confused...again.

Hi there,

Sorry I haven't written in a while. I've been quite busy. Short semesters and moving will do that to you.

Yes, my landlord decided to sell the place and now I'm stuck in someone else's house, having to share bathrooms and internet connection. Die. Okay, that last thing I can control. Being able to allocate bandwidth is a privilege I've earned as an IT student.  

Also, people are funny.

Not good. Not bad. Just funny (more on this in my next post).

It's also funny how truth are revealed in times of insanity.

Being on the fast track to graduation is not a walk in the park. It requires commitment and focus. And well, my second natures they are not. My enthusiasm comes in burst of temporary obsessions. Like holiday crackers, they burn bright and fast. 

And so far, this semester has been a blast. I had a few electives I needed to take as a condition for graduation and I've saved them all for now. Psychology, American Literature and English. This is what liberal arts feel like. I'm not gonna lie, they're probably useless for like, making money and shit, but damn they're fun. Reading novels and having deep, profound discussions about the human condition, like, that, is totally my jam bro.

However, it is making me question my choices in life. 

It's not good timing, I admit. I mean with 6 months to go? Never a good idea. It's just I can't help but wonder if software engineering is what I want to be doing with my life. Don't get me wrong, it's not like I suck at it. I don't suck at it.  

Am I challenged? stimulated? Yes. 

Am I fulfilled? content? well, that's a different story. 

Anyways, this is a food blog. Let's talk about food. 

Actually, I think this one speaks for itself.

500 gr of Australian Rib-Eye

Perfectly Medium Rare

Served w/ pasta pesto

Mushroom Sauce

I'm not going to lie, there's hardly a recipe here. The rib eye is unseasoned, although perfectly executed, if I do say so myself. See, I've been busy on google lately. You know, research on how to cook the perfect steak. It was a one-shot deal for me cos, come on, this shit ain't cheap so I gather as many information as I can before I even bought the meat. Here's what I got.

• To get that perfect medium rare-ness, you need a decent size steak. Ask the butcher to cut you a new slice, measure thickness with your fingers, that rib eye is 3-fingers thick.
• Make sure the steak is at room temperature and patted dry before it hits the grill.
• Grill the steak as is. No seasoning until after it's been cooked. The reason for this is salt draws out moisture. We want the juice to stay inside the steak.
• Get your pan/grill as hot as you possibly can (smoking). Pour a little olive oil to grease the pan.
• Cook the steak about 4 minutes each side, flipping it only once. More than that and you're done (no pun intended).
• After each side is done, cook the edges as well.
• Turn the heat to medium. Add a knob of butter and bask the steak for 30-45 seconds.
• Take the steak out. Cover with tin foil and let rest for AT LEAST 5 minutes.
• Put some mushrooms, shallots and cream in the pan along with the remaining juices to make the sauce.
• Season the steak and serve.

Have fun, carnivores.

how you like them apples..

I am currently on break.

Officially anyways.

Mentally, I'm still in that weird in-between phase where my mind is adjusting to a  much slower pace.

I can't wait until we fully transitioned.

This is my contribution to that process..



That is my apple cake. Did I tell you that apples are my favourite fruit to bake with? I haven't? Well, apples are my favourite fruit to bake with. Way ahead on berries or citruses.

Since I'm not feeling the least bit chatty today, lets get to it, shall we?



I got this recipe from David Lebovitz's site. My favourite part of this one is that it calls for different types of apples. As many as you can find and whatever you can find. I have there some cherry apples, local "manalagi" apples, granny smiths and the red USA crisp apples. Coincidentally, these are all quite sour apples, which I think balances the sweetness of the cake perfectly.

 

French Apple Cake

French Apple Cake
Adapted from davidlebovitz.com

• 110 gr flour
• pinch of salt
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 2 eggs
• 100 gr butter (room temperature)
• 150 gr sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
•  Rum

Firstly, peel and core the apples, then dice them into 1-inch pieces.

Secondly, preheat your oven to 180 Celcius.

Sift the flour, salt and baking powder together. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs until foamy then add the sugar, vanilla and rum. The amount of rum is entirely dependent on your preference but if you want to leave it out completely, double or triple the amount of vanilla.

Throw in the flour mixture and mix well before adding the butter.

Now the batter is ready. Get some parchment paper and line your cake pan. Pop the apples into the batter and fold them until they're nice and covered. Spoon the cake mixture into the pan. Use the remaining batter to make sure the apples are covered and the cake is somewhat flat on top.

Bake for 55 minutes- 1 hour. Additionally, when the cake is done, turn on the broiler to brown the top of the cake for around 5 minutes.

Dust cake with some powder sugar and serve with custard.



Use this recipe to make the custard but instead of 1 2/3 cups of heavy cream, do 2 cups instead since a  runnier custard complements the apple cake perfectly.

Yield: 8 Serving

out to sea..

