Coco-Raisin Chocolate Chip Cookies

Hmm.. I don't really know what to call this cookies. I made this just because I have too many raisin in my kitchen's closet. My youngest looooves raisins and sultanas, while my eldest could almost throw up if he forced to eat them.

So I was thinking how can I make something with sultana that everyone can eat it? How should I 'camouflage' it? Aha! I thought. How about chocolate chips? Their colours is about the same as raisin. But then, how could I disguise the raisins' texture? If it's in a bread or cake, my eldest might notice it. Besides, my right hand is still in injury, I think it's because handling mouse too much. It's not a joke (even though that means I was in computer too much which is might be silly), my husband said many people got hands injury when they're using computer mouse too much. So anyway, that means I can not knead bread dough. I've tried once, it made my hand more aching and my bread gone baddddd. Then I thought cookies will be saver to hide raisins.

I made the cookies based on the previous chocolate chip I made before. I substitute half of the chocolate chips with raisins, and substitute almond with coconut. Still without any synthetic food additives.

Here's the responses of my beloved little men while they were eating it:
My eldest son came to me while he was munching the cookies and said: Bunda(Mum), did you put chocolate in it?
Me: yes.
Few minutes later, my youngest chased me to the kitchen, munching cookies and said: Bunda, did you put raisin in it?
Me: yes.
Me: (silently giggled)

The point is, my husband and I always try avoiding lie to the kids. So this is not a lie, I answered every my kids' question honestly. Anything that they don't ask, I don't answer, he he.

By the way, I really don't know what to call this cookies. Sorry if the name gets too long then :)
Anyway, here's the recipe:


Coco-Raisin Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients:
1 cup wholemeal wheat flour
1⁄2 cup brown sugar
1⁄4 tsp salt
1⁄3 cup oil
1 egg
1⁄4 cup chocolate chips
1/4 cup raising, diced
1/4 cup dried coconut shred

Directions:
- Mix with spoon flour, chocolate chips, raisins and coconut.
- In another bowl mix with electric mixer egg, oil, sugar and salt until thick and the consistency resemble to mayonnaise.
- Add the flour mix into the egg mix. Fold with spatula, just until all wet.
- If the dough seems too wet, put the dough in the fridge at about 15 minutes, while we heat up the oven to 170C.
- Line a cookie tin with a baking paper.
- With two teaspoons make a ball of dough and put onto the the tin. You can press the dough a little with your finger to make it wider if you like.
- Bake about 10 minutes.
- Take out from the oven and let it cool. The first time they took out from the oven they might seems a bit soft, but after cooled it will be harden a bit. It will be chewy inside and crunchy on top.

Homemade ChocoCashew Spread

Do you ever buy something in a jar and thought, hmm this thing seems very easy if we make it by ourselves at home, rather then bought it in the supermarket.

Well, that's what I thought about nutella. I tought this could be probably contains hazelnut and chocolate, that's it. I believe home made is better because we are the one who put ingredients in our food. While store-brought food, well, we don't really know what did they put in store-bought foods. They probably using preservatives, and who know how much and what kind of sugar they put in it, right?

Then I found that many home made nutella recipes do not use chocolate, instead they use cocoa powder. Hmm, interesting. Even better, I thought. I also found that some of them using honey, with more less sugar. This getting better and better, I thought!

So, I made this yesterday, not using hazelnut but using roasted cashew. I bought non-salted cashew from bulk food alley. I used the blender to grind and blend the ingredients, it is quite smooth, but not too smooth. If you see the pictures you still can see it a bit gritty. But, for me it's not a big deal. I actually love the result.

The true tester is the family, of course. My husband thought it was a bit too salty. But, I thought it taste okay, if you get used to peanut butter. Then, the next test was to the kids. My eldest straightly recognize that the jar is not the regular chocolate jar. Of course, I re-used the marmalade jar.

After he tasted it, he said he likes it. Alhamdulillaaahhh... I know that everything-chocolate is good to him, ha ha. As my youngest woke up, I didn't worry at all, he can eat almost anything.

Then my conclusion is that I will make again after this one is finish, probably with less salt.
Not to mention that it saves money too ;)

ChocoChasew Spread

ingredients:
1 cup of roasted cashews
5 tbsp milk
6 tbsp honey
2 tbsp canola oil
2 tbsp cocoa powder
3 tbsp hot water
1/4 tsp salt or less

Directions:
- Make paste from cocoa powder and hot water. Set aside.
- Grind cashew, salt, and milk until smooth.
- Add oil and honey, blend well.
- Add cocoa paste and blend well. If it's too hard for your blender to blend all, you might want to continue stirring with spoon.
- Move into a jar, close tight and put in the fridge.
- Enjoy it with anything!

Do you...

Hi, how many of you trim off the fat from your chicken before cooking it? I do :p They look yucky..

