Food
Surfing food blogs takes up about half the time I spend on the internet and I've got tons of delicious tags for recipes organized according to ingredients, cooking methods, occasion etc. Living away from home has made me cheerfully and rabidly domestic - only in the culinary sense though, I hate every other household chore with a passion. Vacuuming, for example, is one of my major gripes.
When uni blues hit, I cook. When I'm stressed, I bake. When I feel particularly celebratory, I head straight to the kitchen. There's the utilitarian approach - boring, everyday, limited-cooking-time stuff , there's the dinner party approach - where I usually massively overcook (4 people, 5 main dishes, ftw), and there's the experimental approach - where I find an interesting recipe and randomly feel the urge to make it, then I ring people up and excitedly invite them over for a taste-test. Successful dishes and I'm all aflutter with glee; when something occasionally goes hideously and disastrously wrong (oh cinnamon rolls! oh mushroom soup - never ever use substandard coffee!), I mope around for ages while my sister gamely attempts to consume bits of it to cheer me up. My kitchen mishaps always make for very interesting stories anyway.
I've done things that would make my mom wring her hands. She comes from the quick, easy and simple school - don't get me wrong though, I LOVE the quick, easy and simple food but sometimes....I'm drawn to exciting!foreign! and terribly delicious looking dishes that might take 5 hours of preparation (and they weren't those dump-in-slow-cooker-wander-off-and-come-back-to-discover-delicious-food-types or that require about 48 hours of marinating (ah heaven), or simply just decide in the wee hours of the morning that it's the perfect thing to try MYSTERY X recipe.
My LJ looks particularly empty and lifeless, so here are some pictures of what i've been up to in the kitchen!
Dinner last night! Chicken and sweet corn soup, tortilla, and kang kong. Guess how many eggs were used in the preparation of this meal?
8.
Also I've done something vaguely funky with photoshop, which is why the picture is strangely blurred in some areas and not in others. It was mainly because I discovered the lens blur filter and got carried away playing with it for a bit, then discovered I don't really know how it should work when there so many thing in the picture and couldn't be bothered to find out.
under the cut
Tortilla with bacon and mushroom
This was still delicious the next day! <3 Especially with barbecue and tomato sauce on top...mmmm!
The recipe is adapted from Smitten Kitchen's tortilla de patatas:
3 medium-sized potatoes, peeled, cut into thin slices and julienned
2-3 pieces of bacon, diced
3 mushrooms, diced
2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp dried thyme
Olive oil
1 small onion, thinly sliced
6 large eggs
2 tablespoons chicken broth (I used 1/4 tsp of chicken stock powder and 2 tbs of water)
1. Add about 2 tbs of olive oil into heated frying pan (preferably non-stick cos we'll be dealing with eggs later) at medium heat, throw in the diced bacon and cover the pan. The bacon will spit and hiss and sound evil, but you will be protected by the lid! - and get awesome bacon flavoured oil and crispy bacon bits! It'll take a few minutes for the bacon to crisp up and depending on how crisp you like your bacon.
2. Remove the bacon bits onto another plate and check the level of oil left in the pan, if there's enough, add the potatoes. If there isn't enough oil, just top it up with olive oil. Stir the potatoes around occasionally to keep it from sticking and browning too much, until they're about half-cooked. Season the potatoes with cinnamon and nutmeg. Smitten Kitchen says it takes about 7 mins for the potatoes.
3. While waiting for the potatoes to cook, beat the eggs with 2 tbs of chicken broth in a large bowl. Don't beat it with a vengeance, just a few rounds until the yolk and white are scrambled together.
3. Make a space in the centre of the pan and add the onions. If there's not enough oil, top it up - maybe 1-2 tsp worth. Stir the onions for about 3 mins. Then mix well with the potatoes.
4. Make a space in the centre of the pan and add the mushrooms - the potatoes and onion mixture will be around the edge of the pan. Stir the mushrooms around until they're cooked. Mix well with the potatoes and season with dried thyme (1 tsp).