Happiness is a word not easily defined. There is no universal identifier, no single, agreed-upon meaning, something along the lines of subjectivity and open interpretations. Me, I'm quite convinced otherwise.

hap·pi·ness 

 [hap-ee-nis] 

–noun1. A day spent by the sea.2. Good fortune; pleasure; contentment; joy.

They say I exaggerate.

My mum and I, decided to spend the day together last Tuesday. It's been a while, I'm not going to lie. The usual excuses; she's been difficult, I've been difficult, things've been difficult, et cetera, et cetera. The point is we did and man, was it glorious.

We got there quite late. Very late, in fact, the sun was all but gone when we arrived. It didn't matter, to be honest, the sun and sand has never been my favourite thing about the sea. I'm not being silly I swear. It's just that I prefer the wind and the water. Both were, as always, perfectly present that evening.

The next day, inspired by our trip, I decided to make fish soup. I also decided, since I didn't have any recipe for this particular dish, that I'm just going do this one by gut (pun intended).

Ok, that's not entirely true I just have to get that out. I watched an episode of Jamie Oliver's cooking show the other day. He was sitting in a small row boat trying to cook a soup not unlike this one. He used fresh fish which he had just "caught" right before taping and sea water. Yes, THAT sea water. Do you love it or do you love it?

Now I know some people doesn't share my love for mr. Oliver, but how could you not love a guy who makes the simplest dish worthy of rooftop shouting? Or has such passion for olive oil? Oh and did I mention, cooks with sea water?

Rockstar.

Anyways, I don't have a photographic memory, or a very good one at that, but this is soup we're talking about. The only thing you need for certain is your taste buds. Trust.

Mediterranean-style Fish Soup 

Tomato Fish Soup

inspired by Jamie Oliver

• 6 - 7 tomatoes
• 1 large onion, diced
• Whole fish, gutted and cleaned (You can use fillets but it won't taste as good, I promise. Alternatively, you can use only fish heads and make a fish head soup)
• Sea salt
• Olive Oil
• Lemon
• Black Pepper
• Dill & Parsley

Now, you're wondering why those ingredients list doesn't include exact measurements, that's because there is none. Just keep tasting the whole thing throughout and add the ingredients accordingly.

Firstly, remove the skin from the tomatoes, now there's a lot of ways to do this but I like to scar the tomatoes with a knife and roll them around in a pan of olive oil over medium heat. It's fast and flavours the oil in the process.

Diced the skinless tomatoes and throw them back onto the pan along with the onion. Make sure you use plenty of olive oil. Cook for a little while then put in the fish along with the herbs. Season well and mix.

To get maximum flavour, and to show off, I season with these. Call me a snob, but fleur de sel is definitely superior than your everyday kitchen salt, flavour-wise and health-wise. Plus they're completely affordable so there are literally no excuse not to convert to natural sea salt, people.

Kusamba Fleur de Sel

Where were we?

Ok, next just pour in some water and let the whole thing simmer for an hour or two. When it's done, taste and season some more. Spoon into a bowl and squeeze half a lemon over individual serving.

Soup simmering with parsley stalks.

what life? what life? what life?

When I was young, I used to think that your life begins in your twenties. I used to picture myself living in condo by the beach while people in roller skates whizzed by my front door only slowing down to admire my shiny mini cooper. Now you might think that these are the absurd delusions of a 12 year-old girl but I can honestly tell you that these thoughts lingered until at least the last year of high school. I blame Will Smith of course, as you do. Specifically that one song in which he says miami a lot.

Real life is much more mundane, yes? Two years into my twenties, I've yet to graduate from college, find a job that doesn't require me to drink 10 cups of coffee just to get through, or be in possession of a mini cooper. NO MINI COOPER. Where did I go wrong? Why do I have so little to lose? In the quest of having it all, I really have nothing at all. If I die tomorrow, the only thing I'd be remembered as is as my parent's smart ass daughter. Which is not a lot, since being that is practically a birthright. See ma, I know my impudence doesn't amount to anything.

I sound like I'm complaining again. Well, I'm not. In the likely scenario that I'd be alive tomorrow, life would actually be pretty good. It's getting there. Not that I know where there is, but it's like when you're going down a really long country road, let's say on a bike. It's hilly and quite bumpy, but as you go along the view gets nicer and nicer. So by inductive logic, however frowned upon by your team-deductive college professors, you can only assume that you're going somewhere awesome. And you don't even mind the bike, cos you know your ass will be nice and sculpted by the time you get there. This is how I choose to see it. 80 percent of the time. The other 20 percent I'm not going to mention, since it's quite dreary, but lets just say it involves a very large and constantly swirling black hole.

