[Recipe] Coffee-Rubbed Porterhouse Steak with "Yehaa" Raspberry Sauce and Sweet Potato Salad

We always get so clueless on what to eat and cook for dinner. It can be really stressful most of the times because at the end of the day, we always come back to almost the same stuffs every (day or) week. Well the case for this dinner was that, it is all started couple of days ago when we had this really good sandwich of coffee rubbed chicken at Industry Beans and OMG! It was really good and we said to ourselves that we have to make something like this at home because no surprise here that: 

1. We really love good coffee.

2. We really love good steaks.

3. We really love good berries sauce. 

So as a result, we thought "Hey, why not marry all them together" with good seasonings - smoked paprika, freshly cracked black pepper, ground cinnamon and the finest sea salt flakes; and boy oh boy! It was just, MAGICAL. The coffee crusted steaks really worked well with the "yehaa" raspberry sauce (due to the existence of "a bit of heat" in the sauce) and the sweetness from the sweet potato salad just complement and balance the overall components in this dish. I am not going to say anything anymore, so here goes the recipe:

Coffee-Rubbed Grilled Porterhouse Steak

Serving: 2

500 g Porterhouse steaks

1 1/2 tbsp coffee grounds (we use Sensory Lab Steadfast Espresso Blend)

1 tsp smoked paprika

sea salt flakes

olive oil

"Yehaa" Raspberry Sauce

1 cup fresh/frozen raspberry

1/2 tsp cinnamon ground

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

1 tsp white balsamic vinegar

sea salt flakes

sugar (optional)

Instruction:

1. Mix coffee ground and smoked paprika.

2. Pat dry steaks with kitchen towel and season with sea salt.

3. Pat the coffee ground mixture onto the steak.

4. Heat heavy bottomed skillet over medium heat and add olive oil.

5. Cook steaks for 5-6 minutes on each side.

6. Let it rest on a plate covered with foil for 5-10 minutes before serving. 

7. In a small saucepan add raspberry, cinnamon ground, cayenne pepper, white balsamic vinegar and a pinch of sea salt.

8. Let it simmer and reduce for 1-2 minutes before serving.

Sweet Potatoes Salad

1 sweet potato

1 avocado

2 tomatoes

mint

toasted pine nuts

olive oil dressing 

Instruction:

1. Boil sweet potato until tender, drain and put aside.

2. Mix everything in a bowl.

3. Prepare your preferred salad dressing. 

4. Pour in salad and mix well before serving.

14 of The Cooking Projects

[We realized that we're leaning towards noodle and raw green salad at the moment and consuming less rice lately]

Anyway I have so many recipes to share in this blog but so little time to actually sit and write the whole stuffs. But if any of you followed me on Instagram (@aimaris), I actually shared most of the recipes or ingredients in the Instagram. Can say it's pretty handy to microblog on Instagram compared to in here. Haha. 

Recipe: Healthy Chocolate and Walnut Brownies

I think it's time for both of us to eat more healthy food than we used to before. Living in Melbourne where majority of the people are very conscious of what they put in their mouth, making healthy and organic food really cheap here and it's a really good advantage to us. So I say today, is the day!

So I made a very healthy chocolate and walnut brownies just now. And the very best part of it was, I used olive oil and Greek yogurt in the brownies mixture to replaced butter and milk. Sounds Mediterranean 'nuff for ya? Lol. And nutritionally speaking a piece of this brownies is just equivalent to 150 cal only (source: www.olivetomato.com)! Oh yeah! Well anyway I've simplified the method to make it from the original recipe but nonetheless the brownies still yield that perfect moist, chocolaty and yummy brownies. So here goes the recipe: 

Super Healthy Chocolate and Walnut Brownies

Source: here

Ingredients:

1/4 cup of olive oil

1/4 cup of low-fat Greek yogurt

3/4 cup of sugar

1 tsp of vanilla extract

2 eggs

1/2 cup of flour

1/3 cup of cocoa powder (you can add 1-2 tbsp more)

1/4 tsp of baking powder

1/4 tsp of salt

1/3 cup of chopped walnuts

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven at 180C and line your baking tin with baking paper.

