Black Sesame Seed Burger Buns

     

     

Baking bread is my passion. But my breads are only for our own consumption. Experimenting with the amount and types of ingredients to give different end results makes baking bread an exciting adventure for me in my kitchen. This round I ground the black sesame seeds and mix them into my dough. The result is yummy buns which can be eaten by themselves without any spread nor fillings. 

Ingredients:

• 600 g bread flour (makes 13 buns of about 95 g each)
• 7 g yeast
• 80 g sugar (can be slightly less or more)
• 60 g black sesame seeds, toasted and grind
• 400 ml warm milk
• 1 egg (Grade A)
• 40 g butter
• 1/2 tsp salt (if butter is unsalted)

Method:

• Activate the yeast - add sugar to warm milk, stir to dissolve the sugar and sprinkle the yeast on top. Set aside for 5-10 minutes.

• Once the yeast has been activated (there are bubbles in the yeast mixture), pour it into the bowl of the stand mixer.

• Add egg to the bowl.

• Add the bread flour, ground black sesame seeds and salt into the yeast mixture.

• Start the mixture on a low speed until all the ingredients are incorporated. Then increase the speed to medium high.

• When the dough has formed into a ball, add butter to it.

• Continue to knead the dough till it is smooth and elastic. Then transfer it to an oiled bowl.

• Cover the bowl with cling wrap and put a damp towel over it.

• Let the dough proof in a warm place till it has doubled in size.

• Lightly flour or grease your table top.

• Remove the dough from the bowl onto the floured / oiled surface.

• Punch out the air from the dough and knead it for about 5 minutes.

• Divide the dough into smaller pieces of dough of 95 g each.

• Roll each dough into a ball and place it onto a flattened cake liner.

• Let the dough balls proof until they have doubled in size.

• Pre-heat the oven at 175 degrees C.

• Eggwash (just egg yolk with some water) the dough and sprinkle some black sesame seeds on top before baking.

• Bake the dough for 28 minutes until the buns are golden brown.

• Let them cool down on a metal rack.

• Enjoy.

Kuih Kosui Gula Melaka / Kuih Lompang

 

Kuih kosui or kuih lompang is a traditional Malay kuih which is made from rice flour and tapioca flour and gula Melaka or pandan juice. Kuih kosui which is made using gula Melaka will be brown in colour and that with pandan juice will be green. It is eaten with coconut flakes. This kuih can be steamed in individual small round moulds or in a big square pan. Coconut flakes are added to the top of the kuih if it is steamed in small round moulds. If it is steamed in a big square pan, the kuih has to be sliced up and rolled in coconut flakes after steaming.

Kuih kosui can be easily found in markets. However, as it is easy to make, we can make it any time if we have the flours, gula Melaka and pandan leaves at home.

Ingredients:

• Coconut flakes from half of a coconut (without brown skin)
• 1/4 tsp salt

• 160 g gula Melaka
• 360 ml water
• 3 pandan leaves

• 120 g rice flour
• 60 g tapioca flour

Method:

• Steam coconut flakes with salt.
• Leave aside.

• Add gula Melaka and water to a pot.
• Add pandan leaves (knotted) to it.
• Boil till gula Melaka dissolves.
• Let the syrup cool down.
• Remove the pandan leaves.
• Sieve the syrup.

• Add water to a steamer and turn on the fire.
• Let the water boil.
• Oil 12 porcelain or stainless steel moulds.
• Put them into the steamer to heat them up.

• Mix rice flour and tapioca flour in a mixing bowl.
• Add the syrup to the flours.
• Stir till there are no lumps.
• Transfer the flour mixture to a pot.
• Place the pot over very low fire.
• Keep on stirring the flour mixture until it SLIGHTLY thickens.
• Sieve the mixture into a pouring jug.
• Pour the mixture into the prepared porcelain or stainless steel moulds.
• Steam the batter for 25 minutes or till it is cooked.
• Remove the kuih onto a plate.
• Spoon the coconut flakes onto the top of the kuih.
• Serve.

Butter Bread

Butter Bread, as the name suggests, has butter as its main ingredient. Butter gives the bread a rich flavour. We usually eat it on its own i.e. there is no requirement of a spread. Other ingredients include milk, sugar and egg. Depending on one's preference, butter bread can be shaped in a number of ways, the simplest being to just roll up the dough and place into a loaf pan to be baked. Or, the dough can be rolled up, sliced and the sliced dough arranged in a loaf pane or a round pan as described below.

