2 Kids Friendly Tofu Recipes

My eldest loves tofu. He's a very picky eater. Believe it or not-- he used to survive on eggs and tofu only. So sneaking nutritious ingredients into eggs and tofu is a sure way to make him eat!

Specialty fried tofu 

Ingredients

2 eggs

1 box of silky tofu

1 tube of Japanese egg tofu

30g all purpose flour

30g rice flour

1/2 piece of minced chicken breast

1/4 cups of julienned carrot

1 small onions, chopped

Salt, pepper, sugar to taste

350ml oil for frying

Serves 4

Place 1egg, half the flour, silky tofu, egg tofu, onions, carrot and chicken into the food processor. 

Once combined well, steam the mixture in a square metal baking tray in boiling water for 5 minutes.

Cut the tofu into squares.

Coat each tofu with a layer of beaten egg.

Then coat each tofu square with the other half of flour mixed. 

Deep fry in hot oil until golden. 

Serve warm and enjoy!

Silky smooth tofu egg custard

Ingredients

4 squares of firm tofu

4tbsp minced chicken (marinated in soy sauce, sesame oil and corn starch)

2eggs

200ml warm water

8 goji berries for decoration

Salt, soy sauce and sesame oil to taste

Serves 4

Lightly beat and season the eggs.

Slowly add the warm water in and mix.

Strain the egg mix into a round stainless steel plate to get rid of bubbles.

Place the tofu into the egg mix.

Place chicken mince and goji berries on top of each piece of tofu.

Cover with heat proof cling wrap/another plate.

Steam over low heat for 8 minutes or until set (jiggly yet firm). 

I forgot to add warm water.... Therefore the custard became a bit coarse in the photo.

Enjoy while warm! 

Healthy Nasi Lemak recipe

Most Malaysians crave for that occasional coconut milk rice for breakfast. But this dish is great for lunch and dinner as well. How to make it healthier? It's none other than substituting the coconut milk with fresh milk and use low GI rice such as Basmathi rice.

Nasi Lemak (Coconut Milk Rice) ingredients

A: 
0.5 tablespoons coconut oil
1shallot,
sliced 0.5 inch ginger,
sliced1 clove garlic
125g Basmathi rice, washed and drained

B: 
200 mlwater
100 mlNestle full cream milk
2pandan leaves

Sambal Ikan Bilis (Chilli Anchovies)

1.5 cups dried anchovies (We used bilis bulu ayam as it's more crunchy-- fry it over medium and high heat just when they started to turn golden)
0.5 cup oil
2 cloves of garlic mashed
6 shallots mashed
15 dried chillies or 75ml chilli paste
1.5 tsp belacan (prawn paste)
0.5 tspsalt
1.5 tbspsugar
2 red onions mashed
2 tamarind pulp soaked in1.5cups water

Other Ingredients

3 eggs hard boiled, cut into halves
1cucumber cut into slices
1 cups peanuts

Serves 4 (conventionally 250g rice is used but our family doesn't eat much rice)

In a pan, stir fry ingredients A until fragrant.

Add in rice and stir for a while. Turn fire off.

Transfer the rice into a rice cooker and pour in ingredients B.

Let the rice cook in the rice cooker.

Done!

Serve with sambal and condiments. We also had stir fry sweet potato leafs and sambal squid for lunch.

Since today is Easter Sunday with MCO still in place due to Covid 19, we had a mini Easter egg hunt at home using the hard boiled eggs after breakfast. The children were extremely egg-cited to be able to decorate the eggs with food grade magic colour pens.

1 of the spots I hid the egg.

Tips: If no coconut milk is added to the rice, the rice is safe to be kept refrigerated overnight.

How to make Sambal Anchovies and side dishes for the nasi lemak? I followed the recipe from HuangKitchen.com.

Enjoy! 

