Apple Fritters

Fritters make wonderful tea time snacks! Banana fritters, sweet potato fritters, yam/taro fritters, tapioca/cassava fritters...these are all so easily available at many afternoon street stalls which is a common sight throughout Malaysia. But apple fritters? It's definitely not something I would think of or able to find at those afternoon fritter stalls here. Maybe because apples are not locally grown fruits and thus cost more. So when I saw this simple apple fritters recipe in my dessert book by Martha Day, I knew instantly it will be a hit! This recipe is also wonderful for me since I (as mentioned in one of my posts below) don't really enjoy eating apples as they are. Turning them into desserts or snacks seem like the perfect alternative . Coated with cinnamon sugar, the perfect perennial companion for apples, I assure you that these fritters make wonderful snacks that will delight you and your guests. It is so easy and quick to make too. So, be sure to make more if you have friends coming over! Brew some of that wonderful afternoon tea, and you're set to be the perfect host!

When I made these, I've forgotten to add baking powder in the batter as stated in the recipe. Take note of it if you plan to make some as the baking powder will make quite a difference - it'll give puff to the fritters.

Easy apple fritters recipe:
- 130g plain flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 2/3 cup milk
- 1 egg, beaten
- oil for deep frying
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 2-3 large tart-sweet apples, peeled, cored and cut into 1/4 inch round slices
- some icing sugar for dusting

Method:
- Sift the flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl. Beat in the milk and egg with a wire whisk.
- Heat the oil in a heavy frying pan.
- Mix the sugar and cinnamon in a plate. Toss the apple slices in the sugar mixture to coat all over.
- Dip the apple slices in the batter, using a fork or slotted spoon. Drain off excess batter. Fry in batches, until golden brown on both sides. Drain the fritters on kitchen paper.
- Sprinkle with some icing sugar and serve hot.

Have a great day!

Mushroom Braised Pork

There are several recipes for soy sauce braised pork as I'm aware. One of the authentic Nyonya recipes is 'bak tauyu', which doesn't use spices or condiments, but just light and dark soy sauces, and with a little bit of sugar. Potatoes can be added in for additional ingredient. I remember having 'bak tauyu' and rice as one of my regular meals during childhood.

Another version my late Mom used to cook is 'bak lor'. This version uses large pieces of pork belly braised in water, star anise, clove, cinnamon, light and dark soy sauce and sugar. The meat is braised until very tender and when the layers of fat have softened, giving a melt-in-your-mouth feeling. Then, the pork belly is cut to slices of about 1/2 inch thick and arranged on a plate. The thickened sweet black sauce is then poured over the pork belly slices and this is usually served with cucumber slices on the side and with home made chili sauce. If there's a heaven on earth, this must be it!!!

While 'bak tauyu' is more of a normal daily meal, 'bak lor' holds a higher 'status' in the Nyonya food hierarchy (if there is one) as it is often cooked during functions and celebrations like birthday dinners at home or on Chinese New Year days. Anyway, as cooking is always so versatile, I made braised pork as I like it - kind of combining the two versions. This goes very well with hot plain rice.

Ingredients:

- Cinnamon (about 2 inches long)
- 2 star anise
- 4 cloves
- 400g pork belly, cut into 1 inch-thick pieces
- 8 dried Chinese mushrooms (wash, then soak in some hot water for 30 minutes & cut in half if too large)
- 3 hard boiled eggs
- 2 whole knobs of garlic, remove some of the papery outer layer skins, break the knobs in 2 large portions and wash clean
- 1 large piece of dried bean curd skin, wash and soak in water till softens, then tear into pieces
- 1 liter water
- 1/4 cup light soy sauce (or more or less according to preference for saltiness)
- 2 tbsps dark soy sauce
- 2 tbsps sugar

My cooking method is simple. Mix everything in a pot and cook under medium heat. Add some water from time to time if needed if the sauce dries up a bit. Cook until the meat and mushrooms are tender and finally, when the sauce has become thicker and lesser in volume, but not dried up (usually about 1-1.5 hours). Take a final taste and add a bit more sugar and soy sauce if necessary. The sauce should be a little sweet and salty, infused with the taste and smell of cinnamon, clove and star anise.

