I Have Moved

Morning peeps. Just to inform that I've moved my blog to :

cikyahcooking.com . To all readers, I dope hope that you'll continue to visit me, yea! 

Another Trial and Error Story

Good morning peeps. Finally, Blogger has returned to its normal self. I was trying very hard to update my entry yesterday but to no avail.

I want to share a recipe which was done some time last week. You see, I was invited to an engagement ceremony of a distant cousin. The story was, this relative of mine held a wedding reception for his son the week before. Due to my father's health condition, he couldn't make it to the ceremony. As a result, I was assigned to go to this uncle's house and of course, brought something to compensate for the absence. In other words, representing my father and in fact, the whole clan back in Melaka. The meeting was short but it ended up with another invitation. This time, the daughter was getting engaged.   

I'm familiar with the host but what I found uneasy was, I haven't met his other relatives for a very, very long time. I was pretty sure that they won't really recognise me. You know, a kind of uneasy feeling being around people you don't really know. Due to this fact, I felt that I shouldn't be arriving empty handed. Anyway, to cut a long story short, the recipe below was attempted. I could simply say that it was just like killing two birds with one stone. Pleasing the relatives and finishing the Nutella stock. I beg your pardon? The taste? Soft and moist with a rich, nutty taste. Give it a try, will you?

Nutella Cupcakes

Ingredients :

125g unsalted butter, at room temperature

125 caster sugar

125 self-raising flour

2 eggs

1/2 tsp soda bicarbonate

2 tsp of vanilla essence

2 tbsp of milk

enough Nutella to use as filling

enough paper casings to line your muffin tin

Method :

1. Preheat the oven at 150C.
2. Sift the flour and soda bicarbonate and keep aside.
3. Cream the butter and sugar.
4. Gradually, add in the eggs and the the other ingredients and mix well.
5. Spoon the mixture into your paper casings. Top with some Nutella and spoon the remaining mixture on top.
6. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or till golden brown and a skewer inserted into the cupcakes comes out clean.
7. Leave to cool on a wire rack.
8. Serve.

Looking On the 'Overlooked'

Good morrow to all. I understand that I've been neglecting this blog but this morning, I decided to write something here, just to give some room to the brain after going through eight classes worth of essay papers!

Anyway, since I've become my daughter's official driver, I have lesser time to looking through my recipe books and what to cook for dinner. For the past months, the dishes prepared had been the usual ones. They were merely repetitions on the family's selection of 'had been approved' daily dishes. 

However, sometime this week, as I went down to the kitchen, bearing in mind that I'd told Mr KHz that I would prepare his favourite steamed fish, I noticed that my MIL had prepared her fish curry. It was definitely the time to panic for I was sure that Mr KHz would choose the steamed fish over the fish curry. Coking two fish dishes at the same time was certainly not a very wise option, I suppose.

As usual, my recipe book to the rescue and I remembered that I had bought some prawns in the freezer. My problem was, all the ingredients had to be pounded coarsely and when time was not on your side, using the mortar and pestle felt like a burden. I took out the blender, put the chopped ingredients in and suddenly I noticed the word 'pulse' on the blender control panel. I know, I know. I shouldn't have felt so calm but I just couldn't resist the temptation on knowing what would happen if I press the pulse button. If you were in the kitchen with me at that time, you would rolled on the floor, laughing to see a person who was so overjoyed over what her blender had produced. I was filled with glee and gradually, felt very silly for I had overlooked the 'pulse' sign which would had saved a lot of my precious time. Mind you, I have been using the same blender for the past three years! From now on, I have to be more alert on everything and everyone. Call me lame but I hardly have any resolutions so I guess, this could be my first one.

The result of my 'overlooked' sign is in the photo below. Enjoy!

