Tomato Muffin - AD Baking Time

I must be in a high level of stress *__*
I've baked two items in one night.. Cheese Biscuits and Tomato Muffins...

Oh no, another muffins? Err.. so sorry yes it's another muffin. Why? Because I don't have any mixer here, and muffin doesn't require any (I miss my Tang-O so much!). And why tomato? Because I had four big ones I haven't touch since last week.

Baking here requires more trick and strategy. I brought along with me muffin tins and paper cup. Ms. Lingling has a set of cup and measuring spoons. The rest is about estimating and converting grams/litter to cups/spoons :D

I also have a mission to finish all baking stuff I've brought before I go back to Sg. Because it will be a waste if nobody uses them here. Another thing is to use whatever in the fridge since so many times Ms. Lingling (and plus me now) tend to buy things but forget to eat them.

So here we are with tomato muffins :D

Well, I used my basic muffin recipes, but I think the taste is not so nice :(
I should have made savory muffin with tomato instead making a sweet one. This one is lost in between - mmh, ok, next time will be better :)

Cheese Biscuit - AD Baking Time

Mhh these biscuits are way too salty :(
I used Edam Cheese and slightly salted Lurpark Butter - maybe I should use the unsalted butter, but they're really too salty for me. Must eat it with coffee or hot chocolate...

And today all my meals got cheese inside... Hoo, Singapore, will I return to you in a good shape? :P

HB Famous Macaroni Schotel - AD Baking Time

It's weekend and for the past few days I'm absolutely in my baking moods. Me and Ms. Ling Ling went to Abu Dhabi Co-op yesterday, it's like Singapore's NTUC Fair Price - a hypermarket owned by goverment, I think.

It wast the most fun outing :P since I got the chance to spend quite times there and browsing around - studying what they have here in Abu Dhabi compared to Singapore or Indonesia. I found that baking stuff is quite hard to find (please, anyone lives here, correct me if I'm wrong). I've tried Carrefour and this Co-op but the selections are very limited. But they do have more options with cheese and somehow their cheese is so cheaper than Singapore. Huwww... it's not fair :P

So I've made my plan to make baked pasta and today here it is :) It's one of Hihihi Bakery's signature food, and the recipe taken from Ci' Ine's blog - modified by me (Ci Ine, terimakasih banyak untuk resep2nya). Actually months ago I've made a posting about it, but anyway, enjoy the pictures here.

I used big macaroni elbows, and some Iranian herb cheese

(I can't really remember the names or the origin)

Fresh baked and ready :)

Would you like some?

Mmh, want some more ma'am?

This is actually Mark and Spencers can soup - I added carrot, beef ham and salami and some cheese cubes inside. Mmhhh, tak terkatakan!

White Grape Muffin - AD Baking Time

It's quite challenging since it's not my kitchen and I don't have my equipment with me. Now it’s been the 2nd time I baked here and I feel veerrry happy  :D

When my boss assigned me to go to Abu Dhabi for three weeks, kitchen and baking were ones of my biggest concerns. I couldn’t get away so long from baking… even if I have deadlines, usually I still do baking at least once a week. So I was so curious whether the office apartment has an oven or not :P

It’s a good thing I wouldn’t stay in a hotel – but in my branch office apartment – so at least there should be a kitchen. So I was really hoping that the kitchen has an oven – and when one of my colleague said that Ms. Lingling – one of AD staff who lives there – ever told him that she’s tried to make cakes, I was so happy because it means she has an oven. Hehehe… so easy to make me happy :P

So I started to think of things which don’t require too many things like mixer etc. So I remember reading mbak Vania’s blog about her moving to Mumbai, where she brought along muffin tins and baking powder with her because muffin is the easier thing to make. I thought it’s a brilliant idea, so between my clothes, shoes, toiletry, and 4 kg of documents and a very big laptop (from the office – whew they’re really trying to kill me), I put 2 muffin tins, some amount of paper cups, baking powder and baking soda, and two measuring spoon and cup inside my suitcase.

My mind was filled with ideas – what can I make without mixer (and scale :P) – muffin, brownies, baked pasta, and bread pudding. Mmh… I was glad I’ll have something to do with my free time there – and baking always makes me happy.

