Category: Yelly Eats

Everything and anything about food, cooking, baking, and recipe-testing

Yelly Eats

Chocolate bark

Yelly

I saw Ina Garten make this in one of her shows and I thought, “Wow that looks really easy!”

And believe me, it was really easy!  All you have to do is melt chocolate of your choice (I used half dark chocolate and half milk chocolate to balance the bitterness of the chocolate) in a heatproof bowl over boiling water, making sure that the boiling water didn’t touch the bowl.  The process might be slow but the chocolate comes out really beautiful and shiny.

Then you spread the chocolate over wax or parchment paper and sprinkle your choice of nuts and dried fruit and let it cool and become solid.  It’s important to remember that you shouldn’t put the cooling chocolate into the fridge.  Doing this will cause the chocolate to lose its sheen.  Also, if you intend to use dark chocolate (60% or higher), it might be a good idea to temper the chocolate with a heaping teaspoon of icing sugar and a teaspoon of vanilla paste so that the bitter taste is calmed down.

Chocolate bark cooling

Once the chocolate has cooled and hardened, you can either use a sharp knife to slice the chocolate into shapes or break them apart with your hands.  I prefer the knife option though, because if you break the chocolate up with your hands, the natural heat of your hands will make you leave finger prints all over the chocolate.

You can vary the sprinkles, depending on who this is for.  I placed salted cashews, dried apricots, dried berries and dried cranberries.  This makes for a tasty goodie bag item, which I learned, is also called a “hostess giveaway”

Chocolate bark

Yelly Eats

Scones!

Yelly

I’ve been wanting to bake scones since I saw this Gary Rhodes show on TV.  He made making scones look so easy.  Mind you, I’ve always believed these experienced chefs always make everything look so easy to make!

So I started looking up scone recipes.  I started with opening Paul Hollywood’s book.  The recipe was quite interesting because it used bread flour instead of regular flour.  I was a bit worried that it wouldn’t taste like the scones that I’d loved so much from The Delaunay counter.   So I decided to look through Mary Berry’s  Baking Bible.  I looked at Mary’s recipe and thought this was going to taste more traditionally scone-y.

Mary’s Baking Bible is lovely because the instructions are straightforward and not formidable at all.  It tells you what to do and if you do it, then it’ll come out wonderful.  The recipe said it would make 20 small scones and it made 21.  I probably made a couple of scones too thin, which made it possible to make an extra scone.

When the scones came out the came out soooooo lovely and golden brown!

I couldn’t not have scones, clotted cream and jam.  I’d been having quite the sickly week as there is a bug making its rounds at work, so I thought I deserved a tiny bit of a treat.  Because I was feeling a bit blecchy, I was worried about how the scones would turn out.  It was definitely a comforting treat.  The next time I do Mary’s scones, I’ll put a bit of fruit in it!  Should make for lovely fruity scones!

 

Yelly Eats

Fajita night!

Yelly

I am a wannabe domestic goddess (you wouldn’t think so if you saw what my front room looked like!  Martha Stewart I definitely am not!) and I have illusions of joining the Great British Bake Off.  I say illusions because I am in no way, shape or form ready to bake at that level just yet!  I say “just yet” because it is the great dream…and I am slowly self-training my way into readiness.

I love to cook and I adore my tiny kitchen.  But there are days when I really don’t want to spend to much time in it.  Tuesdays, more often than not, are days when I don’t really want to cook.  It’s my I’m-so-tired-I-could-cry day for some reason.  So on a Tuesday night, I will usually find myself sitting on the train hoping there are leftovers in the fridge, or me buying a ready meal from the supermarket to pop in the oven when I get home or there is the phoning-takeaway-of-choice  route.

