Walnut Muffins

What I like about how these muffins turned out is that it rises really nicely (but not too much) and the top are a little crusty..... mmmmmmm...... best eaten when warm....

Ingredients:

375g self-raising flour

125g brown sugar

a pinch of salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

115g butter, melted

250ml milk

1 egg

walnuts, roughly chopped

1) Preheat oven to 200 degrees celsius and line a 12-cup muffin tray with paper muffin cups.

2) Combine flour, sugar, salt and baking powder in a bowl.

3) Beat melted butter, milk and egg together

4) Add dry ingredients and chopped walnuts to egg mixture and mix until just combined. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups and bake for about 20 minutes or until tops are golden brown.

Wholemeal Peach Muffins

There was a feature in the newspaper about online bakers some time back. The cupcakes/muffins/cakes featured were sooooo pretty...... some with colourful icing, others shaped like mice or even handbags!! So I thought I'd make an attempt to decorate my muffins a little.

The recipe I chose was in the healthy section of the book...... wholemeal flour, low-fat milk, low-fat cream cheese (for the topping) etc etc etc. I must have missed out something or got some of the measurements wrong.... because my muffins turned out rather dense.... and when it was eaten cold from the fridge, it didn't taste good at all...... yucks :p

However, it's my 1st attempt to top muffins with a little "extra", and it looked ok in the photo, so..... this post is for my failed attempt at wholemeal muffins...... I'll see if there's a chance to retry this recipe and make it work :)

Chocolate Chip Muffins

This is the first time I've tried a muffin recipe which doesn't use any butter, sunflower oil is used instead. The muffins turned out fine, but think I still prefer the buttery kind.
Ingredients:
300g plain flour
225g sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 tablespoon cocoa powder
2 eggs
115ml sunflower oil
175ml milk
chocolate chips
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1)Preheat oven to 180 degree celsius
2) Mix all dry ingredients, except chocolate chips, together (flour, sugar, baking powder, cocoa powder)
3) Combine all wet ingredients in a bowl and beat with an electric whisk until combined.
4) Add dry mixture and chocolate chips to wet mixture and stir until just combined.
5) Spoon batter into 12 muffin cups placed in a muffin tin and sprinkle some chocolate chips on top of each one. Bake for about 20 minutes.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

More chocolate recipes! This is my favourite chocolate chip cookies recipe:

Ingredients:
2 eggs
100g sugar
200g butter (softened)
300g self-raising flour
chocolate chips
walnuts (roughly chopped)

1) Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy
2) Add in eggs slowly and beat until well mixed
3) Fold in shifted flour into butter, sugar, egg mixture
4) Add in chocolate chips and walnuts
5) Bake in preheated oven (180 degree Celsius) for 15-20 mins until golden brown

Cold Tofu Dish

This has got to be the fastest and most fuss-free dish ever! Tofu is a very good source of soy protein and some research have shown that it can help to lower cholesterol as well as alleviate symptoms associated with meno pause.

Ingredients:

1 packet silken tofu (cold)

fried shallots/onions

dark soya sauce

sesame oil

Place silken tofu onto a plate, drizzle some dark soya sauce and a little sesame oil over the tofu and finish off by sprinkling fried shallots on top.

Chocolate Muffins

I'm a chocoholic..... I love hot chocolate that's really thick and creamy, chocolate ice-cream with chocolate chunks and fudge, even a simple block of dark chocolate. Some studies have shown that chocolate contains flavonoids, a type of polyphenol antioxidant. Dark chocolate is also thought to lower blood pressure in people with hypertension.

Now, for a simple fix for cravings for chocolate, try this recipe that makes about 4 medium sized muffins:

Ingredients:
4 tablespoons soft butter
55g sugar
1 egg
85g self-raising flour
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
small pieces of chocolate (to place in the centre of muffins)

1) Preheat the oven to 190 degree celcius
2) Place butter, sugar, egg, flour and cocoa powder into a large bowl. Beat these together until it's well-mixed.
3) Put paper baking cases in a muffin tin (or use muffin paper cases that won't flatten under the weight of it's contents). Spoon in half of the batter into the paper cases and add pieces of chocolate to the centre of each. Spoon in the rest of the batter to cover the chocolate pieces.
4) Bake for about 20 minutes and serve warm so that the chocolate centre is still runny.

