Nasi Lemak and Sambal Ikan Bilis

This weekend, I'm undecided between nasi ayam and nasi lemak
Nasi ayam:
- rice cooked in chicken broth
Nasi lemak:
- rice cooked in coconut milk
Until Saturday evening groceries, I haven't got a clue of what to cook.
This morning, I woke up (early mind you), and after I just remember that during groceries I bought canned tomatoes, for anchovies sambal (sambal ikan bilis). Therefore, I decided OK, we'll do nasi lemak then. Sambal can be eaten with basically any rice. But it's best to it with nasi lemak! But to make nasi lemak, I need coconut milk. I rummaged through my kitchen, and there it is! A can of coconut milk (which I don't know how long it's been there ihihihi. I checked the expiry date and it's still OK. So I thought there is no difference between when it's been sitting there in my kitchen or in the shop, rite?
So, rice - check, coconut milk - check, chilies - check, canned tomatoes - check
The anchovies?? I always knew that I have a tupperware of dried anchovies stored in the fridge. My mom posted it to me ages ago. I think early this year or so. I thought.. dried anchovies, in the fridge, in airtight container.. they can't turn bad, can they? I open the container and zooming for any moving micro-organisme. Looks good to me. In fact, the anchovies looked so clean!

I started with the nasi (rice) first. Amazingly I always prefer to cook rice in a pot "manual" way, rather than using the rice cooker.
Went in the rice, water, coconut milk, ginger slices and a bit of salt.
Oh.. I don't have the exact measurement for those ingredients. As for the rice+water+coconut milk proportion, I used the "manual" method, taught by my mom, aunt and grandma. I measure it by using my fingers.
Anyway.. while the rice on the stove, I started omelette. Usually hard-boiled eggs accompanied nasi lemak. But I'm kinda lazy to use yet another clean pot. So I just make do with omelette, so that I could still use the pan to fried the sambal.
Omelette done.

Now the anchovies sambal.
Again I don't use exact measurement, but here are the ingredients:
Anchovies Sambal (Sambal Ikan Bilis)
- Dried anchovies (washed and soaked in warm water)
- Onion
- Ginger
- Garlic
- Ground chilies
- Canned tomatoes
- Salt
- Sugar
- Lemon juice

Drain and fry the anchovies. When they turned yellowish, set aside.
Add a bit more oil, then add in onion, ginger, garlic, ground chillies.
After that, add in fried anchovies, add in canned tomatoes, salt to taste, lemon juice and sugar.
Cook in high heat and toss until the sambal dried as your liking. I like my sambal a bit dry.

Serve the nasi lemak with sambal and omelette.. There you go!


Dried anchovies


Anchovies Sambal (sambal ikan bilis)

Roti

Since it's getting colder these days, I had the tendency to leave work (on time) and straight heading home. Therefore I have ample time to be busy in the kitchen.
Yesterday, I found a Roti Canai recipe on the net, and thought "hey, I have all those ingredients" So I started rolling my sleeves and mix one ingredient to another. Mind you, I don't have electric mixer. All those cooking are by these 2 bare hands! I stored the dough in the fridge so it will be ready when I'm home the next day.
Today, as I got home, I am all fired up to do some Roti Canai.
But, my mistake (a bit), because I didn't leave them to be at room temperature. I straight flatten out the dough and it's a tough task! In addition, I'm all hungry and can't wait to eat my dinner!
For roti canai, you need to spread the dough until it is very thin. If you missed, you might tear the dough. To do so, you need lots and lots of oil. I don't really like playing with oil, coz it's kinda icky. Anyway, it's a good adventure. hihihi
Here are the pics of my dinner: Roti Canai and Beef Thai Curry

Nutella Cupcake

Feel like to bake this weekend...
While searching for cake/cookies recipe, I stumbled on lots and lots of websites which featured cupcakes. I thought.. why not. Since usually the recipe is for 12 cupcakes, they are small. There are only 2 people in the house, so I'm not looking forward for a big cake. So cupcake it is! I spent Saturday getting all the ingredients.
Before that, I have to decide on one recipe from all the recipes what I found on the net. For first timer, I thought Nutella cupcake could be the winner. Nutella always taste good.. so I can't go wrong there!

