Not sure if you have received this hoax email before, which story centered around a freely distributed RM250 Famous Amos Chocolate Cookie Recipe?

I got that a while ago, ignored. But received again from Piggy last year, saying that her sister baked it successfully and is quite delicious, except that it is the chewy type, which can disappoint some who expect it to be crispy.

I waited a year to bake it!! CNY is nearby, and I thought maybe I should bake it for CNY!

It is not an easy task. I don’t think I will repeat this in a short while. The part about grating the chocolate bar is killing me. And then, have to roll the dough into tiny pieces… With the small oven we usually have at home (i.e. not commercial), it is so slow. Every tray can only carry that many pieces only, have to leave space for the biscuit to expand. I think it yielded about 100 tiny pcs or so, didn’t really count it. Tedious, tired, sweaty…

Anyway, my kids loved it so much. I think before CNY the cookies are going to be gone!

Here is the recipe. I reduced the sugar by half, and still think it is quite sweet. Can’t imagine how people eat with the original recipe!!

‘FAMOUS AMOS’ CHOCOLATE COOKIES RECIPE
Ingredients
1 bar butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups flour
2 1/2 cups oatmeal, blended to powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
340g chocolate chips
250g Chocolate bar, grated
100g nuts (your choice), chopped

Method
1. Preheat oven at 190C
2. Cream the butter and both sugars
3. Add eggs and vanilla, mix evenly
4. Fold in flour, oatmeal, salt, baking powder, and soda.
5. Add chocolate chips, grated chocolate bar and nuts. Mix well (I used my hands in a food grade plastic bag, as it is too thick for my mixer).
6. Roll into small balls (around 1 inch in diameter) and place two inches apart on a cookie sheet/tray.
7. Bake for 10 minutes at 190 C.

When the cookies are removed, they are soft. But when left cool, it will harden up and become slightly crisp outside (but chewy inside).

A reader has highly recommended this recipe of steamed raspberry cheesecake, and left a comment here for me to try it out.

I have not had time to do any cooking or baking for a while until I’ve recently settled in my new job and got a new maid. Just made this cake yesterday…

This recipe is very different from all the other ‘common’ ones, in many ways. For a start, it is the EASIEST and SIMPLEST cheesecake recipe that I have tried. It is steamed instead of baked. And it uses 6 eggs rather than 4 that other recipes usually call for, but my friends and I do not quite like the overpowering egg scent and taste, and if I were to make this again, I will reduce to 4 eggs like the usual ones.

The original recipe calls for raspberry jam, but since the shop ran out of stock, I replaced it with blueberry. I believe you can substitute this with any fruit jams that you like.

RECIPE
Ingredients
500g cream cheese
1/2 cup caster sugar (reduced from original recipe)
6 eggs (recommend to reduce to 4 eggs)
1 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla essence
200ml UHT cream
200g fruit jam (raspberry, blueberry, strawberry, etc)
Juice from 1/2 lemon

Method
1. Cream cheese and sugar until smooth
2. Add in eggs, vanilla essence, and cream. Mix till smooth.
3. Pour into lined 8″ round cake tin.
4. Mash the jam until very smooth, pour half of the jam into the cake mixture. Stir with a chopstick to create marble effect. Reserve the other half of jam for decoration.
5. To avoid water sipping in, cling wrap the cake tin 3 times tightly.
6. Steam the mixture for 2 hours under low heat (after water is boiled).
7. Cake is cooked, if the surface is firm to touch and shrink from the sides.
8. After cooled, chill in fridge for at least 1/2 hour before decorating.

Decoration
1. Pour the rest of the jam onto a pan, mix with 1/2 lemon juice. Bring to boil.
2. Spread over the chilled cheesecake, and chill for another 1/2 to 1 hour. It is ready to be served.

I bought a recipe on bread making. It looks quite easy to make, but I didn’t know the kneading part is so so so tough and time consuming. I don’t have a bread maker, unlike what described in the book I spent so much time preparing the basic sweet dough. I will give this bread making a stop, until I get myself a machine. Imagine, I did this from 5pm and ended post midnight!! I got myself a set of Oreo Biscuit Honey Bun, some dried Crab Meat Buns, and chocolate loafs. The chocolate loafs and crab meat buns are not very successful so I’m not going to share the recipe until I get it right.

