Announcing event Lets Cook for Valentines (chocolate/hearts)

Time is too slow for those who wait,

 too swift for those who fear,

too long for those who grieve,

too short for those who rejoice,

 but for those who love, time is eternity. 

 ~Henry Van Dyke~

Saint Valentine's Day, commonly shortened to Valentine's Day, It is an annual commemoration held on February 14 celebrating love and affection between intimate companions. It is traditionally a day on which lovers express their love for each other by presenting flowers, offering confectionery, and sending greeting cards .

February brings us the theme of love, with Valentines day fast approaching, lets create some wonderful culinary delights to shower our loved ones with. As chocolates and hearts are generally associated with valentines, the theme for this event is to cook any dish  for your loved one but you must feature chocolate or hearts or both  in your dish in some form.You can do this by either using chocolate as an ingredient  in your dish or alternatively you can use hearts in the presentation / garnishing of your food .

To Participate:

1.Prepare a dish vegetarian only (eggs allowed) please link your dish using the linky below by entering your Dish Name and Post URL
2.Please link this event announcement with your entry, this is mandatory.
3.Use of logo is  not mandatory but it helps to spread the word if you can use it.

4. Multiple entries are allowed, archived are only allowed if reposted and updated with this event link.

4. In the event of problem using linky you can email me the entry at simplysensationalfood@gmail.com

Please use this format

Your Name:

Recipe Name

Recipe URL

Image no larger than 300 pixels.

Add your Lets Cook for Valentines Chocolate/ Hearts Entries here:
Dish Name and Post URL

Singapore Five Spice Powder

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Aromatic and fragranced  spice powder made with star anise, cinnamon, fennel, cloves and szechaun pepper corns. Its perfect for stirfries and five spice rice.

Ingedients:

5 star anise
2 sticks of cinnamon
10 cloves
1 teaspoon szechaun peppercorns
1 teaspoon fennel seeds.

Method:

1. In a heavy bottomed frying pan , dry  roast the spices for 2-3 minutes to release the fragrance.
2. Leave to cool for few minutes and then transfer them to a coffe grinder and grind to a smooth powder.
3. Transfer to an air tight jar and use as required.

You may Like:
Szechaun Chilli Sauce

Submitting to:
Flavours Of Singapore event by simply.food

Roti Jala- Singapore laced Pancakes

Lacey thin pancakes that are a wonderful accompaniment to a spicy curry.

Ingredients:

4 oz /120 grams  plain flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder
Cold water or Coconut milk  (I used water)
1 egg (I used 1 tablespoon yoghurt instead)
1 tablespoons sunflower oil

Method:

1. Sieve the flour and add the salt and turmeric.
2. Add the yoghurt and mix with the flour.
3. Add water a little at a time to form a batter of dropping consistency.There should be no lumps.

4. Fill a  roti jala cup mould with the batter.(I used an icing bottle or you can use a ketchup bottle)

Image from Baking Frenzy

5. Heat a non stick pan  and oil it sparingly with the oil.
6. When it is hot turn the heat to medium  and using the roti jala cup mould quickly spread the batter in to the pan using a circular motion  or forming vertical stripes as in this video.

7. Once the pancake has set after 2-3 minutes, you can fold it into three and transfer to serving place and repeat for remaining batter.There is no need to flip the pancake.
Serve with curry of your choice.

You may like :
Pudla savory pancakes

Submitting to:
Flavours Of Singapore event by simply.food

Pisang Goreng- Banana fritters.

Sweet banana deep fried in a crispy  crunchy coating ,drizzled with a flurry of icing sugar.

Ingredients:

3 sweet  firm medium bananas (Do not use over ripe bananas)
30 grams / 1 oz  rice flour
120 grams  /4 oz plain flour
60 grams  / 2 oz  corn flour
Pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
180ml (approx) water to make batter
Sunflower oil for deep frying.
Icing sugar to sprinkle

Method:

1. In a  bowl add the flours and salt and gradually add the water to form a  thick batter that coats the back of a spoon.(It should be fairly thick so that it coates the banana and doesn't drop off)
2. Peel and slice the bananas into two .Cut each slice into  three pieces and keep aside
3. Heat the oil and when it is hot, dip the  banana pieces into the batter and drop them gently into the hot oil.
4. Deep fry the banana fritters on medium heat  until golden brown , remove from oil and drain on kitchen paper.
5. Sprinkle some icing over the bananas and transfer them to a serving dish.

