French Crepe Party Ideas

The happy problem with French crêpe party is that there is no limitations in terms of the type of fillings you can enjoy, and you end up eating more than everything.

The northwest region of France in Brittany is famous for their crêpes, but nowadays, you see French crêperies everywhere, even in Wellington. And they serve yummy crêpes!

The biggest difference between a French crêpe and an American pancake is their thickness. A French crêpe is so much thinner that you get to enjoy more, with different types of fillings, from savoury to sweet ones.

So, you can imagine that when we hold crêpe parties, there's more fillings than your stomach can hold. It's not a lot of work or pre-cooking, as we use basic ingredients like butter, sugar, nutella, bananas, strawberries, bacon, mushrooms, shredded cheese, walnuts, blue cheese, lemon juice, eggs, almonds, liquor, orange, cinnamon...

One problem with making crêpes is that, they are best enjoyed when they are hot. So if you're making crêpe on your frying pan, it makes serving everyone at the same time difficult. The French (or rather Tefal) have found a happy solution to this problem with the Multi Crêpe Party device. You basically plug it and put on your dining table, and everyone surrounds it like a steamboat and makes their own crêpe together. It makes 6 much smaller crêpes at the same time. It's fun, and useful even for parties of more than 10. Everyone just end up standing around the table, cooking and eating. However, this electronic device may be hard to find outside France, but they are widely available in stores like Carrefour or Darty in France (we actually went to the trouble of carrying one back from France).

Crêpe batter
Serves about six

250g flour
3 eggs
500ml milk
pinch of salt
about 1 teaspoon of melted butter
water

Mix flour and egg. The mixture gets very thick and dry. Add milk slowly until you get a smooth batter. Add butter and salt.

We find that the batter could be thinner, and usually add about half a cup of water and more milk, so that the crêpe spreads thinner.

Chill in fridge for about half an hour.

To cook, spread a thin layer, one at a time, on frying pan or use a multi crêpe party device.

To serve, add fillings, fold into half or quarter, or just simply roll up.



Simple Crêpe Fillings suggestions

Savoury
Bacon: This is always a winner. Fry them until they are crispy. Top with shredded cheese or mix with mushrooms.

Mushrooms: You can stir fry mixed button mushrooms (diced into small cubes) with olive oil, garlic and chopped fresh parsley (seasoned with salt and black pepper). Another alternative is to fry with bacon (and chopped onions), add some fresh cream, season with herbs, salt and black pepper).

Eggs: Beat an egg into the multi crêpe party, you get a perfect round sunny side up. Put it on top of the crêpe and add bacon and cheese if desired.

Blue cheese and Walnut: For the slightly more exotic taste buds. Popular with our crêpe party guests so far.

Sweet
Butter, sugar and cinnamon: My all time favourite! Melt them altogether on the crêpe and eat it while it's hot. Sinfully good.

Sugar with lemon juice: For some tangy punch, squeeze some lemon juice onto sugar.

Banana or strawberries with melted chocolate: Always pair well together.

Banana with milo: A great pair here too

Banana with orange: We tried cooking banana with orange juice/pulp. Something new for a change.

Banana and honey: Classic

Strawberries with sugar: Tried it yesterday and it's good.

Ice-cream: If you're fast to eat before it melts on the hot crêpe.

Liqueur: You can make a Crêpe Suzette by putting sugar and liqueur such as rum on it (with fruits like bananas), and setting it on fire. Sure to capture everyone's attention.

Jam: Or basically, just scour through your pantry for anything that you find suitable. It will ensure a successful crêpe party with a big spread of fillings to satisfy every palate.


note: Crêpes in pictures shown are made this morning with leftover batter from our crêpe party last night, using a normal frying pan.

Fresh Pasta with Prawns and Scallops

So what do you think I would do with the leftover fancy ingredients from the fancy Pre-Christmas dinner. Well, cook up another fancy meal the next day.

With leftover scallops and fresh lasagna sheets, we made another buttery seafood pasta. We had reckoned that a tomato or cream base would be too overpowering and mask the taste of the fresh scallops. It's very simple and fast, and can be done with dried pasta. Recipe has been adapted from my ultimate fish cookbook.

The dish also gives us the pleasure of using our fresh parsley from the pot, which is growing very well. Growing our own herbs doesn't actually save us any money, as we end up spending on soil, fertiliser, pots, even organic pesticide...but it gives us much pleasure to pluck them whenever we need them.

Fresh Pasta with Prawns and Scallops
Serves two

Pasta (quantity left out, as I find that different people have different portion size)
handful of prawns
handful of scallops
50g unsalted butter
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped
salt and ground black pepper

As we were using our lasagna sheets, we trim them into thin strips. Lasagna sheets give much flexibility, can try cutting heart shapes out of them for a valentine's dinner perhaps. :)

Cook pasta in large pan of lightly salted boiling water.

Melt butter in a large heavy pan with the garlic and parsley. Toss in the prawns and scallops and cook over medium heat for about 8 minutes, until the seafood are cooked.

Drain pasta thoroughly and rinse with boiling water to remove any starch.

Stir pasta into the prawn mixture. Season with salt and pepper and serve immediately.

Tiramisu in Chocolate Cups

The last fancy dish of the pre-Christmas dinner is Tiramisu.

