I have already published a banana bread recipe on my blog, posted a little over a year ago! That recipe is vegan; it features only oil instead of eggs. I modified that recipe following some research about acids, baking soda and baking powder to make a recipe with eggs. Same old classic, just different ingredients and one more year’s worth of baking experience!

To be finished in a day...

Banana bread:

• 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1/4 tsp. cinnamon powder
• A pinch of salt
• 3 over-ripe bananas
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup neutral oil
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup chocolate chips + extra

Preheat your oven to 180C/ 350F. Grease a loaf pan with some oil and line it with parchment paper. Whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. In a large bowl, mash the bananas. Add the sugar, oil, vanilla and egg, mixing until combined. Sift and fold in the dry ingredients using a spatula. Fold in the chocolate chips. Pour the batter into the prepared pan, sprinkle a few more chocolate chips on top and tap the pan to release air bubbles. Bake for about 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean. Cool the bread completely before removing from the pan.

There’s always a lot of excitement in the air when you can finally cook something by substituting a key ingredient with an alternative or a healthier option. Eggs and meat majorly fall in this category. You could argue why one uses a substitute when you can use the original. Well, there are a lot of reasons. You might not eat meat, want to go the more healthier route or in many people’s cases (including mine) see how you can put a fun twist to an old classic. Not just because it can be eaten more widely but because it’s exciting and sometimes resourceful and useful.

Using jackfruit to make meatballs isn’t my idea nor is it very uncommon. I have been inquisitive about it since the first time I heard about it. At a first glance, using jackfruit as a meat substitute might seem quirky, if not uninviting. However, if you notice closely, cooked and shredded jackfruit closely resembles pulled pork—in texture and form. This may clear some unwanted fog surrounding jackfruit. Now the question is—how exactly do you use it?

I steamed the jackfruit before using it as the base of the “meatball” mixture. You could use it raw, but you would have to bake the meatballs for it would never cook in time in the pan. I also chose not to rely on a pan to cook the jackfruit since I wanted it to be cooked before that stage so I could simmer the “meatballs” in the tomato sauce. This adds to the taste but also keeps them moist. This was definitely an enjoyable cook; the jackfruit may have taken half an hour to steam but making spaghetti in the afternoon with tomato sauce from scratch is something absolutely incomparable. Oh, and nothing beats the smell of rendered onions and garlic!

Vegan jackfruit "meatballs"!

Tomato sauce:

• 4 large tomatoes
• 1 small onion
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 1 tbsp. oil
• 1 tsp. paprika
• Salt
• Pepper
• Fresh parsley

Score the tomatoes and boil them until cooked. Once cooked, place them in a bowl of cold water. Skin the tomatoes and blend them in a food processor until smooth. Finely chop the onion and garlic. Render them in some oil until they start to colour. Add the tomato puree and simmer on a low heat for about 10 minutes. Season with paprika, salt and pepper. Add fresh parsley.

Makes 6-7 “meatballs”:

• 7oz jackfruit
• 1/2 cup breadcrumbs
• 3 tbsp. milk
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1/2 tsp. Italian seasoning
• 1/2 tsp. paprika
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. fresh parsley
• Neutral oil

Using oiled hands, cut the jackfruit into small cubes of equal size. Remove the seeds. Steam the jackfruit for about 30 minutes, until soft and cooked. Meanwhile, soak the breadcrumbs in milk. Cool the cooked jackfruit and shred it with 2 forks. If there are any hard, uncooked pieces, discard them. Add the shredded jackfruit to the soaked breadcrumbs, add garlic and season with Italian seasoning, paprika, salt (use no salt if the Italian seasoning is already salty) and parsley. Combine thoroughly to form a mass. Shape 6-7 equal-sized balls. Add about a tablespoon of oil to a pan. Fry the meatballs, until crisp and golden all around. Simmer the meatballs in the tomato sauce for about 5 minutes, on a low flame.

To finish off:

• 3oz spaghetti
• Parmesan cheese

Cook the spaghetti in salted, boiling water. Remove the simmered meatballs from the tomato sauce and add the spaghetti, coating it with sauce. Serve with the meatballs and grated parmesan. 

Ever since I made Thai curry, I’ve been itching to make another savoury meal. This time, however, I was determined to cook fish since I wanted to add new proteins to my repertoire. I also had a can of coconut milk in my pantry (bought for the aforementioned Thai curry), so naturally I had the urge to use it! Before we skip to the components, let me brief about two requirements I wanted to meet with this particular meal. Whenever I think of accompaniments to seafood, I never picture purees (which would be the natural route for other proteins), rather I picture sauces, probably because I bank so heavily on them to cover the raw seaweed-like scent of fish. Naturally, I wandered in the same direction and thought of a sauce, which was my first requirement.

