Red Wine Oxtail Stew / Oxtail Bourguignon (紅酒燴牛尾)

Fresh and meaty oxtail, red wine, rosemary, garlic, onions, tomatoes. By reading the list of ingredients, you know this makes a great french stew.

This slow-cooked oxtail meat is so soft and melting, and drenched with rich red wine sauce. This insanely delicious comforting food is absolutely perfect for parties and family gathering!

Be it Red Wine Oxtail Stew or Oxtail Bourguignon, or French oxtail stew, they are technically the same, although some could argue that they are different. Each family has different style of cooking Oxtail Stews. List of ingredients may vary. Some prefers more spices, some prefers basic flavors. French braise them with red wine and mushrooms, and it can be beef or oxtail or veal.

There's no lack of Oxtail Stew recipes online. But mine has shorter list of ingredients tho. So, it's easier to achieve. Everything is available in Cold Storage. But it does not means that this stew is effortless. Mashed potatoes would make the perfect side dish to complement oxtail stew.

Although oxtail is regard as cheap cuts in some country, but in Singapore? No. Not really. Oxtail is expensive in Singapore. In some restaurants in other countries who serves this dish in a peasant way, especially French, and slowly going into haute cuisine. But not yet there, and we're not sure if they will be there or not, unlike Beef Bourguignon.

Ingredients

• 1.5kg Fresh Oxtail
• 3 tbsp Plain Flour
• 4 tbsp Cooking Oil
• 2 Large Yellow Onions
• 4 Cloves Garlic
• 2 Fresh Tomatoes
• 2 cans Whole Peeled Tomato
• 2 sprig Rosemary
• 400ml Red Wine
• 400ml Beef Stock
• some Spanish Chorizo chunks, about 7 inches long (Optional)
• 2 tsp Ground Black Pepper 
• 2 tsp Salt (or more to taste)
• 2 tbsp Tomato Ketchup 
• some coriander leaves as garnishing

Method

1. Coat oxtails with 3 tbsp of plain flour evenly. In a french pot, heat up 4 tbsp oil, and give oxtail a nice sear until brown on every side. Remove oxtail and set aside. 
2. Throw in chopped onions, and garlic into the same pot. Saute until onions are soft. Add in fresh tomato wedges and whole peeled tomato can. Fry for another few minutes until tomatoes slightly softened.
3. Add in browned oxtails, arrange them nicely on the pot, ensuring each piece is at the bottom, while the tomatoes is on top. 
4. Add in carrots, rosemary, red wine, beef stock, spanish chorizo and ground black pepper. 
5. Let it simmer on the stove for 30mins, and transfer the pot into a baking tray, and send the pot into pre-heat the oven to 170 Degree Celsius for 1.5 hours. Do check for splatters and spillage. Reduce to 160 Degree Celsius if there's a need. 
6. Leave oxtail stew aside and let it age for a night. Remember to reheat it before going to sleep. 
7. On the next day morning, add salt, reheat the stew pot and let it simmer for another 30mins or upto 1 hour. 
8. Scoop away the top layer of fats. Add in tomato ketchup and give it a stir before taste test. Adjust saltiness accordingly, and the stew is ready to eat.
9. Optionally, for more presentable looking stews (like mine); Extra effort is needed - Transfer all oxtails, carrot chunks and chorizo chunks from the stew juices. Stew juices will then be strained, and then reduced under flame until stew juice achieved desired thick consistency. Pour thick stew juice over oxtail, and reheat oxtail stew under flame before serving. Don't forget the coriander leaves :)

Here's the complete pictorial guide for your easy reference. I'm sure this series of pictorial guide could complement the method in writing and so as to achieve better understanding. 

Step 1 : Dust oxtail with flour and pan-sear it till brown color. This gives really good flavors to the oxtail stew. 

Step 2 : Be very sure that you do not wash the pot after searing the oxtail. We need those brown patchy mess! Just throw in onions, garlic, tomatoes, and give it a good stir fry.

Before you even start cooking, do select the right flameproof casserole french pot size for your dish. The pot size should be able to fit all oxtails in just nicely with little leeway for other ingredients to fall down to the bottom of the pot except liquids. Like this, you don't have to tie kitchen string around each oxtail piece to hold the meat on the bone which I find it extremely tedious.

Step 3 and 4 : Add in oxtails, ensuring oxtails are at the bottom. And then, add the rest of the ingredients except salt.

