Thai Pumpkin Custard, Sankaya

 Thai Pumpkin Custard, Sankaya

Ingredients:

One small pumpkin 400 – 600 g

4 eggs

2 dl coconut milk

300 g palm sugar

2 tbs rice flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

A few pandan leaves

Instructions:

Wash your pumpkin thoroughly. Cut a square opening in the top. Use a very sharp knife to cut it out.  Pull the square out and cut off the strings.
Scoop out all of the pumpkin seeds inside and rinse to ensure it's clean and smooth inside.

Soak the cleaned pumpkin in 1 l lime water for about 20-30 minutes. (just ordinary water with some lime in.)

Mix the eggs, palm sugar, coconut milk, rice flour, salt and vanilla extract.

Fold the pandan leaves with your hands and mix the custard mix with your hands, using the pandan leaves to squeeze the mix. Dissolve the palm sugar using your hands and the leaves to squeeze. When all is mixed and sugar dissolved, pour the mix through a sift.

Pour the custard into your hollowed out pumpkin, just to the bottom of the circular opening.  Place the filled pumpkin in a bowl or tin and if the tin is wider, add some foil around the pumpkin to give it support all around. You don´t want the pumpkin to break as you steam it.

Place in a steamer. Put the lid you cut out on the side. Don´t close the filled pumpkin. Let steam for 45 minutes untouched. Once it's done, allow to cool a bit before touching.

To serve you can now fix the top so the lid fits to put back on. It looks cool when presenting.

When cooled, slice the pumpkin as you would slice a cake, to individual pieces and enjoy!

You can eat the entire pumpkin - the skin and flesh of the pumpkin and the creamy custard inside. Refrigerate any leftovers.

If you have additional custard left over pour into a shallow dish, top with slices of pumpkin, and steam alongside the whole pumpkin custard. Once it's done, slice into pieces for a little bit of a different pumpkin custard dessert.

Ice-cream sandwich

Ice-cream sandwich

Ingredients for the “sandwich-cake”

115 g butter, melted and cooled

100 g of granulated sugar (about 1 dl)

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 tsp salt

62 g of wheat flour (about 1.2 dl)

20 g of cocoa (about 0.5 dl)

Ingredients for filling

Alternative 1: You can buy 1.5 package vanilla ice cream (regular, rectangular in cardboard box)

Alternative 2: Make your own ice-cream

Ingredients for easy, quick homemade ice-cream

5 dl whipping cream

1 can condensed milk

Instructions for making the ice-cream

Whip the cream, then add the condensed milk. Mix everything well.

Now for the fun – add taste to your ice-cream with what you like! It could be chocolate, nuts, berries, sprinkles, caramel sauce, chocolate sauce. Today I had sprinkles and blueberries for mine.

If you want different tastes divide the cream into different bowls and add the seasonings and mix.

To freeze pour the mix into a baking tray, a bread tin or any tin that will easily allow you to cut slices for your ice-cream sandwich when frozen. Freeze the ice-cream for at least six hours. When frozen cut into rectangular pieces the size you prefer for your ice-cream sandwich. Cut the cake the same size and put one cake on top and one on the bottom. Wrap in plastic and freeze again until you want to eat your ice-cream.

Instructions for making the “Sandwich-cake”

Preheat the oven to 175 degrees. Add baking paper or a baking sheet and mark out a rectangle, about 23 x 30 cm.

Beat butter and sugar fluffy. Add eggs, vanilla sugar and salt and whisk a little more.

Mix flour and cocoa powder and mix into the batter.

Spread batter on baking paper and spread it as evenly as possible until it covers the rectangle you selected.

Bake in the oven for 10 minutes. Remove and let cool for one minute only. Cut out small rectangles the size you want your ice-cream while the cake is still hot.

Cut ice cream in about 1.0 - 1,5 cm - thick slices and put a cake on top and one below. Wrap individually in plastic film and store in the freezer until serving.

Peach Pie

Peach Pie

Ingredients

Pie Crust 

3 cups flour, (180 g)

125 g unsalted butter

2 tablespoons granulated sugar

1 egg yolk

Filling

4 large egg yolks

4 cups creme fraiche

1 cup granulated sugar

1 vanilla pod

3 - 4 peaches

    

Directions

Pie crust

 1. Mix flour and butter in a food processor. Add the sugar and 1 egg yolk, work quickly into a dough.

2. Press out the pie dough directly into a pie pan (preferable with removable bottom about 26 cm in diameter). Prick the bottom with a fork. Place the dish in the freezer for 20 minutes.

