Some fun for the holidays....

The kids are having their school holidays rite now... this year is the 1st time my DS gets to enjoy a mth-long school holiday. Altho' he had not done very well for his 1st exams in his life (LOL), we just have to let them do somefin else besides preparing for the next school term to start.

"I" suggested to let the kids try their hands on baking their own cupcakes and decorating it. I'm all for it as it gives them somefin fun to do.

Got the KA to mix the batter and the kids did the measuring of the ingredients. Then the actual fun begins when the cakes are cooled enuf for decorating.

Here's the results of their hardwork... looks good eh?

Tomatoes remedy for diabetics

This is a recipe to detoxify the body and also good for diabetics with the addition of oligo. Generously shared by Billy Wang, a DJ who was striken with cancer before and shares alot of health recipes for the benefit of everyone.

What you need

• Mini tomatoes (about 1 pkt S$2/-)
• Natural vinegar (get it from organic shop) 1/4 cup
• Cold water 1 cup
• Oligo 1/2 tbsp (from organic shop)
• Sea Salt 1/2 tsp
• Red Chilli (1 or 2 pc)
• Black peppercorn 1 tsp

What to do

• Wash the tomatoes n dry it. Use toothpick to poke the tomatoes about 6-8 holes.
• Boil water, sea salt, chilli n peppercorn till oligio n seasalt melt.
• Cool it, pour into a glass container n add in the vinegar and oligo.
• Pour in all the tomatoes n leave it for 6-8 hrs. Can put it in the fridge n last about a wk.
• Take 6 pcs a day.

In case you guys dunno wad is oligo (i haven't even heard of it b4! and went searching for it till i found this shop, HOCKHUA, selling it.) Here's pic of the oligo:
This is the vinegar i have at home. It has wild honey added to it.

哥哥牛一

Today's my brother's b'day. He asked for a peach fruit cake... so here it is....

Happy Birthday Bro! Wish you'll have someone to bake you a cake next year, k? *wink*

I used LeeLee's sponge cake recipe and a whole can of peaches for this cake. Minimum whip cream.

Joining the craze....

Hokkaido Milk Loaf - like all japanese breads, it's soft and fluffy. And remained so even after 2 days! it's amazing how the japanese can formulate recipes like this.

The bread has becomes suddenly very popular in the baking forum that i frequent, IK. Definately have to do with the texture of this loaf, and also the wonders of technology... with the creation of a bread machine, many people have been able to enjoy a fresh loaf of home-made bread anytime of the day. However, I do not have a bread machine... altho' I do have plans to acquire one in the near future (hoping that there'll be a promotion for bread machine in GSS). So in order to save myself some arm exercises, I used my KA to knead the dough. However, after 10 mins, I still decided to use some arm power to knead it till it passed the pane test. Finally happy with the dough, I left it to poof and then shape it and poof again b4 gng into the oven. This loaf became the family's tea-break this afternoon. My family love bread... and kids esp, love soft white bread. So this has become a family favourite! Guess I'll be making this bread more often in future.I have a similar recipe which i extracted from one of the taiwanese website long ago. Went thru' my folders of recipes collected thru' the years and spotted it. So this is one of the recipes on my to-do list for the longest time. Glad that I finally had the chance to try it out. Yay! one more item struck off the list. :)

Leftover dough which cannot be fitted into the loaf tin went into individual muffin cups.

Cotton-soft Japanese Cheesecake

Chanced upon a promotion at Giant supermart one of the weekdays while grocery-shopping during lunch break. The philly LIGHT cream cheese was on offer... $3.95 for 2 blocks of 250gm each! Acutally I tot it was the price for only 1 block. I tot why not, since it's on offer(usual price is $4.70/block) and it's LIGHT cheese... suppposedly 30% less fat... 0_0 i definately need that! So i reached out to grab a block only to realise that it's 2 blocks binded together.... ok... i won't mind buying 2 blocks since it's on offer (i tot to myself)... then i went on to check the expiry date (always do that when u're buying diary products!) and saw that it's BEST BEFORE 7 JUN 07. hmm... so it means i'll be making use of the cheese b4 the expiry date....This is the cake just out of the oven.... smell heavenly!

