Passion Fruit Cheesecake

Project No. 2

Still thinking of ways to work on my passion fruit pulp....... ahha I could make a cheesecake. Since I was baking cotton cheesecake for a friend yesterday, I whipped up extra batter for a small cake for ourselves. After pouring the batter into the pan for my friend's cheesecake, I folded in 3 Tbsp of passion fruit pulp into the remaining batter, sent the cake into the oven & thinking if it would turn out well ??

Well, it did ! The passion fruit pulp & my cotton cheesecake mingled well, it was light, spongy, sweet, sour......... I loved it, so did CJ ! When I told hubby about the cake, his response was "isn't it sour ?" so he has yet to try, JF doesn't seem to like passion fruit because of the seeds but she says she likes the juice, no way, she has to eat the seeds too if she trying ! CJ seems to have acquired the same kind of taste as me.

Almost A Baking Marathon !

Chocolate Chip Muffins

Cheese & Sugar Buns

Cranberry, Cheese & Sugar Buns

Honey Sponge Cakes

Cotton Cheesecake, baking in the oven


Since the girls started their summer holiday, I have been getting up later & later each day (lazy mummy!) Today it was 6.45am. After having breakfast with hubby, I started my baking at 7.30am.
The orders today are all little buns, muffins & cakes. I've prepared the bread dough for the cheese buns yesterday afternoon, after the 1st proving, I divided the dough into equal size balls & refrigerated them to be baked this morning. While the buns are returning to room temperature & proved for the 2nd time. I whipped up a batch of chocolate chips muffins. Well the timing is just right, when the muffins are done the dough will be ready to be sent into the oven too. While the muffins are baking, I prepared the batter for the honey sponge cakes. It's good to have 2 ovens so my baking & waiting time are cut down (the electricity bill comes last !). After the muffins are done, the buns & honey sponge cakes are sent into both oven respectively ! By 9.30am, all the goodies were done. While they were cooling, I prepared the cotton cheesecake batter for 3 oval loaves that a new customer (heehee) ordered, they were sent into the oven at 10.15am , that's why now I'm here, posting while those loaves are baking in the oven, got to run now, they shld be ready soon...........

Birthday Cake For The July Stingrays

Kim had this cake made for the "July Stingrays" ! My girls were giggling when they saw the wordings, especially JF, "stingrays ! she said ", made her wonder who they are, heehee I don't know, think it's fun to have a group birthday celebration with a customized cake !
This is a 2.5kg cotton cheesecake. She only called me at noon time yesterday & wated the cake in the evening.I was out running errands. Remembering that I do have have enough cream cheese for this cake, I rushed to the baking supply shop & grab some, by the time this cake went into the oven, it's 2pm & it was done in 1hr45mins. After cooling the cake down & doing the wordings & simple deco, it was ready to go at 6.30pm. I'm glad that after almost 2 years of baking, I can manage my time better, skills & speed improve too (heehee). Before this, I used to panick when there's a last minute order, guess practice does make 'almost' perfect cakes.......

Passion Fruit Cupcakes

Project No. 1

I've managed to scoop out all the pulp from my basket of passion fruits , there should be about 3 cups of them. I've gone through my recipe books, found a passion fruit curd cakes recipe which is little passion fruit cakes filled with passion fruit curd. I didn't have time to make the curd so I just baked some passion fruit cupcakes.

Ingredients :

90g Butter
110g Sugar
2 Eggs
150g Self-raising flour
1/4 cup Passion fruit pulp

Beat butter, sugar, eggs & flour in a mixer bowl on low speed until all ingredients are just combined. Increase speed to medium & beat until mixture is changed to a paler colour, stir in passion fruit pulp.
Divide mixture among paper cases. Bake in preheated oven of 180 C for 20 mins.

* I've used paper cases of standard muffin cup size, the recipe only yields 9 cupcakes. The texture of this cupcake is tender & moist, taste sweet & sourish & perfect aroma !

