Crispy Banana Fritters with Spicy Soy Dipping Sauce

I have been eyeing on trying this snack during MFF - Johor when I saw the fritters made by Gertrude of My Kitchen Snippets
I found it's an odd way of eating banana fritters dipped in spicy soya sauce. To me, soya sauce and anything with chilli are not to mix with any sweet treat
Anyhow, curiosity won me over and I gave it a try. My thought was, in any case, if I can't eat them together, I just use the dipping sauce to eat grilled fish or chicken :)
So, here it is...

 

 

Recipe is from My Kitchen Snippets

(she made a combination of banana and sweet potato fritters)

 

What you need:

 

For the batter:

(blend everything together)

200ml water

110g plain flour

25g rice flour

50g butter, room temp

1/2 tsp turmeric powder

3/4 tsp salt

4 bananas (I used pisang raja), sliced

oil for deep frying

 

For the dipping sauce:

2 bird eye's chillies

1 clove of garlic

1 tsp sugar

enough of dark sweet soya sauce

 

Method:

1. Heat oil over medium heat
2. Dip sliced bananas into the butter and then put into hot oil. Fry til golden. Remove from oil and drain on paper towel
3. Making the dipping sauce: Grind bird eye's chillies , garlic and sugar using chopper, transfer into a small bowl. Pour in dark sweet soya sauce and mix well. Serve with fritters

 

First bite, I was like no, it's not for me. Second bite, third bite..actually, it's not that bad. It's a kind of blending pretty nicely inside your mouth, sweet and salty plus some spiciness all in one

Ask me whether I will eat banana fritters this way again in the future, I honestly say it's not my personal preference. But it's a good experience though, I'm glad I gave it a try :)

 

 

I like these banana fritters. Crisp on the outside, sweet and juicy on the inside. Nice!

 

This post is for Best Recipes for Everyone Mar2015 Event Theme: My Favourite Traditional Kueh by Fion of XuanHom's Mom and co-host by Joceline of Butter, Flour & Me

 

 

This post is linked to the event, Little Thumbs up organised by Doreen from my little favourite DIY and me, Bake for Happy Kids, hosted by Faeez from Bitter Sweet Spicy at this post

Sweet Potato Balls In Coconut Sauce (Kolak Biji Salak)

This sweet treat is popular in Indonesia, usually eaten warm as dessert
I myself like eating it both warm or cold, as dessert or simply as a snack

The name is widely known as 'Kolak Biji Salak' which I assume based on the resemblance from the shape of the little balls
Salak is one popular tropical fruit 'Salacca' and Biji is 'Seed'
Kolak is a term for desserts using sauce made of mainly coconut milk & palm sugar

 

 

Recipe is from Hesti's Kitchen

 

What you need:

 

For the sweet potato balls:

500g yellow flesh sweet potatoes - steamed and mashed while hot til smooth

100g tapioca starch

1/2 tsp salt

 

For the palm sugar sauce:

250g palm sugar

1/2 tsp salt

600ml water

2 pcs of pandan leaves

2 tbsp tapioca starch / sago flour, dilute with 2 tbsp water

 

For the coconut sauce:

(mix everything together and bring to boil while stirring occasionally)

250ml coconut milk

1/2 tsp salt

2 pcs of pandan leaves

 

Method:

1. Making the sweet potato balls: Mix evenly mashed sweet potato, tapioca starch and salt. Shape into little oblong shaped balls. Bring a pot of water to boil. Put in all the balls in it and let cook til all float. Drain and set aside
2. Making the palm sugar sauce: In a pot, mix in palm sugar, salt, water and pandan leaves. Bring to boil and then strain. Over medium fire, add in tapioca starch mixture and cook again til boiling and thickened
3. Add in sweet potato balls into the palm sugar sauce, let it boil for awhile and remove from heat
4. Just before serving, drizzle coconut sauce on top in each serving bowl

 

After drizzling with coconut sauce, stir everything in

 

 

 

Ready to eat! Mine was not so oblong nor round LOL

 

 

This post is for Best Recipes for Everyone Mar2015 Event Theme: My Favourite Traditional Kueh by Fion of XuanHom's Mom and co-host by Joceline of Butter, Flour & Me

 

 

 

Chia Seeds Banana Bread

Banana is one of my favourite fruit. Anything with banana, I surely will try
This recipe I saw is just one of so many banana bread recipes I'd like to try. But the use of chia seeds intrigued me to give it a try asap LOL
So here it is...