Cheers,

Spiced Fried Chicken Drumsticks

If you are not up to complex cooking after a long tiring day at work, well here's a very simple fried chicken drumsticks recipe for you. It's so simple because I use powdered spices. All you need is a teaspoon each of turmeric powder, chili powder, cumin powder and coriander powder, and 3/4 teaspoon of salt. Mix it all evenly together on a large plate. Next, place 5 pieces of unfrozen chicken drumsticks which have been rinsed and drained off excess water onto the powdered spices and roll to coat all over. Randomly sprinkle with some tap water if necessary in order to damp the spices. Cover and leave to marinate in the refrigerator for 30 minutes. Heat 3/4 cup oil in a non-stick frying pan and shallow fry all sides of the drumsticks till browned and cooked.

Enjoy!...& till then,

Mom's Nyonya Ikan Cili Garam (Nyonya-style Fried Fish with Chili Paste)

Preparing Nyonya food is often considered a laborious task as the cuisine is synonymous with super heady aroma and spicy blend of various spices and ingredients prepared in the most traditional way - using stone mortar and pestle (lesung) or a very thick and heavy stone slab that comes with a stone rolling pin (batu giling). This perception that many hold is, well, quite true!..that is, depending on what you cook. Not all Nyonya or Peranakan food are difficult or require a long-drawn process to prepare. There are times that I just want a quick-fix Nyonya food and ikan cili garam is definitely one of my favorites in the super easy category. Unlike the older generation of Nyonyas who were known to be real fussy cooks who swear by the use of tools like the lesung and batu giling to bring out the best of taste and fragrance from the spices or ingredients, I am just thankful to whoever that invented the electric blender!

Below is my darling late Mom's recipe. She used to cook this sometimes 2 or 3 times a week and we were so contented with just a simple dish. Hers tasted fabulous because she would tirelessly pound all the ingredients by hand using lesung or batu giling. The only complain I have when I made this sometimes was when the chilies were not spicy enough. This is where comes the addition of bird's eye chilies (cili padi). The ingredients for the paste are extremely uncomplicated - only shallots, chilies and salt. However, never underestimate how simple and few ingredients can make a dish tastes oh so delicious!

The best types of fishes for this are ikan gelama (sorry! donch know what it's called in English), pomfret, mackerel, stingray or snapper. (The fish in the pics is ikan gelama, as we call here in Malaysia).

Mom's Recipe

2 fishes (whole or slices)
1/2 cup oil

Pound/blend together:
5 shallots
6 fresh chilies
3 fresh bird's eye chilies (cili padi)
1/2 tsp salt

- Heat the 1/2 cup oil in a non-stick frying pan. Fry the fish till brown. Drain off the oil and place the fried fish on a serving plate.
- Using the leftover oil from frying the fish, take about 3-4 tbsp and heat it up in a frying pan/wok. Pour in the blended chili paste and saute for 12-15 minutes over medium heat. Drain the oil and dish up the chili paste and pour over the fried fish. (Note: If you believe that life should be lived well, then dribble some of those oil from saute-ing the chili onto the fish too. Yumm yummm!)

Two Scoops of Sorbet

I would love to try making my own ice creams but without an ice cream maker, I doubt it is easy or possible at all. My sisters who have made their own perfect scoops encouraged me to get myself an ice-cream maker. The type of ice-cream maker they have is the one that needs to be stored in the freezer overnight or something like that. Personally, I think it is rather troublesome because some space in the freezer needs to be allocated for the maker. I wonder if there are other types of ice-cream makers where pre-freezing of the machine is not required. I am just clueless about home-made ice creams and the gadgets required!

Anyway, since I don't have a maker, I decided to make the equally refreshing, non-creamy cousin - sorbet or sherbet. According to the info on Wikipedia, sorbet is a frozen dessert usually made from fruit juice or puree. Chocolate or cocoa version is popular too. Some sorbets contain wine or liqueur for extra flavor. At first, I wondered what is the difference between sorbet and sherbet. Well, apparently they are the same. The term sherbet or charbet is derived from Turkish whilst the term sorbet or serbet is Persian.

The two recipes below are based on my dessert book 'Desserts All Around The Year' by Martha Day. With some mandarin oranges in my refrigerator at the time of making this sorbet (about 3 weeks ago), I decided to tweak Martha Day's original lime sorbet recipe by using the mandarins instead. These sorbets are so good and so refreshing! They are so easy and cheap to make and what's best is that they make just the perfect desserts for family and friends after a hearty meal.

