Cooking Recipe and Tricks

Gladly that I broke my routine and baked this chicken pie, instead of cooking rice, for our dinner the other day. Even though my husband is a rice lover, he’s pretty attracted by the delicious fillings. We could have all the proteins and vegetables we need in a pie. For myself, I love the pie crust in particular, that’s made and adapted from Maggie Beer’s Sour Cream Pastry recipe. The sour cream made the pastry taste so wonderful, producing a soft and flaky texture, that you don’t want to miss any bit of it. What can beat a home-made pie? It smelt so good, when it’s baked fresh from the oven. The pie pastry and fillings can be made in advance, nicely kept for days in refrigerator. You can resemble and bake this pie on the go, then enjoy a hot delicious pie without waiting too long. This chicken pie is pretty versatile, suitable for summer or winter days.

Chicken, Leek and Pea Pie (Printable recipe)
By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 10 mins + 20 mins for chilling
Cook time: 50 mins
Yield: One round pie dish/pan, 24cmx4cm in size

Ingredients of crust:

• 200 gm unsalted butter, cold and coarsely chopped
• 250 gm plain flour
• 125 ml sour cream

Ingredients of fillings:

• 250 gm chicken breast (or chicken thigh)
• 80 gm bacon, diced
• 1 leek, white and light green part, finely diced
• 2 tsp minced garlic
• 100 gm green peas, fresh or frozen
• 50 gm corn kernels, fresh or frozen
• 10 gm butter
• 18 gm plain flour
• 200 ml chicken stock
• 1½ Tbsp white wine
• 2½ Tbsp cream
• 2 Tbsp parsley, chopped

Ingredients of egg wash:

• 1 egg yolk
• 1 Tbsp milk

To make the pie crust:

• Place butter and flour in a food processor, pulse to mix until it looks like breadcrumbs. Add the sour cream and continue to pulse until mixture just comes together. Gently shape into two discs. Do not over-knead. Wrap in plastic film and refrigerate for about 20 minutes.
• Remove crust disks from the refrigerator. Roll out one between two plastic films to a 32cm circle, about 3mm thick. Carefully line the pie dish as the base.
• Roll out another crust disk to a 25cm circle, as before. Keep it in plastic film. Put both pastry disks back to refrigerator for later use.

To make the fillings:

• Dice chicken. Season with salt and pepper. Pan fry chicken over medium heat until cooked. Set aside. If using frozen peas and corn kernels, soak them in boiling water for 10 minutes. Drain well.
• Add 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil and 10 grams of butter over medium-low heat. When the butter begins to melt, add leek, garlic. Cook until fragrant and the leek softened. Toss in the bacon, continue to cook for about 2 to 3 minutes. Stir and combine occasionally. Toss back the chicken. Pour in white wine, cook for 2 minutes. Sprinkle the flour, stir to combine. Add the stock and cream. Cook to reduce the sauce by more than half and thickened. Stir in peas and corn kernels. Taste by yourself. Season with salt and pepper if necessary. Stir in parsley. Transfer the fillings into a large bowl and let it cool down. Refrigerate it for 20 minutes.

To make the pie:

• Preheat oven to 220C (425F). Prepare the egg wash: mix egg yolk and milk in a small bowl.
• Remove both pastry disks and the fillings from the refrigerator and let sit for a while until they soften just enough to be workable. Fill the case with the fillings, topped with pastry. Crimp the edges to seal and score the top pastry. Cut a 1cm-slit in the middle of the pie. Egg wash the pie.
• Bake in preheated oven for 10 minutes. Then reduce heat to 200C (395F), continue to bake for a further 35 to 40 minutes, or until golden and cooked through. If the top is browning too quickly and too much, loosely cover with a layer of foil until the dough is cooked through. Remove from the oven. Serve hot with salad greens.

Other delicious chicken pie recipes:

• Chicken Pot Pie from Simply Recipes
• Chicken Pie Recipe from Exclusively Food
• Chicken, Leek and Fennel Pie with Cream Cheese Pastry from Citrus And Candy

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Posted by
Christine Ho


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Monday, July 11, 2011

What draws me to pomegranate, might be its vibrant red, perhaps its healthy benefits to our body. Comparatively, pomegranate contains much more antioxidants than many other kinds of fruits. Some people might be put off from its acidity and astringency. But for me, I just like its unique flavour. I can’t explain how and why I fell in love with this fruit during my first encounter. Not only does its juice taste great, especially in cocktails and mixed drinks, but also it can be a wonderful ingredient of making desserts. Take this soufflé as an example, the tangy taste of the pomegranate provided a perfect balance to this elegant dessert, which ended our dinner perfectly the other day.

