Moments in my Life

Irritated in Bangkok and back home!

2012-01-17T21:13:00.001-05:00

Only way out of Rayleigh was to take a longboat to Krabi and a taxi to the Krabi airport. Something I noticed in our travels - the people bent over backwards to get us to tour offices, cooking classes, events. They sent taxi's, helped us load luggage, negotiated prices on our behalf. BUT once at the end of the event, we were on our own to get back. The harshest was getting in and out of Rayleigh - we had to walk quite a distance, sometimes through the water with our bags to the longboats. This may sound like the complaints of a pampered tourist but Michelle and I spent quite a bit support the Vietnam economy and our bags (yes pleural!) were HEAVY!!

But we managed our bags and flew to Bangkok. Bangkok was our last port of call prior to heading home. At this point I was some what ready to head home...ready to catch up with friends, do some proper laundry, get back into the kitchen and actually kinda excited to get back to work (don't judge me, my work is cool! Cool-ish)

Our first night we headed to Khaosan road, about a good 40 mins from our hotel. This would become a regular hike for us! Coles notes of history tells me that Khaosan road translated to "milled rice" was a major street for the rice market in olden days. But now it's famous for being a Backbackers ghetto, everything from cheap hotels to crafts to clothes to tailors (oh tailors! Michelle and I may have once again succumbed to clothes shopping!) to pirated...well everything. You can get fake IDs (of any sorts) and even handicap parking signs. I will admit I was tempted for a whole half second (imagine all the parking spots that become available?!) but I figure karma would swiftly kick me in the butt. Well if not karma, definitely my father, he has this whole honesty thing going...it may have rubbed off on me...

On our first full day in Bangkok, we decided to hit up the sites, which basically translates to pagodas. We were told Bangkok has 450 pagodas within the city. As we were checking out a street map, a tuk tuk driver (3 wheeler taxi) offered to take us to see all the major sites for just 30 baht (approx 1 CDN dollar). Of course we should have been suspicious but we agreed. He took us to see 2 or 3 pagodas, including the standing Buddha...

to lucky Buddha

Every place was very elaborate and dripping in gold...

Check out the details on the doorway...

Then things became a bit dicey. The driver started taking us to export centres and tailors. Even though we said we won't buy anything he wanted us to just go in and look around. It became quite obvious that we were not the free spending tourists he expected. The breaking point came when we refused a 1 hour boat ride that would cost us close to 30 CND. He raced back to where he picked us and basically told us to get the heck out of his taxi!! We later learned that the drivers earn 200 baht if we go into the shops and browse and commission of up to 50% of whatever we buy!

Rest of the day became frustration in convincing taxi drivers to take us to our destinations without shopping side trips. "50% discount in fair for one stop, just one stop!"

One of our taxi's took us to a restaurant for lunch. It was obviously one of these commission places as the prices were about 50% higher than other places (still cheap!) and during the meal at least 5-6 taxis pulled up with foreigners. The food was good though. Michelle tried red curry. I am still not sure how she ate this as I found it quite spicy!

I stuck to my usual green curry...oh green curry how I love thee!

Next day we went shopping! Chatuchak market in Bangkok is one of the largest markets in the world open only on the weekends. We were lucky to leave Bangkok saturday night as it meant we could shop to our hearts content during the day. It's a 35-acre space home to more than 8,000 market stalls. We shopped for a good 4-5 hours and I am sure we only covered 10% of the stalls. This place had pretty much everything from clothes to antiques, apparently to animals (we didn't walk around to see this). Basically if you can dream it up, Chatuchak probably has it. If not (and this is highly unlikely!) Khaosan road probably has it! We were too busy shopping to take pics, so I nicked this overhead shot from the net...

Despite the transportation frustrations, Bangkok was wonderful! Full of energy, crowds and so much to see. In just the two days I am sure we only saw a teeny tiny slice. At some point I would love to go back to explore more.

End off all this we hopped on one of many aircraft for the 26 hour travel to get back to cold wintry Ottawa. Luckily all the flights were of pretty much on time. There is nothing worse than anticipating a long trip and seeing the delayed sign flashing up!!

All in all it was a fantastic trip, full of experiences. I was very lucky to travel with one of my best friends! I am happy to report that the trip was pretty drama free and yes we are still talking! Well more like emailing like crazy, but that's us back home. Probably helped that we are both pretty laid back, took things as it came (i.e the COLD in Beijing!) and had very large margins of what freaked us out! At some point will have to throw a dart at a world map and see where to explore next!

Rayleigh - Paradise with a view...

2012-01-16T15:53:00.000-05:00

Ever since we got to Thailand we were told we have to visit Rayleigh before we head home. So from Koh Lanta we hopped there for 2 nights. Rayleigh totally lived up to all the hype! It was what I expected Koh Phi Phi to be.

The beaches were magnificent! The sand was as smooth as flour. The ocean was gorgeous shades of blue and more fantastically no oil! The beach filled to the brim with people but still fully enjoyable. One of my favourite parts (that I hope Michelle has pics of) was the long boats that operated as restaurants. They cooked everything from pad thai, to fried rice to simple cut fruit. My fav was grilled chicken that you eat of the boat.

Best part of the island was this monkey forest you walked through to get to the beach. There were tons of baby monkeys running around...super cute! Seriously look at these faces and tell me evolution isn't a sound theory!!!

We ate seriously well there (not that we were deprived any where along the way!) Our second night I went a bit coconut crazy...drank coconut and had fried riced stuffed in a coconut! Yum!

Our plan to stay way from fried food got waylaid when we saw coconut shrimp!

Elephant Trekking!

2012-01-09T20:15:00.000-05:00

One thing I really wanted to do in Thailand was to ride an elephant. Originally we intended to fly to Pai but between time and finances (mostly time!) we nixed that trip and decided to hop islands instead. But luckily Koh Lanta seem to have a number of tours. We wanted to find a place that treats the elephants well and didn't have baby elephant shows and such. Our travel agent seemed to understand this and pointed us to an outfit,

Now I may have my rose coloured glasses on but this place seemed to treat their elephants well. The trekking was through a shaded grove of trees, the guides allowed the elephants to stop to eat a bit and be playful with other elephants on the trek and for the most part let the elephant travel at his own pace. I was happy that there was no hitting the big guy...

