My 2013 Review

My 2013
End of the year! It's time to contemplate of what I have achieved this year and also time to make a list of resolutions for the upcoming new year 2014!

As far as I can remember, I don't think I actually made a list of resolution for 2013 *oh how I wish I had*. So, I will just share on what I have achieved this year - with no planning:

GOT MY AUSYTRALIAN PARTNER PROVISIONAL VISA (TR)
Finally I'm eligible to stay indefinitely in the land of kangaroos and koalas! This means I'm allowed to find a full time job too, alhamdulillah!

APPOINTED AS MENTOR FOR TEENS HALAQAH
I never thought I'd ever receive an offer to be a mentor. This is absolutely a huge responsibility! But with the help of my mentor and support from my husband, this has become a learning opportunity for me too in becoming a better servant to Allah.

GOT MY FIRST AUSTRALIAN JOB
I was offered a role in the same company and department that I have worked for in the past (for their Sydney office) after 3 months of intense job seeking and after 4 unsuccessful interviews. In this event, God's hand played a huge role. Because looking at my experience and current state, there is no way I would have landed a job without His miracle and also the du'a of my closest people. So, this is my greatest miracle, story, and achievement this year.

EARNED MY FIRST AUD!
Alhamdulillah my first official job pays well. The first time I got my salary transferred to my account, I was in shock. I've never earned that much money in a month! Let alone working in only four days a week. Even saving up my allowance money and seeing it reach $1000, seems like already a lot for me *terharu*.

FLYING SOLO
This doesn't mean that I went on a solo flight or a solo adventure :P. Flying solo here means that I'm trying to be independent financially by having my own little business. I opened a small shop at Etsy, selling my calligraphy artworks. Alhamdulillah I've sold two of my works so far. Unfortunately, due to the increasing busy-ness, I haven't had time to update the shop (I turned off the ad campaigns) and has been progressing very slowly in coming up with new designs. For 2014, I have to be more productive in making artworks so I can really keep my business going.

LEARNED NEW COMPUTER PROGRAMS

• Adobe Illustrator - Essential for my calligraphy business :)
• R (statistics software) - Learnt this while I was still looking for a job. I tried to enhance my skills in my area of expertise, which is market research and data acquisition, so I took classes related to statistical methodology, computation, data analysis, and marketing.
• Easiquest (questionnaire design software) - Learnt this in office as a part of my role.
• Unix (systems) - Learnt this in office as a part of my role.

I CAN FINALLY SEW! 
Finally, after abandoning my sewing machine for some time due to my fear of failing in sewing, I gathered the courage to actually start! I tried to make a skirt, but foolishly cut short the front side of it after realising that the front part and the back part of the skirt don't actually align. But I succeeded in making curtain covers for my shelves :D.

I have prepared a new list for 2014. It is quite ambitious. I'm not even sure if I can tick all of them by the end of next year, but at least I know what I want to achieve :).

InshaaAllah me and hubby will be spending our New Year's Eve at Bradfield Park, Milson's Point to see one of the best fireworks in the world. So excited!

*reposted from my old blog

Don't Let Your Dreams be Dreams

Source: http://bazzerio.tumblr.com/

The sentence in the above picture is one of the powerful sentence for me, I have it up on my Twitter page. It gives the sense of refusal to give up and strong will.

Sometimes I see people with goals and dreams, but seems like they didn't prepare or actually did something to achieve it. For me, every second counts. Once you fail to make a good use of your time, no one knows how much you will regret it in the future. Time keeps running, yet sometimes we don't act fast enough to keep up with the pace.

Don't let your dreams be dreams. Act to achieve and realise it. It's a reason you're living your life day by day. To be able to go through each and every day. Sometimes the end result just doesn't matter. The path towards it, the ups and downs you went through, is nothing but to make you a better person.

Don't let your dreams be dreams. How do I do it?

1. Make a list of what I want to achieve. No boundaries, just write anything that you want to achieve, even the most ridiculous ones. Because I believe, by writing it, it will remind us of our target so we can focus on it and unexplainably miraculously will help us achieve it. I have a couple of personal experience where my dreams that I wrote in a piece of paper came true one by one, and I never ever expect it to actually happen (sometimes I even forgot).
2. Make bullet points of the things you need to do to be able to achieve it. Sometimes I do this, sometimes not. But if is a big goal that I need to structurally plan the small actions, I will definitely make bullet points.
3. Don't just work hard, pray hard as well. I personally believe that what I had achieve is not merely because of my skills, but God's hand plays a big role in my life, my plans, my goals, my dreams, and my achievements. So, if someone says I'm lucky this-and-that, I'd say alhamdulillah, this isn't luck, I prayed hard for it.

So, what are you waiting for? Have a dream,write it down, and live your life realising it :).

Keep Calm and Stay Positive

Uncertainty after uncertainty, that's what I've been going through in my journey in job seeking. At one point I was on fire and another point I was desperately pessimistic. Every time I was feeling down after I heard no news after an interview, I would lose the will to look for more opportunities. But I keep feeding my positive dog with positive thoughts. It's hard, I know, but I know I've got to do it. I keep telling myself not to stop looking, not to give up trying, it's just a matter of time inshaa Allah. If I stop looking, I might miss out on a really good opportunity. If I give up trying, it means I'm delaying my success. With all energy that I have left, I'm still pushing myself. I refuse to give up. 

