Raya 2013

Ramadan Activities

Iftar with family and trying new menu in restaurants

Daughter with my brother and his

Shopping was a headache with Raya frenzy

Lots and lots of patrons shopping for Raya

Outing with my parents for Iftar

Majlis Tahlil

Visiting the Ramadan Stalls

Not forgetting getting ourselves nearer to our creator, Allah SWT

Cheese & Chicken Springroll

Let me post another menu during this Ramadan.  I made this for Iftar and its delish!  This dish is so simple but yet so delicious. 

The recipe is as follows:

• Carrot (grated)
• Cabbage (grated)
• Chicken (minced)
• Big Onion
• Garlic
• Cheese (whatever brand you like, I use Cheddar)
• The popia roll
• Egg york

Thats it.  Very simple, those of the above are for the filling.  Just cook everything, except the cheese.  Only add the cheese before wrapping the roll.  Let it cool and wrap it inside.

Delicious!

The cabbage and carrot (I forgot to take pic of the cheese!)

The minced chicken

The cooked filling

The springroll before frying

Yummm...

UBD Offer Letter

This is the highlight of our day especially our daughter.

After applying for it in April, she got it.  She was accepted to study at our very own university, University Brunei Darussalam or UBD.  She will be taking Bachelor of Science and Majoring in Biological Science. 

She is esctatic and I am over the moon.  So very happy for her.  We expected it, there is no doubt in my mind that she will get through.  Looking at her A Level result she is infact on top of the pact to be accepted here.  So no doubt at all.

I supported the fact that she will study locally.  At the beginning of the year when she got her result, she has to decide to study locally or overseas.  I must confess that deep down in my heart I kind of dreading if she wanted to leave Brunei and study overseas.  I am not being selfish but to think of her not here break my heart but at the same time if thats what she destined to do then I will support her.  But now she will be here, I am so thankful :)  Although down the road we found out that UBD is offering what they call Discovery Year on her 3rd year at University.  Whereby this program (amongst other programs) offers the students a chance to study overseas at any universities around the world of their choice.  Which sounds so awesome.  So we are planning she will go for this.   Yay...

So excited. I am sure this is going to be a new beginning for her.  A new exciting and fun university life which I am sure will benefit her in the future.  Alhamdulilah.

Another new recipe to try..

During this Ramadan, I am planning to try a number of easy recipes for Iftar.  Something delicious and nice.

And after  the successful try of beef pastry puff last week, and since I still have a few frozen pastry in the freezer,I tried to bake what is called a Strudel.  I browsed the internet again and found so many variaties of strudels, and recently I bought a very delicious locally made strudel from a local online business.  Very simple ones with whipped cream and jams (strawberries, kiwi, mangoes and apples).

I was keen to try and see for myself how easy it is to make them.  And tadda....  below is the outcome!

Isnt that looks so yummy?????

Yes it is so yummmyyyy.......



Despicable Me 2

Before Ramadan again our daughter insisted to watch the sequel of Despicable Me which was also called Despicable Me 2.  We went on the first sequel in 2010 and I did enjoyed the film.

So without further hesitations lol, we went to watch the sequel and yes I still enjoyed it.  The return of Gru and his little girls and of course the cute Minions were the catch of this movie.  They were still halirious!  And how cute when the girls wanted Gru to find a girlfriend so that they could have a mother.  Although this time, Gru becomes a spy and was hired  by a Anti villian League to deal with some powerful criminals.   He was paired with another spy which was a lady and they fall in love, aaawww.... I love the touch of romance in the movie and how Gru started to have feeling towards the opposite sex haha.

Anyway, its a good movie to watch (although its a cartoon lol).  And it did well in the box office as well, so yay....

Ramadan Mubarak 1434

To all muslims around the world.  Happy Ramadan.  May Allah bless us all in His Barakah & Rahmah.

Beef Pastry Puff

My desire to bake continues..........

This weekend i tried my hands on making the beef pastry puff.  Which I think was quite easy.  Found a very simple recipe.  And it was even simpler when I used the frozen pastry puff which cut off so much time on preparing the dough.  I heard how notorious making the dough could be!  You got to get the right mixture and combination to get the perfect dough.  And you have to try so many times.  And I dont have that many time hahaha.

So I opted the frozen one and it worked wonders!!!

Make sure you thaw it properly first.  I advise you to thaw the frozen puff in the normal fridge overnight and then leave them in room tempature for about 30 minutes before putting in the filling.

The filling was simply using the normal curry with minced beef, potatoes and blended onions and garlic.

I baked them in about 15 minutes with 170 degress centigrate temperature on my oven.

And thats it!

The frozen pastry that I used

The filling

 

The pastry before going into the oven




The finished product



Yumm...

Taman Peranginan Tasik Lama

I should go out and enjoy the scenery in Brunei more.  There are so many nice places here.  But we dont usually go and explore them.  Well.. maybe we do, but not as often as I would like.  Time is always the issue, or laziness??? haha..

Last weekend, the office organised HLP (thats Healthy Lifestyle Programme) for the employees where everyone could go out of the office for an hour any time of day to do a simple exercise and destress. 

This programme has been going on for a long time and I used to be so active in the past when I worked in Seria.  Havent been involved in any HLP for a long time. 

This activity is encouraged in BSP so our small department decided to join along because its part of the corporate initiatives.  And its for a good cause as well.  So a few of us discussed on it and decided to go to Taman Peranginan Tasik Lama for our first department HLP.  And I like it, its a nice place.  Its a jungle in the middle of the city.  We could still find monkeys, squirrels and other insects and small animals in the vacinity.  There are still pretty flora and faunas around. 

