raspberry and litchi jelly

i love memories. you may never be able to relive them again, but you can certainly play them back as and when you wish and as many times as you like.

and sometimes, you may even be able to savour a little bit of them once more.

like these raspberry jellies that my mum used to make. whenever any of us opened the frigo and spotted the blushing red liquids setting in their little glasses, it will start a process of 15-minute interval sprints to the fridge to check if the little rubies have settled. we will carefully hold a glass, shake and tilt it around a bit to inspect if it is ready. much to my mum's chagrin i must imagine.

it was only with that same childhood anticipation that i mixed up a batch of these raspberry jellies one sweltering hot arvo, this time dotting the jellies with some sweet canned litchis and perfuming them slightly with crushed tangerine juice (leftovers from chinese new year).

and it looks like some habits never die. *grin* wobble, shake, tilt. every half hour this time, thankfully. only takes 2-3 hours to set before i got to walk 25 years down memory lane again. heaven in a spoonful.

A Citrusy Galette des Rois

I cannot wait. That is, to sink my teeth into all things buttery, yeasty and good. Yep it's less than 2 weeks til I leave for des vacances in France and I'm feeling antsy to get going. I swear I must be hallucinating 'cos I hear all those baguettes and croissants calling out to me, waxing lyrical with their flaky, crusty tones. Aaahhh.

Since my family and friends aren't able to come with me, I felt compelled to whip up a little bit of France for dinner last Saturday. One of my absolute favourites is this lovely citrus version of a galette des rois. It takes only 10 minutes to put together and another 20 minutes before you emerge with a soft, golden pillow, held high with the warm, almond-infused vapours.



I finally got to use the cookbook by Stephane Reynaud that my "tai lo" Ed + Ron got for me when I left for Singapore. :) It is a basic recette for a galette des rois, only zested with orange and pelted with a good squeeze of orange jus. I know you will enjoy it as much as everyone did. Bon ap!



Galette des rois (avec orange)
Adapted from Ripailles Traditional French Cooking by Stephane Reynaud
For 6

2 sheets of puff pastry
150g almond meal
150g caster sugar
2 eggs
150g butter
1 egg yolk
1 medium orange

Mix the almond meal and sugar together. Melt the butter, cool and add to the almond mixture. Add the eggs, zest and juice of one orange. Stir to just combine.

Roll the puff pastry out into 2 circles. Spread the almond mixture onto one of the disks, leaving a 1cm marign all around. Brush the edges with egg yolk and place the other disk on top. Seal.

Using the point of knife, trace a rosette pattern all over the top nad brush with egg yolk. Bake for 30 minutes at 180degC.

Pretty darn good coconut rice pudding (Riz au lait et creme de coco)

Sometimes the best things happen out of spontaneity. I wasn't even that keen on dessert after a dinner of zucchini omelette and some seriously good pate Henaff with bread, but someone sure did. And he sure knows what gets me.

"Shall we make some riz au lait?"

"Nah, I'm not really that hungry."

"Do you think it'll taste good with coconut cream? Cause I'm really craving it."

"Oooo coconuuttt. Yeah why not?" Pause. Can feel resistance crumbling faster than sable cookies now. " And make sure you add a little gula melaka while you're at it."

Well I can't say no now can I? He even volunteered to make dessert! And I have to admit, watching him take pleasure in preparing the riz au lait made me feel a little fuzzy inside.

This dessert is extremely easy to prepare, if not a little laborious as you will need to stir it frequently to avoid the rice getting burnt. But you'll sure be glad you did when the heady, coconut fragrance hits your senses. This post is dedicated to Aparna's Sweet Celebrations event - Happy blog anniversary!

You'll need:
Coconut cream
Milk
1 cup of basmati rice
Vanilla extract
Sugar
Gula melaka (caramelized coconut sugar)

Wash and rinse out the excess starch from the rice. Add slightly more milk than is needed to cover the rice. Bring it to a boil, then turn the heat down to low. Stir constantly while the rice is cooking, adding more milk if necessary to keep a creamy consistency. Add coconut cream, a splash of vanilla, sugar and gula melaka to taste. (Remember it's all about your taste preference!) When the rice is ready, remove from heat and serve warm.

