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This amazing cream cheese frosting is a perfect compliment for a carrot cake. Slather over the entire cake or spread on individual slices—tastes heavenly. Of course, you can also choose to eat it with anything you want. Bread? Sure! Pretzels? Go ahead! Bacon? Okay, I haven’t tried this one, but you certainly can. d:
WARNING: This recipe is just for the frosting. If you want to eat it with carrot cake, we have a healthy recipe for that here. We are also posting another, less healthy one that we just tried recently very soon. Wait for it.
Makes enough to make 3 layers of 10″ round
- 12 oz. (336 g) cream cheese, at room temperature
- ⅔ cup granulated/superfine sugar
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 tbsp grated lime zest
- 1 tbsp lime juice
- 1⅔ cup sour cream, at room temperature
- Put cream cheese, sugar, and salt in a mixer bowl. Beat at medium-high speed with a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment until light and fluffy, approximately 7 minutes.
- Fold in the lime zest, lime juice, and sour cream until incorporated.
- Cover and refrigerate until stiff enough to spread, about 30 minutes.
With a carrot cake, this frosting also tastes heavenly with rum-soaked raisins. Get 1 cup raisins and soak in rum for at least 30 minutes (or overnight). Slice the carrot cake horizontally into 3 layers. Divide the frosting into 3 parts. Frost the first two layers and divide the raisins between the two layers. Stack all three layers and frost the top of the cake.
If you don’t own a paddle attachment, you can use the normal beater as well, though you should beat the mixture for shorter time.
To improve the appearance, you can replace up to half tbsp of grated lime zest with longer (half to 1 cm) zest.
Acknowledgment: The recipe is adapted from carrot cake recipe in The Sweet Spot by Pichet Ong. 
This is a recipe passed on from a Danish mother to his Danish son, to my Singaporean friend and then to me! There has been some contention whether this is a pie, strudel or crumble. But who cares? It’s amazingly easy and good! It requires almost no measuring, just lots of instincts and calories.
Makes approx. 5 servings
- 1 cup plain flour
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 3/4 cup butter
- 2 peeled thinly sliced apples
- Preheat the oven to 180 °C.
- Lay the apples at the bottom of the baking dish and cover with sufficient water such that all the apples are just covered.
- Mix the flour, sugar and butter and lay the mixture on the apples. The mixture should be dry and slightly crumbly. If not, add more flour.
- Bake for about 1 hour, stop just before the mixture cease bubbling. The apple flavour should have infused into the crumble.
- It is almost impossible to serve this crumble onto individual plates so just dig in and bond! hygge.
A pinch of cinnamon and nutmeg can be added to the pastry for more flavours
This is also excellent when served with ice cream.
Acknowledgment: Jakob for the recipe and Toh Wen Qiang for the demo!
This is a simple to make moist cake which like our carrot cake, turns out to be more like a kueh, but we still love it! A perfect recipe to use up those forgotten apples at the bottom of your fruit chiller.
Make 1 10″ tube or Bundt cake (12 servings)
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp freshly-grated nutmeg
- ½ tsp salt
- 3 large eggs
- 1 cup light brown sugar, firmly packed
- ½ cup vegetable oil (corn or canola)
- 3 cups peeled, cored and coarsely peeled apples
- 1 10″ tube or Bundt pan, sprayed with vegetable cooking spray or thinly coated with oil/butter
- Set a rack in the middle level of the oven and preheat to 350°F (180°C).
- Mix flour, baking soda, spices, and salt together thoroughly. Sift once.
- In a large mixing bowl, whisk eggs to break them up. Whisk in the brown sugar, followed by the oil.
- Fold in the half of the grated apples using large rubber or wooden spatula.
- Fold in the flour mixture, followed by the rest of the apples.
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top.
- Bake the cake for 45 to 55 minutes, or until it is well risen and firm, and a toothpick inserted halfway at the centre of the pan comes out clean.
- Cool the cake in the pan on a rack for 5 minutes, then unmold it to a rack to cool completely.
For advance preparation, double-wrap the cake in plastic and freeze for up to a month. Bring to room temperature before serving.
It is much easier to grate a whole apple than a sliced up one.
Acknowledgment: This is a slightly simplified recipe from Perfect Light Desserts (Nick Malgieri & David Joachim).
This simple soup is quick to make and delicious. Serve this as a side dish to a main meal. I also like to eat this alone as breakfast. You can prepare the soup in less than 5 minutes if you have dashi stock at hand.
Makes 4 servings
- 3 medium eggs
- 3½ cups dashi stock
- 1 tbsp shoyu
- 1 tbsp mirin
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 tsp potato starch or cornstarch
- Warm the dashi stock in a saucepan. Add the shoyu, mirin, and salt.
