KookyCulinary

Taking a break from bentos, this is an easy dish that I make often

Spaghetti with Crunchy Onion Chicken.

I don’t have the exact measurement but roughly all you need to make Crunchy Onion Chicken are:

• French’s French Fried Onion. (Substitute with Panko or Cornflakes if not available) - finely crushed
• Eggs
• Chicken Breast
• Flour

Method:

1. Coat the chicken breast with flour, then dip it in the eggs and finally coat it with French Fried Onion
2. Bake in the oven at 400 for about 20 minutes.  

Today’s bento: Croissant, turkey, baked chips and apple sauce.

When my little girl brought back her bento from school today, I noticed that she only ate the croissant. When I asked her why she didn’t finish her lunch, she said that her teacher told her it’s time to pack up. It turned out that she was so busy talking while eating her croissant that lunchtime was up by the time she finished her croissant!! Sigh……

Today’s Bento: Fried BeeHoon (rice vermicelli), chicken nuggets, grapes and cheese. I wanted to make a smiling face but somehow it ended up looking like a monster face, at least that’s what my little girl called it. Oh well, as long as she was happy with it!

I will be away from my kitchen for the rest of the month. Yep, I am off on a trip to visit family. So in the meantime, I will be posting some Bentos that I made for my little girl earlier. Hopefully, I will have more yummy photos to share when I get back.

Today’s bento: Spaghetti with carrots & sausage, mandarin orange and rice krispies.

P/S: I currently have very limited internet access, so I am sorry I am not able to reply to comments now.  I will answer all your previous requests & questions once I am back home in a couple of weeks. Sorry!!!  

Ok, I promise this is the last of my Chinese New Year bakes. How can it be Chinese New Year without pineapple tarts, right?

I actually made the fillings a week ago but have never gotten around the make the tarts. Actually I also could not decide which recipe to try since there are so many different recipes out on the internet! Then on Saturday, I went to a Chinese New Year potluck with my bible study group. There I met a new friend A who generously shared her easy recipe for the pineapple tart. A, thanks for a great and easy recipe. It’s delicious!! Hope you’ll be coming back here for vacation again soon.

** Updated as of 2/8/09

To those who have requested for this recipe, I am sorry but I seem to have misplaced my recipe. I know it’s somewhere in my house but I just can’t find it now. I will update it once I find it. In the meantime, click HERE to check out the recipe from one of my favorite blogs for a similar pineapple tart.

I gave some of my Chinese New Year goodies to Lil’ C’s chinese school teachers. I thought it would be nice to include some cupcakes for them too, just for fun

So I made these vanilla cupcakes and decorated them with some marshmallow fondant. It was harder than I thought because the decos have to be very small & I have fat fingers!!! It was hard trying to make everything delicate. I think the princess doll cake was easier because it was bigger.

Another one of my Chinese New Year snacks. I am not sure what is the exact name for this snack but it is really good. To make this snack, just roll the spring roll skin into tiny rolls, seal with eggwash and deep fry till golden brown. Remove from oil, drain and roll it in sugar and sesame seed.

The little helper and mommy would like to wish all our Chinese readers a very Happy New Year!! Wishing everyone “XIN NIAN KUAI LE” (HAPPY NEW YEAR) and “XIAO KOU CHANG KAI” (SMILE ALWAYS). GONG XI FA CHAI!! 

I wasn’t planning to bake any Chinese New Year cookies this year but after drooling at this talented mommy’s yummy Chinese New Year bakes, I couldn’t resist the temptation anymore. So I ended up baking this super easy and one of my favorite cookie, the Chinese Peanut Cookie.

Recipe:
500 gm roasted peanuts - finely ground
500 gm flour
250 gm icing sugar
3 cups oil (approximately)

Method:
1. Mix peanuts, flour and sugar together till well-mixed.
2. Drizzle in oil and mix till you can form a ball with the dough. Do not add in all the oil at one time. Just add enough for the dough to be formed.
3. Either use a mini cookie scoop or shape by hand into little balls.
4. Apply eggwash before baking at 325 for 20 minutes or till golden brown.

Chinese New Year is approaching next week. Majority of the Chinese in the world will have a big celebration. I always feel that I am one of those rare minority who don’t really celebrate New Year. I left home at the age of 13 for further education and since then, I rarely go home for New Year. One of the reason was because the New Year season was always the busiest for my family since we were in the tourism business. So we never had the time to celebrate CNY. However even though we don’t really celebrate as a family, we would always receive lots of yummy goodies from relatives and friends. That is probably the only “New Year tradition” that I know - the food.

For this New Year, I haven’t made any cookies yet but I did make this sticky cake. It’s one of my favorite New Year food. I love to pan fry this with either egg or sandwich between 2 slices of yam (taro) or sweet potato. I know some people like it soft and coated with shredded coconut. How do you like to eat your sticky cake?