Chocolate-Espresso Mousse cake

Besides the Asian sweet water chestnut soup, I also baked a Chocolate-Espresso Mousse Cake for dessert this morning. Today is the Sutera Harbour annual 7K run, I know I'm going to need some sugary stuff before I go running, so whipped up this wonderfully light cake so I can indulge before I run.

I've always been dreaming of a light chocolaty cake with coffee flavour in it, no fat, no flour, seems impossible right ? Well, such cake do exists, it's David Lebovitz's recipe on this wonderful Chocolate-Espresso Mousse Cake ! It's so velvety, smooth & melt in your mouth, as if you've gone to chocolate heaven, trust me, I'm not exaggerating,just that you do need a good grade chocolate, I've used Varlhona 55%.
This cake is indeed tricky, you really have to freeze it, dip a knife in hot water before you cut it, if not you'll end up with crumbs all over cos' the cake is so fragile, it's basically made up of chocolate, eggs & sugar, nothing else, JF had 2 pcs before we left the house at 4pm today !

Talking about the 7K run @ Sutera Harbour, I thought I couldn't make it this year as I've not been running so frequently like I used to due to my baking schedule. Well, I was wrong, I managed to clock in at 41.35 mins for the 7km, just slightly slower than the 40 mins time I've maintained for the past 3 years. I was happy though, given the fact that I'm few years older than before, hee hee ! I had my pretty french pedicure on my toe nails, so while I was running one of the toe nail was cutting into the other nail, I could feel the pain but just ignored it, only until I finished running that I took off my socks that I realised that my left sock was blood-soaked, that's the price to pay for beauty I think !

Sweet Water Chesnut Soup (生磨马蹄露）

Saturday is the day I do my weekly marketing at Foh Sang next to the big drain. I'll buy a week's supply of meat or fish & some fruits. Back home I'll cut up whatever I've bought, portion them & freeze in individual containers. I just have to defrost them when I've decided what to cook the following week, that makes it easier for me because when I get busy with my baking I don't need to run out to the market just to get a chicken breast or maybe some prawns ! This is also the day I prepare my stock to be frozen for later use & to make desserts too ! Today I didn't make any stock, instead whipped up few desserts that will last us for a few days ........

I got 2 bags of water chesnut this morning, 1 kg in total weight. I always but extra because there's always some rotten ones in the bag. From these water chesnuts, I make ourselves some sweet water chesnut soup (生磨马蹄露）.

Ingredients :

1kg Water chesnut, peeled
10 Pandan leaves, tied into a knot
3 Tbsp Corn flour
3 Egg whites
Rock sugar to taste

With a chopper or food processor, mince water chesnut till fine. In a saucepan with about 5-6 cups water of water, add pandan leaves, bring to boil, add rock sugar to taste, remove pandan leaves & 1/2 cup of the syrup. Add minced water chesnut to the sugar syrup, bring to boil again.
Mix the cornflour with the 1/2 cup cooled sugar syrup, add this to the water chesnut mixture to thicken it & turn off the heat. Lastly, add the eggwhites into the soup in a light swirl.

I will post the other desserts & recipes when I come back from my annual 7K run @ Sutera Harbour, got to go load some carbo into my tummy for the run............

Passion Fruits !!!

A Taiwanese friend called me this morning to ask me if I want passion fruits, my first response was to ask her if she's in Taiwan or KK ? Why do I ask, because I've never seen passion fruits here ( forgive me if I'm ignorant ! ) in KK. I've always love the aroma of passion fruits so anything in the supermarkets that has the word passion fruit on it will always catch my attention, be it candies, preserves, juices.......
I've only seen a dark purplish skinned type of passion fruit but never a yellow passion fruit & only found out today that it's called lilikoi. I must have about 25 of them & they only cost RM5.00 ! When my friend gave them to me, I was like are you sure these are passion fruits ? Well, when I smell them, there's indeed that special aroma, to prove it, I cut one fruit, oh yes, it's really it, I was like a little girl jumping for joy ! The taste is sourish first then sweet, I let both my girls taste the fruit & glad they liked it. The basket of passion fruits are sitting at a corner in my kitchen now, still thinking what am I going to make from these ............