- When the dashi stock is almost boiling, mix the potato starch in 1 tablespoon of cold water and set aside. Beat the eggs in a bowl.
- When the dashi stock comes to boil, stir in the potato flour mixture—this will lightly thicken the soup.
- Stir in the eggs and remove from the heat so that the eggs are not overcooked.
- Use a chopstick to immediately stir the egg clockwise 3 or 4 times, then counterclockwise 3 or 4 times. The eggs should break up nicely into small, delicious bits.
- Serve immediately in small bowls.
If you can’t get shoyu (Japanese soy sauce), replace that with scant ½ tbsp chinese light or dark soy sauce. If you choose to use light soy sauce, the colour of the soup may not turn dark enough (I personally find its look a little unappetizing, though the flavour does not change much).
You can use either the powdered dashi stocks sold in Japanese market or make the dashi stock yourself.
The recipe from this lasagna comes from… the back of the San Remo’s lasagna packet! Well actually, only for the cheese sauce. We used our own ragù recipe for the meat sauce. After multiple tries and modifications, this might actually be worth a try. ;) We named this San Remo lasagna in honour of the back-of-the-packaging inspiration though.
Serves 6 as a main course
For the cheese sauce
- 2 tbsp butter
- 65 g shredded cheddar
- 65 g shredded mozzarella
- 2 cups whole milk
- 2 tbs plain flour
- Prepare either of the meat sauce recipe.
- When the meat sauce is almost done, start preparing the cheese sauce: Melt butter in a saucepan and stir in the flour; fry for 3 minutes.
- Remove from heat and stir in the milk.
- Return to heat and stir over medium fire for about 15 minutes. Its okay not to stir it continuously.
- Add in the cheese and stir the mixture till all the cheese melts.
- Preheat the oven to 180 degree celcius.
- Assemble the lasagna in a 12″ x 12″ baking dish. The base layer will be the meat sauce. Followed by a layer of lasagna sheet, meet sauce and cheese sauce. Repeat the three layers to make about 3 to 4 layers in total. Remember to always end with the cheese sauce layer.
- Grate the additional cheese over the lasagna and bake for 40 minutes.
The pasta sheets will expand when cooked, so there is no need to ensure that the sheet covers the whole layer. You can of course also overlap the lasagna sheets to cover the baking dish if you like pasta.
The difficulty in the recipe is adjusting the moisture level of the ragù such that the pasta sheets can be properly rehydrated and cooked without becoming soggy. This will depend on the shape of your baking dish ,the number of layers you have and the exact temperature of your oven, to name a few. Have fun experimenting!.
For the cheese sauce, you can also use cheddar only or mozzarella only (or any combination of the two cheese to make up 130 g).
Acknowledgment: San Remo instant lasagna packaging for the cheese sauce recipe.
This is our improvisation over the mushroom-flavoured beef ragù recipe that we posted before. The story begins one fine morning when we realized that we had half a pumpkin left over from the pumpkin soup we made a week earlier. While Ying Ying decided to make pumpkin soup, I decided against it later on. Too bad the pumpkin and carrot were already baked. I remembered reading Jamie Oliver using pumpkin in one of his lasagna recipe. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the recipe with us. Oh well, what better than to improvise ourselves! Surprisingly, the lasagna turns out really good. Here is the ragù with pumpkin recipe. (Oh, and did I tell you that we only had 300 g of beef?)
Makes approx. 900 g
- 300 g minced beef
- 200 g minced pork
- 1 heaping cup (~250 g) Prego fresh mushroom flavoured sauce
- 1½ white onion, chopped roughly
- 2 shallots, smashed and minced
- 3 cloves garlic, smashed and minced
- 1 fresh tomato, diced
- Tomato sauce (to taste)
- 2 tbsp sugar
- 2-3 tbsp margarine
- 1 tsp freshly-ground nutmeg
- White and black pepper (to taste)
- Salt (to taste)
- 2 cups warm water
For the baked pumpkin
- ½ medium pumpkin
- 1 large carrot
- vegetable oil
- First prepare the baked pumpkin and carrots. Preheat the oven to 180 °C. Chop the pumpkin and carrots into large pieces (approximately 3 cm x 3 cm). Smear the baking tray with some oil and place the pumpkin (with the skin side up) and carrots on a baking tray. Bake for 35 minutes.
- When the pumpkin is done, remove the skins gently. Dice the carrots into small cubes.
- Heat the margarine in a large wok until bubbling but not brown and fry the onion. When the onions are turning soft, add garlic and shallots and fry for another 30 seconds.
- Add the minced beef and pork and fry until they are no longer pink, ensuring that there is no big lump of meat.
- Mix in the Prego sauce. Stir in tomato sauce, salt, both peppers, nutmeg and sugar. Mix thoroughly and fry for 3-4 minutes.
