Finally, a place we can call our own

Home Improvement

2011-11-05T10:27:00.003+08:00

Remember the little paper lanterns that we used for the light bulbs on our ceiling? Well they've turned yellow with time so M headed out to Daiso again and found new replacements:

This was a little bamboo container. M made some adjustments to the base to accommodate the fittings for the bulb and voila! A new lampshade!

Strawberry Muffins

2011-10-30T14:17:00.001+08:00

It's been some time since I updated this blog (bad girl, I know). Have not had much time for baking lately but today, I had to do something with leftover strawberries so what's faster than strawberry muffins?

The recipe was from Joyful Baker but I added a bit of milk to the recipe as I find the batter a bit too dry. The measurements for the rest of the ingredients are also estimated (after metric conversion).

Ingredients (extracted from Joyful Baker's blog):

½ cup unsalted butter, melted

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

1 tsp vanilla extract

½ cup sour cream

1 ½ cups fresh strawberries, cut into small pieces (I sprinkled a bit of white sugar to this as they were very , very sour)

2 ¼ cups all purpose flour

¾ cup light brown sugar

1 ½ tsp baking powder

¼ tsp baking soda

1 tsp ground cinnamon

½ tsp salt

* I added some milk to the final batter. Eyeballed so no way to tell how much I added :)

Here's the how-to:

*oven pre-heated to 180 deg C - my table top oven needs a slightly higher temperature than suggested in the blog*

1. Melt butter and let sit to room temperature.

2. Mix dry ingredients (flour, sugar, soda, baking powder, cinnamon, salt). Mix in strawberries to coat completely with the flour.

3. Whisk eggs, sour cream, vanilla extract. Add in melted butter.

4. Gently fold dry ingredients into the whisked egg mixture. Don't over-mix or your muffins will become hard.

5. Fill up your muffin cups (paper cups are God-sent) and bake them for about 20-25 minutes (tops should spring back when pressed lightly).

Enjoy!

Pizza

2011-02-27T19:42:00.004+08:00

This has been one of Yohei's favourite - home made pizza. The dough's made from scratch. I've used Jamie Oliver's recipe but I halved it and it yields 2 x 9" pizzas. Do go into his site for the recipe and the method. I've reduced the amount of yeast to 4g (instead of 7g) as I find that less yeast is needed in our hot weather (thank goodness!)

Here are the pix taken this evening :)

Before...

After...

Triple Chocolate Mousse

2010-12-25T09:20:00.004+08:00

I've posted this before, long time back but heck, it's Christmas! What's Christmas without some sweet temptations?

I made this for my little get-together a week before Christmas and I think someone's going to blame me for his/her weight gain :P

This recipe was taken off Anna Olsen's "Sugar" programme and it went onto my "die-die-must-try-to-make" list immediately. Here's the ingredient list:

Dark Chocolate layer:
6oz (~ 170g. I'd give it a bit more) Dark Chocolate (I have used Cadbury Old Gold 70% cocoa and Carrefour housebrand 74% cocoa and both are good)
1/2 teaspoon gelatin powder
1/2 cup milk
1 1/4 cup whipping cream

White Chocolate layer:
5oz (~ 141g) White Chocolate
1/4 teaspoon gelatin powder
1/4 milk
1/2 cup whipping cream

Milk Chocolate layer:
6oz (~ 170g) Milk Chocolate
1/4 teaspoon gelatin powder
1/4 cup milk
1/2 cup whipping cream

How to:
The method for all layers are the same. You should only prepare each layer as and when you need it.

1. Stir the gelatin into the milk and let it sit for a while.
2. Melt chocolate in a bain marie (or over a pot of simmering water), stirring constantly.
3. Heat the milk till it just starts to bubble and whisk it into the melted chocolate.
4. Let the chocolate + milk mixture cool to room temperature.
5. Whisk the whipping cream into a soft peak.
6. Gently fold whipped cream into cooled chocolate mixture.
7. Pour into mould and even out. Chill till set before putting on next layer.

