Grass Jelly Drink

I can feel the heat and spirit of summer. My son loves to play outside *Of course after months playing inside the house during winter time* One day he played ball and bubbles excitedly. He might want to be a soccer player ^_^.

On a hot and sunny day, usually I need something cooling and refreshing.

Grass Jelly with ice cube and palm sugar syrup with Pandan Leaves flavor is very satisfying for me.

Grass jelly is made by boiling the aged and slightly oxidized stalks and leaves of Mesona chinensis^[1][2] (member of the mint family) with potassium carbonate for several hours with a little starch and then cooling the liquid to a jelly-like consistency.^[1][3] This jelly can be cut into cubes or other forms, and then mixed with syrup to produce a drink or dessert thought to have cooling (yin) properties, which makes it typically consumed during hot weather. The jelly itself has a slight bitter taste, a light iodine lavender flavor, and is a translucent black. It can also be mixed with soy milk to produce a milky white liquid with black strands in it. (Source : Wikipedia)

Ingredients :

1 can grass Jelly, cut into small cubes

Syrup :

6 tbsp of sugar

125 grams of palm sugar

2 pandan leaves

Water

Method:

Prepare the syrup by dissolve sugar into boiling water (eye ball the amount of water), and also put pandan leaves into the mixture. Let it cool.

Mix grass jelly with the syrup, add ice cube or crushed ice.

Colorful Rum Ball

Last Monday we went to Hampton Beach to see Sand Sculpture Exhibition. On the way to the beach there were some stores who sell colorful summer dresses. They displayed the dresses near the road. They hung the mannequin along their deck. I just loved the color. It looks so festive.

Inspired by their festivity...I remember my colorful chocolate sprinkle (meises Ceres from Indonesia). I've planned to make rum ball to use left over whipped cream that will be expired soon. I use colorful sprinkle instead of regular chocolate sprinkle.

INGREDIENTS :

Any cake (yellow cake, or chocolate cake)

whipped cream

chocolate chips

rum

METHOD :

1. Crush all the cake using food processor until it become powdery. Set aside.

2. Make ganache : 1:1( whipped cream : chocolate chips) : Heat them in microwave, 30 seconds and stir, repeat this step until all melted and blended.

3. Mix no.1 with ganache and rum, using food processor until they become like dough and easy to be formed. Just eye ball the amount of ganache you'll use.

4. Form the mixture into small ball ( 1 tbs), roll into chocolate sprinkle. Put the ball in paper cup. Put in the fridge 1-2 hours to make it firm.

Banjir Dessert di Hari Ulang Tahun

I couldn't believe, I got so many dessert on my birthday...

Thank you everyone for your caring and thought. I can feel them while enjoying the food. It is good also to have friends and relatives who came to my house so I didn't enjoy them alone. I only make Tiramisu and Sweet rice porridge. I got two Oreo Ice Cream Cakes...^_^ oh my...They ruins my diet he.he..he..

Bolu Gulung (Roll Cake with fruits and cream)...

Lapis Buah (Layer Cake with fruits)

Wajid (Sweet rice cake and palm sugar)

My Tiramisu

Sweet Rice with Jackfruit and Toddy Palm

Btw, on Sunday, people in my church brought so many food for us for dinner...Unfortunately I didn't take the pics...Thanks again for all :-) You've made my day...

Sweet Rice Porridge with Jackfruit & Toddy Palm

I learned making this Cambodian dessert from my friend at aerobic class 3 years ago. It's super easy but delicious, suitable for serving a crowd. I brought this dessert last saturday when I visited my friend at Swanzey NH, 2 hours driving from my house. It was fun, making new friends, enjoying delicious food together.

INGRIDIENTS :

3 cups sweet rice --- soak in water 2 hours or more

2 cans of coconut milk

water

sugar

salt

Pandan leaves 2-3

2 cans of Toddy Palm and Jackfruit

METHOD :

1. Cook sweet rice, coconut milk, pandan leaves and water ( I used 6 quart pan, it's about 3/4 pan). Cook until soft, stir occasionally so the rice will not be sticky on the bottom of the pan.

2. Add sugar and a pinch of salt. Taste , adjust according to your preference.

3. Drain the syrup from Toddy palm and Jackfruit can. Pour out the fruits on top of the porridge.

4. Serve it warm or cool. I prefer cool porridge...yummm....

Tiramisu For my Birthday

Cooking on my bday? I chose something unbaked for my day.

I remember mba Ienas Tsuroiya Recipe. I've been using this recipe for many times.

It's good.... I changed rum into coffee liquor (Kahlua). I made two batches, one is in pyrex 13", and the other is in spring form pan.

Indonesian version for this recipe is HERE ( Tsuroiya.multiply.com : recipe without gelatin).

Here is my modification by adding gelatin to make it firm in my spring form pan.

INGREDIENTS:

6 egg yolks

1 cup sugar

16 Oz mascarpone cheese

1 envelope of gelatin, dissolve with small amount of water.