This picture of just ONE chicken thigh. Look how many fats in it.

Kitchen's downs

Nobody's perfect, right? I know.
It's been few weeks I've been failed in making cakes, and few kind of food too. I don't know why, any of my experiments didn't come out with any satisfaction. It probably unconsciously got in my mind, therefore about a couple weeks ago I dreamt that I made cake and my grandma and my mom(both of them had passed away) ate it. I don't think this dream has any specific meaning. I was just happy to see them in my dream; my grandma, my mom and my cake :)
Since that dream my experiments STILL not getting any better. Maybe this is what they called as 'baking blues'. Apparently it's the acute one. Usually people having this kind of blues but still can make cakes. In my case, I can't even make cake right!
Well, I never really expect my kitchen experiment to be always perfectly success, now my little family. So I just let things flow. However, it's been few weeks, I got bored looking at ugly cakes and wasted flour and eggs...and butter.. and milk.. Arrrgh!
I know I don't have to make everything, but I don't like to see my kids eating too much store-bought ready meals too.
Oh dear, I even begin too lazy to type a post.
For the sake of my sons, cooking blues please go awaaaayyyyyy!!

Sate Kerang

Mussels Satay. Yay.
If every week your food shopping is around beef,chicken and fish (like minee), you might get bored of what you cook (like I do). So, remember there are a lot of other creatures in the sea that we can 'catch' from the fisheries! For example, mussels. At the last shopping I grabbed a bag of frozen mussels and thinking of satay. Hm.. I wish I could just buy Sate Kerang (Mussels/Cockles Satay) just like in my home country, but here, I have to cook it by myself.

Thinking about buy or cook our food. It is probably more practice and easier when I was in my home country where I could just buy any food I like. But living here makes me more experience in cooking and baking. I am forced to! Of course, because not much people selling Indonesian food here. Not much at all. Not to mention not so many various Halal food here. Sometimes there are times when we feel that we are forced to do something, and feel a bit down about it, but we finally know that it is good for us.

Back to topic. Ehm.

Usually my hubby won't let me buy mussels, because he said that this creature able to live even in polluted water. He doesn't want us to be contaminated by any poisonous pollution. However, I successfully persuade him by saying, "We're in New Zealand now, don't you think the sea is much cleaner?". He agreed right away :p

I got this recipe, and I don't do much change to it, except the type of clam(the original recipe used cockle) and the amount of chilli, because my toddler would eat too. My family enjoyed them, Alhamdulillah. My husband just requested me to make Sambal Kacang(peanuts sambal/sauce) next time I make it again. Noted! So, I probably going to make it again next week, and I will update this post with Sambal Kacang.
By the way, I know I'm still not good in photograph, especially for night shooting. It's also look too plain. Maybe I should prepare the photo scene first before cooking. Although sometimes it's hard to do it when all your family member trying to grab the food as fast as they can. Oh well, I'll try again next week, InsyaAllah.

Anyway, here is the recipe.

Sate Kerang (Mussels Satay)

Ingredients:
500 gr mussels
1 tbsp gula jawa (Javanese palm sugar)
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp sweet soya sauce
100 ml water
3 tbsp oil
2 cm galangal, smacked
2 cm ginger, thwack with knife's back(or anything you got)
2 stalk lemongrass, thwack!
4 indonesian bay leaves, or you can use any bay leaves
4 kaffir lime leaves, tear a bit
skewers

Spices, grind altogether:
4 cloves shallot
2 cloves garlic
1/2 tsp coriander
4 red chilies, I use only one for toddler friendly sake

Directions:
- Heat the wok or pan and pour the oil
- Stir ground spices, lemongrass, lime leaves, salam leaves and ginger until fragrant.
- Add gula jawa, soy sauce and salt, stir well.
- Add the mussles and pour the water, bring to boil until cooked.
- Thread the mussels to the skewer, grill
- Enjoy

Easy Pizza

My eldest son knows Pizza Hut. And KFC. And McDonald. Oh yes, he does. So wherever we go, he could spot those junk food restaurants. He likes pizza. So far after we got here, I just bought pizza crust from stores, and put on the toppings myself, bake few minutes and served. But, since I made bread once or twice, I feel a little confidence to try another type of breads. I made pastry too! But I haven't post anything about it, because I don't think it's 100% success. Well, maybe just about 70-80% success, ha ha!
Anyway, as always, I Googled the easiest recipe there is. I stumbled upon this Jim Lahey's easy way to make pizza crust. The ingredients are just minimum. All you have to do is stir and sleep over it. The change I made was just the water. The recipe just says 'water', but I decided to use lukewarm water instead.

I made it, and it turned out great. Just the way I like it. I made thin pizza with the easiest topping: whatever I had in fridge. Surely, I will make this again.


