And....

Ok - confession time. I did not JUST buy the multi-cooker at habitat. In addition to paying the excess amount to purchase the multi-cooker, I might have also purchased a pizza stone. And a pair of kitchen shears.

For the longest time, I have been dying to try making the perfect New York slice pizza at home. Not that I have been to New York, so it's not like I know what it tastes like. But nevertheless, I wanted to make  pizza at home because buying pizza is such a rip-off. Plus, I always feeling like I need to buy meatlovers pizza or BBQ chicken or something to make my money worth while. I would NEVER pay for a magherita in Hobart. It's just sauce and cheese and they are not that much cheaper than the other sorts of pizza, so no thank you!

End rant about the exorbitant prices of bread and sauce, aka pizza.

So, it turns out that all my life I have been making pizza the wrong way... the crust was always soggy in the middle where the toppings were. I have tried quickly baking the pizza crust beforehand and then putting the topping on there and melting the cheese but to no avail. SO, imagine how excited I was when I stumbled upon this recipe for a delicious pizza crust. It did call for the use of a pizza stone, but instead I used my metal pizza tray. I put it in the oven and blasted it on full heat so that the pan was also piping hot when I put my pizza dough on it. And I used my wooden chopping board as a pizza peel. It was delicious. My mother was suitably impressed (she was visiting from Malaysia then, and she LOVES pizza). But I think we can do better with a pizza stone.

And we did. It was delicious. I'm never buying pizza in Hobart again.

It was simple, garlic and mushroom pizza. I will update this post with photos when I take them. (of course I'm making it this weekend again)

I also used my breadmaker to do the hard yards for me. I should mention that this is NOT my own recipe, but I can't remember where I got this recipe from now, so I can't credit the person who created it (sorry!) Recipe below:

·  2/3 cup whey (or just water, if you don't have any whey)

·  1 teaspoon sugar

·  1.5 teaspoons of dry yeast

·  1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour or 1 3/4 cups bread flour

·  1/2 teaspoon salt

·  1 tablespoon cornmeal (optional) 

Chuck all these ingredients in the bread maker, press “menu” until you get to “dough”  and press start. Check the dough after 8 mins and touch it, if it is sticky and too soft, add some flour (one TBS at a time). If too dry, add water 1 TBS at a time as well. The dough should not stick to your fingers (but tacky).

I also dusted the pizza peel (in my case, it was still my trusty wooden chopping board) with semolina, which gave it the extra crunch. I just topped it off with garlic, mushrooms, some extra virgin olive oil and some mozarella.

Turns out I can't roll a round pizza - this was taken on my "peel" with the dustings of semolina. 

Delish!

xoxo

Chili Prawns...

Not quite Nigella, you are a genius! I'm love love loving this recipe for chili prawns.

Prior to going to Singapore last year, I was harping on about chili crab and how awesome it was. And I don't understand why I thought so, I never ate crab when I was younger! I thought that it was weird and gross and thought that it was cruel of my parents to force me to eat it! So my dad used to just grab the mantao and dipped it in the chili sauce for me and of course I loved it! Still refused to eat crabs, but man the sauce was yummy!

So the last trip to KL, we have everything BUT chili crab. Everyone was hell-bent on making me try all sorts of different crab, crab with salted egg, crab and black bean! And the mantao they served with the crab was fried! I could have SWORN that it was steamed mantao and to be quite honest, the fried mantao made me feel a tad ill.

Either which way, I was keen on trying to make chili crab.

Um, problem - even though I now love eating crab, I still refuse to handle them. Crabs and lobsters - it's just too cruel (but yes, I eat them - it's a weird thing, I know!) So I was browsing the other day and stumbled on Not Quite Nigella's chili prawns. And you know what? It was DELISH!

For anyone wanting to get the recipe, visit her webiste here. She was right, it was a fast and easy dish to make, with simple ingredients. And what I loved about it was that the sauce can be prepared ahead of time, so you can prep this dish when you get home from work! Absolutely genius!

Thanks for sharing the recipe Not Quite Nigella!