Max bought me some real good Spanish Chorizo from Spain sometimes ago. I added Spanish Chorizo into the stew. Why? Because Spanish Chorizo has its distinctive smokiness and deep red color from dried smoked red peppers. It gives really nice flavor to the stew. You may argue that this isn't French stuff. It's optional. You don't have to follow exactly the same. No strict rules here. You also may add some paprika for extra heat if you prefer.

I'm quite regretful for using 22cm french pot for this dish. When I send the pot into the oven, it splatters and spills. So, I transfer to a 24cm french pot after that. So, selecting the right pot size before you cook is really important.

Leaving oxtail stew to age overnight is the key to success. The flavors will infuse all over during aging process. And Le Creuset french pot hold heat amazingly. It still 'cooks' during the cooling down process.

Step 8 : This stew will gives you a thick layer of fats floating on top. Don't get freaked out. Don't remove those fats on the first day. Because fat layer on top prevents air going into the stew, and this also explains the stew keeps well overnight without keeping it in the fridge. Fats will only be removed on the day you consume the stew.

This dish can be done in a rustic way. It can stop at step 8, or boil a little longer if one wish. Or like me, you may proceed to put in extra effort to go to step 9. This also means you have to wash extra pot, sieve, and utensils.

Step 9 : Stew juices needs to be strained, and reduced under flame until desired thickness has reached before pouring over the oxtail stew. You may also do another taste test after the sauce is reduced, just incase you want to do any further adjustment. Tomato ketchup would be a good compliment to the stew juice.

Look at the end result. My oxtail stew will have a nice gloss with the reduced stew juices poured over. And sprinkle chopped coriander leaves over oxtail stew gives another level of attractive look.

Although steamed rice is a good option as a side dish, but I assure you, Oxtail stew is best eaten with mashed potatoes as a side.

My mashed potato recipe is very simple. Some Russet Potatoes, good slab of butter, some fresh milk, and season well with salt and pepper. And oh! don't forget to prepare some salad too!

Cooking method for this dish requires slowly simmering the oxtail in wine, tenderizing the meat that would have been too tough to cook in any other way. Total cooking time of my Red Wine Oxtail Stew is 3 hours, not counting cooling time, and aging time. The meat fall off the bone nicely, but still remain some chew. I'm absolutely satisfied. It's insanely delicious!!!

Thou this dish needs abit of patience to cook, but I assure you that this is worth every effort. Do give this dish a try. I'm sure you will love it.

Strawberry Peppermint Tart

There are times when all that matters is creating something glamorous. A little red dress instead of a black ones. Abit of lace peeking out, that sparky eye-shadow and lots of lip gloss. 

You might not know what I'm talking about, but when you look at this picture, I know you do. I'm talking about this Sexy Strawberry Peppermint Tart.

It's Christmas, and I thought, this is the right time to share this recipe. Christmas is about Red, and that little Green in-between. 

I've come up with my own version of Strawberry Peppermint Tart that I adore recently. It's light, refreshing and with that sweetness in-between the tang. I've spent quite sometime to come up with this favorite combination tart of my own and I come to a realization that different individual appreciate different type of layering combination.

I'm anal. I prefer mine. Sexy. Delicious!

When I create this Strawberry Tart, I imagined that I want my Strawberry Tart to have the kind of Strawberry overload succulence explodes in my mouth, the cheese layer melts away in my mouth like butter. And oh, I want that cakey layer too, but not heavy, and the combination taste must be nothing short of heaven. 

So, here, with all my cookbook readings and online readings, I've come up with my own favorite Strawberry Peppermint Tart. But I won't pretend to tell you that this is easy. The difficult part is not the tart making. The difficult part is to gather all the ingredients and to get the nicest Strawberries for the tart. 

I used 6 Inch Tart Tin (Gobel Brand), Made in France. Got it from Tott Store at S$26. If you are making bigger tart, you can double up the recipe accordingly. 

Ingredients

for the Tart Crust

• 90g Cold Unsalted Butter, cubed
• 150g Cake Flour
• 45g Icing Sugar
• 2 Egg Yolk
• Pinch of Salt

for the Almond Filling

• 40g Unsalted Butter
• 30g Icing Sugar
• 1 Egg
• 1/2 tsp Corn Starch
• 40g Almond Powder
• 1 drop of Vanilla Extract

for the Cream Cheese Layer

• 125g Cream Cheese, room temperature
• 20g Unsalted Butter, room temperature
• 25g Icing Sugar
• 15g Fresh Lemon Juice
• 50g Creme Fraiche
• 4 tbsp Good Quality Strawberry Jam

for the Strawberries Layer

• 30 to 35 Fresh Strawberries (I used Organic Strawberries from USA)
• 4 tbsp Mirror Gel 
• 3 tbsp Water
• Few drops of Peppermint Extract
• Some Fresh Mint Leaves