We've made Tiramisu several times to pretty great success. Our friend Aure has a particularly good recipe which we liked.

This time, we tried a new recipe, partially from a newly acquired cookbook "The Chocolate and Coffee Bible". It's from the same publisher (Hermes House) as my ultimate fish book and contains a wealth of information about chocolate and coffee, from history, types, quality, brands to recipes and decoration tips.

Tiramisu always present a challenge when it comes to serving, as it's difficult to cut without collapsing. Such that it may be easier to make individual servings in glass.

Well, chocolate cups make even fancier serving dish than glass.

Tiramisu in Chocolate Cups
about 4 servings, depending on how generous you are with each portion

1 egg yolk
2 tablespoon brown sugar
a little vanilla essence
1 generous cup of mascarpone
1/2 cup strong black coffee
2 tablespoon coffee liqueur (or almond essence) - we forgot to add. still good.
sponge biscuits
cocoa powder for dusting

For the chocolate cups
150g dark chocolate
2 tablespoon unsalted butter

For the cups, cut out 4 rounds of baking paper. Melt chocolate with butter in a bowl set over a pan of simmering water. Stir until the mixture is smooth, then spread a spoonful over each circle to within 2 cm of the edge. Try to not spread too thin (about 1mm thick), otherwise it would be difficult to remove the paper without breaking the cups.

Lift each paper round and drape over an upturned teacup so that the edges curve into frills. Put into the fridge to set (it's faster this way). Then lift off and peel off the paper to reveal the chocolate cups.

It's the same for making chocolate leaves. Spread the melted chocolate onto, say a mint leaf and leave to set before peeling off the leaf.

Make the Tiramisu filling. Using an electric mixer, beat the egg yolk and sugar in a bowl until smooth, then stir in the vanilla essence.

Soften the mascarpone if necessary, then stir it into the egg yolk mixture. Beat until smooth. Set aside.

Mix coffee, liqueur. Break up the sponge biscuits roughly (1 inch length).

Place the chocolate cup on individual plates. Dip each piece of sponge biscuit very briefly into the coffee and place in the cup. Soaking the biscuits too long in the coffee will result in the Tiramisu becoming wet and soggy and losing its shape.

Put a layer of biscuits, then spoon over the mascarpone mixture, top with another layer of biscuits, followed by more mascarpone. Repeat for the other cups until you run out of either mascarpone mixture or sponge biscuits.

Chill for at least 30 minutes. Dust with cocoa powder before serving.

Open Ravioli with Parma Ham, Asparagus and Basil Butter

Wellington is known for its cafe culture. We have so far spent many a weekends exploring the diverse selection of cafes, each with its unique and individualistic character. Well, I don't really drink coffee, but always enjoy my brunch at a local cafe, each with a different menu and using the freshest local ingredients in season. Many times, at a place with a view to die for, be it by the wild coastline, in a valley, nested in a quiet suburb or by a busy street.

And some Italian cafes make you linger longer (and spend more) with their gourmet store alongside the cafe. Like this one, that we passed by, and ended up with a salami, mascarpone and Parma ham (all not quite local), after we said we are planning to prepare a nice dinner of ravioli and tiramisu, and looking for dried sausage for a camping trip. They certainly cost more, but the Parma ham is oh so good.

Well, it was supposed to be a fancy dinner, so we ended up with fancy ingredients. Very Italian too with recipe from my "easy Italian in minutes" cookbook, except that we replaced sage with basil. It's quite straightforward to prepare.

Open Ravioli with Parma ham, asparagus and basil butter
serves two

100g asparagus
125ml white wine
65g butter, cut into tiny cubes
half teaspoon white wine vinegar (we used red wine vinegar, I guess the deviation is not significant)
bunch of fresh basil, finely chopped (important to have fresh herbs for this)
Parma ham, cut into thin strips (recipe calls for 60g)
Parmesan, shaved
salt and pepper
125g fresh lasagna sheets (having fresh pasta really makes the difference)

Cook the asparagus gently with the tips out of the water for 3-4 minutes in boiling water until tender.

Heat the wine and reduce the liquid to 1 teaspoon, then slowly add the butter over low heat. Add vinegar and season to taste. Carefully fold in the chopped basil.

Cook the fresh lasagna sheets according to the pack instructions (we're not adventurous enough to make our own pasta yet).

Arrange one lasagna sheet on a plate and spread with a little herb butter, then place some of the cooked asparagus and strips of Parma ham on top. Layer up with more sheets of lasagna and filling. Repeat for the other portion.

Using a vegetable peeler, shave the Parmesan cheese and sprinkle over the pasta.

Parfait.

Scallop Ceviche

The Ceviche is a popular appetiser in Latin American countries. Each country from Mexico down to Chile have their own touch of individuality.

The dish basically involves marinating and cooking fish or seafood in citrus such as lime or lemon. Traditionally, you have to marinate for about 4 hours for the seafood to be 'cooked', but we cheated a bit by blanching our scallops with boiling water to save us some time.

Our resulting ceviche is 'created' after looking at several recipes and adapting them to what we have and like.

Scallop Ceviche
Serves two

100g scallops
1 yellow peppers
1 clove garlic
1 thumb size red chili
2 lemons (limes work better, being more acidic, but they were sold out in the supermarket)
half a grapefruit
Olive oil
Coriander leaves


Slice scallops horizontally.