(1 cup of rice will serve 2 hungry people)

Lick-your-plate-clean chocolate spoon cakes

If there is one dessert that's synonymous with the little black dress, it'll have to be half-cooked chocolate cake or spoon cake as I like to call it (yes, a spoon is mandatory!) :) You can dress it anyway you like: a dash of spice, a good douse of coffee, crunchy nut pieces or just leave deep, dark and delicious. Whatever it is, you simply cannot err on the wrong side with this.

This is one dessert that I've made several times but have not blogged about before. Since the weather is warming up a little, I decided to add some fresh cherries that I had picked up at the local grocerer's to offset the richness of the cake. Mmm, cherries and chocolate. Now you're talking my language.

This is specially for Lorraine's Ultimate Chocolate Cake event. Click here for the details!



Half-cooked Chocolate Cakes
6 tsp sugar (you can add more if you like, but this is way enough for me)
225g bittersweet dark chocolate
3/4 cup butter
3 eggs
1 tbsp flour
pitted fresh cherries

1. Butter ramekins. Over a bain marie, melted chocolate and butter. Stir well to combine. Remove from heat.
2. In another bowl, beat the eggs and sugar until thick and pale yellow.
3. Temper the egg mixture but adding a bit of warm chocolate mixture to it, then adding the rest. Combine well.
4. Fold in the flour gently until just combined.
5. Place a couple of fresh cherries in each ramkein. Spoon the batter carefully into the ramekins, adding as many cherries as you like as you go along. Place in a preheated oven of 425F and cook for approximately 13 minutes. Remove and serve warm with ice-cream on the side if desired.

Caramel Cake with Caramelized Butter Frosting

Dear dear me. Moist, satisfying sweet, intensely buttery and slightly nutty, I can't believe how luscious and addictive these cakes turned out to be.

This is the first time I've experimented with brown butter as I've always been wary about the whole carsinogenic thing, but hell, so are those deliciously crisp charred bits you get with your bbq and that doesn't stop me from consuming them from time to time. That being said, I'm only browning the butter on this occasion for the sake of experimenting. If I make these cakes again (which I'm very very sure I will), I think I'll leave out the browning bit.

After being introduced to salted caramels from my trip to Bretagne, I just can't adjust to normal caramels anymore. So the teeny weeny teaspoon of salt stated in the recipe was really quite unacceptable in my opinion. A good, liberal sprinkling of pink murray salt? Oui s'il vous plait!

Another change I did was to use yoghurt for the buttercream frosting instead of heavy cream. That was a chance I took since I did not really feel like buying a tub of heavy cream just for a couple of tablespoons. I am not sure how my other fellow Bakers fared, but it seemed like I needed a couple of tablespoons more of yoghurt than what the recipe called for. The yoghurt provided an extremely pleasant, sourish tang and is one amendment I'm happy to keep.

These cakes are a Shuna Fish Lydon recipe. The recipe can be found at her website at Eggbeater. And thanks to Dolores, Alex and Jenny for hosting this month's theme! You've certainly satisfied one sweet tooth.

The Tea Room @ QVB

High teas have never really particularly appealed to me. The idea of piling you up with a whole lot of desserts is a weeeee bit of a stretch even for my immense sweet tooth. Personally, I'd rather just have one or two quality desserts at a time so I can savour the treat. But of course, a birthday celebration always calls for excesses, and Sunday saw us at The Tea Room in QVB.

The Tea Room was set with gorgeous high ceilings and chi-chi wallpaper, but a strong, almost fishy odour overtook our senses and had us baffled. I wonder what it was. Feeling rather famished after a morning session out on the water, I decided to skip the sparkling today and settled for the traditional afternoon tea set. I needed something strong and bitter to accompany the sweets and ordered an aromatic black lavender tea.



The sweets and savouries arrived on a 3-tiered plate. On the bottom tier were buttery scones studded with raisins and slices of spinach tart. The scones were delicious with a thick, grainy jam and cold clotted cream. I particularly enjoyed the warm, savoury spinach tart.



