Chocolate hokkaido chiffon cupcake

This March is gonna be a very busy and packed month. Few days ago, my parents and sis were around in Sandakan to clear out our old house which we're ready to let go. It seemed impossible but we successfully cleared the house in a few days including majority of its furniture and electronics. Most of the items were discarded (sadly), some were transported to my place, out of those loots, I managed to complete my study room/ play area for the little fella, which I am very happy with. Balance of the items were given away free to friends. Now that my parents and sis have gone back to JB, I need to work my ass on the accounts of Just Health so I can submit to my accountant by the end of this month, and I still have an event to work on for this month, that event is happening in about 10 days and I still haven't done much about me. Arghhhhhh!! (Yes yes I am working on it now, while blogging). 

Despite all these, I am still cooking and baking for the little fella. I try my best to wake up at 6am every morning, so I have sufficient time to make him a snack and a lunch. 

This was something I have made two days back ~  very yummy chocolate hokkaido chiffon cupcakes which were our breakfast for two days. They kept very well in the fridge. On the third day, they are still edible, but they tend to be drier. 

It was a recipe adapted from my little favorite DIY, here. 

Ingredients A 

• 60g grapeseed oil
• 80g fresh milk
• 85g superfine flour
• 2tbsp cocoa powder 
• 5 egg yolks 
• 1tsp pure vanilla extract 

Ingredients B 

• 5 egg white 
• 80g brown sugar

Instructions: 

1. Combine oil and milk in a bowl. Place over a double boiler and cook with low heat, stir well. (I zap the combo in microwave for 40secs) 
2. Add egg yolk, mix with a whisk. Add in vanilla extract. 
3. Sift in flour and cocoa powder. Combine till smooth. Do not overmix. 
4. Using a hand electric mixer, whisk the egg white and add in sugar in three batches until stiff peak. 
5. Add 1/3 of egg white meringue into the egg yolk batter. Combine well. Fold in the remaining egg white meringue into the egg yolk mixture. 
6. Fill up 3/4 of the cupcake liner. Gently knock once or twice. Bake in preheat oven at 150degC for 23min. 
7. I let the cupcake lie on its side on a metal rack when cooking. You may also knock the cupcake on table top once before setting aside to cool. (Apparently this is a must to prevent the cupcakes from shrinking, I didnt do this and my cupcakes did shrink a little). 

Honey banana muffin

I ran out of sugar at home, but I still wanted to bake some muffins for little fella's friends at school. So I searched for a recipe that uses honey instead. These turn out nice and sweet (sweet enough even with just 1/3 cup of honey), they are also nice when steamed (for 12min) instead of being baked. I steamed 3 cos the oven tray couldn't fit more in.

It's lunar new year day 7 today, also known as 人日, translated as 'people's birthday', or 'birthday of men'. So here I am wishing everybody 'Happy Birthday'. 

Here's the recipe I adapted, from Kitchen Treaty

Ingredients (makes about 15-18 small size cupcake) 

• 2 cups of all purpose flour, sifted 
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1 tsp cinnamon powder 
• 1/2 tsp salt 
• 4 medium sized bananas, chopped
• 1/4 cup grapeseed oil (instead of butter) 
• 1/3 cup honey 
• 1 large size egg 
• 1 cup milk 
• 2 tsp pure vanilla extract 

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 175deg C. 
2. In a large bowl, sift in flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. 
3. In another bowl, combine oil, honey, egg, chopped bananas. Add the milk and vanilla extract and combine thoroughly. 
4. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredient bowl, with a spatula, mix until just incorporated. I used a hand mixer to mix until just combined. 
5. Divide batter between muffin liner, until about 2/3 full. 
6. Bake for 15-18min. 

I'm linking this post to 'Cook and Celebrate CNY 2015' organized by Yen from Eat your heart out, Diana from Domestic Goddess Wannabe and Zoe from Bake for Happy Kids. 

Easy 5 ingredients spaghetti bolognese

This morning for my 1breakfast1lunch project, I made a quick fry egg to go with multigrain and seeds bread as breakfast, and this easy 5 ingredients spaghetti bolognese for lunch.

