The Occasional Cook

Cakes and Cookies, Desserts, Malay, Singapore

Durian fritters

February 20, 2014March 3, 2021 7shasha7

An easy tea time staple in Malay homes will be the jemput–jemput pisang or banana fritters. I remember an aunt who married an American and then moved to Wyoming. She told me she made these for her neighbours and they loved them. They were also tickled by the literal translated name. Jemput means invite and so she’d tell them ‘banana invite-invite.’ When I got older, I learnt that jemput also means to take a small amount of something. So basically it means small amounts of batter.

That afternoon I decided to make a variation using durian. The Southeast Asian king of fruits so despised by Westerners (and some locals too!)

I took the flesh out from its seed and added some plain flour, a tiny bit of brown sugar and a pinch of salt. Then fry small amounts of the batter in hot oil. It was a success!

Noodles and Pasta

Shirataki noodles

February 18, 2014February 18, 2014 7shasha7

I heard of these zero calorie noodles from watching The Hungry girl. After a quick google, I found that only the Isetan supermarket in Orchard road sells this.

Apparently it’s good stir fried dry and thankfully I did so. I must say that while the noodles themselves contain no calories, the sauce and all the other ingredients do pile the calories so be cautious if using these noodles to really lose weight.

The texture is really really really springy and it slides down your throat so be careful when swallowing and make sure the noodles go down the right pipe! I was so afraid that my four year old would not be able to take this and didn’t dare let him try some.

It’s a good try, and great fun to eat. The zero calories is a big draw but since its not easily accessible here, I’ll just eat regular noodles and walk more. 😁

I dry fried with the usual garlic and then seasoned with soy sauce and abalone sauce. I added tons of veggie like bean sprouts and baby spinach. I also added sliced fish cakes and lots of chillies.

Cakes and Cookies, Desserts

Chocolate chip cranberry cookies

February 2, 2014February 2, 2014 7shasha7

I decided to make cookies one day. Following not very closely the Hershey’s recipe at the back of the pack. I prefer using all town sugar rather than the mix of castor sugar and brown sugar. The result was not a sweet cookie-perfect for us since we all don’t have a sweet tooth.

The recipe

21/4 plain flour
1 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
250g butter
3/4 x 2 brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
Cranberries
Almonds and hazelnuts
Chocolate chips (2 packs)

Bread and Batter, breakfast, Desserts, Snack

Lemony Scones

January 19, 2014March 3, 2021 7shasha7

This morning for breakfast I made scones. This time I tweaked a recipe from the Web, so essentially they are not copyrighted hahaha. Apparently if you change three measurements or ingredients from the original, it’s yours.

So here’s mine recipe:

350 g self raising flour
A teaspoon of baking powder
100 g butter
1 tbsp caster sugar
180 ml skim milk
1tsp vanilla essence
1grated lemon zest
Juice from one lemon

In a bowl I grated the butter into the flour and baking powder mix and used the rubbing in method. Then I added the sugar. The milk I warmed it up a bit and then added the vanilla essence, lemon zest and lemon juice. Or scones you have to work vey quickly and if you live in a hot and humid country like me you’ve got to make sure that all this is done in less than 5 min. I brushed milk onto the unbaked scones. And then bake it a hot 220 oven.

The result was soft lemony buttery scones. 🙂

Salads and Vegetables, Sides

Carrot Vichy

January 19, 2014March 3, 2021 7shasha7

For lunch yesterday, I roasted chicken and then decided to make carrot Vichy. I first heard if carrot Vichy from Bourdain’s Christmas special. And so yesterday was a good time to try because firstly I had a whole bag of young Aussie carrots waiting to be consumed and secondly The Mom was coming over. Apparently it’s simply cooking carrots in water, butter and sugar. The resulting dish was very delicious bit definitely too sweet for our Asian tastebuds. Plus I felt so guilty cooking already sweet and fresh carrots in this sugary buttery concoction. Suffice to say that this would be the last time I’ll be making this. Well, at least I tried!