Chocolate Chip Cookies

There's no such thing as too many chocolate chips in a cookie !

And because I'm the only one who's gonna gobble most of it , no donation , thank you ! lol

Hey ! What's the purpose of making homemade goodies if you're gonna skimp on most ingredients ?!

Not me ! Er I'm being very generous these past few bakes hahaha I didn't even reduce the butter !

But I'm notorious when it comes to what matters the most and that's chocolate ! Chocolate is good for you anyway ! Uhmmm in moderation ?! hee hee  Moderation ?! Bah humbug ! hahahha

Almost the same recipe as these Triple chocolate and espresso cookies except omit the cocoa powder , white chocolate and the espresso powder . Add 7 ounces bittersweet chocolate ( about 1 cup ) . I added about 350 grams of bittersweet and semisweet chocolate chips .

Yang Chow Fried Rice

I got this leftover char siu ( Chinese barbequed pork ) hibernating in the fridge for 3 days now , so what better way to cook it than this popular Chinese-style fried rice .

A simple and easy one-dish meal  to make when you got loads of leftover rice -which I have most of the time .

Nah ! I intentionally cook more rice last night so that I can make this dish hahahahha

You can substitute the char siu with Chinese sausage , ham , roast chicken or any other preserved meat that you like and just call it your own personalized fried rice lol Add more greens like green peas , haricot vert or some of its cousins , cubed carrots or fresh corn kernels for color and texture contrast .

Serves one very hungry me or 2 normal person

2 cups day-old cooked rice
about 100 grams char siu , sliced
75 grams shrimps , shelled and deveined
3 stalks of Chinese kale , cut in pieces and blanch
1 egg
1 tsp ginger , finely minced
salt to taste
some diced spring onion
*** you can add light soy , brown sugar and minced garlic if prefer

* Whisk egg and season with a dash of white ground pepper and a tiny pinch of salt . Heat a wok or a non stick pan , add oil ; pour in the beaten egg and cook until set , transfer to a plate ; keep warm .
* In the same pan , add more oil , add in the ginger , fry until fragrant ; add in the char siu ; fry until heat thru then add in the shrimps and cook until it changes color . Add in the rice , stir thoroughly to remove any lumps ; cook for about 3-4 minutes , season with salt and add in the scrambled egg , mixing well ; adjust taste . Add in the spring onion , give it another good stir and dish up . Serve hot .

Char siu / Chinese barbequed pork

Pad Thai

When you think of Thai food , what comes immediately to your mind ? Tom yum soup ? Pad thai ? Me ? 'tis always pad thai . Yup , because it's fried noodles ....

I already made a passable gon chau ngau ho and char kuey teow so another noodle dish with nearly the same ingredients except adding some that makes this dish unique and a dish that most Thais couldn't live without ....

Pad thai is #5 in World's 50 most delicious food by CNNGO

This is one of the dish I've been hankering about for quiet sometime and since I got most ingredients on hand , so there .

I even made a decent pad thai sauce . Though the recipe calls for Thai seasoning sauce which I don't have , so I made a combination of fish sauce , soy sauce and chili paste and I might say , it's quiet good heh ! But next time will add more chili to the sauce .

And because I always forget to add one ingredient when I cook or bake , this dish is no exception lol Nothing drastic , just the fried shallots  , which I promptly add while I'm scarfing a plateful of pad thai after I finished taking loads of photos of it ! hahahaha

Please click this link for Recipe and video how-to

Chopsticks shot of course ! hee hee

Longganisa and Cucumber Salsa

Surely you couldn't get better than this ?! hahahaha

Longganisa is what we call the native sausage in the Philippines . Nearly every region in the country has their own version ranging from sweet , garlicky , hot and everything in between . The good thing about making it homemade , well , for one thing , you can be sure you're using good cuts of pork , add whatever seasoning you like and 'tis easy to make , too ! Cheap , too ^__^

This is a popular breakfast meal served with sunny-side up egg and rice or fried rice but you can eat it whenever you like with rice or as a stuffing in your sandwich and ice cold Coke hahaha . Back home , maybe they get tired of frying it , they started selling it as a barbequed longganisa , spearing several pieces in a wooden skewer and grilling it over charcoal ! Yummy !

My version is skinless since I can't find sausage casing here .

Skinless longganisa :

750 grams ground pork
2 1/2 T minced garlic
1/2 tsp chili flakes
1/2 tsp black pepper
3 T rice vinegar
2 T brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 T chicken powder
2 T achuete oil , recipe stolen here
1 T arrowroot flour
1 1/2 T Spanish paprika

* Combine and mix ingredients together , adjust taste by frying a small portion of the mixture or you can taste it raw . Chill overnight . Get a small portion and form into a small logs , fry and pig out hahaha

Cucumber salsa :

1 small cucumber , diced
2 small shallots , sliced
half of a small chili pepper , diced
juice of 1 lime
2 tsp fish sauce
1 T palm sugar
1 T chopped coriander

* Combine and mix ingredients . Great as an appetizer . Goes well with my sausage lol

Char Kuey Teow

Or my version . Sans prawn -  a tad expensive these past few days . Or I'm just feeling cheap .

I haven't eaten this dish for quiet sometime . Come to think of it there are lots of food that I haven't seen nor eaten for a while -__-''

I'm planning to make another gon chau ngau ho but I still have one lone Chinese sausage so I decided to make this .

It may look like gon chau ngau ho but the taste is much more like the char kuey teow that I usually ate at Toast Box . By the way , their coffee , free with a set meal , tastes HEAVENLY hee hee

But I haven't been there for a while and been dreaming about it , so I tried making it and the taste is really really good , okay , okay , according to me hahahaha

I did cook this in the stainless steel wok , but as we're using induction stove it's not really the same as when using a gas stove . I did maintain a high heat throughout but some noodles still stick on the pan and unlike when I made gon chau ngau ho last time , where I seldom stir the noodles before adding the sauce, this time I stir it vigorously heh !

