Bread and Butter Pudding

We are experiencing sweet tooth for the last several days. To satisfy the craving, I initially planned of making a “maja blanca” or Filipino white pudding but for some reasons, I can’t set the rhythm of starting the preparation. The other day, I purchased full ingredients for a single mixing of “leche flan” or caramel custard but still, even with the thought of the appetizing dish, I can’t shift myself into a cooking mode. :) I felt too lazy to even make the caramel syrup, so as expected I remained unable to prepare the luscious crème caramel until now. But after some contemplation and serious reevaluation though, I finally realized that the problem is that I am afflicted by a virus called “DITS”.

Yes, you heard it right, I have been suffering a minor case of “Do-It-Tomorrow-Syndrome” ……… wait …… based on the way I’m posting in Reel and Grill over the past few months, make that a chronic case of “DITS”. :-) Since I diagnosed it by myself ……… of course, I have to treat it by myself …… with force if necessary. :-)

This bread and butter pudding is probably my antiserum …… my salvation of sort. Firstly because it is so good that it could well please our sweet dish wanting. Secondly, it is so easy to do that I’ll need minimal effort to undertake it. And, lastly, we have a fridge full of several days-old sliced bread and lots of fresh milk. All together, it makes the perfect condition forceful enough to finally eradicate the unwanted syndrome. :-)

 As a backgrounder, bread and butter pudding is a bread-based dessert made by arranging layers of sliced or cubed bread (traditionally left-over or stale ones), added with butter and scattered with raisins and dried fruits in an oven dish into which mixture of egg, milk (or cream), sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon powder, vanilla and other spices, is poured. It is then baked in an oven until the mixture has set and crust is slightly browned on top. Some people may serve it with custard or cream, but often the pudding under the crust is moist enough to be eaten without sauce.

Leche Flan or Creme Caramel or Caramel Custard - Kulinarya Challenge for June

One of the most highly-sought family dishes that I have not yet shared here is the Filipino egg custard called “leche flan”. On the scale of 1-10 the “leche flan” that our family, the Villanueva’s of Padre Garcia, Batangas, usually prepare is 11. I will repeat that in word just in case you did not get it clear - eleven. I know it’s logically wrong, but it’s hyperbolically true. I kid you not! For me and all of my friends and guests who tasted it, our egg custard is way better than those you can order or eat in any of the 5-star hotels or popular restaurants (at least from all of those that I and my friends have tried), be it in Manila or in any other key cities in the country.

Okay, I may be quite biased here but it is really that good. Wait, make that …… really that exceptional (objectively supplied)! :) Since it’s not very convincing to praise your own trait or sell your own merit, I guess, you’ve got to actually taste it to believe what I’m saying. :-)

The recipe is not really a strictly guarded secret. Nope! Many people knew it. I once talked to someone who uses the exact ingredients but nonetheless produces a much inferior dish. Maybe the recipe or at least a similar or very close recipe is already even published in the internet as we speak. But the meticulous cooking method, involving the careful preparation of the caramel syrup and the slow and controlled steaming process, which knowledge the family developed over a long period of time, makes the difference I believe.

I consider it as an acquired special skill learnt through practice and eventually shared or passed on from generation to generation ……… from parents to children, from mothers to daughters and daughters-in-law, from older sisters to younger sisters and sisters-in-law and in my case, from wife to husband …… although I’ve seen my mother (who diligently and painstakingly taught my better half) and aunties prepared it a countless times during significant family occasions. :-)

But it isn’t the recipe that I will be sharing here now ……… not just yet. Sorry! :-) For this post, I would like to feature my own concoction of the popular dessert dish. Hear me out first. You see the family recipe calls for several cans of condensed and evaporated milk which happened to be too pricy around here. So I developed my own recipe which uses fresh whole milk which is rather abundant and of course very reasonably priced (a.k.a cheap), about 1/8 of the canned milk price compared per unit volume. Besides, fresh milk is what they use in the Portuguese crème caramel recipe which is very similar to the Filipino “leche flan”.