This soufflé was baked with Royal Pom’s complimentary pack of two giant pomegranates that I’ve ever seen that big. They were very nice, perfectly grown, and juicy. Only one pomegranate was far enough to make juice for two large soufflé cups. I was very satisfied with the taste and texture, as well as amazed by its colourful looking. But I don’t quite understand why the soufflés turned into light purple in colour, instead of light red. Anyone has any idea?

Pomegranate Souffle (Printable recipe)
By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 40 mins
Cook time: 14 mins
Yield: Two 1-cup capacity ramekins

Ingredients:

• 125 ml pomegranate juice
• 35 gm caster sugar
• 1 tsp cornflour
• water, a dash for mixing with cornflour
• icing sugar, for dusting

Ingredients of egg whites:

• 3 egg whites
• 25 gm caster sugar

For coating ramekins:

• 40 gm butter, softened at room temperature
• 20 gm caster sugar

Beautiful pomegranateFresh juice from one giant pomegranate.Coat a ramekin with butter and sugar.Method:

• Mix the cornflour with a dash of water, just enough to make a smooth paste. Set aside.
• Place the pomegranate juice and sugar in a saucepan, over medium heat and cook until the sugar is dissolved completely. When it almost boils, reduce the heat to low, whisk in the cornflour paste, a little at a time. Continue to cook for about 1 minute, stirring constantly to avoid from forming any lumps in the mixture. Make sure not to allow mixture to boil again. Remove from the heat. Let cool completely.
• Preheat the oven to 180C (350F).
• Place the egg whites in a large clean bowl. (Note: Make sure there’s no oil or water in the bowl at all.) Use an electric mixer to beat the egg whites until many bubbles form. Add the sugar, a little at a time, beat at high speed until stiff peaks form. (Please refer to this video: How To Beat Egg Whites.) Make sure not to over beat the egg whites, lest they will break down.
• Transfer pomegranate mixture into a large mixing bowl. Add a little bit of egg whites and stir in to loosen the consistency. Gently fold-in the remaining egg whites. (Please refer to this post with video: How To Fold-in Egg Whites).
• Brush the ramekins with the softened butter. Do use upward strokes to brush the sides. It helps the soufflés rise properly. Chill in the refrigerator until set. Repeat this step. Sprinkle in a bit of the caster sugar, turning the ramekins to coat evenly the base and sides. Set aside.
• Spoon the mixture into buttered, sugared moulds. Scrape the mixture off the top with a palette knife in order to have a smooth surface. Make sure not to get any mixture on the side of the ramekins until the moulds are full. Clean the rim and sides if any. Bake it the preheated oven for about 13 to 14 minutes, or until golden brown and risen 2cm above the rim. Serve immediately dusted with icing sugar.

• The intensity of sweetness of every pomegranate is different. Adjust the amount of sugar to taste accordingly.
• You might replace the fresh pomegranate juice with bottled ones.

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Posted by
Christine Ho


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Thursday, July 14, 2011

This traditional Chinese dish conveys a mystical message even in Chinese community, as it’s often cooked for women post-labour. In fact, it’s a dish that everyone, including men, can enjoy, and needless to have a fear of embarrassment. Many Chinese yumcha restaurants offer this dish with a very pricey tag. The pig’s trotters (aka pork knuckles) are so moist, tender and succulent after the slow cooking in the tasty sweetened black vinegar. The natural collagen of pig’s trotters is very good for our health too. Both of my daughter and hubby especially like the hard boiled eggs that soaked in the tasty sauce. They can finish one after another. What I have to do is to make sure they don’t over eat.

Every family has its own version of this dish. The recipe I posted here is adapted from my mother-in-law’s cooking. She used to cook this dish for her daughter and every daughter-in-laws in her family, including me of course. Lucky me, I could learn from her in person during my travel back to Hong Kong. Hope you’d enjoy this dish as much as I do. A side note, my MIL only uses the Pat Chun Sweetened Vinegar（百珍甜醋）, because she loves its taste the most and doesn’t need to blend it any other kind of vinegar.

