Little Lunch Box 25 小饭盒

School reopens today! Yeah! I will be busier but I will have more peace at home. :P



My daughter starts her school early today for her art enrichment class in school so its lunchbox day after breaking for a month. She already told me last night that she wants kaya with bread when she spotted me buying her favourite kaya. =_=|||



I was prepared to make her just normal triangle sandwiches (brain cells still holidaying) when she told me her idea. She said I can try making origami dog using bread and seaweed for the face. :o



So here you have it. Her idea of origami doggy sandwiches. :)

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Little Lunch Box 53 小饭盒

Its Learning Journey for the kids in school today.  Hence, the kids have to bring their own lunch or snack



A few days back, my daughters friend ask her grandma to check what I will be making for my daughter and wants her grandma to make the same for her too. Hehehe ... Grandma asked if I could help make lunch for her grand-daughter too. ;)



To make it easy (for me :P) I decided to prepare burgers so I do not need to use lunch boxes.



My daughter requested for chopped broccoli and coriander to be in the meat patty and I prepared egg roll with some leftovers crabstick and spring onion as sides too.

So, this was the girls lunch, wrapped in foil and packed in foam box. ;)

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Little Lunch Box 24 小饭盒

Todays my sons turn to go for his Learning Journey trip with his school. I packed super simple tuna sandwiches for him. I include a packet of fries and a bottle of milk too.

For someone who hates eating bread, I made the sandwiches small. I cut a slice of bread into 4. Visually, its not a lot but its actually the same. :P Yup, thats my son. I still need tricks to make him eat. :P

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Little Lunch Box 36 小饭盒

Another simple lunch for the kids. This mum is getting lazy. :P



I bought the fishy fish cake and the squarish fish tofu from the wet markets yong tau foo stall. I sliced them into half, steamed them and use them to top the rice thats mixed with furikake. Those in the middle are sausages, by the way.



I bought them miso soup too to go with these. ;)

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Lunch Box 3

Opps. Its another Lunch Box post. :P Im cooking fried rice today and thought it will be a good lunch box idea.

This is a rather common lunch box, omu-rice . Its basically egg over rice. I believe the authenic way is to have the rice wrapped in the egg. I wouldnt want to go through the haste of doing that for 2 reasons. It needs more eggs and the kids wont appreciate the effort of doing it. They will just cut the egg and eat it whichever way I do it. :P

So, heres my simple version of omu-rice . Im not using over-night rice hence the rice is a bit more moist but we prefer it that way. Its softer. All the ingredients are my sons favourite except for the hon-shimeiji. ;) You decide what you want in your rice

To have the egg cover the rice, you first cook the egg. Have slight over half an egg hanging out the lunch box. Adjust the remaining to fitting nicely in the box. Spoon the fried rice into the box sitting on the egg. Flip the rest of the egg over then use a spoon to gently push the edge of the egg to the sides to tuck them in. And there you have it. :)

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Lunch Box 9

My son has been buying his own food in school since he started school. I thought its a good practice for him to be independent and for him to learn how to handle money.

However, I noticed that for the last couple of days, he did not eat during recess because he came back with all money I gave him for recess. I told him I had to let him bring food to school and the first thing he ask for is rice. :P Thats because his school does not have rice other than nasi lemak.

This is the simple fried rice I prepared for him today. Its with shredded carrot, baby corn, prawns and star-shaped fish cake. If you wondering why the rice seems yellow, theres nothing wrong with the photo. I fried the rice coated with egg, hence the yellow hue. ;)

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Little Lunch Box 05 小饭盒

My daughter asked for bean
sprouts with A LOT of garlic and blanched broad beans. Rice cooker being used to make porridge
for the kids for lunch so I pack noodles for her instead. Her must-have eggs are quail eggs in the form of little chicks here.

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With Recipes Lunar New Year Lunch Gathering With Relatives

This year mum and I decided to do a combined New Year lunch gathering to invite our relatives over for a festive lunch. We hope to take this opportunity to get touch and mingle with everyone since we seldom get a chance to eat together as a big group during normal days of the year.

