HomeMadeS

Sweet NZ: Brownies Kukus and Life Drawing Class

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sun, 23 Nov 2014 21:26:00 +0000

"Emma Watson"
November 2014--haven't finished yet :)

I am feeling guilty that I have neglected this blog and its readers for a very long time, and I am sorry for that. Life has taken me to a different direction, to where I have never expected before. The good thing is, I am still on the creative field.

Lately, I have been joining a life drawing class which is taken place at different locations on different days, depending on who's hosting at whose place. This is a new experience for me, totally different from food preparation, washing dishes, or pulling out weeds. It is a paper-and-pencil stuff (or speed painting, if you must), in an artful sense, that requires a good eye for details. Just like food photography in principle, only I do not need food stylists to work with.

Honestly, I don't know how to catch details from life drawing before, and I have no clue any other drawing technicalities it may require. But I remember one saying: 'Don't think, just draw." And so, I learn by doing.

"Three Angels", dedicated to my three darlings.
8 November 2014

I have no accredited art background, except a few short consultations with an art teacher when I was at school, but I love arts.

Drawing is no stranger to me, though. I have loved drawing since as far as I remember my childhood. My mother once said, I liked sitting on my desk for hours, and all she could see from behind was the movements of my hands and shoulders. She said, I used to draw a picket fence house on a hill, surrounded with animals and roses, or fish in an ocean, magazine models, and landscape.

I one time had had my drawing displayed at my school art exhibition to raise money when I was still at the primary school. It did not sell, but I was so proud of myself to see my piece of work was hung amongst the greatests--from my child eyes--, and I was only 9! It was a drawing of three colourful fish in the ocean, with all other deep sea creatures, using colouring pencils and crayons. I remember it well since my art teacher approached me and informed me that she would include the drawing that I was working on on the exhibition.

Balinese Dancer.
October 2014.

I have not been drawing as much during my twenties and thirties, since I was too busy with works, trying to earn a living. Perhaps an absent-minded doodling here and there. However, the addition of children in my life has somehow opened up my interest in arts to a new window of world, in a sense of 'I can do something with it'. Although I have not been practicing quite as much, I can feel it like my own skin.

Now, I have arrived to a new door. I want to illustrate children's books one day. Have a look at my works on my Instagram @pena_ilalang if you like. Should there be any of you need help with illustration for children books, you may contact me. I am sure we can arrange something.

Life Drawing, Ararimu, Auckland
29.10.14

Right now, I am sort of figuring out how to do it. At the meantime, teaching my children the technicalities of drawing as part of their homeschooling subject, the parts that I know, I am allowing myself to sharpen my skills which have been buried in too much ignorance of the importance for sodding years. Eventually, I really want to dig myself deeper, build my own style, and allow my expressions be read by audience. Wish me luck.

So yeah. There's where I have been.

But you know what? I still cook and bake. And garden. We share plates at the drawing class, so I am not really too far away from food and its enchantment, you see. I still take food photos, although only taking it from my iPhone. The thought of having an SLR and a huge 100mm f/2.8L on my hand is still a bit too much to bear at the moment. Even a smaller 50mm f/1.4 is still feeling too awkward for me. Sigh. I am still not getting my mojo back for shooting food with proper cameras these days, please don't ask why.

Last week, we had a really nice lunch. It was like a Christmas table. There was bread, cheese and crackers, croissants with ham and cheese, steamed asparagus in butter sauce, zucchini fritters with tomato salsa, and bottles of good wine (judging by a group of smiley faces with twinkle eyes around me--since I don't drink, I wouldn't know). I brought my homecooking to the table, too: samosas, pecan brownies, and caramel slice.

Brownies are so simple to bake. They are also pantry-friendly. Once you have flour, cocoa powder, eggs, butter or oil, and sugar, you can bake a brownie. And of course, dark/milk/white chocolates, nuts, fruits or even vegetable like beetroots, can deepen the flavour and add interests in texture.

I have baked many kind of brownies in years, Chocolate and Raspberry Brownies, Brownies (all kind), and brownies which are kept off the record--either they are burned to bone dry or my batteries are flat-- and my favourite brownies of all Nigel's 24-carat Brownies, but do you know you can steam brownies? Well, better believe it if you don't. Because I have tried it, and it is not disappointing.

It is dark, chocolaty, and moist. It's like fudge brownies and it's more cake-like rather than common shiny crust brownies. I think the combination of butter and oil gives this brownie lovely texture that it isn't dry even when it is a day old.

I have to modify the recipe since I don't use cake emulsifier like most bakers in Indonesia do, and use extra egg yolks instead. I also use Whittaker's 72% dark chocolate to intensify the texture, and use extra dark chocolate to layer it.

Brownies Kukus (Steamed Brownies) by Ny. Liem
shared by Nath Bangun
modified by me

Ingredients
6 large eggs (add 2 egg yolks, since I do not use cake emulsifier)
225 gram caster sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 tps vanilla (extract)
125 gram plain flour
50 gram Valrhona cocoa powder
125 ml cooking oil
50 gram margarine or butter
100 gram dark chocolate, chopped

60 gram dark chocolate, extra, chopped

How-to:

Heat a steamer, bring the water to a rolling boil. Wrap the lid with clean teatowel (this is to prevent any water accumulated on the inside lid dropped on to the batter).

Grease a loaf tin with margarine or butter, line with baking paper (I use two round 15 cm small tins), grease paper with margarine. Set aside.

Sift together flour and cocoa powder. Melt butter and dark chocolate, let cool, then mix well with oil.

Beat eggs, sugar and salt until fluffy and pale, add in vanilla, mix well. Fold in flour mixture, stir well with spatula or with a mixer on low speed. Add in the butter, oil and chocolate mixture. Mix well.

Pour mixture half way into tin/s, steam on medium heat about 15 minutes, sprinkle extra dark chocolate on, and pour in the remaining brownie mixture. Steam until cook through. Remove from the steamer, let it cool.

We ate them warm.

It is an old photo that I haven't posted yet, but it is legally mine, so I am sending it to Alessandra Zecchini for Sweet New Zealand event this month.

Genoise Cake Desserts

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sun, 28 Sep 2014 22:16:00 +0000

Klub Berani Baking is now 7 years old. We are still 'getting together' to try out recipes and bake every two months. Sometimes it's an easy challenge, other time is rather tricky one. Those who dare will always await the new recipe sent to their mailbox and are eager to face up each challenge patiently and passionately; those who don't will miss out. There is a little discussion every now and then in our mailing list emails or through KBB's Facebook Page; often is we are clattering in our kitchen without further ado, unless many are held back till the deadline is approaching. Oh, what fun for the hosts to work on the round-up the last minute.

As with each challenge, I have set up a list what areas we are going to do more by listening to members's suggestions and initiation from the crews. I have tried to make it different variety and interesting values, although what you think it's various and interesting does not always work the same to others. At least, I and the KBB crews keep it fresh each year, so that we don't fall into boredom. We also look for what's trending in the bakery world these days, so we can also experience it in our home kitchen. Such as last challenge, Kurtos Kalacs, was booming in Indonesia at the time we had it tried out.

This time, we are baking Genoise Cake as the base for making a desserts. Rather a fancy one, I think, since it is involving chocolate belts and whatnot. And because it is an important occasion for it is KBB's birthday.

It has to be something special, don't you think?

There is no major difficulties in baking Genoise Cake for me, since I have baked it many times in my 13 years grueling in the kitchen. So, the cake turned out nicely and good size. A rather tricky matter for me is to make the chocolate belts. I have got a situation here.

After I've done all of those steps, from preparing the ingredients, baking, to filling and icing the cake, I put the cake in the fridge while I am melting chocolate in a double boiler for the belts.

So OK. Thought I have bought a transparent sheet used for chocolate and desserts, which I forget what's the name, and ramble through my utilities cupboards and found two sheets of them. The size was not as long as I want it, so I joined them..with a sellotape. I am thinking that it may be alright because there will be no overlapping sheets to crack the chocolate later on.

Right. After tempering the chocolate, I started having fun, squeezing all the chocolate on top of the sheets, trying to make a rather simple belt really, just drizzling it around here and there; a bit thickening the chocolate on the bottom to cover the sides of the cake. And then... the phone rings. It was my kids, wanting me to pick them up at the pony club. I was panic!

The journey will take around 20 minutes altogether from home to the Kaipo Flats and back. By then, my chocolate will be set! I grabbed the keys and drove away rather out of my comfort zone, keeping finger crossed that my chocolate won't be too hard to bend around the cake. As soon as the kids jumped in, I started to head home under their protests. I said, I have chocolate to rescue soon!

And so, I ran to the kitchen as soon as we arrived, did not even bother to lock the car. My chocolate was hardened and it was unlikely to bend it. But I tried anyway with all my might. It worked, thank goodness! I left the cake there while I did other chores.

I peeled the sheets off the chocolate and thought it might cracked. Yeah, it cracked the top one where the joined was. Oh well, it might not be a perfect cake in appearance but I am sure it tastes really good.

And it does!

We had a slice each after working in the garden.

Happy Birthday, KBB!

Review: Membuat cake-nya saja ngga ribet sih, cuma saat bikin chocolate belt-nya ada masalah. Saat bikin chocolate belt aku musti jemput anak-anak dari klub berkuda, sampai takut nih chocolate bakal terlalu keras saat pulang. Tapi alhamdulillah, coklat masih bisa dikerjakan dan jadi santapan yang enak untuk afternoon tea atau desserts.

Kurtos Kalacs: A Homemade Version

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Thu, 31 Jul 2014 04:54:00 +0000

First time I heard about kurtos kalacs is as KBB's latest challenge. I'm dared, and so I bake. I thought it was just like butter puff pastry and baked coiled around a certain mold such as creamed horn baking mold shaped like a trumpet. But, it's apparently a little different from it.

We do not need a specific mold to create that coiled tunnel-like shape. Our tool is just wooden-made or metal-made rolling pin, wrapped in tin foil and lined with baking paper. The pastry will be wrapped around it, a coil at a time along the pin.

This Hungarian favourite candy is very unique and I love baking it!

