Avocado Gula Melaka Popsicles

Now how can one tolerate with such a hot and humid weather??? Aircon has been my best friend these days. All I want to do when at home is stay in my room with the air con and TV nowadays. Super no life!

To curb the heat, I cannot stop making popsicles. Eating icecreams make me fat (and guilty).  Popsicles are the new icecream (at least for me and hubby!).

So easy and fun to make, kids can join in the fun too!

Go make and eat them!! Yummy!

Avocado Gula Melaka Popsicles
2 ripe avocados
230ml milk
1.5 tbsp gula melaka syrup (for blending)
1 tbsp (for swirl patterns)

Gula Melaka syrup
100g gula melaka
40ml water
4 pcs of pandan leaves, knotted

Place gula melaka, water and knotted pandan leaves into saucepan and let gula melaka melt. Stir well. You may use a spatula to gentle press down pandan leaves and stir about so that gula melaka syrup will be infused with pandan fragrance.

Pour gula melaka syrup through sieve to rid bits of residue. Ready to use.

Popsicles
1. Half avocados and scoop out fruit flesh using a spoon and place into blender.
2. Add in milk and gula melaka syrup. Place on blender cover and blend into smoothie. If smoothie is too thick, add in a little more water. You may do a taste test, if smoothie is not sweet to your liking, add in more gula melaka syrup accordingly. Blend well.
3. Spoon into popsicle moulds. For swirl patterns, spoon in blended smoothie halfway up mould, spoon in some gula melaka syrup, top with smoothie to almost top of mould and then use a chopstick to stir and make swirl patterns.
4. Stick in popsicle mould cover and place in freezer.

5. When frozen and ready to eat, place popsicle mould under tap water, taking care not to let water sip into frozen popsicles. Twist and remove. Enjoy!

Avocado Gula Melaka Smoothie 鳄梨椰糖奶冰沙

Are you an avocado smoothie fan? I sure am! I particularly like the avocado gula melaka smoothie sold at Alexandra Food Market, and would surely get a glass of it to ease my never-ending avocado smoothie crave.

It has been sometime since I last had my avocado gula melaka smoothie fix, and I thought it is about time I tried blending this smoothie at home. And so I went avocado shopping at the supermarket. Got 3 of the buttery fruits!

Honestly speaking, I have tried to replicate this smoothie drink at home for several times and have never got anywhere near the ones sold at Alexandra Food Market. This time, I decided to melt gula melaka with water and some pandan leaves. I did not do this the last few times when I DIY the smoothie at home. I merely used melted gula melaka, fresh milk and some condensed milk as per friend's recommendation, which did not turn out to my liking. This time, I "concocted" my own avocado gula melaka smoothie and I simply love it! Hubby who also adores this drink gave a thumb's up. Taste and smell of the blended goodness is so so near to the food centre's avocado smoothie standard.

I am gonna blend this yummy smoothie again! No need to travel that far for my favourite drink anymore! Yay!!!! =)

Avocado Gula Melaka Smoothie 
2 ripe avocados
140ml milk
3 tbsp gula melaka syrup
2 handful of ice cubes

Gula Melaka syrup
100g gula melaka
40ml water
4 pcs of pandan leaves, knotted

Place gula melaka, water and knotted pandan leaves into saucepan and let gula melaka melt. Stir well. You may use a spatula to gentle press down pandan leaves and stir about so that gula melaka syrup will be infused with pandan fragrance.

Pour gula melaka syrup through sieve to rid bits of residue. Ready to use.

Smoothie
1. Half avocados and scoop out fruit flesh using a spoon and place into blender.
2. Add in milk, gula melaka syrup and ice cubes. Place on blender cover and blend into smoothie. If smoothie is too thick, add in more ice and blend. You may do a taste test, if smoothie is not sweet to your liking, add in more gula melaka syrup accordingly. Blend well. Serve with or without ice cubes.

Homemade Kaya Jam

Egg prices have been on the rise recently but that is not deterring me from baking!  There are just so so SO many things in queue now that I want to bake and try to cook.  24 hours a day is never enough, for me!

Back home yesterday after work, I had no plan to cook, bake or make anything.  I just wanted to bathe, have dinner, laze on my comfy sofa and watch TV (and maybe read up food blogs and bookmark any interesting recipes).  I did kept to my plan until I came across this one recipe that jotted me up.  I had to do this - the kaya jam!  

The jam went right into a cleaned glass bottle.

I am sold. I could make these anytime when I feel like it.

No more jams with those unhealthy preservatives!

I had all the 5 ingredients that were called for in the recipe and I had no reasons to sit and wait till the next time to try this out.  All I need was just 30 minutes all-in-all?  I managed to convinced myself and I was back in my little kitchen in no time.  So much for planning to laze and rest.  I can only say that some things in life do not go according to plan :P 

Hubby came by into the kitchen and asked what was I doing.  Kaya jam was my answer to him and he gave the "Oh!  Wow!" answer and sink back into his sofa.

In merely 30 minutes' time, I showed Hubby what I had made and he was impressed.  Homemade Kaya jam, made at the comfort of my home. 

My dear Hubby asked me to make some plain white bread to go along with the homemade Kaya jam.  Okay, but his white bread has got to wait - I already have something that I wanna make to pair with those homemade Kaya jam!

Homemade Kaya Jam
Recipe by JewelPie

45g Palm sugar / gula melaka
200ml Coconut milk, undiluted (I used Kara brand coconut milk)
4 to 5 pieces of Pandan leaves
4 egg yolks
3 tbsp sugar (I used brown sugar)

1. Whisk egg yolks and set aside. 

2. In a small pot, pour in coconut milk and palm sugar. 

3. In a low heat, melt palm sugar. Stir throughout.
4. Add pandan leaves and another 3 tbsp sugar into the pot.  Cook in high heat.  Stir until sugar is melted and coconut milk bubbles.
5. When flavoured coconut milk is hot, turn down the heat.  With one hand, slowly pour it into egg yolks and another, whisk the egg yolks. 

I tied the pandan leaves and squashed it a little to bring out some of the pandan fragrance before adding it into the coconut milk solution.

How the jam solution got from watery state to the thickened jam form. This change took roughly 10 minutes.

6. Pour egg yolks back into the pot.  Let it simmer and stir throughout.  The solution will thicken.  It should take about 10 minutes.  If it's not sweet enough, you can add more sugar. (I did not have to add more sugar because the jam was sweet enough)
7. Discard pandan leaves with a pair of chopstick and tongs.  The kaya would be sticking on the leaves, remove them with chopsticks.
8. Transfer to a bottle.  Let cool, cover and refrigerate.  It should keep up to a week or longer.

Notes:
- Use fresh coconut milk if you can.  It tastes much better.
-  To ensure that it can be kept longer, sterilise bottle with hot water and use a clean spoon to scoop the jam.