Wednesday 26 February 2014

Air-fried Button Mushroom Melt

It's mushroom time again, couldn't get enough of these Smurfette's houses...
La la la-la la la
Sing a happy song
La la la-la la la
Smurf it all day long

Remember this song? Oh my, so nostalgic... LOL.




Ingredients
About 10 button mushrooms
Salt and black pepper
Italian dried mixed herbs
Olive oil
Cheddar cheese
Mozzarella cheese
Dried dill (optional as garnish)

Methods
1. Rinse the mushrooms and remove stems.
2. Season with pinch of salt (go light with salt), black pepper, Italian dried mixed herbs and a little olive oil. Mushroom has it's own unique yummy taste and it is perfectly alright to skip these seasoning. On certain days I don't season them at all, going Au natural. Adding a little olive oil to coat the mushrooms is for preventing them drying out with Airfryer (AF).
3. Pre-heat AF at 180 degree C for about 3-5mins.
4. While AF is pre-heating, place all the seasoned mushrooms into the AF wire basket with the hollow part facing upwards. Sprinkle both cheddar & mozzarella cheese on top of each mushroom cap.
5. At 180 degree C, AF the mushrooms for 7-8 mins.
6. Dish out and sprinkle with some green herbs (optional) like parleys, basil, drill, etc and serve hot.

Enjoy these juicy and cheesey mushrooms while singing 'the happy song' ;)


The other mushroom dish that uses AF is at http://yukiecody.blogspot.sg/2014/02/air-fried-mushroom-melt.html

Saturday 22 February 2014

Mochi Cheese Puffs (Brazilian Cheese Puffs pão de queijo)






Ingredients

1 beaten egg
1/3 cup olive oil
2/3 cup fresh milk
170g tapioca starch
50g mozzarella OR cheddar cheese (I used a mix of both cheese)
50g parmesan cheese
1 tsp salt

Methods
1. Add all ingredients into a blender and use a spoon to stir first.
2. Switch on your blender and using slow speed to blend the batter smooth.
3. Pre-heat oven at 200 degree C.
4. Grease mini muffin pan with butter and use an ice cream scoop to fill each muffin hole till brim. You can also use silicon baking ware for this. The recipe will yield about 14 puffs.
5. Bake for 20mins or until the top is slightly brown.
6. Cool a little and remove using a cutlery knife.

Modified from MummyMoo's recipe

Notes
- Try not to use donut tray for this as it will not puff up nicely and result in a dense and hard texture. 
- This only taste good for a day, the puffs will lose their texture and not as soft on the second day. 
- Adding more cheese is not advisable, it will result in a  heavier puffs and harder texture.


Oven View
Puffing puffing away, look at how much they puffed up?! It was about double the size, so interesting to watch the puffing process.

Wednesday 19 February 2014

Air-fried Turkish Yogurt Grilled Chicken


Ingredients
2 deboned chicken thighs (cut into small pieces about 5x4 skewers)
2 tsp minced fresh tomatoes
2 tsp plain yogurt
1 sprig rosemary (chopped)
1-2 tsp honey
Salt & pepper

Methods
1) Marinate the thigh meat with all seasoning overnight and thread the meat on skewers
2) Airfry at 180 degree C for about 12-14 mins, check especially after 10 mins
3) Serve with grilled pumpkins and your favorite chilli/creamy sauce.

Grilled pumpkin
Remove skin and cut the pumpkin into small pieces. Season with black pepper and salt, spread a little oil and air fry at the base at 180 degree C for 15mins or until they are soften with a little browning.


I use the base of Airfryer to grill the pumpkins, followed by baking mussel button mushrooms using the basket. Lastly is to stack the double rack on the basket for the chicken skewers by cooking 3 items at the same time. This requires close monitoring because their timing are different, the only common requirement is the temperature where 180 degree C is used.






Air-Fried Spinach Frittata




Ingredients
1 small red onion - minced
1/3 pack of spinach
3 eggs
Salt, pepper n mozzarella cheese



Methods
1) Preheat Airfryer at 180deg C

2) In baking pan, add oil for a min
3) Add minced onions into the pan for 2-3mins or until they turned translucent
4) Add spinach n fry for abt 3-5mins to about half cooked. They may looked a bit dry but it is ok, just keep frying with the oil.
5) Whisk the beaten eggs, season n add cheese then pour into pan
6) Bake for 8mins or until cooked

Air-Fried Mushroom Melt

Playing again with my Airfryer and it's baking pan. The pan may look small but it could whip up quite a decent portion depending on what you are cooking. Those who love mushrooms and cheesy stuffs will fall for this. Recipe below is meant for 2 pax as we love mushrooms, just couldn't get enough of it.