Squeeze enough lemon or lime juice to submerge the scallops entirely in the juice and leave in fridge for 4 hours. If you're short of time, like us, blanch the scallops with boiling water first before marinating them in the citrus juice.

Chopped garlic and chili. Slice the yellow pepper thinly and cut the grapefruit flesh. Mix everything and add a little olive oil.

When the seafood is ready, add into the mixed fruit/vegetables. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve within 2-3 hours.

Our Pre-Christmas dinner

Since we may be stuck in some remote small town, or even in a tent in the South Island on Christmas, cooking instant noodles over a small camping stove, we thought we might as well have a nice dinner one week earlier.

Being in recession mode, and also for the pleasure of cooking something fancy, we decided against going to a fancy restaurant. Afterall, we've been dining out quite a lot recently.

Yet, being in festive mode, we spent some effort in gathering nice ingredients, and more time and energy in preparing it. After three intensive hours, the result was quite rewarding.

Starter came in the form of Scallop Ceviche, a Latin American dish. Main course was Open Ravioli with Parma Ham, Asparagus and Basil Butter. Dessert was Tiramisu presented in a delicately 'crafted' choclate cup. No extra space for aperitif, cheese or bread.

Will share recipes in upcoming posts.

Strawberry Tart with Crème Pâtissière

Strawberry season certainly rocks. With this deliciously seductive fruit in season in New Zealand now, we can't resist buying one pack after another, especially when they look so lusciously sweet and affordable. And of course, we have no more excuse not to make some strawberry dessert.

In Singapore, strawberries are not only pricey, they are also seldom sweet, being all imported and probably harvested before they are ready to be eaten to endure the long journey.

Originally torn between making a Strawberry Tart or a Strawberry Charlotte, Rémi couldn't wait to sink his mouth into his dessert and opted to make a tart (you need to chill a charlotte for at least a few hours).

French Pastry Cream (Crème Pâtissière) is used to line the sweet tart. To Rémi, the difference between a good pastry and a lousy pastry can be judged by the amount of cream used in the tart. Stingy pastry makers who are out to cut cost tend to use more cream than fruits.

Our cream recipe comes from Camille's classic French cookbook again. In her dessert section, she carries several types of dessert cream and sauces, including Crème Chantilly, Crème Anglaise, Coulis de Fruits Rouges, Sauce au Chocolat and Sauce au Caramel au Beurre Salé. Well, we shall see if we will try each and everyone of them.

French Pastry Cream (Crème Pâtissière)
makes slightly more than one tart

1 egg plus 1 egg yolk
15g flour
15g corn flour
65g sugar
25ml milk
vanilla essence

Bring milk with vanilla essence to boil, and let it stand for 10 minutes.

Whip the egg and yolk with the sugar until it has double in size and paled in colour. Then add the flour and corn flour, and add the warm milk gradually while continuing to whisk.

Put back onto fire and let the mixture thickened while beating continuously and strongly so that the cream does not stick to the bottom of the pot. Remove from heat and continue to whisk for 1 minute.


Strawberry Tart
Serves 4

1 sweet pastry dough (pâte sucrée)
enough strawberries to pack the size of your tart
strawberry jam

Make the sweet tart dough. Bake at preheated oven at 200C for about 10 minutes. Allow to cool.

Make one portion of crème pâtissière. Spread on the cooked tart. Halved the strawberries and line them on top of the cream.

Dilute the jam lightly with some water and use it as a glaze over the strawberries. Chill before serving.

Camille's Cheese Soufflé, just like mom did it

Rémi has the credit to this beautifully puffed up Cheese Soufflé. I've seen soufflé many times but not really tried it. So, no basis for comparison whether it tastes as good as real, but according to him, it is just as his mom did it. Pretty good. And the big ramekin was just bought yesterday specifically to satisfy his soufflé craving.

Recipe comes from the ever trusty Camille's classic French cookbook.

What I learned is that every soufflé is made from 2 basic components:
1. a French Creme patissiere base/flavored cream sauce or purée
2. Egg whites beaten to a soft peak meringue.

And other than cheese, soufflés can have chocolate, banana, lemon, jam and berries in its base.

Cheese Soufflé (Soufflé au Fromage)
Serves 2

20g butter
20g flour
200ml milk
2 eggs
70g gruyère cheese, cut into small pieces
ground nutmeg
salt, pepper

Preheat oven at 220C.

Melt butter on low fire. Add the flour and stir until evenly mixed.

Remove from fire, and add milk, a little at a time. Stir until the mixture thickens and becomes creamy.

Add the cut cheese and egg yolks. Separately, beat the egg whites until hard, and gently add the egg white into the first mixture.

Pour into soufflé mould, or big ramekin and bake at 220C for 20-25 minutes. Do not open the oven door during the cooking process, and serve immediately. Soufflé doesn't wait and will collapse very quickly. Luckily, we managed to grab a few snapshots.

Quick Sambal Ladies Fingers and Garlic Butter Prawns

My way of cooking the ladies fingers and prawns may not be the best in town, but it's my suggestion of what to do when short of time. Especially when I'm running late and have no time to defreeze meat (I don't believe in microwave oven).

