Healthy breakfast

I was at a photoshoot the other day and learnt this from the owner and chef Debbra Lee of Fit For 2 and Bisou. And I've gotta tell you, I have NEVER eaten healthy food that's so bloody delicious!

Anyways, one of them was a Bircher Muesli - which is pretty much soaked oats with some fruits and or nuts.

Bircher Muesli was created by Swiss physician Maximilian Bircher-Benner who needed a diet that was rich in fresh fruit and veggies as part of theraphy.

Anyways, Deb's recipe is super easy and most of the stuff are already in your kitchen. Prepare it the night before, scoop it out in the morning and you're good to go! Plus it's a great snack because it's healthy and not so fattening!

This is my version of her recipe.

Ingredients

• 2 apples. She actually grates them but my grater is a bit too fine so I chop them up in teeny pieces
• 1 cup rolled oats
• Cinnamon powder
• 1 cup or a 135g tub of natural yoghurt
• 1 cup or one tetra pack of apple juice

I usually fill half the container with oats. You can use as much as you can but for starters I'd say about 1 cup would be great. It's always a great idea to start small just to get the feel of how it's done.

Then I add in about 3 shakes of cinnamon powder. I don't put in too much because I don't want it to over power the mix. But if you love the taste of cinnamon, by all means, put in more :)

Then add in the grated/diced apple.

Pour in the yoghurt.

Then pour in the apple juice. I usually use one small tetra pack instead of measuring from the big pack. We don't drink that much apple juice at home so using a big pack means I have to make this quite often and my usual batch lasts me three days....

Mix it well and you're done! Just put it in the fridge over night and you'll find a nice gooey and healthy breakfast ready to go.

Tip!

The measurements for yoghurt and juice really does depend on how much oats you use. When mixing it, if you feel that it's a tad dry, add a little more yoghurt or juice (up to you). It's supposed to be nice and moist but not runny.

When you scoop it out in the morning (or as a snack) and find that it's a little dry... fret not, just add a little yoghurt or fresh milk to loosen it up!

You can even top it up with some fresh berries or a sprinkling of nuts for that crunch.

This is a great basic recipe that you can modify any way you like. Experiment with different types of juices or fruits. Mangos and berries go really well with this. You could also try dried fruit. I usually use apples because they keep really well.

Let me know if you've tried this or made your own variation. I'd love to hear from you!

Happy cooking (or mixing)!

xxx

Bunny

Easy dishes: Indian-style cabbage

Since the pup's part Indian, we decided to start cooking more Indian dishes at home. So for the first try, we're doing a popular Indian-style stir fry cabbage. You can get this from most Indian food stores - they serve it as a side dish with rice and curries.

I never realized how easy this dish was until I started cooking it.

Ingredients

• 1 tsp ghee
• 1 tbsp mustard seeds
• 1/2 tsp cumin powder
• 1/4 tsp turmeric
• 1/4 tsp chilli flakes/cayenne
• half a head of cabbage, sliced thinly
• salt, to taste

Heat up the frying pan (or wok) on medium low and add the ghee to it. I don't actually use a full teaspoon of ghee but just scrape off more or less.

Tip!

You don't HAVE to use ghee - I mean, it's not the healthiest of fats cook with. But the occasional ghee dish is alright I guess. You can of course use your regular cooking oil for this but I can tell you one thing - ghee gives it that distinct flavor :)

Once it's fully melted, add in the mustard seeds and mix well.

You need to be very alert and quick with this dish. Make sure you keep stirring the mustard seeds around to make sure that they're well coated with the ghee. You'll know it's ready when you see mustard seeds popping up and down. That's when you need to add in the other spices.

If you leave it on for too long, the seeds will start to burn, so I usually measure everything out in a little plate so that I can quickly pour it in!

Mix everything and keep stirring. You want to get the spices infused and if you just leave them there, they'll burn. So keep stirring and you'll get a nice paste.

Add in the cabbage and stir well.

p/s: This is me being a tad ignorant :P I obviously have too much cabbage for my little pan but sometimes I just can't be that all bothered. Please do not do what I do! I ended up with a lot of runaway cabbage pieces and bits of spices splashed on the stove.

Once the cabbage is well coated with the spices and cooked, do a quick taste test. Most times it'll need a bit of salt for flavor. You can turn the heat to low and adjust the flavor.