Chicken and Pork Empanada

Folded pastry around meat and veggie stuffing is probably the most accurate definition of my true Filipino comfort food. It is among the simple gastronomic treat that immediately reconnects me with home ……… family, relatives, childhood friends and everything in between. It is an ordinary snack which every bite for me is capable of educing flashes of happy thoughts, retrieving golden memories and subsequent feeling of divine-like contentment. It could somehow serve as a mother’s tender touch or spouse’s caress that provides warmth, consolation, sense of security and peaceful refuge even when you are actually so far away from home. I am referring to the tasty stuffed bread called “empanada”. :-)

Popular in many countries of Latin America, southern part of Europe and South East Asia particularly the Philippines, empanada refers to the stuffed bread or pastry, either baked or fried, made by folding a rich buttery dough or bread patty around the stuffing. The fillings usually composed of varieties of meats, seafood, vegetables or even sweetened fruits. It can be served as a small meal, a starter before a meal, finger foods in parties, dessert after a meal in case of sweet fruits fillings, morsel while watching TV or movies or sporting events and snack at any time of the day.

There are many international variations. In Argentina, their empanadas are often served at parties and festivals. The fillings are mainly chicken or beef spiced with cumin and paprika. In Brazil, they have fried turnovers filled with seasoned ground meat, shredded chicken, cheese, seasoned ground shrimp, hearts of palm and various other fillings. In Jamaica, they have their Jamaican patty that contains various fillings and spices baked inside a flaky shell, often tinted golden yellow with an egg yolk mixture or turmeric. Puerto Rico’s “empanadilla” is a small empanada that uses flour or cassava flour dough and lard. In Spain, empanadas are often made from thin, flexible, but resilient wheat pastry. The variable filling includes tuna, sardines and chorizo in a tomato puree, garlic and onion sauce.

However, the type I will be preparing here is of course the Filipino empanada. It usually contains ground pork or beef or chicken meat or chopped shrimps, diced potato, green peas, chopped onion and raisins in sweetish-buttery dough made from wheat flour or all-purpose flour. The dough can either be doughy or flaky and plain or covered in bread crumbs. The empanada can either be baked or deep fried with the former being my preferred method as it does not involve a degree of oil accumulation to the finish product. The golden brown tasty crust without the hint of fat (from frying) complemented with the sweetish meaty fillings is such a delightful delicacy to me. :-)

Orange Cake, Easy and Zesty

I love oranges. I really do! Like “ponkan” (a type of tangerine almost the size and color of an orange), apple and banana, orange is among the regular fruits I eat to curtail off food cravings during late nights when I have to stay awake either writing, blogging, watching movies or browsing the internet. I can consume lots of it just before going to bed and not have the feeling of guilt or being bloated. For this reason, I maintain a good stock of orange (or “ponkan” if available) inside the fridge which I regularly replenish every Saturday.

This practice of keeping a steady stock of orange in our home became very handy one day when I needed and wanted to bake a cake. While I would usually prepare either banana cake or carrot cake during such a time, the absence of banana and carrots from our pantry that day forced me (in a good way) to look at and consider the other ingredients at hand which happen to be orange and apple. I settled for orange and it proved to be a wise decision. The orange cake, unlike chocolate cake, was quite easy to prepare and was also zesty and tasty.

Basically, orange cake is just a common pound cake added with some orange juice and flavored with its zest. Although it can be served without any frosting or just sprinkled with icing sugar, I prefer it with some light frosting simply made by dissolving confectioner’s sugar in some orange juice. It adds zing to the taste and at the same time retains the cake moist for several days. Amazingly, orange can really be used to make a truly exciting cake.

Sweet orange which refers to the citrus variety called “Citrus sinensis” is the most commonly grown tree fruit in the world. While it is reported to have probably originated in Southeast Asia (this makes me wonder how come it is not commercially grown in the Philippines?) and first cultivated in China (2500 BC). Brazil, USA (Florida), India and Mexico are now the top growers of the tree for its delicious fruit, either to be eaten as a whole or to be processed as juice.

Watalappan - Sri Lankan Egg Custard

In spite having been in Sri Lanka for almost 6 years and constantly enjoying its exceptional cuisine for such a long period of time, in our accommodation courtesy of our Sri Lankan cook, in our office during company affairs or during an employee’s birthday, in between restaurants, hotels and resorts during our occasional dine outs and holidays and in houses or reception halls of local colleagues and friends when attending their special occasions like weddings, we are yet to try cooking any of their highly varied native cookery and delicacies by ourselves.