At one point we got to take turns to slip of the seat and ride "Nookiay" (our elephant's name, at least I think!) bareback. It was really cool to feel his legs as he shifted from one leg to another.

At the end we got to thank Nookiay and feed him pineapples! Made all three of us happy!

Later Michelle read on a guide book that once Thailand banned the use of elephants for logging and such, there were a number of out of work elephants and handlers begging for food/money in the streets of Bangkok. Eventually someone got the bright idea to move the elephants to touristy areas for treks. So hopefully the elephants are treated and fed well in their new career.

Paradise in Kho Lanta...

2012-01-05T23:13:00.000-05:00

An hour ferry ride from Phi Phi got us to the door step (or should I say the pier) of paradise.

This time around we lucked out on our blind booking as this is the view from our little lodge...the view makes up (mostly) for the smell in our bathroom!

Kho Lanta is super quiet compared to Kho Phi Phi. The beaches are proper beaches (if a bit rocky) with space to lie around without a motor boat in sight. The ocean stretches fore miles, sparkling shades of blue without the thin sheen of oil. Though to be fair, the beach at Kho Phi Phi is really a bay so here more ocean to absorb all the crap. Our first night we picked a restaurant at random, ate with our feet immersed in smooth sand and sat around to watch a fire show....

There were so few people, it almost seemed like a show just for us...

On our second day here we went snorkeling, about 45 min speed boat ride from Lanta. I am proud to say I actually learnt to breathe with one of those snorkel thingies. Felt very much like Darth Vader! The fish were beautiful, I thought i saw nemo but it turned out to be the black and yellow clown fish...was that Dora? The coral still creeps me out though. Some were so huge it practically made it to the surface. I scurried away from those as fast i could....

Between snorkeling expeditions, lunch was at one of the most gorgeous beaches I've ever been to! This is saying a lot considering i am from Sri Lanka! The sand was like flour under our feet. Even in the hottest sun it some how remained cool to the feet. The colours of the water...all I can say is wow! The pic below shows teeny tiny stretch...

These days life is as follows...roll out of bed, change into the day uniform - swim suit and sarong. Walk on the beach, run for 2 minutes (exercise for the day!), put on a tank top for breakfast, lounge in the water, read, nap, have a fruit shake, lounge in the water, have lunch, lounge some more until the fingers seem pruny and force myself out of water, then stroll in search for dinner. I am debating offering my engineering services to Thailand government and finding a hut...

Food is also out of the world. First night we splurged a bit and tried snapper...it melted like butter in our mouths. Halfway through we gave up on utensils and went at it with our fingers!

We childishly giggled over our menu as you can get "no name" for a starter...

followed by a "pineapple smut" for a drink...I tried this the next day, do not recommend it...too sweet!

Coffee is rich and dark, smells delicious but way too strong for me. When you ask for milk comes in this cute little jug. I need about four more of those so have stopped asking for coffee.

But hey if the only thing I have to complain about is the coffee, i think I am doing well and hardly likely to get any sympathy eh?! :)

Next post elephant trekking...let me just say OMG!

Sun (finally!) in Kho Phi Phi...

2012-01-05T04:59:00.001-05:00

We got up ridiculously early on new years day (one of us never slept, it wasn't me, I had a hearty 3 hours of sleep!) to make our way to Phuket via Bangkok (holy Bangkok airport is huge!) We were in Phuket for just one night as we were making our way to Kho Phi Phi the next morning. I was quite concerned that it poured the whole evening and into next morning. But as Michelle says our trip karma held up and it was all blue skies on the way to Phi Phi...

Hellllloooo Phi Phi!! Picture below you see basically all of the living space. It's built up into the mountains, on top of each other and just plain crowded. I wasn't expecting this. It was cool in it's own way once you get used to it. Also it's all foot traffic and the ocassional bicycle. No cars, no motorbikes, no horns! Bliss!

We definitely did not lack sun shine or warmth!

This was our beach for two days...

Our last two nights we went a bit cheap on our accormodations and well it was a life experince. More on Michelle's blog. But meh, can't complain too much, we spend most of the day on the beach and one afternoon took long boat tour around the islands...the scenery was just magnificent!

Check out the colour of the water. It was so clear you could easily see to the bottom of the ocean floor...

At one point we jumped out for some snorkeling, but really you could see the fishies from the boat (pic from the boat as my camera isn't water proof)

We hung around for a gorgeous sunset and then back to land for food...

When in Thailand what else are you going to eat but curry?! The menus are full of western food though - BLTs, burgers, pasta...seriously?!! Why would you come across the world to have this? and at an inflated price?!

I may have even had curry for breakfast!!! With the essential fruit shake of course. In this case banana.

I saw seafood salad on a menu and was obsessed till I tried it. But sadly it was a bit disappointing. All the elements were there just not dressed well. Still it felt good to have some veggies that were not slathered in oil!

I love love love Kho Phi Phi for it's various bbq (or fried) meat on sticks. We tried shrimp and chicken but ran out of time for crab. I KNOW! We just didn't plan our time or stomachs properly. Hopefully there are opportunities at the next island and if all fails in Bangkok. Though Mish and I have made a pact to tried grasshopper and frogs in Bangkok. Urrmmm...could someone call my doctor and make an apt for the day I arrive please?

So Kho Phi Phi was great to see in that the scenery was fantastic. BUT I was sorely disappointed in the beaches. On one side of the island the boats come right up to the beach at any given point and it's a pretty narrow beach to start with. There was also some brown debris that I couldn't identify. On the other side of the island big ferries and power boats pulled in. There were designated swimming areas (sans the mystery debris) but up close the water had a thin layer of oil. :( I was quite disappointed at how commercial and polluted this area is becoming.

I suggest Kho Phi Phi for a day or two, just for the scenery, beach parties and general meham in the village but definitely not for lounging about the beach or swimming in the ocean.

