Bangkok Trip Jul 2009

It's the year end and everyone is going for overseas trip..... how I envy my work buddy who will be going for 2 weeks in Dec and I have to be around to cover his duties. Since I won't be going for any more trips this year, dd and I went for a short trip to Malacca a couple of works ago. We simply just eat and went for massage (our favourite indulgence :P ) and walk (to burn away the calories!).

Before I upload the photos, I thought I'd blog a little about our Bangkok trip few months back. :D There's no way I'd be able to post most of the photos so I'd just post mainly photos of the food we had. :)

This is our very first meal - Macdonald breakfast at the Budget Terminal.

Up up we soar....

We couldn't check into the hotel then, so we head straight for our first meal at Bangkok. Sharks fin soup at Platinum Fashion Mall food court. Sharks fin soup is very common in bangkok and you can almost find it in every restaurant and eating outlets.

I can't remember what was this, I think it was wanton soup noodle. Their soup base is quite different from ours, less saltish and more sourish, and I like that.

Baiyoke Boutique Hotel. Just a simple budget hotel, so can't expect too much.

Heading for spa!

Healthland Spa. It's highly recommended. Thumbs up!

Tonkatsu curry rice...

Mixed grill...

Tempura curry rice (sorry for the half-eaten shot, was too hungry that I just digged into my food!)

The curry rice especially the thick-cut tempura and pork cutlet were really superb! Probably we were too hungry. :P

Next day: Walking along Chinatown. I couldn't resist taking pictures of bakeries. :)

Steamed corn cob

This is like our local "chwee kueh" (the chai pok or radish)

The Rice kueh

We reach our destination!

Sharks fin soup...

Fried rice... with salted fish. It's so good that I had almost a big plateful even though I've not had a decent plate of fried rice for ages.

Steam crab...

Baked Scallop with pork and fried onions...

Bird nest soup....

Do I look like I'm doing commercial ? :PPistachio and chocolate ice-cream at MBK

Our dinner, mango sticky rice. We were so full that we could not take in any food.. :P

Next day: buffet breakfast at Baiyoke Sky Hotel 76th storey. The food were nothing fascinating but the view was breathtaking.

We travelled on foot the whole day, taking their local buses, MTR (similar to our MRT) and sky strains before we reach their night bazaar.

Tom yam soup

Bee hoon soup. Their soup base is full of lime and lemongrass flavour, full of flavour even though it may not look appetizing.

I'm an expert in making sure no coconut flesh is spared! lol..

Open area with stage performances...

Guava and lychee juice, fresh with juicy squeezed pulps.

Aren't these cupcakes beautiful? :) We bought two to try out. I find their cream smooth and creamy and doesn't feel greasy in the mouth.

Grilled bananas.

Steam buns but we didn't had those.

dd's favourite! How can we miss them? :P

sweet corn keuhs
continue our journey..............

Another spa destination.

The spa here was well, ok, basically we felt nothing more then they rubbing lots of massage oil on our bodies! :P

dd thought these from the street when he thought they were fishball. They were actually some kind of sweet tapioca kueh and they were really nice!! I always love starchy food like sweet potatoes or yam and I really love this. Anyone know what is this and how to make it??

Of course there are much more but I'd just stop here :) Alright, we are ready to catch the flight! We'll be back soon!

Yoghurt 波籮土司

This Yoghurt 波籮土司 is simply a white loaf bread made from yoghurt with a buttery pastry crust on top. When fresh out from the oven, the golden crust smelled wonderful and the finished product looked beautiful, not too far off from the photo in 孟老師的100道麵包's bread recipe book. :D

But when I tried slicing the loaf, the crust break off into pieces. Well, seems like 波籮crust is more suitable for individual buns instead of bread loafs. Or is it due to my slicing skills? Anyway, I can still eat the bread with the pieces of crust. Don't have to discard the crust. :)

I'm kinda lazy to post the recipe since you can also find it here. I'm recommending it because this a good soft bread recipe especially if you happen to have only yoghurt at home. You can use the 波籮crust recipe if you are making individual 波羅包.

Min Jian Kueh (2)

This is my favourite kueh and I'd never get tired of eating this. In fact I'm always on the lookout for different versions from different stalls. Dear2's neighbourhood has two stalls selling this so I often get to eat it. :D Though I'm quite particular about eating a nice Min Jian Kueh, so far I'm quite satisfied with many except for one thing - it must be freshly made, on the spot! Or at least within the first hour or so. Otherwise the peanuts will turn soggy. I think I love Min Jian Kueh cos' I love peanuts. I can't understand why I love peanuts so much! lol...

I've made Min Jian Kueh previously using another recipe and the steps were rather tedious. I decided to give this recipe a try from Fiona's blog and surprisingly this so easy recipe turned out to be no less inferior! In fact I prefer this probably because I made it thinner this time. After leaving the batter for 2 hours to rise, I could see the honeycomb-like texture as the batter was cooking.

I made a peanut paste by processing ground peanuts with sugar. I would try using ground peanuts with sugar next time. Yes I'm definitely gonna make it again! :)

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies

I made these cookies for my ex-colleague who has resigned some time back as a farewell gift for her. This is a crunchy cookie (not soft, chewy type) and I must say is a good recipe cos' it stays crunchy for over a week as long as you keep it well in an air-tight container. The recipe is from 孟老师的一百道Home-made Cookie.

