Sunday, October 31, 2004
Exploding Pannatone
My first attempt at making the Italian bread, pannatone was an interesting experience. The recipe called for 400g of flour, yeast, salt two eggs, 5 egg yolks, 50g of sugar, 180g of butter and 150 g of raisins. When it came to getting a mixture the texture of sticky dough, more flour was needed - so something more in the region of about 600g of flour! Then when the dough was kneaded and risen twice, it was put in the oven where it carried on growing - even though the heat should have killed off the yeast by then. But it kept on growing and growing and growing. A pannatone monster so to speak. Eventually, I had to take it out of the over and remove some of the dough as it was oozing from the side of the pan. When the bread finally stopped rising - I ended up with the biggest pannatone in the world - well an exaggeration. Next time I make it, I will halve the ingredients.
Sunday, October 24, 2004
I want a bread maker!
I've been in a baking frenzy the past few weeks. I have just bought two new cook books filled with cake and cookie recipes and have been manically making dozens of biscuits and cakes. I spent this weekend with Timmy, baking and cooking and subjecting our families to our culinary experiments. I made coffee and walnut muffins whilst Tim made ginger cake in the bread maker. Then he made milk bread and I made tea bread, with real tea. Tim's bread maker is very useful and there are loads of recipes I would like to try to make - like brioche and pannatone, that is, if Tim will let me use the machine. Well, perhaps its his last stand in the kitchen that I have taken over.
Thursday, October 21, 2004
Ma Lai Koh or Steamed Cake
Ma Lai Koh (Malay Steamed Cake)
Ingredients200 g Sugar
200g Self Raising Flour
5 Eggs
40 g Melted Butter
250 ml Evaporated Milk
1 teaspoon Vanilla Essence
1 teaspoon baking powder
Method
Mix the sugar with the butter, then beat the eggs and vanilla sugar into the mix. Then add the flour and mix until the batter is smooth then pour the mixture into a greased cake pan. Steam for about 20 minutes or until the cake has risen and a skewer comes out clean when the cake is tested.
Labels: Recipe
Tuesday, October 12, 2004
Hot Hot Hot.... Jelly Beans?
On our trip to London, we went to Harrods to have a quick look at this infamous shop of extravagance before getting on a train back to Birmingham. For the last couple of weeks, we have been discussing the variety of Jelly Belly jelly beans available in the UK and we noticed on the packaging they describe 50 flavours and we have tried 49 of them, but the last one, the jalapeno flavoured ones are no where to be found. They don't sell them in Birmingham, apart from in the expensive box sets. You can't even get that flavour online and sent to the UK. So when we found them in Harrods food hall, how could we resist buying some? So I bought 50g of them and realised why they aren't for sale anywhere else. They do taste of chilli, but it has a funny after taste. However, if you combine them with a mango jelly bean, they taste of mango chutney.
Monday, October 04, 2004
22lbs of Melon
It was a dark and stormy night, and the waves were as big as houses... Ok there were no waves since I don't live by the sea. It was basically pretty windy out there last night and my dad has the maddest vegetable garden in the world. He likes to grow melons, huge shark's fin melons.
A couple of years ago, he grew so many green plants that it actually covered the greenhouse - making the greenhouse actually green. But I digress. It was a stormy night last night and the wind was blowing hard, and the force of it blew down one of my dad's prize melons. A whopping 22 pound one - I think it might be the largest one that he has grown. I shudder to think how long it will take us to eat it. I mean last year, he grew something like a hundred of those things. Ok, not all of them were this hefty, but even giving half of them to friends and family, there were about another fifty to eat and my dad won't sell them. Hmm... how many ways can you cook melon that is not that sweet? Boil it, bake it, fry it, make it into soup?
A couple of years ago, he grew so many green plants that it actually covered the greenhouse - making the greenhouse actually green. But I digress. It was a stormy night last night and the wind was blowing hard, and the force of it blew down one of my dad's prize melons. A whopping 22 pound one - I think it might be the largest one that he has grown. I shudder to think how long it will take us to eat it. I mean last year, he grew something like a hundred of those things. Ok, not all of them were this hefty, but even giving half of them to friends and family, there were about another fifty to eat and my dad won't sell them. Hmm... how many ways can you cook melon that is not that sweet? Boil it, bake it, fry it, make it into soup?