After three days we packed up our crazy heavy bags and beat a path towards Kho Lanta...

Living it up in Saigon...

2012-01-02T08:50:00.003-05:00

Each morning in Saigon started with a mango strawberry shake from a fabulous french bakery. Outside of France, Vietnam has the best freaking bread (and pastry!)

Our first night we got caught in the rain and slipped into a restaurant that had Hotpot that we've been wanting to try for a while. Due to some questionable service we got pointers from the service across from us...yes put in all the veg now, keep the lid open etc etc. Quite delicious and amazing to think it's hot broth with veg and seafood.

New Years eve was sent at a bit of an high end restaurant...all right at this point considering we've been street fooding it up any sit down restaurant would seem high end, but the prices confirmed it!

But meh you only ring in 2012 once right? So we indulged. Menu was very western (so foreign to us, especially to our stomachs now!) We had lamb wrapped in phyllo on a bed of something green and mashed. We think beans...

I had a burger...now doesn't this seem like the ultimate burger?!

One of the many drinks was called traffic light...for obvious reasons. No no not those reasons, the colours of the drink silly!

On our last night in Vietnam, Michelle and I finally discovered Vietnamese Ice coffee aka Ca she sua da. On our last night!!! Where has this been all my life?! It's a concoction of espresso and condensed milk. Hmm...maybe it's a good thing we only had a fleeting affair with this...

Happy New Year from Saigon...

2012-01-02T08:41:00.000-05:00

Saigon (aka Ho Chi Minh City - HCMC) was crazy for all things New Years! The streets are lighted up - at least on the posh side of town, lighted dragons run the side walks (after all it is the year of the dragon soon) and concert stage to rival NYC was set up.

It seems all of Vietnam was sponsored by Heineken to celebrate the new year!

We met one of Michelle's friends in Saigon to ring in the new year. The crowds were insane! Hiked about 45 mins, all dressed up, as traffic was pretty much at a stand still.

It was worth it as the company was fantastic, as was the venue and food. All in all an awesome beginning to the new year! (Look ma I bought new clothes and actually paid for a sleeveless blouse! I may be growing up. I know it's been a while, I am the brown one...)

As Adidas demanded we released our inner dragon (well a bit...) More here.

We flew to Thailand on New Years day and celebrated the Canadian New Year with pad thai and overpriced chocolate...

Sunny (kinda) in Nha Tran...

2011-12-29T00:29:00.000-05:00

We made our way to Nha Trang via 13 hours sleeper bus ride from Hoi An. This bus ride cured me of any good feelings about sleeper buses. Though I think the problem was more the operators. In this particular trip we didn't have assigned seating. The operator was trying to push all the foreigners to the back of the bus where it is cramped and bumpy. This started a good hour yelling session between the operator and a Vietnmese local got on the bus and they magically had assigned sleepers. Go figure!

Nha Tran is a sea side town, at the moment mostly families. But there are tons of constructions...lots of big hotels. I am sure sooner than later it will be a huge resort town. We only had one night in Nha Tran...some what on purpose, the water was too cold to frolick and while it was warm it wasn't particularly sunny!

We tried clay pots for dinner at a restaurent that supports local orphanages. Prices probably were a little higher than other places but it was worth it, both for the cause and the taste! It was a bit sweeter than I expected but still really good.

From here we finally smartened up and took the train to Saigon! I can't properly articulate the improvement. I actually slept some, though by now my body seems to be used to the lack of sleep but still a full day around town!

Fashionistas in Hoi An...

2011-12-28T04:20:00.003-05:00

Five hour bus ride got us to the picturesque city of Hoi An. It is a LOT less hustle and bustle compared to Hanoi or Hue and a shoppers paradise. The streets are lined with shops that will custom make shoes, clothes (everything from suits to work out clothes to jackets!), hats, and luggage. Michelle and I indulged in some clothes and shoes. One regret is that our bags are so full already and that we are still in the middle of our trip. If I make my way to side of the world again Hoi An will be my last port of call with at least one empty suitcase!

We didn't just shop, we did the culural bit in that we went to My Son ruins, but I am sure Michelle will cover that better.

It was sad to see so much destroyed during the war...you can still see the craters and there were some unexploded B52 bombs on display. They kept mentioning that the americans destroyed the temples, a holy site. But why did they bomb it? Well because it was used as a military base. Well now...

A cool part about the ruins is that to this day the construction techniques used by the Cham builders are a mystery. Yes they used brick but there is no mortar between the bricks. So how is it kept together? One hypothesis is that the builders found a way to "glue" bricks together using tree resin. Another theory is that the builders used a sticky mortar made from the same clay as the bricks themselves. Once the bricks were glued together wooden structures were erected and the whole thing set on fire. Kind of a building size kiln. Then everything was painted using sugar/honey/a resin(?) and re-fired. Following the war some areas were rebuilt using current methods. But these areas are already full of moss and falling apart while the Cham builders work is standing!

Notice the figure on the building? This is carvings of the priests of the time. No one is sure how the carvings were done either. Most of these carvings are missing heads, stolen by the french and now in some museum in france. Using pics and such of the heads in the museum, they are rebuilding the heads in some carvings (like above) but you can definitely tell the difference!

Oh we were in Hoi An for Christmas. There was a huge church that did a pretty elaborate play. Joy to the world is Vietnamese is...well...interesting! :)

Food wise..first night in Hoi An we did the usual street food...in this case Cau Lau, a Hoi An specialty. Similar to Pho in that it's noodles and broth but in this case sliced pork and herbs on top and the broth í quite different. As they say "same same but different"...

This followed by fried banana. Don't worry I have mended my ways on fried food. Apparently there is a limit and you reach that fast!

All right fine I will admit it, I caught a damn cold! Next couple of days we stuck to restaurant food just to give the body a break. Banana shake followed by eggs. Michelle tried Eggs Benedict.

Our last lunch in Hoi An we tried eel. Well Michelle tried eel I had óoast. This ứa eel in lemon grass and chili. I expxpected eel to have more like a squid texture but it ứa more like fish with a spine...