1 1/2 cup whipping cream

Rum/Kahlua

24 Lady finger

1 cup chocolate chips

1 cup thick coffee ( mine : 1/2 thick coffee, 1/2 Kahlua)

Dutch Processed Choco Powder

METHODS

1. Mix hot coffee and chocolate chips, when it is cool enough, add the liquor, set aside. We will use this for soaking our lady finger.

2. Beat egg yolks and sugar, continue beat them on double boiler ( in case we are afraid of raw eggs). Beat until the mixture's color is pale. Add the rum/Kahlua ( about 2 tbsp or more up to your taste buds). Add Mascarpone cheese and dissolved gelatine, beat until well mixed.

3. In other bowl, whipped the cream until soft peak.

4. Put no.3 into no.2 , whipped just until it mixed well...do not over beat..

5. Soak lady finger to no.1, arrange on the bottom of the pyrex. Pour out no. 4 as the second layer. Repeat this step to make 2 layer of lady finger and 2 layer of mascarpone mixture.

6. Let it set overnight or at least 8 hour in the refrigerator.

7. Before enjoying your tiramisu, shift choco powder on top of your tiramisu.

Beef Kebabs for a Crowd

We went to Pawtuckaway State Park, Nottingham NH on Memorial Day's week end.

Jev was really happy, meeting people, playing with his friends.

This photo is the second round of his playing time. After cleaning up the first round, he ate his lunch, and then his friends came and they enjoyed their time together.

I tried to make kebab for our potluck picnik...but I think I need more to put more marinade sauce. I supposed to use ground cumin, but I only have whole cumin at home :-( .

I'm not happy with the result. I will try to do it better next time.

I tried to combine recipe from Big Food book by Elissa Altman and recipe spicy kebab from Alton Brown, Foodnetwork.

Marinade :

3/4 cup extra virgin oil

3 cloves of garlic, peeled and minced

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon black pepper

Juice of one lemon

1 tsp cayenne pepper

1 tsp cumin

Whisk all the ingredients in small bowl.

Kebab :

4 lbs of beef sirloin or top round, cut it into cubes

Small Onions cut into 4

1 pint of cherry tomatoes

2 large bell pepper, seeded, cut into large square

1 can chunk pineapple, drained the juice

(about 35 skewers)

Using long bamboo skewers, thread together kebabs in this fashion: Onion, tomatoes, beef, peppers, beef, pineapple.

Place skewers in large container, drizzle with marinate, double plastic wrap and refrigerate for 8 hours or overnight.

After the grill is ready, we can put the kebab on the grill, let it cook... Do we need to separate the veggie/fruit from the beef? I found the beef takes longer time to cook.

Cakalang Bumbu Manado (Manadonese Style Smoked Tuna)

Yippiiie...I got Ikan Cakalang Fufu (Smoked Tuna Fish) from Manado, North Sulawesi Indonesia. My mom told me to make a dish the same as she usually makes at home beside the chilli sauce (rica-rica). I asked her what is the specific name for this recipe..She couldn't remember. So I just called it Manadonese Seasoning Smoked Tuna Fish.

Ingredients :

500 gram Smoked Tuna Fish - Cut into chunk

1 big shallot - thinly sliced

2 green onion - thinly sliced

2 lemon grass - crushed the white part

2 kafir lemon leaves

1 cup coconut milk

white basil leaves

Put into a blender/food processor or grind it :

5-8 cloves garlic

5 -7 cloves candle nuts

2 cm ginger root

5-10 Thai Chili ( according to your preference)

salt & pepper

Direction :

1. Stir fry shallot until it fragrance.

2. Add minced/smooth seasoning, stir until the color changed.

3. Add lemon grass and also Kafir lemon leaves

4. Stir the smoked fish into the sauteed seasoning, mix it well.

5. Pour the coconut milk into the fish-mixtures, continue to cook it until the liquid reduced. Before the liquid reduced, add green onion and White Basil leaves.

6. Enjoy it with hot steam white rice.

Classic Marble Cake

This is my mother in law's recipe. My hubby loves it very much. So when I was in Indonesia. I asked her to teach me how to make it. Usually I will use melted margarine that is poured into the batter after eggs and sugar are beaten, but this classic recipe use margarine in room temperature directly mix and beat with the sugar and eggs.

The result is denser than usual cake , but still smooth and delicious.

Ingredients:

400 gram Margarine ( I use Blue Band brand)

400 gram sugar

8 egg yolks

6 egg whites

350 gram shifted flour + 50 gram powder milk ( I change it to 3 tbsp of condensed milk).

Directions:

Heat the oven 180 C/350 F

Beat Margarine, sugar and the egg until smooth and raised (use hand mixer about 15 minutes)

Add the flour, fold into the batter.

Pour the batter to baking pan that's been greased and floured.

Bake for about 50-55 minutes