Jan 06

Banh chuoi nuong (banana and coconut pudding)

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OK, I realise I shouldn’t be posting quite so many recipes, but I couldn’t resist this one when Anh put it online as part of the Delicious Vietnam blogging event (a collection of blog posts celebrating the food of Vietnam, which incidentally has my own bì cuốn–and which netted me Luke Nguyen’s Indochine cookbook when I won the prize draw!).

Bánh chuối nướng literally means grilled banana cake (see how my vocabulary is improving? :D ), and it looks something like this:

Slice of cake

Have I got your attention now?

(recipe under the cut)
Read More »

Jul 26

Chocolate and pineapple brownies

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Aka the recipe I made when I found myself with an extra can of pineapple and some leftover chocolate. You would think that the pineapple would not go well with the chocolate–but it does, trust me. It’s actually a very yummy combination, the pineapple bringing the moisture and sugar that the chocolate lacks.

 

Chocolate and pineapple brownies
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Recipe type: Dessert
Author: Aliette de Bodard
Prep time: 20 mins
Cook time: 20 mins
Total time: 40 mins
Serves: 6-8
A wonderful mix of tart pineapple and gorgeous chocolate.
Ingredients
  • 100 g dark chocolate
  • 1 can pineapple slices (340g, 10 slices)
  • 140g sugar (be prepared to throw in some of the juice from the can if the mixture’s too liquid, or to adjust the flour if it’s too dry)
  • 120g flour
  • 1 bag vanilla sugar (8g sugar and a dash of vanilla extract otherwise)
  • 2 eggs
  • 125g butter
Instructions
  1. Pre-heat oven to 180°C (gas mark 6)
  2. Melt the chocolate and the butter, let the mixture cool down for a bit.
  3. Meanwhile, dice the pineapple slices into smallish bits (I go for the width and length of my fingertip).
  4. Mix the sugar, vanilla sugar, and the eggs. When the above chocolate-butter mixture has cooled down, add it and mix everything until the dough is smooth.
  5. Prepare a low cake mould by brushing its sides with a little butter and a little flour. Pour the dough into it.
  6. Cook for around 20 minutes: the cake should be still moist.
 

There you go–enjoy!

ETA: adjusted quantities following further experimentation

Jul 08

Carrot cake

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So, here’s the variant on the carrot cake…

Carrot cake
A picture, though it’s really hard to make this look good, as it basically lacks contrast of any kind. It does taste like all kinds of yummy, trust me on that.

Adapted from kitchen tigress, who got it in turn from Angela Nilsen. I replaced those ingredients I didn’t have, and adjusted the quantities of oil, which seemed a bit excessive. Like most carrot cakes, this came with an icing layer, which was basically sugar and butter. I dislike both, and the cake tastes good enough without them, so I skipped that part without much remorse.

Carrot cake
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Recipe type: Dessert
Prep time: 10 mins
Cook time: 1 hour
Total time: 1 hour 10 mins
Serves: 6-8
A light and moist carrot cake without icing.
Ingredients
  • 85 g pecan nuts, chopped into pieces
  • 1 tablespoon orange blossom water
  • 2 tbsp orange juice
  • 115 g chopped-up prunes (substitute raisins if prunes are lacking)
  • 225 g flour
  • 5 g baking soda (half a packet)
  • 1 rounded tsp ground cinnamon
  • 175 g sugar
  • 100 g sunflower oil (about 1/4 cup)
  • 3 eggs
  • 280 g finely grated carrot (3-4 carrots)
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 180°C (thermostat 6/7).
  2. Sift the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and sugar together until well-mixed (this is more important than usual, because you really want that spoonful of cinnamon to spread in the cake, otherwise you could be in for an interesting surprise after the cake is cooked).
  3. Fold in the eggs one after the other, followed by the orange juice and orange blossom. Dribble the oil in, mixing thoroughly until you have a thick dough.
  4. Add the nuts, prunes and carrots. Mix well.
  5. Flour and butter a cake mold, and put in the oven for 45 minute-1 hour, until golden and risen.