The top tier had the finger sandwiches with creamy smoked salmon and a ham & cheese filling. I was starving so I practically devoured these. There was also a most tasty little cream cheese tart. Finger lickin' good.



The middle tier was of course laden with all sorts of sweets. There was a little strawberry boat with a cream filling, a passionfruit yoyo sandwiched with the most heavenly tangy cream, two meringue drops sandwiched with what I think is a pistachio cream, a rich square of mud cake and a carrot cake. The passionfruit yoyo was the standout - it still has me salivating at the thought of it.



Given the innocuous little bite-sized quantities, we were more than stuffed at the end of it. Looking back, I should have tried the gluten free menu. Maybe next time!

The Tea Room
North End, QVB
455 George Street, Sydney
9283 7279

Eclairs

Sometimes, too much of a good thing really can be a bad thing.

Think about it. Apples half the size of your head. Big fluffy pillow-like croissants instead of small, buttery, flaky ones. Slabs of banana bread pumped up to the equivalent size of 3 slices of bread stacked together. Now what they make up for in quantity, they fall short in quality.

I usually buy free range eggs and there was a substantial discount on some large 800g free-range ones. Well, money oftentimes speaks louder and so we thought, what the heck, how different can it possibly be? Oh trust me, when it comes to eclairs, it can take on catastrophic proportions.



The original recipe called for 5 large eggs, so I decided to halve it and go for 2.5 eggs. My first batch of eclairs looked more like a bunch of cooked tongues, all flat and spread out. Zut. Quel q'un se es assis sur les eclairs? Did someone sit on my eclairs? I thought I didn't do the recipe right, so this time I repeated the recipe, but decided to use just 2 eggs instead. The second batch struggled to rise and did so more than the first batch, but probably won by a nano-millimeter. Pffft.

I decided to do a bit of research and found that the problem might be too much egg. To make sure this was the case, I watched a video on Youtube to get a rough idea of what the consistency of the pate choux should be like.

So half stirring and half praying (as I was down to my last 2 eggs), I used 1.5 eggs and voila, the eclairs puffed up beautifully and obediently like mini corn cobs. Taking into mind that this was achieved with one whole egg less, I was a little gobsmacked. These 800g eggs were not just large eggs, they must be extra-large eggs. Shudder.

The creme patissiere on the other hand was a breeze to whip up. I love love LOVE coffee eclairs and substituted melted chocolate with a tbsp of instant coffee instead. It was rich, velvety and simply lovely. I piped the creme into the eclair instead of slicing it into half and spreading it in between. And since we had to keep a chocolate element in the eclairs, I dipped them in a simple dark chocolate ganache made with dark 74% chocolate and thickened cream. My, the combination was so very good.

Let's just say I'm glad I only have to do this once a month or I'll probably end up looking like a choux puff! Merci beaucoup Tony and Meeta for coming up with this splendid idea! You can find the recipe at their blogs.

Riz au lait, son fondant aux pommes caramelisee et son sirop d'erable

Having come across Linda's "Got Milk?" event in support of breastfeeding, I knew I had to participate. Yes I haven't got any kids yet (and I dont see any in the near future as well), but one thing for sure: when I do, I'm going the au naturel way. I can only imagine it's such a wonderful feeling to be able to nourish and nuture your bub like this.

I've bookmarked this dessert ever since I gleefully flipped open the glossy cover of Natalie Beauvais' "Trop Mad" cookbook. Believe it or not, this is the first cookbook I actually own ever since starting this food blog! To top it off, it's a gift from my bebe which really makes it all the more special. :)

This lovely dessert is a rice milk pudding with caramelised apple puree and maple syrup. It's quite a mouthful, but boy is it a delicious one. The ingredients are simple, basic and wholesome, making the most out of the natural sweetness of maple syrup and apples. Goes in line with the whole idea of breastfeeding hey?

