While waiting for Pooh to knock off, I found an interesting pastry book at Raffles City’s MPH. It has step-by-step pictures with tips about making all types of pastry – sweet or savoury. For S$27.02 with 10% off for Passion card members, this is value-for-money.

Today, I was craving a good quiche for lunch.

The book has a recipe for smoked salmon quiche with potato pastry.

Since I don’t have smoked salmon, I replaced it with diced honey baked ham and a mixture of Gruyere and Cheddar Cheese

Outcome? Delicious! But, there’s room for improvement.

Ham and Cheese Quiche adapted from Catherine Atkinsons’ Smoked Salmon Quiche with Potato Pastry - Serves Six

Ingredients:

Filling
240g honey baked ham (replaced 275g smoked salmon)
6 eggs
150ml fresh milk (replaced creamy milk. I wonder what is creamy milk?)
300ml thickened cream (replaced double / heavy cream. My brother used only 30ml for his pumpkin soup. I had to use thickened cream cos the expiry date is today!)
2 – 3 tbsp chopped fresh dill (omitted cos I’m not using salmon.)
2 tbsp bottled capers, drained and chopped (omitted cos I don’t have.)
Salt and ground black pepper
Mustard (This is not in original recipe!)
Cheese, grated (This is not in original recipe! Used Gruyere and Cheddar cheese. Grated 2 cups.)

Potato Pastry
1 floury potato – about 115g, peeled and roughly diced (hmmm… mine was 165g)
225g / 2 cups plain flour, sifted
115g butter, diced
1/2 egg (I used 1 small egg)
about 2 tsp chilled water (omitted cos I’m using 1 egg.)

Method (My way)

1. Cook peeled potato (poke it with a fork all over to release steam when it cooks) in a Microwave oven on high for 5min. Basically, to obtain soft mashed potato. If you don’t have Microwave oven, use the usual method of cooking potatoes in boiling water and mashed it when it’s soft. Leave aside to cool.

2. Pour the sifted flour and butter in a large mixing bowl. Cut butter in flour to create a mixture that looks like fine breadcrumbs either using a pastry cutter or a fork.

3. Mix eggs and mashed potatoes before pouring into mixture (2). Bring the mixture together. Add chill water, if needed.

4. Roll out the pastry on a lightly floured surface to line a deep 23cm / 9″ round quiche pan. Chill for 1 hour. (I am still waiting for my pastry mat ordered from Amazon… Thus, the dough was not rolled but pressed directly onto a pyrex pie dish to form the pastry shell. I made a mistake here by not baking the pastry at 200ºC for 10min followed by an egg wash and bake further for 3min. Thus, it was undercooked when baked together with the fillings. Can’t blame me, this book is meant to be read from page 1 onwards and expects the reader to remember all the techniques.)

5. Preheat the oven at 200ºC with a heavy baking sheet in it. (I didn’t quite understand this. The author wrote that it’s vital step to ensure pastry base cooks through. hmmm… meaning to take out the entire pastry shell out of the pastry tin?)

6. Diced a 1-cm thick ham and grated cheese. (For salmon filling, just chop the salmon pieces into bite size.)

7. Beat eggs, milk, cream and mustard in a bowl. Season with pepper. (For salmon fillings: Stir in chopped dill and capers and season with pepper. Add chopped salmon and stir to combine.)

8. The original recipe says “Remove pastry case from refrigerator, prick the base with fork and pour salmon mixture into it. Place on baking sheet and bake for 35 – 45min till filling is just set and crust is golden brown.” What I did was “Remove pastry case from refrigerator, prick the base with fork and spread 1 cup of grated cheese followed by diced ham and another cup of grated cheese. Pour the mixture in (7) to just below the brim. Bake for 35min.”

Quiche before baking.

Quiche after baking.

See the bottom crust is undercooked and soft…

One such slice with tea is filling for lunch!

Have fun baking!

Have you ever felt cheated after buying some sales items? I have. Bought this book “Baking Code” for S$15 at John Little’s Expo Sale last month. Guess what? It is sold cheaper at Popular!

Anyway, I tried its method of making bread soft using  overnight sponge dough. Final product is soft but it’s basically a bland bread with raisins… not going to post the recipe here. Just some pictures.

This is the overnight dough – proof for 30min then refrigerate it overnight. Need to use cling wrap over it to prevent hardening.

After 30min… didn’t take a picture of it the next day, the the dough simply filled up the entire rice bowl!

The overnight dough is already knead into the main dough mixture and this is after proofing.

Dough was divided into 9 pieces as shown below.

After 30min… poof! Fresh yeast is very important! Hmmm… wonder how much it will grow further if I simply set aside like that?

After baking…

Soft and fluffy! But, the buns are heavier than the usual one bought from traditional bakeries.

I wonder why?