Chilling times:
Milk Chocolate: at least 4 hours
Dark & White Chocolate: at least 1 hour

My notes:

The quantity here for the white and milk chocolate is half of the quantity Anna Olsen's original recipe. I'm not much of a sweets person so I've decided to use less of the milk and white.

Depending on how you are serving the mousse, you can change the sequence of the layers as you wish but I find the dark/white/milk sequence tastes best (especially when you have your spoon right to the bottom and spoon out all 3 layers into your mouth at the same time... heavenly...). Just make sure that each layer is well set before you pour on the next layer (otherwise the layers may mix up together).

For ease of serving, I used individual cups but you can also make it in a big tray. Just make sure you lined the tray with a plastic wrap first. To serve, put the large serving plate over the mousse, tip the whole thing over and peel off the plastic. Slice the mousse with a hot, dry knife and use a cake server to lift off.

Garnishing:
Anna Olsen used a Dacquoise Crunch (a meringue spread thin and slow-baked, then broken up into pieces). I didn't do this because of time constraint. I just might try it next week :)

Have fun!

The Fung Family 2011

2010-12-06T21:08:00.002+08:00

Plain muffins

2010-09-26T16:50:00.002+08:00

Tried out a plain muffin recipe from about.com and felt it a tad too salty and I can taste the baking powder in there. I shall up the sugar and butter and cut the salt and baking powder next time and perhaps use self-raising flour instead. I've added chocolate chips after pouring into the tray and they stayed on top. I would fold in the chips the next time. Anyway, here's the original recipe, just in case you are interested:

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon sugar
3/4 cup milk
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup melted shortening (I used butter instead)

This would make 6 muffins from the standard muffin tray.

Happy experimenting!

Pancakes

2010-05-30T16:24:00.004+08:00

There's a request from Yohei for pancakes so I dug out the trusted pancake recipe that I copied from the domestic Goddess' website and made a small batch (ok for the uninitiated: She's Nigella Lawson)

I halved the recipe and made just a couple for each of us to satisfy the craving but you can still make the batter in full and put in a jug, then just pour and use as and when you need. You can probably keep it for a couple of days in the fridge but do give it a good shake / stir before you use it just so everything binds properly.

INGREDIENTS

225g plain flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

pinch of salt

1 teaspoon sugar

2 large eggs, beaten

30g butter, melted and cooled

300ml milk

butter for frying

Serving Size : 11 blini-pan-sized pancakes

Mix the dry ingredients together, make a well in the middle then beat in the eggs, milk and melted butter (or you can just put them in a blender blitz, just like how Nigella would). Once well mixed, put batter into a jug for easy pouring.

Heat a griddle till hot, brush on some butter, pour your batter in. Wait till it starts to blister on the surface (the little bubbles forming on the top) and it's time to flip over.

Enjoy!

Yohei likes his with just sugar and bananas :)

Home Made Mayo

2010-01-17T15:45:00.005+08:00

What do you do when you opened a tin of tuna, chopped up a bunch of celery and then find that you have no mayo in the house? You make your own mayo! That's exactly what I did (albeit 1 day later because I don't have any mustard at home either :P)

Well, I've finally bought the dijon mustard from the supermarket and set to work making my first batch of mayo. I've gone through the internet for home made mayo recipes and they basically use quite the same proportions but I've made a little adjustment here and there to my taste and here's what I used:

1 egg yolk
2 teaspoons of dijon mustard
1 tablespoon of lemon juce
1/2 cup of oil (the suggestion's to use a light-tasting oil so it won't mar the taste of your mayo)
1 teaspoon of salt (to taste)

Setting the whisk on medium, I whisked together the egg yolk and dijon. When they are well mixed, I dribble in the oil, little by little to make sure they bind together well. As you whisk away, the mixture should look creamy and 'together'. Finally, add in the lemon juice and salt and whisk away to combine everything.

Voila! Creamy mayo, with a fresh tang. Sunshine!

And straighaway, I made myself a mini tuna mayo sub topped with green olives. Oh I added a few shakes of cayenne pepper to the tuna mayo too!

Bon Apetite!