Ingredients:

• 160 ml warm milk
• 40 g sugar
• 7 g yeast
• 50 ml melted butter
• 1 egg
• 400 g bread flour
• 5 g salt
• 40 ml melted butter (for brushing on dough)
• 1 egg yoke (for brushing on dough before baking)

Instructions:

• Activate the yeast:
• Add warm milk to the bowl of a mixer.
• Add the sugar and yeast to the bowl.
• Stir and wait for 5-10 minutes for bubbles to be formed.

• Once the yeast has been activated, add melted butter and egg white to the yeast mixture.

• Then add the bread flour and salt to it.

• Knead till window pane is achieved.

• Rest the dough till it doubles in size.

• Punch down the dough to de-gas.

• Flour your counter top.

• Transfer the dough onto it and shape it into a ball.

• Roll out the dough to a rectangle, 20 inches x 12 inches. (If you do not have a big counter space, you may divide the dough into 2.

• Spread melted butter onto it.

• Roll up the dough (from the longer side up).

• Now you would have a long roll.

• Slice the dough into the number of pieces you want.

• Place them in an overlapping manner into a round baking pan which is lined with greased parchment paper. (My pan is 8 inches in diameter.)

• Let it proof till double in size.

• Brush the dough with egg yoke.

• Bake the dough in a pre-heated oven at 175 deg C for 35 minutes.

• Remove the bread from the baking pan and let it cool on a metal rack.

Ikan Tenggiri (Mackerel) Masak Lemak

My family and I went to have lunch at a nyonya restaurant and one of the dishes we order was Ikan Tenggiri Masak Lemak. It was very delicious; the fish was very fresh and the sauce was creamy with a tinge of sweetness, saltiness and sourness. So, I decided to replicate it at home. The resulting dish was similar to that we ate at the restaurant. 

Ingredients:

a. 2 slices of ikan tenggiri

b. For blending

• 10 g chili padi
• 8 g dried chili
• 75 g shallots
• 25 g garlic
• 50 g lemongrass (white part only)
• 20 g fresh turmeric
• 20 g galangal
• 20 g ginger
• 25 g belacan, toasted
• 15 g candlenut
• 1 cup water

c. For cooking

• all of the blended ingredients
• 1/2 cup cooking oil
• 3 g assam keping
• 1 cup water
• 2 stalks lemongrass, bruised 
• 1 cups thick santan
• 2 pcs of kafir lime leaves
• 1 tsp salt or to taste
• 1 tsp sugar

Method:

• Blend all ingredients stated above under "For Blending".

• Heat up pan with cooking oil.

• Add all of the blended ingredients to the pan.

• Fry them till they are fragrant and oil splits from the ingredients.

• Add water, assam keping and lemongrass.

• Let the sauce simmer slowly for about 5 minutes.

• Add the santan and let it boil. (If sauce is too thick, add some water. It should not be too thin either.)

• Add kafir lime leaves.

• Season with salt and sugar.

• Add the tenggiri. (Do not overcook.)

• Serve with white rice.

Ondeh-Ondeh Jagung

I have made ondeh-ondeh purple sweet potato and ondeh-ondeh pandan before. I decided to look for other ingredients to be added to my ondeh-ondeh dough to make my cooking journey more interesting and to give my family more variety of taste. So, I came up with jagung or corn. I modified my ondeh-ondeh pandan recipe to make my ondeh-ondeh jagung. 

Ingredients:

• 200 g glutinous rice flour
• 50 g all-purpose flour
• 300 g creamed corn
• 150 g coconut flakes
• 1/2 tsp of salt
• 3 pandan leaves, wash and knot them.

Method:

• Add salt to grated coconut and steam them for a few minutes.

• Open a can of creamy style corn and weigh out 300 g to be used in the recipe.

• Weigh and sieve the glutinous and all-purpose flours into a bowl.

• Add 90 percent of the creamed corn to the bowl of flours and knead till they are smooth. If the dough is too dry, add more of the creamed corn till you have a soft dough.

• Divide and weigh the dough into 23 g-piece. Roll the dough into balls. (You may weigh to make smaller or bigger dough balls. Note that the balls will enlarge once cooked.)

• Pound the cylindrical block of gula Melaka to break it up into smaller pieces.

• Take a dough ball. Flatten it and scoop 1/2 a teaspoon or more of gula Melaka onto it. Bring up the edges of the dough to seal it. Place it onto a floured plate.

• Repeat this till all the dough balls have been filled.

• Boil a pot of water. Add the knotted pandan leaves to it.

• Drop the dough balls into the boiling water.

• Once the dough balls float to the surface, it means that they are cooked. Let them roll in the boiling water for about 5 minutes more to ensure that the gula Melaka is melted.

• Remove the cooked balls onto the plate of grated coconut. Roll them in the grated coconuts. (I managed to get 24 pieces of ondeh-ondeh from my recipe.)

• Plate them and serve.

