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. My Tasting Palette .
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. In celebration of food and dining experiences . |
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Exploring and discovering new restaurants Dining and chilling out with my loved ones Baking and cooking over the weekends Sharing my love for food with others
Vanilla bean pods (one can never have enough) Valrhona Cocoa powder Valrhona chocolate Macarons from Laduree and Pierre Herme Madelines mold Pretty cake stands (I only have one and only one) YUZU from Japan! (They taste great in almost anything) A food tour to Italy and France Opportunity to study at Le Cordon Bleu |
Sunday, January 14, 2007 [[Of recent dessert indulgence]] With little time to bake, I've been getting my sweet tooth fix at Canele. I've tried about every cake at Canele. =) heh. After our lunches, we went to Canele to "da bao" desserts back for the family- got a New York Cheesecake ( Really like this one coz it isnt too heavy), the Le Royal (I still think it's among the best of what they have) and the almond profiterole (so-so. Not a big fan of cream or profiteroles.) One day, I should get my lazy ass to walk to the end of Mohammad Sultan Rd to try out The Patisserie.  New York Cheesecake and the Le Royal  Almond Profiterole *** [[Of a simple dinner]] My family and I headed to eat at Kam Boat at Shaw Lido. We are really used to the food there and we get warm and friendly service so it's a good place for a simple meal. We ordered the drunken live prawns( really like it coz the prawns were fresh and I like the taste of the hua xing jiu and hong zhao, red dates), the 3 mushrooms and toufu in a claypot (so-so), sweet and sour pork(for my sis), "gu lei choi", and "la mei fan", and ended off with bird nest in almond cream (Hearts). Hmm, I should really pick up chinese cooking someday.  "La mei fan" 
Saturday, January 06, 2007 [[More biscotti]] My current obsession! I have baked this 3 times already in a week! Finally bought almonds so these contains almonds. I prefer it to the chocolate ones. Shall try baking cinnamon rolls next time. My sis loves them. Especially the ones with chocolate chip.   My box of Biscotti
Tuesday, January 02, 2007 [[Biscotti- second time round]] My first attempt at biscotti was a dismal failure. That has kept me away from baking it for a long time(about a year). This time, I was more inspired from the new cookbook I got for xmas- Nigella Lawson's Feast: food that celebrates life(which is a fantabulous book). I decided to give myself a second shot. (after all, we all do need second chances in life dont we?) I'm glad that I dared to venture into making biscottis once again. Because this is much much better than the first. I just baked them in the evening at 6pm. And now, there are gone. Apart from being too choclatey, there are of the right texture and flavour. Gotta improve them in terms of looks wise and definitely cut down on the chocolate bits. You see, I didnt have almonds at home so I added extra chocolate- resulting in the too chocolatey flavours. Anyhow, I'll definitely bake more biscotti next time(soon i hope)! I totally relish the afternoon tea break of italian biscuit and coffee/tea.  Breakfast Biscotti From Nigella Lawson's Feast: Food that celebrates life Makes 20 1 egg 100g caster sugar 1/2 tsp vanilla extract few drops of almond essence 125g plain flour 1/2 tsp baking powder 1/4 tsp salt 50g natural shelled almonds 75g dark chocolate chips 1.Preheat the oven to 180 deg c. 2. Whisk the egg and sugar until pale and moussily thick(use an electric whisk!!You need the mixture whipped enough so that it will leave a trail of ribbons) 3. Beat in the vanilla extract and almond essence and then slowly fold in the flour, baking powder and salt. 4. When the batter's all combined, fold in the whole almonds and chocolate pieces and then form the dough into a loaf like log. 5. Lay the biscotti log on to a piece of baking sheet and bake for 25 minutes; it will be a pale brown colour. Leave for 5 minutes to harden slightly and then cut diagonal slants of about 1 cm thickness along the length of the loaf to give finger-like pieces. 6. Put these back on to the parchment-covered baking sheet and cook again for another 10 minutes, turn the biscotti over and then cook for another 5 minutes. 7. Let the golden brown biscotti cool on a rack and then store them in an airtight container ready to be plucked and dunked at a moment's anticipatory notice.