2. Dump everything in a bowl and mix it well with a mixer.

3. Pour the mixture in the baking tin and smooth the top layer of the mixture with spatula.

4. Bake for 25 minutes.

Recipe: Super Easy Pavlova

I love easy recipe. The one that I can just whip in few minutes and it will be ready in less than an hour...or preferably less. So since I...er Husband just got me a bench mixer so my expectation for my preparation time should be 50% less than how I used to spend my time perhaps? Lol. So here goes the recipe:

Super Easy Pavlova

Source: Best Recipes

Ingredients:

2 egg whites

1 1/2 cups of sugar

1/2 tsp of vanilla

1 tsp of cornflour

1 tsp of vinegar

4 tbsp of boiling water

Instructions:

1. Place all ingredients in a small bowl or mixing bowl.

2. Mix everything using your mixer at high speed for a good 15 minutes.

3. Prepare pavlova tray with non-stick baking paper

4. Spread mixture onto prepared tray in a 20 cm diameter circle.

5. Bake at 180C for 10 minutes and reduce heat to 150C, and bake for a further 45 minutes.

6. Serve with fresh whipped cream and berries.

Verdict:

Great and super easy pavlova recipe that uses only 2 eggs! And yield perfect and crispy outer texture of the meringue with soft marshmallowy texture in the inside. Love, love, love!

Food, food, food!

"One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well."  

- Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own

Nasi minyak, with chicken curry and acar sayur

Chicken sausage wrap with Aioli sauce

Lamb Rogan Josh

Paruppu vada or dal vada

Grilled lamb with husband's homemade black pepper sauce, rosemary sauteed vegetables and my homemade potato gratin

Recipe: Potato Gratin

Ingredients:

4 potato

2 cloves of garlic

a knob of butter

thickened cream

cheese

salt

pepper 

Directions:

1. Rub your baking dish with garlic and butter and put aside.

2. Peel and slice the potato as thinly as possible. But if you have food processor then it will be easier.

3. Layer the potatoes in the dish, adding a little salt and pepper between layers.

4. Once you get your desired layer of potatoes, pour in thickened cream and sprinkle generous amount of cheese on top of it.

5. Cook in the microwave for about 20 minutes. 

6. If your microwave has a grill function, finish the gratin under the grill for another 5-10 minutes.

*For traditional way of baking potato gratin: Cook it in oven for about 1.5 hours at 160C

North Carlton Canteen

New cafe in Lygon St. North Carlton Canteen, Melbourne. Good food, good coffee, good place to hang out.

Recipe: Butter-less Pandan Cake

My craving for Pandan cake can best be described...like a volcano that is about to erupt! Haha. So I woke up this morning with a great feeling that today is the day that I'm gonna bake the cake but only to find that I did not have any butter at home! Why oh why. :(

So because of that I quickly googled recipe for a basic pound cake that uses no butter. I know there are lotsa 'em but I want something that is quick and easy to make and requires basic or less ingredients, without compromising the taste and moist-ness of the cake. So I found one, a recipe from Mayuri's blog and I tweaked a bit to my preference. :)

Butter-less Pandan Cake

Ingredients: 

2 eggs

3/4 cup of sugar

1/2 cup of vegetable oil

1/2 cup of milk

1 1/4 cups of all-purpose flour

1/2 tbsp of baking powder

1/2 tbsp of Pandan paste

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 180C.

2. Beat eggs well in a bowl. Add sugar and beat well.

3.. Add oil and milk and beat well.

4. Sieve flour and baking powder into the mixture and fold it.

5. Add pandan paste and fold the mixture. 

6. Grease your baking tin (I used 8 inch round tin) and pour the mixture into it.

7. Once done, drop the cake pan a couple of inches onto the counter the knock out all the bubbles. 

8. Bake it for 50-55 minutes or until the toothpick comes out clean.

My Guy and Banana Cupcake with Chocolate and Peanut Bbutter Frosting

I'm feeling good today. So I baked cupcakes for dearest husband, banana cupcake with chocolate and peanut butter frosting while listening to Mary Wells "My Guy" song...in loop! :)

Recipe: Pasta with Naked Tomato Sauce and Homemade Meatballs with Creamy Sauce and Raspberry Jam

I've been missing IKEA meatballs and few of its menus couple of days ago because the one we got here is a no-no as the meatballs are mixed together with minced pork. So in order to feed my craving, I thought I might as well just recreate my favorite menus from IKEA. Pasta with tomato sauce and meatballs with creamy sauce and lingonberry jam. But...apparently I am lacking of breadcrumbs and lingonberry jam at home. No biggie at all, as I can just replace it with raspberry jam and make no breadcrumb meatballs instead. Lol. *pat self on back*

So here goes my version of my favorite menus from IKEA.

