of things past and present

Just several days ago, i open the pages of my journal and with a flip i came to the last entry written and my goodness has it been that long already. the date was 19th november 2007 and i asked myself what have i been doing all these while; all at once the memories are back as though it happened only yesterday.

while i did make an effort to pen down the dates and along with some notes, of those days that are memorable due to some significant happening. and yes i have around 12 pretty entries to complete before the close of my internship journal episode. but as i am lazy, i've decided to write one long and winding entry covering those 12 important dates with a classy signing off.

it was quite a shock as i realised that i have a little more than halve of the journal unwritten and what am i to do with all these blank pages. when i bought this pseudo paul smith journal with a cover design so classic that it can stand the passing of time, i had planned to use all the pages. but it seems five months is a little too short for that many happenings.

unwilling to let all these pages left unwritten, i'm gonna write all my recipes in them. one a day and numerous by then. recipes attempted and tweaked. something that i can carry along on my next internship or when i am gonna live abroad. all my desserts, readily accessible with the flip of the page.

while now that august has come to an end, a beautiful one indeed with refreshing rain and warm sunshine during the past week. the tang of oranges comes to mind. claudia fleming's lemon pound cake with a twist i've decided to use those round and cheerful citrus fellows instead. then comes one of my favourite things, zesting the oranges.

at a glance the use of five eggs kinda gave me a shock as usually pound cakes only use up to four, then the jus called for in the recipe seems a little miserable and as the saying goes, do as your heart desires. i minus one egg and double the jus as i want a more flavoursome cake. and yes if there's one thing claudia should know, it's the need to be generous with the zest.

blitz the sugar and zest to bring out the tangy aroma, a generous pinch of zest for the melted butter and when everything comes together the batter is a wonderful thing of oranges. i spooned them into muffin liners and once baked, what gorgeous fellers they are, and surprisingly soft and fluffy too.

sometimes

with the rain clouds above unfurling with the winds marching in alongside, the trees and grass rustle and sway while leaves and blades dry from the harsh sun sweeps and swirls as the wind passes. reflecting the weather, my mood sways too and thus the weekend come and go with no desire to bake.

sometimes the feeling of solitude is just so great it depresses. it's like watching the sunset above the clouds, a feeling that makes even the expressiveness of words falter. sometimes i hope and pray for that empty seat beside me to be taken. and that loneliness i hold on to preciously is somehow fading away.

i feel like riding on the shinkansen watching the world go pass in a blur as the rain splashes down on the window making the scene outside dreamily comforting as everything seems blanketed with a grey veil. and inside there is calmness and peace in my mind, yet alone. listening to the tatter of the rain and the hypnotising sound of the train flying down the tracks, all is well.

randomness

singapore has finally gotten an olympic medal after 48 years of waiting, while although our table tennis players are born in the roc, they have decided to live in and represent singapore. i know there are numerous of us who are proud of their achievements, the glory they have brought for our little red dot, but there are also others who feel otherwise.

i have heard too many a times people saying that our win at the olympic is not really singapore's win as our players are from the roc, well come to think of it, since singaporeans want a pure blooded player to win at the games then i believe our children should start picking up the sport they love from young, but then again in the minds of parents academic achievements are sometimes a matter of life and dead.

four years ago and even eight years ago, i've heard people saying singapore will never win an olympic medal. and after all these years when we have finally gotten another silver medal, singaporeans are unsatisfied, brushing off the win as though its faux as our dear players are from the roc. this little red dot has plenty of bigoted and arrogant people, no?

i really do not care where our players come from, as long as they are representing singapore, with the hope of bring sporting glory to the city state, i believe that as singaporeans we should be cheering them on whole heartedly regardless of their birth place. that's the singapore spirit and mind set that we should have.

when i saw the singapore flag raising above the podium, i felt proud and happy, for the nation and for them. all the hard work and effort they have put in have finally paid off. so come on singaporeans, our attitude has to change. we're of world class standard in many areas but certainly not socially in thinking and action wise.

