Tom-Yum Chicken

People who knows me long enough will know that I love Thai food very much. I can make a one day trip to Hatyai, Southern Thailand just to enjoy the Thai food there. My appetite will boast when it come to this sweet, sour and spicy food. I will forget entirely about my diet plan or the big "sparetyre" around my waist ~ LOL..

- kaffir lime leaves -

Normally we will have the soup type Shirmp or Seafood Tom-Yum all the time. It's Tom-Yum paste cooked into soup with different seafood in it. Shirmp, squids, fish meat and clams with mushrooms, chilies and tomatoes. Lemon grass and kaffir leaves was added for the extra flavour. It was normally served with the rice noodles (bee hoon) which is has become one of my favourite Thai dishes, a must have when I visit Thai restaurant. It's just delicious, for those who haven't tried Tom-Yum before, please go and find out now!!

Today, I want to share with all of you one easy way to prepare this Tom-Yum recipe, Tom-Yum Chicken. This recipe are perfect for those who is working. Just marinade the chicken with all the ingredients a night before or in the morning if you want to cook it for dinner then just wrap it with aluminium foil before we bake them in the oven and Voila~ you'll have this delicious Tom-Yum Chicken for your lunch, teatime or dinner. Easy right??? This is what I did when I'm lazy to cook. No need to do a lot of washing and it really save a lot of time... hehe!! Lazy me!

Tom-Yum Chicken Recipe

5-6 large chicken drumsticks with thigh(skinned)

Ingredients for marinade:
2 tbsp Tom-Yum Paste (I use Peace Brand, I've tried and it's excellent!)
8-10 shallots (skinned)
5 clove garlics (skinned)
3 red chillies (seeded, cut into smaller pieces)
4-5 small hot chillies/cili padi (I omit this, my kids can't take it too spicy)
4 pieces kaffir leaves (cut into smaller pieces)
2 tbsp honey
some salt

For Garnishing:

lemon (cut into wedges)
some mints leaves

Method:
Wash chicken, remove skin and all the excessive fat. Use knife to cut few lines on it for better marinade.
Blend all the marinade ingredients until fine and in paste form. **Do not add water when blending them.
Rub the ground ingredients on chicken and marinate for at least 2 hours or preferably over night.
Preheated oven at 200c, wrap the chicken seperately with aluminium foil (can line it with a piece of banana leaves if you want-optional) and bake for 30-35 mins.
Serve warm with steamed rice or we can just eat the chicken alone.

Note: ***Adjust the flavour according to your own preference and it's also depend on brand of Tom-Yum paste used. When the chicken is cooked, there will be some chicken juice inside the aluminium foil. **Don't throw that away, that's the best Tom-Yum soup you can ever have!!*** hehe~

Enjoy Your Weekend & Happy Cooking!!!

AMY

Orange Chiffon

Again, another successful chiffon attempt and this time I baked Orange Chiffon, my kids favourite. It was a great surprise when I see all the comments left in my comment box. I never get so many comments at one time. I'm so happy. Thank you so much my dear friends!!

I decided to post the recipe of this Orange Chiffon now and let any of you who interested, can try it out. This is a good recipe and a successful one. Anyhow, this is my second time baking it. My first Orange Chiffon was snapped up in few minutes time, eaten by my group of girlfriends when they are at my house to see me demonstrate and show them how to bake chiffon the other day. I don't even have any chance to take a picture. The first Orange Chiffon turn out just as GREAT as this one. So, I truly recommend this recipe for all of you to try out.

Recipe adapted from Kevin Chai's ~ Chiffon Cake Is Done and I made some changes to suit my tastebuds. Here we GO!!!

Orange Chiffon Recipe

Egg Yolk Batter:

7 egg yolks (I use large size eggs, room temperature)
50g caster sugar (I reduce 10g and I found it's still too sweet*)
1/4 salt
4 tbsp cooking oil (I use Organic Sunflower Oil)
2 tbsp grated orange rind (I blend it using blender)
60ml orange juice (I squeeze juice from 1 orange)
few drops orange colouring (I omit this)
110g self-raising flour (I use cake flour)

Egg Whites Foam:

7 egg whites
1/2 tsp cream of tartar ~ I substitute it with 15g (approx: 1 tbsp) corn flour.
130g castor sugar

Method:

1. Prepare the egg yolk batter: In a mixing bowl, combine egg yolk, salt and sugar. Hand whisk till the sugar dissolved. Add in oil, orange rind and orange juice. Stir till well combined.
2. Fold in flour until it forms batter and no lumps left. Set aside for later use.
3. Prepare the egg white foam: In another bowl, beat egg whites till it form soft peak. Gradually add in sugar till it finished. Add in corn flour and continue beating at high speed until frothy and stiff peaks form. **(Check with your finger, press on the egg whites and you can feel it's hard and the egg whites won't dropped out when you over turn the bowl)
4. Gently fold the beaten egg whites foam into egg yolks batter until it is well blended.
5. Pour batter into ungreased 9" (22cm) chiffon pan. Bake in preheated oven at 170c for 30-40mins or until it is cooked.
6. Remove from oven and immediately invert cake onto table until it is completely cooled before unmould it.

