Coconut pudding and pandan jelly train

Today is the first day of World Breastfeeding Week in most parts of the world. To celebrate and as a reminder of the Got Milk? event I'm hosting I made these little train shaped puddings. But first a little more on breastfeeding. Last time I mentioned the benefits of breastfeeding. This time I would like to give moms-to-be who want to breastfeed my 50 cents of advice:
1. Check out your local La Leche League. LLL Leaders are experienced mothers who are accredited by La Leche League International to help mothers and mothers-to-be with all aspects of breastfeeding. They are available at all times to take your phone calls.
2. Find a good (local) breastfeeding forum on the internet (eg LLL), you'll get a great deal of information and questions answered by just reading other people's questions. I never posted any questions but I'm sure that was because I had already read so many questions and answers by other people that I never had to post any questions.
3. If you're giving birth in a hospital check out how the hospital deals with breastfeeding. And think about how you would like them to deal with you breastfeeding your baby. Let them know what you want.
4. Most new breastfeeding moms will get sore or cracked nipples. In my experience the lanoline ointment doesn't do much for cracked nipples. What really helped me were Mothermates hydrogel breastfeeding pads.
5. If you have problems concerning breastfeeding, go to a professional. A professional for breastfeeding is a lactationist. She (or maybe he?) knows all there is to know about breastfeeding and can help you.

Also I found some handy tips on how to prepare for breastfeeding on www.kellymom.com.
And did you know that celebraties are just like people? Even famous women breastfeed their babies ;) Check out the famous nursing moms link at www.breastfeeding.com

Btw there's still time to enter Got Milk? Just make a sweet dish that has milk as an ingredient (any milk, also non-dairy is ok) and blog about it. You will find all the details here. Deadline for entries is August 7th. I'll be doing a round-up soon after. Looking forward to your entries!



A's sister gave me this very cute train cake pan for my birthday (thanks H :) Instead of baking cakes in it I used it to make pudding. The white pudding is simple milk pudding made with some creamed coconut as a flavouring. The green jelly is agar agar jelly with pandan extract. For the jelly I just followed the instructions on the package but divided it by 4. I did use a little less sugar. I poured a little bit of the hot liquid into part of the train moulds and the rest in a bigger flat mould to use for cutting the jelly up. I wasn't sure the two puddings would stick together so I tried making them simultaniously so that the agar agar jelly wasn't completely set when I poured the milk pudding on top. I was hoping this would help them stick together
The plan was to use tapioca starch for the milk pudding, an ingredient I've had for a while but never used before. When it was time to add the tapioca starch I realised that I was using a saucepan that was too small to whisk the pudding in. I couldn't whisk full speed and it turned out that tapioca 'binds' different from cornflour. The process of thickening is almost instantly, combine that with a small saucepan and you end up with a lumpy pudding :( Not something I wanted to pour in my moulds. Instead I poured it in a big mould as a back up if the train pudding didn't turn out the way I imagined. After it had cooled it tried inverting the pudding but that didn't work. Tapioca starch makes for a real strange pudding, instead of sort of solidifying it was sort of chewy, gelly...very strange...at least it is when you're using it for the first time.
So I had to make new pudding and decided to stick with good old cornflour. By the time I finished the new pudding, the agar-agar jelly had already set.
And the thing I feared would happen, happened: the 2 puddings didn't stick :( Luckily the agar-agar jelly was so firm that I was able to poke it out of the moulds and put it back on its place :)
This was my first time eating agar-agar jelly and I thought it was a bit too firm and tough. Next time I'd use a little less. I was perfect for cutting up though.
As for the taste, the pandan tasted very nice and Far Eastern but the consistency of the jelly was a bit too firm imo. The coconut pudding was delicious, not too much coconut taste but enough to enjoy. And because I used creamed coconut no distracting coconut fibres :)

Even though the train looks ok in the picture I don't really recommend making it because the two puddings don't stick together. I will give you the two recipes I used though. The coconut pudding is great on it's own and if you're into Far Eastern sweets you might like the jellies on their own too. My kids didn't care for the coconut pudding but loved the pandan jelly. My eldest thought it was candy - something he rarely gets - so he was excited :)



Pandan jelly (adapted from package)

50 g (1 ¾ oz) sugar
250 ml (1 cup) water
3 g (1/10 oz) agar-agar powder (sorry, no idea how many ts)
½ ts pandan extract (mine contains food colouring as well)

Bring the sugar, water and agar-agar powder to a boil. Allow to boil for 2 minutes. Stir in the pandan extract. Pour into mould and allow to cool to room temperature. Store in the fridge once cool.

Coconut pudding

1 l (4 ¼ cup) milk (divided in 900 ml / 3 ¾ cup and 100 ml / ½ cup)
100 g (3 ½ oz) creamed coconut
90 g (3 ¼ oz) sugar
80 g (2 ¾ oz) cornflour

Bring the 900 ml (3 ¾ cup) milk and creamed coconut to a boil.
Meanwhile mix the cornflour with the 100 ml (½ cup) milk until lump-free. (stir again just before adding to the milk)
Add the sugar to the boiling milk. On low heat add the cornflour mixture to the hot milk while whisking vigourously. Allow to cook for a minute while you keep stirring.
Pour into mould and allow to cool to room temperature. Store in the fridge once cool.