Anyways, poorly constructed analogy aside, why the sudden cognizance of things impending you ask, my dear imaginary friends? Well, I just turned 22 a couple weeks ago. It was a good one. We had mexican. I saw some people I haven't seen in a while, some longer than others, overall a nostalgic week. I've come to realized though, now that I'm older,not having expectations for birthdays, makes it extra nice when they turned out to be good.

my partners in crimes and me

And this one reminded me, maybe my life haven't quite turned out the way I expected but maybe that's not a bad thing? I mean, I used to love S Club 7 and mcDonalds ice cream. What the hell did I know?

a little relapse..

Okay. I'm afraid I've been a little reluctant about writing here today. See, I know the only recipe I have up my sleeve this week directly contradicts my last post (scroll down for a reminder). I know this. But I just can't help myself. It's like they say, once you go black you never go back. But like, replace black with desserts and you'll have a much more diplomatic, albeit less catchy, sentence.

Will you hear me out anyway?

You will?

Thanks.

So I set out looking for a great steak & kidney pie recipe just because I use to love them as a child and you know I have that thing for nostalgia and childhood longings, but as it happens, this recipe, like all things great and urgent, came through one of my rss feed. It was of the very humble and sorely underrated crumble. 

It came courtesy of one of my favourite british food writer, Mr. Nigel Slater. If you love heartfelt cooking and childhood memoirs, you will adore him as much as I do. Trust.

Strawberry Apple Crumble served w/ Cold Vanilla Custard

I decided to do this recipe in two parts. One for the crumble another for the custard. I know a custard recipe seems a bit redundant at this point, but this one sets just a touch firmer than your usual pudding.

Strawberry Apple Crumble

adapted from Tender Volume II by Nigel Slater

Obviously you're going to have to make the custard beforehand to have it ready when the crumble's done. So lets start with that.

Vanilla custard:

• 1 vanilla pod, scraped
• 1 2/3 cup heavy cream
• 3 egg yolks
• 4-5 Tbsp sugar, depending on how big of a sweet tooth you have of course.

Firstly, heat the cream in a pan, per usual do not let it boil or bubble in any way. In a separate bowl, whisk the egg yolks along with the sugar and vanilla until all are well incorporated. This might take longer than you'd think. Pour the hot cream into the yolks in a slow steady stream, all while still whisking the yolks. When all the cream is well mixed into the yolks and sugar mixture, pour them back into the pan and heat once again.

Now this is where you need to be careful, use super low heat and just keep stirring until it starts to thicken. If you see the mixture starts to separate, it means you've left them on the heat for too long or the whole thing is too hot. If this happens, don't fret. Just pour the mixture in a food processor and blitz until they're silky smooth. Pour them in a bowl and let them cool before popping them in the fridge.

For the crumble top:

• 95 grams butter
• 150 grams all purpose 
• 45 grams sugar

For the fillings:

• 50 grams butter
• 75 grams sugar
• 3 Granny Smith apple peeled, chopped and seeded
• 200 grams fresh strawberries, chopped
• Juice of 1/2 lemon

Put the butter in a hot pan until nice and melted before adding in the apples and the sugar. Stir and make sure the apples are all sitting in one layer. Turn the heat down to low and leave them to cook for a while. The juice from the apple should have the consistency of syrup and when your apple starts to color a little, you'd know its done.

Put the apples in a baking dish then place the strawberries right on top, nice and evenly. Sprinkle some sugar and squeeze your lemon over the whole thing.

To make the topping, put the butter and the flour in a medium bowl, and rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips until the mixture looks like fine breadcrumbs (you could do this in a food processor, but be careful not to over blitz them).Distribute the topping evenly over the apples and strawberries. Bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until pale golden.

Yield: 1 9-inch pie plate

we have a winner..

I am happy to report that after consecutive weeks of disastrous Sundays we finally had a good one. The weather was nice, there were people, there were biscuits and crumbly deserts. All is right again. Of course it didn't hurt that my coursework was on track for once or that my boss has finally decided to cut me a break or the fact that my midterms score came out splendidly, oh and did I mention there were biscuits? and custard? and cakes?

Yes, cakes, in fact I was secretly hoping you'd notice the new addition by yourself, my dear imaginary friends, but in case you didn't, here it is. Not that you need any justification for adding cupcakey magic to anything but I've been baking them almost every week now that it'd just be a bit repetitive to post them on the main page every time.

Anyways, I've been thinking. This past few posts have all been about baked sweets of some kind and that was partly the reason I started this blog in the first place but you know there's only so much you can say about cakes right?.. wait what am I saying?? dear lord, such blasphemy. What I meant to say was I need to keep it fresh, for my sake, for your sake, for blood sugar's sake. So in that spirit, I present to you..

Bacon, Cheddar & Onion Biscuits

Okay, it's not a complete departure from my usual posts. Its baked, its brunch but baby steps people, baby steps.