UDANG  BERLADA

Ingredients:

• 1 kg of white prawns (the larger the better, peeled but keep the tails intact)
• 12 red chillies
• 5 shallots
• 4 pips of garlic
• 1 piece of 'asam keping'
• 2 pieces of kaffir lime leaves
• 1 tsp of turmeric powder
• salt and sugar to taste

Method:

1. Coat the prawns with turmeric powder and salt.
2. Heat some oil in a wok and fry the prawns until slightly brown and keep aside.
3. Put in the red chillies, shallots and garlic into the blender. Put in little water and pulse. Your mixture should be coarse and not fine.
4. Using the same oil used to fry the prawns. Stir fry the pulsed ingredients till the oil separates from the gravy.
5. Put in the prawns, kaffir lime leaves, 'asam keping' and salt and sugar to taste. Stir until the gravy coats the prawns.
6. Enjoy!

What's your order for today sir?

As part of my plan on not to overspend on raw ingredients for cooking or  buying food for Iftar, I decided to try this simple recipe derived from my trusted site, MyResipi.com. I have always believed in preparing simple dishes for my family. My choices are always easy to cook, using easily available ingredients and should be able to cater for my two kiddos who are well-known to have the pickiest tastebud! As usual, Mr Khz (and sometimes, the kids) decide. If he likes it, I would categorise the dish as good. If he said NO, then, the recipe will remain untouched. My views could be biased for Mr KHz is easy to feed but still, any opinion deserves to be taken into consideration.

Today, I've prepared a simple dish using prawns. On weekdays, I cook using whatever is available in the fridge but on the weekends, I usually give Mr KHz the honour to choose what he feels like eating. Since he had mentioned prawns, I decided to try a recipe by dayang jack from the site that I had mentioned earlier. Give it a try, will you?

HONEY PRAWNS

Ingredients:

400g fresh medium-size prawns (marinade with 1/2 tsp turmeric powder, 1/2 tsp of salt and 1/2 tbsp of cornflour for 10 minutes and deep fried till crispy and keep aside).

1 onion

1 red chilli

3 cloves of garlic

1 and 1/2 tbsp honey (mixed with 60ml of water)

2-3 bird's eye chillies (bruised)

1/2 tbsp chilli sauce

1/2 tbsp of dark soy sauce

1/2 tbsp lemon juice

2 stalks of coriander leaves (chopped coarsely)

Method :

• Grind onion, chilli and garlic till fine.
• Pour in about 3 tbsp of cooking oil ( I used the oil used for frying the prawns) in a wok and stir fry ground ingredients till fragrant.
• Put in the honey mixture, soy sauce and chilli sauce and stir. Then, put in the bird's eye chillies and stir till the sauce thickens.
• Next, put in the prawns, lemon juice and coriander leaves. Mix well.
• Serve hot.

Salam Ramadhan

Salam Ramadhan untuk semua. Alhamdulillah, dengan limpah rahmat dan keizinanNya, sekali lagi kita telah diberi peluang untuk bersama-sama mendapatkan keberkatan bulan yang indah ini. Semoga ibadah puasa tahun ini lebih bermutu dan diredhai.

Ramadhan memang sentiasa dikaitkan dengan rezeki yang melimpah-ruah sepanjang ianya berlangsung. Pelbagai makanan ada dijual di mana-mana. Ibu-ibu juga sedia memasak juadah berbuka pilihan ahli keluarga, yang selalunya menjadi cara menghargai dan memberi semangat dan dorongan buat anak-anak yang pertama kali berpuasa. Sekadar peringatan untuk pembaca dan juga diri saya sendiri, di bulan yang mulia ini, marilah kita bersama-sama mengelakkan pembaziran. Mungkin juga boleh dijadikan permulaan menanam sikap berjimat di kalangan ahli keluarga.

Memandangkan blog ini berkaitan masakan dan penyediaan makanan, sukalah saya berkongsi satu lagi resepi tukang masak tersohor, Puan Rubiah Suparman. Kepada yang memang menyukai masakan kampung, saya yakin resepi di bawah ini tidak akan mengecewakan.

