Red velvet cupcakes

I think baking would be a lot more fun if it didn’t involve so much washing up.

I spent my Saturday morning baking  indulgent and decadent Red Velvet Cupcakes (recipe from thecakemistress ), possibly the most fattening cupcakes around with  sinful thick cream cheese frosting.

Jo’s getting this box of mini cupcakes when I see her tomorrow. As you can see, piping frosting is obviously not my forte. They look like lopsided rosettes (T__T), but at least they’re yummy :).

The redness of the ‘red’ velvet cupcakes aren’t very evident until you bite into one, very appealing colour, reminds me of Valentine’s day. This cupcake is quite ‘cakey’, moist and morish. The good thing about baking cupcakes, you actually know how much sugar goes into these things so it stops you from devouring them like Cookie Monster or should I say Cupcake Monster.

Question of the day: Why is Gerry hugging the car engine and is he in pain or in ecstasy? Winner gets a Red Velvet cupcake!

Stir fried chicken with lemon, honey and snake beans

Ingredients
500 g skinless chicken breasts, diced
2 1/2 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp shaved palm sugar
1/2 tsp ground white pepper
1 tbsp peanut oil
2.5 cm piece ginger, finely chopped
2 gloves garlic, finely chopped
2 long green chilli, finely sliced
3 spring onions, cut into 2 inch batons
1 cup green beans, cut into batons
1/4 cup roasted peanuts
80 ml ShaoXing wine
150 ml lemon juice
2 tbsp honey
8 Thai basil leaves, torn
1/4 fried shallots

Method:

1. Combine the chicken, fish sauce and palm sugar and pepper in a bowl. Marinate for 10 minutes
2. Heat the peanut oil in wok, add chicken. Stir fry until mixture begins to caramelise then add the ginger, garlic, chillies, spring onions, snake beans and peanuts, and stir-fry for 2 minutes.
3. Add ShaoXing wine, lemon juice and honey and cook until liquid has reduced and thickened into a sauce.
4. Transfer to serving dish and garnish with Thai basil and fried shallots.

After a mini hiatus from the kitchen, I’m back with this recipe that I tried from my Teage Ezard cookbook (the one that Gerry bought for me). Once I read the words palm sugar, ginger, garlic, fish sauce, shaoxing wine, basil,I knew I had to try to cook this dish because it incorporates some of my favourite cooking ingredients. I didn’t add snake beans because I don’t like beans but added more spring onions instead.

The flavours came out exactly how I like my Thai dishes, sweet, sour, slightly spicy (green chillies have this wonderful spicy kick yet sour flavour) and with that fresh aroma of lemon juice and fragrance of ShaoXing wine. It’s a keeper recipe so do try it.

Lunch tomorrow is a cucumber, tomato and basil salad with some of the stir fried chicken and cashew nuts. We’ve officially moved in to the new office and the lunch room feels like a different world that I’m having trouble going out and actually doing work. The first yoga lesson of the season was also held today and it was soo good, made me realise how much I’ve missed yoga.

The weekend was so glorious that Mondayitis hit me extra hard today. So I’m back to counting down the days to Friday again (-___-).

Chicken in white wine cream sauce pasta

Ingredients (serves 2)

2 boneless chicken breasts
1/2 cup chopped mushrooms
1/2 cup chopped onions
3 slices ham/bacon chopped (optional)
2 tablespoon heavy cream
1 cup white wine (or just enough to cover half the chicken)
flour seasoned with dried tarragon, salt and pepper
olive oil/butter

Method:

1. Dredge chicken in the seasoned flour. Add olive oil or butter to pan.
2. Brown chicken in pan till light brown on both sides.
3. Then add the mushrooms, onions, ham and fry till onions are soft and translucent. Add wine. Simmer covered on low heat until chicken is done, around 20 minutes.
4. Remove chicken from frying pan, leaving onion and mushrooms. Shake 1 tablespoons flour and the heavy cream into pan. Stir into the drippings in the frying pan. Flavor with tarragon according to your taste.
5. Cook until sauce thickens. Pour over chicken and serve. Garnish with additional herbs of your liking.

This was one of the first western dishes I learned to cook back in my uni days. I used to serve it with roasted potato wedges but nowadays I usually cook up some fettucine or spaghetti and add it to the chicken for a cream based pasta.

It was another horrendous day at work today, so bad that my colleagues were really angry on my behalf, still, I felt comforted that at least my own teammates were so supportive. Sigh, if only people could be professional and  not shoot the messenger.

On the bright side, on the way to work and back from work, I saw full arch rainbows in the sky! So pretty, I love rainbows…. I was too greedy and made so many wishes that now I think none of them will come true (T____T).

Gerry has returned from his Brisbane/Melbourne trip and he bought me a present again! Another cookbook, this time it was a Thai/Malaysian food cookbook which I really really like. Thank you Gerry!I actually read this book a couple of years ago in Borders, back then (actually now still the same) I couldn’t bear to fork out money for cookbooks and would go to Borders, sit there with my favourite Irish Nut Creme coffee and try to memorise these recipes. Cheapskate or what?! But it was actually very fun lah.

Ok, FINALLY it’s Friday, I don’t expect a good day at work tomorrow, but maybe with such low expectations, things might turn out alright? *fingers crossed*

*Fail* Jamie Oliver Sticky Chicken became Kecap Manis Honey chicken

This dish took ages to cook, first I bunged everything in the oven and waited for the said 35 minutes. 45 minutes later, the bone still wouldn’t pull away from the chicken like Jamie promised. Must be he has a super duper oven. So I got impatient and just took it out to grill (instead of bbq).

