Kuih Lapis II

I finally made a proper kuih lapis! It's no longer two-toned; now it has got three colours!

Look at all the pretty layers... Although the layers are not perfectly even, i'm still really happy with the result.

Admittedly, the "red" layer should have been redder instead of pink.

I really love to peel the layers off one by one, hahaha. ^0^

Kumquat marmalade + pizza

It's citrus season now! When I walk through Queen Victoria Market there are stall holders yelling "Mandarins for $1 per kg!" And my uncle's kumquat tree is full of juicy kumquats. They gave us a bag of them, and so I decided to make kumquat marmalade. Kumquats are sour, but their peel is actually sweet, perfect for jams.

The hard work is mainly getting all the seeds out. After that I stew the fruit in sugar and its juices. Kumquats are really juicy, I reckon I've got half of the juices on me instead of in the pot.

I pour the jam into a glass jar...

And tried it out on a cupcake. It has a beautiful flavour from the kumquats.

Very shiny and glossy =DDDD

For lunch we made pizza! Prawn, capsicum, red onions and tomatoes, sprinkled with mozzarella cheese on top of a pizza base. It can't get more simpler than that!

Smells heavenly when it came out of the oven. Look at the golden melted cheese on top. *drool*

Lobak + Pumpkin soup

My mum and I made lobak today. We followed a recipe from my great-aunt, who is an amazing cook. She whips up the best Asian food, I really miss her cooking... It is also called Penang Five-spice roll. Basically it's filling made of minced pork and other goodies, wrapped in bean curd skin and fried to golden crispy perfection. Or baked, in our case. Much healthier.

Filling of... gosh we added lots of stuff. Well, it's mainly pork mince, water chestnuts, spring onions, five spice powder, etc. The smell made my mouth water, and it's not even cooked yet!

Then we wrapped it up in bean curd skin... making sure to seal up the ends. All those precious juices from the meat will leak out otherwise.

Into the steamer it goes~ For about 15 mins before it goes to the oven to bake.

Here it is in all it's savoury goodness. I love the added crunch the water chestnuts gives the lobak. Absolutely scrumptious.

I also made pumpkin soup, which is so easy with a hand blender. The first time i used it pumpkin went flying everywhere, haha. But my Mum came to the rescue and the pumpkin went to mush under my stick blender, mwahaha.

Creamy, rich and smooth pumpkin soup, so yummy with toasted home-made garlic bread.

Healthy cakes

It's back to uni time! Which means full days with hardly any breaks in between. One thing I hate is having a grumbling stomach while trying to concentrate on the lecturer at the same time. I absolutely cannot function when I'm hungry. So I decided to bake some healthy bite-sized snacks that I can sneak into my mouth during lectures, hehe. First up is a Sweet Potato Apple cake. I grated a sweet potato, an apple and added it to batter, plus some chopped almonds for protein. I didn't even add any sugar, just 2 tbs of honey. And it's fat-free. It turned out to be a sweet, moist cake that I really enjoyed.

Before it goes into the oven.... here it looks like carrot cake batter, haha.

Fresh out of the oven~

Next I made my fat-free pumpkin cake again. But this time I added some chopped chestnuts.

Soft, moist and sweet... Plus it's good for you!

I feel healthy just looking at them, LOL.