Riz au lait, son fondant aux pommes caramelisees et son sirop d'erable

(Pour 8 personnes)

Le riz au lait:

100g rice

1L whole milk

1 tbsp vanilla extract (or to taste)

80g caster sugar

Le fondant aux pommes caramelisees:

1 kg apples

80g caster sugar

juice of half a lemon

6 tbsps of sirop d'erable (maple syrup)

Preparation:

Riz au lait: Rinse the rice under cold running water. Place the rice in a heavy bottom saucepan and add 1/4 of the milk together with the vanilla. On a low heat, bring the rice and milk to boil, stirring so that the rice does not burn. When the rice has absorbed all the milk, add the rest of the milk a little at a time, stirring frequently. When the rice is soft and the last of the milk added, add the sugar and combine well. Remove from heat and cool. Set aside.

Fondant au pommes: Wash and peel the apples, dicing them into small cubes. Place the apples, sugar and lemon juice in a saucepan and cover. Heat over a medium-low flame, stirring now and then to prevent the apples from sticking to the pan. When the apples are soft enough and slightly caramelised, remove from heat and mash. Cool and set aside.

Dressage: To assemble, place a good spoonful of apple puree into a glass. Add 2 good spoonfuls of rice pudding and top off with a tablespoon of maple syrup (or as much as you like). Enjoy!

Fruit Fan Fare! August MBP 2008

With these little babies in season, it’s hard to walk past the fruit stall and not grab a bagful. Especially when the damage is only a mere $2! Oh the pure joy you get when finding a steal extends even to the fruit stall…?



Having bookmarked this recipe from Australian Gourmet Traveller for ages, I was glad when the perfect excuse to make it finally came up. Aparna of My Diverse Kitchen is hosting MBP August 2008 with the theme “Fruit Fare”, where fruit has to be incorporated into a dish. One of the rules is also to use a recipe from a fellow blogger, and incidentally, one of my all-time fave bloggers, Jen of Milk and Cookies has also made these and blogged about it before. You can read it here.



These baby lemon cakes were such a breeze to make, and my initial dismay at how little the batter for 2 servings seemed to be were soon turned to relief as I realized how moist and rich these were. Even better was the discovery of lemon-specked honeyed butter which I can see melting so beautifully on a nice thick slice of toast. Sweet heavens.

Served warm, this works out to be a real wintry treat! Try it and I’m sure you’ll love it.

Note: Some changes I made: (1) Instead of using lime, I used lemon. (2) As I didn’t have self raising flour on hand, I used good ol’ plain flour with a little bit of baking powder. (3) Also since I prefer whole foods, honey was used in place of sugar in all cases. (4)Yoghurt was used in placed of sour cream. (4) The passionfruit cream also called for icing sugar, but I omitted that and found it juste parfait. Feel free to add the icing sugar if you feel it isn’t sweet enough.

Baby lemon cakes with Passionfruit Syrup & Cream

Lemon cakes:

125g soft buerre

3/4 cup honey

2 tbsp finely grated lemon rind

3 eggs

1/2 cup yoghurt

1 cup self-raising flour

Passionfruit syrup:

1/2 cup honey

1/3 cup lemon juice

pulp from 3 passionfruit

Passionfruit Cream:

300ml thickened cream

pulp from 1 passionfruit

30gm icing sugar, sieved (optional)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 170C. Beat le buerre, honey et lemon rind until light and fluffy. Add eggs and beat to combine. Add yoghurt and combine. Fold in flour and spoon mixture into 10 greased and prepared small cake moulds or a muffin tray. Bake for 15 minutes or until golden. Cool.

2. For the syrup, place all the incredients and 1/4 cup water in a small saucepan and stir over medium high heat. When combined, bring to a boil and simmer for 10 mins or until syrupy. Makes ~ 1 cup.

3. For the cream, combine the ingredients and whisk until soft peaks form. Refrigerate until needed.

4. To serve, pour half the warm syrup over cool cakes and serve with passionfruit cream and extra syrup passed separately.

Filbert Gateau with Praline Buttercream

It's that time of the month again - and the DB task this time is a Filbert Gateau with Praline Buttercream cake by Carol Walter.