Turon/ Sweet banana spring rolls recipe

What do to when my in laws send me a cardboard box full of wonderfully riped bananas? Besides eating them as fruits, this is one of the easiest dessert recipes I have-- Turon/ Sweet banana spring rolls. Quick and easy-- can involve the children to help as well.

Ingredients:

4 ripe bananas, cut into 8 pieces

Spring roll wrapper

Optional:

1 can of ripe jackfruit or fresh ripe jackfruit, cut into strips

½ cup Brown sugar + 1 tbsp. cinnamon powder ( other options include chocolate sauce, cream cheese or peanut butter)

Instructions:

Place the brown sugar- cinnamon mixture into a bowl. Roll the banana slices in the brown sugar.

Place a wrapper in your working area and then place a slice of banana on the wrapper. 

Replace the cinnamon sugar with 1 tsp of chocolate sauce, cream cheese or peanut butter spread in the center of the wrapper.

Add 4 to 5 strips of jackfruit if desired.

Make the spring rolls into rectangular or log shaped.

Spray spring rolls with vegetable oil.

Line the Air fryer basket with perforated parchment paper and place the turon.

Air fry at 210C for 12 minutes, flip after 9 minutes. Spray with vegetable oil after you flip to make the rolls crispy.

 Enjoy while warm!

Lazy Keto Banana Ball's Recipe

We are indeed trying very hard to clear off ripe bananas in the pantry. It gets a bit sick to eat bananas after bananas. So there's another recipe for banana balls aka cekodok pisang in Malay-- the lazy Keto way.

Ingredients

300 g banana(s)- 3/4 medium sized 

50g rice flour or corn flour

25g wheat flour

25g coconut flour

1egg 

1⁄4 tspsalt

1⁄4 tspbaking soda

350ml oil for frying

Serves 6

Add all the ingredients into the food processor until they become a sticky paste or dough.

Heat oil over medium heat for at least 4 minutes.

Drop a small amount of batter into the oil to test. If it cooks immediately, it's ready.

Use 2 metal tablespoons to scoop the dough up straight into the hot oil. This is because the dough is kind of gooey. That's why I deep fry instead of air fry them. This mixture of flour makes the balls fluffier.

I don't add sugar to the mix. But sugar can help the caramelization process so the bananas balls are crispier. 

Fry until the balls are golden brown.

Serve warm. 

Tips: 

They don't taste as good when left to cool. But if you have excess batter, you can refrigerate it overnight.

If you are adding coconut flour to a gluten-free flour blend or substituting it for flour in a regular recipe,  substitute coconut flour for up to 20% of that blend. The liquid and/or fat combination needs to be increased by about 20% (fat preserves the long term moisture of the final baked product). 

Coconut flour typically call for a lot of eggs. Every 1/4 cup (30.8g) coconut flour typically requires one egg for both moisture and structure.

When storing coconut flour, it’s best to keep it airtight and refrigerated since coconut flour absorbs moisture.

Green papaya, guava and tofu pok rojak recipe

When life gives you a box of papayas, refrigerate a few green papayas! There are not many recipes one can make with papayas but this simple rojak recipe is a family favorite.

Ingredients

1 medium green papaya, peeled and shredded

1 medium ripe guava, diced

10 Bentong tofupok, quartered

Nurey's Sambal Rojak dressing

Hellman's Sesame dressing

The fruits can be prepared and refrigerated a few hours in advance because it takes about 15-20 minutes just to cut them. I love to serve them chilled.

Air fry the tofupok for 10 minutes in the rolling for fryer basket. We have Butterfly Air Fryer at home. Much more spacious and economical than many other air fryers. We love Bentong tofupok because it's famous for the dense tofu filling and freshness. A slightly more sinful version will call for cut Chinese crullers instead.

Toss all the ingredients together just before serving! Instead of the conventional rojak paste, we used sesame dressing for the children. They just can't take any spiciness.

Or air fry tofupok turned inside out to make pockets to stuff raw papaya fillings. It's heavenly when dipped in sweet chilli sauce.

