Homemade Almond Croissants

 

How to turn a Costco croissant into an almond croissant?  It was fairly easy actually and can save a almond croissant lover a ton of money by doing it at home.  All you need is almond flour and almond extract, and the rest of the ingredients you would probably have it at home. 

All you need to do is to make a simple frangipane and air-fry the croissant in the air fryer at 350'F for 5 minutes. 

Frangipane

1 large egg

1/2 cup almond flour 

1/4 cup cane sugar

1/2 stick or 4 Tbsp. Unsalted butter, soften

1/2 tsp. Almond extract 

1/4 tsp. Himalayan rock salt

Methods 

1.  Whisk egg, butter, sugar, almond extract, and salt together.   Then, add almond flour and whisk together into a paste.

2.  Cut the Costco's croissant into half and spread the paste inside.  Top the croissant with some more paste and sprinkle sliced almond on top.

3.  Air-fry in the air fryer at 350'F for 5 minutes.   Serve!

Air-fryer Sesame Balls

I remembered the sesame balls that I used to have in Malaysia while I was young was filled with ground peanut filling.  After I moved to the US, the ones that I had were filled with mung bean paste or red bean paste.  Even to these days, I have not seen one that's filled with peanut filling, and I missed that.

Then, while browsing my Facebook page, I saw a video clip about an air-fryer sesame balls recipe that caught my attention.  An easier way to make this without the oil and heat while deep-frying sounded just perfect for me.  Furthermore,  by making it myself I can fill it with whatever filling I desired.   So, without further hesitation, let's get working.  I made my own peanut filling by grounding some toasted peanuts and sweeten coconut flakes in a food processor and then added some cane sugar and toasted sesame seeds.  Mixed well to be used as filling.  Sorry, no measurement here as I just eye balling with what I had in my pantry.

Ingredients:

1/8 cup + 1 Tbsp. White cane sugar

175ml warm water

200g glutinous flour

Filling of your choice

Sesame seeds, to suit

Method:

1.  In a bowl, dissolved sugar into the warm water.  Set aside.

2.  In another bigger bowl, add in the glutinous rice flour and pour in the sugar water mixture.  Mix and knead until a soft dough is formed.  You can add more water or glutinous flour to adjust the consistency. 

3.  Then, pinch a piece of the dough, shape into ball and flatten it and wrap the filling inside inside and close it.  Coat the balls with sesame seeds completely. 

4.  Place the sesame balls into the deep-fryer and spray with oil.  Air-fry at 370'F for 10 minutes. Open the air-fryer, and flip to the other side, spray with oil and air-fry for another 10 minutes at the same temperature. 

5.  When it is done,  don't open the air-fryer just yet,  let it sit in there for 5 minutes before open.  Otherwise,  it might cracks.  Then, serve warm!

NOTE 1: It got harden when its cold.  So, air-fry leftover at 330'F for 4 minutes.  Serve immediately. 

NOTE 2:  I still prefer it deep-fried.  Texture wise is better.

CNY dessert

Tang Yuan in red bean dessert soup signified "团团圆圆".

 

Steamed radish cake signified "好彩头"

Pan-fried version.  The other version is healthier without the oil.  I actually preferred it without pan-frying as it tasted nicer as it was soft and yummy.

Recipe:  https://belachan2.blogspot.com/2016/06/steamed-radish-cake.html?m=1

I always go back to my own trusted recipe that I have been using years after years. 

Homemade Guilingao

It is very easy to make guilingao at home.  It is a cooling food and I loved to make it when someone in my family is feeling heaty. 

You just need to buy the guilingao powder from the Asian grocery store.  I used 2 Tbsp. Guilingao powder per 550ml water.  Add guilingao powder into the saucepan, then add in the room temperature water and whisk until blended.   Then placed it on to the stove top and heat it until boiling, keep stirring and watching it as not to let it over boiled, around 5 minutes.  Set it aside and scoop out any bubbles.  Let it cool completely.  It will harden.

