ZWILLING J.A. Henckels TWIN Signature 6-pc Knife Block Set unboxing

Finally my knife set has arrived after a very long wait from mysale.

So here goes the picture of the unboxing.

About the set:TWIN Signature is ZWILLING J.A. HENCKELS stamped line, offering sharpness to the aspiring cook. Precision stamped from one piece of ZWILLING Special Formula Steel. FRIODUR® ice-hardened blades guarantee optimal balance of hardness, toughness, and corrosion resistance. Hand sharpened and polished, laser controlled edge. The result; knives that start sharper and stay sharper longer. Ergonomic designed three rivet, full tang handle features a ZWILLING J.A. HENCKELS logo.

Box front - explain about the knife. It mention that knives are manufactured in Germany

Side of the box 1

Side of the box where there are description of the contet. Notice that it says knives are made in Germany, kitchen shears and block made in China and sharpening steel made in Taiwan

Let's unbox! What is inside?

content of box

10 hole knife block

My new toys unbox

It include a warranty card that says lifetime warranty

Instruction manual

I am so happy that I finally bought the knife set after many years of waiting! Btw an interesting fact is that the authorise dealer of zwilling offers free sharpening service! 

Red bean bread recipe

I got this recipe when I attended bread classes. The dough is called sweet bread and you could use it for various combination with hotdog, chicken floss, tuna and cheese.

Today I use it on the ready made red bean so that I could enjoy red bean bread. I found this nice and not too sweet red bean paste at Bake with Yen. On the package it also state that there is less sugar. It only cost rm6++ I will definitely purchase it again.

Hoy Kee Food Industries Sdn Bhd - Low sugar red bean paste. The company is located in Semenyih Selangor. I bought the paste in Bake With Yen.

I notice on the packaging of the Hoy Kee Food packaging, they also have the following paste flavors:
white lotus paste, white bean, pandan lotus paste, lotus paste and pandan bean paste.

For both the sweet bread and red bean I made some modification. I wanted to incorporate black sesame seed and wholemeal flour into the sweet bread dough. As for the red bean, I added toasted white sesame seed as I love the combination of both flavours.

Sweet bread recipe (Make about 18 pcs of bread)

Group A

1. Bread flour/high protein flour 400g

2. Sesame powder 50g (replace with point 1 if unavailable) 

3.Wholemeal flour 50g (replace with point 1 if unavailable)

4. Sugar 75g

6. Salt 5g

7. Yeast 15g

8. Cold water 125g

9. Ice 125g - purpose is to slow down the bread from rising to give you more time to shape the bread.

10. Bread improver 7.5g

Group B 

Melted butter 75g

Steps

-Mix A till the dough can be stretch a bit. This take some practice. Important is to mix at low speed using stand mixer. In between scrap and mix dough evenly. It took me about half an hour.

-Mix B into A. Also at low speed and careful not to overmix. The texture of the dough is soft and elastic. To test if it is ready, pinch a small amount of dough and stretch it to test for window pane test.

-divide the dough into 50g++ ball.

-Put in the red bean paste and shape to a bun/flower.
-Let the bread rest for 40 min. You may spray some water to help the bread rise intermittently.
-Bake in a 175 degree oven for 20min.

Divide the dough into 50gram each

Red bean paste
Ready made red bean paste 500g
Toasted sesame seed (optional) 20g

Just mix the paste and the seed. Divide into 18 portion/28g each.

You may end up using more of the red bean paste if you like more filling. If that is the case, I mix 100g of red bean with 4g of toasted sesame seed.

Shaping the bread
1. Flatten the dough. Put the red bean at the centre and roll into a ball.
2. Flatten the ball and put on the tray line with non stick parchment paper.
3. Use a knife to slit 5 line like a shape of a flower
4. Lift up the flower petal and twist two times. Twist all 5 petals.
5. Spray some water and decorate with some toasted sesame seed.

If you wanted a shortcut or you are press for time, you could always just stop at point 1, spray some water on the bun and decorate with sesame seed. As shaping 18 piece of bread does take up some of the prep time.

Shaping of the bread in progress.

Empress electric lunch box by cosway review and unboxing

I saw my Fren using the empress electric lunch box. She uses it because she is staying alone, renting a room and she make various dishes just with that 1 electric lunch box alone! To me it's a terrific idea. I went and bought the lunch box in a heartbeat since she is satisfied with the product.

The brand Empress is the cosway in house brand. I initially tried to search the product online but I could not locate an online website that sells it. I could only locate other OEM brand in lazada. I only realised that I could only buy from Cosway.

I bought it for rm108 during promo price. The promo I notice happen rather frequently and I was made to understand by my friends that the original price is around rm199. It also comes with a 1 year warranty

After using it, I find this appliance worth every penny as I uses it daily for my lunch in office. I cook from scratch by assembling my raw food in the respective container the night before, bring to work and steam! Off course you can choose to bring your leftovers and steam.

I love that I can prepare at least 3 dishes at one go, to eat my lunch piping hot and eat my lunch with fresh as oppose to overnight ingredients!

My other Frens who saw me using this in office, also went and buy either the same brand or oem from online website. I then get to compare the quality of oem product and empress. My friend bought oem type at rm70++. When compared the  material of the oem product are of lesser quality - metal bowls are thinner, it seems to take longer time to cook, the top tier does not conduct steam well so bottom are cook but the top part are not cook and the plug is not a malaysia plug. Which pretty much convince me that empress is good.

