KEEP THOSE KIDS OCCUPIED, THAT’S HOW.

Yesterday we did so many things. I entertained them with a buffet breakfast, changed them into their swimsuits and let them play with water at the balcony (one bath tub of water = 2 hours of fun. Quite worth it if you ask me) and ended the day BAKING these easy-to-make chocolate lava cookies which CBB absolutely adored.

The best part is NO mixer is needed – nobody got time to wash up! Look at these kids. Ask them to decorate with chocolate chips and see what they doing. They had fun in the process!

The cookies turned out pretty well – these are chunky, crumbly cookies, not crispy. Just the way they should be. The kids had fun decorating them:

Here’s how to make them.

The post Activity with Kids: No Mixer Chocolate Lava Cookies appeared first on Budgetpantry | Singapore Mummy Blog on Food, Recipe & Baby.

The Panasonic Cubie Oven (NU-SC100W) is an all-rounder Convection Steam Oven that lets you steam, roast, bake, healthy fry and even disinfect baby bottles and tableware in it.

Some amazing features of the Cubie Oven:
1. Prepare quick and healthy meals in no time at all
2. Multi-cooking functionality
3. Super easy to use!

Cooking styles
Steam
In the ‘Steam’ mode, hot steam is generated in just 20 seconds and the entire oven is filled with 100 °C steam in under three minutes. This translates to much faster cooking time as compared to traditional steaming methods. What I love most about this feature is there are no multiple items to wash – wok, steamer rack and what-have-yous. Just fill the water compartment at the top, place your dish inside the oven, turn the knob, press ‘Start’ and that’s it! A healthy and delicious meal is ready in minutes.

Hot air convection

The hot air convection function (healthy fry!) give you amazing results every time. With hot air convection, you can cook fried food with minimal oil and do away with the guilt of deep frying.

Steam + hot air convection

This is my favourite mode! Today’s recipe of Pandan Madeleine with Coconut Cream is made using this mode. With steam + hot air convection, the madeleines are first steamed to maintain moisture, and then baked to perfection. I love the crisp outer layer that you can achieve with this mode. You can use this function to roast vegetables too for kids and adults alike by first steaming the vegetables till cooked, then roasting or caramalising them. Yum!

So with the Panasonic Cubie Oven, you get these three super modes to ensure that your food turns out perfectly every time: Steam, Steam + Convection, and Convection only. You can even ferment bread dough in it! The 16 auto menus let you prepare delicious dishes in a jiffy. Some examples are steamed fish, steamed egg, steam frozen food (like mantou or buns!), steamed chicken, homemade yogurt, pizza, cheese cake, fried fish, chicken chop, breaded prawns, korean chicken wings and more.

Compact size

The Panasonic Cubie Oven is so compact, it’s unreal. Measuring only 355mm wide, it takes up just a small corner in my space-constraint kitchen. Yes, I do have three pull-out work tops for my small kitchen for prepping food (seriously the best decision made during renovation!), but the kitchen countertop is still so small. With the Cubie Oven, I can do away with multiple kitchen appliances as it fulfils so many functions in one. The multiple tray levels let you cook more than one dish at the same time. Like you can steam vegetables and make chawanmushi all at once. And don’t be fooled by the compact size. A whole fish of 28cm fits inside with no problems.

Verdict

The Panasonic Cubie Oven is compact, but powerful and versatile. A worthy addition to any kitchen! And yes, you can even disinfect baby bottles in it. Is this amazing or what?

Recipe

And now for my recipe of Pandan Madeleine with Coconut Cream made using the Steam + Convection mode. Everything is ready in less than 30 minutes including prep time. I hope you enjoy the recipe!

The post Panasonic Cubie Oven: Pandan Madeleine with Coconut Cream appeared first on Budgetpantry | Singapore Mummy Blog on Food, Recipe & Baby.

I love sticky glutinuous rice but am not a fan of the various steps involved and things to wash when making it. Well I have nothing to fear because there’s always my awesome everything-also-can-cook Tefal spherical pot rice cooker to the rescue!

All you need to do is wash the glutinuous rice grains, place them in your ricecooker, steep for 30 minutes and cook! While the rice is cooking, make the coconut sauce to add to the rice later. Slice up some mangoes and tada!

The crunchy bits on top of mango sticky rice is usually fried mung beans. You can get mung beans from the supermarket (I saw it at the Indian spices section at Giant) and fry them yourself. I didn’t want to do that so I got some fried dhal snacks from Sri Murugan opposite my house, crushed them and topped my sticky rice with them. So unauthentic but I love the crunch LOL. Alternatively, substitute mung beans with any crispy beans.