There is no difficulty in making this, except baking it. I know that Hungarians use a specific rotary oven to bake kurtoskalacs or use amber from a specialty open fire oven to achieve that lovely golden caramel colour.

Since, I don't have a rotary oven function and cannot be bothered with using our bbq pit, I just use our conventional oven with method suggested by the recipe we are using.

You can find the recipe at Kristy's blog here.

I have three rolling pins that I can use and they are all wooden. But one of them is too small, so I just use two of them. After wrap them in aluminium foil to avoid scorching them while baking, I line the foil with baking paper. I don't use a metal paper clip since ours are plastics, so I just use baking thread instead. It works well.

The ingredients are pantry- and fridge-friendly: bread flour, eggs, milk, sugar, salt, yeast, and cooking oil. Starting with mixing warm milk, sugar, and yeast together until it's starting to go frothy, we then mixing this mixture into the flour, eggs, and oil together. Knead well. We do not need to add any extra flour. We really don't want to get the dough too dense. The dough that I have got is rather supple although not too tacky. It feels right.

Like any other bakery item using yeast, we need time to let the dough rest for an hour to proof. I manage to squeeze in another chore to fulfill during the resting time.

I came back when the dough is doubled in size. Winter does not hold a yeasty dough to go chill, apparently, since we have a fireplace going a whole day which is heating up the rooms beautifully.

So here we go. With the various length of rolling pins I have, I use two wedges of the dough for the longest one and a wedge each on each end of the shortest one, which then gives me 3 small and 2 long baked kurtos kalacs.

First two trial and error, I use melted butter to brush the pastry before sprinkling the raw sugar on, and baked them on top of a roasting tin. The recipe suggested to brush the bread when it's half-baked, but when it brush off the sugar on it as well. So I thought of another thing to do.

For the next batches of bread, I brush the bread with melted butter, sprinkle the sugar thickly and flatten it a little bit to stick the sugar a bit further into the dough. It works well. As you can see from the photo below, that the sugar crystals stick properly on the bread although I have brushed melted honey on it as well.

I am very pleased with it. Yay!

Review:

Ternyata ngga susah ya bikin roti gula-gula asal Hungaria ini. Yang repot memang cuma cara memanggangnya, tapi bisa kok dibikin di oven biasa seperti oven listrik saya. Nambah satu ilmu nih. Trims ya hosts.

Mother's Day: Vegan and Gluten-Free Almond Funfetti Cake

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Tue, 13 May 2014 04:00:00 +0000

I made this lovely Funfetti cake which happens to be vegan and gluten-free for my Mother's Day day. But then my children decided to present me some gifts they bought with their own money (they sell chickens, pullets, chicks and eggs from our farm) a day earlier, so we all enjoy this cake that very day. They are precious little darlings to me.

I am rather proud of being a mother. If I can say, it is the highest achievement in my life.

Indeed there are neither trophies nor money to be earned by a full-time mother for her 24/7 works and dedication, but being with my children is such precious a trophy itself.

I am happy to be with my children as much time as possible, before eventually they believe they are grown up enough to leave the nest. Someone said to me 'Yeah, kids this age are growing like mad, and then they'll stop growing, and then it seems they are growing too slow to leave home". Oh well. I'm sure she did not mean what she said. At the moment, I am enjoying having them at home.

My children present liveliness in my life, sprinkling happiness in my heart which I will be holding a lot more time in the future. Our bonding is genuine and it feels wonderful.

This cake represents the rainbow dusts that they have been sprinkling to my life since they were born. All those colours that paint my path life, with them close in my heart, are designed to make me happy. And I am.

This year's Mother's Day is a day to commemorate our love and companionship throughout the years in much more understandings, since they are growing much bigger and much more aware of their surroundings to enable them to understand my existence for them and them for me.

I am thankful they are here in this world to brightening my life and make my life much more meaningful.

I was inspired by Sally's Easy Homemade Funfetti Cake of Sally's Baking Addiction and I have to alter the recipe to be vegan and gluten-free version. Here is what I do.

First thing first, I am using Healtheries Gluten-Free Baking Mix which is available at the supermarkets and health food shops here in New Zealand. I use rice bran oil for the cake and have to use Olivani margarine for the 'buttercream' (despite of their unhealthy content, so they say--I cannot see if I can use coconut cream since it will take away the vanilla flavour in the cake). I also need to increase the use of leavening agents since vegan baking does not use any eggs, therefore more acid-alkaline ingredients to be used. I use lemon juice, freshly squeezed.

So here we are.

Vegan and Gluten-Free Almond Funfetti Cake
I use three 18cm cake tins for this recipe, spray with cooking oil and line the bases with baking paper.

Cake
1 1/2 cups gluten-free flour
1/2 cup almond meal
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon fine salt
1 1/2 cups caster sugar (NZ Chelsea Sugar company does not use bone char when process the sugar bleaching, so their products are all vegan, FYI--check their website if you like www.chelsea.co.nz)
2 cups almond milk + 2 teaspoons lemon juice, let stand for 5 minutes
1/3 cup rice bran oil
Egg replacer: 1 Tablespoon flaxseed powder + 3 Tablespoons water, mix well and let it be thicken
1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
2/3 cups hundreds and thousands or other sprinkles

Preheat oven to 160C.
Sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and fine salt. Add in almond meal, mix well.
Combine the soured milk, oil, egg replacer, vanilla extract and sugar together, whisk until smooth. Fold in mixed flour. Mix well. Add in sprinkles, mix well. Divide into three tins.
Bake for 20 minutes or until each cake is golden brown and springy to the touch. Remove from tins, transfer to a cooling rack and peel off the baking paper. Let cool before icing.

Vanilla "Buttercream"
230g Olivani margarine (not the lite one, it is not vegan, so I was informed)
3-4 cups Chelsea icing sugar
1/4 cup almond milk
2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Extra sprinkles to decorate

Beat the margarine until fluffy and smooth. Beat in the icing sugar a half cup of the time, until all used. Soften the icing with almond milk a little at a time until the desired spreading consistency. Add in vanilla extract, mix well. Use it for sandwiching and icing the cake. Sprinkle with extra 100s and 1000s or other sprinkles.

Sweet NZ: Healthy Vegan Cookies

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Tue, 06 May 2014 21:48:00 +0000

I first tried out Nikki's Healthy Cookies back in 2012, out of sheer curiosity. How can be a certain type of cookies filed under a 'healthy' group while others are 'not so'. What makes it different?

It was beyond my expectation.

Judging by the ingredients checklist, I was a bit skeptical on how I can produce a single cookie, without eggs as the filler or binder, or butter as the flavour enhancer. It must be some kind of magic tool to whip up some 'uncommon' ingredients to be a batch of cookies. I have never thought and then learned that butter and eggs are not everything. They can be left out and we still can eat cakes, cookies and even bread.

Now, I was doubtful no more. It took me by surprise how delicious they can be.

I am amazed how fruits, either dried or fresh, can be used as a substitute to sugar in baking, for there are adequate natural sugar in fruits anyway. They are modestly sweet. Impressive!

as shared on my IG @arfibinsted

You see, with a little training, we can always go back to use a natural sweetener. Taste the real thing. That fruits and vegetables have their own natural sugar. It's there for us to enjoy as is, without adding heaps more additional sweetness that tends to make us forget how it's supposed to be. Then, perhaps we will be living in an obese-free world.

This natural sweetener works like magic.

The cookies are sweet, sweet enough to my liking. But, perhaps you will expect them to be as crispy as a butter-and-sugar cookies, they are not. Mind you, there are no sugar crystal we are melting to harden the cookie structure here. These cookies are soft and chewy. They remind me of honey muesli slices although not as crunchy.

I am happy enough to revisit Nikki's Healthy Cookies again.

And this time, I bake its similar cousin, 5-Ingredient Gluten-Free and Vegan Cookies. These gluten-free and vegan biscuits that Dana of the Minimalist Baker had produced in her kitchen will be my entry for Sweet New Zealand event, hosted by our very own lovely food blogger Sue Busch of Couscous and Consciousness. Hop on to Dana's blog to find the recipe and you might as well get more awesome recipes from her.

I don't alter anything what the recipe calls for, accept using our local chocolate block, NZ's very own Whittaker's 75% Dark Ghana. Now, I have a doubt that this dark chocolate is vegan after all. I have searched some topics about vegan dark chocolate in NZ and some people said that Whittaker's Dark Ghana dark chocolate is accidentally vegan, but when I read the ingredients list, there it's said to have a trace of milk chocolate in it. So? I don't know. At least, I hope there's no animals to suffer in producing these blocks of chocolate. Maybe next time, I'll use Fair Trade 100% dark chocolate, just to make sure.

Isa's Punklicious Vanilla Bean Cupcakes

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Thu, 17 Apr 2014 02:44:00 +0000

Isa's Vanilla Bean Cupcakes are surely awesome. They taste punklicious even without eggs and dairy products. They also keep moist at room temperature for two days (well, that's how long the cupcakes last at this household). You can hear the crunch of vanilla beans every time you take a bite. It's impressive.

I make them gluten-free as well, so that is a bonus.

I am sending these cupcakes to Marnelli of Sweets and Brains for Sweet New Zealand event she's organizing this month.

So here's what I do with Isa's Vanilla Bean Cupcakes with Ganache.

Isa's Vanilla Bean Cupcakes with Ganache

by Isa Chandra of Post Punk Kitchen

I substitute all purpose flour with gluten-free flours mixed with almond meal so it will be safe for me and my children, since we are gluten intolerance. I also reduce the sweetness of the cupcakes and use the ganache to be the filling instead of using it as the frosting.

Cupcakes Batter

1 cup unsweetened almond milk (I use rice milk)

1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar (I use 2 tsp freshly squeezed lemon juice)

1/2 cup white rice flour

1/4 cup sorghum flour

1/4 cup potato starch

1/4 cup almond meal
1 teaspoon Xanthan Gum (my gluten-free modified version)

2 tablespoon cornflour

3/4 teaspoon baking powder (I use 1/2 teaspoon)

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt (I use 1/4 teaspoon)

1/3 cup canola oil (I use rice bran oil)

3/4 cup sugar (I use 1/2 cup homemade vanilla sugar)

1 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 vanilla bean, split and scrapped

Ganache

1/3 cup amond milk

1/3 cup semi sweet chocolate chips (I use Whittaker's 72% Dark Ghana, chopped coarsely)

2 tablespoon maple syrup (I use honey)

Cupcakes

Preheat the oven to 160C. Line 12 hole muffin tins with cupcake papers. Isa sprays her cupcake liners but I just leave them as they are. Put the milk and lemon juice in a bowl and whisk well. Set aside.