To serve,

Scoop some into a bowl.  Top with honey or maple syrup and 1 Tbsp. of heavy cream.  Enjoy!

Keep any leftover guilingao in the refrigerator.

Peach Macadamia Milk Jelly

Warm weather lets you crave for something cold.  Instead of grabbing an ice-cream from the freezer, cold jelly would be your other option.  Of course, you can use any milk or any fruit of your choice to create this jelly.  Get inspired from this and play with your own creation!

 

Ingredients:

1 little macadamia milk

10g agar-agar or jelly powder

3/4 cup cane sugar

28oz canned peach, drained and cut into cubes

Methods:

1. In a bowl, add in cane sugar and jelly powder, mixed well with a whisk, set aside.

2. Pour the milk into a large saucepan and turn up the heat.  When heated and before boiling, whisk in the sugar and jelly powder mixture, whisk well until the sugar dissolved.  Turn off the heat and set aside.  Then, add in the cut peach cubes.

3.  Pour into the mold of your choice or just a rectangle pan (like picture shown above) and let it cool on the countertop.  When cooler, put it in the refrigerator for around 2 hours.  Cut and serve as desire.  Enjoy!

Air Fried Sweet Potato Fries

Sweet potato always goes on sale during the holidays season, so I bought a few to make my sweet potato pie and air fry sweet potato fries.  I am very much prefer the sweet potato than the potato because it is healthier.  I like red potato for the baked crispy potatoes and Russet potato for smashed potatoes.  Anyway, with the air fryer, making sweet potato fries is so much easier and I have a meal ready in less than 40 minutes.

I am serving the sweet potato fries with my air fried Cornish hen and butter thyme broccoli.

Gula Melaka Coconut Sago Dessert

One of the Malaysian favorite dessert.  Sago/ tapioca pearls with coconut cream and gula Melaka.

Toasted Coconut Chia Seeds Cake

Coconut toasted coconut cake, so yummilicious.

I had a vision and I made this cake and it was so divine!  When I told my Edda about my vision of this cake, she gave me the look that it was not going to be good, she said I don't like coconut cake.  Oh well, as it turned out she really loved it and had few pieces after it was cooled.  I asked her, this is really good right and she said yes and please don't share it with anyone.  Hahaha....she wanted the whole cake for us!  As usually I would share half of the cake away.  

Super fragrant and super moist coconut chia seeds cake!  The chia seeds gave it a little crunch when biting into the moist cake.

This creation is so unexpectedly delicious that I decided to keep the recipe within my family.  Who knows, I might decide to sell some of my bakes in the future!  As for now, this is priceless!

Matcha Yogurt Cake

I remembered I made yogurt cake before and it was pretty good.  A co-worker gave me a big tub of Brown Cow vanilla yogurt so it gave me an opportunity to make this cake again.  I told her I am going to make a yogurt cake and give it to her.  She didn't know we can use yogurt to make a cake hence just had to let her try it herself I guess.  I decided on the Matcha flavor just because I liked it. This is another one bowl and a whisk recipe that I liked very much.  Easy and not a lot of things to wash later.  This cake is best the next day, a soft and moist cake with vanilla and matcha flavors.

Steamed Layered Sago Kuih

I was in loved with this Malaysian dessert when I first had it in Malaysia many moons ago.  I had no idea this dessert was actually so easy to make as I thought it would be difficult to produce this dessert at home.  I suddenly had a craving for this sago kuih again and went on Google to look for how it was made.  To my utter surprised, it was fairly easy to make and since I have all the ingredients in my pantry, I set up to give this a try!  I would try other flavor next time or other recipe for a different texture? This one is chewy.

