Spoon and Chopsticks

Last week I made this amazing upside down peach cake inspired by Julie Goodwin's recipe. I made few changes to the original recipe according to my taste. The idea of this cake is to bake with a layer of peach on the bottom of the pan and turn it upside down after taking out of the oven. If you layer the peach slices well, the cake will turn out very beautiful. You can also use pineapple or apricot instead of peach.

It is summer here in Sydney now. I usually don't have a good appetite during summer. I just feel like eating something cold and easy to prepare. I came up with this salad which is spicy, sour and refreshing. I think this salad is ideal for hot weather. It is extremely easy to prepare with only few easy steps. You can enjoy it with bread or on its own.

Today I'd like to share with you an unbelievably simple dish. This dish is very nutritious as it contains all the good ingredients such as spinach, soya bean and sesame. It is extremely easy to prepare and delicious to eat. You can use it as an accompaniment with rice or bread.

This is a simple beef salad made on a stove flat-top pan. The charred flavour of the meat and tomatoes gives a distinct flavour and the spring flavour brings the crunchiness and freshness of green veg in this dish. Sesame oil adds an aromatic flavour in this dish. This beef salad goes well with rice or bread. This salad also makes a great accompaniment with drinks. I like it hot but you can reduce the amount of chilli if you like.

Give a treat to yourself and your family with this delicious milk cake. Texture of this milk cake is soft and simply melts in your mouth. This is one of my favourite cakes. It is simple and has very few ingredients. Try this with your leftover milk in the fridge that is about to expire.

I like to make my own sushi at home. It's really fun to make sushi and is much cheaper to make it at home. The best thing about the homemade sushi is that you can put any fillings you like. Making sushi may be a bit time-consuming but it's worth the effort. Sushi is also great for snacks on parties and picnics as you can prepare it ahead and it does not require heating up.

Sushi is usually prepared using makisu (bamboo sushi mat). Since I don't have this available, I use aluminium foil, as an alternative, to help roll up sushi. I am quite satisfied with the result as you can see in the photos below.

I am going to make 3 types of sushi: seaweed sushi, egg-roll sushi and reverse-roll sushi.

Today I am going to post a recipe for a beautifully home-baked banana loaf with a light cream cheese frosting. This is a great accompaniment with tea or coffee, You can modify the recipe to adjust the amount of sweetness as desired. I have used a light cream cheese for preparing the frosting. If you like richness, you can use a full-cream cheese.

Making your own pizza base and pizza sauce at home is a fun way of making pizza. It's great for a weekend lunch. Home-made pizzas are certainly cheaper and healthier than the ones from most pizzerias. I like to make my own pizza base as well as the sauce. Pizza sauce is very easy to make. Nothing beats your own fresh pizza sauce with herbs. Making pizza base can be a little time-consuming but it's worth the wait. I have used a square pan for my pizza- no significant reason for that. I just don't have a large round pizza pan at the moment. I hope you will enjoy my recipe. I'll let you read the rest of the post and wait for your comments.

Dried Anchovies in Tomato is a great accompaniment with rice, flatbreads and other types of breads. The dried anchovies goes very well with tomato and other spices. You can also add green or red chillies if you like it hot. I prefer using Roma tomatoes because they have a sweet flavour but you can still use other tomatoes. This dish is very easy to prepare with only few preparation steps. Let me know what you think.

Making yoghurt at home is very easy and is much cheaper than buying from the market. Having yoghurt at home is really handy for various purposes. For making yoghurt, you need a starter. If this is your first time making yoghurt, buy a small tub of "thick" plain yoghurt to use as a starter.

Once your yoghurt is ready, keep about 2-3 tablespoons of yoghurt in a fridge to use as a starter for your next batch.

I would like to share with you an accidental recipe that turned out unbelievably delicious. I was trying to make fries for lunch. I wanted the potatoes to be half-boiled but they were over-cooked. So I had to abandon my initial plan. I didn't want to throw away the potatoes. Then I came up with the idea of making fritters with semolina coating. My husband is not a big fan of vegetables but he totally liked the vegetables in the fritters. He liked it so much that he asked me to make it again the next day.

The fritters had a fine crunchiness. Probably the semolina coating gave the fritters this crunchiness. Do you have an accidental recipe story that you would like to share?

The story of this cake began with an orange in my kitchen. I had to finish the orange but didn't want to eat it. So I thought of making a cake with it. For sweetness, I wanted to try something different. So I thought of using a raspberry jam. I also used cocoa powder, which helps in enhancing the orange and raspberry flavours and also gives a nice colour to the cake. The cake came out really nice and moist. Great with a cup of tea or coffee. What do you think?

This recipe is inspired by Chaat, a popular Indian savoury snacks. I like the blend of different flavours in Chaat- sweeet, sour and hot with the creaminess of yoghurt. Chaats are usually made with Samosas or thick Pappadums. In my recipe, I have used toasted corn chips as an easier alternative.


It is very easy to prepare this dish and there is hardly any cooking involved except for boiling the potatoes. Preparing this dish basically involves layering ingredients and mixing them well before eating. I find this dish ideal for summer as the cold yoghurt helps cool down your body. I hope you will enjoy.

Dduk bok ki is a popular Korean dish made using hot pepper paste and rice cake. Hot pepper paste is usually available in Korean grocery shops. Some Chinese groceries sell it too. Rice cake is available in almost all Asian grocery stores.