Hower the Empress product has its downside. When heated there is a bit of plastic smell. Further when u cook, the smell of food will emit which might be disturbing to others. I then comfort myself by covering the metal bowl with a normal small plate to minimise the water generated from the steam from dripping into my food during steaming.

Let see what's inside the electric lunch box

In the package it include 3 stainless steel plate, 2 cover, 1cup for measuring, egg holder with stick and instruction manual. 

This is a set. The big, small  plate and plastic cover. the small plate is stack in the big bowl. Plastic cover cannot be use during steamming. It is also not leak proof so be careful if you were to transport soup. It will leak out.

Medium size bowl with cover. Its suppose to be airtight however it is not airtight to me.

Empress electric lunch box. The diagram in a nutshell.

The instruction manual will also teach you how to cook the rice- 1cup of the plastic cup provided with 1and half cup water in the stainless steel bowl.

How to use
I use a normal drinking cup, fill up about 3/4 cup water, pour into the plastic main unit, stack the bowl like in the diagram.plug in and press the one touch button. I general use about 30 min to cook. The vege I will put it in at the last 5-7 min. Do note that when the water run out at the main unit, the cooker will auto shut down as per manual instruction.

If u do not want to use so many tiers, you can omit the middle tier altogether.

You may come to notice why I didn't post the photo of the plastic exterior. This is due to i have left the plastic exterior permanently in my office! So you can just refer to the diagram for an overview.

Mushroom soup recipe (improved!)

 Mushroom Soup Recipe 2 (for 2-3 bowl)
200gram mushroom (wash and cut to slices)
2 onion (chop to pcs)
2 clove garlic (chop to pcs)
4 bay leaf - cut to small pcs
1 long coriander (optional)  - cut small pcs
4 tablespoon milk
500gram chicken stock
1 tablespoon flour

some oil

Seasoning
salt
blackpepper
Mushroom seasoning (optional)


steps:
1. In a frying pan put the oil and saute the onion and garlic for few minutes till soften.
2. Put in the mushroom and saute. some liquid will come out from the mushroom. Cook for few minutes till slightly soften and mushy.
3. Spread the flour over the mixture and toss it a bit for even coating.
4. Transfer the mixture + chicken stock + bay leaf + long coriander into a pot and cook. While cooking I prepare the garlic paste for the garlic bread.. I cook for roughly half hour. By then the soup has thicken. the mushroom mushy in chunks.
5. Off the fire, remove and blend with hand blender.
6. Back to the fire and add in milk + seasoning to taste.

Banana Yogurt Ice Cream Recipe

Currently I am in the process of making Banana Yogurt Ice Cream. If it is successful, to me it will be a fine substitute from using whip cream for fruit type of ice cream. Off course the taste may be slightly different.

So far the taste test tasted yummy! Now the mixture is in my fridge to cool overnight and to use ice cream machine tomorrow for the outcome

Banana Yogurt Ice cream Recipe
2 Banana (choose those really ripe one to get the maximum sweetness)
300gram yogurt
100gram brown sugar

Chinese Red Bean Bun

 Steps to assemble
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEWrtGQ7qHk

Recipe of bun
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXtZ9fuK5ic&list=TL5S4fPxy0dC_laJcQ1SbSA9lYIE3mRZig

3 cup flour
1 cup water
1/2 yeast

1st rise - 40min to 1 hour
Then divide dough to 2 then divide into 16 balls
Put the red bean paste in (I use a ice cream scope -small size)
Then let it stand/2nd rise for about 30-40min. It will be slightly bigger.

Steam for 12 minutes. Off fire and let it be in steamer for 5 minutes else will be hard

Recipe of red bean
1 cup of red bean (soak 8 hours or overnight)
Water enough to cover plus 1-2 inch extra
2/3 cup of sugar to taste

I use the rice cooker to cook the red bean. It took about 2 hours. 1st hour I use the porridge function. 2nd hour I use the rice function. When using rice function, the water will eventually evaporate.
Once the red bean soften and water evaporate, I mash it with a potato masher, add the sugar and cook the red bean paste in a pot. The sugar will make the paste wet, thus cook to the consistency of your liking

Making Putu Piring

I tried making putu piring as I have good quality gula melaka from my trip there. I also has a delicious putu piring in Melaka that is rice with gula melaka.

This inspire me to find out how to make my own putu piring. The outcome is that at the 1st few bites, its delicious, cause I stuff it with a lot of gula melaka. However I lack certain basic utensils like small bowl and cloth. Thus my putu piring is a bit dry. I will definitely try this again when I have all the utensils.

The recipe:
http://thenewartofbaking.blogspot.com/2013/06/putu-piring-malaysian-steamed-palm.html

Putu Piring
(Makes about 15 pieces)

Ingredients
250g rice flour (I prefer the Thai's Erawan brand)
4 pieces of pandan leaves, cut into 4-inch section
160ml - 180ml hot water
1/4 tsp salt

For the Filling
150g of grated palm sugar

For the Topping
100g of grated coconut
2 pandan leaves, cut into 4-inch section
A pinch of salt

15 (3x3) banana leaves squares