Method - for the Tart Crust & Almond Filling

1. Blitz Tart Crust ingredients in a food processor till crumbly. Pour the crumbs on a double layered clingwrap, wrap them up into a ball shape. Use your hand, give them a few press until the crumbs are well combined into a pastry dough. Do not overwork the pastry.
2. Roll the pastry into a round 8 inch shape with the aid of the clingwraps to prevent pastry from sticking to the rolling pin and working top. 
3. Wrap rolled pastry well with clingwrap, and put the pastry into the fridge for 1 hour. 
4. Remove pastry from fridge, remove the clingwrap, press the tart crust into the tart mold evenly with your fingertip. Do not panic if the pastry cracked. Just cut the excess pastry at the side of the tart and patch it on the cracked side. It's like playdoh. This tart crust pastry is very forgiving. Just shape the tart crust until you are happy with the thickness and prick the tart crust bottom with a fork to finish. 
5. For the almond filling, combine all almond filling ingredients in a food processor. Blitz until everything comes together, and it is ready to spread on top of the tart crust. 
6. Bake the tart crust with almond filling in the pre-heated oven at 175 Degree Celsius for about 23 to 25 mins. Remove from the oven and let the tart cool down. 

Method - for the Cream Cheese Layer 

1. In a big bowl, mix all Cream Cheese layer ingredients together until combined. Spread the cream cheese mixture on top of the cooled tart. 
2. Spread a layer of good quality strawberry jam on top of the cream cheese layer. if you are lazy, you can also mix the strawberry jam with the cream cheese. But your cream cheese layer will be softer. 

Method - for the Strawberries Layer

1. Ensure Strawberries are washed, hulled and dried with kitchen towel. 
2. To glaze, mix Mirror Gel, Water, and Peppermint Extract in a big bowl. Put the Strawberries in and give it a toss. Ensure Strawberries are all well coated with the glaze.
3. Arrange glazed strawberries on top of the tart evenly. Make sure strawberries are standing straight, tall, and proud. Make sure strawberries are arranged to the rim of the tart. Make it full!
4. Brush more mirror gel mixture on top of the arranged strawberries to give it a nicer gloss. Put the tart into a container, covered well, and let the tart sit in the fridge to set for about 4 hours. 
5. For finishing touch, arrange some fresh mint leaves on top before serving. 

I've did quite a few attempt. I tried to remove the almond filling layer, and double up the Cream Cheese filling. It's a crowd pleaser! But tart crust might crack during baking process. To salvage it, Alan recommend me to apply a layer of chocolate on the tart crust to secure it. Like that, my Strawberry tart will be fully cream cheese base and with that hint of chocolate. It's nice. Many people loves it.  

But I personally still prefer the version with almond filling in it. Because almond filling gives another level of distinctive flavor to the overall taste of the tart. And also, with the almond filling, I have no worries if my tart crust will crack or not during baking process. It will hold together. Very safe. 

Do take note that different type of strawberries gives different results in overall taste. My take is, if you are putting in so much effort to make this Strawberry Tart to impress your loved ones, you don't be stingy. Good ingredients gives you good quality tart. 

Now, let's take a look at the layers. It has thin layer of tart crust, a layer of almond filling, a layer of cream cheese filling, a layer of strawberry jam, and then, the fresh organic strawberries coated with peppermint glaze, and oh... that touch of green mint leaves. 

The tart has it's refreshing Peppermint moist, that cakey almond layer, and that creamy richness, while the strawberries are plump and juicy. One bite on it, it all mixes together to make a decadent scrumptious slice of heaven. 

Before you complaint about how expensive those ingredients are to make this Strawberry tart, ask yourself. How much are you willing to pay for a slice of Strawberry tart that looked like this at Fruit Paradise? Think again :)

I think I've had enough of describing how much I love Strawberry Peppermint Tart. It's Christmas! It must be Peppermint! 

When I'm looking at my Strawberry Tart, it's like, that little red dress fits you oh, so perfectly.

It's pure indulgence, pure pleasure. And this is the kind of pleasure you can create at home freely and share the joy with your friends and relatives. 

I hope you like it. And Merry Christmas to everyone!

Pandan Coconut Butter Cake （班兰椰香牛油蛋糕）

To me, the flavor of Pandan is wholly unique and indescribable. The butter cake is nicely perfumed with the scent of Pandan leaf and coconut, but taste wasn't overpowering. Pandan and Coconut? Yes! They are perfect match!

