Indonesian Style Chicken Rice In Coconut Sauce (Nasi Ayam Semarang)

Indonesia is so big that even chicken rice has many different types
One of them which is I'm familiar with is the one originated from Semarang, the capital city of Central Java province
The city where I was born, hence my enthusiasm in practising to cook this dish :)

It's mainly coconut rice accompanied by a few dishes which are also cooked in coconut milk
Yum yum yum... Yeah, Indonesians love to cook dishes with coconut milk
God knows how the cholesterol level in this dish LOL
Such a big frustration to know yummy stuff is usually not recommended by dietitians wew....

What I cooked was the coconut rice accompanied by stir fry chayote in spicy coconut sauce, chicken and also eggs & tofu cooked in coconut sauce
Only 3 dishes to accompany the rice but it's pretty tedious to prepare even though it's worth the trouble since it cant be found anywhere in Singapore :)

Here's the recipe - it's from my mum...

For the coconut rice:

300g uncooked rice
100ml coconut milk (I mixed 60ml Kara coconut cream and 40ml water)
1 tsp salt
320ml water
3 pandan leaves

1. Rinse rice and combine well with coconut milk, salt and water
2. Set aside for 10-20 minutes, then add pandan leaves and cook in rice cooker

For the chicken dish:

1 chicken, cut

Blend together:
*1/2 tbsp coriander seeds, mix with a little water and grind
*5 shallots, chopped
*4 cloves of garlic, crushed
*a thumb size of turmeric, peeled and chopped
*a pinch of belachan (fried prawn paste)
*6 candlenuts - grated

2 bay leaves
water
salt, sugar
5 tbsp Kara coconut cream

1. Boil chicken with blended ingredients and bay leaves, water, salt and sugar
2. When the chicken half cooked, add in coconut cream and bring to boil
3. Lower down the heat, and simmer til thick coconut layer surfaced
4. Scoop the thick layer and transfer to a small pot, set aside
5. Bring the chicken to boil and off heat

For the tofu and eggs dish:

the thick coconut layer from the chicken
water
1 bay leaf
3 blocks of firm tofu - cut and fried til golden brown

5 eggs
2 cloves of garlic - crushed
palm sugar
tamarind paste mixed with water, mix well and strain
salt
dark sweet soya sauce (kecap manis)

1. First, cook the eggs first: Boil eggs for 15 minutes approx, drain and peel. In a small pot, boil the peeled eggs together with garlic, water, palm sugar, a little tamarind juice, salt, and dark sweet soya sauce. Bring to boil and simmer for 15minutes, til eggs browned - off heat and drain eggs
2. Mix thick coconut layer with water, add in bay leaf, fried tofu and the cooked eggs 
3. Bring to boil and simmer til thickened

For the stir fry chayote dish:

 

2 chayotes, peel and julienned, mix with salt and squeeze by hand - rinse well, set aside

4 shallots, sliced

1 clove of garlic, crushed

a pinch of belachan (fried prawn paste)

1 tbsp blended red chillis (smooth)

water

2 tbsp coconut milk

salt, sugar, oil

1. Heat oil in a pan, stir fry shallots, garlic, belachan til fragrant
2. Add in chillis and add water
3. Add in coconut milk, followed by salt, sugar and bring to boil
4. Adjust the taste
5. Add in shayote, stir well briefly and off heat

Scoop coconut rice in a serving plate, together with chicken, tofu, egg and chayote

Serve immediately

Just to share, back there in the origin city, people serve this rice dish on a plate made of banana leaf and eat with spoon made of banana leaf. Somehow, eating this way makes the dish taste even more yummy but it needs skill and practice to master eating with the spoon, not so easy :)

I googled to let you see how the spoon looks like... here it is:

You see the long slim rectangle thing on your right side? That's the spoon :)

I guess this is another great dish to fill you up for those fasting..

I submit this post to LBT Ramadhan dishes August 2012

THB #7 - Blueberries Coffee Cake

I shared a silly story...
It happened yesterday morning when I just woke up around 7am
I checked my handphone and read Zoe's comment in my previous posting about her early post for this cake and I was literally jumped out of the bed and quickly on my pc
I was like, oh God I'm late! I haven't posted the cake I hosted! Silly silly silly... how can I forget!!!
So I quickly edited the pictures, and started typing while the rest of the family having their breakfast. DH looked at me typing my blog post cluelessly cos it's a rare sight to see me doing that in the early morning
While typing halfway I was like, eeerrr... today is 10th? Or 9th?
Then I realized that it was the 9th! An immediate feeling of relief filled me in from head to toe. Oh, I'm not late, I'm not late...yippee!
So I just continued typing and saved it and here it is, posted right in time LOL

A silly story about somebody so blur like me hahahahaha....

