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.

A Recipe To Keep

Those who venture the eateries around Taman Tun area should be familiar with Restoran Puteri, owned by former actress, Rubiah Suparman. For your information, there are two branches of the aforementioned restaurant but the one I went to was on the hilltop. My verdict? A very nice and tasty spread of traditional Malay dishes, cooked to home-style perfection. For those with a sweet-tooth, not to worry for cooling desserts are readily available for you to sample . The dishes are served buffet style, at an affordable price, and to be honest, I was full( literally and figuratively) of glee. Satisfied and happy.

Some time this year (I really cannot remember when I bought the book and yes, age is definitely catching up!), I got hold of her second recipe book which features most of the dishes available at her restaurant. In this entry, I want to share with you a fish dish that looks like the usual 'sambal' but with a different taste. As I've always said, simple but satisfying.

TERUTUP IKAN TENGGIRI

Ingredients:
A:
4 medium slices of mackerel
1 tsp of turmeric powder
1/2 tsp of salt

B:
1 large onion
2 pips of garlic
1/2 inch of ginger
10 dried chillies (deseeded and blanched in boliling water for 10 minutes and drained)
1/2 inch of shrimp paste

C:
1 lemongrass (bashed)
1 tbsp of tamarind (to be mixed with water to get 5 tbsp of juice)
1 and 1/2 tbsp of sugar
salt to taste

Method:

• Rub the fish with salt and turmeric powder and deep fry till golden brown. Keep aside.
• Ground the ingredients in (B) till fine. In a large wok, heat up 5 tbsp of cooking oil and stir fry the ground ingredients with the lemongrass till fragrant and the oil separates from the gravy.
• Then, put in the sugar, tamarind juice and salt to taste. Put in the fried fish and stir gently.
• Serve hot.

A Cook's FAQ

Good morrow to all and Salam Maal Hijrah to all the Muslim readers. A new year, new hopes, new beginnings, and hopefully, with the Almighty's blessing, happy endings.

Since today is a non-working day, so............................ what's cooking in the kitchen? Nothing in mind? Planning to dine outside, I suppose? Well, when it comes to preparing food, usually mothers are the one deciding on what to prepare ( as well as experiencing headaches and mental block), just to state a fact. Hence, the most frequently asked question would be, "What should I cook today?"

Having picky eaters in the house, I do find preparing food for them to be quite tricky at times. Last Monday was one of the days where I had to prepare two dishes to suit Mr KHz's tastebuds as well as trying to succeed in making Atush and Daus eat! Want to know what they had on Monday? Here goes.....

For the two picky eaters, I had prepared "Fish and Chips" (minus the salad for it was meant for me). For your information, Atush was the one who decided to have this.

As for Mr KHz, I prepared this dish, using the recipe taken from one of my food magazines. Of course, me being me, some alteration had taken place. Below is the photo of "Udang Masak Wangi". The verdict? He liked it although I was skeptical at first for one of the ingredients used was finely sliced torch ginger. What a surprise, huh? Anyway, I'll include the recipe later for I have to look for the magazine first, tee hee hee........

'UDANG MASAK WANGI'

As for me, my idea of a satisfying meal is having something very simple. My kids only eat fish if it's "fish" and chips" while Mr KHz opted for less bony ones. I, on the other hand, like fish of any sorts possible. Want to know what I had for lunch on Monday? Well, look at the photo below.


A plate of piping hot, fried 'ikan selayang' eaten with a mixture of sliced onion, bird's eye chillies and sweet soy sauce, and not to forget, a decent portion of fragrant rice. Aaahhhh....what a bliss!