Soup Pasta

2010-01-16T18:01:00.003+08:00

Here's our dinner for tonight - a spiral pasta in soup. The soup base is simple - ikan bilis and the sinful prawnhead, strained when done. Then I add in carrots (Yohei loves his carrots soft) and tomatoes to the soup . When I am ready to start cooking the pasta, I put in the brocolli to make sure they are cooked through and not hard, then put in the shelled prawns. before turning off the fire Boil the pasta as per package, put them on a bowl, put the ingredients on top and ladle the soup over. Voila! Simple, fast, no added oil, salt or other seasonings. Oh but of course my bowl will have the pre-requisite cut chilli padi.

Dessert will probably be kiwis but I'm still waiting for the king to finish his food before deciding.

Christmas Trees Sugar Biscuits

2009-12-24T10:22:00.003+08:00

My very first attempt at making sugar biscuits with royal icing! The icing's made with egg white. I'm bringing them to our potluck Christmas party today at Betsy's. I'll put up the photo of the Christmas Basket that I'll be putting together as a present for everyone.

My First Loaf

2009-11-28T17:39:00.004+08:00

My friends know that I am into cakes and cookies. The bread baker at home is really Moobe. This is my virgin attempt, using a recipe found in a blog called A Year in Bread. All in all, it took 4.5 hours (from the word go to the finished product) but it's well worth it. I could have left it for a little longer on the final proofing as it's not as light as I wished but nonetheless, it's nice. I halved the recipe, and used 5g of dry yeast with a couple spoons of warm water to get the yeast going. I'd use a little less yeast next time. Oh a little less salt will be good too.

I think I will mix in herbs the next time. Here's the ingredients that I used (approximately half of what the original recipe called for):

283g plain flour
14g sugar
5g dry yeast (mixed with 2 tbl sp warm water)
15g butter (melted)
454g milk (room temperature, though it called for warm milk in the recipe)
412g bread flour

for the method, do refer to the original blog post. The writer had step-by-step instructions, right down to the nitty gritty. Very useful indeed!

Eyeballs anyone?

2009-11-02T09:03:00.003+08:00

Halloween potluck at Ayako's called for a 'scary but edible' dish. What's scarier than bloody eyeballs?

It's simply red jelly (we've put in cut-up strawberries) wrapped in a snowskin (see recipe from my mooncake) and then streaked with food colouring for effect. The 'pupil' is the snowskin mixed with a bit of cocoa powder. I'll probably make it in other shapes for other occassions haha!

New Thangka added

2009-10-30T12:52:00.003+08:00

A beautiful Thangka made of leather and bronze pieces. It's about 200 years old and has been sitting in storage at the owner's home for too long :)

So M's helped clean it up, loaned a part of our wall to W T so the Thangka can be admired the way it should :)

One Pot Wonder

2009-10-18T08:01:00.003+08:00

A 1 pot dinner for Sunday that costs less than $20 (and enough for 2 meals!) See the crab shell on the top? (oops, forgot to turn it over... hahhaa!)

中秋晚餐

2009-10-03T21:19:00.003+08:00

中秋佳节吃点特别的。。。也不是什么特别的，就只是平时甚少弄的焗猪扒饭。

Snowskin Mooncake - Part 2

2009-09-27T19:50:00.000+08:00

Ambitious me had wanted to make some cocoa snowskin mooncakes. Running short of lotus paste, I decided to shelf that as I don't know how it will go with the white lotus paste. Instead, we made the normal snowskin with white lotus paste filled with either Chinese chestnut or sunflower seeds. Used about 3 batches of the recipe that I put up last month to make 44 pieces of mini mooncakes. I'll use the Garfield mold the next time :) but first, I need to get more lotus paste.

Home Improvement - Ceiling lights

2009-09-27T10:14:00.000+08:00

Whoa! It's been almost 2 months since I last updated here. Not much has been happening around the house (save for the usual father-son squabbles :P ).

Yesterday, Mr. Handyman decided to cover up the ceiling bulbs with a cute little lantern that we bought from Daiso. It makes the bulb less glaring, more comfortable to the eyes.