Combine and sift all the flours, baking powder, baking soda, Xanthan Gum and salt in a mixing bowl. Add in almond meal and mix well.

Measure the sugar and mix in the vanilla seeds. I use my hands to blend the seeds into the sugar so they will be incorporated well. Mix it into the combined flours.

Put oil into the combined milk and lemon juice, mix well. Make a well in the mixed flours, almond meal and sugar. Pour the combined oil, milk and lemon juice into it, mix well. There won't be any lump. The mixture should be like pancake batter although mine is a bit thicker.

Spoon a little batter at a time on the bottom of each cupcake papers. Spoon in the firm ganache in the middle of each cupcake, then top with the rest of the cupcake batter. Bake for 20-22 minutes or until golden brown.

Ganache

Bring the milk to boil in a small saucepan, lower to simmer. Add in the chopped chocolate and honey. I just take the saucepan off the stove as soon as I see the chopped chocolate has started to soften and mix the mixture thoroughly with a little balloon whisk until smooth. Leave this ganache in the fridge overnight before I make the cupcakes the next day. Roll the cold ganache into balls and put them in the centre of each cupcakes.

Getting Doughy with Tangzhong Starter

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Thu, 27 Mar 2014 01:01:00 +0000

When I met Alli of Pease Pudding on one of Helene Dujardin's workshop in New Zealand, we were talking about sourdough bread that will be her bakery's hero. The sourdough starter is told to be at least 25 years old and is still being used up to this day. Isn't it amazing?

I used to make my own sourdough starter and kept it at the back of our fridge until it was ready to use and re-feed. I loved baking batches of sourdough bread and was proud of myself. The skin was crusty and the texture was lovely. Every batch produced wheaten vapour aroma that spread all over my kitchen and perhaps escaped far and wide to touch our neighbour's sense of smell. No one reported casual damage though, mind you.

Unfortunately, I don't keep that starter anymore when I have found out that I am allergic to wheat and its products. So sad to be parted with the starter that I have used for 2 or more years. So I gave away the starter to a good friend. Hopefully she could keep it and be a part of her. But lately, I found out that she spoiled the starter and had to throw it out of her fridge. Tragic.

However, every now and then I still bake bread. I can't tell you how I missed it. I missed the aroma of a freshly baked bread which can be enticing and pleasurable although I am more a rice person than that of those who cannot live without bread. I sometimes 'treat' myself gluten-rich in moderation, so not to worry.

I've been baking batches of bread lately. Not a sourdough one though.

I made batches of Hokkaido Milk Bread these days since I am amazed how fluffy and cotton-soft the texture is. It reminds me of those loaves of bread or chocolate filled buns that I often ate when I was little, came warm from a local bakery.

I adapted Christine's Recipe and made assorted bread from it.

The good this of it is that it won't go stale up to 3 days, IF you are doing it right. Pay attention to and do the exact measurement will reduce failure, I guess.

I made batches of them, from a plain loaf, green tea or buns filled with desired filling.

I even made cheese bread, which I don't often do. I was curious with what's so special about cheese bread that my Indonesian friends back home are so raving over it. Perhaps, I am not only a bread person, but also not a cheese one either. It does not give me excitement to match cheese with bread, unless it is sandwiched and grilled.

Lately, I quite like to try to make green tea bread, so I give it a shot.

Making my own experiment by using green tea powder in half of the dough and leaving the other half plain, I thought I'll make it braided, like Chocolate Cinnamon Babka.

I expected the bread will rise higher, but then again I did not use a bread pan to support it. The aduki beans filling is also rather dense for the sponge to rise up during proofing and baking. But I quite happy with the outcome.

So, have you baked bread today?

Play with Lights: Food Photography Workshop with Helene Dujardin

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Mon, 24 Mar 2014 21:27:00 +0000

Auckland's weather was gorgeous yesterday afternoon and I was so excited to be able to meet Helene Dujardin at one of her food photography workshops in Auckland, New Zealand.

One important thing I got from the workshop is to play with the lights. Lights can convey different messages on photos if we direct them to what we are going to deliver. Different light setting will give a different message, look, and feel.

Take a look at the sample photo I took during the session. This photo below was taken without any intention to direct lights. The lights spread and come from any direction, including behind me (I was on the other side of the room), but the main light comes from the front.

Notice where the lights paint on this shoot. And compare with these two other photos below.

Can you see it? Can you feel the differences?

If you can, congratulations. Go on ahead and keep it up at it. If you cannot, then you need to play around with your lighting once, second, third, zillion times more, if you can, to understand it, to get the feel of it, to be able to create different stories or messages. It might sound difficult, but it's not. Go get your black cards and start directing your lights to get different mood. It's all about creativity and imagination. Wake up, get up, and start kicking around. You'll get there eventually.

For me, this is a wake up call. Photographing is not only composition, beautiful styling and excellent props, but also giving messages to the audience through directed lighting. If your lighting is flat, your photo won't look interesting.

It was a very lovely and important workshop for me. Now I can see clearly where I am going from this on.

I also had a great time catching up with my ladyfriends yesterday, and met Nicola Galloway of Homegrown Kitchen who runs cooking workshop in Nelson and Rebecca Oliver. Here are some photos that I took from my iPhone.

Ponsonby Central, 6 Brown Street,
Ponsonby, Auckland, NZ

Waikanae crab omelette with morsels at Toru Cafe.
The best omelette I've ever tasted.

Toru Cafe
Ponsonby Central, Auckland

Photos I manage to snapshot through iPhone during workshop.

As well as with Helene, I also had a good catch-up with Allison of Pease Pudding.
Pssttt...Alli is going to open her own bakery this coming April.
Come and see her in Kumeu, Auckland!

And more food and drink afterwards with good friends. Thank you Carmella and Boon, Danti and Yessy!

Foxtrot Parlour at Ponsonby Central,
Ponsonby, Auckland

This cappuccino is excellent. Frothy, creamy, and the coffee was excellent!
at Foxtrot Parlour,
Ponsonby Central, Ponsonby
Auckland

Non-alcohol cocktail "Cherry Bomb"
At Prego Cafe and Restaurant
Ponsonby, Auckland

Antipasto Misto
at Prego Cafe and Restaurant
Ponsonby, Auckland

Baked whole snapper, Risotti ai Gamberi, and Polenta Cakes
Polenta Cakes were awesome, crispy outside and creamy soft inside. We love them!
at Prego Cafe and Restaurant
Ponsonby, Auckland

Short Espresso was super excellent! Strong, thick, and fresh.
at Prego Cafe and Restaurant
Ponsonby, Auckland

Goodie bag from Nourish Magazine
Thank you, Vicki!

My companies for the evening: Carmella and partner Boon-Li.
Thanks you two! X.

A lovely catch up with Danti and Yessy
at Toru Cafe
Ponsonby Central, Ponsonby
Auckland

Till we meet again!

Sambal Tempeh: An Indonesian Favourite

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Mon, 17 Feb 2014 09:36:00 +0000

Sambal Tempeh is one of many Indonesian dish we love. We like its texture and its flavour combination. We like it either thinly sliced, julienne, or cubed. We like it hot with loads of chilies, sweet and sour with the acidity of homegrown tomatoes, or dark and sticky with drizzled of kecap manis.

We like it in many ways, because tempeh is a versatile soy cake.

Tempeh has been a missing ingredient in my kitchen for years, since I could not find where to locate shops which sell tempeh starter. Unless we are back holidaying in Bali, we have not eaten tempeh anymore.

Since Tonzu's organic tempeh seems to stop coming onto shelves at our local supermarket, I decided to home-produce tempeh myself, just to supply our household and to be there when we need it.

So, I phoned order Tofu Shop in North Shore, Auckland one day to send me the original tempeh starter, coming directly from Indonesia. I found split soy beans at our local Asian groceries shop and that is marvelous, given that I don't have to hull and split them myself.

I soaked the beans overnight and started to cook them the next day. Drained and placed them on top of a large serving tray lined with paper to absorb more water. I let them dry, until they were completely dry. I stirred them every now and then, to make sure that there is no excess water trapped in between layers of beans.

When they were dry, I spooned over them the tempeh starter, and then mixed them thoroughly. It is said that you have to mix the starter well into the soy beans. This is to make sure the rhizopus spread evenly in between layers, top and around the cakes, so you will have beautiful tempeh structure.

This tempeh making is not my first try. It was back in 2008 I first tried to make tempeh. I used grape leaves to wrap the tempeh, which was rather not disappointing.

I was trying to replicate my late grandmother's used of teak leaves when she produced tempeh to sell at the local market. At that time, banana leaves were hard to find, even at our local Asian groceries shop. I had to think of something else. Just because our grape leaves were lush and green, I thought I could use them. I still think that banana leaves are the greatest leaves to wrap tempeh though. They make tempeh smells so distantly, part mushy because of the rhizopus, part greenish, you know, like fresh air after the rain. I really can't find the right word for it.

This time, I just use ziplock bags, because they are simply handy. Just remember though, when making tempeh not to forget to punch your wraps or bags with a toothpick or something similar size, so your rhizopus will be able to breathe happily. Otherwise, your tempeh will become a wet soy bean cakes with aroma you don't want to smell, ever.

So I made 1 big tempeh in a big size ziplock bag, and 4 small size ones. I froze the small ones and use the big one to fill in the time we've been missing out.

I made Sambal Tempe to start the feast with. Here's what I do.