{Chinese New Year Gathering} Our Big Family! Photo Credit to Alvin @ http://mralvinlyt.tumblr.com/

As this was my first time cooking for 30 pax, I was pretty excited about the whole gathering and I also spent quite some time drafting the menu to cater for festive feel plus majority preference.  And thanks God, everything went on smooth with surplus of food and everyone has a wonderful family bonding time together too.

Gift For Our Neighbour

Beside the family gathering, every year we also prepared something as a token of appreciation for our neighbours. Being staying around my area for more than 10 years and we have two families of wonderful neighbours whom we always joke and chit chat whenever we see each other. And every year during Lunar New Year, Malay Hari Raya, Deepavali and Christmas season, we would exchange gifts and food together to soak in the festive atmosphere as well as appreciate each others culture and friendships.

FAMILY LUNCH GATHERING DURING
DAY 2 OF CHINESE LUNAR NEW YEAR

Above is my draft lunch menu which we also added a few last minute dishes in order to feed a group of 30 persons. And below are some foodporn of the dishes that we had during the lunch gathering.......

APPETIZER

{Appetizer} Spicy Top Shell

Since I dont really fancy top shell, I have limited ideas on how to create a dish using this. But mum on the other hand loves to use this as side dish (Chinese Salad) together with some onion, cucumber and spicy sauce. And to enhance the taste, mum also added in some small chilli (diced) and crashed roasted peanut which makes it taste similar to Thai-style salad.

(Preparation: 10 minutes)

Ingredients:
3 Cans of Top Shell
2 Japanese Cucumber, skin removed
6 Calamansi (酸柑), halved and juice
6 Shallot, thinly sliced
1 Small Chilli, chopped
2 Tablespoons of Thai Sweet Chilli Sauce, optional
Some Roasted Peanuts (optional), roughly chopped

Method:-
1. Rinse and drain the top shell, thinly sliced and set aside.

2. Cut the cucumber into halve, lengthwise then sliced 0.5cm thick diagonally.

3. In a mixing bowl, mix together top shell, cucumber, shallot, chilli, calamansi juice, chilli sauce and some freshly ground black pepper together.

4. Season the taste with more calamansi juice/chilli sauce, top it with some crashed peanuts before serving.

{Appetizer} Yogurt With Mixed Fruit Salad

For kids and those who dont like the Spicy Top Shell, I have prepared some Yogurt With Mixed Fruit Salad as alternative choice. This is a quick appetizer which you could easily whipped it up at home using assorted fruits of your choice like:- dragon fruit, apple, pear, avocado, orange, strawberry and etc. Mix the cut fruits with either flavoured yogurt or Greek yogurt for a thick and creamy texture. 

MAIN DISH

{Main} Mini Buddha Jumps Over The Wall

Buddha Jumps Over The Wall (佛跳牆) is made from numerous delicacies with more than 10 ingredients such as bamboo shoots, scallops, sea cucumber, abalone, shark fin, chicken, Jinhua ham, pork tendon, mushrooms and etc. These ingredients are then simmered over low heat for many hours with just the right amount of heat to achieve the irresistible taste of this traditional dish.

But on our end, instead of making this soup dish from scratch we shorten the cooking process by using ready bought "Buddha Jumps Over The Wall" soup broth. On top of it, we add in extra ingredients like abalone, sea cucumber, fish maw, scallops, chicken broth and etc to create our quick and easy Mini Buddha Jumps Over The Wall (迷你佛跳牆).

{Main} Longevity Noodles With Superior Broth

You might find this "noodle dish" familiar because I have shared the recipe in my previous post on the Chinese Cooking Demo by Chef Eric Low.  

For our version instead of using the traditional Longevity Noodles, we replaced it with Ee Fu Noodles and also add in Chinese Cabbage (Napa Cabbage) for extra sweetness.

{Main} Braised Pork Belly With Mushroom

To pair with the steamed white rice, mum specially prepared this pot of Braised Pork Belly With Mushrooms which is well received and gone within minutes too.