I steamed it in my old-time electric steamer and to my total dismay, my 10+ years steamer broke down in the middle of steaming!!!  What a timing for broken down.  So, I had to cover it with foil and finished steaming it in my wok on the stove top.  Today was not a good day for me, one obstacle after another kept on happening to me on the same day!  I wanted to go to the bank to have some document notarize and found out I forgot my cellphone which had my ID card at home ( thus I had to drive home to get it),  then I went to the bank they told me they charged $5 for cashier checks (so I had to go to Walmart), went to Walmart and realized they only took cash or debit card for money order (I didn't have either one so had to drive home), then got a call from school to tell me to come pick up my younger girl because she was not feeling well and had fever (So, had to drive to school), then my steamer broke down half way through steaming (and I had to find alternative way to finish steaming my kuih, I prepared this in the morning before I got a call from the school, supposed to bring it to my friend's house at night.) and because of my girl not feeling well, I had to cancel the plan to have dinner at my friend's house! :-(  Whoa, I didn't expect all these to happen when I had all plan up nicely the night before.  Seriously, life is so unpredictable!  

Vietnamese Honeycomb Cake Revisited

After I visited a Vietnamese Baguette restaurant and they gave me few pieces of honeycomb cake to try, I realized that I haven't been making this cake for a long time.  So, it prompted me to give it a try again.  I got the honeycomb effect and it seem successful, however, I found it on the dry side.  I have no idea why, do you think I baked it for too long?  or I need to add more coconut milk?  Why it is dried?

Short-cut Curry Puffs

This is my short-cut way of making curry puffs as I don't have lots of time to spend in the kitchen. Edda wanted me to make curry puffs for her, and I remembered I used to make curry puffs while I was in my early 20s and people loved it.  I didn't have the recipe anymore but I remembered I only used flour, salt and butter I think.  I loved my keeper flaky pie crust recipe and it had all the ingredients that I remembered, hence I set out to try this flaky pie crust recipe for my curry puffs.

The skin is flaky when deep-fried as well.

As how did I come out with the short-cut curry puffs?  When I cooked a big pot of curry chicken with organic red potatoes, I took some of it without the gravy and keep it in the freezer.  When I have the mood or time to make curry puffs, I defroze the curry chicken potatoes the night before and then cut it into smaller pieces.  Then, I used my food processor to make the flaky dough.  After that, just wrap it and then deep-fried it in my newly acquired deep-fryer.  Viola!  Just like the name implied, this curry puffy skin was flaky.  Just toast it in a toaster oven to have a warm curry puff the next day.

You can also individually freeze these uncooked curry puffs and then put it in a Ziploc freezer bag and deep-fry it as needed.  In this case, you can have curry puffs anytime you desired.  It is great to invest in a deep-fryer, it makes deep-frying so much easier for me.  I especially love to deep-fry firm tofu in my deep-fryer and had it with my noodle soup, so good!

Red Bean Roti Canai

While shopping at the Asian market one day, I saw this frozen red bean roti canai.  It reminded of the Chinese red bean pancake dessert that I had when I was in Malaysia, so I bought this on impulse.  I just pan-fried this oil free in a non-stick pan and it came out looking like roti canai instead of the Chinese dessert that I thought it was.  It just tasted like roti canai with red bean filling so I was kind of disappointed.  Edda said she didn't like it at all.  Oh well, guess we wouldn't be buying this in the future.

I think the one that I made here long time ago tasted better than this!

Roti Canai with red bean filling.

Swirl Green Tea Vanilla Pound Cake

I have a block of cream cheese sitting in the refrigerator so I had to find a recipe for it.  I remembered I once made a orange cream cheese pound cake that was really good.  I should have follow that recipe with I adapted instead of trying this new recipe at allrecipes.com.  It is still good but it was not as good as it could be as I have tasted better.  I was kind of disappointed.  Next time I will use the recipe in my blog for cream cheese pound cake instead of trying another recipe.

I added green tea powder for the middle layer.  Next time I probably make it all green tea flavor as this high quality matcha powder is really fragrant.  I took half to my work place and they all loved it. It felt great to share your food to someones who appreciated it.  :)

Golden Shrimps to Welcome the Chinese New Year!