Plate up and you're done! The great thing about this dish is that it is rather messy so there's really nothing much you can do to pretty it up. Another great thing about it is that, you don't necessarily have to serve it piping hot. It works well cooled down too.

Tip!

If you'd like, you can add some carrot slices, some ginger, curry leaves, or chillies to this dish.

Happy cooking!

xxx

Bunny

The weekend meals: Home made burger patties

Another favorite of ours to make on weekends are definitely home made burger patties. They're so easy and you can really have them any way you like! Double win!!!

We usually use about 150g of meat per patty.

Remove from container and mash it around a bit. I noticed by doing this, it helps to bind the meat together and makes it a little chewier. But don't do it too long because then it will become too chewy and dense!

When you're done, form them into two patties. You can do this any way you like, but we shape it according to the bread bun :P

But general rule is, the thicker it is, the longer it takes to cook and you'll really need to make sure that the insides are cooked before the outsides burn so sometimes thinner patties are better.

I used to make patties with extra veggies, seasonings, bread crumbs and even a bit of egg. You can too! But it's just that we're on this pure ground beef patty thing right now :)

Season both sides with salt and freshly ground pepper and put it in the fridge to let it chill for at least half an hour.

Tip!

If you're using a container, place the lid on. If you're using a plate, place some cling wrap on because if you don't, the patty will dry out a bit.

When the patties are ready, pan fry them with a little butter and olive oil on medium heat. Meat patties tend to kinda puff up in the middle while you cook. To stop that, make an indentation in the middle. You could use the back of a spoon or your thumb. We were just having a bit of fun so we made more indentations across :P

When one side is done, flip over. This side will take about a minute less to cook. When you're done, remove from pan and place it on a plate.

Tip!

Never press the patty down when cooking because this releases the yummy juices and your patty will end up dry.

MAKING THE SIDE DISHES

We usually like more veg on the side than just chips because every other fast food serves chips with burgers!

Today we made butter sautéed veggies and mash.

Here we have butter sautéed mushrooms and onions.... just cut them up into similar sizes, heat up a pan with butter (make sure it doesn't burn!), put the onions in first, when they're almost translucent, put the mushrooms in and stir 'em around. Add some freshly ground pepper and a pinch of salt.

It takes 5 minutes. Seriously.

Then there's mash. Peel and chop two potatoes up into about inch sized chunks. Boil in salted water till they're soft (test it with your fork - if your fork goes thru a chunk easily, that means it ready to be mashed). Drain, add some freshly ground pepper, a dollop of butter and a quick glug of olive oil.

If you have a potato masher, use it. If not a fork does the job pretty well too!

Do a quick taste test. Add some table salt if needed. If not, then you're done!

Finally, plate it all up and enjoy your dinner!!!

The weekend snacks: Gyoza

I've been having this hankering for some sort of dumpling (wantons, sui gows or gyozas) for quite a while now. So today while I was out grocery shopping, I picked up some items for making some gyoza!

Thing is, I've never made these before so I was a bit nervous about how they would turn out.

Anyways, here's the ingredient list....

• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• 1 tsp corn flour
• 1 tbsp ginger, grated
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 cup cabbage, finely shredded
• 350g minced pork

The main marinade ingredients - soy sauce, sesame oil, corn flour, garlic and ginger.

Mix them all up. You'll get a weird looking but wonderful smelling mixture!

Add in 1 cup of shredded cabbage. This helps give the gyoza a bit of a crunch and makes it less meaty. In some other variations, a little bit of chives are added in. Or for the Chinese version, chopped water chestnuts are added.

Add the minced pork in and mix well. You can try using other types of mince but pork really works the best.

The recipe didn't call to let it sit and marinade, but I decided, 10 mins in the fridge can probably help the mixture really soak everything up. I'm a strong believer in marinading :)

I couldn't find any gyoza skins so I bought wanton skins instead. They're kind of similar but these are a little thicker, and they're square instead...

Tip!

If you like, you could get a cookie cutter or a bowl, place it over the wanton skin and cut off a nice circle to make it look more gyoza-y. I was just too lazy :P

Lay them out on a flat and dry surface. The skins are already dusted in flour so you don't have to dust the surface.

Place about a teaspoonful of the filling mixture onto the skin. Try to place it as much to the middle as you can.

