Minced Beef Shepherd's Pie

Me and ES are trying to break the mochi's guinness record. We've been spending every weekend cooking! yes. amazing. I hope we keep up this passion and soon before you know it, we'll be competing in iron chef. woohoo.

Anyway, we've been attempting western cusines due to the influence of all the american culinary shows. Should try whipping up some simple homemade dishes soon which is less time consuming and more practical as daily meals. My dream is to be able to serve my mama san a real chinese homemade dinner. Akan Datang!

I've finally fulfilled my dream of making shepherd's pie. Beef is usually used for shepherd's pie. But I'll attempt chicken next time. ooohh.. and guess which part of the pie I love the most? The mashed potatoes. I'm a carbo fanatic. It's nice though. Loved the texture and it was pretty flavourful coz I used lots of herbs, black pepper and thyme for the beef.

~ furla...I kept this much for U! too bad....lalalala.~

~ ES boiled these crayfish which we caught the other day and stir fried it with butter and salt. really high in sodium but really tasty. Great appetizer.~

Easy Shepherd's Pie Recipe (courtesy www.simplyrecipes.com)
INGREDIENTS
1 1/2 lbs ground round beef (marinated with salt, black pepper, thyme and italian herbs)
1 onion chopped
1-2 cups vegetables - I used peas
1 1/2 - 2 lbs potatoes (3 big ones)
8 tablespoons butter (1 stick)
1/2 cup beef broth (I used chicken broth in replacement)
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce (omitted this coz I didn't have it! but still taste pretty ok)
Salt, pepper, other seasonings of choice

METHOD
1 Peel and quarter potatoes, boil in salted water until tender (about 20 minutes).
2 While the potatoes are cooking, melt 4 Tablespoons butter (1/2 a stick) in large frying pan.
3 Sauté onions in butter until tender over medium heat (10 mins). If you are adding vegetables, add them according to cooking time. Put any carrots in with the onions. Add corn or peas either at the end of the cooking of the onions, or after the meat has initially cooked.

4 Add ground beef and sauté until no longer pink. Add salt and pepper. Add worcesterchire sauce. Add half a cup of beef broth and cook, uncovered, over low heat for 10 minutes, adding more beef broth as necessary to keep moist.
5 Mash potatoes in bowl with remainder of butter, season to taste.

6 Place beef and onions in baking dish. Distribute mashed potatoes on top. Rough up with a fork so that there are peaks that will brown nicely. You can use the fork to make some designs in the potatoes as well.
7 Cook in 400 degree oven until bubbling and brown (about 30 minutes). Broil for last few minutes if necessary to brown.

Serves four

Chicken burgers with garlic rosemary mayonnaise

ES was so determined to make our own burgers for Sun lunch that we spent Sat night fantasizing what burgers to make, what ingredients to buy and how tasty it would be. We finally chose this burger as it was aligned to our weekend theme - couch potato slackeee weekend. Took only about 20min to make, easy and tasted really good. Well, I guess anything with that dollop of mayo cannot taste that bad. Yep, quick recipe from FoodNetWork Asia. good for a lazy meal at home.

(Serves 2)

For the mayonnaise:

100g mayonnaise
10g chopped fresh rosemary leaves (or use ground italian herbs)
1/2 clove garlic, minced

For the burgers:
225g ground chicken
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
2 burger buns
2 tbsp olive oil (I prefer butter)
4 butterhead lettuce leaves

1 tomato (4 slices)

Method
1) For the mayonnaise: In a small bowl, mix together mayonnaise, garlic, and rosemary; set aside.

2) For the burgers: Preheat a griddle pan over medium-high heat. In a large bowl, add the ground chicken, salt, pepper, and 1/2 of the mayonnaise mixture. Using clean hands, gently combine the ingredients and form the chicken mixture into 2 patties. Place the patties on the pan and cook for about 7 mins on each side. Transfer to paper towels and let them rest for a few minutes.

3) Brush the cut side of each bun with the olive oil/butter and 1 tsp of the mayonnaise mixture. Toast for 1 to 2 mins until slightly golden.