Tonight however, is different.  Tonight is fajita night!  While I cheated yet again tonight (I bought a fajita spice packet from the supermarket!), here’s a fajita spice mix recipe that I know works really well:

Ingredients:

Spice Mix
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1-2 teaspoons chili powder (or go without, this really depends on how hot you want it to be!)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon paprika (sweet variety, or if you can find the smoked variety, that will work too)
1 teaspoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon crushed chicken bouillon cube
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 teaspoon cumin

2 tablespoons vegetable oil
650g chicken thighs, diced (I use chicken thighs because they don’t dry out as much as chicken breasts)
1 medium sized white onion, sliced thinly
1 red, 1 green and 1 yellow bell pepper, julienned (pepper colours can be changed, of course, depending on what’s available)

Directions

  1. Mix together all the spice mix ingredients.  In a metal or glass bowl (only because the spice mix will stain plastic bowls), mix chicken, vegetable oil and the spice mix together until the chicken is well coated.
  2. Making sure the pan (I used a non-stick pan) is very hot, brown the chicken and cook for about 10 minutes.  Add the onions and the bell pepper and cook for a further 5 minutes.
  3. Serve in warm soft tortillas with sour cream, salsa and guacamole.

And there you go!  A meal that’s quick, easy and surprisingly healthy (especially if you go easy on the condiments!).

Yelly Eats

Pan de sal at last!

Yelly

I’ve been looking for a pan de sal recipe that I can work with and I have think I may have found it.

Pan de sal is a Filipino bread roll that is sold at very nearly every corner bakery shop in the Philippines.  I’ve missed it so much that I’ve told myself it’s necessary for me to learn how to make it.  This is the third adaptation of a recipe that I’ve seen online.  As usual, I read and reread the recipe to make sure I could follow the steps without reading through the recipe over and over (even if I had the iPad open on the recipe anyway!).  I always worry when I’m making bread because I’m never sure it’s going to turn out right.  But there was something right about how the dough looked while it was being kneaded in the Kenwood.  I kneaded the dough by hand and the dough felt right then too.  When I oiled the dough to prepare it for proofing, it looked right.  Ha!  Listen to me waxing philosophical about bread dough!

After following the baking instructions and making the bread rolls, I must admit, I was a bit worried again.  It might’ve have looked right as proofing dough but I always worry that I’m too heavy handed with anything I bake!  With a lot of whispered prayers I popped the trays into to oven and waited (impatiently) for 15 minutes until the timer pinged to tell me the rolls were ready.  They looked gorgeous and they tasted even better.  They finally tasted like the pan de sal I remember from the Philippines!

And, yes, I am very, very please!

Yelly Eats

Chocolate Guinness Cake

Yelly

I made this cake yesterday to bring to work today.  We were having a buffet for someone’s leaving do.  I thought as I wanted something chocolatey and the person was Irish (or at least I think he is), I thought an Irish-themed cake would be a great idea.  So I went and baked a chocolate guinness cake!

The recipe was from Hummingbird Bakery’s Cake Days cookbook.  I’ve made this several times now and one thing that I completely love about the Hummingbird Bakery books is that if you follow the recipe to the letter, the cakes turn out beautifully!

Yelly Eats

Baking is the best medicine?

Yelly

I called in sick today because I got up and my head was absolutely pounding and I felt absolutely horrible.  Nevertheless, I soldiered on.  I jumped into the shower and went through the motions and got ready for work.  30 minutes into my morning rituals, I just sank into bed and said to myself that I was well and truly too ill to even finish getting ready.  I got back into my bed clothes and dived back into bed.  I got up after a couple of hours and only to call in sick.  I didn’t feel human until nearly lunch time.

I forced myself out of bed and tried to just sit up.  I knew that the longer I stayed in bed, the more I would feel horrible.  I knew my body well enough.  If I gave it a chance to wallow in illness it would wallow until it was well and truly pruney!  So I got up.  I thought I’d do a spot of baking because baking always made me feel better.  Although, as an afterthought, I was breaking an unofficial rule that I followed: never to cook or bake when I’m not feeling well (whether it was illness or just a general tiredness)!  I thought doing a spot of recipe development would help me feel better.

I’ve been trying to develop this base recipe.  So far, it’s worked for banana bread, blueberry cake, and apple sauce cake.  I recently baked a lemon and poppy seed cake and had a few leftover lemons and loads of poppyseeds so I thought I’d bake another lemon and poppy seed cake.  I had this great idea that I’d try making mini lemon and poppy seed bundt cakes using my lovely mini-bundt cake tin.  I’ve only used it once, making my Lola Lucing’s torta cebuana (which reminds me, I need to try  making them again!).

