Sweets For My Sweet

During the weekend, I baked mostly sweets for my sweety Kenzie boy as I wanted to explore my amateur baking skills and also introduce more varieties of food to him. He is such a picky eater and he only likes sweet foods (but not all things sweet because he dislikes ice cream though, hmmmm). I cooked fish and tomato porridge for him on Saturday morning and I mixed 1 mashed boiled egg yolk before serving him. He totally hated it. Only had two mouths of porridge. Frustrated, I then quickly made honey cereal mixed with milk, and only two mouths of cereal went into his mouth. Giving up, I turned to liquid food. I boiled barley "fuchuk" tongsui the night before, and it was already ready in the morning, fed to him and he finished half a cup. I am really worried that he is not getting enough nutrients as his tummy is only loaded with sugary drinks and milk. Sigh.

Anyway, for dinner, decided to try something different. I baked bread and butter pudding topped with chocolate chips and he just ate a few mouths. That was it? Sigh. But at least something went into his tummy instead of just milk.

I spreaded margarine on both sides of six pieces of bread (crust removed), arranged them in my baking bowl. The milk custard was made using 200 ml milk, 2 tbsp brown sugar and 1 egg. Baked them for 30 minutes.

Bread and butter pudding topped with chocolate chips

Yesterday for breakfast, Kenzie's menu was oats with a bit of condensed milk and french toast (dipped in egg whisked with sugar and then lightly fried with a bit of cooking oil). He ate the oats but hated the french toast. Maybe he did not like the texture of the oily bread. French toast is one of my favorite food and I still remembered when my mum made french toast, I jumped with joy and I could wallop the whole loaf of bread.

Went to my mum's place and Kenzie had lunch there. Mum cooked pork chops with onions and lots of gravy. So Kenzie had some rice with gravy.

Came home in the afternoon and I was in the mood to bake some mini apple butter cakes for a change instead of the usual banana or orange butter cake. Oh, coincidentally  it was the Chinese Valentine's Day yesterday (Chap Goh Mei). Haha. So I was thinking to bake for my hubs, too. Anyway, same ingredients, the only difference was I used chopped apples and mixed into the batter instead of the usual mashed bananas or orange zest+juice. Simple ingredients with simple instructions: 1/4 bar butter, 1/2 cup self-rising flour, 1/2 cup sugar, 2 tbsp milk, 1 egg and wee bit of vanilla essence. Ooh, and about half an apple, cubed. Mix everything together with a whisk (I just used a spoon). Butter the baking mould and scoop the batter into the mould. This recipe could yield about 12 pieces of mini apple cakes.

I did not bother marinating the apples in cinnamon powder and brown sugar as I do not have any cinnamon powder at home. I had to say the apples inside the cake tasted bland (with only some hint of apple taste), but overall it tasted very good and melted together with the cake. If the apples were omitted, it would make a very tasty butter cake. Hubs gave thumbs up for this cake. Maybe this coming weekend, I will attempt on pure butter cake since I have some good quality butter left in the fridge.

Fed some to Kenzie, and guess you already know what will happen next. He had a few bites, then threw the entire cake on the floor! Oh, rascal.....

Rest Day

Stayed at home the whole of yesterday as we have been going out everyday from last last Saturday (Chinese New year eve) until last Saturday (7th day of Chinese New Year). So yesterday, Sunday, was the last day of the Chinese New Year holidays, also the day before work starts as usual and working life back to normal again, we just stayed at home as we did not have any mood to go anywhere.

In the morning, I have decided to bake a banana cake as I was craving for banana cake for the past week. The ones bought outside usually are very sweet, and full of banana essence on first bite. But I was very disappointed as the cake failed on my first attempt! I think it was too heavy, thus, cannot rise nicely. It looked perfect in the outside, but the texture inside looked like steamed cakes. Nevertheless, hubby supported the cake and finished half of it. He kept saying it was delicious. The remaining half, I brought it to work today for breakfast.

Ingredients: 1 cup self-rising flour, 3/4 cup sugar, 1/2 bar butter, vanilla essence, 2 tbsp milk, 2 eggs and  3 mashed pisang emas (in future, I will just reduce to 1 banana).

Had lunch around 12pm, and then afternoon nap with Kenzie around 1.30pm. At 4pm, I wokeup and got ready to cook.