Last weekend I made cream cheese brownies. I brought the recipe with me along the way from Singapore – printed in A4… one of my surviving kits :D

Tonight as I didn’t know what to do after the whole afternoon, I started to think about baking again. I remember there are some white grapes in the fridge, and coincidentally we also have white grape juice. The other basic ingredients are in hands, so I browsed the net for basic muffin ingredients.

I found one in Allrecipes.com, looked at a glance at the reviews and marched in to the kitchen. I halved the recipe and substituted the milk with the grape juice – actually because I thought I didn’t have any milk (but then I had). I reduced the sugar a bit and substituted the oil with melted butter.

I put amount of white grapes (they’re quite ripe), put them in the oven, and voila…

They’re done and I was as happy as a happy bee: D

Kaastangel

Me not like it yet :(

Choux Pastry aka Kue Sus

Ayeeee, finally I'm brave enough to make this :D


Original recipe was taken from Mbak Riana's blog (Mbak, makasih lagi untuk resepnya :D)
Yesss, of course the bla bla bla will come later :P
See you around :)

Another Chocolate Puding

It's another chocolate puding. This time I managed to write down the ingredients while I was cooking. I'm not satisfied enough with this version - yet my friends said the puding was nice - something wasn't there but I'm not sure what it is. No idea at all.

Ok, another promise to write more next time...
Time to rest :)

 

Green Pancake aka Dadar Gulung

Well, if you don't like "green pancake" as its name, do me some favor and tell me what is the exact english name for it. I don't like it either but can't think much when I got this stomach cramp -  not so much fun :S

Original recipe was taken from Mbak Shinta's kitchen (Mbak, trimse berat ya resepnya... hasilnya bagus dan enak, dan hitungannya pas hihihi, tapi saya musti latihan lagi bikin dadarnya supaya bisa pas tipisnya) 

Ok, I'll write again some other time, meanwhile, just enjoy the pic and remember - practice makes perfect! Bubyeee

Choco Cookies for Hari Raya

I got the recipe from internet - from some *errr, what my friend said about it - spam, junk mail, or whatever, I'll update later*, as I read the recipe, I thought this could work out. Especially it required some big amounts of oatmeal - something I never be able to finish from my stock - where most recipes ask for quick-cooking oatmeal and I only have (loads of it!) instant oatmeal.

I tried the cookies several months ago, it was nice despite they weren't so crunchy - thanks for the unstability of my old oven. Last week when my parents visited me, they brought along a new oven for me :)

I tried to bake some banana cupcakes with new oven, but then I learned that what people saying are true - you must know your oven well. It ended with a burnt big batch of banana cakes :(

So today I tried baking the cookies in three batches - all with different time and temp.

First one is following the recipe 190 C (where's the symbol for degree here?) for 10 minutes -> turn out well, almost overbake and very crunchy.

Personally I don't like cookies - I don't like to eat my own baking exactly. So it's very difficult to decide which one is better - crunchy cookies or chewy ones. Of all my friends that have tried my cookies before - all of them have different opinions, some would prefer crunchy, some would prefer chewy.

So I baked the second batch with 150 C, 15 minutes. The cookies were chewy - it's also ok. But I started to have some doubt in my mind - is it cooked well? How if some people protest on this? So much for a li'l (or low?) self confidence.

I baked the third batch with 150 C, 25 minutes. I thought "ok, i'll get the perfect one this time. All the wonderful taste between chewy and crunchy." But the temperature was out of control for some first minutes. It was so HOT, and I lowered down the heat, then I wait, and I wait, and I did something else, and I remember I haven't got my cookies but I thought I would be just fine - I used a very small heat. I took the pans out, and put the cookies on the cooling rack. They look a bit darker than usual and they were a bit burnt *_____* what an experiment :P

Anyway, these are the pictures :) I'll post the recipe sometime later, I'm so sleepy :P
Enjoy :D

This cookies use oat, so we can say it's kindda healty :P



Use the blender to grind the oat



Add the choc chips



Add the melted choc - the recipe called to grate the choc, I found it was so handful, so I just nuked it



Final batter, ready to put in baking pans

Ready to bake, yay, you're sooo pretty XD




Freshly baked mmhhh :D




My Cookie Jar :)

Tump, remember when I made my cookies for the very first time?

Potato & Broccoli Schotel with Cheese Sauce (Again!)