Last week I gathered up the courage to start applying again. It was on Saturday. I was quite bored and I thought that I didn't want to miss any opportunity that came up during that week, so I applied to some vacancies. I counted the number of applications that I sent. It was seven; seven applications. On Monday, I got a call. Surprise, surprise, it was from my past employer (I sent application on that Saturday). I was very happy. That was the phone call I've been waiting all my life here in Australia. I got an invitation for an interview the next day. I prepared beforehand and made sure I wasn't going to be late like my last interview (which was embarrassing). I made sure everything was perfect. I did my best, and will let Allah do the rest. I still haven't got a call back though, but I'm hoping it will come in soon. But if I didn't get the job, I will go back feeding my positive dog again and reminding myself again "just a little bit more...". 

Halal Spot: Billu's Indian Eatery

Sorry for having delayed this post for sometime! A couple of weeks ago when we were moving out, me and husband went to eat out at Billu's Indian Restaurant. It's my second visit there (the first was in January). As the name says, Billu's is an restaurant located in Harris Park which specialises in Indian cuisine. Billu's has been around for 23 years. The restaurant is quite fancy, but you don't need to dress properly tho. I realised that on my trip this time, they have this exclusive menu book and the waiter/waitresses looks very preppy as well! It's as if you're being treated in an exclusive dining. Love it!

This time I ordered butter chicken and basmatti rice, while Honey opted for biryani as usual. On our first trip in January, I ordered chicken tikamasala and cheese naan. The butter chicken was really nice and tasty! And it goes really well with basmatti rice (or naan). The biryani is very flavourful. You can really taste the mix of the spices. Oh, and it tastes really spicy (for my tongue). If you love strongly-spiced flavoured food, then this is it. Their naan bread is really wonderful! And, oh, you should try their cheese naan (eat while it's hot). It's the best! Can't go wrong with that.

Aside their Indian main course, they also have glass display full of sweets that you can buy in bulk (in kilograms). We tried one of it, gosh I forgot the name, but the shape is like a big chocolate ball. It tastes awesome! The inside is solid, it's not like a sponge cake. It's sweet and you can taste a hint of lemon in it. I would definitely buy more to stock up at home! But unfortunately we still have some cookies left, so we would like to finish it first. I can't wait to go there again, as I would really love to try other sweets!

I really recommend this place for dining out (dinner) or just hang out with your friends at daytime to enjoy the sweets. I would definitely go back to try other menu!

Billu's Indian Eatery

62 Wigram Street

Harris Park NSW 2150

www.billu.com.au

(photo will be posted when I have transferred the pictures from husband's iPhone :P)

Black Forest Cake

On Eid Adha, my husband's pengajian held a family gathering. I was assigned to bring cake (as usual; I got a nickname "bakery" from my pengajian). And some of the wives requested something chocolatey like a blackforest cake or a mud cake. There's actually a mud cake that I've been really wanting to try from The Great Australian Bake-off book, but since a mud cake look too plain, I went for a blackforest cake instead (even tho I'm not that fond of blackforest). 

I used a recipe from Allrecipes.com. I got soooo many compliments with the cake. My friends said the cake is not too sweet or too milky-tasting. And when I shared the recipe, another friend of mine said, "it looks really easy to make". Indeed! You don't need to cream butter and sugar, which is a lot of time saving.

INGREDIENTS:

Cake:

• 2 1/8 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 cups white sugar
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 3/4 baking soda
• 3/4 tsp salt
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1 tbsp vanilla essence/extract

Cherry filling:

• 2 (450 gr) cans pitted cherries
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 1 tsp vanilla essence/extract

Frosting:

• 3 cups whipping cream
• 1/3 cup confectioner's sugar

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C. Grease and flour two 9 inch round cake pans (I used square pans).
2. Combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla essence/extract and beat until well blended. Pour the batter into prepared pans.
3. Bake for 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean. Cool cake in pans on wire racks for 10 minutes.
4. Drain cherries, reserve 3/4 cup juice. Combine 1/4 cup of the reserve juice, cherries, and sugar in a saucepan. Combine the other 1/4 cup of reserved juice and mix with cornstarch. Heat the saucepan and stir just until the sugar dissolves. Then add the cornstarch mix and cook until it thickens (use high heat if you don't want most of your cherries to break apart). Turn off the heat, then add vanilla essence/extract.
5. Combine whipping cream and confectioner's sugar in a chilled bowl. Beat with mixer at high speed until stiff peaks form.
6. Assembling: Split the cakes into halves. Crumb one of the halved layer for decorating the sides (I didn't do this, I just saved the layer to make a mini blackforest, as pictured in this post). Brush the layers with the last 1/4 cup of reserved cherries juice to moisten the cake. Spread 1 cup frosting on a layer and top with cherry topping. Repeat process for the second layer. Top with third cake layer and frost sides and top of the cake. Shave some dark cooking chocolate, sprinkle it around and on top of the cake and decorate the cake with the remaining frosting.

Source (with small changes in directions).

Bubur Ayam (Chicken Porridge)

The bubur ayam (chicken porridge) idea came when I had leftover cakwe that I had bought from an Asian grocery. Turned out that cakwe from Asian grocery is not like what I had expected. The appearance is the same with cakwe Medan, but the taste is totally different, meh. 

The bubur ayam recipe does look like a long list, but it's worth the work. Especially if you're badly craving for it, hehehe.