'Sambal Tempoyak Daun'

Bahan-bahan
1 ikat pucuk ubi ( saya gandakan kerana tiada pucuk labu dan daun kaduk)
1 ikat pucuk labu       }
10 helai daun kaduk  } (saya abaikan kerana tidak dapat dicari di pasar)
1 helai daun kunyit (saya gunakan 2 helai)
2 batang serai
10 biji cili api
1 labu bawang besar
1 ulas bawang putih
1 sudu kecil serbuk kunyit
2-3 cawan santan pekat (saya gunakan santan kotak Ayam Brand dan dicampur air mencukupkan 3 cawan)
1 papan petai (diambil bijinya) (saya hiris tipis)
3 sudu besar ikan bilis (saya tumbuk kasar-kasar)
3 sudu besar tempoyak
garam secukup rasa
1 sudu teh gula pasir (ini tiada dalam resepi asal)


Cara memasak:

1. Hiris halus pucuk ubi, daun kunyit dan serai. Rendam dalam air garam.
2. Sementara itu, cili api, bawang besar dan bawang putih dkisar halus. kemudian, toskan bahan-bahan yang telah direndam tadi dan keringkan airnya.
3. Masukkan ke dalam periuk dan letakkan bahan-bahan kisar tadi bersama ikan bilis, petai santan dan tempoyak. Masak hingga mendidih dan pekat.

What Mr KHz Brought Back From Masjid Bulat

Section 14, PJ, is well-known for many reasons. Despite the fact that it's near to impossible to get a parking space at this place, it never ceases to attract people from near and far. Gadget die-hard fans cherish this place for its Digital Mall but those who frequent this place would simply but surely state their reasons why this place remain their top spot. I'm pretty sure that these reasons, would include the RM1 per packet nasi lemak (as well as the fried rice vermicelli) sold by the young mechanic side by side the newspaper uncle or the yummy lontong sold at one of the stalls above the wet market. Personally, I am also 'guilty' of  frequenting this place. The wet market is a lot smaller, (compared to the one in Taman Tun), causing me to feel at ease because I am familiar with almost all the vendors at this place. I know that the makcik ( I call her 'kakak' and since I know she's from my hometown, I never have a second thought whenever I purchase the shrimp paste ('belacan') from her stall) selling vegetables recognises me, as well as the fishwife and not to forget the bubbly chap who would willingly chop my chicken into any size I want.

Mr KHz, on the other hand, is also a regular at Section 14. Nope, he rarely goes to the market and he does not really fancy the Digital Mall so, where does he go to that I label him a regular? If you may ask, he goes for his evening prayers at a mosque here, named Masjid Tun Abdul Aziz, or commonly known as Masjid Bulat - due to the shape of its dome. This entry is a product  from a visit to this mosque. Talking about this mosque, the committee members had an open day on the 31st of  July to find funding for the activities planned, and of course, for charity. They set up stalls, selling mainly cooked food and I joined the fun by sending my chicken puff and cinnamon rolls as part of the sale. Besides food stalls, there were also stalls selling materials for baju kurung, homemade crafts and religious books. The committee also organised quite a number of competitions, where 'ketupat weaving' was one that I could remember.

Among all the stalls, one particular stall did attract Mr KHz's attention. He had taken the trouble to drag me to the stall (the place was small and it was a bit crowded so it's kind of difficult to walk around) selling 'ikan keli!' Mr KHz and his food addiction. He pointed at the fish and he smiled at me - his witty smile. I agreed to fulfill his wish because the fish was already gutted and cleaned. To cut a long story short, the purchase led to the dish in the photo below.

DEEP FRIED CATFISH IN SPICY SAUCE

(IKAN KELI GORENG BERLADA)

The recipe is taken (again) from Rubiah Suparman's Lauk Pauk : Malaysia, Singapura dan Indonesia book and he said that he enjoyed it. Here's the recipe if you wish to try but the amount was halved from the original recipe.

Ingredients:

1/2 kg catfish 

5 red chillies

3 bird's eye chillies

1/2 onion

2 pips of garlic

a small piece of 'asam keping'

1/2 tsp of sugar

1 tsp of turmeric powder

salt to taste

Method:

1. Clean and gut the fish and soak for 10 minutes in a mixture of salt and tamarind juice. Wash thoroughly and drained well.
2. Coat the fish with salt and turmeric powder and deep fry till crispy. Keep aside.
3. Pound the other ingredients coarsely. Heat up a wok and stir fry until the oil separates from the gravy. Put in the 'asam keping', salt and sugar.
4. Arrange your fish on a serving platter and pour the sauce all over the fish.
5. Serve hot.

