Author: gochugaru girl

The Cotswolds: From Burford to Broadway

Posted on by gochugaru girl

St John the Baptist Church in Burford

 

When I was in Secondary School, there was a cheerful but serious girl in my class who once declared that ‘it always rains on Good Friday, wherever you are in the world, because this is the day that Jesus died on the cross’. This is the story of God coming to earth in the human form of Jesus for the sole purpose of taking on our individual and collective burden of sin. What the cross achieved was a reconciliation, for it takes such a sacrifice to restore the broken relationship between God and man.

For the past 40 years I have made it a point to check the weather on Good Friday to see if it rains. More often than not, here in England, there is some or a lot of rain in April.

But not today.

Today, we had one of the sunniest days in the past six months. This made for an excellent start to our weekend in the Cotswolds. The plan would be to drive up to Oxford, head west to Burford then drive north to Broadway where our hotel is located. In detail: Oxford – Aston Pottery and Gardens – Burford Garden Centre – Burford – Daylesford Organic – Stow-on-the-Wold – The Fish Hotel. Below are brief descriptions of each place we visited.

 

Besides hand-stencilled pottery, Aston Pottery and Gardens also sells a large range of gifts, with an on-site cafe

 

Burford Garden Centre is a stylish storehouse of everything you would need for your home and lifestyle, from furniture to furnishings, stationary to scarves. Its core business is still selling plants and everything associated with gardening. There is a beautiful bookshop next to the garden centre and a cafe on-site. I think this is a great place for family shopping.

 

 

Besides the beautiful church in Burford there were two very interesting shops in this lovely town. The first is the House of Mälu where you can commission your own bespoke leather holdall, from the same atelier that also makes leather bags for some of Italy’s top fashion houses.

Speaking to James Watson, who showed me the holdalls, I gathered that there is a racing connection to these bags. I am not familiar with the world of motor racing, so had to research what GTO stands for. The term Grand Turismo Omolgato is Italian in origin, and refers to road-racing vehicles which are not designed as one-offs. The class of cars have at least limited production and are open for public sales. Maybe it’s something like going down to the Ferrari showroom and saying you want a fast car, not for parking outside Harrods in Knightsbridge but for racing cross country over rough terrain.

More interesting was the fact that Mr Watson told me that his great, great, great grandfather started A.S. Watsons, the renowned pharmacy chain in East Asia. More about it here, but it was so much more engaging to hear from a family member.

 

Some of Burford’s more interesting buildings (top) and James Watson with the GTO holdalls (bottom)

 

The other interesting shop in Burford is the Oxford Brush Company who assure that ‘we have a brush for everything’. Once you enter the shop you know you have reached brush heaven.

 

 

Some of my favourite foods (top) in Daylesford Organic in Kingham…shame I am on holiday and do not have access to a kitchen. A display of chopping boards made from woods such as walnut and maple (bottom). Like the Burford Garden Centre, this is a great place for the family to visit as there many things to look at, as well as a cafe and restaurant on-site.

 

 

Stow-on-the-Wold: we had gelato at the just opened Alfonso Gelateria, and peeked into D’Ambrosi Fine Foods. No food photos but here is one of a building I thought was unique (top). The one shop I would recommend here is The Crock, because it sells all kinds of useful household and kitchen items, like enamelware, which are increasingly harder to find these days (below).

 

 

We had a rest at the hotel before dinner at The Horse and Groom in Bourton-on-the-Hill. Excellent fish and chips, but the menu has been reduced to three items each on starters, mains and dessert. I am not sure why, but since the service and Mr Gochugaru’s pint of Butcombe’s were both also excellent, I did not ask too much.

 

 

And So To Bed…

There is no shortage of good hotels and inns in the Cotswolds. We are staying at The Fish Hotel because its location is convenient for visiting nearby villages and National Trust properties. There is an on-site restaurant and it is possible to walk from the estate to Broadway and other towns. There is a boot room where you can borrow wellingtons and maps of the walks. To top it, they can send round a Singapore Sling to your room. La vie est belle mon ami.

