visions of clarity...do as infinity

Sunday, October 21, 2007

Singapore Food Festival!!!

Hello!

Yesterday was the successful Singapore Food Festival in umich! =) XW, GL, Kevin and I helped Ted cook Nasi Lemak... Gosh was that tough..xP But yay! We sold out within like, one hour.=) =) =) Hehe.

Let's see. The rice was tough to get right because of the proportions but! I did the damn ikan bilis and peanuts and chilli which was.. awful to say the very least. I am never deep-frying again unless absolutely necessary. Like a life-and-death kind of situation. Do you know how many times we got splattered by hot oil thanks to the refusal of the ikan bilis to dry?!!?!! (T_T) Oh! And I did all the omelettes with Kevin/GL cracking and whisking them for me.=D =D =D I must say, it's super fun to make omelettes and very very easy once you have a brilliantly hot pan and enough oil.=)

Our display plate for the stall:

I think it looks quite good.. And everyone loved the ikan bilis and peanut mixture.=) Freshly roasted peanuts are really yummy! And Kevin is the Peanut King. Hahaha. And I must say that my frying skills are not too bad even if I did scream a lot.xP

I am now convinced that I never want to open a food stall selling nasi lemak though.. I'll go crazy frying eggs, ikan bilis and chilli. But when I was frying the ikan bilis and peanuts, it was great fun stealing bits to "taste".xD xD xD

Our sign that is dying to fly away!

All of us in our bright red T-shirts proclaiming us part of the Food Festival.

Our stall!!! I was at ballroom before the food festival so I was late and couldn't take a picture of the stall with food. xP Sigh. And now my feet are hurting like crazy from the horrible ballroom shoes.xP

Even though we kept stealing food from other stalls [it's great having friends manning neighbouring stalls.=D =D =D], XW, Kevin and I were still a bit hungry so we went to China Gate to get takeaway Chinese food!

AHH! SO CUTE!!!

I was so excited to see those umm.. Chinese takeaway boxes.xD xD xD SO CUTE! Hehe! So I was like, omg! We should buy Chinese takeout more often!!!

Sadly, the food doesn't look good at all.. And it wasn't very good either.. As XW kept saying.. Once you've eaten at TK Wu [and Asian Legend] here, nothing else tastes nice. O well. At least it wasn't too expensive?

O yes! When we came back from Holland, we went to eat at Lucky Kitchen:

It was half-decent to be perfectly honest ... Not too bad considering I assumed the place would serve horrible food. Haha.=P But YAY. VEGETABLES. Look at it! VEGETABLES! I am having withdrawal symptoms from not having enough proper, nice, cooked vegetables. It is SO SAD.

And the cupcakes we carted back from Rachel's house.^_^

Wee! Such accomplishments we made yesterday.^_^ I'm so proud of everyone for making nasi lemak and must thank Ted for promising to lend us his house for further cooking endeavours! xD

cheers
*[-witchstone-]*

[music : 浪漫手机 周杰伦]
[mood : ^_^]
[food : Don't make me look at nasi lemak again for at least a few months.xP But I want to eat ikan bilis!!!]

Jiamin: WHAT?!

Fel: You see.. It's one thing for there to be tons of apples around the US but in Michigan, Fall is apple season but it's almost over because some places didn't have a good harvest.

YX: Yes! I told Jianxin before. Haha. And she was like, you know her?? Haha.=D

Labels: Ann Arbor, apple crumble, chocolate cupcakes, east quad, edibles, Holland Michigan, nasi lemak, Singapore Food Festival, umich

Sunday, April 15, 2007

A Cooking/Baking Weekend

Hello

I didn't do anything significant this weekend except um... Cook. And bake. O dear! I MUST go shopping soon!!! xD Haha. And get away from some of this domesticity. I'm quite sated in the "must-cook-NOW" department.

I must warn you ahead of time that this will be an image-heavy post.

Yay! So I saw this recipe in Today for Roast Chicken with Rosemary and Lemon. And it sounded SO GOOD! =D And I also made Garlic Bread from 101 Cookbooks and Asparagus with Tarragon Dressing from Donna Hay Magazine.

