Simple plain scones

We have always love scones since AC days. We love the yummy scones from da paolo and treating ourselves once in a while during our AC days. And then, when we came to the UK, we realised how much fresher and more yummy scones are here. We have always been going for high teas just to taste yummy scones, and buying scones from the different bakeries and finally, we decided to make our own scones. We found the perfect recipe for scones and realise how cheap, easy and fast it was to make!

Ingredients:

230g Self-raising flour

50g Cold butter

120ml Milk

4 Tablespoon sugar

Directions:

Pre-heat oven to 220degrees celcius. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl in this order - self-raising flour, sugar, butter and milk. Once mixing all the ingredients together, you should obtain a slightly sticky ball of dough. To makes things simpler, just scoop the mixture into a cupcake/muffin tin, and place into the oven for 10-12 minutes. 

Normally, you would roll out the mixture to make a round shape so that the scone will raise in a nicer way, however, we really like our scones to be irregular shaped as it looks cute! Lastly, you can add other ingredients inside to make 'flavoured' scones, such as a combination of raspberry, blueberry and white chocolate, or the typical sultana scone. Try it yourself! It is really easy and fast :)

We made about 16 mini scones!

Prawn Congee with Century Eggs

It's basically exams period, and that can only mean 1 thing - more cooking, or more baking. But obviously since baking is usually higher in calories, I cook. Plus, I tend to finish my baking food within like an hour. I rarely, or hardly, ever cook Chinese food, because the measurements are usually pretty hard to define them. So please take note that the measurements may vary from one's palate to another.

I used to have this instant porridge packets, which basically takes me literally 3 minutes to cook it and it only cost me 0.75euros per packet. It's a cheap and easy dinner, and I basically throw in whatever ingredients I feel like eating that day. But since it is exams period (yes yes, I blame it on exams), I have more time to make it from scratch. Plus, the asian market doesn't sell my porridge anymore so I haven't been eating them in months.

Plus, my boyfie somehow wanted to eat congee. I wanted to make the more traditionally chicken or pork congee, but boyfie wanted seafood/prawns.

Ingredients:

1 Cup of rice

8 Cups of water

2-3 Tablespoon of Chinese cooking wine

A handful of dried shrimps

A handful of dried mushrooms (shitake)

Prawns

Shredded carrots (to your liking)

Century eggs

Crab meat (diced)

Vegetable stock

Spring onions for garnish

Directions:

Soak dried shrimps and dried mushrooms in hot water. After it has been softened, throw all the ingredients in, excluding the century egg and crab meat. I cooked it under "white rice" setting first, but then I changed to stew. The rice would slowly break up, so don't worry about it being all grainy in the beginning. Stew it longer if you like your congee thicker and add water if you like it more watery. I stewed mine for a good 1.5hours. Then throw in the prawns to cook it. Add the crab meat, century eggs and spring onions at the end when serving. 

I was reading recipes online and that they say you should marinate the prawns first, but obviously I was too lazy to do that. But go ahead if you like to. Variations also say that congee would taste better if you soak the rice in water or sesame oil + salt for a good hour. I didn't had the time to do that either. And I used vegetable stock because I'm a person who really likes a more flavourful taste rather than a plain white congee. But you can do without it, if you like. 

From the picture, you can't exactly see the crabmeat or prawns because I kind of finished it all in the first serving and usually the second servings do not have much ingredients left. I love the colour of the crabmeat, carrots and spring onions, giving it that colour to a mundane white congee. Ahh, all food only looks good. But pictures can sometimes be deceiving. 

I made a good 6 bowls/portions with these ingredients.

Sushi feast!

I have always loved sushi. It's really frustrating how Dublin's sushi are really expensive and not in any way the freshest. Then again, Singapore's sushi has been getting way to expensive. &I don't know, I always felt like eating Tamago nigiri or California rolls and etc (basically non-seafood sushi) at Japanese restaurants are such a waste of money. They probably cost about the same as a piece of Salmon nigiri or Tuna. I'm pretty much quite money minded when it comes to food, and also therefore like not to "waste" money on food like these as it is not worth it.

Tamago isn't that hard to make when you actually know the ingredients to it. After learning how to make a Tamago, you'll probably never buy them again at Japanese restaurants because it honestly just not worth it.




