Basic Sweet Bun Dough
[Note: The measurement here, yields a LOT, which I think can make 6 batches of this Oreo Biscuit Bun]
INGREDIENT
400g High protein flour
100g Low protein flour
50g sugar
1 tsp salt
13g instant yeast
100g butter
25g milk powder
90g fresh cream (unwhipped)
50g condensed milk (cold)
1 large egg
170g cold water

METHOD
1. Add all ingredient except water into bread maker or mixer (with dough hook). Mix well. Slow the spped and add in water slowly, beat for a min.
2. Change mixer speed to medium for app 10-12 min, or until the dough is elastic. (if use hand to knead, you might end up kneading hours like me!!)
3. Cover dough with wet cloth or cling wrap for 10 min.
4. Place dough on table, stretch it and fold over, cover with big bowl and rest for another 10 min.
5. Dough is ready for whatever bread you want to turn into. Refer to below for Oreo Biscuit Honey Bun.

OREO BISCUIT HONEY BUN
[yields 4 pieces]
INGREDIENT
Filling
50g Oreo biscuit, chopped
20g almond flakes, roasted
20g honey
(Mixed well)

Others
4 pcs Oreo Biscuit for decoration
Almond flakes, non-roasted
Some honey
Some evaporated milk
Baking tray, greased

METHOD
1. Prepare 200g basic sweet dough, divide into 4 equal portion of 50g each. Shape into round and leave to rest for 10 min.
2. Flatten the dough and place filling in the center and seal up.
3. Place onto baking tray, cover with a big bowl and leave to rise for 35 min or double in size.
4. Brush with evaporated milk. Place one piece of Oreo biscuit in the middle of the dough. Arrange almond flake on the side of the dough. Brush some honey onto it.
5. Bake at 190C for 10-13 min or until golden brown.

This is another alternative of the light cheesecakes that I love. Just tried baking it once, DH brought a piece to his office for the girls to try – I was so happy with their reaction!!! Everyone should give this a try, as it is really, REALLY, good.

INGREDIENT
1 slice of 8″ sponge cake
400g chocolate milk
250g cream cheese
50g plain flour, sieved
5 eggs, separated white and yolk
50g caster sugar
A handful of chocolate chips

METHOD
1. Preheat oven to 180C. Line an 8″ cake tin. Place a slice of sponge cake inside.
2. Double boil chocolate milk and cream cheese until cheese is melted.
3. Add in plain flour, mix well and cook till thickened. Remove from heat and leave to cool.
4. When cooled, add in 5 egg yolks. Mix well.
5. Whisk egg whites and caster sugar at high speed till peaked. Fold into the cream cheese mixture.
6. Strain the mixture onto the sponge cake.
7. Sprinkle chocolate chips on top and stir with spatula slightly.
8. Steam-bake at 180C for 20 min. Reduce to 140C and continue baking for 2 hours or until cooked.
9. Turn off the oven, leave the cheesecake inside for another 1 hour.
10. Chill in fridge for 4 hours. Top with apricot glaze, and chill again before serving.

MIL bought me one very large piece of cod fish, and I thought I want to make something different instead of just fry or steam. So I searched around and found this delicious casserole dish – Portuguese Cod Fish Casserole. It has as different taste like our usual Chinese or Western styles.

Very yummy. I was quite surprised to see Ian and Isabel took this dish easily. I could eat a lot, probably can finish it without leaving any for DH. LOL!

I served this dish with some steamed broccoli. Steamed together with the cod, indeed.

INGREDIENTS
1 large thick slice of cod fish
2 large potatoes, peeled and sliced
1 large onions, sliced
1/4 cup olive oil
1 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
1 teaspoon paprika
2 tablespoons tomato sauce

METHOD
1. Remove bones, cut cod into 4 large pieces. Steam cod for 5 minutes. Set aside.
2. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
3. In a casserole dish, layer half the potato slices, all of the cod, and all of the onions. Top with remaining potato slices. In a small bowl, mix together olive oil, garlic, parsley, paprika, and tomato sauce. Pour evenly over casserole.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 45 minutes, or until potatoes are tender.

If you can take chilli, add pepper flake into the sauce would give you additional flavour.

The other day I bought from MPH sales, a recipe on steamed cakes. Happened that I have all the ingredients required, I steamed this cheesecake on the same day. This is very suitable for households without an electric oven. Steaming is also seen as less ‘heaty’.