I have this habit of shadowing the cook in my head before I actually step into the kitchen. In the midst of that, I realised I would need only one pan for cooking the fish and assembling the sauce. So I tried to think of a third and last component that could also be finished in the same fashion. Having this one-pan wonder idea (my second requirement) in my head, I immediately thought of all the roasted flavours you can achieve by using only one pan. I wanted to take advantage of that and so I made a side that naturally has that flavour profile: roasted garlic green beans, which also pairs well with fish. Plus, its healthy (anything that has greens in it is healthy, though don’t apply that logic for a sliver of lettuce in a double decker cheesy wagyu burger).

As for the fish, I made a quick marinade with a base of ginger-garlic paste and threw some spices! Now it would really be a shame if I didn’t tell you the whole dish especially after I made a promise! Well, I still won’t. That’s why there are post titles.

A one pan meal!

Spiced sea bass:

• 4 fillets of sea bass
• 2 tsp. ginger-garlic paste
• 1 tsp. red chili powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/4 tsp. turmeric powder
• 1 tsp. canola oil
• About 2 tbsp. water

Mix the ginger-garlic paste, chili powder, salt, turmeric, oil and water till you get a marinade of a spreadable consistency. Brush the marinade on each side of all fillets and rest for about 20 minutes. Heat some oil in a pan. Cook each fillet for about 3 minutes on one side before flipping and cooking the other side for 3 minutes.

Garlic green beans:

• Green beans
• 1 tsp. oil
• 2-3 cloves of garlic
• Salt

Boil the green beans in water until just cooked. Drain and transfer them to a bowl of cool water to halt the cooking process. Pour about a teaspoon of oil in the same pan you cooked the fish in. Add chopped garlic, followed by the green beans once the garlic turns golden and fragrant. Cook for about a minute. Season with salt.

Coriander-coconut cream sauce:

• 2 tsp. oil
• 1 cup coconut cream/milk
• A small piece of ginger
• 1/2 a small red onion
• A pinch of turmeric
• Salt

Thinly slice the onion and grate the ginger. Heat some oil in the pan. Add the onion and ginger and season with turmeric and salt. Cook for about a minute on medium heat before adding the coconut milk. Reduce the heat to a low and cook for about 2 minutes, seasoning with salt, if required.

The science behind baking buttermilk biscuits is essentially the same as in scones. Let’s start of with the ingredients. Buttermilk biscuits have flour, baking powder as a leavening agent, butter and of course, buttermilk. To understand the bit about why you aren’t supposed to overwork your dough, it’s necessary to understand what gluten is.

Gluten is basically a structural protein found in wheat (and other grains) that provides a body to the dough. It gets activated when the flour gets wet and then kneaded. Think of the roots of that dried plant in your window sill, still holding the soil together. The gluten is the roots. But there’s a catch: the more you knead the dough, the more gluten forms; the more the roots grow, the more compact and dense the soil becomes.

This is where the cold butter comes in: the butter, while it is still cold and un-melted, does not allow the flour to get too wet when the buttermilk is added. That way enough gluten is formed to bind the dough together, while still keeping the final result soft and flaky. When you overwork the dough, you’re 1) squeezing air out from the dough and 2) melting the butter with your body heat. This results in more gluten being formed, since you are kneading it too much and the biscuits turn out to be dense because there is no air in the dough and the butter is melted. Essentially, the butter won’t melt in the oven to form a pocket of air. So the key is to knead the dough until just combined and not overwork it.

I like to slightly cool the rolled dough in the fridge before shaping the biscuits, since the dough has come in contact with a fair bit of body heat. This ensures the dough stays cold and you don’t have to work too quickly to prevent the dough from getting too warm.

Makes 6-8 biscuits:

• 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
• 1 tbsp. baking powder
• 2 tbsp. cold butter
• 3/4 cup buttermilk (see recipe below)
• Milk

Preheat your oven to 450F or about 232C. Combine the flour and baking powder in a large bowl. Using a pastry cutter/ bench scraper/ two knives in a cutting motion, cut the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles course crumbs. Add all the buttermilk at once and mix with a fork until just combined. The dough should still be slightly crumbly, just holding together. It’s okay if there are still a few clumps of flour. Transfer the dough onto a floured surface. Fold the dough for about 8-10 times, for a few layers to be formed. Roll the dough to a 1/2 or 3/4 inch thickness. Refrigerate the dough for about five minutes. Cut biscuits using a 2- 2.5 inch cutter dipped in flour after every repetition. Place the biscuits on an ungreased sheet pan lined with parchment paper. Brush the biscuit tops with milk using a pastry brush. Bake in the oven for about 15 minutes or until golden.

Buttermilk:

• 3/4 cup milk
• 3/4 tbsp. distilled white vinegar/ lemon juice/ apple cider vinegar

Combine and let stand for 5 minutes before using in the recipe!

Chocolate cake has a special place in my heart and I always feel guilty after looking at it. Maybe because I still remember eating only one slice of my birthday cake from 2 years ago (which I baked and iced myself) and having to throw most of it away as I fell sick. I’ve baked and not baked (I’m looking at you no-bakes) numerous chocolate cakes and today’s instance is no different except for the fact that it turned out a little bit different than what I though it would: a torte instead of a cake.

