Shrimp and Crab avocado salad

整Salad 真的不是我的強項，party 時只會草草地弄Caesar Salad。個個都鍾意又易做。今次有啲不同，因為今次是作客而又potluck。聽說朋友的孩子比較喜歡食西餐，而且一早就知道主人家會弄白洒青口及焗雞，一聽就知我最好也弄西餐比較合適。不過如果我帶中菜他們也ok ~

因此我負責帶菜和粉/麵/飯。西餐：那就是沙律和意粉吧! 因主人家也是煮得又食得，不可太"馬夫"，所以要比多啲心思！【Salad is Shrimp and Crab avocado Salad】這不是什麽特別的Salad，但我要比它弄得好看一些，裝飾一下。It served individually by wine glasses. 每人有一杯Salad!! Salad 有5層：

1st layer in bottom: assorted baby romaine with Maple Syrup + Wine Vinegar with Rasberry sauce. I don't have the exact measurement, I like it to be more sweeten (actually my husband and kids don't like vinegar dressing, 他們很怕酸), so I will tend to mix more maple syrup to it. You will use a bowl to mix the dressing and taste it before tossing with salad. If you don't have maple syrup, you can use honey. I don't like using honey because it is too thick and too sweet comapre to maple syrup. Also you can substitute the Romaine with any salad veggie you like.

2nd layer: crab meat (I bought it from Costco), mix with mayonnaise, garlic salt and black pepper, some lemon juice

3rd layer: Avocado cut into tiny bits, make sure you put some lemon juice to prevent oxidation (turn black). Put avocado on 3rd layer. I also put some cherry tomatoes (cut in half) and put on the side of the wine glasses to decorate and put more colour to the salad to look goods. Of course it tastes good too.

4th layer: Cooked shrimp (I also bought this from Costco). Mix with pepper and garlic salt. Add some lemon juice.

5th layer: put some Japanese tobiko (fish roe) on top for decoration.

Salad itself is easy to make, you just need a bit more time to put them to each wine glasses for better serving appearance. 又好睇又好食!

Perfect Italian Macarons 馬卡龍

I did not make Macarons for quite a while. Last 2 times the macarons were not perfect and with lumps on the shells. Last Sunday, we were invited to a dinner gathering. The host family made Mussels in white wine cream sauce served with bread. And they also prepared some baked chicken thighs. I prepared Smoked Salmon Angel Hair pasta in white wine cream sauce and Shrimp&Crab avocado salad to match their dinner theme! We had a great sharings and gathering time! And of course, it was polite to bring some treats to host family so I decided to make "perfect" macarons this time. Long time ago, I can made perfect macarons in the first few times. I failed in the last few times because I was impatient to follow through the whole recipe. I skip steps. This is not right I know. Therefore, I make sure I need to do it right and accurate this time! This recipe is from my cousin-in-law!

Recipe: (can make around 80 shells. That is about 40 macarons)
Italian Meringue Macarons
200g almond meal or ground blanched almonds
200g confectioners’ sugar
200g sugar
50g water
150g egg whites, divided into two 75g portions

Directions:

1. Stack two baking trays on top of each other. Line with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.
2. Process almond meal with confectioners’ sugar in a food processor. Sieve out any large bits of almond.
3. Combine sugar and water in a saucepan. Heat on medium until all the sugar is dissolved.
4. Meanwhile, place 75g of egg whites in a mixer bowl with the whisk attachment.
5. Continue cooking until the sugar syrup reaches 118 C/245 F. While the sugar is cooking, begin whisking the egg whites. They should reach stiff peaks by the time the syrup is at 245 F. If it whips too fast, turn down or turn off the mixer.
6. Turn the mixer speed to low. Carefully pour the sugar syrup in a slow stream into the mixer.
7. Turn the mixer speed to high and let the meringue for several minutes until it has cooled and appears glossy and firm.
8. In a large bowl, combine the almond meal mixture with the remaining 75g of egg whites until partially combined.
9. Scoop the meringue on top of the almond meal mixture. Using a spatula or dough scraper, carefully fold the meringue in, trying not to deflate it.
10. The final batter should be thick and flow slowly like magma. Do not overmix.
11. Scoop the batter into a piping bag fitted with a ½” diameter plain tip.
12. Pipe 1 ½” rounds of batter onto the prepared baking sheets. Let the sheets sit for about 20 minutes to let the shells harden.
13. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 160 C/320 F.
14. Bake one set of macarons for 15 minutes, rotating once.
15. Let tray cool for a few minutes before removing from the silicone mat. Let finish cooling on wire racks.

