Marmite & Butter Sandwich Bun Bento (228)

My projects after waking up this morning:

1) boil the corn soup
2) bake some buns

Little girl waked up with the smell of bread again, she requested to spread marmite & butter between the bun for her breaky.  Then she wanna the same bun again for her bento, by adding a small piece of corn and some de-seeded longan, it was ready in 10 minutes.

I skipped the note of the day, turned lazy after the busy works in the morning :p

Assorted Prawn Fritters Bento (227)

I had a small bag of prawns in the freezer for quite sometimes, finally decided to use it for some paste to make some prawn fritters.

First I spread the prawn paste (added some diced carrot and spring onions) in between 2 spring roll skins, then between seaweeds, shallow fried them til golden brown and crispy.  With the leftover bit of prawn paste, I just fried them as balls.  Took me almost an hour to cook the fritters and pack the bento, phew!

Assorted prawn fritters, 2 cucumber sticks, some watermelon cubes and a container of ketchup and mayo

Note of the day with Oddish from Pokemon

Soft Rolls With NO Kneading Method

Been reading the Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day for a while, I was amazed with their no kneading bread, but since I didn't buy their books, I didn't get a chance to try out their bread.  Then few weeks ago, saw 周老師的美食教室 posted this 'No kneading required super soft bread 免揉超軟麵包', I was so delighted to see it and finding time to try it out.

Managed to give it a try at last, I measured & mix the ingredients together last night, then took a portion of the dough out from the fridge this morning, made 4 bacon rolls and 6 pepperoni & cheese buns.  I got the batch of fresh breads out from the oven by the time little girl waked up, wonderful timing!

Ingredients (I halved the ingredients from the original recipe)
250ml water
1 tsp yeast
450g bread flour
90g sugar
1/2 tsp salt
30g milk powder
1 egg
90g melted butter

1. Mix all ingredients together until forming a wet soft dough
2. Place dough into a container and let rest in refrigerator over night or at least 2 hours

Pepperoni & cheese roll

This morning, after rolling the bacon, pepperoni & cheese into the dough, I let them proof for 1/2 an hour, lightly brush them with milk, then baked at 180C for 15 minutes.

Bacon rolls

See, they r that easy, don need any machine / hand kneading, and the result it turned out, really super soft just like 周老師 promised.  I think I will always keep a batch of the dough in my fridge now, so that I'll have fresh breads out from oven in the morning whenever I want, hurray!  Bye bye Gardenia, I won't need to buy u anymore :p

Bacon Rolls Bento (226)

This bento was fast, just blanched those cheese cocktails and edamame, then cut the cocktails into shapes, dumped the rolls, fruit & the rest into box, ready in 15 minutes.

2 bacon rolls (fresh out from the oven this morning), edamame, 5 cheese cocktails and 2 orange wedges

Note of the day with Aron from Pokemon

Marble Cream Cheese Brownies

Baked 2 batches of this marble cheese brownie on Thu, the 1st batch was for my 2 secondary school/class mates and the 2nd one was for my family.  Recipe was adapted from AG's Joy of Making Cookies.

Ingredient - Chocolate Batter
(A)
150g chocolate
80g butter

(B)
120 g sugar
pinch of salt
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence

(C)
120g flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
80g chopped walnuts

Cream chesse batter
(A)
200g cream cheese (used 250g)
40g butter (skipped this)
75g sugar

(B)
2 eggs
2 tbsps milk

(C)
30g corn flour

1. Grease and line a 31 x 22cm Swiss roll pan with greaseproof paper and grease the paper
2. Chocolate batter: melt (A) over simmering water and let it cool.
3. Add in (B) and mix till well blended.  Then add in (C).  Mix till well combined.  Pour 2/3 of the batter into the pan
4. Cream cheese batter: cram (A) til light, then add in (B) and cream till smooth.  Lastly add in (C) and mix till well incorporated.  Pour it into the chocolate batter
5. Spoon the remaining chocolate batter onto the plain batter.  Swifl the mixture to marble
6. Place it at the bottom rack of the oven.  Bake at 180C for 35 - 40 minutes
7. Cut it into bars when cool.

This marble cheese brownies were very delicious, I ate 3 big pieces right after it was cool off, whereas picky eater Y ate 1 and baby J ate 2 pieces!  Little girl gets to eat it only during supper :)

No, they r not meat loaf (my dad said they look like one though), these r marble cheese brownies for my 2 mates, hope they enjoy the cake just like the kids

Cucumber & Soba Maki Bento (225)

Didn't make this maki for little girl for such a long time, it reappear in my mind again last nite :p

After cooking & washing the soba, I marinated it with a tablespoon of men tsuyu (concentrated noodle soup), then wrapped into maki.  Bento took about 25 minutes to complete.