By the way, just to let you know that I didn't get a single cent at all from my puffs and rolls. Why? I was just doing my minute share as a member of the society and the best part was, I had fun.

Can I have this Mama?...and I want to help with the topping!

Good morrow to all! Finally, an entry. To tell you the truth, this entry is done in between cooking my chicken curry and updating my status at Goodreads Malaysia. Yes, I've been bitten by the reading (cannot put the book down) bug so my cooking activities are limited to preparing usual dishes for the family. However......since I managed to finish one book yesterday afternoon, I decided to go for another therapy, which is undoubtedly baking.

As I flipped through my recipe folder, my darling Atush suggested Cinnamon Rolls. For a picky eater like her, I found it very surprising when she actually liked the rolls when I baked them for the first time. Enjoy the photo and I've included the recipe (owned by yani@MyResipi.com) if you plan to indulge in this sweet, tasty treat. Oh, for your information, I managed to get 12 rolls from this recipe.

CINNAMON ROLLS WITH CREAM CHEESE FROSTING

Ingredients:

(A)

300g high protein flour

50g unsalted butter

8g instant yeast

1 egg (well-beaten)

140ml fresh milk (at room temperature)

1tsp salt

(B) (Filling)

20g unsalted butter

3tsp cinnamon powder

50g brown sugar

(C) (Frosting)

20g unsalted butter

50g cream cheese

60g icing sugar

Method:

• In a mixer fitted with a dough hook, mix flour and butter until they resemble breadcrumbs.
• Next, put in the yeast and salt and keep on mixing.
• Then,pour in the milk and beaten egg.
• Keep mixing until the dough becomes pliable and does not stick to the edge of the mixing bowl.
• Cover the dough with cling film / damp kitchen towel and proof till it doubles in size.This will take around 45 minutes to 1 hour.
• Meanwhile, mix all ingredients in (B) and divide into two portions. Keep aside.
• Line your baking tray with paper cups.
• Next, punch the dough and divide it into two portions and shape into balls. Let to rest for 10 minutes.
• Take a portion and roll into 20cm x 25cm rectangle. Spread the filling evenly and roll the dough tightly. Cut into 6 portions and put into the paper cups. Repeat these steps with the remaining dough and filling and let to rise again. Mine took 45 minutes because the weather was a bit cool yesterday.
• Then, preheat your oven at 170C and bake your rolls for 15 minutes.
• Meanwhile, beat the ingredients in (C) until creamy. Spread this frosting once your rolls are out from the oven.

Enjoy!

Sisterhood

Good morrow to all readers. This entry would be totally different from the previous ones. As I was flipping through my photo folder, I couldn't help noticing the photos of my younger sister's engagement day, which took place in December 2009. Talking about the photos, I have been wanting to share them with you folks but somehow, I just didn't know what happened to my initial plan.

Sincerely, I do have mixed feelings about her tying the knot. We have been together through thick and thin all these years. The thought that we might not be able to do things together, to have fun or even to share the pain, do make me feel a bit sad. As sisters, we laughed, we teased, we reprimanded, we shared, we scolded and eventually, we came back to our sanity and we forgave and forgot. True enough, blood is definitely thicker than water. In between the heartache, (jealousy at times) and painful experience, the sisterly bond surfaces and all is well once again.

Being the eldest, I have been given the responsibility to cater for her engagement and wedding ceremonies, in terms of preparing the 'hantaran'. In fact, I'm in the middle of completing the hantaran for her wedding, which will take place, Godwilling, next Friday, the 4th of June. Well, since I have never planned to be a wet blanket, dear sister, congratulations and many happy returns in years to come. My dua' is forever for you. Amin.

Here are some photos of her engagement day. Enjoy!

The star of the day!