Tamago recipe:
4 Eggs
2 Tablespoon of mirin
1 Tablespoon of sugar
1 Teaspoon of salt
1 Tablespoon of dashi (Honestly, I didn't measure how much I put in for it)
- It's completely up to you if you like dashi in your Tamago. You can also do without it

Directions:
Basically pour all the ingredients together and mix it well. The hardest part is getting a rectangle pan (or circular if you're more professional with it), and pouring it out a very thin (or as thin as you can get) layer of the egg mixture. The non-stick or oiled pan should be heated under medium fire for better control. And as soon as you see the top part of the egg getting cook (it should still be wet) and the bottom completely cooked, time to start rolling your eggs! You want to start folding them about 1cm. The beginning is the hardest part, so be careful of breaking/splitting the eggs because it is very thin. I suggest using a pair of chopsticks to fold it when you lift it up with a spatula. And just continue rolling them, it gets easier when dealing with bigger volume of egg. &Tadah, your wonderful Tamago is formed. Remember to refrigerate them because.. I don't know? Sushi taste better cold?

By the way, I'm so proud of my Tamago because of the beautiful layers. Looks a little like kueh lapis eh? So, since I've made Tamago, you can't not just have Tamago alone. You got to continue the second step of making a sushi. Or rolls/maki. Obviously, I don't have the money to buy seafood, but you can have any ingredients you like in a roll/maki. I'll do with the 'poor-people's' maki.

Ingredients:
Crab sticks
Cucumber
Tamago (Look above)
Avocado
Seaweed
-
2 Cups of Sushi rice
2.5 Cups of water
4 Tablespoon (or more) of rice vinegar
2 Tablespoon of sugar
2 Tablespoon of salt
-
Sushi mat, or if you don't have one, just use a parchment/baking paper. That's what I did, it works perfectly fine.

Directions:
Wash your rice and add water. Pop it into the rice cooker. Isn't a rice cooker just so convenient nowadays? Meanwhile, waiting for the rice, combine the rice vinegar, sugar and salt together. Cut up your crabsticks, cumber, Tamago and avocado into slices. Once your rice is cooked, open the lid to let it cool down for a little while. And once it is warm, add the mixture into it and stir! The rice gets dry pretty easily, so I suggest using a towel to cover the pot if you're not using it.

There's 2 ways into making a maki - either the rice inside the seaweed or outside. Either way, put your seaweed shiny side down on your sushi mat or parchment paper and add your rice. Make sure it is somewhat evenly spread out, you don't have to flatten it just yet.

a) Rice inside seaweed
Take a whole seaweed and spread the rice on it, leaving about 2cm of the top part empty. Then add your ingredients! The tricky part is rolling it. Take the end of your seaweed+rice and you want to cover ALL the ingredients. Tug your ingredients underneath it. When doing so, make sure you press the ingredients in so it is compact. After getting the "shape", let go of the parchment paper and make sure your ingredient (or at least 9/10 of it) is inside. Then start rolling it again, it's pretty simple once you get the hang of it. You also want to keep in mind that you want a "squarish" maki, so make sure you mould it into that shape.

When cutting the maki, the most important thing is your knife. Make sure it is VERY sharp and clean. Don't press your knife downwards against the sushi, but actually slicing it. A sharp knife makes it all much simpler. Remember if there is rice being stuck to the knife, wash it and do it again. You only have 1 chance of cutting the make right. &Because you usually hold and press onto the maki while cutting it, the tip is to "remould" it again with the parchment paper AFTER slicing all of them.

b) Rice outside seaweed
You have to cut your seaweed into 2, because it would be too big a maki for 1 seaweed. &Like again, shinny side down. This time, spread ALL the rice on the seaweed. You don't have to really care about compressing it now. Flip the seaweed and rice over and this time, press it down to "compress" the rice. Don't worry, the rice would not stick to the parchment paper, that's the beauty of it. Add your ingredients in the middle & roll it up the same way as above. Top your sushi with toasted sesame seed to make it look more professional than it already is.

Wal-lah, beautiful sushi makis. Easy to make. I made about 6-7 rolls with the amount of rice. &If you are ever too lazy to cut them up, YOU CAN HAVE A SUSHI BURITO. Dum dum dum.

Singapore, the land of home and food!

Been a few days since dulcy and I got home! :) Been indulging in local food!

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Kuay chap at Heartland Mall hawker centre, with my 30 cents soya bean (cheapest soya bean ever). Soya bean uncle and aunty have never changed their pricing of their drinks since they opened! And I'm happy that they still remembered us! Hee! Duck, egg, tau fu and pig intestines. So yum yum!

