Dessert recipes not to be forgotten

Was actually tidying my photo gallery halfway when I see alot of photos on things I have made. Time flies. October was gone before I can post up a few recipes that I have tried. These days I have not been staying up later than 12 so hardly get anything personal done. Have to summarise what was done and not recorded in this post so that I can still retry these recipes that I love.

1) 柚子果凍

This is a very simple recipe. I have to use up my ice jelly powder before it expires so I have been very hardworking sourcing for recipes online as well as the library. However, there are so many recipes but hardly any uses 愛玉粉 which is the ice jelly powder. Most recipes uses 寒天粉 which is actually agar agar powder. Out of desperation, I chose a simple recipe and replace the agar agar powder with my ice jelly powder. The kids like it and so do I.  As long as it is a cooling tasty dessert, who cares if it is ice jelly powder or agar agar powder. But the ice jelly powder is yellowish.

Ingredients (材料）， for 3－4 people

寒天粉          2g
水                  300ml
柚子茶          100g
蜂蜜               2大匙

Method （做法）
1。 將水輿寒天粉倒入鍋中開中火加熱，一邊用木匙攪拌一邊將寒天粉煮融。沸騰之後再煮2－3分鐘，一邊攪拌使其完全融解。
2。 加入柚子茶輿蜂蜜攪拌融解。
3。 倒入杯子內，待稍微降溫之後用保鮮膜封口，放入冰箱冷藏凝固。

This is my Korean Yuzu Tea dessert made from Yuzu tea and ice jelly powder. I have forgotten to take down the title of the book that I got the recipe from (before I return the book to the library).

2. Gula melaka and coconut milk agar agar

Besides this dessert, I also tried making layered agar agar that has coconut milk. I love to eat anything with coconut milk. However, I did not succeed in making the agar agar separated. When it was being pour out, the liquid is a light brownish in colour. Most of my friends whom I shared my concern on the separation issue seem to assure me that the liquid will separate when cool. So I put the agar agar into the fridge and wait. The outcome is still the same, uniformly brown! But like all desserts, as long as they taste good, no one minds. I tried the recipe from Blessed Homemaker. I must clarify that there is nothing wrong with the recipe as many others have got it with the same recipe. My friend did mentioned that the coconut milk I bought in small carton may be the culprit. I have no chance to try again yet as my kids did not take the gula melaka well.

My brown gula melaka coconut milk agar agar.

Ok, I have to sleep now and will find time to post another birthday cake that I have made. *yawn*

Easy chocolate Ice Cream - no machine needed

I googled this recipe off the internet. Luckily I photographed it down with the link. I was trying to use up my Baileys so have to find other ways besides just drinking. This ice cream was made in July 15th.

Here is the recipe from David Lebovitz The Easiest Chocolate Icecream Recipe .... Ever

Easy Chocolate Ice Cream : No Machine Needed
(Makes 4 - 6 scoops)

You will need :
55g Dark chocolate (around 50% cocoa), chopped
80ml milk, whole or low-fat
80ml Baileys liquor
1 medium-sized ripe banana, peeled, and cut into chunks
1 tablespoon (about 15ml) dark rum

Directions :

1. Put chocolate and milk in a medium bowl and melt in microwave. Use 20 second burst and stir well after each.
2. Pour that chocolate milk, Baileys, chopped banana and rum into a blender and whiz together until smooth.
3. Tip into a plastic or metal container, cover, and freeze for at least 4 hours. And that's it.

Isn't that simple? No need for ice cream maker. Did not even mentioned have to take out and whiz for a few times. Well, I find that the texture is not like ice cream. It is more like Gelato texture and it melts very very fast. I read that the banana is there to help create the creamy feel but I did not feel it. This time I do not have nice magazine pictures to tempt you but my melting away one. :-)

Well, I don't think I am going to try this recipe again. Luckily it is a small portion, otherwise I will gain alot of weight just by eating this one.

Strawberry Trifle

My index are getting more and more disorganised. I started this blog to help me organise the tried recipes but don't think it is helping. Only the recent ones are helpful as I tend to forget what I have baked or made. Wonder if it is possible to revamp the whole index. Haiz.

Anyway, I remembered I made layered desserts before (should be a recipe from HHB) and this should not be my first one, but I could not locate the previous try in my blog (will try harder when have time). I made this on July 7th (as my picture is dated).

It looks very pretty, like this, from the magazine

But mine looked like this :

I do not have much time to bake, so I use the small amount of time to make these simple desserts.

I cannot remember which magazine I have got this recipe from, but it goes like this :-

Strawberry Trifles (Makes 4 servings)

Ingredients

1 tbsp icing sugar
250g strawberries, finely diced and 4 sliced strawberries to garnish
200g sponge cake or pound cake, diced
250g Yoplait Creamy Light Strawberry Yogurt
2 gingersnap biscuit, finely crushed

Directions

1. Sprinkle the icing sugar over the diced strawberries and let them stand for 5 minutes.
2. Line the base with a wine glass with the sponge cake. Top with 1 tbsp strawberry yogurt and 1 tbsp strawberries. Continue to layer until the glass is almost full.  Repeat with remaining glasses.
3. Top each cup with the sliced strawberries and sprinkle the gingersnap biscuits over. Serve immediately.