Now you may be wondering (or not if you’re not interested) what a torte is and why I’m comparing it to a cake. A torte is basically a richer, denser version of a cake that has no or little flour. Instead of flour, tortes rely on ground nuts to provide structure to them. In my instance I only realised this after looking back at the recipe: it had more nuts than it did flour and no leavening agents, but lots of eggs.

Initially I thought that the first step (creaming eggs and sugar) would give a result similar to chiffon cake (Notice that I’m using the word similar and not same; that’s because chiffon cakes have only whites, this cake uses the whole egg). I noticed I wasn’t using (only) whites to make meringue and the recipe did not call for any baking soda/ powder. This left me wondering how the cake was going to rise in the oven. My suspicions were correct and it barely rose, turning out to be a torte rather than a 2 layered cake!

If you’ve read up to here (I know no one reads my blog posts) I’m really sorry for this cake analysis. But let’s come to the other components! We have a rich chocolate ganache and some feathered white chocolate for some theatrical awe. The result? A dense, pistachio loaded cake with decadent ganache. It’s not too sweet, not too heavy; just the right ticket, as Harry’s Aunt Marge once said.

There's never enough chocolate.

Chocolate & pistachio torte:

• 4 eggs
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 tbsp. Dutch processed cocoa powder
• 2 tbsp. butter, melted
• 2.75 oz dark chocolate, melted
• 1 cup chopped toasted pistachios

Grease a 7 inch baking pan and line it with parchment paper. Preheat your oven to 325F/ about 132C. In a large mixing bowl, cream together the eggs and sugar for about 10 minutes with an electric mixer until the mixture is pale yellow and foamy. Sift and fold the flour and cocoa powder into this mixture. Gently add and fold in the melted chocolate and butter until just combined. Fold in the chopped pistachios. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for about 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Cool completely.

Chocolate ganache:

• 1/2 cup fresh cream
• 100g dark chocolate

In a pan, heat the cream on a low flame until it just starts to bubble. Add the chocolate and allow it to melt in the cream, stirring occasionally to break any lumps. Once the chocolate has combined and you no longer see white streaks of cream, remove from heat and cool slightly.

Feathering and assembly:

• 60g white/ milk chocolate
• 1 tbsp. butter
• Prepared ganache

Melt the white chocolate over a double boiler. While the chocolate is melting, spread the ganache over the cooled cake using an offset spatula. There may be some extra ganache, so enjoy! Once the chocolate has melted, add the butter and stir. Cool for about 5 minutes before transferring to a piping bag with a round tip 4 (I use Wilton), or any other small round tip. Pipe circles onto the ganache. Feather with a toothpick. Allow to set in the refrigerator for about 5 minutes then it’s all yours!

This recipe has been in the works for nearly six months. I never really got around to doing it because I didn’t seem to have a shallow bowl to plate it in (a real problem to have, isn’t it?) and so it never really got the green light from me. I really loved the idea of making a subtle East Asian themed savoury meal with ingredients like coconut milk, curry leaves, galangal and tamarind with sweet floral back notes of lemongrass. I always feel as if there’s this whole undiscovered door to the culinary world of East Asia.

I appreciate Thai food a lot: its subtle, balanced and has that unflinching note of devotion towards preparing food. All of these qualities also remind me of soul food. I’m not referring to a particular cuisine, rather a comforting sense, which I especially feel in curries from Thai cuisine. This bowl of food has Thai green(ish) curry, tamarind chicken and fragrant rice. The sweet, sticky and tangy chicken is wonderfully complemented with mellow, fragrant and creamy notes from the curry. Rice is a necessity here: some form of starch is an absolute must to complete this dish. This is an overall great dish: its delicious, you get to practice making your own curry paste and you step into the Thai culinary world.

Green Curry Bowl

(generously serves 1)

Tamarind chicken:

• 1/8 cup tamarind flesh
• A little over 1/4 cup hot water
• 1 chicken breast
• Salt
• 3 tbsp. water
• 2 tbsp. brown sugar
• 1/2 a small onion
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 2 red chilies

Soak the tamarind in some hot water for about 25 minutes, occasionally mashing the flesh. Pass the mixture through a sieve, scraping the bottom of the sieve. Cut the chicken into bite sized medallions. Season with salt and set aside. Thinly slice the onion, chop the garlic and red chilies. Heat some oil in a pan. Render the onions and garlic, until they start to brown. Add the chicken and stir fry for about 2 minutes. Meanwhile, combine the water, 3 tbsp. of the prepared tamarind juice, brown sugar and chilies in a small bowl. Add this mixture to the chicken and stir fry until the chicken is cooked. Spoon an additional 3-4 tbsp. of the tamarind juice on the chicken while cooking to coat the chicken. Remove from heat.