Earlier on I substituted lemon with lime (forgot to buy lemons), err, the end result, lime and lemon are really quite different. And I was too lazy to bash up the garlic cloves etc. so I made my own marinade with kecap manis (sweet soy sauce), oyster sauce,  honey and Worcestershire sauce and basted the chicken with it.

End result?

Jamie Oliver western style bbq chicken became Daitaoha Malaysian style grilled chicken. It actually tasted not bad, only so not Jamie Oliver. On another note, it was my ex manager’s last day at work today, really quite sad since he was my first real boss and a very nice and supportive one as well. He left me his brand new chair and some good books! Sigh, I will miss him.

Oh yes! My blog will feature a new regular, Xian Zhang, Jo’s bf is flying to Perth tonight and he will be here for the next few years for studies. Exciting or not? So I have to go to bed now because his flight is at midnight.

Jamie’s recipe below:

Best barbecued sticky chicken with lemon and garlic

Ingredients

• 8 chicken thighs, bone-in and skin on, preferably free range or organic
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• olive oil
• 1 bulb of garlic, whole
• 2 lemons
• 5 sprigs of fresh rosemary, tied together
a good handful of rocket or pea shoots, washed and spun-dry

Method

Get your barbecue on about an hour before you want to cook and preheat your oven to 180ºC/350ºF/gas 4.

Season the chicken well with salt and pepper and drizzle with a little olive oil. Get a big double layer of tin foil and pop the thighs in the middle with the bulb of garlic. Chop one of your lemons in half and pop this in too. Wrap the chicken up then put your foil parcel on a baking tray and into the hot oven for 35 minutes until the chicken pulls away easily from the bone – if you have to tug at it it’s not ready, so pop it back in the oven for another 5 minutes or so.

When done, carefully take the chicken out off the oven and unwrap it. By this time your barbecue should be at the perfect temperature – a good medium heat – so get your chicken on to start charring.

While this is happening, get on with your sticky glaze. Carefully, clove by clove, squeeze the sweet roasted garlic out of its papery skin into a pestle and mortar. Carefully squeeze in the juice of your roasted lemon halves too. Give this a good bash up and season with salt and pepper then add a good lug of olive oil and mix until you have a thick paste. Now squeeze in the juice of the other lemon so you get 2 levels of lemon flavour – one sweet and roasted, the other fresh and zingy.

Use your rosemary sprigs to brush the paste onto the chicken, basting and turning for about 10 minutes so you are building up a lovely layer of sticky garlicky sweetness and a wonderful golden brown colour.

Once you’re happy with the chicken, use tongs to move it to a nice platter then top with the rocket or pea shoots and any remaining marinade and tuck in!

All in a Day’s Work

Home cooking for the past week.

Jo’s reaction to this dish was ‘wah, how come today get instant noodles?!’ After so much home cooked food, it’s actually a treat to eat yummy instant noodles, especially our favourite Indo Mee. I topped the noodles with grilled basa fillets marinated in a mixture of white miso paste, sugar and mirin. Lunch the next day was thinly shredded raw cabbage with the fillets, very nice even eaten cold.

I’m very proud of this recipe! I wish I could post up a recipe but then I didn’t take any measurements. A variation from my teriyaki hambaagu, these mini chicken patties are made of minced chicken, chopped onion and cabbage  mixed with an egg and seasoned with a little salt and pepper. I pan fried the chicken on low heat and basted the golden patties with my teriyaki sauce. Served on top of a bed of shredded cabbage (in case you haven’t noticed, shredded cabbage are my new favourite salad veg), it was really quite yummy (=^__^=) and Jo loved it.

Tonight’s dinner was lime chicken salad with grilled chicken, shredded cabbage, rock melon and grape tomatoes. The dressing was made of fresh lime juice, light soy sauce, fish sauce, rice wine vinegar and palm sugar. I think it will be an eye opener for lunch tomorrow, goodness know I need it.

Work has been really tiring and I find myself constantly wondering ‘am I doing any good? am I actually helping?’ Very early in my career at the new place, while attending a farewell morning tea for an exec, the exec gave a  speech saying ‘I had to leave, because I was too tired of seeing nothing being done, nothing working, so I am going back to where I came from, to rest, because I am too tired’.  I hope I’ll never be in that situation even though I see many of my colleagues spiralling towards that weary road. I like to think that I’m still optimistic and will never give up.

On a bright note, I found this box of chocolates on my desk this morning. A secret admirer? I can already imagine Jason going ‘oooh’ and raising his eyebrows. But sorry to disappoint you, it was from a colleague who said that she wanted to thank me for all my help in the past few weeks. Isn’t that sweet? My other colleague also bought me a crystal elephant figurine (with sakura flowers on the back, I thought of Jo immediately but sorry hor, it’s on my office desk) from her Thailand holidays. I have nice colleagues.

I was still feeling down when I received a phonecall to go for an interview next Monday. My boss has already offered to give me mock interviews, I’m not so keen on the job, but an interview experience is an interview experience. I’ll try my best.

A while later, I received my travel itinerary. Remember how I mentioned I was going to the heart of Australia for work? I really meant Alice Springs, yes, I’m going to the Northern Territory, the red earth.  Perhaps I will only get to see the interior of the hotel, but I’m hoping for more, I want to see and experience the real Aboriginal Australia.

I fly next week. I knew it was going to be an exciting month, but now it’s a bit too exciting for me. I hope all goes well *fingers crossed* wish me luck!