Jamming with Mum

Yes, jamming literally.... 

We took advantage of the school holidays to go back to Mum's place for a short break.  All of us (including doggie because there's so much more space for her to runaround) always enjoy our time there.  Besides the pampering from folks, being in a laid back town is already a wonderful way to relax and unwind.  Simple lifestyle amidst  a more serene and green environment.      Kiddo loves it very much too (maybe he's a kampung boy at heart), it is where he gets his back to nature experiences.  He will ask grandpa to bring him around on a motorbike to visit nearby villages, farms and fishing ponds.  Often they come back with goodies like freshly pluck fruits or vegetables.  I really love this bond that the both of them share.

While kiddo enjoys his time with dad, me and my mum had our share of fun too.  This time around we made apple jam with this big bag of granny smith apples that she bought at a bargain.   

Mum helped me find the props used in the photos.  I hope the yesteryear feel in the photo came through :)    Some pretty old stuff here, besides the jam and the apples of course :)  The cross-stitched table cloth with the cute duckies is a gift my mum got from her student 40 years back!  That band around the bottle, old but not as old as the table cloth, is actually a beach wear accessory from Aloha land some 10 years ago.  It was among other stuff that we had left behind after leaving the nest but Mum never threw or gave them away instead continue keeping them well for us.  Stuff that have been forgotten but still evoking beautiful memories when they appear in front of our eyes again.  Thank you, Mum!  

Although I made reference to some recipes and there are lots out there, we didn't follow any to a T.   Basically, recipes for fruit jams are quite similar, key ingredients being the fruit, water and sugar which are then cooked until fruit is soften with a thicken consistency.  But when apples are used, there is a slight difference.  Some recipes call for blending/pressing of the apples through a sieve while other don't after the apples are soften.   After tasting it, I decided to go through the extra step by pressing them through a sieve as there was this grainy feel to it.

We loved the end result, one bottle for Mum and one for me.   One has got to make your own jam to know the difference between homemade and off the shelf ones.  It's much much more fruity and so much less sweet compared to off the shelf ones.   Good with bread, crackers, as fillings for buns or served on the side with pancakes or even roast.

Recipe

Reference : A Table for 2 or More and The Temptations

Ingredients

• 1kg granny smith apples
• 15 tbsp sugar (after 13 tbsp, add on per tablespoon basis to taste)
• 400ml water
• 2 pieces of 2 inch cinnamon stick
• 5 cloves
• Zest of 1 lemon
• Juice from half a lemon

Steps

1. Cut apple into chunks.  Put apples and water into a pot.  Bring water to a boil then allow to simmer until apples are soft.
2. Press apple pieces through a sieve and discard skin.
3. Put the puree back into the pot then add in sugar, lemon zest, juice and spices.  
4. Put a saucer (to be used for checking if jam is ready) into the freezer.  Cook until thicken.  
5. To check if jam is ready, place a spoonful of jam on saucer.  It if forms a blob instead of spreading out, it's ready.
6. Pour jam into sterilised bottles.  Place the cap on and let it cool down.

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Fried Chempedak and Mum's Not So Secret Recipe

We had these for tea yesterday.  Mum made them and they tasted really great.  And I learned that she has a special deep frying batter recipe which I think is worth sharing.  

What are these? A local fruit fried in batter, in a manner similar to banana fritters.   A street food found  when the fruits are in season.  The name of the fruit is Chempedak, an exotic fruit native to South East Asia.  I searched around and I don't think there's an English name for it, but its close cousin known as Nangka in the local language is Jackfruit in English.  Some say the fruit looks ugly, its edible arils are kinda soft and gooey adding to the ugly definition.  But they have a very strong aroma (which some can't stand, something of the durian category)  and they are sweet tasting.  They can be eaten raw but taste heavenly when fried in batter.

A look at the arils, I love the beautiful orangey hue.  Depending on the size of the fruit, one can get around 50-100 arils in a fruit.

And this is how they looked after being fried.  It's a little unfortunate that the arils are kinda thin for this particular fruit (think Forrest Gump and his box of chocolate).  Note the nice, crisp golden brown and non greasy thin layer of batter.   Can you see its gooey texture??

Now, coming to Mum's special recipe...Typically batter for deep frying would be made from flour and water with a little salt added in.  Out of curiosity, I asked Mum for her recipe because I found hers very light, thin, crunchy and most importantly not greasy.  I wasn't expecting anything extra ordinary but I was pleasantly surprised to know that she added 2 tablespoons of instant oats into her batter! Way to go Mum, such a brilliant way to sneak oats into our diet! Am not sure if it resulted in the nice texture of the batter but it sure didn't taste like it was there!  Besides oats, she used a ratio of 20% rice flour to 80% wheat flour plus a teaspoon baking powder.   Sorry, no exact measurements, simply because Mum doesn't think it's necessary.   Some wise words from her though, the batter should be slightly thick, not runny.  Classic example of Mum's knows best!  

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Gemstone Jelly

Doesn't it look pretty? It's jelly but gemstones came to my mind when I was removing it from the mould. It's like a combination of gemstones! Rubies, amber and diamonds, all in one! Imagine having gemstones as big as these, nice... Unfortunately, my photo may not do it justice. A little overboard maybe, but it won't hurt to let one's imagination go wild, at least once in awhile. Well, don't they say nothing happens without a dream??

Normally i would just make dragon fruit jelly but these had a combination of 3 types of fruits. The top layer got its red (the "Ruby") from the dragon fruit, orangy hue ( the "Amber") at the bottom came from orange juice while the lychees hidden inside were like sparkling Diamonds!