21st Birthday !

A 3kg chocolate cake done in a rectangular shape for a 21st birthday celebration, a boy oh should be an adult now ! I always wonder what does the key signify, freedom ? Nowadays kids are so independent, they get freedom before the age of 21 but still this is an Asian tradition I think a key on your 21st birthday...........

Happy Birthday Bryan !

A carrot cake with cream cheese frosting made for Bryan, whose birthday falls on next Monday.
Enjoy the cake, Bryan........

Durian & More Durian !

Since it's the wonderful season of King of fruits now, I have been making durian cake almost every day for the past week, today being peak of the week, 4 durian cakes ! Being a durian lover myself, I'm going to make one for ourselves for the weekend, indulge........

Vermicelli alla Vongole

The clams that my friend got from me were fantastic ! There were not much sand even after soaking them for almost 24 hours. To make sure all the clams are alive, I took each clam near my nose to smell it & discard any that has gone bad, in the end out of 1.3kg of clams, I only threw 4 away ! We had a marvelous lunch yesterday, this is the first time my girls have clams in their pasta, I've always avoided seafood in their meals until lately cos JF has quite bad eczema. CJ even wanted to keep the shells because they looked so pretty, I said NO !!!!

The recipe :
serves 4

1 kg Clams
125 ml Olive oil
40g Butter
1 Onion, finely chopped
6 Garlic cloves, finely chopped
125 ml White wine
1 red chilli, finely chopped

1/2 cup Flat-leaf parsley, chopped
Cooked vermicelli for 4 servings

Heat the oil & 1 tablespoon(15g) of the butter in a large saucepan over mediun heat. add the onion & half of thye garlic & cook for 10mins, or until lightly golden, ensure the garlic doesn't start to burn. Add the wine & cook for 2 mins, add the clams, chilli, & the remaining garlic & butter & cook, covered, for 8 mins, shaking the pan regularly until the clams pop open.
Stir in the parsley & season, add pasta & toss well.

* In order not to let the vermicelli get too soggy, I removed them & portion accordingly on plates, cook the clams longer until the juices had reduced, the flavour is even more intensified !

Lemon Swissroll

I 'm so into the mood of cooking so dessert is a must too ! Made a lemon swissroll this morning, the sponge is flavoured with lemond rind & lemon juice while the filling is home-made oh so yummy lemon curd ! Chk out this link for another recipe of lemon curd, it's good too, all you need is some patience....... This cake is in my list too, lemon curd cake, for the ultimate lemon lovers, I'm one of them !

Beef Noodles Soup

I am a person who will spend hours stewing beef & cooking a separate pot of flavourful beef stock to go with it when we can just go to a coffees shop to have a bowl of beef noodle soup ! I believe in a good pot of stock whenever I feel like cooking noodle soup.
At 7.30am, I cut up 1 kg of beef shin into big chunks, blanch in boiling water, place them into a pot with a pc of ginger, 4 star anise, pinch szechuan pepper corns, 8 cloves, 2 chopped onion, garlic,soya sauce (both dark & light), sesame oil, rice wine, sugar, dash of black vinegar *, with enough water to cover the beef chunks, bring to a gentle boil, turn down flame, simmer for 4 hrs. I would normally season when the stew is done, in fact the beef will be so flavourful that maybe an extra dash of soya sauce or more sugar is sufficient, depending on individual taste.