So off I went and baked.  I think they turned out quite well, except the seemed to be a tiny bit drier that I wanted them to be.  I think the tweak needs to be that the temperature needs to be a bit lower and there needs to be more syrup for the cakes to soak in.  But otherwise, they looked adorable!  I didn’t necessarily feel better after baking because I felt even more shattered if that was at all possible.  I’m not exactly going to complain though because I made 12 beautiful mini bundt cakes and 4 cupcakes as a result!

Yelly Eats

Rum baba, yum baba!

Yelly

One of my favourite sweet treats is a rum baba!  I had one in Manila AGES ago and never forgot how good it was.

Alan had this waiting for me when I got home from work on Friday.  My tummy thanks you very, very much for the lovely surprise! ♥

I saw Paul Hollywood make this on the Great British Bake Off masterclass this week.  And, of course, because I love it, I’m going to HAVE TO learn how to make them myself!  I HAVE TO!

Yelly Eats

Sweet and sour fish!

Yelly

I few weeks ago, I finally managed to go to Hung’s in Chinatown in London, upon the recommendation of  London foodie, Helen Pang.  Helen has never recommended anything that has disappointed.  She was the one who introduced me to Gelupo Gelato and Gelupo is now a mainstay of my London trips–whatever the weather.  So when Helen recommended Hung’s, I made a mental note to try the food there.  I’m still, sort of, mourning the loss of Tai Ka Lok and I was still sort of looking for a restaurant to replace it in my list of absolute London Chinese restaurant maintstays.  The first visit to Hung’s was so amazing that when we went to London again a few weeks later, it was a definite must-go-to.

We had a lovely supper: braised mushrooms and pak choi, a portion of crispy pork, sweet and sour fish and boiled rice.  The sweet and sour fish was absolutely divine!  The fish was lovely and sweet and it kind of melted in your mouth!  I’ve been dreaming of Hung’s sweet and sour fish that I had to do something similar at home.  It was a pretty good idea because I had frozen basa fillets lounging in my freezer!

My mom used to make sweet and sour sauce from scratch, Filipino style, but I wanted to see if  I could make something closer to the Chinese style of making the sauce.  I googled it and found a recipe that was so similar to my mom’s that I knew it was going to taste really nice.  You can find the instructions for the recipe here.  It cooks in 5 minutes and you can add anything you want to it.  You just put together all the ingredients and cook it until it’s as thick as you want it to be.

  • 1/3 cup white or rice vinegar (Note: rice vinegar gives better results)
  • 4 tablespoons brown sugar
  • 1 tablespoon ketchup
  • 1 teaspoon soy sauce
  • 2 teaspoons cornstarch mixed with 4 teaspoons water

I breaded the fish before I fried them.  I sort of love breading anything really.  I do a little conveyor belt of the elements bowls of  seasoned flour (or cornstarch), beaten egg and breadcrumbs.  Depending on what you’re making, seasoned flour to me usually just means salt and pepper mixed in with the flour.  One tip I learned from either Nigella or Ina Garten (it was so long ago that I can’t remember!  It might even be Giada de Laurentis!) was to use just one hand so that you kept the other hand clean because breading things can be quite gluggy!

After breading the fish, I fried the fish to a crispy, lovely golden brown.  Make sure that you rest them on kitchen paper so that the excess oil is absorbed.

Then while the fish was cooling, I cooked the sweet and sour sauce.  Instead of adding the cornstarch right away, I added sliced onions and chopped red and yellow bell peppers and allowed them to cook slightly.  I added a few cubes of pineapple out from a tin.  A slight variation from the recipe, instead of using 4 teaspoons of water, I added 4 tablespoons of the pineapple syrup from the tin to dissolve the cornstarch and added that to the cooking sauce.

Once the sauce is at the thickness that you want it to be, you can assemble your dish.  To keep the fish lovely and crispy, I suggest just pouring the sweet and sour sauce over it.  And voila!  You have sweet and sour fish!