Snowskin Mooncake

2009-08-30T15:04:00.003+08:00

Our first attempt at making snowsking mooncake! Joint effort by yours truly and our king of the house - i make the dough, he does the assembling and the tough work of knocking the little thing out of the mould.

Simple list of ingredients:

Skin:
100g kueh flour
70g icing sugar
30g shortening
120g cold water

Sieve flour and icing sugar together.
Rub in shortening
Gradually add in water till you get a soft dough
Divide into portions to fit your mould

Filling:
Lotus paste
Melon seeds (optional)

Mix the melon seeds (if using) with the lotus paste. Divide the filling into small portions to fit into the skin and mould. Be careful not to over fill otherwise it will burst through the skin.

Assembling:
Roll out the skin, wrap the filling in, and put into floured mould. Press down tight to let the patterns form nicely. Knock out the mooncake. Chill before serving.

Have fun!

Home Improvement

2009-07-14T09:42:00.004+08:00

Barely 1 year into moving in to this flat and already we are running out of storage and display space. No space to add new cupboards so Moobe made some shelves.

Nothing fancy, just practical shelves added for our living room to display the pictures and some nice items gifted to us

ran out of space in the cabinet for all the flour jars so out they come to the counter top. The shelves are made from left over board from Ikea.

Cream Puffs Chapter 2

2009-07-13T09:08:00.003+08:00

With the left over cream from my triple chocolate mousse, Moobe decided to whip up a batch of filling for his puffs.

Triple Chocolate Mousse

2009-07-10T15:41:00.002+08:00

For those with a sweet tooth :P Didn't wait till the milk chocolate layer set properly and hence the white chocolate merged with the bottom milk chocolate haiz.. nevermind. It will be better the next time.

By the way, the recipe's from Anna Olsen. Don't have time to make the Dacquoise Crunch Garnish today. Will definitely make it the next time round.

Chocolate Fudge Cake

2009-06-16T16:14:00.002+08:00

It's been quite some time since I last baked this. Yohei requested for this for 'Yohei & Mommy day' today...

puff

2009-06-03T23:24:00.003+08:00

Moobe baked some puffs today. Taste wise it's close to Beard Papa but the texture's still a little lacking. Nonetheless it's still good :) He's tweaked one of the recipes. I'll have to find out which one and what changes he made. Will update on this soon.

breadsticks

2009-05-14T10:00:00.002+08:00

Moobe baked some bread sticks yesterday. Not bad, if I may say so :) even my fusspot Yohei (yes, fussy when it comes to bread) happily munched away. Leftovers this morning gets a spray of water and heated up again for the crisp crust. Think I'll have them with my coffee this morning.

Japanese style cheese cake

2009-05-11T11:43:00.004+08:00

Tried my hand at baking cheese cake yesterday (I normally do the easy non-bake ones). It's not the heavy American / New York type but the light, fluffy Japanese Cheese Cake that saw queues snaking outside the shops when it was first introduced here. The recipe was simple but the baking time was long. I can't remember where I got the recipe from. If I recall, I will put the credit up here but meanwhile, here's what I used (being just an experiment, I used only half the ingredients and used a loaf pan instead of the round pan):

A.
250g cream cheese
100ml fresh milk
50g butter

B.
140g sugar
6 egg whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar

C.
60g cake / superfine flour
20g corn flour
1/4 tsp salt
6 egg yolks
1/4 tsp lemon juice
6 egg yolks

How to:

1. Preheat oven to 160 deg C, lightly grease 8" round pan & line with parchment / greaseproof baking paper.
2. Melt A in a bain marie (or a double boiler) and let the mixture cool off
3. Whisk the egg whites and cream of tartar in B till foamy, add in sugar the sugar and whisk till soft peaks form. Cover and put in the fridge while you prepare the rest of the cake.
4. Fold C into A (prepared in Step 1) then gently combine the whisked egg whites in Step 2 with this mixture.
5. Pour into cake pan and bake for 1hr 10 mins in a water bath.
6. Let cake cool before removing from pan. This cake is best eaten chilled.