Ok, back to business..
I must say I am happy, really happy to have chosen this recipe
It's delicious soft cake with nice fine texture bursting with the juiciness of the berries in every bite
I used blueberries this time since I had many instock and they're quite sweet with a hint of tanginess which complimented well with the sweetness of the cake
Oh, not to forget the chopped almond on top, such a heavenly experience when I sunk my teeth on the cake, the crunchiness worked perfectly well with the cake
Yum!

I mixed the berries with the batter after coating them with a little flour
I baked half recipe and used cupcakes mould for intake control - which still didn't work, cos everytime I passed my dining area and bumped my eyes on them, I would go and grab them LOL

Here's the recipe:
(half recipe)

What you need:

114g (4 ounces) cream cheese at room temperature
57g (4 tbsp) unsalted butter at room temperature
85g (half of 3/4 cup) granulated sugar
30ml (1/8 cup)fresh milk
1 large egg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt
1 1/2 cup fresh blueberries + 1 tsp plain flour
25g (1/8 cup) firmly packed brown sugar
1/4 cup chopped almonds

1. Preheat oven to 175degC
2. Lay cupcake liners on cupcake tray
3. In a large bowl, combine cream cheese, butter and granulated sugar and beat with electric mixer til light and fluffy
4. Stir in milk, eggs, vanilla, beat thoroughly
5. In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt. Stir to blend
6. Add to the cheese mixture and beat til smooth
7. Mix in flour coated blueberries into the batter, stir gently to avoid the batter turned blueish in color
8. Spoon the batter in the prepared pan
9. Mix brown sugar and nuts together and sprinkle evenly over the batter
10. Bake for 30 minutes or til the cake is golden brown and cake tester skewer comes out clean
11. Let cool and serve warm or room temperature

This half recipe gave me 11 standard size cupcakes

I'm so happy that with a blink of an eye, it's already the 7th bake of The Home Bakers, and event hosted by Joyce
The recipes are from the book Coffee Cakes by Lou Seibert Pappas
Please check out the site and other members' bakes and you're too most welcomed to participate - trust me, you'll have fun! :)

Homemade Muah Chee (Happy Call)

This simple yummy sweet chewy crunchy snack is DH's favorite
So glad I could make this, and it's surprisingly so simple using Happy Call pan :)

Recipe is from Ellena's site

What you need:

1 cup glutinuous rice flour
1 cup water
1/2 tsp sugar
2 tbsp shallot oil
Peanut powder with sugar for coating (I bought ready to use pack)

1. Sautee 4 shallots, thinly sliced with 2 tbsp oil on Happy Call pan over low heat til golden brown, remove shallot and leave the oil in the pan
2. Mix flour and sugar in a bowl, slowly stir in water, whisk til combined
3. Over medium low heat, heat shallot oil, swirl in the flour mixture slowly, stir with wooden spoon til form soft dough
4. Lower heat, continue to toss and cook the dough 3-5 minutes depending on the heat til dough is smooth and slightly transparent on the surface
5. Remove and set aside on an oiled container
6. Just before serving, coat with peanut powder and cut into bite size

Note:
* The process can be done in 15 minutes max
* I usually double the recipe above for the whole family to enjoy - my parents and sister - that is, not my kids :)

Chicken Corn Patties & Some Awards

The whole family loves these chicken patties so much, packed with added goodness from corn and french beans
A way to make my kids, especially Ian, to eat vegetables :)

I love to dip it in bottled chilli sauce but won't say no if I have to eat it plain :)

Here's the recipe, from Food4Tots

What you need:
(wigh slight modification)

200g minced chicken
1/2 large fresh corn on the cob
10 strings of fine French beans – finely diced
1 small red onion – minced
½ cup panko crumb
2 ½ tbsp cornflour
1 large egg (lightly beaten)
2 tsp canola oil

Seasoning:
1 tsp salt
¾ tsp sugar
dash of pepper

1. Put chicken breast, sweet corns, fine french beans and red onion into a mixing bowl and combine well. Add in breadcrumb and cornflour to the mixture
2. Add in egg, seasoning and oil. Mix well
3. Heat a little oil in a non-stick pan. Drop 1 heaped tbsp of batter into the pan and flatten slightly with a spatula/ fork. Lower heat and cook for 2-3 minutes on each side or until golden brown

