Chinese Pumpkin Sesame Cakes

I saw this Pumpkin Sesame Cakes in a Chinese cooking show recently.  It was a pumpkin recipes special and it featured this and a steamed variety.  For the steamed one, the cooking host shaped the dough into a little pumpkin and then steamed it until cooked.  She served it with some sort of sweet syrup.

I was attracted to this pan-fried version as it looked really tasty.  What's more I am also a big fan of sesame seeds so of course I had to give this recipe a try.  I was also curious of how it would taste like.

I gave it a bite to let you see the texture inside of this cake.  It tasted like nian gao, since it was made of glutinous rice flour I guess.  Slightly chewy and not bad at all.  Mine was not sweet enough, I would prefer it to be sweeter.

Remember to pan-frying it in low heat pan so that you won't burn the sesame seeds.  Sesame seeds burn easily in high heat.

Before pan-frying

Method:

Pumpkin,  cut the skin off, cut into half, seeded and save the seed to roast.

Cut pumpkin into slices.  Steam for 30 minutes or until soften.  Mash with a fork. Squeeze out the juice. Mix in some brown sugar, stir well.  Then add some glutinous rice flour until a dough is formed.  In a plate, spread out the white sesame seeds.  Roll the dough into a cylinder shape, cut and slightly roll it flat with your hand.  Coat both sides with sesame seeds.  Pan fry in low heat until golden brown on both sides.  Drain on paper towel.  Serve.

2 cups smashed pumpkin , 3/4 cup (less sweet)  to 1 cup of brown sugar (sweet).  I only used 1/2 cup of brown sugar and it was not sweet at all.  I think the original recipe was made without adding any sugar.

Green Tea Pumpkin Seeds

I always wanted to roast some pumpkin seeds.  My opportunity came when I had a bag of pumpkin seeds given by a library event (pumpkin carving) that we went to.  I loved green tea flavor and so automatically I wanted to try green tea flavored roasted pumpkin seeds.  This is definitely good and make a great snack.  Me and my girls all loved it.

Since this was slow roasted for an hour, we can certainly pop the whole thing in the mouth.  It's totally edible with extra fiber and crunch.  You can taste the green tea and salt.  Of course if you choose to just eat the seed, you can do that too. I did that while watching my korean drama.  LOL!

Ingredients:

1- 1 1/4 cup whole pumpkin seeds (cleaned, remove pulp and strings, wipe with paper towel and let dry)

1 Tbsp. canola oil

1/2 Tbsp. Kosher salt

1 tsp. green tea powder or matcha

Method:

1.  Preheat oven to 275'F.  Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil.

2.  Mix the ingredients in a bowl and spread it on the foil lined baking sheet.

3.  Bake for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.  Let cool and store in an air-tight container.

(Double the recipe for 2 cups of pumpkin seeds)

Water Chestnut Jelly Cake

If you have been reading my blog, you probably aware that I did this before but the plain version.   With the yellow rock sugar that I used, my water chestnut cake turned out white, not the result that I was looking for.  So, this time I played with the recipe and used Malaysia's Gula Melaka and added the chopped water chestnuts.  It turned out so much better, love the fragrant of Gula Melaka that I could taste with each bite as well as the added crunch from the water chestnuts.  It is really refreshing eaten it cold straight from the refrigerator.  I prefer this instead of pan-frying it with batter, less grease thus healthier.

This will be the way I am making this in the future until I am out of the Gula Melaka, then the other substitute that I could think of will be the Chinese brown sugar in bar shape.  That would give me the color that I want but with different fragrant.

Ingredients:

250g water chestnut flour (馬碲粉)

500ml water
1 5oz (141g) canned of diced water chestnuts
750ml water
350g  Gula Melaka

Method:

1. Open the canned of diced water chestnuts, drain, lightly rinse and chop into desired pieces.
2. Mix water chestnut flour with 500ml water and whisk to mix well.  Set aside.
3. Boil Gula Melaka with 750ml water until sugar dissolve. Add in the chopped chestnut pieces.
4. Pour water chestnut mixture into Gula Melaka solution and keep stirring until it turns transparent and thick.
5. Pour the thicken chestnut mixture into a well greased 8 inch pan.
6. Steam on high heat for 30-45 minutes.
7. Let it cool at room temperature and then cover with a plastic wrap and keep in the refrigerator for at least three hours.  Preferably overnight.
8. Slice and serve it cold.