Green curry:

• 2 tbsp. green chilies, chopped
• 2 tbsp. chopped galangal/ ginger
• 3 tbsp. coriander stems, chopped
• 4 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped
• 1 stalk lemongrass, roughly chopped
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/2 tsp. cumin powder
• 1/2 tsp. coriander powder
• 1/2 tsp. pepper

• 3/4 cup coconut milk
• About 3/4 cup water
• Salt

Blend the chilies, galangal/ ginger, coriander stems, garlic, lemongrass and water in a food processor to form a paste. Season with cumin powder, coriander powder and pepper. Heat some oil in a pan. Add about 4 tbsp. of the green curry paste and fry until fragrant. Add the coconut milk and water and stir. Add more curry paste, if needed. Let the curry simmer on a low heat for about 5-7 minutes. Season with salt and remove from heat.

Bring it all together:

• Cooked jasmine rice
• Mint, for garnish
• Lemon wedges, for garnish
• Onion slices, for garnish

In a bowl, lay the tamarind chicken in the green curry. Garnish with mint leaves, slices of onion and wedges of lemon. Serve with jasmine rice.

 I recently went hiking in the late afternoon, and my, did that give me many food ideas! Not my first time really; I happen to add a lot of things to my to-do list while I’m cycling too. As the name suggests, I was inspired by colors I saw during the sun, low in the horizon. I wanted to challenge myself to see how many colors I could put on one plate without many components! We have, on the menu, spice rubbed chicken breast accented with fragrant coriander, carrot puree brightened with turmeric, a warm beet and almond salad and a generous pan sauce with hints of lemon to utilize what is left in the pan after cooking the chicken!

Speaking of pans, have you ever noticed brown, caramelized bits at the bottom of your cast iron after cooking meat or vegetables? That culinary gemstone is called “fond” and is the base of delicious pan sauces. So to make a pan sauce, you start by deglazing your pan. In simple terms, you add liquid (stock, wine etc.) to the pan and scrape the fond. All you have to do now is to reduce the liquid by half and season it! The sauce packs a lot of flavor and makes a perfect swan-like end to the dish by being poured over the meat in your plate!

Not only does this meal have many hues from the color scale, it also ranks high on the scale of flavor!

"On the colour scale"

Spice rubbed chicken:

• 1 chicken breast
• 1 tsp coriander powder
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp mustard
• Salt
• Coriander
• 3 cloves of garlic

Evenly spread the mustard on both sides of the breast. Evenly coat both sides with coriander powder, paprika, torn coriander leaves and salt, per taste. Rest for about an hour before cooking. Heat some oil in a pan. Add crushed garlic cloves and lay the breast away from you. Cook for about 3-4 minutes on each side, until golden and cooked through. Remove from the pan and allow to rest. Reserve the pan with the fond for the sauce.

Carrot puree:

• 3 small carrots
• A small piece of ginger
• A pinch of turmeric
• 1 tsp. butter
• Salt

Peel and roughly chop the carrots into equal sizes. Boil the carrots, along with the ginger in about 3 cups of water. Add a handful of coriander and season with salt. Drain the carrots and ginger and reserve the stock formed. In a food processor, blend the carrots with the ginger, season with turmeric and salt. You may thin the puree with the stock. Set the puree aside.

Pan sauce:

• 1 cup reserved stock
• Salt
• Pepper
• Lemon zest
• 1 tbsp. cold butter

As soon as the chicken is done cooking, add the veggie stock to the pan and scrape the fond from the pan. Allow to simmer and reduce by half in volume on a low heat. Season the sauce with salt pepper and some lemon zest. Remove from heat and whisk in the butter.

Warm beet and almond salad:

• 1 beet
• 2 tbsp. almonds, roughly chopped
• 1 tsp. paprika
• 1/2 tsp. butter
• Salt

Cook the beet in a pressure cooker for about 15-20 minutes. Allow to cool. Meanwhile roast the chopped almonds and toss them in some paprika and melted butter. Peel and chop the beet into small cubes, combine with the almonds and season with salt.

Plating:

Slice the chicken breast on a bias. In the center of the plate spread some carrot puree and spoon the beet salad at one end. Lay the chicken pieces on the puree and spoon some more salad. Garnish with microgreens/ coriander. Serve with the pan sauce, to be poured on the chicken.

Let me present to you a spontaneous, unforeseen dessert that I literally whipped up at the eleventh hour. The truth is that I made crème pâtissière or French pastry cream for filling choux au craquelin. Sadly, my cream puffs did not rise (my craquelin biscuit was too heavy; I’m working on that!), as a result of which they were dense and undercooked and could not be filled with the pastry cream (I will be baking choux pastry again sometime in May, so be around!). As much as I was disappointed that my afternoon didn’t give me the results I hoped for, I’m still very glad that I gave choux au craquelin a chance!

