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Regards,
Sefa Firdaus

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The Reason...

Why I abandoned this blog is this cute little boy, a beautiful gift from heaven for me and my hubby. Let me introduce you my beautiful Kareem.

Hope this picture can answer all the questions I got in my inbox. Please bear with me, as soon as I can manage the time being a new mom, I'll blog again.

For those who sent me email, I am sorry that I can't reply yours yet, I'll try my best to do it soon.

And thanks for reading though this blog is dying ;)


Regards,
Sefa Firdaus

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Oatmeal Banana Almond Cookies - 2nd Annual O Foods Contest for Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month

I know that I supposed to care more about my blog, but what should I say except I don't have time to update my blog. My beloved got his knee operation (ligament operation - a well known injured among the football player) last August, and ever since he has to use crutches to help him walk. Due to his conditions, he depends himself on me in doing almost everything. Thanks God that he is getting better now and on 14th of October, he wont have to use the crutches anymore.

Actually I don't want to update this blog until I read Michelle of Bleeding Espresso wrote a comment here about the 2nd Annual O Foods Contest for Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month that she organized together with Sara of Ms Adventures in Italy and by luck, I made this cookies last month and was able to take the photos, so I decided to join in the last minute.

The O Foods tradition started in honor of an award-winning pastry chef Gina DePalma, author of Dolce Italiano: Desserts from the Babbo Kitchen; Gina has been fighting ovarian cancer for the past year and a half, and in addition to physically battling the disease, she has also started the Cowgirl Cure Foundation to raise awareness and money for research as well.

From the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund:

* Ovarian cancer is the leading cause of death from gynecologic cancers in the United States and is the fifth leading cause of cancer death among U.S. women; a woman’s lifetime risk of ovarian cancer is 1 in 67.
* The symptoms of ovarian cancer are often vague and subtle, making it difficult to diagnose, but include bloating, pelvic and/or abdominal pain, difficulty eating or feeling full quickly; and urinary symptoms (urgency or frequency).
* There is no effective screening test for ovarian cancer but there are tests which can detect ovarian cancer when patients are at high risk or have early symptoms.
* In spite of this, patients are usually diagnosed in advanced stages and only 45% survive longer than five years. Only 19% of cases are caught before the cancer has spread beyond the ovary to the pelvic region.
* When ovarian cancer is detected and treated early on, the five-year survival rate is greater than 92%.

You can always help by donating for Ovarian Cancer through FirstGiving.

Now let me jot you down the recipe. I did some modification by substituting walnut with almond (without toasting the almond) and chocolate chunks with chocolate flakes.

Oatmeal Banana Almond Cookies
Recipe from Martha Stewart's Cookies, The Very Best Treats to Bake and to Share through Vania, Dita and Elsye and modified by me

Ingredients:
1 cup all- purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp coarse salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1 large egg
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup mashed ripe banana (about 1 large)
1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
8 ounces semisweet chocolate flakes (original recipe use: 8 ounces semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped into 1/2 inch chunks (~224 gr))
1/2 cup coarsely chopped almond (original recipe use: 1/2 cup coarsely chopped wanuts (about 2 ounces))

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Whisk together both flours, salt and baking soda in a bowl.
2. Put butter and both sugars into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy. Reduce speed to low. Add egg and vanilla; mix until combined. Mix in banana. Add flour mixture just combined. Stir in oats, chocolate flakes, and almond.
3. Using a 1 1/2 inch ice cream scoop, drop dough onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper, spacing about 2 inches apart. Bake cookies, rotating sheets halfway through, until golden brown and just set, 12-13 minutes. Let cool on sheets on wire racks 5 minutes. Transfer cookies to wire racks; let cool completely. Cookies can be stored in airtight containers at room temperature up to 2 days.

Makes about 3 dozen.


Related post:
Onion Gravy - O Foods For Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month

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Sambel Kecap (Sweet Soy Sauce Chili Paste)

Actually this one is a re-post that I present it for "Masak Bareng Yuukk..!!!" (Let's Cook Together) with August theme "Aneka Sambal Nusantara" (Various Kind of Indonesian Chili Paste). I chose this chili because I have the new picture of it that I made for SLF Special Edition: The Beauty of Red and White.