Blogger, you ate my posting! How dareeeeeeee you *____*

Ok, this should be a very short one. I baked it tonite, and it's almost finish in 15 minutes. Tonite all the girls were loosing sense of diet - oh no my parents are coming and I will receive these double comments - Mom would say "stop eating, keep your diet", and Pap would say, "Ha, this' nicer. You always look like a skeleton. You should see your mom when she was your age - she's montok, and beutiful".

- ok please, any Singaporean or English language reader - don't ask what that words means. XD

Original recipe was taken from Mbak Anne's blog (oh mine, I've written this part for three times now) - (Mbak Anne, makasih banyak ya sharing resepnya... sangat enak, saya minta ijin untuk posting ya :D)


Before baking - layers of potatos - broccoli - cheese sauce


Fresh from the oven :D



Errr... 10 minutes later? - I'll make it 15 so it's not so shameful XD



oohoo no... I keep the rest in the fridge, believe me :D

Chocolate, Peanut Butter and Strawberry Jam

What do you get if you mix chocolate, peanut butter and strawberry jam?

-other than bellytummyjelly, I mean :P

I spent my childhood in Bandung, a small town 3 hours from Jakarta (thanks to highway technology, they've made it 2 hours ride now). The city was cool - it was much colder in my childhood time - and of course it hold so many good foods.

One of my favorite foods was ROTI BAKAR aka Toast Sandwich. Anything related to bread was the responsible agent for my bellytummyjelly - I would say. We could choose our own filling - chocolate or strawberry or peanut were the basic ones. More luxurious options would be mince meat (aka cornet beef) with eggs or cheese.

But though I might choose the expensive one - of course I used to have big brothers or aunty or anyone to treat me on this :P - I would prefer the cheaper ones (hey, I'm a simple girl with a modest preference!), and Chocolate-Peanut-Strawberry would be on top of my list! Yeah, now you can call me greedy, ahahhahaa…

But this time my posting isn’t about toast sandwich. But of course it still has something to do with chocolate, peanut butter and strawberry jam :)

Few days ago I made a birthday cake for my colleagues, and I used chocolate cream as a topping. Got the recipe from Pak Sahak when I went back to Jakarta – it should be my posting below, so just wait for it - and I had some small amount of leftover cream. The cream consisted (of course sinful things) of whipped cream, dark chocolate covertures, strawberry jam and peanut butter :D

I could use them for frosting some cup cakes – I did give it a thought – but I need something more effortless so I was thinking of making pudding. I have some sachets in my stock so I spent some li’l time in my kitchen this morning. Please don’t try to ask for the recipe because this time I just put things into to the pan :D

The taste is sooo yummy – too bad I didn’t measure the ingredients so next time I must do a trial again. I did give some additionalstrawberry jam, milk, and sugar :D

As sinful as it can be, ladies and gentlemen, I present you the other version of my childhood favorite food!

I just bought a new set of baking dish from IKEA - first time using and I like it so much :)

add some vanilla sauce - or strawberry would be nicer - and you will join my club! :D

Birthday Cake for Laura, Tammy and Dion

So You Know about Good Food?

When you say good food, what’s in your mind?

Chocolate Rice Sandwich, I would say :P
I love it very much that I never get bored of eating it. Never, since my childhood until now :P

You may wonder why I put chocolate rice in my sandwich (my Singaporean friend asked me in astonishment when she saw me once). She thought I had too much chocolate rice in my baking stock so I used it for sandwich. Ahahahhahaa… if she only knew :P





For Indonesian (and yes, I’m Indonesian and am proud of that :P) it’s very common to eat chocolate rice sandwich. And of course, you must know the best brand – CERES – is the best ever since I was a child. Never want to change, and never want to live without it :P thanks to my friends, whenever they go back to Indonesia they used to bring me some. Oohohoho, how I love them :D

We use margarine instead of butter. The famous brand in Indonesia is BLUE BAND – it’s very tasty and although it’s margarine, but the texture is firm enough to replace butter in baking. I once tried PLANTA, I believed it’s a sister-brand of BLUE BAND since their package look similar. But the taste is not the same. So one day I bumped into MEADOW LEA margarine, and I would say it’s the closest thing I can get to Blue Band, and I never buy other brands until now :P