Of course I did not buy any gingersnap. I have used the last few pieces of Sara Lee pound cake so I have scrapped off the pound cake skin sticking to the aluminium foil tray and sprinkled them on top. You did not see it in my cups here because the kids cannot wait till I finish photo-ing it.

I guess desserts cannot be anymore simpler than this assembly job. I did not create the layers but am sure you can. Give this treat to yourself and your family. :-)

p/s : now I am thinking of making it again.

Another nice drink

Long long time ago, I ordered this drink 西洋菜蜜棗水 from Macau Express in Expo and I liked it very much. I was recently told it is also served in Crystal Jade.  I remembered asking my friend from Hong Kong to share the recipe, but I had since "lost" the email in the inbox.

Actually, my intention is to cook watercress soup as requested by hubby but it is such a big bunch of watercress (bought from NTUC) so I think the taste will be too overpowering if I used all. I wouldn't want to drink the soup again 2 days later (I will definitely have leftovers since kids will only drink a little) so I had the idea to cook it into the sweet drink. I googled the net for recipe (in mandarin) but it returns mostly the version with pork/pork bones. Finally I found one. My hubby thinks the drink is close to what we have then, but the watercress taste is still rather strong. I am only using 100g of watercress to abt 1.5 litre. So I will try to reduce the watercress portion the next time I try.

This drink is said to be good for the lungs and for cough. No matter what it is for, it will be a good drink.

p/s : I happened to itchy hand, google with english and it returned with more results. Perhaps will try the rest of the recipes the next time.

Cool stuffs for hot weather

Did this drink cool you down? It is so hot nowadays that I am making more drinks and cold desserts. This is lemonade. My friend June (June, thank you very much for sharing) posted her drink over Facebook and it looks so refreshing, so I just have to try it out since I have ready ingredients. Furthermore hubby is not in town half the week so there is no one to help with eating the bakes... 

After cooking both ingredients together, I had around 400 - 500 ml of syrup. I waited for the syrup to cool a little before adding the lemon. I cannot remember how much water did I add, but after adding alot alot alot more water, it is still quite sweet. However, my kids went "I am in heaven (imagine them dancing and prancing round) .. I am in heaven ..." after they took a sip of the drink. (*grin*)

After making this lemonade .. I tried my hands on Panna Cotta. I got the recipe from a book I borrowed from the Clementi Library. The recipes featured in this book is rather straight forward and simple enough and I am thinking of adding it to my bookshelf. I am very happy with the taste of this dessert but the presentation and the assembling method needed improvement! Let you see what I mean.

 

Did you see the pretty red jelly rising up through the cream layer like molten lava? I thought the jelly layer has set after like 30 minutes in the fridge .. but it proves not. So when I had the warm cream pour onto the jelly layer .. this happens... Anyway, not very unsightly and after topping up with jelly again ..  all we have to do is wait for the dessert to set and the night to fall. I must say I really like to eat this. I think there is a high chance for me to make this again because this is indeed a good way to use up whip cream. I had problem finding small strawberries to decorate the little cups (to look like what is shown in the book and some restaurants) but they are tasty on their own.

Here's the recipe (from 簡易蛋糕甜品自煮樂 － 芝芝著）which I will need again.

Ingredients ( makes 4-5 dessert cups)

strawberry jelly 
- 1 pack of strawberry flavoured jelly powder
- some hot water
- some powdered gelatin


Panna Cotta
- 150g whipping cream
- 150g milk
- 30 sugar
- 5g leaf gelatin (same weight if used powdered gelatin)


Method


Making strawberry jelly
1. Follow the instructions printed on strawberry jelly powder packaging. Dissolve jelly powder and powdered gelatin in some hot water. Pour into dessert cups. Chill in fridge until set.


Making panna cotta
2. Combine whipping cream, sugar and milk in pot. Heat over low heat for 1 minute. Turn heat off.
3. Add soaked leaf gelatin. Gently stir until gelatin dissolves. Let cool. Pour into dessert cups. Chill in fridge until set.


After making the above successfully, I had the idea of trying out the chocolate panna cotta. This time I have to google for recipe. I found one off the net, but forgot to copy down the source. The ingredient are as below.

Chocolate Panna Cotta

400ml cream
200ml milk
40g sugar
125g dark chocolate 
14g gelatin

I did not copy down the method as I believed it should roughly be the same. I did read to make sure that gelatin is still the last one to add. However, this time, the chocolate did not melt nicely. There are specks of chocolate which never did get dissolved. I even made two version, normal fresh milk and chocolate milk. The chocolate version is more tough than the white version. I still like the white version better. Here is the no frills (ie no deco) chocolate panna cotta.

There are wordings on the bottom of the mould, so the pudding has the prints. The kids, upon seeing the prints, said that the pudding is like store bought, with the brand on it. LOL.











Now I wonder how much weight did I gain after eating all these.

When I am not baking ...

When I am not baking, I will be busy with housework or cooking. Recently, I made pop corns with the new wok, made Sloppy Joe Burgers, made strawberry pudding as well as ice jelly cocktail. I even tried making pizza with pita bread since I am so lazy to make my own base.