Beside the location (+/- 10 minutes from our office), we knew its a popular places for the locals to go for recreations, exercises such as jogging, hiking or strolling along the beautiful pathways with the rest of the families.  Even the royal families always present and do their daily exercise routines.  Even HM The Sultan brings his entourage or royal visitors for a stroll or brisk walk.

I've been here when I was younger but havent seen all the facelift and all.  I knew the place is beautifully decorated and renovated now and I felt such a relief to see them still look so presentable and lovely :)

The site map

The directory on where to find what

The ever so famous waterfall

Monkey!

Fried Ice Cream (Ais Krim Goreng)

Have you heard of this??

Maybe yes ? No??

Me too.  Not until recently.  Well... maybe I did hear about it but I didnt have any recollections on what its like and how to make it.

I came across the recipe by accident too.  While I hunt the pavlova recipe then I saw it.  I was surprise on how easy it is to make them.  And the ingredients were even simpler, crazy simple lol...

My verdict??

Not sure.  Well.. its ok, the outside was crispy and hot but when we bit into it, our mouth was greeted with the coldness of the ice cream..  Kind of a unique taste.

But one word of caution.  Not to fry them too long otherwise the bread soaked most the oil and becomes too oily.  Thats what happen to a few of my fried ice cream.  Very oily although still crispy.

Give it a try and judge it yourself!

The recipe is just  these:

Bread
Ice cream
Oil to fry

And thats it!!

The ingredients

The ice cream on top of the bread

Get another bread and put on top

Use a plastic glass to cut the bread into round shape

This is how it looks like before frying

Freeze the bread and ice cream inside the freezer for a few hours.  I put each bread into separate small plastic bags to avoid them from sticking to each other

Then fried and this is the end product!

Haze 2013

I wonder when do we learn from previous incidents?  It is happening again right now.  Our country is surrounded by haze from the open burnings in Indonesia and its not nice.

As if we are choked by smoke and fumes.  Its getting so bad now in Brunei and same thing happens in Singapore and Malaysia as well.  In fact its far worst in those countries as mentioned in this news.  Some schools in Malaysia's most affected states are closed and some major events in Singapore are also cancelled or postponed because of this.  Its really is serious.

In Brunei, it hasnt been raining for a while at the moment and its making it worst.  The weather is dry, humid, hot and smokey.  I hope it will rain soon so the rain could help to clear the smoke.

Below is the picture taken from my office.  See all those smoke on the horizon?

Pavlova is so yummy..!!

I've been baking a number of cakes for a few weeks now and I am loving it!!!

This weekend I tried my hands on pavlova.  I've read that it is so easy to make and the ingredients are simple and easy to find, easily available at home.

So I googled the recipe and found so many of them in the internet!  So popular I must say lol...

I gave it a try and it really was so easy and fast to make.  And it was so yummy too... I made it not so sweet especially on the meringue and the topping so it easy on the tongue as well.  So heavenly.  Like you are eating a cloud... lol.

And since I am into cupcakes these days, I made the pavlova in a cupcake style.  I could do it in a big chunk but prefer to have it in a separate mini cups so me and the family could savour it one by one and not to spoil the design and taste.  I freeze them in the refrigerator but I didnt put the topping and fruits on top until serving so as to preserve the freshness and the crispiness of the meringue.  Cant wait to savour it again later!

Serves 6-8, makes approx 16 cupcakes or 1 large pavlova

 

Ingredients:

 

6 free range egg whites

1 ½ cups of castor sugar (I only use not even a cup and it really was enough and not too sweet).

Squeeze lemon juice

1 vanilla bean or 1 tsp of vanilla extract

1 tbs corn flour

1 tbs vinegar

The topping:

500ml thickened cream (I didnt put sugar on it)

1 punnet strawberries

Other fruits that can be used - bananas, kiwi fruit, peaches, etc.  Use sour fruits to counter attack the sweetness.

Method:

• Preheat the oven to 110°C
• Line 2 cupcake trays with papers or lay a sheet of baking paper on a tray.
• In an electric mixer whip the egg whites on high until frothy.
• Keep beating on high and slowly add the sugar.
• Keep beating on high until the meringue reaches stiff peak (when you lift the beater the peaks hold their shape and don’t fold). This will take about 5 min.
• Add a squeeze of lemon juice and the vanilla and beat again quickly to mix it through.
• Use an ice cream scoop (those ones with the squeeze handles) to scoop the mixture into the cupcake papers or use a spatula to spread the mixture onto the pan in the shape of a circle.
• Bake on a low temp until light brown and crispy. Approx 45 min for cupcakes or approx 1.5 hrs for a large one.
• Turn off the oven and let it cool slowly with the oven slightly ajar.
• Whip the cream (do not add sugar!). This can be done in advance, while it is in the oven or just before serving.

 Just before serving cover with cream, chop fruit and decorate.

 

 And these are the work I've done:

 

Whipping the white egg until frothy.  It took maybe 5 minutes

Tadaa...

Ready to go in the oven

Ready to eat!!!

Look at that! So yummmyyy...

My new driver!

The best thing about having a grown up daughter is that I have someone to drive me if I am too lazy to drive!  For the past few days my daughter has offered to drive me to work and I am so grateful for the opportunity of not having to drive in the traffic jam.

I know she is such a good daughter, I didnt ask her but she insisted, and I am very happy with that! LOL