Sambal Tempe

Tempeh Marinade

500g tempeh blocks

2 cloves garlic minced with 1 tsp salt

a little water

oil for shallow frying

Sambal Tempe

5 shallots, thinly sliced

3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

5 red chilies, thinly sliced

5 green chilies, thinly sliced

3 red bird chilies, thinly sliced

1 cm galangal, sliced

2 tsp tamarind paste

1 bay leaf

1 1/2 tsp dry shrimp paste

200 ml water

2 Tbs kecap manis

salt and sugar to correct the seasoning

a little oil for cooking

Tempeh Marinade

Sliced tempeh thinly.

Mix minced garlic with salt and a little water. Combine garlic paste with tempeh and set aside for 20 minutes. Heat the oil in a frying pan. Take tempeh slices, drain excess water on an absorbent paper, and then fry until golden brown. Remove from heat and set aside.

Sambal Tempeh

Heat the oil in a frying pan, large enough to fit in all the cooked tempeh. Cook all the chilies, shallots, garlic, galangal, bay leaf, and shrimp paste until fragrant and soften.

Meanwhile, combine tamarind paste and water, squeeze the tamarind until all the juices are mixed with water. Discard the solid tamarind pulp. Add this mixed tamarind juice and water into the fragrant chilies mixture. Mix well.

Correct the seasoning with salt and sugar. Cook until slightly thicken, then stir in the cooked tempeh slices. Mix well. Drizzle in kecap manis. Stir well and keep cooking until it's rather sticky. Remove from the stove and serve immediately with warm jasmine rice and steamed greens. Enough for 6-8.

Asinan Jakarta

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sun, 19 Jan 2014 22:38:00 +0000

Asinan Jakarta is simply a vegetable salad with sweet and sour dressing, which is very popular in the capital city of Indonesia, and is widely sold almost in any corner of local suburbs. Whether it is offered as street food, served at traditional warung (food stall) or even restaurants, Asinan Jakarta is very refreshing and delicious.

There are options available for choosing which vegetables to go with the dressing, but using fresh vegetables will make a huge different. I'm pretty lucky to have a large garden and have time to manage and grow our own vegetables, so my option is to use whatever I have in the garden, freshly picked.

I have mustard cabbage in my garden, so I brined them last night. This is to substitute the salted cabbage required in the recipe. I also use our organic carrots, chillies, cucumber, cabbage, chives, and kale sprouts to add an interesting crunch.

I use Pak William's recipe on ACMI website (http://acmi-indonesia.org/masakans/view/1/Asinan%20Jakarta#.UtxTaH_XeSN). Pak William W. Wongso is an Indonesian culinary expert whom I have admired for such a long time. Luckily, Facebook is able to bring our distance closer, so we can occassionally have a 'chat' about Indonesian food.

ACMI is the shortened of Aku Cinta Masakan Indonesia (I Love Indonesian Cooking/Food) which provides information on wide variety of Indonesian food. If you only know beef rendang or sate ayam to be Indonesian food, then you only know too little. Think about this, Indonesia has thousands of islands and each island has its own culinary uniqueness which I don't think I will be able to taste them all in 10 years to come!

There are many Indonesian food I don't recognize or never have eaten before, including Asinan Jakarta. I've been to Jakarta many times and lived in Depok for quite sometime but I have never ever eaten or made Asinan. When Pak William posted a bowl of Rujak Aceh Noodle on his Facebook, I was involved in a short conversation with him about it which led me to my kitchen and made Asinan Jakarta instead of Rujak Aceh. Rujak Aceh needs certain type of mangoes, which is called Kweni or Kueni--the most scented variety ones, and it is impossible to get it in New Zealand.

So, yes Asinan Jakarta it is.

I have never had this flavour combination in salad before. Eveything tastes really beautiful and fresh and exotic and WOW. The dressing enlivens the dead saliva after too much greasy meals, and Pak William's suggestion to have this Asinan as an appetizer will be a wonderful experience.

What's more can I ask? The vegetables are crunchy, the dressing delivers pleasing sensation accompanying every bite, making it not just an accessory on the plate. In fact, the dressing acts as the super star in this matter.

I think this is what Ayurveda wisom of life Deepak Copra ever mentioned in his cookbook [The Chopra Centre Cookbook]:

"Ayurveda suggests that a little sweetness adds delight to life, whereas too much can be cloying. A touch of sour adds interest, but too much makes us grimace. A little salt provides endurance but too much raises our blood pressure. Bitterness, pungency and astringency add spice and complexity to life, but too much may cause us ro feel irritable, resentful and withdrawn. The flavours of life in the right proportion add richness to both our food and our experience".

That's it. This salad confirms those statement. Trust me.

Asinan Jakarta

By ACMI (www.acmi-indonesia.org)

I must omit centella asiatica leaves since I haven't got them in my garden, and had to make my own brined cabbage using mustard cabbage the night before I made this.

200 gr tofu, cubed 1 x 1 x 2 cm
100 gr cabbage, thinly sliced about 1 cm
150 gr bean sprouts, trimmed
200 gr brined cabbage, washed, drained and sliced 2 cm
150 gr cucumber, sliced ½ cm
150 gr carrots, grated coarsely
100 gr chive bulbs, trimmed
50 gr centella asiatica, trimmed, optional (I used kale microgreens, instead)

Asinan Dressing: grind all of these ingredients to make paste, except vinegar

3 to 4 red chillies or red bird chillies,
1 Tbs dried shrimps, soaked in hot water,
5 Tbs roasted/fried peanuts
300 g sugar
3 to 4 tsps salt
1000 cc boiled water
3 tsp vinegar

Morsels
150 gr roasted/fried peanuts
7 to 8 noodle crackers
8 Tbs palm sugar syrup (it's palm sugar and water, cooked and cooled)

How-to

Clean and trim all the vegetables.
Asinan Dressing : cook all the ingredients until boiled through, removed from the stove. Cooled, and then pour in the vinegar. Mix well.
Arrange vegetables on a plate, bowl or other container, pour the dressing over. Keep in the fridge to let them settle for a while, about half day.
Remove from the fridge and served sprinkled with peanuts, crackers, and palm sugar syrup.

Gluten-Free Roti Gambang and Orchard News

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 05:23:00 +0000

This pouring rain we are having for days recently have given me a lot of excuses to be browsing my old recipe books or binders and do baking. I've revisited some recipes I've not made again for years, like this Roti Gambang. I first saw Roti Gambang recipe on one of my Indonesian blogger friends at Multiply.com, but since the site is closed down, I cannot provide you her link. However, she got the recipe from my good friend and fellow Indonesian veteran food blogger, Riana (http://pennylanekitchen.wordpress.com/2006/05/19/roti-gambang/).

Roti Gambang is a spice Batavian quick bread which is characterized by the richness of gula Jawa (dark palm sugar--make sure to use Indonesian dark palm sugar, because it's made of palm nectar, not of coconut like many other Asian sugar products), sesame seeds and cinnamon. The addition of almond in the mixture is to give a much crunchier texture.

I'm using gluten-free flour and almond meal to substitute the wheat and breadcrumbs. They taste just as delicious. I might try to make a rather softer texture next time and bake it in a small loaf tin that we can carry to our summer tree house, enjoying the growing seasons from the height.

Apples, stone fruits, passionfruits and grapes are all at the maturing stage right now, while feijoas are flashing red with their blooms, ready for fruiting in Autumn.

However, we are not lucky with cherries. They are not suitable for our climate, I suppose, since we don't have a very cold winter. These cherries will never be enjoyed by us but birds.

Our strawberries have never ever been staying red too long. We have a three year old merry berry fairy who's ready to pick them each time they start blushing.

It's rather exciting with our orchard this year. On one afternoon, we were visited by a swarm of bees, around three weeks ago, and imminently rang our local beekeeper to help us move them into our ready-and-vacant long-bar beehive we had it made two years earlier. It's about time, we said that bees have eventually come all the way for their new (possible) residential lodge.

Mary Dwen, our local beekeeper, with my husband helping, is removing the bees into the beehive, ever so gently and considerately. We had to hold our breath from afar while watching the whole process. This is a new science lesson for my homeschooling children, for sure.

So yeah. With all of this excitement, we do hope they'll be happy to stay and make honey for us. They don't need to be worried because we are not using pesticides that can harm them. We will be a good provider, ensuring my flower garden is all ready for nectars supplies. Should they be needed.

Roti Gambang (Indonesian Spice Quick Bread)

I'm making the gluten-free version of this quick bread.

Gluten-Free Roti Gambang

By Femina Online

Source: Riana Ambarsari

250 g dark palm sugar, grated (find these at Wah Lee's at Hobson St or Tofu Shop in North Shore if you're in Auckland. Otherwise, dark cane sugar or brown sugar may be used).
175 ml water
380 g gluten-free flour
125 g almond meal
25 g milk powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp cinnamon powder
1/4 tsp vanilla flavouring essence
2 egg yolks, loosely beaten
200g margarine if you want softer texture, use less for a rather dry one

112g raw slivered almond, crushed lightly with rolling pin

3 Tbsp water, for brushing
3 Tbsp sesame seeds

Instruction:

Put sugar and water in a saucepan on a medium heat. Stir the sugar until dissolved and let it boiled for a while until bubbly. Remove from the stove and let cool.

Combine flour, almond meal, milk powder, salt, baking soda, baking powder, crushed almond and cinnamon powder. Pour in the sugar mixture. Add in egg yolks and vanilla essence. With a thick and strong wooden spoon, mix well until all the mixed dry ingredients hydrated. The mixture should be rather sticky. Add in margarine, mix well. Leave and cover the mixture a rest for 30 minutes for easy handling.

Preheat the oven to 150C.

Line baking trays with baking paper. Weigh mixture 75g each, roll into balls, oval shape or long fingers like I do, and put them on the trays. My mixture is not sticky but rather greasy (in a pleasant manner), so there's no need to brush each bread with water. The sesame seeds stick on them easily.

Bake for 30 minutes. I noticed the texture is rather too soft for me, so I re-baked the whole batch in a very slow oven to make them crisp on 120C. They came out fine and we love enjoying them with black jasmine tea.

