Mince Meat with Szechuan Veg

Mince meat with Szechuan Vegetable Pickle :)

Black Bean & Pepper Chicken

One of the dishes for today's dinner.

Kim Chi Making 1st Attempt

A very easy recipe learnt from a korean chef from The Palace Restaurant located at the Chevron House.

Breads with Filling

I hv the sudden urge to bake bread in the wee morning at 5am!!! Just to clear my doubt whether my rice cooker can be used to bake bread or not! As it is still so early & i dun wish to wake up my neighbors with the noise of the mixer machine... so i start preparing the filings for the breads. I started with cooking the curry chicken fillings. then i tots perhaps i can hv different fillings to make it more interesting. i remember i still hv another pack of French Galic Sausages in the freezer. So i make cut it into slices & also diced it. When its almost 6.30am i started mixing the dough. I left on the dining table cover with cling wrap, waiting for it to proof.

Next i move on to clean up the kitchen area & then i saw the butter! OH SH#*!!! i forgot to add in the butter & salt! Panicked! i quickly remix the dough and added in the butter... keeping my fingers cross that it will turn out edible...:"X. As i was mixing the dough i looked at the recipe again and damn! how can i misread the amount of butter. it is suppose to be 50g and i added in 80g! why am i so blur ?! will it spoil the entire bread? i hope not. so this time i make sure it the dough is thoroughly well mixed with the butter & salt. Hoped that the dough wont be too sticky & oily.

Fortunately, the bread proof pretty well. I hv 4 different fillings for the bread: Curry Chicken, French Garlic Sausages (Sliced & Diced), Black Raisins & Pork Floss.

The bread turned out "OK ONLY". It is NOT as light & fluffy as it is suppose to be... it is a little compact. Nevertheless, my family, especially my sis, who is very supportive of my bake products, loves eating it. As for myself I am someone who like to bake but not so much into eating them. but still, each time i will definitely eat some, just to know what went wrong and how will it affect the end product.

Easter Day...Baking Gingerbread Man instead of Bunny with my God-Daughter Teajanz

Its Easter Day baking

Hazelnut Fruit Cake

Tweaked original recipe:

• to reduce 200g of brown sugar to 170g
• to reduce 100g ground almond to 75g
• to replace 2 tbsp of treacle to 2 tbsp of hazelnut ganache

Result: sweetness is just right but cant really sense the aroma of hazelnut. perhaps next bake will not include any cinnamon & nutmeg powder so the spices' fragrance will not over power the hazelnut's fragrance.

Eileen ate it and commented that the moisture of the cake is just nice, even tho she is not a fruit cake lover.

Carrot Cake - 1st time making a carrot cake

This carrot cake is not those typical chinese carrot. I told my mum its an ang mo style carrot cake :P

My best fren Eileen was at my place playing with her netbook and transfering pics from her phone to it. I was playing bejeweled on facebook, then i browse the net for a while and found this carrot cake at AllRecipes.com . Read many 5 stars reviews. so i decided to make it. Some time I bake as & when i feel like it. i decide to bake the carrot cake. i think I kinda surprised her with this spontaneous baking at almost 12 midnight.

Reduced 2 cup of white sugar to 1.5 cup of brown sugar -> Result: not sweet enough
The recipe calls for 2 tsp of baking soda & 2 tsp of baking powder which i tink it is way too much for the cake. It resulted in a cake with a strong baking soda/baking powder taste which spoilt the entire cake and made it taste like a chinese Huat Kueh 发糕 instead. The recipe also used 1.25 cup of veg oil which i would replace it with melted butter if i were to make it again. The cake lacks the buttery fragrance which a cake should have. The only good side of the cake that it is moist enough.

Perhaps some days when i have nothing else to bake i will then try making it again.