Last bit of indulgence chocolate cream cake...more chocolate cream than cake but all delicious!!!

Cooking in Hue...

2011-12-28T03:44:00.001-05:00

Our last morning in Hue we signed up for a cooking class, as it turned out perfect activity for a day pouring down rain! The class included a tour through the local market to gather ingredients. As it turned out we signed up on a saturday, market day for everyone. The place ứa packed with stalls. Reminded me of the weekend markets in Sri Lanka.

The fresh fruit and vegetable ứa gorgeous!

I don't think the pictures capture the bright fresh colours...

They also had fresh duck and chicken...

Fresh fish...and I mean fresh. In some cases the fish ứa still wriggling in the pan. ;( Thể was also a fresh meat section. The ladies shop the meat bare hand then take money and make change with the same hand. It's true that the money is germ central!

Then it ứa back to the restaurent to start cooking! Check out our hats, don't we look professonal?! Notice the 3/4 full bottle of oil in front of us? It started out full and I joked that by the end of the lesson it will be empty...urm...reality wasn't funny! Everything required dousing in oil but á the chef said "it's okay" bécause we drain it at the end. Colour me skeptical. And I miss paper towels, or paper of any kind...

Anyway we made Hue stuffed pancake with peanut sauce to be eaten chopped up in salad. I finally know the secret of peanut sauce, it must be cooked!!

Hue style fresh spring rolls with chili sauce...

Deep fried spring rolls...

And the reason for me signing up, Hue Beef Noodle soup or

mỏre corectly Bun Bo Hue...

Vietnamese dinner when I get home! Well with some tweaking...

Soggy in Hue...

2011-12-25T04:29:00.000-05:00

Fourteen hour bus ride from Hanoi got us to Hue (pronounced "Huey"). I won't go as far as to say the bus ride was great but it was manageable. The bus has a bunch of pod like long sleeper chairs and one is yours for the duration. Being a "bit" taller than the average asian, it was a bit of an awkward fit, but the ipod made sleeping possible!

Hue seemed a lot slower than Hanoi. You can actually cross the street like a normal jay walker instead of doing a traffic ballet. First afternoon we walked around to discover the city a bit and look for lunch. The minute we saw the lady below Michelle and I made a bee line for one of her mini chairs...

We just said we'd each like one and sat down for what ever she dished out. There was an omelette of some sort, mystery fried and sauced meat (we think fish) some delicious noodles and mystery veg on a bed of rice! We are becoming quite the queens of street food as this was delicious and yes you guessed it, cost us a dollar! I am never going to be able to go out for lunch back home...$10 for a salad?! What?!!

As it turned out the first day of dry weather was a complete fluke. The rest of the time in Hue it drizzled broken with periods of pouring rain! During such a down pour, we went in search of a Japanese restaurant (Michelle wanted to eat Sushi in Asia) only to find the place closed. So we found our selves at a restaurant/street food place. We pointed at some prawns, squid and veg. I quite liked the prawns, but the squid was a bit too "pure." I was stuffed with something, no idea what but definitely needed to be a bit more "sauced" to get rid of the "fishiness." I guess it was to be expected that we would hit a snag in our quest for street food adventures.

At this point my umbrella was soaked through as was Michelle's jacket and we were just trying to get back to our hotel. Along the way we found a french boulangerie and everything was magically okay when we tasted the little bit of heaven below!

We felt even better when we realized that the boulangerie helps kids from a Vietnamese orphanage train as chefs/pastry chefs and places them in high end hotels. All the food at the boulagerie was made by these chefs-in-training!

All in all I liked Hue, I liked the slower pace, I liked the market. I just wish the weather was a bit drier for us. As we left everything including our hotel room just felt damp!

Lost in Hanoi...

2011-12-21T23:01:00.003-05:00

I'd like to think I am good at following maps, but sheesh Hanoi kicked my bum! The hostel map showed fairly grid like European designed city, but the streets are nothing like that...there are crazy 4-5 street intersections and just plain old streets that are no where on a map! But about the 2nd day we learnt to recognize enough to make our way back to the hostel. We spent a day in Hanoi, did a day trip to Halong bay (gorgeous!) and one more full day visiting Hanoi cultural sights - Ho Chi Minh mausoleum, his house, palace etc. Check out Michelle's blog for details.

Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum was a bit sad for me as he wished to be cremated and vetoed a mausoleum rather wanting the money to go towards schools. But upon his death the incoming party changed his will, embalmed the man and built a mausoleum anyway. It's done up very elegantly, the body is well preserved, there are tons of guards in white but this is all against what he wanted.

Anyway to change gears to food (and people) we met Neil on the Halong bay tour. On his recommendation we searched for street food bbq. I am guessing this was a restaurant as well, all the guys were wearing yellow t-shirts with 47 on it, but all the people were sitting in mini stools on the side walk. At one point I was sitting on the street pretty much in the gutter! Kind of like Korean bbq they give you a hot grill with a heat source. Then you drizzle a generous amount of oil and throw beef and veg. (pic below) and season with a lemon and spice mixture.

It was delicious!! An experienced we would have missed had we not met Neil! So thanks Neil, for the brilliant company and for being such an adventurous foodie!

Following the meal we stopped at a bar where again you sit on the streets on mini stools. Can you spot the foreigners?! I keep saying this reminds me of the after work bars over spilling with people in London...well sans the suits and wine of course.

Next morning we decided to be like the locals, walked down the alley from our hostel for beef noodle pho.

All this for one dollar! The pho was so much better than the restaurant we ate at during our first day in Hanoi!

This is a bit of a weird story but follow me...after all the cultural sights, we followed Neil's guide book to a restaurant that only serves one dish and has been for years, maybe centuries (I said maybe!)

We asked for the menu, this is what we got....

The dish is monkfish marinated in galangal & saffron, stir-fried right at your table with a bowl of rice noodles, peanuts, sauce and some herbs.