Bacon Cheddar & Onion Biscuits

adapted from thepioneerwoman.com

• 2 cups All-purpose Flour
• 1 teaspoon Baking Powder
• ¾ teaspoons Salt
• ¼ cups Vegetable Shortening (crisco, Etc)
• 10 Tablespoons Milk (whole Milk Is Best)
• 4 Tablespoons Vegetable Oil
• 1 whole Egg
• 10 slices Thick Cut Bacon, Fried & Chopped into tiny little pieces
• 1 cup diced onion, sauteed.
• 1 cup Grated Sharp Cheddar Cheese

Firstly, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt then using a pastry cutter, cut in shortening until all combined. If you don't have a pastry cutter, you can always use a fork. Just press the shortening bits into the flour repetitively until they're thoroughly combined.

Pour the milk, oil, and egg in a separate bowl and whisk it all together.  Combine flour mixture, milk mixture, bacon, onions, and cheddar cheese in a large bowl. Stir gently until all combined.

Spoon batter into greased muffin tins. Bake for 20 to 22 minutes on 190 C ( 375 Fahrenheit) until golden brown. Remove from pan and serve warm.

Yield: 12 biscuits.

to be or not to be..

Kids, stay in school. I mean it. Stay in school; as long as you possibly can. Because, trust me on this, when you get out you will be expected to get and keep a job which is hardly as glamourous as you might imagine and when I say you I mean me. Ok, I didn't mean to sound like Bob Saget prologue-ing an episode of How I Met Your Mother, but this whole having-a-job thing is really stressing me out. Specifically the part where I'm supposed to do university all at the same time. See, I have this new job. It involves a lot of web design and programming which I love so it's an awesome position. The pay is good. My boss is great. But, and that's a big but, the honeymoon phase has hardly began and already I'm faced with a dilemma. Midterms are coming up next week and I've just been informed that I will be working on a site which has to be up by the end of that same week. Whut?

Sigh. So that's that. I have no idea what I'm gonna do. Do you think sleep is a necessity or more like an optional kinda thing?

On a happier note, I've started getting orders for my cupcakes & cookies this past 2 weeks. So stoked about that. Maybe that's what I should do. Give up on this whole computer nerd thing and open myself a pretty little bakery or cupcakery. Is that a thing, cupcakery? it should be a thing.

see cookie, eat cookie..

These past couple weekends have not been kind to me. I've looked forward to them being nice and relaxed and so far this has not been the case. It's no one's fault but my own of course, I'm a crammer. I fill my weekend itinerary with way to much stuff. Stuff, that on it's own, can be fun and relaxing but when crammed with a myriad of other "fun and relaxing" activities mutates into quite the stressful monster. One of those activities is baking. Besides being marred by my unrealistic expectations, these past few weekends had also been the love children of various special occasions for which baking was called for. The endless birthday cycles of friends and family members, not to mention the lunar new year this last weekend, my oven was logging in some serious overtime.

Sufficient to say, at the end of each and every one of those occasion I was exhausted and could barely look at my oven without cringing at the thought of undertaking another baking project anytime in the near future. But then, divine intervention... a friend of mine has stumbled upon a chocolate chip recipe and thought of me. How kind. The next thing I know, sitting in my inbox was an email, describing in excruciating details, all the wonders of this recipe and before I knew it, I was sold. The strong yet misguided contempt that I had for my oven, so five minutes ago.

Chocolate Chip Cookie

adapted from the New York Times

Now, you should know that this is the best homemade chocolate chip cookies recipe ever. I know I said that quite a lot around here but what can I say, I am an awesome recipe hunter. 

• 2 cups minus 2 Tbsp. (241 gr) cake flour
• 2 cups minus 2 Tbsp (241 gr) bread flour
• 1 ¼ tsp. baking soda
• 1 ½ tsp. baking powder
• 1 ½ tsp. coarse salt (if you absolutely can't find coarse salt, such as kosher salt, then I guess you can use ordinary sea salt)
• 2 ½ sticks (1 ¼ cups; 283 gr) unsalted butter, softened
• 1 ¼ cups (10 oz.) granulated sugar
• 1 cup plus 2 Tbsp. (8 oz.) palm sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 500 gr bittersweet chocolate chips or chunks, preferably about 60% cacao content.

Firstly, combine flours, baking soda, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. Whisk well; then set aside.

Using a mixer, whisk butter and sugars until very light and fluffy, about 3 to 5 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Mix in the vanilla. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula as needed. Reduce the mixer speed to low; then add dry ingredients, and mix until just combined. Add the chocolate chips, and mix briefly to incorporate. Press plastic wrap against the dough, and refrigerate for 24 to 36 hours. The dough may be used in batches, and can be refrigerated for up to 72 hours.

Now, I can't stress enough how important it is to let the dough sit for at least 24 hours. Give the dough enough time to let all the flavours really bond together and I promise you it'll be worth the wait.

