Archives for March 2012

March 17, 2012

Burgers @ Food For Thought Botanical Gardens

Food for thought has become one of our favourite places to bring our baby girl to. Besides supporting a good cause, affordable lunches, the plus point about it is that it has an outdoor play area for children to toddle around. It is also situated at Botanical gardens – perfect for a meal after a morning walk.

We have tried their breakfasts before – their pancakes are lovely and their mee rebus is decent, but most other things are well, slightly overpriced for the serving size. Their burgers (served after 11am) are a pretty good deal though. They cost between $8 to $12, fries served separately. They are rather generous with their serving of fries so we only ordered one serving of fries to share between the two of us. The burger pictured above is the pulled pork and ham burger with BBQ and mayo dressing. It is definitely one of my guilty indulgences of the week but it was worth the calories. I love the softness of the homemade potato bun as well!


My husband had the chicken pesto burger. The pesto was absolutely flavourful and complemented the chicken well. I was only allowed one bite and my husband devoured the rest himself.

Food For Thought
1 Cluny Road, Singapore Botanic Gardens,
#B1-00, S259569

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March 14, 2012

Grilled Wings using the Airfryer

I love the Philips Air-fryer. It makes frying so much easier, and healthier too, since it uses hot air to crisp up food instead of hot oil. I discovered that it does a pretty good grill too! One just needs to control the temperature well. Before we got the air-fryer, I hardly fry food at home. It is too oily, greasy, unhealthy, and creates too much of a mess. I bought it because I thought that maybe, I could cook healthier “fried” food alternatives for my little one in future. I discovered more use for it than just that.

These wings were simply marinated in oyster sauce, dark soya sauce, pepper and loads of minced garlic. They were then placed in the air-fryer for 10 minutes at 200°C and then for 5 minutes at 150°C. The results? Succulent, juicy grilled chicken wings. More air-fryer experiments to follow!

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March 14, 2012

Daring Cooks March Challenge – Red Wine Braised Beef

After a super long hiatus from Daring Cooks, (now, when was my last challenge?), I’ve decided to embark on this monthly challenge again. The past year has been crazy, and committing to a monthly challenge has been rather impossible. Now that the babe is 1 year old, it’s time for me to return to my monthly cooking/baking challenge.

The March, 2012 Daring Cooks’ Challenge was hosted by Carol, a/k/a Poisonive – and she challenged us all to learn the art of Braising! Carol focused on Michael Ruhlman’s technique and shared with us some of his expertise from his book “Ruhlman’s Twenty”. I wanted to cook braised beef short ribs initially but couldn’t find short ribs. Seeing that I had 1kg of old beef sitting in the freezer, I decided to use that up instead. For the braising sauce, I used a combination of 2 cups of red wine (that was all I had left in the bottle) and 1 cup of beef stock. After simmering in the oven for 4 hours, the results were delicious. The beef was absolutely tender and chock full of flavour. I served it over fluffy potato mash and everyone had clean plates at the end of dinner.The picture above does not do justice to the dish – if only I can figure out how to take better pictures using indoor lighting!

I learnt something new in this challenge – gremolata. See that greenish yellow thing that’s sprinkled on top of the braised beef? That’s gremolata, a combination of parsley, minced garlic and lemon zest. It was an amazing addition. It added much freshness to the braise, something I’ve never quite tasted before.

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March 11, 2012

Cheesy tomato and tuna pasta for the little one

In a recent shopping trip to the supermarket, I discovered salt-free canned spring water tuna. I didn’t even know they sell that at NTUC finest! What a lovely discovery as that means that I can cook tuna pasta for my little one. I made extra pasta sauce and cooked some spaghetti so that the adults could have some too. The little one had hers with mini pasta bows. When she saw her bowl of pasta, her eyes lit up and she went, “WOW!” That was worth all the effort.

Cheesy Tomato and Tuna Pasta
Serves 4 adults

Ingredients:
1 small onion, chopped
40g unsalted butter
6 button mushrooms, sliced
1/4 tsp dried thyme
2 tbsp plain flour
300ml milk
100g cheddar cheese, grated
1 tomato, peeled and deseeded, chopped
1 can tuna in springwater, flaked
salt and black pepper to taste
sprinkling of parsley
pasta of your choice

Method:

  1. Saute onions in butter until translucent.
  2. Add sliced mushrooms and saute for 2-3 minutes.
  3. Mix in dried thyme.
  4. Add flour and stir till well mixed. Slowly add in milk and cook till thickened.
  5. Stir in tomatoes and cheese and heat through.
  6. Season with black pepper (and small amount of salt if cooking for children above 1)
  7. Pour over cooked pasta and top with flaked tuna.
  8. Sprinkle with parsley and serve.
Filed Under: Baking and Cooking, Food for Tots, Rice, Noodles and Pasta Tagged With: Leave a Comment