The Microcosmic Space

2007-11-25T00:12:00.000-08:00

New York Cheesecake

(this recipe has been modified from http://allrecipes.com on Chantal's New York Cheesecake)

Ingredients:
2 packs of crackers (30 pieces altogehter), crushed
4 tablespoons butter, melted
2 packages cream cheese (250g/each)
1 1/2 cups white sugar
3 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
100g cream
Fresh strawberries
Almond Flakes
Chocolate sauce

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C. Grease springform pan
2. Mix crushed cracker with melted butter. Press onto bottom of springform pan.
3. Mix cream cheese with sugar until smooth. Blend in milk, and then mix in the eggs one at a time, mixing just enough to incorporate. Mix in sour cream, vanilla and flour until smooth. Pour filling into prepared crust.
4. Bake in prehated oven for 1 hour. Turn the oven off, and let cake cool in oven with the door closed for 5 - 6 hours; this prevents cracking. Chill in regrigerator.
5. Serve with cream, fresh strawberries and chocolate sauce.

2007-11-23T03:46:00.001-08:00

Linguine with Salmon....

I haven't cooked for such a long time since I came back to Thailand so I decided to use the opportunity of having no parents and brother at home to cook!!! Actually, despite of the need to cook is also boredom that drives me to do so. I will have the whole house for myself for the next two days. Living in a big house by yourself is driving me nut. Anyhow, I woke up early *surprises* and took off for a grocery shopping with a little bit of shopping window as well...hahahaha.. it's a girl thing you know! The traffic wasn't that bad when I went to Siam Paragon and so was the way back, yet I felt so terribly sorry to those people on the opposite lanes... you can do the math right.. suffer people suffer...

I got home with my growling stomach, pretty loudly and scary actually. My initial plan was to go there and get some ingredients for New York Cheesecake and Laksa and probably I'd grab some lunch from there. After a short reminiscing, I totally forgot about my big pack of linguine in which I bought AGES ago and planned to cook a nice dish for my mom. Oh well, today no mom but I still have my big stomach to feed. Add more things to my shopping lists, salmon, cream and Italian seasoning. It didn't take me long to cook the sauce but the most painful part was waiting for the linguine to be cooked. However, the outcome turned out extraordinary... yes I need to use that word because it really did okay! Oh well I guess you just have to try but please give me a yell before you do come or else my guard will beat the crap out of you cuz you come at the wrong time...hahahha... why am I talking so much shits today! well blame it on my boredom...

The sauce itself is pretty simple, on a hot pan sauce, you just add tomato can sauce with a wee bit of soy sauce and cream then add salmon. Easy and simple as that. I think it's faster than fried rice but please don't count the cooking time for the linguine. Overall, it was a really nice dish, fast and easy to cook but make sure you get fresh salmon like I did...yum!

Tomorrow is New York Cheesecake and the following day will be LAKSA..yum... Time flies but sometimes I wish I could fly faster. I'm so hard to please huh! oh well what to do.. LIVE WITH IT PEOPLE!!!

2007-02-08T05:58:00.000-08:00

Baked Apple Mustard Pork Chops with Mushroom Sauce.

My last updated recipe was in October 2006..that was a big while ago. Oh well at least I moved my lazy bum to overhaul a new recipe this time. It's nothing ultra special except that I changed from Beef to Pork (my mom doesn't eat beef so yeah). Anyway, as usual..easy and doesn't take long to prepare/cook. Please note that for the sauce, it's the same method as 'Sneeze Beef' recipe except that I added in 5 button mushroom and changed from beef stock to vegetable stock.

Baked Apple Mustard Pork Chops Ingredients:

Pork chops 4
Salt 2 tea sp
Pepper 3 tea sp
Apple 3, halved cored
Sugar 2 tea sp
Mustard Seed 1 tb sp

Place pork chops on a baking tray, sprinkle salt and pepper all over the meats. Place apple on the top and the bottom of each meat, sprinkle sugar and mustard seed on top of apple. Bake for 45 minutes under the heat of 200 degree celsius. Pour mushroom sauce over pork chops. Serve with fresh salad and chips.