Naked Tomato Sauce

Ingredients:

1/2 big onion

3 cloves of garlic

1 can of diced tomato

2 tbsp of mixed herbs

1 cube of beef stock

salt

black pepper

sugar

olive oil

Instructions:

1. Pour oil in pan and saute onion and garlic until brown.

2. Add diced tomato and all the tomato liquid into the pan.

3. Add beef stock into the sauce.

4. Add mixed herbs, salt, pepper and sugar.

5. Let it simmer and put aside.

Meatballs (With no breadcrumbs)

Ingredients:

700g of minced beef

1 onion

4 cloves of garlic

1 tbsp of cayenne pepper

1/2 cup of parmesan cheese

1 egg

salt

olive oil

Instructions:

1. Mix everything together in a bowl.

2. Using your hand, shape the beef into the forms of meatball.

3. Pour oil in pan and fry the meatballs until it perfectly cooked.

Creamy Sauce

Ingredients:

100ml of cream

200 ml of beef stock

Chinese soy sauce (1 tsp of light soy sauce + 1 tsp of dark soy sauce)

1 tbsp of plain flour

salt

white pepper

Instructions:

1. Cook the beef stock over medium heat.

2. Add cream, soy sauce and thicken with flour if preferred. Season well with salt and pepper.

Recipe: Tomato Rice with Ayam Masak Merah

Made tomato rice and ayam masak merah couple of days ago and...ahhhh it was really good. *pat self on back* So here goes the recipe: 

Tomato Rice

Ingredients: 

1/2 medium-sized onion, diced

2 cloves of garlic

100g of butter/ghee

1 cinnamon stick

2 star anises

2 cardamom pods

3tbsp of tomato sauce

1 cube of chicken stock/250ml of liquid chicken stock

milk

3 small pots of long grain rice/basmathi

*I used long grain rice as I don't have basmathi rice at home, so the measurement of water is 2 1/4 small pots of chicken stock + 1 small pot of milk/evaporated milk

**If you're using basmathi rice, let the rice soak in water before starts cooking, for about 20 minutes. And for every 1 small pot of basmathi rice = 1 1/4 of water

Instructions:

1. Melt butter in pan and saute onion and garlic until brown. Add cinnamon stick, star anises and cardamom pods.

2. Add pre-washed rice into the pan and stir thoroughly until all the rice is well-coated with butter. Then add tomato sauce and stir gently.

3. Remove the pan from heat and pour everything in rice cooker. Add chicken stock and milk in it. Stir for one more time and cook rice as usual.

Ayam Masak Merah

Ingredients:

4 Chicken Drumsticks

1 big onion

2 cloves of garlic

2 tbsp of blended chili

1 lemon grass

1 cinnamon stick

1/2 cup of tomato sauce

3 tbsp of chili sauce

3 tbsp of oyster sauce

1 cube of chicken stock/250 ml of liquid chicken stock

1 tomato

1 tbsp of flour

turmeric powder

salt

sugar

Instructions:

1. Clean chicken and pat dry. Marinate chicken with flour, turmeric powder and salt. 

2. Fry chicken until half-cooked. Put aside.

3. Saute half of onion and garlic until browned. Add blended chili, cinnamon stick and lemon grass.

4. Add tomato sauce, chili sauce, oyster sauce and chicken stock into the pan. Let it simmer.

5. Add the chicken, tomato and another half of the onion.

6. Season with salt and sugar according to taste.

Bake with Love: Cappuccino Cupcake with Peanut Butter Frosting

Made these cute mini cuppies yesterday, cappuccino cupcake and peanut butter frosting with or without dessicated coconut using the egg-less, butter-less and milk-less recipe (here). :)

Plate to Pixel and Pasta for Lunch!

I was delighted to received my Plate to Pixel book by Helena Dujardin, last evening from Book Depository. By the way Helena's the blog owner of Tartelette, one of my favourite foodography blogs. So I flipped through the book, and I super loved the content and admired how 'personal' she had been in writing the content of this book. :)

Oh! And husband has been such an angel to cooked this Grilled Chicken and Mushroom Carbonara Pasta for our lunch today. Yumm! :)

Recipe: Asparagus & Mushroom Risotto

What we had for today, again thanks to my husband for god knows how rajin he had been and will be! He made this yummy asparagus and mushroom risotto for our lunch today. It was really nice and creamy but just perfect enough to satisfy our appetites. :)

Since there have been a few people asking me about the recipe, thought I'm just gonna share it here.

Asparagus and Mushroom Risotto

Ingredients:

1 tbsp of olive oil

1 onion, diced

2 cups of Arborio rice

4 cups of chicken stock

1 cup of boiling water 

1 cup of grated Parmesan

50g of butter, chopped

1 cup of fresh button mushroom

1-2 bunches of asparagus, cut into 5cm pcs

Freshly ground black pepper, to serve

Directions:

1. Heat oil in a large saucepan on medium heat. Saute onion for 5 mins, until softened

2. Add rice and stir to coat grains

3. Add stock and water, bring to boil and reduce heat to low

4. Simmer, covered for 12 mins or until the rice is tender

5. Remove pan from heat

6. Add butter, saute mushroom and asparagus

7. Combine grated Parmesan with rice and sauteed mushroom and asparagus

8. Serve risotto with freshly ground black pepper

Grilled Salmon, Baked Potatoes and Dill Sauce

I think the ultimate perk of having a husband who loves (and rajin) to cook good food is that you can always be fed with good food. I am thankful to Allah! Definitely. I was born and raised in a family that loves to cook and eat and indulge other people with good food. Me dad was a really good cook. Ayam percik, nasi minyak, gulai lemak, you tell me, those were all beyond words to described. Me mum's too. Her sambal udang, orange cake, nasi ayam, etc. Those are definitely to die for! I maybe kinda bias here but both my sisters are too and my mother in law, she's brilliant! We're lucky that we know how to value food and eat, cook and indulge people with our cooking. 