I like the hotness and sweetness of this dish. I like to eat dduk bok ki when the weather is cold or when its rainy. It keeps your body warm. It is a quick and easy dish. It can be served for lunch or dinner.

My husband loves cheesecake. He especially loves cheesecakes baked at home. To give him a surprise, I made this cheesecake for his birthday.

I used fresh lemon juice, fresh orange, cocoa powder, cream cheese and condensed milk to create this masterpiece. :) Hope you'll find this recipe interesting. Feel free to share your views.

An incredibly simple and delicious dish you can enjoy any time of the day. Great for taking lunch to work. Accompanied by rice or flatbread, it makes a perfect quick meal with amazingly easy preparation steps.

This recipe was inspired by a cooking show I was watching the other day. I've simplified the recipe and tried using fewer ingredients. However the final result was no less than the recipe on the show. The preparation is extremely easy and the outcome is delicious.

Making flatbread at home is very easy and tasty than buying from the market. My flatbreads contain no oil yet they are delicious and extremely easy to make. The market version usually contains preservatives and may contain excess amount of oil. Making them at home is also much cheaper. Once you've started making them at home, you will never go back to the ready-made flatbreads.

The marinade for this roast chicken is a unique combination of red chilli pickle paste and Hoisin sauce. I bought the red chilli pickle paste from the Indian grocery. The combination of red chilli pickle paste and Hoisin sauce gives a special flavour of hot, sour and sweet.

I have done something different with my scones this time- turned them into quick and simple mini burgers. Mini burgers are great to serve at a party and are enjoyed by kids and adults alike.

I tried this recipe few weeks ago when I was quite uncertain about what I should prepare for lunch. I thought the rich and spicy flavours of kimchi would nicely complement the rice noodles. It turned out to be a great dish. It is very easy to prepare and your can have it for your lunch or dinner. It includes all the good ingredients such as mushrooms, cherry tomatoes, mince and kimchi. Kimchi already has fish sauce, spring onions, Chinese cabbage and radish in it. Read my kimchi post to learn how to make kimchi at home.

This is my simple and quick night-time drink just before going to bed. I've heard drinking hot milk gets you to sleep quickly. I don't know if that's true or just a myth but it surely works for me. Drinking plain milk is sometimes boring. If I am not really full after dinner, I usually drink hot milk with Roasted Vermicelli.

I usually buy Roasted Vermicelli from my local Indian grocery. They also call it Sevai or Sewai. I have found several Sevai pudding recipes on the Internet. I will probably do one for another post in the future. I once tried hot milk with thin Chinese rice noodles and it wasn't good at all. So stick with roasted vermicelli for a better result.

A simple and easy chart to learn about the benefits of each vitamin plus sources from fruits, vegetables and nuts.

I baked scones for this morning's tea. This is a simple recipe and it only took me about 30-35 minutes. The scones came out really good. It's worth the time spent. Freshly baked scones are perfect with butter, jam or honey.


Ingredients:

• 1 and 1/2 cup of self-raising flour
• 50-60g shredded cheese
• 2-3 dates, cut into small pieces
• 1/2 teaspoon of ajwain (you may substitute ajwain with sesame seeds)
  
  

Kimchi is one of my all-time favourite Korean dish. It is a great accompaniment with rice and noodles. The good thing about it is it can be prepared in large amounts and can be kept in a refrigerator for a long time. Making kimchi at home is much cheaper than buying from the market. So lets try making kimchi.

My recipe is a combination of ideas I got from various websites and cook books. Let me know what you think of this recipe.


Ingredients:

• 1 large Chinese cabbage
• 1 medium size onion, chopped
• 5-6 cloves of garlic, chopped
• Small piece of ginger, chopped
• 3-4 strips spring onion, cut into small pieces
• About a 1/2 radish, thinly sliced in strips
• Salt, a lot
• Korean red pepper powder as taste (I used about 4-5 tablespoons. You can buy this from Korean grocery shop. I tried once with ordinary chilli powder but the result was not as good as using the Korean red pepper powder.)
  
  
  

It's winter here in Sydney. Winter is great for soup. I made this simple beef bone soup with onion, garlic and ginger to keep myself warm and to drive the flu away.


Ingredients:

• 3-4 pieces of beef bones. Try to get bones with a bit of meat on them.
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 8-10 cloves of peeled garlic
  

These are delicious home-made sausage rolls that are liked by everyone and can be enjoyed anytime. For children who dislike vegetables, the veggies can be hidden inside the rolls by mixing with the meat. You can also put grated zucchini, mushrooms and spinach in the mixture. Serve the sausage rolls with your own dip or use the ordinary ketchup.


Ingredients:

• 2 sheets of puff pastry, partially thawed
• 250g beef mince
• 1/2 onion, finely diced
• Few sesame seeds or ajwain
  
  

This is a great dish that goes well with rice. The main ingredients of this soup are potatoes, black-eyed beans and bamboo shoot. Bamboo shoots are readily available in Chinese grocery stores.



Ingredients:

• A handful of sour bamboo shoot (If you don't prefer sour taste, you can use normal bamboo shoot.)
• 1/2 cup black-eyed beans, soaked overnight
• 5-6 medium sized potatoes, peeled and cut in small cubes
• 50g mince (You can make it a vegetarian dish by not adding mince.)
• 1 tomato, chopped