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Summer time comes with abundance of peaches, plums, nectarines, cherries, melons, etc. This is also the time when these fruits are cheap and at its' sweetest. I made a similar cake before and this is my other version. Not too pretty looking because some of the fruit sank but nevertheless it's still delicious. This time I used the sour plum and peach for my choice of fruit and thus I used 1 cup of sugar for my cake to counteract the sourness of the fruit. If your choice of fruit is sweet, you can use 3/4 cup of sugar. And remember to put this cake in the refrigerator as the moisture from the fruit will turn moldy if not.
Ingredients:
(A)
1/2 cup butter (or 1 stick or 113g)
1 cup sugar (use 3/4 cup for less sweet version)
(B)
3 large eggs
(C)
3 Tbsp. whole milk
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. Rum extract (optional)
(D)
1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
(E)
Summer fruit of your choice, I used slices of peach and red plum (sprinkle with a little sugar and mix well)
Method:
1. Preheat oven to 350'F. Spray and lined a 8-inch square pan with parchment paper. Spray again and on the sides. Set aside.
2. In a mixing bowl, beat (A) together until creamy. Add (B) one at a time, beat well. Add (C), beat well with electric mixer. Then, add in (D), beat until smooth.
3. Pour batter into the pan, level nicely and arranged the prepared fruit on top (don't press it down). Bake for 40-45 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
4. Cool on wire rack. Place in air-tight container and store in the refrigerator. Set it aside at room-temperature for 10-15 minutes before consuming.
My friend gave me a big bottle of her homemade XO sauce recently. What a treat for me as I loved XO sauce but not willing to pay the price for it and yet too lazy to make my own. So, I was real grateful of receiving this gift from her, like a valuable treasure.
For this above dish, I cooked the Chai Hsin with XO sauce and season with a little salt and that was it. Easy, flavorful and delicious. I have since used the XO sauce to top the soft tofu and microwave for a minute and a dish is served. XO sauce not only used as condiment but in stir-frying dishes as well. The restaurant here used the XO sauce to stir-fry squid and rice rolls noodle too. What other creative way have you used your XO sauce with?
I bought few packets of A1 Emperor Chicken Spices when I was in Malaysia. Today, I wanted to try something different with it instead of the usual baking or steaming the chicken. I simmered the chicken instead and added wood ear fungus and wolfberries/ Goji berries/"ke chi". I loved this version too, truly flavorful and delicious.
Ingredients:
1 packet A1 Emperor chicken spices
8 chicken drumsticks, chop into 2 or 3 pieces each
1/8 cup of wolfberries
1 cup of wood ear fungus
Few thin slices of gingers
Cooking oilMethod:1. Add a little oil in a pot. Add in ginger slices and fry until fragrant. Add in cut chicken pieces and fry until slightly brown on the outside. Add in water to almost cover.2. Add in Emperor chicken spices, wood ear fungus and wolfberries, stir to mix well. Let it simmer in low heat for 1 to 1.5 hours or until chicken is soften.
Three cups chicken literally means chicken cooked in 1 cup of soy sauce, 1 cup of cooking wine and 1 cup of sesame oil. The resulted dish is very fragrant and the sauce is delicious. The cup measurement here must means the traditional Chinese rice bowl and cooked in a big pot of chicken, for a large family back then where everyone live in the same house (grandparents, uncles, aunties, etc). So, for the small family size these days (a family of four), we cannot use the stated measurement as the name. We have to cut it way down as long as the measurement is still the same, for example 1/8 cup for all or 1/4 cup for all or 1/2 cup for all. How much you add will depend on how much chicken you wanted to cook. I added Chinese mushroom into mine to soak up the delicious gravy. I won't be sharing my recipe here as you can easily find the recipe on the web.
When my husband was away for a business trip, I cooked something easy for lunch. I had minced some pork and decided to make pork balls with it. Then, I just boiled the soba noodle until cooked and set aside. Boiled another pot of water to make the soup for this noodle. When the water was boiling, added the marinated pork balls, boiled until the pork balls were cooked. Added in the bok choy and seasonings for the soup such as soy sauce, sesame oil, chicken stock granules, salt and a little dark soy sauce. I added some cripy fried shallots too.
Served the noodle in a bowl, added in the soup with pork balls and bok choy. Later cut some Japanese seaweed (for sushi roll) and place it on top of the soup. It was special with the added seaweed as it brought another flavor into the noodle. Easy to prepare and nutritious too! I ate mine with spicy chili in oil with soy sauce as a dipping sauce, shiok lah!Now, I would love to share this dish with Presto Pasta Night, an event created by Ruth from Once Upon a Feast.
This week host is Amy of Very Culinary , do go and check out her round up on Friday!
And I am also submitting my recipe to the Original Recipe event hosted by Lore at Culinarty. Check out others' recipes around the week of 15th.
The only time I would make a banana cake is when I have some banana freeze up in the freezer. Sometimes we would have one banana left that was too ripe and nobody wanted to consume it. So, I put it in the freezer bag and left it in the freezer. When I have two in the freezer, that's the time I would make this cake for breakfast. This banana cake is made with butter and thus it's not that oily. Don't get me wrong, I like banana cake made with oil too as it's very moist but sometimes it can be quite oily. 
Ingredients:1 stick + 6 Tbsp. butter, soften
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
2 cups cake flour or all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
2 big banana, mashed
1/4 cup whole milk
1/2 tsp. banana essence
Method:
1. Cream butter and sugar until light and creamy with an electric mixer.
2. Pour in eggs, one at a time and beat until creamy.
3. Add in milk, mashed banana and banana essence and mix well.
4. Add in cake flour, baking powder and baking soda and beat until combined.
5. Pour into a greased and floured bundt pan and bake in preheated 350'F oven for 35 minutes. Cool in pan for 10 minutes before inverting it to cool completely on a wire rack. Store in air-tight container.
I don't know about you, but this looks absolutely delicious to me. We all loved Japanese curry, especially Vermont Curry Hot brand. When my hubby was on a 3 nights business trip away from home, I cooked a big pot of this Japanese curry with chicken breasts and mixed veggie with onion and red bell pepper. It was so easy and so yummy that we could have it for days. I also served easy noodle soup for lunch for variation. But seriously, this is so good and healthy. As you can see, I did not add potatoes in mine, not quite fancy with the starch and prefer mixed vegetable instead. This mixed vegetable has Lima beans too, extra bonus eh?
Look how good that is! Even though the packet said it's Hot, but it is not hot at all. My two girls can eat a bowl of rice with lots of gravy in it with no problem as Japanese curry is on the sweet side, very different from our Malaysian curry. What I love more is no coconut milk is used so I can eat with no guilt feeling. One packet came with two packs inside so you can actually cook two big pot of Japanese curry when you buy one. Very suitable for working people who cook big portion on weekend and pack it in individual serving size in containers for weekday meal.
