Homemade Kaya

My mother always made tonnes and tonnes of Kaya to give away to my godmother, my neighbours and her friends when I was younger.  And I do miss her kaya once in a while.  With kaya easily available at all bakery shops and supermarkets.  It seems no sense to make my own kaya.  What is however interesting to note is that when one turns and look at the ingredients list at the side of the bottles, one will find many preservatives on the list of ingredients.  The thickened kaya sold at supermarkets may also contain ingredients like modified starch.

The key problem with home-made kaya is therefore, given no preservative, often do not keep more than two weeks in the fridge.  I made a large batch a few years ago and as it was too much (and also too crazy) to finish it all within two weeks,  I actually stopped.  However, I do have a craving for homemade kaya again recently so decided to make it again.  It wasn't this bad this time round, as I halved the original recipe and also gave half to my mother-in-law which made her very happy.  Below are the ingredients and method for my recipe.

Ingredients:

1 bunch of pandan leaves (about 6- 8 leaves).  (separate into individual leaves.  For each leaf, further tie lenghwise into 3-4 strips.  Then tie the bundle into a knot.)

200 ml coconut milk (You may use the ready packets found in the supermarket)

200 g of sugar (You can use brown sugar, or even substitute with 1/2 -1/3 brown, black or "orange" sugar.  I used organic raw sugar for mine.  It is very versatile.  You can adjust sweeter or less according to taste as well.)

5 large eggs

Method:

 Strain the coconut milk over the top pot of a double boiler.

Add the sugar and eggs into the pot as well.

 Whisk well till the eggs, coconut milk and sugar are well-combined and the sugar has dissolved.

 Once mixed, put in the knot of pandan leaves. Place the mixture over bottom of a double boiler which is boiling.  Lower the flame till middle, till the water just boils with smaller bubbles.

 Continue whisking the top pot till the mixture turns into a thick custard, remove the pandanus leave.  The mixture may be a little lumpy, if you like it smoother, you can blend the mixture with an electric hand-held blender.

Fill into bottles that has been washed and preboiled in hot water the cooled down.  You should consume all the kaya within 2 weeks.

Onion Omelette

This is one of the simplest dish that everyone in my family loves and it is a great way to get my children to eat more onions.  It is also a dish that can be easily whipped up at anytime in my kitchen as I always have onions and eggs.  Okay so this is how the receipe goes. 

*Serving Size : 3 -4
*Preparation Time (including the cooking): 15 min

Ingredients:

• 4 large eggs
• 1-2 large yellow onions  (Proportion depends on whether you like more eggs or onion.  You may use the red onions, my mother-in-law favours this)
• sea salt, pepper, soya sauce (shoyu)  and fish sauce (optional)
• 2 tbsp sunflower oil (or any other cooking oil)

Procedure:

Peel the onions, wash it and slice it into slivers.

Heat the wok up using medium flame.  When the wok is evenly heated, drizzle in a layer to cooking oil.   While the oil is heating up, peel and slice the onion into slivers.  (See diagram left.)

Add the onion into the wok and lightly fry.  Drizzle in about 1/2 tsp. of light soya sauce at this moment.  This will make the onion more flavourful.  When the onion slivers start to brown at the edge, lower the flame so that it will not char.

At this point break the eggs into the bowl, add in about 1/4 tsp of sea salt, a pinch of pepper, 1/2 tsp. of light soya sauce and a dash of fish sauce.  The fish sauce is optional, but it does enhance the flavour of the eggs, so I always add it when I make omelette as I already have a bottle in my kitchen. (My mother used to swear by it.)

Mix the eggs up with a fork (or chopsticks).

Spread the onion in the wok evenly out on the base of the wok.  Pour the egg mixture over onions. Increase the heat to a medium flame.  Leave the mixture to cook and brown on the undersides.  The omelette is ready for flippling, when the centre of the omelette starts bubbling and the oil starts foaming from the edge of the omelette.

When the lower side has started browing (above) flip the omelette to now brown the top side, I usually split the omelette in half across the diameter using my spatula and flip one-half over with the spatula before flipping the other one in the same manner.  If it is difficult to manage you, you can quarter the omelette and flip each part by itself. 

Comments: 

1. 
   
   This omelette is cooked slightly different from the western way of cooking in which usually the raw onions are just mixed into the whole omelette and cooked.  The light frying in the first part makes the onion more fragrant.
2. 
   
   This is a great dish with Teochew Porridge.  If cooking for Teochew Porridge, you can add in a little more sea salt as the porridge is bland and this enhances the taste of the porridge.
3. 
   