3. Preheat the oven to 200 ° Celsius.

4. Bake the pie crust in the oven until it is lightly browned, about 15 minutes.

Filling

5. Whisk egg yolks, sour cream and sugar. Split the vanilla pod lengthways, scrape out the seeds and add them to the batter. Pour into pie shell.

6. Rinse and slice the peaches. Put them in a neat pattern over the batter.

7. Bake the pie in the oven about 40 minutes or until the batter has solidified.

Serve with ice-cream or whipped cream or custard sauce.

Homemade Custard Sauce

Ingredients

4 dl milk

2 eggs

2 tsp potato flour

1 tablespoon sugar

1 tablespoon vanilla sugar

Directions 

Whisk lightly together milk, eggs, sugar and potatoflour in a saucepan. Heat, stirring constantly, but do not let the sauce boil. Place the pan to cool when custard is getting thickness you like. Season to taste with vanilla sugar.

Vanilla sauce is quick to make, actually as fast as making from of a bag, and the taste of homemade is so good .

Raspberry and Rhubarb Pannacotta Pie

Raspberry and Rhubarb Pannacotta Pie

Ingredients:

Pie crust

10 chocolate dream cookies

10 gingerbread cookies

75 g butter

Filling:

3 sheets of gelatin

3 dl whipping cream

1 dl sugar

250 g raspberries and rhubarb

3 tbs agave syrup

3 tbs water

2 tsp cinnamon

200 g Philadelphia cheese (cream cheese)

Fresh berries for decoration

Directions:

For the pie crust mix the cookies in mixer until crushed to crumbs. Melt the butter. Mix the crushed cookie crumbs with the melted butter. Press the mixture into a cake pan with loose bottom. Put in the refrigerator while you make the filling.

Place the sheets of gelatin in a bowl with cold water.

For the filling: pour the cream in a pan and mix in the sugar. Place on oven and stir while heating until the sugar is melted. Remove from stove. Take the gelatin sheets out of the water and press the water out with your hand. Put the sheets in the mixture of cream and sugar. Stir until dissolved. Leave to cool a bit.

Put the raspberries and rhubarb in a pan and add the agave syrup, 3 tbs water and cinnamon. Stir while heating until the mixture is smooth and jam like. Cool off.

Mix half the jam of raspberries and rhubarb and all the Philadelphia cheese/cream cheese. Add this to the cooled off cream and gelatin mixture. Stir until smooth.

Pour the mixture on top of the cooled pie crust and place back into the refrigerator for at least 3 hours or until it is firm.

Serving take off the edge of the pie pan and place the bottom on a nice serving tray. Decorate by putting the rest of the jam of fruits as a layer on top of the pie. Decorate with fresh berries and whipped cream.

Tapioca Pudding

Tapioca Pudding

Ingredients:

3 cups coconut milk (or whole milk)

1/2 cup small-tapioca pearls (not instant)

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 large egg yolks, beat lightly 

1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise, seeds scraped and reserved

1/8 teaspoon fine salt

*Fresh strawberries for decoration

Instructions:

Place 1 cup of the milk and the tapioca pearls in a medium saucepan and stir to combine. Let the pearls soak uncovered at room temperature for 1 hour.

Add the remaining 2 cups of milk, sugar, egg yolks, vanilla seeds, and salt and stir to combine. Place the pan over medium heat and cook while stirring, until the mixture just comes to a simmer, about 10 minutes (do not let the mixture boil).

Reduce the heat to low and cook, while stirring, until the mixture thickens and the tapioca pearls are softened, about 15 minutes.

Serve warm (the pudding will thicken as it cools).

You can find Tapioca pearls in the Asien Markets. Tapioca comes in different colors, white, green or even pink or mixed colors together. Today I made my Tapioca dessert from mixed colors and decorated with fresh strawberries.

Pancake Dessert

  Pancake Dessert

This batch will make a small portion for about two people only.

