Ondeh Ondeh

Harvested some sweet potato from our garden. It is great if I can make something that my Gardening Club buddy can share with after weeks of weeks of hard labour. Ondeh Ondeh is a traditional dessert made with Sweet potato, glutinous flour, gula malacca (plam sugar) and coated with shredded coconut . It is my first attempt and am glad it turn out delicious. Most importantly: enjoy the joy of sharing ;>

P.S Thanks to Anne who helped called aunt Jenny to call me and teach me how to make this.

Merry Christmas

Mini Wedding Cup Cakes with Cake Stand

Chocolate Cream Ganache Cake

As bakers, sometimes we're so engrossed in how to perfect the baking skill and decorating skill that we forget the purpose of taking up this hobby i.e. the pleasure of the baking process itself and having a taste of the final products. I don't really have much time sitting down and enjoying the results. I wanted to give myself a pat on the shoulder by making a cake for myself. This is to remind me of my passion and I don't wanna lose this and make this a routine.

My loved ones always give me 101% support in the process. Whether to bring the kids out so that I have quiet time to finish up the cakes, or lending me a helping hand in decorating hundreds of cup cakes... My gratitude is beyond word. So I wanted them to get to enjoy not only the process but results. I didn't make anything fancy but one that tasted great. So I used Valrhola chocolate. Even my hubby who doesn't really like cakes is full of praise - he has been very honest in giving feedback on my cooking/baking.

It is just a chocolate sponge cake layered with chocolate cream, coco cranch and finished up with chocolate ganache. I also used some balance icing to practise my piping skill to give this cake some essence. Simple yet delicious ;> That's all I need after rushing to complete some cake orders.

Congratulation Jia Ying & Christopher (Slide Show)

I have more photos of this wedding cake so click onto the slide show and enjoy!

Pistachio Butter Cookies

My Humble Garden

Wagyu Striploin

This piece of steak cost us a bomb... Some times back, I bought a wagyu beef trimmings and I simply stir fried it with salt and pepper. It tasted heavenly. The marble of fat was evenly distributed. It just melt in the mouth. So this time I bought more and picked a better one. Surely we had very high expectation especially because this piece cost more. It turns out having lots of tendon in the meat and it's tough, although the meat taste great but I am really disappointed ;(

Thank You Teachers

Sea Food Feast

The sea food feast we had last Sat was the blog of the month. All thanks to God Ma Diana who generously paid me to cook for her to celebrate her coming birthday. She invited our Pastors, SH and our family to enjoy the occasion - total 8 adults and 4 kids. She emphasized that I must play with ingredients that I rarely tried before and the dishes had to be fanciful and of hotel standard ... ha ha, she has exquisite taste bud...

Some special requests from her : lobsters, crabs... of course seafood feast will be the best choice. I was busy the past week digging through my collection of cook books to look for the right recipes and work out the shopping list and process flow. The main challenge is to stay within budget, cook and be ready within very tight timeframe and serve them hot and be with the guests to have a good time.

Most of the dishes were new to me but I guess 1 of the tricks of cooking seafood is blanch the ingredients in hot oil before the actual cooking. This would seal up the flavour and the meat remain moist and juicy.

Menu:

1) Broccoli fried with Scallop

2) Fresh Oyster fried with Soya Sauce

3) Steamed Soo Hock Fish

4) Baked Chicken Breast with Palma Ham and cheese

5) Lobster baked with cheese

6) Fried Clam with black beans, chili and garlic

7) Black Pepper Crab

8) Meshed Potato

9) Fruit Pie

Shannea's Birthday

More photos to view

Thanks Louise from Cake Journal for the advise and the cake recipe from Baking Mum

Shannea's Birthday Cup Cake

Baked Alaska for "Daddy" (With Video)

"NEW ADDED VIDEO BELOW"

My husband is not a "cake" person so I was not sure if baking him a cake for father's day was a good idea. I always watch "Chef at Home" by Michael Smith. He showed how to make Baked Alaska once. I am really impressed by the way the dessert is presented. Pour some hard liquor on it and set the "cake" on fire... yeah u heard me right - set it "ON FIRE".

You shouldn't really call it a cake because the center of this dessert is ice cream, topped with flavoured whipped egg white, lightly baked in the oven for, say, 10 min. Then pour some hard liquor on it and set it on fire.

No harm trying it out because I had lots of left over egg white as a result of making so much ice cream. I chose mango ice cream because it is more refreshing compared to other flavour. I also did some special effect of some frozen diced mangos placed in the center.

My hubby was quite troubled and worried by the way I was going to play with the cake as I told him I'd set it on fire in the middle of our dinning table... After some explanation on how I intended to do it and with some fire safety precaution like standing by a few wet kitchen rugs and a bucket of water. We all had fun and he was pleased.

Here I wish all the fathers a "Happy Belated Father's Day".

Home Made Icecream (Part 2)

Weather is super warm this month, very good excuse to make lots of ice cream and forget about the diet...

As usual, my girls like the strawberry ice cream best. The parent choice will be a grown up flavour... Rum and Raisin, it is really a perfect match with rum soaking raisins in it, oh can't wait to make more.

Have few ripe bananas, no harm mixing them into the vanilla ice cream... it taste surprisingly good.