Delicious Chocolate Banana Cupcakes

I had to put delicious up there in the title because it was delicious.  I used my marbled banana chocolate cake recipe and made it into chocolate banana cupcakes.  I invited few friends for a play date and decided to make something for coffee/tea in the afternoon.  I made this along with some chocolate chips cookies and I just realized all my snack have chocolate chips in it!

The cupcake was soft, moist, chocolaty and tasted like banana.  Truly delectable!  I added chocolate chips because my girls loved them.  I had to stop them from eating more because this was meant to be shared. ;)  At the play date, I noticed that all the kids would pick out the chocolate chips to eat first, my girls included. :)  If you like my recipes, put this on your to-try list, you won't be disappointed.

I saw this butterfly silicon cupcake cups at Target and had to buy it, it was 6 for $1 at the Dollar section, how cheap.  It was so cute too and I regretted I didn't pick up the flower silicon cups for the same price, as when I went back, it was all gone. :(  I guess you paid for quality too, this had some broken pieces and the silicon was pretty thin, but it's usable.

How it looked from the bottom. 

Ingredients:

(A)
1/2 cup + 2 Tbsp. sugar
1/4 cup canola oil (or vegetable oil)
1 large egg
1/4 cup milk (I used 1%)
2 bananas, smashed (I used frozen)

(B)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt

(C)
1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips, melted (microwave [900watt] for 1 min 40 seconds) 


Extra chocolate chips for decoration (optional)


Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 350'F. Line a baking pan with silicon cupcake cups or line some paper cups in muffin pan. Set aside.

2. In a big bowl, hand whisk together (A). Add in (B), whisk until well blended.

3. Add in (C) and whisk to combine.

4. Use a big spoon and scoop some of the batter into the silicon cups, slightly less than 3/4 full.  Place some chocolate chips on top for decoration (optional).

5. Bake for 20 minutes or until a bamboo stick inserted in center comes out clean.

6. Cool on wire rack and store in air-tight container.
 

Bak Kua (Chinese Pork Jerky)

Bak Kua, my all time favorite when I was a kid and now too.  Love to sandwich it in bread and have it as breakfast.  This is also one favorite for Chinese New Year, people give this as gift in Malaysia.  They also served this for people who visits their houses.  When I moved here, bak kua was non-existence.  All I found that was similar to this is American beef jerky which I couldn't stomach.  Then, four years ago, I found a very easy bak kua recipe shared by a fellow blogging friend.  I tried it and loved it and have been making it all these years.

 

This recipe is so easy to make and trust me it is really good.  The above has about 1lb. of ground pork, I thought I might be able to share with my friends until my hubby spotted it.  He never dared to try the bak kua I made all these years (he thinks it was yucky so more for us) and suddenly he came and grabbed a piece to try and kept coming back for more and more.  Needless to say, any food that he set his eyes on, will be gone in no time.  He only left few pieces for my girls and I.

Vietnamese Fried Springrolls (Cha Gio)

We loved Vietnamese fried spring rolls (Cha Gio). I loved the texture and crispiness of fried rice paper, it added a touch of difference from the usual fried Chinese spring rolls or egg rolls. It was quite pricey to order it in a restaurant as it costs about $2 a piece. So, I decided to make it at home. I got to put more ingredients in my filling as usually what we got at a restaurant was filled with minimal ingredients. It was definitely a treat but I hated that my hair smelled of fried oil afterward.




Ingredients:

(A)
Ground Pork
Wood ear fungus, soften
Carrot, shredded
Green onion, chopped
Glass vermicelli, soften in hot water, cut
Fish sauce
Sesame oil
Salt
Black/ white peppers
A touch of sugar

Vietnamese rice paper
Oil for deep-frying


Filling before wrapping.

Method:

1. Mix (A) together in a bowl. Let it marinate in the refrigerator for at least an hour.

2. Soften the Vietnamese rice paper in warm water, place filling on it and wrap it up spring roll style. Set aside and finish the rest.

3. Heat up oil in a wok. When hot, turn the heat to medium and deep-fry Cha Gio in batches. About three at a time and be careful not to let it touch each other as the skin would break. Deep-fry until golden brown in color, drain on paper towel.

