Purple Sweet Potato Mont Blanc (紅いも モンブラン)

Friendship; it is something we all need. We invariably form relationships with people all the time. There are different stages to the sort of relationships people have with one another - be it a mere acquaintance or a close friend. I find that friendships last because two persons take the effort and time to stay in contact, update each other about their daily lives and just generally be there. It is often easy to gradually find that you might be drifting away from your friends - be it lesser time spent together or moving on with different schools/jobs.

I am thankful and humbled that I have two friends from my childhood days that I still consider my best friends. Our friendship have weathered through the years, and even though we were not (and are still not) the sort to meet up weekly, we have managed to stay in touch all these years. They have seen me throughout so much - my formative years as a crybaby kid, dorky adolescent, self-conscious young adult, to whom I am today.    We all stay relatively near each other, but as we were in different schools, and when two of us were studying abroad, we were not the sort that meet up daily, weekly, or monthly. We try to meet up whenever we could once every few months, and now that we have all graduated, it does make it easier to meet up more regularly.

2012 has been a great year. I got to travel with both of these friends - I traveled to Vietnam in January with one, and to Seoul recently in July with the other. It was quite an experience to just spend time with them 24/7. I feel that a vacation makes you learn so much more about someone whom you seem to have known all your life (and thought you know everything about them).

You might be wondering what my rambling about friendship is all about. It just happened that on my vacation recently, I happened to mention to my pal that I love sweet potatoes, especially the purple variety. It was just in passing, yet I was touched that she actually remembered this small fact. When we came back from our holiday, she actually gifted me with two boxes of sweet potatoes (one box of yellow and one box of purple). Awwww.

Needless to say, I was ecstatic (and thankful of course). And also, a little apprehensive. It's 10kg worth in total. Oh my god. How was I going to finish everything?

One thing for sure, I knew I was going to save some to make desserts. The first thing I planned to make was purple sweet potato mont blanc. I've been wanting to make it ever since I saw Evan's version here.

Purple Sweet Potato Mont Blanc (紅いも モンブラン)

Mont Blanc

I met up with Evan for lunch and a planned baking session - subject unknown. She was going to bring some of her baking books so we can look through and decide, in the end however, we decided to make Mont Blanc instead. Initially, as we were both entremets fans, we had hoped to make one, but due to time constraint, we decided on something else instead. I had always been wanting to attempt to make Mont Blanc, but was kinda afraid to. And Evan's done it before, so what better to do so when I have someone who's familiar with it by my side?

Sable breton; Assembling the Mont Blanc