I Learned This Online

While surfing the net to look for gardening tips, I was sidetracked and found some recipes too. That's often happens, and reason why sometimes you can reallly spend hours online, as I'm sure some of you agrees with me.

I stumbled upon a photopage entry on this traditional malay cake, Serimuka. Hey, it lookes pretty easy, and the writer also mentined she used the pandan leaves behind her house. And guess what? I also have lots of pandan leaves in my backyard. Sorry I forgot to save her web address, but I think her name is Liza. Here is the recipe.

SERIMUKA

Layer: A

2 cups glutinous rice

2 1/2 cup coconut milk

A pinch of salt

Layer: B

2 cups of thick coconut milk

2 cups of pandan juice (+ some green food colouring)

1 cup of sugar

3 tbsp flour

3 tbsp custard powder

1 egg

A pinch of salt

Ingredient A

1. Clean the glutinous rice and soak for a few hours.

2. Steam until the rice turns soft and cooked.

3. Press the cooked rice until it becomes nice and solid.

Ingredient B

1. Mix the top layer ingredients together. Sift it out to get a smooth blend.

2. Pour nicely over the bottom layer.

3. Steam again for about 30 minutes.

4. Once cooked, cool it first, before cutting into pieces.

Ta daaa..... almost half eaten entry! Not too perfect result, but delicious all the same. Actually the bottom layer is a bit too soft and doesn't cut well. I guess you need to lessen the liquid content, or maybe its just still too hot to cut. Everybody was hungry...lol!

And here's the source of the pandan juice that graced the top layer of the cake. So far, it had helped me to cook nasi lemak, bubur caca, bubur kacang hijau, pandan chicken, etc.

And yes, when one of my cabinet got this certain musty smell, I just place one or two leaves there to get rid of the smell. And when I took home a whole loads of durian from my friends house/orchard in the car, this leaves helps eleviate the strong odour from tha car faster.

This special plant also have some medicinal values. It was used as bath extracts for women under confinement, and also good for hair. Also used to treat diabetics, joints and muscle pain. Some mid-wife adds this ingredient to their massage oil for that aromatic and medicinal qualities.

I just noticed that there are new sprouts of young batches at the bottom of this plant. Cool, because some of the plants I see end up growing tall and skinny after repeatedly being harvested. Then I learned that what you can do about it, is to cut off the top portion and replant it on the ground, while the stump will regrow with new leaves. You will end up with two plants, too!