 Mushroom soup:: looks like sesame paste huh
 Aglio olio pasta
 Wagyu steak(we bought the beef from Isetan supermarket) with cranberry wine sauce and the much-loved red pearl onions
[[New Year's Eve dinner]] Menu Mushroom Soup Glazed red pearl onions aglio olio pasta wagyu steak with cranberry wine sauce Molten chocolate lava cake *** It's great to be cooking a whole meal for a festive celebration. The food that J and I cooked turned out quite alright. The glazed red pearl onions were a great hit! It turned out much better than I thought it would be. During the boiling of the stock and apple juice, the onions already gave off a sweet aromatic smell. Plus, it's so easy to make them- only fact is that it is rather time consuming. The mushroom soup recipe was from Nigella Lawsons. Mushroom soups are always maligned (I think). I dont really like them-at least the campbell soup type and those served at cafes. Those are really full of cream and flour rather than mushrooms. The recipe that we used had 750g of mushrooms- portebellos and shitakes and swiss browns. So you can imagine a full mushroom bodied soup. The process of making the soup is really tedious though and really time-consuming! We spent a great deal of time doing that. The wagyu steak was cooked by my dad. He loves cooking too. That's where I picked up my love for experimenting with food. It was not bad. Just that it was a little too cold coz we were waiting for the pasta to be ready. And putting them in the oven didnt help much. The last dish was the dessert. My dad didnt really like the ones we made on his birthday. He found them too "pudding-like" (for the cake part). This time, we got another recipe courtesy of P from the restaurant. It turned out really great. Though the first one couldnt really stand and it was a melted mess. The rest were lovely. My sis proclaimed it to be "the best chocolate dessert she has had in a long time". We bought orange sorbet ice cream from essentio at Greenwood ave to make the two a perfect much- the citrus flavours from the ice cream and the rich dark chocolate flavour from the lava cake. The chopped pistachios gave the dessert an extra punch. (I just love the greeness of the pistachio nuts!haha)I think the key to the lava cake is still the timing- overbaking it will reduce it to a mere chocolate cake, while underbaking it will give you a melted chocolate mess. We had a delightful dinner together with champagne to welcome in the new year. =) Hope to have more of such dinners in the future! Glazed red pearl onions [Gourmet magazine Dec 2006] Serves 8 2 1/2 lb fresh red pearl onions 3/4 cup apple juice 3/4 cup chicken stock 2 tbsp unsalted butter 4 sprigs thyme 1/2 tsp salt 1/4 tsp black pepper 1. Blanch pearl onions in a 6-8 quart pot of boiling water for abt 1 minutes, then drain in a colander. 2. When the onions are cool enough to handle, peel. 3. Cook onions with the remaining ingredients, covered in a 12 inch skillet over moderately low heat, shaking pan occasionally until onions are tender and glazed and most of the liquid is evaporated, about 45mins-1hr. *** Mushroom soup Serves 4-6 250 g swiss brown mushrooms, roughly chopped 500g portebello mushrooms, roughly chopped 150g shitake mushrooms, roughly chopped 500g floury potatoes, peeled, cut into rough chunks 2 cups of white wine 1 bay leaf 1 tbsp olive oil 1 small onion, finely chopped 1 large garlic clove 50g unsalted butter 1/2 tsp dried thyme 2 cups of milk 1. Boil the potatoes in water, peel skin and chop them into rough chunks 2. Put the potatoes in a saucepan with 1 3/4 cups of white wine, the bay leaf and 2 tsp, bring to boil. 3. Reduce heat and cover and let simmer for 30 minutes. 4. Meanwhile, get out a saucepan big enough to hold all the soup when made and heat the oil over low heat. 5. Cook the onion until slightly softened. and add in teh crushed garlic. 6. Add all the mushrooms, butter and thyme. They will absorb all the butter. Stir regularly and after abt 10minutes, they will give off liquid and appear less dry 7. When the mushrooms have cooked down a little, the potatoes should be tender, so tip them in the potato mixture. Add a cup of water into a mushrooms. bring the water to boil, then return heat to low. Simmer for 20minutes. 10. Cool slightly then puree it in a blender and return to stove and heat with milk and remaining 1/4 wine. *** Molten Lava Chocolate Cake Serves 6-8 300g good quality chocolate 160g unsalted butter 4 egg yolks 4 eggs 100g sugar 35g all purpose flour 20g cocoa powder 1. Melt the chocolate and butter together under low heat, stirring it till you get a smooth consistency. 2. Measure and sieve the dry items. Beat the eggs into the dry mixture. 3. When the chocolate mixture is slightly cooled, pour it over egg and flour mixture and blend till smooth. 4. Grease mini tins and pour the chocolate mixture into them. Push in a dark chocolate piece for that extra chocolatey flavour when it melts. ***
Monday, January 01, 2007 [[Dim Sum lunch at Hua Ting, Orchard Hotel]] 
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