Baked Fish en Papillote in Mayonnaise-Mustard Marinade

Experts have said that one measure of your creativity is how many novel uses of an everyday object you can come up within the span of two minutes.

For example, a chair can be used for sitting. A chair can also be used for...uh...uh...

Darn.

But I wonder if creativity is also when you can ponder, "If buttermilk ranch dressing can be used for fish marinade, then what about mayonnaise?"

Does that count as creativity?

I give creativity experts their due respects. But for this, I'll let you be the judge, friends.

Since I ran out of buttermilk ranch dressing but have soon-to-be-expired-oh-darn-what-do-I-do-with-it mayonnaise, here's what I cobbled together.

Leading leftovers: Wholegrain mustard, Mayonnaise

Baked Fish en Papillote in Mayonnaise-Mustard Marinade

2 piece of wax paper, with enough room to wrap the fish pieces in and folding of the edges
2 tbs wholegrain mustard
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
4 tbs mayonnaise
1 fillet fish, halved
a handful of coriander
a pinch of salt

1. Sprinkle on salt, freshly cracked black pepper, oregano and coriander leaves on each side of the fish fillets.

2. Mix mayonnaise and mustard together. Slather this mixture on each side of the fish fillets.
3. Leave the fish fillets to marinate for several hours in the fridge.
4. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 190 degree celsius.
5. Okay, here's how to bake fish en papilotte-style. First, fold the wax paper in half and open it up. Place each fish fillet piece on one piece of the wax paper. Fold the parchment in half, enveloping the fish fillet inside.
6. On the edge of the wax paper, make a fold (the fish is inside the wax paper envelope pictured below).

7. Make another fold over that first fold. Press each fold down firmly.

8. Keep making folds over the last folds to form a seal all around. It is actually like making the seal for curry puff pastry.

9. Place on a baking sheet and bake it in the pre-heated oven for 14 minutes. Serve it sizzling hot!

Present the baked fish still cocooned in their paper for your guests to tear it open with a flourish. Because considerate hosts let their guests put in their own finishing touches like that.

Enjoy!

Macaroni in Chicken Cream Sauce

Because I care excessively about other people's opinions, here's what I'd like to find out from you.

Of the individuals listed below, who do you feel has made the biggest contribution to the culinary world in recent times?

(a) Jamie Oliver
(b) Gordon Ramsey
(c) Rachael Ray
(b) Tim Berners-Lee

Oh, I knew you would say (d) too!

Had the World Wide Web never been invented by Sir Tim Berners-Lee, how would I otherwise have been able to tap on the wisdom of home cooks and chefs all over the world to know that soon-to-be-expired heavy cream and leftover chicken broth can be matched in matrimony?

I dedicate the following dish to Sir Tim Berners-Lee. May his work continue to usher in more competent cooks, happier tummies and world peace.

Macaroni in Chicken Cream Sauce (adapted from Eating Well)

80g macaroni pasta
1/4 cup chicken breast meat, shredded
75g carrots, diced
a handful of coriander leaves
1/2 teaspoon ground pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon canola oil
1/2 medium onion, minced
1/2 cup mushrooms, thinly sliced
1/4 cup chicken broth
2 tablespoons heavy cream

1. Boil water. Place some of the boiling water into a bowl of sliced mushrooms and leave to soak.
2. To the rest of the boiled water, add in macaroni pasta and carrots (because I like them soft), following the pasta cooking instructions. When done, drain the pasta and place in a bowl.
3. Season chicken with pepper and salt on both sides.
4. Heat oil in a medium skillet over medium heat. Add the chicken, turning to prevent burning. Transfer to a plate when cooked.
5. Add minced onion to the pan and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 30 seconds.
6. Add in mushrooms which had been soaking in the bowl of boiling water.
7. Pour in chicken broth and cook until reduced by half, 1 to 2 minutes.
8. Next, stir in cream and let the mixture simmer.
9. Add in the cooked chicken and coriander leaves into the pan.
10. Add the chicken cream sauce to the pasta.

What would The Failed Chef do next time?

• I had omitted the wine (don't really care much for wine) and chives (replaced with with coriander) called for in the recipe, so that might have affected the recipe. The recipe tasted okay, but as this recipe was my vehicle for purging the fridge of leftovers (and for this expressed purpose it worked great!), I had to make do with what I had though I might be more faithful to the recipe next time.

Cinnamon Swirl Butterscotch Beer Bread

I have always admired technocrats who scour the world for best practices in areas such as defence, education and nation building, which they then adapt to the needs of their own countries.

