the 100 day challenge: half way point...

Just over half way actually...53 days to be exact. So what's it all about? You can read the original post here but essentially I challenged myself to go 100 days without buying anything I didn't really need, in order to think a bit more deeply about what I needed as opposed to what I just wanted.
I had a long list...here's how I'm travelling.

• Magazines: Remember that I am a self confessed magazine tragic. I have bought one magazine. One. This month's Country Style at the airport  last week.

• Appliances: the kettle gave up the ghost about two days after I started the challenge (of course!) and it was dangerous to continue using it, so I had to buy a new one. I suppose I could have boiled water on the stove, but nah, that wasn't going to happen.
• Clothing, shoes and accessories: Clothes ~ nil. Shoes ~ one pair of beaded thongs when I was in Bali for the princely sum of $8.33. Accessories ~ two beaded rings in Bali at about $2.50 each. I didn't buy a beautiful necklace there that cost $300. It was a close call!
• Craft materials: some fabric to finish Ruby's quilt and some wool for the first born's crochet blanket. Alas neither of them are quite finished yet!
• Anything decorative for my house: nope, not even a Buddha in Bali!
• Linen and towels: that's another no. But I did buy a new ironing board cover the other day. Does that count?
• Cosmetics: a bottle of duty free perfume on the way to Bali. Femme by Boss - 'tis very nice and one of my perfumes had run out so it was a replacement, sort of. Don't you think?

• iPad applications: Blogpress. Well that's an essential for a blogging girl on the go isn't it??
• Op shop purchases: haven't set foot in one for 53 days!

Pretty impressive don't you think?

What's that you say? What about books Kerry? Weren't they on your list too?

Ah, yes, well...I may have bought a few of those.

But I'm certainly not going to beat myself up about that. They are, and of course I knew this already, my one necessity. I have always answered "a book of course" whenever asked the question "what would you buy with your last $20?" 

Not that anyone's ever actually asked me that question, but that's hardly the point :) And I have been doing an awful lot of reading lately.

I feel really good about this challenge. I am most surprised by the fact that I'm not missing the magazines very much at all. I still have a subscription to Real Living and that's doing me nicely, and I'm not all that interested in going shopping. It's a bit of a revelation actually.

So I will continue until September 18th when my hundred days are up and then I'll see how I feel. I'm not even all that inclined to reward myself at this point, but I probably shouldn't speak too soon!

Has anyone else been on this challenge with me? How are you going with it?

Homemade Biscuits

A wonderful lazy Sunday afternoon ... lovely weather... bored out of my wits ... hmmmm what can I do?  I was reading a book and suddenly I was inspired!  The woman baked breakfast biscuits and served it with gravy and sausages.

I googled for a simple recipe recipe and found one.  I went to the kitchen and checked if I have the ingredients to bake a batch of biscuits.  Oh, yes!

Biscuits



2 C. flour
2 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
4 T. butter, cut into small cubes
3/4 C. fresh milk

Combine the flour, baking powder and salt.  Add butter and cut in using 2 knives or pastry cutter.  When it resembles like corn meal, add the milk and stir with a fork until well blended.

Scoop the dough using a small scooper into the small ungreased muffin pan.  In the recipe, it says I have to flatten the dough into a disc and use a small dough cutter, too much hassle so I just opted to use the scooper.

Bake at 400F for 8-10 minutes.

Serve with butter, jam, honey or gravy.

I still have the left over gravy from yesterday



and 3 pieces of the sausage links I bought from S and R.



My merienda was sausage, biscuits and gravy with a cup of coffee.



Tita Portia and Wriggly liked my experiment.  Tita Portia said it reminded her of the biscuits she used to eat at the Officer's Club in Taiwan together with fried chicken, gravy, sweet potato pie and banana/apple fritters.

I love baking when the weather is perfectly cool.  A productive lazy afternoon indeed.  Hahaha ... what a contradiction.

BABY CORN METHI PULAO

Ingredients:

Baby corn..... 6 (cut into 1 inch pieces)

Basmati rice ... 1 cup

Tomato .... 1 medium sized (chopped)

Green chillies .... 2-3 (slit)

Methi leaves .... 2 tbsp

Mint leaves ...... 6-8

Coriander leaves .. 1 tbsp

Cardamoms ...... 2-3

Cloves ................ 2-3

Garlic paste ....... 1 tsp

Turmeric powder ... 1/8 tsp

Cumin powder ....... 1/4 tsp

Coriander powder ... 1/4 tsp

Salt ... to taste

Oil ...... 3-4 tbsp

Method:

1. Heat oil in a pan. Tip in the cloves and crushed cardamoms. Add the garlic paste and saute.

2. Next add the tomatoes, baby corn and the greens. stir fry for a minute.

3. Now add the spice powders and salt. Mix well.

4. Put the washed and soaked rice and saute. Add double quantity of water (2 cups).

5. Boil it and then reduce the heat and let it simmer until done.

Pulao can be served with raitas or any stir-fried subzi.