For the bread I prefer to have White Bread. Yeah of course it would be so much healthier if you make your own, but bread-making is so time consuming and too much to do for one’s personal pleasure (dont' remind me of my decision to buy Bread Machine :P It's still a lot things to do even with bread machine, ahahaha exusesss! :P) My friend once said, “You know whole wheat is so much better than the white ones, my mom would never allow me to eat other than whole wheat”. Yeah, so much for the wheat, but personally I think White Bread is the best combination for chocolate rice, ever. The plainness of the bread strengthen the chocolate taste :P

Spread the margarine - thin layer will do :P

Dont' forget the chocolate rice - the more the better, but you must watch your diet :P

This's just nice :)

TAdaaaaaaaaaaa.... hey old friend, nice to see you again! (And again and again and again tomorrow)

You may wonder why I used the last slice of the loaf - some people hate it and even throw it away - but I like it very very much :D

This same sandwich was the one to be blame for ruining my diet 10 years back when I weighed around 12 kg heavier than now, ahahhahahaa… what a day :P

*And yes, the morning I took pictures for this posting, I bought a new loaf of bread. I spent the whole Saturday at home - making steam cakes for selling at the Embassy yesterday and it was raining heavily so going out would be too much trouble - and yes, I finished the whole loaf that day. Ahahahhaa... only eating bread for the whole day XD

To Overcome Fear

How do you know you're truly in love with someone?

You don't think about him all the time

You don't talk to him often

You hardly meet him everyday

You don't meet him in your dreams either

And when you close your eyes

still you can't see his face.

How do you know you're truly in love to someone?

It's not even the 'ocean-rage feeling' type

You hardly laugh or cry

No heartbeat attacks when you talk to him

No hug, no embrace, no chance to hold

How do you know you're truly in love with someone?

Last nite I was back to my kitchen. Since the day I failed in making steam cake, I was overwhelmed by the misery of losing the knack to cook. It was developing to great despair since nothing was rite. Not even one single thing. It's like I was also loosing my passion in baking. Thanks to my friends, they gave me courage to carry on :)

But this bread I bought last Sunday is not getting fresher - I skipped breakfast for the whole week (not to mention I did skip dinner as well - just can't eat, sigh) and I also have bananas waiting for me. I used to make banana juice - I mix it with any fruit I have in hand, but nowdays it seems too troublesome to make.

I used to bake almost every day, so I have blocks of chocolate, cheese, cartoons of milks and so many things in my kitchen. I thought I really had to do something. Had this thought in mind to make a bread pudding. My previous bread pudding got good responses from my friends (though I don't really like it). So I decided to make a bread pudding again - this time plus banana and Nutella.

I visualized the recipe in my mind - modifying the previous recipe and adding bananas and Nutella in it.

Everthing went well and I was ready to put the things in the oven when I realized

- o h m y g o d o n c e m o r e ? -

I forgot to put in melted butter :( I rushed to my bedroom turning on my computer googling to find out what it would be without butter? Still it be ok? I noticed that every recipe I had opened content butter in it. Oww owww... :(

Haaaaa...

But then I recognized this warm feeling inside my heart.

"No girl, this is not the time to give up. Get up and go back to the kitchen, you know what to do."

So I melted the butter (not to mention I also forgot to add vanila ahahhaha) and added it in the batter. The butter wasn't mixed well with the rest of the batter but anyway, just do it lah :P

The pudding turned out OK, and my friends like it very much :)
Yiippppp!!! :D

Banana Bread Pudding with Nutella

(this is ¾ part of the original recipe, taken from Ibu Esti’s blog, I used small aluminum cup, makes 15 medium cup)

Ingredients:
7 or 8 slices of bread (can’t remember *_*)
2 big ripe bananas
Nutella spread (can’t tell how much)

3 Medium Eggs
75 g Caster Sugar (personally I think this’ too sweet)
60 g Butter/Margarine – melt it
450 ml Milk (on 1st trial I used Heavy Cream – made the pudding moister)
¼ tsp Vanilla Extract (forget to use it either *~*)

Some cheese (did not weigh it) for the top of the pudding


Instruction:
Spread the Nutella on each bread slice
Add the banana inside and roll the bread
(I’m bad in writing in English, so someday I’ll show you how in pictures)
Slice the bread and put the slices in the bake pan

Beat the eggs and the sugar until light
Add in vanilla extract, milk and melted butter
Pour the batter to the bake pan
Steam for around 10 minutes, put on the grated cheese
And bake for 15 minutes, 180°C
(what an instruction! I’ll re-write again soon :P)

I can overcome this fear inside, that's how

Don't let the sun catch you crying

Don't let the sun catch you crying

The night's the time for your tears

Your heart may be broken tonight

But tomorrow in the morning light

Don't let the sun catch you crying

-Don't let the sun catch you crying by Gloria Estefan

It's very sad when suddenly you lost your magic touch.