Egg noodles? My dad said it was 鸡蛋面. So I guess I directly translated it! It's at Ang Mo Kio hawker centre, near Ang Mo Kio Secondary school and some other school that I can see from the hawker centre but have no idea which school is it. Soup with meatballs, minced meat, egg, fish cake and vegetables! So yummy.

It's really hard to find night markets in Singapore nowadays (and they can happen anytime and anywhere). Luckily my mum spotted one for us at Toa Payoh, and we went the next night to grab the food!

Managed to grab the steamed puti piring (a Malay food that is steamed with brown sugar inside), muah chee (rice cake with peanut and sugar) and tako yaki (Japanese tako balls with sotong inside, eaten with BBQ sauce, mayonnaise and fish flakes)! Didn't managed to eat ramly burger because it was a really long queue! :( Maybe when daffy's back, we'll go again, provided it is still there.

Steamed tutu kuehs! At Queensway mall, because I had to get some sports attire from there. It's 5 for $2.50. :( Increased price! But I love it so much! I always eat the peanut fillings one, despite having another choice of coconut. Apparently now there are other fillings like chocolate and durian. Hmm..

Ya Kun kaya toast! Who can ever forget this. 2 slices of kaya butter toast with 2 soft boiled eggs and ice milo. Perfect breakfast to begin the day with!

Laksa at Katong! Famous and cheap! Only $2. Seriously, where can you find laksa that is $2? Apparently my parents said they started their business on motorbikes, at $0.50 per bowl. Haha! Laksa has fish cakes and cockles (my favourite).

Durians from Serangoon! Some may claim it's smelly, but some (like us) claim it's the king of fruits. Noms! There are 2 types, sweet and bitter. We love the sweet type, whereas my parents love the bitter ones.

Can't wait for daffy to come home! Counting down the days! :)

Asian delights: One

So we are finally leaving Singapore in exactly a week now! :) Honestly, I'm pretty excited although there's so much here to give up.. JUST LIKE ASIAN DELIGHTS! So my siblings (including my brother) and I came up with this list in which contains places and food to eat before we leave. So we are currently fulfilling it in this week by having breakfast, lunch and dinner. Trust me, I'm feeling such a fatty.

So first thing on the list which have been strike out: MELLBEN SEAFOOD

If you haven't tried this yet, you're totally missing out in life. A definitely must-eat-food in Singapore. Let the photos speak before words do..

P.S: Pardon the stupid captions below the pictures. I've no idea why blogger is doing this to me. :(

Where Mellbone Seafood is.

The exact location and address. GPS it! :) 

Look at the damn queue! :( 

The amount of food we ordered for 8 people and 1 baby! :) Obviously we are a fatty family that can gobble down any food that comes in our way

Look at the amount of people that were already eating dinner! This is taken at 6pm. Typical Singaporeans trying to avoid the dinner crowd. :D

My little niece all excited for her favourite crabs. :)

Bamboo clams! 

Their all-time favourite and best thing ever crabs. I honestly can't remember what's the name of it, but trust me it's the biggest picture on their menu, so it's very easy to spot. :D 

Ordered 2 bowls! Woohoo.

The girl who was taking our order recommend this - Strawberry prawns, or something like that. It's super weird, but I guess it's an acquired taste. I feel the prawns itself it good without the strawberry thing. :D 

Salted egg coated pork ribs! This is not too bad. 

We missed out 2 photos of tofus. One tofu is their signature dish which is like, probably, handmade tofu with some gravy and there are pork floss on top. We didn't really like it, so I guess you can not try it. And there's another which is some deep fried tofu thing. It's rectangular in shape and you can find it on the menu of the top right of the 2nd page? I think I'm pretty creepy by memorizing their menu.

Anyhow, if you haven't tried this, YOU MUST!

We started queueing from 6pm, and as you can see from the photo, the queue is horribly long. But trust me, it's worth the wait. We waited for about an hour plus before we can finally have a table, but 45 minutes more for the food to be cooked. The bad thing about this place is that you cannot call up and reserve tables. It's a must to queue. You can only call up to order take aways (if I'm not wrong).

We ate on Sunday night thus the waiting time is so long but obviously the queues for weekends are far worst than weekdays, but you still have to queue no matter what. Let me tell you a secret though! If you intend to eat there, go in big groups roughly about 6-8 people. Because they have more big tables than small ones. People who comes in twos or fours have a higher chance of waiting for a table than to groups. :D

You can follow our Asian delights for this whole week! :) I've placed a tag on the right borders!