As for the pastry cream, I did not want to squander it, so I used it in a very humble dessert: custard cups. For the individual components, we will be making crème pâtissière folded with apple sauce and swirled with whipped coffee, followed by crisp rolled apples dusted with brown sugar! These apples I've used are Rockit apples, grown in New Zealand. They're basically mini-apples which I saw at a grocery store and decided to give a try! A very simple dessert, however I wasn’t in the mood of committing to a complicated project, given the reason for the creation of this dessert. 

HOWEVER, I did use the presented circumstance for something constructive: this was a great time to redeem myself and make thinly rolled apple roses/ slices, which I fell short of in “royal echoes”! Oh alright, maybe the custard did help them to remain rolled, but at least I could cut the apple evenly and roll it without breaking!

Crème Pâtissière cups

Apple sauce:

• 1 1/2 apple, peeled, cored and chopped
• 1/4 cup cool water
• A pinch of salt
• A pinch of sugar
• Cinnamon powder

Combine the chopped apples and water in a pot. Cook on a low heat until the apples become tender and soft. Remove from heat and mash the apples, season with pinches of salt, sugar and cinnamon and pass the sauce through a sieve. Cool completely.

Crème pâtissière:

• 2 egg yolks
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 8g corn starch
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 tbsp. butter
• Prepared apple sauce

Whisk together the yolks and sugar, corn starch and vanilla extract until combined and double in volume. In a saucepan, heat the milk until it just starts to boil. Slowly drizzle a third of the heated milk into the eggs and sugar, whisking vigorously. Pour this mixture into the remaining milk and return to a low flame, stirring constantly until the pastry cream thickens. Remove from heat and combine the butter. Cover with a plastic wrap and cool in the fridge before folding in the apple sauce.

Assembly:

• 1 apple
• 1/2 tbsp. coffee
• 1/2 tbsp. water
• Brown sugar, for dusting

Pour the pastry cream into individual cups/ ramekins. Add the coffee and water to a bottle and shake until bubbly. Equally divide the mixture into the prepared cups and marble with a toothpick. Chop the apple in half and cut thin slices. Roll the slices and place them in the custard and dust with brown sugar.

Serve cold!!! 

Whenever I see people talking about their macaron related failures, I imagine them imagining a macaron very sarcastically telling them that they’ll never be able to hold a candle to a macaron. To me, making macarons is all about being aware about the things you’re supposed to be careful about—it could take some research, time and effort, but it’ll be totally worth it. You’ll save some tears and drama. This also involves being aware of the tiniest of details like how clean your bowls and utensils are, how well you separated your eggs, “is your almond meal fine enough?”, how long you mixed the batter, so on and so forth.

To those of you little puzzled, let me rewind, take a step back. No, I’m not talking about those coconut cookies you’ve been eating nor the French president. I’m talking about macarons: little French cookies that everyone is intimidated about. The cookie is made of egg whites, whipped to stiff peaks, folded in with sugar and almond meal. The batter is piped into circles and baked to form “shells”. The filling between two shells can be anything you like: ox teeth, cat fur, saw dust etc. Just kidding. Its usually buttercream but can include whatever you like.

Today, I’M making macarons (coconut with coconut lime buttercream!), for the very first time! They aren’t hard to make per se but there are definitely minute details that make the process overwhelming, if not thought through before. As someone who made macarons for the first time following some research, I do have a few tips to share! 

Top tips to get your macarons going.

Let’s talk about they eggs: the egg whites should be well rested to slightly dehydrate them and you cannot have any yolk in your whites, since the yolk fats do not allow the formation of meringue. Speaking of fat, all your utensils that will come in contact with the egg whites must be cleaned with white vinegar, to remove any potential grease. Secondly, have everything at hand; do not give yourself an opportunity to run a marathon in your kitchen! Prepare your baking sheet with parchment, assemble your piping bag and measure out ALL your ingredients before starting. Weigh all your ingredients using a kitchen scale, for accuracy. 

Classic French cookies

(Recipe adapted from preppy kitchen)

Macaron shells:

• 100g egg whites
• 140g almond flour
• 130g granulated sugar
• 90g granulated sugar
• 2 drops of white vinegar
• 1/4 cup desiccated coconut

Pour the egg whites into a clean bowl, cover with plastic wrap and poke large holes with a toothpick. Allow to rest in the refrigerator for at least 6-8 hours, preferably overnight. Bring the egg whites to room temperature before whipping.

In a food processor, blitz together the almond flour and 130g of granulated sugar. Sift into a bowl and set aside. In a large bowl wiped with white vinegar, whip the rested egg whites with an electric mixer until foamy. Add 2 drops of white vinegar (to stabilize the meringue) and slowly add 90g of sugar. Continue to whip to stiff peaks. Add a third of the sifted almond flour-sugar mixture to the meringue and GENTLY FOLD in with a spatula until just incorporated. Repeat until all the almond flour and sugar mix is just incorporated. Don’t overmix.

