#348_Old-Fashioned Suman at Katiba

                           
                                          
This is my all-time childhood kakanin. I enjoy eating it with Katiba, specially with ripe mangoes and Pancit Guisado. Mmmmmm!

My mother has been making this suman ever since I can remember. For her it is usually a 3-day ritual, making the Katiba one day, prepping the banana leaves the next day, then the following day she would make several batches of suman so she can give some away to friends and neighbors (pangregalo) specially during holiday season. Unfortunately, none of her four girls including yours truly have attempted to make it.

When I called her up last week to tell her that I finally replicated her suman recipe, she got so emotional. The reason probably was because finally somebody in the family can carry on her legacy of suman making (sistahs, got the hint?). I told her that I've missed her suman and I've always wanted to make them when I got here in the US. My problem has been that I've never have access to the banana midribs which she uses to tie the suman. The leaves that are available here are frozen and the midribs have been removed. Now, I've solved the problem by using toothpicks to secure the flaps, an idea of which I got on the web just recently.

This Suman is a kind that doesn't have any sugar added in the rice mixture. The sweetener and flavor come from the coconut caramel sauce or Katiba. So beware, if you eat this by itself, it's bland. There's not much taste to it, just like eating mashed potatoes without the gravy or eating spaghetti without Spaghetti Sauce on it. That's why this Suman is best accompanied by Coconut Caramel Sauce or Katiba in Pangasinan, Matamis na Bao in Tagalog. Although you can dip them in white sugar just like how we had done when mother was unable to make the Katiba, the taste is not the same as when it is eaten with katiba. It is so amazing that the katiba brings out the flavor of the suman.

After posting pictures of this Suman on my FaceBook page the other day, I received some requests from friends and fans on there for the recipe and the instructions on how to wrap the suman. Actually the suman recipe itself is super easy to make, but I'll try my best to write down the instructions step-by-step on how to form the banana leaves into "cone cups". Please bear with me. Here it goes.....

                                                 Preparing the Glutinous Rice:

· Share

                                       

 Rinse 4 cups glutinous rice with cold water. Discard water.

 In a bowl, combine glutinous rice, 1 can coconut milk and 1 Tb salt.

Let soak for at least 4 hours (best soaked overnight).

 Prepare the banana leaves.... 

  1) Wash then dry the banana leaves 

(I placed the leaves in a pan then poured very hot water in it to welt them)

2) with a pair of scissors, trim off the midribs, leaving  skinny edges.

 Forming the banana leaves  into "cone cups":

1) Tear up the leaves into about 5-6 inches wide
2) take the top right corner.....

                                       3) bring it towards you and at the same time rolling it up.....

                      4) continue rolling it up until the whole leaf  is wrapped around itself and is shaped like a cone.
                                                   
                                               Now you're ready to fill the cups with the rice....

5) With one hand holding the cone-shaped leaf, lightly spoon a heaping tablespoonful (more or less depending on the size of the cones) of the soaked rice into it. (Don't fill it up high so you can close the flap and don't press down the rice so there's some room for the rice to expand while boiling it).

               6) push in the side facing you which is the shortest side, covering the rice.....
                                

                                       7) fold over the left side with your thumb, then the right side or vise versa....

8) Fold down the back side which is a pointy side and bring it to the front, tucking the outer leaf under....

        9) then secure the flaps with strong toothpicks. Use bamboo toothpicks as they are much stronger than the wood kind.

10) Arrange the suman in a big pot; cover it with cold water. On a medium heat bring it to a boil, then turn down the heat to medium low; simmer for 1 hour and 30 minutes. Start testing for doneness after 1 hour 15 minutes.

 

Place cooked Suman in a colander to drain.

11) Serve suman with Katiba and ENJOY!!

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

How to make the Coconut Caramel Sauce or Katiba

 or Matamis na Bao:

This is the only kind of hard sugar that I can find. In the Pangasinan, we use what we call "Sinakob" which is a solidified molasses from sugar cane and look like halved coconut or convex shaped usually packed together. At the Asian store, I saw similar ones, but they are "palm sugar".