Trotters in Ginger and Sweetened Vinegar (Printable recipe)
By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 30 mins
Cook time: 120mins

Ingredients:

• 730 gm pork trotter (pork hocks/pork knuckles)
• 200 gm ginger, old or young
• 2 bottles (600ml each) sweetened black vinegar (I used Pat Chun sweetened vinegar)
• 6 eggs

Method:

• Peel the ginger. Cut into smaller pieces if it’s too large. Lightly bruise the ginger with the broad side of a cleaver or chef’s knife. Cook over low heat on a wok or fry pan without any oil. (This cooking method is called “white wok” (白鑊) in Chinese, that means frying without any oil.) By doing so, help the ginger dries up the water inside as much as possible. Make sure not to burn the ginger though. When the ginger looks dry, add a bit of oil, fry the ginger until aromatic. Set aside.
• Use a large clay pot or a casserole (Don’t use cast iron or metal ones though, not suitable for cooking vinegar.) Pour in the vinegar. Cook over medium heat and bring it to boil. Add the ginger. When it boils again, reduce heat to low and simmer for another 10 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool completely. Cover and store at a cool and shady place, the vinegar and ginger will keep longer. Or place in a fridge, let the ginger absorb the flavour. You need to cook the ginger vinegar and bring it to a boil once a week, then let cool. If the vinegar is not polluted, it could last for 4 to 5 weeks, long enough to sustain for consuming during confinement period.
• Rinse and clean the pork trotters/hocks, remove any hairs if any. Blanch in boiling water for about 20 minutes to remove any impurities and blood. Drain well. Set aside.
• Remove ginger vinegar from fridge. Place at room temperature for a while. Then cook and bring it to a boil. Add the pig’s trotters. When it boils, reduce heat and simmer for about 1 hour, or until the pork becomes tender.
• While cooking the pork, prepare hard boiled eggs: Place eggs and water in a saucepan, the water should cover the eggs. Turn on the heat, cook the eggs on medium heat and bring to boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 6 minutes. Drain out the eggs with a slotted spoon and immediately transfer to a bowl of very cold water. Leave to cool completely. Shell the eggs.
• Transfer the eggs to the ginger vinegar. When it boils again. Turn off the heat. Let the eggs soak in the vinegar until turned brown on surface. Done. Serve hot.

• The amount of ginger used here was quite small compared to an ordinary confinement one as I just cooked this to ease our craving. You could adjust the amount of ginger and pork to your preference. It’s very flexible.
• Make sure the vinegar cover all the ingredients, so get a clay pot or casserole in the right size.
• The traditional way of making this confinement dish for women is to use old ginger. That said, old ginger is good for helping women to expel wind from abdomen and get speedy recovery from giving birth. However, the woody, fiberous texture of old ginger is quite tough, not an enjoyment to eat for some people. Thus, if you don’t cook it as a confinement dish, just like me, use young ginger. You’ll enjoy the less hot taste and tender texture of young ginger more.

Other yummy pig trotter recipes:

• Braised Pig’s Trotters in Sweetened Vinegar Recipe (猪脚醋) from Tastes of Home
• Pork Trotters in Black Vinegar 猪脚醋 from Table for 2 or More

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Posted by
Christine Ho


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Monday, July 25, 2011

The jewelry-like fleshy seeds of pomegranate are the most attractive to me. The seeds contain fabulous sweet, slightly tart flavour, very suitable for making refreshing juice for summer days. Well, it’s still winter here, so the first idea that came up in my mind was to make a warm soufflé to end our dinner with one of the giant pomegranates sent by Royal Pom. What else could I make good use with the other giant pomegranate? I am a kind of person who can enjoy ice-cream on a freezing, windy day. Although the weather was quite cold and wet last week, I couldn’t help craving for this beautiful pomegranate sorbet. Again, this pomegranate sorbet served as a perfect ending of my dinner last week.

Pomegranate Sorbet (Printable recipe)
By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 15 mins
Cook time: 15 mins + 3 hrs freezing time
Yield: serves 2

Ingredients:

• 2 Tbsp water
• 1/4 tsp gelatine (or gelatin) powder
• 150 ml pomegranate juice, fresh or bottled
• 7 to 8 Tbsp caster sugar, or to taste
• a pinch salt
• 65 ml heavy cream

Method:

• Use a sauce pan, pour in water, sprinkle the gelatine powder over the top. Let sit for 8 to 10 mins. Turn on the heat and cook over low heat, for about 1 minute or two. Swirl the saucepan occasionally.
• When the gelatine looks not grainy, add pomegranate juice, sugar. Season with a pinch of salt. Stir well. Simmer until the sugar completely dissolved. Set aside.
• Transfer the pomegranate mixture into a bowl, chill in a fridge. Stir in the cream. Follow the manufacturer’s instructions, blend the mixture in an ice-cream maker until soft and fluffy. Then freeze until firm. Done.