{Main} Stir-fry Sweet Peas with Leek And Carrot

A very "green veggie" dish that mum and I come up with using Sweet Peas, Celery, Chinese Leek, Mushrooms, Carrot, Wolfberries, Lily Buds and Chinese Preserved Sausage for extra seasoning flavour. Before serving, I also scattered some roasted cashew nuts on top for extra crunch too.  

{Main} Baked Honey Chicken With Rosemary

Instead of deep-fried chicken wings, I bought 2 kg of mid-joints to make 2 different recipes to cater for two groups of guests. First we had this Baked Honey Chicken With Rosemary which was savory and yet with hint of sweetness from the caramelized honey. Recipe can be found here. 

{Main} Korean Spicy Chicken Wings

Next for my cousins and aunties who are fans of Korean food and drama. I specially made this Korean Spicy Chicken Wings for them. Although mine were not as spicy and fiery as compared to those from Nene Chicken, but majority of them love my combi of using Gochujang paste, sesame seeds, grated ginger and etc which you could find my recipe here at one of my Korean Cooking Project post.

{Main} Hakka Style Rice Wine Chicken

Traditional Hakka Style Rice Wine Chicken (黄酒鸡 ) (my recipe) made by my mother-in-law who is a typical Hakka lady whom is good in culinary skill. She has a lot good traditional recipe on Hakka delicacy such as Abacus Seeds (recipe),  Steamed Pork Belly with Mui Choy (recipe), Soon Kueh and etc which I still learning and try to make it simple to share the recipes in my website with those who are keen in trying those dishes.

{Main} Homemade Assorted Mini Pizza

Everyone loves pizza especially those with lot of cheese and pipping hot ones that are just out from the oven. In order to speed the preparation and serve it hot, we used ready bought Pita Bread (thick crust) and Wholemeal Wraps (thin crust) from supermarket to use as the pizza base.

Its so fun creating our own pizza using ready bought pizza base (put in the fan-force oven for about 3 minutes till slightly crisp before use), pizza sauce (I used tomato base spaghetti sauce) , sausage, pineapples, capsicums, shredded mozzarella cheese, prawns, tomato, mayo tuna and etc as the toppings.
 

{Main} Assorted Finger Food

Party cannot do without fingers food like nuggets, chicken gyoza, fish balls, sotong balls, hotdog, sausages and etc as these are the all time favourite for both kids and adults.

DESSERT

Assorted Drinks

{Dessert} Osmanthus And Chestnut Koi Jelly

I love dessert so for this New Year gathering, I made some Koi and Ingot Jelly using Konnyaku Jelly Powder plus Osmanthus Flower and Water Chestnut. You can read more on how to make this auspicious jelly at the recipe post here.

{Dessert} Longan And Cranberry Yogurt Cake

For cake I also made two different flavour to cater for the group of old and young. And since it was the 2nd day of Lunar New Year, I decided to bake my new inspiration which was the Longan And Cranberry Yougrt Cake. I really love this new flavour which is moist, fluffy and full of flavour from the dried longan, cranberry, cointreau and chia seeds. Give this a try if you love orange flavour cake with dried fruits in it.

Recipe is available at this link here.

{Dessert} Double Chocolate Yogurt Cake

Chocolate lover would love this because I use 70% dark chocolate plus chocolate chips and Valrhona Dutch Process Cocoa Powder to make this moist and rice chocolate cake. To enhance the texture of the cake, Greek yogurt and fresh orange juice were also added into it.

Ingredients: (makes 2 small loaf tins, 17cm x 8cm x 6cm)
175g Unsalted Butter, room temperature
200g Caster Sugar
3 Eggs, 60g each
200g Self Raising Flour
45g Valrhona Cocoa Powder
100g Mini Chocolate Chips
40ml Orange Juice
200g Greek Yogurt

Method:-
1. Please refer to here for steps on making.