4. Serve with Thai chili sauce, or Vietnamese Nuoc Cham (sweet vinegar sauce).

Note: 

1)  I read that by adding a little sugar in the warm water to soften the rice paper will help the rice paper to brown evenly when deep-frying.

2)  Adding an egg or two in the filling might help the rice paper to remain crispy, the filling has to be dry so that it won't create moisture when fried and soften the rice paper.

Baked Chickpeas/Garbanzo Beans

I love this canned chickpeas, it provides such a convenient for me. I have since used it in stir-fried, my version of Japanese curry and baked it as snack. Sharing with you the crispy snack version. You can create your own seasoning mix for the chickpeas as well. A healthy and easy snack for your afternoon.




Ingredients:

1 canned of chickpeas/ garbanzo beans
Olive oil
Cumin powder
Paprika
Fennel seeds powder
White sesame seeds
Sea salt



Method:

1. Washed and drain chickpeas in a colander. Spread them on a baking sheet and pat dry with paper towels.

2. Sprinkle some olive oil (or extra virgin olive oil) on top, add some cumin powder, paprika, fennel seeds powder, sesame seeds and sea salt to taste. Mix them well with your hands and spread evenly on the baking sheet.

3. Preheat 400'F oven. Bake for 30 minutes, stir them at 15 minutes. Turn oven to broil (500'F) and broil for 3-5 minutes or until crisp.

Fried Peanuts

My hubby loved to buy roasted peanuts in shell from the supermarket to snack on. But he is very particular and picky about his taste. Once, he bought a bag of peanuts and decided he didn't like the taste and refuse to eat it anymore. So, what was I going to do with a big bag of peanuts? I shelled all of it while watching T.V. (yeah, multi-tasking is women talent) and freeze it. One day, when I was watching the CC4 "Everyday Food" cooking show, the chef was featuring crispy fried peanuts and that was it, I was like, "Now I can reuse the peanuts!" So, I reused the peanuts to create this "new" snack and my hubby loved it. HAHAHA... He couldn't stop snacking and had to set it aside in order to control himself. He definitely had no idea where these peanuts came from. LOL!





Ingredients:

2-3 cups of peanuts
1 tsp. salt
1 egg white
2 Tbsp. cornstarch to coat

Seasoning: 5 spice powder, chili powder, salt and sugar.


Before frying and coated with cornstarch.

Method:

1. Mix peanuts, egg white and salt together, stir well. Add cornstarch and coat well before deep-frying in medium heat oil. Pour enough oil for deep-frying, test with a peanut, if peanut float on top, it's hot enough. Turn to low heat and deep-fry until crunchy. Drain on paper towel.

2. I failed to achieve that crunchy stage, so I toast the peanuts in my toaster oven for 6-7 minutes, divided two trays. Once crunchy and still hot from the oven, sprinkle the peanuts with seasonings. Toast well. Leave to cool. When cool, keep in air-tight container for snack.

Deep Fried Shrimp Wontan

I happen to have some wontan skin in the freezer and also I haven't done any deep-fry food for awhile, so I thought I would give my girls some deep-fry treat. They loved crispy and crunchy food but I have cut down a lot of deep-fry food. So, whenever Evy asked for it, I will make them the healthy crunchy baked chicken strips or baked crunchy fish fillets. They all loved it and I can provide the crunch without the oil.

The idea of this dish came along from food bloggers who used the whole shrimp instead of minced shrimps with pork as filling. I added onion and carrot just because I always wanted to have some veggies in my cooking. By doing it this way, my girls tend to eat the onion too. Otherwise, they would just picked out the onion and put it on the side of their plates. No matter how I stress that onion (or ginger, or bell pepper) is good for their bodies, it just went it one ear and out the next. *sigh*



Ingredients:

Shrimps, marinate with hoisin sauce, sesame oil, salt and white pepper.
Some sliced yellow onion
Some sliced carrot
Wontan wrappers
Oil for deep-frying

Some water to seal

Method:


1. Take a piece of wontan skin, put a shrimp in the middle, add some onion and carrot.


2. Put some water at the edge of the wontan wrapper and seal the filling like shown above.


3. Add a little water at the corner and stick it together like above picture.

4. Prepare the rest as shown. Heat a pan with enough oil to cover. Turn to medium heat and deep-fry the wontan in batches until golden brown. Drain on paper towel before serving.