4) Spread the remaining mayonnaise mixture on the tops and bottoms of the toasted buns. Arrange them according to your preference!! Top each with lettuces and tomato slices.

Sausage Risotto

Finally, we made risotto after getting the aborio rice from holland V cold storage. Yep, not all cold storage sells this italian short grain rice since it's not really commonly used. Includes ingredients like white wine, green peas,thyme etc. stuff really exotic to me. First time doing this and I suspect that I did not use enough chicken broth hence, the taste wasn't fantastic. It took some time to cook down the broth as well and I added in a bit of water since the rice wasn't cooked well and I've ran out of chicken broth. I don't really like sausage in it and if I do try making it again, I'll probably replace it with ham or bacon. Cooking is all about improvising it to suit your tastebuds.

The recipe if you would like to try. We scaled it to 2 pax portion but it was still a bit too much rice for us. Asians really eat like birds.

Risotto Recipe (serves 2)
• 1-1/2 teaspoons olive oil
• 1/2 (16 ounce) package al fresco® All Natural Sweet Italian Chicken Sausage
• 1/2 cup chopped sweet onion
• 1-1/2 teaspoons minced fresh garlic
• 1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1/2 cup and 2 tablespoons Arborio rice
• 1/2 cup Chardonnay or other dry white wine
• 1-3/4 cups chicken broth, low-sodium
• 1/2 cup frozen petite sweet peas

1. In a large saucepan, heat oil over medium heat. Saute sausage and onion until onion is translucent, about 3 minutes. Add garlic and thyme and cook until garlic is fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add rice and wine; stir 1-2 minutes or until wine is absorbed.

2. Stir in 1 cup broth. Lower heat to medium-low and simmer, uncovered, until broth is absorbed, stirring occasionally, for about 15 minutes. Continue adding stock, 1/4 cup at a time, stirring until liquid is adsorbed and rice is tender and creamy, about 5 minutes.

3. Stir in peas and 1/4 cup Parmesan; cook 1 minute or until heated throughout. Season with 1/4 tsp black pepper. Garnish with parsley and remaining cheese. Serve immediately.

ES can cook, so can You!

ES imposed a special personal project on himself - to cook a meal all on his own! We checked out some recipes from the Asian Food Channel website and he decided to try these!

I'm only in charge of photography and being his assistant, passing him pots, pans etc. The cleaning up was always the most dreaded part of the whole cooking process, which ES did on his own while I was busy preparing my lemon cheesecake for dessert. No pics of cheesecake coz it took too long to set...and when it set in the morning, we gobbled the bulk of it for breakfast.

~ The stuffed mushrooms were yummy. I liked the filling which was made with garlic, sour cream, cream cheese, pepper, salt and some herbs, topped with cherry tomatoes and mozzarella. Bake for about 15-20min @ 240deg. Makes a great appetiser and simple to prepare for gatherings!~

~ hard at work peeling garlic... eeks. I hate chopping up garlic..~

~ our main course was just as tasty just that it wasn't salty enough. This was improvised from clams and pancetta coz we didn't like both ingredients. I love the chicken ham, garlic and olive oil. It is just simple aglio olio recipe which I've cooked countless times..but with prawns. Chile actually = dried chilli. We figured that this is an angmoh recipe so they used dried chilli to minimise spice. I say...go for chilli padi..!~

Overall, 8/10. Good job baby! additional 2 marks for cleaning up = 10 marks! woohoo.

31 Oct - Happy Birthday ES!

Happy Birthday ES! Yup, he's my halloween baby. I get quite excited everytime I think of cooking something new. Yes, lazy but still managed to move my butt to cold storage to get that ribeye for dinner. oh, and that's my fave strawberry shortcake from fourleaves. haha.. it's more to satisfy my craving. But it IS nice. The kitties intro it to me.haha.

Steaks are amazingly easy to cook. The best is if you can marinate it overnight with loads of herbs, black pepper, salt, a dash of sugar and olive oil. I only managed to marinate it for 3 hours but it tasted good too coz I guess anything taste yummy when it's fresh. The honey mustard potato salad to me was yucky. Maybe the boiling and peeling of potatos really irked me too much for me to enjoy it. Trust me, the cook is usually too tired to enjoy the meal.