So here is the recipe:

Nutella Frosted Cupcakes
10 tbsp(140 grams) butter, softened
3/4 cup white sugar
3 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 3/4 cups (200 grams) sifted ap flour
1/4 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
Nutella, approx. 1/3 cup

Preheat oven to 325F. Line 12 muffin tins with paper liners.
Cream together butter and sugar until light, 2 minutes. Add in eggs one at a time, until fully incorporated. Don't worry if the batter doesn't look smooth. Add vanilla. Stir in flour, salt and baking powder until batter is uniform and no flour remains.
Using an ice cream scoop, fill each muffin liner with batter. They should be 3/4 full, if you're not using a scoop. Top each cake with 1 1/2 tsp Nutella. Swirl Nutella in with a toothpick, making sure to fold a bit of batter up over the nutella.
Bake for 20 minutes.
Remove to a wire rack to cool completely.
Makes 12.

Here is the cupcake! Just spread the top with nutella and sprinkle some multicolor chocolate rice... (The cupcake burnt a bit coz I put on quite high temperature huhuhu)

A dose of Vitamin C

In line with eating healthy, we bought an orange presser machine!
It's easy to use, and easy to clean as well.
It consists of basically 3 parts: the motor, the middle part where the juice flows and the top part where we press the halved orange

Oranges (I bought those sold in netted bag). Cut them into half.

Ready to be used..


Just press down the halved orange and this will start the motor and the top part will turn.


Left only the skiinnn..


Mmm.... a dose of Vitamin C. No sugar added, no preservative..

Grilled Salmon and Salad

Salad?!! yes my friend.. you read it right! I started to eat Salad in hope to live healthy (read: lose weight)
The white thingy in the salad is Feta cheese. Just to give a stronger taste to the salad. The reason I hate salad is because vegetables have this earthy taste.. bleergghh...
But this meal is great and I think healthy hihihi...

Steamed caramel cupcake + Strawberry Chiffon Cake

The last time I did steamed cupcake was the Apam Kukus Pondan, made from a ready-made flour.
This time I made an attempt to make cakes from scratch! I bought some incredible things such as soda bicarbonate, cream of tartar and strawberry essence. Hehehehe..
So I braved myself last Sunday to make not one but TWO types of cakes. One is a steamed-type and another is a oven-baking-type.

Steamed caramel cupcake (Apam Gula Hangus - literally translated: Burnt Sugar Steamed Cupcake)
I started off with this one, because just need to add everything (caramelized sugar, eggs, among other things) and then put the liquid into the paper cupcakes, as seen below.



As my bamboo steamer is medium size, so I need to do them 4 by 4.
Here is the result.... hehehe...





Strawberry Chiffon Cake
While the first batch of steam cupcake is steaming, I started the mixing of chiffon cake. OK this is a very difficult cake to do for first timer. Unless you've made this with someone who is experienced in chiffon cake, do not dream that the chiffon cake will be perfect. However, that didn't deter me from making it hehehee.
For chiffon cake, I need to do 2 different mixing, one mixing is with the egg yolks, flour, etc. And another mixing (in a separate bowl), I need to whip the egg whites to become foam with pointy soft peak, and with the help of cream of tartar.
I didn't take the pictures of the-making-of because I was so psyched about making this cake.
Mind you, I whipped all my cakes by hand.. No machine used!!

I know that somewhere along the way I might have done something un-chiffon. But heck! I need to try this hehehe.. Another un-chiffon thing I did was I didn't use tube pan.. hahahaha.. The reason is that I don't want to waste money on tube pan. I bought aluminium rectangle cake pan.
So here is the result:







Kissing cakes... mmmmm...



The taste is yummy, it has the strawberry taste. I like. It also has the spongy texture, but it should be double the height and has more air inside it.
To give you an idea, this is what the chiffon cake should look like (kekekke)

Rendang, Ketupat and Mini Nasi Impit

Look what I found in my collection of Malaysian foods!
I have all what it takes to make a nice Hari Raya dish hehehe...
I asked my mom to send Nasi Impit instant because for once I like to eat nasi impit without having to impit (packed) the rice in the tupperware.
So my mom sent them to me, and in addition, it is the mini nasi impit!
(note: Nasi means rice, Impit/Himpit means packed)
I never had Mini nasi impit before.
It is like 6 times smaller than the normal Nasi Impit instant.
So here is what the Mini Nasi Impit looks like when it's out from boiling water and the rice is cooked. It took about 60-90 minutes to cook them.



Nasi Impit with the classic side dishes: Beef Rendang, and Serunding Daging (beef floss)


This is what my hubby had. Poissons panés avec des petites boules...