Going back to roots - 'Sirih' is a must

Another 'hantaran '

and last but not least...........

'Makan Time'!!!!

Surprisingly, during the engagement ceremony, I was not asked to do any cooking at all. Perhaps, my Mak didn't have the heart to ask me to do so but who am I to be compared to all the experienced chefs who were around on that day! Anyway, the ceremony ended well and I was a very happy (and tired).

No dear, it does not fly. It zooms!

Last night, as I was 'struggling' to decorate the cupcakes, the thought that my boy is already four years old suddenly triggered me! What? Does time really fly? No dear, it does not fly. It zooms!

My Daus has always been the funny one. Despite being clingy, (as boys usually are to their mothers) his actions do melt my heart most of the time. Aha, not to forget his 'ways' of stopping me from scolding him by saying "It's okay Mama. I'm sorry" and a few pecks on my cheek to compensate for the damages done. Kids and their wonderful ways- never fail to convince you that all the hardship that you go through to provide for them, is worthwhile after all.

Well, as I am not planning to be mushy very early in the morning, feast your eyes upon my amateurish creation for Daus to celebrate his 4th birthday with his friends in school. Really hope that that they would enjoy the cupcakes!

Daus' 4th Birthday Cuppies

This time, I decided to you a very simple butter cream recipe. All you need is:

• 120g butter (soften)
• 280g icing sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla essence

This recipe is simple and let you exercise your muscle at the same time! All you need to do is to beat the butter till pale and add in the sugar a spoonful at a time and keep on beating using a wooden spoon. keep on beating till you reach a soft consistency ans spread on your cupcakes. One more thing, for the letters, I just used ready made fondant and guess what? I finally had the chance to use my alphabet cutters which have been sitting in the kitchen drawer for years!

Simple yet Satisfying

Good morrow peeps. What is your plan today? As for me, the usual activities - cooking, cleaning my messy room (the kids' stuff scattered continuously) and trying to finish marking my students' exercise books. After a tiring day at school yesterday, I couldn't stop thinking of what to cook for dinner as I was driving home. Thanks to Mr KHz who only requested for my home version of 'Prosperity Burger'. As usual, burgers are very simple but never fails to satisfy his hunger pang. Notice the burgers in the photo below? Yes, he gobbled up three!

PROSPERITY BURGER

I tried the recipe for the sauce after reading MamaFami's blog. I had my first try making the sauce when I went back to Melaka last month. The verdict? The recipe is definitely a keeper! Since the buns and meat patties were bought, I shall include the recipe for the sauce. Please have a try!

Ingredients:

2 cups of chicken stock ( I used 1 chicken cube and mixed with boiling water)

1/4 cup of fresh milk

2 tbsp black peppercorns (coarsely ground)

1/2 onion (diced)

1 tbsp cooking oil

2 tbsp sweet soy sauce

1 tbsp oyster sauce

1 tbsp butter (MamaFaMi used margarine)

3 tbsp of cornflour (mixed with 3 tbsp of water)

salt and sugar (if necessary)

Method:

1. Heat the oil and stir fry the onion till fragrant.
2. Then, pour in the chicken stock and let to boil.
3. Next, put all the ingredients except the cornflour mixture and let to boil again.
4. After that, lower the heat and pour the cornflour mixture until you have achieved the desired consistency.
5. Dip the meat patties into the sauce and enjoy your burger!

Promotion! Promotion! Promotion!

Hiya peeps! Already planning for the weekend? Good for you! As for me, my Atush is having her Sports Day this Saturday so I guess, I have to 'be in school' for one more day! Anyway, moving on to cooking, the first reason I'm putting this entry is to share a recipe using one of Mr KHz's favourite ingredient-mutton. The second reason is, I am promoting a recipe (one of the 23) from 'Senangnya Memasak Kambing' by Hanieliza. To all who are reading, try to get her books in this series and you won't be disappointed. For RM5.50, it's a real bargain.

Here's the cover of the book I was talking about

The recipe that I've tried is....................