I approve of this 'if-this-practice-works-in-one-system-can-it-work-in-another' line of inquiry.

I try to emulate this mode of thinking as best as I can.

Tonight, I ask myself, "If cinnamon swirls work great in cake, why not in bread?"

You can tell, I nurture my technocrat tendencies in as many areas of my life as possible.

I don't merely just ask the difficult questions, I also execute and implement.

Hence: Cinnamon Swirl Butterscotch Beer Bread!

Just look at its crunchy crust.

Then slice it up and feast your eyes on the exquisite patterns the cinnamon swirl make on the yellow-ish coloured background of the bread.

Next, take a bite.

Once your taste buds register the taste of the cinnamon swirl butterscotch beer bread, the alarm system in your head goes off. Your brain will start convulsing. You get disoriented but you don't know why.

So you take another bite to understand what in the world is happening. With that second bite, the receptors on your taste buds scramble to conduct an emergency meeting with their counterparts in the brain.

And then it hits you why.

Because the only fault of this Cinnamon Swirl Butterscotch Beer Bread is that it had the nerve to look like the Cinnamon Swirl Cream Cheese Pound Cake but taste nothing like.

Presenting my case: Cinnamon Swirl Cream Cheese Pound Cake

Compare that with the Cinnamon Swirl Cream Cheese Pound Cake Imposter a.k.a Cinnamon Swirl Butterscotch Beer Bread. Mucho resemblance?

It was all much too confusing for me.

And that, to be honest, was its only flaw. It wasn't that the bread tasted bad. It was just that this turned out looking like the cake that it wasn't, and for some reason, sets off cognitive dissonance in my mind which interferes with my enjoyment of the bread itself on its own merits.

But if you are a better person than I am, and know not to judge things by how they look, here's the recipe.

Leading leftovers: Melted butter, whey, beer, butterscotch

Cinnamon Swirl Butterscotch Beer Bread (adapted loosely from Bakeat350)

Bread:
2 1/2 cups self-rising flour
3 tbs brown sugar
10 ounces room temperature beer# + whey
2 tbs melted butter (you can use up to 1/2 cup if you want. Plain beer bread will work fine with just flour and beer)

Filling:
2 tbs Butterscotch sauce (mine was hardened in the fridge and cut into cubes)
1 tbs ground cinnamon + 1/8 cup of brown sugar (for cinnamon swirl)

# Bakeat350 recommends dark beer but I used Stella Artois because I have Niid-Tu-Git-Reed-Of-Levtofers-syndrome

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees celsius. 
2. Prepare and grease a 9-inch loaf pan.
3. Sift the flour and add to the mixing bowl.
4. Add brown sugar and stir into the flour.
5. Add the beer gradually and stir until combined.
6. Add one third of the beer bread batter into the prepared loaf pan.
7. Here are my hardened pieces of butterscotch sauce...

I poured these pieces of the butterscotch sauce on top of the sprinkling of the cinnamon-sugar combination.

8. Next, top over it, the next third of beer bread batter.

9. On top of this layer of beer bread batter, sprinkle the cinnamon-sugar combination and butterscotch sauce.
10. End off with last third of the beer bread batter at the top.
11. Take your spatula and make swirling motions in the batter to create cinnamon swirls.

12. Pour melted butter over the batter before baking for a crunchy crust. You can also do this in the last 3 minutes of baking.
13. Bake for 1 hour. 
14. Check for doneness and remove immediately from pan and place on a wire rack to cool completely.

What would the Bungling Chef do next time?

• The butterscotch pieces disappeared into the batter, so if I do want butterscotch chunks, I may have to get bona fide butterscotch chips.
• Beer bread works great with herbs, but not so much with cinnamon.

But really, has there been anything Nutella can't fix?

Mee Goreng (Attempt Numero Deux)

One of my earliest memories of my late great-grandmother is how she would lovingly pick vegetables out from my food because I refuse to eat any food with vegetables in it. All this while coaxing me that vegetables are actually good for me, and I should try them next time.

I was young brat then who was stubborn, confused and didn't know what was good for her.

The only thing that has changed since then is that now I am no longer young.

So I thought of her again as I was cutting vegetables and deliberately putting them into my mee goreng decades later.

And I'd like to think that my late great-grandmother would have been proud of that.

