Drinking to health

Back at home whenever we have a sore-throat or slight fever, the moms would boil us a big pot and make us this Barley drink (affectionately known as ‘Barley water’ in our books).

The Man complained that his throat ached a little after the Indian luncheon that we had.  Well, what do you expect with crazed Singaporeans craving for curry?  We went ballistic with the free-flow of curry and had loads of Papadums at the fixed price buffet. The throats kinda paid the price thereafter.

So today, decided to make us some cooling and refreshing Barley drink to sooth the throats.  The weather’s been rather erratic as well, hot on some days and then down-right chilly or even wet the next days.  So better to keep our health in check where possible with this ‘cooling drink’.

I didn’t have any pandan leaves on hand to make this drink the traditional way that mom would have done.  So, I improvised again and the results were pretty close.

Refreshing Barley Drink with Lemon

Ingredients:

• 200g of fine pearl raw barley, washed
• 2 litres of water
• 1/2 packet of winter melon sugar “sticks” 冬瓜糖
• Rock sugar (optional)
• Lemon slices (optional)

Method:

1. Boil the water and add the washed barley and winter melon to the boiling water.  Under low heat, let barley and the winter melon simmer for about 30 minutes to an hour.  Add rock sugar to drink if you desire it to be sweeter.
2. Drain and discard at least half of the barley so that it doesn’t ‘cloud’ up the drink.
3. Note that you can eat the winter melon for the crunchy sweet taste as it will not dissolve.

Drink up and enjoy this cooling treat that can be served warm or chilled and with a slice of lemon in it.

Corn and cheese biscuits

The weather outside looked so sunny and perfect for a lazy late morning by the pool.  I changed, got all ready to head down but was greeted by a cold draft as I opened my window to test the temperature.  Brrr…..

Then I got all bored from surfing the net and decided to channel my energies to baking (again).  Lunch hour was near and I was craving for these corn muffins, you know the ones that you could get at Kenny Rogers?  So, I decided to make me a small batch for  I figured it would be a good way to shave off 2 hours from the lazy day.

Fluffy corn and parmesan cheese biscuits (Recipe adapted from Waiting for Gateau)

Makes 9 small biscuits

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of all-purpose flour, plus extra for the counter
• 1/2 teaspoon of sugar
• 1 teaspoon of baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon of salt
• 1 cup of heavy cream
• 1 tablespoon of unsalted butter, melted
• 1/2 cup of canned corned (can be adjusted according to your liking)
• 1/2 cup of grated parmesan cheese (can be adjusted according to your liking)

Method:

1. Adjust the oven rack to upper-middle position and preheat the oven to 160degrees C. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and parmesan cheese. Then pour the corn into the dry mix and give it a good mix.  Stir in the cream by hand until dough forms, about 30 seconds.  You may need to add 1-2 tablespoons of cream if the dough seems dry from the cheese.
3. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and gather it into a ball. Knead the dough with floured hands about 4-6 turns until it’s smooth.
4. On a floured counter, roll or pat the dough to 3/4-inch thick. Cut the biscuits into rounds with a floured biscuit cutter (I had no biscuit cutter so I used the end of the can to make the round shapes for the biscuit).
5. Place the biscuits on prepared sheet pan and bake 20 – 25 minutes until golden brown. Remove biscuits from oven and place on cooling rack to cool slightly.
6. Brush the hot biscuits with melted butter and serve.

As I took the biscuits out of the oven, I was really pleased with the results, for the top of the biscuits was a lovely shade of golden brown.  Again, I couldn’t resist popping one to see if it tasted any good and it did!!!  The parmesan cheese provided a nice savory flavour to the sweet corn.  The biscuit was light and fluffy.  This would taste so good with some good ol’ mac-and-cheese along with roast chicken or with a bowl of hot vegetable soup.  Yumz!

This is definitely going into my recipe book for its quick and simple to make.  Perhaps for the next batch of biscuits, I’ll play around with other ingredients. 

Skinny Breakfast Pizza

Back in Singapore, on weekends, breakfast tends to be quite an ‘elaborate’ affair in our home.  By elaborate, it would usually be a local breakfast feast that either consisted of ‘Vegetarian Bee Hoon’, ‘Prata’, ‘Kaya Toast’ or ‘Soon Kueh’, I could go on, but I should probably stop before I get superbly homesick. So here in Geneva, while we do not have the luxury of going out there for our local breakfast fare, we try to whip up a decent ‘feast’ in our kitchen.

I’ve been a fan of Smitten Kitchen’s site and while surfing the recipes, I came across this Breakfast Pizza and it looked something fun that I could assemble on a weekend.  So, it has been on the back of my ‘to-do list of recipes’, and I thought I give it a shot for this week’s stay-in brunch.