To prepare the chicken bolognese sauce: 

• 2-3 cloves garlic, finely minced 
• 1/2 onion, finely minced 
• 4 tomato, roughly chopped
• 1 chicken thigh meat, minced and marinated with dash of orange juice, pinch of salt and liquid amino 
• 1/2 cup of water
• Seasoning eg balsamic vinegar, salt, pepper etc (optional) 

Instructions: 

1. Heat up a pan with 1-2 tbsp of cooking oil, I use a choice of rice bran oil or grapeseed oil. 
2. Stir in minced garlic and onion, fry till aromatic, about 1-2min. 
3. Stir in minced chicken. Stir fry for about 1-2min. 
4. Stir in skinned and chopped tomato. 
5. Pour in water. Gently simmer for about 15 to 20min for flavor to develop. 
6. Season with choice of seasoning.  
7. Serve with spaghetti or pasta. 

Crispy hash brown

Every morning, I had to make a breakfast and a lunch dish for myself and for my little boy. Our lunch is gonna be a simple one, organic pumpkin ramen with minced meat and tofu, with soft boiled egg, so that leaves me more time to make something different for breakfast. We have loads of potatoes left in the fridge, so I wanted to make a potato cake or hash brown. I haven't made hash brown for a very long time, so I thought I shall make some crispy ones for the little boy, so he can bring one to school as tea-time snack too. 

Ingredients: 

*3 medium sized potatoes (I made 3 hash browns from this) 

*3 tbsp grapeseed oil (for panfrying the hash brown)

*2tbsp grated Cheddar 

*Salt and black pepper, for seasoning 

Method 

1. Peel and wash the potatoes. Grate them. Sprinkle with salt. Drain and use a thin cloth or sieve to further press out the juice. (I drank the juice that got squeezed out, cos raw potato juice is very good for people with gastric. It heals inflammed stomach lining. I have been having gastric and bloatedness for a couple of days). 
2. Combine with grated Cheddar, and season with salt and black pepper. Use the thin cloth to mould the grated potato and cheese mix into a ball shape. 
3. Heat up grapeseed oil in a flat frying pan.
4. Pan fry the hash brown. Press the potato ball and cheese ball mixture flat, till about 1cm thickness. Fry until it turns golden brown. Then flip to the other side until it turns golden and crisp as well. 
5. Remove from pan and serve immediately. 

Steamed pandan milk cupcakes

Happy New Year peeps! 

I haven't blogged for so long. Been busy. Vacation. Work trip. Busy in shop. Little one started going to playschool. Etc etc. Anyways, despite all these, I managed to kick my own butt to make some nice treats for the little fella. The hubby has been away for a few days so it was just the lil' fella and I during the weekend. He has been behaving so well, I got surprised. I realized that he's especially well-behaved when there's not many of us around. When the grandparent, the aunties and uncles are around, his mischievous side reveals. 

I made these steamed pandan milk cupcakes for our Sunday treats. It smells so good. I plucked those pandan leaves from my garden and blitzed them with milk, was intending to make pandan chiffon cake w/ them, but was disappointed to realize I haven't got cornflour at home to make the cake flour required to make chiffon cakes. Oh, by the way, if you have not known, to make cake flour from all purpose flour, here's how you can do it - to make 1 cup of cake flour, just take 1 cup of all purpose flour, take away 2 tablespoon of all purpose flour, replace with 2 tablespoon of corn flour. Cake flour renders a soft and cotton-y texture to the chiffon cake. I have tried making chiffon with all purpose flour. Failed terribly. The cake rose nicely, but it collapsed when I sliced them, and wasnt as soft as the ones baked with cake flour. So I randomly picked a recipe for pandan steamed cakes from google and found this, which to my surprise, it tastes good! It was a surprise to me, cos when preparing it, I felt that the batter was a little on the thick side, almost like the texture of creamy peanut butter, yet it turn out quite soft and crumbly. I had some extra left over, so I kept them in the fridge. The next day, I steamed them for another 5 min and had them for breakfast. Tastes as good! 

Recipe adapted from Peng's Kitchen

This recipe yields 8-9 cupcakes 

• 2 eggs, medium size 
• 100g sugar (I used 80g brown sugar) 
• 1/4 tsp salt 
• 60g corn oil (I used virgin coconut oil) 
• 100g pandan milk (taken from the pandan milk I have made from blending together 8 pandan leaves and 200g fresh milk)
• 200g all purpose flour, sifted 
• 2tsp double action baking powder (I omitted the baking soda, and used 2.5tsp baking powder) 
• 1/2 tsp baking soda  

Method 

1. Using an electric whisk, beat eggs, sugar, salt and oil until thick and frothy. 
2. Beat in pandan milk till combine. 
3. Sift in flour, baking powder and fold till smooth batter is formed. 
4. Fill up cupcake liner till 3/4 full. 
5. Steam for about 12min. 