I love ladies fingers. Strange name, isn't it? But the pods do look like it. I wonder if there's any plant name "men's toes". Must be round and very hairy.

Ladies fingers are also know as Okra. They are of African origins and well-loved in Singapore and Malaysian cooking (though I know of friends who would not eat them too). It's common in Yong Tau Foo soup noodles, and can be stuffed with fish paste, or just simply blanched in soup. It's also added into Assam Fish, together with brinjal (egg plant), tomatoes, pineapples...yummmmmy.

And ladies fingers are fantastic when cooked with sambal chilli, just like Kangkong (water spinach, it's another vegetable that deserves a separate entry).

If you go the traditional way of making the sambal chilli, you'll like have to take out the pestle and mortar and start pounding dried shrimps, belacan, shallots, chillies together (I remember using a blender during my school days, much quicker). But I'm suggesting my shortcut method here with ready made sambal chilli. And you can do the same for kangkong too.

Quick Sambal Ladies Fingers
Serves two

150g ladies fingers
1 big teaspoon of ready sambal chilli sauce, easily found in any Asian grocery store
1 shallot
1 garlic
1-2 teaspoons dried shrimps

Soak the dried shrimps in water to soften it. Use warm water if you're short of time.

Chopped shallot, garlic and dried shrimps. Mix with the sambal chilli sauce. You may like to squeeze a little lime juice into the paste if you have some.

Cut the ladies fingers diagonally.

Heat oil in frying pan. Add in the mixed sambal chilli paste and stir fry for a few minutes until fragrant, but without burning.

Add in the ladies fingers and mix well with the chilli paste. Add about half cup to a cup of water to prevent the chilli paste from burning. Fry for about 3-5 minutes and dish out.

Serve with rice.



Garlic Butter Prawns
Serves two, with the ladies fingers and rice

Prawns (number depending on how generous your portion is. I'm stingy, so have 4 small prawns per person, it's fair and equal and no one gets more)
Garlic (also according to taste, I love garlic, so use about 4-5 and still think not enough)
1 teaspoon butter (well, this would be according to your conscience too)
Sugar and salt
corn starch

Remove shells from prawns. If using frozen prawns like me, unfreeze under cold running water to save time. Coat with corn starch.

Chopped garlic.

Melt butter in frying pan, add garlic and fry for 1-2 minutes until lightly brown and fragrant. Add the prawns. Sprinkle sugar and a pinch of salt. Can consider garnishing with lemon slices too.

Serve with the above. Both dishes here are quick to prepare.

Getting to the heart of an Artichoke

I was introduced to the Artichoke by Rémi. Just like a Westerner may be baffled by a durian, I was stumped by how to eat this edible bud of a thistle that originates in the southern Europe around the Mediterranean.

I kind of consider this blog in part, a project to learn more about what goes through my mouth into my body (think our generation's obsession with highly processed food which greatly distorts the original look, taste and feel of many ingredient).

From what I find out, the main producers of artichokes are France, Italy and Spain, which is why it is a common starter to a French meal. In Chinese, it is 朝鲜蓟(ji)，or菊蓟、菜蓟、法国百合、荷花百合...but I do not recall this being commonly used in Chinese cuisine.

To eat it, you have to peel each leaf petal, one by one, dip in whatever dressing, and sip or chew the bottom (the side enjoining the stem) flesh off. I find this process truly unsatisfying, because the flesh is tender and tasty and leaves you craving for more. Yet, there's so little to suck off the leaves.

The joy comes when you reaches the heart. But before eating your heart out, you have to remove the "choke", which is the fine prickly hairy growth covering the heart of the artichoke. The heart of the artichoke is usually the most prized part that is used in restaurants (such that I may have tasted the artichoke many times without knowing how it looks like). Discard the leaves. The stem is said to be edible if well-cooked, but oops, I didn't know and threw it away.

To cook an artichoke, Rémi found that the fastest and easiest way is to steam for about 15 minutes. One can also boil it uncovered for about half an hour. Camille's French classic cookbook has also three artichoke recipes, all of which require more than an hour of baking or simmering. The tips of the leaves is quite sharp, which is why it is not uncommon to cut them off before cooking.

To make the dip, one suggestion is to combine olive oil, Dijon mustard and balsamic vinegar. Yummy.

Veal in white sauce (Blanquette de Veau)

Quite a few very traditional French dishes actually go well with rice, and Blanquette de Veau is one of them.

I always thought that rice is very Asian, and in Camille's classic French cookbook, she has recommended rice as the accompanying side dish for several recipes, which left me wondering. It's quite common for Rémi's family to serve rice, but I have always assumed their family is the exception than the rule.

So, I learned that Carmargue in Southern France is actually a rice-producing region. This place is famous for pink flamingos, which incidentally can't read signs telling them to keep off crops and thereby a headache to the French rice growers (there's this interesting book History of Food that gives a fascinating history of rice, among others, google to read extracts of the book).

How do French cook rice? From what I heard, I'm afraid their version of boiled rice is incomparable to that churned by any Asian rice cooker. That they cook rice like pasta, boiling them in water, and straining them.

So, I'll rather serve my delicious veal with Thai rice, cooked with my trusty rice cooker. The white sauce goes very well with rice.

