Dulce de Leche

   I feel so happy about being able to write this.


   I made homemade Dulce de Leche!

   I began to read about this caramel sauce as I read and browsed through blogs. It seems that it's popular in South America (correct me if I'm wrong) and there are several ways of doing it. Most methods seem to require the use of condensed milk. The thing is, in Malaysia we usually have sweetened creamer (which is made from palm oil) rather than the dairy type, and people say the latter is better for making Dulce de Leche.


   However, I came across a recipe in Joy of Baking (one of my favourite baking sites) that provides a recipe using regular milk, with several other ingredients. It seemed simple enough, so I bookmarked the recipe waited for a time when we'd have enough extra milk to make it.


   This morning, I made some Dulce de Leche as we all rushed to prepare for leaving home. I had just over an hour and the sauce required around 40 to 60 minutes of cooking time. I was a little apprehensive at first, and was afraid that I'd burn the whole thing, but I had to use the milk or it's go bad while we weren't at home.


   And lo and behold I did it! It wasn't so hard. Thankfully, I'd seen the video provided by Stephanie in the Joy of Baking, which is really helpful. I watched it many times before, which helped. It wasn't as fussy a process as I though it would be- even though it required me to stay by the pot, watching and stirring the sauce constantly, I was still able to clear up the mess in the kitchen, wash the dishes etc. I just made sure to check the sauce every 30 seconds to 1 minutes. I managed to burn the bottom a little bit by the end of the cooking time because I forgot to turn down the heat, but it didn't do too much damage and I just strained the sauce before pouring it into a container. I can't wait to find some use for it when we get home!


   You can read the original recipe here. Watch the video- it's really interesting!


   These are the ingredients I used:


   1 litre/4 cups fresh milk
   3/4 cup (150g) caster sugar
   2 tablespoons golden syrup (in place of corn syrup)
   1/2 teaspoon baking soda
   1/8 teaspoon fine salt


   This is what I did:


   Stirred together all the ingredients on low heat, increasing the heat to medium and lowering it again when I found it necessary. It took around 1 hour to achieve the nice, caramel colour. Probably would have taken less time if I'd bring the mixture to boil more quickly. But it worked anyway.

10 minutes into cooking

30 minutes (I think) into cooking

Hah! You can see bits of the burnt caramel.
Hakuna matata. Just strain the sauce and you'll be fine.

   I didn't quite believe it when Stephanie said she could simply lick the dulce de leche of a spoon. Well... I ended up cleaning up the leftovers in the pot. Delicious!


   Another goal in baking/cooking achieved. What's next?


   I'm beginning to develop a philosophy in baking- you needn't be afraid of making something that you want to make! Don't be afraid. Go ahead and try that recipe that you've eyed for a long, long time. If it doesn't work out, well then try again. I should tell myself this many, many times. For this particular recipe, it worked.


   The dulce de leche can be kept in the refrigerator for up to a month.

I love the beautiful brownish-golden colour.
What should I do with this?
Any suggestions?

   I enjoyed entering the three blogging events for August, so I think I'll be brave and enter more events when I get the chance. I'm entering this for Jac's September Bookmarked Recipes, but I'll provide the links later. For now I need to sleep!


   p.s. We reached Kedah safely at around 7pm. Today was the last day of Ramadhan. Tomorrow is the day of Eidul Fitr. Selamat Hari Raya/Happy Eidul Fitr to all Muslims!


   p.s.2 Ooppss! I forgot to include the Bookmarked Recipes event logo. Here it is:

   The event is hosted monthly by Jac of Tinned Tomatoes, and was originally created by Ruth from Ruth's Kitchen Experiments. Do take a look at the September round-up, and don't forget to join the next round-up for October! 

15 Hours of Baking... huh

   I'm rather tired. I started baking at 9am today, and turned off the oven at about 2am just now. Well, I did take some breaks in between, but most of my time today was spent in the kitchen. What an achievement!


   Let's see. I made some cookies:
   1. Vanilla Custard Kisses (still haven't made the filling)
   2. Afghan Biscuits
   3. Surprise Cookies (something my Dad named, and my favourite out of today's bakings)
   4. Chocolate Chip Whoopie Pies
   5. Hazelnut Cookies


   I'll post entries about them later. I also baked a few more goodies in the last few days:
   1. Bright-eyed Susans
   2. Tate's Chocolate Chip Cookies
   3. Mocha-Crescent Thingies


   I can't imagine how people who take orders for Eid manage! I love baking, but doing it non-stop can be a little tiring. Thankfully KakYong. Aiman, Ummi & adik helped. Dad and Abang helped by eating! Haha. 


