Easy breakfast and brunch ideas for the busy moms.

With a kid coming along the way, I have finally came to my realization that being a mom is not "relaxing". It's a never-ending full time job, even more so when I was home alone with my baby. Cooking with a baby at home is a challenging task, so I have created some of these recipes I hoped to share with other moms out there who are also struggling with juggling between baby and work.

Vegetarian one pot pasta (serves 1)

This has got to be the easiest, no-mess recipe. If you are stuck at home with no one to look after the baby, give this a go.

Slice  2 garlic cloves, a chunk of carrot, 1 potato, 1 onion and 2 tomatoes. Rinse 2 shiitake mushrooms. Break up 1 portion of spaghetti into halves (I used spaghetti because it cooks the slowest, but feel free to use any other pasta). Combine in a pot and pour water over, just enough to cover. Place pot over high heat until liquid boils, season with salt, then cover with a lid and let it simmer for 20 minutes, or until most of the water has evaporated. Add in any green and continue cooking for 2 more minutes or until it has wilted slightly.

P/S: I preferred my dish a little moist so I retained some of the soup.

Rice vermicelli with vegetables in anchovy soup (serves 2)

I like anchovy soup base! Boil the anchovies for no more than 15 minutes and you get the perfect flavour. The best thing about this dish is I don't have to use salt at all.

Clean 200 g anchovies (pick larger sizes for soup) and remove the heads. Rinse twice. Pour 600 ml of water and cook the anchovies over high heat. When it boils, switch to low heat and let it simmer for 10-15 minutes. In the mean time, slice a chunk of carrots, 1 potato, 1 onion and some cabbage. Soften 2 portions of rice vermicelli in water. When the soup is done, remove anchovies from the soup. Place all vegetables into the soup and boil until they are cooked, about 10 minutes. Put in the rice vermicelli and cook for another minute. Serve.

Beef burger (serves 2)

This is a winner.

Mince 1 garlic clove, 1 onion and ground 200 g beef. In a bowl, combine the ingredients with about 3 tbsp barbecue sauce (alternatively, just marinade them with some soy sauce) until they are well mixed. Divide the mixture into two even portions. Place a sheet of cling film on your palm, and put one portion onto the film. Shape the mixture into a patty of even thickness, then wrap. Repeat with the other portion. Let the patties sit for 30 minutes in the fridge. Preheat oven to 170°C. Place a sheet of aluminium foil on a tray and rub it with oil. Remove the cling film and bake the burgers for 20 minutes.

Serve, on toasted bread, with cheese, sliced tomatoes, sauce and cabbage.

Well-balanced breakfast (serves 2)
This dish is sufficient for me to last the morning. You can add in minced meat

Dice 1 large potato. Bring a pot of water to the boil and throw in the potatoes, simmer for about 15 minutes. In the meantime, beat 2 eggs. Scramble them over medium heat (I turned mine to low heat after the pan was hot enough for it to cook slowly), until it is just cooked (turn off the heat before all of it solidifies, and let the residue heat to continue cooking the egg). Remove from pan. Heat up butter in pan, and stir fry shimeji mushroom until most of the liquid has evaporated, then add in some cabbage and stir fry until it has cooked, and season with salt. Remove from heat. Drain the potatoes, then add 1 tbsp butter and a splash of milk (optional), and mash.

Serve the mash potato with the egg and vegetables.

Creamy chicken fettuccine.

Creamy Chicken Fettuccine (serves 2)

150 g fettuccine, cooked according to package directions

2 tbsps butter

100 g chicken, cubed and rubbed with salt and pepper

3 cloves garlic, sliced

2 onions, sliced

50 g mushroom, sliced (I used Enoki)

Veggie, sliced

200 g cooking cream

Salt and pepper, to taste

Parmesan, grated

1. Heat 1 tbsp butter in pan, then sauté chicken over high heat. Remove from heat.

2. Add 1 tbsp butter in pan, sauté garlic and onions until fragrant, add mushroom and veggie with a splash of water and cook for 1 minute, or until they are slightly cooked. 

3. Pour cream into pan. Add cooked chicken and simmer sauce until slightly thickened.

4. Remove sauce from heat. Pour sauce over fettuccine and add Parmesan. Serve.

Garlic, pork and black pepper stir-fry vermicelli.

Adapted from Ina Garten's recipe for spaghetti aglio e olio. Here I have an equal amount of black pepper to be used in place of the red pepper flakes that I don't have.

It's perhaps the only dish that would make me willingly chew on the garlic. Mince even finer to make your kids eat it.

Garlic, Pork and Black Pepper Stir-Fry Vermicelli (serves 1)

Vermicelli, cooked according to package's directions and pasta water reserved

1/4 tsp olive oil

2 cloves garlic, minced

Pork strips

Choy sum, leaves separated and stalk cut into strips

Pinch of salt

1/8 tsp ground pepper

Mixed herbs

1. Heat olive oil over medium heat. Stir-fry garlic until fragrant.

2. Add the meat strips and lightly sauté until half cooked, then add the choy sum.

3. Season with salt and ground pepper. (A pinch of salt is usually enough, since the pasta water is salted.)

4. Add a splash of pasta water and let it boil. Reduce to a simmer, let sit until liquid reduces to 1/3.
5. Remove from heat. Toss the vermicelli in the reduced liquid and herbs. Serve.

You can also toss together a handful of grated Parmesan, if you like.

Baked ginger and lemon salmon with stir-fry spaghetti.

