Bread Making Practice : Butter Rolls

Sunday, September 23, 2007 Posted by YY on 11:28 PM comments (0)

Another bread making practice, pay liao $300 bucks to learn, must do more rite? *Tot we got scared of bread just some wks ago... -_-'' *

So today we tried butter roll. This K ar, just refuses to get a decent weighing scale..I am referring to a trusty electronic one tt costs above $40..*mine costs $75 -_-' * So we use the spring weighing scale lor..zzz~

The dough was one sticky mess to work with => no pics, cos all the dough was stuck on my hands. After it was fermented for the first time, we rounded it to proof it for 2nd round. This is before proving for 2nd time, note size.


Notice there's an odd ball in the above pic..suddenly a 7th bun pops up ..this one gotta ask Chef K cos he divided one ^^

Butter roll x2 in another shape..recipe book recommended shape =.=' (before 2nd proofing)



Proof 2nd time liao..wee~ they grew up


After baking. Abit overbaked though cos the color is abit dark, but somehow earlier by 2 mins it wasn't dark enuff.





Closeup on texture



That's my breakfast for tmr - 1 bun ONLY, the rest let others try la eh~ *heng only 9 buns to be divided btwn 2 persons*

Cooking Expedition (22/9) - Japanese Cuisine

Posted by YY on 12:44 AM comments (0)

If you have been reading my blog, you would have noticed how much I loved Nirai Kanai's pork belly, finally managed to try it today on our own.

Started marketing early in the morning *nt me la..i still snoozing -_-' * But couldn't find the FATTY pork belly, so got something less fat..*whats up man..everyone wants fatty meat suddenly?! * Couldn't get pig bones either, so soup stock for noodles would have to be done using pork ribs le lor..zzz~

Menu:

Starters: Sesame paste salad dressing with bacon bits, roasted garlic and butterhead

Main course : Rafute Ramen (Stew Pork Belly with ramen)

Drink : Bundaberg Lemon and Lime Bitters


Starting cooking real early, pork ribs need to boil abt 3hrs *actually I think can be longer*, and the stew pork belly sauce..needs damn long..

To begin with, let's broil the pork belly on pan first and scrape off the black parts. To be honest, I duno what this process is for..to remove the pig hairs?!


Pork ribs soup boiling~


This is KELP (the leaves), it comes in dried version. Wipe clean before putting into water to boil. Switch off once water starts to boil, cos it will turn slimy~ The stock is called dashi stock. We didn't put in bonito flakes though..


This sauce is a real horror, cos it uses 200grams of sugar, one whole small bottle of Jap soy sauce, 1 cup of scotch whisky, garlic, ginger...... and one cup of the above dashi stock.


Boil for freaking long time, *look at time on photos* and we add in the pork belly


Meanwhile, to make the salad we sorta roast the white sesame seeds abit in the pan. *Do not over roast, it turns bitter*


Add in mirin and cook for another half hr, uncovered~


Sesame paste , looks like baby's food eh -_-' Includes sugar *yes sugar again* , vinegar, mayonaise, onion, soy sauce


The final salad, leafy stuff : buttercup, very good for salads. Roasted garlic and fried bacon bits included.


Noodles cooked in pork ribs soup, with spring onions, fried onion, soft braised egg and our main star: stew pork belly. Braised egg was cooked for 4minutes in water, then remove shell and dipped in the pork belly gravy till colored. *note egg yolk is 3/4 cooked*


To end off the satisfying meal, we had a fizzy lemony drink~



As K was saying I have not been rating the previous expedition, that's because I participated mah..then if I say good like old wong sell cucumber, ownself sell ownself praise. -.-'

Scores:

Sesame paste dressing : 7/10 *room for improvement to remove sesame sediments*

Ramen soup base: 7/10 *room for improvement in taste department*

Egg: 8/10 *can dip inside gravy for longer time*

Stew Pork Belly: 8/10 *cld be more authentic with using Awamori - okinawan wine, but we cannot find in SG zzzz~*

Cooking crab cakes finally~

Sunday, September 16, 2007 Posted by YY on 11:42 PM comments (0)

Went to another supermarket..the trusty old NTUC. Managed to get the mustard for crab cakes and wee~ get to try it today.

But before that, let's plan the menu:

1.) Rosti with sour cream
2.) Pork chop with maple syrup + Hp sauce
3.) Crab cake with lemon mayonaise
4.) Rootbeer float (Root mug tastes much better than A&W)

Pork chops, to be baked after pan frying for awhile.

Rosti..flipping the rosti resulted in slightly lesser strands for dinner though..