Happy Trying & Enjoy!!!

Note: For those who still new in baking chiffon, egg yolks and egg whites have to be seperated and place in different mixing bowl. Make sure you use the clean bowl and beater, free from oil to beat the egg whites. The process of beating egg whites are very important, make sure it is already in stiff peak foam before you started to mix it in the egg yolk mixture.

Click HERE to see my Orange Poppy Seeds Chiffon.

AMY

Cranberry & Raisin Scones

This was my very first time baking scones. I tried scones years back when I tour europe and I didn't have a good first impression on it. The scones there are rocky hard and I could hardly cut them half to spread the butter. I don't bother to learn baking them as I have bad impression for scones until I see this Blueberry Scones baked by Wendy - The Adventures Of Giggles

I was totally inspired by her lovely blueberry scones. Too bad, I can't get all those fresh blueberries here in Alor Star. I failed to get the frozen one as well, maybe not much people demanded for it. What I can get is only blueberry puree, the one which is more sticky like jam type and I can't use that to bake scones. To replace blueberry, I substitute them with dried cranberries and raisins. But, according to Wendy, blueberries are the BEST for scones. I really want to taste it now. Wendy, keep one for me okay?? lol

After I bake the scones, I totally change my impression toward it. The recipe shared by Wendy are fantastic! The scone are soft and yummy. Not too sweet and it's best eaten warm with some butter or fruit jam. However, I still prefer the eat them with butter. Do give it a try!!

I was lazy to retyped the recipe and please feel free to click HERE for the recipe from The Adventure Of Giggles!

**I substitute the blueberries with the same amount of dried cranberries & raisins mixture.

Happy Baking!

AMY

Nutella Cup Cakes

A quick bake for my kids and they loved it!!

Nothing will go wrong with Nutella. It's simply yummy on anything. If you are a chocolate lover ~ make sure you didn't miss this Nutella Cup Cakes. I have baked it many times and will repeat to bake it again and again in future.

Please refer HERE for the recipes. Do give it a TRY!! Cheerz~

Important Notes: ***I reduced 1-2 table spoon of sugar in the recipe as I found it's too sweet to my taste buds, the nutella itself are already sweet. I only add 1/2 teaspoon of Nutella chocolate spread on each cupcakes, don't add too much or it'll be too sweet and for those who don't like the buttery taste on cakes just substitute the butter with the same amount of margarine. HAPPY TRYING!! ***

AMY

Pizza ~ Simply Tasty!!

Once a while, my 3 kids will crave for Pizza when they are getting bored with rice. Taking the kids out to dine at Pizza Hut are quite expensive, I might as well bake one myself. I can't afford to bring them out too often, each trip normally will end up spending RM50-RM60 sometimes more, including all the side orders like chicken wings, garlic bread, salad, mushroom soup and drinks. Sigh..! economy so bad, must save a bit ~ lol

Pizza are very well depended on the sauce used and the most important part is CHEESE. It didn't went wrong with a lot of cheese and it's not hard at all to bake our own pizza. Mix all the ingredient for the crust and let it proof for 20-30minutes. Spread the dough on pizza pan and top it with our favourite toppings ~ tuna, bacon, hotdog, mushrooms...etc, etc. I used this Prego Pasta sauce on my pizza and it taste fantastic!!

Baked this pizza for my kids so, I made their favourite toppings - hotdog, mushroom, onion, pineapple and a lot of cheese...yum, yum!! I use Mozzarella cheese. If you are cheese lover, you can always spinkles some Parmesan cheese powder on pizza before serving for more cheesey flavour. I'm hungry now, when think of the pizza...haha!

Pizza in the oven

Look at the melted cheese...at this time you can smell the yummy pizza from the oven.

For the PIZZA recipe, please click HERE!



Believe me or not?? It's simply tasty!!

AMY

Thank You, Tracie !!

I would like to thank Bitter Sweet Flavours - Tracie for giving me this Kreativ Blogger Award. This is the first award I got since I started blogging...hehe! Thanks again sweetie!!