I'm a lazy cook. You knew it when I resorted to fixing salmon in an oven.

The batch of salmon we bought had its skin on but it was cut width wise, so I didn't have to cook the salmon skin down and then flip it. Salmon serves best with tomato or lemon, or anything with a refreshing sour tang.

Both recipes were adapted from Food and Travel's July 2012 issue.

Spaghetti with pork and napoli sauce.

Have I expressed my concern over my low-carb diet that includes an eradication of white wheat foodstuff including spaghetti?

Well it turns out that boiled white spaghetti has a low glycemic index of 44 according to IDF, but still it is loaded with carbohydrates (43 g carbs in every 140 g spaghetti, as listed on Google) so eat in an appropriate amount. I've always been a small eater so that's not much of my concern.

Not sure how many variations of tomato sauce have I posted in this blog but here goes - my most used pasta sauce recipe at home.

Creamy pasta on a distressed Christmas eve.

So my little brother had sent me some of his loving from Cameron Highlands, who suffered with a journey back in heavy rain.

On Christmas eve, several areas across my hometown were severely flooded after a day of rain. The atmosphere was rather depressing, with parents on alert with the updates emerging from the net, friends' houses inflicted and the rest hoping that they would not be affected, all I could do to divert my attention was to cook.

With the little cooking cream left from the previous recipe, I had always wanted to try a recipe of creamy cheese-y pasta.

The strawberries then turned into a photogenic side dish besides a decent dessert. Dipping these sour berries into melted chocolate definitely was an elating experience.

Lasagna with Tomato and White Sauce + Very Malaysian Risotto.

Lasagna with Tomato and White Sauce

On new year's eve, I had these instant lasagna sheets left in my fridge so I've got to make him his last homemade lasagna of the year.

Anyways, my faith in making my own tomato sauce had reduced until I decided to take up kitchenknifegang's advice. I used to cook the blended tomatoes at one go which resulted in a greater time taken to boil, this time I reduced the juices in batches.

Tomato sauce:
500g ripe tomatoes, peeled and blended (I reckon it's better to use cherry tomatoes, my sibling did once and the taste was fantastic)
1 small red onion, chopped
200g pork, minced
Italian mixed herbs
Pepper

1. Heat oil in pan. Cook onion, then sauté minced pork until thoroughly cooked.
2. Pour in quarter of the blended tomatoes, let it simmer cooking over medium heat, stirring constantly.
3. When the juices have reduced to one-third, add in the next batch of blended tomatoes. Repeat until all used up.
4. Flavour with herbs and pepper.

Improvise?

Yes definitely. Decent tomato paste SHOULD be used. The flavour of this sauce was still too bland as a pasta sauce, eventhough it was dry enough.

White sauce:
1 cup milk
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp flour

1. Melt butter in pan. Add in flour and stir to incorporate.
2. Pour in milk and stir over medium heat until thickens to your preferred consistency. This could take a while.

Also added were mixed herbs.

We also cooked the instant lasagna sheets for a moment in water, so that they would not take too much time to turn tender when in the oven, like before. When assembling with a good 200g of shredded mozzarella:

After 20 minutes at 180°C.

Very Malaysian Risotto

To be honest, I've been reminiscing about risotto that's been transformed by my ex, and even more after the post I've mentioned: Simple Parmesan Baked Risotto.

The reason this risotto is very Malaysian is that instead of the typical risotto rice like Arborio, I used locally produced rice. I was going to try the dish with Japanese rice but he couldn't find it in his kitchen, and it would be such a waste for me to buy a 500g packet for the 10g of rice I was gonna use.

Besides, I'd also used Chinese rice wine. I originally went for Shao Xing but it again, could not be found.

What I did:

500ml vegetable stock (cooked with these seasoning granules)

1/3 cup rice, uncooked

150g pork, minced

2 Shiitake mushrooms, soaked and sliced

1 tsp rice wine

Formaggio (I mistaken this as canned Parmesan)

1. Melt butter in pan. Sauté pork until cooked.

2. Pour in two ladles of stock and all the rice. Stirring constantly, simmer until stock reduces by two-third.

3. Stir in the wine along with another two ladles of stock, again, reduce until one-third is left.

4. Repeat by adding two ladles of stock at a time, simmering until rice is tender enough.

5. Then, add in Shiitake mushrooms while cooking the last batch of stock.

6. When the rice is moist enough (don't dry it up too much), turn the heat off. Pour cheese enough to cover the rice, and mix thoroughly. Serve.

Improvise?

The pork should not be cooked before the rice and stock are in the pan, as it loses flavour and becomes plain and dry after the dish is done like it does in soup. I was cooking only for myself, so the pork was still alright.

Mac 'n' cheese.

Nothing gets you instant access to temporary haven like a good big plate o' hot cheesy nourishment.

Think a dollop of warm strawberry sauce on a lump of ricotta cheese cake with double cream.

Fresh grated mozzarella, now molten, farmhouse scented, on top of a serving of bolognese lasagna.

A cup of hot chocolate (literally, hot, chocolate, click on this '.') beside a cheese plate.

After a seemingly endless struggle with life, the only upside of the day would have been settling down on a big fat couch next to a coffee table with a night-long strife supplement.

Then you'd imagine yourself, fearless, with the sharp edge of a sword pointed at your nose tip. "Try me, I'm as hard as concrete," you roared.

And where did I get the recipe again? I don't want to recall.

The next dish shall be an improvement.

Jamie Oliver or Alton Brown?