Address: Farncombe, Broadway, Worcestershire WR12 7LH

 

Reception at The Fish Hotel

 

The Happy Everything Dinner

Posted on by gochugaru girl

 

 

What a great evening for our family to have a communal dinner. With our combined faith and cultural backgrounds we are celebrating both Passover and Easter. Over in Malaysia, Cousin A and Kepong Auntie went to visit the grave sites of our extended family as it is the Chinese Ching Ming Festival, where we remember our ancestors. It was also Brasenose Girl’s birthday yesterday. So it is a Happy Everything dinner where we have multiple reasons to celebrate life and Spring and the gathering of those whom we love around the dinner table.

The first I did this morning was to sharpen my knives. The first thing I did yesterday morning was to work out the menu, which we wanted to keep mainly vegetarian. I shared the workload with Junior 2. I made Carrot Salad with Cinnamon, Aubergine in Charmoula, Grilled Red Pepper Salad and a Roasted Cauliflower Salad. The recipes for the first three dishes are here and the cauliflower salad recipe is below.

Junior 2 made Hummus, Tabouleh, Harissa Roasted Potatoes, and sliced and grilled two blocks of haloumi cheese. We roped in Junior 1 to bring in some flatbreads and pastries as he lives near Green Lanes, home to multiple Turkish and similar ethnic restaurants and food shops.

 

Carrot Salad with Cinnamon

 

 

Aubergine in Charmoula

 

 

Grilled Red Pepper Salad

 

 

Roasted Cauliflower Salad (recipe follows)

 

 

For the Salad:

900 g trimmed cauliflower florets + cauliflower leaves, if any

300 g trimmed tender stem broccoli florets

3 tablespoons pomegranate molasses

1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil

2 tablespoons dried sour cherries

2 tablespoons dried cranberries

60 g toasted hazelnuts, chopped

30 g fresh coriander, chopped

2 teaspoons toasted sesame seeds

1 fresh red chilli, deseeded and chopped

salt and ground back pepper to taste

olive oil for roasting

 

How to Make:

Preheat the oven to 220ºC/200ºC fan.

Place the cauliflower on a roasting pan and drizzle over a good quantity of olive oil. Sprinkle on some fine sea salt and ground black pepper.

On a separate roasting pan do the same with the tender stem broccoli and cauliflower leaves.

Roast the broccoli and cauliflower leaves for around 8 minutes, until they are slightly charred around the edges.

Roast the cauliflower for around 15 minutes, until it is slightly charred around the edges.

Whilst the vegetables are roasting, place the pomegranate molasses, sesame oil, dried sour cherries and cranberries in a large mixing bowl. Chop the hazelnuts, coriander and chilli. Leave aside.

As soon as each vegetable is cooked, add them to the mixing bowl. Toss everything together and place on a serving plate.

Garnish with the hazelnuts, coriander, chilli and sesame seeds.

 

Hummus and Tabouleh

 

Cod fillet in a ‘sandwich’ of sliced sweet peppers, preserved lemons and fresh coriander. Roast in an oven at 180ºC/ 160ºC fan until the fish feels firm

 

Dessert was sliced oranges in vanilla: Slice the top and bottom off 12 oranges. Place each orange, flat bottom down, on a chopping board. Slice the peel away from the flesh, using even downward strokes. Carefully trim away any remaining white pith. Slice each fruit horizontally into 5 or 6 segments. Place in a salad bowl with 1 tablespoon of vanilla bean paste. Stir through everything and add a few fresh mint leaves before serving.