INGREDIENTS:

Porridge:

• 300 gr of jasmine rice
• 2 litres of water
• 3 cm ginger (or about 2 tsp crushed ginger)
• 2 sticks of lemongrass

Chicken:

• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 5 garlic cloves
• 3 cm ginger
• 1 whole chicken
• 1 1/2 litres water
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 tsp white  pepper
• 3 garlic cloves, for frying the chicken

Soy sauce:

• 1 1/2 tbsp kikkoman sauce
• 1 tsp fish sauce
• 1/2 tsp anchovy sauce
• 1/2 tsp sesame oil

Serving:

• Finely chopped celery
• Fried red onion
• Pickled radish
• Sliced cakwe

DIRECTIONS:

1. Porridge: Mix all the ingredients together and cook it in your multi cooker / rice cooker according to the direction. If the porridge came out too dry, you can dilute hot water and stir until you get the porridge consistency that you want.
2. Heat vegetable oil and sesame oil in a pan. Saute 5 sliced garlic cloves.
3. Boil water, add in chicken, ginger, and sautéed garlic. Cook until chicken becomes tender. Drain the chicken and cut into dice pieces. You can save the broth in the freezer for cooking later.
4. Saute 3 finely chopped garlic cloves, add the diced chikcen, add white pepper and salt.
5. Soy sauce: Stir well all of the ingredients together.
6. Serving: ladle the porridge into a bowl, sprinkle cakwe, chicken, and pickled radish on top. Garnish with finely chopped celery and fried onion. When you're about to eat, add 2-3 tsp of soy sauce and mix all the porridge. If you find it not salty enough, you can add more soy sauce.  

Crepes

Eating crepes always makes me happy. This recipe is often my go-to whenever I crave for some light snacks. It's very easy to make and so yummy as well! I found this recipe from Beth La Manach from "Entertaining with Beth" in Youtube. I definitely recommend you to try, as I have been making this over and over again.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 cup flour
• 2 tbsp sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 2 cups milk
• 4 tbsp melted butter

DIRECTIONS:

1. Whisk together flour, sugar, and salt.
2. Mix in the milk to the dry ingredients and whisk until the batter is smooth.
3. Add the well beaten eggs, mix to combine.
4. Sprinkle the melted butter. Mix well.
5. Heat non-stick pan and dab with bit of oil.
6. Pour the batter and quickly spread around the batter in the pan by rotating the pan.
7. When the sides begin to turn golden, scrape the sides. Then turn it over on top of cutting board and tap hard on it to get the crepes to come off of the pan. 
8. Spread your favourite filling onto the crepes and fold into quarter circle.
9. Dust some powdered sugar on top.

NOTES: I upgraded the sugar amount to 2tbsp for a tad sweeter crepes.

Source

Mexican Rice

OMG, I can't believe it has been more than two months since I last posted something here *shame on me*. When I was about to post this recipe, suddenly the card reader refused to read my SDHC *darn-all of the pretty pictures were in there*. It took me quite a while (too long) to get a new card reader. Also, I've been busy prepping for my store opening at Etsy, inshaaAllah, and taking some free online courses to refresh my brain. So, that pretty much sums up why I haven't been able to post anything here. But I did, though, tried some new recipes; but it wasn't worth the upload... so... meh.

Anyway, I will just post what I had already drafted last month before the card reader incident happened. So, here it is:

On the 29th night of Ramadhan I pushed myself to do the last i'tikaf while I was having a severe sore throat. And the next day, I succeeded in losing my voice. Since then my throat hasn't gotten better. I didn't prepare anything festive and special for Eid. I just went around from one open house to another, hehe. I did manage to make opor ayam (by hubby's request) on the 10th of August, tho, but I was still feeling unwell so I didn't have the chance to take serious pictures and blog it.

Oh ya, this Ramadhan I participated in Indonesian Foodblogger cooking challenge (view my entry here) with the theme "noodles". I submitted my mie Aceh recipe and alhamdulillah it made it to the top 10! I didn't win eventually, but at least getting a place in the top 10 in my first attempt (out of 30 participants) is pretty impressive :). I can't wait to try other people's noodle recipes because they all look so yummo!

Today I want to share a Mexican rice recipe. I was browsing the internet yesterday and came across the word "Mexican rice". Hmm... I got curious and searched for a recipe. After reading the ingredients, I said to myself, "This is easy! I can make use of my quite-old-but-never-used cast iron pan as well". I called my husband in the last minute to get me a bunch of coriander leaves (how I wish I have a herb garden!). I adjusted the recipe with what I had in the kitchen. If you want to check out the original recipe, scroll down until the end of this post!

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 can of crushed tomatoes
• 1 medium onion
• 3 green chillies
• 2 cups of jasmine rice
• 1/3 cup of olive oil
• 4 minced garlic cloves
• 2 cups of chicken broth
• Salt
• 1/2 cup of coriander leaves, minced
• Lime

DIRECTIONS:

1. Process tomato and onion in blender until smooth. Measure and reserve exactly 2 cups (I forgot to measure it and just dunked in the whole thing into the pan). Discard excess.
2. Remove seeds from 2 green chillies. Mince flesh and set aside. Mince the remaining green chillies for later.
3. Wash rice thoroughly with cold water and rinse. Do this around 2-3 times.
4. Heat oil in oven-safe pan with tight fitting lid (I used cast iron pan) over low-medium heat. Drop a few rice grains, if they sizzle then it's ready. Add rice and stir fry until rice is light golden and translucent, about 6-8 minutes.
5. Add garlic and 2 minced green chillies; stir constantly until fragrant.
6. Stir in broth, pureed mixture, and salt. Increase heat and bring to boil.
7. Cover pan and transfer pan to oven. Bake in 190 degrees Celsius for 30-35 minutes. Stir well after 5 minutes.
8. Stir in the minced coriander leaves and the remaining minced green chillies.

