Lisa's Lemony Kitchen

Recipe from Australian Women Weekly (AWW) magazine Aug 2010. When I was browsing through the AWW magazine, the first thing that caught my eye was the cake then my eye shifted to search for the recipe... and upon reading the title... I go what!!! 'Sour Cream in cake ??'.. it was bizarre...  Sour Cream and lemon ??... again... doubly bizarre...  But the curiosity in me ...took over. I wanted to give it a go... worst case scenario... I could bake it in the morning when kids and hubby are out to school and work, if I am unhappy with the outcome... I'll ' bin ' the cake and nobody would know... :) Result : the cake was divine hence it made its appearance in my blog... :)   This is what Pamela Clark, Kitchen Director of AWW said about the cake: " A heavenly butter cake with a bonus of the zesty flavour of lemon. It's rich, moist, buttery and cuts and keeps well. What more could you ask for?" It came second in the list of their top 1

Starting of this term, Miss E is taking Home Economics as one of the subjects in school. She enjoyed playing 'grown-up'... pretending to be 'Masterchef ' :) The teacher gave out an assignment and the students were meant to pick up (at random) a vegetable to cook...and her group picked up   CAPSICUM !! :) what an irony... its the one vegetable that she  dislike ... However, the show must go on ... she has to do some research and cook a dish using capsicum... so she found this simple recipe from Simply Great Meals and was trying it out over the weekend... We left her to do all the works herself including cleaning afterwards... She substituted basil with beetroot leaf as none could be found in my vegetable patch. We tasted her lovely capsicum rolls ... but  Miss E  ... she refused to have a teeny-weeny bite... 1 red and 1 yellow capsicum  2 tablespoons Leggo's Pesto - Traditional  80g cream cheese  80g fresh ricotta  16 basil leaves Cut capsi

Chinese is famous for Wontons, while the Indians for Samosas...  and we love both... Similarity ~ in order to have that golden look and crunchy texture, we need to deep-fry... and I am not a big fan of deep-frying :(. Instead of making the dough/pastry... I opted for filo pastry instead...and filled it up with Dosa potatoes It is quick and a healthier version of samosas... ... and no deep-frying is required... yay!!!  500g potatoes - cubed, microwave 2 garlic - chopped 1 brown onion - chopped 1 inch ginger 1 teaspoon tumeric powder 1/2 teaspoon chilli powder 1 tablespoon corainder seeds - ground 2 tablespoon cumin - ground Filo Pastry. Ground garlic and ginger to a smooth paste. Add in tumeric and chilli powder. In a pan, heat up 3 tablespoon canola oil and saute the garlic mixture until fragrant. Add grounded coriander and cumin... stir until fragrant. Add potatoes and cooked until it is slightly mushy. Season to taste. Leave it to cool. Pre hea

  Kimchee, gimchi or kimchi ... is a Korean traditional side dish. It is easy to make and Mr H Jr ... who does not eat anything 'green' ( aka as vegetables ) loves kimchee . If we were to buy a tub of 400g of kimchee from Asian grocer, it would set us back by AUD5. And our homemade kimchee , cost us less than AUD2 for 700g to 1 kg...  A brilliant condiment to go with steam rice, noodles in broth... and just recently we tried kimchee pancake!! Very versatile fermented vegetable indeed! :)   0.8-1kg chinese cabbage seasalt garlic andd ginger - finely chopped crushed chilli sugar Wash, clean chinese cabbage then thicky sliced. Add seasalt ... submerge the cabbage (hold down by placing plate on top)....and marinate overnight in the refrigerator. Wash off the salt and drain in a colander. Mix the cabbage, chilli, chopped garlic and ginger into a bowl and mix well... Add sugar or salt according to one's preference.

We love going to Kailis Brothers in Leederville  for our fresh seafood supply...  We always ended up with 1 whole Salmon and Hiramasa. The best thing about going to Kailis is that ...they will clean the fish (gut and scale off) and cut into whatever and however you prefer, be it fillet or cutlet or even for sashimi... hmmm... maybe Kailis should give me some discount for promoting their produce in my blog... I wonder!! :) They even have a chef to do some demonstration cooking (not everytime though)... we were lucky to be there when they were promoting their other produce... 2 types of infused 'Organic Olive Oil' ~one with Blood Orange and the other with Lime... sound wonderful..   I was talking to the chef and managed to find out his 'secret' ingredients ....and I get to taste  this wonderful dish... it is so yum ... The chef was using Barramundi, Greek Oregano and Maldon seasalt...  Greek oregano can be found in some speciality shop (it has a bitey t

It was raining the whole day yesterday... weatherman says, there'll be more rain this week and next week. We need rain... it has been a dry winter... not a very cold one either (hmm... there will be less cherries this year .. and will be pricey too!!).. Rainy days  always reminded me of my younger days... some donkey years ago !! Our monsoon season was from July onwards... very heavy downpour with flashing lightning and loudest thunder... very scary indeed...for a young child, especially when it was nearly bedtime... It, too reminded me of one special dish... a 'poor man's' dish...~ fried salted fish with hot steaming rice and ground white pepper?.. It is the most unhealthy meal but I relished the taste of crispiness, saltiness, and the heat from white pepper... could warmed up my tummy... :)   salted fish ~ kurau or mergui 100g -150g dried chillies 1 tablespoon ground fennel  50g raisins 3 tablespoon of golden fried shallot (from grocer or 3 shallots

Kedah folks called this ' Serawa ' but those from the Southern part of Malaysia would called this Pengat ...  a dessert made from sweetened coconut milk... There are varieties of ' Serawa '... we can have this with only bananas.., durian or jack fruit... This is a simple dessert that I love... as a young child...I would only picked and eat bananas from this serawa ... :) Mom would usually whipped this up for our afternoon delight or breaking fast. It is quite heavy with coconut milk, sweet potatoes, yam and banana...  the food is 'sinfully rich' ... that is why it is so delicious and yummy...  200g kumara - cubed and steamed 100g yam - cubed and steamed 2 banana - sliced just before adding into the pot 400ml thick coconut milk 100g sugar 3 daun pandan (screwpine leaves) - knotted 100g sago 600ml water Bring sago to boil in a medium size saucepan until the sago become transparent. Add pandan leaves and sugar. Stir until sugar dissolves. Pour in

This is an old recipe from mom's cookbook. I guess it must have been at least 35 years old... Back in those days, mothers would cook their savoury or white rice using wood fire or stovetop (be it kerosene or gas), but I am not an expert in cooking any kind of rice on stovetop let alone wood fire !!... it would ended up with some burnt rice at the bottom of the pot or the rice would still be grainy and uncooked... since I did not 'graduate ' from wood fire nor stovetop cooking class... any rice dishes will be cooked to perfection in my wonderful gadget ~ called  'Rice Cooker' ... :) I prefer to savour this dish as it is... and I know some would prefer to have some gravy to go with it... I suggest to try it with dalca or lentils curry  and some crunchy Asian salad. 2 cups Basmati rice 700g diced steak beef 200 ml tomato soup 100 ml evaporate milk 350-400 ml water or stock 1 tablespoon coriander seeds 1 teaspoon cumin 1 teaspoon fennel 1 teaspoon b