The texture of the cake is light, somewhat close to the store-bought type but Moobe feels it needs a bit more cheese though. I'll find out what Joy and Lai Leng think tonight :P
Happy baking!

Cheesy Munchies

2009-04-16T15:23:00.005+08:00

For all the cheese lovers...

Went into Nigella Lawson's website and found a recipe for Cheesy Feet. I don't have cookie cutters in the shape of a foot so Yohei used bear, elephant and rhino instead.

Verdict? A tad too cheesy for some but it's great with beer!

Dinner - Home-made Spinach Noodle

2009-04-07T17:56:00.006+08:00

Yes! I finally got hold of the pasta maker from my sister (mom's machine is lost somewhere in her sea of unlabelled boxes haiz) and we are making spinach noodle (Yohei calls it "green noodle") for dinner. Here's the first installation (the making process...)

You've gotta wait till after 8pm for this to continue :)

2nd installation is in!

Easy peasy...

The noodles boiling happily in the pot

yummmmmm....

It's really easy to make the noodles. I used 200g flour with 1 egg and strained liquid from a couple bunches of spinach, mixed them up, gave them a good knead and let the dough rest till we were ready to get dinner going.

The pasta maker came in really handy and made the rest of the process a breeze. All I had to do was to roll the dough out thin and then cut into ribbons. In the ribbons go into a pot of boiling water, while Moobe gets the pan going with the simple tomato base (yes, again... it's Yohei's current favourite) with minced pork and mushrooms (with lots of garlic, onions and carrots).

I'll probably try using carrots for the pasta the next time if my King gives me the nod *rolls eyes*

Lunch - Home-made Pasta

2009-04-06T13:39:00.002+08:00

Holy Molly! I made my own pasta for lunch today!

Yohei has his in little flower shapes which he helped cut out with a little cookie cutter.

Moobe and I had ours cut into long strips. The pasta is made according to Jami Oliver's recipe in "Jamie's Kitchen" - for 6 people, 600g Tippo (ok I used normal flour because I don't have Tippo) flour to 6 eggs. I made 200g today, enough for 2 adults and Yohei.

I kneaded the dough at about 10am and left it to rest, covered, till we were ready to cook lunch at about 12ish. Terribly hard work rolling out the dough so I'm definitely going to see if I can take over my Mom's pasta maker :P

The sauce is a simple one of minced pork in tomato sauce base with loads of garlic, celery and chopped tomato. Us adults had added Cayene pepper for some kick.

I really like the texture of the pasta and it's really easy to make (ok except for the rolling part).

Tomorrow, we shall try spinach noodles...

Lunch - Cold Cha Soba

2009-04-05T13:35:00.003+08:00

Today's lunch is cold Cha Soba, boiled eggs and Moobe's version of Cha Siu (roasted pork). Sorry, no recipe haha! But I'm pleasantly surprised on the food cost. $2 for the Cha Soba from Daiso, 2 eggs @ 30 cents, pork about $3 (there's another smaller helping in the kitchen not shown). In all, I'd safely say our lunch cost below $8. Ok that excludes Moobe's labour :P !

Rich Chocolate Brownie Bars

2009-04-04T11:37:00.003+08:00

I baked brownies this morning and cut them up into little bars. Here's what I used:

60g Unsalted butter
150g Dark chocolate (I used Cadbury Gold 70% cocoa)
150g sugar
75g Self-raising flour
1/2 tsp Vanilla extract
5g salt
2 eggs
75g chopped walnuts / Hersheys chocolate chips (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 180deg C and grease your baking pan (if required)
2. Melt butter and chocolate
3. Put together dry ingredients (flour, sugar, salt) and mix them up with your spoon
4. Whisk eggs with vanilla
5. Pour egg mixture into dry ingredients, add in the melted butter/chocolate. stir and mix.
6. Put in the optional ingredients and give it a light mix
7. Pour into baking dish and put in oven. Bake for 15 - 20 minutes (depending on the size of your pan). Check for doneness (tooth pick should come out clean from the middle of the pan)
8. Let cool completely on a wire rack and cut into bars

You can chill or freeze the uneaten bars and warm them up when required. Best served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream :)

giant french toast

2009-03-17T18:20:00.002+08:00

Have you seen a french toast this big? In the words of Moobe "港式西多,美式size" haha!

