I’ve been trying Mealime – a meal planning site that sends you weekly meal plans (recipes and shopping lists) for meals that you can prepare in under 30 minutes. It’s great, although the one thing I find is that I miss the coloured photo showing me how my finished product should look.

Fortunately, Google Images is great for this – copy the recipe title, go to http://images.google.com and paste the recipe name in the search box. So far, I’ve bee rewarded for a slew of photos showing me how the product should look:

Bonus Round:

Now I know what a scallion is… and adobo sauce… all thanks to Google Image search as well.

(Scallions are what us Aussies call spring onions… and tabasco sauce is an acceptable bottled form of adobo sauce)

Scallion Google Search!

Adobo Sauce Google Image Search

The French Stall has a great lunch-time menu, which is why we frequent it quite often.

They have a couple of sites (you can view their website here for the latest info), but we frequent the one at Macpherson Road. Great grub!

We love the French Onion soup and the grilled dory… but we’ve tried a few things on the menu and they’ve all been pretty good!

Bon appétit!

Romani Spagetti (Broccoli Spagetti)

One of my favourite things about cooking with my Thermomix is that I can cook rice, noodles or pasta, while using the steam to cook vegetables and other parts of the meal. This makes the cooking more or less ‘set-and-forget’ – perfect for me!

This is called Romani Spaghetti after a friend of mine who used to invent dishes for a local restaurant. This was his creation – a good, simple meal to have after a day at work.

Here is my ‘Thermomixed’ version of his recipe.

Ingredients

Spaghetti (80-100 grams per person)
Broccoli (half a head per person, cut into florets)
Parmesan cheese (grated or ground, to taste)
Salt
Olive Oil
Red Chili (cut, to taste)
Garlic (we like it strong – 2 to 4 cloves per person)

Method

1. Add 1 to 1.5 litres of water, salt (to taste) and 5 grams of olive oil to the Thermomix bowl. Cook for 14 minutes, temperature 100 degrees C, speed soft.
2. Arrange the broccoli florets in the steaming tray (bottom level), and the garlic in the top tray. (If you are cooking for one, you can put all in the same tray – see photo below.)
3. When the water is boiled, add the spaghetti.
4. Put on the lid, lock into closed position, and add the steaming trays to the top.
5. Cook for 9 minutes, temperature 100 degrees C, reverse, speed soft.
6. When cooked, drain spagetti into bowl and then pour over a dollop of olive oil. Gently toss with cut chili, and garlic (crush the garlic into the pasta after steaming).
7. Add broccoli and the parmesan cheese to the pasta and toss gently (so that you don’t damage the florets).
8. Serve!

Broccoli, arranged in the steaming tray

I love food. I love to cook food, and if I eat out and experience something I like, I love to try and imitate it at home. Recently I had fabulous garlic bread and found out the secret ingredient – chives!

So this is really simple… mix:

• 150 grams of butter
• medium bunch of chives
• garlic – I personally like it really strong, so we add 8-10 medium sized cloves of garlic

Put all in the Thermomix, set the dial to the closed lid position, and then hit turbo for 2 secs. Do this for as long as it takes for the chives, garlic and butter to mix together. (Usually I do this 4-6 times.) Add a little salt to the last time. I do this mainly for the preservation factor – it lasts longer in the fridge.

Smear on your garlic bread (or use it to cook with prawns in a pan – also very yummy).

Honestly, however, I’m not sure how long this keeps as we generally use it within a couple of weeks – very popular at our place!

Enjoy!

Garlic & Chives Butter

This was not an easy wine to drink. To be honest I’m now quite sure why. Had a nice taste but somehow by the time I reached the bottom of the glass I was forcing myself to drink it.

Somehow I think it was a bit heavy, which I found surprising considering the blend.

Would I buy again? Probably not.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Bacon used to be the name of a bun that I used to pick up at the Bread Talk here in Singapore. For those that don’t know, Bread Talk is a local bread chain that does rolls, buns, danishes and other bread assortments – like Baker’s Delight in Australia. At any rate, they stopped making this particular one, and for a while there I was popping into every Bread Talk that I passed to see if they made this bun. No luck!

Then it occurred to me that I can make it myself.

So, based on my modified Thermomix bread recipe… here goes, with a modification or two to suit my own taste!

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Bacon Bread

Ingredients

The Dough:

100g Spelt Flour
300g lukewarm water
1 sachet instant yeast
salt to taste
400-420g baker;s flour
20g olive oil
Dried basil flakes (optional)
Pepper (optional)

[See my post on bread ingredients available in Singapore if you're not sure what to use here.]