Veal in white sauce (Blanquette de veau)
Serves two

250g veal (meat of young calves)
1 big carrot
1 onion
1 leek (I substituted with asparagus, probably not a good idea, but it's not every week that I have leek in stock)
1 onion
2 sprigs of parsley, 1 sprig of thyme and 1 bay leaf
1 clove

For white sauce:
15g butter
15g flour
1 egg yolk
125ml fresh cream
1/2 lemon
salt and pepper

Stick the clove into the onion. Put vegetables, veal, herbs, salt and pepper into a pan and cover with water. Bring to boil and simmer for about 2 hours. Remove the white froth forming at the surface.

Before serving, melt butter and mix in the flour and 3 big scoops of the vegetable broth. Beat the egg yolk, fresh cream, lemon juice together and stir into the butter and flour mixture. Add in more vegetable broth if necessary. Season with salt and pepper.

To serve, put veal and vegetables on serving plate and pour white sauce over. Serve with rice.

The vegetable broth is very rich and tasty too, I'm currently freezing it as vegetable stock. Not sure how I can use it yet, but it's going to be an experiment.

Chinese Egg tart with a French twist

I definitely wasn't expecting good results for my first Chinese egg tart experiment, but I was in for a pleasant surprise.

I've googled different egg tart recipes, and there's so many different ways of making it, just as there are many types of egg tarts.

Some are almost like an egg orgy, using more eggs than the crème brûlée. Me being the prudent, health-conscious, stingy homemaker, I opted for one that uses the least number of eggs. I found this egg tart recipe among the stack of old recipes I brought back from Singapore, and its source is unknown. Whoever gave me that, I'm deeply grateful and happy to share. And it is extremely easy to make.

But being too lazy to experiment with a new crust altogether, and definitely not up to making a flaky crust, I've opted to use the French sweet pastry crust (pâte sucrée) by Christelle Le Ru. Even lazier, Rémi, the pastry maker helped me with making the dough the day before. So I just have to gather the egg mixture together, put everything in shape and voilah!

Chinese Egg Tarts with a French twist
Makes about 14

1 sweet pastry dough (pâte sucrée)

Sugar syrup:
200ml water
100g sugar
4 pandan leaves

Custard filling:
Sugar syrup above
2 eggs
50g milk (original recipe calls for evaporated milk, I uses normal milk, with 1 spoon of liquid cream for an extra boost)

Make the dough and chill for 15 minutes.

Press the pastry with your fingers over the base and sides of the prepared cup cake pastry tin. Prick all over with a fork and bake for 10 minutes at preheated oven of 200C.

Make sugar syrup by boiling all the ingredients together. Cover for 10 minutes and allow to cool before using. Remove the pandan leaves (it's possible to find frozen pandan leaves in Asian grocery stores, as how I do. They give the sugar syrup a tinge of very nice and essential fragrance).

For the egg custard filling, mix all ingredients together, including the sugar syrup. Use a strainer to get rid of the unwanted bits from the eggs. The mixture should be smooth and silky.

Pour the egg mixture into the already cooked pastry and bake at 160C for 20-25 minutes.

The egg tart filling should be soft and moist, yet not liquid. And yet not overcooked. So start watching the oven after 15 minutes. The egg custard should be a little puffed up when it jellies.

Original recipe asked for 1 drop of egg yellow colouring, but as I'm quite against food colourings, I omitted it and the natural colour of eggs looked great.

Getting Apple Tart right

For the past few years, finding the key steps to making the simple Apple Tart seems as elusive as understanding a woman having PMS. We tried so many times with different types of apples, we tried pre-cooking the tart dough. We also consulted at least two French mothers who are good at it (this being a very traditional, typically French dessert), and who in turn told us to simply put sliced apples on top of the raw dough and bake it. To them, it's as straightforward as frying an omelette, there's just no science behind it to help you get it right.

Well, out of the say 6-10 times we made the apple tart, we probably only got it right 1-2 times. Either the tart base wasn't cooked well enough, or the apples too dried out, or both. And we couldn't understand why it was successful on those rare occasions. Luck? Maybe.

Last night, we may have found the answer. That is to squeeze as much apples as you could into the tart, so that they will ooze out just enough juices for the perfect apple tart. We had been too stingy with apples before, perhaps.

Apple Tart
1 tart dough (Pâte brisée)
at least 4 apples
sugar
cinnamon powder

Preheat oven at 180C.

Roll out tart dough. Line on a prepared tart tin. Spread apple slices onto the tart, packing as tightly as possible, and into nice patterns if you like.

Drizzle sugar (amount according to how much of a sweet tooth you are) and sprinkle cinnamon powder over.

Bake for about 30 minutes or until golden brown.

Jamie's incredible baked lamb shanks

Jamie described his baked lamb shanks "incredible", and I'll say the taste is quite truly so. The first time I baked this, I may have baked a tad too long, as the vegetables were all melted into almost nothingness. Last night, on my second try, I'd shortened the cooking time, so the lamb was less brown, but it tasted as good nonetheless.

The lamb was baked for so long in its own fats, as well as butter and olive oil, that it was almost like a confit. The onions and carrots added a sweet twist to the otherwise savoury dish. I omitted leek, simply because I didn't have it in the fridge.

I find Jamie overly generous with oil, so I've reduced the amount of butter and olive oil used. My version may be less good than his for sure, but it'll be less sinful as well. Especially as I also exercised portion control and shared one shank between two persons.