Fried Rice

Fried rice is a simple all-in-one dish which is really easy to put together. If you have any leftover meat from last night's dinner, throw those into your fried rice, add some vegetables or egg etc and you'll get a complete meal! I started "scavenger cooking" when I was young and would search my mum's fridge for scraps of ingredients and would use whatever I could find to make this dish =p

Here's a rough guide on how I cooked fried rice:



Ingredients:
1 bowl cooked rice
ginger (cut into strips)
red onion (diced)
carrot (diced)
long beans (cut into small pieces)
fish cake (cut into strips)
1 egg (beaten)
light soya sauce
white pepper
cooking oil

1) Heat up some oil in the wok. Pour in beaten egg and fry an omelette. The omelette can be cut into small pieces.

2) Using the oil left over from frying the egg (add more if needed), fry the ginger strips, red onion for a few minutes until fragrant. Add in carrot, long beans, fish cake to the wok and fry for a few more minutes.

3) Add cooked rice and the pieces of omelette to the wok and mix with the other ingredients. Add light soya sauce and white pepper to taste.

Udon in Soup

For busy people out there, the everything-in-one-dish is real time saver. This udon in soup is simple to prepare and can be easily modified to suit your own tastes and preferences.

Serves 2 persons

Soup:
4 cups water
chicken bones
carrots
1 red onion
2 tablespoons miso paste (optional)
light soya sauce

Ingredients:
2 packets Udon
Lean pork
1 tube silken tofu
1 packet enoki mushroom
japanese fish cake
dark soya sauce
white pepper

1) To prepare the soup, put chicken bones, diced carrots and onion into boiling water and boil for about 1/2 hour. Add in miso paste if desired. Add light sauce. (This soup can be prepared before hand or ready-made soup bases can be used too)

2) Slice lean pork and season with light/dark sauce and white pepper. Cut tofu into cubes. Cut japanese fish cake into strips. Cut off the ends of the enoki mushroom.

3) To assemble the whole dish together, heat up the soup base until it starts to boil. Cook udon in the soup for about 3-5 minutes or according to the instructions. Remove from the soup and place into bowls. Add all remaining ingredients into the soup. When these ingredients are cooked, arrange them on top of the udon. Add soup to the udon and it's ready to be served!

Pear with White Fungus Dessert

Here's a simple thow-everything-into-the-pot-and-boil kind of dessert..... no joking!

Serves 2-3 persons

Ingredients:

2 1/2 cup water

1 China pear

1 pandan leaf

1 tablespoonful of wolfberries

1 small piece of white fungus

sugar to taste

Preparation:

1) Soak the white fungus in water until soft. Cut into small pieces

2) Peel and cut the china pear into small pieces

3) Boil the water and add in the pear, pandan leaf, wolfberries and white fungus into the boiling water. Let it boil on slow fire for about half an hour. Add sugar to taste, remove the pandan leaf and serve either hot or cold.

Muah Chee

After eating up 2 packs of sesame glutinous rice dumplings, I was left with 2 packets of grated peanuts which came with the rice dumplings. I've always loved muah chee (a sticky gooey glutinous rice dough coated with grated peanut and sugar mixture), so I decided to make my own muah chee.

There were quite a number of variations on the internet in muah chee recipe, from steamed to boiled dough to directly spooning the flour into boiling water. Here's my modified version adapted from these:

Servings: 1 - 2 persons

Dough:

100g glutinous rice flour

5 tablespoons water

Peanut Mixture:

grated peanuts

sugar
(amounts according to personal preference)

Mix water and glutinous rice flour to form a soft dough. For those who don't cook by measurements, add in water bit by bit until the dough feels like Playdough. It should hold together nicely but not crumbly, and not wet enough to stick to your hands.

Roll the dough into small strips and put into boiling water (make sure the water has come to a quick boil). Remove dough strips from boiling water when they float to the surface.

Place cooked dough strips into peanut and sugar mixture to coat. Use an oil coated scissors to cut into preferred size and coat all pieces with peanut and sugar mixture.

Memories...

I remember being the "flour sifter" as a kid when my mum was baking... big sheets of newspaper would be used to cover the dining table to prevent the whole place from being covered with flying flour..... hmmmm..... is that why she always measured more flour than was required in the recipe? :p