So yeah, as of today, as usual me being the busy 'hungry' student and husband's being the usual ultra-rajin made this beautiful and ridiculously good dish, grilled salmon with baked potatoes and dill sauce. And I don't simply dig this sorta dish if we're out dining in some good restaurants or what. Simply because there are gazillions vegetables present in this dish and salmon being cooked with the existence of soy sauce. But boy I was wrong, it was beyond words! And again husband nailed it! Way, way, way better than what we had anywhere else. :)

I'm proud of him and I believed it does boost his confidence in cooking as well. I am his judge and also his lab rat, but I'm super fine with that. After all, cooking it's definitely a combination of having good skills, common sense & passion about it. ;)

The cooking project

Yesterday's lunch. Garlic & butter grilled fish with perfect poached egg and salad.

Hello again...

Nowadays I am very much on Instagram. So do visit me: @aimaris :)

*cleaning up all the dusts in my blog*

Hello! Been a while since my last post. And we've experienced so many things in life. Some of it were good things but some of it aren't. But some of the main highlights of our life for the past couple of weeks were Zorro has died *sob sob*, our marriage turns two! And few other good & bad things which I prefer to blog about it later. But all in all, we're thankful to Allah for all the good things we have and have had in our life. :)

Hope you guys have a pleasant Monday! Take care.

Good food at home

Husband's good food. :)

Recipe: Best Bread Machine Bread

 Good day everyone!

Thanks to the long holiday, I'm baking like mad here. Especially bread. I know, me & yeast we don't have that "special bonding" before. But thanks to me husband, he was kind enough to buy me a bread-maker and I'm loving this brilliant machine like mad here! :) 

So here I am baking this fantastic, super soft & super fluffy white bread. And I'm very proud to say that my mission is successful. Thanks to the bread-maker of course! Lol. ;)

Recipe: Best Bread Machine Bread

Source: allrecipes.com

Serving: Perfect for 1.5pounds of loaf

Ingredients:

1 cup of warm water (45 degrees Celsius)

2 tbsp of white sugar

2 1/2 tsp of instant dry yeast

1/4 cup of vegetable oil

3 cups of bread flour/ high protein flour

1 1/2 tsp of salt

Methods:

1. Place the water, sugar & yeast in the pan of the bread machine. Let the yeast dissolve and foam for 10 minutes. 

(Note: I know most bread machine manual said that the liquid comes first, and then the flour, salt, sugar, etc. Then only the yeast. But this one it's a bit different. You might wanna follow the steps in order to get this sort of achievement. :D)

2. Add the oil, flour & salt to the yeast.

3. Select Basic or White Bread setting and press Start.

2 hours & 53 minutes later, I got the perfect white-bread that I'll never buy the store-bought bread again. ;)

Self-hand-cut Potato Pop with Home-made Salsa Sauce, Beef Pepperoni & Mozzarella Cheese

I'm super hungry, so my husband was kind enough and made these for both of us.

Self-hand-cut Potato Pop with Home-made Salsa Sauce, Beef Pepperoni & Mozzarella Cheese

THE BEST EVER!

Which I already tweeted about it just now. ;)

HUSBAND PLEASE, CAN I WANT MORE OF THIS? @_@

Recipe: Everyday Chocolate Cake

4 words.

Easy. Quick. Perfect. Delicious! ;)

Recipe by Smitten Kitchen

Everyday Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:

1/2 cup (1 stick) of unsalted butter, softened

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 granulated sugar

1 large egg, at room temperature

1 cup buttermilk (substitute: 1 tbsp white distilled vinegar + the rest of 1 cup with fresh milk)

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 1/2 cups of all purpose flour

3/4 cup Dutch cocoa powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

Method:

1. Preheat oven at 160 degree of Celsius

2. Butter and lightly flour a tin loaf

3. Cream the butter until smooth

4. Add sugars and beat until fluffy for about 3 minutes

5. Add egg, buttermilk and vanilla essence

6. Sift flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa powder and salt and mix together with wet ingredients

7. Stir together until well-blended

8. Pour the batter into loaf pan and bake for 60 - 70 minutes or until the cake tester comes out clean

Good luck and happy early Monday! :)