Now, let's talk about the taste, honestly, i am not too sure about it. Another case of don't be deceived by its look? The orange flavour was so dominant that it overpowered the other two. Of course, one will not forget the presence of the dragon fruit with the crunching of the little black seeds but there was not much rescue for the lychee, it was kinda like there but not there, because the taste and scent of lychee was missing.

I am not sure if I am gonna make this again. Yes would be the most likely answer but I will omit lychee, might try longans (I have tried longan and dragon fruit and it was a good combination). Longans instead of lychees for diamonds, after all Diamonds are Girls' Best Friends, how can we live without them :))

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Happy Birthday Mummy!

This time around it was Mum's birthday. It was extra special because everyone made it this year and it was the first time a new family addition was around to celebrate it with her. Am sure our presence was the best present for Mum :) We give thanks to be able to gather for this occasion. May God shower his blessings on her and let us have many more of this celebrations with her.

After a few successful attempts at the Japanese Cotton Cheesecake, I was confident that I would be able to put up a good one for Mum. The only thing I had to put some thoughts into was how to make it pretty. A birthday cake shouldn't be all plain. I settled for fruits. Firstly, Mum doesn't like creamy and sweet stuff but more importantly I have never done icing, hahaha! Didn't want to take any risk and spoil the cake.

So here's the cake with fruits as dressing. Arranged some oranges, kiwis, rambutans, grapes and strawberries to get a vibrant colour combination. Made some orange clear glaze to give it a glossy effect.

Am glad that Mum and the family loved it. Mission Accomplished! Yeay!

Orange Fruit Glaze
Source : Food.Com
Ingredients:
1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons corn flour
1 cup fruit juice (I used orange, substitute with any fruit juice prefered)
2 tablespoons corn/sugar syrup

1. Bring sugar and 1/2 cup of juice to boil.
2. Dissolve corn flour in remaining juice.
3. Add no. 2 to boiling juice and cook until thick.
4. Stir in corn/sugar syrup. Bring to a boil.
5. Cool and use! (It's more than enough for a 8 inch cake)

Note : The glaze is orangy and not clear white.

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Blueberry Mania - Antioxidant Overload

Recently, i noticed that the stores were carrying blueberries from Chile. They are pretty big and most importantly on the sweet side which were quite rare. On top of that, they were cheaper than the American ones. What a bonus, good time to overload on some antioxidants!

I even went to the extent of contemplating whether I should buy some extra boxes and freeze them for future use. I actually did some research on how to freeze them :). Apparently, all one needs to do is to wash and dry them before putting them in one flat layer and smaller single usage volumes for ease of use.

These two new bakes are the results of the blueberry hoarding.

1. Blueberry with Lemon Sugar Muffin

Blueberry muffins are common but to have them with lemon sugar toppings made them special. Added to that, the recipe called for yoghurt making them soft and light. They were really yummy. I made them twice, the second batch was for a friend. For the second batch, I added part of the lemon sugar in between to give the muffin a more overall lemon tang because i felt that having it on top wasn't good enough for me! Having them on top means one can only enjoy the lemon tang with every bite if you have a mouth which is big enough to make a bite from top to bottom! Besides that, I used slightly lesser sugar (5%) and also baked it at 200C. I am not sure if it's my oven temperature but I realised that anything lesser doesn't give my muffins a nice dome. I am glad to say that it got good review from my friend and his family. Yeay! The recipe is listed below for my friend who wants to try making it at home :)

Recipe

Source :Table for 2 or more

250gm cake/superfine flour (I used All Purpose Plain Flour)
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
200gm sugar (I used 190 gm)
1 heaped tsp lemon zest
125gm blueberries

2 eggs

80gm melted butter

200ml plain yoghurt

1. Preheat oven to 180/170C (I used 200C)

2. Sift flour with baking soda and baking powder.

3. Remove 2Tbsp of sugar and combine it with the lemon zest. Set aside.
4. Mix the balance of sugar with sifted flour. Set aside.
5. Lightly beat eggs and combine with melted butter and yoghurt.
6. Make a well in the centre of the flour mixture and pour in the eggs mixture.
7. Mix just to combine, never overmix.
8. Put in blueberries and stir lightly to mix only. Do not break the berries.
9. Spoon batter into muffin cups (approximately 12). Just make sure it's only 3/4 full . Top with some lemon sugar (3).
10. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until tester comes out clean.

Alternatively for step no. 9, you can fill half the muffin cup, put some lemon sugar in between before topping up with more batter and lemon sugar again.

2. Blueberry and Plum Yoghurt Cake


I gave in to this one because of the beautiful photos that I saw when i was reading the recipe for the muffins. Similar ingredients meant i won't have too much of leftovers lying in the fridge. There are many variations in terms of the choice of fruits that can be used for this cake. No nectarines lying around, I used plums instead. I was very happy when it turned out looking as nice as the ones I saw on fellow bloggers' blogs (Table for 2 or more and source). It actually lived up to expectation, pretty and tasty too! This time, a friend who tasted it asked me to make a whole cake for her because she couldn't get enough of it with the bit that I could spare :)

Recipe

Source : Piggy's Cooking Journal who adapted from 手のひらサイズのベイクドケーキ

144g butter, at room temperature
100g castor sugar
2 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
144g self-raising flour
2 tablespoon yoghurt
2 nectarines, cut into slices (I used plums for this time around)
Blueberries (Enough to go around )


1. Preheat oven to 180C. Grease 2 small loaf pans.
2. Cream butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.
3. Beat the egg into the batter, followed by vanilla extract. Mix until just combine.
4. Mix in yoghurt, follow by flour. Mix until the flour just disappear from the batter.
5. Pour batter into loaf pan. Arrange fruits on batter according to preference.
6. Bake for 35 minutes or until tester inserted turns out clean.
7. Remove from oven and cool cakes on wire rack.

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