Serve with Vanilla icecream.

You may Like:
Coconut  milk  pudding.

Submitting to:
Flavours Of Singapore event by simply.food
Teatime snack event by Torview
ABC series desserts by Ramya

C.E.D.D Fresh Produce event by Raven guest hosted by Veggie Platter

Singapore Coconut milk pudding.

Creamy, smooth pudding with a delicious coconut fragrance and taste.

Ingredients:

250 ml coconut milk
1 tablespoon agar agar flakes
2 tablespoons sugar

Method:

1. Add the coconut milk to a sauce pan and heat it up.
2. Add the sugar and agar agar flakes and stir on medium heat untill agar agar and sugar have completely dissolved.
3. Get two ramekin dishes and strain the mixture into them.
4. Leave the pudding  aside to cool to room temperature.
5. Once cooled, place in fridge to set for two hours.

Serve chilled.

You may like:
Coconut Barfi

Submitting to:
Flavours Of Singapore event by simply.food
Teatime snack event by Torview
ABC series desserts by Ramya

C.E.D.D Fresh Produce event by Raven guest hosted by Veggie Platter

 

Giveaway ~ Hotel Chocolat Valentines Chocolates

 

With February almost on our door step, the thoughts of love are softly filling the air. Love and chocolate are just meant to be together, hand in hand. Young or old there is nothing more pleasing than  receiving a surprise box of chocolates and that is exactly what has happened to me. I received this irresistible luxury box of chocolates from Hotel Chocolat with a single message 'Try me'. Beautifully packaged, it made my heart skip a beat whilst opening the box. Next came the tasting, spoilt for choice and not knowing where to start as each and every chocolate was filled with tempting irresistible liquid caramels, melting pralines and ravishing truffles. The chocolates were simply divine and oozed luxury at its heights. What more could a girl want???..... they are heaven in  box!!!

 

At Hotel Chocolate they take the gifting of chocolate very seriously, they genuinely know how to spoil you. With fusions of dark chocolate, white chocolate, chocolate with liquors, ganaches, spices and fruits, there is every possible combination to tease and tantalise the chocolate lover’s palate.

This year for valentines they have made a big and bold return to the golden age of romance – to a time that knew all about sweeping people off their feet and when love was never more glamorous.

 

Amongst the selection there are boxed  Valentines Day chocolates for him and for her. To compliment these there are also irresistible truffle hearts in glamorous boxed collections and boxes of cute little chocolate hearts made with silky smooth solid chocolate with gorgeous fillings.

Romantically packaged  you can set someone’s heart racing with these gorgeous chocolates, tied with satin ribbons, hidden love notes and more. So this Valentine with the help of Hotel Chocolat make your true romance really begin.....

 

Many Thanks to Hotel Chocolat for sending me these chocolates to try, the opinions I have expressed are my own.
To spread the romance, Hotel Chocolat have generously offered to send one luxury box of chocolates  to one lucky winner of this competition. The competition is open to any reader from  the UK, US, Canada and Europe .

To participate:

Please log into Rafflecopter and follow the instructions.

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

Rules:

• This giveaway is open to all readers over 18 who live in the UK, Europe ,USA or Canada.
• The winner will be chosen via Rafflecopter (which uses random.org) and announced on this page.
• The winner will be contacted by e-mail, if they do not respond within a 48 hours  another winner may be chosen.
• There is one prize of the Sealed with a Kiss Chocolates.
• I am running this competition in good faith on behalf of Hotel Chocolate, who will be responsible for sending the prize to the winner. Their decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into. They reserve the right to substitute the prize for one of a similar type / value if the prize above is not available.
• Instructions form part of the terms and conditions
• Entries using any software or automated process to make bulk entries will be disqualified.
• No cheating. Please do follow the instructions. I will verify the winning entry and check that you have commented / tweeted / subscribed etc. Anyone who cheats will be disqualified.
• There is one main way to enter and several ways to get bonus entries, including bonus daily entries. Follow the instructions in the form above. If you already like / follow comment in the rafflecopter widget and let me know to get your entries.

Szechaun Stirfried Rice

Spicy aromatic rice stirfried in a chilli garlic  Szechaun sauce.