   We're setting off for Kedah at around 9am. If we manage to leave by then. If I have time, I shall post some recipes before we do, but if I don't I'll do it when we get there- provided I have time to copy down the recipes! There's still so much to do, but we're all looking forward to meeting everyone for Eid. It'll be fun. And a little sad too, with Tok (my paternal grandmother) who no longer recognises anybody. 


   The kitchen is a mess. 

Looking forward to Raya Bakes!!!

   Abuya a.ka. is an absolute dear when it comes to fulfilling his children's wishes. He went and bought all these baking ingredients for me and I couldn't wait to start when I saw them! I've already made some cookies, and hopefully I'll be able to share them with here soon.


   I'd just though I'd showcase photos of some of the ingredients here. Though they may seem normal for most bakers, I'm still excited because baking ingredients are quite expensive and we rarely spend a lot on them. I love seeing how much I have on hand to experiment and have fun with!

Three different kinds of chocolate chips.
Butterscotch, chocolate and uhm... black and white?
I love choc chips.
The three different kinds remind me of a recipe I saw at Bakerella's... hmm...

Baking chocolate, but this isn't the bitter kind. There's a hint of sugar in it.
I prefer the last kind that I bought. That you could eat on its own.

Dessicated coconut- been sitting on the shelf for quite a long time. I should get to work and use them.
Cornflakes- though I'd prefer Kellogg's, using these for baking should be fine.

Ever since we moved to Kelantan, I buy most of my baking stuff at Barang Kita.
It's a bakery store and it has quite a lot of interesting and of course useful stuff.

Yes, halal gelatine!
Please visit their website for more information.

Brown sugar!
I love working with brown sugar.
Recipes that use them somehow tend to  produce better results! (I think)
And Ummi says they're a lot healthier than plain old granulated white sugar.

And an assortment of flavourings, colourings and whatnot.

Hehe... messy. I should get around to arranging them.

   In the future I plan to share some stories about the ingredients that I use and where I purchase them. I'd like to write about my search for Halal certified products too. I hope the information will be useful for Muslims who (happen to, if they ever do, stumble upon and) read this blog. I also hope it will help non-Muslims understand better about why eating halal food is important to Muslims. You may have some Muslim friends, and you want to make something for them to eat. Well, I hope I can help you in my own small ways.

Veggie/Fruit a Month: Peaches - Peach Pie

   I've always loved peaches. The wonderful smell, the bright, beautiful colours of both the skin and the flesh and the flavours... and it had always been one of my biggest dreams (I have a lot of those, by the way) to make a Peach Pie.


   And here it is, a Peach Pie, to celebrate the gathering of all 7 members of my family! We're all home, and it was lovely to have ifthar together. We joked, shared stories, poked fun at each other and just enjoyed being together as a family. 


   This the fourth time I've made pie using BC's Pie and Pastry Cookbook, and I'm afraid I'm still struggling with the pastry. I cheated several times (such as cutting the rolled-out pastry in half and placing the halves one after another before pinching them together in the pan... hehe) but it turned out okay. I was afraid they wouldn't brown, that the peaches would taste weird, blablabla... but it was okay. It turned out fine.


   So here it is, my most (I think, anyway) successful pie yet. My youngest brother says it's nice warm, but KakYong and Abang think it's be good cold. Abuya gave me the thumbs-up sign, so I guess it went well. I took over an hour preparing the pie with some help from KakYong, and went it finally went into the oven I felt relieved. Well, perhaps not truly  relieved because I was worried the pie wouldn't cook... blablabla again. I'm happy to say I'm no longer so afraid of making pastry!


   So enough said, let's go to our pie, shall we? I'm including measurements for three pie sizes (8-inch, 9-inch and 10-inch) but I made a 10-inch one. Once again I've not included the recipe for the crust because like I said, I'm still struggling with it, though I know it's a good recipe because it works better than any other so far!


   My final say: This peach pie is a peach!!!

PEACH PIE

Source: Betty Crocker's Pie and Pastry Cookbook

8-INCH PIE
Pastry for 8-inch Two Crust Pie
4 cups sliced peaches (about 6 medium)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
2/3 cup sugar
3 tablespoons flour
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon butter or margarine


9-INCH PIE

Pastry for 9-inch Two Crust Pie
5 cups sliced peaches (about 8 medium)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoon butter or margarine

10-INCH PIE

Pastry for 10-inch Two Crust Pie
6 cups sliced peaches (about 10 medium)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 1/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
3 tablespoon butter or margarine

Heat oven to 425F/210C.


Prepare pastry.


Toss peaches and lemon juice. Stir together sugar, flour and cinnamon; mix lightly with peaches. Turn into pastry-lined pie pan; dot with butter. 


