Baba ganoush

Ate Baba Ganoush at Ataturk (a pretty good restaurant on Bussorah Street). Decided to try to replicate it. Unfortunately, doesn't taste like that version, but still decent quality.

If I were to make it next time, I'd use slightly less tahini and raw garlic to bring out eggplant taste more. When refridgerated, the raw garlic intensified. The tahini added a bit too much sesame taste to it - leading one consumer to say "I thought this was hummus" (another taster said she hated eggplant normally by implication saying the eggplant wasn't obvious.... uh ... ).

Used the recipe from : http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2014/02/the-best-baba-ganoush-recipe.html

Ekmek Bread

Made some ekmek bread using this recipe :
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/21106/ekmek-turkish-bread/

Works well. No completed product pic coz I forgot to take it, but it tastes good, with a mild sourdough taste. Served it to classmates in my leadership & teamwork class and they liked it.

The starter used in the recipe needs a modified instruction for our hot and humid climate (triangulated by searching for starter techniques in hot climates). You can feed the starter every half day, not one day. This means starting at the evening of the 1st day and ready to start on the bread on the morning of the 3rd day.

The starter was bubbling on the 3rd day and smelled weird, almost like old socks. But a search of the internet showed that starter can have strong, weird smells.

Beef Stew and my fav tomato sauce recipe

This marries my favourite tomato sauce recipe found at

http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2014/09/the-best-slow-cooked-italian-american-tomato-sauce-red-sauce-recipe.html

With beef.

essentially, brown some bacon. Take out the bacon, then brown the beef. Then for the rest of the way, use the tomato sauce recipe. I also added a cup of syrah (may not have been necessary).

Live Prawns are devilishly hard to peel

This is not a metaphor or some s**t. I found out the hard way.

Chanced on a NTUC Income selling live prawns, so I bought some. Some of these prawns were still alive when I got home. Heck, some of them were still moving after I cut the heads off.

I'm not a tyro at this. I've separated my fair share of prawn meat and shell. But man, the meat on these prawns stuck on the shell like velcro. After some huffing and puffing, I had to give up on having nicely non-mangled prawn flesh - gotta find some way to disguise them tomorrow.

This must be a reason why restaurants serving fresh prawn dishes never take off the shell. (the other reason being that the shell itself should be a thermal shield mediating the heat cooking the prawn).

Live and learn.

Homemade Yoghurt

The ordinary yoghurt we bought in the supermarket in Harbin was superior to the yoghurt we get here. So I decided to see if homemade yoghurt can replicate the effect.

To do this, need some yoghurt with live culture (you are going to provide the medium to grow the bacteria). You are supposed to start off with store bought yoghurt, but once you make your yoghurt, you can use that as a starter. 1 portion by weight of live culture yoghurt can be used to 20 portions of milk to make yoghurt.

Basic model
1. 25g of yoghurt with live culture. 500g of milk.
2. Bring the milk to a 82C temp in a pot. Stir the milk to make sure its the same temp throughout.
3. Let it cool till about 43C.
4. Spoon some of the cooled milk out to the yoghurt and break up the yoghurt with a spoon.
5. Pour the yoghurt/milk mixture back into the main body of milk. Mix it.
6. Heat the mixture to 42C for 7 hours.
7. Refridgerate to let it set. 24 hours seems to be better.

Result: the texture is good and creamy. But slightly acidic to my taste. I added about 3-4 tablespoons of honey and mixed it in. Tastes pretty good for a first try. 

Good for breakfast with fruit and spelt cake. But also good with toasted pine nuts in a shot glass, as a after dinner dessert.

Seems to me this can go 2 ways going forward. I can experiment with adding in the additional ingredients in the beginning. And I can experiment with adding heavy cream, for the fat. Also, there's a possibility of turning this into an ice cream.

In a shot glass with toasted pine nuts on top. The pine nuts lend texture, and a long finish at the back of the tongue

The break in the surface is due to me testing its texture before I took the pic.

Not all yohurt comes with this. Also apparently the more types of bacteria the better for the starter.

Seafood soup

Done it before, but this version seems nicer, so documenting it.

1. about 600g of shells (half prawn, half crayfish). 5 garlic cloves (diced). 1 medium onion (diced). 1 small leek (diced). sprigs of thyme. Brandy. Teaspoon of dried fennel. Tablespoon tomato paste. 1 cup of homemade tomato sauce. 1 lime leaf (Kaffir). 1 teaspoon gelatine. half teaspoon fermented fish sauce.
2. Pour a couple of tablespoons of oil and saute onions and leeks with the fennel until fragrant and almost translucent. Add in garlic and saute about a minute or two more.
3. Turn heat to high, put shells in pot. Saute until shells turn pink and there's a heady fragrance coming from the pot.
4. Add in tomato paste, stir it in and mix well. Saute for tomato paste to caramelise.
5. Pour in brandy - maybe a tablespoon or to taste.
6. Add in tomato sauce, thyme, fish sauce and lime leaf. Pour in enough water to cover the shells.
7. Bring to boil. Turn down heat, cover, and simmer for 40 mins.
8. Strain soup to remove solids.

To use the seafood soup as in pic, boil soup. When boiling, individually cook seafood till just done. Serve with soup separate, or pour warm (not boiling) soup back over seafood. Alternatively (and I'm going to try this next), use the seafood soup for a steamboat.

Back to basics: the (almost) no fuss french baguette

To make a really great french baguette takes great painstaking care. Probably a less humid climate also helps 8-).  I don't think I want to do that.

I'd like to make a good enough baguette (better than the average I can purchase) with no undue fuss. The result is quite tasty, but the crust texture is still not to my satisfaction. On another occasion, I shall sacrifice my baguette to science and try baking longer and leaving the step 12 to be longer as well.

I haven't made one in a long time, so I'm doing it again.This variation is for 1 medium baguette. Scale appropriately.

1. Bread flour 200g (2/3 AP, 1/3 bread flour), salt 4-5g, yeast 2-3g, room temp water 140g (70% hydration). 
2. Make a well in the bowl and pour water and then the yeast. Gently mix the yeast into the water, then slowly incorporate the flour with a spatula. For larger amounts, use a mixer, but do not overmix.
3. Let the dough stand for 60 mins. Then cover and refridgerate (spritz water to keep it moist) overnight.
4. Take out dough and let it stand for 2-3 hours depending on weather.
5. Tip out dough. Gently stretch and fold for a bit. Then for a final stretch and fold and shape the dough.
6. Leave the dough to prove a 2nd time for about 60-90 mins (depending on weather). Keep the dough moist.
7. preheat oven to 250C. 
8. Just before putting in dough, slash the dough, throw a few ice cubes into the bottom tray and start steam injection for highest level.
9. Put in dough and bake for 10 mins with steam.
10. Put temp control to 190C, turn off steam injection and open the oven door for 30-40 secs.
11. Close the oven door and continue baking until well browned.
12. Open the oven door, turn off oven and leave the bread in the oven to continue to develop the crust.