I used brown sugar for this recipe but you can use caster or white sugar if you wish.

The post Ricecooker Mango Sticky Rice appeared first on Budgetpantry | Singapore Mummy Blog on Food, Recipe & Baby.

How do you celebrate the year-end holidays? For me, I do it with get-togethers and food! Truly, December is a time for family and friends, and what’s a get-together without desserts? This year, I decided to bake a lovely pear, cranberry and chocolate crumble for one of our gathering sessions on Christmas Day!

The Pyrex® 950ml Limited-Edition Glass Storage Bakeware (Set of 2 in two designs)

Baking this delicious, buttery crumble is nothing short of easy, especially using the Pyrex® 950ml Glass Storage Bakeware. This made-in-USA limited edition Holiday Trees design is just the right size for about 4 servings, and like all Pyrex® bakeware, it is safe for use in the freezer, oven, microwave and top rack dishwasher. I am featuring the Holiday Trees design here, and there is another design in Snowflakes which you can see below.

I love it that it comes with a secure lid (can’t go into the convection oven!) for food on the go, cos it’s super useful when I have to transport food from home to gathering place! I can also store leftovers and do away with cling wrap or foil. What I adore about Pyrex® is that its non-porous glass will not absorb stains and odours and is a breeze to wash. Ahh.. Pyrex® – my favourite bakeware since I started cooking in my teens! I have 4-5 of them in varying sizes in my kitchen.

There are only a handful of ingredients in the basic version of a crumble recipe: fruit of your choice (apples, pears, peaches, bananas all work well), sugar, butter and flour. Yes! Without the ‘fancy’ stuff, a crumble is really one of the easiest things you could bake, quite foolproof too! For this version, I used ripe green pears and added chopped dates (you can use raisins) for the filling, and added rolled oats and chocolate chips to my crumble topping. I only used 50g sugar as I added chocolate chips. Once the bake was out from the oven, I decorated it with fresh cranberries for a perfect sweet and tart balance. Full recipe below!

Corelle® Collection in Nature Heart design

This delicious dessert will be perfect served on these beautiful Corelle® plates. Corelle® features:

Where to buy

The Pyrex® storage set (two designs: Holiday Trees and Snowflakes) valued at S$35.90 is a gift with purchase for any S$200 spent on any World Kitchen brands (Corningware®, Corelle®, Visions®) from all major department stores from 24 November 2016 to 3 January 2017. Both the limited edition, gift-with-purchase storage containers are random and while stocks last only! The Snowflakes design is gorgeous too – which do you like more?

See these posters for more promotion details:

If you like my posts and updates, or would like to be informed of baby/cooking-related giveaways and promos from time to time…..
Like my Facebook page or follow @budgetpantry or @chuabeebee on Instagram! Yes, I just started an Insta account for CBB too!

Recipe

The post Festive bake: Pear and chocolate oat crumble featuring Pyrex & Corelle appeared first on Budgetpantry | Singapore Mummy Blog on Food, Recipe & Baby.

What do you do with a loaf of bread with a ‘Use by’ date of tomorrow? Make fun food!

It is always funny to me how a slice or two of bread for a casual snack sounds excessive (at least to me), but transform them into a dessert and it becomes a snack that just disappears from the plate (into my tummy) within seconds! I had a few slices of bread which were just starting to go stale. The expiry date was the next day and there was no way we would be able to finish it. I sometimes toast them and make bread crumbs to coat my chicken fillets with, but most of the time I’m too lazy to do it.

So in order not to waste food, I made French Toast Nutella Rolls with the bread yesterday! Ok I didn’t exactly use Nutella, but I used Ovomaltine, which I bought from Candy Empire for $10.80 and later found in Sheng Siong for $6.90.

It’s really simple: choose your fruits (I used strawberries and bananas), spread a layer of Nutella or Ovomaltine on your bread, arrange the chopped fruits at the edge of the bread, roll it up and lightly press the seams down on your plate or work bench. Dip in beaten egg and fry in a little olive oil. Rotate all sides with a pair of tongs till they’re just turning golden.

My aunt and I had two flavours each and Jason polished off the last one. Leftover bread? No problem! This would be a fun activity to do with your kids or nieces and nephews. If you’re not into strawberries and bananas, you could also use blueberries, blackberries, apples and even cheese (chocolate and cheese is super yums)! Have fun rollin’!

The post French Toast Nutella Rolls – the easiest dessert ever! appeared first on Budgetpantry | Singapore Mummy Blog on Food, Recipe & Baby.