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'KAMBING MASAK MERAH'

Ingredients:

(A)

500g mutton (cubed)

1 tbsp fennel seeds

1 large onion (sliced)

(B)

2 cm cinnamon

3 star anise

3 sprigs of curry leaves

20 dried chillies (deseeded, blanched in hot water and finely ground)

5 shallots (finely ground)

3 pips of garlic (ground)

3 cm ginger (ground)

3 ripe tomatoes (ground)

1/4 cup of cooking oil

salt to taste

Method :

• Marinade the mutton pieces with fennel seeds for 1 hour.
• Heat the oil and stir fry the star anise, curry leaves and ground ingredients till fragrant.
• Put in the marinated mutton and stir well. Cook till the mutton is tender.
• Then, put in the onion slices and cook over low fire till the oil separates from the gravy.
• Season with salt and stir again.
• Serve with white rice or chappati.

Lagi lagi Hangus!

Salam pagi Selasa. Jangan risau, paparan hari ini tentang hangus yang sedap! Betul, cikyah tak tipu! Ini, cerita Apam Gula Hangus! Resepi yang didapati daripada hazz@MyResipi.com itulah dan rasanya memang tidak mengecewakan. Pendek kata, memang jenis resepi yang cikyah suka. Ringkas bahannya, mudah membuatnya dan yang paling penting, sedap rasanya. Nak tahu kenapa cikyah mengesyorkan resepi ini? Mak cikyah kat kampung pun suka dan Mak cikyah ni, sangatlah teliti bila ada kena mengena dengan kuih muih ni. Bukan senang dia nak sebut sedap tau!

Apa kata kita tengok gambar dulu. Bak kata Mak cikyah, rupa tak cantik, tapi hati baik!

APAM GULA HANGUS

Bahan-bahan

1 cawan gula pasir

2 biji telur (cikyah guna telur Gred C)

1 cawan air

1/2 cawan minyak masak

2 sudu besar mentega (resepi asal guna marjerin)

2 sudu besar susu pekat manis

1 sudu teh soda bikarbonat

1 1/2 cawan tepung gandum

Kaedah

• Gula dihanguskan kemudian dicampurkan dengan air dan disejukkan
• Masukkan telur,susu,minyak dan mentega ke dalam mesin (mixer) dan pukul anggaran 3 minit
• Masukkan gula yang telah disejukkan tadi bersama-sama soda bikarbonat dan dipukul lagi.
• Akhir sekali masukkan tepung dan dipukul lagi sehingga sebati.
• Kukus adunan tadi di dalam loyang yang telah disapu dengan minyak masak selama 45 minit.
• Sekiranya adunan nampak cair bolehlah ditambah sedikit tepung agar apam tadi tidak mendap dan basah dibahagian bawahnya.

A long due reply

First of all, very, very sorry to my dear Dikwi for such a long delay to complete this task. Anyway, here goes!

Here are the rules to accept the award :

1. Thank & link the person that gave you the award. THANK YOU DIKWI

2. Pass this award onto 15 bloggers you’ve recently discovered and think are fantastic.

• All Around Ina
• Cupcakes Dream
• Nisza Beats & Peaces

3. Contact said Blogs and let them know they’ve won the award – I'm on the way!!!

4. State 7 things about yourself.

1) A kitchen addict - I resort to bread making to knead my anger away!

2) Caring

3) Love anything blue, green and brown but trying very hard to start accepting pink as also a nice shade of colour (err..sorry ya, Wi)

4) Love reading although hardly have the time to read

5) An avid recipe book collector

6) Love arts and craft

7) Adore nice wrapping papers - will buy them for no particular reason - love them to bits!

There! Finally it's done.

Cravings...

The Oxford Dictionary and Thesaurus defines craving as a strong desire or longing. Others would crave for new shoes, a new car or perhaps a new phone. Well, when it comes to cravings, mine would definitely be closely related to food and this usually involves giving more profit to the hypermarkets! It can be a can of condensed milk (although I only need to use a few tablespoonfuls) 'in case' my 'craving' to make my 'Apam Gula Hangus' arises or adding more ingredients to the already-stuffed larder so it is easier 'in case' my kids request for something special.

