Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Focaccia love.

The planned focaccia bread making was attempted today! ;) It was a simple enough recipe which called for only a handful of ingredients. I followed it as much as I could, substituting bits and pieces here and there where I deemed appropriate. The final results was simply rewarding to say the least. The smell of freshly baked focaccia in the oven was akin to a step away from heaven's door.

I can't believe how easy it is to actually make bread from scratch. In the past, I was slightly wary of the ingredient - yeast, and thus was not interested in trying my hand at the bread genre. However, I found instant yeast in the local supermart and bought it, together with gelatine (another never tried before ingredient), determined to actually do something about trying new things now that money has been spent. ;)

Two key ingredients - Herbs and olive oil; Dough before proofing; Dough doubled in size after proofing; Mini round focaccias.
Sprinkled mixed herbs, black pepper, salt and chopped fresh garlic atop the dough.

The recipe produced enough dough for me to shape into one large rectangle and three small rounds. It's just a personal preference that I love mini portions of baked goodies. They just look so cute and dainty. ;) This recipe is a keeper, I foresee that we'll be buying less of the focaccia bread we used to buy since I have plenty of bread flour to use up before I fly back to Brisbane. I'll be making additions along the way, like perhaps add sundried tomatoes, and mixing the herbs into the dough the next time I make it to add flavour to the bread.



Thus, here's a toast to trying out new things in the kitchen. A munch of focaccia later, my thoughts have already flown to flick through the list of recipes I have in mind to try out. Scrolling through the long list in my mind, I knew without any hesitation that the next thing I bake would be a cake. The problem is, what cake? I'm torn between three choices, the hazelnut gateau I tried a couple months before, a matcha and chocolate opera cake or a strawberry charlotte. Choices. Choices.

Tuesday, January 06, 2009

Cinnamon rolls.

Moving on to try a new genre of baked goods - bread. I baked the cinnamon rolls a couple days back, probably just a couple days after the earl grey muffins (which my sister snubbed not behind my face but to my face - in her own words: "It's not sweet one! I'm not diabetic, so why did you bake such diabetic food." -.-).

Considering the fact that cinnamon and sugar are certainly not diabetic, I set out to make the below rolls.



They were pretty yummy straight out of the oven, I couldn't resist popping one in my mouth while it was still hot cos the cinnamon smell wafting through the kitchen was seriously going into my head, inducing me to taste one the moment I removed the tray from the oven. When cooled, it tasted crunchy, an okay recipe I guess. But I still preferred the taste straight out of the oven. ;)

When I offered them to my sister (her majesty, no less), she actually looked at them and proceeded to say: "I don't like these kind, I like the kind like bread that type." I was torn between the urge to force one down her throat or to throttle her. 好难伺候哦. snigger. Surprisingly, she did try it the next day I think, and say it was not bad. lols.

I think, with plenty of free time on my hands, I'm baking at a much frequent pace. Ups and downs of it. ;) Next on list: foccacia bread!

Oh yeah, have been hanging out with friends again these few days. Meeting some of the hockey babes for quick lunch and a session at Minds Cafe, a karaoke session with Jos and mahjong session at my house again yesterday with the usual kakis, lunch/shopping (guilty) at IMM with Wen today before heading to Daily Scoop and had ice-cream there with Jia.

I'm in need of live music again. Can't wait for Saturday. ;)

Thursday, January 01, 2009

Happy 2009!


So I had a date with Wenli last night. We headed to town late about 11 and had supper...till the new year. (: We were chatting normally and, had in fact, missed the first few moments of the year till we checked the time. Haha. Wen, remember what we were doing for the first few minutes of the new year? snigger.

We caught Twilight, and there were still many people catching the show even though it's been screening for quite some time already - proves that I'm not the slowest person in Singapore to watch it. ha! The movie was not bad. As someone who've already read the book, there are bound to be comparisons made between the novel and the film. The novel was more lengthy, describing things and people in extreme detail, while the movie cut them off, and even altered some of the story content. Oh well, it's hard to bring to life a book as always, so I'm not saying it's a bad movie, just that it's an alright show.

One thing I can't fathom - is Robert Pattinson that hot? I don't see his appeal. Not before in Harry Potter, and not now in Twilight. I mean, I could see why girls of all ages would be charmed by him, but personally, he's just not my type to swoon over. ;)

Anyway, here are the earl grey muffins I was talking about yesterday. I found the recipe at some website and it looked really healthy, with no butter, minimal olive oil and sugars - seemed like a low-fat muffin to me. So I decided to bookmark for future reference. Boy am I glad I did make it cos it tasted pretty good for a muffin without all the butter and sugars. I don't feel as guilty popping one of these miniature muffins into my mouth compared to say, a regular frosted cupcake? heh.