• 3 large eggs

• 115 g almond flour

• 1 heaped teaspoon baking powder

• 140 ml milk

• 1 pinch salt

• Food coloring

• Quark, Cottage Cheese, Frosting * for decoration according to your choice

• 1 Banana

Directions

Mix the eggs, flour, milk, salt and baking powder. Divide the batch into different cups and add the food colors you want to each cup and stir. Fry the pancakes in a frying pan and cool off.

Making the cake

When cooled off cut the pancakes in halves. Place them on top of each other with a layer of frosting and banana slices in between. Place the pancakes with the cut edge out, to show the colors of the layers. If you want to avoid sweets totally, use natural yoghurt or quark between the layers instead of frosting. Since I wanted to make it cake-like I mixed frosting with vanilla tasting quark.  Another alternative could be to use cottage cheese between each layer and on top. Decorate with the frosting around the backside.

Healthy dessert or breakfast smoothie!

A healthy dessert or breakfast smoothie!

Ingredients:

Rhubarb

Prunes

Water

Non fat natural Yoghurt

Oatmeal

Sesame Seeds
Coconut flakes

Chocolate

Banana

Last night I wanted to have some small snack as it was Friday night. I didn´t have fresh fruit at home but I found I had some frozen Rhubarb in the freezer. So I tried to think of some other way to use the Rhubarb than making a pie with pie shell that would mean butter and fats. I really wanted to make a healthy dessert and no sugar or fats added. Still I was thinking it is a bit sour with Rhubarb without sugar and sweetening. So I was wrecking my brain really. I even found I had some dried Prunes in the kitchen cabinet.

Thursday I watched a program with Gordon Ramsey and he made a dessert from Yoghurt and fresh fruits. So I decided to take the idea and try to make my own variation with the ingredients I had. I even had some oatmeal and sesame seeds, coconut flakes and some dark chocolate and some bananas.

I made a compote of the Rhubarb by boiling it with a little water. And for the Prunes I did the same thing. I boiled them until totally soft and the fruits kind of dissolving into a compote. I than mixed it with a mixer and let it cool off completely. Since the Prunes are a bit sweet I got both the sweet and the sour tastes in the dish. If I had had strawberries for instance, or some other berries or fresh fruits, I could have used that and made the compote of instead. After making the compote I made it cool off completely and put it in the refrigerator for a while to get really cold.

The oatmeal, coconut flakes and sesame seeds I roasted in a pan and also cooled off completely.

After cooling I arranged the dessert in tall wine glasses to make it a big fancy with layers of natural, nonfat Yoghurt, a layer of Prunes compote, a layer of Rhubarb compote, banana slices, roasted Oatmeal, coconut flakes and sesame seeds, to the top of the glass.  For the dessert I topped it with some slices of banana and a little flakes of dark chocolate to make it look festive. 

 

It came out as a really fresh dessert. A bit sour with the Rhubarb without sweetening and a bit sweet with the Yoghurt, the Prunes and the bananas, and a bit crunchy with the roasted oatmeal and sesame seeds, and the small chocolate chips on the top.

I had some left over in the morning and made a variation of a smoothie for breakfast. Just with the same layers, but no chocolate on top. 

  

I deliberately chose to make the compote without sugar, but if you want a sweeter taste, add some teaspoon of sugar to the compote when boiling, or honey or like for instance Agave Syrup. It would give a sweeter taste if you prefer, but also some calories, which I avoided in this one. And the sugar not needed since I intended to not preserve the compote, but use it at once.

American Pumpkin Pie

American Pumpkin pie

I have made pumpkin pie many times but never been as satisfied with it as this time. The taste was incredible. And I believe it is because I baked the pumpkin to prepare the pumpkin meat instead of boiling it as I have done before. Try this receipt!

Ingredients:

Pie crust

3 dl wheat flour

2 tbs sugar

125 g butter

1 egg yolk

 

Filling

4 dl chopped pumpkin

2 eggs

2 dl sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ginger

½ tsp salt

2 tbs wheat flour

2 dl whipping cream

Directions:

The piecrust:

Mix the flour, sugar and butter together with your fingers to a grainy mass. Add the eggs and work the mass to a dough. Press the dough into a pie pan, about 24 cm in diameter. Let the pie crust rest in the pan in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.