Cucumber & soba maki, an tea egg (from 優之良品), a slice of marble cheese brownie and 4 orange wedges

Note of the day with Jigglypuff from Pokemon

Little girl insisted me to draw the little microphone as it is Jigglypuff's 'weapon' helping it to put its enemies to sleep by singing a lullaby (listen to it below & beware it'll put u to sleep!)

Cheesy Angel Hair Bento (224)

Mixed the Prego's cheese & herbs sauce into the cooked angel hair, added some leftover fried salmon, baby green peas and a piece of cheddar cheese.

Bento & lunch was ready in 15 minutes.

Pear wedges, angel hair, salmon and baby green peas

Note of the day with Natu from Pokemon

Mayo Chicken Sandwich and Sago Jelly Bento (223)

Made a very small and simple bento for little girl today as she has class duty and she left school earlier today.  As it's the report card collection day, which mean I'm going to school to meet up with her teacher and she get to leave right after the meeting.  Overall, I'm quite satisfy with little girl's results, hope she'll keep it up.

Bento was made in 15 minutes, mainly on the preparation of the mayo chicken.

A mayo chicken sandwich and 2 marshmallows...

... and a small bowl of sago jelly with strawberry syrup

Note of the day with Ditto from Pokemon

Little girl likes this mayo chicken sandwich so much that she ate 2 for breaky!  Don know it was due to the mayo chicken or the cuteness of the sandwich :)

Mao Mao 毛毛 Bento (222)

I believed some of u who understand Chinese may be shocked when u see the title, the 毛毛 is not hair nor anything like it but it is the name of a dog.  To be precise, 毛毛 is a miniature poodle, a shy, quiet, cute and fluffy little dog who belongs to our friend: McL and his misses JaneY.  We went to their house on a Fri evening during the holiday, and it was our 1st time meeting 毛毛 and its mate Cash, an active, happy and a rather too friendly Jack Russell.  At the beginning, little girl was afraid of both dogs, especially Cash, which like to hop on us when we got close to it.  As for little 毛毛, it would hide behind the sofa whenever we went near it, it was so shy.  To let little girl get close to 毛毛, JaneY and McL would hold on 毛毛 and kept asking little girl to touch its paws, cuddled its head, then slowly let 毛毛 licked her hand.  They even let her hugged 毛毛 on her lap and took a few photos together.  Since then, not only little girl, hubby too (one who dislike dogs), r so in love with 毛毛, we would talk of 毛毛, googled for some poodle photos.  Little girl had suggested some names to us as if she will own one soon :p  Hubby has agreed to get her one, when she is slightly older, may b another year or 2 later, wohoo!  Thanks McL & JaneY, we'll have a poodle soon!

Ok now, back to my bento :p  I had this theme in mind after seeing little girl loves the dog so much.  I made it as a surprise this morning, with leftover rice and the veggies we had last nite.  The bento was ready in about 25 minutes.

From top left: fish cake sticks, 毛毛 onigiri, a triangle bowl of mushroom & kai lan stem, 2 heart nuggets, some cucumber sticks and a container of mayo

I felt so sorry that I made 毛毛 so unlike it and ugly :(

Note of the day with 毛毛

So I drew it base on the photo it took with little girl, she was very satisfy with the drawing :)

Zhong Zi 粽子 Bento (221)

Hi, I'm back from the 2 weeks idling!  Wished to have a longer holiday, where I able to sleep as much as possible and wake up without the noise of the alarm, sigh...

To start off with an interesting bento, I made little girl 2 bears from the zhong zi.  This bento took me about 15 minutes to assemble.

From left: a nougat, 5 thick slices of cucumber, a mini yellow alkaline zhong zi with some brown sugar, an apple gummy and 2 savory zhong zi bear-bears

Note of the day with Chikorita from Pokemon

A week before Duan Wu Festival 端午節, and just after we received the 1st batch of zhong zi...

Me:  Girl, u wanna eat zhong zi?
LG:  YES!  * She ran to me happily, thought of having the yellow zhong zi which is her fav *
Me:  But we don have the yellow zhong zi, only the salty zhong zi.
LG:  Ooh... * showing me a long face *  I don wanna eat loh mai kai.
Me:  These r not loh mai kai, dear, there is no chicken in the zhong zi, it is pork.
LG:  * Suddenly *  I know what to call it!  Loh Mai PIG!  * kept giggling *

Ever since, among my little family, zhong zi r known as those yellow ones and loh mai pig r those with salty mushroom and pork!