5. Stir the potato mixture slowly into the bowl where the egg mixture is. Mix well and let it stand for about 10 mins.
6. Heat the pan up - medium high, make sure there isn't any brown bits sticking - if there is, scrape it off, then add 5 tsp of olive oil. Pour the egg mixture slowly into the pan making sure that the ingredients are evenly spread out. Scatter the reserved crispy bacon bits. Press down so that the ingredients have adhered well and the top is generally flat. Turn the heat down to medium low and cook it for about 8 mins until the top is wet but not too liquid. Use a spatula to make sure the edges don't stick onto the pan and shake the pan a little (or use the spatula) to make sure that the bottom doesn't either.
7. Flip onto the other side!
This is much harder than it sounds haha. My plate was large enough for the tortilla but small enough to fit in the pan, so I covered the top of the tortilla with my plate. Put on oven mitts and then use one hand to turn the pan upside down, using the other hand to support the bottom of the plate. Then slide the tortilla back into the pan! Reduce heat down low and cook for 4 more minutes.
8. Invert the tortilla and plate it up in its full glory!
Stuffed Portobello mushroom with couscous, pine nuts, red peppers and raisins
This was done a pretty long time ago so I can't remember how exactly I did it. But here's the general gist of it, referenced and bastardised from here and here.
3 Portobello mushrooms
1 cup Couscous (if you want, tsp of cumin as well)
1/2 Onion, sliced
1 clove Garlic, minced
1/3 Red Pepper, diced into small pieces
1/3-1/4 cup pine nuts
1/4 cup of raisins
Balsamic Vinegar
Salt and Pepper
Olive oil
1. Rub portobello caps with olive oil - just enough to coat, and lightly salt and pepper both sides. Drizzle about a tsp of balsamic vinegar on each. Roast with the cap facing downwards at 190C until soft and warm. This takes about 15 mins.
2. Prepare the couscous according to box directions. Usually it is 1 cup of hot water to 1 cup of couscous, maybe seasoned with cumin. Cover for about 5 mins until couscous has expanded.
3. Heat olive oil in a pan at medium heat. Saute onions and minced garlic for few minutes. Add in the red peppers and cook for 2-3 mor minutes. Add in the couscous. Mix well and add some balsamic vingear to taste. I'm quite stingy with salt so I didn't add any - you might want to salt to taste. Add the pine nuts and raisins. Make sure everything is mixed evenly. Remove from heat.
4. Take the mushrooms out of the oven and stuff them with the mixture. Return them to the oven for about 15 more minutes until the mushrooms are tender.
Braided lemon bread
I decided to forgo sleep to make this. It seemed like a great idea at that time - I read about this while at uni at about 1am, cycled to Flinders St on a Friday night (which is pretty scary for a biker: drunks, streets with unidentifiable puddles and homicidal taxi drivers) because I didn't have the ingredients at home, put on Billie Holiday on the stereo and wasn't done til about 7am. My brain does funny things after midnight. While kneading the dough, I felt like I was communing with the dough. Are you happy now? No? You're insecure and sticking everywhere! But I still love you and will not threaten you with too much flour because then you will be stable but ultimately unhappy. I want you to be happy, dough! Please come together in a happy ball! Crashed at 7 while waiting for the bread to rise, woke up at 10. Baked and had it for brunch.
But no one should be deterred from making this cake simply after reading about my experience. Trust me, most of my culinary experiments are adventures in more ways than one. It's pretty much the norm now.
It is not a difficult recipe! It does not have exotic ingredients (I just didn't have butter and cream cheese at home)! Most importantly, it is PRETTY AND DELICIOUS! People, it is a THING OF BEAUTY.
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen
SPONGE, the first:
6 tbs warm water
1 tsp sugar
1 1/2 tsp instant yeast ( I used 1 packet)
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
Mix all the ingredients in a small bowl, stir well and then cover with cling wrap. Set aside for 10-15 mins. It should bubble and start smelling really yeasty.