If it may look like a tad dry it's because I just use about 2 tablespoon of oil and most of it were absorbed by the eggs . So if you want a more glossy noodles just add more oil .

There should be always a chopstick shot ! And just to let you know , it's really quiet hard holding a chopstick full of food in your right hand while taking photo on your left hand hee hee

550 grams fresh wide noodles
150 grams fish cake , sliced
1 Chinese sausage , steam and sliced
1 tablespoon garlic , minced
2 small shallots , sliced
2 eggs
some spring onion slices

For the sauce : Combine 3/4 T dark soy sauce , 1 T fish sauce , 1 T sambal oelek ( chili paste ) , 1 T brown sugar , 3 T water , pinch of salt and a generous dash of white ground pepper .

* Heat the pan and add oil , add the shallots and garlic fry until garlic turns golden brown . Add the sausage and fish cake ; fry until the cake turns lightly brown . Add the noodles , stir , toss and scrape the bottom to prevent sticking , about 3-4 minutes ; add the sauce , stir until well combined ; adjust taste ; add in the sprouts , continue tossing and stirring then make a space in the center of the pan and add in the eggs , stirring and  let eggs cook through and then stir into the noodles , mix thoroughly until well combined . Add in the spring onion , give another good stir . Serve hot .

Mango Ice Cream

Please vacuum the floor beforehand ! hee hee 

My first ice cream of the year .

I haven't eaten ice cream since October last year .

I know ! I missed half of my life tsk ! heh !

But then who wants to eat ice cream when it's about 15° outside ?

Now  , now ! Most of you that resides where 10° is just ho hum will smirk at this but then I'm from the tropics where they're not selling puffed jacket  or maybe they're selling it now ?! ^_-

I love winter here in Hongkong , partly because I can cover up my unmentionables hahahaha And just to let you know that , of course ,  ice cream shops here still thrives during winter and no , they're not selling it at half price hee hee . Maybe I'm the only one who doesn't like to eat ice cream during winter

So , as summer approaches , I'll start sweating like a pig  *sigh* but then I can make ice cream to my heart's content . I'll still drool when I check out Haagen-Dazs or Ben and Jerry's but as it's $28/scoop ( don't know if the price's still the same ) I'll rather buy 1L of whipping cream , which is cheap , by the way and make different flavor . Hey ! I'm cheap ! hee hee

This is a strawberry ice cream recipe , I just used mango .

Recipe from Desserts for Beginners by Peggy Wong

180 grams fresh mango puree
60 grams sugar
2 egg yolks
120 grams whipping cream
60 grams milk
1/2 tsp lemon juice
I added some mango pieces

* Whisk egg yolks and sugar until pale yellow .
* Heat milk in a pan until warm ; pour half of the hot milk into the egg yolks , whisking as you add to prevent curdling . Return the mixture to the saucepan and stir with wooden spoon until thickened . Set aside to cool .
* Mix lemon juice to mango puree and fold this to the egg mixture . Cool completely and put into the fridge to chill .
* Add the whipping cream to the cold egg mixture , mix until well combined and pour into the ice cream maker ; spin until thick and creamy . Transfer into ice cream container and layer some mango pieces and freeze until firm , about 4 hours or overnight

*** If you're not using an ice cream maker , use handheld mixer to beat the whipping cream until stiff and fold this to the cold mixture into two portions . Freeze mixture for an hour until half frozen ; then scrape the mixture and beat using a handheld mixer , in high-speed , until smooth but not melted . Repeat this 2-3 times to improve texture ; then freeze until firm .

*** Check out some icy concoctions at Sugar Puff , she didn't use an ice cream maker and she made different yummy flavors  .

Cream Cheese Pound Cake

I got some leftover cream cheese inside the fridge and I'm afraid that it's going to get moldy so I decided to make this cake . I'm planning to use that actually for another cheesecake - decent swirl , anyone ?! hahaha but as it's less than 200 grams so it's a no-go .

I have some reservation when I made this cake . If you see the original recipe at Joy of Baking , it's quiet a  huge cake and nearly shuddered at the thought of making a cake with that much sugar -__-" I made half of the recipe but still reduced the sugar a bit more so as most of the main ingredients. As I was baking and thinking , maybe I reduced too much of the ingredients - and I usually do this anyway tsk ! - the outcome will too dry or in won't rise at all . Surprisingly , it turned out well , I even make a not-so decent glaze ( my homemade icing sugar's too grainy pftttttt ) and drowned one of the cake with it hahaha   

I've been itching to use my 3 small cake pans because one has this flower design at the bottom and the other one's a very small bundt pan . Good thing , my cream cheese batter fits into these .

Original recipe @ Joy of Baking 

190 grams all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

120 grams butter at room temperature

175 grams cream cheese at room temp

170 grams caster sugar

3 large eggs

1 1/2 tsps vanilla extract

zest of half a lemon 

* Preheat oven to 350°C/ 180°F . Grease 3 small pans ( I used two 6-inch cake pan and a 4 1/2-inch mini bundt pan ) .

* In a bowl , sift together flour , baking powder , baking soda and salt .

* With a hand mixer , in a large bowl , beat the butter and cream cheese until smooth . Add sugar , in 3 additions , beating well after each addition . Continue beating on medium-high speed until light and fluffy . Add eggs , one at a time , beating well after each addition . Add the vanilla and lemon zest until well combined . Add the flour mixture and mix until well incorporated .

* Pour into the prepared pan and bake for about 45 minutes .