The filling:

Bake the whole pumpkin in the oven for 1 hour on 180 degrees. The pumpkin is ready when it is soft when you press it. Take out from the oven and let it cool off. Cut open and remove all the seeds. Than spoon out the pumpkin meat and place it in a Sift to drain all the water out of the mass, leave it for about 30 minutes.

When the water is out mix the pumpkin meat into a pure, add the eggs, one at a time. Add the rest of the ingredients for the filling and mix it smooth and pour it into your pie crust.

Bake in the oven for about 50 minutes on 200 Celsius Degrees.

Serve with whipped cream or sift some icing sugar on top. I decorated with whipped cream and served the pie with some extra whipped cream on the side as well.

Norwegain Karamellpudding

Karamellpudding

6 dl milk 

(or 4 dl milk and 2 dl cream)

4 tbs sugar

1/2 ts vanilla sugar

5 eggs

2 dl sugar to make the caramell

Whisp eggs lightly together and add the sugar to dissolve. Add the milk and vanilla sugar.

Melt the sugar in a frying pan and pour into cold. Turn the mold so the sugar covers the bottom and edges of the mold. Fill the mold with the batter by pouring it through a sift. Fill only 3/4 full.

Bake in oven on 150 Celsius degrees for 2 hours. Place the mold in a pan with water. The water should not boil. Try the pudding with a toothpick to see when it is done.

Mango Sticky Rice

Mango Sticky Rice

 Ingredients

1 cup Thai sweet or sticky rice, available in Asian groceries
1 can coconut milk, unshaken
3 tablespoons raw or white sugar, divided
1 teaspoon salt, divided
1/2 teaspoon cornstarch (or tapioca flour, available in Asian groceries or in gluten-free section)
2 ripe mangos
Toasted sesame seeds and mint, to garnish
Covered saucepan
Steamer basket
Small saucepan
Instructions

Equipment

1. Gather your ingredients. The sticky rice is the most important thing here; you cannot use regular rice. Look for or ask for Sticky Rice in the store.

2. Soak 1 cup of dry sticky rice in water for about 1 hour. (Some recipes instruct you to soak it overnight, but 1 hour seems sufficient.)

3. Drain the rice and rinse it thoroughly. Then pour about 1 cup of water into a saucepan, and place the rice in a steamer insert inside the saucepan. Cover tightly and steam over low to medium heat for 20 minutes.

4. While the rice is steaming, make the first sauce. You will make two coconut sauces to go on the rice: One thin one to mix into the rice itself, and then a thicker sauce to spoon over top. Start by opening the can of coconut milk and spooning out the thick cream on top.

Place the thicker coconut cream in a small bowl. You should have approximately 1/2 cup, give or take a bit. (All measurements here are approximate, which is completely fine for this recipe.)

5. Pour the thinner, lighter coconut milk left in the can into a small saucepan. (It will be a little over 1 cup.) Stir in 2 tablespoons sugar and 3/4 teaspoon salt. Warm over medium heat, stirring frequently, for 5 minutes. Do not let the sauce boil.

6. By now the rice is probably done. The grains should be tender and shiny. Spoon the rice out into a bowl (it will be clumpy).

7. Slowly pour the warm coconut milk over the rice in the bowl, stirring frequently. You want the milk to coat the rice but not leave puddles. Keep stirring, and stop pouring in coconut milk when it looks like the rice is saturated. You may not use all of the milk.

8. Set the rice aside to finish absorbing the coconut milk; after 15 minutes or so it should have soaked up any milk that is still liquid.

9. While the rice is standing, make the coconut topping sauce. Rinse out the coconut milk saucepan, and pour in the coconut cream that you took off the top of the can. Stir in 1 tablespoon sugar, and 1/4 teaspoon salt. In a separate bowl, whisk together a few teaspoons of water and the cornstarch.

10. Whisk this cornstarch slurry into the coconut cream and cook over low heat for about 3 minutes, or until the mixture thickens considerably. Set aside.

11. To cut up the mango, first cut off the bottom so it can stand upright.

12. Slice away the skin in thin strips, until the mango is completely peeled.

13. Cut off the flesh in slices, starting with the broad cheeks on each side, then the thinner strips that will come off either side.

14. To serve, place about 1/3 cup cooked sticky rice on each plate, and arrange mango slices around it. Drizzle with the coconut topping sauce, and sprinkle with a few toasted sesame seeds.