As for the beef stock, I used frozen beef neck bones from Merderka Supermarket, boil the bones for about 5mins to remove excess oil. For about 1.5kg of bones, I would use 3 unpeeled big onions (halved), 10 unpeeled shallots (halved), 1 bulb garlic (top cut off), cloves, cinnamon stick, star anise, black peppercorns, 1 big pc ginger (smashed). In a large pot, heat oil till hot, add onions, shallots, garlic, ginger & cook till browned, add cloves, cinnamon stick, star anise, black pepper corns, continue cooking till aromatic add the bones & water to cover the bones, boil to boil, turn down heat & let simmer the longer the better, I usually cook my stock for 5-6 hrs. When the stock is done, remove the bones from the pot, strain the soup through a sieve. What I always do is to make the stock a day earlier, refrigerate & remove the layer of fat on top of the soup that has hardened the next day.
Bring the stock to boil again & season to taste.
We usually have our beef stew with noodle or kway teow, served with vegies & the beef stock. I added some beef balls to the soup today, got them from the provision shop in Dah Yeh(next to Lotus), these balls are from Tenom, very crunchy but a bit too salty for us.

* I read from a newspaper last Sunday about stewing beef that we should cut the beef into bigger chunks so the meat juice will be retained in it after long hours of stewing, too small a pc the beef will break apart. Keep the simmering heat constant, turning up the flame will only harden the beef. Add a dash of black vinegar to help tenderise the beef while stewing. I tried that today, the beef did turn out so tender & moist, without breaking apart, wonderful !

Vongole !

There are times when I'm so desperate for clams that I went searching through supermarkets for the canned variation. Even higher-end supermarkets like Tong Hing & Merderka don't carry clams in a can, I've tried a local brand of clams in brine but that tasted awful, just clams in some very salty water, definitely not clam juice ! The only brand that I've tried in KK is Snows that Lintas Superstore carried some time ago, their minced clams in juice is fantastic, so full of clam juice with that sweetness, I've used it many times to make my favourite Manhattan Clam Chowder, I'll happy to have just bread & the chowder the whole day, nothing else !

So when my friend called me this morning that she bought for me a bag of clams weighing at 1.3kg, I was so happy & surprised cos' I've basically given up hope searching for clams whenever I have cravings for linguine vongole or clam chowder. I've tried searching for these beauties at the KK fish market & have even went all the way to the Donggongon 'Tamu" on Thursdays to look for them, well I've been lucky once at Donggongon ! I'm not sure about the varieties of clams available but these that my friend got for me look clean & pretty & there isn't much grit in the big bowl that I soaked the clams too ! I've place these in the fridge, they're going to be my lunch tomorrow, can't wait..........

Hokkaido Milk Loaf (北海道牛奶土司）

These loaves are baked today, at 3pm

The texture of the bread, so soft I was pulling it like shreds of cotton wool !

These loaves were baked yesterday afternoon


We had Hokkaido milk loaf (北海道牛奶土司）for breakfast this morning & as we couldn't get enough of these wonderful loaves, I baked some again this afternoon for tomorrow's breakfast ! I found this wonderful bread recipe in a Taiwanese blog quite some time ago & fell in love with this tang zhong (汤种） bread. The characteristic of this method of making bread yields soft & cottony bread, no softener is used. The original recipe is in Mandarin, such a long recipe to type in hanyu pinyin so here's the link to the recipe !

I'm seriously not good in shaping my loaves, I made double recipe yesterday, we had 2 loaves, the other loaf I gave it to a friend. Today it's only 1.5x recipe but I made them into smaller loaves in 1 pan, still not very happy with the shapes !

Hubby & the girls like to have the bread with butter & preserves but I prefer it plain, with a cup of coffee for my breakfast...........

Strawberry & Mango Cake

My sister just called me this morning to tell me she's 8 weeks pregnant. That's great news she has finally decided to start a family of few years of marriage & and my sister-in-law is due to deliver her baby in October too, wow baby boom in my family !

L has been making my life miserable lately, so I bake to make myself happy.....
Baked a vanilla sponge cake this morning, wandering if I should fill it with strawberry or mango, haha ended up a layer of each, my own concoction !!
I enjoyed a slice of cake in the afternoon with a cup of coffee, my way of reliving stress from whoever......... and of course to congratulate my sister !