For a perfect macaronage (macaron batter), the batter should steadily flow in a ribbon from your spatula, you should be able to form a figure “8” with your batter without breaking and the “8” should sink back into the batter within 20-30 seconds.

Transfer the batter into a piping bag with a round tip (I used Wilton round tip 12). Line a baking sheet pan with parchment paper. Fix the parchment with dabs of the macaron batter. Pipe one inch dollops, about an inch apart onto the parchment (Hold your piping bad perpendicular to the sheet pan, swirl and vertically lift up once piped). Tap on a counter to release air bubbles, sprinkle with desiccated coconut and allow to rest for about 35 minutes before baking in a preheated oven at 300F (149C) for about 16 minutes. Cool before gently lifting the shells from the parchment.

Tip: Do not over rest the macaron shells since the meringue beneath the formed skin will soon deflate resulting in a pocket between the meringue and skin, forming a hollow macaron.

Coconut-lime buttercream:

• 1/4 cup butter, softened
• 5-6 tbsp. confectioners sugar
• 2 tbsp. desiccated coconut
• 1 lime

Beat together the butter and sugar until light and airy. Fold in some desiccated coconut followed by lime zest. Transfer the buttercream into a piping bag. Pipe the butter cream onto the flat side of one macaron. Sandwich with another macaron shell of the same size. Repeat with the rest!

If you have any macaron related questions, don’t hesitate to comment down below—I’ll try to answer your question using my first experience!

This dish originates from me buying a whole bottle of rose concentrate for a workshop that needed two whole tablespoons of it. While half of the bottle has made me numerous afternoon rose milkshakes, I still have a long way to go and I hope to use some of it for recipes on my blog! I initially envisioned making an elaborate dessert, mostly as an excuse to finish it off, but I scraped that idea because I couldn’t think of anything past a rose coulis or sauce. Using so much of rose concentrate in a single dessert didn’t quite reason with my health-conscious consciousness. Instead, I decided to transform one of my favourite desserts, being apple crisp.

The base of the dessert is a rose and saffron apple crisp with a rose syrup macerated apple rose as a garnish. I mostly see desserts like these as an opportunity to try out new things! In this case it was learning how to cut an apple really thin and rolling it to form a rose. I don’t have a mandolin so I reasoned that I’d cut the slices with a knife. I got it right in my fifth attempt and suddenly saw myself with a knife and an apple for the final pictures for this post. The only problem was that I shot myself in the foot by not practicing for a whole month. This meant that my slices were too uneven and the rose broke. Instead, the final plate features a fan of apple slices, which I can totally live with but not without a mandolin which I need ASAP!

Apple crisp, with a rose-filled twist!

Apple crisp:

• 3 apples, thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 tbsp. rose syrup
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup all purpose flour
• 3/4 cup rolled oats
• 6 tbsp. cold unsalted butter

Toss the apples, sugar and rose syrup in a bowl and allow to rest for about 15 minutes. Combine the brown sugar, flour and oats in a large bowl and cut in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Grease 6 large ramekins with butter. Arrange the rested apple slices at the bottom of each ramekin, until they reach half the depth. Fill the remaining ramekin with the oats and flour mixture. Bake in a preheated oven at 180C for 20 minutes until golden brown. Allow to cool before unmoulding.

Macerated apple slices:

• 1 large apple, cored
• 1/4 cup warm water
• 3 tbsp. rose syrup
• A pinch of salt

Combine the water, rose syrup and salt to form the maceration liquid. Cut the apple in half and cut thin slices. Soak the slices in the maceration liquid for about 10 minutes before removing onto a large plate.

Plating:

Run a knife around the edge of a cooled ramekin. Invert it onto a plate. Fan out the macerated apple slices.

If you are making an apple rose: On a flat surface, place the apple slices end to end, slightly overlapping each other. From one end, being to gently roll the slices to form a rose. Garnish the apple crisp!

I’m all 50/50 when it comes to egg and egg dishes but if there’s one egg dish I would make myself for a Sunday morning breakfast as a reward for making it through a hectic week, its menemen! Apart from the M’s, N’s, and E’s, menemen is made of eggs, peppers, cheese and lots of juicy tomatoes: all cooked together until the creamy goodness ready to befriend some crusty bread.

Menemen can sound a lot similar to Shakshouka, but they are variations of one another, like Mediterranean siblings, if you will. Shakshouka involves cracking eggs into wells of stewing tomatoes and letting them sit and cook, while in menemen you mix the eggs in to create a silky version of scrambled eggs. Plus, menemen has cheese, which shakshouka doesn’t.

The most important step (also the most forgettable) while making menemen is to peel your tomatoes. I know this might sound ridiculous but if you don’t, the skin will just sit in the pan and won’t allow the tomato to stew correctly. It’s not something that softens to break down and stew! And of course, I had to forget doing it which meant my stew wasn’t liquid enough. So to improvise, I turned it into a cross between the original menemen and Indian “anda bhurji” and sprinkled feta on top.

