Sushi

sushi with tuna mayonnaise

I learnt how to do sushi because in my kampung town in France cannot find any sushi restaurant.  I made the easy one. In the supermarket they sell the sushi kit, I did not buy them cos this is for rolling the sushi and too much work for a lazy cook!  Firstly, have to cook the sushi rice and I follow the instructions on the packet, make sure it is rice for sushi.

Ingredients :
300 gm sushi rice
40 cl water
4 tbsp rice vinegar
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt

Rince the rice and put them in the rice cooker with 40 cl water.  Cook the rice. While the rice is cooking, in a casserole, dilute the sugar and salt in the vinegar and set aside to cool.  Once the rice is cooked, remove from the rice cooker and add the vinegar solution.

Sushi Rice

 Cut the seaweed sheets along the line. Dispose the two small ends into the mouth!

Seaweed sheets

Cut seaweed sheets

Wet the palm of the hand and squeeze the rice into rectangular balls.

Rectangular rice balls

Roll the seaweed sheets around the rice balls.  Stick the end of the seaweed with water.

ready to roll

seaweed around the sushi ball

Top the sushi with whatever toppings you may like.  I top mine with tuna mayonnaise. For a can of 160 gm tuna, drain the oil and add about 2 tbsp mayonnaise. 

Err... only 4 left, hubby passed by and one was gone before I could finish taking a photo!  He too whack the tuna mayonnaise so I only manage to make 10 nos. The balance of the sushi rice was rolled into California Roll/ California Temaki.
Sometimes I top with Egg mayonnaise, crabstick, shrimps mayonnaise or smoke salmon!

Galette (Buckwheat crepe)

Galette Complete

Now that I have learnt to make Crepes, it has to be Galette next.  Galette is a savoury buckwheat crepes, popular in Britanny.

Ingredients :
90 gm buckwheat flour, sifted
30 gm all purpose flour, sifted
1/2 tsp salt
200 ml milk
3 eggs
30 gm butter, melted

Mix together the flour and salt, then with a whisk add the milk till smooth. Add the eggs and then the melted butter.  Let it stand for 2 hours, to let the flour absorb the moisture.

Galette batter

Butter the crepe pan, then cook the batter in the pan, with the help of a special wooden spatula for galette spread the batter evenly around. Cook on both sides. Makes about 4 galettes with 26 cms (11 inches) crepe pan.

Galette with the special wooden spatula

I am doing Galette Complete which is ham, egg and grated emmental cheese.  Add a slice of ham on the galette, then add an egg (hubby likes his egg yolk broken and spread around, some people like the egg yolk intact), top with about a tablespoon of grated emmental cheese.

Galette with topping cooking away

You can add whatever topping you like, sliced tomatoes, sliced mushrooms, sausages......

Eee Kueh

Eee Kueh

Every year on my birthday, my mom would make Eee Kueh for the family.  She has stopped making them for a while, so every year my brother's mother in law would make them and he would bring them for me for my birthday! This year I'm spending my birthday at home in France so I did not want to miss this Eee Kueh, so I have decided to make them....

Place the glutinous rice flour in a mixing bowl. Make a well in the centre and gradually add water, mixing with your hand until it forms a soft dough that does not stick on the hand. For every 100 gms of dough you need to add about 100 ml of water. I make about 250 gms.

Divide the dough, the biggest portion of the dough is the white colour, my mom use to make red, yellow and green! Since I have only red colouring I settle for only red colour.  The coloured balls have to be smaller than the white balls.

White dough ready to form balls

Divide the dough into small portion and roll in between your two palms.

White Balls

Red dough

Red balls

My mom used to make the balls at night and let it sit for a night.  I made mine in the morning and let it sit till the evening.  Cook the syrup about 1 tablespoon of sugar for every 100 ml, if you like it sweeter add more sugar.  If you have ginger just add a small piece of ginger about thumb size.  I don't have any ginger so I just add a dash of ginger powder. Set aside.  I do not like a lot of syrup so I just made about 500 ml.

Boil a pot of water, add the white balls and when it floats up, remove and place them in the sugar syrup. Then do the same for the coloured balls.  Do not re-heat the sugar syrup once you have place the Eee Kueh into the syrup cos it would taste horrible after that.

Sago Gula Karamel

Living in a tiny village in France, it is very difficult to find Asian Products in the Supermarket! I was so happy to find Sago in the Supermarket! Over here it is called either Perles d'Orient or Perles Japon, this is one of our family favourites when we were in Malaysia. Well, you guessed it, cannot find Gula Melaka, so we settled for Caramel and top it with Creme Anglaise!

Here is a simple and lazy but GOOD Sago recipe, use 20 gm per person or 2 tbsp per person. Place the sago in a pot and  top up with a lot of water, between 3 - 4 times the quantity of the sago. Let it boil about 20 minutes, stir constantly. When the sago is transparent, it is ready, remove the pot and pour the sago over a sieve, to seperate the water.  Place the sago in individual serving dish and chill for at least 4 hours.

I top mine with Caramel that I bought in the supermarket and a little Creme Anglaise that I bought it in the supermarket too, real lazy!

Sago Gula Karamel dan Krim Orang Puteh

Crepes

Crepes with Fig Jam

Crepes

I still remembered the first time I made crepes, I got the recipe from a blog and it did not turn out the way my Breton hubby likes it! 'This is not crepes, I am Breton and I should know better!' he exclaimed! Then he took out his recipe book from the hotel school he attended and whar lar! Here is the recipe:
Crepes au Sucre
Ingredients :
250 gm all purpose flour (sifted)
500 ml milk
50 gm unsalted butter, melted
2 eggs
50 gm sugar
2 gm salt (or a pinch)
1 tsp crepe essence (optional)

Method:
1.  Mix the flour, sugar and salt. With a whisk, add the milk and beat till smooth, then add the eggs.  The recipes says add the eggs first then the milk but I find that adding the egg then the milk, the batter comes out lumpy, so I normally add the milk first.

2.  Add the melted butter, then if you have add the crepe essence, sometimes I forget and there is not much difference.  Let the batter stand for 2 hours to let the flour absorbs the moisture. The time for the batter to stand is up to you sometimes I let them stand longer and sometimes shorter.

3.  Butter the crepe pan or a normal frying pan and cook a thin layer of batter, cook on both sides. It depends on the size of your pan, but mine about 9 inch (23cm) pan, makes about 12 nos.

4.  This time I fill my crepes with Fig Jam which my neighbour made, my all time favourite is with nutella.

In France, crepes can be found in almost all supermarkets and I never liked crepes till I learnt to make my own.  Fresh from the pan, it is very addictive!