APAM BALIK - PANCAKE TURNOVERS

Brass pots and pans are so hard to come by nowadays and are getting a little pricey for my liking. I went in search for them about a week ago at PJ old town, rummaging through topsy-turvy and dusty old shops. These are shops that seem completely disorganized with cast iron woks, bamboo brushes, heavy duty commercial gas rings and a myriad of other kitchen stuff sprawling over to the floors in dark dim corners ready to trip you up. These are shops that seem to have anything that you would need in an Asian kitchen from the small home cook to the commercial restaurant or stall owner plus some more from canes to whack your children with, if you are so inclined, to plastic dustbins, to rattan baskets, to tiffin carriers and to feather dusters. My kind of store.

Unfortunately they did not have the brass mould that I was looking for at a price that I was willing to pay for. So I left and decided that a good old non stick would just have to do for the pancakes that I was planning to make.


Traditionally this pancake turnover or apam balik is made in a brass mould because brass distributes heat evenly, is thick and heavy so food does not scald easily. These are what the brass moulds look like...


And these are the pancakes that are made and sold to a long queue of customers every Sunday.


The fillings are crushed peanuts, creamed corn, sugar and artery clogging magarine.

So these are what I made today,a Monday, when the apam balik family stall is not around. This is a very good recipe that makes a very good apam balik. As good as the apam balik man's apam balik I must say. It was given by one of the Malaysian ladies when we were in Taiwan at a time when many Malaysians get homesick and yearn for good old Malaysian street food. Thanks to her we were able to satiate our appetites for lovely apam balik. Did I tell you I have a bad memory for names? Unfortunately I do. I must try to recall.


The picture above and the one below are the first two apam baliks that I made. They weren't as pretty as the very last one that I made (in the first 2 photos above). Practice does make perfect. But it tasted good nevertheless.


Here's the recipe..........makes about 6 pancakes depending on the size of your pan...

340 gm plain all purpose flour
4 tsp baking powder
3 tsp sugar ( I used about 3 tablespoons instead)
2 eggs
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups water
1 cup evaporated milk
3 tsp vegetable oil (I used canola oil)
a pinch of soda bicarbonate

1 cup or crushed peanuts (slightly coarse, not like powder)
1/2 cupof granulated sugar, more or less
a small tin of creamed corn, optional
some butter or magarine

a little cooking oil for swiping the pan.

Mix all ingredients in a medium bowl until you get a smooth batter. Let the batter rest for at least 30 minutes or more. It will thicken upon resting and yield a nice thick batter.

Heat up a non stick pan. I used one that was about 7-8 inches in diameter. Swipe the pan with a little oil using kitchen paper. Make sure the pan is nice and hot.

Ladle up some batter, about 100 ml (a little less than 1/2 a cup), the amount depending on how thick or thin you would like your pancake to be. Pour the batter intot eh heated pan. Make sure the pan is on medium heat. Spread the batter around the bottom of the pan using the back of the ladle (in the case of the stall owner below, she used her enamel mug) until the batter is in an even layer.


Let it cook a little while until bubbles begin to appear....like so.....



Then sprinkle a layer of crushed peanuts, then a layer of sugar (granulated) and then if you like drop small dollops of sweet creamed corn from a tin, some blobs of butter or magarine and let the pancake cook until the top firms up and the batter is cooked through.


Using a flat ladle or spatula. lift and fold the pancake in half and take it out of the pan and place on a wire rack while you continue making more pancakes with the rest of the batter.




Cut up the pancake and serve, preferably hot or warm.


Home made apam balik below......YUMMY.............

PRETZELS

Curly Wurlys, that's what we call them, Hub and I. It's so much easier than saying Pretzels.


I always thought pretzels were hard crispy and shiny little biscuits in that weird shape that we, as children, used to dig for out of a deep blue, Danish Butter Cookie tin along with the butter cookies, some of which were made in the same weird shape. The Danish Cookie tin was 'the' cookie brand at the time when Famous Amos did not exist, when festive cookies were not yet sold commercially all over town, when young wives and mothers convened on an agreed friend's home to make cookies by the hundreds if not thousands together.

It was a time when the husband of the friend whose house was swarmed would conveniently move out of the way, disappear or pop his head in every now and then to banter and tease his wife and her friends and occasionally stretch out an intruding arm to steal a cookie. It was a time when all kinds of cookies were baked, not on baking tins, but on the flat aluminium lids of aluminium pots. Sometimes we, the girl kids, would help by swiping butter on the lids before the cookie doughs were shaped and placed on them or in between baking one batch of cookies and the next.

It was a time of laughter, jokes, bantering, teasing, gossip and loads and loads and loads of cookies and their killer smells. So, as you can imagine, every household belonging to the same group of friends would be serving those very cookies to each other when the house to house visits begin on the big day. No matter which house you visited within the group you'd be having the cookies that you made together. Strange.

It was a time when it was unimaginable to buy festive cookies. It was also a time when there were no such things as Auntie Anne's, Cinnabon, Famous Amos, Dunkin' Donuts and God knows what else.

