Happy Easter :)

I can't believe I managed to ward off Facebook during lent!! Yippee---

Happy Easter :)

The weather was clear, and my friend was getting baptized.

Went to his church (I don't go there normally because I'm a Catholic). It reminded me so much of MGS that I almost cried during the praise and worship. I really miss those days.

I made braised quail eggs for my friends. I thought there wouldn't be that many people I know at that church, but it turned out that I saw so many that they were not enough for everyone.

Felt so bad about it but I couldn't do anything. It took me 4 hours to get the eggs done. And I don't even really know everyone whom I met just now.

All I knew was that I need to save 3 mini bags for my close friends. Even if I gave the three reserved bags out, they still won't be enough for everyone anyways.

( = 3=) ~♪

I'm sorry  ｍ(｡≧Д≦｡)ｍ

Read More

Bread Cup

I tried this bread cutter and toasted white bread in oven toaster inside a cup.

Toasted bread cups

 Some of them were burnt because I left the toaster unwatched. It took only about 2 minutes to get it brown and crispy.

Bread cups filled with tuna, egg, white corn, yellow sweet corn, carrot and asparagus in Kewpie (Japanese mayo)

Would taste better if the salad were colder but my friends said it's yummy (and one complained that the bread was burnt)

:)

Read More

Hayashi

I want to get rid of my Hayashi Rice sauce mix but I was too lazy to cook rice so I made kwetiaw (flat, broad rice noodle) with hayashi rice sauce. It says on the package that I can use noodles instead of rice and I guess they must be referring to udon. The closest noodle I can find in my cabinet is kwetiaw. 

Kwetiaw with beef, cauliflowers and broccoli hayashi sauce

And somehow it felt like eating jajangmyun. LOL.

So I have leftovers and I decided to cook rice this time.

Delicious.

I really want to try making hayashi sauce from scratch (the ingredients list listed onions, carrots, potato and some other vegetable powders, and starches like corn starch - maybe if I boil the veggies long enough...?)

Read More

Steam!

I really miss long chili pepper stuffed with minced pork seasoned in soy sauce, white peppers and sesame oil, and then steamed. Childhood favorite ♪

I'm not a big fan of my steamer. The holed base would suddenly fall down and then I have to pull the base from the bottom of the pot using strings because it's stuck at the bottom :(

I tried to make manju again (to test my perseverance). This time I used chestnut and red bean fillings. I can't believe I failed 4 times making the dough because I strictly followed the recipe. That's what you're supposed to do when you want to bake but NO! I used my instinct to measure how much flour I should put and my sense was right! This time it turned out in a pretty good shape, BUT...

THE BAKING SODA MAKES THE BREADING BITTER!!

I don't know what's wrong with my baking soda. It's a cheap Chinese brand baking soda. I'm throwing it away *cries*

Read More

Another Birthday Cake

The first cheesecake I've ever made from scratch. Hurray!

My friend and I kept checking the recipe because it was also her first time making cheesecake. Turned out to be pretty simple and easy. At first I thought we would screw up because I don't have pans big enough to make a water bath (bain marie? I forgot what the jargon term for water bath in baking is) for a 9" pan that we bought.

We tried using Edible Markers to draw but it didn't work - probably because the markers are water soluble and cheesecake is just full of fats. 

I drew an outline of Hello Kitty on a piece of clean paper and made a paper stencil using cutter. After the stencil was done, I placed it on top of the cake and then I sifted hot cocoa powder (because I don't have baking cocoa - I don't bake) on the stencil. Removing the paper stencil from the cake was quite a challenge - we don't want the unwanted cocoa powder on the paper to fall on the "blank" parts of the cake.

Quite a while ago I bought a pair of mini pin-set (I'd like to call it forceps better) to make bento. I used that forceps, so we avoided the risk of damaging the cake should we use our fingers instead.

I forgot to make the eyes but I think it went pretty well!

For the eyes, I just made a small oval hole on a piece of paper and then poured some cocoa powder on the hole using a spoon.

And then... my friend and I, being slightly 'mean', decided to color the ribbon using chili pepper or sauce because our birthday girl can't take spicy food. When I was making the spicy sugar paste, I felt a little bad for making her eat something so spicy, so I added more and more sugar to mask it. I used tons of granulated sugar, Sriracha sauce and cayenne pepper. And for a final touch, I added red food coloring diluted in water.

Ta-daaah!!

My friend took a shot of me doing the artwork. LOL. 

Read More

Glooom

I get really gloomy when I read news across the world.

What can I do to help? At least for now, what can I do to help without sacrificing my current life goals?

I can't even help people around me. How can I help the world?

Are prayers enough?

Read More

Lazy

Dump everything together and voila.

Someone please bang my head for being so lazy -.-;

Read More