This goes to:

WWC - Corn for Dinner

Hosted by - Kaarasaaram & Lite Bite

Signature Recipes

@ Sara's Kitchen

Quick Easy Recipes

@ Food Blog News

Iftar Moments Hijri 1432

Any One Can Cook - series 28

@ Taste of Pearl City

BROWN ONION GRAVY

Ingredients:

Onions ........... 6-8 (sliced)

Tomatoes ...... 2 (chopped)

Green chillies ... 4-5 (chopped)

Ginger paste .... 1 tbsp

Garlic paste ...... 2 tbsp

Oil ...................... 6 -7 tbsp

Method:

1. Heat oil in a pan and pour oil. Add the sliced onions and saute them until brown.

2. Add the chopped tomatoes, chillies, ginger and garlic pastes.

3. Pour 1 cup water and simmer it till the onion is cooked.

4. Let it cool and grind it with a hand grinder or in a mixer.

5. This is a basic gravy used for most of the currys and non-vegetarian dishes.

This can be made and frozen before to be used as and when required.

It really helps when you have a party or guests coming. it saves a lot of time, chopping frying etc etc. when you have the base ready.

Cheesecake war

'

July 30

Davio’s, a northern Italian steakhouse in Philadelphia, wanted to prove to the world that the City of Brotherly Love had better cheesecake than New York City. 

So its owners threw down the gauntlet in front of ’Cesca, an Italian restaurant on New York’s Upper West Side. ’Cesca picked up that gauntlet, and a cheesecake war was declared.

It was a reasonably friendly war. Both restaurants exchanged recipes and worked with each other to replicate the desserts in each other’s restaurants, with the crew at ’Cesca learning to make Davio’s vanilla bean cheesecake with blueberry compote, and Davio’s staff whipping up ’Cesca’s mascarpone cheesecake with orange cream and orange brittle.

The two restaurants served half portions of both cheesecake’s side by side from Tuesday, July 26, through Thursday, July 28. The Cheesecake War Dessert special was offered at both restaurants for $10, and customers were asked to pick their favorite.

The loser of the war will have to post a photo of themselves eating the winner’s cheesecake in the the winning city's baseball jersey.

Above is a picture of the two desserts as they were plated at Davio’s.

I was asked as a neutral party to post the results today, which I'm told is National Cheesecake Day.

They are, well, actually they're mixed:

Votes from Davio’s customers

196- Davio's
42- Cesca

Votes from 'Cesca customers
65- ’Cesca
11- Davio's

Total:
Davios: 207
’Cesca: 107

That’s to say that customers in both cities preferred the hometown cheesecake by a wide margin. Although Davio’s sold more cheesecake overall and got more votes, a larger percentage of ’Cesca’s customers preferred that restaurant’s cheesecake, voting 6 to 1 in favor of the local dessert, compared to 4.7 to 1 from Davio’s customers.

Maybe Davio’s wait staff should be given an award for selling 238 orders of cheesecake in three days. 

Davio’s has about 150 seats in its dining room, ’Cesca seats around 125.

In any case, it seems like it was a pretty smart promotion, and a great way to sell more dessert in the middle of the week during a slow, hot summery month.

Busy Saturday

It was a busy weekend for me.  Even though I had a lot of things to cook and bake, I enjoyed every minute of  it.  I baked a batch of raisin scones for Tita Portia yesterday for her meeting.  She is coming up with a coffee table type of book on beading with almost 50 of her students participating in this endeavor.

The photographer for the book took some photos today and she asked me to prepare something for them.  I love making Chicken Galantina.



I deboned the chicken myself.  Sometimes you can ask the staff of the Magnolia chicken station to do it for you.

I always serve galantina with jellied cranberry sauce.



The salad I put together had blue cheese, black grapes, pears and walnuts.



I should have put the dressing on the side because the guests said it was too much.

Tita Portia asked me to make mashed potatoes.  The fluffy kind.



It was a busy Saturday because aside from preparing the food for Tita Portia's guests, I still had to prepare the lunch for Ate and her family.  It was just a simple affair of Roasted Chicken.



The chicken really tasted as juicy as the picture.  I love this recipe.

I made gravy from the drippings, Sophie's request.



Simple stir fried vegetables.



Hermie cut up the vegetables and mixed them in a bowl.  I told her next time to set aside the leaves so it will be crisp tender when I cook it.

I made molo soup.  I was looking up the recipe in my blog when I discovered I do not have one!!!  I had to look it up in my old hand written personal recipe book.

Molo Soup



1 k. Soup bones
1 whole onion
peppercorn
4 liters water
1 T. rock salt

Boil in water the soup bones, whole onion, peppercorn, and salt for an hour.  Flake the chicken and set aside.

Saute garlic and onion in cooking oil.  Add the flaked chicken, continue cooking for a few minutes then pour in the broth.  Season with pepper and patis.

Molo dumpling

1/4 K. ground pork
150 g. singkamas, chopped finely
2 slices Purefoods Sweet Ham, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 white onion, chopped
1 egg
1 T. flour
salt and pepper
25 pcs. Ling Nam Molo wrapper

Mix all the ingredients.  Put one tablespoon of filling in the center of the molo wrapper.  You can freeze the dumplings up to this point  or drop into the boiling soup.

