste, the rice will be black. The recipe that I had provided below is cooking black-colored rice.

Recipe of Loh Mai Kai (Chicken in Glutinous Rice)

Ingredients: Glutinous Rice Mushroom Vegetarian Chicken Vegetarian Char Siew Seasoning: Pepper Water Salt Mushroom Seasoning Dark Soy Sauce Soy Sauce Paste Oyster Sauce (Wan Jia Xiang Brand) Preparations: Dip the glutinous rice in water first while you prepare other ingredients. Fry the mushroom, vegetarian chicken and vegetarian char siew. Put the mushroom and vegetarian chicken in a pot. Add in all the seasoning shown above. In addition, add in starch to the pot of mushroom and vegetarian chicken. Let it boil and cooked. (Similar to cooking dark gravy with beancurd – look at the picture below and you will know what I am referring to, a dark gravy mixture) Filter out the glutinous rice and put inside a tin. In the tin, add in all the seasonings above again. Add in hot water into the tin of glutinous rice. Bring the tin of glutinous rice to steam. When the glutinous rice is cooked, put the mushroom, vegetarian chicken and vegetarian char siew at the bottom of the mould. Following on, fill up the mould with cooked glutinous rice. Bring it to steam for another 5 mins. Finishing: Scoop out the ready loh mai kai onto a plate and serve. You may serve it together with belachan chilli.

Thinking of what type of vegetarian char siew and vegetarian chicken you can use? Take a look at the pictures I had taken, use it as a reference for you.

Vegetarian B.B.Q Meat (Char Siew)	Vegetarian Fragrant Chicken (OKK)
Sliced Veg Char Siew	Dark Gravy Mixture

Vegetarian Creamy Mushroom Soup

Recently, I had an interest in cooking creamy mushroom soup. I searched high and low for a vegetarian creamy mushroom soup recipe, finally I found one at The Modern Vegetarian Recipes. This is the only recipe that I had found without any onions or garlics.

My creamy mushroom soup

Tadaa! This is my creamy mushroom soup. Does it looks similar to the recipe’s picture? Well, it looks quite similar but the taste is still not something that I wanted. My brother says it does not taste creamy enough. Not sure what it is lacking of? I did not use instant powder like campbell soup because I am not sure of the ingredients in the campbell soup. So the best way is to do it from scratch so I know what are the small small ingredients that can make up a wonderful creamy mushroom soup.

Recipe of Vegetarian Creamy Mushroom Soup

Ingredients: Fresh White Button Mushroom, Coarsely chopped Margarine Water Unsweetened Soy Milk Plain Flour Salt Pepper Herbs Preparations: Chopped the fresh white button mushroom coarsely. Fry the mushroom with margarine. Boil the water in a pot. When the water has boiled, pour in the unsweetened soy milk. Add in the flour slowly while continuously stirring. Make sure it is well-mixed. Put in the mushroom, herbs, salt and pepper. Continue stirring until the soup has thickened. Tips: Can put in some ham to increase the taste of the soup, more things to bite and adds in slight brown color to the soup Finishing: Scoop out a bowl of the creamy mushroom soup. Garnish it with some herbs. Serve it together with toasted bread and black pepper (optional).

Not very satisfied with my first try, I will try cooking it one more time. Aim to make it taste more creamy!

Mini Pumpkin

Mini Pumpkin

Have you seen mini pumpkin before? Have you eaten mini pumpkin before? How do you cook the mini pumpkin?

Size. You can find these mini pumpkins from the supermarkets. Let’s compare the size of the mini pumpkin with a small packet of coconut milk. The mini pumpkin looks shorter and wider/fatter as compared to the small packet of coconut milk.

Cooked Pumpkin

How to cook it. So far, the only method that I know is to steam it. Cut the mini pumpkin into 4 smaller pieces and steam it. After steaming, the skin will be so soft that you can just bite it off.  Use a spoon to scoop out the flesh.

Taste. The mini pumpkin tastes sweeter compared to the normal size pumpkin.

Next time when you go to supermarket, look out for this mini pumpkin. It wasn’t sold in all supermarkets.

French Toast and Half-boiled eggs

Food for thought for breakfast? You can try making french toast yourself. It is very easy and only needs few basic ingredients that you definitely can find at home.

If you have leftover breads that is going to expire or is already expired for 1 or 2 days, you can used it to make french toast. This way, you won’t waste it or feeling heart pain by throwing it away. Please take note that you don’t use any bread that is expired and has become mouldy. I won’t be responsible if you have any food poisoning.

It can be any breads that you can find at home, but preferably plain white bread or multi-grain breads whichever you think will be suitable to make french toast. I had never try any french toast that is made from corn bread, chocolate bread or any other fanciful bread you can find in supermarket now. If you want, you can give it a try, maybe the taste will be wonderful too. In the picture below, I had actually used multi-grain breads.

This french toast is similar to the french toast you always order from Ya Kun or Wang Jiao. Just that they have a thicker layer of egg covering the bread and some kaya paste to eat along. Make some half-boiled eggs too, so you will feel more filling.

Recipe for Half-boiled Eggs

1. Immerse the eggs into hot boiling water for 5 to 7 minutes
2. You are ready to serve with pepper and dark soy sauce

French Toast Top View	French Toast Side View

Recipe for French Toast

Ingredients A: Breads Ingredients B: Eggs Sugar Soy Sauce (optional) Pepper (optional) Preparations for French toast: Mix ingredients B together with a fork inside a plate (ease of stirring it). Heat up the frying pan. Pour a little bit of cooking oil inside. Immerse a piece of bread into the mixture, make sure both sides of bread has eggs spread evenly on it. Put the bread into the frying pan. Cook till the bread becomes golden brown. Repeat steps 4 to 6 for the rest of the breads. Finishing: Place the french toast on plates and you are ready to serve. To make it more delicious and filling, serve it along with a cup of coffee/tea/milo and 2 half-boiled eggs.