The Filling:

100g Ham or Bacon
Olive oil
Pepper and salt to taste
2 eggs
Parmesan cheese
Chedder cheese

Method

1. Add (in this order) to the TM mixing bowl: spelt flour, water, yeast, salt, flour, oil, basil flakes (about 1 dessert spoon, or to taste), and pepper (1-2 tsp, or to taste).
2. Mix ingredients on Speed 7, for 5 seconds to combine.
3. Set the dial to closed lid position, and then knead the dough for 1 min and 30 secs, on Interval speed.
4. Once the dough is kneaded, place it in a slightly oiled bowl. I usually just get a paper towel and use it to wipe a dollop of olive oil around the bowl. Cover the dough with plastic wrap (eg. Glad wrap), and leave it to rise in a warm location for 20-30 mins. This rising process is normally called ‘proving’. It should approximately double in size.
5. Once dough has proved, lay the dough on a large flat surface sprinkled with flour (I use the baker’s flour). Roll out until it is about 20cm across and about 40cm long.
6. Grind/grate the cheeses and mix together (use as much or as little as you wish), keeping in mind if you use too much, it can leak out of the bread on to the baking tray during the baking process. About 100-150 grams is usually enough.
7. Pour the olive oil down the centre of the dough – I usually use an ‘S’ pattern (see yellow line in sketch below).
   
8. On top of the olive oil layer the various ingredients according to your taste and preference. I generally use the following order:
   • pepper
   • basil
   • salt
   • a portion of the cheese
   • ham/bacon
   • beaten eggs
   • more cheese
   • pepper
9. Roll the dough into a long roll, ensuring that the sides are sealed so that ingredients do not leak out. You are rolling the shorter sides towards each other, so you will end up with an approximately 40cm long roll.
10. Transfer the rolled dough to a floured baking tray.
11. Join the ends of the roll together so you end up with something that looks like a big donut. If pinching the ends together doesn’t hold, wet them with a pastry brush and try again. Usually wetting the dough will make it stickier. Use a pastry brush so you don’t wet it too much (which can result in the dough losing its firmness and you end up with mush).
12. I like to brush water over the top of the dough to make the crust a little crunchier. You can sprinkle seeds on top if you like. I sprinkle more flour on top as well.
13. Bake for 35 mins in a preheated oven – 180 degrees Celsius for fan forced ovens, 220 degrees C if your oven is not fan forced.
14. I usually like to open the oven door when there’s about 8-10 minutes to go and sprinkle a bit of cheese on top.
15. When done, take out of the oven, and leave to cool on a cooling rack for about 5-10 minutes. This ensures the cheese has cooled down a little.
16. Cut and serve!

Eat your heart out Bread Talk and Baker’s Delight!

Finding Bread Ingredients in Singapore

OK – so you’ve decided to bake some bread, and you have all the instructions in your Thermomix cook book (and you’re so excited to hear that it takes 50 minutes from start to pulling the bread out of the oven) or breadmaker… so now just to buy the ingredients.

Living in Singapore, we’re lucky and we’re unlucky. When we see baking instructions from the US, Europe and Australia, sometimes what is in the recipe doesn’t match what is written on the packaging on the shelf in the store. And if you’re like me, you don’t WANT to try 5 different brands before you settle on one you like. I HATE waste.

However, where those that live in Singapore are lucky is that we do actually have quite a large variety of flours available to us in Cold Storage supermarkets. We don’t have to go to any specialty shops to buy the more exotic flours like Spelt and 10 Grains.

And if you aren’t blessed enough to have a Thermomix, don’t worry – these are flours that work with most breadmakers, or you can even bake by hand! Experiment away, and don’t forget there are many books and websites out there on breadmaking!

What do you buy?

I’ve included a list of some of the brands that I use to follow the Basic Bread recipe on Thermomix. I noticed in Australia that there are a lot of pre-mixed bread flours, however this wasn’t something that appealed to me. Instead, the following works just fine.

Flours & Yeast

Bread & Other Flours

Bread flours by either Prima Flour or Bake King both work well. They can be found in NTUC and Cold Storage in Singapore. As the recipes that I’ve worked with to date have mixes of plain bread flour with other flours (in proportions of 80/20, or even up to 50/50), you will want to go and get some of what I call the more ‘exotic’ flours. Cold Storage is my first stop for these, and I get the 10 Grain or Spelt flours from Bob’s Red Mill. They’re not cheap (S$5-7 per 680 gram bag), but one bag will usually last me 4-5 loaves.

Yeast

I’m pretty basic with my yeast, and stick to what I know. I’ve had a lot of success with instant yeast, as it does not need to be ‘activated’. To find out more about yeast in general, try this Yeast FAQ. I use the saf-instant brand pictured in the left of the photo above. One sachet = one loaf of bread. What could be easier???