KBB: Gingerbread House

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Tue, 26 Nov 2013 22:08:00 +0000

It's the third time I make gingerbread house. First time it was back in 2007 when my good friend's daughters came to visit and had fun decorating the houses with my children (http://www.homemadesbyarfi.com/2007/12/weekend-kitchen-project-gingerbread.html). Second one was for my son's birthday, back in 2008 (http://www.homemadesbyarfi.com/2008/12/sticky-birthday-gingerbread-houses-and.html). This time, I made it as an entry for KBB's latest challenge.

The design is a bit tricky and unbalanced to my opinion. Or maybe it was me who misunderstood the building instruction and miscalculated the outcome (which it was my mistake!). But I thought I was precise. However, it's done.

Making the dough is not a hassle. It's easy and quick. When the dough was chilling in the fridge, I made the measurement and the house templates. We still have some dough left for extra gingerbread men and animals. Baking and cooling the biscuits while I was washing the dishes.

Then, the fun began. I noticed that the walls on the left and right were shorter than they should be. This is the thing that I thought I didn't measure it correctly. I reread the instruction again, and there the mistake I made. The front and back measurement was supposed to be 51/2 inches wide and 3 inches tall. There's the answer why the roofs can't be fitted well at the joints.

I had a difficulty to keep one of the roofs staying where it should be. I used a support to keep it in place, but it kept sliding down. I was so frustrated that I applied more royal icing to join both roofs, which it was a disaster!

So yeah. My gingerbread house which is laden with sugary treats has a crack in between the roofs. It stayed strong when the royal icing was set, so it was a relief.

Sweet NZ: Hydrangea Cupcakes

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Tue, 26 Nov 2013 00:46:00 +0000

I've been too busy with baking these days I don't even realize I've baked a lot of them. It's the fun of producing and decorating that takes away the fancy of eating them. Well, mostly I baked for other people, so I didn't get to enjoy it myself.

This baking marathon has started with weekly baking to fill in the cake tins for my family, and recently is moving to a further step as to make a contribution to the pre-school's fund-raising gala, and then finished with my mother-in-law's birthday cake and whatnot last weekend.

On the fund-raising gala, I baked a gluten-free chocolate cake in a wonder mold which later on was transformed to be the barbie's dress. I cut the cake into three layers, sandwiched and iced them with buttercream before decorating it with sugarpaste. It took me 3 hours to decorate the barbie, and it was bidded for only $35 (I expected more bidders, but it wasn't really a big crowd of people to be honest), bought by Pam whose daughter was going to have a birthday on a closer date. She could have the barbie before the actual D-day, she said. How lovely.

Moving on closer to the end of November, there is my mother-in-law's birthday coming. She requested to have 'butter and flour' birthday cake, given that I always bake gluten-free goodies. Why not, I thought. So I baked two batches of mud cakes, sandwiched with dark chocolate ganache, and thought of decorating it as a purse cake for her.

I watched Paul Bradford's purse cake tutorial on You Tube and learned how to decorate it from there. Yes, I'm self-taught. I like learning and doing on my own pace and time. It wasn't disappointing, don't you think? I just keep the design simple. I was so happy to see Mum was thrilled and loved the cake as well.

On that very day, I also contributed a plate of gluten-free chocolate brownie cupcakes, iced with chocolate ganache, and gluten-free vanilla bean paste cupcakes, iced with buttercream that I piped on the cupcakes to resemble hydrangeas.

I'm sending Hydrangea Cupcakes to Mairi (www.toastnz.com) who is hosting Sweet New Zealand (http://www.toast-nz.com/2013/10/sweet-new-zealand.html) this month. Sweet NZ was initiated by Alessandra Zecchini (http://alessandrazecchini.blogspot.co.nz) as a monthly sweet event of a Kiwi food bloggers.

The vanilla cupcakes can be viewed on Donna Hay's website here (http://www.donnahay.com.au/recipes/sweets/cakes/vanilla-cakes-with-raspberries-and-cream) only that I substitute the wheat flour to gluten-free flour and use vanilla bean paste, since I ran out of vanilla essence. For buttercream, I use my own buttercream recipe. To achieve hydrangea flower resemblance, I coloured half of the buttercream blue and the other half stays white. Using Wilton 2D tip attached in a piping bag, spoon the blue buttercream into the bag, push the buttercream to the side of the bag to make a hole for the white buttercream. Then, spoon the white buttercream into the middle of the piping bag, where you've created a hole. Press to let some buttercream out, then use the next one to pipe on top of the cupcakes. It will create two-tone buttercream flowers, just pipe all around the top of the cupcakes closely one flower to the other. You'll amazed how pretty your cupcakes will be looking. Have fun!

Double Ginger Cake

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sat, 02 Nov 2013 02:39:00 +0000

I'm fond of Nigel Slater. The Kitchen Diaries book that I bought myself for Christmas back in 2008 is the cookbook that I often browse through and the recipes I often use in my own kitchen. It is my favourite cookbook.

I particularly love the content of the book and the-matter-of-fact photographs which represent the honest cooking he produces from his kitchen. I love his generosity in using herbs, spices or other ingredients that truly is reflecting a humble soul of a cook who loves to eat and who cares so much about the flavour the particular food has to offer.

In Summer, when my zucchini plants are producing, I always make Nigel's zucchini cakes with dill and feta. I love the creaminess of melted zucchini mingled with the saltiness and distant pungent of feta cheese. I love the presence of dill that intensifies the flavour even more. I also have tried Nigel's Peach and Blueberry Soured Cream Cobbler when there are crops of peach, peachcott or peacherine in our orchard ready to be used in a hot Summer day. We often have it with ice cream or just with whipped cream, sometimes with mascarpone if I have it in the fridge.

Whenever craving for chocolate, I often make Nigel's Chocolate Almond Cake or his 24-carat Chocolate Brownies which are always a hit in the family. Nigel's Coffee and Walnut Cake is my second-favourite to his Double Ginger Cake that I always come back to, every now and then.

Nigel's Double Ginger Cake is a must-bake cake if you should love ginger. I made my own ginger in syrup two days before I bake the cake. I use young ginger roots I bought from an Asian groceries, peeled and cooked them in white sugar and water. I reserve the syrup in separate drinking bottles for making ginger ale later on (just ginger syrup and soda water to quench our thirst after gardening under the sun on the weekends), and roll the cooked and sliced ginger roots in white sugar, transferred them on a baking tray lined with baking paper, left them dry overnight. The white sugar coated ginger will be crystallized. I chopped these and use them for Nigel's double ginger cake.

I baked the cake a day before we enjoyed slices of it. I've found out later on that a two-days old cake perfects the flavour even more deeper. It's delicious! So delicious I tweeted about it and Nigel himself tweeted back, to my surprise!

So here's the recipe: http://uktv.co.uk/food/recipe/aid/533822 if you haven't yet got his book.

Curry Puffs aka Karipap, A Way to Enjoy Curry

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Tue, 08 Oct 2013 20:07:00 +0000

When I saw a batch of pasties photos on Widya's facebook timeline, I fell in love immediately. Those pasties look so beautiful with flaked layers that enclosed yummy curried food inside. I thought of making it, and finally gave myself a go.

I came across Sam Tan's blog post in search of Karipap, and I use her recipe to make mine.

I have never thought the process is that simple. Started by making two kind of dough: water dough and butter dough, and proceeded with filling of your choice, mostly curried one--that's where the name is coming from, I suppose, it is a curry puff.

Water dough rules the skin part, while butter dough acts like common butter block in butter puff pastry.

Frankly saying, food processor makes chopping and blending as easy as one, two, three. So I saved my time and muscles (doh!) to work on it just to break the ingredients into breadcrumbs-like mixture.

I turned the mixture on my worktop, and manually knead it until it becomes homogeneous, like a butter block.

I weighed each dough and work on them one pair at a time.

Next process is to put the butter block in the centre of the water dough, enclosing it until we have one united dough ball. This dough is ready to roll out.

Roll out thinly and then roll to be spiral, roll out again, and roll a spiral like you normally do when rolling a Swiss roll, so Sam Tan said.

Slice this spiral roll. This is the best part: each slice will carry layers of dough. These layers will determine the beauty of karipap look.

Roll each slice of dough thinly and fill it with prepared filling. I make beef, potato and peas curry, like the one you make for samosa's, which I cooked the day before I make these pasties and cooled in the fridge to develop its flavour even more.

The next step becomes my daughter's work. She loves fold-and-pinch the edge of the pasties. It is a great team work in the kitchen. Pasties are nicely done.

We enjoyed Karipap as our light lunch. Actually, it is quite filling with potatoes and all, it is not quite 'light' as light. We still have some leftover for dinner as well, and we eat them with some green salad I picked from our garden. So it was pretty much a nice Karipap day!

White Wedding Cake for 6 Years of Having Fun

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sun, 29 Sep 2013 18:45:00 +0000

Klub Berani Baking (KBB) is now 6 years old. We are celebrating it with mini wedding cake using a homemade fondant.

To tell the truth, many of us bakers don't often make our own fondant. We think it's time-consuming and we'd rather pick a ready-made one up on the baking isle or purchase it online from a cake decorating shop. But, truly speaking, it's not that difficult making your own fondant. I found out that I need to work fast and use it as soon as it's made, otherwise, it will go rather hard to knead. Not sure if the measurement I made was correct or it's something else. However, it's done and I'm pretty happy with it.

This is my entry for KBB's 36th challenge, this month hosted by Moniza and Emma Isti.

Modelling Fondant

It is my first attempt to make modelling fondant from this cook book. I usually make my own marshmallow fondant and chocolate modelling fondant which I use on this barbie cake. This fondant is totally new to me. However, I've taken the challenge, so I must go on.

It's quite simple to make fondant. It's just the matter of dissolving gelatin and glucose warm syrup mixture into pure icing sugar, knead well, and voila! Your fondant is ready.

The tricky thing is that fondant will be hard in just a matter of an hour. You must remember how this fondant is wrapped when you pick it up from a supermarket baking isle, so that is what I need to do. Wrap it in thick plastic food wrap and cover it with aluminium foil, store it in the cool spot of my pantry until ready use. I have found my fondant keep well and smooth when I then used it.

Cupcakes

Gathering the ingredients for cupcakes is not a problem, since they are all in my pantry. I use Whittaker's White Raspberry chocolate block because I love the raspberry flakes in it and it is to add more flavour in the cupcakes.