Cover with top crust (with slits, or you can a lattice top, which I did); seal and flute. Cover edge with 2- to 3-inch strip of aluminium foil to prevent excessive browning; remove foil last 15 minutes of baking. 


Bake 8- and 9-inch pies 35 to 45 minutes, 10-inch pie 40 to 50 minutes or until crust is nicely browned and juice begins to bubble through the slits in the crust. Serve with lemon sauce (recipe below).




Baker's Notes
1. If you can't get fresh peaches, you can use canned ones. I got two cans of peach halves for a good price at Mydin (around RM 5.00+ for each can) and only used one and a half cans (around 13 peach halves). Drain the peach halves or slices (keep the juice for another recipe) and decrease the sugar to half of the required quantity. 


2. We increased the quantity of cinnamon in our pie- I love cinnamon!


3. I baked my pie for 1 hour at 240C. It came out a nice, golden-brown colour and when the timer went off, some caramelised sugar/juice was beginning to seep out of the top crust.

OLD-FASHIONED LEMON SAUCE

Makes 1 1/3 cups.

*According to the book, this sauce is good for blueberry and mincemeat pies. It worked really well with the peach pie.

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter or margarine
1/4 cup water
1 egg, well beaten
3/4 teaspoon grated lemon peel
3 tablespoons lemon juice


In saucepan combine all ingredients. Heat to boiling over medium heat, stirring constantly. Serve warm or cool. Store sauce in covered container in refrigerator.




Baker's Notes
1. We had 3/4 of a lemon left, so we put all of that in instead of just 3 tablespoons.
2. I decreased the sugar to 1/3 cup.
3. The sauce firmed up a little too much while it was sitting in the fridge, so we just added a little hot water and it worked fine.

   I'm submitting this recipe for the Veggie/Fruit a Month, an event created by  Priya of Mharo Rajasthan's Recipes. The event is hosted monthly by a different person/blog with a different fruit or veggie, and this month the host is Susan from the Well-Seasoned Cook and the theme is Peaches! (I hope I've put all the links properly- still trying to get used to this!)

   I'm also submitting this to the August Bookmarked Recipes hosted by Jacqueline at Tinned Tomatoes. The event was originally created by Ruth from Ruth's Kitchen Experiments. (I meant to join last month but didn't quite have the nerve). I've bookmarked this recipe ever since I started reading the book, so I hope it counts! 


p.s. Uploading photos takes ages! Pheww!!!

Batik Cake a.k.a. Hedgehog Slice

I know, I know, I need to work on the presentation. Next time, huh?

   I've made this cake twice. Once for ifthar at home. The second was when I went to KakYong's (two or three days ago). I'd promised to take some baked goodies for her, but I didn't have time to make any so hopefully this Batik Cake made up for it.


   I've known and eaten this cake ever since I was five and I've always loved it. We used to make the crunchy sort though- no eggs. The biscuit and chocolate always got stuck to your teeth and brushing them was a lot of work! I discovered that people have become more creative and instead of just dumping the whole lot of biscuit pieces into the chocolate mixture, you arrange them, layer by layer, and the cake turns out really pretty when cut. I forgot to take a picture of the second cake (which turned out nicer than the first one).


   The fun thing about this recipe is that you use everything up in one go (well, perhaps not the biscuits). The cake is sweet and really chocolaty. There are several versions of the recipe (some also include cocoa) but I just followed the one with the fewest ingredients.


   The following recipe is based on the second cake I made at KakYong's, but the photo is from the first one. I'm too lazy to go and check the recipe at Wendy's, so this is what I remember putting in and doing:


BATIK CAKE a.k.a. HEDGEHOG SLICES
Sources: Wendy and Kak Hana


*Note: Wendy provided a really useful step-by-step tutorial. Thanks!


1 regular-sized can condensed milk
1 200g packet Milo (or your favourite malted chocolate drink)
4 eggs, lightly beaten
150g or 2/3 cup butter (cut in cubes)
1 packet Marie biscuits
1 tsp vanilla ( optional-I didn't put it in)


In a saucepan, stir together condensed milk and Milo until well combined.


Stir in eggs and mix until well combined.


Put saucepan on stove and put in butter cubes and turn on heat to medium low. Cook custard until thickened, then turn to low heat. Cook until mixture becomes think and grainy. Turn of heat.


Hah, this is where I get lazy. Go to Wendy's blog and look at her step-to-step tutorial. I should have told you to do that in the first place. Apologies... getting a little sleepy. Next time I'll try to include photos of my own step-by-step attempts, haha.


Thinking of making this when we go back to Kedah for Eid (there'll be a stove at the homestay so yay!)