This Mexican rice taste very nice. It is like some sort of tomato rice and the coriander leaves gave it that extra fragrance and unique taste. Hubby liked it and gave a thumbs up! We ate it with accompanying fried egg.

NOTES:

• The green chillies flavour didn't really come out, to be honest, so it's a bit missing that "chilli" (not hot) taste. Maybe using real jalapenos is best or maybe adding green bell pepper can work too.
• I used 1 block of chicken bullion in 2 cups of water. Just use accordingly to your chicken bullion instruction and adjust it to the recipe's chicken stock measurement.
• Don't be afraid to mix in a lot of coriander leaves! Because it really makes this rice taste sooo good. I was a bit afraid of mixing in the whole 1/2 cups of minced coriander leaves, but regretted it at the end that I had not put more!
• I don't really know how to properly serve Mexican rice, but having it side-to-side with grilled chicken or fried egg would be really nice!

Source

A Good 5 Minute

The next morning after I was feeling really hopeless, desperate, you name it; hubby sent this to my Whatsapp:

BACA 5 MENIT SAJA, INSYAALLAH BERMANFAAT  

HUSNUDZON kepada ALLAH 

Nabi NUH belum tahu banjir akan datang ketika ia membuat kapal besar &i ditertawai kaumnya. 

Nabi IBRAHIM belum tahu akan tersedia domba ketika pisau nyaris memenggal buah hatinya. 

Nabi MUSA belum tahu laut akan terbelah saat dia diperintah memukulkan tongkatnya.

Nabi MUHAMMAD SAW pun belum tahu kalau Madinah adalah kota tersebarnya ajaran yang dibawanya saat beliau diperintahkan berhijrah. 

Yang mereka tahu adalah bahwa mereka harus PATUH pada perintah ALLAH dan tanpa berhenti BERHARAP yang terbaik. 

Ternyata dibalik keTIDAKTAHUan kita, ALLAH telah menyiapkan SURPRISE saat kita mematuhi dan menunaikan perintahNYA. 

Seringkali tangan-tangan ALLAH bekerja di detik detik terakhir dalam usaha hambaNya.
So, never give up !! Make better for the best :) 

Kalaupun hasil yang kita usahakan jauh dari harapan, bahkan menyakitkan, jngan kita berkecil hati. Karena sering ALLAH mencintai kita dengan cara-cara yang tidak kita sukai. Tetap HUSNUDZON kepada ALLAH apapun yang terjadi. 

ALLAH berfirman:
"Boleh jadi kamu membenci sesuatu, padahal ia amat baik bagimu, dan boleh jadi pula kamu menyukai sesuatu, padahal ia amat buruk bagimu. Allah mengetahui sedang kamu tidak mengetahui."
(QS. Al-Baqarah: 216). 

✔Ingatlah:
Tidak ada yang tidak mungkin bagi ALLAH SWT
Selamat pagi  :)

It totally made me tear.

Just A Little Bit More...

A couple months ago I was catching up a bit with an old friend who is also a "rantau". We were in the same boat when talking about how boring it was having to leave our jobs just to be with our husband and all we did at home was just housewife's jobs. I am at my most now. I am bored to death, despite that I know I can do other things (and have facilities to support). I needed something to distract me 5 days a week from 8 to 7. 

I started looking for a job about a month after I arrived here on my spouse visa. I thought I could change industry and looked for some supply chain or engineering job. Whenever I wrote my cover letter, I was never sure what to write because I barely had any experiences in that. Sometimes it got to the extent that making cover letters was really a pain for me. I don't know how many applications I've sent but I always end up with rejection emails, sometimes even within a day or just after a couple of hours after I clicked the "submit" button. I never got a call for an interview. Not a single one call back.

So, then when Ramadhan came, I focused myself in Ramadhan and committed not to do any jobseeking stuff. Afterwards, I changed my strategy completely. I tried seeking for jobs related to my previous experience in market research industry and also changed my cover letter and resume completely. Alhamdulillah, within a week or two, I was able to get a call for an interview with an agent and another one from a data collection services company.

I remember telling my "rantau" friend how stressful it was for me being jobless for quite a long time (I had to bear with no-work condition visa for 6 months until I was finally able to get that green light to start applying for a job). She was almost desperate as well. It was difficult for her just staying at home waiting for a miracle to come. Around 3-4 months after applying for a job, she finally got a call for an interview. And alhamdulillah, she got the job. One thing that I remember from her was her saying, "Hang on just a bit more...". And that sentence got stuck in my head ever since. Whenever I tried to be positive, I just remember that sentence... just a little bit more...

I'm still doing the sabar-ikhtiar-doa-tawakal routinity. Hopefully something will come up for me real soon. Aamiin. 

How to Plan Your Ramadan Meals

Hello readers! How is your fasting going up to now? Can't believe that 1/3 of the Ramadhan month has passed us. So sad, isn't it? Since we only get to encounter it once a year. Anyhow, due to the month of Ramadhan, I might not be posting up recipes because I'm doing less cooking, but I will share with you some tips that I got from my halaqah to make the most time for your ibadah in Ramadhan.

COOK LESS

Who loves to cook and spend hours in the kitchen? I'm one of them, hehe. Well, in the fasting month, every minute is so precious that it is even too precious to be wasted just for cooking. So, in the fasting month, try to spend less time in the kitchen. If you usually cook for almost 2 hours (or more) and even had the time to bake cakes or cookies, please hold the urge. Try to cook less than an hour and only bake cakes and cookies when you are on your period.