The proses is rather simple and is familiar to me as to be added on my weekly home baking venue.

The cupcakes are quite delicate to my liking. Perhaps because I substitute the flours to gluten-free ones. But I'm not alone here, as I heard other girls in the club getting the same result.

I always adapt the amount of sugar in many recipes, as I'm finding they are too sugary for me. With 75g WHITE chocolate, 75g dried apricots, and 220g of sugar, plus the cupcakes will be covered in fondant, it is way too much for me. I thought I'm a sweet tooth, but compared to many other people, I am not quite there yet. I don't think I will.

Substitution and modifying recipes to your own needs is allowed in the club, so I reduce the sugar by 50% while keep the amount of white chocolate and dried apricots the same. I also use gluten-free flour and almond meal to replace the self-rising flour and plain flour in the recipe.

Baking time was no hassle. In fact, this is the easiest cake I've ever made in the KBB's challenges history.

OK. Cupcakes done. And here I am, trying to make a cylinder from two sandwiched cupcakes. The cupcakes were rather crumbly, so when they are completely cooled down, I try to trim the edges with my small Japanese serrated knife, which does the job really well. I was attempted to use bread knife, but the eyes are way too big for the job.

Now, the fun has begun. With the amount of fondant I have, I need to divide it into four parts: three of them are going to be used for covering the cakes, while the rest of them will be used for making flowers.

Daisies are just simple form of flowers. Even if you are a beginner to cake decorating, you will be able to do it, easily. I still keep my cake decorating tools that I used to use when attending a cake decorator gathering somewhere. Now, I'm considered retired (nah, not really).

This homemade fondant, as I said, will turn quite hard when it is exposed in open air, which is excellent for making flowers for decorations, but it's not so good when you try to cover your cakes. I had to knead and re-knead my fondant to keep it smooth after unwrapping it. The trouble is that when it is sticky with apricot jam, then you won't be able to use it anymore, since the fondant will look dirty.

When covering the fondant over the sandwiched little cakes, I notice that it needs a bit of a technique to actually include the whole cylinders.

First, I discover that the fondant is too stiff to use it to covering the cakes from the top. When I try to smooth the sides of the cakes, the fondant cracked and hardened. It also makes thick frills on the bottom of the cake as I try to gather it to enclose the whole cake. I was not happy.

Second, I roll out the fondant as thinly as possible to form a rough rectangle. I cover the sides of the cake cylinder first, and then cut a circle to match the size of the cake top. It worked, but I wasn't happy with the visible border it creates between the sides cover and the top one. But it would be able to be disguised with decorations.

Third, I cut a circle to match the top of the cake and then run a rectangle-rolled-out fondant to cover the sides of the cake, smoothing the top while joining it. It was not easy but I thought I prefer this technique.

With a little imagination to fill it out even more, I thought I have done a good job. Now, it is time to do the taste test. We are all having a slice each, but none of us eating the fondant. The cake is nice, perfect for our gluten-free treat. The white chocolate raspberry is giving more flavour in it, which is rather like a bonus.

Well, we were enjoying our little cakes. Happy Birthday KBB!

Review:

Proses pembuatan cupcake tidak ada kendala, begitu pula dengan pembuatan fondant dan royal icing. Sepertinya membuat fondant sendiri dan langsung dipakai itu bikin kecil kemungkinan fondant akan langsung keras ya.

Gluten-Free Hazelnut and Cocoa Nibs Slice

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Fri, 06 Sep 2013 05:25:00 +0000

It was in the beginning of September last year when I took this photo of one of our young hazelnut trees on the back of our hillside property. Its young leaves just started to open up from their sleepiness during dormant weather, and it's likely that Spring had sent them a message to persuade their slender brown twigs to start waking up. The leaves were young, green, fresh and proud.

A few honey bees and bumble bees were gathering on the almond tree nearby, taking the goodness from its blooms and working on pollinating at the same time.

Beyond it, a couple of fig trees were just happening to take life cycle the same stage as the hazelnut tree, lazily opening their young leaves. Its fruits were still budding, hard and green. Its branches were still bare-looking, seems shivering from early Spring chilliness. We often get southerlies up here which could allure us to stay indoors and sip hot chocolate. Perhaps, they're looking forward to be growing in the sun later in the year. Like we are, in another humanly dimension.

It is always a joy to witness everything around me growing, blooming, and starting to produce in Spring. It's just like to observe before-and-after photos, one is bleak, the next one is colourful.

Sometimes, I am just amazed of how four seasons work that effects garden and orchard; if Winter can really do magic by putting everything to sleep, letting plants and trees conserve their energy within in order to go through a growth spurt; if Spring then takes control of the next cycle, by blowing kisses of fairy dust over flowers, other plants and trees; if Summer holds the density of growth under its powerful sun, supplying men with generous produce; and if Autumn with its coolness starting to flash its amber button to calm everything down. Every season owns its role and characteristics. I don't feel wise to just like one season only, for each season brings connection to the next one.

When we decided to plant nut trees on our land, it was because we simply wanted to fill in the gaps that were automatically created as soon as we chucked the whole lot of wild blackberries shrubs down the hill (well, actually my husband did, but I was the one who made the coffee, mind you). We started planting almond trees, then hazelnut, walnut, chestnut, macadamia, and pinenut trees. Just recently, we added around 80 Manuka trees and more native trees and shrubs. We just love the feeling of Kereru and Tui birds coming and eating berries of native trees around our house and down the bank. It's what owning a land for, isn't it, that we're looking after nature as well as making it productive.

pinenut tree

We do understand that these nut trees might not be enjoyed thoroughly as much as we want at their young age, but we make sure they will be devoured by our children in the future.

From season to season, walnut, chestnut and hazelnut have started producing, and we have had a taste of each every year. Nuts are just best enjoyed when they are freshly cracked, don't you think?

When making this hazelnut slice, I used some of our homegrown hazelnuts mixed with bought ones. I am sending this to Sweet NZ, this month is hosted by Carmella of Easy Food Hacks.

Gluten-Free Hazelnut and Cocoa Nibs Slice

175g chilled margarine
1/4 cup caster sugar
1 cup gluten-free flour
1/2 cup hazelnut meal
1/2 cups almond meal
1 tsp vanilla essence

Milky Filling:
50g margarine
3/4 cup sweetened condensed milk
1 Tbs brown sugar

Topping:
3/4 cup hazelnuts, roasted, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup cocoa nibs

Prepare a 22cm square tin, greased and lined. Put the flour, sugar, hazelnut meal and almond meal in a medium bowl. Rub the chilled margarine in until resemble coarse breadcrumbs. Place two thirds of the mixture on the base of the tin, press firmly. Chill the remaining mixture in the fridge.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 160 C. Make the filling by melting margarine, sweetened condensed milk and brown sugar together in a saucepan, until well combined. Remove and let cool. Spread it over the base.

Bring the remaining flour and butter mixture from the fridge. Mix in chopped hazelnut and cocoa nibs. Sprinkle over the filling. Bake for about 40-45 minutes or until golden brown. Leave in the tin to cool a bit and cut into squares or fingers. Makes 15-20 pieces.

Sweet NZ: Gluten-Free Rustic Apple Pie

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sat, 24 Aug 2013 22:22:00 +0000

Autumn could be quite pleasant when our orchard was fruitful with great crops of apples and pears, especially when it would give me a chance to be making apple or pear pies a wonderful experience.

There was always a satisfaction of picking apples fresh from the trees and cook them in my own kitchen and to be enjoyed by the whole family. It was an endless joy that hopefully would give my children not only beautiful memories they can keep in their lives, but also provide sources of culinary experiences made-from-scratch that will be enriched their natural and valued modest upbringing.

We grow different varieties of apples in our home orchard, ranged from dessert apples to cooking apples; Captain Kidds, Kids Spray, Braeburn, Fuji, to name the least.

We don't use spray other than the mixture of milk, liquid copper, baking soda, and soap to fight fungus, or pyrethrum liquid when we see any bronze beetles or other bugs started to do damage on either trees or fruits. Otherwise, we just could ponder when the treatment we choose to use does not give a great impact than we have expected, other than a promise to make a better future the next season.

For this rustic apple pie, I used green apples which I don't know what its name is, but it is not the famous Granny Smiths, I'm sure. It is as green as Granny Smith but not as small. This green apple variety grows its fruits really huge, as huge as a saucer. My beloved husband planted it for my cooking purpose and did have much more fun to grow it out in the orchard than jotted down its variety on a piece of paper, which then could gets misplaced somewhere, he reasoned. Not that good at being organised, are we?

I'm sending this gluten-free apple pie to join Sweet New Zealand, hosted by Marnelli of Sweets and Brains.

Gluten-Free Rustic Apple Pie

I treat gluten-free pastry as delicately as I do to gluten one. Almost frustrated by how short the pastry is, I decided to just let it be looking as rustic as it tends to be. I could not be bothered to either crimp it, nor making fancy lining. I just love the way Nigel Slater does on his cooking: honest and generous. At least, I try.

This pastry makes a not-too-sweet crust which I prefer. You can add more icing sugar if you like it sweeter or much sweeter.

Gluten-Free Shortcrust Pastry

500g gluten-free flour, sifted
50g icing sugar, sifted
200g margarine, chilled
a pinch of salt
zest of 1 lemon
2 egg yolks, lightly beaten with 4 Tbs of cold water (I add another two or more if I think my pastry is still too dry--gluten-free flour tends to need more liquid, I notice)

1 small egg yolk for egg wash (I tend to just mix it with water to make my pie dairy-free, but feel free to use milk if you wish)

Combine sifted flour, icing sugar and salt together. Add in margarine. Rub it in the flour mixture until resembles breadcrumbs. Add in lemon zest. Add in beaten egg and water, combined well. Work on it until it can be shaped into a ball, but I tend not to overwork it. Shape into roughly a rectangle and wrap in plastic bag. Leave to rest in the fridge for 20 minutes. Divide the dough for bottom and top of pie.