When you’re ready to bake, preheat oven to 350°F (180 Celsius). Remove the bowl of dough from the refrigerator, when you first took it out, it'll be quite hard so again give it about 20-30 minutes to soften slightly.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a nonstick baking mat.

You can use an ice cream scoop to mold the dough into individual cookie, it'll generally hold about 85 grams of dough, which makes for a 5-inch cookie but I find this a little big for my liking. I usually just do about 40 grams of dough per cookie and roll them into a ball, which can be a little bit messy but if you don't mind getting your hands dirty then this is the way to go. Another thing is while shaping the ball, you want to do it as quickly as possible, otherwise the dough will go all gooey in your hands.

These cookies need to enter the oven nice and cool, even verging on cold, so after shaping them if you feel they've melted a little bit, pop them back in the fridge and let them chill an additional 5-10 minutes.

Bake them for 15-20 minutes depending on the size of the individual cookies. When they're done, let them cool before putting them in an airtight container.

Yield: 48-50 individual cookie.

let them eat cake..

Hello there, sorry I haven't posted in a while, it's been a hectic week. My parents' birthday was last weekend. Yes, both of theirs. Mum's on Friday and Dad's on Saturday, talk about convenient. I baked them one cake to share. They didn't mind, there were plenty to go around.

This is how it came to be. All week I was looking for the perfect cake recipe for my folks' birthday. Now my experience in baking is limited to cookies and the occasional cupcake, never have I attempted the arduous process of making a full size cake, for the purpose of a birthday celebration no less. There was no screwing this up. I needed a simple yet gratifying, in every sense of the word, recipe to work with. So I looked and I looked then I googled and looked some more but alas, no cake. Everything was either too much hassle or not enough, meaning boring, but just as I was about to do the walk of shame to the nearest bakery, this little baby fell from the sky. Ok, popped into my inbox, but by no means any less heaven-sent. It's the best birthday cake recipe I've ever attempted. Ok the only birthday cake recipe I've ever attempted but the first of many I'm sure.

When I first read the recipe and saw Guinness on the ingredient list, I was sold, no questions asked. I mean what's not to love about a cake that listed my favourite stout as one of its main component. Oh right, there's no photos of the full size cake because I'm afraid that won't do this recipe much justice. I mean I really should work on my frosting skills.

Cake
adapted from thehungrymouse.com

• 1 cup Guinness
• 1 cup butter + more for greasing the pans
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 150 gr of bittersweet chocolate, chopped
• 2 cups flour
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/2 Tbsp. baking soda
• 3/4 tsp. salt
• 2 eggs, separated
• 3/4 cup sour cream

Firstly, put the butter in a heavy-bottomed pan along with the cup of Guinness and set it to medium low heat. Put the chocolate in and stir it in the butter until its completely melted. Add the cocoa powder into the mixture and whisk while on the heat. When it's well mixed turn the heat off and let it cool down to room temperature.

While it's cooling, combine the flour, sugar, baking soda and salt in a bowl. Mix well and set aside. Beat the egg yolks with the sour cream in a stand in mixer. Pour the cooled chocolate/butter mixture slowly while the whole thing is whisking.

At this point, combine the flour mixture with the chocolate mixture and fold well. Whisk the egg whites until stiff peaks and fold it into the batter. Be careful not to overfold, just until no more white streaks is visible.

Finally, top 2 9-inch cake pans with parchment paper and divide the batter equally. Bake in a preheated 350 Fahrenheit (180 Celsius) oven for about 30 minutes.

Chocolate Filling

• 50 gr bittersweet chocolate, chopped
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• 1/2 cup heavy cream, whipped
• 1 1/2 tbsp cocoa powder

In a heavy-bottomed pan, heat the heavy cream along with chocolate. Stir until chocolate has melted and add the cocoa powder. Let cool to room temperature before combining with the whipped cream.

Chocolate Fudge Glaze

• 100 gr butter
• 100 gr bittersweet chocolate
• 3 tbsp corn syrup 

In a heavy-bottomed pan, melt the butter along with the chocolate. Mix well before adding the corn syrup. Then let cool to room temp before using.

Frosting

This bit is optional. Given the richness of the cake and the glaze, the frosting might be a lil much for some people. Having said that however, I've toned down the butter and sugar in this recipe, it's  so I don't think it'll be a problem. But then again, that's just me, decadence is my middle name. If you don't have that big of a sweet tooth however, trust me, skip the buttercream frosting.

• 1 1/4 cup confectioner sugar
• 65 grams butter
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Whisk the sugar and butter until both are thoroughly combined before adding the cream and the vanilla. Whisk the whole thing, adding more cream if necessary for spreading consistency.