It's been two weeks since I started to bake again after being ill. And ever since that day, I never made any single thing rite. Potato croquette, Bread pudding (this one is still ok but only so so), 2 times banana cakes, Carrot cake, and now the steam cake..

Hihihi Bakery will be closed (again hiks) for unknown time. I'm definitely losing my magic touch ;(

I hope tomorrow I can smile again. Don't wanna let the sun catch me crying.

Carrot Cake - still faulty :(

Last nite I pushed myself to bake again. Bit hard to bake since I made awful mistakes several times last week. And I - you know they say you must cook with love and I think that's just true - was not really feeling like baking.


But we got some carrots in the fridge waiting helplessly :p and I've been wandering in internet looking for carrot cake recipe last week so I think I really had to do something about the carrots.


Started quite late at nite - around 10 something - I knew this one is going to end up at midnite. So I determined myself to start :)


Weighing and halving the recipe always been my problems lately - since I was back to kitchen again after being ill, don't know why it's very hard to concentrate on numbers :(


But then this time everything went ok. Original recipe was taken from Mbak Riana's blog, with some modification. (Mbak, pamitannya dah nyampe ga ya? Minta ijin nge-link ya :D)

I do have some problems with the oven, it's really too small for the amount of my baking these days. I burnt some of the cakes :P

I bought (err, my Mom did) the smallest one thougt it's only for learning yet now it's not enough hehehehe... anyway, I did took the picture this morning and I'm happy with the result :D

Can't wait to try again!

Carrot Cake
(Source: Bogasari Baking Center Cake Baking Course – from Mbak Riana’s blog modified by me)

I halved the recipe, made 18 medium cupcakes – just nice.

Ingredients:
3 medium Eggs
150 g Caster sugar -> some say the cake is bit too sweet, can reduce to 140g
¼ tsp Salt
½ tsp Emulsifier
130 g All purpose flour
½ tsp Baking soda
¼ tsp Baking powder
½ tsp Cinnamon powder ->the original recipe from Mbak Riana gives each 1 g for Baking Soda, Baking powder, and Cinnamon powder. When I wanted to halve the recipe I found the ½ g will be odd. So I added the amounts, hoping everything to turn out fine. It’s seems ok :)
220 g Carrot – I grated the carrot with a fine grater
75 g Canola Oil


Instruction:
Beat eggs, sugar and salt in high speed until thick.
Beat in emulsifier, continue beating until pale, creamy, and very thick (the beater is leaving a trace that doesn’t disappear for quite awhile).
Shift the dry ingredients. Using the lowest speed, beat in the flour mixture into the egg batter. Turn off the mixer.
Fold in the blended carrot, mix well with spatula.
Slowly fold in the oil, make sure you mix everything well before pouring the batter into the pan.
Pour the batter into cup cakes cases.
Bake in preheated oven at 180ºC for 25 minutes (do the toothpick test).


Cheese Cream Frosting
(Source: Philadelphia Cream Cheese package – from Mbak Riana’s Blog modified by me)

Ingredients:
60 g Philadelphia Cream Cheese
20 g margarine
1/4 cup icing sugar
1 drop of Lemon Paste

Instruction:
Beat the Philadelphia Cream Cheese and margarine for 4-5 minutes or until soft and light (fluffy).
Beat in the icing sugar lemon juice, continue beating for 30 seconds or until mixed well.
Frost the carrot cake.

Bolu Kukus Stowbery Going Trendy (aka Strawberry Steam Cupcake)

I modified the normal Steam Cake, by adding some strawberry jam inside and adding some strawberry essence and red colouring.

One of my faithful costumer :P kept nagging me to make red and green steam cake instead the normal chocolate one I used to make. So I tried out this one, but since I was quite afraid the cakes wouldn’t rise because of the jam’s mass, I randomly put it the jam in only three cakes.

Couldn’t tell them which one has filling/not. Sometime later, I got some hysterical responds from those who get the cakes with filling :P
Turned out to be very much OK! :D

li'l satisfied customer :P