Whilst I have featured here some of their foods such as the widely available baked, grilled and fried everyday snack which includes “roti”, hopper, fish bun and egg roll (our group’s favorite) amongst other things and interesting food products or ingredients such as the healthy “kithul” jaggery and treacle, this is my first attempt to actually prepare one of their popular sweet dishes called “watalappan”. Interestingly, “watalappan” is Sri Lanka’s version of the common custard pie. It is a dessert and snack dish very similar to the Filipino steamed egg custard called “leche” flan.

The unique aspect of “watalappan” is the use of their local palm sugar (made from inflorescence sap) called “kithul” jaggery or treacle in lieu of ordinary sugar (made from sugarcane) and coconut milk instead of cow’s milk. Apart from its obvious health benefits, the innate, unrefined and unadulterated taste of palm sugar and inherent sweetness of coconut cream make for a distinctly earthy-sweet egg custard which has hints of subtlety and purity due to the natural forms of the ingredients being used.

Egg Pie or Filipino Custard Pie

For an ordinary Filipino snack or “meryenda”, especially in the provinces, freshly baked goodies from the many neighborhood bakeries are probably the most easy to acquire and serve to your family and love ones. They are truly tasty, available daily, have many choices and reasonably priced. Come “meryenda” time or during coffee break, all you have to do is to visit the bakery closest to your residence, make your pick and you will be equipped with really fragrant, fresh from the oven and utterly delicious snack in a short period of time.

Among these easy baked “meryenda” of the Philippines is the sweet and luscious egg pie. A Filipino custard pie made from eggs, milk, sugar, vanilla, lemon essence and sometimes butter. While egg pie is probably an authentic Filipino baked goodie, its delightful taste has a very close resemblance with that of the Portuguese and/or Chinese egg tart extremely popular in Macau and the common or plain custard pie of North America.

It has been quite a long time since I last made this exciting snack and dessert dish. I thought of making this again so that I can share it with you, especially with Filipinos living abroad whom at certain point in their life living in a foreign land will surely reconnect with the memories of their childhood and inevitably experienced cravings for the typical Filipino “panaderia” or bakery products, like “pandesal” (Filipino bread roll), “ensaymada” (sweet bread topped with cheese and sugar), Spanish bread (sweet bread with sugar and margarine filling), “pan de coco” (sweet bread with coconut filling), “mamon” (a chiffon cake type of soft bread), and of course the delicious egg pie. Yes, it always happens to me.

Chicken Barbecue or Barbeque (Oven Cooked)

Barbeque, also spelled barbecue and usually abbreviated BBQ, Bar-B-Q and Bar-B-Que, is among the common food that I greatly missed here in Sri Lanka. Why? Well, if in the Philippines and other Southeast Asian nations, barbeque is a very common any-meal food which you can find in almost every corner and junction of the roads in key cities, towns, municipalities, villages and neighborhood, urban centers and all other areas where there is a regular congregation of people, it is the exact opposite here.

That is right; I am yet to see a single barbeque stand or kiosk anywhere on the streets, parks, playground, tourist spots and any recreational areas for over 5 years of my stay here. While Sri Lankan’s also like barbeques, it is just not a common street food item, like “roti”, “kottu”, “appa” etc. :-)

The term barbeque can refer to the meat and cooking process as a food, to the cooking apparatus oftentimes called barbeque grill as an implement and to a party or outdoor activity where such food is the main table fare. Here, we will be talking about barbeque as a food.

Barbeque is a method of cooking meat, seafood and vegetables with the heat and hot smoke of a fire, smoking wood or hot coals of charcoal, cooking gas or even electricity. The meat or fish or vegetable is usually applied with marinade, spice rub, basting sauce or even simply seasoned with salt and spices or soaked in condiments with citrus extract prior to cooking. Barbecue is fun and exciting because it is usually cooked in an outdoor environment heated by the smoke or direct heat of wood or charcoal. Whew…….now I’m craving.