Ingredients

A pack of portobello mushrooms (about 8 pieces,sliced)
A pack of golden needle mushrooms
2 tbsp of yellow capsicum (sliced)
1 tbsp of red capsicum
(sliced) 
1 small red onion (sliced)
1 tbsp butter
Salt n pepper
Cheddar n mozzarella cheese



Methods



1) In Airfryer baking pan switch to 180deg C and melt the butter for a min
2) Add onion for 2mins
3) Add capsicums for 2mins
4) Season mushrooms with salt & pepper, add into pan and mix well. Cook for 5mins
5) Give a good stir to moisturize the mushrooms & cook for another 5mins
6) Sprinkle cheese and melt it for about 2mins under 200deg C

7) Serve hot 




Tuesday 11 February 2014

Air-fried Hasselback Potatoes



Ingredients
2 russet medium potatoes
2 tbsp of butter
2-3 garlic cloves (minced)
Salt and black pepper
Shredded cheddar cheese
Shredded mozzarella cheese


Methods
1) Scrub and clean the potatoes (skin intact).
2) Slice potatoes thinly but not through, by placing a chopstick at each side will prevent slicing through.
3) Melt butter & fry minced garlic on wok.
4) Preheat air fryer at 180 degree C for 3-5mins.
5) Line the air fryer grill pan/basket with foil with the sides fold up to act like a shallow pan, this will help to collect the melted butter.
6) Pour melted butter over potato without garlic, garlic will be burnt will add in to air fry for a long time.
7) Air fry for 30mins same temperature.
8) Baste the potatoes with melted butter collected on the foil at every 10mins interval
9) 2-3 mins before done sprinkle with salt, pepper, cheddar n mozzarella cheese


Tips:
- The cooked garlic minced could be use for another dish, the main idea is for the butter to be fragrant. 
- Basting helps to prevent the potatoes from drying up.

Air-fried Baked Rice

Michelle shared a fantastic idea to bake rice using air fryer for whatever leftover from the previous meal. So I purposely cooked additional rice and made more creamy butter sauce for the previous meal, I also kept some broccoli and carrots to be used. Here's my version of baked rice using another Philips accessory, the baking pan.


Ingredients
2 pax overnight cooked rice
1 tbsp butter
4 garlic cloves (minced)
3 tbsp of broccoli florets
2 tbsp of carrot cubes
1 veal sausage (sliced)
8-10 tbsp of creamy sauce (I used the leftover from creamy butter sauce)
3 tbsp of shredded cheddar cheese
2 tbsp of shredded mozzarella cheese

Methods
1) Preheat air fryer for 3-5mins at temperature 180 degree C.
2) Melt butter inside baking pan for about 1-2mins.
3) Saute minced garlic for about 1-2mins or until fragrant.
4) Add in broccoli florets and carrot cubes to fry for 3-4mins. Add a little water will help to speed up the softening.
5) Add sausage slices and cook for 2-3mins or until they turn slightly browned.
6) Add in the rice and mix well.
7) Pour in the enough creamy sauce and mix well, level the rice with a ladle.
8) Sprinkle cheese evenly and air fry for 8-10mins. Above photo was done in 8mins.

Tips: You could use whatever ingredients you have and any store bought pasta sauce.

Sweet Hearts Cheesecake


"Oh no my block of cream cheese is expiring soon!" I exclaimed when I was checking my stuffs from the fridge. Time to make something out of it, here's a easy one from Angela Chia.

Ingredient

250g cream cheese block
65g castor sugar
1 beaten egg
6 oreo cookies
Fresh vanilla beans or essence
Red food coloring gel
Toothpick

(Recipe modified from Angela Chia's.)

Method
1) Remove the cream sandwiched between the oreo cookies and place the cookies into bakable cup.
2) Cut cream cheese block into cubes and whisk together with the sugar well. Add in egg and vanilla beans till combined.
3) Scoop the mixture into 6 cups and leave a bit of the mixture for coloring. Firmly tap/knock the cups on tabletop to burst the trapped bubbles.
4) Using a piping bag, snip off the tip and pipe 7 dots on the top.
5) Use a toothpick to circle/ connect all the 7 dots forming a trail of connecting hearts.
6) Bake at pre-heated oven at 150 degree Celsius for about 20mins.
7) Cool at room temperature and fridge for at least 4 hours before serving.

The fresh vanilla beans really enhanced the flavor

Air-fried Rosemary Garlic Grilled Prawns

I wonder what took me so long to pen down recipes for air-frying dishes. This kitchen appliance is my new love and it really does wonders being a helpful assistance. Not only that I could cooked french fries without oil or little oil, it makes food juicer and cook faster. Here's a grilled dish making use of my newly purchased accessories, the double rack with skewers.



Ingredients
8 prawns (medium size will be ideal, mine were large prawns)
3-4 garlic cloves (minced)
1/2 tbsp melted butter
1 sprig rosemary leaves (chopped)
salt & black pepper
Green capsicum (prepare 8 slices)

Methods
1) Marinate the prawns with all above seasoning for an hour or longer.
2) Use 2 prawns and 2 capsicum slices per skewer.
3) Preheat air fryer.
4) With temperature 180 degree C grill the prawns for 5-6 mins.
5) Increase temperature to 200 degree C and grill for a min.

Tips:
Sometimes when I ran out of time I will lessen the marination timing for prawns, probably just a 10mins will do.

For air frying, you could always open the drawer to check on your food and it is advisable to do so. After all this cooks faster compared to conventional cooking hence is good to check before they turn overcooked.

This dish could be done in oven as well. It is much faster to do it in air fryer and the prawns will retain the juiciness. The only disadvantage will probably be the quantity, you can't grill a lot at one go.

Creamy Butter Prawns

The pricing for seafood is known to be expensive during Chinese New Year but not all true for this year. I learned from the news that the price for prawn has gone down instead. So here it is, more prawn dishes on the dining table ;) The recipe is available at Creamy Butter Crab page except that I replaced crab with prawn and omit curry leaves since I didn't have it. I have also added small red onion which added some sweetness to the dish.
I used 8 large prawns for this but maintained the amount of sauce quantity which will be a lot. I did it on purpose to keep the creamy butter sauce for the next day to make baked rice.