 

 

I made another chocolate and olive oil birthday cake (recipe here) because Junior 3 continually urges me to make it, saying it is the best chocolate cake she has ever eaten. It is not even her birthday! Today’s frosting was a chocolate ganache, made easily by warming up 150 g each of 70% dark chocolate chips and double cream in a small pot, stirring, cooling then pouring over the top of the bundt. This has almost no sugar compared to the regular cocoa and icing sugar frosting, but we made up for it with the sweet chocolate eggs.

 

 

We finished dinner very late, everyone helped with the washing and drying, and there were enough leftovers for a simple meal tomorrow. I will attempt to finish writing up my Singapore notes in the next week or so. For the Easter weekend Mr Gochugaru and I are heading to the Cotswolds to walk, eat and sleep. We are so looking forward to it.

 

HAPPY EASTER!

 

 

Singapore: A Walk in Chinatown

Posted on by gochugaru girl

 

 

Singapore is full of Chinese people, whether local-born, Chinese nationals or ethnic Chinese tourists (like myself). It might seem a bit strange to have an area called ‘Chinatown’ because it’s not as if that is the only area where you can find Chinese residents or businesses run by Chinese people. This then, like Kuala Lumpur’s Chinatown, is the historical area where the first Chinese immigrants settled in the 19th century.

We took the MRT (underground/ subway) to Chinatown because I read about a recently opened section of the Thomson-East Coast Line. Living in central London, we travel by Tube all the time, but our system is over a hundred years old. It creaks, breaks down, acts up and travelling on it is increasingly frustrating and joyless. We took the Thomson-East Coast MRT Line from Orchard station to Maxwell station. The trains and stations were clean, bright and the signs were clear. I sighed with happiness.

 

The Thomson-East Coast MRT Line currently runs from Woodlands North to Gardens by the Bay

 

Clear local maps at Orchard and Maxwell MRT stations (I love maps)

 

I was probably just lucky to find Maxwell station devoid of passengers…this is my fantasy scenario for public transport travel

 

Chinatown Complex at 335 Smith Street (which I refer to as Smith Street Market) houses a wet market in the basement, clothes and souvenir stores on the ground level and cooked food stalls on its upper floor. Smith Street is the only road in Chinatown to be named after a European. Sir Cecil Clementi Smith was Governor of the Straits Settlements and High Commissioner to Malaya from 1887 to 1893.

 

 

I specifically wanted to see this mural (entitled Chinatown Market) painted on the side of 30 Temple Street, of tea being poured out from a giant teapot. There are other murals by the artist Yip Yew Chong along alleyways in Chinatown.

 

 

Sometimes we need to look beyond what is in front of us. Here is the reality behind the photo above…roadworks and traffic jams

 

Part of the mural (the rest was obstructed by road machinery) on the side of 30 Temple Street, showing a kopi tiam / local coffee shop scene

 

Temple Street is lined with shops selling all sorts of catering equipment. The first photo is of a wooden barrel used to make 豆腐花 tau foo fah, a soft tofu dessert.

 

 

Sia Huat at 7-11 Temple Street: if you cannot find what you are looking for here, it probably does not exist. This shop is an Aladdin’s cave of every item needed to prepare, cook, display and serve food, set over several shop lots and two floors.

 

 

Another mural by Yip Yew Chong in an alleyway between Smith Street and Temple Street, depicting scenes from the artist’s first home which was in Sago Lane. It is entitled 我家牛车水 My Chinatown Home. For those interested in language, 我家 wǒ jiā means ‘my home’, and the three words 牛车水 niú chē shuǐ literally mean ‘ox car water’, translated to bullock water cart. This is a reference to the ox-drawn carts that transported water to the area, and today Chinatown is still called 牛车水 in Mandarin. For a map of other murals in Chinatown, see here.

 

 

The area is full of interesting traditional shops selling dried and preserved foods. Its buildings are better maintained than similar ones in Penang and Kuala Lumpur, which we had visited earlier in our trip.

 

We only had time to make a short visit to Chinatown, and even as a Chinese person I found the shops here very interesting. Singapore is so much more than a convenient stopover. I could easily spend a week here, go out day and night, and still have things left to see/ eat/ do/ write about for another day.

