April 07, 2014

A weekend full of cooking activities

Last weekend was full of cooking activities. It started on Friday nite where I made the congo bars. Actually I have invited some of my usrah friends to come to my house on Saturday afternoon. So I made the congo bars ahead of time.

On Saturday, I cooked Sheperds pie and fried macaroni for tea. I made some adjustment to the mashed potato because i remembered the last time I made this, my Sheperds pie splitted into two when cut - the potato layer and the filling, because the mashed potato is a little bit hard. So this time, I added some fresh milk and butter when I mashed them. And this time, I am using chicken instead of beef. Save you a lot of time. (If beef, I need to rebus until tender). The end result is still yummilicious. And the better texture of the mashed potato topping made it even more yummier. Hmmm.. I loved it!



The 2nd dish I made was the fried macaroni. Macaroni is the trick for small kids! They love macaroni. Just a simple recipe. Boil the macaroni until tender. Blend some onion, garlic and anchovies. Saute them, put in some crab stick, fresh mushroom and diced green pepper. Put in the macaroni. Add whisked egg. Put some salt, pepper and mixed herbs. Voila! And as expected, it was a hit to the small kids! and the kids' mama too. Hehe.

While I was busy preparing Sheperds pie and fried macaroni, Maisara insisted that she wanted to make congo bar cookies, a type of biscuit using congo bar recipe which Humaira and Maisara had made it a few times already. I did not really like it though so I said to Maisara to make a real cookies. So I showed her a recipe in the internet which I have been eyeing for quite some time but haven't really make the effort to try it. It was a very simple recipes but it actually turned out real good! Yes, Maisara and Humaira made them themselves but with my supervision. Everybody loves it! And Humaira and Maisara had started talking about their business plan. Hehe..



On Sunday, Luqman made me do some homemade apam balik. He is a fan of apam balik. He has been nagging me to make this since I told him that I have found an apam balik recipes last week. I already bought the ingredients but haven't found a suitable time to try it until yesterday. So since the family ate quite an early lunch yesterday (because they have Akademi Bolasepak Sutera and came home very hungry or should I say, starved!), I made the apam balik at around 3pm. Wow, the recipes is definitely a keeper. I didn't know that making apam balik is this easy. Hehehe.. And delicious and soft and I can put corn cream and nuts as much as I want. But next time I need to double the recipes, not enough for our big family heheh... 



At 5.30pm, Maisara complained that she was hungry. What! Just ate tea and now you are hungry again! Hahaha.. I scanned through the fridge and saw a bowl of macaroni which I have boiled yesterday but I purposely left some. Mac n cheese it is!  I take out 3 crab sticks, about 1 cup fresh milk, a spoon of butter, a spoon of flour and 2  cheese slice. Melt butter, saute flour using whisker until brownish, add fresh milk. Stir for some time, add sliced crab stick, put in cheese until melted, put in macaroni. Add some salt, pepper and mixed herbs. Mix and stir. Taraaa... Hmm... makan lagi... And I am very happy because Aqil ate a lot of it. Aqil please put some weight! huhu...

Well other than these, of course I also cooked for lunch and dinner - asam pedas ikan senangin for Saturday, ayam masak kicap for Sunday lunch and chicken soup for Sunday dinner. There is nothing can replace the feeling when I cooked for my own family. I usually take the effort to really cook on weekends because on weekdays, I pass the cooking task to my maid. And the most important thing is my kids love my cooking. Yippee!!

p/s - recipes for cookies and apam balik coming soon....

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