Was it good? That's a big yes! The sauce (cooked oil really!) tasted like a better version of butter (if there is such a thing!) The fish was moist, and the vegetable perfect though I am not sure what everything was.

But here's the weird part...following the meal we got the bill and we were very slow (some might even say dumb) in trying to figure out to split the bill 3 ways. Not quite true, we figured out how much each had to pay but making the proper change was an issue. At one point we told the owner what each of us owed and asked to pay individually. She shook her head at us and a few minutes later dropped some money at our table. No idea why.

Eventually we left a pile of money BUT the owner refused our payment! She gave us back our money plus the money she gave us! I am still confused as to what happened. It was beyond a free meal....she gave us money to eat at her place, or maybe gave us money to leave the restaurant. I don't know. Either way it's weird and at random times I am still trying to figure out what happened!!!

Eating through Beijing...

2011-12-20T21:10:00.002-05:00

So I think we all knew I was going to be a bit of a slacker at this blog thing! But Michelle is great at updates found here. But now that I actually have my act together here's a slice of Beijing food culture...well at least the bit we experienced. We were pretty tame I think. Stayed away from the donkey, dog (apparently a bit chewier than beef) and cat!

Our first night we went in search of Peking duck...I mean when in Beijing what else are we going to start with! We found a restaurant near our hostel, not the fast foodish contemporary restaurant recommended by Lonely planet. The restaurant was packed with local people, we were the only foreigners, not that it made any waves. So I think we got a pretty authentic experience.

Below is "chicken" with sprouts and peppers wrapped in pancake.

This followed by Peking duck again wrapped in pancake. In an attempt to be some what healthy we ordered bok choy in garlic that came drenched in oil. Don't get me wrong it was delicious but healthy well that's another story!

Overall our first meal was fantastic! The duck was crispy on the outside, moist on the inside. The whole thing felt pretty rich, so definitely a once in a while celebration meal.

Next day we were lured in with free tea into a tea store where the lady performed a mini ceremony. It seemed like she washed the leaves with the first batch of hot water and then offered us the second, third, fourth version until we finally turned our cup upside down!

Second night we went to a little whole in the wall place. I judged the tastes and authenticity by the crowds in the restaurant and this place was pretty full! Top going clockwise is chicken with veg and peanuts, sweet peas in garlic (and oil!!!) and fried chili crispy shrimp. The shrimp came with the heads on which I just munched through. Somehow the fried chili peppers didn't seem as hot as their fried version. Again delicious!

For our last lunch we went back to the first Roast duck restaurant. This is mashed potatoes with blueberry sauce (i.e blueberry pie filling!) I know what you are thinking but seriously you must try this! It is delicious! I am pretty sure the potatoes were powdered, so I can only imagine how good real potatoes will be. Family and friends back in Ottawa, you won't have to wonder, I will be recreating this for you once I am home.

Lucy, we tried the preserved eggs just for you. OMG so good. I will have to wiki at some point to figure out how the egg white turns into this translucent gel like thing, but all I can say is sooo good!

Last not least we tried scallops with veg. As usual it was good but the scallops were not really what we are used to. To begin with it was pretty small and surrounded by a tail?! Meh whatever, it was good.

All in all no complaints about Beijing on the food front. We just wish we had more time to sample through more of the exotic like black chicken with turtle in a nutritious broth.

Next food in Hanoi...for that let me just say at one point I was sitting in a mini kid stool, on the street, near the gutter and having the best bbq!

Airplane Food...

2011-12-20T20:41:00.000-05:00

I know people moan about airplane food, but I don't understand it! I love airplane food, maybe not so much the cold sandwich and chips from Air Canada for $15 but the international food is awesome! This was our dinner from JAL from Chicago to Narita...Chicken and Noodles, with cold noodles wih sauce, ceasar salad (aka crouton salad!), plum wine (YUM!) and haggandas ice cream. JAL was huge on ice cream!

Following meal service they set up snack stations in the back of the plane...all you can eat rice crackers of various forms, cookies and even a chocolate!

Eastern airlines seem to serve food no matter how short the flight.

Spiced Pumpkin Cakes with Ginger Walnut Streusel and Rum Caramel Glaze...

2011-12-06T11:09:00.001-05:00

Now that I am home (and have been for 2+ years already eek!) I am some what the designated baker for the brothers work events/charities. I am not complaining (yet) since this gives me a chance to try stuff and not have it lying around the house. One of my brothers bake sales I am made these Spiced Pumpkin Cakes with Ginger Walnut Streusel. Except I screwed up the streusel a bit not that it affected the taste!

The recipe is from this fantastic food blog, Apricosa. IF nothing else check out the brilliant pictures for this cake, thousand times better than my dark version!

I used all pumpkin since I forgot to get sweet potatoes. Even though my grocery store is open 24 hours I refused to run out to get sweet potatoes at midnight!!! I used evaporated milk instead of condensed milk (didn't want them too sweet) and as usual I cut the sugar in the recipe. I also added an extra layer to these cakes since I've been all about rum lately. I made a quick rum caramel syrup to glaze over everything. All in all delicious and definitely to be repeated.

Oh in case you are curious, apparently these sold out first. The brother could be just being nice too so I keep baking...he's a lawyer, they are wiley...

Croquembouche...

2011-12-05T10:24:00.000-05:00

A mini croquembouche to a christmas party that wasn't a christmas party. I had planned to free style the structure but pretty soon realized that at least for the try in need a base - so made a cone from cardboard, covered with foil and started assembling.

I piped the profiteroles this time in order to get it small and the same size. This was semi successful. Filled them with a rum pastry cream - Yum and definitely to be repeated! Though next batch I am debating trying a chai pastry cream. The caramel was based on Laura Calder's advice. I love the depth of caramalization but for a bigger batch reheating would not be be an option. I guess learn to work faster or work with small caramel batches.

Cake Blocks...

2011-10-23T21:43:00.008-04:00

Next to the wedding cake this was one of my biggest projects, a cake for the baby shower. Somehow the hardest the part was stacking the cake to form blocks. Not having any square cake pans I had to make sheet cakes and stack...in some cases "glue" pieces together. It's still a bit homey (can you see the crumbs!) but I am pretty happy with this...