Baked Wild Mushroom and Cheese Omelette

Thunderstorms and lightning bring both concern and joy to me. I’m worried that strong thunder will cause, as it usually does, our circuit breakers to shut off and of course, without electricity there will be no computer access and internet connections, at least in our dwelling. On the other hand, they excite me because for reasons I am not quite sure, when there are thunderstorms and lightning, there is a good chance that wild mushrooms will be sprouting, as it always happens as well, in our lawn and garden the following morning,

The other morning, I found several wild mushrooms in our backyard. I realized it has been raining with occasional lightning and thunderstorms the previous night, hence the mushrooming. I eagerly harvested the wild vegetable and stock them inside the fridge before going to work. I usually cook wild mushrooms into tasty vegetable soup like the one I posted here. That day however, I contemplated on preparing a different dish using some of the surprise exotic harvest. In that afternoon, I ended up baking wild mushroom and cheese omellette.

While mushroom is actually the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, some varieties can be very delicious. But proper care and familiarity should be considered in harvesting the wild vegetable as some kinds can be potently toxic and highly poisonous. I won’t advise anyone to just pick wild mushrooms from their gardens and backyard and cook into meals. Basic knowledge on the edible varieties should be acquired first before even thinking of gathering them for food.

Carrot Cake, Healthy and Tasty

I am not so much into sweets. I only enjoy several types of cake. In particular, I only like those moderately sweetened and not covered with overly sweet icing. You will notice this by the types of cake that I bake and feature here like the banana cake and chocolate cake I posted earlier. However, I am open and don’t really have a problem to preparing even those not suited to my taste, provided I will be serving them to family and friends. After all, fulfillment in cooking, or baking for that matter, is a factor of sharing to your love ones. And besides, personal satisfaction is only as good as the satisfaction of those whom the food was shared with.

Another cake that works well with me is the healthy and tasty carrot cake. Like banana cake, it is fruit and/or vegetable base and not excessively sweet. Carrot cake is a cake which consists of finely grated carrot mixed with cake batter. The carrot softens during the baking process and the resulting cake usually has softer but denser texture and coarser crumb than the traditional cake. The carrot itself enhances the flavor, quality and appearance of the cake. Usual recipes include optional ingredients such as nuts, raisins, coconut or pineapple. The last one is my favorite addition to the cake.

Baked Fish

I was asked by one angler who read my posts on shore fishing what I did with a certain type of fish that I caught. Well, all of our catch that we take home ends up in our stomach. If the type of fish is unfamiliar or something new to me, I ask my friends who grew up in a fishing community and very familiar to all types of tropical fishes to either teach me cooking them or by themselves, to directly prepare them for me.

The bottom line is that no catch is ever wasted. For a true angler, the catch, no matter how small or insignificant, is too precious not to be eaten or be wasted. Whilst I cannot post all the cooking adventures we are doing to the catch, some have been proudly featured here like in pesang “lapu-lapu” or stewed grouper, fish shanghai or fried spring roll, “paksiw na isda” or “tilapia” stewed in vinegar and crispy fried parrot fish.

Still most often, fish caught are either grilled or fried. It is among the simple, fast and easy ways to cook and enjoy them. If the fish are quite small for grilling, they are stewed or poached like in “paksiw”, “pangat” and “tinola” dishes where in spite of the small size of the fish, they served and satisfied really big appetite.

Easy Sliced Bread Pizza

There is “something” in pizza that could really make me drool. When craving hits me, it is really difficult to ignore or resist such a desire. While the “probably best pizza restaurant” in Sri Lanka which I featured before in my post “Best Pizza in Sri Lanka” is just a 30-minute ride from our area of residence, it is only open at night and not available during the afternoons when cravings usually arise. To make things worst, there are only a few other pizza houses or restaurants serving decent pizzas particularly in the city which we frequent during weekends. Therefore, easy ways of preparing pizza within the limited resource of our accommodation is something I have been continuously exploring.

In connection with this, I have already posted how to make a home-made chunky pizza sauce and a home-made crust or pizza shell in the past. In addition, I have prepared and featured how I make pizzas like the “Chicken Sausage Pizza” and my all-time favorite, “Shrimp Garlic Pizza”. While I always make sure that at least, I have a regular stock of pizza sauce, I usually ran out of shell as its preparation takes a longer time which I hardly have during weekdays, after office hours. So out of necessity, I have been preparing pizza using sliced bread as crust. And I should say, the resulting pizzas aren’t bad. They also have that “something” which I always wanted in a real pizza and the most important thing is that they always satisfy the cravings. :-)

With the ordinary flat bread pizza crust available in the frozen section of groceries here, which we found to be quite thick and too bready, I guess using sliced bread is in fact a better alternative in the absence of our home-made pizza shell. For as long as crusty and firm sliced bread are used, an amazing pizza is in the making.