I received a request on Friday night, asking me to make a cake for one lovely auntie who's celebrating her 84 years old birthday over a Soka Gathering. Idea strikes me, and I drafted this recipe on a paper on a friday night at 11.55pm before I forget. I tweaked the ratio using my all-time-favorite Butter Cake that I've posted back in 2012, and I get started with my baking preparation.

This cake is really overwhelmed with response from fellow beautiful aunties and uncles who tasted my Pandan Coconut Butter Cake this afternoon. Both Facebook readers, friends who had been WhatsApping me for the recipe, yes I know. I've rushed this recipe for you guys now as promised.

This cake is really yummy. I can't help it but wanting to share to everyone. It's so moist, fragrant and flavorful. Me and Max only get share a small piece because fellow aunties and uncles snatched the whole cake within a few minute when the birthday auntie says "Wah! Very delicious leh!". That's how overwhelmed it is.

There is no need to frost the side of the cake at all. Sometimes less is more. And that's how I feel.

This makes large cake and good for you to bring it to a party. Please read all the notes and steps that I've written. Those details are there for a reason.

Ingredients

• 250g Salted Butter, room temperature
• 5 Eggs, large sized and in room temperature
• 150g + 50g Castor Sugar
• 200g Self Raising Flour
• 1/4 tsp Baking Powder
• 1/4 tsp Bicarbonate Soda
• 1 tsp Extra Virgin Coconut Oil (Optional) 
• 50ml Coconut Cream
• 20ml Concentrated Pandan Juice *See Preparation Note
• 25g Desiccated Coconut

Whipped Cream Topping

• 1 tsp Corn Flour
• 1 tbsp Water
• 1.5 tsp Castor Sugar 
• 100ml Dairy Whipping Cream
• 50ml Coconut Cream
• some grated fresh and firm coconut flesh
• some green lime zest
• some edible sugar flowers as deco (Optional)

Preparation Note
- You will have to prepare the concentrated pandan juice way in advance, at least 5 hours. The reason is because you need time to allow the pandan juice to set before you can get the best out of the best that sunk at the bottom.

1. Buy a bunch of Pandan Leaves (aka Screwpine Leaves). It cost me about 20cts from the wet market. 
2. Wash Pandan Leaves clean and snip them into pieces. 
3. Dump pandan leaves into the juicer, add a cup of water and blits away. 
4. Strain the pandan juice, covered, and keep them in the fridge to set for few hours. I left mine in the fridge untouched overnight.
5. When the pandan juice is set, you will see two layers. The dark greenish colored concentrated pandan juice will sink down. That dark green part is the part we want for the cake. 

- Yes. It's tedious to make your own concentrated pandan juice. You can choose to use the bottled  pandan paste that you can conveniently bought it at any Phoon Huat or Supermarket. But you know? It taste different. You can go ahead and use it. The choice is your's.

The dark greenish concentrated Pandan juice sunk at the bottom after it's left in the fridge overnight.

Method - for the Cake

1. Pre-heat oven at 175 degree, fan OFF. 
2. Prepare 8 x 8 inch square baking pan. Line the base and the side nicely.
3. Separate egg whites and yolk 
4. Sieve flour together with baking powder and bicarb soda.
5. Mix both concentrated pandan juice and coconut cream together in a small bowl. 
6. Cream butter and 150g castor sugar until pale and fluffy. Add in extra virgin coconut oil (if you have it), beat for awhile, and followed by adding egg yolks, one at a time. 
7. Put in half of the sieved flour, mix on low speed until they are half mixed. Add in pandan juice and coconut cream mixture in 2 additions until well incorporated. Mix in the balance flour. As long as the batter is mixed well, stop it. Do not over-work the batter.  
8. Beat egg whites until soft peaks, gradually add 50g castor sugar in 3 additions until egg whites achieved stiff peak.  
9. Take 1/3 of the egg whites, fold into the batter. Take another 1/3, and repeat the folding process. 
10. pour the mixed batter to the balance to the mixing bowl where the balance 1/3 egg whites is. Continue to fold it until well mixed. Be gentle. We need to retain the egg whites bubbles as much as we can. 
11. Pour batter into the lined pan, level, and bake it for 1 hour or until skewers comes out clean. Leave cake to cool completely, use clingwrap to wrap it well and put them into the fridge overnight to let the whole cake infuse. Butter cake taste better overnight :)