- Mix in 2 cups of warm water and the diced tomato.
- When the meat sauce starts to simmer, mix in chopped pumpkin and diced carrots.
- Cover the wok and stir occasionally until the water is reduced to half the volume (but still wet). Taste the ragù and adjust the seasonings as necessary. The ragù should taste a little sweet due to the pumpkin.
- Continue simmering until most of the water has been reduced, stirring more often to prevent the ragù from burning.
We find this ragù a very good match as lasagna sauce. The saltiness from the cheese sauce perfectly balance the additional sweetness from the pumpkin, while the pumpkin also provides a much better consistency for the lasagna.
Acknowledgment: This is an improvisation over our original beef ragù recipe with the pumpkin inspiration from Jamie Oliver.
This is a favourite cake of ours. Carrot cake simply tastes amazing! And it is also very healthy with no butter or margarine. So go ahead try making one! If you follow this recipe exactly, the cake is likely to be very dense, with a kueh-like consistency.
Make 1 10″ tube or Bundt cake (16 servings)
- 2¾ cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp freshly-grated nutmeg
- ½ tsp salt
- 3 large eggs
- 2 large egg whites
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed
- 1 cup unsweetened applesauce
- ½ vegetable oil (corn or canola)
- 1 tbsp finely-grated orange zest (optional)
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 3 cups peeled, grated carrots
- 1 10″ tube or Bundt pan, sprayed with vegetable cooking spray or thinly coated with oil/butter
- Reduced-fat cream cheese (optional)
- Set a rack in the middle level of the oven and preheat to 350°F (175°C).
- Stir flour, baking powder, baking soda, spices, and salt together thoroughly. Sift once.
- In a large mixing bowl, whisk eggs and egg whites to break them up. Whisk in the granulated and brown sugar. Then whisk in the applesauce and oil, followed by orange zest and vanilla. Make sure that the applesauce is sufficiently cooled before adding to the eggs to avoid heat denaturation at this stage.
- Fold in the carrots using large rubber or wooden spatula.
- Fold in the flour mixture. Don’t overmix!
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top.
- Bake the cake for about an hour, or until it is well risen and firm, and a toothpick inserted halfway at the centre of the pan comes out clean.
- Cool the cake in the pan on a rack for 5 minutes, then unmold it to a rack to cool completely.
- Optionally, spread a slice with cream cheese. For less healthy choice, slather the entire cake with cream cheese.
For advance preparation, double-wrap the cake in plastic and freeze for up to a month. Bring to room temperature before serving.
We have no idea what is a Bundt pan too. We used a disposable aluminium tray and it works too!
To make the apple sauce, cut two large apples into small pieces and place in a saucepan with just enough water to cover. Bring to boil, then simmer for 20 minutes. If the apples get very dry before that, add some water. Use a potato masher or fork to break any large pieces.
Baking powder is DIFFERENT from baking soda. Baking soda is sodium bicarbonate, baking powder is sodium bicarbonate with a leavening acid and a filler (usually starch). An interesting experiment would be to try different proportions of the baking soda and baking powder. Do drop us a message if you get any interesting results!
Acknowledgment: This is a slightly simplified recipe from Perfect Light Desserts (Nick Malgieri & David Joachim).
This Foo Yung Hai (some sort of omelets with fillings) recipe was born out of my frustration when searching for Foo Yung Hai recipe online. You see, I’ve eaten Indonesian-style Foo Yung Hai a lot when I was small, and I was pretty sure that those recipe I found won’t recreate the same flavour. This one does come close, even though it uses beef instead of pork that my mom used. Oh well. It tastes great!
Serves 4 people (Makes 2 omelets)
- 200 g minced beef
- ¾ onion, sliced thinly
- 1 tsp ginger, minced
- 3 cloves garlic, smashed and minced
- 1 shallot
- 1 tbsp light soy sauce
- 1½ cup water
- ½ chicken stock cube
- ½ tsp dried basil or 1 tsp fresh basil, chopped
- White pepper, black pepper, salt—to taste
- Vegetable oil
- 8 eggs
For the sweet and sour sauce
- 3 tbsp white rice vinegar
- 2 tbsp white wine
- 3 tbsp sugar
- 3 tbsp tomato sauce
- 2 tsp light soy sauce
- 2 tsp cornflour
- 1½ cup water
- 2 cloves garlic, smashed and minced
- ½ tsp ginger
- ¼ onion, chopped roughly
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- To prepare the sweet and sour sauce, mixed vinegar, white wine, sugar, tomato sauce, and soy sauce in a bowl.
- Heat oil in a saucepan and fry onions until soft. Add ginger, and fry for a few more seconds. Then add garlic and fry for about 30 seconds.