Other than the slight panicky moment when the buttercream would not come together (this was fixed with a little bit of heat), the cake was relatively easy to whip up, having had some experience with Dorie Greenspan's Perfect Party Cake. And yes, it did involve a fair bit of creamin' and whippin' and my arm's still aching! I know I know, the call to get an electric mixer is getting ever stronger and resistance could be futile if I continue baking at this rate?



Anyway, shall keep this post short and sweet. Thanks to Chris of Mele Cotte for picking July's DB challenge! :) The recipe can be found at her blog!

PS: My darling boy got me a cookbook by Natalie Beauvais on Bretonne cuisine. I've already dog-earred several recettes! Trop Mad!

Olive oil and orange rosquillos

If you take a look at the food blogs around, it seems like almost everyone's already attempted a baked doughnut, except yours truly of course. I've bookmarked this recipe from Australian Gourmet Traveller eons ago and finally found the time to try it this morning.

And the entire batch almost ended up in the bin. 2 things happened. One: it wasn't a recipe for baked doughnuts but fried ones, but it did not deter me still since I am on a quest to eat more healthily. Two: I decided to ignore the quantity stated for the orange juice and go by 'feel' as I do sometimes. Uh-oh. For someone who loves everything in excess, the mere 1/2 cup of orange juice that the recipe called for didn't look enough and moreover I did not feel like wasting half an orange (yeah it was a BIG orange), so in went an entire cup (probably even a little more). So it's little wonder that the batter didn't come together as it should.

With my fingers stuck in what felt like gunk, it got to the point where I wanted to chuck out the dough and just settle for some Milo cereal and milk for brekkie instead. But the dough clung on so tenanciously that I decided what the heck, I'll just dip my hands in copious amounts of flour and try to do the best I can.

These were already brushed off as a lost cause and I only had enough curoisity to warrant 5 small rings. When the little rosquillos browned and cooled, I absently picked one up and nibbled on it. Thinking it would be rock hard from the excess amount of flour that was added, I was surprised when it was soft, chewy and bready. Mmm, not half bad really. Paired with a little chunk of 70 % cocoa chocolate that I had bought for making brownies for Tony, it was quite good too, but I found myself preferring the rosquillos on its own even without the recommended dredging in cinnamon sugar.

Before I knew it, I finished 3 little rosquillos. Think these deserve a try again.

Olive oil and orange Rosquillos
Note: The yoghurt I used in place of the pouring cream imparted a slight tangy, sourish flavour that people might not be used to. I only used it to make it healthier, but stick to pouring cream otherwise :)

1 egg

1/2 cup pouring cream (I used plain thick yoghurt instead)

1/2 cup freshly squeezed orange juice

1 orange, finely grated rind only

1/4 cup olive oil

1/2 cup caster sugar

2 cups self-raising flour

1 tbsp ground cinnamon

Vegetable oil for deep frying if desired

1 Combine eggs, cream, orange juice, orange rind, olive oil and 120gm sugar in a large bowl, mix to combine, add flour and mix until a soft dough forms, then knead for 1 minute. Divide dough into 20 pieces and roll onto a lightly floured surface to form 15cm-long cylinders, then pinch ends together to make little doughnut-shaped rings.

2 If you would like a sugar dressing for your doughnuts, combine remaining sugar and cinnamon in a bowl and set aside.3 For deep frying: Heat oil in a deep-fryer or large deep saucepan to 180C and cook rosquillos, in batches, for 4 minutes, turning once or until golden, then drain on absorbent paper. Cool completely, then coat with cinnamon sugar. Rosquillos are best eaten the day they’re made, but will keep for 1-2 days when they will be best suited to dunking in coffee.
If you wish to bake it, what I did was preheat the oven to 400F and put the rosquillos in til they turn brown (approximately 15-20 min).

adapted from Australian Gourmet Traveller

Cheesecake popsicles - April DB challenge

If there's any faster way to ruin a diet, it's to pack all your calories into innocuous little bite-sized pieces. They look so harmless in that state cos they look well, kinda tiny, and that means we can sort of waive off the calories right? Oh sure. Just wait til you put one in your mouth. Oh it's incredibly good. You ooooh and aaaahh and mmmm for a bit as you savour the last creamy traces.