Roll out if possible, but I often just roll out necessarily and line the bottom pie as much as I can. When there are holes, I try my best to smudge the pastry to 'merge' it or pinch a pastry from the leftover linings to cover them and smooth it as I go. But I always make sure there are no holes for the filling to escape, because I want that filling and its juices are kept inside for the goodness to enjoy alongside crusty pastry.

Fill the pastry with the filling. Cover with the remaining pastry. Again, I won't make it too much fussy about this, should there be any little holes on the top pie, so being it as the steam release. Brush with the egg wash as generously as you can.

Bake in the preheated oven of 200C for 15 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 170 C, until the pastry looks deliciously golden brown and some of the apple filling juice oozes out, to tell you that it's ready to eat.

Serve warm with cream or ice cream. Whatever you choose, it is a divine autumn treat.

Apple Filling

6 green apples, peeled, cored and sliced thinly
zest and juice of 1 large lemon
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
2 Tbs cup caster sugar (I add this when the apples are very tart)
2 tsps ground cinnamon
2 Tbs cornflour
1 tsp ground nutmeg
4 Tbs margarine

Mix the sugars, spices, cornflour and lemon zest in a bowl large enough to fit in the apple slices. Throw in the thinly sliced apples. Drizzle in the lemon juice. Mix well. Arrange it on the base of the pastry, or just mound it as you like. Dots the margarine around and in the centre of the filling.

Photos: Afternoon Tea at Lesley's

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sun, 11 Aug 2013 07:09:00 +0000

Just an urgent post, before I start the business of homeschooling again tomorrow.

It was a lovely afternoon although the gray clouds up there were threatening to spill out some rain (and indeed, it was raining when I drove home). I enjoyed the food and the companies (Mairi, Alli, Carmella, and Gilli)--I will definitely work hard in the garden just to burn those calories, otherwise, if it's raining I might make sure I do a whole flow body yoga tomorrow.

The lovely host was Lesley, over at Eat, etc. Lesley lives in Pukekawa, apparently only 25 minutes drive from my own place. She lives in a rural area as well as I do. Hop on to see her blog to get to know her more, if you like.

Here are some photos I took. Till we meet again, ladies!

Pavlova and Meringue Roulade

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Wed, 31 Jul 2013 19:53:00 +0000

Meringue Pavlova Roulade. That's one thing I have never done before. Looking at it, it seems just that kind of ordinary Swiss Roll, but hell, it's trickier than it looks. I am making this as an entry for KBB's 35th task: Basic White.

I think I have got no trouble at whisking egg whites but I might have done it better.

Since I was whisking it manually, I worked reasonably hard by making it as fluffy as it's supposed to be.

When the meringue was in the oven and baked, I saw a disaster coming through. The surface of the meringue goes hiking up the hill which I thought it was rather weird. Does it need to stay flat, you think? I don't know. I never make meringue pavlova before, so this is my first.

While Pavlova can be my beloved's favourite sweets that I often bake when there are egg whites leftover from some other baking, it can easily be done straight. You do not need to roll it. Given it eaten as is or lavish it with whipped cream and berries, he would just take it either or.

With Meringue Roulade, it's more challenging. The compulsory of rolling it like your common Swiss roll is definitely a complete test, whether you roll it good, or you roll it dreadful. Mine is the latest, to be honest.

I don't mean to be hard on myself, but being perfectionist is not that bad for some reason. When it is coming with baking, that is. Although other times, I just can't be bothered.

Anyway, when I take the baked meringue out and carefully put it on generously sprinkled (actually, not sprinkled, but spooned) caster sugar on a sheet of baking paper, the meringue decided to clinging on the baking paper.

Damn, I thought. My meringue has crippled edges, torn and hopeless. My mind was searching for any how-to the know-hows to overcome this terrible thing. Surely there is a way.

I know I will use whipped cream to use as a filling, but will that be able to glue and mend the broken heart? You know what, only one thing to find out: do it!

I still have a huge jar of homemade lemon curd I made from our Tahitian limes which as usual are in season and abundant in our garden. I whipped the cream, drop a tablespoon of lemon curd in it and a little drop of vanilla essence, spread that on the meringue, carefully. To accentuate further more, I drizzled around half cup of lemon curd on the cream, and began to roll.

This is how it turned out. Not that bad. That crippled edges can be bound nicely. The cream did a good job on it, being a glue.

I think I will do a better job when I make it again next time. I will use more egg whites so that to make the roulade thicker which I think will roll nicely.

The addition of lemon curd is a right choice. My beloved husband enjoyed it very much. He hasn't got a rival on this, since I don't quite fancy pavlova nor meringue roulade.

Review:

Saya memutuskan untuk bikin dua-duanya, tapi yang saya highlight kali ini adalah meringue roulade. Ternyata tak segampang yang dikira ketika menggulung meringue itu ya. Ada retak sana sini meskipun nanti bakal dilem sama cream dan ditutup sama gula. Suamiku suka banget, karena perpaduan lemon curd dan cream dalam meringue bikin rasanya jadi seimbang.

Gluten-Free Chocolate Whoopie Pies and Earl Grey Teas

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Tue, 30 Jul 2013 20:04:00 +0000

Winter comes in with its southerlies bone-chilling blow that makes a tropical gal like me have to seek a refuge to find the warmth spot possibly found around the house (or from someone I know and love so much). Sitting close to the fireplace is quite comfy, especially when it's enjoyed with good companies, hot drinks and a plate of sweets.

Hot chocolate is the ultimate drink in wintertime no doubt, however, coffee or tea can be rather a common deal as well.

I love my Earl Grey teas. It may come from any brand, whether it's packed by let's say Twinings, T2, Coffee and Tea Lovers, or Dilmah to name a few, I can just expand my options.

Nonetheless, loose teas Monk Pear from T2, and Superior from Coffee and Tea Lovers are my two top favourite of Earl Grey teas so far. They have unique flavors, packed with the essential Earl Grey iconic citrus scent Bergamot, with additional goodness of herbs, dried fruits or dried fragrant flowers, which will be bursting in each sip and gently tickled my senses.

Loose teas have fresher taste than those are dusted in bags, my opinion. However, they often are available only at specialty shops like T2 or Coffee Tea Lovers, which is rather costly. Perhaps, you may think I'm quite consumptive, but then I don't buy Gucci bags, own expensive cameras with expensive super lenses, wear Jimmy Choo shoes, buy world-brand cosmetics, have a walk-in wardrobe crammed with designer clothes, go partying at luxurious villas and drink posh wine or champagne, spend time holidaying every month--if not year at the grandest hotels while traveling around the world, or dining at the finest Michelin-star restaurants. I don't live in a glitter world, but I just like my cup of tea with qualities. Simple as that.

Nope, I don't feel guilty by simply enjoying my cuppa. After all, it makes me happy.

As happy as my children when I made these little whoopie pies. There's something about these hucklebucks that attracts so much attention of young ones. Perhaps, it's its soft texture, or the filling sandwiched in between. Or perhaps both.

Or how Donna Hay's serves whoopie pies can be seen as a clever preference from my young ones' view.

I substitute the flour with gluten-free and add a little almond meal in the mixture. I thought the filling will be too sweet for my children, so I just make a simple chocolate buttercream and roll the sides of the whoopie pies with chocolate hails, specially ordered right from Indonesia.

A Guest Post: Gluten-Free Coffee Chiffon Cake

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sat, 27 Jul 2013 19:45:00 +0000

Back in June 15th, I received an email from Lubna that she'd like me to write a blog post for Ramadan issue on her blog. I have had written about Indonesian traditional food and those comfort food I love since I was a child a lot in this blog, so I thought I could do something hot happening at that current time.

Since I was craving for coffee, therefore, my entry for her Joy from Fasting to Feasting VI was Coffee Chiffon Cake.

Chiffon cake may be told to be a rather tricky one to make. Not many food bloggers in the world ever made chiffon cake, but it seems quite a popular cake in the Asian world.

I once ate chiffon cake which was made of white glutinous rice flour in Ubud, Bali when one of our staff members held a Hindu ceremony for her newly-built temple. The chiffon cake was made for the offering. Nevertheless, she served some slices for us, as to respect our presence during the ceremony. It tasted rather surprisingly good. It was light. Although a bit dry to my taste, it was just as delicate.

When Klub Berani Baking challenged us to bake our own chiffon cake back at the 16th task, I dared myself to experience more of it. I made Chocolate Chiffon Cake, Rainbow Chiffon Cake, Pandan Chiffon Cake, to name a few. And there are loads more if you surf Google, from the most favourite one to the most unique.

The flour used for chiffon can be anything. Take a look at Widya's Banana Chiffon Cake which made of black glutinous rice flour, for an option.

The flavour is your preference, and perhaps with a little adventurous mind, you can make chiffon cake ubiquitous. There is Jasmine Tea Chiffon Cake, made by Mira; Cheese Chiffon Cake, made by Sofie, Carrot Chiffon Cake made by Syanti, or the particular combination of this Red Guava Chiffon Cake made by Lukie.

To combine fruits in chiffon cake is a common practice. There's Blueberry Chiffon Cake by Kitchen Corner, Durian Cheese Chiffon Cake by Sajian Sedap, and how about this Strawberry Chiffon Cake by Betty Crocker? Like I said, chiffon cake is ubiquitous.

Well? Are you interested in trying to make it now? Don't think of its tricky part, but think how much fun you're going to put into it. Once you get hold of correct whisked egg whites consistency, you might as well get yourself experience more flavour. The thing that I actually will do myself.

Have fun!

Spice Up with Sate Padang

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sun, 14 Jul 2013 13:50:00 +0000

My son and I are spice lovers. It's a statement. We are like those soldiers who are wounded in a battlefield but keep shooting at the enemies until the last drop of blood leaked out. We 'fight' the heat of chilies that squeezes the snort out on a gentle force. We 'suffer' the peppery sting that shocks the tongue. And we savour the delectable of spices until the last drip of sauce licked clean. It's that kind of adventure, enjoying a plate of homemade Sate Padang. Finishing the meal itself is a strong endeavour, I tell you.

The richness of spices in it is incredible. First bite, there is a punch of peppery flavour that kicks in your taste buds. The next thing is that all the spices are blending in, offering you the heat, the savoury, and the saltiness-type of Padangese cuisine.

