Random Recipe: Orange and Ginger Stained Glass Biscuits

Have you taken part in my blog giveaway yet?

Dom's random recipe challenge for this month was awesome! We were partnered up with another blog who randomly chose a recipe for us from one of our books after we numbered them! My partner was Manu at http://cookingmanu.blogspot.com/

Manu randomly chose a recipe  for me called "orange and ginger stained glass biscuits" in BBC Food's 101 Cupcakes and Small Bakes.

The picture with the recipe was so cute since the heart shaped biscuits had ribbons tied to them and were hung from branches of a Christmas tree.

I made mine round but it was a total fail as they didn't come off the tray! :( apart from one. Which I abused excessively for pictures.

The recipe quite simple and I think to get it right you should add parchment paper to the already greased baking tray.

Here's the recipe:

175g plain flour
zest of one orange
1 tsp ground ginger
100g cold butter, cut into chunks
50g muscovado sugar
1tbsp milk
12 fruit flavored boiled sweets, crushed

Preheat oven to 180C. Grease two non stick baking sheets with oil. Whiz together flour, ginger, orange zest, and butter in a food processor. Pulse in the sugar and milk and turn out and knead briefly until smooth.
Wrap, then chill for 30 minutes.
Roll out to the dough to a 1/4 inch thickness. Cut shapes with 7cm cutters and use 4cm to cut out the middle.
Put the crushed sweets in the middle of each biscuit and bake for 15 to 20 minutes until middles have melted and edges golden brown.
Leave to harden then transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Nasi Goreng- 2nd Blog Birthday and a GIVEAWAY!

It's been exactly two years since I started food blogging and like everything else, it seems as if it was just yesterday.

Looking back, I realize how much as I've grown as a person who enjoys cooking and baking (dare I say chef?). I've discovered a wealth of new information, met amazing people (both online and in real life!), and read some amazing posts. I've tried to harness my interest in photography by focusing on food (but admittedly, not as much as I'd like to) and what's the best part is that having a blog has been a catalyst for my increased passion and interest in the world of food.

Here's the first food related post I wrote on this blog (exactly two years ago) "Autumn- the season for rich colors and gorgeous comfort food". This post was dedicated to butternut pumpkin which has grown to become one of my favourite vegetables along with capsicums. It contains two soup recipes and one vegetarian stew recipe. And yes, there aren't any photographs in that post.

And exactly one year ago: I posted a restaurant review of one of my favourite restaurants: Saladicious in Jumeirah.

To mark this auspicious event, I'm having a giveaway! One lucky winner is going to receive this lovely little book called "200 Delicious Desserts". The publisher is Hamlyn and what I love about this series is that the pictures are gorgeous, the recipes easy to read, and the results fabulous. The choice of recipes in this book is wonderful and includes a pear and almond tart, coffee and hazelnut choc ices, double chocolate puddings (YUM!), and strawberry choux puffs (to name just a few!- there are 200 as the title indicates!)

What you have to do in order to win is really simple!
1. Like "Spontaneous Euphoria Food Blog" on facebook
2. Follow @Spontiphoria on twitter
3. Leave a comment on this post saying that you did the above two and mention which of your recipes on this blog is your favourite and why!

The winner will be chosen by a friend of mine through picking a name out of a hat (fun, eh?)
The deadline to enter is exactly a month from today November 23, 2011

Now on to today's recipe:

Nasi goreng. Nice spicy rice with prawn crackers and fried egg and chicken satay skewers with peanut sauce. MMMMM.. but this is a vegetarian option (with the eggs, though- but you can easily omit it!)

I made this a month ago, and have made it four times since already. It's THAT good.
And it's so simple!

Ingredients
3 tbsp peanut or sunflower oil
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 onion, finely chopped
2 birds-eye chilies, finely chopped and deseeded
2 garlic cloves, crushed
5cm ginger, grated
1 cup button mushrooms, chopped
200g baby corn, chopped
1 red capiscum, chopped
1 yellow capsicum, chopped
1 green capsicum, chopped
3 cups brown rice, cooked
2 tbsp oyster sauce
2 tbsp sweet chili sauce
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 spring onion, finely sliced
80g brussel sprouts

Procedure
- Heat 1 tbsp of the oil in a wok and add the eggs. Swirl to coat the base of the pan. Cook until set and then remove from wok and slice into thin strips.
- Heat the remaining oil and cook the onion, chili, garlic, and ginger until fragrant and soft, around 5 minutes.
- Add the button mushrooms, baby corn, and capsicums stirring for around 10 minutes until mushroom and corn has softened.
- Next, add the rice and stir to coat. Then add the sauces, spring onion, and brussel sprouts and stir again until everything is well combined.
- Transfer to a serving dish and arrange the strips of omelette on top of the rice.
- Serve immediately.

