Savoury Bread Pudding

My mom said that savoury bread pudding reminds her to her deceased sister. My aunt was really good with cooking and I guess a lot of people kinda miss her cooking. I decided to try making the savoury bread pudding. How difficult can it be to prepare a bread pudding? I googled and studied some recipes and came out with this. I never remember the taste of my aunt's bread pudding, but I do remember there's minced beef and garnished with chilies and some leaves I don't recall from my childhood.

Savoury Bread Pudding

3 nos. potato, cut into small cube
400gm minced beef
1 no. onion, large
2 clove garlic
2-3 tbsp curry powder
1 loaf bread
400ml fresh milk or condensed milk
3 eggs,large
salt to taste
vegetable oil
butter
2 chillies, cut brunois for garnish
celery leaf, sliced
fried shallot

• Preheat oven to 175 degrees Celsius. Grease rectangle/square cake pan with butter/ oven proof dish.
• Blend onion and garlic.Heat a little bit oil in the frying pan and add in blended ingredients. Add in curry powder and fry until fragrant.
• Add in minced meat and potato. Season with some salt. Set aside.
• Beat milk and eggs in a bowl. 
• Soak bread into the milk batter and make a layer in the cake pan. 
• Spread some curry minced beef filling on the bread. Repeat the process with another layer of bread just like preparing a lasagna. 
• Sprinkle some red chillies, celery leaf (or coriander if you prefer) on top. 
• Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. 
• Garnish with some fried shallot before serving.

Onion Rings

These onion rings were really crispy. I would never thought that I would be able to eat so many onion rings in one serving. I ate half of them as I was frying the other batch to cook in the frying pan too! Yes! It was that good!

I got the recipe from Jeaniemormof2 in allrecipe, and I altered a bit here and there to suit my available ingredients. I didn't have bread crumbs with me when I made these onion rings. So, I made my own bread crumb. I toasted a couple white bread, and grind them in food processor. They turned out to be really good and crispy!

Ingredients

1 onion, sliced into 1/4 inch

1 1/4 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1 tsp dried/chopped oregano/basil

1 egg

1 cup + 2 tbsp milk

3/4 cup dry bread crumbs

oil for frying

Directions

1. Separate the onion slice into rings, and set aside.

2. In a small bowl, stir together flour, baking powder, salt and herbs (oregano or basil).

3. Dip the onion slice into the flour until they are all coated. set aside.

4. Whisk the egg and milk into the flour mixture using a flour. Dip the floured rings into the batter to coat. Then, place on a wire rack to drain until the batter stop dripping.

5. Spread the bread crumbs on a plate or a shallow dish. Place rings one at a time into the crumb and coat them well. Repeat with remaining rings.

6. Deep fry at the rings at high heat a few minutes or until they turned golden brown. Remove to paper towels to drain.

7. Ready to serve.

Mandu

I made some Korean Mandu a few weeks ago. One thing that I love about Korean food is that they used very little oil and they're healthy. I guess, that's why Korean are so slim! I got the recipe from Maangchi. Head over her website and watch the video to learn how to fold and make that ripple shape (Mine doesn't look as good as hers).

In Maangchi recipe, these mandu is pan fried with some oil and covered. My mom deep fried them instead. I think, deep frying them makes the skin a bit tough.

One thing that I love about these mandu is that you can put them in your freezer and fry them later :) It's very  convenient, don't you think?

Ratatouille

I bought some Zucchini and had ratatouille in my mind. I always wanted to make this since I watched Disney's Ratatouille. Shopping and cooking using ingredients I've never used is my new hobby!

I googled for recipe and decided to try Chef Wan's version (adapted from 'From the Garden to the Kitchen). It's simple as compared to the other recipes. (I found a recipe of traditional ratatouille too! It requires some work, but I'll try them someday).

Ratatouille 

1/2 zucchini 

1/2 eggplant cut into small cubes

1/2 red capsicums (I used 3 colors capsicum)

15 black/green olives (I discarded this)

1 large onion chopped

4 garlic, minced

A handful of fresh "Herb de Provence" 

3 tomatoes diced

2 tbsp tomato paste

1/2 cup olive oil 

1. Heat oil. Fry garlic, onion and sweat all vegetables.

2. Add chopped tomatoes, paste and "Herb de Provence".

3. Season with salt and pepper and stew the vegetable for another 25 minutes on low heat.