Post #148

here comes the dessert for our dinner for 4. i previously made an 8' cake tin version and this time round i adjusted the recipe to my liking, so as to make it less sugary but lighter and fluffier *whilst still v naughty* its unusual i can spend so much time on a dessert, but it was well worth the effort!! although i may not make these tiny versions anymore and revert to the cake tin version :)

the concept comes from rocky road chocolates, but transformed into cake form.


-Mini rocky road cake-



a chocolate and espresso coffee chiffon cake base topped with a light and smooth chocolate mousse. and in the centre there is a layer of naughty goodness - marshmallows, sugar coated pistachio and almonds, dried cranberries, currants and turkish delight. this cake is so fun to eat!! kinda has a sexy exterior but a cheeky kiddy interior.

the interior:



my first cake attempt:



see the brandy snaps? took me a while to make them look good. and despite the effort, the snaps LITERALLY snapped in the end after a day of refrigerating >.< apparently they wont last for more than a few hours in the fridge. d'oh

Post #147

we had visitors coming over for dinner friday night, and i thought cooking 2 hot dishes and 2 cold dishes plus a dessert for 4 would be plenty... i should have remembered that we have 2 blokes, and feeding them with a lot of veg probably cant fool their tummies that its food they're consuming!! haha. despite the fact that we may be a little down on food, we had a great time with these guys!! ^^

the cold dishes~


-Fig + proscuitto with lemon mint yoghurt dressing-

bought these figs in a pack and they're not bad. this combo is always a winner and so so easy to make!!

now this is special. whenever i watch jamie's 30 minutes meal, i'd complain how he could always get the coolest ingredients and claim that he got them from normal super. heirloom tomatoes, humongous buffalo mozzarella, the thinnest cured meat, odd coloured carrots, zucchinis and broccolini and strange species of micro herbs. envious. we dont see them in OUR super... so you can see how i got over excited when i saw purple carrots on sale at coles. its black outside and has a v dark purple colour inside.


-Carrot + purple carrot, corn + green salad with herb dressing-

taste wise, purple is just the same as normal carrots but i believe the colour of the food and its combination play a role in food appetite. certainly my appetite! red and dark purple carrots, green leaves, yellow corn and green salsa verde dressing. the dressing i blended together parsley, mint, lemon zest, lemon juice, chilli + olive oil. simple but refreshingly delicious!

the hot dishes~


-Roasted rib eye beef with cauliflower mash-

rolling the beef on some chopped thyme, olive oil and seasoning. then pan fry it before putting it into the oven for roasting. too simple to make, if you know how long it should stay in the oven =.= having made some v raw roasted beef last time, i went the other way this time :( lucky it was good quality meat.... but made it kinda a waste, my bad >.<

but but, i successfully made a cauliflower MASH rather than a SOUP. :)

finally, risotto. i like making risotto, somehow i find it less fiddly than other pasta... maybe there's less pots and pans involved.


-Prawns, asparagus, zucchini + lemon risotto-

add the grated zucchini in last or it will turn grey. all fresh colours and it was beautiful :)

dessert posting next time.

Post #146

i bought myself a little toy - a veggie twister.

when you eat sashimi in jap restaurants, you'd see underneath the raw fish a pile of curly julienne carrots and radish. this little toy does a rustic job of that :) it may not be professionally presentable, but its probably enough for domestic purposes and its fun!!!



and to test it out, i've made a colourful salad~

see the 2 functions of the twister?! curly julienne strips and curly slices:



lovely summer colours - red tomatoes, yellow mangoes, green cucumber + mint, orange carrots and white vermicelli in a vietnamese nouc cham dressing. so refreshing and eye appetising!


-Colourful vermicelli salad with nouc cham dressing-

and a meaty friend of the vietnamese style salad:


-Lemongrass chicken skewers-

Post #145

felt like some simple homely food last night, plus our rice container is almost empty =.= i thought we'd have congee and noodles instead. will need to fill up our rice tank on the weekends...

cooking up a smooth congee can be a real battle against one's level of patience *which was already running low after a long day at work*. you let the rice bubble away in the water bath until it slowly thickens and then gradually starting to break down... what a painfully snailing process!! and when the impatient unit *moi* gave the bubbly hot thickened congee a good stir, the congee reacted most violently and splurted 2 burning hot drops on the finger Y.Y

anyways, it was tasty still...


-Congee with minced beef, pickled veg + raw egg yolk-
-Stir fry egg noodle with bean sprout in soy-
-Pan fried pork + veg dumpling-

congee was v nice. smooth with good flavours from the minced beef and the salty pickled veg, rounded off with a raw egg yolk, stirred through into the congee just before eating. makes such a diff to the congee!!

Post #144

sis introduced us to a tetsuya product called "black truffle salsa", which is kinda like a runny paste containing all the earthy goodness that one can possibly dream of~ mushrooms, black summer truffle, porcini mushrooms, anchovy, garlic in olive oil and water. the bottle says its for butter, which presumably you're suppose to add to butter and eat with bread?! sis made pizza for us using this, it was YUM.

tonight, i was going to cook a steamed egg custard. remember the mushy egg custard with pumpkin mash on top?! well, that was a bit of a taste disaster. this time, i had a much sensible idea. so much more sensible, and delicious~ ;p


-Steamed egg custard with mushrooms + black truffle sauce-

so i separately cooked a thick sauce using some swiss brown mushroom slices and chestnut mushrooms with a big teaspoonful of truffle salsa, then pour it on top of the cooked custard. so so good.

close up:



AND cooked one of hubby's favourites:


-Stir fried water spinach with fermented tofu and chilli-

Post #143

i didnt realise till recently... or maybe i did but only admit it recently, that i like most things layered. cakes especially, for some bizarre reason, the layered ones attract my attention. i find it quite intriguing. does it taste better if a cake is layered?! possibly.. or does it?

a perfect example. the indonesian layer cake. i remember as a child i used to peel the layers when eating it, and its without a doubt, fun, playful and delicious. imagine without the layers...? the fun is gone.

once in a very long while i would make crepe cakes, or be tempted to make crepe cakes. i love crepes, and whenever i see layers of crepes in cake form, i have an urge to try it out. they were never successful tho, and always ended up becoming hard and unpleasant to eat after being fridged. until the other day i came across something called "french crepe cake". the recipe says to prepare the cake in 2 days... and despite this, i was brave enough to give it a try. i was too attracted to the picture of the sliced up cake, a beautiful beautiful 20 layers of thin crepes with thin layers of white cream in between. it was like an angel of a cake!!!

dont be fooled by the boring exterior~


-French crepe cake-

here comes the angel~