The ingredients needed to make this easy and quick fix pizza are sliced bread or sandwich bread, of course, some sausage or ham or bacon or salami or any other processed meat you like, good quality mozzarella cheese, some fresh vegetable for toppings like tomatoes, mushroom, chili peppers or bell peppers or capsicum, onions, etc.

As normally done in creating pizzas, all fresh vegetable ingredients are properly washed and chopped or sliced into correct topping sizes, cheese are grated or if too soft, crumbled, sausages or other meat products are lightly fried or cooked and thinly sliced. Then, everything are arrange within easy reach during cooking along with the gorgeous chunky pizza sauce.

First preheat your oven to 375 - 400 degrees Fahrenheit (°F). That’s about 190 to 200 degrees Celsius or Centigrade (°C) or Gas Mark No. 5 - 6 on your oven.

In a perforated pizza pan or better yet pizza stone or baking stone, arrange about 4 slices of bread, more if your pan is wider. Evenly spread about 1 to 2 tbsp pizza sauce, with all the chunky goodness, on each slice of bread.

Then distribute the vegetable ingredients on top which, in this case, are just tomatoes, chili peppers and oyster mushroom. On top of the veggies, evenly scatter the delicious sausages cut up to small pieces.

Put the pan inside the pre-heated oven and bake for about 10-12 minutes or until the toppings are cooked through and the bread crust lightly toasted to golden brown.

Take it out from the oven and quickly spread the crumbled mozzarella cheese on top. Return it to the oven and cook for 5 minutes further or until the cheese has cooked through and melted just right. Don’t overcook the cheese.

With such a stunning pizza, it is so human to immediately take a piece, grab a bite and forget the lesson we already learnt many times before that while cheese in pizzas seems perfectly cool from the outside, it could still be scorchingly hot in the inside. :-(

But a few burnt taste buds will not thwart us from continuously enjoying this sliced bread pizza with all that juicy but still crispy veggies, tasty sausage and sumptuous melted mozzarella cheese. After all, we probably have a large glass of ice cold cola drinks by your side prior to eating, which comes very handy in such events of fiery incidents. :-)

Try this at home…….but avoid a blatant mistake….…make sure to have the first bite when the melted cheese is really cool, in and out. Enjoy! c “,)

Garlic Bread with Real Garlic Bits

Garlic is probably among the most important ordinary and inexpensive cooking ingredients. It imparts a fantastic taste that varies extensively depending on how it is cooked or prepared. It can provide different flavors from a subtle sweet to a mild piquant to a strong almost overpowering one. From the posts in this blog alone, you can find many diverse uses of garlic in various food preparations where the rather simple garlic assumes a major role in creating a truly tasty dish.

The delicious Gambas Al Ajillo is basically shrimp in lots of garlic. The wonderful Shrimp and Garlic Pizza is surprisingly good with just the two toppings, shrimp and garlic, plus some cheese. The widely popular Garlic Fried Rice of the Philippines is mainly fried leftover rice and garlic and yet sumptuous and very delicious. The Toasted Chili and Garlic is so versatile and particularly impressive as add-on to dips and in making ordinary soupy dishes extra special entrees.

Garlic is a species in the onion family “Alliaceae”. Its close relatives include the onion, shallot, leek and chive. It has a characteristic pungent, spicy flavor that mellows and sweetens considerably with cooking. A bulb of garlic, the most commonly used part of the plant, is divided into numerous fleshy sections called cloves. The leaves, stems and flowers on the head are also edible and are most often consumed while immature and still tender.

In praise of the versatile ingredient, another garlic laden dish will be the feature of this post – Garlic Bread. Garlic bread typically consists of crusty bread topped with garlic and olive oil or as many restaurants now prefer, melted butter. It is often eaten as a simple accompaniment to pasta and other Italian dishes. It is either grilled or broiled until toasted or baked in an oven. A modern variation on the recipe tops the garlic bread with a variety of cheeses, often mozzarella, cheddar or feta.

Typically garlic bread is made from baguette or Italian or French long and narrow loaf. However, other similar types of loaf bread can be used when you don’t have baguette at hand. In fact, I used even ordinary crusty type of bread and it’s also wonderful like this local loaf bread of Sri Lanka.