PLAN AHEAD

This is very important in order to achieve efficient cooking and effective grocery shopping. I know how painful it is if you have to think what to cook every other day. Save your time and pain by planning ahead your menu; what you would like to cook during Ramadhan. So you will have more time to concentrate on your ibadah and not flipping cooking books nor browsing for recipes. It helps you to spend less time for grocery shopping as well, and you know when to restock.

STOCK UP AND PREPARE YOUR SPICE MIX BEFOREHAND

If you can't cook from scratch in less than an hour, stock up some ready made pasta sauces or instant spices (such as soto, rawon, balado, etc). By stocking up, you're saving your time from grocery shopping! If you love your own recipe, you can whip up a big batch of blended spices and freeze them in one-time-cooking portions. When you need them, just take them out of the freezer.

SOUPY FOOD

A member of my halaqah said that in Ramadhan her husband likes to eat soup-y stuff. When I thought about it, I think that's a great idea because it helps your throat to swallow the food (especially for sahur). So, during this Ramadhan, the menu I have planned is all soup based.

ORDER YOUR LEBARAN COOKIES 

My friend say to just order Lebaran cookies from your favorite shop. But if no one makes the same good cookies as you, you can still make your own cookies but NOT in the last 10 days of Ramadhan. The last ten days is the time when we should make the best of our time, the best of our prayers. So, while there is still time left, hurry make the cookies now! :)

My First IDFB Challenge Entry!: Mie Aceh

I'm so excited to be writing my first IDFB Challenge entry! Setelah beberapa bulan jadi anggota pasif IDFB (Indonesian Foodblogger) yang hanya bisa mupeng lihat kreasi mbak-mbak yang super duper mouthwatering, akhirnya saya memberanikan diri ikutan IDFB Challenge #11 yang bertemakan Mie/Noodles.

Saya selalu suka makanan berbahan mie. Whether it's mie ayam gerobak, bakmi Gajah Mada, mie kocok, ifumie, mie Jawa, atau mie-mie-an yang lain. Tapi ada satu mie yang menurutku yang sangat menantang untuk lidahku. Rasanya pedas, dengan kuah kental, dan kaya akan rempah. Yah, kalau boleh dibilang sih setipe sama makanan India gitu, hehehe. Ayooo coba tebak!? Yep, it's mie Aceh!

Beberapa waktu lalu saya sedang pingiiinnn sekali makan mie Aceh. Tapi apa daya, di Australia ga ada yang jual. Yang bisa saya lakukan hanya ubek-ubek resep di internet. Pengalaman pertama kali membuat mie Aceh, saya menggunakan resep dari salah satu majalah memasak ternama di Jakarta dan saya kecewa berat dengan hasilnya. Rasanya jauh dari yang pernah dulu saya rasakan di rumah makan Aceh. Alhasil saya gunakan tips yang pernah diberikan oleh teman saya yang sesama orang rantau disini and came up with my own recipe. Oya, saking ga sabarnya bikin, sampai ga pakai kerupuk emping!

BAHAN:

• 6 bawang merah
• 4 bawang putih
• 150 gr udang kupas
• 150 gr daging sapi
• 1 sdt cuka
• 1 batang daun bawang
• 900 ml kaldu sapi
• 1-1/2 sdm kecap manis
• 300 gr hokkien noodles (atau mie kuning basah bulet)
• 2 sdm seledri, cincang halus
• 1 tomat
• Taoge
• Kol
• Garam sesuai selera

Haluskan bahan-bahan berikut:

• 8 bawang merah
• 4 bawang putih
• 4 cabai merah besar
• 1/2 sdm jinten
• 4 kapulaga
• 1 sdt kunyit bubuk
• 1 sdt lada
• 1 sdm bubuk kari (optional)

CARA MEMBUAT:

1. Haluskan semua bumbu halus dengan diuleg atau diblender.
2. Tumis bawang merah, bawang putih, dan bumbu halus.
3. Masukkan daging sapi dan udang. Masak hingga berubah warna.
4. Masukkan tomat, taoge, dan kol yang sudah dipotong tipis. Masak hingga sayuran layu.
5. Masukkan kaldu sapi, cuka, seledri cincang, dan kecap manis. Masak hingga air berkurang dan mengental. Tambahkan garam sesuai selera.
6. Masukkan mie dan daun bawang yang sudah dicincang, aduk rata. Masak 1-2 menit.
7. Hidangkan di piring dengan pelengkap kerupuk emping, timun, dan bawang goreng.

The Positive Dog

Last Sunday, hubby and I decided to have our own weekends. He went for rally for Syria around Hyde Park and I went to enjoy Hotaru sushi (my fave!). His rally went on for a couple of hours and I only spend 1 hour, at most, at Hotaru. So, while waiting for him to finish, I went to Kinokuniya, just on the upper floor of Hotaru.

Reading is not my thing, but that time I just had to read something to prepare for an interview, heheh. I basically like to read non-fictions or motivating books. So, I went to the motivation shelf and pick up a small book that I guess I can finish by proof reading in a short time. I came across this book titled "The Positive Dog" by Jon Gordon. The book is super good! I almost bought it, but the price stopped me. The book tells a story about two dogs living in animal shelters waiting to be adopted. Through their journey, they share a lot of things about being positive. Being positive makes you stress less, makes you happier, can lengthen your age, makes you healthier, etc. But staying positive is difficult. You have to feed the "positive dog" with various things like smile voluntarily, do the gratitude walk, etc.