Strawberry Shortcake

It's hubby's old friend, Chris' birthday on Monday, his sister called to order a cake for him, also for tonight, since my schedule is not very tight today, I said ok.
This cake is popular with my family too, hubby had this for his birthday,
so did CJ !
It's a vanilla sponge cake filled with 2 layers of freshly whipped double cream & sliced strawberries.

A Cake For Alan !

The birthday boy Who turns 36 next week is born in the year of Rat & the family is celebrating over dinner tonight. Once again my kitchen is filled with the fantastic aroma of this durian cake. Amy wanted the greetings to be in Mandarin & if a little mouse can be drawn onto the cake, luckily the words are in 简体中文 ! I think my 'designer' did a good job in writing & drawing.......

Express Pizza

While waiting for the dough of the whole wheat pretzels to rise yesterday, I whipped up another batch of pizza dough. I've been using this recipe that I got from Super Food Ideas :

8g Instant dried yeast
1/4 tsp Salt
1 tsp Sugar
3/4 cup Warm water
2 cups Flour
2 1/2 Tbsp Olive oil

In a mixing bowl fitted with a dough hook, combine flour, yeasr, salt, sugar & water, mix well, add olive oil & continue to mix on medium speed for 10 mins until smooth & elastic. Leave in a warm place, cover & let rise for 30 mins or until doubled in size. . Punch dough & mould into a round ball, stretch dough thinly onto a greased pizza tray.


I've forgotten to buy pineapple this time so went through the freezer to see what I can find in it. Ended up with sausages, pepperoni, home-made tomato sauce & I still have some cherry tomatoes in my fridge, so everything went onto the pizza followed by shredded mozarella cheese.
Bake the pizza at preheated 220 degree oven for 15 mins or until golden & crisp. Since three's no greens on the pizza, I steamed some broccoli to serve with the pizza, one express meal done......

* I've prepared 1.5x of the dough to make 2 pizza base, the other portion is in the freezer for our next pizza meal. To avoid an oily pizza, I used a greaseproof paper to line the pizza tray.

Whole Wheat Pretzels

The girls have been bugging me to let them make some whole wheat pretzels in their " My A to Z Recipe Box" that I got for them from Borders in February. The recipes in the box are very simple, kids friendly but still an adult's help is required, after all they are just few year old kids !
Our pretzels didn't quite looked liked pretzels, I was hoping for something like our favourite Aunty Anne's Pretzels ! Sad to say, I've never done well in my Arts class in school, always just managed to pass with a 'D', so our pretzels turned out like I don't know what, I'm not telling who made which among the three of us !!!!
In case anyone might be interested in some dough twisting during the weekends or holidays with their kids, this is an easy recipe to try :

1 1/2 cups Flour
1 tsp Salt
11g Instant yeast
1 1/2 cups Milk
1/4 cup Brown sugar
2 cups Whole wheat flour
2 Tbsp Oil

Milk for brushing pretzels
Course salt, sesame or sunflower seeds

In a large bowl, combine flour, salt & yeast, mix well.

In a pot, heat milk, brown sugar & oil, heat gently until warm (not hot)

Pour the milk mixture into the flour mixture & beat with the electric mixer for 3 mins, then add the whole wheat flour & mix well.

Shape the dough into a ball, cover & let rise for 1 hr.
Punch dough down, pull a handful of the dough & roll it into a long snake. Twist the snake & tie in into any shape you like. Place pretzels on baking tray lined with greaseproof paper. Brush each pretzel with milk & sprinkle with coarse salt, sesame seeds or sunflower seeds. Bake in preheated 475 F for 20 mins.

* I halved the recipe & made 8 pretzels, each pretzel weighing 50g. The pretzels are not as crusty as those found in shops, I've tried one, it's quite chewy though. I sprinkled the top with cinnamon sugar instead of salt, the pretzels are baked in 220 degree & they are cooked in 12 mins.