Baked Madeleines again!

Simply have to try with my new silicon madeleine mould! Got it at S$22.20 after 30% discount at Creative Hands, Harbourfront Centre.

This time I tried coffee ones by substituting matcha powder with coffee and cocoa powder in this recipe.

My notes are in bracket

Matcha Madeleines – Yields 12 (But, I had 18 big ones and 40 small ones! )

Ingredients:

100g butter
2 eggs
100g sugar (Reduced to 80g)
1 tbsp honey
100g cake flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tbsp matcha (means Green tea powder here. I used decaffeinated espresso powder from illy’s cos I don’t drink coffee. Also added 1 tbsp of cocoa powder… hehe…)

Preparation:

- Sift flour, baking powder and matcha
- Preheat oven to 170ºC
- Melt butter in microwave
- Grease and lightly flour Madeleine cavities.

Method:

1. Whisk eggs till smooth.
2. Add honey and sugar. Whisk again.
3. Add flour and matcha. Use spoon to fold in the mixture.
4. Add melted butter and fold again.
5. Fill each cavity till just below the rim.
6. Bake at 170ºC for 10 – 15 min. (I used 12 min in a convection microwave oven. The madeleines had crispy exterior with cake-like texture inside. Small ones are even crispier if you bake using the same duration.)

Have fun baking!

I don’t have a Madeleine tin and do not want to eat so many Madeleines. My family members aren’t supporters of baked stuff as they think it’s heaty and fattening.

So, I used a kueh balu tin to try this Chocolate Madeleine Recipe. It’s surprisingly light with a slight crisp on the edges. Best of all, it works even when I halved the recipe and replaced all-purpose flour with wholemeal flour (I’ve 700g to clear )

This adapted recipe makes twelve 3cm chocolate madeleines.

Ingredients

1 egg
35g caster sugar
25g Wholemeal flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tbsp cocoa powder
30g melted butter

Method

1. Preheat oven at 180ºC

2. Whisk egg and sugar in a bowl (a rice / soup bowl is sufficient) using a teaspoon.

3. Sift flour, baking powder and cocoa into the egg mixture and fold in melted butter.

4. Spoon a teaspoon mixture into each mould (greased with remaining melted butter) or 2/3 full each. ( I filled it to the brim as I have only one tin.

5. Bake for 10 minutes or when the Madeleines are set.

See the “skirting”? It will overflow if filled to the brim.

Simple to do and quick to finish

I’ve always wanted to try making otaks (baked spicy fish paste in banana leaves) myself.

Its list of ingredients looked daunting enough for me to try though! After years of procrastination (also lack of time), I’ve finally did it!

This is the otak I made today. Doesn’t look as orange-red as it is supposed to be. That’s because I have misread the recipe and halved weight of coconut instead of coconut milk! Double amount of coconut milk was used. I was using Kara coconut cream…

Anyway, here’s the correct recipe

Ingredients (36 sticks)

285ml coconut milk (Extract from 680g coconut or buy ready ones from supermarket)
1.2kg Spanish Mackerel
170ml (¾cup) Water
Pinch of Salt
2 Eggs, lightly beaten
2 leaves of Kaffir Lime Leaves (finely sliced)
4 leaves of Tumeric Leaves (finely sliced)
36 “22×20cm” Sheets of Banana Leaves (Washed and Scalded)

Paste Mixture

225g Shallots (peeled)
30 Slices of Galangal (Blue Ginger – 85g)
5 Crushed Candlenuts
25 dried chillies (soaked to soften)
1 Tbsp Shrimp Paste (Belacan)
20g Tumeric (Peeled)

Seasoning

3 Tbsp Sugar
2 Tbsp Salt
3 Tbsp Peanut Oil
2 tsp Coriander Powder

Method

1. Grind Paste Mixture till smooth and set aside.

2. Mince 60% of the Mackerel you have and sliced the remaining 40% thinly. (I have problems getting Spanish mackerels from my wet market and NTUC nearby. So, it was replaced with Halibut Fillets (practically boneless!)… I think it’s a bad substitute cos the otak had “powdery taste”)

3. Add water and salt to the minced fish and mix till a sticky paste is formed.

4. Add coconut milk and egg to the fish paste and blend well. (That’s where I had gone wrong with the coconut milk measurements resulting a not-so-spicy otak)

5. Add the paste mixture and seasoning to blend. Add fish, sliced tumeric leaves and Kaffir lime leaves into the mixture. Mix well.

6. Place 2 tbsps of the fish paste in the middle of each banana leave, fold left and right lengthwise, top and bottom widthwise, then fasten with toothpicks as shown below

7. When ready, bake them in the oven at 200ºC for 10min on each side.

Tada! It’s completed.

Best eaten with plain white bread or Thai Jasmine rice