Ingredients:

8 oz cold precooked boiled rice
3 tablespoons Szechaun sauce (Home made recipe here)
8 button mushrooms thinly sliced
1 red onion thinly sliced
1/4 red capsicum diced (small)
1/4 yellow capsicum diced (small)
1/4 green capsicum diced (small)
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic cut into thin slices.
1/2 teaspoon salt

Method:

1. Heat oil in a wok, when it is hot add the garlic and saute for 30 seconds.Add the onions and saute for another minute.
2. Add the mushrooms and pepppers and stirfry for 2-3 minutes.
3. Add the salt, szechaun sauce and mix well.
4. Add the boiled rice and toss until rice is evenly coated with sauce and vegetables and heated through throughly.
5. Transfer to serving dish.

You may like:
Singapore stirfried Tofu

Submitting to:
Lets Cook with Rice event by Radhika of tickling palates
Flavours of Singapore and Lets cook with Left overs events by simply.food

 

Szechaun chilli sauce

A spicy chilli sauce that is versatile in all oriental  stirfry dishes.

Ingredients:

10 Red dried chillies
1/2 red sweet pepper(long one)
2 cloves garlic finely minced
1 teaspoon ginger paste
1 teaspoon sesame paste
2 tablespoon oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon chilli powder
10 szechaun peppercorns finely ground.
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1 tablespoon sweet chilli garlic sauce

Method:

1. Soak the red chillies in hot water overnight.
2. In the morning drain the red chillies remove stalks, seeds and membrane and chop roughly.
3.Finely chop the red sweet pepper.
4. In a blender jug add the sweet red pepper and the chillies and blend to a coarse puree .
5. Heat oil in a pan when it is hot add garlic and ginger and saute for  30 seconds.(take care not to burn the garlic)
6. Add the blended chilli paste, salt and chilli powder , chilli garlic sauce , sesame paste and saute till sauce thickens .
7. Remove from heat and stir in the vinegar.

Add to stir fried rice or vegetables as required.

NB- I added the sweet pepper to keep the heat less, however if you dare replace it with an extra 10 red chillies instead.Also for cooking with the sauce works well with coarse texture , however if you want to serve as dipping sauce blend it smoother.

You may like:
Sweet red chilli sauce

Submitting to:
Flavours Of Singapore event by simply.food

Detox with Green Tea.

With the recent festivities and today’s fast paced lifestyles we are all indulging in rich processed foods,eating too much fast food and living  very hectic stress full lives.We eat at odd times, sleep less, exercise less and consume too much caffeine. All these habits have a detrimental effect on our bodies.These bad habits break the body's natural power to combat illness as we introduce more harmful toxins into our body bringing on diseases as well as illnesses. Many people on realisation and guilt of over indulgence binge diet after festivities. These are short lived and rarely successful. The only way to help our bodies to detox is by cutting out fat and over processed food, cutting out ready meals and introduce a well balanced healthy diet consisting of fruits, vegetables, carbohydrates and proteins.

Cutting out caffeine is a major part of this detox. A good way to do this is to introduce our bodies to healthy drinks such as green tea and fruit teas. There are many benefits of drinking Green Tea . Green teas are made solely from the leaves of Camellia sinensis that have undergone minimal oxidation during processing. Green tea originates from China and has become associated with many cultures throughout Asia. Green tea is processed and grown in a variety of ways, depending on the type of green tea desired. As a result of these methods, maximum amounts of polyphenols and antioxidants are retained, giving maximum green tea benefits.

Twining  have introduced green tea to the western world. At their Tea Shop there is  a vast selection of aromatic flavours, there is a taste to suit each individual palate . You can find flavours such as green tea with cranberry, ginger, blackberry and raspberry, pineapple, mango and many more. All these teas are refreshing, healthy and perfect to start your Detox. Furthermore at only £ 1.39 for a box of 20 teabags they are not only delicious, but amazingly good value for money too. Just think this is 20 cups of flavour some tea  at only 7 pence a cup!!!!

To check out the full range of flavours you can visit the Twining’s tea shop where you can buy Green Tea  at a click of a button

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Being spoilt for choice you are not sure which tea  flavour to purchase??? Don't worry Twining’s will also send you free samples of this wonderful tea to try it out.. To get your free samples visit here. (Tea samples available in UK only)

My ideal way to enjoy  the tea I found is to choose your flavour, add the teabag to your favorite mug,  top it with hot water. Leave for 2-3 miutes after which discard the tea bag  and add a squirt of runny honey just to sweeten it slightly and finally ............Enjoy and be assured that you are helping your body and  protecting it  from all these conditions:

• Cut stroke by up to 80%

• Recommended by Cancer Society as a “High Priority for Cancer Prevention”