I was supposed to blog about my trips. But there was so many backlog on the trips to update, I get lazy when I think about it. Anyways, here's one of my favorite photo from my trip to Taiwan with the little one. Here's my babywearing little J with my I-angel hipseat carrier (model name: Josh). 

  

Buttery cornflake cookies

It's my son's second day at preschool today. Tell me if you're like me. I have a feeling I'm the one more excited than him. I wake up early to prepare two special treats for him to bring to preschool. Well, not that he's not excited. He loves being in school. Everytime asked, he told me, school is fun! (oh well, I shall keep track and we'll see how long he'll think school is actually fun!). After he got home from his preschool, he has been singing all day long! I asked him, do you wanna go to school tomorrow? He said YES! So I guess it's only fair to say we are both equally excited about him going to school. 

Yesterday, I prepared him pasta with minced chicken in creamy pumpkin sauce, and a pot of yogurt. Food like that may be messy, and I do wonder what the other parents prep for their kids. Anyways, I shall make something that's easier and less messy to eat today, ie buttery cornflake cookies (a recipe shared by a mommy from Healthy Food for My Baby facebook group) and banana muffin with chocolate chips and cinnamon streusel, recipe adapted from Sally's Baking Addiction's blog. Both are delicious and very moorish!! When the cookies were just done, I have been munching on them, and I shouldn't cos they would give me sore throat but they are too delicious!! (Note: They are a little soft and chewy when fresh out of the oven, after about 15 to 20min when cooled down, they will turn crispy). For the muffin's recipe, please refer here. 

Here's the recipe for the buttery cornflake cookies, recipe shared by Yvonne Woi from Healthy Food for My Baby facebook group. 

This recipe yielded about 30 cookies

• 125g unsalted butter, chopped and softened to room temperature
• 60g brown sugar 
• 1/2 tbsp vanilla essence 
• 1 1/4 cup self raising flour (or replaced with all purpose flour plus 2tsp baking powder) 
• 1tbsp milk
• 1 1/2 cup cornflakes, lightly crushed 
• 1/2 cup craisins/ raisins/ chocolate chips (I omitted these)

1. Preheat oven to 175deg C. 
2. Cream butter, sugar and vanilla until fluffy. Sift in flour. Add in milk and combine the dough. 
3. Add in crushed cornflakes. 
4. Line baking tray with parchment paper. Scoop the dough using a teaspoon, roll into balls, flatten very lightly with folk or finger (just very lightly, in face, if you want your cookies to be thick-ish, you wont even need to flatten it). 
5. Bake for about 15min or until cookies turn golden brown. 
6. Leave to cool. 

Banana muffin with choco chips and cinnamon streusel

It's my son's second day at preschool today. Tell me if you're like me. I have a feeling I'm the one more excited than him. I wake up early to prepare two special treats for him to bring to preschool. Well, not that he's not excited. He loves being in school. Everytime asked, he told me, school is fun! (oh well, I shall keep track and we'll see how long he'll think school is actually fun!). After he got home from his preschool, he has been singing all day long! I asked him, do you wanna go to school tomorrow? He said YES! So I guess it's only fair to say we are both equally excited about him going to school. 

Yesterday, I prepared him pasta with minced chicken in creamy pumpkin sauce, and a pot of yogurt. Food like that may be messy, and I do wonder what the other parents prep for their kids. Anyways, I shall make something that's easier and less messy to eat today, ie buttery cornflake cookies (a recipe shared by a mommy from Healthy Food for My Baby facebook group) and banana muffin with chocolate chips and cinnamon streusel, recipe adapted from Sally's Baking Addiction's blog. Both are delicious and very moorish!! When the cookies were just done, I have been munching on them, and I shouldn't cos they would give me sore throat but they are too delicious!! (Note: They are a little soft and chewy when fresh out of the oven, after about 15 to 20min when cooled down, they will turn crispy). For the cookies' recipe, please refer here. 