INGREDIENT
250g cream cheese
150g whipping cream
80g caster sugar
100g flour
30g corn flour
4 eggs, separate yolk and white
2 tbsp chocolate emulco
1 tsp vanilla essence

METHOD
1. Whisk egg whites with half of the caster sugar until peaked.
2. Mix cream cheese with sugar until well mixed, add in egg yolks one by one, and followed by whipping cream.
3. Fold in (1) and flour batch by batch alternatively. Mix well.
4. Take out 1/4 of (3), mix well with chocolate emulco.
5. Add vanilla essence to the remaining of (3) and mix well.
6. Pour 1/3 of (5) into a lined 7″ cake tin, top with 1/3 of (4), swirl to create some pattern. Steam 10 min.
7. Repeat step 6 until all batter used up.

This macaroni is with white cream sauce. I have been trying to bake using ingredients from scratch, but finally settled with ready made cream sauce. :p This is very yummy though!

INGREDIENTS
3 cups macaroni elbow
6 scallops
8-10 prawns, shelled
1/4 red, yellow and green pepper, diced.
1 large onion, finely chopped
3 large fresh button mushrooms, cut into quaters
3/4 can of white cream sauce
1/4 pack of grated/shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 pack of mozzarella cheese
1/2 tsp paprika
Salt & pepper to taste

1 bunch of asparagus, washed and break into halves.
Some olive oil and salt to taste.

METHOD
1. Cook macaroni as per instructed on pack. Drain and stir in some olive oil.
2. Marinate scallop and prawns with some pepper and salt for a few minutes.
3. Heat some oil in a saucepan, saute onion until translucent. Add in paprika, some salt and pepper.
4. Stir in pepper and mushroom and fry for a while before adding prawns and scallop.
5. Add in cream sauce, mix well until bubbles. Remove from stove, add in the cheddar cheese and half of the mozzarella.
6. Scoop the mixture into an oven proof bowl, top with the remaining mozzarella.
7. In a separate baking pan, arrange asparagus, rub in olive oil and salt.
8. Bake both the macaroni and asparagus in a pre-heated oven at 180C for 20 minutes.

Ever since my mom had heart attack, she has switched to eating this 10-grain rice instead of normal white rice. Quite delicious, not as bad as we thought. Then, in one of the healthy cookbook, one recipe turned this mixed grain rice to even more delicious.

INGREDIENT
2-3 bowls of mixed grain rice (cooked as usual)
1 tsp cumin powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp Omega 3-6-9 oil (or replace with flaxseed/grapeseed oil)

METHOD
Mix all ingredient well, and serve hot. Do not heat the mixture as the benefit of the good oil will be gone once heated.

This is a healthy way of eating spinach. No oil. The miso paste also adds more nutrients. Sesame adds fragrant too! My kids who don’t like vegetables love this dish. I learnt it from one of the health book I bought recently.

INGREDIENT
1 pack of spinach
2 tbsp white sesame
1 tbsp miso paste
1 tbsp Thai chilli sauce (甜辣酱)

METHOD
1. Steam or boil spinach (whole) in work till soft.
2. Drain the spinach, keep some water for the gravy.
3. Cut the spinach into about 2″ length and arrange on plate.
4. Dry-fry white sesame till slightly yellow and fragrant. Crush the sesame slightly.
5. Mix sesame with miso paste and chili sauce. Pour onto the spinach and serve immediately.

I have always wanted to make Chawan Mushi. I heard that it is very easy to make. Finally got the chance to try it last week. Yummy! With this recipe, you can make it really like the ones you eat in shop!! The only difference is what you want to add in your chawan mushi.

INGREDIENTS
2 eggs
1 piece filament crabstick
2 prawns
2 pcs chicken fillet
3 shiitake mushrooms
40cc shiro dashi
400cc water

METHOD
1. Finely cut crabstick, chicken, prawn and shiitake mushroom into small pieces.
2. Stir egg slightly and strain with a fine muslin cloth.
3. Add shiro dashi, water, ingredients and egg mixture into chawan mushi cup.
4. Steam for about 10 min with cups covered. Serve immediately.

The key to success is in point 2. You must strain with the muslin cloth. I didn’t know it is so hard to squeeze the egg mixture out of the cloth. It shows how ‘unfine’ the egg is, before it is strained!

Really, really, really, yummy… BTW, even if you want to replace the chicken, prawn and crabstick with veggies, this is still not-vegetarian, because Shiro Dashi is made of fish. Vegetarian to note this.