English Breakfast Latte Ice Cream

Floating and melting island of ice-cream...

This ice cream was inspired by memories of how I used to spend my Saturday mornings back in Singapore when I was still young, single and carefree. What I'm trying to say is that instead of waking up in the morning to children's cries for milk, nappy change and brekkie, Saturday morning was absolute bliss with unlimited me-time, quiet time, any time. I pretty much had a standard routine where I would take a leisurely walk to the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf about ten minutes away, grab a copy of the newspapers and order myself some breakfast. In terms of food, there wasn't much to choose from, and it was usually a toss up between bagels or muffins of some sort. After all, I was really only there for the English Breakfast Latte, and I would order the same thing every Saturday morning. The regular staff there kind of know how I like it, with "more tea" (i.e. more tea leaves). But when someone new takes my order of EBL with "more tea", I usually receive the puzzled look plus the occasional furrowed brow, followed by the question "Err...More tea...?". Yes, I tell them. More tea leaves. I like it stronger, I explain. (And no, I'm not asking for a large EBL for the price of a small).

Wonton Noodles (Wantan Mee)

I am pleased (and utterly thrilled!) to announce that I am doing a guest post for Rasa Malaysia today. Ever since I got that email from Bee a couple of weeks ago, I have been looking forward to this, plus I have also been feeding my family with loads of wonton noodles over the last two weekends. Thankfully (for all of us), my second attempt at perfecting the recipe was a success and I was really happy with how it turned out. I have to say my favourite part of the dish is the pickled green chillies because that's how I remember enjoying these noodles back in Malaysia. If you prefer to omit these chillies, try mixing the noodles through with Sriracha chilli sauce instead. Sriracha has a tangy zing and bite that lifts the flavours of the noodles and gives a subtle kick of heat to the dish. Do check out my Wonton Noodles guest post at Rasa Malaysia!

Imperial Pork Ribs with Plum Sauce

Some of the recipes that I post are inspired by dishes that I've tried elsewhere, loved and attempted to replicate at home. I remember the exotic-tasting Muhammara sauce that came with the deep-fried kataifi prawns that I loved at Kazbah (and the Breakfast Tagine too!). Oh, and not forgetting the awesome chilli crab dip with potato wedges they used to serve at an Irish pub called Muddy Murphy's back in Singapore. And more recently, I found a great recipe for Japanese Hashed Beef that turned out even better than the one I had at Oiden Bowl Bar. In today's post, I am featuring this melt-in-your-mouth dish of braised pork ribs in a sweet and sour plum sauce. The first time I ordered this at Phoenix restaurant, I was expecting deep-fried pork ribs with peking sauce. When the food arrived, I actually thought they gave us the wrong order and was a little disappointed that it wasn't deep-fried. However, the moment I dug my fork into the meat, it was so tender and pulled apart so easily that I knew this was going to be good!

Claypot Yee Mee

I made this simple braised yee mee for lunch today, something I haven't eaten in a long time. I had forgotten how good these noodles taste. I don't cook with my claypot much, so I figured I might as well put it to good use. You can find yee mee (these are crispy noodle "cakes") at Asian supermarkets and they are usually made in Malaysia. I suppose it's more a Malaysian dish than anything else. You don't really need a claypot for it although it would probably taste more authentic, apart from keeping the noodles hot. I've used chicken and mushrooms here, but you can omit the mushrooms and substitute the chicken with a mixture of seafood or pork.

Strawberry Ricotta Ice-cream Sandwich

I just bought my very first ice-cream maker, a very affordable Cuisinart in pink. Love it! It's actually a very simple contraption consisting of a freezer bowl which rotates on a spinning base, and there's a paddle that's inserted in the bowl which then churns the ice-cream as the bowl rotates. I've made ice-cream in the past, but using the manual method of freezing the mixture and stirring with a spoon every half hour so as to avoid ice crystals from forming. The kids and I had fun watching the mixture churn and slowly turning into ice-cream. Instant gratification.

Fudgy Nama Chocolates

When Nami posted the recipe for Nama Chocolates on her website Just One Cookbook, I read it and thought "Wow, making homemade Royce chocolates looks pretty easy. Just make chocolate truffles and cut them into squares instead of shaping them into balls." Now, why didn't I think of that? Royce chocolates hail from Japan and they have opened quite a number of stores around Asia. So far, I have only come across the Royce chocolate store at Takashimaya in Singapore, where I would usually walk past the display counter hoping that the salesperson standing behind would be offering free tasting samples (in miniscule 1 centimetre cubes). It was such a treat at the time (a long time ago!) when I considered them a luxury item, what more with a name like that.