• If not using ice-cream maker, you might like to whisk the mixture with a blender, then freeze until firm. Yet, don’t blend too long, lest too much air incorporated inside.

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Posted by
Christine Ho


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Monday, August 01, 2011

This draft of this post has been sitting way too long in my folder. Finally, I managed to edit and hit the publish button and get it alive on my blog. It’s been quite an exciting and busy fortnight since I officially got a bookdeal from a large, prestige publisher. The theme of my first cookbook will be simple recipes for home cooks, with many of them are classic Hong Kong dishes that I grew up with. Please bear with me for my posting backlogs.

Back to my favourite fruit, pomegranate. Pomegranate juice is a very healthy and refreshing drink in summer. Although it’s still cold down under here, I love making desserts with its lovely juice. After I made the pomegranate soufflé, immediately a fan posted a question about how to juice pomegranate on my fan page.

The arils, wrapped inside the white pulp membranes, compose of edible red-diamond-like flesh and white hard seeds inside. Trying to get the lovely juice from the edible flesh sounds quite troublesome, yet it’s worth the work. Here’s a hack around that I experimented, much easier than I thought.

How To Juice a Pomegranate (Printable version)
By Christine’s Recipes
 
Time: 25 mins
 
Yield: 150 ml (depends on how big your fruit is)

What you need:

• 1 pomegranate
• 1 sharp knife
• 1 large bowl
• 1 food processor
• 1 tablespoon
• 1 fine sieve

Method:

• Cut the pomegranate in half.
• Hold the half pomegranate in your palm with cut side down as picture shown. Place a large bowl underneath. Use another hand to smack the rind with a large spoon. The seeds should eject from the pomegranate directly into the bowl, leaving only a few deeply embedded arils to remove. Repeat this step with another half until you get all the seeds out.
• Transfer the seeds into a food processor, briefly grind the seeds. Don’t blend too long, because the juice becomes bitter if too many hard seeds inside are broken.
• Strain the juice through a fine sieve with the help of a tablespoon and lightly press. You’ll get clear and fresh pomegranate juice.

Other helpful posts:

• How to Cut and De-Seed a Pomegranate from Simply Recipes 
• Prepare a Pomegranate – As Easy As 1-2-3 from Royal Pom 

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Posted by
Christine Ho


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Tuesday, August 09, 2011

This recipe has been posted long ago on my Chinese food blog. Here comes the English version for those who love the traditional Hong Kong sweet soup. This sweet green mung bean soup is great for summer, served either in warm or cold. There is one special ingredient, stink grass listed in this recipe. Hope you won’t be scared off by its name, 臭草 (literally means “stink grass” in Chinese). I don’t quite know how and why this little, humble herb got this unpleasing name. In fact, the herb smells very fragrant that makes this Hong Kong sweet soup very special. No other herb can replace it. Many of my Chinese fans claimed that they can’t have the sweet soup without this little herd.

Those two tinny sprigs were gift from my friend who grows them in her backyard. You might try your luck to see if you can source some from any Asian grocers nearby. If no luck, just the green mung beans and seaweed can also make you a good dessert. Hope you like it as much as my family does.

Sweet Green Mung Bean Soup (Printable recipe)

By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 60 mins
Cook time: 90 mins
Yield: 4 to 6 serves

This little herb, “stink grass”, smells very fragrant actually !

Green Mung Beans are available at Asian stores.

Ingredients:

• 200 gm green mung beans
• 2 sprigs rue/stink grass (臭草)
• 8 pieces seaweed
• 50 gm rice
• 2 liters water
• rock sugar, to taste

Method:

• Rinse the beans and soak for about 1 hour. Soak the seaweed until softened. Drain well. Cut into thick strips. Rinse rice and drain well. Set aside.
• Use a large deep pot. Add 2 liters of water and bring to boil. Add the beans, rice and stink grass. Cook over high heat. When it boils, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until the beans are soft. Keep an eye on it while cooking because you don’t want the soup to spill over everywhere.
• Add the seaweed and rock sugar to taste, continue to cook until the sugar completely dissolves. Done. Served hot, warm or cold.