This recipe can make around 80 shells. That is about 40 macarons. I only used half the measurement this time. So I still have alot of macarons. I decided to give them out to a few dear friends. One of my friend like dessert alot and she said she will take photos after she got my macarons. I, therefore, made some gifts box to make them look even better!

西米糕 Steamed Sago Pudding

My husband asked me to make this pudding for a long time. Therefore, I made this on his birthday day.



Ingredients: (4 servings)
50g sago
2 tbsp water chestnut powder 馬蹄粉
3 tbsp water
30g sugar
1/2 tbsp vegetable oil
120g red bean paste
tools:
egg tarts moulds or aluminum cups

Directions:

1. Bring 1.5 measuring cup of water to boil (not within ingredient listed). Add sago anf cook for 10 mins. Turn heat off. Stir. Cover pot. Let stand for 15 minutes until sago is transparent. If it is still not fully transparent, stir and then boil it for 5 mins. Turn heat off and cover pot. Let stand for another 10 mins until sago is fully transparent. Repeat steps if your sago is bigger in size. Drain. Rinse to cool sago off. Drain and set aside.
2. Combine water chestnut powder with water. Sift to remove sediments. Pour into sago. Add sugar and vegetable oil. Mix well
3. Grease moulds with oil. Pour sago batter to fill moulds to 70% full. Add some red bean paste. Add remaining sago batter. Put into steamer. Steam over high heat for 8-10 mins until transparent.

Hong Kong Cafe style 3D noodle cake 港式茶餐廳公仔麵蛋糕

May is my husband birthday month! This year, he turns 40. We need a big celebration for him this year! On the weekend before his actual birthday, we are going to invite some friends over to have BBQ party! We will have some BBQ wings, sausages and big squid! I will prepare a seafood platter. And we will order some sushi take out! Along with this, I will of course make him a birthday cake! My husband is on diet now so he did not eat HK cafe style noodle for a long time (especially 公仔麵)! Therefore, I want to make a cake related to food and I chose HK style noodle cake. 公仔麵 noodle+火腿ham+雙蛋double eggs+腸sausage+friend fish ball 炸魚蛋. I need a week to prepare his cake (of course part-time). Here is my journal of making this cake:



Total hours spent on making this cake is 6 hours in total! No wonder you need to spent >$100 for a basic "3D" cake. I guess the total cost of ingredients is only $10 dollars. But the amount of time to make this kind of cake is huge! time=$$



Party day (deadline) May 20 Sunday
Monday: Start googling on noodle cake image. On the internet, I found mainly Japanese Ramen Noodle cake.

Tuesday: Start to brainstorm what kind of noodle, sides, shape of bowl, colour etc.Also what kind of cake base. Thinking thinking thinking day. And I need to think of how to make the noodles that looks like real noodles by using fondant.

Wednesday: Start to buy ingredients that I don't have at home for making this cake. For fondant, I need to buy Marshmallow and icing sugar.  I got butter, eggs, flour, and mango puree at home for making the cake base. No need to worry about the case base. I am going to make normal cake with Mango Buttercream frosting. For noodles, I finally find out a way to make perfect noodle. It is to use a pasta machine to make noodle. So I go get a cheap manual pasta machine. Now I can make fresh pasta at home too!! At night, I prepared marshmallow fondant. It only takes 15 minutes to work on that. No big deal.    (Total time spent today: 15mins)



Different colour fondant



Thursday: Today is hand and wrist exercising day. Today I  start to colour the fondant with food colour for making bowl (green), egg (white and golden yellow), ham (dark pink), sausage (brown with red), chosticks (light brown), friend fish ball (light brown yellow) and noodle (light yellow). This takes me around 2 hours to do all the colour mixing. It is hard to mix colour to make it looks real. I am going to make a 7" 2 layers cake and the bowl will going to look like the one in picture on the right. (Total time spent today: 2 hours)



Do they look real? They are all edible. Except the wooden chopsticks (the pair on top) placed there for comparing.