The carrots were an attempt to smuggle some veggie into ES's meal. Next time, just stick to the safe but boring mayo potato mochi san. ES liked it though. I think he's just hungry. The garlic prawns were done to ES's request. YUMMY.

Pancakes brekkie

Haven't cooked for ES for some time. And since he wasted a few drops of perspiration fixing my new speakers and installing some software for my comp, he shall be bestowed brekkie meant for the royals.

Made an all american fluffy pancake breakfast set with totally mochi style hotdogs and scrambled eggs. He loved it though I was too sweaty and tired after the cooking to enjoy the food, which is always the case. haha. Anyway, he liked the fluffiness of the pancakes. Tips: Do not overmix the cake mixture to prevent tough cakes. Just stir it till the big lumps of flour are gone. A little lumpy texture is normal to make good pancakes!

Recipe for pancakes: Auntie Jemina from NTUC!! hahaha. easy bitsy.

Chicken Hotdogs: Chopped into pieces and lightly pan-fried. Wanted to serve it whole but it looked too huge and daunting on the breakfast plate.

Scrambled eggs: Beat 2 eggs with quarter cup milk or slightly more. add a bit of salt. Pan fry.

~ ES loved the scrambled eggs. Simple but delicious.~

Potluck Potato Casserole

made this potato casserole for potluck at pam's place. improvised abit by adding ES's fave chicken sausage into the high carbo dish. I didn't keep strictly to the recipe as it might result in wastage if I can't finish the ingredients. So I adjusted the proportion of ingredients. The harshbrowns were tasty in itself so it makes things easier.

It was so super easy to make, filling, cheesy and yummy. Great for potlucks! We were so hungry that I missed the most important part of the potluck... taking pics of the food!! sigh. so here goes the recipe.........without a pic. SIGH. really hate it.


Potluck Potato Casserole - improvised from cooking light

1 1/2 cups fat-free sour cream
140g shredded reduced-fat sharp cheddar cheese
2 tablespoons minced fresh onion
5 teaspoons butter, melted
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
850g frozen hash browns, thawed (about 12 pieces)
300g cream of chicken soup (make the soup as per campbell's instructions)
1 pack of chicken franks or sausage (other suggestions: bacon, ham etc)
1 cup coarsely crushed cornflakes
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley

Preheat oven to 180 degrees.
Combine first 10 ingredients in a large bowl; spread evenly into a 13 x 9-inch baking dish coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle cornflakes over potato mixture.
Bake at 350° for 1 hour or until bubbly. Sprinkle with fresh parsley.

Yield: 10 servings

Prawn Aglio Olio on a hot sat afternoon

accomplished another pasta mania mission today. we decided to cook aglio olio with prawns and add some chilli padi for some spiciness. The result was a simple, oishii homecooked aglio olio. yummy.

As usual, ES was in charge of cooking the pasta.. he's getting quite good at it. gave him another task today which was to pan fry the prawns.

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Aglio Olio Recipe wa kantan ne:

For 2 pax:

1) Pan fry 3 small pieces of garlic in olive oil (about half a cup or as u prefer depending if you like it wet or dry) till fragrant. Watch the fire. Do not over fry if not the garlic will taste bitter.

2) Add in a bit of corn starch so that the oil doesn't splatter.

3) Add a bit of coarse black pepper, salt, some chilli padi, shreds of crab stick to taste.

4) Lightly fry the pasta in the garlic olive oil mixture. Dish out when ready!

Prawns:

1) deshell and marinate the prawns in salt, pepper, cornstarch. Do not add soya sauce. Our prawns tasted very chinese style coz my mama san came along and added in light soya sauce lor. And also, use olive oil to fry the prawns so that it doesn't taste too chinese. Why am I complaining, it still tasted great. heh.

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I can only manage simple cooking. I hate the washing up after that. If I had a maid, I would try out different dishes as and when I like minus the washing! ya...but then again, if i had a maid, I would be too lazy to cook even. so.

couched on the sofa and we caught 5 episodes of HK drama with bubble milk tea after that... so..that explains for the need to go for a jog later. when the sun sets that is, weather is scorching.