Laksa : my two versions

Felt like having "laksa Penang" (northern style rice noodle) yesterday but I'd yet to find one that really suit my palate nearby. So I decided to make it myself.

But whilst making it I was watching the food channel and it showed one chef making a different version of noodle gravy..,

oh my, and I craved to have both.......hahaha..

First I made the gravy for "Laksa Penang"..with its main ingredients "daun kesom" (laksa leaves), "bunga kantan" (ginger flower)..lots of "asam keping" (for sour taste) and little bit of "belacan" (shrimp paste)...and fish flakes of course. :-)

While the gravy was boiling..made another one with another half of the fish flakes. I didn't make the TV version as I felt like having my home state version, "Laksa kuah merah Terengganu".

But as I'd never done it before, I searched for the recipe on the net. This version used coconut milk and curry powder.

So "Laksa Penang" for lunch :

and "Laksa Terengganu" for dinner,

and the result was not bad if I may say so myself....not bad for my first attempt...hehehe...

:-)

Chef: but not a master

Last weekend I tried making this fruit tart using the recipe that I got from watching the food channel ;

...not bad but the pastry crust too sweet for me, need to make adjustment on the sugar...

At noon today, suddenly had a craving for thin crust pizza..I know I had a pack of multipurpose pastry in my fridge.

However, I needed time to defrost it, so decided to make the dough myself, but too lazy (HAHA) to check the recipe so made up my own :-D.

Not thin crust though...

Into the oven for 15 minutes

Opened a can of tomatoes

Added leftover of beef bolognese sauce from the freezer

Some frozen veggies

Slices of chicken sausage, leftover from breakfast ;

Grated cheese ~ had Gouda and no Parmesan cheese

TA DA !

hehehe...

After that "treat", did some spring cleaning but I still had time to chat with friends at "Whatsapp" and check on my FB..hahaha..

and at one point, saw that I was tagged in one photo (the following picture is from mr google) :

She said it was for someone "who's busy cleaning the house"....,

mmmm..I can still remember the taste of that fruit salad ice cream when I had it few days ago during lunch with her.

Now I have the craving for it...but have to wait until tomorrow to buy it, as I cannot make it...hahaha...

:-)

3rd day of Syawal - the bolognese.

When my sister said that she'd like me to teach her my version of spaghetti bolognese, I said ok and we went shopping to buy the ingredients the evening of 2nd day of Syawal (and my..some racks were empty and the lines at the check-out counters were long!..we thought we'd be the odd ones out shopping..hahaha..)

Anyway..the next day, it ended up me making it basically by myself as my sister was doing something else...[and she wasn't confident enough to cook it as Nazeem's friend, who loved bolognese and his family were coming :-D]

The whole big pot of it with my "little" helpers ~ Nazeem, Faraheen and Batrisyia.

My version of the sauce was (and has always been) different from the original Italian or any other western versions. But my mum loved it, as with the rest of my family at home (and our guests too.. Alhamdulillah)

While I was busy making that, Batrisyia said she wanted to try making fruity ice-blended :

She did, and a nice one too!

:-)

* Mother's day * - change of venue...

We wanted to treat mak for "mother's day" hi-tea at her favourite place like we did last year, but she didn't agree to our suggestion so we decided to cook something at home for today's lunch instead.

"Chicken Briyani rice"

"Dessert ~ cumi with fruit cocktails"

"Fried stuffed to-fu"

My sister-in-law happened to drop by and brought this "pulut kuning" :

"WE LOVE YOU MAK"...praying for your happiness and may you be blessed always..amiin.

:-)

Lontong : modified

With the rice cube ready, this morning the "sayur lodeh" (veggies cooked in coconut milk) was prepared...and as I was going to meet some friends for a little discussion, brought the "Lontong" dish to their home for brunch.

As "lontong" has always been one of my favourite food, I was a little upset that it didn't turn out as nice as I would have like [even though my friends said it did :-)]

I told them its "below par", I'd forgotten some veggie and also I didn't prepare the sambal or even brought the "serunding" ..hehehe..

Even though I'd yet to eat anything this morning, I didn't enjoy much of this..

Came back and slightly modified the one at home...,

and ta-da...

I love lots of veggie :-)

That's more like it.

mmmm...and I had a second helping..hehe..

:-)

Weekend eve..