- Add the sauce mix to the saucepan, followed by water. Heat under medium heat until it begins to simmer.
- Add cornflour, stirring until it dissolves. Simmer in medium-low fire for about 15 minutes. Stir occasionally. The sauce should be more sweet than sour and the flavour should not be too strong.
- Meanwhile heat 2 tbsp oil in a wok and fry onions for the omelette fillings until soft. Add ginger, garlics, and shallots. Fry for another 30 seconds.
- Add the minced beef to the pan. Fry until it is no longer pink, ensuring that there is no large pieces.
- Add white pepper, black pepper, basil, and soy sauce and mix thoroughly.
- Add water and half the stock cube (you can cut it into small pieces before adding). Mix well and let simmer until half the water has been reduced. Add salt to taste. Further reduce the water until only a little is left.
- To make a single omelet, heat 1 tbsp oil in a flat, medium frying pan. Meanwhile, whisk 4 eggs together and mix in half of the meat mixture.
- When the oil is hot, pour the mixture and fry under high heat. Keep scraping the egg to the center so that the watery mixture will run down and set faster. When the egg is half set, lower the fire to medium low. Fry until the egg looks set, then flip the omelet. Fry for another 15 seconds and slide to serving plate.
- Fry the other omelet.
- When serving, pour the sweet and sour sauce on the omelet.
If you are making 1 omelet or more than 2 omelets, you can make the meat mixture wetter and save the unused mixture (and sweet and sour sauce) in the fridge. The next time you want to fry the omelet, warm the meat mixture and follow the step from the preparation of the egg-meat mixture onwards.
This recipe should work well with minced pork or minced chicken too. Perhaps with some minor adjustment to the flavouring.
Acknowledgment: This is an original recipe.
This is a soup great cold for a hot day or hot for a cold day! The mild taste of the pumpkin goes well with spice and buttered toast.
Serves 6 bowls
- ½ local (Singapore) pumpkin
- 800 mL chicken stock
- salt and freshly-ground black pepper
- 1 carrot
- 2 onions, diced
- 1 potato, cubed
- 1 onion, diced
- 2 garlic cloves, diced
- Chop the pumpkin into 3 inch cubes and place skin up on a baking dish. Peel and chop up the carrot. Drizzle with oil. Bake at 180 °C for 40 mins.
- Scrap the flesh off the pumpkin smash it with the carrot.
- Heat 2 tbps of oil and fry the onions and garlic till soft.
- Fry the potatoes till soft.
- Add in the smashed pumpkin and carrot.
- Add in the chicken stock and bring to a boil.
- Leave to cool and blend in a food processor or use a hand held food processor.
- Serve with freshly ground black pepper.
Make your own chicken stock or simply use a UHT packaged version but skim off the fat/oil before use.
This soup can be frozen for up to 6 months. Do not worry if the soup separates upon thawing. Just warm it up and its as good as fresh!
This is a very versatile soup which can be used as a mushroom sauce too. Though healthy sounding, this original recipe is not easy on the arteries so do go easy on it. For a much healthier version which does not compromise on taste, see cooking tip #4.
Serves 6 bowls
- 500 g fresh swiss brown mushroom
- 600 mL chicken stock
- 200 mL water
- salt and freshly-ground black pepper
- 80 g butter
- 2 onions, diced
- 1 clove garlic, squashed
- 2 onions, diced
- 2 tbsp plain flour
- 3 tbsp cream
- Wash the mushrooms quickly but thoroughly and dry with paper towel.
- Cut the mushrooms into very small pieces. This will take some time but do not be lazy.
- Melt the butter in a big pot, add the onions and garlic before the butter turns brown.
- When the onions are soft but not browned, add the mushrooms.
- After 3 mins, sprinkle the flour evenly overly the mushrooms and mix well.
- Add the chicken stock and water, bring to a boil.
- Let the soup cool, then blend in a food processer till the desired consistency is reached. Some of the soup can be left unblended for a chunkier soup. Return the blended soup into the pot.
- Bring the soup to a boil again and stir in the cream. Season with salt and pepper.
Make your own chicken stock or simply use a UHT packaged version but skim off the fat/oil before use.
Make sure that the soup is cool before blending to avoid accidents. A handheld blender will be easier to use than the container type.
This soup can be frozen for up to 6 months. Do not worry if the soup separates upon thawing. Just warm it up and its as good as fresh!
For a healthier alternative, peel and cube a large potato and add into the pan with the mushrooms. This will thicken up the soup beautifully so that the cream can be eliminated. If you boiled some potatoes for some other dish, save the cooking liquid and add it to the soup together with the chicken stock. Reduce the amount of chicken stock and water according to the amount of potato stock added.
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