Since we have decided to stay home on Sunday, I had already thought of what to cook for dinner on Saturday. What I had in mind: Roast chicken and tuna maceroni. So I marinated the chicken on Saturday night - with salt, pepper and beer. I got this beer idea from hub's boss on Saturday morning when we visited him in his house. We were chatting about food and suddenly, he was talking about roast chicken with beer. So for a change, I tried it since we have enough cans of beer sitting in the fridge.

Anyway, I already took out the chicken from the fridge to sit at room temperature at about 2pm. So by 4pm, it was already at room temperature. I baked the chicken at 200 degrees with some butter. After about 40 minutes, I threw in some cheese-sausage puffs as well. While the chicken was baking halfway, I thawed 4 slices of frozen pastry, dabbed tomato sauce on each of them, rolled half a cheese-sausage into each slice of pastry together with some onions and baked them together with the chicken for about another 20 minutes.

While the chicken and sausage puffs were baking in the oven, I worked on my maceroni. It was a simple dish, with minimum ingredients. I only used: 1 tomato, 2 medium-sized onions, 1 can tuna, 1 can of Campbell cream of mushroom and 2 slices of cheddar cheese (as topping, optional though).

My style: Boil maceroni in a pot. In another wok, fry onions and tomatoes in olive oil. Then, throw in the can of tuna. Once the maceroni is soft, scoop the maceroni into the wok and mix in the can of cream of mushroom (no water needed) as I wanted the gravy to be thick and creamy. Stir until everything is mixed, top with cheese and serve (no baking needed).

We enjoyed our dinner very much and hubs kept saying everything was very delicious. The chicken was fantastic, with its crispy skin and buttery gravy. After dinner and doing the dishes, I was thinking of a refreshing dessert. A fruit shake perhaps? Made with apples, strawberries and bananas. Just cut everything into pieces, blend with cold water and add a wee bit of sugar. Serve with ice cubes. Kenzie enjoyed every sip, too.

Gong Hei Fatt Choy!

Today is the 6th day of Chinese New Year and I have started to go back to work. Here's a recap on what we did for the past whole week:

1st day of CNY - wokeup around 8-ish am, gave Kz his red packet, then off to mil's for brunch (vegetarian food). Mil cooked: cabbage with "meen kan", varieties of mushroom with black fungus & "fun si" with "fuchuk" dish. Went to my parents' place around 11-ish am, went home as it was Kz's nap time, went back to mil's after Kz wokeup and stayed there til dinner time.

2nd day of CNY - went to Jusco Cheras Selatan for grocery shopping, went back home, went to mil's after Kz wokeup from his afternoon nap. Nothing much to do as most visitors came on the 1st day of CNY.

3rd day of CNY - went to my aunt's place for lunch, went back home for Kz's nap, went to hub's friend's place around 4-ish pm, went to Taman Billion Sweed's cafe for a simple western dinner.

4th day of CNY - Boiled beef soup in the morning (beef, potatoes, carrots and onions). And since we have no more friends to visit, decided to bring Kz to the paed as the clinic has already opened today. Just for consultation and a peace of mind (he has ugly ridges on his left last finger since few months ago). Paed said it was nothing. If it was malnutrition, it would have been on his 10 fingers, and not just 1. Made sense. Well, paid RM30.00 for a peace of mind. Went home. Wait for Kz to nap. Went to mil's for dinner (overnight food). Simple day.

5th day of CNY - Valentine's Day! Sent Kz to the nanny in the morning, hubs and I went to Sunway Pyramid mall to celebrate some couple-time and Valentine's day. Bought some groceries at Jusco. After that, we still had time before the restaurant opens at 12pm. I bought two new pairs of shoes. Finally, at 12pm, buffet lunch at Shogun Japanese restaurant. Left the mall around 1.30pm, picked up Kz from the nanny and stayed at home for the rest of the day. Had instant noodles and bread+tuna for dinner as we were still very full from the buffet lunch. Cooked simple maceroni+cheese for Kz for dinner separately.

6th day of CNY - Sent Kz to the nanny as usual. Hubs fetched me to work (yes, I started work already. Hubs will start work next Monday). Hubs will have his own activities today, which he called it his "freedom day", haha. He will go for "cha kar chap" with his family after he fetched me to work. Then I think he will go for a movie, hair-cut, buy diapers for Kz, etc. He will pick me up afterwards at 5.30pm. No fancy dinner as we will heat up leftover food in our fridge tonite. There's soup and white-cut chicken from mil, chicken feet mushroom from my mum. Sigh.