Happy Chinese New Year and Gong Xi Fa Cai to those who celebrated!!  May this new year brings all of us much joy, peace of mind, great health, good luck and fortune!  I had experience a lot over the past three years.  Hell in 2014 and 2015 and basically had my world turned upside down.  Things that I have never thought could happen to me, happened to me and I had to wake up and be strong for myself and both of my girls.  Emotional roller coasters that I had to overcome and the responsibilities that I had to bear to ease the transition for my girls.  Glad to say that everything worked up well in God's hands.  Everything flown into place with the help of the invisible hands and the universe and I am very blessed.  We settled ourselves and move on in 2016.  That was the reason for the lack of postings all these years, I didn't have the luxury of staying at home and inventing and experimenting with new recipes anymore.  My time was limited to sending my girls to school and back, taking care of them and work, work, and more work.  My day off I just want to rest and/or bring my girls out to eat and do stuff.  I finally got more half day off for myself and spending more time with my girls and get to cook more home-cooked meal which was great!  I needed a break and learned to truly appreciate those working and full-time moms. It was not easy.

Okay, back to this recipe.  I made this super-easy deep-fried Golden Shrimps recently for a CNY party.  One bag of 2 lb extra large shrimps, shelled but with the tail on.  Made some cuts on the side of the shrimps to make it straight.  Then season the shrimps with sea salt, black pepper, organic no-salt seasonings from Kirkland, sesame oil and a little sweet potato starch.  Mix well.  And then wrap each in the wanton wrapper, seal with flour/water glue, set aside and finish the rest.  Lastly, deep-fry until golden brown and cooked through.  Serve with Thai sweet chili sauce.  Enjoy!

Marmalade No-churn Ice-cream

After I learned about this easy self-made no-churn ice-cream, I just loved to play around with new flavors!  This is one flavor that I tried after the green tea flavor.  I had some marmalade that I made in the refrigerator, so I thought why not I tried putting preserves into the mix and hence here it is!  Next time I would love to try the mocha flavor that I loved.  Creativity is endless and so does the flavors, just play with it as you will create your own kind of flavor that none in this world!  Enjoy and have fun experimenting!

Coconut Mochi Cake

I have some sweeten coconut flakes in the refrigerator and making a coconut mochi cake just strike me as an excellent idea.  It couldn't be yummier and the crust was crispy in the day it was baked and turned soft the next day.  Nevertheless it was still delicious!  If you like all things coconut, you might want to give this recipe a try!  Least to say it was super duper easy to make as well.  Enjoy!

No Bake Chocolate Oat Bars

No Bake Chocolate Oat Bars to go!  I made this bar before back in 2013!!  I think it's about time that I made another version of this bar again.  Any healthy nuts, dried fruit, seeds you have, just add it into this bar and you are good to go!

Packed and ready to grab and go bar.  My girls loved it!

Citrus Poppy Seed Short-bread Cookies

I was just in the mood for some short-bread cookies.  I had freeze some orange zest for use in baking in the future and this recipe definitely called for it.  This cookie is fragrant with butter and citrus and very crunchy.  I hope you would like this short-bread cookies.  It is not hard to make but the dough is crumbly so it can be hard to shape into a log.  Good luck!

Caramel Hoen Kwe Water Chestnut Kuih

This Hoen Kwe kuih is refreshing and so easy to make.  This kuih is supposed to be white in color but due to my inexperience or first time cooking using this hoen kwe flour, I sorted caramelized the sugar and resulted in this caramel color kuih.  Tastewise, it was actually a plus because this kuih was fragrant with caramel and soft with the crunch from the water chestnut.  The original recipe from the back of the Hoen Kwe flour tub was too sweet, so I cut the sugar down to 1 cup.  A bit similar to water chestnut kuih but the texture is different.

Pour into a glass container, let cool and refrigerate for at least 4 hours before slicing.