Assembly

At this point, all your ingredients should be cooled down and ready to assemble. Firstly, cut one of the cake into two thin, even layers.

photos courtesy of thehungrymouse.com

Once it's sliced, spread half of the fillings onto the bottom layer. Take your still-whole cake and place it on top of the bottom layer. Spread the rest of the filling on top and finish the layer with the other half of the sliced cake. Now this is much easier said than done. The cakes are extremely fragile and they might fall apart but you shouldn't worry too much, remember everything is going to be covered with frosting and fudge.

Gently spread your frosting over the cake as evenly as you can. Chill in the fridge for 30-45 minutes. Once the frosting is set, slowly pour the fudge over the cake, letting it dribble down the sides. At this point you can go ahead and serve or pop the cake in the fridge allowing the fudge to set.

Yield: one 9-inch cake.

Bananas for brunch..

I want to talk about brunch. 

Ok, that's not true. I want to talk about me first then about brunch.

Now I've mentioned before that I am a recently converted morning person. I wasn't always like this, no sir, before I was just another lowly late-riser whose idea of breakfast is a bowl of instant noodles at 12 in the afternoon. That's on the weekends of course, weekdays are even worse. What with my morning classes and everything, I hardly have time to take a shower let alone have breakfast. On a good day, I could maybe squeeze in coffee but believe me those days ain't easy to come by. So, morning classes amiss, I decided to make a change. 

I set my alarm clock to 6 am and no matter how late I stayed up the previous night, I would force myself to get out of bed the second it went off. It wasn't easy I tell you. The first couple of days were what they call, a non-starter. You know how it goes, the alarm would ring and instead of putting it on snooze you'd turn it off blah blah blah.. Anyways after a few of those, one sunny Thursday morning, I finally did it. I knew it was a Thursday because my calendar said "Have a tolerable Thursday" and I totally did. I'm kidding, I don't have a calendar that greets you with heart-warming quotes and darling phrases that I hang on my door so I can see it and be uplifted when I go out to school everyday. That is lame and I am not lame. At all.

Long story short, well.. shorter, I now love breakfast. love. It might be my favourite meal of the day. What can I say, I love scrambled eggs, and toast, and cheese, and, once in a while, bacon. Cold foamed-milk and coffee, it's become a habit. I cannot not get up early and do breakfast these days. Not even on the weekends.

I have a point which I'll be making shortly I promise, but before I do I just want to share with you a thought I just had. Breakfast should come with dessert. Right? Am I right? Not dessert for breakfast, that's a totally different thing, but dessert with breakfast. Think about it.. It should be a thing. Man, I wish it was a thing... 

Anyways, where were we? oh yes, given my breakfast habits, you could see why I didn't care much for brunch. Until one Sunday morning, I was eating my breakfast just like every other day when I came to the realization that it wasn't every other day. It's a Sunday and dammit I need some company. No one gets up at 6 am on a Sunday. No one. Well ok, some people. But no one here. And that's when it hit me, I've got some time before everyone wakes up, I'll just make brunch.

Baked sweet and spicy bacon with potatoes

And so that's what I did. I made eggs benedict, bacon and some skillet-fried potatoes. Not the most cardio-friendly items on the planet I admit, but it's a Sunday. And that, my friends, will be the end of my justification.

Quick bacon recipe: Cover bacon with some brown sugar, chilly powder and freshly ground black pepper. Put in a 350 Fahrenheit oven for about 10 minutes. Best bacon ever. There are no photos for the benedict I'm afraid because by the time I remembered to take a picture it was all but gone. Which is just as well because delicious as it was, that benedict will not be the hero of this story. That honour goes to...

Banana Cream Pie, with Mascarpone Custard

That, dear readers, is my magnificent, gloriously indulgent, banana cream pie. Now I must say, I feel calling it a banana cream pie would be a gross act of understatement. I mean, it's not exactly your every day run-of-the-mill banana cream pie. I know, I know, what a snob right? A banana cream pie is a banana cream pie but hear me out. I first learned of the recipe from an article in the New York Times website. I had been looking to make a banana cream pie for a while, I just could never find a recipe that was anything to write home about. So upon reading said article, I was inspired to try and create my own version. 

This pie has a nice, perfectly chewy crust. It uses mascarpone custard and caramelized bananas, so it's a little step up from the traditional banana cream pie recipes but I promise you it's totally worth the effort.

What you need:

The pie crust

• 250 gr digestive biscuits, finely crushed
• 4-5 tablespoon sugar
• 50 gr butter (half a stick), melted
• 1/2 a banana
• 4 tablespoon heavy cream
• an 8-inch pie plate

This is not your ordinary pie crust. For one thing, I used digestive biscuits instead of graham crackers for the simple reason that I couldn't find any. The other thing is, given the nature of a cream pie, I wanted to make the crust just a bit chewier, a nice contrast to the bananas and the cream. Just blitz the banana in the food processor along with the cream then add the rest of the ingredients. Mix well. This makes for a firmer, less crumbly mixture. Press into a pie plate and bake for 10 minutes in a 190° C oven (375 Fahrenheit). Let cool completely before adding the pie filling.