I served the patties with the vegetable dish below, stir fry xia peck chye with enoki mushroom in oyster sauce, which I posted before
Recipe can be viewed here

Enjoyed the simple dishes yet yummy and nutritious :)

Now, a thank you message for Angeline from Angeline's Side Of Story and Jasline from Food Is My Life for passing me some awards... Thank you!
Do check out their fabulous blogs and enjoy their wonderful creations :)

This award is from Angeline

And this one is from Jasline

And I must apologize to Jasline for posting up the awards she passed to me last April!

I'm so sorry Jasline, I guess I must have been busy baking LOL

Here's the award:

The Versatile Blogger Award requirement is to pass the award to 15 bloggers while Reader Appreciation Award and ABC award require less, hence I'm passing all these three awards to these lovely and inspirational 15 bloggers below:

 1. No Frills Recipes

 2. Blog With Yan

 3. Peng's Kitchen

 4. Let's Get Wokking

 5. Jessie - Cooking Moments

 6. Piece Of Cake

 7. Angeline's Side Of Story

 8. Simple Baking

 9. From Taiping With Love

10. Cook With No Books

11. Food Is My Life

12. Kitchen Flavours

13. Bake For Happy Kids

14. Food 4 Tots

15. Hesti's Kitchen

Please check out their outstanding blogs, you'll not regret!

They do deserve to get the awards :)

Sharing 7 things about myself is also one of requirement for The Versatile Blogger Award

So here it is...

1. I have a sweet tooth, but crazy about savoury stuff too! I just can't choose, it depends on my mood of that time

2. I can't shop alone, I'll end up buying things I don't need, but I love shopping alone!

3. I love washing dishes!

4. I have to nap! No time? Short one will do!

5. This is bad ---> Throwing and banging things will make me feel better when I'm angry! Oooppsss!

6. I am bad in remembering faces, so please bear with me if we meet before and the next day we bump into each other in another place and I can't recognize you!

7. I used to hate nuts and anything with nuts, but now I love love love munching them!

I have ever shared another 7 things about myself for another award

You may view it HERE

ABC award requires me to share things about myself in alphabetical order A-Z

For this, I really need time - hope you all understand, this really needs time to think :P

Thank you again, Angeline and Jasline, I have passed back the awards to you, simply cos I have to choose you too!

These awards do give encouragement in the things we love and passionate about - blogging and spending time in the kitchen LOL

Have a great week!

Green Banana Roll Ice Dessert (Es Pisang Ijo) - Another Recipe

My second time making this dessert after coicidently found my beloved pisang raja
This time I used Hesti's recipe
What can be more authentic than making this dessert using recipe from somebody originally from its origin? Yes, es pisang ijo is originally from Makassar (Southern Sulawesi proveince in Indonesia) and Hesti is from there and still lives there :)
The first es pisang ijo I made almost a year ago used different recipe which tastes as nice, though. I didn't shape it nicely that time
Well, even this time was not too neat, either, but slightly better :)
And this time I didn't put enough green color it turned out to be too pale, while last time I put too much green color til it was so bright hahaha...
Anyway, we enjoyed it so much. 10 big pieces finished overnight LOL

Eaten with 'campolay syrup' from Indonesia (picture can be viewed HERE) and the thick coconut sauce, plus some crushed ice - you'll forget how many calories it is in the bowl LOL

What you need:

(with slight modification)

The banana roll:

150g plain flour

50g rice flour

400ml coconut milk (I mixed 250ml kara and 150ml water)

100ml pandan water (5 pieced of pandan leaves blended together with 100ml water and strained)

1/2 tsp salt

1 tbsp heaped sugar

1 tbsp margarine

10 pcs very ripe pisang raja - steamed

a few drops of green coloring ( I reckon 7-10 drops will give nice color)

The sauce:

1200ml coconut milk (I mixed 700ml kara and 500ml water)

150g rice flour

1/2 tsp salt

175g sugar

2 pieces pandan leaves

How to make the banana roll:

1. Mix together plain flour, rice flour, sugar, salt, pandan water and coconut milk til smooth, strain if neccesary
2. Pour in a pan (I used 18cm square), steam til cooked, around 25 minutes
3. While still hot, pour the dough in a large mixing bowl and add margarine, knead til smooth
4. (wrap one of your hand, the one you use to knead, with a clean cloth and put in the wrapped hand in a hear proof plastic)
5. Divide dough into 10, flatten with rice cooker spoon, arrange banana on the flatten round dough, roll slowly like rolling swissroll and shape like a banana
6. Wrap each banana roll with clingwrap and steam on medium fire for approximately 15 minutes
7. Transfer the rolls on serving plate, unwrap, let cool

How to make the sauce:

1. Mix all ingredients in a pot and bring to boil over medium fire while stirring constantly
2. Keep stirring til the sauce thickened

Serve cold with campolay syrup, crushed ice and the sauce

This refreshing dessert is a perfect companion for those break fasting :)

I submit this post to LBT Ramadhan dishes August 2012

ABC August 2012 - Pluots & Black Plums Galette Pizza

Please don't laugh when you see the pics below
It's 100% intention in baking galette but turned out to be pizza like, I didn't know whether I should cry or laugh LOL

My galette pizza - that's how I named it, it's a miracle that I still could see the edges, even though it sagged and couldn't cover the fruits at the sides
If you see there's one point on the right side where some of the juices has leaked out during baking

It started when I decided to make half of the recipe
I did write down in the book - the quantity I needed for half recipe, but somehow I misread some
One, the amount of water for the dough was 30 ml (half recipe)
I was dreaming - I'm sure, that I read it as 300ml and I realized it when I have poured all
I quickly poured the balance of the water but I guess some has mixed up with the dry ingredients
Two, I misread the quantity of the lemon juice. It should have been 1 tbsp for half recipe, I used two
Two solid reasons for a chaotic kind of dough
I tried to add more flour and keep in the chiller for longer time, but when doing the rolling, all were back to square one
It's very fast turning to sticky dough even though I used lots of flour as a help, I had to be fast to trasnfer it to the baking tray and continue to flatten the dough by hand
Piling up the fruits at the centre and it's a nightmare when I tried to lift up all the edges, very frustrating but there's no turning back at that point of time
So I just tried the best I could and brushed it with milk and at the same time tried to lift up again with the brush
Once it's inside the oven, it started to sag slowly which I witnessed with broken heart but I couldn't do anything. Angry for being so blur wew....
After it's cooked  (about 50 minutes), I took out the tray from the oven and I could see a big pool of leaked black burnt sugar
Luckily I could easily separate the galette away from the sugar
I quickly transferred it to the serving plate and that's what you saw in the pic above

Texture of the crust was not too bad, even though I knew it should have been better
Taste wise, it's good but it looked a little wrinkly here and there

For the filling, I followed the recipe exactly - halved
it's funny how these fruits were still so sour after the additional sugar I made
Yes, the black plums were sour, but the pluots were real sweet and also the sweet glaze, not to forget. Perhaps I just omit the lemon juice the next time I bake this again using not so sweet fruits

I had no oranges in the fridge so I just used sweet orange jam mixed with apple juice for the glaze

These are the fruits I used, one at the left side is pluot and two at the right side are black plums

This post is for Avid Baker's Challenge (ABC) August 2012 hosted by Hanaa

Recipe is from the book The Weekend baker by Abigail Johnson Dodge

Please hop on ABC's site to view other bakers' galettes

Chicken & Prawn Balls Soup

A simple recipe from my mum
A typical dish loved by kids especially :)

What you need:

15 medium size prawns - deshelled, deveined, cut into small pieces
1 boneless chicken breast, diced
1 shallot - sliced
2 cloves of garlic - sliced
enough sago flour
1 egg white
salt, pepper

1. Put all ingredients in the food processor, adjust the taste
2. Keep in the fridge for around 30 minutes

To make soup:

1 chicken bone
3 cloves of garlic - crushed
1 carrot - thinly sliced
2 stalks of spring onion - cut small
fried garlic from 5 cloves of garlic - sliced thinly and fry til golden brown
a pot of water
salt, pepper, 1/2 cube chicken stock

1. Bring to boil a pot of water with chicken bone and chicken stock
2. After boiling, scoop in the balls (I used 1 tbsp measuring cup), let cook til all float
3. Add in carrot, simmer for approximately 5 minutes til it gets softer
4. Add salt, pepper and adjust the taste
5. Bring to boil and off heat
6. Add in chopped spring onion and fried garlic

We love to eat this soup with a bowl of rice and garlic chilli sauce