From the Stovetop With Love
December 28, 2008 at 7:44 pm | In Family, Kids, Kitchen, Mothering, Recipe | 2 Comments
I thought that if I served my children vegetables often enough from an early age, they would grow up liking them. Well, I was in for an unpleasant surprise when S, who loved spinach once upon a time, declared that she no longer liked it. I was flabbergasted and very disappointed. I consider eating your greens a very important part of one’s meals. I grew up being somewhat forced to eat them and I grew up loving them.
Whenever I whip up a batch of stir fry vegetables, the kids seldom eat them, eat with sincere enthusiasm that is, well, except maybe for H, who has more of my taste buds. However, recently, I discovered, again and again, that when hubby whips up his ’secret recipe’ vegetables, the kids usually take to them like fox to chickens. I am flabbergasted and bewildered. Disappointed? Well, maybe a tad envious, but not disappointed. Ok, well, a little bit. A pinch. A smart pinch.
What’s wrong with my vegetables? What’s so special about hubby’s?
Hubby claims,
“I cook it with love. You cook it with grumpiness.”
Yeah right. I have to admit though, he does have a point. A thoroughly great point may I add.
I throw my hands up in the air and say,
“See how they eat their veges when you cook it? From now on, you cook the veges.”
Hubby also claims he has a secret recipe, which he later says is ‘cooking with love’.
But, don’t I cook with love too? I’d like to say I do, but to be utterly honest, I guess some of the times I don’t. I do it because I have to. Well, maybe if I don’t have to cook everyday and get to be treated to some outside food once in a while, I won’t be so grumpy! Hint. Hint.
I recently decided to take matters into my own hands and solve this vege business once and for all.
Hubby’s remark,
“They like it because it’s fresh!”
did it. I had replied,
“Well, I can’t afford to cook fresh veges each time.”
His mother does, but then again, she had a maid when her children were young and only two children, five years apart at that. Do I sound bitter? I suppose I am. Hence, the resulting action.
“S, from now on, you cook fresh vege, ok? If you all like fresh vege, I can’t cook it each time. But you can.”
Yesterday, I taught her how to make a simple cabbage stir fry. They love it when hubby uses turmeric in his veg stir fry, so that’s what I taught her. Today, for lunch, she whipped up another stir fry, this time she included carrots. I have to give it to the kid. It was delish! It feels great to have someone else cook for a change. I think I grew sick and tired of my own cooking after all these years.
Do I still sound bitter? Nah…no longer. Not when I get to eat freshly cooked vege without lifting a finger. I can live with this.
Sweet and Simple!
Sultana Speckled Rice
December 15, 2008 at 6:06 pm | In Allergies, Kitchen, Recipe | 6 Comments
Making Baby Z’s food has been one of my love-hate relationships now. On one hand, I love making his food because it gives me a gratifying feeling to cook for others, just like when I cook for my husband and children. On the other, I also hate it especially when I also have to cook a separate meal for the rest of the family at the same time, under pressure, and sometimes, with a hungry wailing Baby Z, who sometimes cling to my leg while I’m bustling about the stove.
In short, we always have to be on the lookout for his food level. If it looks like it’s almost finished, I have to make sure I cook a new batch so I could avoid the above-mentioned scenario. When the three older kids were younger, I had a perfect cooking arrangement, which for some reason I am not able to execute today. I would cook our lunch and dinner right after Fajr while hubby gives the kiddoes their morning baths before he leaves for campus. That way, by the time they were done, lunch and dinner was also ready, and I had gotten my fill of heavy breakfast. The kids’ breakfasts were served and the rest of the day usually consisted of no cooking and full time kids nurturing.
Now, I seem to be struggling continuously with growing kids with ravenous appetites and a toddler with multiple allergies who is not able to eat what we eat unless I ban all the food he’s allergic to for the rest of the family. It is still a struggle, but alhamdulillah, we haven’t had any major allregic reactions, well except for that one wheezing incident that rattled me greatly.