Chocolate Lava

2008-12-28T11:03:00.007+08:00

It so happended 2 of my nephews came over for dinner last night and king junior asked for Chocolate Lava for dessert. It's been a few months since I last made that so to make the boy happy, Chocolate Lava for dessert it shall be!

The chocolate came oozing out when I cut through with my spoon. Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:
A.
100g dark chocolate (I used Cadboury Old Gold 70% cocoa. You can use your favourite)
100g unsalted butter (cubed at room temperature)

Melt these 2 items together using a bain marie.

B.
2 eggs
50g sugar

Beat these together till it turns white.

C.
20g flour (I used self-raising but you can use plain too. It just won't rise as much)

Method:

Heat your oven to about 180 deg C. Butter your ramekins (no ramekins? use muffin cups but make sure you butter them well so the cake can come off easily when done)

Pour melted chocolate / butter (A) into the egg mixture (B). Stir to mix well. Then stir in flour (C). Stir till well-mixed.

Pour into ramekins and bake for 10 minutes, till the outside's done and the inside's still runny. If you are using muffin cups or even paper cups, reduce the bake time to about 8 minutes or even lesser. But don't worry about over baking. I like it runny in the middle (hence the lava) but if you over bake, you will just get a super moist chocolate cake :)

You can prepare the batter ahead and just pop into the oven and then serve immediately, with ice cream, fruits (sour cherries with vanilla ice cream + cream are a good bet) or just eat it on its own.

Left overs can be stored in the fridge (in their ramekins or cups), and popped into the oven to heat for a couple of minutes the next day and turned into super moist chocolate cake.

Enjoy!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

2008-12-21T08:19:00.009+08:00

Yohei has been bugging me for chocolate chip cookies so after dinner last night, we made some. Since it's Christmas, we thought we could bake some tree-shaped ones and Yohei wanted the boy & girl shapes. They didn't really turn out that well. The tree almost lost its shape after baking. Lesson? The mould must have very defined shapes so it can withstand the baking without losing its shape.

So it's back to conventional round shape for the rest of the batch :P

This is a slightly different recipe that LeeLee (Hugbear) shared on M4M. The dough turned out firmer (i.e., can shape with hands) quite unlike LeeLee's recipe where I could only use tea spoons to drop the cookies onto the baking tray. Maybe I didn't get it right with LeeLee's but anyway, here's the recipe. It's a tad sweet for me so I'd cut back on the sugars if I do use it again:

Chocolate Chip Cookies
Recipe by Connie from Kitchen Capers Forum
Yields about 40 small cookies

125g Butter
70g Castor sugar
70g Brown sugar
½ tsp Vanilla essence
1 Egg
260g Self-raising flour
130g Chocolate chips (Add more if you like more choc chips)

Pre-heat oven to 180C.
Sift the flour, set aside.
Beat butter, essence and sugars using mixer until smooth.
Add egg and beat until well combined.
Stir in sifted flour and the remaining ingredients.
Take rounded teaspoons of mixture and roll into balls.
Place balls about 4cm apart on slightly greased oven trays or line with baking sheet.
Bake in pre heated oven for 15 minutes or until browned.
Cool in trays for short while and transfer to wire rack for cooling.

Salvaged coffee table

2008-12-15T11:02:00.004+08:00

Our Ikea Lack coffee table is giving way and Moobe found this just in time. He salvaged it downstairs, gave it a new coat of paint and we got 4 glass panels for the top. There! We can now put away the rickety old Lack into the storeroom haha!

Chocolate Crispies

2008-12-15T10:12:00.003+08:00

We eneded up making chocolate crispies with half a bar of dark chocolate, some golden syrup and crushed corn flakes. Just for the fun of it, out came the cookie cutters for the cute little shapes...

can you tell what they are? haha!

Fortune cookies

2008-12-15T10:08:00.003+08:00

Ayako & Cindy came to experiment with me on the fortune cookies that we wanted to make for Christmas eve party... alas... this is what became of it...