Stir Fry Pickled Daikon Leafs with Chicken

I thought of frying the pickled daikon leafs with shredded pork but the pork is in freezer and I'd forgotten to defrost it in the refrigerator a nite earlier, thus cook it with the shredded steamed chicken I had ready.

I soaked the pickled daikon leafs in water to get rid of the saltiness, but I was too 'kan zhong' (anxious), drained it in just a few minutes, should have soaked it longer :p

Ingredients
1 clove garlic, diced
1 shallot, diced
150g pickled daikon leafs, diced
a handful of steamed chicken, shredded
1 tsp sugar
1 tbsp soy sauce

1. Heat a pan, put in oil, diced garlic and shallot, fry til fragrant
2. Stir in chicken, fry for 3 minutes then put in the pickled daikon leafs
3. Season with sugar and soy sauce, fry for another 3 minutes.  Ready.

My version of pickled veggie noodle 雪菜麵

We had it for dinner with noodle in chicken broth and some stir-fried bean sprouts.  Though it was salty on its own, it tasted just fine with the noodle.  Little girl able to slurp this bowl of noodle fast and with no fuss!

Pickled Daikon Leafs 雪菜

Been seeing a lot of vegetable sellers selling local radish/daikon with leafs this few weeks.  I bought 2 of it last Tue, had the radish for soup, whereas the leafs, I pickled them.

I love eating xue cai noodle 雪菜麵, and I'd order a bowl whenever I visit any Esquire Kitchen or Shanghainese restaurants.  I'd been eager to try out pickling the vegetables myself after seeing lots of bloggers or website stating that it is very easy and simple, thus when I saw those greens on the daikon, I bought them instantly.

I used Carol's recipe to pickle those daikon leafs by adding just 1 ingredient => salt.  Her recipe called for only 1/2 tbsp of salt but the forgetful me put in 2 tbsp!  The pickled veggie has turned into salted veggie at the end (n_n)

Daikon leafs and salt

Sprinkle salt to washed & air dried leafs

Wrap in a clean plastic bag, place into refrigerator for at least 3 days

Pickled daikon leafs, a week later

Sweet Potato Balls 蕃薯蛋／地瓜球

Found this fried sweet potato balls recipe last week, since I'm free at home with little girl today, and having some sweet potatoes sitting in the pantry, I made a small batch of 27 balls.

Ingredients

200g mashed sweet potato
50g glutinous rice powder
15g sweet potato powder
25g sugar
20g lard (I used corn oil)

1. Mix mashed sweet potato and the rest of ingredients together, combined and knead slowly until forming a dough
2. Roll the dough to a long strip, divide into equal portions and roll them into balls
3. With a sauce pan, heat oil til reaching 110C, put in sweet potato balls, fry until they are floated, lightly turn the balls and fry them until golden brown.  Drain oil and serve.

While the balls were still warm, they were crispy at outside and gooey at the center, I like the texture but funny that little girl dislike it.  Once they were cool, they turned soft and gooey, still nice to eat.

Tang Zhong Bread Dough Vs Potato Bread Dough

I prepared some rolls & buns for picnic (went with Eve, MF and their kids) on last Thu.  I decided to try out 2 different bread doughs for some rolls & buns to see which one would give me a softer result.

Here r the bread doughs I used: the tang zhong bread dough and potato bread dough.  Both recipes were get from Carol's.  The tang zhong bread dough was the one I used on last bread posting - the milky sausage rolls.

Ingredients for potato bread dough:

150g mashed potato
240g high protein flour
30g low protein flour
30g sugar
3/4 instant yeast
1 egg
90cc milk
30g butter
1/8 salt


The method is the same as tang zhong bread dough.


Now, let's compare the doughs, the one in front is having tang zhong bread dough and the one further behind is potato bread dough:

Sausage rolls

Sambal ikan bilis (Malaysian anchovies chili in can) bun

Butter & sugar buns

The inner look of sausage bun with tang zhong dough

The inner look of sausage bun with potato dough

Seriously speaking, there aren't any different when the buns & rolls just out of the oven, look wise, taste wise and the softness too.  During picnic at the next morning, I still can't tell the different.  I had 2 again for tea at the later afternoon, and I could tell I preferred the potato dough from tang zhong, as the tang zhong were a very little bit drier than the potato's.

If u happen to compare these doughs, please tell me ur result and opinion, ok?

Milky Sausage Rolls

Baked a batch of this milky sausage rolls to my aunt in law, her daughter & grand-kids has returned from Spore, I believed these rolls would please the kids.