I'm a simple person when it comes to food. My cravings are usually very humble, easily and readily available. I will not deny that mood plays an important role in deciding what to eat and when is the best time to sample the food. For example, many would opt for sweet things just to get out of that annoying, depressive mood swing. Well, talking about sweet things, it is totally different with Mr KHz. He eats chocolates all the time and I can confirm that he's not depressed. Care to explain?

Have I told you that I hail from the kampung? As banana trees are in abundance and fresh bananas are always available, my Mak always serves this scrumptious treat at tea time. Piping-hot banana fritters or more deliciously known as 'pisang goreng' is never a failure to satisfy my need to have something sweet and crunchy. My preference would be to dip those oily chunks into a sweet and spicy soy sauce. With a cup of warm tea, life seems so blissful and all problems drift away.

"Goreng pisang panas! Goreng pisang panas!"

During both of my pregnancies, I craved for this sweet and cooling treat. I was very thankful that I did not suffer from diabetes or else, it would be a very tormenting period for me for I sampled this mostly every day! Yes, you read it right. Every day! Smooth, silky, cooling vanilla ice-cream. Nothing else but vanilla ice-cream. Just that.

Come the durian season, I will definitely go for this scrumptious fruit and I'll try my very best to go back to my hometown - just to satisfy another craving.

First, having a glorious time enjoying the fruit. Then, trying very hard to coax Mak (and my younger sister is very good at this as she always succeeded) to make the beauty in the photo below. Intoxicating, sweet, fragrant and chewy- all in one package.

The heavenly 'Kuih Koci Inti Durian'

And......to cut the long story short, I had another 'craving attack' yesterday. So...for lunch, I had a very satisfying meal. Cheap, simple and delicious!

Hot and Spicy Sardines

Well, dear readers, started to have cravings too? ;-)

After The Long Silence

Ahoy there! It's me again. Although I don't blog, I still find the time to keep on reading entries from my favourite sites and by doing this, I do feel at ease after my long, tiring day at work. Anyway, since this blog is about food and cooking, I managed to squeeze some time last Sunday to prepare a dish for my Mr KHz. I do miss cooking for him on a regular basis. On the other hand, I do feel grateful that he understands my situation at the moment (although he does mention that I haven't cooked his favourite meals for quite some time) so, here goes! To Mr KHz and his cherished tummy!

'KUETIAU KUNGFU'

This simple but satisfying dish was inspired by Mat Gebu ( with alteration, of course). After all, he is a master in the kitchen, so there's nothing to worry in trying his recipes. Well, the ingredients needed are:

A)

500g g flat rice noodles (kuetiau)

3 large eggs

B)

100g prawns (shelled but leave the tails intact)
150g chicken fillet (cubed)
100g squids (cleaned and cut into rings)

150g cauliflower (cut into florets)

150g broccoli (cut into florets)
1 medium size carrot (julienne)
3 pips of garlic (finely chopped)

2 red chillies (sliced)
2 tbsp of cooking oil
2 tbsp of cornflour, to be mixed with 1/2 cup of water
1 tbsp of chicken granules, to be mixed with 1/2 cup of hot water
2 tbsp of oyster sauce
1 tbsp of ground white pepper

Method:

For the gravy

1. Heat the oil in a wok and stir fry the chopped garlic till fragrant.
2. Put in the prawns, chicken and squids. Pour in the chicken granules mixture, pepper, oyster sauce and carrot and let to boil over medium fire.
3. Next, put in the cauliflower and broccoli and the cornflour mixture and mix well.
4. Then, lower the heat and simmer till the vegetables are cooked and add salt to taste. Keep aside.

For the noodles:

1. First, beat the eggs in a bowl and keep aside.
2. Then, using a non-stick wok, heat the oil and put in the noodles. Stir fry for 2 minutes and pour in the beaten eggs over the noodles and keep stirring till the noodles are slightly brown and crisp.

To serve:

1. Put in the noodles into a bowl and spoon the gravy over the noodles.
2. Serve with sliced red chillies and fried shallots.