I got two side cracks instead of one at the centre LOL

It's bouncy when I touched the top :)

 

 

 

Recipe is from Sharon Lam of Delishar

 

What you need:

 

1 3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour (original recipe used 1 cup plain flour & 3/4 cup whole wheat flour)

1 tsp baking soda

3 tbsp chia seeds

1/4 tsp salt

3/4 cup sugar (I used fine brown sugar)

3 over ripe bananas, mashed

1/2 cup canola oil

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/3 cup buttermilk (I used low fat plain yoghurt)

2 eggs

 

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 165degC. Line a 20x10cm loaf pan
2. Mix mashed bananas, vanilla extract, sugar, yoghurt, and oil until combined
3. In another mixing bowl whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, and chia seeds
4. Add wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. Mix until just combined. A little visible flour traces are fine. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan
5. Bake for 1 hour 20 mins or until skewer inserted comes out clean

 

Very easy to make, it's soft, moist, full of banana flavour with a slight crunch from the chia seeds. Delicious!

A slice of yumminess :)

 

 

 

This post is linked to the event, Little Thumbs up organised by Doreen from my little favourite DIY and me, Bake for Happy Kids, hosted by Faeez from Bitter Sweet Spicy at this

 

 

ABC March 2015 Lemoniest Little Lemon Loaf

This is one light, fluffy, fine textured cake with a hint of lemon taste in every bite, love it!
A bake for Avid Bakers Challenge (ABC) hosted by Hanaa's Kitchen, where we will be baking using recipes taken from Scientifically Sweet, a blog by Christina Marsigliese


Too bad I couldn't get browned crust on top and the sides. Look at how pale my cake is. It's like there's something missing from this cake, so incomplete without the beautiful brown crust :(
I reckoned it's because of the position of the oven rack. I should have placed on the higher rack. By the time I realized it, the cake has been fully baked I didn't want to bake further

The changes I did:

• I replaced 1/3 of the flour used with whole wheat pastry flour
• I used caster sugar instead of granulated sugar

You may view the full recipe HERE

One of the cake I definitely will bake again, and I will make sure I will get the browned crust in the future :)

This post is for Avid Baker's Challenge January 2015, a baking event hosted by Hanaa from Hanaa's Kitchen 

 

 

Braised Seabass & Other Food I Cooked 4 Chinese New Year

I know Chinese New Year was just over, I just want to share what I have been cooking during the festive season this year :)

This year, there was only 1 new dish I cooked for Chinese New Year
The rest were dishes I did last year, simply because I was craving to eat them again :)

Here is the new dish, braised seabass
Recipe is from Peng's Kitchen, she used red snapper instead

This is a must try dish, really delicious!

 

What you need:

1 whole seabass (or red snapper)
3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
50g spring onion, finely sliced
6 large dried shitake mushrooms, soaked til soft and sliced (original recipe only used 3, but I love mushrooms so I added LOL)
300ml water
2 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tsp ikan bilis stock powder
1 tsp sugar
2 tsp light soya sauce
1 tsp dark soya sauce
1 tbsp shallot oil
dash of pepper
red chilli and spring onion for garnish (I skipped)

Method:

1. Rinse fish and pat dry. Heat some oil in wok, add in fish and pan-fry for 5mins til light brown. Flip over and fry another 5mins. Drain and set aside
2. Heat 1 tbsp oil in the same wok. Add in garlic, spring onion and mushrooms and stir quickly for 30secs. Stir in remaining ingredients and slide in fish. Cover wok and bring to boil. Cook over medium heat til sauce reduced by half. Dish up and serve immediately

 

 

Other dishes I did were Cantonese Pan Fried Prawns I also cooked last year, and a simple fried noodle dish with eggs, pork balls and fish cake slices

Recipe for the prawn dish can be viewed HERE

 

 

 

The fried noodles is just a simple one

I made scrambled eggs and set aside. Also I prepared egg noodles as per instruction in the packaging, after draining I mixed in fish sauce and a little canola and sesame oil to the noodles.