For the fillings

Mascarpone Custard

• 200 gr mascarpone
• 3/4 cup heavy cream, lightly whipped
• 4 egg yolks
• 1/4 cup caster sugar

For the custard, you might want to add 1-2 tablespoon of corn starch to the mixture just to make set firmer during the cooling process. I didn't because I prefer a smooth, runny texture but either way is fine.

First, whisk the egg yolks with the sugar in a bowl over shimmering water for about 3-4 minutes. Then gently fold the mascarpone into the mixture then the cream. Fold enough until smooth and even-coloured then stop. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let it cool for about 45 minutes. Once it's cooled, pour about 2/3 of the custard into the pie crust and refrigerate until it sets (1 or 2 hours). Set the remaining custard aside.

Caramelized Banana

• 3 cups banana, sliced
• butter
• sugar

Cover each banana slice with sugar. Heat skillet with just enough butter to cover the whole surface. Cook the bananas until golden brown on both sides. 

Assembly

Place the bananas on top of the now refrigerated custard pie nice and evenly. Pour the remaining custard on top. Now for maximum taste and texture integration, ideally you want to let the whole thing sit in the fridge for a couple hours maybe overnight. But since we live in the real world, at this point you can go ahead and cover the pie with some whipped cream and serve.

Yields: an 8-inch pie.

Double Trouble Chocolate Cupcake

I'm back at my place. Classes have finally began, and the holiday's officially over. To be perfectly honest, I'm glad it is. All that fatty, sugary goodness have had my jeans begging for mercy. Now, contrary to popular beliefs, I do watch what I eat and how much of it, it's just during the holidays that is much easier said than done. See, I get this involuntary reaction every time I see a refrigerator. I just have to open it. It doesn't matter if I'm full, half-asleep and/or otherwise, I will always reach for that door and pull. Which is not a problem if the fridge in question is filled with fresh healthy treats that satisfy my hunger pangs but keep all my buttons intact, but when it's stocked to the max with a vast array of dairies and desserts, well, it’s not a pretty sight, gluttony is very unbecoming, so I’ve been told.

That is, in a nutshell, why I am glad to be back. See here, I am the master of my universe. I can at least try and make an effort to eat healthier. What's that? You don't believe me? Fine, I'll prove it to you. As of this writing, my fridge manifest reads like the who's who of the whole foods section. Fresh strawberries and grapes, a carton of milk, a box of Belcube swiss cheese, organic eggs, 2 bags of baby spinach, fresh soy milk, unsweetened orange juice, streaky bacon, organic peanut butter, tofu & tempe, honey marinated chicken breasts, fresh eureka lemons and a cupcake. Huh? Huh? Not bad right? A few questionable items but overall? who's being all grown up and sensible?

Ok, so there's no way to actually prove it to you because I'm too lazy to take a picture, but umm, cross my heart and hope to die stick a needle in my eye those are the things my fridge contains. There's a story behind that cupcake too, mainly that I made it. It was my last chance to bake one before I left my folks'. Here it is. My double trouble chocolate cup cake with peanut butter filling.

So I brought these babies to a get-together at my friend's house and boy, were they a hit. And why wouldn't they be, I mean look at it. That deep brown colour, the smoothness and simplicity of the frosting. A real no-nonsense, melt-in-your-mouth-like-buttah cupcake. Plus, they're not too sweet and, given the richness of the cake, only little frosting is needed. Although I do have to warn you, it might be necessary to chased these cakes down with a tall glass of cold milk.

What you need for the cupcakes:

• 60 gr bittersweet chocolate, chopped
• 30 ml of coffee
• 100 ml heavy cream, or milk.
• 120 gr butter
• 150 gr sugar
• 150 gr cake flour
• 1 tbsp cocoa powder
• 1/2 tbsp baking soda
• 2 eggs, room temp, separated
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• pinch of salt

Peanut Butter Filling

• 6 tbsp peanut butter
• 8 tbsp heavy cream

Firstly, preheat the open to 350ºF (180ºC) and line a muffin tin with 12 cupcake liners. Melt the chocolate by pouring the hot coffee over it.  Whip the butter and sugar until fluffy then add the egg yolks. Mix in the chocolate/coffee mix and stir well.

Whisk together the cake flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. Stir in half of the dry ingredients, then add the cream or milk, then the remaining dry ingredients, mixing just until blended.

Whip the egg whites till stiff, then fold into the mixture. Be careful not to overfold the mixture. Just fold until there are no white streaks left. Divide the batter between the muffin cups and bake for about 25 minutes, until the batter feels just set in the center. Remove from the oven, then let cool for a few minutes.

When the cakes are completely cool, cut a deep hole in the middle then pipe in the peanut butter filling. Cover the hole back.