If you notice, the color of the chili in the first photo above is not as brown as the one below. It happened because I wanted to have the red color for representing our national flag, red and white.

This chili is really a keeper in my family. My better half loves it very much and once when we invited some friends over dinner and served them this chili, they love it too. Thanks to Dita, who just gave birth to a beautiful baby boy named Neo, for giving me the recipe. Please click this link for the recipe.

As one of the main ingredients of this chili is fried garlic, I want to send the photo below to Click: August 2009 - Allium hosted by Bee and Jai from Jugalbandi.

Garlic

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Sate Padang (West Sumatran Satay)

I prefer to translate Sate Padang into West Sumatran Satay as Padang is the capital city of West Sumatra province. According to Wikipedia, there are 3 varieties of West Sumatran Satay but they are commonly called as Sate Padang.
Those 3 variants are: Sate Padang, Sate Pariaman and Sate Padang Panjang (it named after the city in West Sumatra). All of them are made from beef and oxtongue, the differences are from the sauce.

Sate Padang has a very hot and thick sauce made from peanut and lots of chilies. It is said that Sate Padang has a combination taste between the other two (Sate Pariaman and Sate Padang Panjang).

Sate Pariaman has a red sauce while Sate Padang Panjang has a yellow one. The both sate has different taste. Sate Ajo Laweh is the famous satay from Pariaman and Sate Mak Syukur is known as the best one from Padang Panjang and well known all over West Sumatra.

So, I believe now you know where to go to eat Sate Padang where you are in Pariaman or Padang Panjang. For the one in Padang, I haven't got any information which one is the best, but when I was there, it's easy to find the one that can spoil your belly. Yummy!

I've been trying so long to get the recipe of Sate Pariaman, but never got one. Then I always try to avoid using turmeric when making it, yet you can see from the photos here that they are still yellowish. I believe it happened because of the turmeric leaves I used.

Let's not worry about the color of the sauce I made since the taste was really heaven. I'm not writing this because I'm the one who made it, but when my better half grilled the satay, the smell reminded me of the one sold by our fav street vendor back home. Then when you put them all together, my hubby said that it's like Eid in his mouth (you might known is as "it's like Christmas in my mouth").

Now, let's me share you the recipe so you don't have to suffer from seeing the photos or reading my story as you can make your own. Believe me, this recipe never failed.

Sate Padang (West Sumatran Satay)
Recipe from various sources and modified by me.

Ingredients:
1 kg oxtongue (or beef or combination of two)
12 lime kaffir leaves
4 stalks of lemongrass, take only the white part, bruised
2 turmeric leaves, shredded (optional)
Salt and sugar as needed
12 tbsp of rice flour, dissolved with small amount of water
Water for boiling the beef tongue
Bamboo skewer
Cooking oil

Spices, grind:
12 cloves of garlic
10 red chilies (you can add more according to your taste bud)
2 knucklebones of ginger
1 tsp cumin powder
2 tsp coriander powder
2 tsp galangal powder
1 tsp white pepper powder
1 block of beef broth
Salt as needed

Condiments:
Rice cake
Fried shallots (bawang goreng)

Method:
1. Boil the tongue until half cooked. Sift the water and set aside. Clean the white part of the tongue and cut into cube form.
2. Mix the ground spices with the water from boiling the tongue. Fold in the tongue. Add lime kaffir leaves, turmeric leaves and lemongrass. Bring into a boil then reduce the heat, simmer until the tongue completely cooked. Sift the broth and set aside.
3. Thread 3-4 pieces of tongue into a skewer. Do it until all the tongue used up. Brush with a small amount of cooking oil and grill couple of minutes until both sides are brown (do not grill too long as tongue is already cooked).

Sauce:
1. Reboil the broth over small heat.
2. Gradually pour into rice flour mixture while stirring.
3. Keep on stirring until the gravy becomes thick.

Serving Suggestion:
Place Sate Padang and rice cake on the plate. Pour onto the sauce and garnish with fried shallots. Serve hot.

Now, what do you wait more? Let's eat your own homemade Sate Padang.

By the way, The Beauty of Red and White event is extended until 31st of August. Just send us your best red and white food photo.

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