Just now was feeling rather blue,

And didn't know what to do,

Before I start to yawn.

Thought of cooking omelette with prawn,

I'd yet to unfold my legs,

When I remembered there were no eggs,

But on the stove now are some cubed rice,

Having that for lunch tomorrow would be nice.

For tonight need to have the supper,

Can't go to sleep with hunger,

So I boiled some water,

Going to dip those biscuits cracker.

** Have a pleasant weekend everyone **

:-)

Outcome of being to the market...

[Note : Food entry again..hehe]

This time round of "holidaying" in K.T, I'd gone to the market more times than usual..for Terengganu "kueh-mueh" (delicacies) mostly.....and on one of the trips, went to "survey" the wet market and tempted on seeing the so-fresh seafood, I ended buying some.. :-D.

This afternoon, I was running quite late in preparing lunch before leaving for K.L. Then Batrisyia came and asked if she could help me ~ she offered to cut the veggies..so sweet of her.

Whilst making one fish dish, I suddenly felt like eating fish fried in batter..and with the help of my niece, who gathered the ingredients that I asked for and did the mixing of the batter...,

Here's the result :

Thumbs-up to her indeed :-)

Thank you very much "cik manis" :-)

My little helper, soon to be 8-years old Batrisyia (and btw, thank you so much for all the birthday wishes to her in the previous entry..appreciate the thought)

Thumbs-up from "Wan" as well after I'd given her the credit. :-)

Notice little fingers up there?..hehe

Brought back some of that to K.L along with the other dish that I made :

Fried Siakap (sea bass?) in soy sauce

Back in K.L and had that for dinner few hours ago, luckily mum insisted that I brought back some cooked rice as well, if not I'd have to be in the kitchen again..hehe.

:-)

Stuffed Tofu @ Bean Curds

a.k.a "tauhu sumbat" ...I've always love it..the veggie ones that is..and I prefer it with peanut sauce to chili sauce.

On Saturday after the Putrajaya trip, whilst doing grocery shopping I remembered the stuffed tofu that we had at I.A's house during our trip and decided to make it.

We had this at I.A's house last year :-)

errr...I have the tendency of trying out recipes without referring to the notes, most of the time I'd try to recall from memory..of what I've watched or seen. Sometimes it would turn up right, sometimes it's not..,

like the recent times when I tried making scones and bread..they turned out hard like bricks (not that hard, a bit softer..hahaha.)

...and I digressed from tofu.. :-)

Anyway, I attempted making the stuffed tofu for that Saturday night:

Tofu stuffed with mixture of fish fillet etc, ready to be steamed.

After 10 minutes in the steamer

Fried ~ coated with egg and flour.

Thanks I.A for introducing this :-)

That batch was gone in a short while..made a second batch (slightly more) on Sunday evening and some are kept in the freezer...hehe..

*******

Benefits of tofu (info found online) :

Tofu

~ low in fat, calories, cholesterol..and an excellent source of high quality protein from non-meat foods.

~ rich in B-vitamins and contains a lot of calcium. Calcium helps in the prevention of osteoporosis - thinning of bone tissue and loss of bone density.

~ friendly to the digestive system as it is easy to digest due to the removal of soybean's fiber during the manufacturing process.

~ rich in isoflavones. Isoflavones reduces risk osteoporosis, breast and prostate cancers.

Most soy-foods, including tofu, helps in the reduction of cholesterol in our body. It helps maintain the level of good HDL cholesterol by lowering the levels of bad LDL cholesterol.

*******

:-)

Food : can't help it..

hehehe.. I love eating and luckily I'm quite okay being in the kitchen.

AND I could easily be "swayed" by the food that I see, hear it mention by someone or food that I come to think of..and then I would try to have it as soon as possible :-D

Fishball soup, and I added lots of so-un

Penang Laksa because I was thinking of "daun kesum"..haha

Muar noodle, after I read it at Hati Curio's blog..hehe..

After I saw a picture of lamb chop in someone's blog :-D

Yesterday felt like having "lontong" with "sayur lodeh" for Sunday so I cooked this "nasi impit"...

But for a reason today I had to change it to something else and hence the chicken soto :

Chicken soto for brunch today :

and whilst in the kitchen, made this as well ~ "rojak ikan"

Fish "gravy"/dressing with cucumber and fish crackers.

:-)