In a pot, dissolve the "sinakob" with a can of coconut milk over low heat. Continue to simmer, stirring occasionally until the mixture becomes thick. That's it! but here's a caveat for you....this process takes a lot of patience as it takes a long time to thicken the mixture. It took me about 1 hour to get the consistency that I wanted, which is a pourable consistency. Here's an idea: if you don't want to make katiba from scratch, you can use the store-bought Coconut Jam sold at the Asian or Filipino stores. And here's another idea that I still need to try: take a can of Dulce de Leche and dilute it with some coconut milk and heat it up on the stove over low heat, (maybe microwave will do). Dulce de Leche are available in Mexican stores or you can make your own Dulce de Leche by boiling a can of unopened condensed milk for 1 hour...a process that I still need to try one day.

#344_Dressing Up Ms. Barbie with Fondant

Barbie Doll cake

I dressed up this doll cake with homemade marshmallow fondant.

#343_Sweet Potato PanCakes Surprise

No More ‘Mallows Picketer

In the Philippines, Sweet Potato, known as Kamote is one of the staples that we always eat almost every day of the week, whether as a snack or as a breakfast item.
When we were growing up my mother always told us not to peel the Sweet Potatoes when we eat them because nutrients were hiding in those peels. She was right. Aside from a good source of fiber, Sweet potatoes have plenty of nutrients in them.

My Sweet Potato PanCakes Surprise

I call it Sweet Potato PanCakes Surprise because you can surprise your family or friends with different fillings in the cakes each time you make them. They are like chocolates in a sense that people will never know what they're gonna get until they bite into it.

Here's my "surprise" for today.

My recipe is super easy to prepare and is very forgiving. Nobody can go wrong with it, in fact when I make this, I just eyeball everything.

My simple filling is composed of (mostly leftovers) sliced ham, sliced cooked chicken, grated jalapeno jack cheese. If I have leftover roast beef I'd throw it in there too with peas & carrots.

Here's my recipe for the Sweet Potato Cake Surprise

2 lbs. Sweet Potatoes
1/2 stick butter
Microwave the Sweet Potatoes for 5 minutes until soft (microwave one at a time).
Mash with fork until smooth. Stir in the butter or mash sweet potatoes and butter together.

For the filling:
1 cup cooked chicken, sliced into cubes (I used left over rotisserie chicken)
1 cup sliced ham
pinch salt
dash of freshly cracked pepper
1 cup jalapeno jack cheese, grated
Mix everything in a bowl

1 cup panko bread crumbs for coating the cakes
Canola oil for frying

Procedure:
1) Put the Panko bread crumbs in a bowl. Drop about 1/2 cup of mashed sweet potatoes right into the bread crumbs, spreading them out to form a circle.
2) Put about 1/4 cup of fillings on the mashed sweet potatoes.
3) Make a patty by taking another 1/2 cup of mashed sweet potatoes and place it on top of the filling, covering the entire bottom sweet potatoes. Sprinkle patty with more crumbs.
4) Repeat procedure until everything is used up. You might have some leftover fillings you can use for something else.
5) Heat about 2 TB canola oil in a frying pan and fry the patties, 3-4 patties at a time depending on the size.

Spread out mashed Sweet Potatoes on the bread crumbs forming a circle.
It doesn't have to be a perfect circle.


Put some fillings on the mashed sweet potatoes and make a patty.


Coat patties with Panko bread crumbs

Just a little bit of oil is needed to fry these cakes.


Serve them with maple syrup if you desire.

ENJOY!!!

#342_Mad Hatter Cake

Here's my take on a Mad Hatter Cake

Sorry, folks, I don't have time to blog this minute, so I'm just posting pictures of my latest project.
Mad Hatter is a character in the Disney movie, Alice in Wonderland and I was commissioned to make a cake, and this is what I came up with.

#341_Three-Cheese Chicken and Ham Pan de Sal

I was going to make some Cheese Pimiento Pandesal, but somehow I made a detour along the way, (when I opened the fridge) and ended up with a filling that is somewhat "pizza-ish" and somewhat "cordon bleu-ish" instead of just a simple cheese plus pimiento filling. No regrets though because I just love the outcome. It's incredibly flavorful and has a little bit of kick from the Jalapeno Cheese.