Here's the recipe for the banana muffin with chocolate chips and cinnamon streusel

This recipe yielded about 8-9 muffins 

Muffin

• 1.5 cups all purpose flour 
• 1.5 tsp baking powder (I omitted the baking soda from the original recipe) 
• 1/4 tsp salt 
• 1/2 cup brown sugar 
• 50g butter, softened to room temperature, chopped
• 40g grapeseed oil 
• 1 large egg
• 3 ripe bananas, mashed 
• 3tbsp plain yogurt / milk

Streusel topping (You may opt out the topping, but I felt that the topping makes it extra yummy!) 

• 1tsp cinnamon powder
• 1/4 cup dark muscovado sugar
• 3/4 cup chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts 

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 185deg C. 
2. Make the streusel first by combining all ingredients in a bowl. Set aside. 
3. In another bowl, sift in flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside. 
4. In another bowl, beat together sugar, chopped butter, oil and egg until fluffy. Beat in mashed banana and yogurt. Sift in dry ingredients until everything is just combined. Do not overmix. 
5. Fill muffin liner with about 3/4 full batter. Top with streusel topping.
6. Bake muffins for 10min at 185deg C. Lower temperature to 175deg and bake for another 10min. 

Cheese and mushroom muffin

My nanny is off for a whole week. So I'm a full time 'working' mom, taking care of my son in the shop, while looking after my shop, dealing with the clients with the little cheeky fella roaming around the shop. Phew! It's not easy, but surely fun to spend so much time with him daily. He's with me in the shop till about 3pm, then I bring him home for a bath and his dose of sedative - his MILK! and off he goes for his nap. I then return to the shop for a final hour before I call it a day. So what does he do in the shop? Everything! He reads, he draws, he plays with his playdough, he plays with his toys literally everything, other than napping in the shop. All in all, I'm still appreciative of this week. I got to get up close with him on a few issues, his temper, his basic manners and some other stuffs. Now that he's a 2 year old, he communicates and understands instructions pretty well. So I better start these early than later. 

Anyways, enough about my story. Here's the breakfast I made for us this morning, a savory breakfast muffin - cheese and mushroom muffin and a creamy pumpkin soup. I'll be sharing more about the easy 5-ingredients creamy pumpkin soup later on this month during my class in PJ (see this link for info), so do pardon me as I won't be revealing the recipe here in this blog, yet. 

Back to the muffin. I wanted to make cheese and mushroom scones. But I realized I didn't have any butter nor cream in the fridge. So instead, I searched for a recipe on savory muffin and adapted it to make it my own. It's a great recipe for a savory soft muffin if you don't like too much of sweet stuffs for breakfast. 

 Ingredients:

• 250g all purpose flour, sifted 
• 1tsp baking powder 
• 1/2 tsp salt 
• 50g cheese 
• 1 medium size egg 
• 50g oil, I used grapeseed oil 
• 150g milk 

• 4 brown button mushrooms, cleaned and slice (about 120g) 
• 2-3 cloves garlic, finely minced
• 1/2 onion, finely minced 
• pinch of salt 

Instructions: 

1. In a frying pan, heat up a tablespoon of oil. Stir in minced garlic and onion, followed by sliced mushrooms. Seasons accordingly. When mushrooms are soft and juices are drained off the mushrooms, they are ready. Keep the mushrooms, not the juice. Chop the mushrooms into small cubes. This step can be prepared in advanced. 
2. Combine dry ingredients, ie flour, baking powder, salt in a bowl. 
3. Beat together egg with oil and milk. Sift in dry ingredients. Add in the grated cheese and chopped stir-fried mushrooms.
4. Fill the batter into muffin cup to about 2/3 full (this recipe makes about 5 muffins). Option: top with an onion ring and more grated Cheddar. 
5. Preheat an oven to 175deg C. Bake for about 20-25min.  

Super moist and healthy carrot cupcakes

I haven't made carrot cake for the longest time ever. Maybe I just dreaded the process of grating carrots, or perhaps the process of cleaning the grater. In actual fact, neither the process are cumbersome at all. Okay, I dunno why. I should bake more of this, cos this is so healthy, with such little amount of oil (and I used virgin coconut oil), yet they turned out super moist and yummy. The taste or texture of carrot are seriously not noticeable. I prepared them for the lil' fella's take out breakfast box, fingers crossed the nanny will tell me he loves the cupcakes. Oh ya, the nanny is bringing him out for breakfast with her friends, so I made a take-out-breakfast-box for him, consisting of his favorite food, ie plain yogurt with freshly chopped mango, some cheese crackers and this carrot cupcake. He held the container tightly with him when we were on our way to our nanny's place. Bless him! Oh, I forgot to mention, with the amount of sugar I have used in this recipe, it wasn't too sweet, just right for my liking. Try it! You'll be in love with them! 

