baked kueh keria (sweet potato doughnuts)

Hi All! I hope you haven't forgotten that my book launch is coming up next Saturday, 21 July from 2pm - 3 pm at Kinokuniya, Level 3 Takashimaya Shopping Centre. My official e-vite finally came last week and it's so adorable, I just have to show you what it looks like : 



I'm really looking forward to it and hope to meet as many of you there, as possible. The event is open to all and if you'd like to take a friend or two or three along, go right ahead! Now let's get on with today's post.....

There comes a time in most mortal food bloggers' lives (like when a shoe horn becomes necessary to get into a pair of jeans) when the painful realisation that some serious calorific intervention is required, hits home, hard. 

ma lai koh (malay cake) modern version

It's that time again, when Biren  and I put on our thinking caps, crank up the stove or oven and start rifling though our recipe notes to bring you another Nona Nona collaboration! This time round, I said "Chinese kueh"! And of course, Biren being the trooper she is, immediately said "yes!", even as she was probably thinking, "Oh boy! What crazy sounding substitutions will I have to make this time??!"

Well, I don't know, because haven't you heard? Biren and I jump into each Nona Nona episode with nothing more than an idea, theme, ingredient or cooking style in mind, always not knowing what the other will come up with!

kueh bakar or kueh kemboja (baked pandan cake)

Dessert is not negotiable in our house. Hubs daily craves something sweet after dinner, and glares balefully at my proffered plate of fresh fruit, when guilt drives me to seek healthier alternatives. It's only minutes before he'll be opening and closing the fridge and pantry cupboard doors in search of something for his throbbing sweet tooth. Determined resistance on my part only sends him down to the McDonald's outlet five minutes away on foot, for his cinnamon melts fix. I now know better than to even start peeling an onion for the main dish, if dessert isn't ready and waiting.

This  delicious Malay kueh (cake in Malay) is one of his favourites as it's wobbly, creamy with coconut milk and amazingly fragrant because of the ridiculous amount of pandan leaves I use to flavour it. That gorgeous jade-like green did not come out of any bottle, let me tell you.

kueh keria (malay sweet potato doughnuts)

Before I share today's recipe for an old school sweet treat, I just want to let you know that this will be my only post for this week and the next, as I will be leaving for Barcelona in two days and will not be back until the week before Christmas. Yes, I'm expecting the time of my life and I hope I don't forget to take photos in the midst of the fun I wil be having. Now about those doughnuts....

My grandmother loved to regale me with stories of the war she witnessed and just barely survived. The one thing she missed, or so she told me, while evading bombs and eking out a living as a widow with three children, during World War Two, were these simple but oh so moreish doughnuts. She sure was right about that much - of the dozen that I made, six went on a treacherous journey, down my gullet, never to be seen again.