This book is really good to keep you positive. It's small and easy to read. This book help me a bit to relieve the pain inside me, so I really recommend this book to anyone who is currently going through a stressful time and anyone who needs some motivation kicks. 

http://www.amazon.com/The-Positive-Dog-Story-Positivity/dp/0470888555

Happy Paper-versary!

As the title goes saying "Happy Paper-versary", indeed it is our first wedding anniversary.

We went out to watch a movie. Had to skip Monday (1-Jul) because it is cheaper on Tuesdays.

It didn't take long for us to realize that we're made for each other, inshaaAllah. And I am very much 100% sure that Allah put His magical hands into our matter. I never knew him, at all, yet after just a month of chatting on Facebook and around 5 times of face-to-face meeting I instantly said "yes" to his proposal. But I wasn't all that stupid just because he graduated from the same high school as me, he plays guitar, and he works in-a-country-that-I've-sweared-to-myself-that-I-will-never-ever-would-want-to-visit that I said "yes". I worked hard to get an answer from God. Alhamdulillah, there was one striking moment where I knew God was telling me, "Dita, this is the person, the answer to your prayers". I realised that finally all of my "hard pray" paid off. Some of my friends joked that that was the result of my i'tikaf, hahaha. But to be honest, I've seeked his help longer than that and put all of my heart out for it.

Some people say, you're a match if your face look-alike. Well, it doesn't happen to everyone, but in our case it does seem to apply. Once, my husband was accompanying me to Qantas office in Jakarta to make a delay to our flights. At the concierge desk, I must admit that both of us acted like siblings. The officer asked us whether we're brother & sister. I laughed at it, and said "No, he's my husband". "You both look-alike, you know," the officer replied. I guess we do :).

Rosewater Meringue Kisses

This cute meringue kisses is definitely a less guilt snack. The ingredients are very simple as well. Kids will definitely love this, because it looks really cute, the color is just oh-so pretty, and it taste yummy melt-in-your-mouth. I had kept one jar full of this kisses and when my husband was having his halaqah at our place, two kids ate almost all of the meringue kisses that I have!

In the real recipe, the kisses are supposed to be sandwiched with cream (or jam?) in the middle. But I didn't bother myself making the cream so I was just happy with the meringues itself :D. Hope you enjoy making this pretty-little-cute meringue kisses!

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 egg whites
• 1/2 cup caster sugar
• 1 tsp rosewater extract
• Few drops of pink food colouring

DIRECTIONS:

1. Beat all of the ingredients for about 15 minutes with electric mixer until sugar is dissolved.
2. Spoon mixture into piping bag. Using star tube, pipe about 4cm stars onto trays 2 cm apart.

NOTES:

• Bake all the meringues in one go, because if you leave the mixture too long in open air, it will lose  its fluffiness.

Salt & Chilli Prawns

This salt & chilli prawns recipe is very easy to prepare and make. Suitable for those busy working women or lazy housewife (like me, ahahaha). This dish is meant to be eaten with steamed rice, because  after all it's an Indo-kind-of-dish (even though it's heavily influenced by Chinese cooking as well).

Ingredients:

• 500 gr prawns
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp white pepper
• 3-4 tbsp corn starch
• 1 lime
• 2 red chillies, minced
• 1 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 tbsp spring onion
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper

How to make:

1. Mix prawns with juice from 1 lime, leave for 10 minutes. Add in 1/4 tsp of salt, white pepper, and corn starch; mix well.
2. Deep fry prawns in hot cooking oil until golden brown; then set aside.
3. Heat 1 tbsp of the remaining oil from frying the prawns. Saute minced garlic clove and red chillies until the oil almost dries up. Add in chopped spring onions, salt, fried prawns, and sprinkle with black pepper. Mix all together until prawns are evenly coated with the other ingredients.

Source: "Menu Sehari-hari & Akhir Pekan" Vol.1, Yasa Boga

Silk Tofu Soup

Another heart warming soup recipe for winter! Yeay! The soup is very Chinese-influenced. It is very very easy to make and the taste is savoury and light. Anyway, just trust me, it is great to warm up your body in winter or if you are having fever ;)

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 cylinders of silk tofu, diced
• 100 gr minced chicken
• 100 gr prawn
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• 3 garlic cloves
• 700 ml water
• Some chicken bones (optional)
• 1/2 tsp white pepper
• 1 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 tbsp tapioca flour (mix with a bit of water)
• 300 gr cai sim
• 2 tsp sesame oil
• Salt, if needed

DIRECTIONS:

1. Heat vegetable oil and saute the garlic. Add in minced chicken and prawn, and cook until the colour changes.
2. Add water, chicken bones, white pepper, and fish sauce. Then bring to boil.
3. Add in the tofu; lower the heat and simmer for about 10 minutes.
4. Add the tapioca mix to thicken the soup. Add cai sim and sesame oil. Cook until the cai sim wilted.

NOTES:

• You can substitue tapioca flour for corn starch. If you want a thicker soup, you can add more tapioca mix.
• If you don't have any leftover chicken bones, you can leave it out. But it always makes a yummy broth if you use chicken bones :D

Adapted from: "Menu Sehari-hari & Akhir Pekan" Vol.2, Yasa Boga

Tomato Soup

For you who needs some veggie intake boost, this heart warming soup is a good option. This soup is packed with rich-in-vitamins tomatoes and is perfect to warm up a cold winter night. The recipe is actually adapted from BBC Good Food (with a few changes) and I just had to put this on my blog because it's such a pain reading it on the actual website whenever I want to make this again.

