Rosette Cookies / Kuih Rose / Kuih Loyang / 蜂窝饼

I was gifted with the rosette mould last year, tested it and it wasn't successful. For Chinese New Year, I thought I give it a go again and have to say I am getting the hang of how it works. I am happy with the results.

Recipe : https://mykitchen101en.com/how-to-make-thin-and-crispy-honeycomb-cookies-kuih-loyang-rosette-cookies/

Chinese New Year : Peanut filled pockets { Kok chai }

We're 11th day into Chinese New Year but these deep-fried snacks had finished long ago! :D

These turned out as I remembered, crispy with sweet peanut filling. I couldn't stop munching on them.

Kok Chai

Recipe via Malaysian Chinese Kitchen
serves :  32 mini puffs

Ingredients

For dough

300g all-purpose flour 

0.5 tsp salt  

120ml vegetable oil 

160ml water

For Peanut Filling

½ cup (75g) raw peanuts 

2 tbsp (18g) sesame seeds  

¼ cup (53g) sugar

• Instructions
  

  Filling

  1. Toast peanuts in a small fry pan over medium heat for 3 to 4 minutes until lightly brown. Remove and allow peanuts to cool. Coarsely chop or grind peanuts.
  2. Toast sesame seeds in the same pan for 1 to 2 minutes until lightly brown.
  3. Combine peanuts, sesame seeds, and sugar in a medium bowl. Mix well and set aside.

  Dough

  1. Combine all-purpose flour (rice flour, if usinand salt in a large bowl. Make a well in the center. Pour vegetable oil into the well. Mix with a spatula. Slowly add water a little at a time to form a soft, non-sticky dough. You may or may not require the full ⅓ cup (80ml) water.
  2. Remove the dough from the bowl and knead on a clean work surface for 3 to 4 minutes. Form dough into a ball and place it back into the bowl. Cover with a towel and allow dough to rest for 10 minutes.
  3. Remove dough from the bowl and shape into a cylinder about 12 inches long. Cut dough into 16 equal size pieces.

  Forming the Mini Puffs

  1. Take a piece of dough and shape it into a circle of about 2½ inches in diameter by rotating and flattening the edges. Place a teaspoon of filling in the center.
  2. Fold the dough into a semi circle. Seal by pressing and pleating the edges together. Repeat with the remaining pieces of dough.

  Frying the Mini Puffs

  1. Heat about an inch of vegetable oil in a wok to fry everything at one go or a small saucepan to fry in batches.
  2. Deep fry mini puffs over medium low heat for 4 to 5 minutes or until golden brown. Remove and allow mini puffs to drain in a metal strainer.
  3. Allow kok chai (mini peanut puffto cool completely before storing in air tight containers for up to 2 weeks.
   

Chinese New Year Cake / Nian Gao / 年糕

When it come to taste of Chinese foods, we work on the basis of sweet, sour, bitter, and spiciness. Another element which is also very important is the textures. Some of the favoured texture is stickiness, crispiness and bounciness of foods; which can be found when you're enjoying dim sums. To achieve stickiness, glutinous rice is used.

This Chinese New Year cake symbolises "raising oneself higher in each coming year" or 年年高升. You can read more on wiki.

My cake turned out very pale despite after almost 8 hours (!) of steaming. The cake is suppose to be dark caramelised colour. I know what I did wrong, and will improve on it the next Chinese New Year.

I made this based on recipe from Nasi Lemak Lover.

Chinese New Year dishes : Yusheng / Yee Sang / 鱼生

I love this "salad" dish with raw or smoked fish during Chinese New Year. The crispy crunch of the fried wonton, contrast with the fresh fish and vegetable toss in plum sauce is my idea of heaven!

For recipe, please refer to my recipe from last year.

Chinese New Year Baking : Almond London Cookies

Chinese New Year is once again around the corner (February 8th)! For this year, I thought aside from the staple pineapple tart, I should try my hand at another favourite cookies for the festival. When I saw a recipe for Almond London Cookies during my blog surfing, I knew I want to make these. These did not originate from London and I have no idea why this cookies exists in Malaysia. The cookie is basically a toasted almond wrapped with short cookie dough, bake lightly, then dipped into melted chocolate and finish off with a sprinkle of chopped/nibbed almonds.

For step-by-step tutorial, please go to Nasi Lemak Lover.


Almond London Cookies
Source : Nasi Lemak Lover (linked above)

150g whole almonds

30g nibbed almonds

170g butter (salted)

60g icing sugar, sifted

20g egg yolk (used 1 yolk)

300g cake flour (used plain flour)

300g chocolate

Method

1. Toast whole almonds in oven at 180°c for 13-15mins, and toast nibbed almonds at 180°c for 1-2mins. Set aside to let it cool completely before use.
2. Cream butter and icing sugar till light and pale.
3. Add in egg yolk, beat well to combine.
4. Add in cake flour, mix until it come together to form soft dought. Do not over work it.
5. To weight dough 6g each, wrap up a whole almond, and shape into oval shape.
6. Bake cookies at 160°c (fan forced) for 15mins or until golden brown, set aside to cool completely.
7. Melt chocolate over double boiler or microwave oven. Dip cookie in melted chocolate. Use a small fork, transfer coated cookie into a mini paper cup.
8. Sprinkle some toasted nibbed almonds on top. Chill in the fridge (~10mins) to set the chocolate before storing in air-tight container. Store in cool place to prevent chocolate from melting.