Part of my mise en place:

The finely minced garlic was ordered by my mother who was all, MAKE IT FINER OR YOUR GARLIC BREAD WILL BE BAD! Or something like that.xD In any case, I found mincing garlic as finely as possible a most therapeutic activity.=) Seriously. I got all zen while using this huge and dangerous looking chopper to chop up garlic as small as I could.^_^

Mincing Garlic = Good for you. [Plus garlic has all those antioxidants and what not! xD]

The chicken before going into the oven! I hate touching raw meat so I used chopsticks to attempt to poke the garlic and all that marinade around the chicken. I love chopsticks. They are SO useful.

The final product after 40 minutes in the oven. Sadly, I think rubbing all that marinade in by hand would have been better in infusing the chicken with more flavour.

For the garlic bread,

This:

Plus this:

Equals this:

xD Garlic-Lemon Bread with chives. YUMMY. This was actually quite good except that I felt I could have let MORE butter soak into the bread. Which would make it very good but very very very very very fattening.=S But seriously. The lemon brightened it up and made it really yummy.xD

The tarragon dressing on asparagus.=) The recipe called for white wine vinegar but I couldn't find that in Cold Storage so I used this Japanese brown rice vinegar we had lying around at home instead. It was quite yummy.=D Beams. The taste of tarragon is pretty unique and slightly spicy [I tried eating it on its own when I was plucking it off the stem because I've never tried tarragon before] but quite aggressive. It is not a mild-flavoured herb.

I also made my usual chocolate cupcakes.=D Beams.

That day, Jiamin and I watched The Neighbour No. 13, starring Shun Oguri and this really ugly other guy. It was just.. FREAKY. O.o O my gosh. It was shot in a very suspenseful way and was quite art-housey because... the ending was very HUH-DON'T-UNDERSTAND. Haha.=X And Shun Oguri was like, hardly the lead actor there.-_-"

Thankfully, after Joyce came and I had fixed my old DVD player on top of the new one [the new one CAN'T PLAY JAPAN DVDs!!!!!!!!!!! Of all the horrors. I was MOST upset. But with our superior technical abilities, we managed to fix the old DVD player to the new sound system so we can watch alice nine. and Gackt in concert but with surround sound! xD Yay!] we watched a bit of alice nine.'s Alice in WonderFilm! xD It horrified Joyce. Haha. She was less horrified at Gackt's Sixth Day and Seventh Night though. Yay for Gackt and his drama!! =D

Then we watched Gigolo Wannabe which had a MOST unsatisfying ending.-_-" But! Shun Oguri had a MUCH bigger role here and was very charming and goodlooking so that was good.=D Haha. *bimbotic* It had a very simplistic plot that leaves for a nice-to-watch but not-critically-acclaimed show.=P

For dinner, we snacked on the cupcakes, the Dutch-Swiss rolls and Japanese instant noodles!!! xD

Joyce excitedly took photos of the instant noodles because each flavour is represented by an animal and then these animals are featured as miniature fishcakes in the noodles! =) Very cute. So here you go:

^_^ Kawaii! I liked the... Ummm.. Can't remember. Haha.=X The panda one I think? Plus it had thin noodles, which I love.^_^

Then we watched SNOW QUEEN!!! Hyun Bin! xD xD xD Wah, it is SUCH a sad drama. O goodness me. (T_T) Too many sad moments!!! We must find 1 or 2 weekends to finish the series!!! Beams.=D

Then today, I made low-fat banana bread for my mom:

It's very very very moist.=) And it had quite a good flavour. But still, not the banana bread/cake texture I'm looking for. Hmm.

And I baked up my korova cookies.=D For this batch, I used my darling Valrhona cocoa powder instead of the Margaret River one that I used the last time.

It made SUCH a difference!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The flavour this time is REALLY rich, flavourful and almost-complex! xD And SO chocolatey!!! Yummy. My mom still thinks it's too sweet. I must remember to cut down on some sugar next time.

