Dan Lepard's Banana Bread

Dan's recipes are very much welcomed into the family lately, here is another good recipe.
I cannot believe my husband had 4 slices in one go!  The rest of us had 2 slices each.   Needless to say, it was all gone in the same day.

Matcha Cranberry Mantou

As far as I know, matcha always go well with red bean.  I was kind of lazy to make sweetened red beans for these mantou , so I decided to try cramberries instead. It worked well too.

Coffee Peanut Sesame Mantou

                                                 Another experiment of mine here..

Never fail Lo Bak Go

Beside this recipe, I have tried and tasted many different Lo Bak Go recipes over the months, I should say this is the best so far and it is just as good as the one in Yum Cha Place.  Good to keep this.

Pandan Steamed Cake ( Fagao)

                 Attractive sharp green fagao.
                 The texture is soft, fluffy and moist....

           Recipe from: Nasilemaklover ( slight alteration)
       Ingredients:
       250g self-raising flour
       1 tsp baking powder
       150g castor sugar
       1 large egg (beaten)
       200ml pandan juice
       45g corn oil

     Method
     1.  Mix flour and baking powder, set aside.

     2.  In a bowl, whisk in sugar and pandan juice until sugar well dissolved.

     3.  Stir in egg well, add in oil.  Gradually add in flour mixture and stir until well combined without lumps.

     4.  Pour batter into cupcake mould, steam at rapidly boiling water for 20 minutes.

Red Rice Yeast Walnut Mantou

I baked red yeast walnut bread and red yeast buns quite a while ago,  adding red yeast is also what I intended to do with the mantou here.  With this experiment, I added extra red yeast powder to bring out deeper red tone.  Love the texture and the look.

Pandan Kuih Bakar (Malay Kuih)

Kuih Bakar is a Malay cake, the texture is quite similar to custard but less sweet.  Pandan (screwpine juice) aroma is really beautiful!

Ogura Green Tea Cake

                      Super moist, light, as soft as cotton... plus, it's quite healthy cake too.
                      I find it especially good to eat after chilled.

It's done..,
 ready to be flipped over to cool.

Recipe:  Food@HomeSweetHome
Ingredients (A)
Corn oil  65g
Milk  80ml
1/4 tsp salt
 6 egg yolks
1 egg
65g Superfine flour

2 tsp matcha powder + 1 tbsp hot water




Ingredients (B)
6 egg whites

Inverted back to the right side ,
 ready to be sliced.

75g castor sugar
1/4 tsp cream of tartar ( I used l tsp lemon juice)

     For (A)
     1.  Beat egg yolks, whole egg, corn oil, milk and salt until foamy.

     2.  Mix in flour and matcha mixture slowly until well combined.  Set aside.




      For (B) (slight alteration)
     1.  Beat whites until foamy, add in cream of tartar and sugar, continue beating until it reaches JUST stiff peak.

     2.  Take 1/3 portion of whites into green tea batter and mix to lighten the texture.  Continue and fold in the remaining whites in two more batches until all is done.

     3.  Pour into a 9" cake tin,  bake at pre-heated oven 170C for 45 mins.  Place a tray with hot water at the bottom rack of the oven.  By creating steam in the oven helps preventing cake from cracking or drying up.

    4.   Insert a skewer see that it comes out clean.  It's done.

    5.   Invert cake to cool completely before serving.

1.    

Purple sweet potato wholemeal bread ( black rice and black sesame)

This is my own experiment, tested and tasted.  Soft, fluffy, moist for days, beautiful aroma of black rice.

Simple pumpkin and egg cake

             This is a simple yummy cake, so similar to the ones that I used to buy from the Asian grocery shops.

fluffy..

Recipe: Butter, flour and me

light and moist..

Ingredients: (  6 inch cake tin)-- I used a small loaf tin
Egg yolks  ( you need 3 )
Pumpkin mash  60g
Corn oil  50g
Cake flour  65g (sifted)
Cornmeal / Polenta / Maize flour  5g (sifted)
Egg whites  ( you need 3)
Castor sugar  65g












Method
1.   In a large bowl, mix egg yolks and pumpkin mash well.  Add in oil and mix.  Gradually add in  cake flour and cornmeal and mix well.  Set aside.

2.  In another clean bowl, beat whites ( I added one tsp lemon juice) in  a few batches until it reaches stiff peak.

3.  Take a small portion of beaten whites to add in the yellow batter, to lighten the texture.

4.  Pour all yellow batter into the white batter.  Fold gently.

6.  Bake in pre-heated oven 35 -40 minutes. Invert the cake tin immediately, serve after it is completely cooled.

 

Matcha ice cream

          I love the green.... so green and strong flavour of..... matcha!
          Yes, tasted really really good.





Recipe: Just one cookbook
Ingredients: ( I doubled the ingredients as I used a 2 litre ice cream maker)
2 cups half and half ( or 1 cup whole milk and 1 cup heavy whipping cream)
3 tbsp matcha powder
1/2 cup sugar
pinch of salt

after cooked, transfer to a ice water bath  ( I used only tap water, water changed twice)

churning..

soft matcha.. ,  freeze it .

Method
1.  Freeze the ice cream bowl for 24 hours.

2.  In a medium saucepan,  whisk and cook the half and half, sugar and salt.  Add in matcha powder, stir constantly until it starts to foam and very hot to touch but not boiling.

3.  Transfer and let it sit in an ice bath ( I just used tap water, water changed twice).  When it is cool, wrap it up with cling wrap and chill in the fridge for 2 to 3 hours ( I chilled it in the freezer for half hour).