Then I sautéed minced garlic, add in sliced fish cakes and pork balls, stir in soya sauce, oyster sauce, salt and pepper then mix everything well

Add in noodles, followed by the scrambled eggs, toss and serve immediately

 

 

 

 

The last dish I cooked also this year was the Fish Maw with Mushroom Stew. This year I added some enoki mushrooms
Too bad I didn't take any pic of the dish this year
Anyway you may view the recipe for the delicious dish HERE

Picture taken last year:

 

So, there you are, all of my cooking aside from the usual steamboat I always have for the eve of Chinese New Year. You should try too, all are really yummy :)

Nutella Huat Kueh

A very simple to make, and it yields yummy, nice, fluffy, soft huat kueh
This is the fourth huat kueh I tried this year, the easiest too, and the one gave me the best result, really gave me big 'huat' LOL

The first recipe I tried - using yeast, didn't bloom at all, instead the tops were beautifully rounded haha... Texture also a little too chewy and yeasty
The second recipe - using soda drink (I used Fanta orange since it was orange huat kueh) was a disaster. It did bloom quite okay but it's not cake, it's tough and chewy like rubber. I tried this recipe twice and it came out exactly the same :(
The third recipe was actually can be considered a success but it didn't bloom as big as I wanted to. Texture and taste was good, though

All of them ended up in rubbish bin - except the third recipe which I enjoyed eating
I tried those recipes using oranges. All in all, I wasted eight of them, and I guess about 3/4 kg of flour, not to mention the other ingredients and gas from steaming them. What a loss!

I did huat kueh twice some years back, using two different recipes, and had no problem at all. So right now I'm so curious and have a mission to conquer those three recipes. But after the failures, I just waited for my mood to set in
And then, this morning, I saw Victoria from Victoria Bakes posted this huat kueh
OMG! Nutella huat kueh? Nutella? Okay, let's do it now! Furthermore, today is the 15th day of Chinese New Year, perfect time! :)
So, here it is, mission accomplished! :)

 

 

What you need:

(below is double recipe, makes 8)

 

240g cake / top flour

10g baking powder (I used double acting)

270g fresh milk

200g Nutella (original recipe used 90g for one recipe but feedback was not sweet enough, so I increased the amount a little)

some semi sweet chocolate chips (my addition) 

 

Method:

1. Preheat steamer over high heat. Prepare individual muffin aluminium cup lined with muffin case
2. Sieve flour and baking powder in a large bowl. Pour in milk and mix well - batter is thick and sticky
3. Add in Nutella, stir well. Lastly, add in chocolate chips, mix well
4. Spoon batter into the muffin cups until full, and steam for 15 mins
5. Off heat and let them sit inside the steamer for another 3 mins before removing the lid

 

Things to take note when making huat kueh:

• Steamer must be really hot (boiling water) when putting in the cups - put them in fast
• Spoon batter til full in order for them to bloom beautifully
• Batter must be really thick and not pourable
• Do not open steamer at all while steaming the cakes
• Cover steamer lid so the condensation water will not drip onto the cakes

 

See some chocolate chips here and there? I didn't put in a lot cos I didn't want to put too much weight to the batter - I'm not sure if my theory correct, I was thinking they will not be able to huat perfectly if I add to o much chocolate chips :)
To think again, I should have used chocolate rice instead, Will do so in the future :)

Another thing you see? Yes, some white dots! I must have not mixed the wet and dry ingredients evenly enough. Luckily it didn't affect the taste  and texture :)

Soft, fluffy, and yummy!

Somehow after adding the amount of Nutella, I still find it's not sweet enough. However, the chocolate chips does help :)

 

 

 

For the other three recipes I mentioned above, I will definitely update you all when I manage to conquer them! :)

 

 

This post is for Best Recipes for Everyone Mar2015 Event Theme: My Favourite Traditional Kueh by Fion of XuanHom's Mom and co-host by Joceline of Butter, Flour & Me

 

 

 

To all, Happy Cap Goh Meh! :)