If you want to make menemen, remove the skins and if you don’t, that's fine too! So I guess this is a two-in-one recipe?

                 Shakshouka's Mediterranean sibling!

Makes one large portion:

• 1 tbsp. butter
• 2 tbsp. olive oil
• 3 small green peppers
• 1/2 a small onion
• 3 medium tomatoes
• 2 tsp. chili paste
• Salt
• 2 eggs
• Turkish cheese/ Mozzarella
• Chili flakes
• Parsley/ coriander, for garnish

Finely chop the peppers and onion. Peel the tomatoes and roughly dice them. On a medium flame, heat the oil and butter in a pan. Add the chopped peppers and onion and render until soft. Add the chili paste and mix. Add the tomatoes, turn down the flame to a low and let the mixture stew, covered, for about 15 minutes. Season with salt.

Crack the eggs into the stewed tomatoes and gently combine, on your lowest flame. Once the eggs have almost cooked or the mixture starts to coagulate, grate some cheese over the pan and remove from the heat. Sprinkle some chili flakes and garnish with parsley or coriander! 

The sizzle while rendering peppers, the sound of stewing tomatoes and crumbling cheese over the pan are just parts of this satisfactory Turkish breakfast experience!

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      Previous Post    Mushroom dumplings with broth

Long time no see, plated savoury! I feel like I naturally gravitate towards desserts, seeing some of the recent posts, but trust me, savoury dishes excite and hyperactivate me just as much. This dish is an instance of a strong urge to make something umami, a dish that packs lots and lots of flavour and one anyone could close their eyes and savour! That little starting point for me to evolve this whole dish was the idea of pouring steaming hot broth from a jug into a bowl that emphasized on flavour of the dish’s heart. Obviously since this was umami, I decided to go with something dashi-esque, which in this case is a mushroom-shoyu broth.

As I was dwelling on how I would make the broth, I started to think of what I would do with the mushrooms I would use to flavour it with; I realised I could use it as a filling for a dumpling! My plan numero uno was to use only mushrooms, but my dad told me it would lack texture and mouthfeel, so cauliflower & walnuts made an entry. And lastly, I garnished the dish with onion petals, not only to add a delicate touch to the dish, but also to brighten up for plating!

An umami bomb!

Mushroom-shoyu broth:

• 6 cups water
• 4-5 large mushrooms
• 1 large carrot
• 2-3 spring onion greens
• 2-3 tsp. shoyu (or soy sauce)
• Salt
• Coriander leaves (with some stem)

Roughly quarter the mushrooms, peel and chop the carrots and dice the spring onion. Add them to the water and bring to a slight simmer, covered. Once it starts to simmer, add 2-3 teaspoons of shoyu and season with salt. Add a handful of coriander and allow to simmer further. Remove the mushrooms once cooked and reserve them for the filling. Slightly reduce the broth on a low flame, seasoning if required. You may discard the remaining veggies or use them while steaming the dumplings.

Dumpling filling:

• Reserved mushrooms
• 1 cup cauliflower florets
• 1/4 cup walnuts
• 4-5 garlic cloves
• 1/2 inch ginger
• 3-4 basil leaves
• Salt
• Pepper
• Oil

Toast the garlic in a little bit of oil until golden. Finely chop the cauliflower until it almost resembles couscous. Roughly chop the walnuts. Pat dry the mushrooms to remove their moisture (or squeeze the moisture though a cheese cloth and add the juice into the broth), finely chop them and combine with the cauliflower and walnuts. Add grated ginger, minced garlic, torn basil leaves and season with salt and pepper.

Dumpling wrapper:

• 1 cups all purpose flour
• 1 cup mushroom broth
• 2 tsp. oil

Combine all ingredients and knead for about 5 minutes to form a smooth dough. Cover the dough and let it rest for about 20 minutes.

Folding and steaming:

• Water
• Cabbage leaves

Divide the dough into tiny balls, each the size of a dime. On a floured surface, roll a ball into a thin circle. Place a spoonful of filling in the centre. Dip a finger in water and run it around the edge, so that the dumpling doesn’t open. Form a half moon, squeezing the air out as you seal. Keeping the sealed edge away from you, make a dent in the filled part of the dumpling and join the two ends to form a bowl shape. Repeat with the rest. In a colander for steaming, place the dumplings on a bed of cabbage leaves. Steam the dumplings over a double boiler for about 20 minutes until cooked.

Assembly:

• 1 small onion
• Coriander leaves

Slice the onion in half and sperate the layers. Cut each layer into two parts, resembling a petal. Soak the petal in the mushroom broth for 5 minutes and slightly salt it. In a large bowl, pour some broth and garnish the dumplings with the onion petals and coriander leaves.

 I really like the idea of making a dish or a drink when you’re not having the best of days or you just want to sit back and “slow down” the pace of the day. In either cases, a dish or drink, I would go for a heart-warming classic, something easy to whip up and maybe something nostalgic (and specially in the case of a meal, something unhealthy). Now of course, I have not been drinking Kahwa since childhood, but it is a drink that gives warm and “royal” vibes.