But omg. I am SO using Valrhona cocoa powder from now on!!! xD xD xD BEAMS! Ahaha. Sadly though, my mom reminded me that Valrhona is ummm REALLY expensive. X__x O dear. But heck it's worth it! xD Like the last time I made these, my mom kept going, HEY! That one's BROKEN! *eats* =P And sadly, I was doing the same. Haha.=X

I also got much more even/nicer cookie shapes this time.=) The last time, they spread too much.xP Must remember to cut them thick from now on.=)

Thank you Pierre Herme for coming up with this wonderful recipe! And thank you Dorie Greenspan for adapting it for the home cook!!! xD

Yay for baking! Boo for calories. At least this might cure some Monday blues.^_^"
cheers
*[-witchstone-]*

[music : Training Days 2006 Drug Party set list + Missing Gackt]
[mood : ^_^]
[food : Korova Cookies!]

cch: Ahem. Why do I need to BUDGET for UNIVERSITY?! -_-" And go away. You get the most from Temasek and that's ALL you're left with?! -_____-" Omg! I am earning FAR BELOW the median!!! (T_T) Sobs. And indeed my friends are all rich. WAILS. *counts pennies in a corner*

Wendaye: I actually think the squirrel is cute! Haha.=P Omg! I'm going to see King Lear with my brother!!! =D =D =D Beams. Like, omg. SO EXSPOONSIVE. X__x But yay Ian McKellan or however you spell his name! ^_^ I have to ummmm read King Lear... Soon.^_^" Have you bought tickets? We can all wave at each other in the theatre!!! Haha.=P

Labels: alice nine, Asparagus with Tarragon Dressing, baking, Banana Bread, chocolate cupcakes, cooking, edibles, Gackt, Garlic Lemon Bread, Korova cookies, Roast Chicken with Lemon and Rosemary, Snow Queen

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Bouchons au chocolat

Hello

Wee! Today, after baking.. These are the result:

^_^v Yay!

Don't they absolutely, marvelously chocolatey? And cracking on top in the most insidious manner to show off their fudgey, chocolatey insides? [While also hiding their absolutely, marvelously chocolatey selves in the pan..]

And unmolded:

^_^v Bouchons au chocolat, a recipe taken from Orangette who got it from David Lebovitz.=D I am VERY inclined to getting his chocolate cookbook now.^_^"

Jiamin and I tried it. Ohmygosh. SO GOOD! xD xD xD Not to praise ourselves of course.. It was entirely the fact that the recipe was quite good in the first place.^_^" It was like a molten chocolate cake without the molten center.. So I can well imagine that if it's so good using good ol' Hershey's baking chocolate, it would be fabulously, amazingly good when you use really good chocolate.xD xD xD With 7 ounces of chocolate in total, it really is FULL of chocolate [and then there are chocolate chips to contemplate!].

Closeup:

Mmm.. It's not too dry, rather fudgey, full of chocolatey goodness.. And would be the perfect ending to a wonderful meal.^_^ [Of course, it's also a rich and full fat ending but hello! Let us forget the calories for now.=D]

And while the original recipe says you'll get 12 half-cup muffins out of this, I got 18 [of what I presume are half-cup muffins].^_^" As I've always said.. The muffin tins in America must be HUGE!

We also baked the usual chocolate cupcake recipe. I was really ambitious and wanted to bake 3 recipes but there wasn't enough time..=S

Nevermind. I'll bake again on Friday! *beams* I'm simply DYING to try this chocolate cookie recipe. It looks fabulous! =D [And the fascination with chocolate has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with Valentine's Day.xP] But I'm a bit nervous because I have no luck with cookies.(T_T)

From the Esplanade at night! Took this last night while we were there.^_^ Amazing how it looks so pretty all lighted up.=)

Ohmygosh I am SO tired. My neck, back and legs ACHE.(T_T) *trudges away*

cheers
*[-witchstone-]*

[music : Le Ciel Malice Mizer + Siren Song + Ship of Fools Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE OST]
[mood : tired but happy]
[food : chocolate!]

wendaye: Hmm. I guess you'll have a problem getting the bean paste and GOOD strawberries? And also making good mochi. But apart from those.. Can lah! =D Haha.

pixiezdust: Wo Bao has been around for QUITE a while. Haha.=P They distribute it in the morning like Today I think.=P

cch: Yay! You should TIME it next.=D

Labels: Bouchons au chocolat, chocolate cupcakes, edibles, misc

Twittering~