Mandarin Orange Sorbet

250g cups granulated sugar
600ml water
grated rind of 1 lemon
juice of 1 lemon
175ml freshly squeezed mandarin orange juice

1. In a saucepan, dissolve the granulated sugar in 600ml water over medium heat, without stirring. Boil for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and let it cool.
2. Combine the cooled sugar syrup, lemon rind and orange juice in a bowl or jug. Stir well, taste and adjust the flavor. Add more icing sugar if you want it sweeter but do not over-sweeten. Add more lemon juice if you want it a bit more tart.
3. Pour mixture into a freezable container and freeze for 3-4 hours or until soft set. Remove from container and chop roughly. Place in food processor or blender and blend until smooth. Return to container and freeze again. Follow this step for an additional 2 times, each time placing it in the blender after it has soft set and freeze again. Blend until a smooth consistency is obtained. Best prepared 2 or 3 days ahead because of the process.

Chocolate Sorbet

475ml water
3 tbsp clear honey
115g caster sugar
75g cocoa powder
50g plain dark chocolate, broken into squares

1. Place water, honey, cocoa and sugar in a saucepan. Heat gently, stirring occasionally until sugar has dissolved.
2. Remove from heat, add the chocolate and stir until melted. Let it cool down and freeze until soft set.
3. Here on, follow same method as step 3 in the mandarin orange sorbet recipe above. Do the freeze/blend process for 3 times to achieve a smooth consistency.


Last but not least, if you're a real ice-cream lover and love to have it home-made, you'll be truly wowed by the tantalizing array of ice-creams at Perfectscoops by Quinn. Perfectscoops is by far one of my favorite blogs dedicated only to ice-creams. I had the warmest pleasure of meeting Quinn in person during my recent bloggers' meet up in Kuala Lumpur. With a warm and infectiously bubbly personality, it is not hard to guess that this lovely gal just loves ice-creams in every way possible!

Enjoy!

Semolina/Sugee/Sooji Cake

Among my fellow Malaccans, semolina or sugee/sooji cake is believed to have been introduced by the Portuguese community in Malacca and has now become a favorite butter cake for many, especially the Peranakan/BabaNyonya families here. The Portuguese people in Malacca are descendants of their forefathers who sailed thousands of miles to South-east Asia in search of spice trading routes which resulted in an era of Portuguese colonization of Malacca during the 16th century. Like the BabaNyonya community in Malacca, the Portuguese community still retains its own cultural identity, Kristang language and famous cuisines.

There are many recipes for semolina cake but as I'm aware, often times each Peranakan family has their own secret version that was passed down by grandparents or parents who had earlier learned it from their Portuguese friends of their generations. Personally, I have 4 different recipes for semolina cake, in which 2 are considered 'secret recipes' passed down from earlier generations - one from my late Mom and the other from a dear Peranakan friend who is currently residing in Toronto and who inherited his family's secret recipe from his mother.

Basically, semolina or sugee derives from wheat and is great for making cakes and desserts. It's a popular ingredient for making Indian desserts too. Semolina cake has become very popular these days and many recipes are easily obtainable. Many love it for its rich buttery aroma and grainy texture which gives one a delightful eating taste. Since semolina cake is absolutely delicious and too good not to be shared, here is a wonderful recipe which I had cut out from a women's magazine a couple of years ago. My family loves semolina cake and I made this for them last week for our Chinese New Year get-together in Malacca. I decided to 'dress it up' with chocolate frosting and basic CNY-theme deco. I'm no expert at cake deco and this was made in quite a rush, thus the molding of the God of Prosperity (Cai Shen) was, as you can see, wayyyy less than perfect (thus, no close up shot of it..;). Well, it doesn't matter since the taste is in the cake and the crumbs were all wiped out by my nieces and nephews!

Semolina Cake

140g cake flour
1/2 tsp baking powder (I used 1 tsp)
100g semolina
1/4 tsp salt
4 eggs
100ml milk
2 tsp vanilla extract/essence
250g butter, at room temperature
200g sugar (I used only 170g)
2 tbsp honey

Sift flour and baking powder into a bowl and stir in semolina and salt. Mix well.
Beat eggs, milk and vanilla essence together in a bowl.
Cream butter, sugar and honey till light and fluffy. Gradually trickle in egg mixture, beating constantly. Mix in flour mixture on low speed and stir till well combined.
Spoon the batter into an 8-inch cake tray lined with baking paper.
Bake for 45 minutes at 150 deg C or until an inserted cake tester comes out clean.
Cool cake for 15 minutes, then unmould and let cool.
Decorate as you like or have it as it is. Best served with a cup if tea.



Best,