The dough recipe was adapted from Carol's basic 'tang zhong' (湯種基本麵包麵團) bread dough recipe.  I found this method similar to Alex Goh's Magic Bread, the only different is swap the hot water to hot milk.

Ingredients

(A) Tang zhong:
50ml hot milk
50g bread flour

1. Heat milk in microwave for 1 minute, then pour hot milk into bread flour, mix well to form a dough
2. Place dough in a covered container, then into refrigerator once cool
3. Able to store it for 3 - 5 days in refrigerator

(B) Main dough:

100g tang zhong

230g bread flour

20g cake flour

1/2 tsp instant yeast

1 egg

100g cold milk

25g sugar

30g butter

1/4 tsp salt

1. Put all dry ingredients (bread flour, cake flour, instant yeast, sugar and salt) into mixing bowl
2. Mix with slow speed for about 1 minute
3. Pour in milk, egg, then add in small pieces of tang zhong, mix for 5 minutes with medium speed
4. Add in butter, mix for another 15 minutes or until dough is soft and not sticky
5. Roll dough into a ball, let it proof in an lightly oiled and covered container for about 60 minutes or double its size
6. Punch air out from dough, lightly knead it and separate dough into 30g balls, let rest for 10 minutes
7. For each tiny ball, flatten the dough with a rolling pin, place a sausage in center, cut a few horizontal line at the side borders of dough, gently pull and crisscross the cut strips til the sausage is covered
8. Let sausage rolls proof for 1/2 an hour, gently brush sausage rolls with egg wash twice
9. Preheat oven at 180C (about 10 minutes)
10. Bake for 15 minutes or until golden brown

I ate 1, it was very very very soft and milky, even picky eater Y who doesn't eat bread, ate 3 in 1 go!  My aunt in law told me the rolls were still soft even after 2 days.

Pan Fried Pepperoni Pizza Bento (220)

SIL bought me a long stick of beef pepperoni last Sun, I don know what to do with it, until this morning.  I was out of sandwich bread or pita bread, so trying to think of something going along with the pepperoni, my brain reminded me of the frozen roti canai dough.

Pan fried pepperoni pizza with roti canai

So, u can see here, the pan fried pepperoni pizza with roti canai as pizza base.  It is easy & simple to prepare this:

1. Pan fried the frozen roti canai (one side only) for about 2 minutes or until it turned golden brown
2. Remove from pan, on the cooked side, spread ketchup, line the pepperoni, and top with lots of cheddar & mozzarella cheese
3. Move roti back to pan, cover the lid, cook with low fire until the cheese melted and the bottom of the base turn golden brown.  Serve while warm

This pizza is very delicious, the base is very crispy and it goes very well with the pepperoni too.  Little girl had 1/2 for brunch, 1/4 for bento, and the remaining for me & hubby :)

I used about 15 minutes to cook and assemble the bento.

Beef pepperoni pizza, guava and some fruity sweets

Note of the day with Cherrim from Pokemon

It will be the mid-year holiday for the children in Malaysia, thus there won't be any bento posting for the coming 2 weeks, happy holiday!

70's Chinese Songs

I watched this 王牌大名星 variety show by accident yesterday, 吴宗宪 and 侯佩岑 was interviewing 刘家昌, a man who wrote lots & lots of beautiful songs during the 70's.

I was still studying in primary school when I was introduced to these songs by my then teenage elder sisters, however, I was surprised that I still able to remember the lyrics and able to sing along while watching the show.

I search thru YouTube, found some of the songs he sang during the concerts he held at HK and Taiwan.  Let's listen to this, 在雨中, a very nice & popular song during those time, with 尤雅:

This one, 海鸥, I remember singing this song in school with friends, another beautiful & touching song, sang by Andy Lau in the concert:

This, 我家在那里, sang by 甄妮,  upon hearing this song again, I moderately remembered some movie clips, those acted by 甄珍 (his wife), 林凤娇 (wife of Jackie Chan)，林青霞，秦汉，秦祥林，邓光荣，etc.

For those who seldom listen to Chinese songs, I bet u'd know this song, sang by Teresa Teng 邓丽君，月亮代表我的心, and this 云河 :

Don u think songs from those days r so meaningful, beautiful & easy to remember?

BLT Mantou Sandwich Bento (219)

I remember seeing few chefs fixing BLT (bacon, lettuce and tomato) sandwiches at the AFC Channel, decided to give it a try but using mantou instead of bread.

Used 10 minutes to steam the mantou & fry the bacon, then another 15 minutes to assemble the sandwich, skinned & seeded the lychee, fry the sausage and place them into bento box.

2 BLT mantou sandwich, 2 octopus sausages and some lychee

Note of the day with Cherubi from Pokemon