When we tried spread it thin on the sheet as suggested by the recipe, it burnt too fast on the edges and couldn't come off the sheet (think we forgot to oil it haha!). So Moobe added water to the batter and turned it into pancakes which Moobe & Tom polished off with chocolate icecream :P

Lunch - bite-sized chicken in simple tomato sauce over beehoon

2008-11-21T11:20:00.005+08:00

It's a quick early lunch today. I had some left over chicken pieces from making nuggets on Wednesday morning. Since they've been marinated and are sitting in the chiller box, I thought I'd better use them up quickly.

I made a simple tomato sauce with olive oil, onions, tomatos, tomato puree, salt and pepper. In goes some frozen vegetables and the chicken. This is spooned over beehoon (rice vermicilli) that I've scalded and mixed together. Of course, my dear Yohei has to add his little squirts of tomato ketchup onto his food (he's into his ketchup-everything phase). As for me, nothing beats a chilli padi added to my bowl :)

Elaine's cake

2008-11-06T23:17:00.003+08:00

Ayako and company wanted to spring a surprise on Elaine for her upcoming birthday. Since Elaine liked the Chocolate Fudge Cake that i made when they came to the house early last month, I was tasked to bake it again.

Just for the fun of it, I used bear-shaped cutters to cut out 2 pieces of the cake and held them up with toothpicks.

Moobe decorated the cake with melted white chocolate.

Baking bread II

2008-11-06T11:28:00.003+08:00

The first loaf was a complete flop (somehow inedible) and Moobe made a second attempt while I off at work yesterday. The taste is not bad this time round :) We had them with a filling of minced pork paste that he made out of left-over babi ponting that Joy brought over when we had the pot luck the other week.

Don't ask for the recipe though. He didn't note down the changes he made haha!

Baking bread

2008-11-04T23:13:00.001+08:00

Moobe's first loaf of bread for a long, long time. We don't know if it can pass the taste test but the looks are definitely there :) If it turns out well, I will share the recipe here.

Toilet woes

2008-11-04T16:19:00.003+08:00

The master bedroom toilet leaked from the base every time we flushed so I called the Town Council people to fix it. The technical officer came with his contractor 2 weeks back and simply applied a coat of silicone to the base, insisting that it will fix the problem, when I kept telling them they have to open up the toilet to check the pipes since that must be where the leaks are from.

"We had this problem before and this is how it's fixed," the technical officer insisted.

As they left, I told the officer the toilet will definitely leak again because the problem's not solved. True enough, the next day, water flowed out from another spot at the base, and it's worse this time round! I immediately called a senior officer at the Town Council and lodged my complain. They promised to send someone down to fix.

1 week passed and finally a plumber came today. When I told him what happened, he immediately asked why the other contractor didn't open up the toilet bowl to check.

*roll eyes*

When the toilet was removed, here's what it looks like:

The HDB contractor who fixed up the toilets during the upgrading works did such a lousy job, the pipe and joints in the toilet bowl has dislodged! Don't ask me how that can happen. It's clearly, as what the plumber said, a F*#$(#$*#( screwed up job.

So now that the plumber has fixed the toilet, I hope we'll not get anymore surprises.

For those of you who has toilets upgraded by HDB, keep a close watch on your toilets...

What do you see?

2008-11-04T15:30:00.002+08:00

This image surfaced at our corridoor one day. What do you see?

Fried Rice for Lunch

2008-11-04T15:21:00.002+08:00

This is one of the simpler things I like to whip up for my lunch box - Fried Rice. I'll normally just scan through the fridge to see what is in there and will try to use up things that need to be cleared out soon. I love it when there's a squeeze of lime on my fried rice and some red cut chilli padi too!

Beary Toasts

2008-10-31T11:15:00.004+08:00

Breakfast today - slices of bread cut out into bear shapes, dipped into a batter of eggs, milk, sugar and a drop of vanilla essence then pan fried. I think I'll toast them instead the next time round.