Ingredients:

• 1 kg ripe tomatoes
• 1 onion
• 1 carrot
• 1 celery stick
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1-2 tbsp of ketchup
• 2 bay leaves
• 1.2 litres of beef stock
• Pinch of sugar
• Salt
• Black pepper

How to make:

1. Dice the tomatoes. Cut celery, carrot, and onion into small pieces. 
2. Heat olive oil and saute the onion. After it starts to wilt, add in celery and carrot. Cook the vegetables about 10 minutes. Stir a couple of times to prevent sticking to the bottom of the pan.
3. Squirt ketchup and stir. Add in the diced tomatoes, sprinkle a pinch of sugar, black pepper, and 2 bay leaves. Put the lid on and let the the tomatoes stew over low heat for 10 minutes.
4. Pour the hot stock and stir. Turn the heat high and when everything is bubbling, turn the heat to low and put the lid on. Simmer for another 25 minutes, stirring a couple of times.
5. Take out the bay leaves. Use a hand blender to puree the soup right in the soup pan, or you can ladle the soup into a blender and pureed it.
6. Lastly, improve the taste to your liking by adding more black pepper, sugar, or salt.

Notes:

• The actual recipe calls for vegetable stock, but I find it tastes better using beef stock
• Best served warm with accompanying puff pastry. Or you can make it into tomato zuppa soup.

Source

Red Velvet Mini Cupcakes

Am so very sorry that I haven't put up anything for a month (?). I was kinda busy here and there, got flu for a while, needed to catch up with house work, and when I was ready to blog the Mac needed a repair. But anyway, finally now I'm catching up on my blog posts!

A couple of weeks ago I was severely craving for a very moist red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting. I wanted to try another recipe and found an "ultra" moist red velvet cake recipe that turned into an ultra disaster. It was nowhere wear good and I had to throw away the whole batch. Afterwards, I quit looking for an ultra moist recipe and just searched for the best red velvet recipe. So then I came across this recipe.

Ingredients:

• 2 1/2 cups sifted all purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
• 20 ml (up to 50 ml) Queen's Pillar Box Red food colouring
• 1/2 cup butter (room temperature)
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 2 eggs (room temperature)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 cup buttermilk, room temperature
• 1 tsp white vinegar
• 1 tsp baking soda

Cream cheese frosting:

• 450 gr cream cheese, softened
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 1/2 cup confectioner sugar, sifted
• Pinch of salt

How to make:

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees Celsius. Prepare the mini cupcake pan and place the patty papers.
2. Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. In a small bowl, mix food colouring and cocoa powder evenly.
3. Beat butter and sugar together until light and fluffy (about 3 minutes). Beat in eggs, one at a time.  Then beat in vanilla and red cocoa paste. Add 1/3 of the flour mix to the butter mixture, beat well, then beat in half of the buttermilk. Repeat and end with the last third of the flour mix. Beat until well combined.
4. Mix vinegar and baking soda (it will fizz). Add it to the cake batter and stir well to combine. 
5. Working quickly, spoon the cake batter into the mini cupcake pans half way full. Bake for 10-15 minutes. Check early, cupcakes is done when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool the cupcakes to cool completely before frosting.
6. Cream cheese frosting: Beat butter and cream cheese until smooth. Add in the confectioner sugar, salt, and vanilla extract and beat with low speed to incorporate. Then turn the mixer on high and beat until light and fluffy. 

My cuppies have dome-shape top because I put it on fan-forced oven mode

The cream cheese frosting is amazing! The cake is just okay (but maybe because I accidentally put 1 teaspoon of baking soda into the dry ingredients). The color wasn't as I had expected because when the wrapper is ripped open, you can see chocolate cake crumbles. The original recipe calls for 60 ml American food colouring whereas I live in Australia and I think the products here might have a different effect. I contacted Queen's Food (I used their Pillar Box Red food colouring) and they said usually they used about 20ml of colouring for one red velvet recipe. But if you ought to use the whole bottle, it shouldn't give any bitter taste.

I brought some of the cuppies to my halaqah because I couldn't possibly finish it by myself at home and hubby doesn't like red velvets. They said it was good and looked really cute. So, I guess I approve this recipe! ;) 

Source

Sambal Pecel Ayam

Looking for a pecel ayam chilli condiments? Look no further because you just found a good recipe! I just sounded like a marketing gal :/. My Padang-nese friends loved it! But my husband still like the sambal ijo better (I don't know why). The pecel ayam recipe will follow yaaa... because I haven't made it again and I needed to make some changes to the recipes.

Ingredients:

• 7 red chillies
• 10 small red hot chillies
• 2 tomatoes
• 5 garlic cloves
• 4 shallots (I use 1/4 of red onion)
• 4 candlenuts (kemiri)
• 1 tsp lime juice
• Salt

How to make:

1. Fry all the ingredients with oil, except lime juice.
2. Put all the ingredients in a food processor, add lime juice and salt.

Source: "Sajian Ala Kaki Lima"

Mie Aceh

So sorry that I haven't posted in a while. I was quite busy, quite scared doing some "real" baking, and two days ago I just caught flu :(. Today I'm going to share with you my Mie Aceh recipe. Yes, it's MY recipe! Hehe.. I'm a big fan of Mie Aceh for it's spicy and flavorful taste. I used to buy it at Pidie 2000 near my campus in Depok. 