2006-09-17T05:15:00.000-07:00

Deep fried Pork Chop rice

Ingredients:
Trim pork 3 pieces
Oyster sauce 1 tablespoon
Sugar 1 teaspoon
Fish sauce 1 teaspoon
Pepper
All-purpose flour
cold water
Vegetable oil

In a medium bowl, mix oyster sauce, sugar, fish sauce and pepper. Marinate the sauce with trim pork then leave in the fridge for an hour.

Put vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Mix the all-purpose flour with cold water (2:1). Dip the pork to the mixed flour, cook in the vegetable oil until both sides are golden brown. Cut the pork into a bite size. Serve with hot jasmine rice and miso soup.

What you see on the top is stir fry vegetable with satay sauce. It's pretty simple to cook. I used the left over vegetable oil from cooking deep fried pork chop. Put broccoli and carrot in a medium heat pan with vegetable oil. Add in fish sauce, sugar and a little bit of water. Stir fry until the vegetables are cooked, add satay sauce in. Serve with hot jasmine rice.

2006-09-17T02:47:00.000-07:00

Crunchy French Toast

This particular french toast recipe is a wee bit different from the normal french toast that you get from restaurants. It has home-made sense in it, not something posh or highly valued on presentation. If you have visited my blog 'princess of darkness', you would know that I love french toast so much. I actually don't mind having french toast even it's dinner time.

Okay, let's make this crunchy french toast.

Ingredients:
Egg 1
Cinnamon ground 1/2 teaspoon
Vanilla extract 1/2 teaspoon
Sugar 1/2 teaspoon
Milk 2 1/2 tablespoon
Wholemeal bread 5 slices
Cornflakes 2 handfuls
Vegetable oil 1 cup
Maple syrup
Chicken Rasher (optional)

In a medium bowl, beat egg, milk, cinnamon ground and vanilla until blended. Put vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Place corn flake crumbs in a shallow dish or bowl.

Cut each slice of breads into half (if you like bread crum leave it but if you don't just get rid of it). Dip each bread slice into egg mixture and then dip into corn flake crumbs.

Cook in vegetable oil skillet until both sides are golden brown. Serve with your favorite syrup and fruits (in my case, I usually serve with fuji apple, strawberry and of course banana). In addition, this morning i wanted to eat bacon so I cooked chicken rasher (which has the same taste as bacon) and add that to my french toast dish.

2006-08-05T22:22:00.000-07:00

Chilli fetta and smoked hot pork crostini, Bacon-wrapped pork fillet with caramelised apple

Feel like having classy appetizers? It's no harm having a luxury hors d'oeuvre once in awhile and since this might be my last birthday party in ChCh so I might as well give my starter dish a special touch. Let's begin with Chilli fetta and smoked hot pork crostini.

Ingredients:
Crostini 10
Fetta cheese
Chilli flakes 1/2 tea spoon
Lemon basil leaves 10
Lemon juice 1 teaspoon
Olive oil 1 1/2 teaspoon
Craked pepper
Smoked hot pork 5, halved
Serving: 10

To make crostini, buy one loaf sourdough bread, slice into 12 slices, brush with olive oil and cook on a preheated char-grilled pan for 2 minutes each side or until golden brown. Cut the fetta into 10 slices and place in a bowl with the the lemon juice, chilli flakes, lemon basil leaves, oil and pepper. Gently toss to combine. Heat a pan over high heat, cook smoked hot pork for 30 seconds each side or until crispy. Layer the crostini with the smoked pork, fetta and basil leaves.

Chicken rasher-wrapped pork fillet with caramelised apple.

Ingredients:
Pork fillets 150 g, trimmed and halved
Garlic cloves, crushed 2
Seeded mastard 1 tablespoons
Olive oil 1 tablespoon
Salt and cracked pepper
Red apples 2, cored and sliced
Brown sugar 1 tablespoon
Chicken rasher 10
(you can also use bacon, the reason i used chicken rasher cuz it tastes almost exactly like bacon but less fat)
Serving: 10

Preheat the oven to 180 degree celsius. Place the pork, garlic, mastard, oil, salt and pepper in a bowl and toss to coat. Set aside.
Place the apple on a baking tray lined with baking paper and sprinkle with the sugar. Wrap each piece of pork with the chicken rasher and place on top of the apple. Roast for 30 minutes or until the pork is cooked through and the apples are caramelised.