For the one loaf bread above, the other ingredients needed are 1 head garlic, peeled and minced, 1 stick unsalted butter, to be melted, ½ tsp dried oregano, ½ tsp dried parsley, a pinch of salt and 2 stalks fresh flat leaf parsley. If salted butter is what you have, use it by all means but just adjust the amount of salt.

First, using a sharp bread knife, slice the bread to about ¾ inch thick. If you are using baguette, slice it in half along the entire length. Then cut them into manageable lengths, about 6 to 8 inches. For my loaf, I sliced it in such a way that its slice has an outer part as shown below.

Before proceeding, preheat the oven to 350°F or about 175 °C. Doing this will save you a considerable amount of time in the kitchen. :-)

In a small sauce pan, melt the butter on a very low heat. Lifting and swirling pan as necessary to control the temperature and just melt the butter and not heat it to oil consistency. Turn the heat off and add the minced garlic to the melted butter, stirring lightly. Add inn the oregano, dried parsley and salt and stir to blend. Finally add in the fresh parsley and stir once more.

Arrange the sliced bread cut side up, with the outer part on their backs. Spread the butter-garlic mixture over the sliced bread carefully distributing the garlic and herbs on top. Slather the butter basically soaking the crust. Place the prepared bread on a baking pan and bake in the oven for 15 minutes.

Transfer the baking pan to the highest notch closer to the heat and adjust the oven setting to high heat. Broil for further 2 minutes or until the sides or edges of the bread is golden brown and toasted. Be careful not to over broil and burn the bread though. If you want a slightly soft on the inside just shorten the period of broiling.

After broiling, let garlic bread cool for about a minute. Slice diagonally to about inch thick. Transfer in a plate and serve immediately with your favorite pasta dish or soup.

I ate it on its own over a cup of Ceylon tea and it’s also wonderful. But I felt strong cravings for some spaghetti…….whew. Enjoy! c“,)

Shrimp-Garlic Pizza

Pizza is a world-popular dish made with an oven-baked, flat, generally round bread that is often covered with tomatoes or a tomato-based sauce and cheese. Other toppings are added according to region, culture, or personal preference. In restaurants, like the one in Bentota Beach Resort which I posted before, pizza can be baked in an oven with stone bricks above the heat source, an electric deck oven, a conveyor belt oven or, in the case of more expensive restaurants, a wood- or coal-fired brick oven. On deck ovens, the pizza can be slid into the oven on a long paddle called a peel and baked directly on the hot bricks or baked on a screen or a round metal grate.

Modern pizza originated in Italy as the Neapolitan pie with tomato. In 1889 cheese was added. According to the original Italian rules, the genuine Neapolitan pizza dough consists of Italian wheat flour, natural Neapolitan yeast or brewer's yeast, salt and water. For proper results, strong flour with high protein content (bread flour than cake flour) must be used. The dough must be kneaded by hand or with a low-speed mixer. After the rising process, the dough must be formed by hand without the help of a rolling pin or other mechanical device, and may be no more than 3 mm (1/8 inch) thick. The pizza must be baked for 60–90 seconds in a 485 °C (905 °F) stone oven with an oak-wood fire.

This process might be different to yours or mine in some ways, but it does not matter. The important thing is that we create a sumptuous pizza our own way.

The bottom base of the pizza, called the "crust" in the United States and Canada, may vary widely according to style. It could be thin as in hand-tossed pizza or Roman pizza or thick as in pan pizza or Chicago-style pizza. It is traditionally plain, but may also be seasoned with butter, garlic, or herbs, or stuffed with cheese or recently, sausage. When making pizza at home, it can be baked on a pizza stone or baking stone in a regular oven to imitate the effect of a brick oven.
Recently, I posted how I make my pizza crust or shell. Earlier before, I also have a post about how I make my chunky home-made pizza sauce. But for today’s pizza, I decided to prepare one that is not using tomato or tomato based sauce. I call it shrimp garlic pizza which I developed trying to re-create the pizza gamberetti I usually eat at an Italian restaurant here in Sri Lanka which serves really delicious pizzas.

