A Perfect Tea-Time Delicacy!

Hello how’s your day? I hope everything’s fine!

And for you who are having problems or feeling bad, I’m glad to recommend you enjoying a kind of food that can help you feel better. It’s always a great idea to lounge and have a break with a cup of tea/coffee and some snacks! This time I recommend you a pastry that is suitable for breakfast and tea time. Children will love it too as the flavor is so irresistible, haha…

It’s Hong Kong Style Egg Tart! Sometimes it’s also called as Chinese style or Cantonese style egg tart. Does it really come from Hong Kong? 

Yup, egg tart was first introduced in Hong Kong in 1940s by local tea houses (cha chan ting) and coffee shops. Because of its delicate flavor, Cantonese style egg tart has been included on World’s 50 Most Delicious Food by CNN Go in 2011! Find out more on Wikipedia

 

Also, egg tart is my favorite food! Every time it comes out from oven, the sweet smell, taste, and texture are always able to whet my appetite. The flaky outer crust of egg tart is somehow a perfect match for the soft and sweet custard filling, yum!

Home-made Egg Tarts, yummy!

Here, I provide the recipe of this lovely egg tart just for you!

Cantonese Style Egg Tart                                                         

 

Ingredients

-        Crust

600 grams            All-purpose flour (the brand of all-purpose flour in Indonesia is Bogasari Segitiga Biru)

350 grams            Margarine (or butter)

100 grams            Granulated sugar

2 eggs

1 pinch salt

1 tablespoon Custard Powder

-        Filling

8 eggs

350 cc Milk

200 grams Sugar

100 cc Water

Vanilla essence as desired

Cooking Method:

1.   Preheat oven to 200˚Celcius.

2.     Blend in the eggs, butter/margarine, and custard powder. Then pour in the flour, mix well.

3.     Put the dough into refrigerator for half an hour.

4.     Roll and cut the dough into pieces and place in small tart mold. You do not have to grease the mold with oil.

5.     Making pastry filling: Stir in milk, eggs, vanilla, water, and sugar together. Afterwards, strain the liquid to separate egg white lumps in order to produce a smooth filling for the tarts.
6.   Finally, pour the liquid into the pastry crusts.
7.   Bake for 45 minutes.

This recipe can produce around 53 pieces of egg tarts. You may also decrease the quantity of each ingredient to suit the amount of egg tarts you desire.

Homemade Healthy Bun !!

Hello….food lovers! What comes to your mind when talking about Buns? Oh… to me, that’s one of my favorite food, either steamed or fried. Hoho…as I know more and more variations of bun fillings have been produced recently, such as red bean paste, minced pork, and even cheese, chocolate, custard cream, and many more. Those fillings surely enhance the flavor of buns! Thinking about those warm buns starts making me hungry ^^

Buns can be modified too. Besides the fillings, the bun’s skin can be made into many styles and flavors as well! This time let me show you one type of steamed bun that my mom had made. Indeed I did not forget to preserve the look with camera.  

They look yummy, don’t they? Perhaps you might think why they’re all yellow? Did my mom use food-coloring? Hahahaha…. No artificial coloring had been used during the making of these buns. Instead, my mom used pumpkin to create the color of the buns! Yes…Pumpkin! What’s more, pumpkin adds more nutrition into the food! It is a good source of fibers, vitamin A, C, E, and minerals, including magnesium, calcium, and iron!

Well, this is how she made it. First, she steamed pumpkin chunks and mashed them, then mixed it together with the other common ingredients for making buns, like flour, sugar, water, yeast, etc.

And these were the result….

Steamed Pumpkin Buns

Broccoli...oh Broccoli...

Hello! It's just so exciting to have time for blog update!

There are two stories about broccoli that I’d love to share with you, dear blog visitor! :)

Yup, this vegetable has created different effect on people whom I know. I suppose most of us love it, right? It surely has good taste, texture, and nutrition. However, my private teacher dislikes it, or in other words, fears it. How’s that? 

At first, everything was normal until one day; her sister bought some cheap broccoli from the market. Maybe because they were sold in a low price, they were no longer fresh. The seller then sprayed the broccolis with much pesticides and chemicals to retain the color. Attracted by the price, her sister brought them home and cooked the broccolis for her family. Poor Ms. Tan, my private teacher, and all her family members. Not long after eating that plate of broccolis, they rushed to the toilet because of food poisoning. From that on, they no longer eat this vegetable anymore.  

That is the first story about broccoli. Even though Ms. Tan had encountered such trouble, it does not affect my family’s interest in this vegetable, especially my father. He is an ultimate broccoli lover! Of course there is a reason for that. 

One day, my father went to Jakarta for business. Afterwards, he decided to have lunch in a local restaurant. There he ordered a plate of sautéed broccoli. It was simply cooked with garlic and a little cooking oil.  When the bill had finally come, he was so astonished to see the price of that plate of broccoli. It was too high! Later on, my father, who seldom goes to the market, found out that the real market price for broccoli was not even half of the price of that plate of broccoli! Moreover, my mom had ever explained to him about the goodness of this vegetable. From that on, he often buys 8 until 10 kilograms of broccolis for a week! You know, I’m almost fed up with eating the same vegetable for a whole week, hahahaha…

Well, I have some tips to help you neutralize the effect of pesticides on the vegetable :

First, cut off all heads of broccoli into pieces.

Second, prepare some water that is enough to wash the vegetable.

Third, stir in a teaspoon of salt into the water. Then, soak the broccoli in the liquid for around 15 minutes. Don’t forget to clean (rub gently) the stems to help reduce pesticides. Salt contained in the water is effective to dissolve the pesticide on the surface of vegetable.

Finally, drain them and rinse once more with clean water.

Now, you can cook without worry! :)

By the way, I’d captured a picture of a plate of this boiled vegetable served on our dining table, and this is it!

How I was mesmerized...

Hello my blog visitor!

Nice to meet you all! This is my second blog besides this one. Well, to me, this blog is indeed as special as the previous one but here you will find out something that I adore very much lately. It's photography. I can't recall when exactly this began to attract me but now I’m completely captivated by it. It becomes one of my interests that I usually do if I have spare times. I am always keen to dig into any information related to photography. However, it is only my hobby since my dream job is not in that field (though I wish I can get some extra income from it too  :P )   

I am still an amateur, equipped with only a simple pocket camera, but I have the same passion as those professionals! HAHAHAHA…. ^^

As what I know, there are some branches of photography, i.e.: landscape photography, fashion photography, food photography, and stage photography. I myself have fallen in love with one of them that is Food Photography. 

How’s that? 

One day, when I was toying with my pocket camera, my mom came from the kitchen with freshly cooked beef tomato spaghetti. I was attracted by combination of colors on the plate. At once, I captured the cooking with my camera and…voila!

Homemade Beef Tomato Spaghetti

I was mesmerized by the result! I was excited at how the tastiness of food could be preserved and stand out with just a single click. Since then, I am so enthusiastic in Food Photography. 

 Here, in this blog I’ll begin posting mouth-watering photos and I hope they can raise your appetite too! Most of them have been simply edited with photo-editing application. I will also include some recipes for you who love cooking. Truly hope you’re always happy to visit my blog!