Tuesday, October 9, 2012

Tepung Bunga

My baking buddy, Lena from Frozen Wings is hosting this month's Malaysian Food Fest, Terengganu Month. I have never been to Terengganu before and am not familiar about their speciality cuisine at all. So my search for famous Terengganu food begins. While searching from various websites for details on Terengganu and it's famous cuisines, I suddenly remembered that I have a magazine stashed somewhere from years ago that has a section on Terengganu food. Of course, I "ransacked" my cupboard and lo and behold, I still have that copy! And it was a Bahasa Malaysia (Malay) magazine, back in October 1997, gosh, exactly 15 fifteen years ago! Found the section on "Sajian Terengganu Kekal Asli" and a few nice recipes for me to try! Bingo!!



Jelita Sajian magazine, issue October 1997



These are called Tepung Bunga, one of the many traditional kuihs of Terengganu. I am curious why this is called "Tepung Bunga", when translated, Tepung is Flour, and Bunga is Flower. It is made from glutinous rice flour and coconut milk. I have seen some other version that is slightly different from this from various websites. But I like that this version uses pandan leaves, which are pounded and the juice are extracted for the natural colour, aroma and taste of the pandan leaves. 



Let's make some Tepung Bunga

  1. Pandan leaves from my garden. Wash, clean, and snip to small pieces. 
  2. I blend the leaves with some of the coconut milk in a blender.
  3. Strain the juice, press out the pulp that remains on strainer to collect as much pandan juice as possible.
  4. Add some salt to taste, I added in about 1/2 teaspoon, add the rest of the coconut milk, stir to dissolve the salt.
  5. Pour the coconut milk mixture into the bowl of glutinous rice flour.
  6. Knead to a soft dough, add a little water if appears dry.
  7. Divide dough into small balls.
  8. Shape each ball like a doughnut and drop in hot oil over medium-low heat. Do not let them touch each other as they will stick. Fry both sides until golden brown and cooked. Remove and drain on paper towel to absorb excess oil. Serve with caster sugar or icing sugar scattered over.



Tepung Bunga is ready! That's the page where this recipe was taken.



They puffed up when fried. Advisable to fry over low heat, as the first few cracked when I fried them over medium heat, so I reduced the heat to medium-low, and they fried up really nice. However once left to cool, they would shrink and would not look puffy anymore. According to other versions that I've read, these kueh would puff up when fried and would "deflate" minutes when taken out of the hot oil, guess this is the characteristics of this kueh!



Serve these Tepung Bunga with some fine sugar, here I have used icing sugar, scattered over. The texture of these kuih are chewy and soft, it reminds me of eating  Tang Yuen (Chinese sweet glutinous rice dessert), as both these desserts uses glutinous rice flour as the main ingredient,  but this has a slightly salty taste with the aroma and taste of the pandan leaves. These are very nice, eaten with lots of icing sugar scattered over, as the sweetness of the icing sugar goes well with the slightly salty kueh. Once they are cold and flat, they became more chewy, eat them while they are still warm.




I'm submitting this post to "Malaysian Food Fest, Terengganu month hosted by Lena of Frozen Wings"


The following recipe was adapted from Jelita Sajian Magazine, issue October 1997, I have translated the original Malay version to English Language.
Tepung Bunga
5 pandan leaves
1 cup coconut milk
300gm glutinuos rice flour
pinch of salt (I use 1/2 tsp, just right)
oil for deep frying
caster sugar for dusting

  1. Pound the pandan leaves to a paste and mix with coconut milk. Strain and squeeze out juice from the pandan paste. (I chose to blend the leaves with some of the coconut milk, strain and press out the juice using the back of a spoon, as pictured above).
  2. Mix the coconut milk mixture with the glutinous rice flour and knead to form a soft dough. 
  3. Divide dough into small rounds and shape like a doughnut. Repeat with the rest of the dough. Fry in hot oil until cooked and golden brown. Remove and scatter with caster sugar before serving.



Monday, October 8, 2012

World's Quickest Yeasted Coffee Cake : Free And Easy Bake-Along #34

Time for our Bake-Along and my turn to select a recipe. Since I have always wanted to bake World's Quickest Yeasted Coffee Cake, so that's my selection for this week. This is a super easy and quick way of enjoying a slice of bread, though why is it called coffee cake and not coffee bread? After all, it uses yeast. Well, since it is called yeasted coffee cake, I suppose that makes perfect sense. Though I still think that "bread" would be more appropriate than "cake"! What do you think???



Cake or bread, it does not matter, when the end-result is just wonderful. 



The recipe uses all-purpose flour, but I substitute with bread flour instead. And it uses quite a lot of yeast, I did thought of reducing the yeast amount, but decided against it at the last moment, since this bread is to be baked in a cold oven, I suppose that amount of yeast used would help it to rise more in a shorter time.  Lena and Zoe has given me some tips that this bread is extremely sweet since both of them have baked this earlier than me. So I have adjusted the sugar amount (refer to the recipe below, my changes in purple), and sweetness turned out just right. Thank you, girls!  And I have used walnuts instead of pecans.