Method - for the Whipping Cream & Decorations

1. Ensure Whipping Cream is always in chilled condition. This is the first thing you need to check.
2. In a small saucepot, add in corn flour and water. Stir well on a very low heat. It will turn sticky and gluey very quickly. So, you will have to remove it from the heat once it starts to thickened and quickly pour the thickened corn starch onto the castor sugar. Continue to stir until the castor sugar is melted.
3. Prepare bowl of ice water, get another clean and dry bowl, sitting on top of the ice water, pour 100ml of whipping cream. Whisk till soft peak.
4. Add in the thickened corn starch mixture into the whipping cream and continue to whisk till stiff peak is achieved. Keep it in the fridge. 
5. In another clean and dry bowl, sit on top of the same ice water, whisk 50ml coconut cream till stiff peak.
6. Take out the whipping cream, combine both whipping cream and coconut cream together, put it back to the fridge for later use.
7. As part of the delicious topping, I grate some firm coconut flesh coarsely using my microplane, and then sprinkle a tsp of castor sugar on top of the grated coconut. 
8. Grate some green lime zest to create another level *fwoh* to the overall taste of the cake and it gives nice color contras to the grated coconut too.
9. To assemble - I want my cake to look clean and showcase the beautiful pandan color of my cake, So, I trim the side of the cake. However, trimming is absolutely optional. Spread the cream on top of the cake generously. Push the cream to the edge, but leaving some space to avoid cream touching the side. Sprinkle grated coconut flesh evenly and top with green lime zest for the color contra. You can stop here, or you can add more decorations if you wants. 

Note : This is a fresh whipping cream with coconut cream. Fresh whipping cream always taste delicious, not as heavy and rich as buttercream, and they are absolutely not as stable as other cream. They must be chilled all the time. I added some corn starch, wanting to delay the melting time of the whipping cream. You can add gelatin of course, but I didn't do that this time. Always remember this point. This whipping cream is NOT stable. Never attempt to put the cake under room temperature and leave it unattended. The whipping cream topping will melt. If you want sturdier cream as topping, then, you have to change the topping recipe to suit your individual preference.

The side of the cake is trimmed to showcase the nice green color. 

Grating my coconut flesh using Microplane. 

And not to forget the nice touch of green lime zest. 

The result of this cake..... Simple, old-fashioned flavor. Combination of Pandan and Coconut, this definitely won't go wrong. Adding Extra Virgin Coconut Oil gives extra flavor to the cake. It's like, instead of adding coconut essence, I would recommend you to add Extra Virgin Coconut Oil. They smells amazing and they are genuine stuff! I use Coconut Oil for cooking too. But if you don't have em' at home, then you can choose not to add. It makes no sense for you to buy a bottle of Coconut Oil just because you wanna use 1 tsp for this cake.

I like my cake to be less complicated and unpretentious. Although cake decorations will create good impression to your guests and wow them, but the cake must be delicious! Good flavor and texture must be the first priority! Share this recipe if you agree with me. Hahah.

I love the topping. The white snow flakes melting away, the greens came alive. It's like... Winter turning into Spring! How lovely!

 Look at this beautiful white hair auntie. She's 84 this year. Her sweet smiles melts my heart away :)

As long as the fellow seniors are happy, my effort is worth it for sure :)

Happy Baking everyone!

Kueh Bangkit (Melt-In-Mouth Coconut Cookies)

Max asked for Kueh Bangkit this year. When I asked him to describe what kind of specific bangkit he wants, he says "You know? That sweet-powdery softness and warms your mouth with the fragrance of pandan and packed with coconut flavor?"

Ohh,,, he has a specific request!

Ever since I started learning baking, Kueh Bangkit was never on my to-bake list. Not until Max asked me to do so. Kueh Bangkit is one of his favorite Chinese New Year cookies. Obviously (refer to above on how he describe that)

In my childhood memory, my faint recall was that Kueh Bangkit is sweet, chalky, packed with coconut flavor, and melt-in-mouth. When I said melt, it really melts IMMEDIATELY in the mouth. The moment the cookies touches the tongue, it melts. Yes. That's the one! 

When I grew up, moved to Singapore for work, everything has turned commercialized. Unlike my home-town Kampar that sells home-made cookies during my childhood times. They do, still have some in Singapore, but really good ones? You've got to be lucky to find one. I started to dislike Kueh Bangkit ever since store-bought bangkits invaded the market. Bangkits displayed on the supermarket or neighbourhood bakeries didn't attract me at all. This is where I stopped having interest on Bangkit. 