Here's the recipe, which I have modified, adapted from Little Miss Kimberly Ann.
It made about 7-8 medium size cupcakes

Ingredients

• 1.5 cup of all purpose flour, sifted (or 1 cup of all purpose flour; half cup of wheat flour) 
• 2tsp baking powder (I have ommitted the baking soda from the ori recipe, and replaced with baking powder) 
• 1tsp cinnamon powder 
• 1/2 cup brown sugar 
• 1 egg, lightly beaten 
• 2tbsp oil (I used virgin coconut oil) 
• 1tbsp apple puree (I used a tablespoon of blueberry jam) 
• 1/2 cup fresh milk
• 1 banana, ripe, mashed 
• 1.5cup grated carrots
• 1/2 cup grated Cheddar 
• 2tbsp sunflower seeds, as topping (optional)

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 175degC. 
2. In a large bowl, combine all the dry ingredients. 
3. Add the wet ingredients and stir until combined thoroughly, but do not over mix. 
4. Pour batter into cupcake liner, filling about 3/4 full. 
5. Bake for about 20min, or until an inserted skewer or toothpick comes out clean. 

Easy chicken bolognese for toddler

Bolognese sauce, other than creamy mushroom sauce, is a staple recipe in my kitchen. I usually whip up bigger portion of it and serve it over a few days, or sometimes, I even freeze portions of it, and use them when I am out of food for the little fella. It's so versatile. It is perfect with pasta, also goes well with rice as pasta bake or just simply rice and sauce, I have also used them as the filling for sheperd's pie under mashed potato. This round, I served it with cous cous. This is also the first time the lil' fella is having cous cous as his main meal. 

To prepare the chicken bolognese sauce: 

• 2-3 cloves garlic, finely minced 
• 1/2 onion, finely minced 
• 1/3 medium sized carrot, finely chopped 
• 4 tomato, lightly scored at the bottom, and boiled in a pan of boiling water for 2min to remove the skin, then finely chopped
• 1/4 chicken breast, minced and marinated with dash of orange juice, pinch of salt and liquid amino 
• 1 cup of chicken stock, homemade 
• Seasoning eg balsamic vinegar, salt, pepper etc (optional) 

Instructions: 

1. Heat up a pan with 1-2 tbsp of cooking oil, I use a choice of rice bran oil or grapeseed oil. 
2. Stir in minced garlic and onion, fry till aromatic, about 1-2min. 
3. Stir in minced chicken and chopped carrot. Stir fry for about 1-2min. 
4. Stir in skinned and chopped tomato. 
5. Pour in chicken stock. Gently simmer for about 15 to 20min for flavor to develop. 
6. Season with choice of seasoning.  

To prepare the cous cous:

• Place 1 cup of cous cous in a flat container. 
• Pour in 1 cup of  hot boiling water or hot boiling stock into the container with cous cous in it. 
• Cover with lid for 1-2min. Open up. Fluffy with fork. Ready to serve!  

Easy fried rice for toddler

When he saw this, he was so excited about it, he said 'so cute!' (in canto)

Fried rice is my boy's favorite lunch. Actually, not right, it's MY favorite meal to prep as his lunch. It's easy, incorporating whatever I've got left in the pantry or in the fridge and it is still nice even if not served warm.

Here's a very simple and easy recipe for fried rice for my toddler boy:
This recipe makes two little portion

• 2-3 cloves garlic, roughly minced 
• 1/2 small onion, roughly minced 
• 1/3 medium sized carrot, chopped into tiny cubes 
• Some greens eg beans, kailan, peas etc 
• 1/2 chicken breast, cut into small cubes, marinated with pinch of salt, pepper and liquid amino 
• 2 bowls of cooked rice (cooled down) 
• Seasoning eg salt, pepper powder, liquid amino etc 

Instructions: 

1. Preheat wok with 1-2 tbsp cooking oil, I use a choice of rice bran oil or grapeseed oil. 
2. Stir in garlic and onion, and fry until aromatic and onion turns translucent. 
3. Stir in carrot and chicken. 
4. When chicken is cooked through, stir in cooked rice. Season with your choice of seasoning. 
5. Ready to serve! 

*Sometimes, if there aren't much ingredients or there aren't any meat in the fried rice, I would also add in egg.