Notes:

• You might like to skip the rice, the texture will become thinner.
• The dried sea weed will increased 10 times in size. A small amount of it is enough.

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This is one of my favourite homey dishes often cooked by my mother. I always feel that she’s the best in cooking it. The fish fillet is pan fried perfectly and the sauce is just balanced. It is suitable for kids and seniors, and meat lovers of course, excellent with hot steamed rice.


Pan Fried Fish Fillet (Printable recipe)

By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 5 mins
Cook time: 15 mins
Yield: 3 to 4 serves

Ingredients:

• 1 piece fish fillet (mackerel or other white fish)
• 1 tsp shallot, minced
• 2 to 3 slices ginger, shredded
• 1 stalk spring onion, diced or shredded

Ingredients:

• salt, to taste
• pepper, to taste
• 1/2 tbsp Shaoxing wine
• cornflour/corn starch, for coating fish fillet

Sauce:

• 1½ tbsp light soy sauce
• 2 tsp dark soy sauce
• 2 tsp sugar
• 6 tbsp water
• sesame oil,to taste
• pepper,to taste

Thickening:

• 1 tsp cornflour
• 2 tbsp water

Method:

• Rinse fish and wipe dry with kitchen papers. Season with salt, pepper and wine. Let sit for 10 minutes. Lightly coat with cornflour. Set aside.
• Heat oil in a non-stick frying pan. Pan fry the fish over medium-high heat until both sides are golden brown and cooked through. Remove from the pan, cover to keep warm.
• Add some more oil in the pan. Saute shallot, ginger and white spring onion dices. Pour in the sauce. Bring it to boil. Add thickening and cook to preferred consistency. Pour the sauce over the fish. Garnish with spring onion. Serve immediately.

Note:

• You might use any favourite white fish fillets.

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You might’ve noticed that my family and I are not vegan eaters. But I do love having many different vegetables served on table, sometimes enjoy a no-meat day. These dumplings have got several vegetables in five different colours for fillings, and can be a perfect light lunch, or snacks for tea time.


Steamed Vegetable Dumplings (Printable recipe)

By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 40 mins
Cook time: 20 mins
Yield: 2 to 3 serves

Pastry Ingredients:

• 300 gm plain flour
• 150 ml hot water, 80C/175F
• 60 ml water, at room temperature

Filling ingredients:

• 1 to 2 shiitake mushrooms
• 45 gm corn kernels
• 25 gm carrot, diced
• 50 gm chinese chives, finely chopped
• 34 gm vermicelli/cellophane noodles, soaked, softened and sectioned
• 3 water chestnuts, about 56 gm, skinned and diced
• 45 gm spicy tofu (picture shown above), diced
• 1/2 tsp minced ginger

Seasonings:

• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp chicken bouillon powder
• 2 Tbsp water
• sesame oil, to taste

Method:

• Sift flour into a large mixing bowl. Drizzle the hot water evenly into the flour in a circular motion. Use a spatula or chopsticks to quickly mix well, to create little flour crumbs.
• Add room-temperature water in three batches and knead into a smooth dough. Place in a greased bowl, covered with a plastic film. Let it rest for 30 minutes.
• To make the fillings: Heat oil in a wok or frying pan. Saute ginger over medium-high heat. Add mushrooms, carrot, dried tofu, corn kernels and chives. Stir fry until aromatic. Add vermicelli and water chestnuts. Stir in the seasonings. Set aside. Let cool down.
• Roll out the dough into a long tube shape. Cut into 14 to 16 equal portions. Roll each portion into a small disc with a rolling pin, each about 8cm in size. Wrap a heaped tablespoon of filling and pinch the edge. Repeat this step with the remaining pastry and fillings.
• Steam the dumplings in a wok or a steamer over high heat, for about 15 minutes, or until cooked through. Serve immediately.

Notes:

• The chicken bouillon powder can be replaced with shiitake mushroom powder for vegan eaters, which is available at Asian stores.
• The leftover dumplings can be kept in a covered container in fridge up for 3 to 4 days. Frozen can be kept for a month.
• Spicy tofu is also available at Asian stores, often placed in chilling section.
• The texture of the dumpling skin is made from hot water and flour, produced a soft and springy feel. You might like to refer this video of how to wrap a dumpling. The pastry is very stretchy and tender, thus wrapping the diced fillings inside is quite a challenge for a beginner. It’s nothing wrong if seal tightly without pinching the edge at all. You’ll make some beautiful rustic dumplings. Just make sure no fillings would leak out.