I tell myself, if I want to make, I will make the one that makes me find back at least 70% of my faint childhood feel (probably). If not, I won't consider my bangkit a success. So, this post is to share with you my experience on my attempts on Kueh Bangkit.  

As usual, before I start experimenting something, I will make sure I do some reading. I flipped through some cookbooks, check out the online recipes. Comparing the liquid and dry ingredients ratio, I finally settled with fatboo's recipe that sounds really convincing. 

Some people tells me that Kueh Bangkit is easy to make. But mind you, they are easy to fail too. So, becareful on that. To ensure my first attempt a success, I followed the recipe obediently without tweaking it. This also means, I followed the particular ingredients (and the brand) mentioned on the recipe. Only on the 2nd and 3rd attempt, I then tweaked the recipe abit. So, please... be good. For best chances of success, just follow as I said. 

This recipe ask for Ayam Brand Premium Coconut Cream and Sago Flour. Max hunt these two ingredients up and down for me and it is not avail. We managed to found Sago Flour at Sheng Siong Clementi. For the coconut cream, he is so smart enough to call Ayam Brand Singapore to ask for it. Later, we learnt that Ayam Brand Premium Coconut Cream is named as Pure Coconut Cream in Singapore. So, same content, different name I guess. According to Ayam Brand staff, this particular Coconut Cream gives the most similar quality as the freshly squeezed coconut milk in the market. It contains nothing else except coconut cream (no stabilizer).  

DISCLAIMER : This is NOT a sponsored post. Because this Coconut Cream really brings out its good flavor. I feel that I should credit and recommend this coconut cream to you guys to ensure higher chances of success in attempt. And please remember, this recipe ask for coconut CREAM, not coconut milk. Becareful. 

Ingredients

(Source : Fatboo, with modification after my 3rd attempt)

• 800g Sago Flour (2 packs of 400gm)
• 10 to 12 Pandan Leaves (Screwpine Leaves)
• 240gm Ayam Brand Pure Coconut Cream
• 300gm Icing Sugar (Originally ask for 200gm) *See Note
• 3 Egg yolks (medium sized eggs 50 - 55g)
• Drops of Red coloring (optional)

Note : 

1. I increased Icing sugar from 200g to 300g Icing Sugar on my 2nd and 3rd attempt, and I swear that it does taste better! The existence of Sugar enhances the coconut flavor.   
2. This recipe makes approx. 330 Bangkits, depends on the cookies thickness. I've got 220 out of this recipe. So, I assume that my cookies is thicker than Fatboo's one. 
3. The existence of red coloring is to add some festive feel to the overall look of the bangkit. It's absolutely optional.  

Flour Preparation

10 - 12 Pandan Leaves : Wash and wipe with paper towels till dry. Cut into desired lengths. 

800g Sago Flour : In a big wok, fry sago flour over low heat for 10 mins. Stirring all the time to ensure the flour is not burnt. The initial frying stage would be lumpy and hard to stir. 

Cut Pandan Leaves : Add it into the flour and continue to fry another 10mins till flour is light and the pandan leaves are dried and crinkled. The flour will become dry and flies up when stirred. This indicates that the flour is ready. 

Note : 

1. You may not be able to finish the Sago Flour at the end of the baking process. But it's better to prepare more as some will be used for managing the dough, flouring the pastry board and so on. Read on, experience it, and you will know. 
2. You can prepare the flour one day in advance (or upto 5 days in advance), as the flour needs to cool down completely before you can use them. 
3. It is highly advisable to leave the fried sago flour overnight to ensure that it is completely cooled. Once it is cooled, sift and store the prepared flour in air-tight container.

Pastry Preparation

1) In one bowl, stir 240gm Coconut Cream and 200gm Icing Sugar with hand whisk till sugar dissolved and mixture turned semi-greyish thick sugary solution.

2) In another bowl, whisk 3 Egg Yolks and the remaining 100gm Icing Sugar under high speed till creamy white and sugar is dissolved.

3) Lower speed, add in (3) coconut sugar solution and whisk till well mixed.

4) With a wooden spatula, add in 560gm Fried Sago Flour, still till well mixed. *See Photo

5) Cover the dough with a piece of wet cloth to prevent pastry from drying out, let the dough rest awhile.

You only need to mix 560gm Fried Sago Flour into the wet mixture. The rest of the fried sago flour is for you to dust the working top, adding more flour to the sticky dough, dust the rolling pin, and everything else. The pastry is VERY STICKY. In my first attempt, I thought somewhere went wrong, I was worried through the entire experiment as it's not easy to handle.