{Dessert} Baked Cheesy Nian Gao With Prata

Apart from the cakes and jelly I also made this addicting snacks for the guests and they really enjoy it, especially for those kids who do not know how to appreciate "Nian Gao (年糕)" on its own. With this fusion method of wrapping traditional nian gao with shredded cheese using ready bought prata skin I am sure it would make a great snack for your visiting guests.

If you could not find prata skin, replace it with either puff pastry or spring roll wrapper (deep-fry the end product instead of bake) . But remember do not over-filled the wrapper with Nian Gao or else the parcel would burst during baking or cooking.  Related recipe could be found at my recipe link here.

Lastly I would like to wish everyone a Prosperous and Happy Lunar New Year! 

祝大家新年快乐，万事如意，蛇年行大运! 发发发!!!

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Lunch Box 14

This is my last lunch box I prepared for my son. He doesnt want to bring lunch box to school anymore. :(

I suspect that he prefers to bring money to school so he can buy and eat whatever he likes. Noone to stop him. :/ Hmm ... I dont think Ill stop making lunch box for him. Im just going to let him have some freedom and fun buy food from the school canteen, then start making lunch box again.

This lunch was made according to my sons request. Noodles, lightly stir fried with sesame seed oil and oyster sauce. I added Kai Lan, carrots and fish cakes to it too. I actually wanted to do something with the carrots but run out of time, so I just had to leave it as it is with the hole in the middle. :P

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Little Lunch Box 57 小饭盒

Today is the last day of my daughters school swimming programme and its also her swimming assessment.

After more than a month break from swimming, she forgotten all the techniques that her coach taught her. (=_=)||  Whether the kids pass the assessment or not, I bet they had lots of fun. Too bad the school stopped having swimming as ECA as they are shorthanded. Oh well ...



Anyway, my daughter loves her best friends little doggie, called Miu Miu (branded dog ... hehehe), a lot. She kept asking her friends grandma to bring Miu Miu to school so she could play with her for a while after school. 



On Monday, Miu Miu went to school to wait for the girls to finish school and my daughter played with her for while. She was a bit disappointed that Miu Miu wasnt there yesterday. So I decided to make her doggie sandwiches today. :)

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Little Lunch Box 19 小饭盒

I bought some Apple Baked Ham yesterday, which is my kids favourite. The elder requested bringing ham for school. I told him, it would be sandwiches (which he hated :P) as I dont think I can wake up at 5am to prepare his lunchbox for him :P



So, this sleepy head mum did a simple ham rolled sandwiches for the elder one to bring to school for his recess. I packed his favourite strawberry milk too.

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Little Lunch Box 11 小饭盒

My daughter requested for Kaya Bread today. She said her friends are all having bread for recess and she wants bread too. o_O I prepared the bread, as per her request.

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Little Lunch Box 44 小饭盒

This is a simple lunch box I prepared for my daughter for her recess last Wednesday.



Before I start packing, she told me not to make any animals for her (she is not into cute food). She said she dont know how to eat them. She said just make like our dinner. :P



I still couldnt resist and sliced a braised egg and decorated it a little. I regretted a little cos moisture from the rice did some changes to the egg yolk. Then when my daughter saw it, she said, "I thought I said please dont make any animals?" :P :P  Opps ... 

Okay, I will try not to next time. ;)

Braised Egg on Mixed Rice (white and brown rice)

Chicken Cutlet and Sweet Peas with Edamame & Crabstick

Introducing more fruits to my fruit hater :P

She has accepted apples and blueberries. Letting her try golden kiwi.

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Little Lunch Box 32 小饭盒

Its pink lunch box aka sandwich day, again!



Todays lunch box idea came from the 2 little cure penguins we bought for the kids during our trip to Hong Kong Ocean Park.



I made the sandwich using cheese and chocolate bread bought from local bakery. Sadly, this is going to be last time that they will be selling chocolate bread.



The staff in the bakery said its not sellable and that they are making a lose for making chocolate bread. :( It tastes and smells really good. Too bad the residents around the bakery dont like it.

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