Boat Race 09

The Oxford & Cambridge Boat Race

If you haven’t know, this is one of an important annual event between Oxford & Cambridge at River Thames since 1829.

while waiting for the battle to begin @ 1540hrs, I got myself a BBQ beef burger to generate some fats to beat the cold…

 I’m at no sides. Congrats to Oxford though at the same time I feel for Cambridge when their heads were down with disappointments (cos I’ve train hard and lost races too). It’ll be a good motivation to work even harder in preparation to challenge Oxford next year for a rematch!

Drooling,

Juanie

MOF @ My Izakaya

For the first time Kel is craving for ice cream before I do! I think any ice cream would have done the job for him yesterday and we passed by Ministry of Food at Suntec City, he was keen on the Japanese soft serve ice cream and I was ogling over the mince with rice~

Seriously, the mince with rice is not bad. I could just have that with teriyaki salmon anytime – which was what I did. My previous favourite place to go for mince with rice was at Marina Square but they have since down-slided.

The sushi was value for money, I would say. And of course, the red bean rice ball ice cream dessert hits the right spot.


Warm love,
Starningblue

Choc Green Tea Marble Cupcake

I love baking marble cake. I love the marbling effect. I literally stop myself from marbling too much.

Missing the butter and chocolate marble loaf I made eons ago, this time I make cupcakes out of chocolate and green tea marble. A recipe I collected from a blog I have lost touch with.

Look at the mini cupcakes I made from the leftover batter not enough to make a normal cupcake. So cute!

However, the taste of this is not as expected. First time I make marble cake with yogurt, turns out it smells sourish and the texture of the cake is overly sticky and dense. Not fluffy and soft.

I really want to learn trouble shooting with baking. Not just to dump the bad ones and forget about it. That's why I signed up for baking class (don't even know if it is still going to happen) and that's why I want this book!

Regardless of my emotional ups and downs in the kitchen, one constant supporter I have always is Chester. Ever eager to do a taste-test, ever loving and protective of me walking in and out of the kitchen just to make sure everything is okay.


Warm love,
Starningblue

Choc Fudge Cupcakes

When work doesn’t tire me out too much and the baking itch gets to me, I trawl my recipes. For this Choc Fudge Cupcakes, I didn’t really need to do a quick dash for grocery, I had all that was require. Great~

The recipe called for frosting but I wanted to use up the box of After Eight Mints sitting in the fridge. When topped onto the cupcakes fresh from the oven, it just melted decadently.

To be honest, I love cakey brownies instead of the fudgy chunky version. In comparison, this recipe made the fudgy chunky cupcakes… *which my sis readily helps herself to more*

How do you identify from the recipe whether it is fluffy and cakey or moist and fudgy? I really need that baking class that I signed up for (it got postponed due to lack of participants! Yikes.)


Ingredients

3/4 cup unsalted butter
170g semisweet chocolate, chopped
3/4 cup sugar
4 eggs, separated
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 tspn baking powder
1/2 tspn cream of tartar

How to

Heat oven to 170C. Grease line muffin pan with baking cups. Place butter and chocolate in metal bowl; place over medium saucepan of simmering water. Let stand until melted; stir until smooth and cool to room temperature. Whisk in sugar and egg yolks. Stir in flour and baking powder.

In another bowl, beat egg whites and cream of tartar at medium-high speed till egg whites peak. Fold a quarter of the whites into chocolate mixture. Gently fold in remaining whites until well mixed.

Fill muffin cups two-thirds full and bake for 25mins. When baked, cool on wire rack for 10 min. Remove from pan and cool completely.

Hmm, miss the brownies I made for Christmas~

Warm love,
Starningblue

Ice Cream Parlor

Since its ice-cream week, I thought I’ll contribute something too.

Morelli’s Gelato since 1907

Some says its the Rolls Royce of ice creams.

Freshly made daily in the Italian traditional artisan method

Heavenly!

Drooling,

Juanie

What's your flavour?

This is ice cream week, not only for myself but also for 8 Days. (weekly local magazine) 20 pages dedicated to worthy licks with full images to tempt and Ice Cream Awards 2009 to boot. As for myself, a tub of Baskin Robbin’s Pistachio Almond was small treat from JB last weekend. *indulgence*

Flipping through those pages was totally uncomfortable; makes me want to reach for my Baskin in the fridge! With the features of various ice cream joints in Singapore, I realized I have tasted most of them and until this week, I had no idea I love ice cream that much! *grin*

Just imagine staring down at write-ups on Island Creamery, The Daily Scoops, Haato and my all-time love Haagen Dazs, just to name a few to start you on some popular ice-creameries over here.

From 8 days, do you know your frozen desserts?

Ice Cream Contains milk, cream eggs (some not), must have at least 10% fat
Gelato From Italian word to freeze ‘Gelare’. Less cream but more milk than ice cream, usually less than 7% fat. The smoother, denser consistency comes from 50% less air than ice cream!
Sorbet No fat! Just water, with sugar and flavourings, usually fruits.
Sherbet Like sorbet, with milk.

How enlightening is this? I never favoured sorbet or sherbet, too zingy for my liking and now I know why I like Haagen Dazs to bits – soo creamy because of the low air content in their ice cream! *and they pride themselves for that!* Totally good stuff~


Worth a mention and a try, The Ice Cream Gallery is voted for Best Boozy Kick. Be rest assured I will be there soon enough to taste the raved rum and raisin.

So, what’s your flavour?


Warm love,
Starningblue

Rainbow Cupcakes

I was just sipping my coffee mourning another week’s work ahead when my lovely colleague opened that white box to offer me these rainbow coloured mini cupcakes; I’m all smiles and really, she made my day.

These yummy cupcakes are as bite-sized as a small chocolate truffle. Love how the steamed cake melts in my mouth then presents the brown sugared coconut beneath.

After I tasted this a few years ago, I realized I have rarely seen this sold anywhere! Only once have I bumped into a street stall selling traditional Malay cakes and treats where they stocked many flavours of the rainbow cupcakes. *my colleague ordered from a home baking contact*

Apparently, this is made on special occasions (weddings, new year…) in Malay culture. The internet does not provide much details on this so no recipe, no references!

Although I did find one recipe kind of similar to this, I would have to try it out to know if that is THE ONE.

Stay tuned :)


Warm love,
Starningblue