For me, one of the best things to eat is a warm, crispy, flaky pastry filled with savoury mushrooms and melted cheese. Imagine my joy when I discovered I could have “pastries” in any form, with any filling sweet or savoury anytime I wanted, straight from my Philips Airfryer. The “pastries” are in inverted commas because…….. I make them with Chinatown Frozen Prata.

(grabbed from Chinatown Corporation’s website- I use the plain ones in green packaging)

These delicious puffs were a result of three things: laziness, budget and sunshine. It was a pretty Saturday morning where I am usually too lazy to cook. There is normally no one at home (the two old ladies like to go OG shopping on Saturdays) and the husband WILL be sleeping. I rummaged my kitchen in search of anything I could put together without “wasting” an ingredient. For example, if there’s a brand new package of mushrooms in my fridge, I won’t open it just to make a snack. I would be putting myself in a position where I’ll have to use up those mushrooms quick or have them go bad.

And that was what happened that day. I had some mushrooms left over from the Japanese Mushroom Hot Pot which had to be used up. And then I had frozen prata. And mayo. And THERE WAS SUNLIGHT. These days, when I cook, I take a picture. If the light was bad, sometimes I don’t cook because I can’t take a picture. Does that make sense?

You could do these a few ways: add a drop of flavoured oil and toss it with the mushrooms, a sprinkle of paprika, some cheese, have it twisted closed beautifully or simple haphazardly gathered up for a open-faced puff.. the variations are endless. You could also make banana/ apple strudel puffs using these frozen prata which I will share in another post!

For now, I think it’s time to savour these amazing mushroom puffs.. done in less than 10 minutes!

The post Airfried Mushroom Prata Puff appeared first on Budgetpantry | Singapore Mummy Blog on Food, Recipe & Baby.

Remember the 水饺面 / Dumpling Noodle that I made recently? I cooked it again for Sunday brunch!

This time, I decided to make an airfried version on top of the regular boiled one. I added more water chestnuts and a teaspoon of fish sauce to the marinade, and the filling was even more delicious than the previous version.

Jason was beyond happy:

We shared the portion la, although he is getting more gluttony these days, I wasn’t about to overfeed him. Does this happen to anyone of you? You know, your husband never gets full?

I airfried these in my Philips Airfryer for just 7 minutes at 180 degrees. I kept opening the basket to check cos I know dumpling skins get golden reallyy quick. I was kinda worried that the meat wouldn’t get cooked, but these turned out very well.

To learn how to fold the dumplings this way, go to Just One Cookbook. Nami has step-by-step pictures on folding gyoza and the effect is the same. This website will also help alot.

Have fun, and enjoy making these airfried dumplings! They’re great as a snack and remind me of dim sum.

The post Airfried Crispy Dumplings appeared first on Budgetpantry | Singapore Mummy Blog on Food, Recipe & Baby.

This recipe is just in time for Chinese New Year!

I’ve been seeing deep fried crab sticks disguised as Chinese New Year goodies these couple of years and am intrigued by the ingenuity of the sellers. I mean, this is such a simple thing to prepare and takes no effort, and you’re selling it at the same price as pineapple tarts? No way am I gonna fork out $16-$18 for a bottle of this! I decided to make my own this CNY.. 3 heaped plates of the above for $1.90? My wallet (and principle) says “Yes!”

This is super easy to make and it turned out crispy and fragrant. I didn’t even pat them dry nor do anything extra. My aunt even said these taste better than prawn crackers. If you’d like, you can do Cajun flavoured or curry flavoured ones… just sprinkle lightly with seasoning! Small tip: I didn’t face the problem of the crab sticks flying everywhere, but if you do, you can place a steamer rack over – I think it will help a bit.

Note: I tried out another popular brand, Li Chuan crab sticks from Sheng Siong and didn’t like it. Although they were crispy, it was because of the higher ratio of flour:fish paste. It lacked fragrance and was also dry. I don’t recommend it. There are also two types of DODO crab sticks – one frozen and one from the chiller section. Although they taste the same, I found the ones from the chiller easier to unroll. Recently, I’ve tried out air frying at 160C for a longer time (instead of at 180C) and prefer it this way! I have updated the recipe’s temperature below :)

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