Chocolate Lava

2008-10-30T14:29:00.005+08:00

When J & LL came over the weekend, I tried baking chocolate lava which turned out a tad too dry (yea, overbaked :P). Yohei requested for Chocolate Lava for dessert today and since WT was coming over to get some paperwork done, I baked a small batch. It turned out much better, having learned from the previous stint but I think I can still improve on the the temperature control. The chocolate is moist, as you can see from the picture but it doesn't flow out as I had hoped it would. Ah well, there will always be a next time. The recipe came from here.

I halved the recipe and it yielded 5 small ones (used small cups as I don't have any of those regular ramekins). For chocolate, I mixed 3oz of Carrefour's Noir chocolates (60%) with some Hershey's unsweetened chocolate since we all prefer it rich with the slightest hint of bitter.

It would have been much better if we had some vanilla ice cream handy but that would be too sinful, wouldn't it? :)

Enjoy!

Muffins for Breakfast

2008-10-16T09:50:00.002+08:00

Yohei's been bugging me to bake muffins (because I refused to let him take Ee Jia's muffins the other night). The recipe's called Easy-for-Kid's Chocolate Muffins from AllRecipes.com. The muffins are not too sweet but could do with a bit more butter :)

So the Kings are having muffins for breakfast this morning :)

2008-09-10T15:44:00.002+08:00

how can i forget about my corridor? the steps are covered with homogeneous tiles that matches the rustic theme. my corridor's pretty wide and being the last unit on my end, we have the luxury of a 'private corner' so we placed a couple of our rattan stools out there for those 'outside yakkity' moments :)

2008-09-09T12:39:00.000+08:00

Simple fried rice (西炒饭) for lunch today :)

2008-09-08T16:47:00.001+08:00

Finally! everything's packed and tidied (thanks Moobe! You're a gem!) We knocked down the kitchen walls so the vision's wider. The walls have been left untouched and the floor for the living and bedrooms is smooth rendered cement screed. Gives the place a 'natural' feel. To make the space more versatile (since I might run classes from home), we've decided not to use sofa. The good old cushions have been put to good use :)

2008-09-08T16:46:00.001+08:00

We had a 12ft cabinet with a solid work top done to fit into the tiny space. The thing we splurge on was for a high oscillation cooker hood so the oil and fumes from cooking will not be all over the place. We only did the bottom level for the cabinet, not the top. if we need more space, we'll just go to Ikea to buy add-ons.

We used a shelf from Ikea as display cum partition between the kitchen and living room. This makes it more interesting (rather than see right through from the main door) and the lamps that we placed on top of the shelf provided extra lighting for the dining area (incidentally, we do not use ceiling lights, with the exception of the toilets and store room).

There is a ceiling fan in living room, kitchen and both the rooms so it eliminates the use of an air conditioner.

2008-09-08T16:03:00.002+08:00

Simple chests of drawers as wardrobes for our family of 3. On the top of the drawers are things close to our hearts (the painting given by Ayako for Moobe's birthday last year, a photo of a lotus taken some time back in Hong Kong, our family portrait when Yohei was about a month old and the black cat painting done by Moobe).

Yohei's still in our room (he's decided he still wants to sleep with us) and we've inflated his 'GTI' and used it as his bed. Our good old air mattress is back!

The 2nd room has been turned into our work space cum Yohei's play room. At least now we can contain his mess and not have his toys strewn all over the house.

2008-09-08T16:00:00.000+08:00

Ah... toilets! We've decided to use the master room toilet for our daily business while keeping the common toilet as the bathroom (since no one wants to use the squat toilet, brand new or not).

Moobe's installed an Ikea Rast chest of drawers on brackets so we won't wet it when we wash the floors in the master toilet. This drawer will be the vanity chest :)

We've got ourselves a little bath tub so we can enjoy a little soak now and then. We've place one of those Ikea wood rack over the squat toilet and put a rattan stool over it just so no one will think of using the toilet haha!

2008-09-05T00:00:00.000+08:00

The load of stuff that we had to move to the flat (and there are more that are not in the picture haha!)

2008-07-31T11:31:00.000+08:00

our 'welcome' file from HDB and the envelope containing our keys to the our new home