4 Cakes For Mommy !

Durian Cake

Cotton Cheesecake


Carrot Cake

Chocolate Cake


Received a call from Mong Sie a few days ago from KL, re ordering a cake for her Mum's birthday today. I feel so bad for not able to bake for my mum's birthday every year. She wanted something special, few flavours in a box, so I baked her 4 different cakes in miniature 5" size. They looked so cute, I couldn't stand the temptation, baked double portion for all cakes for ourselves but only managed to take a pic of the cotton cheesecake being cut open, the chocolate cake can be viewed here .
Both the carrot & durian cakes are gone before I have the chance to take pics of them.

Lao Shu Fen With Braised Minced Meat

After our morning run, we went for breakfast at the famous Kampung Air wantan noodle stall. Just as we were leaving, I saw that the opposite stall has a picture of Lao Shu Fen with minced meat. I started to recall that when I was a kid, I always had this in soup version with fishball, my siblings & I grew up with this ! Since my girls have never try Lao Shu Fen, I decided it will be our dinner tonight. Went to the mini market near my house to get a packet of Lao Shu Fen, I find it hilarius that the manufacturer call it jelly !

Ingredients :

1 packet Lao Shu Fen
Beansprouts
200g minced meat
Ginger, garlic & shallots, finely chopped
4 dried mushrooms, soaked & sliced, liquid reserved
Soya sauce
Pepper
Sesame oil
Hua Tiao wine
Sugar
Chicken stock or water
Vegetarian black bean sauce *

1. Heat a pan with oil, cook the ginger, garlic & shallots till fragrant, add minced meat, followed by sliced mushrooms. Add chicken stock, soya sauce, pepper, sesame oil, Hua Tiao wine, sugar & the vegetarian black bean sauce to taste. Bring to boil & let simmer for about 20 mins, thicken with cornflour mixture. Blanch the Lao Shu Fen in boiling water to remove the excess oil, place in individual bowl, topped with blanched beansprouts. Pour sauce over the Lao Shu Fen, sprinkle with fried shallots & spring onion before serving.

* I've used this vegetarian black bean sauce that I got from vegetarian supplies shop for many years. Oyster sauce can be used as a substitute even though I don't use it in my cooking, find it too salty & I don't use MSG.

Cheng Tng (清汤）

Dried snow fungus (彰洲雪耳），dried lily bulb, dried longan, barley (生意米）,
pang da hai (胖大海）


osmanthus (桂花） agar agar


Besides Ice Kacang & Bubur Chacha, Cheng Tng can be found at almost all dessert stalls at hawker centres & foodcourts in Singapore. Since my girls are on their summer holiday, I have all the time & no excuse not to make my hubby's favaourite dessert, can't remember when was the last time I made this, lots of preparation work, lazy........

The usual ingredients in this sweet soup are dried snow fungus, dried lily bulb, dried longan, barley, pang da hai, sweet potato, large sago & agar agar cubes/strips. I've used snow fungus from Zhang Zhou (彰州）which is of better quality than the normal white bleached one, this variety appears to be very dirty, took a while to rinse off the dirts. As for the dried longan, this smaller version is better than the almost black type which I think is sweetened. The barley that I used is called 生意米, like the nutty taste as compared to the pearl barley which I think gets too soft after cooking. I only found out last night that pang da hai is called sterculia seeds, soak them in water for about 30mins drain & remove the skin, I've used 8 pcs of this seeds, which is a lot, think Cheng Tng is incomplete without this ! I've used a small orange flesh sweet potato, cut into cubes. Cook the large sago in boiling water until they turn transparent, plunge in cold water & drain, it took 30 mins to cook the large sago. Instead of plain agar agar cubes, I made mine flavoured with osmanthus syrup (桂花酱), cut into cubes & set aside.

Tie 10 pandan leaves into a knot, fill a large pan with water, add pandan leaves, snow fungus, barley,dried longan, bring to boil, add sweet potato & dried lily last as these get mushy if overcooked, add rock sugar to taste. Turn off heat, add pang da hai & cooked sago, when the soup is cooled, add the agar agar cubes. Transfer to container & refrigerate, I like my dessert really cold..........