 

Young bamboo plants. A reminder of the Chinese advice: the right time to discipline children is when they are young, while they can still bend without breaking. I did not just make that up, honestly.

 

Singapore: Thoughts of Food and Food for Thought

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It is the weekend here in London and I feel seriously let down by the weather. It seems to me that we have had nothing but ‘grey, cold and wet’ for the past six months. I am glad then that a) I had reasons to be called away to the Far East for a lot of that time and b) I have so much to do when I am home in London. The sound of the rain falling is most pronounced at night, when I am getting ready for bed. A thought occurs that just as in the days of Noah, we have no control over the weather in our day and age. The only positive is that it is better to have rain than to have drought.

Having to stay indoors means I can push myself to write up my Singapore notes. We had such a wonderful time there and it is the one country to which I could happily return again and again. Singaporeans sometimes complain publicly about their government, society, housing, education system etc but secretly I think they are very proud of their country.

We ate very well in Singapore, and I appreciated the excellent service wherever we went. One interaction I will remember is when I emptied a purseful of coins to pay for my matcha soft serve ice cream at Matchaya Takashimaya. I explained to the young man who was serving that I did not want to carry so much loose change around, and would he mind if I did not pay by card? He was lovely. He patiently sorted out and took away all the smaller denominations, leaving me with the $1 coins. When he brought round our drinks and ice cream he took the time to ask where we were from, how long we were staying and what else we might be doing in Singapore. He did not have to, but he did.

I asked myself what it takes to acquire this level of easy confidence. I suppose it comes mostly from good family upbringing and definitely from strong role models in leadership. Leadership from school, the workplace and the government. So many countries can learn from this.

 

 

I love living in London because every type of cuisine is available here, thanks to our immigrant population. In the past month I ate at Sri Lankan, Turkish and Korean restaurants. Singapore is delightful in this respect also. We were invited to meals at Chinese, Portuguese, Korean and Peruvian restaurants. Smaller meals taken at home or in shopping malls were Indonesian, Japanese and Peranakan/ Nyonya.

Some photos below, but not too many otherwise we could be here all day and all night! Also, we were with friends so it would have been rude to take photos instead of eating and engaging in conversation (see end of post for further thoughts).

 

Watching the professionals make siu long bao at Paradise Dynasty in Wisma Atria. I was intrigued by the eight types of fillings

 

Admiring the carving skill at Imperial Treasure Super Peking Duck in Paragon

 

Counting the bottles of wine at Tuga Portuguese restaurant, and wondering if any bottles get stashed away in diners’ handbags or rucksacks

 

Working out the Korean alphabet in the restaurant sign at Anju restaurant

 

A few of the wonderful plates of food at Anju:

관자 gwanja (scallop) with uni ice cream, cubes of kimchi radish and cucumber, dill, chervil and lemon truffle oil

 

호감전 Hogam Jeon: to deconstruct this dish in order to make at home (a future project) a few clues lie in its name. 호박 hobak is courgette, 감자 gamja is potato and 전 jeon is pancake. This was like a rosti but better as it had school prawns in addition to the vegetables. School prawns are tiny prawns which are fried shell and all, adding to the overall crunch of a dish

 

섯밥 Sotbap: scorched rice with dried radish leaves and charcoal grilled seabass. 돌솥 dolsot literally means stone pot and it is the cooking of the 밥 bap (rice) in this that gives the dish its characteristic scorched bottom and smokiness

 

보쌈 Bo-ssam: much loved boiled pork belly, here finished off with a light grilling. 쌈 ssam means ‘wrapped’ and the pork is eaten with pickles and wrapped in lettuce leaves

 

화채 Hwachae: this was a very clever modern take on the traditional Korean fruit punch, in which fruits are soaked in honey or omija berry juice. Here the fresh fruits are served with watermelon sorbet, apple foam, yuzu jelly, omija watermelon juice, mint oil and a honey tuile. We were so spoilt!