4.  Transfer to the ice cream maker and churn for 20-25 minutes ( mine normally takes 40 minutes).
Transfer the soft ice cream into airtight container for freeze before good enough for serving.

Kuih Talam 1

The next time when I make this again, I would wrap the cake tin with aluminian foil to avoid the water condensation on the white layer which had happened here.  Anyway, it was delicious, definitely a good recipe.

Black rice walnut mantou ( steamed bun)

Using my bread experience, I started to try out more varieties of mantou making here. Previously, I have made quite some rice bread with nuts and thought it should be just good for mantou as well.
It did turn out satisfactory here and I enjoyed it.

Purple sweet potato ondeh ondeh ( Malaysian kuih)

These are really good, you just keep eating it non stop..

Steamed Maize buns ( mantou)

I like to bake with polenta / cornmeal / maize, it  gives a beautiful fragrance and brings a bright yellow colour to the buns.  Following Dan Lepard's approach in bread making, I have learnt that soaking cornmeal with boiling water certainly helped to soften the texture, I believe it would also bring out the flavour better.   So, I went ahead like this way.  Another way I altered was, I only added the maize into the flour after the first proof, thinking it might be more easier to mix in.  I am glad it turned out great.

Pumpkin dumplings (tangyuan) with Purple Yam

        I never knew homemade dumplings ( tangyuan) could taste so good, way better than the ones I always get from the Asian grocery shops here!  It is actually very easy to make, takes a few short minutes and it's done!

        I believe the pumpkin mash does a lot of good, bringing a wonderful chewy texture, I shall try the  sweet potato mash next time.  What a good dessert....

     
       

            The purple sweet potato here in Australia is rather dull purple in colour, it still taste good.





       Recipe: Christine's recipe ( with slight change, without barley added)
    Ingredients
    200g pumpkin puree
    240g purple sweet potato ( purple yam) peeled and diced.
   120g glutinous rice powder
   50g palm sugar
   6 to 8 slices old ginger
   3 cups water
   90g rock sugar

    Method (slight alteration)

   1.  Cook the yam in the pot until tender. Set aside.


   2.  In a bowl, mix glutinous rice powder with pumpkin puree.  Knead into a dough until it's not sticky and not wet.  Roll it into a long shape, divide into 12 portions. Wrap a teaspoon of palm sugar in each, knead into a ball.

  3. Boil 3 cups water with ginger, add in rock sugar, simmer until sugar dissolved. Set aside.

 4. Set another pot of boiling water, carefully place dumplings in ( do not put too many in).  Keep stirring into the water making sure dumplings not sticking to the bottom.
Cook over medium high heat, when dumplings floats onto the surface of the water, transfer them into the sugar water.  Add the yam in.  Cook for further 5 minutes and it's done.

Tapioca Pandan Coconut layered cake ( Malaysian Kuih)

     This is a very good recipe,  easy to follow, tasted really good.  Everyone at home loves it and finished it in no time!

Dan Lepard's peanut butter and pumpkin seed cookies

There's combinations of pumpkin seeds, peanut butter, muscovado, (choc chips and sesame seeds as extras) in every bite you take, we just loved it so much.
The middle part is soft while the edge is crispy.

Dan Lepard's easy white bread

Dan Lepard's muscovado peanut cookies

These are really good stuff, after these you just don't want to have those ordinary kind of chocolate cookies.

Earl Grey tea chiffon cake

      I'd finally made a good chiffon cake without a fault, I think...:)
      6 teabags is just the perfect amount for bringing out the aroma of the bergamot citrus flavour I wanted to have.

       Inspiration from Domestic Goddess Wanabe
    Ingredients:
   ( I used 24cm chiffon pan)

    Yolk batter

    7 egg yolks (700g egg with shell)

    30g  castor sugar

    60g  light oil

    120ml hot water

    6 Earl Grey teabags (twinnings)

    150g cake flour

    1 tablespoon baking powder

    Meringue batter

    7 egg whites (700g egg with shell)

    90g castor sugar

    2 teaspoons lemon juice

     Method

     1.  Pre-heat oven 160C.

     2.  Discard the bags, pour in 6 bags of leaves into a jug with hot boiled water.  Cover it up to infuse the aroma from the leaves. Let cool and set aside.

    3.  Using a mixer, beat in yolks with sugar until it turns pale and light.  Add in oil, beat well. Add in tea and the leaves, beat to mix well.  Add in baking powder, add flour in 3 batches.  Set yolk batter aside.

    4.  Beat 1/3 of sugar with lemon juice.  Add in the remaining sugar  (in 2 batches) and beat until it reaches stiff peak.

    5.  Use 1/3 whites to add in the yolk batter,  using spatula and mix it well to lighten the texture.

   6. Fold in the remainder 2/3 of whites gently in 2 batches , making sure no lumps appears.

   7. Pour batter into the ungreased chiffon pan. Tap gently to release air pockets.

   8.  Bake for 55 minutes. Insert a skewer deep down in the centre part, if it comes out clean, it's done. Immediately invert the pan and let cool completely ( I took 2 hours).  Use a knife to go round the edges of the pan to loosen it before releasing cake out.

Dan Lepard's wholemeal bread

I should say, this is the best wholemeal bread I have ever made and tasted, too good.
Thanks, Dan!

Pumpkin steamed meat buns

 I love these gigantic steamed buns, they make you feel satisfied, every bite of it.  I can still remember when I was a little girl, whenever I got to choose I would always want a bigger size steamed bun rather than the usual char siew bun size.