Add cheese..then ham and mushrooms in the final touch was to clear the fridge of yesterday's leftover ingredients -.-


My crab cakes..i know the color nt nice lah..zzz~*nt enuff lighting mah*


Dinner served quite early today ..and Chef K was sick while cooking..and i was using eye power until my turn to fry crab cakes.. >.>'



Close up close up~ It tasted crabby, and bread crumbs gave it the fried flavour. But the combi of sour cream, Dijon mustard, lemon zest, lemon juice, mayonaise gave us a new flavour of lemon mayo which matched the crab cakes well.


Cooking Expedition : Ultra Rich Hokkaido Milk Loaf for dinner

Posted by YY on 1:50 AM comments (0)

Baking lessons have ended and its a good time to try something we always wanted to - The Hokkaido Milk Loaf. This bread requires milk and whipping cream, ultra rich and fattening stuff >.>

Initially dinner plan was to cook crab cakes, somehow cold storage doesn't sell that mustard..ZZZ~ So cooking plans changed drastically while we were strolling aimlessly in the mart. In the end, I decided let's make full use of the bread we make then, we shall have sandwiches for dinner...*Other pple's breakfast combi we eat as dinner*

Menu:
Main course : Hokkaido Milk Bread with
- Honey Baked Ham
- Mushroom
- Gloucester Cheese
- Egg Mayo
- Shredded Chicken Thigh baked with Curry Powder, Garlic and Chilli flakes
Total cost = $36 , freaking cheese costs $9+ liao..zzz~

Putting the techniques learnt in the past one mth, this picture below shows the bread after first fermentation. The dough is now rolled and placed into the tin, to undergo 2nd proofing that is supposed to take abt 1hr. Remember this pic.


Chicken thigh marinated, ready for baking


Hard boiled eggs with their yolks 4/5 cooked.


Egg Mayo, I think its tad too sweet due to Kraft's Mayo. zZz~


There's the bread dough after 1 hr..see the difference in size? Before that they were scrawny, and didnt even fill half the tin.




Gently put on some egg wash before baking


Meanwhile, time to attend to other ingredients for the sandwich. Was thinking to make those mushrooms like mushroom swiss @ burger king but..hmm~too troublesome..-_-'


Finally the chicken is done (The bread was "anxiously" waiting for the oven to be ready =.=') whole kitchen smells like curry powder. Its amazing that the chilli flakes did it nicely..for spicyness.

After awhile, the top of the bread was becoming too brown too fast..because we are using a small kitchen oven. So~ we covered the top with aluminium foil, before it gets chao ta by the time the rest of the bread is cooked.

Finally done in 40minutes...


Btm view of hokkaido loaf



O man..look at the texture *pls forget abt the fats it contains*





Putting cheese, ham, mushrooms and egg mayo then baking the sandwich for another 10mins -> to melt cheese and make it more dry.


Complete dinner..somehow abit big in proportion. 1 whole chicken thigh was shredded and shared. Another was in stomach to curb the hunger pangs >.<


Look at the time on the pics..its about 10pm when we finished cooking.zzz~


Dessert : A&W rootbeer with 1 scope of vanilla ice cream. Talk about calories... =.='''




This last minute changed menu was pretty good, except mushrooms was not in mushroom swiss sauce else it would have been puurrrfect~

Bread : 8/10
Sandwich as a whole : 8.5/10 *except too big for my stomach -_-' *
Drink : 6.5/10 Too Sweet~
Chicken thigh: 8/10 *slurp*
Egg Mayo : 6/10 *Kraft mayo too sweet liao*

Puff Pastry Lesson 2: Apple Strudel and Curry puffs

Posted by YY on 1:32 AM comments (0)

Last lesson on baking for this month, today we are gonna do Apple strudel and Curry puffs.
This time, butter sheet is used (it contains 60% butter) and we are gonna fold and roll this piece of dough+butter for 4 times..its definitely more than the croissant >.>'

However this time, I tip toed and didn't get much muscle aches hee~

Below: Baked green and red apples with cinnamon and sugar. This mixture tastes fantastic!


After rolling and folding this silly dough for 4 times (in btwn each fold, refrigerate), finally its ready to bake. Pic shows putting egg wash onto the apple-strudel-to-be before baking.


The baked product was to be cut into 2, then baked dry before adding apples in.



From the same dough, we made curry puffs too



The dried up puffs



As it seems much better to have 3 layers of puffs *it beats bringing back 3 apple strudels each actually >.>' * so we laid 2 layers of apples with whipped cream and custard..*slurp*


TA DA~ Apple Strudel is done. Tastes gd when refrigerated and sprinkled with snow sugar before serving.