It's party time!

2006-07-25T04:08:00.001-07:00

Oreo Cheesecake

I totally forgot to post this recipe yesterday due to something which I can't quite remember. Anyway, let me tell you that this recipe is not as hard as it sounds. As the matter of fact, it's pretty darn easy but the most annoying part about this recipe is you have to wait for awhile before you can taste one of the most delicious cheesecakes. Okay stop babbling yattering..here is how the recipe

Ingredients: (serving 6 people)

OREO Creme Chocolate Sandwich cookies: 16
Philadelphia Cream Cheese, light: 2 pkg (250g each)
Sugar: 1/2 cup
Vanilla extract: 1/2 tsp
Baking Chocolate, melted: 4 square
Eggs: 2

Preparation:

Quarter 10 of thecookies; set aside. Finely crush remaining 6 cookies. Press firmly onto bottom of greased springform pan. Bake at 160 degree celsius for 10 minutes.

Beat cream cheese, sugar and vanilla with electric mixer on medium speed until well blended. Add chocolate, mix well. Add eggs one at a time, mixing on low speed after each addition just until blended. Chuck in the quatered cookies then pour over crust.

Bake at 160 degree celsius for 50 minutes or until center is almost set. Run knife or metal spatula around rim of pan to loosen cake, cool before removing rim of pan. Refrigerate 4 hours or overnight (the most annoying part).

2006-07-23T03:22:00.000-07:00

Talking about cooking is not fun but when you put your hands on it, that's when the fun begins. I haven't been cooking for a wee while probably because of the tight schedule in a past few weeks or maybe just too lazy. My boyfriend came over for dinner so I was planning to cook something nice for him since he's been such a nice boyfriend to me lately. However, I usually give myself at least 30 minutes for the preparation when I cook but today I only had 10 minutes maximum because I was too busy doing my fine art work at university. I could cook him an instant noodle and add some pieces of meat and eggs in it but then he probably tell me that he could do that at home. So I used left over steak from last night, cream and again left over rice from last night. So here is the recipe:

Ingredients:
Rump steak 2 pieces cooked
Peppercorns cracked 1 tablespoon
Cream 2 ounce
Italian herbs 1 tsp
White wine 2 ounce (*optional)
Beef stock 4 ounce

Heat the saucepan on medium heat, add beef stock, white wine and cream stir. Add peppercorn and salt then stir. Finally add in rump steak and Italian herbs, serve with nice, hot jasmine rice.

See it's simple and easy and most importantly it's YUMMY.

*P.S. The sauce in this recipe is pretty similar to the pepper sauce from 'Seeze beef' recipe except this one doesn't have onion in it.

2006-07-01T03:32:00.000-07:00

Sneeze beef

I haven't had a steak for a long long time, the reason for that is I try to avoid eating beef. However, last night I had in mind that I want to cook steak for today's dinner. I actually made a right choice to cook steak as the taste of fillet steak with pepper sauce didn't disappoint me at all. Here is what you need:

3 pieces of steak
Olive oil for brushing
2 teapoons salt
1 tablespoon cracked black pepper

Pepper sauce
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 brown onion, chopped
2 tablespoons peppercorns, cracked
1 cup beef stock
1/4 cup white wine
1 1/4 cups cream
Serving: 2-3

To make the pepper sauce, heat a saucepan over medium heat. Add the oil, onion and peppercorns and cook for 2 minutes. Add the stock and wine and cook for 3-4 minutes. Add the cream and cook for 2 minutes or until thickened. Drained out the onion and set aside and keep warm.
Pat the steaks dry with absorben paper towels. Brush with the oil and sprinkle evenly with the salt and pepper. Heat a non-stick frying pan over high heat. Add the steaks and cook for 3 minutes on each side for medium-rare or until cooked to your liking. (Thanks Donna Hay for this recipe)

Hmm..This one is a bit rare :P

2006-07-01T03:17:00.000-07:00

Sweet like chocolate...or maybe caramel

Last night, I printed out Caramel Peacan Choc Brownies recipe by accidently. So I decided to try this recipe while I was cleaning up my kitchen. hehehe. Okay here is what you need:

150 g butter, melted
1/2 cup Baking Cocoa
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup self-raising flour
1/2 cup pecan nuts, chopped
3/4 cup Caramel
Serving: 8

Really simple and darn easy to bake. First of all preheat your oven 180 degree celsius. Grease and line a lamington pan (in this case, I used cake tray because I don't have lamington pan). Combine butter and Baking Cocoa, add eggs, sugar, vanilla and sifted flour, mix well, stir in pecan nuts. Pour mixture into pan. Spoon Caramel onto brownie mixture, swirl through. Bake for 35 minutes until cooked when tested, turn out to cool on wire rack. Cut into squares to serve. (Thanks to Nestle Baking website)

Melted caremel...yum :)

2006-06-25T20:31:00.000-07:00

By the way, I have another recipe in my other blog. Chicken and Cheese sandwich. If you want to check it out just click on this link http://princessof-darkness.blogspot.com/2006/06/welcome-to-my-kitchen-part2.html

Enjoy

2006-06-25T06:19:00.000-07:00

Cup Cake Time!!!

Recipe: Chocolate cup cake

Ingredients: Cooking Chocolate 200g
Butter 200g
Brown Sugar 1 cup
Eggs 2
Flour 1 cup
Baking powder 1/4 teaspoon
Vanilla Extract 1 teaspoon
Cocoa powder for dusting

Instruction: Preheat oven to 150 degree celsius. Put butter and cooking chocolate into a pot and heat in on low on cooking element until both ingredients are completely metled. Add butter/chocolate, brown sugar, vanila extract, and eggs together and stir to combine. Mix those ingredients with flour and baking powder after that pour into cup cake containers. Bake for 45 minutes. Let it cool down then sprinkle over cocoa powder.

I didn't have time to decorate nor sprinkle cocoa powder over those cup cakes but it's pretty easy. I actually was thinking about using ribbons tighting around cup cakes but it's quite a waste unless I'm gonna give these cup cakes as a gift to my friends. Opps, I better get going. Enjoy.

2006-06-23T03:59:00.000-07:00

A big cup of hot chocolate with grill mashmellows used to be number 1 of my top 5 favourite drinks and deserts for cold days. However, the declination of hot chocolate and mashmellows has arrived. Now my most favourite drink and desert is Chocolate bread and butter puddings with a warm honey lemon water. Why? The reason is pretty simple because it's filling and more tasty. Also, when you have a mouth full of butter pudding then following by a zip of warm honey lemon water, it's heavenly. It's pretty darn easy to bake as well and no need to mention about warm honey lemon water. You just get a cup of warm water then add in honey and a few drops of lemon juice.

Back to Chocolate bread and butter puddings. I'm the kind of person who don't really like to follow the instruction from recipe books. Why? Maybe because I find that it's against my will..hahaha..nah recipe book for me is like a tour map. You only look at it when you get lost. Okay I'm babbling too much, here is what you need: 4 slices of vienna bread, crusts removed. 25 grams of butter, softened. 50 grams of cooking chocolate, finely chopped or you can break them into small blocks. 1 egg, 1/2 cup sugar, 1/2 cup of cream, 1/2 cup of milk, half of teapoon vanilla extract and Cocoa powder for dusting. Serves 2.

Preheat the oven to 180 degree celsius. Butter the bread slices and layer. Firstly, get a cup which is ovenproof then lay down the first bread slice follow by chocolate. Secondly, put another slice of bread over the chocolate. Now, place an egg and sugar in a bowl and beat well, add the cream, milk and vanilla and mix well. Subsequently, slowly pour over the puddings, allowing it to soak into the bread. Lastly, place the cups in a baking dish and pour in enough boiling water to come half way to the side of the cups (not in the cups okay!). Bake for 30 minutes or until golden and set. Let it cool down and dust over cocoa powder.

It might sound complicated but once you have your hands on it. It's pretty easy. I always tell my friends that 'if I can do it, you can do it'. You won't know til you try.

2006-06-22T22:10:00.000-07:00

This blog is all about food. So if you have any good recipes...please do not hesitate to share them with me.