To maximise oven usage, throw 1-2 potatoes to bake together (but for half the time). Serve the lamb with mashed potatoes or just simply baked ones. Below is his recipe done it my way, as I remember it.

Jamie's incredible lamb shanks
for 1 shank

1 lamb shank
2 sprigs of fresh rosemary
1 sprig of thyme
1 spoon of cold butter, quantity according to conscience
4 cloves of garlic, unpeeled
1 carrot
1 onion
extra virgin olive oil
salt and black pepper
white wine

1-2 potatoes
fresh cream or milk
salt and black pepper

Preheat oven at 200C.

Chopped 1 small sprig of rosemary and the thyme into small pieces if you're using fresh ones. Yeah, my rosemary and thyme plants are still surviving after battling gales and storms. Original recipe also uses sage leaves, which I omitted. So please use if you have them. Mix with butter, salt and pepper.

Make incisions into the lamb shank and stuff the flavoured butter into the cut pockets. Rub the lamb with olive oil, salt and pepper.

Finely sliced carrot and onion (and leek if you have). Cut an A3 sheet of aluminum foil, place the vegetables, remaining rosemary (and sage leaves) and whole garlic in the centre. Put the lamb shank, bone upright on top. Splash some white wine over and wrap up entirely in foil.

Bake for about 2 hours or longer, until the meat is tender. Halfway through the baking, throw the potatoes into the oven. When the potatoes are done, mash with some milk or cream, salt and pepper.

Berry Christmas Chocolate Log Cake

Christmas to the French is what Chinese New Year is to the Chinese. It's holiday season, and a time for family reunion. Another similar trait is that each French family eat and do the same thing every year for Christmas, just like the Chinese. Or so I believe.

On the eve, by default tradition, my family would gather for steamboat. The double steamboat would have a spicy tom yum soup base on one side, and chicken base on the other side. Steamboat ingredients consist of abalone, pork, beef, fish, squid, mushrooms, lots of vegetables and balls (meat balls, fish balls, sotong ball...). Then, you go to the temple to wish for good luck for the new year.

Lunch on the first day of the new year would be leftovers from the night before, as well as food offerings to ancestors, like roast chicken, roast pork, steam fish...There's no guesswork necessary to know the menu for lunches and dinners for the first few days of the festivities, though each family have their own variations.

For Christmas, I was to discover the same thing happening for the French. Christmas service at the church on the eve before the big reunion dinner on Christmas. The yearly menu is fresh oysters (yum yum), salmon, prawns and fois gras. Dessert comes in the form of the yule log cake. Then, there's the Christmas presents exchange, just like there's ang bao giving for the Chinese.

Christmas day itself, there's always the roast turkey.And leftover log cake (or even a second one with a different flavour). For snacks, there's chocolate truffles, just like the Chinese have their new year cookies and pastries.

The log cake recipe is from Rémi's mom. Berry mousse and chocolate topping are from Christelle Le Ru. Decorating the log cake was fun. I even found recipes for making meringue in the shape of mushrooms, but didn't go to the trouble of doing it.

Berry Christmas Chocolate Log Cake
Serves 6

Cake roll (roulade):
3 eggs, yolks and white separated
100g sugar
80g flour
pinch of salt

Berry Mousse:
100g mixed berries, pureed
50g icing sugar
juice of 1 lemon
100ml fresh cream (for whipping)
50g mixed berries

Chocolate Topping (chocolate ganache):
150g dark chocolate
100ml fresh cream

Start with making the chocolate topping and berry mousse first as you need to use them immediately when the cake is done.

Puree 100g mixed berries (we used blueberry, raspberry and strawberry). Sieve to remove the seeds and mix with icing sugar and lemon juice. Whip the fresh cream. Gently fold the whipped cream into the fruit purée. Carefully mix mixed berries into the cream and refrigerate.

For chocolate topping, melt pieces of chocolate over a water bath. Boil the fresh cream and pour over the melted chocolate. Stir until the chocolate is fully melted and the mixture is creamy. Leave to cool.

Preheat oven to 200C.

Beat the egg yolks and sugar in a mixing bowl until the mixture is smooth and forms a pale yellow ribbon when lifted.

Beat egg whites separately until it is thick and foamy. Gently fold in half the flour, followed by half of the egg whites. Repeat for the remaining half until the mixture is well mixed.

Pour the mixture into a tray (about 35cm by 30cm) lined with greased baking paper. Cook for 10 minutes until golden brown.

Flip out the cake, spread the berry mousse immediately, leaving about 2cm clear on all sides. Roll up from the short end.

Coat the cake roll with the chocolate topping and refrigerate for at least 4 hours. Serve with mixed berries

Tips:
- For ideal results in whipping cream, make sure your cream, beater and mixing bowl are COLD. Refrigerate them for half an hour if necessary.
- For better success in making the egg white meringue, bring eggs to room temperature if they come from the fridge.

The five fragrances of Ngoh Hiang

The Hokkien Five Spice Meat Roll is more commonly known as Ngoh Hiang in Hokkien or Wu Xiang in Mandarin, literally meaning "five fragrances". Well, the famous Five Spice Powder (Wu Xiang Fen) used in Chinese cuisine is also literally translated as "five fragrances" from Chinese.