• Protects the prostate from cancer

• Proven to help with weight loss

• One of the strongest anti-oxidants available

• Helps digestion and reduces bloating

• Normalizes healthy bacteria in the intestines

• Proven to help prevent heart disease

• Helps stop dental decay and gum disease

• Helps with bad breath

Thankyou to Twinings for the free samples that they sent me , I am still undecided as to which is my favorite flavour.This post has been sponsored by Twinings

source:

http://www.greenteatruth.org/green-tea-facts/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_tea

photo source:

Green tea leaves

Twinings tea boxes

Exercise person

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Pather Pheni ( Indian sweet pastry dish) ~ICC January 2012

Royal dessert , crispy, flakey sweet pastry that melts in every mouthful.

This post is for the Indian cooking challenge, event by Srivalli recipe by Harini

 

Ingredients

 

8oz fine semolina 

2 teaspoons ghee

A pinch of salt

Water to knead the dough

Sunflower oil for frying

 

For paste:

2 teaspoons ghee

2 teaspoons rice flour

 

Sugar Syrup:

8oz sugar

1/2 cup water

 

Decoration:

Coarsely chopped pistachios nuts

Blanched almonds coloured red.

 

Method:

 

Sugar Syrup

1. Add the water  and sugar in a heavy bottom vessel and bring to boil, cook the syrup till it reaches 1 thread consistency. Once it reaches that immediately take off heat and keep aside to cool.

 

For the Pheni:

1.In a mixing bowl, add the fine semolina, 2 tsp of ghee (in solid form) and work it up to result in crumb like texture.

2.Add a pinch of salt and knead into a soft dough adding water gradually. (The dough needs to be softer than the regular chapati/puri dough. )

3.Cover with a muslin cloth and set aside for a minimum of 1 hour. (The more the resting time the better the quality of the phenis.)

4.In a smaller bowl, whisk the solid ghee and rice flour until they form a smooth paste.

5.Divide the dough into 5 parts  and roll out thin puris out of each of those and cover them to stop drying up.

6.On each rolled out puri, apply the rice flour-ghee paste and layer them one on top ofeach  other.
7. Once you have layered the last puri spread some more flour-ghee paste  and roll the layered puris into a tight log like a swiss roll.
8.Cut the log into 1 inch pieces and roll out each piece with light hands  into a thin puri and keep them covered until ready to be fried.

9.Heat the oil in a pan and allow to heat to medium hot.
10.Fry each of the puris, they should be fryed on medium heat and should crisp up but not change colour they should remain white.
11.Drain them onto paper towel until cool.

12. To decorate the pheni , dip a pastry brush in the cooled sugay syrup and brush the pheni  on both sides with the sweet syrup.(Pheni and sugar syrup both must be cool when  decorating , if decorated whilst either is hot will result in soggy pheni)

13. Sprinkle some pistachio and almond decoration on the pheni and place  on some parchment paper to dry.

14. Store in an  air tight container to keep crisp.

 

NB- It is not necessary to coat these pheni is sugar syrup, they can just be dusted in icing sugar and served with badam milk instead.

 

You may like:

Jalebi

Acar Timun (singapore cucumber pickle)

Acar Timun is a tangy crunchy pickle is commonly available is Singapore as an accompaniment to main dishes.It has a sweet and sour and tangy taste and it is served as a cold relish. The original recipe is from here but I have made some changes to here to suit my taste.

Ingredients:

1/2  cucumber
1 large carrot
1 small red onion
1 inch piece fresh  ginger
1/4 teaspoon mustard seeds
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon chilli powder
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon lime juice
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 green chilli finely chopped

Method:

1. Cut the cucumber in half and remove the seeds. Cut it in to 2 inch very thin  julienne strips.
2. Peel the carrot and cut it into 2 in very thin  julienne strips.
3. Peel the onion and slice it very thinly and separate all the slices.
4. Pel the ginger and cut it into fine julienne strips
5 Heat oil in a pan , when it is hot add the mustard seeds and wait for them to crackle. Add the onions and stir fry for a minute.
6.Add the carrots, ginger,cucumber and chillies and  stir fry for a further two minutes.
7.Add the salt,sugar, chilli powder, turmeric powder and the lemon juice and toss.(vegetables should remain crisp and retain shape)
8.Remove from heat and stir in the vinegar and mix well.
9.Transfer to a serving dish and chill the pickle.
Serve with any main dish as an accompaniment.

