Dough of Love

A friend asked if I could contribute a kid-friendly and healthy recipe to an e-mag she is working on and I was like.. "Of cos! What's 1 recipe? I can give you a hundred!" Turned out, she not only needed the recipe, she needed a photo journal of Ian preparing the food. And she will arrange for the photographer to come to my place for the photoshoot. Now, this meant I have to consider seriously which recipe to use. She wanted something that's good for a meal, and easy enough for Ian to be able to help in preparation. Mostly, Ian helps when I bake cookies, cupcakes or pastries. Seldom does he help with  dinner preparation. Eventually, we settled on a baked "pastry"* that's good for dinner. Pizza!

Before the actual photo session, we did a trial session a week before and we had so much fun.

Mommy prepared the wholemeal pizza dough, homemade tomato paste and various of Ian's favourite toppings.

Pizza boy serious at work.

Mommy says "How about more cheese?"

Ready for the oven!

Super pleased with his artwork.

On the day of photoshoot, it was a success and mommy was so proud that her little boy was cooperative and didn't throw tantrums. Only "problem" was, he couldn't stop eating the toppings even before the pizzas were baked. Cheese, ham and pineapples... he even tried eating the mushrooms raw! He must be real hungry that day. 

Recipe to the wholemeal pizza and a little writeup on our mommy and son adventures in the kitchen can be found at this link...

http://essentialparenting.sg/dough-of-love

  

* Is pizza considered a pastry?
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20111008013017AAx3VTn

Back after a loooooooonnnng hiatus

It has been more then a year since my last post. How time flies. And what have I been busy with? 

Firstly, there is always work, work, and then more (house)work. Then there are the never-ending streams of parties, dinner dates and play dates to plan and to attend. Ian started going to a new school this year. But what kept me busy nearly 24/7 was a second pregnancy (which was not as easy as my first) and the caring of our baby gal, Megan. This feisty little gal couldn't wait to see the world and was born at 35th week, weighing only 2.1kg. Fortunately her lungs were already fully developed and even her jaundice level was within the normal range. All's well except her early arrival disrupted my work schedule and I had to work through my confinement period... depressing. 

As she was very small sized, with tiny features and suckling capability, breastfeeding was hell. It took us a few months to get it right. Tiring and also... depressing. 

As I was struggling to juggle work, a toddler, a newborn who takes only cat naps throughout the day AND night, trying my best not to give up on breastfeeding and among all things, I also had to deal with so many comments that my baby is so small. "Are you feeding her enough?""Why is she so small?""Didn't you eat whatever whatever when you were pregnant with her?"... depressing.

All these are over now. She is growing and developing very well. Weight and height had caught up with the full term babies growth range. Fully breastfed and is now loving solid food. A big pat on my back :)

At 8 months old.

#85 Pork Chop with Sweet and Sour Sauce

There are a few blogs/websites that I visit whenever I need some inspiration on what to cook for dinner. And this blog, Peng's Kitchen, is one of my all-time fav. Simply because the recipes are concise, were tried and tested by the author, and if you have any questions, the blogger is very quick to answer.

Last night, I tried her pork chop recipe, and boy, was it GOOD! Even Jr, who doesn't like chewing meat, ate 2 big pieces of it!

I always associate cream crackers (Soh Tah Piah) with the light snack hospital provides once you are ok to eat after an operation or when I was very young, whenever I'm sick, mum will give me this crackers with hot milo. All not very good memories i must say, until this! Never knew crushed cream crackers make pork chop so yummy.

I combined this recipe with a sweet and sour sauce and served with rice.

Sweet and Sour Sauce Recipe
Ingredients
1 tablespoon oil
1 onion, cut into quaters
1 cucumber, seeds removed and diced
1 capsicum, cut into small pieces
half a can of pineapple cubes

Sauce
3 tablespoon orange juice
2 teaspoon lime juice
3 teaspoon tomato sauce
1 teaspoon plum sauce
1/2 teaspoon Hoisin sauce
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
2 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoon pineapple juice (reserved from can pineapple)

Method
1. Mix all the ingredients for the sauce together in a bowl.
2. Heat oil in pan. Fry onion till slightly soften.
3. Add cucumber and capsicum and fry till veg are slightly soften.
4. Add in the sauce and pineapple cubes, bring to boil.
5. You may want to thicken sauce with cornstarch solution.

#84 Rainbow Hi-5

Bread used today is in the prettiest pink and green! I'm trying ways to make Jr take more carbo and I thought by using this pretty bread, cut in the shape of "Hi-5" and with strawberry jam, he'll definitely like it. But alas, this sandwich returned home with only a thumb bitten off :(

He finished off the organic wholemeal cereal with dried fruits and all the kiwi and told me that he wants ONLY kiwi for breakfast. What to do with my fussy eater?!?!

#83 Simple Sammies

Another super simple breakfast for Jr breakie in school. Organic mixed berries jam sammies in shapes of elephant and teddy. 2 teeny stacks of cheese and a slice of starfruit.

This is the first time I offered starfruit to Jr. Thought he will love it due to the shape but he's just not too adventurous with new food and it came back in the box with just a tiny nibble at the side.

It's ok, I'll try again another day at home. Hopefully when he sees the family eating, he'll eat it too.

#82 Simple Breakfast Bento

Ever since Jr started attending childcare center, I don't have to prepare his breakfast and lunch thus no chance to prepare more substantial bentos for him. He usually drinks milk before going to school and his school will also prepare breakfast for him. Each day, the school's cook will prepare cereal, sandwiches or egg for the kids. Not much varieties, in fact, I thought it's really boring. So I decided to wake slightly earlier every morning to prepare a breakfast bento for him to bring to school. Actually, I'm not even sure if this can be even considered a bento cos it's so simple.

Today's breakfast consists of a chocolate muffin with cheese features and kiwi.

Doesn't the little guy reminds you of Golliwog?

I read about the Golliwog in Enid Blyton's books, an author I 'grew up' with. Love all her short stories and especially novels like The Secret Seven and Famous Five. LOL does this give away my age? I wonder if kids now still read these books? Hopefully Jr will eventually develop a reading habit and I'll definitely introduce these stories to him. 

#81 Lunar New Year Goodies

新年快乐！恭喜发财！

It’s the Lunar New Year and we had so much fun spending time with our family and friends. Rounds and rounds of ban-luck (Chinese Blackjack) and Mahjong and in between, food and drinks and MORE food! I'm glad my appetite has returned and not getting heartburn as often so I did get to enjoy the food and hoards of goodies. 


Among all the CNY goodies, I love pineapple tarts most, but it must be the open-faced, crusty crust with a big ball of pineapple paste type, not those buttery, melt-in-your-mouth types which are mostly sold in stores. Since I can't find the 'perfect' tarts in stores, I bake them every year.

These pineapple paste filled cookies were made for Jr to share with his friends and teachers in school.

Hubby loves peanut cookies, so I made these too...

And seems like I just can't stop baking... I made these honey cornflakes mini cups too!

All these in 2 days! I so need a break from baking.