Try not to be too intimidated by baking bread. I was!! There is so much written on this topic, that I put it off for ages. My only regret is not trying my hand at it earlier. There is nothing like a hot loaf right out of the oven!

Enjoy your bread!

Sometimes I end up with a bunch of vegetables (and sometimes small quantities of meat) in my fridge that are on the verge of expiring. You all know what I mean – you gotta cook ‘em up before they rot. One alternative is to make a vegetable soup. This is another alternative, as usually I have loads of lettuce, tomato & cheese on hand at any time (they are staples in my fridge).

Burrito-style leftovers

Note that this is in no way a ‘traditional’ burrito recipe – it’s just my way of dealing with leftover veges and meat in the fridge!

Ingredients

I generally use the following as a minimum, however any additional left over vegetables that can be ground or boiled down are good fillers for this recipe (including onions, carrots, mushrooms, beans, olives, etc).

1 onion(roughly chopped)
2 cloves garlic
50g olive oil
1 carrot (roughly chopped)
4-5 rashers of bacon (or left over minced beef/chicken/pork)
1 can of kidney beans (or chili beans, or refried beans – whichever is available/left over)
1 medium red chili (roughly chopped) (or chili powder)
Herbs & Spices to taste – I like cumin, pepper, salt & oregano

Method

1. Add garlic, olive oil and onion into the Thermomix bowl. Chop for 4-5 seconds on speed 6. Scrape down the sides with the TM spatula.
2. Saute contents of bowl for 5 mins, Veroma temperature, speed 1.
3. Add chopped carrot and chili to the bowl. Chop for 4-5 seconds on speed 6. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with the TM spatula. Remember to keep the MC in the lid for this step – the mixture is hot.
4. Either dice the bacon by hand, or chop  for 2 seconds on speed 6. Dicing by hand usually results in chunkier bacon bits. This is up to your personal preference. Add any other meat here.
5. Cook on Veroma temperature, speed 1 for 2-4 minutes (this will vary depending on the meat – as a guide: bacon usually only requires 2 mins, beef mince I usually cook for 4 mins).
6. Add 1 tsp of cumin powder, 1 tsp of oregano, salt and pepper to taste. Mix for 30 seconds on speed 1.
7. Add beans and cook for 5 minutes, Veroma temperature, speed 1.
8. Taste and add any spices for flavour.
9. Cook for 5 mins, 100 degrees, speed soft.
10. Optional – some like full beans in their mix. Others prefer a mushy consistency. if you prefer to have everything ‘mushed’ mix for 10 seconds on speed 5. Up to your personal preference. Remember to keep the MC in the lid for this step – the mixture is hot.

To assemble the burrito

I generally like to have mine open at one end, but you can wrap them closed if you like. You can find instructions on folding a burrito here.

In the centre of the wrap put:

• 2 dessert spoons of the bean/meat mix
• small amounts each of lettuce, tomato, cheese, guacamole, sour cream, salsa (I generally assemble them in that order)
• Wrap

Sometimes the wraps get messy and won’t stay together, so I sometimes use wax paper as a wrap around the wrap, so that I can wrap a whole bunch on a plate and serve them, and everyone can help themselves.

Plates and napkins are definitely recommended for this!

In a bit to increase my good cholesterol, prevent heart attack, prevent cancer, save the pandas and promote good against evil in cases of plots for world domination (OK, made that last bit up… ) I’m trying to eat more fish, and reduce some of my ‘bad’ carbohydrates.

Brown Rice & Fish - the tasty version

So out with white rice, and in with brown.

Normally this would be a bad thing – brown rice is dull, right?? Well, thanks to Jamie Oliver, I have found that there are numerous ways to make rice tasty.

Adding lemon zest and butter is one way.

Also, adding lemon juice and dill or basil to the water during boiling is also nice.

Using my Thermomix, I do this using the following method:

1. Put about 400g of rice in the Thermomix basket
2. Add about 900g of water to the mixing bowl
3. Put on Veroma Termperature, speed 3, for 20 minutes
4. After 20 minutes, when the rice is moist, but not fully cooked, top up the water a little, then stir through some dill / basil / pepper / lemon zest to taste
5. This is usually when I put my baked fish on (in a preheated oven for 20 minutes)
6. Set the Thermomix on Veroma Termperature, speed 3, for 20 minutes
7. Add butter, or a drizzle of olive oil and leave for 3-5 minutes
8. Serve the main (fish, meat, whatever) and the rice! Yum!

Loving life, and loving being home for lunch!