Friday: Fun day! Modelling time! Like playing with clay model, and of course this is even more fun because I am modelling something that are all edible. Today I spent around 1 hours 45mins in the morning on making fondant ham, eggs, sausage, fish ball and noodle! And chopsticks too!I tried to place the 7" baking ring there to try to place food together. And this is the draft that the top of noodle cake will look like. After lunch and picked up the kids, I am going to bake the cake. The cake was ready and made in 45 mins. Things are all set to start making the cake tomorrow! (Total time spent today: 2 hrs 15 mins)

Saturday: Cake making day! In morning, I start making mango buttercream. Then I will need to prepare making the fondant bowl on the cake. I will need to let the bowl fondant to harden before putting all the other things on top. So it is better to do it in morning. (Total time spent today: 1 hr)

Basic yellow cake with Mango Buttercream frosting

CAKE FINISHED!

Sunday: Final touch up. Add words and name to cake.Party day! (Total time spent: 30min)

Well, the cake looks good but it tastes extremely sweet (for all adults). But of course of kids love it!





  

Chocolate Lava (Molten) Cake 心太軟

成份:
份量適合: 2個
朱古力（unsweetened)     25g
朱古力. (semi-sweetened) 25g
牛油 (unsalted)         50g 
全蛋             1隻 
蛋黃             1隻
 砂糖             15g
低筋麵粉(cake flour)     15g 
雲呢拿香油    1/2茶匙 

步驟:
 1.  將焗爐預熱至180℃(360 degree F)，朱古力與牛油隔水加熱至煮溶；
 2.  蛋糕杯仔(or Ramekins)掃上一層薄牛油並沾上朱古力粉
 3.  全蛋、蛋黃、砂糖、雲呢拿香油用打蛋器打勻；
 4.  打至杰身 (可以寫到８字) to become creamy white；
 5.  加入朱古力牛油溶液拌勻；
 6.  麵粉篩入，輕輕拌勻；
 7.  麵糊倒入蛋糕杯仔內，放入焗爐中層焗10分鐘；
 8.  出爐後，將蛋糕倒在碟上即可食用。以小刀在蛋糕面層邊位 輕輕界一下，會比較容易倒出蛋糕。

~~Alternate Way~~

For those who cannot take "not fully cooked" eggs. Here is the alternative way. You will need to prepare chocolate ganache to place in middle of the cake.
Chocolate Ganache
1 oz semisweet or bittersweet chocolate, 62% to 70%
1/2 Tablespoons (7 g) butter
3/4 Tablespoons (11 g) heavy cream
pinch of salt

Chocolate Ganache Directions:

• To make the ganache, combine the chocolate, butter, cream, and salt in a bowl and melt over a saucepan of simmering water on the stove. Stir occasionally to make sure it melts evenly.
• Pour the ganache into a container and place in refrigerator for about an hour until it starts to set up. You can also place it in the freezer to speed up the process.
• When the ganache is firm enough to scoop, use a spoon or cookie scoop to make ¾” round balls. Place in a container and store in freezer to keep them firm while you make the cake.

Cake directions:
1. Follow the above directions from #1-#6.
2. Fill the ramekin a little less than halfway up with the batter. Place a ball of ganache in the center of the batter. Cover with more batter, filling the rings about ¾ full – the cakes will rise when baking like a soufflé so don’t fill them too high or they will spill over.
3. Bake cakes for 10 minutes. The cakes should be done – a tester inserted in the side should come out with a few crumbs, but the centers should have melted. You may want to test with one cake first to gauge how long the right baking time will be.

Coffee Earl Grey tea Mousse cake

Cake for 2012 Mother's day

Earl Grey Tea mousse on Coffee cake base and Coffee Jelly top!

I set aside some mousse mixture and cake for making this extra treat for fun:

Coffee Cake base with Earl Grey Tea mousse dome cake.

Recipe:

Earl Grey Tea Mousse: (8")

Earl Grey Tea     6 tea bag

Hot water           180g

Sugar                   20g

Gelatin                 12g

Whipping Cream 400g

Coffee Cake Base: (7")

Cake Flour                 82g

Instant Coffee powder 12g

sugar                           80g

egg                               4

Vegetable oil              1Tbsp

Hot Water                  2 Tbsp

Coffee Jello:

3 in 1 instant coffee  1

Hot Water               200ml

Gelatin                     4g

Directions:

Prepare Cake Base:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease 7" pan or use parchment paper.
2. Cream together eggs and sugar.  Add sifted cake flour to creamed mixture and mix well. Dissolve coffee powder in hot water. Finally sir in the coffee liquid and vegetable oil to the batter until well mixed. Pour batter into the pan.
3. Bake for 30 - 40 mins in the preheated oven. When cake is done, cool down cake by turning the pan upside down on cooling rack. While waiting for the cake done, you may start working on the Earl grey mousse.