My first attempt at Mie Aceh failed after I blindly followed a recipe on a famous Indonesian cooking magazine *bzzzz*. It was missing the "essential" taste of Mie Aceh. A few days later, I gathered some recipes from the internet and came up with my own version of Mie Aceh. Surprisingly, it turned out to be really good and was a really close match! I was super satisfied. Hubby liked it too. It was his first time eating Mie Aceh. I had promised him to treat him to Pidie 2000, but never had the chance. So, this was also an attempt to fulfil my promise.

The color is not quite right :/ Please see the last picture.

Ingredients:

• 6 shallots
• 4 garlic cloves
• 150 gr prawn, peel off skin
• 150 gr beef
• 1 tsp vinegar (cuka)
• 1 green onion (scallion)
• 750 ml beef stock
• 1-1/2 tbsp sweet soy sauce (kecap manis)
• 400 gr hokkien noodles (or mie kuning basah)
• 2 tbsp celery, chopped finely
• 1 tomato
• Beansprout
• Cabbage, chop thinly
• Salt

Ground spices:

• 8 shallots
• 4 garlic cloves
• 4 red chillies
• 1/2 tbsp fennel seed (jinten)
• 4 cardamom pods (kapulaga)
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 1 tsp white pepper
• 1 tbsp curry powder (optional)

How to make:

1. Ground together all the ground spices.
2. Saute shallots, garlic cloves, and the grounded spices.
3. Mix in beef and prawn, cook until it changes color.
4. Add in tomato, beansprout, and chopped cabbage. Cook until the vegetables are wilted.
5. Add in beef stock, vinegar, chopped celery, sweet soy sauce. Cook until the water has decreased. Add salt if needed.
6. Mix in the noodles and add the chopped green onion. Cook for another 1-2 minutes.
7. Serve to individual plates. Complement the dish with sliced cucumber, kerupuk emping, and fried shallots.

This picture was take the night before the previous picture. It looks more mouthwatering for me, hehe.

Notes:

• For beef stock (because I always failed at making a nice stock), I used 2 stock cubes and 900 ml of water.
• This is just my preference, I don't dunk in all the noodles into the spice/seasoning paste (or whatever to call it). Instead, I took another pot, scoop 1 soup ladle full of the spice/seasoning  paste, add 1 portion of noodles, and sprinkle some green onion and salt (if needed). Cook for about 2 minutes until any water left has dried - or at least thickens.

Fried Enoki

Someone was craving for fried enoki!!! Bought enoki mushrooms at 3 packs (400 gr) for $5. And finally had the time to make them yesterday. It's not hard (at all) because it doesn't involve marinating for hours. I just used the leftover seasoned powder that I made for crispy chicken fingers. Fried enoki is great for snacking or eating with rice or porridge (my ultimate favorite at Ta'wan).

Ingredients:

• 300 gr enoki mushroom
• Dry ingredients: check out my Crispy Chicken Fingers recipe
• 100 ml water
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp ground coriander seed
• Vegetable oil for frying
• Chilli flakes, salt, and black pepper

How to make:

1. Prepare the enoki mushrooms. Shred mushrooms on the root with your hands.
2. Make a batch of the dry batter.
3. Mix water, garlic powder, and coriander seed in a separate dish (you can add 1/2 tsp salt too).
4. Dip the mushrooms into the seasoned water, then dip into the dry ingredients. Cover the mushroom with generous amount of dry ingredients.
5. Fry the mushrooms in hot oil until crispy.
6. Sprinkle chilli flakes, salt, and black pepper for added taste.

Tea Tasting

Woolworths was having specials on Twining's Tea 10pk. Just out of curiosity, I bought one pack of Pure Peppermint and a Lady Grey variant. Turned out I loved the Lady Grey so much. It was a unique taste of tea to me, since all I had in my life was Teh Botol, Teh Poci vanilla, and Sariwangi. Afterwards, I went to Woolies again and bought almost every variant that they have. I'm not a big fan of tea, but I quite enjoy it, especially if they have unique taste that tickles your taste buds.

Now that I had packs of them, some I have not know what it tastes like, I came up with the idea of doing a tea tasting! For this round I only did the black-tea tea tasting, which consist of: Prince of Wales, Earl Grey, Chai, Chai with vanilla scent, and Darjeeling.

First test: The Black Tea test

Each tea bags are put in individual glass. Each glass is filled with the same amount of hot water plus two cubes of sugar.

What I think:

Prince of Wales: tastes nice, like the usual black tea. Not bitter.

Earl Grey: you can really taste the bergamot (somewhat citrus-y flavor), but it's too strong for my liking. It feels like drinking tea and smelling my husband's strong perfume scent at the same time. Lady Grey tastes almost similar, but more mild.

Chai: I can definitely taste the cinnamon and cloves. It's nice but I like Indian green tea better.

Chai with vanilla scent: tastes like Chai but with added vanilla scent.

Darjeeling: the least that I liked. It's bitter and sepet.

Second test: The Milk Tea test

Each glass of black tea is added with 1 tablespoon of milk.

What I think:

Prince of Wales: great with milk! Very recommended to add milk.

Earl Grey: after milk was added, the bergamot flavor is still too strong.

Chai: you can make your own Chai latte!

Chai with vanilla scent: very nice! I might ditch my instant vanilla chai latte for this mix.

Darjeeling: adding more milk doesn't help to level down the bitterness. So, I guess it is supposed to be the characteristic of the tea. Hubby likes it though.

Bonus test: Mixed up!

With the leftover milk teas, I combined Prince of Wales and Earl Grey. The result? Adding Prince of Wales tea toned down the strong citrus-y flavor of the Earl Grey.

The verdict:

Lady Grey is still my favorite! 

With added milk, it tastes like the Japanese milk tea I used to have :)