HAPPY HALLOWEEN....

Cinnamon Raisin Bread

Hubby loves to buy Cinnamon Raisin Bread every time when we go to the grocery store. Last weekend I told him not to buy it and I will attempt making them I mean how difficult can that be since I have my trusty break maker..lol...

So yesterday I decided that I should make some as promised and attempted it

Flour coated raisins

What's left of the bread.

Ingredients

1 C of Water
2 tablespoon of margarine
1.5 C of bread flour
1.5 C of Flour
4tbsp of Sugar
1.5 tsp of Salt
2tsp of Cinnamon
2.5tsp of yeast
1.5 C of Raisins

Directions
1. Soak the Raisins in warm water for about 5 minutes so the raisin plump up.
2. Drain the Raisins and coat it with flour (to prevent it from sinking down so much)
3. Put the ingredients according to your bread maker except raisins (mine is wet ingredients to dry ingredients)
4. Add Raisins in after the "first" beep.
5. Bake on Sweet Bread setting.

p/s: I was always told not to put the salt so close to the yeast because apparently it can kill the yeast so I always put mine way at the bottom with the liquids so I don't kill the yeast.

The neighbor came over and I gave them 1/2 a loaf of the bread. Everyone liked the bread including me. See every time when hubby buys them from the store I would not eat them and I am also not sure why but I always tell him because the cinnamon taste is too strong which is not the case but anyway I took it out of the bread maker and I wanted to see if it was cooked and I ended up eating a chunk of it which hubby said that it looked like Stanley got into it..LOL...

When the neighbor dropped by earlier I asked if he wanted to take try some but he said that he wanted to eat healthy and when I talked to him earlier he said he was on his way...So I guess you might be wondering that I just moved here and it sounds like we are really close to the neighbor and that thing is yes we are really close to the neighbor. We actually always go back and forth (well actually the neighbor drops by more because we don't have so many dogs). The neighbor is actually hubby's aunt and uncle Richie that's why I could always toss them some food and be my white rabbit! That's actually where Oreo (she's call Bailey now) is living now too..when our fences was down Bailey would run over with Auntie L and play with Stanley but since the fenced is up now Stanley hasn't played with Bailey but Stanley can see from one of the bedroom that Bailey is there when they let the dogs out.

Audio Visuals Equipments

Not long hubby and I started dating we attended the same university together (I met hubby through a friend and not really at school). We all know that most universities spare no expenses when it comes to installing or upgrading their equipments. To name a few equipments that they spare no expense would be like the printers, computers, audio visual equipments etc. They were always the top of the line equipments that we had at the university. Hubby is so intrigued by the top of the line equipments he would come home and tell me that next time when he has a house he was to buy the audio visuals equipments like they have at the university!!*faint* I don’t own top of the line audio visual equipments like they have at the university but then I know the equipments are not cheap. I am just wondering if I was the person working at the university buying these equipments how would I know that I am purchasing the top of the line equipments and getting it at a best price. If that person was smart and wanted to save money for the state they would go online and do some research before simply going with a company. I did my own research (just for fun) in case we want to ever buy AV equipments and found that Reflex offers competitive pricing, technical support and much more for buying AV equipments.

If it was me buying AV equipments for the university all the time I would make sure I get the best deal and the best service thus saving a ton of money for the state which leads to saving money for the university which then leads to saving money for the students and parents because we don’t need to pay for such high tuition cost.

*This is a sponsor post*

Home made Kaya (I)

The past week I've been having cravings for some Kaya spread but have been too busy with other things to try making it. I google and found out that people DO make Kaya with their bread maker. So I brought out my trusty bread maker (which I am so very glad I invested in one last year) and started making it.

Ingredients:
6 large eggs
1 1/3 C coconut milk (I used canned)
1 1/3-1 1/2C of sugar

Method:
1. Beat eggs so that it's mixed up
2. Put it all in the bread maker and select the Jam mode. Make sure to check the bread maker after a little while in the process to make sure there is none that's is stuck to the side of the pan.
3. When is done it'll look curdy and water just transfer it to the food processor and pulse it a little.

I still need to change stuff around. I am currently sick and cannot taste that great. It taste pretty good but I think that there is still a lot more room for improvement. For some reason my Kaya is creamy looking/texture and if I'm not right is a little too eggy for my taste. I need to see what I can change or maybe google and see what other recipe out there. The weird thing is I didn't even use pandan leaves in my kaya but then it came out light green. From what I can taste so far is not that bad. I'll have to give my verdict once I feel much much better.

p/s: Actually this is my second attempt of making homemade Kaya. I forgot to blog my first attempt. It was not bad the first attempt but it took too long to stir it on the stove..Oh well..will try again until I find the perfect one!

Chicken and Mushroom Steam Pau

I've had cravings to eat steamed pau for quite some time now. For some reason I very rarely would order steamed pau when we eat dim sum so last week I decided that I would try making pau. I did not make the dough from scratch because I've never tried making pau on my own so to be on the safe side I just bought the pau flour and just mixed it up according to the direction.

Before it was steamed

After it came out of the steamer

Yummy

Ingredients

Pau flour

Filling: (marinate it for at least 30 minutes)
Mushroom (cubed)
chicken (cubed)
sesame oil
salt
sugar
garlic
salt
pepper
oyster sauce
soy sauce
dark soy sauce
A dash of Shao Hsing Hua Tiau wine (optional)

Seasoning B:
sesame oil
salt
sugar
salt
pepper
oyster sauce
soy sauce
dark soy sauce
corn flour
water
A dash of Shao Hsing Hua Tiau wine (optional)

Method

1. Prepare the dough according to the direction.
2. Marinate the chicken and the mushroom for at least 3o minutes.
3. Mix seasoning B together (except oil, water and corn flour)
4. Heat the wok and the oil.
5. Pour in the chicken and mushroom.
6. Add in mixed seasoning B.
7. Mix water (I use the water that I soaked the mushroom in) and corn flour together pour over chicken and mushroom after it is cooked.
8. Wait for the water and corn flour to boil again and turn off the stove.
9. Divide the dough into 12 (I didn't get 12 I got 9) and fill the dough with the cooked filling according to the directions.
10. Steam the pau for about 10 minutes.

The steamed pau actually came out not bad in terms of taste wise..I need a lot more practice in terms of presentation. Hubby didn't care for the filling so I'm going to have to find another filling for him. Uncle Richie thought it was weird at the beginning because he's not used to eating steamed pau but he loved it. I gave him 4 to take home. Aunt L don't like mushroom so she didn't try it. Overall I'm pretty satisfied with my end results.