Simply delicious! 

Tips: Papaya when refrigerated will stop its ripening process altogether. When stored at 4C, it remains fresh for at least a week. You can store ripe papayas as well. 

Lazy Keto Homemade Pizza Recipe

Instead of ordering pizza from outside, why don't make some this MCO? Because I'm always looking at something therapeutic to do which can double as a family activity.

Ingredients

2eggs and make up to 100ml with water 

160 g all-purpose flour (spoon & leveled)

60g coconut flour (I used 1/2 pack of pizza base premix from GojesAtkinsFood)

1 and 1/4 teaspoons instant yeast 

1/2 Tablespoon (6.5g) granulated sugar

1 Tablespoons (30ml) olive oil

1/2 teaspoon salt

Sprinkle of cornmeal/ground oats for dusting the pan

*Tips*

If you are adding coconut flour to a gluten-free flour blend or substituting it for flour in a regular recipe,  substitute coconut flour for up to 20% of that blend. The liquid and/or fat combination needs to be increased by about 20% (fat preserves the long term moisture of the final baked product). 

Coconut flour typically call for a lot of eggs. Every 1/4 cup (30.8g) coconut flour typically requires one egg for both moisture and structure.

When storing coconut flour, it’s best to keep it airtight and refrigerated since coconut flour absorbs moisture.

I made my dough and left it to rise for 1hour using Kenwood BM250 breadmaker- function 8 (dough). I love it because I hate kneading dough. The dough should rise to double its size then it's ready!

On a lightly floured work surface using rolling pin, gently flatten the dough into a disc. 

Place on prepared pan and, using lightly floured hands, stretch and flatten the disc into a 12-inch circle. 

Lift the edge of the dough up to create a lip around the edges. Let the dough rest for 15mins for preparing for the toppings.

Preheat the oven at 250 degrees Celsius fan forced.

To prevent the filling from making your pizza crust soggy, brush the top lightly with olive oil.

Using fork to dent into the surface of the dough to prevent bubbling. 

Fresh and messy straight from the oven! Just how I love it. I made small individual pizzas as finger food.

Top with your favorite toppings and bake for 12-15 minutes. 

Alternatively, if you don't like the bread like consistency of the loaf, make and bake the dough using option 7 of Kenwood BM250 bread maker. 

Slice the loaf and place your toppings and bake them for another 10minutes! It becomes a bruschetta instead.

To make savoury pizza, place halved cherry tomatoes, sliced button mushrooms and coarsely chopped prawns on a bed of cheddar slices with ketchup and sprinkle a generous amount of mozarella cheese on top.

To make sweet pizza, replace the ingredients with  cheddar slices, chocolate spread, ripe banana slices and mozarella cheese.

Homemade Soy Milk and Lazy Keto Bean Paste Cake Recipe

Philips soy milk maker is one of the best kitchen companions especially for those who prefer non dairy milk. The most frequent function I use is nevertheless the soymilk function.

Basically just wash and immerse a cup full of soy beans/red beans/black beans/almond refrigerated overnight. Use the cup provided in the package. I use CED Organic Soy/Black Bean.

The next morning, pour the beans into the soy milk machine, fill up uncooked filtered water between the highest and lowest water level. Select the soy milk function then wait patiently for 20 minutes. The machine will do its magic! 

A fresh glass of almond milk doesn't have the strong odour its factory made counterpart has.

After the machine beeped, filter the hot milk. Let the bean paste settle down and dry a while. 

The milk tastes better warm than chilled. It can be refrigerated for about 5 days. 

The leftover bean paste can be added to 1.5 tbsp of all purpose flour + 1tbsp rice flour+  0.5tbsp of coconut flour+ 1egg + 1tsp of sugar. They can be molded into ball shapes and deep fried into golden colours to become a great afternoon tea. It's versatile because mashed bananas can also be added to the fund mix into banana balls. For a healthier version, air fry the balls instead.