 

Raisin Buns

 

Raisins are dried grapes. I love eating raisins as snacks due to their natural sweetness. They are also delicious, moist and rich in nutrients especially potassium which has many important functions. According to healthdirect.gov.au, potassium allows the nerves to respond to stimulation and muscles to contract including those in the heart. It reduces the effect of sodium (present in table salt) on blood pressure. It helps move nutrients into cells and wast products out of cells. Besides eating raisins raw, I also use them in cooking and baking.

Ingredients:

• 350 g bread flour
• 200 g warm milk
• 7 g yeast
• 40 g sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 40 g butter
• 180 g raisins

Method:

• Activate the yeast:
• Add warm milk to a bowl of a mixer.
• Add sugar to the bowl.
• Add yeast to the bowl.
• Stir and wait for 5-10 minutes for bubbles to be formed.


Once the yeast has been activated, add bread flour and salt to the bowl.

Knead till a ball is formed.

Add butter.

Continue to knead till window pane is achieved.

• Grease a clean bowl and transfer the dough to it.

• Cover the bowl with a cling wrap.

• Once the dough has doubled in size, transfer it to your counter top.

• Punch down the dough to Degas.

• Form the dough into a ball.

• Divide it into 12 pieces, rolling each piece into a small ball.

• Take 1 piece of dough ball, flatten it and roll it out into a long rectangle of about 7 cm wide.

• Spread 15 g of raisins on the dough, taking care to leave a gap (free of raisins) along the middle.

• Roll up the dough.

• Cut the rolled up dough into 2. Place each into a cake liner with the cut part down.

• Repeat till all the dough balls have been shaped.

• Cover the shaped dough and let them double in size.

• Pre-heat your oven to 175 deg C.

• Once the dough has doubled in size, egg wash them.

• Bake them for 20 minutes.

• Cool them down on a metal rack once done.

• Enjoy.

Poon Choi

Step 1 - Blanch the Napa cabbage

    

Step 2 - Blanch the Shiitake mushroom

Step 3 - Blanch the prawns

Step 4 - Blanch the carrots

   

Step 5 - Blanch the Enoki mushrooms and scallops

Step 6 - Cut and place the tofu and blanch the abalone and broccoli

Poon Choi is a traditional Hakka festival meal which consists of many ingredients layered in an interesting manner in a big pot, preferably a claypot.  It is usually prepared and served during Chinese New Year as the meal signifies abundance and prosperity. However, nowadays it is prepared and eaten at any time of the year. Ingredients to prepare Poon Choi differ from family to family. But the first layer of Poon Choi is usually the Napa cabbage. The other ingredients include prawns, fish slices, scallops, squids, abalone, sea cucumber, tofu, various types of mushroom and tofu. Carrots and broccoli add colour to make it more attractive. The quantity of the various ingredients below may be varied according to one's preference.

Ingredients:

• 8 leaves of Napa cabbage, cut into 3-inch length
• 5 big prawns (White prawns are preferable. However, I used tiger prawns at this particular time.)
• 5 pieces of big fresh scallops
• 5 pieces of abalone (braised ones as the sauce will be used in the soup of the Poon Choi). I have used those brined ones as I have ran out of the braised ones. However, I have kept the braised sauce from earlier cans that I have opened.
• 5 pieces of Shiitake mushroom (soaked overnight)
• 1 packet of Enoki mushroom
• 2 tubes of soft tofu (egg or plain)
• 5 slices of carrots
• 3 broccoli florets
• 4 pieces of shallots, sliced.

Method:

• Boil 2 litres of water in a pan.

• First, blanch the Napa cabbage. Layer them onto the base of the claypot once they have softened.

• Boil the Shiitake mushrooms till they are soft. Arrange them to the side of the claypot.

• Next, boil the prawns for about 8 minutes. Boiling them any longer would render them hard. Arrange them to another side of the claypot.

• Boil the carrots till they are soft. Arrange them in the centre on top of the Napa cabbage.

• Next, blanch the Enoki mushroom. Arrange them to another side of the claypot.

• Next, blanch the scallops and then arrange them to the side of the claypot.

• Cut and steam the soft tofu. Arrange them in the claypot.

• Blanch the broccoli and place them on top.

• Next, preparing the soup:

• Fry the shallots till they are fragrant.
• Remove the crispy shallots leaving the oil behind.
• Pour the water used to blanch or boil the ingredients to the oil.
• Add the sauce of the braised abalone.
• Let the soup boil.
• Season it with salt (if the soup is not salty enough) and pepper.

• Leave the soup in the pan till the Poon Choi is ready to be consumed. Re-heat when necessary and pour it into the claypot.

• The Poon Choi is ready to be served.