Rolling and Cutting the Pastry

1) Line pastry board with a piece of clingwrap to prevent it from sticking.

2) Working with a cake scrapper, cut out 1/3 portion of the sticky pastry, sprinkle some fried sago flour over, knead in. You need to add in flour bit by bit till pastry is smooth, soft and pliable.

3) Flour worktop, place pastry on it, roll dough out to to your desired thickness. For all my 3 attempts, I conclude that 6mm thickness is ideal for my personal preference.

4) With cookie cutter, cut out the bangkit, place it on a lined baking tray.

5) Using a skewer or a toothpick, put a tiny dot of red color on the bangkit to give this cookies an overall festive feel.

Baking

Bake in pre-heated oven at 160 degree for 10mins. This initial 10mins is to allow the bangkit to set the design.
Then, reduce the temperature to 130 degree, and continue to bake for a further 10 to 15 mins or till Bangkit is very light beige in color. Keep an eye on it. Gauge it yourself. Your oven and my oven temperament might not be the same.

In the original recipe, it mentioned 160 degree for 10mins and 130 degree for 20mins. I tried, but I think 10mins + 10mins is sufficient. So, always feel it yourself. Because your bangkit thickness might be different from mine.

And this is how it looked when it is out of the oven, The hairline cracks on top of the cookies looked quite nice tho. And the little red dot makes the whole bangkit looked nice. I like!

It takes me 3 attempts to understand certain tricks. I learn new things in every baking experiment. For this bangkit, here's my sharing ...

My 1st attempt : Followed the original recipe obediently. Taste and smells good, but not sweet enough to my liking. Fragile cookies, definitely need alot of tender-loving-care. And it does melt-in-the-mouth very quickly as promised. I'm satisfied, and I consider this a success. Max says this gives him childhood feel. I don't know how true.

My 2nd attempt : I tried tweaking the recipe by using 80% sago flour and 20% tapioca flour, and increased sugar from 200g to 300g. The result, taste and smells better with the enhancement in sweetness. But cookies texture is not what I expected. The cookies is 'crunchy'! And yes, it does melt-in-the-mouth, but it melts VERY slowly... Duh! I don't know why, but I consider this is a failure because the cookies texture is not what I wanted. My MIL literally 'promote' it to her friends who came to our house. And I also don't know why this failed bangkit is a crowd pleaser. *face-palm*

My 3rd attempt : This is the recipe written as above. 100% sago flour, 300g sugar. Result was satisfactory. Cukup lemak, cukup wangi, cukup manis (literally means enough of coconuty, enough of sweetness, and nice fragrance in Malay). Although the cookies is still on the fragile side, they are better than the 1st attempt. But to be honest, you can't expect tough cookies to give you melt-in-the-mouth feel. Usually fragile cookies does. That's the logic I guess. I found the 'feel' on my 3rd attempt. And also, I'd say this is a success!

Kudos to this recipe. These cookies are good and well received. Definitely better than store-bought. I guarantee you this for sure. And yes, I repeat myself again, it does melt-in-the-mouth quicky! I have to say, I love this recipe, I really do.

But is this the perfect recipe? Maybe yes to me, but maybe no to others. I will continue to search for a perfect ones. If you do have one, please do share with me. Ok?

And a quick tips for you. When you arrange the cookies into the container, use chopsticks to do the work, With my clumsy fingers, I just couldn't control it well, I damaged a few cookies during the process. And I quickly use chopsticks to do the rest of the cookies arrangements.

I hope you like this recipe. And if you do, please go ahead and share this recipe with your friends and relatives.

In this New Year, may good luck and prosperity follow everyone of you. Happy New Year everyone!!!

Simple Sous Vide Chicken Legs

Recently, I'm learning Sous Vide cooking techniques at home. All thanks to Alan for encouraging me and connect me to this awesome Polyscience product. Also, I chance up to have a great lunch at Heston Blumenthal's restaurant on my recent trip to London. I witnessed how they cook my lunch using sous vide techniques!

After I came back from my 3 weeks Europe trip, I tied up my hair, put on my apron, take a deep breath and start exploring my sous vide machine, starting with the most simple recipe. Simple Sous Vide chicken legs, and then I roasted the chicken legs into perfection before serving.

For those who doesn't know what sous vide is - Sous vide (literally under vacuum in French) is one of the most popular modernist cooking techniques. If you've ever heard or watched famous chefs like Thomas Keller and Heston Blumenthal from hit television shows, they are the people who usually seen promoting sous vide cooking on TV.