 

Colourful welcome and colourful food at Canchita Peruvian restaurant

 

 

I have very fond memories of Violet Oon’s restaurant because we shared a meal here with Seoul Friend and her daughter when we visited Singapore together. We ate again our favourites of satay and pie tee for a light lunch

 

I have so enjoyed looking through the photos of our meals in Singapore. Photos are a great way to recall what we have eaten, but I am mindful that in days past when eating out in restaurants with my parents and grandmother we never took photos of the meals. We took photos of the people around the table. What I remembered most about the meals were the cautionary tales bandied about so freely by the elders of the family. I learnt a lot about life, love, loss through the successes and misfortunes of my aunties, uncles, older cousins and various other old people.

Of course I loved what I ate, however as I get older my kitchen endeavours are less about trying to recreate those dishes, and more about trying to recreate the happy atmosphere of the shared meals. After so many joyful communal meals with our friends in Singapore, I have taken a step forward in working out how to further shape my cooking style and to continue in my culinary journey.

 

Bundt 101

Posted on by gochugaru girl

 

Since purchasing my Nordic Ware lotus bundt pan on our recent trip to Singapore, I renewed my interest in the existing bundt pans (and some American baking books) that I own. I then purchased a few more pans which I thought would be useful for community baking. By this I mean baking large cakes for coffee mornings at church, or for sharing with my neighbours. I am always making rectangular cakes in loaf tins which are reliable but a bit plain looking, after so many years of the same style.

I also bought a dedicated bundt baking book (simply called Bundt, by Melanie Johnson), which unfortunately promised more than it delivered. I had real issues with the recipes because I found them inconsistent and most had no accompanying photos. Some of the recipes are detailed, with three separate parts e.g. cake, glaze and frosting, or cake, filling and frosting. I had to re-read them several times and then use my most creative imagination to conjure up a picture of what a completed cake might look like. Most nights I fell asleep with exhaustion at the process. So, the book is really good if you want to fall asleep, and not so good if you want to bake a bundt.

The reason for not giving up on the book is that there are some novel ideas e.g. slicing the bundt and then filling it with flavoured cream, or topping a plain bundt with frosting. Left to my own devices a bundt will always be a plain bundt as I would rely on the fancy moulding to be the glamour factor. In fact, I still think this is the best use of a bundt pan, which is to shape an ordinary cake into something more intricate looking. Sort of like a cake corset.

 

My own limits on creativity

 

I am learning how to make my cakes look more presentable

 

Another problem I had with the book was that the recipes varied wildly in the amount of ingredients, even when baked in similar-sized pans. All Nordic Ware pans have imprinted on them two helpful hints: the name of the pan and its volume. The volume is the amount of liquid it can hold, and not the amount of cake batter you put into it.

The varied amounts of batter used in Bundt’s recipes will yield inconsistent results using the same-size pans. Some recipes will give a taller cake which overflows the cake pan. Some recipes will make a short cake that does not reach the rim of the bundt pan, and so wasting the whole shape of the mould.

 

My first bundt pan, the Holiday Tree Bundt (10-cup size)

 

Other bundt pans showing their volume in cups

 

Almost all bundt cake recipes state the oven temperature as 180 C / 160 C fan. After several high-domed cakes I went back to the beginning of my baking ‘career’. What I learnt in home economics classes was that if the centre of a cake peaks or domes it means the oven temperature is too hot. Conversely if it sinks in the middle the oven temperature is too cold. I tried lowering the temperature to 170 C / 155 C fan which gave much better results. The cake rose a bit more slowly and more evenly. Baking at a lower oven temperature is possible using a bundt pan because they are so solid and conduct heat so well. I have finally settled on a 150 C fan temperature (in my Gaggenau oven) which yields the best results.

