Pureed Brown Rice Pumpkin Soup

I am not sure of whether to call this brown rice pumpkin soup or brown rice pumpkin porridge.  I made this for my little girl when she was having diarrhea and vomit since everything went into her mouth, it came right out.  I thought if I pureed the porridge, it would go down easier on her.  But guess what?  She refused to eat it, not even a taste test.  The only thing she would eat was Popsicle and of course she could have as many as she wanted since that was the only thing she would eat and won't throw up.

So, I was the one that finished this soup.  I loved it actually, it was sweet and tasted like brown rice.  Now I know what was the difference between white rice porridge and brown rice porridge.  Brown rice taste really stood out. This is suitable for baby, toddler or older people as it's very nutritious and easy to swallow.

Baked Cheese Shrimps Rice

Baked cheesy rice or cheesy baked rice has been quite popular among the bloggers few months back.  I liked the idea and wanted to try it whenever I have leftover cheese or rice.  My opportunity came when I have some leftover Mozzarella cheese from making the Alfredo Chicken.  I needed to finish the leftover cheese within 5 days and just so happen that I had some leftover brown rice.  So, this dish was created.  I did mine in a healthier way as it was less creamy.  No heavy cream, cream of mushroom soup, sour cream, etc.

I found the rice a bit dry, so you can add some fat free or 1 % fat milk into the rice when you add the cheese and stir together.  Perhaps put a layer of rice, cheese, rice and top with more cheese before baking.  Just bake until the top is slightly brown, do not brown it too much as the cheese will turn hard.  Mine was too brown so I know.

Spicy Chicken with Zucchini

I went to my Asian supermarket 2nd anniversary event recently and they were having food demonstration and tasting on that day.  Even the Lee Kum Kee representatives were there to do a food demonstration and sampling of their product.  They were promoting their oyster sauce, hoisin sauce and premium soy sauce and cooked a chicken dish like above and a fried rice.  Their fried rice were tasteless to me but I fell in love with their chicken dish so of course I had to ask them for the recipe.  I tried to memorize it as best as I can and I think this is the best copy I can come out with.  

I added zucchini and carrot for extra veggie intake.  You can also add onion, bell pepper, pineapple or mango if you like.  This sauce is pretty delicious, you can try it out.

Chinese Pumpkin Sesame Cakes

I saw this Pumpkin Sesame Cakes in a Chinese cooking show recently.  It was a pumpkin recipes special and it featured this and a steamed variety.  For the steamed one, the cooking host shaped the dough into a little pumpkin and then steamed it until cooked.  She served it with some sort of sweet syrup.

I was attracted to this pan-fried version as it looked really tasty.  What's more I am also a big fan of sesame seeds so of course I had to give this recipe a try.  I was also curious of how it would taste like.

I gave it a bite to let you see the texture inside of this cake.  It tasted like nian gao, since it was made of glutinous rice flour I guess.  Slightly chewy and not bad at all.  Mine was not sweet enough, I would prefer it to be sweeter.

Braised Pork with Dried Whole Chestnut and Tofu

I recently made some chicken glutinous rice and needed to add some dried chestnuts.  Since I was going to soften the chestnuts anyway, I thought I just cooked the whole packet and freeze half for later use.  I just defroze the soften chestnuts in the refrigerator overnight for this dish.  I bought this natural dried whole chestnut and thus the color was brown.  Not good looking but tasted the same and healthier since it was not whiten.

This was like a braised soy sauce pork except I added a handful of dried chili peppers (not the bird eye dried chili) for some kick.  Since my girls were eating this, so not much to create a huge kick, just a little that I didn't much notice but my little Edda said the tofu tasted spicy.  Probably because I didn't soften it in warm water first, I just added some to stir-fry with the oil.  Perhaps that was why it was less spicy.  You can certainly add more if you like it spicier.  You can also omit the dried chestnuts or substitute it with Chinese mushroom.

Spiced Pumpkin Walnut Cake

I cannot get enough of this cake, it is soft and moist and left you wanting more.  This is almost like my Best Ever Pumpkin Cake except it's has a little more egg with added walnut and one additional spice.  This cake is smaller and I used a 8-inch square pan to bake it.  I created this when I used 1 cup of the pumpkin puree to make the cookies and left with one more cup of pumpkin puree.  I loved pumpkin cake above all others, more than pie, cookies, soup, etc.  So of course I got to make it into a cake.

If you have canned pumpkin puree at home, give this recipe a try.  I am waiting for the Libby's canned pumpkin puree to go on sale so that I can stock up and make more of this cake.  YUM! YUM!  Oh yeah, need to buy more of the chopped walnuts too.