Homemade Yee Sang / Yusheng 鱼生

To understand what this is all about , please visit wiki
Homemade Yee Sang / Yusheng
Ingredients
carrots, julienned
daikon, julienned (I've used local white radish)
cucumber, julienned
pomelo segments then into pieces (I've substitute with grapefruits) 
+ and other crispy vegetables to your liking
raw salmon (I've used smoked)
friend wonton skin (I've homemade based on this recipe by kitchen simplicity  )
Garnish
pinch of 5-spice powder
pince of white pepper

pickled Japanese ginger (I've made my own by shred ginger finely+water+brown sugar+salt+vinegar)
Salad dressing
Plum sauce (I've used apricot jam)
sesame oil
1 lime juice
pickling juice from ginger
Methods :-
1) Prep. the ingredients the vegetables and fruit. Put the prepped veg., pomelo, fried wonton skin and salmon in a bowl or arrange nicely on a plate. Sprinkle on the seasoning. Mix all the salad dressing ingredients together. Drizzle salad dressing all over the bowl/plate. Check seasoning, adjust if need to. Mix well and serve.

Baked spring rolls

On Chinese New Year, my family would make spring rolls; a favourite of mine because I love fried foods. Chinese spring rolls as far as my knowledge goes, is deep fried. The spring roll wrappers could be bought at the wet market or the frozen section of the super/hyper market. These wrappers are moist and must be kept moist until ready to use unlike the dry rice wrappers for the Vietnamese spring rolls.
For this occasion, since the Chinese spring roll wrappers are not available to me, I've used the Vietnamese dried type. Filling for spring rolls for me growing up only consisted of carrots,jicama, dried shrimp stir fried. I've noticed many add mince meat but. that is completely up to you. Just make sure the fillings are not too wet.
Once stir fried vegetable and meat have been cooled. Pre-heat oven at 180°c.
Soak Vietnamese spring roll wrapper one wrapper at a time in cold water, lay flat and fill it up with filling. wrap. brush with cooking oil. place on baking tray with parchment paper. Repeat process until fillings is finish. Once wrapping done, sprinkle sesame seeds on top of each spring roll. Place in oven and bake for 15 mins. check if the skin is crispy. if it is, then it is done. Otherwise, keep baking until skin is crisp.
serve hot with any Asian dipping sauce of your choice.

Pineapple Tarts II

These melt-in-the-mouth tarts are a must during the Chinese New Year; which falls on Feb 19, this year. To make this recipe even easier, I've replaced fresh pineapple with canned ones.

Pineapple Tarts

via IndochineKitchen

Yield 700 g cookies

Ingredients:

For pineapple jam 2 kg pineapple, roughly 4 medium sized pineapples 600 g sugar 3 cloves 5 cm cinnamon stick For cookies 200 g butter 50 g confectioners' sugar 40 g powdered milk 280 g flour, low gluten or all purpose 20 g cornflour 2 egg yolks For egg wash 3 egg yolks 1/4 tsp condensed milk

Directions:

For pineapple jam Puree pineapple in an electric blender till smooth. Combine puree with sugar, cloves and cinnamon stick in a pot. Cook over low heat for 3-4 hours, stirring continually. When it thickens and can be piped or rolled, remove from heat. The jam will thicken during cooling. Prepare this one day in advance. You will end up with 500-600 g pineapple jam, enough for one batch. For cookies Preheat oven to 150 degree Celsius Sift flour, powdered milk and corn flour twice. In a mixer bowl, combine butter and sugar. Cream till light and fluffy, about 4-5 minutes, over high speed. Add egg yolk, one at a time. Beating well. Add flour mixture into the bowl and beat over low speed using paddle attachment. Do this for 4-5 minutes, until everything is mixed well. Work with 50 g of dough one at a time. Roll dough between plastic sheet to 0.2 cm thickness. Pipe pineapple jam on top of the dough. Roll the dough to cover up the jam completely. Use a pair of scissors to cut them up into 4cm log and arrange on greased pan. Brush with egg wash mixture twice using small pastry brush. Bake in preheated oven till golden, 15-20 minutes. Let cool and store in airtight container.

Apricot Butter Biscuits

Apricot Butter Biscuits { Thumbprints cookies }
source : Orang Blossom Water

Ingredients
1 cup (226 g) butter, at room temperature  
3/4 cup sugar **will lessen sugar the next time
2 large eggs yolks  
1 sachet vanilla sugar
2 cups all purpose flour  
1/2 tsp salt About 
1/2 cup apricot jam  
1/2 zest of lemon
 
Method :-  
In a large bowl, with an electric mixer on medium speed beat butter and sugar until smooth.  
Add egg yolks and vanilla and beat until well blended. 
Mix in the lemon zest Stir in flour and salt and beat just until dough comes together. Shape dough into 1 inch balls. 
Place about 1 inch apart on buttered or cooking parchment lined 12 by 15 inch baking sheets. 
Press your thumb gently into the center of each cookie to make an indentation.  
Bake cookies in a 325 °F (163 °C) oven until lightly browned, 18 to 20 minutes; if baking more than one pan at a time, switch pan positions halfway through baking. 
Let cookies cool on sheets for 5 minutes, then use a wide spatula to transfer to racks to cool completely. Spoon about 1/2 teaspoon jam into the center of each cooled cookie.

Walnut cookies

Chinese new year is fast approaching, this year falling on valentine's day! This cookie is one of the must treats during the festive season. Coarsely ground peanuts are the main ingredients ; however, I have substituted it with left over ground walnut which worked out fine .
Recipe from here