You're about to take another bite when it hits. *Blank stare* Um, it's finished? Your eyes get drawn almost by what you're certain is some sort of magnetic field over to the tray of popsicles. The little devil on your shoulder who's been yelling and screaming and stamping his foot all week as you fill up on your whole foods, fruits and veggies is suddenly quiet. Oh yep, he's smirking. Before you know it, you pop one more, and another, and then what the heck, might as well stop counting and then before you know it, you can kiss your waistline goodbye.

Apart from the calorific stampede, the DB April challenge was quite the experience. As you can see, the challenge this time was a tweak on an all-time favourite - cheesecake! I've always loved thick, creamy cheesecakes, my absolute fave being the Chicago Cheesecake from Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf (which you incidentally can't find in Sydney). The gelatin-versions just don't cut it for me. If I'm going to have it at all, I rather go all the way. Sort of reflects my attitude to life. Yeouch.

This month's task was chosen by Elle and Deborah taken from Jill O'Connor's Sticky, Chewy, Messy, Gooey cookbook. The idea was to make cheesecake pops - perfect for a party I reckon - and dip them in a flavouring of your choice. Chocolate was the featured dip, but I was a tad skeptical of that and decided on a caramel au buerre sallee (salted caramel) coulis as well.

I may not have mentioned it, but curiosity is a main driving force for this blog, as is the love for all things sensory in life. Creating foods that I have never attempted or tried before and capturing the details of it all on film gives me a kick like no other, probably akin to a piece of music that transports you to that higher plane, or standing in front of a gorgeous scenery which sucks all the words out of you. For me, it's not knowing what to expect out of the end product til you see it and taste it. When it's great, fantastic. Sometimes it's not, and you just keep tweaking it til you find that perfection.

Thus it is no surprise that this was also a first-attempt at baking a cheesecake, let alone trying to make them into pretty, edible things! I was so pleased when the cheesecake crust took on a lovely golden hue. The texture was how I liked it to be exactly - the full crumbly, tangy taste of cream cheese which coats the inside of your mouth, accented by the addition of lemon (the recipe did not call for it, but I added the juice of one lemon in). The one grip that I had was the amount of sugar in it - I found it a bit too sweet. Some folks might like it like that though.

After leaving the cheesecake to firm up in the fridge, I scooped the little balls with a spoon and quickly shaped them in my palms, after which a bamboo skewer was inserted into it. The whole batch was left to freeze, and later coated with tempered chocolate. Here's where I deviated again and used heavy cream to make a dark chocolatey ganache in place of shortening (that is something that sounds dodgy to me and I would never ever want to buy). It worked out pretty alright, as did the salted caramel coulis. A couple were dipped into crushed graham cookies.

Overall the popsicles seemed to work quite well with the chocolate surprisingly, but I much prefer the salted caramel. Although if you ask me, I would make the cheesecake again and eat it on its own (the purist in me adores the simple, unadulterated taste of foods as it should be). The recipe can be found at the Daring Bakers blog. Hope you'll have as much fun as I did!

Note: I made only half the amount of cheesecake called for and found that the addition of the juice of 1 whole lemon gave it just the right amount of tang. The salted caramel coulis can be made by melting by reducing 1/2 cup of brown sugar and 1/4 cup of water into a dark syrup over med heat. Add 1/2 cup of heavy whipping cream, 3 1/2 tbsps of butter and 1 tsp of salt.

My first Daring Bakers Challenge!

Finally got my first DB task down to pat! The theme was Dorie Greenspan's Perfect Party cake - the idea was to make a layer cake using her basic recipe and tweak it to any flavour you desire. Deciding on what flavours was no mean feat - there were just too many ideas that immediately popped to mind! Should I stick to the original lemon/coconut combination the recipe called for? Pandan cake with gula-melaka filling for a bit of Asian influence? Something totally wacky and off the beaten track? Believe you me, that got me stuck in a quandry for some time!

