DIY Red Bean Pancake / DouSha GuoBing 豆沙锅饼

Had too much time stuck at home during Singapore's "Circuit Breaker", so I tried making something that I was craving for, but didn't want to buy/order from outside. There aren't too many places that do tasty Chinese red bean pancakes, and if they do, they usually serve it as a large serving meant for 6-8 persons to share as a dessert. 

I had some organic red adzuki beans on hand, but was quite sick of making red bean soup or red bean popsicles. I decided to try using frozen prata to replace the pastry encasing the red bean paste. The paste was easily cooked with the help of my pressure cooker. It did take a while to prepare this dish as I had to thicken the red bean soup to a thick paste, cool and spread it out as an even thin layer. This is a trick I learnt from watching ban jien kueh hawkers. 

Easy Mochi with Kinako

We had been making it almost a habit to take post-dinner walks in the neighbourhood where possible. And inevitably ended up looking for some sort of snack to satiate our sweet tooth (Haha!). Y was particularly partial to the Japanese mochi snack sold at Don Don Donki at 100AM, but I balked at the price for such a small pack, which is polished off within 10 mins by the three of us. So I started searching for the recipe and bought the ingredients at Daiso. 

It's so easy that I don't think I will be buying it in future.... 

Recipe from Mono + Co *

100g glutinous rice flour 

60g dark brown sugar ** 

180g water 

2 tablespoons kinako ***

*https://monoandco.com/2016/07/30/easy-mochi-with-kinako/

Luncheon Meat Bun 午餐肉包

I wanted to try the "Ferment Dough" function on the Mayer MMBM12 breadmaker today, so I chose a bakery bun recipe that would require manual shaping and baking in a normal oven.

This is one of our favourites, Luncheon Meat Bun. Basically the dough recipe is a sweet dough recipe that is used for most commonly found items in Chinese bakery shops. The fillings can vary from luncheon meat to sausage to char siew to curry, whatever is your preference. Thus I wanted to try this recipe and see if it is a keeper, so that I do not have to store so many different recipes.

I made only half a recipe as my Breadmaker's capacity is only 750g (a quick calculation put the ingredients at >900g). The steps were standard: mix all dough ingredients until no longer tacky->proof 30 mins -->punch back -->2nd proofing 30 mins-->shape -->final proofing -->brush with eggwash -->bake for 10-15 mins at 200°C.




Original Recipe from “港面包， 港味道” - 邱勇灵 编著

面团
高筋面粉 450 克
糖 112 克
酵母 7 克
牛油／猪油 42 克
温水 3/4杯
鸡蛋1只
牛奶1/4 杯
面粉改良剂 4 克

1杯为250毫升， 鸡蛋一只约为50克。

馅料
午餐肉16片

装饰
蛋液适量 （扫面）
马苏里拉 （Mozzarella）芝士碎适量

Unboxing Mayer Breadmaker MMBM12

Hubby told me there was a Mayer atrium sale near his workplace and snapped a pic of the Mayer Breadmaker (MMBM12) on sale. It was going for about 50% off (compared to online sources and other retailers like Parisilk), so we jumped on the offer and bought it.

Y went with me to purchase it and she was so excited about the new purchase that she actually helped me carry the box (4.5kg) home from our basement carpark!

Naturally, Y continued to harrass me to open and bake bread immediately, so we did just that. 

Opening the box, we found the operating manual/instruction book and a glove(for protecting your hand when removing the inner bread barrel from the machine body). Inside the bread barrel, there was the stirrer, a measuring cup, and a dual measuring spoon.

Purple Sweet Potato Muffins

I was just finishing up the Ogura cake for my sister, and wanted to make use of the oven (since it took so long to heat up and cool down anyway!). Googled and found a recipe for sweet potato muffins, which were easy enough to whip up (I had less than an hour before I had to pick Y from school then)

Sweet Potato muffins (makes 12) 

1 Cup Self-raising flour

1 Cup sugar (I used 3/4C)

1 tsp cinnamon powder

1/2 egg

1 Cup mashed sweet potato flesh

1/2 Cup oil

Steps

1. Line a 12-hole muffin pan with liners, if using. Preheat oven to 375F/190C.
2. Sift the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, cinnamon)
3. Beat the egg til pale, then add the sweet potato flesh and oil. Mix well. 
4. Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, until just moistened.
5. Bake in preheated oven for 15-18 minutes.

Note: for some reason, the baked purple sweet potato turns green, so my sisters and nephews were a bit hesitant to eat when they saw green spots dotting the muffin (looking exactly like mouldy food) I read later that it was due to a reaction with baking soda/powder. 

Purple Sweet Potato muffins waiting to be consumed

Unboxing Kenwood compact oven toaster MO280

We were at Robinsons Raffles City checking out the sale promotions when I saw this on sale. I had been tempted to replace the current Philips toaster (which only toasts sliced bread and warms pastries atop the toaster), with a small toaster oven. I wanted to be able to make simple puff pastry items and pizzas for breakfast/lunch without having to use my built-in oven or airfryer (which blows all the shredded cheese everywhere when in use)

I liked this model as it has a crumb door at the base to clean crumbs/messes. Function-wise, it has temperature control and timer. I can also choose function (whether to have only top heating, or both top and bottom heating)

Hubby had some vouchers to use on hand, so we decided to buy this for $49.90.

I am looking forward to more grilled breakfast items!

Top (from left): Slide-in wire tray; instructions manuals; tray/dish handle (hidden below manual) ; cooking dish.

Mini doughnuts for breakfast (3Oct 2015)

I had bought a mini doughnut maker online some time back, but it was stashed away at my parents' home. I remembered about it recently and brought it back, since I now have the batter dispenser to play with. 

I followed a basic waffle/pancake recipe and tried making it for breakfast at home today. I realised the heating panels are uneven, so the bottom half of the donut was more evenly browned, whereas the top panel gives the "speckled look". 

I tried to even the browning by flipping the doughnuts halfway through the cooking time (this electric machine can't be flipped upside down, unlike the traditional stovetop type) But the structure was not fully set yet, so they tear easily while I was using tongs to flip them manually. In the picture below, you can see the ugly marks left behind by the tongs when I turned them over. These cook fast! 1 min on each side so one batch of 7 gets done within 3 mins.