 

 

After baking another half a dozen cakes, I thought to make a standardised chart giving a basic cake recipe, to which you can add flavourings or substitute part or all of one ingredient for another. Since Nordic Ware is an American company, most bundt recipes are measured in cups. I cannot deal with cups as I like precision in baking, so I devised a spreadsheet using a basic pound cake recipe. A pound cake means you use a pound (454 g) each of flour, butter, sugar and eggs. Once you get the hang of the basic recipe, you can play with substitutions.

I have rounded up/ down the metric measurements to make it less awkward, so it is not exactly a pound cake recipe. To incorporate any additions (like vegetables, fruit, nuts, chocolate) you should use the measurements for a smaller sized pan to prevent an overflow of the batter. Sugar is always reduced in my recipes, but you can use up to the same amount as the flour and butter. Eggs vary in size all over the world so I have weighed it without the shell.

Ingredient Flour Butter/ Fat Sugar Eggs (weight without shell) Eggs in shell, approximately
Pan size
5 cup 125 g 125 g 85 g 100 g 2 large
6 cup 150 g 150 g 100 g 120 g 3 medium
9 cup 225 g 225 g 150 g 180 g 4 medium
10 cup 250 g 250 g 170 g 200 g 4 large
12 cup 300 g 300 g 200 g 240 g 5 large

 

One big, big tip about avoiding the disaster of a cake not turning out from the bundt pan: always make the double effort of buttering and then flouring the pan. I place the butter in the pan to soften a few hours before I start baking, or overnight, then use a stiff pastry brush to let the butter ‘get into the groove’ (remember Madonna’s advice). After that I sift about a tablespoon or two of plain flour onto the butter, moving the pan around to coat it evenly. The excess flour can be removed by turning the pan upside down and giving it a tap, which is best done over a sink.

 

 

There is only one bundt pan company you should consider which is Nordic Ware. They have some recipes on their website if you want ideas. I do not maintain a bucket list, but if I did, a visit to the Nordic Ware factory in Minneapolis would feature in it.

I will share some successful bundt recipes in the next few weeks.

 

Some American Baking Books:

I find using American baking books tricky as almost all the recipes use cups as measurements. However there are so many ideas drawn from the cultural melting pot that makes up the USA that I find new things to bake that I had not thought of before.

Pastry Love: A Baker’s Journal of Favourite Recipes, by Joanne Chang, published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, ISBN 978-0544836488

Zingerman’s Bakehouse: Best-Loved Recipes for Baking People Happy, by Amy Emberling and Frank Carollo, published by Chronicle Books, ISBN 978-1452156583

The Good Book of Southern Baking: A Revival of Biscuits, Cakes, and Cornbread, by Kelly Fields with Kate Heddings, published by Lorena Jones Books, ISBN 978-1984856227

 

Pandan Chiffon Cake

Posted on by gochugaru girl

Happy Birthday to everyone with March birthdays

 

 

It has been a month since I posted my February birthday cake recipe. Life is continuously busy but I am a firm believer that humans are made to engage with work. Having something to keep me busy daily keeps me challenged and makes me happy.

I do need to write up my Singapore notes! Otherwise they will end up like all the other travel notes including our trips to the Scilly Isles and the New Forest.

The pandan chiffon cake recipe has been a hurdle, although I should not have made a mountain out of a molehill. The problem was not the lack of a reliable recipe, as I would base it on my perfected orange chiffon cake. The problem was always whether to use fresh pandan extract or to use pandan essence. In the end I made stab at it and used both.

We had a family lunch to celebrate Junior 1’s 30th birthday, starting with Pommery champagne and sesame prawns on toast (fondly referred to as SPOT in our house).

 

 

I am very fond of Pommery. The reason for this sentiment is that when Mr Gochugaru turned 30 (we are now both approaching 60), I organised a surprise weekend away at the newly opened Hotel du Vin in Winchester, with my in-laws roped in to look after the (then) very small Juniors 1 and 2.