After the incessant to-ing and fro-ing and ho-ing and hum-ming, I decided to work close to the theme and use a lemond curd filling and a lighter whipped cream infused with lavender in place of the butter frosting. ("Lick your lips, help your hips", no?) This is the first time I've made lemon curd after reading so much about it, and I'm pleased to say it was deliciously tangy and sourish, exactly the way I like it.

Oh, the lavender cream. Ooh-la-la. All I can say is that it got me floored. Maybe prostrated. Definitely dancing in absolute reverence to light, billowy, lavender-perfumed clouds. It was simply, simply amazing. I had a hard time looking for the lavender flowers but finally hunted it down in David Jones gourmet foods! (Also couldn't help indulging in a pack of black sesame rice crackers there. Heaven.)

As for the cake, it turned out moist, citrusy and full-flavoured. This is the first time I've attempted a Dorie Greenspan recipe and it's no wonder she's so revered in the culinary circle. I must admit that though the cake was delicious and warranted no complaints whatsoever, I would personally prefer something a little lighter on the spongy side for layer cakes.

The most challenging part was probably assembling the cake, what with the Butter-fingers-itis i seemed to have mysteriously contracted over the past 2 days. Looking at the amount of mess I created and the 2 near accidents which almost saw the cake kiss the floor, it's a miracle I emerged out of the kitchen without any cream stuck on my hair! The results were all worth the effort though. I thought the cake didn't look half bad for a first try and the floral tones and citrus pair up ever so seamlessly. Definitely something I'll serve up at a party!

Here are the recipes for the lemon curd and lavender cream. I am usually quite generous with my seasonings, so feel free to chuck in more lemon/lavender buds if you feel like it!

Lemon Curd - the recipe calls for Meyer lemons but I used normal ones
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon grated Meyer lemon zest plus 3/4 cup Meyer lemon juice
1 large egg yolk
1 tablespoon unsalted butter

Whisk together sugar, flour, and salt in a small heavy saucepan, then add lemon juice in a slow stream, whisking until combined. Bring to a boil, whisking constantly, then simmer, whisking, until thickened, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat.

Whisk yolk in a small bowl, then add about one fourth of lemon-juice mixture, whisking vigorously. Whisk into remaining lemon-juice mixture and gently boil, whisking, 1 minute. Remove from heat and stir in butter and zest. Transfer filling to a bowl and cover surface with buttered parchment paper. Chill until cool, at least 30 minutes.

Heavenly Lavender Cream
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
3 tablespoons mild honey
1/2 tablespoon dried lavender blossoms

Bring cream, honey, and lavender blossoms just to a boil in a small saucepan, then remove from heat and let steep, covered, 30 minutes. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl, discarding solids, and chill lavender cream, covered, until cold.

adapted from epicurious

Mocha Shortbread

I can't believe Christmas is here once again. Last year I was in HK with my family, jostling with the crowd and street shopping endlessly from one lane to the next. This year will be one spent quietly over dinner and drinks with friends in Sydney. Though of course I still wish my family and besties were by my side, I'm more than content for having friends here to spend my holidays with. Yep, they are the people who make time here fly just that little bit faster, not to mention sweeten it by making it so fun!

So, to wrap up the year, I wanted to do something special for them to just show them how much they mean to me. I'm kind of a emo-idiot, if you can call it that way. I get stuck often a time when trying to verbalize or show my emotions physically even though I want to, probably a result of a traditional Asian upbringing. Whatever it is,, I decided to do what I do best next - write & bake of course. :)

I ended up making two batches of cookies - one batch of candycane cookies (in my last post) that were probably cuter to look at than eat, and another batch of mocha shortbread. I just adore the texture of shortbread and how it starts off all crumbly and then melts so beautifully in your mouth. These shortbread fingers were all that and more - dark, chocolately and intensely flavoured with coffee; definitely one for the grown ups. There's just one catch: if you aren't the owner of an electric mixer like me, be prepared to get your heart rate up for a good workout. Even with all that dragonboat training, this was tough for me. LOL.

