Homemade Chicken Patties Sandwich

My mun-in-law used to make chicken or beef patties when she lived with us. Now that she is unable to come and stay with us, I have to make it myself whenever I miss this dish. Thank God that she is very generous, always impart her knowledge without reservation.

This morning my daughter asked me "Mummy, is this chicken patties made  by you?" I answered "yes. why?" She said "it tastes yummy!" Nothing can beat loved ones enjoying the food that you prepared for them.
Just a short conversation like this gave me great encouragement and wanted to do more yummy food for my loved ones.

This is the simple and yummy homemade chicken patties.

Ingredients
200gm minced chicken meat
1 tablespoon of light sauce
1 slice of bread
1 tsp of potato flour
A dash of ground pepper
A dash of ground ginger powder
1 tsp  sunflower oil (for cooking)
Some water (for soaking bread)

Methods
Soak the slice of bread in the water for a few seconds.  Purpose is to wet the bread.
Gentle squeeze out some excess water.  Rub the soft bread into paste. Set aside.
Place minced meat in a large bowl. Add bread paste and light sauce (you can replaced with sea salt),flour , pepper and ginger powder. Mix them well.

With gloved hands, divide the meat mixture into 4 portions. Roll each of them into a ball and then flatten it into a patty.

Heat up a flat non-stick frying pan. Pour about 1 tsp of oil into the frying pan. With a kitchen paper towel or tissue oiled the frying pan. Place the chicken patties into the pan. Pan fry one side for about 2-3 min or until light brown on medium fire. Turn the side and pan fry until light brown.

Toast 2 slices of bread, spread with magarine or butter. Place the cooked patties on one bread with lettuces and sliced cucumber and sliced tomato. Top with another bread.

Serve.

Snow Skin Mooncake (Instant method)

Ingredients:

90 gm. Fried/Cooked Glutinous Rice Flour (Kao Fen/Kou Fien 糕粉)
10 gm. Wheat Starch (Steam for 2min)

30 gm. Shortening
40 gm. Icing sugar
200 gm. Ice-cream soda or 7-up *(see note 1)
1/2 tsp Banana essence(Original recipe called for pandan essence)
1 tablespoon milk(Not in original recipe)

Filling:

500 gm. lotus paste
30 gm. melon seeds

Method:

(1) Sift the glutinous rice flour/kou fien and wheat starch into a big bowl.
(2) Add icing sugar and shortening into flour and rub with  your finger till it look like bread crumb.
(3) Add banana essence and milk into soft drink.

(4)Pour in ice-cream soda(soft drink) into the flour mixture and mix into  a soft dough. Cover it with cling wrap and place in the fridge for 15min(optional)
(5) Divide the dough. Use a weighing machine and weigh 25g each. Apro 12 portions
(6) Divide the lotus paste fillings into 12 portions of 47g.(I am using a 73g mold)
(7) Flatten each dough and wrap with lotus paste filling. Press into a mooncake mould then press it out/ knock out depend on the kind of mould you use.
(8) Keep in airtight container. Chill before serving.

Note : best to consume snow skin mooncake within 3-4 days

Recipe of dough adapted from Aunty Yochana rainbow snow skin mooncake

Filling bought from Phoon Huat

If you prefer to homemade the lotus paste, you may check this link from bigheadmagicmad.blogspot.sg

http://bigheadmagicmad.blogspot.sg/2013/09/homemade-lotus-paste-mooncake.html?m=1

Note 1 : You can replace the frizzy drink with syrup water. That is, 80-100g sugar melt in 180-200g of water by boiling. Leave to cool. Keep in fridge to make cold syrup. However, omit the 40g icing sugar if you are using syrup water.

Homemade Chocolate

This chocolate is my family favourite now. It is economical, easy to make and most important taste very good. It taste like Royce chocolate. After you have tasted this, you wwould prefer homemade over other chocolate.

Ingredients:
400g chocolate chip(56.6% cocao content from Phoon Huat)
200ml Whipping Cream

Method:
Heat whipping cream in a saucepan. When it starts to bubble, turn off the heat. You just want to warm the cream not boil it. Add chocolate chips into the whipping cream. Stir to melt the chocolate and incorporate it into the cream. When all the chocolate has melted in the cream, it will resemble a thick chocolate ganache. Prepare a tray with chocolate small cups in it. Pour the chocolate into the cups. Let it firm up in the fridge min 4hours or overnight. Serve.

Butter Shortbread

My princess loves to eat shortbread. To cheer her up and also to give her  support and eencouragement for her prelim exam. I baked this shortbread. I have tried several different recipe from others' blog . JoyofBaking and Guai Shu Shu recipe are simple and easy to remember. Both using 3:2:1 ratio.One is weighing and the other is using cup. For this that I have baked, I have adopted the Guai Shu Shu's ingredients and incorporated with my own method.

Ingredients
100g icing sugar
200g soft salted butter
300g plain flour/all purpose flour
1tsp vanilla essence

Preheat traditional oven to 180 degrees C with the rack in the middle of the oven. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

Method:
1.In the large bowl, combine flour , sift icing sugar , soft butter and vanilla. Mix everything together into a soft dough.