For the filling, I threw in some Jalapeno Cheese, Sharp Cheddar and Swiss Cheese mixed with slices of ham and cooked chicken (left over Costco rotisserie chicken). Mixed altogether.
For the dough, I used the Pan de Sal recipe found on this blog, click here.

I divided the dough into 24 pieces, (these are huge pieces), flattened them out and placed some filling on the dough pieces. Shaped each into Siopao fashion.

Follow the rest of procedure in making Pandesal, i.e.....
Roll each filled dough in bread crumbs and arrange them on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Let dough rise sufficiently. Bake in a 350 degrees pre-heated oven.

These baked for 23 minutes.

ENJOY!!

#340_Homemade Hamburger Buns

Sandwich or Hamburger Buns in 60 minutes

I've owned a Kitchen Aid stand mixer for over 20 years now, but have never used it to make dough until today. I only use the stand mixer for whipping cream, making icing or frosting. I love using it to whip the meringue for Chiffon Cake, but never made dough using it because I'm hooked with my bread machine.
Today that has changed because the dough recipe for this bun was made using the stand mixer, and I wanted to follow exactly the recipe and procedure.
So I followed everything in the recipe except for the rising time because my house is kind of cold. We keep the temperature in our house at 64 degreesF, a comfortable temperature for me and hubby, but not for the buns.(no pun intended). This means that doughs rise a little longer in my kitchen.

The recipe is from a blog, Wives with Knives, click here for the link.

I don't have to say it because as you can see from the picture the buns came out perfect....the height, the size, the texture. They have a lot of substance. Perfect for any kind of sandwich. Although they might not be as perfectly shaped as the ones made by the blogger on Wives with Knife, hubby says they taste really good, a lot better than Sara Lee.
You see I made these for deli sandwiches for Sunday dinner, which is tomorrow, but he can't wait to taste them so he made himself a couple of PJ sandwiches. I'm glad he volunteered to taste test them for me because he is good at it. I trust his taste because he never fails. When he says something is really good, he means it. I only wish though that I can also get him to taste test the Filipino food that I make.
Anyways, if you want to try this recipe you can just go to the link and get the recipe there.

Enjoy the buns!

Update picture:

Here's the deli sandwich

#339_Ruffled Birthday Cake

I made this cake for a G'daughter who will be turning 12 in a couple of days.

The ruffles are made out of fondant.The white carnation flowers on top are also made out of fondant, but I've made them at my cake decorating class last year and so I thought I'd throw those in there since they also have frills.

Update: 2-19-12
For my friends on Facebook who asked me how to make the ruffles on the cake, I will try my best to explain how I did it with the help of accompanying pictures.

My sister sent me a picture of the ruffled cake a while back and I recently found the same picture on Pinterest. It took me awhile to figure out how it was done and then I finally came up with the idea on how to go about it using the technique on frilled carnation flowers which I learned in the fondant/gumpaste Cake Decorating class. Click here for a video on how to make carnation flowers.

First of all you need a fondant-covered cake ready and fondant for the ruffles.You can use the ready-to-use fondant, but I used the home made marshmallow fondant.

You also need all these tools pictured above: non-stick rolling pin, scallop cutter, brush, veining tool, sponge and dusting pouch pouch. (Gum Paste and Fondant class helps)

Roll out a piece of fondant very thinly and cut out strips using the scallop cutter. I cut the strips narrower than the size of cutter.

I cut the irregular-cut ends with pizza cutter or you can also use a pair of scissors to do that.

With the veining tool, make the frills on the scalloped edges just like you would with the carnation flowers by holding the small end of the veining tool like a pencil, press heel down at the scalloped edges and pull out to form frills. (Here's a video on how to make carnation flower, click here.)

Using a brush, wet the unruffled side with water, I attached the ruffles around the side of cake starting from the bottom then made my way to the top edge of cake.

The ruffled cakes I saw on Pinterest, the ruffles were either facing upward or drooping. I like mine to be straight out so I used these toothpicks to prop up the ruffles to stay straight out and then I removed the toothpicks when the fondant dried up and hardened. But I'm sure there's got to be an easier way to do this without using all these tooth picks tho and professional cake decorators for sure have an easier way to tackle this design.
If you find another way of doing this, please share it with me. Thanx!!