Best part of this was there were so many cake bits and pieces. Bad part - there were so many cake bits and pieces! Don't ask how many meals in the last 3-4 days ended up being cake. Mmmm cake! It was a chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting. It speaks well for this cake that even after consuming all this cake if I find any more crumbs in my kitchen I will still pounce on it!

The parents to be have picked a Winnie the Pooh theme...one of my good friends just happen to be an artsie with some skillz. She did these paintings free hand using edible markers, paint brush and food colouring.

I originally covered backs of the cake with melted chocolate planning to paint on that, but edible markers had issues. But, basic sugar cookie covered with royal icing was perfect.

Homage to the Leaning Tower of Pissa...

2011-06-15T14:17:00.006-04:00

It is once again time for the bro's work cake auction. Last year it was the $90 cake and got beat by $15. This year I was determined to get the highest bid...yes yes it's not a competition it's for charity...whatever. I decided to pander to the masses (though it's not hard to pander when I am card carrying chocoholic!) and make the ultimate chocolate cake - 16 layers of cake and mousse topped with chocolate ganache.

The plan was not to pay hommage to the tower of pissa. Plan was not to present a chocolaty mess. Plan was to make it elegant, inviting, at the very least, pretty something like this.

But I had issues from the beginning. My willy nilly method of cutting sugar bit me in the behind. Apparently I really should pay attention the sugar egg ratio! Lesson learnt (maybe.)

Mousse should be made the night before, or at the very least a couple of hours in the freezer. Lesson learnt. Really should smooth out the cake before frosting and ganaching. All these led to the homiest cake I've ever made!

But apparently this is what a $230 cake looks like. With corporate and government matching this is actually a $1311 cake. All money raised goes to the Ottawa trauma centre (a bit ironic, no?!) You can get the more elegant professionally made cake shipped for $75 +tax (not sure where, google pls.)

This mess is one of a kind. Mine.

Oh yes, got beat by $20 by a "brownie explosion." Damn it! Back o the drawing board...I will get you yet my pretty.

Anatomy of a failed cake...

2011-04-06T07:40:00.009-04:00

I am not sure why I am showing you this first pic, but admire the plate. How cute is that?! This was a x-mas present (or a birthday present!) but either way do I have great friends or what?! The disaster in this case was very much due to my carelessness and stupidity. Stacked two cakes, on the third I cut out a circle so only the ring remained. I broke the “ring” on top and from then on it’s been a bit of an issue. In this particular cake I planned to make the centre cream white (which is actually a custard….Mini aside happy dance I MADE CUSTARD!!! This is huge for me. All this while I’ve curdled everything I’ve made but finally. Might be my new cute pots though!) but I hadn’t left enough before I made the rest chocolate!

Then I realized the cake ring was a bit too deep to do the stacking thing (you'll see later). Hmmm…maybe the ring wasn't the best idea...back to the drawing board for a bit. But to stack some height, I covered it up with a piece that I had cut off from another cake.

I forgot to take a pic of it stacked. I used the centre I had cut out before, cut that into squares and stacked in the ring of the top cake then poured with the custard. And ran out of custard! But in hindsight I probably should have left it as is.

But no I made a new batch. I tried to leave this white, but it wasn’t setting well and figured adding the chocolate would help. It did, but now too much custard on top! Bah!

I originally made a larger cake for a friends bday. For that I made the same cake, but a chocolate mousse filling and drenched the top with ganache. I figure custard was a bit on the calorie light side, not much but a bit counts! Okay fine it wasn't so much about the calories, I just didn't have cream in the house!!! Recipes below:

One Bowl Yet to Fail (knock on wood), Super Moist Chocolate cake

*Preheat to 350 deg F. Prep two 9-in pans

2 cups flour (I’ve done 1 cup AP, 1 cup WW)

2 cups sugar (I cut down to 1 cup some times even 3/4 cup)

¾ cup cocoa

1.5 tsp baking powder

1.25 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt 1 cup milk (I’ve added yogurt, cream or sour cream before)

½ cup oil (something light, even though original recipe calls for veg oil)

2 eggs

¾ cup boiling water vanilla

Mix all dry ingredients, add milk, oil, eggs. Mix well.

Add boiling water, mix well. Finish with vanilla.

Batter will be thin.

Bake for 23-25 mins

No Egg Chocolate Mousse

125 g chocolate chopped,

melted ½ cup butter (I think I added less)

100 ml cream

¼ cup icing sugar

1 tsp espresso powder (optional)

Whip the cream till soft peaks , beat in icing sugar, leave aside (Max the mixer is so good at this!) Melt the chocolate, add butter, stir till it cools (didn’t take very long, I was surprised!)

Add a bit of whipped cream at a time until incorporated. Here I added cream to the chocolate, whipped by hand to mix a bit then got Max to beat it again till it firmed. Then stuck in the fridge.

Custard

2 egg yolks

1 tbsp flour (I used arrow root powder, I am sure corn starch would work too)

1 tbsp sugar

14 tbsp milk (I used skim)

Vanilla or vanilla bean

3 oz chocolate chopped

In a pot add sugar to egg yolks, mix well.

Add arrowroot or whatever thickener powder. Mix well, get rid of all lumps.

Add milk bit at at a time, mixing well to avoid lumps.

Once all milk is added (If using vanilla bean add now) place on stove on mid heat.

Stir, stir, stir and stir some more. Seriously do not leave the pan unattended, more unstirred.

Once thickened remove from heat add chocolate. The chocolate will help thicken further.

Sunsets in Hikkaduwa...

2011-02-07T12:01:00.001-05:00

Day 1

Day 2

Day 4

Day 5

HIkkaduwa...

2011-02-04T08:00:00.000-05:00

After all the climbing and travelling we headed to the southern coast in Hikkaduwa for the last week in Sri Lanka. The brothers and Sam were excited to surf...Hikkaduwa is making a name for great surfing conditions, I was just excited to finally spend some time in the ocean.