This isn’t a super complicated drink, but that’s the whole point: it’s not supposed to be. It just involves boiling water with spices, namely cinnamon, cloves and cardamom and steeping some green tea. And to finish off, some slivered almonds and a few threads of fragrant saffron.

Kashmiri Tea

Makes 4 servings:

• 2 cups water
• 2 inches cinnamon 
• 2 cloves
• 2 cardamoms
• 1-2 tbsp. sugar
• 1 tsp. green tea leaves
• Slivered almonds
• Saffron

Slightly crush the spices in a mortar and pestle. Add the spices to the water. Heat the water until it starts to boil. Remove from heat and add the green tea leaves and steep for about 3-4 minutes, covered. Strain the tea and add the sugar. Garnish with a few almond slivers and 2-3 threads of saffron per serving.

Remember I told you how the Queen got herself coronation chicken sandwiches? Well, what else did she get? Victoria sponge cake! Its simple and elegant and an iconic cake to grace an afternoon tea table. Why else would she get a cake named after her? Little did she know she was literally building a tea time tradition!

So what is a Victoria sponge cake? In layman's terms, it is a cake sandwich. Two layers of light and fluffy sponge cake sandwiching strawberry jam (and in modern versions, also buttercream), dusted with confectioners' sugar on top! The last strawberry season went by in a flash and I missed the chance to make so many strawberry themed desserts! This year, I was determined to dedicate at least one box to Victoria sponge cake, and here we are!

I personally feel like this has been a project worthy of being recorded in a scrapbook, mainly because I stayed true to the time: I made this on a holiday afternoon, accompanied by some afternoon glow, reinforcing the experience! And I have to say this, I’m stunned by my own photography here!

Victoria Sponge Cake

Sponge cake:

• 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1 cup butter, at room temperature
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 4 eggs
• 3 tbsp. milk

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees C. Grease and line two 8 inch cake pans with butter and parchment paper. In a large bowl, cream the butter until smooth. Gradually add the sugar and vanilla and beat at a high speed until the mixture is light and aerated. Add the eggs, one at a time until, beating well. Add a spoon of flour after each addition to avoid curdling. Add the remaining flour and mix until just combined. Divide the batter evenly in the prepared cake pans and bake for about 25 minutes until golden and a cake tester comes out clean. Allow to cool.

Strawberry jam:

• 8-10 large strawberries
• 1/4 to 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• Lemon juice (optional)

Rinse and clean the strawberries. Remove the leaves and chop each strawberry into rough quarters. Add the chopped strawberries and about 1/4 cup of sugar in a heavy bottomed pan. Cook the strawberries on a very low heat, stirring occasionally for about 25 minutes, until most of the strawberries have broken down and turned soft. Add more sugar or lemon juice, depending on how sweet your strawberries are. Turn of the heat and mash the remaining strawberry pieces with a masher. Cool the jam completely.

Buttercream:

• 90g unsalted butter, softened
• 170g granulated sugar
• 3-4 tbsp. milk

In a large bowl, beat the butter until light and fluffy. Add the sugar in parts, beating well after each addition. Add the milk if the mixture is too dry. Once combined, beat the buttercream until it is aerated.

Bring it all together:

• Fresh strawberries
• Caster sugar, for dusting

Remove both sponges from the cake pans and peel of the parchment paper. On a large plate, place one sponge and evenly spread all the buttercream using an off-set spatula. Spread the strawberry jam on top of the buttercream, followed by the second sponge cake to sandwich the jam and cream. Evenly dust a thin layer of caster sugar. Clean and chop the strawberries into halves, and arrange in a circle on top of the cake. Now all that’s left to do is cut yourself a slice!

Planning a barbeque or hosting a hot chicken wings night with your cousins? Temper the heat and clean your palette with this crispy Thai cucumber salad. 

Crunchy and juicy cucumbers and shallots in a tangy and sweet marinade of fish sauce and lime juice. Cilantro and mint scream for monochrome green but the addition of chilies compliment the salad with...red (and heat). Not to mention a generous topping of toasted peanuts!

Makes 4 servings:

• 3 tbsp. lime juice
• 2 tbsp. fish sauce
• 2 tbsp. water
• 2 tsp. sugar
• 2 large English cucumbers
• 1 large shallot
• 2 red chilies
• 1/4 cup peanuts
• Mint
• Cilantro

Whisk together the lime juice, fish sauce, water and sugar to make the marinade. Thinly slice the English cucumber, shallot and chilies. Toss into the marinade and allow to rest for 30 minutes. Toast some peanuts over a low flame until slightly brown. Remove from heat. Once cooled, remove the skin from the peanuts by rubbing them between your palms. Roughly chop the peanuts and mix into the salad. Garnish with cilantro and mint!