the coming of autumn

the blazing days of summer has finally decided to call it a day or season rather and autumn makes her appearance without much fanfare as the pages on the calender flips and flutters through august. with apples of different kinds appearing in the market, i decided to bake something with the flavour of autumn; apple muffins with raisins.

i was hoping to get myself recipe book from kino last thursday but i ended up leaving the bookstore with nothing new in my bag. a search on yahoo and flickr also yielded nothing great of an apple muffin recipe, so i decided its time for some trial and error with luck thrown in too. looking at my blueberry and banana muffin recipes i constructed my recipe based on what i want my muffin to taste like.

with diced apples tossed with brown sugar, a generous heap of cinnamon and a dash of nutmeg, everything seemed autumny enough except that i forgot to stir in a tablespoon or two of amber coloured honey. the batter was seemingly over filling with apple and raisins that it makes spooning into individual muffin liners more tedious.

while ending off with slices of apple, i forgot to mention that the raisins are soaked in rum and vanilla flavoured vodka. the muffins came out of the oven looking surrisingly good and there's that factor of rugged beauty that suits autumn to the tee. well i guess with trial and error comes more trial and error, the muffin needs more apple taste and i have just the ingredients in mind for the next batch.

macarons, these french bitches

when my macarons rose nicely in the oven, i was filled with an undescribable sense of satisfaction. afterall i did met with unsuccessful attempts that caused me much frustration and the oh i need to strangle someone now kinda feeling. however for me, the macaron journey has only began and its gonna be a really interesting one.

so i read that there are two commonly used methods of making macarons, one being macarons au blanc monte which is the usual whisked egg whites with stiff peaks while the other is macarons au sucre cuit which is italian meringue. i chose to use the latter as it's easier to work with and handle in warm and humid singapore.

italian meringue is made by pouring a hot sugar syrup at 118 °C a thin stream into whisking egg whites already giving sitff peaks, then continue whisking till it cools. one great thing i found out about italian meringue is that it produces a beautiful art known as "bec d'oiseau" which i have yet to achieve.

my italian meringues are like white clouds that when scooped and dropped on a baking tray, they retain their shape. for those who have been to canele patissier and seen their meringue clouds, you will know what i am talking about. and yes i love cooking sugar as its amazing to watch the mixture bubble and slowly turn to amber.

my macarons are flawed in several ways, they lack of that smooth shiny dome that makes it looking sexy and classy. somehow the legs are also not really frilly and are kinda small and lastly, are macarons supposed to have a dome or are they supposed to be flat on top. and one thing about macarons is that they are like sensitive little fellers, affected by the environment.

oven temperature and intensity differs between ovens and then there's humidity levels and then room temperature. that's what is so interesting about making macarons as i have to twitch plenty and have many trial and error sessions to get one set of instructions that suit my kitchen and oven.

a few days back i bought a bottle of rose brand rose syrup by t.g. kiat and co. after seeing the beautiful label on the bottle and the cap design. when i took it out of my bag and placed it on the table my mum took a glance and started telling me of how when she was young this was the only brand of rose syrup available on the market and how her sisters and her will be smiling when my grandad bought a bottle home.

so yes if you were wondering, i made a batch of rose flavoured macarons and for the chocolate ganache, i stirred in a generous amount of rose syrup. i feel classy already.

therein lies the beauty of avocados

after numerous blazing hot days it finally rained a few days back, the thunder and lightning composing a melody with the splashing of water puddles on the streets and tinkerinf of rain drops on the roof and glass windows. a melody so unique and natural it takes a moment of calmness to listen and appreciate.

while the sunny tropical days are here to stay, the season is about to change in other places of the world. as i was reading the traveler's lunchbox, a wonderful blog about living in cities the author has been to while working and writing up articles, i chance upon a recipe so delightful that it will make a hot sticky day refreshingly sweet.