The ingredients for this pizza are: 1 pc prepared pizza crust from my recent post, about 8 pcs shrimps, shelled, about 8 gloves garlic, some Gouda and mozzarella cheeses, salt, freshly ground pepper and extra virgin olive oil (even just good olive oil will do).

To prepare, first, chopped your shelled shrimps and seasoned with salt and pepper. Crush, peel and mince the garlic. Grate about 1 cup of Gouda cheese and about 1½ cups mozzarella cheese.

Preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius (°C) or 392 degrees Fahrenheit (°F). Spread about 1 tbsp of olive oil to the crust (more if your crust is bigger), then top with the garlic evenly. Spread the shrimp pieces followed by the grated Gouda cheese.

Put this inside the oven and bake for 20 minutes. After which you will have this.

And then spread the mozzarella cheese on top and return to the oven for another 5 to 8 minutes. Making sure the mozzarella cheese is cooked and melted just right. It’s that simple. It's fun right?

Grab a bottle of your favorite drinks and be ready to be delighted with this distinctly delicious pizza. The combination of shrimps and garlic plus the combination of Gouda and mozzarella cheeses, creates a very unique taste that really works for me. Try it and enjoy! c“,)

Basic Pizza Dough & Crust Recipe

I somehow promised in my Chicken Sausage Pizza and Chunky Pizza Sauce posts that I will feature the preparation of pizza crust or pizza shell some time later. I know how fulfilling it is to create a pizza from scratch. Using the commercially prepared pizza crust from the frozen section of groceries and supermarkets simply does not ring a bell for me. Cold yes, but uncool I should say. Aside from the fact that it is relatively thicker; it always tastes like ordinary bread.

Last night, I finally had the chance to do it. Anticipating the visit of a friend who used to work in our firm here, I decided to prepare pizza crust just in case I might need to do some pizza sometime today or tomorrow. Being ready with such an easy and yet much-sought after snack food will probably lessen the stress on entertaining the guest.

I used the basic pizza dough recipe for this post. Whilst I have a more special recipe for crust, I am reserving it for future posts when we are to make really extra special pizzas. Though this recipe is fairly basic, don’t think it is inferior or something for it will still result to really delicious pizzas. I have used this recipe many times and it never failed to impress visitors and guests alike. Of course the toppings, sauce and cheeses also make the difference, but an amazing pizza always starts with a good crust.

The few ingredients we need are: 41/4 cups + 2 tbsp All-purpose flour (wheat four is the common flour here in our place so I’ll be using it), 1 ½ cups lukewarm water, 1 tbsp white sugar, 1 tbsp or 1 pack dry yeast, 2 tbsp olive or salad oil (I used vegetable oil :-) ) and 2 tsp salt. Yes, that’s all.

Sift the all-purpose flour and salt in a wide mixing bowl. Add the oil and mix the ingredients.

In a small mixing bowl, pour the lukewarm water then add the sugar and dry yeast. Without mixing, let it stand for about 10~15 minutes or until the yeast is bubbly.

Pour the yeast mixture into the bowl of flour mixture. Mix thoroughly until it starts to form into a ball. Transfer the dough ball on a clean table and knead (folding and pushing) for about 10 minutes or until the dough is smooth and elastic. Use the 2 tbsp of flour to work it when it gets too sticky.

Grease a deep pot. Likewise, slightly coat the dough ball with oil to prevent the surface from cracking when it rises. Place the dough inside the pot and cover with damped cloth. Let it proof for 1½~2 hours, until it doubles its size.

For better result, punch the dough in the center to release the air and let it rise again for 30 minutes. After which, knead it again and divide into 4 smaller balls. In the meantime, preheat the oven to 340 ˚F or 175 ˚C.

Place one small piece of the dough in a floured surface and roll into thin crust of around 14 inches diameter. Carefully transfer in a perforated pizza pan. This is not easy to do if you are after a perfect circle pizza crust with uniform thickness. I can do it now, but through constant practice and after gaining 5 kilos due to over eating pizzas. Just kidding! :-)

Bake in the center of the oven for 8 minutes. Remember: 8 minutes only. Allow to slightly cool and then transfer in a rack to cool completely. Do the same for the next 3 pizza shells.

At this point I usually put them in a large plastic bag and carefully stock inside the freezer. I just take what I intend to use at least 5 minutes before cooking time to properly thaw it. c “,)