Five spice powder is so named as it contains all the five flavours (or should we say fragrance) - sour, bitter, sweet, pungent, and salty. Although the specific combination of spices varies nowadays, two standard combination are: 1) Chinese Tung Hing cinnamon (a type of cassia), powdered cassia buds, powdered star anise and anise seed, ginger root, and ground cloves. 2) huajiao (Sichuan pepper), bajiao (star anise), rougui (cassia), cloves, and fennel seeds.

The powder is the key spice in making the Ngoh Hiang. As the meat roll is quite tedious to make, it is a festive dish in Hokkien households (from my observation of my extended family and friends). Besides death anniversaries of ancestors (this may sound strange to foreigners, but anniversaries are celebrated with rich offerings of food in traditional prayers, and the extended family gather together to offer their respect. I see it more as an occasion for family gathering), Chinese New Year is the main period when grandmothers, mothers, aunts etc make this meat roll, along with a big feast of other traditional goodies.

Of course, you can easily find Ngoh Hiang in hawker centres nowadays, but nothing beats the homemade one. Especially when those commercially-made-in-factory ones taste more flour than meat (just like chicken nuggets from MacDonald).

I got the below recipe from my friend PY's mom, who make one of the best Ngoh Hiang. As with most Chinese home cooks, the proportion of ingredients is more by instinct than precision, so use your discretion, as I do when I reduce the quantity in making it. The quantity is huge, as this is a festive dish and so, cooked to feed many many mouths and to last over several meals during the Chinese New Year period.

Yesterday was my first try. There's room for improvement.

Ngoh Hiang (Hokkien five spice meat roll)
makes perhaps 12 rolls

1 large sheet of bean skin
1kg minced pork
300g prawns
20 water chestnuts
2 large onions
2 carrots
10-15 dried shitake mushrooms, soaked
5 stalks coriander leaves
2 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tsp salt
pepper
corn flour
1 packet of five spice powder (I'm not sure how much is this, but use generously, possibly 1 tbsp)
2 eggs

Grate carrots and chopped all ingredients finely. Marinate and set aside for one hour.

Cut the bean skin into smaller squares (or rectangular). Clean them with a damp cloth. It's very fragile, so be careful not to tear it.

Divide up the minced mixture accordingly and roll as tightly as possible like a sausage.

Deep fry in hot oil until cooked (I prefer to use less oil and turn the meat rolls until all sides are cooked). Cut diagonally into 1 inch slices.

Serve as a side dish with rice.

Rye bread and why it should be left to the professional

Yesterday was certainly a busy breadmaking day. Aside from Pizza, Rémi also finally put his rye flour to good use. My conclusion is, unless you have a bread machine, it's more worthwhile letting the baker earned that 5 bucks.

It's just too time-consuming. Three rounds of kneading, and two rounds of glazing, it took half the afternoon and night to complete the full course of making the bread, that due to inexperience, has rooms for improvement (although I would say that his rye bread is excellent, given that it's his first time making it).

I've grown up on soft white bread and love the softness of those traditional white bread loaf you spread your kaya and butter on. Not the commercial square white bread you use for making those triangular sandwiches. So it took me a while to get used to those harder country bread that the French loves.

The French takes much pride in their bread, almost like they do with their cheese. In France, it seems that you can't call yourself a boulanger unless you have some certification, and artisan bread are highly valued.

For the undeterred, I reproduce the recipe from the "Making Fresh Bread" cookbook.

Ryebread
Makes 1 large loaf

450g rye flour
225g strong white bread flour plus extra for dusting
2 tsp salt
2 tsp brown sugar
1 and 1/2 tsp easy blend dried yeast
425ml lukewarm water
2 tsp vegetable oil
1 egg white for glazing (we used milk)

Sift the flours and salt together into a bowl. Add sugar, yeast and stir to mix. Make a well in the centre and pour in the lukewarm water and oil. Stir with a wooden spoon until the dough begins to come together, then knead with your hands until it leaves the side of the bowl.

Turn out on a lightly floured surface and knead for 10 minutes, until elastic and smooth.

Brush a bowl with oil. Shape the dough into a ball, put in the bowl and cover with a damp tea towel. Leave to rise in a warm place for 2 hours, until the dough has doubled in volume.

Brush a baking sheet with oil. Turn out the dough on a lightly floured surface and knock back with your fist, then knead for a further 10 minutes. Shape the dough into a ball, put it on a prepared baking sheet and cover with the damp tea towel. Leave to rise in a warm place for a further 40 minutes, until the dough has doubled in volume.

Meanwhile, preheat oven to 190C. Beat the egg white with 1 tsp of water in a bowl (if you're using it for glazing). Bake loaf for 20 minutes, then remove from the oven and brush the top with the glaze. Return to oven and bake for a further 20 minutes.

Brush the top of the loaf with the glaze again and return to the oven for a further 20-30 minutes, until the crust is a rich brown colour and the loaf sounds hollow when tapped on the base with your knuckles. Cool before serving.

Ying-Yang Rectangular Pizza

Pizza, along with guacamole, counts as one of the frequent dish we make when we entertain.

As usual, Rémi would be the bread-maker, ensuring that we have a crispy thin crust that we could cut easily with a pair of scissors.