This is the part where you need to be practical :) something I've learnt from personal experience. Don't put too much filling in because it will be hard to pleat the sides and trust me, an overfilled gyoza does not taste good!

Use a brush (or your fingers) to brush a little bit of water towards the top and half of either side of the skin. Don't put too much water because it softens the skin almost immediately and makes it really hard to handle.

Fold it upwards and fold some pleats to hold the filling in. Now this is the tricky part. It really does take some time and practice to get this done nicely and neatly.

If you've made a whole bunch, lay them flat and pop 'em into the fridge to freeze. Once they're fully frozen, you can put them in zip lock bag. Cook them the same way you'd do with fresh ones, they don't really need to be thawed out!

Heat up the pan with a little oil on medium.

Give it about a minute or two, then place the gyozas on them. Don't flip them over. You only want one side to have that nice brown crispy skin.

Pick on up to see the underside. If it's nice and brown, that means its ready for steaming!

Pour in about 1/3" of water into the pan. I used hot water here so that it wouldn't take them too long. Make sure you don't pour too much water though... because the gyoza will become soggy.

Note

Remember it's a hot pan with fried gyozas on it, so when you pour water in, there'll be this huge billow of steam. So watch out when you do this.

Cover the pan so that the water gets a chance to boil properly. This is so that the gyozas get to steam properly and absorb the water. Check after a minute to see if the water's all soaked up. If they are, gently remove them from the pan.

Plate up and serve! You can eat them as they are, or get some dip (vinegar, soy, ginger slices, chilli oil) to go with it.

Lemon and parsley lamb chops

If there's one thing that the pup and I can't get enough of... it's lamb! Well... actually that comes in a very close tie with bacon...

Anyways, instead of the usual grilled lamb chops with mint sauce, we tried something new.

I forgot to take pictures of the ingredients :P so here's the list

For the marinade

• 2 tsps finely grated lemon rind
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 2 tbsps chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves
• 2 tbsps olive oil
• 4 (200g) forequarter lamb chops

For the potatoes

• 600g nadine potatoes
• 30g butter
• 2 green onions (also known as scallions or spring onions in this part of the world)

I find using zip lock bags amazingly convenient and simple. For these, I'll just get the house brand ones because they're so much cheaper, and I only use them once!

Anyways, chop the flat leaf parsley and put it in the bag.

Tip!

I've tried this with Chinese parsley because I couldn't find Italian flat leaf parsley at the supermarket. Got a slightly different flavor but still rocked the marinade!

Grate the lemon and put that in as well...

Squeeze 2 tbsps lemon juice in and add 2 tbsps olive oil as well. Mix it well before putting the meat in.

Add the meat in and rub the marinade around it. The recipe calls for four pieces of meat but I'm only using two for this serving.

Put it in the fridge and let it marinade. Recipe calls for two hours.

Tip!

If you can, try to flip the pieces of meat around after an hour to get an even marinade!

After two hours, heat up some olive oil in a pan. Keep it on medium-high heat.

Tip!

Try not to use a griddle pan for this. Although it gives the meat nice char marks while grilling but it also dries it up faster. A frying pan helps to cook it with the oil and its juices.

Remember to remove most of the solids from the marinade because the extra leaves and grated lemon rind will burn a lot faster than the meat. You can leave a bit on while grilling.

Grill each side for about four mins or so. But please go with your instincts as well. If you feel that it's got enough time on the grill then just flip it :)

When both sides are grilled, remove from pan and work on the other piece.

Peel and cut the potatoes in to little chunks. Heat up a pot of water with a bit of salt and put them when the water starts to boil. You'll know when the potatoes are done if you can poke a fork through easily.

While waiting for the potatoes to be ready, chop up some green onions into teeny pieces. You can use less if you're not a big fan of them.

When the potatoes are done, drain properly. Then add in the butter and green onions.

Add a dash of ground pepper too. It really helps to bring the flavor in! Then simply stir it up gently. Don't be too rough or vigorous because then you'll make the potatoes in to mash.

Don't worry, you WILL end up mashing a teensy bit of it. WHen it's done, take a quick taste. Add salt or more pepper if needed.

When all of that is done, you're ready to plate up! Place the lamb on a bed of potatoes and voila.... dinner is served.

Let me know if you do try this... I'd love to hear your comments.

Happy cooking!

xxx

Bunny