I always love Padang food. The mixed flavour of spices in it have that kind of effect on your enslaving nerve in your brain. Each bite successfully entices each taste bud I have. Although I often get that ear-tingling-hot-like-a-steam-loco after such a journey, I'll be coming back for more. It's beyond a thought. It's just what-so-called sensational, I would say.

Back in 2009, the first time I made Sate Padang my own was rather a success. That was to see the kids enjoying each bite. Surely, I did not make it too hot for their taste, but just enough for them to understand how hot the mixture of chili and pepper can be. And THAT is what flavour real Padang cuisine will be like back home.

I used meat which was not lean to try to 'impersonate' the real sate Padang sold at Padang restaurants or street vendors. Apart from fatty meat, it's common to use ox tongue. Now, I don't eat animal guts however fancy you cook them at whatever Michelin Star a restaurant is, cooked by however clever and famous your chef is. I just keep helping myself to think where that piece of meat coming from. And it is rather worrying.

So, when I dag out of the freezer and found corned tongue we preserved from latest home-kill, my mind ran wild. I wonder...if I can use this tongue to make Sate Padang and change my opinion about animal's insides.

The thing about corned tongue, it is preserved with sodium chloride, therefore, it is salty. So salty, I am not sure if the spices can even penetrate in to change the flavour. But...

One thing to find out is to actually do it. So, I dare myself to cook this poor corned tongue with nothing but water in a pressure cooker twice, by changing the water fresh every 15 minutes before cooking another 20 minutes, in order to reduce the saltiness in the meat. I peel and dice the cooked tongue--first time to deal with such organ, kind of weird, however the show must go on. My cooking time is much faster than the one stated on the recipe below, as I'm using a pressure cooker.

Time to cook the spice paste in a low heat and rub this on and around the diced meat. I crossed my fingers to Heaven it will work.

Although perhaps it could work better with fresh tongue, I'd say it was not too disappointing. In fact, it is not disappointing at all. There is a texture of corned meat mixed with spices that enliven the whole lot. I would expect something too salty in it, but it did not taste like it at all. I guess, I cook it right by boiling it twice prior to spice it up.

Now, Padang cuisine does not use bird chilies to heat the flavour up, so I am told. They use dried or fresh red chilies, the wavy and slender type of chilies. I grow chilies in my garden , so I use a fairly amount of them to make paste, just to wake the flavour up, but not enough to give old loco impact though.

May the battle begin. My son and I loved it to every bit. We salute to the spices, we thank the Almighty for creating such clever people to invent the recipe.

Future predict? Weeeeell, I'm not a huge fan of animal guts, you see. So, I'm happy I have tried, but now I know where I am standing. Thank you, but no more, thanks.

Sate Padang a la Sumiyati

Source: Liputan6 website

I have to adjust some of the ingredients here. I have to omit the use of turmeric leaves since I have never seen any fresh turmeric here. No fresh turmeric, no fresh turmeric leaves. I substitute garcinia with tamarind, just 1 tsp. I use beef stock to enrich the gravy. I also reduce the use of chili paste to half amount. So, it's all good.

1 kg ox tongue
3 turmeric leaves

3 kaffir lime leaves
galangal, bruised

lemongrass, bruised

1 Tbs curry powder

garcinia xanthochymus

2 Tbs rice flour + 2 Tbs tapioca flour

vegetable oil

Spice Paste:

15 shallots

7 cloves garlic

4 Tbs chili paste

4 cm turmeric

4 cm ginger root

2 tsp ground white pepper

2 tsp salt

Here's how to.

Cook ox tongue in boiling water for 7 minutes, removed, peeled and trimmed. Wash clean and cook again in a salted water for an hour. When it is cooked, removed, and diced to 1x1x2 cm. Reserve the stock around 600ml (I add beef stock powder here before further cooking). Have this stock ready on a medium heat.

Heat a frying pan or wok, add in oil. Cook the spice paste until fragrant. Add in leaves, lemongrass, galangal, and curry powder. Put 2/3 of the cooked spice paste into the ready stock. Add in garcinia.

Mix rice flour and tapioca flour in a bowl with enough water to dilute, pour into the boiling stock while whisking. The sauce will be thickened fast, so you need to keep stirring. Cook until thickened, removed from heat, and set aside.

Mix the cooked and diced ox tongue with 1/3 remaining spice paste on a low heat until just coated well--no need to cook it even further. Removed from heat. Thread the meat using (soaked in water prior to use for 30 minutes to avoid burning) bamboo skewers.

BBQ the sate for 3 minutes each side, removed. Serve with gravy and sprinkled of fried shallots. Eat warm with the iconic rice cakes (ketupat: is rice cakes wrapped in coconut leaves; lontong: is rice cakes wrapped in banana leaves--Padangese commonly use ketupat, but you can use either or, why not!).

Have a blessed Ramadan!

Bakpia: Something to Remember

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Sat, 15 Jun 2013 21:00:00 +0000

Bakpia is one of many Indonesian cakes that is so traditional you can find them in almost any food shops or bakeries in Indonesia nationwide. It is said that it originates from a food factory in Pathuk/Pathok, Central Java in Java Island, Indonesia. It is the first-sought food to bring back home when someone happens to visit Central Java.

When we first traveled to Jogjakarta in my teen years, these little gems were the most lovely thing I enjoyed. I remember to eat a packet of them while reading a book. Bad habit. But, who cares? I still loved them when I last visited Yogyakarta back in 2000. So I guess, I may be in love with it. Something to remember, something I can still enjoy.

Since there are many varieties sold out there, I have identified which of them I like best. It is the one which is enveloped with thin flaky pastry. So thin, it just melts in my mouth without too much effort biting into it.

The pastry does not taste buttery like your common butter puff pastry. In fact, it is so humble you almost think it does not taste of anything, but it does actually. In fact, it is the most interesting part I find in bakpia.

Living more than 4,000 miles away from Central Java, I search the recipe for it. I found some promising ones, but I would like to stick with the ones which have been proved right. So, I come across Hesti's blog, where she was posting about the very thing I crave for.

Now, here I'm judging by the look, because I still remember vividly the appearance of bakpia I once ate that I liked best. Hers is the closest thing I have found. Other recipes were looking a bit too good to be true with too many flakes like those of puff pastry can produce, or otherwise layers are way too thick with rather dense-looking pastry like quiche pastry which holds too much butter.

I give it a go. Read and re-read the instructions, check and re-check the ingredients. Well, I am not the luckiest person ever alive since I have failed many times to find either whole or split mung beans available in our local Asian groceries shops, so I decided to use aduki beans instead. We can always improvise, can't we?

I cooked the aduki beans paste a night before I make the pastry the next day, so they are completely cooled when is needed.

Now, the interesting part begins: the pastry.

There is not only one kind of pastry here, but two. One is the outer pastry, the other one is the layered pastry. The layered pastry is not quite like the 'real' pastry, but more like crumble pastry. This crumble pastry is going to go inside the outer pastry. Confused? Don't be.

It is rather simple to make. It does not require any butter block or six times rolling-and-chilling like common puff pastry does. In fact, it is made out of flour, a little salt, water, and oil.

OK. Here, I am just going to pinpoint the uniqueness of the pastry. You can cook the filling as to your liking, either savoury or sweet. Be my guess.

Time to make the pastry.

Here is the recipe I got from Hesti's blog. I translate it for you, in case you are interested in making it and can't read in Bahasa Indonesia.

This is not gluten-free, so if you want to make it gluten-free, perhaps you can experiment with rice flour, potato starch, or any gluten-free flour you can think of, and use xanthan gum with it as to help as the 'gluten'. But I can't guarantee, as I haven't tried it with gluten-free flour just yet. Let me know if you have. I'd love to link yours here on my post.

The pastry (outer/skin)
125 gram standard plain flour
65 gram high grade flour
2 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
100 milliliter water
200 milliliter vegetable oil (50 mil for the dough and 150 for soaking the dough)

Heat the water until lukewarm (do not boil), add in sugar. Stir well until sugar is diluted, and remove from the stove. Mix flours and salt. Pour in the sugar syrup. Mix well until all combined. Pour in the oil, knead well.

Take 10 gram of dough. Roll and thin out. Spoon on the crumble pastry layer (the recipe will follow below) on the thinned dough and spread well on. Gather all the sides of the pastry, like when you fold an envelope. This step is important as to produce the flakes later on. Roll it like a ball, and soak in the oil for 15 minutes. Repeat the process until all the dough is used.

Crumble pastry layer
65 gram standard plain flour
25 milliliter vegetable oil
1/2 tablespoon margarine

Mix everything well. Set aside.

Preheat the oven to 200 Celcius.

When all the pastry dough are done, roll out the dough ball. Your crumble pastry layer will be trapped in between the outer pastry. This crumble pastry layer will act like the 'butter block' somehow that retains moisture in the pastry and gives more tone in it. It also will produce the texture of the pastry.

Once the pastry ball is flatten, put the filling in the centre of the pastry. Close the filling by joining all the sides. Roll into balls again.

Bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown.

Gluten-Free Blueberry and Sour Cream Bundt Cake

noreply@blogger.com (arfi binsted) — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 01:48:00 +0000

Something I baked to enjoy on Jan's birthday last weekend dinner. Not too sweet, not too rich. Blueberries make it sweet and moist at the same time. Orange zest give the flavour citrusy and scented. The cream cheese frosting is a teaser, to top up the sweetness of blueberries and the orange zest fragrance. Just right to end the meal.

I am loving my new bundt cake tin, ordered from Cookware Essentials owned by Pam who happens loving to cook and bake herself, as much as I do. Take a look at her recipes on her website. She also has a recipe to fit in this bundt tin.

However, I am using this recipe and altered some ingredients to suit our needs. I use gluten-free flour and almond meal and substitute lemon with orange. I thought blueberries go really well with oranges. I also use margarine and cream cheese frosting.

The cream cheese frosting is scented with orange zest as well as its juice to thin its consistency a little bit. To make it interesting for my kids, I sprinkle some chocolate hails which came directly from Indonesia.