Anyway, I thought I would jot down the recipes for the food I’m continuously whipping up for him, with precise measurements nonetheless, which also actually serves another purpose in my personal endeavors. And today, I made what I dub,
Sultana Speckled Rice
1 tablespoon canola oil
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tablespoon minced onion
1/2 cup cubed boneless chicken (1/2 in cubes)
1 cup ground beef
1 tablespoon tomato ketchup
1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder
1/4 teaspoon ground coriander
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon paprika
2 cups rice, washed and drained
1/2 cup dried golden raisins
4 cups water
1/2 frozen peas
1/2 cup frozen green beans
4 cup
pinch of salt
1. Heat oil. Toss in minced onion and garlic, and saute till fragrant
2. Add the cbicken and ground beef and stir till half cooked
3. Add tomato ketchup, coriander, turmeric, paprika, cinnamon and stir for about 3 minutes
4. Add rice and stir for about 2-3 minutes
5. Toss in the raisins
6. Add water and bring to boil
7. Turn heat to low. Add the frozen peas and green beans, and simmer, covered until all water is absorbed by rice and rice is done.
8. Fluff up and serve to a hungry and belligerent toddler.
Makes 8 cups
Crepes Then Pancakes … Allergy Free At That!
October 11, 2008 at 2:05 am | In Allergies, Kitchen, Mothering, Recipe | Leave a CommentFinally, I’m driven to try out allergy free recipes, inspired by Sh. efforts even though she doesn’t have an allergic child, mashaallah. It took my about an hour, an hour of my morning to finish the crepe batter I had blitzed up. The slightly modified recipe, which I found here, is as below.
Crepes, Malaysianized into Kuih Dadar
CREPES:
3 Eggs worth of prepared egg replacer
3/4c rice milk
3/4c Water
3 Tbs canola oil
1/3c Rice flour
1/8c Sweet rice flour (glutinous rice flour)
1/8c Potato starch
1/8c Tapioca flour (starch)
1/2t Salt
- Blend everything in blender
- Pour onto non stick pan in thin layer
- Wait until bubbles on surface pops and bottom browns before flipping it
As usual, I encountered problems. The first one turned out to be a gooey log of partially done crepe, which tasted like glutinous rice). The second one was better, but I then realized that it takes quite a while for it to be completely done.
If I lifted it too soon, it’s be too gummy. I ended up with only two or three edible crepes from the whole batter, having ruined the rest with gummy crepes, but in all, I’m quite satisfied with the recipe. I even dared to flavor some of the batter with Pandan, thus making it green. Then I filled some with some leftover filling I had made for onde-onde, and it became kuih dadar/ketayap! Even the kids said it was good. Alhamdulillah.
The next day (yesterday), I tried a pancake recipe, which I found here. The recipe is below:
Pancakes
1/4 c. tapioca starch
1/3 c. potato starch
1-1/4 c. white rice flour
4 tsp. baking powder
2 Tbsp. granulated sugar
2 Tbsp. canola oil
1-1/2 – 2 c. soy or rice milk*
1 Tbsp. vinegar
I used rice milk, and I probably made the mistake of using all 2 cups of it despite the recipe’s warning of using less than that until the desired consistency is reached. That made the pancake batter quite watery and I ended up with quite thin pancakes, not like in the photos on the site. I had problems with sticking too, even though I used a non stick pan. It tasted, disappointingly to me, a lot like rice flour, so I mashed half a banana and added it to the batter. It tasted rather like Jemput-jemput pisang. I decided to give it to Baby Z because I made quite a lot. So we gave him a teeny bite and waited a few minutes. Nothing happened, so we gave him another teeny bit and waited a while. After an hour of no reactions, we gave him more, and today he had it for breakfast and for intermittent snacks, alhamdulillah.
That means, that he is okay with rice milk, vinegar, and baking powder; all ingredients I’ve never exposed him to before. And now, I’m trying out a kuih lapis recipe I got from here. The only ingredient in here Baby Z hasn’t had yet is coconut milk. Since today is Friday, I’m not going to take the risk and give him this. Since last time’s incident, I decided to only give him something new on weekdays, and not on the weekends. Friday is too close for comfort to be counted as a weekday. So, maybe next week, Baby Z.
As for me, I just realized that I have about four more months of breastfeeding left, which means that after that, if I managed to wean him completely, I can again take dairy, eggs, wheat, peanut, and soy. Now, why am I not that excited?
Blog at WordPress.com. | Theme: Pool by Borja Fernandez.
Entries and comments feeds.