Garnish with chopped spring onions and toasted garlic.

GREEN MASALA

Coriander Leaves.....1 cup

Mint leaves ........... 1/2 cup

Green Chillies........2-3

Onions................1 chopped

Tomatoes...........1 chopped

Garlic.................7 to 8 cloves

Ginger ...............1 inch piece

Grind the above ingredients to make the green masala.

You can even store it in the freezer for later use especially when you are expecting guests. You can use it in many curries. Some of them are here. Click on them to see the recipe.

HARE BHARE BAIGAN

LADY'S FINGERS IN SAO MASALO

GREEN MASALA CHICKEN

SEYALA MAANI

BESANI SHIMLA MIRCH

Ingredients:

Shimla Mirch/Capsicums/Bell peppers ... 2 (cut into small pieces)

Besan /gram flour ..................... 2 tbsp (roasted without oil)

Onion ................. 1 (chopped)

Saunf/aniseeds ..... 1/2 tsp (crushed)

Turmeric powder .... 1/4 tsp

Coriander powder .... 1/2 tsp

Cumin powder ......... 1/2 tsp

Red chilli powder .... 1/4 tsp

Mango powder ........ 1/4 tsp

Salt .... to taste

Mustard oil ....... 2 tbsp

Method:

1. Heat mustard oil and add the crushed aniseeds/saunf.

2. Add the onions and saute for 2 minutes.

3. Now put the chopped capsicums, salt and all the spice powders.

4. Stir well and simmer on low flame until the capsicum is cooked. Sprinkle a little water if needed.

5. Mix the roasted gram flour/besan. Stir well and saute for half a minute.

Linking this to:

Signature Recipes

@ Sara's Kitchen

Quick Easy Recipes

@ Food Blog News

Iftar Moments Hijri 1432

Any One Can Cook - series 27

@ Taste of Pearl City

Let's Cook series 6 - subzis for Rotis

@ Tickling Palates

STIR-FRIED CABBAGE & GREEN PEAS

Ingredients:

Cabbage ............ 2 cups (chopped)

Green peas ...... 1/2 cup (boiled)

Onions .............. 1/2 cup (sliced)

Tomatoes ......... 1

Green chillies... 1-2

Ginger paste .... 1 tsp.

Garlic paste ..... 1 tsp

Turmeric powder ... 1/4 tsp

Cumin powder ....... 1/2 tsp

Coriander powder ... 1/2 tsp

Red chilli powder ... 1/4 tsp

Salt ........... to taste

Oil

Coriander leaves ... to garnish

Method:

1. Heat a little oil and saute the onions till golden brown.

2. Add ginger, garlic, green chillies and tomato. Add 1/4 cup water and simmer to cook.

3. Now put the chopped cabbage, salt and the spice powders and simmer.

4. Keep mixing at regular intervels, taking care not to burn until it is cooked. Sprinkle water if needed.

5. Finish it by adding the boiled green peas.

Garnish with coriander leaves.

Linking this to:

Let's Cook series 6 - subzis for Rotis

@ Tickling Palates

Quick Easy Recipes

@ Food Blog News

Iftar Moments Hijri 1432

Any One Can Cook - series 27

@ Taste of Pearl City

Signature Recipes

@ Sara's Kitchen

BATTER FRIED SAUSAGES

I had eaten this snack at the Farmers Market in US. Here I have made some changes to make the snack a bit spicy and given it an Indian touch by sprinkling garam masala and red chilli powder.. Instead of using the normal big sausages that they used, I tried out with the mini chicken sausages. It turned out quite good. vegetarians can try this with paneer fingers.

Ingredients:

Cocktail Chicken Sausages ... 10-12

Corn / makki ka ata ... 4-5 tbsp

Maida/white flour ...... 2 tbsp

Salt ............... to taste

Baking powder ..... 1/4 tsp

Red chilli powder ..... 1/8 tsp

Garam masala .......... 1/4 tsp

Oil

Method:

1. In a frying pan pour 1 tsp oil and saute the chicken sausages lightly for half a minute. Sprinkle garam masala and red chilli powder.

2. Mix the two flours adding a little salt and baking powder. Mix with water to make a thick batter.

3. Heat oil in a deep pan. Using a tooth pick, dip each sausage in the batter and deep fry them to golden colour.

4. Serve hot with any sauce of your choice.

This goes to:

Signature Recipes

@ -Sara's Kitchen

Quick Easy Recipes

@ Food Blog News

"The Audition" Premiers Sept. 18

The Canadian Pacific Ballet and Jake West present to you their newest collaboration -
“The Audition”.  Weaving together graceful, romantic ballet with circus arts, The Audition is a hilarious show where we cast a new member in an upcoming role.  Melded to the story are gorgeous dance pieces, new school juggling and tons of physical comedy from a diverse array of talented artists.  Join us to laugh and be mezmerised  as we spin and twirl into your lives.