When he saw his packed bag, Mr Gochugaru was more shocked than surprised and almost refused to go. On the way to the hotel he cautioned me never to pull a stunt like this again. I haven’t, and we are still married.

 

 

To extract the pandan juice from fresh pandan leaves, you have to blend a quantity of leaves with water, squeeze out the juice, pour into a container, wait for the thicker green extract to settle, discard the top pandan water then use the extract in the cake batter.

I was short of time and instead blended the pandan leaves directly with the coconut milk then squeezing everything through a cheesecloth, using it immediately to make the cake. Whichever way you use to extract some juice from the pandan leaves, you will still need to top up the flavour by using a shop-bought essence.

 

There are different brands of pandan essence but the one most bakers recommend, if you can get it, is Koepoe Koepoe (Butterfly) brand

 

This recipe will make one large 25 cm cake, perfect for family parties. You can also divide the mixture and use two smaller chiffon baking tins, adjusting the baking time to reflect the smaller cake sizes.

 

 

For the Cake:

(everything is weighed so it is fool-proof)

225 g self-raising flour

225 g unrefined caster sugar

½ teaspoon fine sea salt

125 g sunflower oil

125 g egg yolks (roughly 7 large egg yolks)

75 g fresh pandan leaves

200 g coconut milk (I use Aroy-D brand)

¼ teaspoon pandan essence, Koepoe Koepoe brand

 

For the Meringue:

300 g egg whites (roughly 8 large egg whites)

1 teaspoon cream of tartar

45 g unrefined caster sugar

 

Equipment:

You will need a 25 cm Angelfood Cake Pan, sometimes called a Chiffon Cake Tin. The tin has to be left UNGREASED.

The same recipe will fill two smaller chiffon cake tins, each with a width of 17.5 cm and 21 cm. Bake the 21 cm cake for around 50 minutes, and the 17.5 cm cake for around 45 minutes. You can freeze one cake for another day.

I used my KitchenAid but you can also use a handheld electric beater.

You will need two large mixing bowls, one for the flour and egg yolks and another for the egg whites.

 

How to Make:

Preheat the oven to 325°C/170°C.

Cut the pandan leaves into thin strips and blend with the coconut milk until you get a fine mush. Place this in a muslin cloth and squeeze out the pandan and coconut extract. Set aside.

Sift the flour, sugar and salt into a KitchenAid mixing bowl, or a large mixing bowl.

Make a well in the centre of the flour and add the oil, egg yolks, coconut and pandan extract and pandan essence.

Using a flat beater or a flex-edge beater (KitchenAid) OR a hand-held electric beater, gently mix the ingredients to form a smooth batter. Keep this aside whilst you prepare the egg whites.

Place the egg whites in a separate KitchenAid mixing bowl (or a large mixing bowl) and using the whisk attachment, beat on a high speed until frothy (KitchenAid speed 6 for around 30 seconds).

Add the cream of tartar and continue to beat until soft peaks form.

Sprinkle in the 45 g sugar bit by bit and continue to beat for about 3 – 5 minutes, until stiff peaks form. Keep watch over the meringue like a hawk so it does not overbeat, as the whites will then become dry and separate.

When the meringue is ready, fold it into the flour and egg yolk mixture, using a large balloon whisk or rubber spatula. Do this in stages, folding the meringue in gently until the mixture is well combined and there are no streaks of batter or meringue visible.

Pour the batter into the ungreased cake tin and bake in the oven for 55 minutes or until the cake bounces back when touched. A metal skewer inserted in the centre should come out clean.

