Tart Tartin - Upside down Apple Pie

I did not blog here for a long time. Sorry. We moved apartments and somehow I lost my cooking mojo. My new kitchen is too modern that I found it difficult to cook. Not enough homey for cooking. When I am cooking in my new kitchen I have a feeling that I am in a star-ship cooking a meal for Captain Piccard. It is difficult to feel like Julia Child inside The Enterprise ( for those of you who don't know, that's the spaceship from Star Trek). Anyways, I like my kitchen a lot but I really hate messing it up. It's difficult to cook when you are afraid to mess up your kitchen. Oh well...If the last few weeks is any indication, it seems that I have regained my cooking mojo. I guess I have finally managed to perfect the cooking-cleaning dance. Anyways...


I love caramel. Caramel is my poison. Tarte tatin is the first type of apple pie that I learned to make. It is easy, fast and best of all full of that caramel goodness that I love. Also it reminiscent of that famous Filipino street food, the one and only banana-q. It is like a classy banana-q. Sometimes I use bananas instead of apples when I am homesick.

Enough babble. Here is the recipe:

8 medium gala apples, peeled, cored, and quartered
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup unsalted butter
1 pack frozen puff pastry (blätterteig)

1. Caramelize sugar, butter and apples in a pan over medium heat.
2. Place caramelized apples in an 8 inch round pan carefully filling all the space with the mixture.
3. Cover with pastry sheet and cut to fit pan. Pinching the pastry onto the sides of the pan.
4. Poke a hole into the pastry.
8. Bake for 30 minutes at 200 C or until pastry is brown.
9. Cool a little bit , then carefully invert to a platter. Serve with ice cream.

Caramelize apples in pan

Cover with pastry sheet and cut to fit pan

Best way to cook rice

I always had pain in cooking rice without a rice cooker. The first few years, I always get the bottom burned. I then learned a new system which I had been using these past few years. That system is Jurassic now so I won't bother describing it to you. A few days ago I learned the easiest, fastest and fool-proof way to cook rice and it is using the .....microwave!

1 cup rice
2 cups water
cook for 15 minutes in microwave (high, 700 W)
cool for a while

Depending on the rice variety used, you may need to use less water. My advice is to try it this way first then if the rice is too soggy, adjust the amount of water.

Quick Salmon Pasta

This is really easy to make and! Cooking time is 10 minutes and preparation time is also 10 minutes.

200g pack smoked salmon
1 clove garlic, minced
1 medium onion, chopped
1 tbsp butter
250 ml full cream
salt to taste
pepper to taste
300 g spaghetti

1. Chop smoke salmon into squares. Set aside.
2. Saute garlic and onion in butter.
3. Add cream. In low fire, simmer until think.
4. Add salt and pepper to taste. Just keep in mind that the smoke salmon you will add later is also a bit salty.
5. Switch off the fire then add chopped smoke salmon. It should be cooked just a little bit.
6. Cook spaghetti according to package directions.
7. When pasta is cooked, combine with sauce then serve.

Technorati tags: Salmon+Pasta Pasta Salmon quick cream recipe