Among these rocks are supposed to be beautiful coral reef and a turtle hatchery. Most snorkel to this area or take a glass bottom tour boat. We briefly considered but that would have interfered with all the lying around we were doing...

I tried to head out earlier for a 30-45 min walk in the morning. This was pretty much all the exercise I got during the day! Though we weren't in a fishing village there were still lines being pulled out in the morning.

I am not sure how long this tree will stay alive but hopefully it flourishes!

I spent most of the day sleeping or reading in one of these cabana type things or

lying in the water. I averaged 4-5 hours in the water, enough to make me dark enough to almost match the little brother's colour! I am still not sure how I feel about my tanning...me the Sri Lankan...

We had a couple of rainy days, one was just bit of drizzling that I ignored and spent immersed in the ocean.

The bro and Sam attempted surfing most days...

Towards the evening of the second day the kid managed to stay up on the board...

for a bit anyways...

We typically stayed to watch the sunset and a couple days had some gorgeous settings!

Siri Pada...once in a lifetime climb...

2011-01-21T08:03:00.000-05:00

From France we hopped to Barcelona, Rome, Nice and Monoco then Sri Lanka for two weeks. I am waiting for my bro to come home with my pics so until then I will skip to the last part of my trip, 2 weeks in Sri Lanka, country of my roots.

We landed early morning Dec 26, then on the 27 woke up at 4am, hopped on a train for 6 hours to climb a mountain.

A climb of 7362 feet or 2243 meters aka 4 hours of craziness followed by another 4 hours of freezing and a 3 hour descent. This is how I spent my second day in Sri Lanka…you know the country known for the gorgeous beaches and beautiful weather.

Oh most if the pics on this post are from our way down. I’ve been racking my brain, I am still not sure who’s bright idea it was that we climb this thing. I am laying this at my father’s feet though…if it seems crazy and Sri Lanka related yeah I am sure my father was involved! Due to some what last minute timing we couldn’t secure seats on the train and ended up standing in a 3rd class cabin for the most of 6 hours! I can't put into words how packed this train was...personal space was very much a premium. The scenery was gorgeous at least the bit I could see as we leaned down occasionally. Sadly no pics. Then a 1.5 hour bus ride through winding tea estates and we finally arrived at the bottom of the mountain.
Bit of history...Sri Pada, aka the Adam's Peak or the Samanala Kanda has the unique distinction of being a sacred mountain to the followers of four of the world's major religions: The Buddhists claim that the foot print was left by the Buddha during the third and final of his visits to Sri Lanka as early as 300 BC. Hindus call the mountain Sivan Adi Padham, as they believe it was the world-creative dance of the god Shiva that left the giant footprint (5 feet 7 inches by 2 feet 6 inches). The Portuguese Christians claimed the impression to be the footprint of St. Thomas who, according to legend, first brought Christianity to Sri Lanka. And finally, the Arabs record it as being the solitary footprint of Adam where he stood for a thousand years of penance on one foot. An Arab tradition tells that when Adam was expelled from heaven, God put him on the peak to make the shock less terrible - Ceylon being that place on earth closest to and most like paradise.

After a nap and full dinner of rice and curry we started climbing the mountain around 10pm. Most do the climb late into the night to avoid the heat but also to catch the sunrise at the summit. The start of the climb was deceptively simple, a nice easy hike through tea estates. The trail of stone and earth steps were lit with white fluorescent (you can see the fuzzy light path in the next pic) light revealing only short distances at a time. The mountain blended into the darkness around, and except for a bright light marking the path, you could not discern its height…just saw the orange lights that marked the summit. Every so often I’d look up and try to convince myself the orange light wasn’t as far away as it look then sigh and run to try to catch up with my group.
The start of the climb was deceptively simple, a nice easy hike through tea estates. The trail of stone and earth steps were lit with white fluorescent light revealing only short distances at a time. The mountain blended into the darkness around, and except for a bright light marking the path, you could not discern its height…just saw the orange lights that marked the summit. Every so often I’d look up and try to convince myself the orange light wasn’t as far away as it look then sigh and run to try to catch up with my group
The steps are lined with little shops that are filled to the brim with all manner of imaginable things and also give you that much needed bit of rest at regular intervals. The brothers and Sam being in much better shape than I, seem to have an easier time but I made use of the rest stops!
When we finally reached the only part of the climb that had railings, I was sure that the summit was around the corner…nope not so much the railing was need since at this point we started climbing pretty much straight up!

But we finally reached the top about 4 hours before sunrise. To say it was windy and cold is a bit of an understatement…clouds floated by us! Despite everyone telling us it would be cold I didn’t believe it till we got there and my teeth started chattering. I mean I live in Ottawa, I survived Edmonton so cold? In Sri Lanka?! Pshh! This is when I truly appreciated my winter coat! What baffled me was that there were women and little kids wearing just dresses and seemed to be somewhat fine!

Sunrise finally arrived but weather didn’t cooperate with us. The clouds blocked the full view but still it was cool to see view.

The descent was a tiny bit easier than the climb and we walked straight into one of the hotels for breakfast - Sri Lanka style! Let me just stay grilled thick bread (to call it toast is insulting) slathered with butter and mango jam, Sri Lankan omelets, tea and I mentioned the bread right?!
Despite the next two days of screaming calves I am glad I did it. But it is definitely a once in a life time experience! We met a family on the bus where the father was climbing for the 17th time and his 11 yr old son for the 9th time. Most definitely not me. I think one of the reasons it was doable was that I didn't realize how crazy it was. Ignorance really is bliss!

There is a saying, to para phrase - if you don't climb once you are fool, if you climb more than once you are a fool! I am no fool...well some of the time!

Last days in Paris...

2011-01-12T15:18:00.013-05:00

I spent my second day in Paris mostly walking around the Latin Quarter. I attempted to follow of the neighbourhood guides on my tour book. Attempt being the operative word, I have a bit more appreciation for the boring old checker board roads of North America. At a point I gave up and just wondered through the streets! Not a bad way to enjoy the day. For lunch I stopped at one of the many kebab places for this delicious concoction!
I walked into yet another church, crashed a wedding and found group setting up for a free Vivaldi concert!