the sound of someone saying avocado milkshake brings back memories of studying at sentosa when my friends will be rushing to grab a takeway cup of this used in beauty product milkshake and all of them were going ohhhh ahhhh about it. paying it compliments and now that we no longer take that bus from seah im hawker center, everyone is telling me how they missed it.

this simple avocado milkshake is one beverage not to be taken lightly. well the thought of avocado in a milkshake doesnt really give a delicious impression that makes you wanna grab a glass immediately. i was sceptical initially, never wanting to try it at the hawker center. but as life is full of surprises, those who tried will be bound to crave for more.

personally i have tried avocado, the most unappetising way; mashed up with lemon juice and sugar in an almost paste like texture. but give me the fruit in milkshake context i will happily sip it on a blazing afternoon with a teaspoon of rum and coffee stirred in.

macadamia nut cookies

oh look, i've finally baked cookies and thank goodness they're not chocolate chip cookies but these rugged white chocolate macadamia nut cookies. these smell damn nice while baking in the oven as the nut and white chocolate go really well hand in hand. just the sound of macadamia nut makes me dream of my traveling days back in down under.

as white chocolate is naturally sweeter than normal chocolate, i threw in a little lesser of them chips in fear that someone might choke on the sweetness. however it seems that these cookies can sure do better with a more generous bunch of white chocolate chips. these cookies go really well on a warm day with a mug of fresh milk.

you know there are times when your cookie goes a little soft and loses that fabulous crunch, well i realised that by dipping it in chilled fresh milk, tea or even your favorite cuppa chocolate, the crunch comes back all at once. little wonders of the bakers.

of peranakan desserts

i remembered the last time i made onde onde was during my internship in shanghai when we started missing the local fare back home and the desserts. since i made these fellers before back in singapore, no harm making them in shanghai when we chance upon pandan leaves in the supermarket at the portman ritz carlton.

the pandan leaves were expensive mine you and we have to use every portion of them. but with the approaching winter and the low humidity levels in shanghai, the balls arn't as chewy and soft as those made here. ohhh and yes, since we couldn't fnd freshly grated coconut in shanghai, i dusted them generously with dessicated coconut.

life is full of surprises and when baking one may simple chance upon new possibilities and dessicated coconut is one of those many. fresh grated coconut has a light taste while dessicated coconut has a more developed and full bodied aroma and taste. however they make onde onde look more like coconut macarons.

i adore onde onde with pure gula malaka fillings rather then the ones filled with grated coconut cooked in the palm sugar. i always attempt to place more gula malaka into the balls as once they melt during the cooking, its will knock you off your feet when you bite into them. i make them small enough to pop them whole, so that the liquid gula malaka will make an exploding entrance.

while making the dough, i realised that it is easier to roll them into balls and later add the filling if the dough is a little drier rather then just nice. kneading and handling the dough will make it stickier and the chances of the ball tearing a hole is higher. once it's round and nice roll them no more.

gosh i think i am gonna break down from exhaustion one of these days, working during the weekdays and when the weekends arrive, its late nights and early mornings all for the sake of playing and baking.

contradiction

i got all worked up while i was in the kitchen this evening as i was piping macaroons onto the baking trays. gosh i never knew such a simple recipe with a seemingly simple set of instructions can be outrageously difficult. i know these french fellers are the most difficult cookies to make, requiring skills and patience but fck fck fckerty fck. its drove me insane.

trust the french to use simple ingredients with simple step by step instructions that can challenge even the most seasoned baker. its all about the every little whisk, fold and flick that determines the outcome and then comes the piping and slamming of the tray on the table. my goodness, you will be left all ready to slam head on the table.

but nevertheless i am gonna give myself a time limit to get these macaroons out right before i get enlisted. and yes, although baking calms the soul, but when its the baking that gets you all happy to strangle someone then it's time to do the household chores and vent your frustrations on getting the house clean.