Mee Goreng (adapted from the Little Techow)

Fresh yellow noodles, 400g (blanched in boiling water briefly)
2 eggs, lightly beaten
mushrooms, 100g (sliced and immersed in hot water)
1/4 cup green peas
Leafy vegetables (e.g. chye sim)
Half a big onion, sliced thinly
Half a tomato, sliced (optional)
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 stalks spring onions, chopped

Seasoning: (mixed together)
4-5 tbsp tomato ketchup
3 tbsp chilli sauce
1 tbsp sweet soy sauce
Pinch of salt
Water (about 200ml)

1. Mix the seasoning together in a separate bowl.
2. Heat some oil in a wok. Add onion slices to the oil and fry until they turn translucent. Add garlic and fry until fragrant.
3. Throw in spring onions and vegetables. Add water if too dry. Fry on medium heat till slightly cooked.
4. Add tomato slices and yellow noodles.
5. Pour in seasoning. Toss noodles to make sure all the ingredients are mixed well.
6. Add the green peas and mushrooms.
7. Push the noodles to sides of the pan to create a well in the middle. Add some oil, and scramble eggs.
8. Toss the eggs and mix well to distribute it to the rest of the noodles.
9. Serve!

What would the Failed Chef do next time?

• Somehow, I still feel that the seasoning is just coating the noodles rather than being well-integrated. It could be my method - perhaps I need to fry over high heat (though I'm wary of burning it!).

White chocolate red velvet cake balls

Beware! Cake balls are tough.

Look at them all disciplined, lined up in neat rows.

Getting here for them wasn't easy. They have left a trail of havoc and mess not only in the kitchen, but also in my head. Because cake balls are experts at psychological warfare and that is what they do best.

You have to respect them, they have been through rough times.

They have been left overnight out in the cold, and the next day thrown into the deep end to fend for their lives in hot liquid. Some get the dunk treatment twice. They barely made it out alive.

Not a smooth life for these folks. Their skins have formed ridges on the scars of the wounds that have healed.

But you know what? Don't judge them.

They are real softies at heart.

They might even strike a pose for you if you ask them nicely.

They still blush when you call them 'amazing' and 'incredible'!

Because they truly are.

Have one!

Or twenty, at one sitting, like I did.

Red Velvet Cake Balls

These were inspired by Bakerella. This being my second time making cake balls, I followed the same directions here. The proportions you should be looking at is a 13" by 9" cake to 1 (16 ounce) container of frosting.

I used the Red Velvet cake and flour frosting and covered them in white chocolate with cake crumbs for the toppings. I put the cake crumbs in the fridge so they harden a little and becomes easier to work with. I plopped just enough frosting until the crumbled cake and frosting forms the consistency of play dough. I think it also helps that the cake is moist but not overly, like the Sprite cake I used last time. It was easy to roll, and the balls didn't melt even when dipped in the chocolate.

I must say I really, really love these cake balls, and so did everyone I gave it too! Unlike buttercream-type and storebought frosting, the flour frosting adds just the right amount of sweetness and complemented the cake really well. Unlike my initial stab at cake balls, these weren't gooey at all. Very smooth texture, very truffle-like. A pleasure to sink your teeth into.

So it's the perfect marriage of the right cake and the right frosting. And they lived happily ever after. In my tummy. Yummy!

What would the Failed Chef do next time?

• Try out using chocolate covering as well and see how the tastes combine?

Flour Frosting

Have you ever heard these reassuring words? Such as:

"Three is a magic number" or

"Third time lucky"?

These are all sweet and well-meaning words.

They are also...

Lies! A pack of damn lies, man!

These words do not apply to frosting, as articulated in the Frosting Code of Conduct.

Presenting my case, if I may -

Exhibit A: The Failed Buttercream Frosting.

Exhibit B: The Failed Cream Cheese Frosting.

And &$#*-ing thirdly, 

Exhibit C: The Failed Flour Frosting.

But the truth - and the truth will set you free - is that this frosting is de-li-cious! That's a sign of how potent a frosting is - that it is delicious even when it fails. See, it says so here on page 89 under Frosting Code of Conduct.

So don't let my failed attempt stop you from trying it. Here's the recipe from MissyDew of Tasty Kitchen.

By the way, joining the rest of you in the 21st century, I am now making frosting on a machine, hooray!