DOUGH, the second:
Sponge (above)
6 tablespoons sour cream (I used the entire 300ml store-bought cup of sour cream)
1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 large egg
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
It's generally easier with a stand mixer, just combine and let the machine do the work for you. Since I didn't have a mixer, I had to do it by hand.
1. Whisk together sour cream, butter, egg, sugar and vanilla in a large, wide bowl.
2. Stir in sponge. Add the flour and mix with a wooden spoon until it comes together in a shaggy, sorta ball .
3. Lightly flour the countertop (another 1/8 cup of flour) and start kneading the dough - try to scrape as much of the dough that is stuck to inside of the bowl and on the counter top so nothing goes to waste. Knead for about 15 mins until a smooth, soft dough forms. I'm pretty new to the whole bread thing so I kneaded it until it was still a little bit sticky, but had started coming together more easily, and the main dough ball was more receptive to incorporating scraps of dough that had stuck around the counter top. See what I mean about communing with the dough?
4. Place the kneaded dough in a lightly greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap. Let it rise for 90 minutes, until quite puffy and nearly doubled.
CURD, optional:
NB: If you can, use store-bough curd. I couldn't find any in store and really wanted the filling to have lemon so I made it from scratch. This makes enough for the bread.
3 tbs lemon juice
3/4 tsp lemon zest, finely grated
3 tbs sugar
1 large egg
2 tbs unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1. Whisk together juice, zest, sugar, and egg in a saucepan at low heat.
2. Stir in butter. Continue whisking until curd is thick enough to hold marks of whisk - sorta jam like consistency, about 5 minutes. Any time it seems to be too hot, take it off direct heat; put it back on the stove after a few minutes.
3.Transfer lemon curd to a bowl, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for an 1 hour.
FILLING, the third:
1/3 cup cream cheese, softened
2 tbs sugar
2 tbs sour cream
1 tsp fresh lemon juice
2 tbs all-purpose flour
Combine all the filling ingredients in a bowl, mix until smooth.
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER NOW:
1. Line the counter top with a sheet of baking paper, lightly (v. lightly) flour the paper. Gently deflate the dough and roll it out to a 10"x15" rectangle. Make sure you roll the entire rectangle onto the sheet of baking paper.
2. Lightly press 2 lines down the dough lengthwise. These 2 lines should divide the dough into 3 equal columns (column 1, column 2 and column 3). Spread the FILLING on the center column (column 2), leaving 2 inches from the top and 2 inches from the bottom untouched.
3. Spread the lemon curd over the FILLING. If the curd is too hard from the fridge, heat it up a little to make it easier to spread.
4. Cut 1-inch horizontal strips on column 1 and column 3. Each strips on column 1 should correspond with a strip of column 2; there should be the same number of strips on each column.
5. Cut out the 4 corner strips - i combined them into a ball, made a well in the middle, put some scrapes of cream cheese and curd inside and sealed the well. I baked the little ball along with the main bread.
6. Fold the bottom flap up and the top flap down over the filling. Start from the bottom to braid. Lift the bottom left strip and bring it diagonally across the filling towards column 3. Lift the bottom right strip and bring it diagonally across the filling - towards column 1, on top of the previous left strip. Continue with the next left strip which crosses to the right on top of the previous right strip, then right strip and so on. For the last strips on the top, tuck it nicely under the end of the braid. For picture reference, check out her website..
7. Cover the dough loosely and let it rise for an hour. (At this point I crashed, so I left it to rise for about 3 hours)
8. Beat 1 large egg with 1 tsp of water. Brush over the top of the bread. (This was enough for two rounds - once before I put it in the oven, and the second time about 20 mins in)
9. Preheat the over to 190C. I sprinkled some granulated white sugar (about 1 tbs) over the top of the whole bread, after the egg wash. Bake the bread for 25-30 mins. Remove from the oven and cool for 15-20 mins before serving.
YOU BEAUTIFUL BABY YOU <3<3
Other less soul-changing, but still present a pretty picture experiments: Roast Fennel stuffed with pork, mushrooms and bread crumbs and Lor Mai Kai.