When I first look at Tracie's Blog, it doesn't even come across my mind that she is only 18 years old college girl. When I was her age, the only cake that I bake is Butter Cake, nothing more than that. She is a genius, very smart girl. Look at her latest post on the Chocolate Banana Cake, it really impressed me, the cake look no different with the one sold in Secret Recipes. Congrats, girl!! I wish my 2 girls will grown up to be like her, a very creative girl !!


The Kreativ Blogger Award comes with some rules:

1. You must thank the person who has given you the award.
2. Copy the logo and place it on your blog.
3. Link to the person who has nominated you for the award.
4. Name 7 things about yourself that people might find interesting.
5. Nominate 7 other Kreativ Bloggers.
6. Post links to the 7 blogs you nominate.
7. Leave a comment on which of the blogs to let them know they have been nominated

Okay, now let me share 7 facts about myself :

1. I love the smell of the freshly baked cakes, bread or cookies out from oven.
2. I love to walk bare foot on soft sandy beach. Enjoy the wind & sound of waves.
3. I love to collect recipe books, mostly are books with pretty pictures of cakes or desserts.
4. My life will be boring and dull without chocolate and ice-cream. I love vanilla flavoured ice-cream with Bailey...Yumm!! (I love to have ice-cream on winter time-when it's extremely chill~lol*)
5. I love THAI food the most and I enjoy Japanese food as well, sashimi ~ slurppsS
6. I wish I could have more time to bake and cook. I got so many recipes lining up, waiting for me to try out...hehe!
7. My other hidden talent is knitting and I don't have time for it now, I'm too BUSY!

The next seven 'Kreativ Blogger' holders would be..

1. Fad About Food - Constance, she is my very first blogger friend who encourage me to have my own food blog. My best pal and I miss her.
2. The Adventures Of Giggles - Wendy, we have been friends for more than 15 years since college days. She finally found her beloved hubby, married and now residing in Arizona, USA.
3. My Kitchen - Lydia Teh, I love the collection of recipes in her blog and the beautiful foodie pictures in her blog.
4. Kitchen Corner - Grace, her success in baking chiffon without cream of tartar and baking powder inspires me to try out her recipe. I love her blog a lot.
5. Tartelette - I love her unique creations and everything in her blog.
6. Closet Cooking - Kevin, his cooking never fails to impress me, he is a GREAT chef !
7. Nasi Lemak Lover - Sonia, I always found her blog very informative and interesting. One of the blog I will repeatly visit and read.

AMY

Moist Chocolate Cake, Anyone???

This is the best chocolate cake I've ever tried. I baked the Steamed Moist Chocolate Cake not too long ago and was wondering how is this oven baked Moist Chocolate Cake turn out, will it be nice?? Anyway, I stumbled upon this wonderful recipe at My Kitchen (original recipe is from kak izan on MyR) This recipe is definitely a keeper. Try it and you will know why I'm saying so...hehe!!

I LOVE everything that is related with chocolate. So, I decided to give this recipe a TRY!! Ya, this cake turn out almost perfect, moist and rich in chocolatey taste. It's worth a try if you are one of the chocolate craze out there.

I use Hershey's natural unsweetened cocoa powder to bake this cake. This is one of my favourite brand for cocoa powder. However, I still found the cake are a bit on the sweet side. I will reduce the amount of sugar use on my next bake. My kids enjoying eating it so much, they just love it!

Ingredients:
(5"x8" loaf pan)

Chocolate Paste:
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/2 tsp instant coffee (optional)
1/4 cup castor sugar (reduce 1-2 tbsp if you prefer it less sweet)
1/2 cup hot water
1/4 cup evaporated/fresh milk (I use low fat milk)

pinch of salt

125g butter, softened
1 cup castor sugar
1 tsp vanilla essense
2 large eggs

1 cup cake flour
1 tsp baking powder

Method:

• Grease and line bottom of cake pan with baking paper and preheat the oven to 180c.
• Combined all ingredients for chocolate paste except MILK in a mixing bowl. Hand whisk mixture till sugar are fully dissolved.
• Add in milk, stir to mix well. Set aside.
• Sift cake flour and baking powder together for later use.
• In another bowl, cream butter and sugar till it is light and fluffy. Add vanilla essense and continue with eggs one at a time. Beat till well combined.
• Gently fold in flour mixture, alternate with the chocolate paste. *Start with flour and end with flour.
• Pour batter into cake pan and bake for 45-50 minutes or till it is cooked.
• Leave it to cool before unmould the cake.

One of the BEST chocolate cake EVER!!

AMY