The 'Danish Cookies' in that deep blue, 'branded', round tin was the ultimate in gift giving, in hampers or as a treat where a flurry of small scrambling hands would be inside of it fighting amoung the different butter cookies and the plain crispy pretzels. The butter cookies would be finished within minutes, the paper cases scattered along with crumbs all over the table and the floor and the poor pretzels, the poor dark brown plain not sweet pretzels would be left behind not quite devoured.

And that was what I thought pretzels were until Auntie Anne's sprung up all over the place like Jacks in boxes with these large soft bread-like curly wurlies in that familiar weird shape that they called pretzels.


So pretzels they are and these are the kind of pretzels I love. Soft, large and bready that makes me habitually falter before I eat it. I'm always not quite sure which end to sink my teeth into so that I don't get the anticipated half empty feeling in my mouth when only a curly strip of Auntie Anne's pretzel snuggles into the back of my mouth leaving the front half empty. So I was quite happy when I made these pretzels and they were fat and chubby and not skinny at all. Yum!


Here's the recipe that I got from this interesting blog Angelahenrie

1 cup milk
1 pkg active dried yeast (11 gm)
3 Tbsp light soft brown sugar
2 1/4 cups all purpose flour + extra for kneading
10 Tbsp butter
1 tsp salt
1/3 cup soda bicarbonate
2 Tbsp coarse salt

Warm milk in saucepan until just lukewarm (not too warm or hot or you'll kill the east and your bread won't rise).

Pour milk into a medium bowl and sprinkle in the yeast. Let yeast soften then stir in the brown sugar and 1 cup of flour.

Dice 2 Tbsp of butter and soften it and hten stir into the mix until evenly distributed.

Add remaining flour (1 1/4 cups) and salt and combine to make a sticky dough.

Knead dough and add more flour to make it a little less sticky. Knead for 5 minutes and don't skimp this step because it makes the dough elastic and easier to roll into strips without breaking.

When the dough is smooth shape into a ball and keep in a lightly oiled bowl and let it rise until double in bulk.

Mix 1/3 cup of bicarbonate soda with 3 cups of water and mix until soda dissolves and place in a shallow baking pan.

Once risen, divide into 6 or 8 parts and roll each part into a long thin strip maybe about 18 to 20 inches long. Lift the strip by holding each end in both hands each. Curl one end towards you and let it rest on the ...........you might like to go look at a picture of a pretzel and figure it out yourself. I'm too jumbled up with directions at this point to explain the intricacies of shaping a pretzel. But it is so much easier done than said. Believe me.

As you shape each one, dip the raw pretzel shape into the soda solution and place it on a parchment paper lined baking tray. Continuing doing all pretzels and let rise for 30 minutes and then bake in a 475 F oven for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile melt the rest of the butter and place in a shallow baking pan or bowl.

Once baked dip each cooked pretzel in the melted butter. Drain. Enjoy. YUM!!!!!

KREATIV BLOGGER AWARD - THANK YOU ELIN

I had such a sweet surprise today. It was from Elin of Elinluv's Tidbits Corner. She gave me this lovely award and for that I thank you Elin. :) Elin has such a lovely blog. It is a repository for all kinds of amazing recipes and having been through most of her posts I have come to realize that she is also one awesome Bun Lady! If ever you're in need of a bun, sweet or savoury, Elin has it. And loads more!

I'm very happy to receive this award for 2 reasons. For one, it is the first 'award' given to me by a fellow food blogger and secondly it's good to know that my blog's existence is worth some kind of an award :-)

This food blog started out as a little something for myself, to past my time and strangely enough as a 'tangible' extension of my imagination, my thoughts and my self-centred fantasies. It was my playground. However, over time it has grown to become an obligation and almost a duty. So there have been times that I have wanted to call it a day. I began to weigh its worth against my time spent and the effort I put in. In other words I no longer felt that I was doing this completely for myself. It was no longer an indulgence.

This blog has become a responsibility because it involves others, like you and members of my family. I should have known that if one chooses to play on a public playground one cannot expect to play alone without being affected and without affecting others. I realize that I was not 'retiring' into a virtual world as I foolishly thought I was when I first started blogging but that I was, in fact, 'starting out' each time I post a post and that I would in the end deal with very real people although I meet and see no one at all. It's creepy sometimes, whimsical at other times but mostly it's a tad confusing.

Giving up this blog isn't as easy as I thought it would be because it grows on you, like an extra limb and for the moment I'm stuck with it. That's the creepy part. At other times it provides a convenient platform that allows me to be quirky and silly up to a point. It allows me to be creative in more ways than one so I do get enjoyment out of it, obviously. That's the whimsy part. But most of all I am still not quite sure whether it's 'good' or 'bad' for me, my husband and my children as a whole. Or rather how much good is it? Or how much time or how much less time is good? Needless to say that is the confusing part :)

But until I find the perfect formula for the Greatest Happiness, until I can figure out the worth of blogging, and only until I do, I'll keep this blog the new factor that I'll have to deal with in my life's equation - for the time being.

Thank you for the award Elin. That certainly gives me a lovely reason to keep going.

And like reality this virtual award comes with rules and conditions. And they are...........