The texture of the bread is moist and very soft. Even though the bread did not rise really high as what I was expecting, especially with the amount of yeast used, but the bread is very soft and really nice. The topping is sticky and goey and absolutely delicious, the walnuts added a crunchy, delightful nutty taste in every bite. 



A lovely bread, great for breakfast and for a tea-time break. Very easy, quick and really simple to make.



Overall review :  Good. Great when eaten fresh from the oven. When left overnight, it has gone a little stale, just like most breads. Reheat before eating.


Please visit my baking buddies, Lena and Zoe and all our friends who has baked along with us in the linky below. 

Bake-Along will be taking a month-long break and we shall be back on 12th November. For our next bake, we will be baking based on a theme bake, Theme : Linzer Tart. The linky will start on 12th November right up to 18th November. Do join us, everyone's welcome.



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World's Quickest Yeasted Coffee Cake
(adapted from : Cake Keeper Cakes by Lauren Chattman)
Serves 9
3/4 cup whole milk
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
2 envelopes (1-1/2 tablespoons) instant yeast
1-3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup granulated sugar (I use 2 tablespoons)
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/3 cup dark corn syrup (I use 3 tablespoons golden syrup)
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar (I use 3 tablespoons)
3/4 cup finely shopped pecans 

  1. Grease an 8-inch square baking pan and dust it with flour, knocking out any extra.
  2. Heat the milk and 2 tablespoons butter in a small saucepan until the butter is melted and the milk is very warm to the touch. Pour into a large mixing bowl and whisk in the yeast to dissolve. Stir in the flour and salt and beat with an electric mixer on medium-low speed until you have a sticky dough. Press the dough into the prepared pan.
  3. Combine the granulated sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl. Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar evenly over the batter.
  4. Melt the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter. Combine the corn syrup, brown sugar, and melted butter in a medium bowl and stir. Spread over the dough. Sprinkle pecans evenly across the top.
  5. Place the pan in a cold oven. Turn the heat to 350 degrees F. Bake until the cake is golden and set in the center, 25 to 30 minutes. Let cool slightly and serve warm.


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Saturday, October 6, 2012

Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream

Want some ice cream? Pumpkin pie ice cream! Creamy, delicious, full of pumpkin pie flavour! I used my homemade pumpkin puree, which I have about a cup left  in my freezer that I wanted to clear. Thought of making some bread or muffins, maybe a cake, when I remembered that I have seen a pumpkin ice cream recipe in one of my ice cream cookbooks. One thing I know for sure, nobody would say no to ice creams! At least in my house!



This is an easy ice cream to make, without any egg-yolk based custard, which is definitely a plus! There is some cooking involved, but it is fairly easy to do. The addition of ground cinnamon and ground ginger do give the "pie flavour" to this creamy ice cream.



A scoop of yummilicious! And a delicious way of using that extra pumpkin puree that you have been storing in your freezer.



Creamy and delicious! One that I would make again as soon as I have some pumpkin puree!


I'm sharing this with :
Recipe Box hosted by Bizzy Bakes
Full Plate Thursday hosted by Miz Helen's Country Cottage


Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream
(adapted from : "Scoop" by Ellen Brown)
Makes about 1 quart
2-1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
3/4 cup canned pure pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling) (I use 1 cup homemade pumpkin puree)
1/2 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar (I use 1/3 cup)
1/4 cup light corn syrup
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup whole milk
1/4 cup nonfat dry milk powder
1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Combine the cream, pumpkin, brown sugar, corn syrup, cinnamon, ginger, and salt in a saucepan. Whisk until smooth.
Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, until the mixture begins to steam; watch it carefully and make sure it does not come to a boil.

While the mixture heats, combine the milk, milk powder, and vanilla extract in a small bowl, and stir until smooth. Add the mixture to the pan, and bring to a boil over low heat, stirring constantly. Whisk the mixture until smooth, and simmer the mixture over very low heat, stirring constantly, for 2 minutes, or until thickened.

Transfer the hot liquid to a storage container and press a sheet of plastic wrap directly into the surface of the mixture to prevent a skin from forming. Refrigerate the mixture uncovered until it is completely chilled (below 40F), or quick-cool it.

Freeze the mixture in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions. Serve immediately for a soft ice cream, or transfer the mixture to an airtight storage container and freeze until hard. Allow the ice cream to sit at room temperature for 15 minutes before serving if frozen solid.

Variation : Add 2 to 3 tablespoons of rum or bourbon to the custard, and fold 1/2 to 3/4 cup chopped toasted walnuts into the churned ice cream.