I've been wanting to make the Japanese cheesecake for the longest time (think it's like 2 years ago that it was on my to-do list!!!!).... yeah lazy me finally pushed myself to do it. I've not done many cheesecakes so far... i think there's been less than 10. and one that requires a water bath is a never-done-before thingy! I came upon a recipe for this cheesecake, posted by Irene, in one of the baking forums. The reviews from those who tried it were good... that spurred me on to try.

So here it is, after being in the oven (and water bath) for 90mins!......Due to my butter-fingers, the cake when unmoulded look like this! argh.... to console myself, the taste is great... i guess that's all that matters rite? haha

cream scones, dream scones....

Finally bought a bottle heavy cream and got to work on the cream scones. Very sinfully delicious! I added cranberries to it instead of currants... good decision! Once out of the oven, I popped 4 pieces into my mouth! wah... not good for my waistline.

Food Review 2007 #4 - Wah Lok Cantonese Restaurant

Today, we went for a Mother's Day lunch at Wah Lok Cantonese Restaurant @ Carlton Hotel. Frankly, this is the 1st time in my life stepping into Carlton! It just occured to me that I've never attended any wedding dinners or events in that hotel. Of course I've always known it's presence at the junction of Victoria Street and Bras Basah Rd.... And having undergone some renovations not too long ago.

I was presented with an opportunity to try the food that when "I" booked a table there for lunch. Was told that the dim sum is not too bad. So we went....

Was rather impressed by the 1st impression of the restaurant. I like the decor and ambience there. The service was not bad too. Service staff were attentive and prompt. We ordered the usual dim sum stuff like char siew baos... har gao...siew mai...egg tarts...some deep fried thingys and even a plate of fried rice and noodles as tummy fillers in case someone is still hungry after the dim sum were served and ingested.

The char siew baos... disappointing.... u know how much i love cs baos.... somehow the baos here have a very floury taste to it. the fillings were also miserable. The siew mais....not too bad.... can taste that the fillings are really fresh. And the har gaos has crunchy prawns... pity that the prawns are really small.... The fun cheong... we ordered the prawns and beef fun cheongs... not good in my opinion... the fun cheongs were thick and the beef ones were esp bad. can't taste the beef at all and the sauce tat came with the fun cheong, altho' quite delectable, was miserable. There's hardly enuf sauce for the 3 pieces of fun cheong per plate... really felt like asking for more sauce....

The steam ribs were nice tho' i din manage to take any pics... i guess 'coz it's nice lor! haha... everyone tried to get a piece of it and it was gone in no time!

Egg tarts... not much to comment abt it.... 'coz it's just taste like any other egg tarts. But there's one item i wanted to highlight.... and SORRIE... again no pics! It's their custard puffs. It's really tiny and crescent-shaped. Gave it a name called "美人腰". The portion is really small...the puff pastry is really light. I can't get enuf of that! haha The lotus leaf glutinous rice... I din get to taste it! DS and DD shared one. But from the looks on their faces, they are satisfied customers. We also had deep fried fu-pei (beancurd sheet) wrapped with fish paste. The fillings were fresh and crunchy.

The roast duck was good. Even Mom said so! so it must be good lar. I think they used small ducks 'coz the meat was very little. But it was still moist and tender when bitten into. The skin remained crisp. yum yum.... We had the noodle braised in mushroom. Not bad a dish....and also fried rice. Well, the fried rice is nothing to shout abt.

The fish fillet with mango sauce. Abit pricy for that small portion. And sad to say... nothing to shout abt also. There was also a veg dish which i din take any pics. It was tofu with green veg.. looks like somefin that everyone can easily churn out at home. To end the meal, the kids ordered fried ice-cream. The adults were too full to go for any deserts. The fried ice-cream is only in mango. No choice of other flavours. It was coated with some flour and dessicated coconut, and a few slices of mango at the side. Verdict for the fried ice-cream? NOT GOOD. Altho' the portion was considered quite big... but it cost $5!... most of the kids can't finish their dessert. and DS even avoided the dessicated coconut coating. The mango ice-cream tasted quite bland.