1. You must thank the person who has given you the award.
2. Copy the logo and place it on your blog.
3. Link to the person who has nominated you for the award.
4. Name 7 things about yourself that people might find interesting.
5. Nominate 7 other Kreativ bloggers.
6. Post links to the 7 blogs you nominate.
7. Leave a comment on the blogs you have nominated to let them know they have been nominated.

Seven facts about me.....

1. Green is my favourite colour for now. My preference changes over the years.

2. Like Elin, if you leave me in the household department the rest of the world does not exist. My greatest weaknesses are plates, bowls, cookware, table cloths, decorative items, quilts, fabric, paintings, flowers, colours and 'British India'.

3. I enjoy most the company of kind, quirky and funny people.

4. I love islands.

5. I enjoy reading tremendously.

6. I cook most of our meals because I think eating out too much is not healthy.

7. When I do eat out I look forward to the company rather than the food.

My fellow bloggers that I am going to pass on this award to are............

Terri of Hunger Hunger for being one of my first communicating blogger friends, for her opinionated opinions, her wonderful life stories and food stories.

Denise of Chicky Egg who is cute and funny and who sometimes comes up with the most wonderfully creative and hilarious recipe instructions.

Tracie Moo of Bittersweet for her youthful enthusiasm in baking with or without her mom.

Marija of Palachinka for her stunning photography and her kindness in helping me learn to watermark my photos.

Lorraine of Ganache Ganache for her passion in cake decorating and her latest creatively hilarious swimming trunk cake.

Ninette of Big, Bold, Beautiful Food for her beautiful blog and her amazing creativity with food powders on her latest post Daring Cooks July 2009 Challenge

And last but never least my eldest daughter Juli of Joyluck Kitchen for her amazing energy and enthusiasm for life, her family and cooking and her lovely fusion food blog.

PINWHEEL COOKIES

Don't sweat the small stuff. Do it now. Not tomorrow, not yesterday. Do it now. Just do it. Throw down the glove, take up the gauntlet.

Yes I did all of that except that I did sweat the small stuff.

Because I simply cannot resist pretty things especially when they are swirly and coy like these little cookies. And because I have 5 resident cookie monsters salivating all over the floor, the sofas, the table, the napkins, the keyboard, me. And because there is a wonderful grandma story behind these cookies too. Here at Disgruntled Julie. But I wouldn't have found it if not for La Table de Nana.


So it was a good thing that yesterday was a day blessed with beautiful weather. A cool breeze wafted through the kitchen door, caressed me, hugged me then floated out the front doors but not before leaving her wonderful softness draped around the house. Yesterday is a day that I will remember for a pleasant day of baking and for the winsome sweetness that these pretty pinwheel cookies brought into our lives even if it lasted for just one day. I'll just have to make more and hope for more Breezy days like yesterday.

These cookies can be quite a challenge though because the dough is a soft dough that is not as firm as a cut out cookie dough. It requires chilling and freezing and rolling and layering and rolling up into logs and finally slicing. I was popping my head in and out of the refrigerator before I could finally sit down, relax and wait for the logs of dough to freeze up. I suspect this would be a good cookie to be made in much cooler climes.But nevertheless I made them and am so delighted with the results. I have used other recipes before but none turned out as beautifully as this. I really can't get over how pretty they are. Can you?


Here's the recipe..........

3 cups plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup butter
1 1/3 cup castor sugar
2 large eggs
2 oz unsweetened chocolate, chopped finely and melted

Sift flour, baking powder and salt. Beat butter until fluffy, add sugar and beat some more till white and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time and beat well. Turn down the speed and mix in flour mixture until combined.

Divide the dough into 2 parts and wrap one half in cling film or plastic bag, shape into a 4 by 4 inch square ...like so....and chill.



Return the other half to mixer and mix in the cooled melted chocolate and mix well. Shape the chocolate dough into a 4 by 4 inch square in cling film or plastic bag and chill with the other half for 30 minutes.

Cut out 4 pieces of parhment paper about 10 by 10 inches square.

Take out the block of chocolate dough and cut it into 4 strips. Return 3 of the strips to the refrigerator. Roll out the 1 strip to about 6 by 7 inches between 2 pieces of parchment paper. Keep aside or preferably in the refrigerator.

Take out the plain butter dough block and divide into 4 strips and roll out one strip to a 6 by 7 inch rectangle in between 2 pieces of parchment paper (keep the remaining strips refrigerated).

Peel off the top pieces of parchment paper from both of the rolled out pieces of dough. Flip the plain dough over the chocolate dough. Peel off the parchment paper from the plain dough. Trim the edges to get a neat rectangle.


Gently by using the aid of bottom parchment paper roll up the layered dough into a nice tight log. Wrap in cling film and freeze the log for 1 hour. Do the same thing for the other 3 sets of plain and chocolate dough and freeze them all for 1 hour.




After 1 hour take them out and roll them back and forth to avoid the logs being flattened on one side and then place them back into the freezer for 3 hours.

Take the logs out after 3 hours, slice, place on a lined baking tray and bake for about 10 to 12 minutes until firm. Cool on a wire rack and sore in an airtight tin. Makes about 60, I think. They're so pretty! :)