Easy Pizza

Ingredients:
3 ¾ cups bread flour, plus more for shaping the dough
1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast
2 teaspoons salt
1 ½ cups lukewarm water

this is the best moment when making bread; when they puffed into chubby but air-light, just like my sons' cheeks when they were babies!

Directions:
- In a medium bowl, stir in yeast into the water. Set aside until it's a bit bubley.
- Thoroughly blend in the flour and salt and with a wooden spoon or your hands.
- Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a kitchen towel and allow it to rise at room temperature for 18 hours or until it has more than doubled. It will take longer in a chilly room and less time in a very warm one. I personally made it after dinner and left it in warmer room over night, then made it as lunch the day after.
- Flour a work surface and scrape out the dough. Divide it into 4 equal parts and shape them: For each portion, start with the edges of the dough and pull it toward the centre. Shape each portion into a round and turn seam side down. Mold the dough into a neat circular mound. The mounds should not be sticky; if they are, dust with more flour.
- If you don’t intend to use the dough right away, wrap the balls individually in plastic and refrigerate for up to 3 days. Return to room temperature by leaving them out on the counter, covered in a damp cloth, for 2 to 3 hours before needed.
- Flat your dough with your hands, add toppings. I added whatever I could get from the fridge; olive oil, tomato sauce, minced garlic, black pepper, bell pepper, mushroom, beef sausages, chicken dices and mozzarella cheese.
- Grill in oven that already heated up to 250C for about 10 minutes. Enjoy.

Sate Ayam

Sate Ayam or Chicken Satay. It's like, everybody's favourite. There are a lot of satay or sate in Indonesia, but this sate is Sate Ayam Madura, is one of the most famous satay in Indonesia.

Back in my home town (am I talking about my home town too much? Sorry), 'tukang' Sate Ayam (Chicken Satay's seller) could easily found around almost any residence area. Some tukang sate usually open on the side of the road or street from dawn to very late of night. Some other tukang sate pushing their cart passing houses while yells out, "Teeee, sateeeeeee!!". If you're bored with your home cooking, just call out the tukang sate and your tummy will be happy. Aww, I love road side food stalls :)
But... now we are in Auckland. There's no way there will be any food seller pushing their carts around your neighbourhood. Ever. Absolutely no Sate. Maybe there are some restaurant that sells Sate. But, it might be expensive and might not have the same taste as we used to bought in home town(again).

Browsing around the recipes, I found this recipe. Hmm, might be not so hard, so I gave it a shot. First of all, the chicken. You can use the breast fillets. But, in my opinion, chicken breast is not so juicy, you know? I decided to use boneless thighs instead. They are more juicy than the breasts. I tossed away some of their fats. Too much bulky chicken's fat scares me sometimes. Thighs have a lot of fat.

I grilled the sate on a pan over stove. For the sauce, I was still not so good in frying the peanuts. Peanuts has to be fry in hot oil, but the heat must be low. We want peanuts that brown and crunchy. Otherwise, the peanuts can be over cooked, too dark, and taste a bit bitter. So it has to be taken out from oil before it's too dark. Well, I was a little late, it became too dark but fortunately it wasn't so bitter. I made it the sauce not so spicy hot because I made them for the toddlers too. If it was for adults only, I might have add more chilli peppers.

Overall they tastes good and reminded us the taste of homeland.

Sate Ayam

Ingredients:
800 gr - 1 kg boneless thighs, diced about 2x2x2cm
1 clove of garlic, crushed
1 lime
2 tbsp oil
15 - 20 skewers
sweet soy sauce

Spices, grind altogether until smooth:
1 big red chilli pepper, toss away the seeds
2 small hot chilli peppers
3 big shallots
2 cloves garlic
6 candle nuts, fried or tasted
2 tsp palm sugar
1 tsp salt

Peanut sauce:
150 gr peanuts with skins, fried
water
lime


Directions:
- Marinated the diced chicken with lime juice and crushed garlic. Set aside.
- Grind the peanuts, but not too smooth. It is better to make it a bit chunky. Set aside.
- Heat oil on a pan over medium heat.
- Cook the grounded spices until well fragrant. Turn the heat off. Take 2 tablespoon of this cooked spice, mix with 2 tablespoon of sweet soy sauce, set aside. Left the other part of cooked spice in the pan.
- Mix the ground peanuts with cooked spiced, turn the heat on, add some water until reach sauce consistency. Cook just until boiled. Set aside.
- Thread the chicken onto the skewers, about 4-5 dice per skewer. Grill about 2-3 minutes one side. Brush soy sauced-spice onto the cooked side of chicken.
- Grill the other side about 2-3 minutes, then brush with spice-soy sauce again. Grill until done.
- Serve them with peanut sauce, sweet soy sauce and a splash of lime juice. You can add some chilli sauce if you like it hot.
- Enjoy! :)