Please pardon me for the blur picture. I took it in the evening time when the light shining through my living room was really dim. This was the best I can have, with the enhancement of some contrast. :P

Ingredients:

80g unsalted butter

90g brown sugar

50g eggs

150g plain flour

15g cocoa powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

110g chocolate chips

Method:

1. Cream butter (room temperature) and sugar until well mixed.
2. Add eggs a little at a time to the creamed mixture.
3. Sift flour, cocoa powder and baking soda. Add the flour mixture to the creamed mixture and using a spatula, mix well until a dough is formed.
4. Add chocolate chips.
5. Gather dough in a cling wrap and chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes.
6. Weigh about 20g of the dough, roll into a ball and press down lightly onto the baking tray. The diameter would be about 5cm.
7. Bake in a preheated oven at 170°C for about 25 minutes.
8. After the cookies are baked, let it cool in the oven for about 10 minutes before bringing out to cool.

Note: This yields quite a large cookie. If you prefer smaller cookies, divide each cookie dough into smaller portions; baking time has to adjusted depending on the size of your cookie.

Recipe Source: 孟老师的一百道Home-made Cookie

Baking for Charity

Last year, my colleague, Huiqin and I participated in our company's Charity Breakfast and this year there we go ahead again! This year, our department changed it to a lunch event. Well, be it breakfast or lunch, our only specialty was bake goods! lol.... Afterall, its a charity event and most importantly its to raise money for charity. We were also expecting our collegues to give us our support. The good thing was we also got to claim time-off because it was a lunch event and we needed time to prepare in the morning. :P

This year, we made cookies, swissrolls, egg tarts and cupcakes. I was too exhausted that I have forgotten to take pictures of the cupcakes I made. The above were double chocolate cookies.

Huiqin baked some egg tarts unfortunately it wasn't a success as she had forgotten she should not poke holes for making egg tarts because fillings had to be poured into the tart shells and by doing so, the tarts got badly burnt. She improvised by making some chocolate tarts instead.

We had lots of fun making and rolling swissrolls at my house. We also took videos how to roll swissrolls but some speech had to be "sensored" so I can't post it here :P

We managed to sell all our goodies! Woo hoo! (In the photo: Me, May Ling, Huiqin).

Birthday Cake - Tiramisu

I was trying hard to decide what should I blog about first cos' I've been lagging alot and there are simply too many too-blog list! For some, I'll just post the pictures in Flickr if they are repeated items unless it's something worth sharing. I've also attended a few hands-on baking workshop and am trying to sort out the photos before sharing. Heh so don't be surprise if what I'm blogging about can be dated way a few months back!

It was only when I started blogging about this Tiramsu cake I made for my girl friend, Shunmei's birthday last month in September that I realised myblog was already two years old and I've forgotten about that! Yes, my first blog post was in Sep 2007, 21. Dear2 and my new house would be ready in two years time *smile* and I'm always thinking that's still a long way to go but looking at this, time can really flies without you realising.
Back to this cake, yes it is another birthday post again! So definitely this have to come first. Shunmei have always wanted a tiramisu cake and I've promised I'd make one for her this year. The last time I made was years back and I remembered I stubbornly wanted to make the most "original" tiramisu as much as possible, and I bought an expresso coffee powder and only used it for one time; and spent several hours trying to make a zabaglione.

This time, I decided to heed Happy Homebaker's advice and gave her version of tiramisu recipe a try. Without the hassle of making a zabaglione (so called originalversion), the tiramisu tasted just as good and seriously I can't tell the difference with this recipe where there was no eggs involved; it seemed just as creamy to me. I guess most importantly you have to use mascarpone cheese, and alcohol if you have it. I managed to get a small bottle of rum from Phoon Huat and used up all. Assembling the layers is also important. I made the mistake of brushing the sponge fingers with too much coffee syrup that it was too soggy especially at the bottom layer which was pressed down by the weight of the upper layers of cheese and sponge fngers. I really like thisrecipe and would go to this again should I wnt to make a tiramisu. :)

I "borrowed" Happy Homebaker's idea and decorate the cake with a simple design of two sakuras. :)
Birthday gal......Her favourite ForeverFriends Bear....

As usual I always have leftover filling and made an extra cup with the chocolate flourless cake as the layers instead of sponge fingers. Yummy!

For now, dear2 and I are actively trying to slim down and we go jogging at least twice a week. I am trying to bake (and eat) less sinful food. :(

Ganbatte for us! :D

Flourless Chocolate Cake

This flourless chocolate cake made not too long ago but I had almost forgotten about it. This is quite unlike me because usually for successful bakes, I would KIV it for photo enhancement and might blog about it later. Hmmm... probably I did not have much memory of this cake because I had happily given it away to my colleagues the next day after baking and left only two or three slices at home. I need to have self-control because my parents are not fans of chocolates. Can you imagine my mum shunning away when seeing thick grooey chocolate?! Whenever I was baking chocolate stuffs, she would go eeee so chocolatety! LOL! I believe her reaction is something all chocolate lovers can never comprehend. :P

I almost forgotten where I took this recipe until I browsed through some of the usual blogs I visit and there you are, Happy Homebaker's chocolate gateau. Unlike some flourless chocolate cake which uses almost just pure chocolate without any flour / very little flour, this recipe is purely flourless but with ground almond/almond meal. It gives a slight fudgy texture, similar to a brownie, yet it won't stick in your mouth. That was how my friend described and I really appreciated that! Not many people actually taste and feel the texture of food. :)

It's a very chocolatety cake but you won't feel the greasiness. Do do try this, especially if you are thinking of finishing up the almond meal before it gets expired. ;)


This is of course for him. :P