Rice Krispies Treats

Do you know how easy it is to make your own rice krispies treat? Most kids love rice krispies but the store-bought one can be quite pricey. I wanted to prepare some snack for Evy to bring to school so I thought of this. I added raisins for extra nutrition (you can add other dried fruit too). I cut and put them into individual snack bag so that I can just grab and put it in her backpack. It's easy for her to snack without her fingers being sticky and dirty as well. I think we can make a Cheerio version of this too. ;)


Packed down and let it cool.



Ingredients:

3 Tbsp. butter
2 Tbsp. creamy peanut butter (optional)
10 oz. marshmallow or 4 cups mini marshmallow
6 cups rice krispies
1/2 cup raisins
1 Tbsp. Nutella spread (optional)


In individual size snack zipper bag.

Method:

1. Use a cooking spray and spray a 9x2x13 pan. Set aside.

2. In a large saucepan, melt butter over low heat. Add in peanut butter and marshmallow and stir until completely melted. Take it off the heat and stir in rice krispies, raisins and Nutella spread. Quickly stir to coat well.

3. Pour into the prepared pan. Spray your hands/a spatula with cooking spray and press it down nicely. Let it cool before cutting.

4. Store in individual snack zipper bag and then the air-tight container.


Then lock and keep in an air-tight container. Best consume within 2-3 days.

Pandan Dodol - Homemade

My family loved dodol. We adored the triangle shaped Durian dodol and Pandan dodol. But the online store where I got my fix from had closed down. So, what to do? Guess I will have to make my own. When I was at Lily's house on CNY party, I got a taste (more than a taste, :P) at her homemade dodol. It was so gooooood, I got a fix then. Later, her daughter told me it was very easy to make, just use the microwave. Okay, anything easy was what I liked, so I went to look at Lily's recipe, very few ingredients which I have, instruction seem fairly easy too. So, why not?

Well, not so easy! Expect to have some good arm exercise at stirring the mixture vigorously for about 11 intervals or so. I kept stirring and stirring and when I touched the dodol, it still stuck to my finger even though it was shinning. Luckily at 11 intervals, I finally did it, I thought it would never stop. So, if you want to eat some dodol, expect to work hard for it. :P


Wrapped nicely to cool off.

You can find the original recipe at Lily's blog. Below is my adaptation of her recipe with added pandan extract. Resulted pandan dodol: soft, with the fragrant of Pandan and slightly chewy, simply delectable! My hard work was well worth it.

Ingredients:

(A)
1/2 cup sugar
8 oz Gula Melaka, cut into small pieces
1/2 cup water
1 tsp. Pandan extract

(B)
1 cup glutinous rice flour
1 Tbsp. rice flour
1 can (400ml) coconut cream (Cream not milk ok!)
1/2 cup water


Dodol, dodol 我爱你！Very generous with my slices, Evy said it looked like a worm. :) Can you see how soft it is?

Method:

1. Add (A) in a microwave safe glass bowl and cook on "High" in a microwave for 5 minutes. Use a whisk and whisk until sugar dissolved. If not, cook for another minute.

2. Add (B) and whisk until combined. Strain the mixture.

3. Cook on "High" at 3 minutes interval, stirring vigorously with a wooden spoon at every interval. Continue to cook and stir until mixture thickens, is shinny and does not stick to finger when touched. It took me 11 intervals, ouch my arm!

4. Transfer dodol to a greased (I sprayed mine with canola oil) cling wrap, wrap up well and let it cool at room temperature. When cooled, cut into pieces and enjoy. Keep it at room temperature well wrapped. It is so good, it will be finished in no time, but very fattening, so snack on it smartly. I finished mine on the 3rd day (I snacked on it smartly, divided by 4 persons each day :P) and it was still as soft as the 1st day.


Look at how my girls helped me polished the bowl! Yes girls, don't waste the dodol.


So good mommy, 很好吃啊，妈妈! :)

Chinese Pastry with Mung Bean Paste

It looks very much like tau sar piah (mung bean biscuit) isn't it? But it is not! This pastry is soft and supposed to look like mooncake, but mine turned out looking completely different, more like Shanghai mooncake. I used Peony's walnut pastry recipe but omitted the walnuts and used mung bean paste as filling. I did alter the baking instruction in the end and perhaps that was the reason my pastry look different? I didn't bother to take it out and apply a second egg wash and put it back for additional 15 minutes. Instead I baked mine for a total of 25 minutes with egg yolk glaze. You think that's the cause?