I’m not going to list the recipe down for I simplified it so much.  I guess you should know by now, I can’t handle too difficult recipes yet so if there’s a short-cut that I can take that will still give me the same results, I’m willing to take that chance.  Thanks to the world of google, I found the short-cut for this recipe that I could take through blogger – Littlepaperplanes.

Instead of making the pizza dough from scratch, I used the flat bread (those that you can easily purchase at the supermarket) as the pizza base.  It turned out really good for the base was so light and crispy.  On top of the flat bread, I threw some mozzarella cheese, some left-over baby spinach (from last night’s salad), bacon (slightly pan-fried) and some parmesan cheese.  Before you pop these pizzas into the oven, simply crack an egg in the center of each of the mini pizza.  We baked these in the oven for about 15 minutes at about 160 degrees.  Adjust baking time accordingly depending how you prefer your eggs to be cooked.

The first batch of breakfast pizzas tasted so good, that we had seconds using some spicy Chorizo sausages that we brought back from Madrid that tasted just as yummy!

The Skinny Breakfast Pizzas are really a fantastic way to kick-start the morning and for us, the weekend.  As I chomped on the pizzas, I suddenly had a brainwave!  I think that using Prata as the base will taste just as good.  It’s not going to be healthy, but who cares?  Not when I’m awfully homesick!  So, I’m going to bring me back some frozen Pratas when I head back to Singers!  Ooh.. can’t wait!

[Update:  Submitted the pics and this post is featured here on Foodgawker, Tastespotting and Tastelogie. I'm so happy!  For it took me close to 80 shots before selecting 3 good shots and even then, I was worried that it couldn't make the cut for many of my previous pictures didn't. ]

My attempt at key lime tarts

Give me a dessert with lime/ lemon or anything zesty and citrusy, and I’m in sugar haven!  Of course, I love the occasional chocolate sweets but what really gets me going are the lemony types.

When we were in the States last year, I went sugar over-load savoring those key-lime pies for our desserts.  So this time round, I decided to try my hand at making some of these refreshing key lime tarts to satisfy those zesty-sugar cravings of mine.

Found a pretty simple recipe that a noob like me could follow closely for now, best part?  It doesn’t require any form of baking!  All I needed to get mini tart crusts that I got off the shelves from the supermarket.  The Man and I tried making the lime curd last week but followed the instructions wrongly, so I decided to re-do the whole batch of lime curd again.  And after slogging in the test kitchen for about 1.5hours, I popped these babies into the fridge to be chilled.  I’m pretty happy at how it turned out- both visually and in the taste department.

Refreshing whipped key lime tarts [Recipe slightly adapted from Barbara Bakes]

Makes about 12 tarts

Ingredients:

For the lime curd

• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 whole egg
• 1 egg yolk
• The juice from 5 key limes
• The zest from 2 key limes
• 3 tablespoons of butter

For the key lime filling of the tarts

• 200ml key lime curd
• 200ml of whipping cream
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 Tablespoon of sugar

Method:

1. To make the Lime Curd: Place the sugar, whole eggs, egg yolks, juice and zest in a medium pan and whisk to combine. Heat and continue to constantly whisk until the mixture turns pale and thickens (about 5 minutes). Remove from heat and whisk in the butter. Sieve the lime curd if needed to remove the zest bits.  Let the mixture cool. You could store the mixture in jars or an airtight container for up to one month in the refrigerator.
2. To make the tart filling: Whip the cream until it thickens (about 5 minutes) then add the vanilla and sugar. Fold the lime curd in with a rubber spatula and fill desired shells. Chill 2 hours then top with additional whipped cream if desired. I decorated the tarts with a slice of lemon and blueberries. Allow tarts to come to room temperature for 10 minutes before serving.

These tarts were simply refreshing and what I really needed to kick-start the week.  I couldn’t stop stuffing my face with them for it’s light and easy to eat!

OOH and update!  Probably inspired by these awesome food-bloggers – R from The Pleasure Monger and Sherie from Maameemoo – I’ve been playing around with my camera and attempting to take better stylised pictures with the food that I’ve been cooking.   Frustrated with a couple of failed submissions to Foodgawker and TasteSpotting, I decided to ‘suck’ in it and try harder at improving my styling skills and fooling around with the SLR that I loaned from the Man.  Also, thanks to the tips from R and online research, I’m finally happy with the shots that I took of the tarts.  Must have taken like 50 shots!  So, I submitted them to Foodgawker. It’s finally been accepted and published!!!!  It’s picture #10862! It’s also been featured on Tastelogie and Photograzing. 

So… at first you don’t succeed, you just keep on trying!