Prepare Earl Grey Tea Mousse:

1. Boil water with earl grey tea for 10-15 minutes. Remove from stove, take out the tea bag and cool down the tea.
2. Whipped the cream until smooth. Put it in refridgerator first. Add sugar and gelatin to Earl Grey Tea. Heat over small pot of simmering water. Stir the mixture until all sugar and gelatin dissolved in tea mixture. Remove from stove and let it cool.
3. Pour tea mixture to whipped cream until all well mixed.
4. Prepared a 8" pan. Place 7" coffee cake base in middle of the 8"pan. Then using a piping bag to pipe the mousse mixture to fill the 0.5" side outside the 7" coffee cake base. Then fill the pan with entire mousse mixture. Please it in freezer to firm it for 30 minutes. 

Prepare Coffee Jello:

1. Dissolve one bag of 3 in 1 instant coffee powder in 200ml of hot water. Mix gelatin to coffee and heat it over small pot of simmering water. Stir until Gelain dissolved. Cool down mixture.
2. Take out the cake from freezer. Once the mousse become stable.  Gently pour the coffee jello on the top.
3. Place it in refridgerator for at least 3 hours before serving.

Hazelnut Chocolate (Nutella) Creme Brulee

Serves: 6 Ramekins

Ingredients:
2 cups (500ml) cream
40 g Sugar
6 egg yolks (100g)
70g Nutella (3tbsp)

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 300C.
2. Heat cream and sugar in small saucepan until steam occur. Remove saucepan from stove.
3. Whisk egg yolk and pour heated mixture of cream and sugar to the egg yolk. While pouring the mixture to egg yolk, keep stirring the yolks to prevent it from over cooked. Add nutella and mix well.
4. Pour mixture to ramekins. Put ramekins to baking tray filled with boiling water up to half depth of the ramekins. Put into oven and baked for 30-40 mins.
5. Carefully take out ramekins from baking tray. Cooled for 30 minutes and then chill them in refridgerator for at least 3 hours before serving.
6. Gently spread thin layer of sugar to top of the custard. Flame it with flame gun. Or if you broil it in oven. I suggested you put your ramekin to freezer for 15 mins before broil it in oven.
Serve immediately.

腰果露 Cashew Nut Sweet soup dessert

Recipe: serves 4

Ingredients
220g raw cashew nut
1/4tsp fine salt
3Tbsp rice
80g rock sugar
4 cups (1000ml)water
1 cup evaporated milk

Directions

1. rinse raw cashew nuts. Cook in some boiling water (not within ingredient listing) with pinch of salt for 2-3 minutes. Dish up. Drain and blow dry.
2. Heat some oil in wok over medium heat. Deep fry cashew nuts until golden brown. Dish up and pat dry with paper towels. (If you bought the cooked unsalted cashew nut, you can skip step 1 and step 2)
3. rinse rice and soak in water for half an hour
4. blend cashew nuts, rice, and 2 cups of water in blender to thick liquid. Sift in strainer or cheesecloth for 2 times until smooth.
5. Bring remaining 2 cups of water to boil. Add cashew nut liquid and rock sugar Cook until rock sugar dissolves. Add 1 cup of evaporated milk. Keep stirring with wooden spoon. Simmer over low heat for 10-15 minutes.

合桃糊（核桃糊）Walnut Sweet Soup Dessert

Recipe: serves 3
Ingredient
200g Walnut
3Tbsp rice
80g Rock sugar
3 cups (750ml) water
100 ml evaporated milk

Directions:

1. rinse walnuts. Drain and fry walnuts in saucepan until dry. Add a bit oil and keep frying the walnuts until you smells the walnuts. (You can deep fry or baked them in oven) This step can increase the walnuts taste in soup.
2. Rinse rice and soak for half an hour.
3. Combine rice and walnuts with 3 cups of water. Pour into blender and blend to smooth paste. Sift with strainer or cheesecloth for 2 times. 
4. add walnut rice paste with rock sugar to 100ml evaporated milk. Cook for 10 minutes over low heat until sugar dissolves.