Chocolate Ganache Frosting
adapted from MarthaStewart.com

Now, I have to be honest, I had a little accident while melting the chocolate so I had to substitute it with cocoa powder. Not the same thing at all, but luckily it still tasted delicious.

• 75 gr good-quality bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
• 1/3 cup heavy cream
• 50 gr butter

Heat the cream, then pour over the chocolate. Set it aside until the chocolate melts then whisk. Add the butter and stir well. Let it cool completely before frosting.

Yield: 12 Cupcakes

No-Knead Pizza

I love eating out. Almost as much as I love cooking in, which is saying quite a lot believe me. When the occasion allows it, I will gladly hang up my apron and put my culinary faith in someone else’s, preferably, capable hands for the evening.

If you’re reading this you’ve probably notice that there is a new addition to the blog.  If you haven't, well, there is a new addition to the blog. For your reference needs and my own amusement, I present to you, the Jakarta Eater. I'll be writing about some of my most exciting food finds in this great metropolitan. From fancy upscale restaurants to rustic little food stands, I will go where my heart, and my wallet, takes me. 

Anyways, enough of the promo, after getting my Italian fix at Basilico the other day, I was inspired to make my own. Now, I've never made pizza before but since I've got some free time, there you go.

Ok, so obviously pizza is not the easiest thing in the world to make and I'll be honest, this post ain't about to change your mind. Having said that, I still think you should give it a go, if only for the satisfaction of being able to say "Yes, I've made a pizza from scratch therefore I'm awesome".

Making a pizza also takes some preparation, especially with the recipe I'm using, Jim Lahey's No-Knead Pizza dough, in which you have to leave the dough to rise for 16-24 hours before baking.  A traditional pizza recipe is quicker, but I just didn't feel like breaking into a sweat kneading my dinner and losing my appetite in the process. Wait, actually that's what I ended up doing anyway so, never mind.

The thing about this dough, making it is easy. Working with it is another story. The dough is extremely sticky, making it almost impossible to stretch, roll or toss. Believe me, I tried it all and then some. Being super defeated, I finally decided to use a baking tray and just slowly and patiently, stretch the dough out, filling the tray, making for a square pizza.

What you do need:

• 3 cups all-purpose or bread flour, more for dusting
• 1/4 tbsp instant yeast
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup water

In a large bowl, mix the flour with the yeast and salt. Add the water and stir until blended (the dough will be very sticky). Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let rest for 12 to 24 hours in a warm spot, about 70°.

Place the dough on a lightly floured work surface and lightly sprinkle the top with flour. Fold the dough over on itself once or twice, cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest for 15 minutes.

Divide the dough into 4 pieces and shape each piece into a ball. Generously sprinkle a clean cotton towel with flour and cover the dough balls with it. Let the dough rise for 2 hours.

Stretch or toss the dough into the desired shape, cover with toppings and bake on top of a very hot pizza stone.

Yield: 4 12-inch pizza

Day 1, 2011

Hello there, how was your last day of 2010? Mine was alright actually. I did start out the night gridlocked, but all's well that ends well I suppose. New year's resolution? To eat better, healthier whenever possible. Regrets? None whatsoever.
Sorry I couldn't take better pictures, I was a little caught up in the moment, if you know what I mean.

Well, happy new year dear readers. 2011 has finally arrived, bearing promises of thrills and excitements or, in my case, cookies. I am in Jakarta after all and that is just what we do during the holidays. See Indonesians have this thing, almost a tradition but more a habit I think, where we buy and trade all types of cookies, kue kering we call them, which literally translates to dry cakes, during the holidays. Except for the occasional chocolate chip cookie, anyone who knows me would tell you I am not a big cookie person. That's not saying I don't like them, I just don't like them like them.  But these ones, these ones are the ones I tell you. The moment I saw them. The heavens opened up and this was what I heard. They're pretty sweet. No, not like literally pretty sweet, more like awesome sweet. In reality, they're just a little sweet and tender and melt-in-your-mouth fantastic. And they're cheesy too, which if you have been following my blog, is kind of the compulsory trade of all my favourite food.

Tapioca Cheese Cookies

Now don't be mislead by the cheese in the name. These cookies are light and fragile and lovely. I promise.

What you need:

• 300 gr tapioca powder, sifted
• 50 gr corn starch, sifted
• 50 gr flour, sifted
• 130 gr margarine, room temperature
• 100 gr butter, room temperature
• 125 gr icing sugar
• 3 egg yolks
• 175 gr Edam cheese, grated  

First, whisk the butter, margarine and sugar together. Add the egg yolks and mix well. Combine the tapioca with the corn starch and flour then add to the butter/egg mixture. Add the cheese and mix well. I used a decorating tube to squeeze them into shape, you can do it however you want but try to use the tubes with the jagged edges. This makes for more surface area which gets the cookies to cook faster without browning too much.

Yield: A lot of cookies.