2.On a lightly floured surface or on a greaseproof paper, roll out the dough into a 1/4 inch thick. Cut into desire shapes using a lightly floured cookies cutter or a knife.  Place on the prepared baking sheets . Bake for 15-18 minutes, or until cookies are very lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack.

Note dated 23/9/2014: preheat fan oven 170°C, bake 10-12min

Dated 22/Dec/2014 :
Melt In Mouth Butter Shortbread
Ingredients:
1/2 cup icing sugar
250g soft salted butter
2.5 cup plain flour/all purpose flour
1/3 cup rice flour
2tsp vanilla essence

Method: refer to above. Baked in pre-heated fan oven  170°C for 10-15min or until slight brown

Chinese Carrot Cake (Radish Cake)

Ingredients:
1 cup of white rice flour
2 cups of water
300g Radish/ white carrot-shredded
1 carrot  shredded
1tbsp dried shrimp -minced
3 shitake mushrooms -diced
1 Chinese sausage -diced(optional)
2 tbsp minced meat
4 small red onion/shallots -minced
Some oil for frying

Seasoning:
2tsp sea salt
1tsp chicken powder
1/2tsp sugar
1tsp fish sauce
1tsp light sauce

Method :
1. Mix rice flour with water. Add salt, sugar and chicken powder. Stir well. Set a side.
2. In a wok, put about 2 tablespoon of oil, fry the onion n shitake mushrooms & shrimp till fragrance or slightly brown and the shrimp is crispy. Then add sausage and minced meat. Stir.  Add  shredded radish n carrot n stir for a while. Add fish sauce n light sauce. Stir well.
3. Lower the fire, pour in the rice flour mixture onto the wok of carrots mixture. Continue to stir until the liquid mixture almost dry. Texture like soft dough.
4. Transfer into a round cake pan or steaming pan.
5. Boil a wok of water. When water is boiled, place the container of carrot mixture into the wok, then put on the wok cover and steam for 40-50min.
6. Garnish with some cut spring onion and serve

Blueberry and Bananas Muffins

Have a few bananas over ripe and do not want them to be thrown in bin. So, decided to make this muffins with added blueberry. This is my first time making this muffin using my existing bananas muffin recipe. As the ripe bananas were very sweet and the blueberry which I used was sweet too, the muffin turned out to be very sweet for my tooth. I would prefer a less sweet muffin so would reduce the sugar level if I will to make this muffin again.


This is the recipe


Ingredients :
100g melted butter
2 cup of self-raising flour
1/2 tsp of baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup soft brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar (I will omit this next round)
1 cup of fresh blueberry.
3 bananas (mashed)
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 eggs


Method:
1. In a sauce pan melt the butter over low fire. Be caution not to burn the butter.  Set it a side.
2. Mixed all the dry ingredients together
3. Mixed the melted butter, lightly beated eggs, vanilla and mashed bananas together.
4. Pour the wet ingredients(3) onto the dry ingredients (2). Very quickly stir them to combine. Last add in the blueberry. Do not over stir.
5. Bake in pre-heat oven 190 deg C for 20min or when the satay stick or toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
6. Remove from oven.

You may like to try these muffins recipes for more variety:
1. Double Chocolate Chips Muffins
2. Blueberry Yoghurt Muffins
3. Orange Muffins

Almond Cookies ( Simple Version)

Read about a  recipe for peanut cookies using 2:2:1:1 ratio from this blog: I bake I cook I eat. Find it is simple and easy. So, I tried on the almond cookie. However, I also read about almond is not as oily as peanut so 2:2:1:1 ratio may not so suitable. I made some changes on the flour. And the ratio become 3:2:1:1 using a measuring cup .The cookie turn out great! And find this cookie is more healthier than the rich almond cookie that I have posted earlier.

What do we need?

Ingredients:
1.5 cup (approx. 150g) plain flour
1 cup (approx. 140g ) raw almonds
1/2 cup (approx. 50g) icing sugar
1/2 cup  (approx. 90g) canola & sunflower cooking oil
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg for eggwash

Preheat oven : 180 deg C

Methond :
1. Rinse the almond with water. Dry fry in a non-stick wok/pan until it is completely dry and fragrant.  Remove from wok and leave it to cool, then, use a blender with grinding function and grind into powder . Alternatively, you can buy ready roasted almond to grind into powder so that you can omit the frying step.

2. In a large bowl, combine all the ingredients except egg and form into dough. It should not be crumbly and can easily form a ball. Add a little more oil if it is crumbly.

3. Use a teaspoon to scoop about 1/2 spoon of dough and roll into 1.5cm balls and place them on a baking tray lined with parchment paper. Press down lightly with a chopstick or alteratively, use a straw or toothpick.

4. Glaze with eggwash.

5. Bake in preheated oven for 10-12min.  Or when it is golden brown. Remove from oven. Leave them to cool in the cooling rack then pack into airtight bottle.


P.S : You may replace the oil with pure groundnut oil/peanut oil.