Rice Cooker Bread (Sunday Project?)

after lastweek sucess in making doughnuts, i embark on a new project to bake rice cooker bread 
i got the recipe from here 
http://www.wikihow.com/Make-Rice-Cooker-Bread

(actually, i ran out of spegetti, rice and …and all i have in my storage is the ingredient left from the doughnut :p )

see how they turn out to be! nice, rite? Too bad i put too much of salt, so it taste a bit funny 
i’m using them to make french-toast for my breakfast anyhow.

Awesome Japanese Trains

I was surfing yesterday an stumble upon a cute photoblog showing some interesting photos of a special Japanese train.

The first train is designed primarily for the benefit of the kids. It encompasses the whole playground equipped specifically to justify all their needs. The second one is also nice due to its unique strawberry design.

Take a look!

My 1st Doughnut

Last Saturday i made some doughnuts and it was a success! (huhu…so proud of myself)

I got the recipe from my “baking Mentor” :p
here’s the list of ingredient:
Ingredients for dough
350g flour
half teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon instant yeast
30g castor sugar
30g butter
1 egg
150ml milk

Ingredient for coating
castor sugar OR
1 chocholate bar + half can of condensed milk (water heat)

Instructions
(1) heat 150ml of milk till luke warm (not boil)
(2) mix milk, 30g butter, 1 egg
(3) add in flour, salt, sugar and yeast
(4) leave the dough at room temperature for 1 hour, cover with damn cloth
(5) fry it and add sugar/chocolate coating

Anyway, i don’t have proper measuring instruments for the ingredients so i improvise and modified the recipe a bit.

Here’s what i used:
600g flour
1/3 tablespoon of salt
1 packet of instant yeast (suitable for 500g of flour, so said the lable)
2 tablespoon of castor sugar
60g butter
2 eggs
2 cup of milk (with my new nescafe cup)

After mixing the dough ingredients in my pot, the mixture turn out to be too liquid. It is somewhat like “pisang goreng” mixture. So, i consulted my Mentor and she said i have to add more flour. So, i slowly fold in more flour. After adding another 300g of flour, the mixture finally form a soft dough. Instead of using my hands, i used the wooden spatula to knit it a lil’ more. Then i left it for some time so that the dough will raise.
…and after 50 mins….alas! my dough is raised and ready to be shaped and fried.

At first i have no idea how big i need to shape it. However, after some experimentation, i finally got it right! The secret for a perfectly cooked doughnut is not to make a round (cross-section) dough ring with small cross-section diameter. Instead, make it FLAT! In such way, u can make bigger doughnuts!

Next, down it goes into the frying pot. Nothing special here, but it is important to note that the dough expand less after some time. So take as little time as possible between start of dough shaping till it is in the frying pot.

After the tedious task of frying the doughnut one by one, i finally came to the point to coat it. Originally, i wanted to make 4 different types of coating: classic sugar coat, cinnamon sugar coat, apple struddle sugar flavour, and chocolate. In the end, out of laziness, i mixed cinnamon, apple struddle flavour and sugar as 1 coating :p still, the result taste superb 
(though i lost my appetite for it since i had to eat quite a few failed experiment samples :p)

Since i couldn’t have finish all the doughnuts i made, i gave them to my friends. Of course, the feedback is positive.

冬至(winter solstice )

冬至 is an important day in chinese culture. By tradition, we eat 湯圓 (tang yuen) !!

talking about 湯圓, i’ve always thought that they are somewhat too plain to be nice. Mom used to make these simple small glutinous balls with a simple caramel sauce. I am not a big fan 湯圓 myself, but i’ve always eaten it during winter solstice (No second helping though).

NB: large 湯圓 is a big “no no” for me :p i remembered grandma used to make them. They are plain balss without fillings!!! i can still recall how traumatizing it is to yank it down my throat… i think i choke a couple of time trying :p

These few years, i’m away studying in Moscow, so i didnt celebrate 冬至 . Anyhow, some friends do celebrate them and i saw them making 湯圓 with peanut fillings. Never realised it can be made that way (shame to call myself a chinese now).

2 years back, i travellled to HongKong, and there, the 1st time i actually enjoyed eating 湯圓 . They serve it cold with creamy mango ice-cream. Everything just RIGHT!

This saturday will be 冬至 again. So happens that the x’mas bash charity concert will be on the same date…so i supposed that i will be celebrating without 湯圓. (Yeap, 1st Malaysian Idol winner Miss Jaclyn Victor will be performing! Cool, no?)