Overall, I would say that it's not too bad, altho' I won't want to go back there again. I hope that Mommy dearest had a good time tho'.

Happy Mother's Day again!

A tribute to my MOM

Today's Mother's day.... and we've been celebrating this day for the longest time i can remember....

Mom has always been my greatest support, my pillar of strength! She had seen me thru' my tough times and had always been encouraging me. Of course there are times where we dun see eye to eye on things.... but how can u stay angry with yr mom? NEVER... we just make up in a blink of an eye. She used to be very busy with her streamstress business, but she never let us go hungry (meals are always on the table when we reached home from school) and was always concerned abt how our studies were doing. Even tho' she did not have any formal education (does 2 years in kindy count?) she managed to learn to read and write mandarin and even picked up sewing while young to earn a living. And when the grandchildren came along, she even speaks english now!

Now myself had become a mom, I can truly understand her thots and care and LOVE for her children.

I'll like to say a BIG THANK YOU and that I LOVE YOU, mom... you're the greatest!

I made a mango marshmallow cake for today. Then realised that my pipping skills had gone to the dogs! haha.... haven't been practising and now such a disaster! Furthermore I think i went overboard with the cream... had to stop myself! shd've left the center part of the cake alone. Haiz.... anyway, this is a super yummy cake! Thanks LeeLee and Florence for the recipe.The unadorned cake.... See the marbling on the surface? hahah.... even tho' I've freezed for abt 45mins for the marshmallow portion to harden, when the jelly mix went on, it still started to float up ....as for the jelly mix... it din turn out translucent.... I did some heart-shaped cut-outs with mangoes and arranged it so nicely on the marshmallow top... too bad it's all covered by the jelly.

just for laughs...

Going Bananas

I've never been a fan of bananas. However, my kids and DH are. Whenever we need to do some marketing and come across fruit stalls, a bunch of bananas will automatically appear in the shopping basket.

DH had left for his usual working trip last week, leaving me with half a bunch of bananas, turning a deep yelllow. Well, I had to do somefin with it rite? So here comes a banana cake.... (but i'm still left with 2 bananas... hm... the kids will have to finish it somehow....)

This recipe is from lucy's blog... wonderfully soft and aromatic... the whole kitchen (apt, 'coz my flat is so small) was filled with the wonderful smell of bananas while baking. Thanks for the recipe lucy! this is definately a keeper.

Dream scones - not quite there yet...

I WANT TO BAKE!

After not being able to do any baking for abt 2 week, I must will myself into baking somefin today. Be it somefin easy and fast... as long as i BAKE!

Was browsing thru' IK forum last nite and decided to give the cream scones Annie posted a try. It looks simple and fast, plus the good reviews posted, it's definately the best choice. However, looking into my fridge, I realised that I only have a little bit of sour cream (leftover from previous bakes)... other than that, I have the other ingredients required for the recipe. So I subsituted the heavy cream with all of the sour cream I have ( I din measure), and added some milk to make it up to 1 cup. From the threads abt this recipe, someone had pointed out that using yogurt instead of cream makes the dough very sticky. So when I worked the sour cream with milk in, I kinda expected it to happen... and it did.

Here's my improvision....

What you need

• 300gms flour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/2 tbsp baking powder
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 70gm unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup raisins
• 1 cup sour cream with milk

What to do

• Preheat oven @180C.
• Sift baking powder, flour and salt tog in a mixing bowl. Add in the sugar and mix.
• Cut in the butter until it resembles coarse meal.
• Add in the raisins and mix well.
• Stir in the cream & milk mixture and bind the dough tog. It turns stickly at this point.
• Place dough onto a lightly flour baking paper on tray and cut into desired portions.
• Brush on more milk on the surface and then sprinkle sugar on top.
• Bake @180C for 20 mins until surface turns golden.
• Best eaten warm! (with your favourite beverage!)

Verdict after the taste test..... this definately needs improving! Probably will go get heavy cream to try.