 

After baking: in stages

Remove the tin from the oven and immediately turn it upside down, resting the legs on a heat-proof surface. As it is ungreased, the cake will not fall out. It is this ‘suspension’ that ensures the cake does not sink as cools. The bubbles created by the beaten egg whites ensure its lightness. Set aside the cake to cool in the tin for at least 1 hour

 

When the cake is completely cooled, turn the tin the right way up. Using a long metal or plastic spatula, loosen the cake from the sides and central tube

 

Remove the cake from the tin (it will still be attached to the base) and using a long metal or plastic spatula, loosen the cake around the base whilst it is till in an upright position. Turn the cake upside down on a large board or serving plate and it will fall down neatly

 

I served the cake plain but it would go well with some coconut ice cream or some ‘salted caramel’ sauce made with gula melaka and coconut cream. I don’t have a recipe for either so this is a future project.

 

There was not much cake left at the end of our lunch…

 

If you are like me, in your late 50s heading towards your early 60s, you will appreciate how fast time flies. In the past 30 years I have seen many happy as well as many sad events in the lives of those in my friendship and family circle. Looking back I was always so keen on organising everything down to the last detail but since the pandemic, and since my father passed away, I have allowed myself to loosen the grip on a lot of things.

I really think we need to accept that we may not be here tomorrow. I am always so relieved when I wake up in the morning and it is another new day. There are always things to do, but now I want to also say ‘there is always another glass of champagne to drink’.

 

PS:

Our menu today (which hopefully someone can read in 30 years’ time) was Pommery champagne, sesame prawns on toast, whole organic chicken poached in an aromatic soya sauce, grilled side of salmon, sweet winter slaw from Plenty by Yotam Ottolenghi, Vietnamese summer rolls with a hoisin-peanut sauce, rice with fried garlic and ginger and the said pandan chiffon cake. Thank you to Juniors 2 and 3 for helping with the cooking. Mx

 

 

Minced Pork with Chilli and Basil

Posted on by gochugaru girl

 

 

I was looking forward to writing up some cake recipes but the last cake I made, a pistachio and white chocolate bundt, was not quite perfect. I am waiting for a clear day to make another one. Cakes need precision and timing and careful watching over. They don’t do well when you are rushing about from one thing to another, so it’s best to wait.

In the meantime I made two dishes from a cookery book which aims to demystify Thai cooking and make it achievable in a regular western kitchen. The first dish is called pad krapow moo (stir-fried minced pork in fish sauce with basil) and the second is gaeng keow wan gai (green curry chicken). Both had some ingredients in common but the results looked and tasted very different.

 

What makes the dish distinctively Thai: nam pla (fish sauce) and fresh bird’s eye chillies

 

The recipe calls for chilli and garlic to be pounded in a pestle and mortar until you get a rough paste, but I chopped up the chillies and crushed the garlic using a garlic press

 

 

For the Pork (adapted from pad krapow moo with nam pla, page 120 of the book):

2 red bird’s eye chillies, finely chopped (I left the seeds in)

20 g garlic cloves, crushed

2 tablespoons sunflower oil

500 g minced pork

2 – 3 tablespoons nam pla (some brands of fish sauce are saltier than others)

1 teaspoon unrefined caster sugar

½ teaspoon dark soya sauce

a very large handful of holy basil, Thai sweet basil or regular Italian basil leaves

 

How to Make:

Heat the oil in a heavy pan – I used a Le Creuset casserole pot. Add the chilli and garlic and fry until fragrant, then add the pork.

Using a large flat wooden spatula, break up the meat and fry until it is cooked through. Add the fish sauce, sugar and dark soya sauce. Add 100 ml water and simmer for 10 – 15 minutes, until the pork is cooked through and the sauce has reduced a little.

Switch off the heat then add the basil, stirring it through until it has wilted.

We ate the pork with steamed jasmine rice and a large bowl of stir-fried vegetables.

 

By the time I finished cooking, an already grey day turned even darker. The dish tastes really good, better than it looks here in the photo!

 

Baan: Recipes and stories from my Thai home, by Kay Plunkett-Hogge, published by Pavilion Books, ISBN 978-1911624059