It's THAT simple and takes around half an hour to make! It's indulgent for a simple dinner at home in front of the TV and glamorous enough (if presented nicely) for when you have guests!

Enjoy! And don't forget to take part in the giveaway contest!!

How the Aztecs did it..

Have you taken part in my blog giveaway yet? Details here!

Choclette is hosting this month's We Should Cocoa challenge with the wonderfully exotic theme of chili and chocolate. It's my second time participating after I made a triple chocolate party cake for last month's challenge.



I love chili with chocolate but have only ever had it in chocolate soups (as I did at Hotel Chocolat in London) and or hot chocolate shots (In Dubai's Vintage Chocolate Bar) and I wondered what it would taste like in ice-cream.



I could sort of imagine the play of the flavours and textures. Velvety chocolate ice cream that cools the throat but has a strong chili aftertaste after you've swallowed it. Seemed so heavenly to me. And so I tweaked a normal chocolate ice-cream and added some thinly sliced red birds-eye chilies.




Ingredients
120g chopped dark chocolate, 70% cocoa solids
2 tablespoons single cream
300ml double cream
2 tbsp milk
50g icing sugar, sifted
2 red birds-eye chilies, thinly sliced
80g chopped dark chocolate, 70% cocoa solids, extra
2 tsp single cream, extra

In a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, melt the chopped chocolate and single cream until mixture is smooth and incorporated. Allow to cool.
In a mixing bowl, beat together the double cream and the milk until soft peaks form. Stir in the icing sugar and chilies.
Add the first batch of melted chocolate and beat until combined. Place the mixture in an ice-cream maker and churn for around 20-25 minutes.
While ice cream is churning, melt the extra dark chocolate and single cream in a bowl over simmering water.
Spoon the ice-cream in a small airtight container.
With a teaspoon, drizzle the extra melted chocolate over the ice cream.

Place the lid on the container and refrigerate it to firm up for at least 90 minutes before serving.

Blueberry and Mascarpone Biscuit Bites

Lemon and blueberry... one of those classic combinations where you can't go wrong, just like raspberry and white chocolate.

I found a recipe in a book called "Lemon and Blueberry Cakes with a Cheesecake Topping"... the picture was adorable, there were these mini cakes topped with a second, equally thick and really white layer of cheesecake  topping. The whole thing was topped with some tiny blueberries. The picture did not correspond to the recipe... in the sense that the procedure in no way would end up making cakes that looked like that!


Anyhow, I tried it. And my suspicions were correct. I ended up with very moist muffins. Disheartened with this result, I decided to play around the concept and come up with something quite similar but not exactly.

 

So I made these blueberry and mascarpone biscuit bites. The base is a biscuit layer (cooked in a mini cupcake tray). The topping is simply some piped mascarpone cheese and blueberries.

I took these to Devina's potluck this Friday and they were a big success. And they're very, very simple to make!

Ingredients, 
oil or butter for greasing
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup caster sugar
1 egg
1 cup self raising flour
1 cup plain flour
1 tsp vanilla extract
250g mascarpone cheese
1/2 cup fresh blueberries

Procedure
Generously grease the cupcake tray.
Beat the butter and sugar until fluffy. Add the egg and beat until combined.
Add the sifted flours and fold in.
Mix in the vanilla extract and make sure everything is well combined.
Take teaspoons of the dough and press into each hole in the tin. Make sure they're 3/4 full.
Bake at 180C in a preheated oven for around 20 minutes until relatively cooked but soft.
Remove from oven and allow to cool completely in tin, around one hour.
Once cooled, spoon the mascarpone cheese into a piping bag with a small star tip.
Pipe from the center out and place two to three blueberries on top.