Hope you enjoy this. Happy Holidays! :)

Mocha Shortbread

Note: For this recipe, I reduced the flour to 2 cups and substituted 6 tbsps flour for 3 tbsps cornstarch since I didn't have any cornstarch on hand.

1 1/2 cups confectioners (powdered or icing) sugar
3/4 cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder
2 cups all-purpose flour + 6 tbsps (or 3 tbsps cornstarch)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoons (6 grams) pure vanilla extract
2 tablespoons (8 grams) instant espresso powder

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Lightly butter (or spray with Pam) a 15 x 10 inch (38 x 25 cm) baking pan.
In a small bowl, sift the confectioners sugar with the cocoa powder. Set aside.
In another bowl, sift the flour, salt (and cornstarch if you're using it) together. Set aside.
In the bowl of your electric mixer (or with a hand mixer), cream the butter until smooth (about one minute). Add the sugar and cocoa mixture and beat until fully incorporated (about 2 minutes). Add the vanilla and espresso powder and beat until incorporated. Then add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and beat until the dough just comes together.
Spread the dough over the bottom of the prepared pan and gently press the dough, with your fingertips or the back of a spoon, to form an even layer. Then, with a sharp knife, score the top of the shortbread into approximately 3 inch x 1 inch (7 x 2.54 cm) fingers. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, or until the top is dry and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove from the oven and place on a wire rack to cool. While the shortbread is still warm, re-cut the shortbread into fingers. Cool completely before removing from pan.

Adapted from Joy of Baking

Apricots, mascarpone and walnuts

Oh bliss. Just 2 minutes to put together and 1 minute to enjoy. Best of all, it's au naturel and chock full of fibre, calcium and natural fatty acids. What more could you ask for?

Apricots, mascarpone and walnuts (noix)
Slit dried apricots into half, but not all the way such that it remains a whole piece (sort of like butterfly-ing a fillet).
Using a teaspoon, fill the apricot with chilled mascarpone cheese. Gently press a piece of walnut into the cheese.
In one smooth motion, pop it into your mouth and enjoy the sweet, tangy, nutty and creamy goodness all at once.
Lick your lips and happily repeat the above steps.

Gula Melaka Ak Bahling

I dont know if you've yet noticed, but yep, I'm kinda obsessed with cooking. In particular, I only want to attempt dishes that sound interesting or those that I haven't done before, which actually encompasses almost everything. Like the soft, chewy, tender, melt-in-your mouth figs braised in red wine vinegar and red wine I made last night. Served with chilled mascarpone cheese and walnuts, it was unbelievable. In fact, it was so good I went for a 2nd serving against my better judgement. I had to contend with a distended belly for the rest of the night. lol

Sometimes my culinary exploits are also borne out of necessity. Like this morning's brekkie of glutinous rice balls (ak bahling) soaked in warm coconut milk. Realising we were out of milk and the stores were not open yet, I had to make do with whatever was in the kitchen. Since there were 3-quarts of a can of coconut milk left in the fridge from the nasi lemak last night, I thought I'll make an improvised version of ak-bahling.



Now the plain ones are easy peasy to make, but stuffed ones? The first ball I made looked like a herd of elephants had just played Twister on it. Oh and did I mention that gula melaka melts VERY quickly? Put two and two together plus clumsy fingers and you end up with a stickey mess. Not very pretty. The second and third ones turned out much better though, and before long, I was churning out stuffed ak bahlings so deftly that anyone watching would have thought I worked in a rice ball factory all my life. The secret to this is simple - the less time the ball spends in your hand, the better. You gotta work FAST. The dough tends to deform easily and the heat from your hands melts the sugar in the dough. I'm so proud of my little babies -see how pretty they look in the picture above? ;p



For the recipe, if you like you can add one tsp of vanilla extract to the dough like I did. One bite into the ball releases a swirl of thick gooey gula melaka into the coconut milk and with the slightly softned but nonetheless crunchy peanuts, it creates a beautiful melange of textures and flavours.

Comfort food for a rainy Saturday morning. :)