Brioche

While the chicken soup is cooking, I started browsing through my recipes for tomorrow's breakfast. The cool weather gave me a good excuse to want to indulge in something fattening, haha....... BRIOCHE
The French make their bread either so crusty without fat or so rich & buttery, I'm into both cos" I'm a great carbo fan, hubby will freak out if he knows about the butter content in this bun !

Ingredients :
400g High protein flour
11g Instant dry yeast
60g Sugar
6g Salt
8g Milk powder
200g Eggs (without shell)
70g Cold water
140g Butter, softened

With an electric mixer on dough hook at low speed, blend the dry ingredients for 1 min. Add eggs & water, continue mixing on low speed for another min. Continue mixing on medium speed for 5 mins. Add softened butter & mix for another 10 mins until dough is fully developed.
Let rise in a warm place for 1hr or until dough doubles in bulk.
Divide the dough into 14 pcs at 60g each & another 14 pcs at 10g each. Mould the pcs into smooth round balls, transfer the large balls into brioche moulds. Use your forefingers to make an indentation in the centre of the large balls & immediately place the small balls on top, press the small ball down into the larger ball to secure the pcs together. Prove in a warm place for 30mins.
Brush the tops with beaten egg. Place the moulds on abaking tray & bake in a preheated oven of 190 degrees for 15-20 mins until glossy & golden.

* The original recipe calls for 1 hr of second proving but in our hot weather, 30 mins is enough. I don't have brioche moulds so I've used the normal tart moulds. I turned the oven temperature down to 180 degrees after 7 mins of baking cos' the colour has already started to turn a golden brown & it took 15 mins to bake the buns. The kitchen was filled with the fantastic buttery aroma, can't help it I ate one just 5 mins out of the oven even though I'm supposed to wait for the buns to cool down first ! Ummmm, so soft & fluffy..........

Double Boil Chicken Soup

Dried mushrooms, dried scallops, jing hua ham(金华火腿）, ginger,
hua jiao（花膠）
1 kanpung chicken, blanched & cleaned
All ingredients in the soup pot, ready to be double boiled
The end result, after 7 hrs of double boiling

After my morning run at 6am this morning at Tun Fuad Park, I looked up to the sky, how dark it was, expected today to be a raining day. I was right, it started raining at about 8am. What a cool day today, so I decided to make double boil chicken soup with rice for dinner tonight. All thanks to the weather, the usual hot & humid weather make me tiring & not in the mood to cook us a nice meal ! After going though my deep freezer, I had all the ingredients I want, 1 kampung chicken, dried mushrooms, dried scallops, a 2" pc of jin hua ham & about 9pcs of hua jiao. My mum gave me a few packets of jin hua ham, each packet the size of a slab of butter, so I cut them into 2" pcs & freeze them individually for each use. The hua jiao I don't know how big a pc is because when my mum gave them to me, they were aready cut up into small pcs, I guess she had the dried seafood supplier to cut them into pcs.

After blanching & rinsing the chicken pcs, I put all the ingredients into a soup pot that fits just nice into my slow cooker, with a big chunk of ginger, love that gingery taste in my Chinese style cooking. I can never double boil my stuff over the gas stove, the water in the outer pot dry out very quickly & I'm one big blur 'sotong', almost burnt a pot few weeks ago !

I turn the cooker to high heat at 9am & double boil the chicken soup for 7 hrs, turning the power off at 4pm, the soup is so flavourful just a pinch of salt is all it need !

Honey Sponge Cakes

A friend of mine always order these honey sponge cakes for her children. These are popular with kids, probably because of the honey in them, remind me of those little ji dan gao we had during CNY !

Durian Cake

Sharon ordered this for her boss's birthday today. As usual 3 layers of sponge with 2 layers of durian filling, pure & aromatic ! The two rolls of not so tidy little dots are actually the durian filling that I piped on the cake. Can you imagine the aroma that's going to fill the office when they cut the cake ............