Pop corns - It all started with HHB's pop corns, combined with kids' growing interest in watching cartoon movie at home and the new wok. HHB's pop corn post introduced the urge, the kids' interest adds to the need, then it became a MUST with the tool available. (*grin*) It is a very fun thing to do. I followed HHB's ingredient measurement as I lost the recipe given by the promoter. It is very satisfying to see the oil coated corn pop up. However, I messed up when I try to coat the popcorn with caramel. I have to melt the sugar but when the liquid sugar starts turning brownish at certain places while some white crystal are still melting, I started to swirl the wok, hoping to balance the heat and upon seeing all the white crystals disappeared, I quickly emptied all the popcorns inside the wok. I think I overloaded my wok and also the sugar may not be totally melted? I got a problem tossing the popcorns and the sugar hardens easily so I had big lumps of popcorns and some sticking to the base with the sugar. Anyway the kids were still thrilled to have the popcorns with their movie and I think I will try again (have the corns anyway).

Here's sharing the popcorns.

Next up is Sloppy Joe Burger. Oh yes, the recipe came from HHB too. Her instructions are easy to follow and understand. Thank you for sharing, HHB. I am running out of what to cook for the kids only (as head of family is often out to make ends meet) and I saw her lovely post on this burger that is made with japanese curry n spaghetti sauce. Japanese curry and spaghetti are my kids' favourite so I think this should not go wrong. Furthermore, I welcome another way to use beef since I heard beef is good for boosting immunity. I made the burgers using Sunshine's butter rolls which are smaller (less wastage incase they really don't like it). The kids really love the filling and the daddy mentioned that it taste like rendang burger from BK yet minus the sweetness. So that night alone, the kids and the daddy polished up the bag of rolls. I have just received orders from the kids to cook it again next week.

Here is sharing my Sloppy Joe.

Finally the dessert (haha just like in a 3 course meal - but I did not make these the same day) - strawberry pudding. My family loves having dessert and the pudding post from cook.bake.love tempted me and my kids. I even purposely buy gelatin for this. Just as expected, the kids are thrilled. The pudding were very well received. What I did not understand was that .. the pudding kind of become quite watery towards the end (they have finish eating and left the bowls for me to pack up and wash) but soon, I got clarification from Angel (blog owner). Thank you Angel.

Here is how my pudding looked like.

Besides this lovely dessert, I also tried my hands at ice jelly cocktail. My kids will ask for this same dessert everytime we told them we are going to order dessert after a meal outside. Since I have heard that it is not difficult at all, I quickly go to Phoon Huat to get the ice jelly powder and with a can of tropical cocktail, the kids got their ice jelly cocktail. Not difficult to make the jelly because it is after all jelly so made it the usual jelly way. LOL. After setting it in the fridge, I just add cocktail and put in some cocktail syrup. I even put in sugar during the 2nd time I made the jelly and the family prefered jelly with a hint of sweetness.  Now I am trying to tempt you with my homemade ice jelly cocktail ;-)

Pizza with pita bread as base was last night's dinner. I love that the end product look very much like a real pizza, where it is round and have a thick bread look alike base. My boy helped in assembling the pizza and while I showered the kids, I let the cheese melt inside the oven.  After a while, the cheese has melted but did not brown. So I changed the oven mode to grill and I left to coach boy on a math's question. After 4 minutes (my timer beeps) I went to look at them and to my horror, some are "over grilled". The "not so black" parts are given to the hungry kids while those below will have to be cleared by me.

Both dh and the kids felt that this version is better than having normal square sandwich bread as base pizza. If I cook more cooling tea.. the kids will have more choices. 

A report on 2 past "projects"

Wao, its almost a month that I have not been baking. No doubt
I hope to start baking frequently soon, but I have other jobs
at hand at the moment, plus a lousy mood these few weeks.

I have previously baked the "Mash potato cheese muffin"
featured in small small baker's blog. Not very successful
(like not well cooked and cheese is burnt!) , so I will not talk
about it here till I get it done well enough. But this muffin is
really very tasty, even my kids asked me to bake again. I
guess they love the cheese taste.

Then I tried my hands on self made ice cream (which is my
favourite food). I made toblerrone ice cream using the recipe
from small small baker too. It really taste so yummy and rich.
I find that it has the texture of italian gelato that I have eaten
in italy during my honeymoon many years ago. My mum thinks
it really taste like ice cream, but my hubby said it did not make
him want to eat more when he finish a small portion (even
thou he said it is tasty). Anyway, I am happy I can make ice
cream. Here's mine.



最近心情不是很好，又忙于一些琐碎事所以没烘焙。不过几天
前还是在晚上烘了small small baker 介绍的mash potato
cheese muffin。但是成品不理想，所以不提了。
然后我跟着small small baker 的冰淇淋食谱自制冰淇淋想讨
自己欢心。虽然没人能证实我的冰淇淋成功否，但我妈妈吃了
说好吃，像。除了老公。他说虽好吃，但吃了却没有想再吃。
其实那不是更好，我可以独吞。哈哈。