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We’re going to enjoy a very hot Christmas festive season as usual in a few more days. Although I still haven’t got myself used to celebrate Christmas in summer, I’ve learned to create imagery pictures of snowing scenes in my mind by enjoying some cold desserts or something look like snow. What I like about these cookies is their snowy look with natural cracks produced by both of the magic of baking powder and icing sugar, giving me more of a Christmas feel. Best of all, the crunchy outside and the fluffy, soft inside make these cookies so enjoyable.

Chocolate Crackle Cookies (Printable recipe)

By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 20 mins + chilling at least 3 hrs
Cook time: 20 mins
Yield: makes 12 to 14

Ingredients:

• 40 gm unsalted butter, softened
• 3 Tbsp icing sugar
• 2 Tbsp brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 50 gm dark chocolate, melted
• 25 ml milk
• 100 gm cake flour
• 3 tsp unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/8 tsp salt

For coating：

• 3 Tbsp icing sugar/confectioners’ sugar

Method:

• Beat the butter, icing sugar and brown sugar with an electric mixer until fluffy and creamy. Beat in the egg and vanilla extract.
• Stir in the melted chocolate and milk.
• Sift in the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt into the chocolate mixture and mix well. Refrigerate for at least 3 hours or overnight, until the dough becomes workable.
• Preheat the oven to 180C/356F. Place about 3 tablespoons of icing sugar in a small bowl. Line a baking tray with a baking paper or baking matt.
• Spoon out the chocolate mixture and roll each into a small ball. Coat each ball in the icing sugar. Place well apart on the baking tray. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until the surface turns crunchy and brown. Let them cool in a wire rack. Enjoy !

Notes:

• When rolling the dough into small balls, the action has to be quick especially in warm weather. The chocolate mixture will melt in your hands otherwise.
• If the chocolate balls start to melt, you might return them into the fridge and chill until they are workable again. Then roll in the icing sugar to coat before placing them into the oven.

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Happy New Year, everyone! Before the new year’s eve, I finally uploaded the last batch of recipes and photos to my publisher. Right at the moment I hit the “upload” button, I started feeling like over the moon, so released. I can’t wait to see my first cookbook in print. Thanks so much for all your support and leaving encouraging words on my fan page and blog.

Here comes one of my favourite snacks, cup cakes, as the first blog post in 2012. They are easy to whip up in the last minute. This time I tried the new muffin tray bought from Ikea. It got deeper holes, so the cup cakes took a bit longer baking time. I was very pleased with the tall, and gorgeous looking of these cup cakes as much as I love their taste. The banana and apple are perfect partners to make me an enjoyable and delicious snack as a reward to myself whenever I finish a project.

Banana Apple Muffins (Printable recipe)

By Christine’s Recipes
Prep time: 15 mins
Cook time: 30 mins
Yield: Makes 12（prepare a lined 12-hole muffin tray）

Ingredients:

• 1 apple, about 125 gm
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon powder
• 2 large ripe bananas, about 320 gm
• 60 gm melted butter
• 100 gm sugar
• 1 egg, beaten
• 125 ml milk
• 240 gm cake flour
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/8 tsp salt

Method:

• Prepare oven at 175C/350F.
• Peel and deseed the apple. Cut into about 1cm dices. Mix with the cinnamon powder. Set aside.
• Use a large spoon or a food processor to mash the banana into paste. Add the melted butter, sugar and egg. Combine well. Stir in the milk.
• Combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt well. Sift into the banana mixture in 3 batches. Lightly combine all ingredients with a spatula or balloon whisk between each addition. Don’t over stir the batter because you don’t want your cup cakes turn hard as gluten forms inside. Mix in the diced apples.
• Spoon and divide the batter into the lined muffin trays. Bake in the preheated oven for about 30 to 35 minutes, or until cooked through. Test with an inserted needle that comes out clean. Remove from the oven and let them cool on a wire rack. Enjoy while the cup cakes are still warm.

Notes:

• The holes of my muffin tray are deep that helps make high, slim cup cakes. The baking time is a bit longer than those with wider holes. But I like the tall, gorgeous looking cup cakes.
• If you use wide and flat muffin tray, adjust the baking time accordingly.

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