Sous vide is very different from traditional cooking method. It needs alot of reading and understanding, as conceptually, it can be very difficult. From the various types of sous vide equipment, questions about vacuum sealing, the food science on the safety of sous vide can be quite confusing at the beginning. It takes me quite sometimes to explore and understand sous vide before I finally decided to invest on the equipment a year later. It's expensive! Of course I have to understand a few basics sous vide cooking before I invest on one.

I won't write too much to introduce on sous vide here, because all infos about sous vide is easily available on google. Once you understand a few basics, sous vide cooking is one of the easiest and most foolproof ways to cook. It saves me alot of time preparing my weekday dinner ahead!

My Sous Vide Professional Series machine, clamped on a big and tall stock pot, vacuum sealer made in Italy, vacuum bags, and some basic ingredients.

How simple? I just rubbed the chicken legs with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Put the legs into the vacuum bags, add a few dashes of olive oil, throw in a clove of garlic and some thymes. Seal it.

Ingredients

• 4 Fresh Chicken Legs
• 4 Cloves Garlic
• 4 strands of Thymes
• 1 tsp Kosher Salt
• 1 tsp Freshly ground black pepper
• Olive Oil 

Method

1. Pat dry chicken legs with kitchen towels. Rub chicken legs with salt and pepper. 
2. Put the legs into the vacuum bags, add a few dashes of olive oil, throw in a clove of garlic and thymes.
3. Vacuum seal the bag. Sous vide for 4 hours at 70C. 
4. To serve : Pre-heat oven at 270C, fan ON.
5. Gently remove the chicken leg from the vacuum bag. Put the chicken leg into the oven for 10mins.
6. Remove from oven and serve immediately. Incase if you wants better appearance, you can either leave the chicken leg into the oven for another 3 to 5mins or blowtorch it as a finishing. 

Here, they are all nicely vacuum sealed and ready to go into the water-bath.

Knowing that I need to crisp the chicken leg skin under a very hot oven before serving and thus the meat will be cooked slightly more from sous vide treatment, I sous vide the chicken leg at temperature 70C, which is slightly lower than the desired core temperature (74C).

The actual process of cooking sous vide is simple. You just need to determine the temperature you'd like to cook your food. Press the button, sous vide machine will heat up the water up to that temperature you want. Place the bag of sealed food in the water-bath until it is done.

When they came out of the sous vide waterbath, there are two options :

1st Options (To eat immediately)

1. Slightly pat dry the chicken leg with paper towels. Remove garlic and thymes. 
2. Put the chicken legs into a very hot oven and roast for 10mins or upto 15mins. Or as I mentioned above, blowtorch up to it's perfection. 

2nd Option (To Keep)

1. Prepare a large bowl of ice-cubed water. Remove the vacuum sealed chicken legs from the water bath. Shock in cold by putting the bags into the ice water until the chicken legs are completely cooled. 
2. Place the chicken legs bags into the freezers and freeze away. 
3. To serve - Put the frozen bags of chicken legs into the sous vide machine with the same setting (70C) and let it sous vide for about 30mins (or more) while you pre-heat your oven.
4. Repeat 1st Options steps.

Blow-torching your food is another awesome cooking method. If you are trying to get your guys to help out more in the kitchen? Buy a blowtorch. No kidding. I know blowtorch isn't really necessary, but it does make the process easier (and way more fun for the guys). It browned the meat very well :)

The thing about sous vide is that the temperature should ideally be the exact temperature you want the food to be when it is done. The result is a piece of meat that has retained the maximum amount of its juices, while still being done. It's an astonishing technique, but all my rambling has done miraculously little to convince anyone. Not many friends around me is into sous vide actually. Even my mother-in-law gave me the weird look when she first saw what I'm doing. I can understand that. Sous vide is not common in Asia tho.

Prepare some salad to go along. I did mine simple. Some Oak Leaves Salad, dressed with Balsamico di Modena. No fuss!

The appearance of the meat on the photo doesn't speak how good it is. Instead of stringy tough (I mean overcooked), the knife can effortlessly cut through the meat. The chicken leg is cooked juuuuust nice! This is a simple recipe that requires very minimum ingredients. But if you'd tried this, it's enough to make anyone convert.

Max ate the chicken leg happily. My only questions was whether was it the cook (me) or the machine? When I tasted the chicken meat, obviously the machine had a hand in what happened.

To say the food that came out of the machine tasted good, is something of an understatement.

I'm still a noob in sous vide cooking. More to explore, more to learn. Do share with me if you are into sous vide. I'm looking forward to make improvement.