And our pizza is never round. We always make a rectangular shape crust and line it on the big black oven tray. It is just perfect for feeding four persons, or two persons over two meals.

Being maker of your own pizza, you get to choose your own topping, and we normally have two sides with different flavours.

Below is our pizza dough recipe, that makes two big rectangular crust. You may consider freezing the second one for use another day. To freeze, roll out the dough to desired shape, line with baking paper, and gently roll the sheet like a scroll of paper. Use within two weeks.

Pizza dough
makes 2 big rectangular crusts

12g yeast (ready to use dried yeast)
8g salt (I guess a pinch would do)
250ml water
500g flour
50g olive oil
1/2 can tomato paste
4-5 ripe tomatoes

Sift flour. Mix flour, salt, yeast and oil. Mix with water and knead for 10 minutes. May need to add more flour if you find that the dough is too oily (or maybe reduce the quantity of oil).

Keep in the mixing bowl, covered by a damp towel, in a warm place for 60-90 minutes. Warm place could be on an open oven door, with the oven switched on at low temperature. Or beside the fridge.

The dough should have doubled in size. Knead lightly and press out the uneven pockets of air. Roll to desired thickness and shape, but the thinner, the crispier.

Place the dough on a floured tray. Spread with tomato paste on the flattened dough. Lined with slices of tomatoes all over.

Spread with your desired toppings and bake in preheated oven at 180C for about 15-20 minutes.

Topping suggestions:
Fresh mushrooms
Onions
Bacon
Olives
Anchovy
Basil leaves
Calamari (how about stir fry in sambal first?)
Prawns
Salmon
Dash of mix herbs all over
Mozzarella cheese
Parmesan cheese

Somehow, we are lacking in imagination when it comes to pizza toppings and always end up with the same things every time.

Sexing up Fondant au Chocolat

Certain French and English words may have such vastly different meanings despite sharing the same spelling.

Lately, I have been translating recipes from Camille's Classic French cookbook using google's online translating tool (meaning I type out word for word the full French recipe onto the computer, without help from Remi). Some of the results can be quite hilarious.

Like the below Fondant recipe, one of the steps requires that I "rape" the chocolate. So, I was to learn later, to my relief, that I do not need to sexually assault my chocolates, but just to shred it to pieces.

Well, the French would have their fair share of jokes about English words. Like you will never see "add a little BIT" in a French recipe. This is because "bite" (pronounced 'bit')in French refers to the male sexual organ.

Other times, the direct translation is totally clueless. Like this chicken stew recipe requires me to cook potatoes by letting them "jump" in butter. Huhhh?!?! The original French word is actually simply "sauté".

Nevertheless, google translate is still 90% accurate in helping me decipher this melting chocolate cake recipe from Camille. And after all the trouble, Remi came home early to make the cake himself.

Fondant au Chocolat
serves 4
(if you only have a big cake mold, double the quantity)

100g dark chocolate (ideally about 70% cocoa)
100g butter
2 eggs
65g sugar
1/2 heap tablespoon of plain flour

Preheat oven to 150c. Butter the cake mold (small one), line with baking paper and butter it again. Don't forget to butter the sides too. Some people use individual serving ramekins, which works well too, like what we do here.

Melt the chocolate squares in a bain-marie (over a water bath). Do not burn the chocolate. Add the butter cut into small pieces and stir into the chocolate till it is melted.

In the following correct order and mixing well between each addition, add the sugar, flour and eggs. Don't know why, but stick to this sequence.

Pour the batter into the pan and cook the cake for about 35 minutes in the oven.

The oven should not be too hot so that the cake does not dry during cooking

Serve warm with vanilla ice-cream. The inside should still be warm and moist.

Note: Just like the guacamole, there's also one million superb ways to make a melting chocolate cake.

The never right way to make Guacamole

A perennial favourite among our friends whenever we have lunch or dinner parties in Singapore, the guacamole is super easy to make and easy to please.

A problem with buying avocados in supermarkets is that they are always not ripe enough. So be certain to buy a few days in advance, if you are planning to use it for entertaining guests. We have resorted to burying our avocados in our rice bucket, in the hope that it would ripen in time, but nope, it didn't work.

And I found out that there are as many ways of making guacamole as there are the number of people making them. Everyone have their concept of what they think are the essential ingredients to making the best guacamole. There's even a big debate out there as to whether tomatoes should be included. Many people use garlic, but I've never added it.

Well, here's my way of making what I like, and it's up to you to decide if you like it or not.

Guacamole
should be enough for 4 if used as a dip

2 ripe avocados
1 onion
Juice of 1 lemon
cumin powder
salt
1 tomato (optional, I've omitted this lately)
chili (the authentic Mexican way is to use jalapeno pepper, I use chili flakes or a thumb size of red chili, chopped)

Half the avocado and spoon out the flesh. Mash with a fork.

Chopped onions and tomato and chili (if using) finely. Mix into the avocado and sprinkle lemon juice, cumin powder and salt. I am generally quite generous with cumin powder, adding it until I feel it is strong enough.

Cover and chill for about half an hour before serving. Not recommended for keeping overnight, as the avocado tends to discolour quickly when exposed to air.

Serve with tortilla or tortilla chips. It's hard to stop dipping chips with it once you start.