 

Jun 16

Rice cooker cake

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Rice cooker cake

Rice cooker cake

So… the results of my cooking experiments, aka, Filipino puto (more or less this recipe, dividing the quantities by 4, switching the amounts of milk and water around, and replacing the margarine by oil). Basically, a simple process: instead of steaming in a steamer, put the mixture in the rice cooker and bake it there… It went mostly well, except for the slight snafu, which had me folding the baking powder into the beaten egg and causing the expanding reaction to be wasted on, er, a beaten egg… Hence the slightly flat look of the thing: it was meant to rise much higher [1]. Also, it’s missing toppings–apparently, grated coconut is nice on it, but the H doesn’t like coconut… But it’s fairly nice all the same.

I do have to add that cooking a cake in the rice cooker is not for the faint of heart: after beating all the ingredients together, you put them into the rice cooker, set it on “cake”, press the button, and trust that the cooker is smart enough to work out the optimal baking time… (yes, I know I’m trusting it to cook perfect rice. Yes, it’s perfectly irrational).

[1] We discussed this on facebook, but I’m not quite sold on the explanation that the thing didn’t rise because of the low temperature and non-stick coating in the cooker–many blogs mention baking cakes in rice cookers with no trouble, and now that I’ve had time to reflect on the whole non-stick thing, I’ve baked cakes in non-stick molds before, and they rose all right… Any pointers welcome, but I’m inclined to suspect my bad timing with the baking powder…

May 11

Cranberry and orange scones

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So, the sekrit project:

Scones

Cranberry scones! Oh so tasty and yummy. Basically, my workplace has this baking competition where entrants bake to a theme, and the theme this time was “red”. (I lost the round to a strawberry tart, but it doesn’t matter, since I have a shiny new recipe to add to my arsenal)

Same recipe as orange and chocolate scones, except substitute the chocolate with 100g of dried cranberries soaked in water for a bit (ETA; after a second round of baking, I would skip the soaking unless your cranberries are really, really dry).

If you’re tired of the food porn, I have a guest post over at Aidan Moher’s A Dribble of Ink, where I discuss my experience in drawing inspiration from non-Western cultures. One thing I did forget to add to the post was the importance of acknowledging the source culture and material: a few handy links to books or websites people can consult can do wonders. (obviously, acknowledging and crediting your referents as well, but that’s kind of obvious).

That’s it. Off to do a crit and then work some more on the novella.

Jun 25

Orange and chocolate scones

Tags: blog, cooking experiments, Uncategorized, , , , , 2 Comments »
So, I did promise the recipe for the scones…

Below are my VD scones (though I didn’t put enough baking soda in, and ended up making oversized cookies. They are supposed to look a bit better than this normally):

Scones

 

Orange and chocolate scones
Print
Prep time: 30 mins
Cook time: 20 mins
Total time: 50 mins
Serves: 8-9 scones
A dessert that combines two of my favourite flavours: chocolate, and orange.
Ingredients
  • 230 g flour
  • 11 g baking soda
  • 60g butter
  • 1 teaspoon caster sugar
  • 145 mL of milk
  • 1 tablespoon Orange Blossom water
  • 120g chocolate, chopped into coarse bits
  • Zest of half an orange, chopped into tiny bits
  • Pinch of salt
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven at 200°C. Leave the butter out to soften a bit.
  2. Sift the flour, the sugar and the baking soda in a bowl, and gently rub in the butter until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Add the milk little by little, until you have a spongy dough.
  3. Work in the orange blossom water, the orange zest and the chocolate chips until the dough is smooth and uniform.
  4. Grease a baking sheet. Divide the dough into 8-9 parts and shape it like cylinders (roughly 5cm across, 1cm thick). Or, if it’s too much trouble, just put dollops of the dough onto the baking sheet :-)
  5. Bake for about 15-20 minutes, until the scones are risen and light golden in colour.

 

Enjoy :=)

(I originally was looking for a chocolate and orange scone recipe after eating very tasty ones in Montreal, but couldn’t find one that worked on the net. In the end, I adapted this from the plain oven scones recipe contained in Scottish Teatime Recipes by Johanna Mathie)