Baking them wasn't without troubles. The previous brand earl grey teabags we had in the house were attacked by pests, and I realised it (luckily) before I dumped a pack of tealeaves into the batter. I was opening up the teabag on a plate to sift through the contents, when I noticed miniscule things crawling about the plate. Eeew. Talk about off-putting. I had to leave the house to get a box of Twinings Earl Grey. tsk. The Twinings Earl Grey smell was really prominent even before I opened the plastic packaging of the box. Yum.



Oh did I mention I recently acquired a new toy??? I mentioned to Dad that I wanted a SLR-like camera, minus the bulk weight of the SLR. He handed me Panasonic DMC-FZ50. It looks really cool. I've been fiddling around with it these couple of days. I'm not even 1/3 through the manual, but I figure that nothing beats hand-on practice. ;) This entry's pictures were taken using the new camera. I love how the effects turned out. (:

I am thankful that Dad deals with electronic equipment - handy when I've developed an interest in photography - and that he passes me stuff when I ask for it. I am truly grateful for having a supportive Dad who indulges me so much.





Happy 2009!

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Baking frenzy.

It was a baking week this week. Eclairs and macarons. The fridge is full of sweet goods - my baked goods, cakes and petit fours (Sister's birthday was just over, and she received quite a few of these) and tubs of ice-cream. It gives me a sugar rush just thinking about the amount of stuff in the refrigerator. Hoho!


I decided on trying out new flavours for the eclairs - earl grey and matcha. Earl Grey cos I know my sister likes earl grey, and matcha for Mua. (:


I didn't really like the earl grey flavour in the end as I felt the overall taste was just weird. Maybe the quality of the earl grey used wasn't good enough (I thought we had Twinings at home, but apparantly not.). My sister also said the earl grey flavour wasn't strong enough and she preferred the matcha ones comparatively.


I made enough to pack some for Mua and Siew and dropped them off at their place that night. Unfortunately for Mua, the box apparantly went "missing" when she reached home and she didn't get to taste any. Awww. Never mind, I'll do some other green tea goodie for you next time dear!



My first attempt at french macarons on 9/12/08. The main motive was to use up the egg whites left over from the pastry cream I made for the eclairs above.








I still had some egg whites lying around, and lots of leftover ganache I made yesterday for the macarons. What should I do? More macarons. ;)

The macarons I made yesterday were pretty pale in colour, I wanted vibrant hues so I added more colouring/powder to the macarons mixture I made today.


I sifted some cocoa powder on the second batch of chocolate macarons, hoping that there would be a nice speckle effect. But alas, I added too much cocoa powder into the macaron mixture itself, so the macarons turned out really dark, and the sprinkling effect was not really obvious.



A few more drops of red colouring turned the macarons into a richer pink hue. Can you spot a vague letter 'M' on the upturned macaron on the right image? I find it so cool - M for Michelle! Haha.



These are actually really really tiny macarons. About the size of a ten-cent coin perhaps. I piped different sizes macarons - mostly tiny/medium ones and a few big ones. I heard that macarons are really sweet bites, so I made them bite-sized so sampling all the different flavours won't leave anyone feeling as though they overindulged in sugar.








Monday, October 27, 2008

Nutty project drives me nuts


I've handed in my 2 assignments due last Friday, with utmost relief. ;) Now all that's left is the assignment due this Friday, and the exam on the 12th. Phew.

Went for a movie How to Lose Friends and Alienate People today with Fiona and Ludwig. Movie was so-so. But the fun part was we had lunch at West End before that and cos we had time, we went St Vinnys! (For those in the dark, it's kinda Salvation Army kinda shop) My first time there. hoho I got a pink patterned bag for $4. ;)

Anyway, cos Therese had said she wanted my help in baking to do some shots for her photomedia, I decided to make Filbert (Hazelnut) Gateau with Praline Buttercream over the weekend. Literally over the weekend. Since the process of making the cake was a damn long list, I spread the job over a couple days. It made things way easier for sure. Then her hsemates, aka the two above, told me on Saturday Therese is not coming anymore. o.o Oh well, since I had already started the job, so might as well finish it right.

Some negative side effects that I had while making the cake were, I overwhipped the egg whites (trust me, you wouldn't want to know how it looks like), so I had to throw away the first batch and do up a second one (which I hand whipped instead of using the electric mixer) and the mountain of washing I had to do. -.- But the effort was worth it (kinda) since the praline buttercream was damn yummy haha.

It's great I halved the recipe so I ended up with lesser portions. One thing about baking so much is that you tend to not want to waste food, so I always cut back on the recipe to whatever proportions possible. I ended up with 6 mini cakes but I only used 5 of those since one of them kinda collapsed tsk tsk. I gave one to Woo as belated birthday, one to my ex-boss (oh did I mention I'm done with my intern thing? (: ), one to Pam who's coming back tomorrow from Bangkok! and one for myself! So there's still one more in the fridge...

hazelnut brittle process
praline paste process
praline buttercream process
assembling the cakes process
the caramalising hazelnuts process with the long long tips.
pouring ganache over cakes process















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