   Again it is a very versatile dish, sometimes I add in shrimp or carrots or both for variations as well.  If putting in carrots and shrimp, you can lightly fry them after the onions start browning before adding in the mix.  When carrots and shrimp are added in, it becomes the common Egg Fu Yong dish which cost about $8 - $12 at a zi-char stall (a small stall selling dishes prepared on the spot either at a hawker centre or coffee shop in Singapore).

Singapore Style Traditional Breakfast in Jiffy - Eggs and Toast

Introduction:

 

 Eggs and Toast with Kaya (Egg Jam) and Butter or with Butter and sugar has always been my childhood food.  At times, I would even have it for breakfast in a row.  Many Singaporeans like it too, judging from the success (and also number) of the many franchises of "Yat Kun Coffeeshop" and "Killiney coffeeshop", this can be found in every coffeeshop in Singapore as well.  This has almost become "National Food" for Singapore.  I guess people like it because it brings back childhood memory.  For me, I hardly patronise the coffeeshops cause I simply find the breakfast too expensive.  For a buttered slice of toast sliced in half and small cup of coffee and 2 eggs, I have to pay between $2.50 to $4.00, where I can cook for my family at a much smaller price, and anyway I like to have it at home.

 

Here I share how I prepare the breakfast, brush my teeth, all in a jiffy in approximately (15 min - 20 min) for a morning for my family of four.

 

Recipe Name:  Soft Boil Eggs and Toast with Kaya and Sugar
Serves : 3-4

Time for preparation: 15 min - 20 min

 

Steps for preparation are

1. 
   
   Fill a saucepan with sufficient water to cover the eggs and set it on a stove for boiling.  You should have significantly more water so the temperature will not fall too much.  You need the heat to cook the eggs.
2. 
   
   Take out the eggs, I usually have 2 eggs per person.  They should be fresh and at room temperature.  If they were previously in the fridge, you may want to soak them room temperature water, like what I did below, to bring them quickly to room temperature.

  To ensure that my family do not get to exposed to homones or antibiotics.  I tend to choose eggs which chickens have not been fed on homones and antibiotics.  In Singapore, I usually buy eggs from Fairprice NTUC and I pick the Sakura Eggs.  It costs a little more at SGD$2.60 - $2.80 for a pack of eggs as compared to the regular eggs at $1.55 per pack of 10.

3.  At this juncture, while waiting for the water to boil, I will set my oven to 170 degrees Celsius and pop in the bread. I tend not to use the toaster (not because I cannot afford to use one), because I can toast the 6-8 slices of bread at one go.

4.  If possible, I will use the traditional bread which I usually get from Balestier Road when I visit my husband's grandmother, or my in-laws visit them on the weekends.  But sometimes, I will just use the ordinary sandwich loaf e.g. Gardenia High Fibre white bread.

5.  While waiting for water and toast, I pop into the bathroom to brush my teeth and cleanse my face.  When I am ready the water would be boiling and one side of the toast should be suitably browned.

6.  I will first turn the toast on the other side to brown the other side as well, before I attend to the eggs.

7.  For the eggs, there are usually a few ways to can cook it from here.

• First Method:  If you have 4 or less than 4 eggs.  You may want to use a gadget which is a soft boil egg maker.  I have one which I bought more than 10 years ago for SGD$5 at Carrefour.  It is just a simple container with a small hole at the bottom with gradations to indicate where to pour the water till.  You place the eggs and pour in the water to the appropriate level.  It works on controlling the amount of time the eggs get soaked in the hot water.
• Second Method:  If you have more than 4 eggs and do not own a softboil egg maker.  You can lower the eggs gently into the hot water with a spoon.  Cover the saucepan with a lid and keep it soaked for approximately 8 minutes.  If you like you yolk a little harder then 10 minutes. Note that if the weather is colder e.g. like in Sydney during winter, you need to soak for 15 minutes.  Alternatively, put the eggs in
  wide mouth thermos flask for 10 minutes.

The toasts should be nicely toasted on the other side as well and should be ready for eating. Remove from oven.  If the toast is too thick, use a bread knife to slit it in half from the middle (I like the thick toasts, cause when slit in half it is extremely thin and just crumbles when I bite into it.)

8.  Essentially the breakfast is ready.  Just crack the eggs into a bowl and add soya sauce and pepper to taste. Take the toast and butter it with butter and Kaya (coconut and egg jam), my children likes butter sprinkled with sugar.  Dip the toast into the soft-boiled eggs and enjoy your breakfast.