For those who are interested in Peony's pastry recipe, click here. Hmm...I should decorate the top with some black sesame seeds or melon seeds ya! This recipe yields 22 mooncakes for me. I gave half away to a friend who came for tea. Don't think we all can finish so much within couple of days since I have no idea how long this homemade mooncake keep in a container.

Dry Roasted Edamame

Look what I found while browsing through Cosco. A lightly salted dry roasted Edamame!! For those who don't know Edamame is the green soybeans in a pod commonly eaten in China and Japan. Actually my Chinese friend introduced me to this Edamame. She boils them in lightly salted water and then open the pod and eat it just like that. Edameme is healthy for us as it is high in protein, fiber, vitamin A, B and calcium. She is a vegetarian and thus she eats this for the protein. She also used it in stir-fry.


I only seen frozen Edamame here. But I was too lazy to boil them in water and then open each and everyone of them to eat so I never buy it before. Not until I saw this dry roasted Edamame. All cooked and peeled and even salted for me. Such convenience and I just had to buy it. This indeed turned out to be a good and healthy snack for me! Edda loves it too but not my picky Evy.

Chinese Scallion Pancakes

Actually I was embarrassed to say I never eaten a scallion pancake before. Not until I made it myself recently using the recipe provided by My Kitchen Snippets. Not sure how the texture is supposed to be like because mine was not fluffy like roti canai, but crispy and savory. Guess will have to buy a packet at the store to truly know the answer.


Hmmm...mine turned out to be the mini size pancakes! :P So no slicing required!


I made 15 small scallion pancakes and it was not bad. We ended out having it for dinner. I also noticed that there is another type of scallion pancake (while browsing through U-tube) which was made with flour & eggs batter (softer version) which I would love to try in the future.

Chee Cheong Fun with Sweet Sauce (Steamed Rice Rolls)

When I saw Lily's chee cheong fun made using a skillet, I decided to try it because it looked so easy. Oh yeah, look can be deceiving because something that she made so easily turned out to be a disaster in my kitchen. I couldn't get mine to cook before I burnt the bottom. Frustrated I tried steaming them and the same thing happen, it felt raw on top. Ended out in the trash it went. I was convinced that I would have chee cheong fun for tea time that I already made the sauce. So, I was left with my delicious sweet sauce that I wouldn't want to waste. So, I went on the web again and found another recipe to try. Making chee cheong fun definitely needs skill since we wouldn't want it to be too thick nor too thin. My first few batches were too thick but I got the hang of it in the end. I definitely need to practice more. But I do love the sweet sauce I came out with, perhaps it has shrimp paste ( hae kor) in it, it's just like the one I remembered. :)



I made my chee cheong fun with this recipe provided by Sinner. Thanks Sinner for sharing!

My Sweet Sauce Recipe:

(A)
2 heap Tbsp. of CKC rojak sauce
1/4 cup of water
1 tsp. sesame oil
1 tsp. sugar

Garnishes:
Toasted sesame seeds, fried shallots and Sriracha chili sauce.

Method:
Boil the above (A) ingredients in a small saucepan until sugar dissolved and thicken.

To serve:
Cut some chee cheong fun, add some sweet sauce on top, garnish with some Sriracha chili sauce, lots of sesame seeds and some fried shallots. Yummy!

Strawberry Toast

Strawberries are abundance these days. In fact all the berries are in season and all are on sales. If you love berries, this is the time to buy and enjoy until you drop. With the strawberry tarts and mixed berries tarts popping every where in the supermarkets and blogs, I got inspired to make my easy Strawberry Toast.

You only need four ingredients to make this delicious toast.
1. Whole wheat or whole grain bread
2. Nutella spread
3. Philadelphia whipped mixed berries cream cheese spread (or other flavor)
4. Strawberry, cut into slices


1. Toast the whole wheat bread in the toaster until toasted. Slice off the sides.


2. Spread generously with Nutella spread.


3. Top with whipped cream cheese spread (flavor to your liking).


4. Top with slices of fresh and sweet strawberry. And then enjoy each bite of this delicious toast.

I served this to my parent in-laws and got rave reviews. Do give this easy morning breakfast or afternoon snack a try.