You may like

Carrot pickle

Submitting to:

Flavours of Singapore event by simply.food

Tomato Chappati~ Blog hop wednesday 11th Jan 2012

This is my entry for Blog Hop Wednesday started by Radhika of Tickling Palates. Its a beautiful concept where not only do you get to make new  blogger friends, cook from their blogs but in return they visit your blog and try out your recipes too.

If you are interested in  joining Blog Hop Wednesday here is how it works:

"The plot behind this attempt is to form 2 groups and make pairs with a blogger who will be your partner for that particular month. This happens every 2nd wednesday of the month. You will then go through your partner’s blog, select, choose, cook, click and post the recipe in your blog on Wednesday and vice versa. The following month you will have a new partner. This way not only you tend to your blog at intervals but also learn some new recipes along the way and get to know a lot of bloggers and make friends."

This recipe is  from Hema's Blog. Looking through her blog there were many recipes that I had never tried before, but finally I settled  for the tomato chappati recipe you can find here.
I had to make a few basic changes as I did not have any tomato gojju and as I had never prepared it before  so I improvised.

Healthy delicious chapattis  with a subtle flavour of tomatoes.

Ingredients:

250 grams whole Wheat flour
2 tablespoons sunflower  oil
4 tablespoons oil for cooking the chappatis
1 teaspoon salt
Water to make Chappati dough
6 tablespoons passata (blended sieved tomatoes)
1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
1/2 teaspoon chilli powder

Method:

1. In a bowl add the flour, salt, chilli powder, turmeric powder, 2 tablespoons oil and mix well.
2. Add the passata and start to mix it into the flour, add water if required to form a soft pliable dough.Cover and leave to rest for 30 minutes.
3.Divide the dough into walnut sized balls and using a little dry flour roll out a thin chappati approximately 6 inches in diameter.
4. Heat a frying pan and place the chappati on it, after a minute flip it over and brush the top side lightly with some oil. Flip the chappati over so oiled side is on the bottom.
5. Brush lightly the top side and once again flip it to cook this side too.Remove from pan and place in a foil wrap to keep warm.
6. Repeat for remaining dough.
Serve tomato chappati with any curry or pickle of choice.

You may like spinach paratha.

Announcing event ~ Flavours of Singapore.

We are are packed and ready to move on to our next leg with our journey in "Flavours of" Series 2 .We have enjoyed wonderful stay in Sri Lanka at Priyas blog and we are now resident in  Singapore for the month of January to sample and cook this wonderful cuisine.

Singapore cuisine hosts a world of flavours,with its rich multicultural heritage, it portrays  an  array of local cuisines such as  Chinese, Malay, Indian and Peranakan among others. Due to the long history of immigration in Singapore, Yusheng as well as traditional Malay cuisine like The Laksa, Satay, and Goreng Pisang have all integrated themselves into the cuisine of Singapore.In addition to these flavours English and some Portuguese influenced Eurasian, known as Kristang is also commonly found.
The cuisine is rich in flavour using aromatic spices such as cumin , cinnamon, coriander, cardamom,clove and nut meg. Other flavours and ingredients commonly found are pandan leaves, kaffir, lime,lemon grass, galangal and many others. Cooking in a wok is very common,and dishes prepared which  incorporate many different types of rice and noodle.

So if all this is tickling your taste buds and making your mouth water then please do check out these sites below for some mouthwatering recipes ideas.
http://asiarecipe.com/sinveg.html
http://www.vegetarian-society.org/recipe
http://singaporelocalfavourites.blogspot.com/2009/09/singapore-indian-food.html
http://www.ifood.tv/network/singapore_fusion_dish/recipes

To Participate:
Sharpen your knives, put on your apron,don't forget the chefs hat and then :

1.Prepare a dish  (vegetarian only - eggs allowed) .
2.Please link this event announcement with your entry, this is mandatory.
3.Use of logo is not mandatory but usage is appreciated as it helps to spread the word visually.
4. Multiple entries are allowed, archived are only allowed if reposted and updated with this event link.
4. Email me the entry at simplysensationalfood@gmail.com

Please put in subject box : Flavours of Singapore
Please use this format
Your Name:
Recipe Name:
Recipe URL:
Image no larger than 300 pixels.

Event Round up ~Lets Cook for christmas red/ green event.

Thankyou to every one who participated in this Festive event and made it so very successful. It received a total of 65  amazing entries .
Here is the round up of all the delicious entries:

The month of January we have Lets cook with left overs event , to send your entries and find out more details click here.