Gong Xi Fa Cai and Happy Valentine!

In this Valentine, I'd like to declare my love for my.... cast iron pan. Heh heh heh...

I acquired a used pan sometime in the fall at a flea market for almost nothing. Just recently I managed to properly season it, used it, and fell in love with it. If you owned one, you know what I'm talking about.

Things you can make with the pan:

Apple cake

Recipe: Apple cake in iron skillet
Verdict: Really yummy, but next time I would use 1 more apple, and reduce the butter used in cooking the apples

Pork chops

Recipe: mine. But it's basically pork seasoned with salt n' pepper, dredge with flour and fried.
Please overlook the blackness of the pork. It's not that burned, just a little bit :)

Potato skillet

Recipe: improvised.
Finally I can eat a proper skillet like the ones at Denny's. There's no Denny's or potato skillets here, so I'm quite excited.

And finally...Fried Chicken!!!!

Pretend there's a fried chicken pic here

I completely forgot taking pictures of it. We're so excited in having fried chicken for dinner, that we forgot to take a pic until there were just piles of bones left.
The chicken is really really good. The Monkey King said that it's comparable to Kentucky's. Mwahaha....that's good. Coz there's no Kentucky here either.
Man...remind me why we move here again?

Anywho...last but not least...

Homemade pizza

I know it's not made from the iron pan. But, it's so good that I just have to post :)

Happy Valentine everyone!
And Happy Chinese New Year too! Wish you all the best in the Year of Tiger.
Gong Xi Fa Cai! I'm off to make dinner. Hopefully I won't burn my duck :P

Death by coffee

I've been following Ree from the Pioneer Woman for about more than a year now. She and Deb definitely contributes to my pouchiness and round buttom :)
When Ree posted this recipe awhile back, I really wanted to try it but never had the time to bake it. Until now.



Recipe: Coffee cake

Frosting recipe: Best creamy frosting

Verdict: I didn't use the frosting recipe from cake recipe, because I'm bored of regular o buttercream frosting. I found the frosting recipe from Tasty Kitchen, and it is sooo gooodd! I'll never go back to the buttercream frosting again (unless I have to). I added 1 Tablespoon of instant coffee to the frosting to make it coffee flavored. The cake is a bit dense. But flavorwise, if you love coffee, this is the cake for you. It's best enjoyed with a cup of coffee. Told you it's death by coffee :))

Farikal (lamb in cabbage)

I couldn't believe that I've been living in Norway for 2 years. Time flies. And during those 2 years, I've never cooked farikal, despite the abundance of lamb during October.
This is about to change...


Recipe: Farikal
Modification: nothing, I think.
Verdict: Really easy recipe. Just just assembled the meat and cabbage in a pot, and leave it for 1.5 hours on low heat. And it came out really good. The meat is soft, tender, and flavorful.

Furikake

I love love love furikake. They are really yummy eaten with warm rice. But sadly, there is no furikake in Bergen. So, after reading Just Bento's furikake, I decided to make homemade furikake



Recipe:

• 1 piece of fish (I use cod marinated in pepper and lemon)
• 1 teaspoon of sesame oil
• 2 teaspoon of soy sauce
• 1 sheet of nori (cut up in small pieces)
  
• 1-2 teaspoon of sesame seeds
  

Heat up a dry non-stick frying pan. Dump in the fish, and break them up with a spatula. As they cook and dry out, keep breaking them up until they form fine flakes. Add the sesame oil, and soy sauce halfway through and keep stirring. Your objective is to dry out and crisp up the fish without burning it.

When the fish is fairly dry and fine, add the nori and sesame seeds. Stir this only takes about 10-20 seconds.

Remove from the frying pan into a bowl. Let cool completely before storing in an airtight container in the refrigerator. It will keep for up to a week. But in our case, we finished it right away.

Halloween Food

I saw hot dog impaled with spaghetti on some blog long time ago. And decided that this would be fun for Halloween. So, for Halloween dinner, I made...



It's impaled hot dog with spaghetti, burned octopus hot dog, and steamed broccoli on regular pasta sauce. It's a hit with JD coz she loves finger food.

I also made cupcakes for dessert


Recipe: Peanut Butter cupcake
Modifications: I use mini cupcake pan, crunchy peanut butter coz I'm out of the smooth one, and reduce the sugar to 1 cup. For the frosting, I just put 1 stick of butter to mixer, cream it and add sugar and powdered sugar until desired consistency.
I tried to color it to orange, but it ended up lilac color...weird

After adding some buttercream frosting and licorice for the legs and eyes

Food recap

Things that I've been baking/cooking in the past week.


Recipe: Deep, dark rich brownies
Vote: Really good. JT even loves it. It's rich, and very satisfying.


Recipe: Herbes de Provence bread
Vote: Taste-wise, it's good. However, the dough was really sticky, and not rising well (on the first rise). And on the second rise, it's more like rising to the sides, and up. Resulting in a bread that's more like a fluffy pancake, as JD (my oldest) said.

Lamb Curry with white and red rice

Recipe: my own


Recipe: Oatmeal cakes
Vote: Pretty good. JD loves it. And it's healthy too. So yay!