For The Love Of Baking

November 1, 2007

Things That Make You Go ‘Mmmm’

When it comes to salad, I am pretty much adventurous. By that, I mean sometimes I got a plate of heaven freshy, other times a bowl of garbage. Organic garbage, though

But this one, I think you can eat. And like, actually. The secret duo are: pecel sauce and cilantro. They unsurprisingly love each other, by the way.

Pecel spice is a spice mix popular in Indonesia, that is used to make the sauce in Pecel dish — an orchestra of steamed veggies that you have to try once in your lifetime because it’s oh-so-good.

Cilantro, well, you know it’s the magic thing that brought Thailand to the glamor world of international food realm. Cilantro is one of God’s exceptional gifts to the world. World with palates like you and me. It turns simple dishes to extravaganza. Making it special, making it expensive.

The salad’s gone already, sorry. Can’t help myself.

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December 31, 2006

Idul Adha Morning

Morning of Idul Adha. Prayed in mosque, went back home.

While hubby was sipping his morning coffee, I threw the ribs I fixed up the night before into the slow cooker and let it cook on HIGH until lunch time. Washed the rice, fixed up the spices, and threw them all into the rice cooker.

By lunch time, the ribs were stewing, the cardamom rice was warming in the rice warmer, Pacri Nanas was cooling in the fridge.

Happy Idul Adha to all muslims in the world!
May Allah accept our sacrifice and place us in highest place.

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November 22, 2006

Food Blogger’s Welcome Dinner

I was tagged by Burcu of Almost Turkish Recipes with this meme, initiated by Angelika of The Flying Apple. Dash off to her lovely blog to find out more about it.

Oh, boy! I’m so terrible at entertaining, let alone constructing a menu. But I do have some favorite dishes I hope my foodblogger guests would enjoy as much as I do.

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November 13, 2006

Retro Recipe Challenge #4: Koninginne Soep

Rain, rain.. come again another day
or today whenever you may
bless the grass, bless the earth
with my window glass you flirt

Laura Rebecca hosted Retro Recipe Challenge every month on Retro Recipe Challenge Blog. This month’s theme was Fall. Well, we don’t have Fall here, but the cold wind that comes with the upcoming rainy season makes my front yard all covered with leaves. It’s Fall in my front yard. So I’m up for this theme.

Retro, short for retrospective, is a modern term used to describe things from a bygone era. -Answers.com

Oooh, comfort food. Nothing beats the comfort of slurping a big spoonful of warm homemade cream soup in a cold windy days. Rain had began to visit Jakarta every now and then, peacefully taking its turn with the pinching hot sun. Although wet season is not really here yet, clouds are now hanging on the sky and cold wind is breezing through my window. Maybe it’s gonna rain tonight. Hopefully.

Flipping through my old recipe book, where I kept recipes I collected when I was 8, there were plenty of choices I could use. Traditional hot drinks like Bajigur, Angsle, Wedang Ronde, Sekoteng, would be very nice choices. But I just can’t resist the image of me gulping those creamy homemade soup and feel its smoothness caressing my tongue and its warmth swirling in my tummy afterward, leaving soft tasty broth in my lips.

I clipped the recipe long ago from Gadis Magazine belonged to my big sister, October 1980 edition. It adapted the dutch name: Koninginne Soep, which is basically cream soup with mushrooms and chicken chunks. I used big straw mushrooms and followed the recipe word by word, including making the broth from scratch and boil it for two hours. And oh it was so good! At first I though the mushrooms were too many and my soup began to smell like damp straw. But then the magic happened when the milk was poured. The whole soup became so soft in everything. Soft taste, soft smell, soft texture.

No more store-bought soup for me.

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October 10, 2006

Monthly Mingle #5: Take Two!

I’d been wanting to participate on this month’s Monthly Mingle hosted by Meeta, but something always got in my way.

I bought the sage, zucchini, eggplant, took a picture, then I made Zucchini and Eggplant Salad (recipe by Santap Magazine). But it’s gone before I had a chance to take a photo! I never knew my hubby loved the dish that much. As far as I know he hates purple eggplants! So you see, this was totally unexpected.

I already put aside the idea of participating when I was cooking this dish the other night, when I realized I just substituted the cucumber with zucchini. So I thought, what the heck, let’s try throwing a little bit sage in it! Let’s see how the dish turn out, then I can make it as my entry for Monthly Mingle #5.

This is an Indonesian common stir-fry dish of carrot, cucumber — which in this case I replaced with zucchini–, small chillies and shallots, spiced with ground fresh turmeric, candle nuts, ginger, shallot and garlic, enhanced by vinegar and sugar. We usually call it “Acar Kuning“, means “Yellow Pickles“. It doesn’t look like a ‘pickle’ to you, I know. But what am I gonna do, I didn’t name it in the first place

But it does have that tangy-sweet taste you usually found in regular pickles.

Well, the sage, I’ve got to say, softened the spices a little bit. I also added black pepper to match with the sage. There were some corns in my fridge, so I threw them in as well. When my sister came by that night, her maid frowned,“What did you throw in this yellow pickles?”
“Any vegetables I had in my fridge,” which was true. If I had some cauliflowers I probably would have thrown them in too.

About the photo, not a very good shot though. I took it in a hurry that night, while it’s still in the wok, before the dish disappeared again into our tummies.

Thanks, Meeta, for hosting the event!

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October 4, 2006

In a Lazy Afternoon

Do you have those old clippings of recipes you thought you’re gonna try someday but turned out never? Sounds familiar, huh?

I have this recipe for so long! I thought it must be a very delish pie ‘coz I love salted eggs. But still, I didn’t get to taste its real taste, because I ended up eliminating this and that, including the pie crust itself, which by the way, happened to be the very essence of every pie! So I got a Vegetable & Salted Eggs Casserole in the end. Is it good? Well, my tastebud is now used to the blandness of fresh raw vegetables, even craving for it, I can eat them like a pig. But if you’re not fanatic of veggies, you should strictly follow the recipe.

So, guess what, I still haven’t tried this recipe! It’s a curse!

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September 26, 2006

Very Healthy Spaghetti

You know, I don’t know much about healthy food, or healthy eating habit. Each time I thought this food is healthy, it turned out to be one with carsinogenic agent inside. Other time I thought this kind of eating habit is healthy, turned out it didn’t suit my tummy behaviour, causing me feeling sick all day. And so on, and so on.

But lately, actually since Santap Magazine stopped its publishing, I turned to its older sister, Nirmala Magazine. I think it’s just because I wanna keep seeing nice food photographs. Because I don’t think any other culinary magazines in Indonesia can beat the stunning yet elegant food photos made by Santap. Since Nirmala is practically the big sister who actually gave birth to Santap, it exercises the same manner of photography. So, yes, I just wanted to see good food photos

But then, they started to intoxicate me with this concept of eating, a cult, who practices natural and healthy eating and cooking. Before I knew it, I’ve been following its guidance. So far, I’m happy

Making this spaghetti was not as simple as I thought it would be. The paprika needed to be grilled first, peeled, chopped. Everything needed to be chopped first, or boiled or cut. But in the end, it’s worth all the slavery. It’s full of fibre (wholewheat spaghetti, yay!), low fat, low cholesterol, all natural (almost, if you use canned red beans). You can eat and eat until you cannot eat anymore, still you won’t be fat. Isn’t it like utopia?

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