Flour Frosting

5 tbs flour
1 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup butter
1 cup fine grain or caster sugar

1. Add milk into a small saucepan.
2. Whisk flour into milk and heat. Do not stop stirring until it thickens. When will it start to thicken? For me, it happens at the point when I was daydreaming about attaining nirvana, after I have moved on from ruminating about where my missing hair band might be. Results vary.
3. Remove from heat and let it cool to room temperature.
4. When cool, stir in vanilla extract.
5. Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, about 7-8 minutes. 
6. Then add the completely cooled milk/flour/vanilla mixture and 'beat the living daylights out of it'. MissyDew also says that  'if it looks separated, you haven’t beaten it enough!'

I confess to being very nervous about this. I am no advocate of violence.

But because I'm highly impressionable, I 'beat the living daylights out of it'. On high for 15 minutes. And this is what I get.

Which is what you don't want to get. You do not want frosting that separates.

Not least because separated, failed frosting does not spread nicely on a cake. Because failed frosting can only do what they are supposed to do. Which is to not spread nicely. This is found in Article 17.4 of Frosting Code of Conduct, just so you know.

You should instead be getting a frosting that resembles whipped cream.

And now we all know that violence is not the answer. Add that to your Code of Conduct!

What would the Failed Chef do next time?

• Make the flour mixture hours in advance (maybe 4-5 hrs) and let it completely cool. Or put the saucepan on ice like MissyDew says or put in for 20-30 seconds in the freezer, take it out, stir and repeat this process 2-3 times until it cools to room temperature as what phatbaker advises.
• Probably not to beat it for so long. Next time perhaps less than 3 minutes, or even less than a minute, on medium high?

Carmine Carmeleona Cake

Ah, the Carmine* Carmeleona# Cake.

There is nothing better.

First, a bit of background:

* Carmine is a deep soulful pink colour.
# Carmeleona is type of fabric worn only by royalty in the land of Kamrua in the 8th century. Archeologists have recently discovered a fragment of this cloth in the ancient tomb of one of their queens.

This Carmine Carmelona Cake has recently exploded and has taken the baking world by storm. No surprise, especially given its especially moist and rich texture.

Has the Carmine Carmelon Cake phenomenon reached you yet?

Oh, alright.

Okay, okay.

If you must know, I was actually attempting...

A red velvet cake.

I go by the philosophy of "If I cannot do justice to the recipes, then I can at least reframe them".

I used 2/3 of this red velvet cake recipe by Art of Dessert.

Red Velvet Cake

3/4 cups butter, melted
3/4 cup vegetable oil
2 1/4 cups sugar
3 large eggs
1 1/2 cups vanilla yogurt
1 ounce red food coloring (liquid or gel)
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
3 1/4 cups flour
3 tbs cocoa powder
2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees celsius. Grease and flour two 8-inch or 9-inch cake pans or line three muffin pans with cupcake liners.
2. In a large mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar till light and fluffy.
3. Add eggs one at a time. 
4. Add yogurt into a small bowl.
5. Cry out "Shoot!" because you realise that you do not have enough yogurt. 
6. Get to the store. At the aisle, devote significant amount of time to think, "Should I buy the 2-tub yogurt because it is cheaper per tub, or buy only 1 tub because that's all I need. But if I buy the 2-tub, I will have leftovers and what will I do with it? I'll have to buy more ingredients. But if I..."Repeat loop as many times as necessary up to the desired level of satisfaction.
7. Next, grab yogurt. Dash out of the store. Come back all sweaty.
8. Then add the required yogurt, vanilla extract and red food coloring to the small bowl.
9. At this time, if you must know, in addition, the
- kitchen trolley counter
- my t-shirt
- my fingers
were also recipients, albeit unwilling ones, of the stain-happy red colouring. It was not brought to my attention that the colouring I had bought was contagious in nature.
10. Then sift together flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt in another bowl.
11. Alternate adding the yogurt mixture and flour mixture into the large bowl.
12. Pour batter into prepared pans or lined muffin pans. Bake for 30-35 minutes (15-20 minutes if making cupcakes) or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool completely.
13. When the cake is cooled, slice in the middle, slap on frosting and serve. I used the flour frosting.

So while it is not true that this is the Carmine Carmelona Cake, it is true that it does have a moist and rich texture.

Yummy!

Just looking at the colours makes me feel all patriotic.

What would The Failed Chef do next time?

• The cake texture was great, but a deeper chocolate accent is missing, though cocoa has been added. Perhaps to add in chocolate chips and cocoa powder like the recipe in the red wine cupcakes?
• Use another brand of red colouring that gives a deeper red - I used up the whole 28ml bottle just to get this colour!