They were brilliant! The acoustics alone were fantastic. I didn't understand the language enough to figure out if the group were some sort of professionals or not.

I made sure to maximize on the crepe experience...the first one I tried was a nutella made by

this guy here who was thrilled to pose for a picture.

The crepes were all generally good but the best I had was on my last day in France at the Lyon Christmas market. Best good-bye to the country. As an aside check out the size of the nutella bottle here...

Last day in Paris I followed yet another one of the tour guide startig at the Moulin Rouge. I am sure this is much more impressive at night

I wound my way around to Montmartre. The square was filled with artists and tourists. The paintings were gorgeous and equally expensive for someone on a budget!

I seriously debated throwing out my budget (they accepted VISA!!) but at the last moment I considered that I had just started my travels and didn't want to damage anything.

Around the corner from the artist square was the Basilica of the Scre Coeur (Sacred Heart) or the white church.

This was my last few hours in Paris. I ran out of time to fully explore the city so definitely require another trip. Maybe next time I'll have time and a nice enough day for a Seine river cruise!

Paris - Day 1

2010-12-25T14:33:00.013-05:00

On my last night in Europe I am finally taking a couple of posts to capture my time. I landed in Paris on an early Friday morning, surprisingly refreshed as I was able to catch some sleep on the aircraft. I have to admit there was a more space than I anticipated, was even able to stretch out my some what long legs! It was no first class but the Boeing 777 is a beautiful aircraft. All right moving on...this post isn’t about the aircraft, though I could go on!

I was picked up by one of my friend’s dad. A two hour drive to just pick me up and spend the day with me. I can’t express how generous and thoughtful this was and how grateful I am. Ha my karma can’t be too bad this lifetime I definitely won the jackpot in the friends department! Anyway after a bit of a crazy drive into Paris we walked at metroed around the sites. First stop Avenue des Champs-Elysees.

The avenue spans from the place de la Concorde (nothing to do with the aircraft as I was sad to discover!) to the Arc de Triomphe. These days this is the most prestigious shopping in Paris! This was one of the many high end car dealerships we walked by. Though I am not sure you can call them dealerships!

Louis Vuitton has their own building...this is as close to the shop as I got!
But back to the actual sites...Place de la Concorde one of the largest squares in Paris has great views on every side. In the old days Marie Antoinette, King Louis XVI and many others were guillotined during the terror. Nice eh?! Middle of the square is a large Egyptian obelisk brought from the Temple of Luxor.

At this time of year the street is lined with Christmas markets. Each city we visited had their version of the x-mas market.

The stall spanned food type places -everything from street eats (seriously check out the size of the pan!!) to food gifts (dry saussage, jams, preserves etc.)
to x-mas gifts (soaps, candles, pottery, clothes) to funky x-mas decorations...

Another thing common to in these parts are outdoor tented cafes/restaurents with heaters. I guess if it doesn't get to minus 30 you can do these stuff. But the part I found genius was that the tables and chairs were set to face the street! Perfect for people watching.

L’Arc de Triomphe is on the other end of the ave. The monument was commissioned Napolean as a tribute to his victories as emperor france and completed years after his death. But more currently it marks the tomb of the unknown soldier. We bought tickets to go to the top, only realizing afterward that the elevator was out of order and we had to climb. My first introduction to spiral staircases – I am not a fan! Still the climb wasn’t as bad and it was fully worth it. Inside near the top is a small museum showing the history and meaning of the monument. It also tracked other countries tombs of unkown soldiers and I was bit surprised to realize Canada was the last to establish one in 2000.

A flame burns in a bronze bowl over the grave that was first lighted on 1923. Each evening at 6 o'clock a different group of ex-servicemen or a patriotic society is asked to march to the arch to rekindle the flame. During this thing I've developed a thing for arcs and the beautiful details on them...I am sure there is a meaning I haven't looked it up yet.

The view from the top was is magnificant! Even better on a sunny day I am willing to bet! Sadly my pictures won’t do it justice. It was quite the cloudy blah day.

It was pointed to me that the arch is surrounded by a large rounded about known as the Star (the tile/brick road is fashioned like a star!) and 12 thoroughfares lead from it.

Next on the tour was the Eiffel tower. I am going to take a leap and say Eiffel tower is probably the symbol of Paris. It was build back in the 1880’s for the universal exhibition and centennial of the French revolution. Apparently it was almost torn down in the early 1900 and only saved due to it’s use as a telegraphy antenna!

This is as close to the tower as I got. I am/was a lot more impressed than this pic shows! I meant to go back to take a look at the construction up close but 2 days in Paris I realized isn’t a lot of time! So the geek in me looked up some fast facts….
Number of Steel Workers: 300
Number of Workers Killed during Construction: 1 (I was surprised!)
Rivets: 2,500,000 (I am guessing +/- a few hundred!)
Steel pieces: 18,038
Height: 300.51 meters (986 feet) (+/- 15 cm depending on temperature)
1st level - 57 meters
2nd level - 115 meters
3rd level - 276 meters
Height including television antenna: 320.755 meters (1052 feet)
Weight: 7,000 tons (1,000 tons removed during 1990's renovation)
Base: 412 feet square, although also noted as about 2.5 acres
Foundation Pressure: 58.26 to 64 psi (9000 psf) (Seriously!!)
Paint: 50 tons every 7 years
Paint Color: Dark Brown
Steps to Top: 1665 per the official website
Steps walkable by visitors (Ground to 2nd floor): 704
Lighting : 352 projectors of 1000 watts
June 14, 1940 the German flag was hoisted on the Eiffel Tower as German army entered and occupied Paris

Last stop was Notre Dame Cathedral aka Our Lady of Paris. It is called one of the best examples of French gothic architecture in Europe. It was restored and saved from destruction (what is with these guys and wanting to destroy their buildings?!!) I don’t remember the time period! This was one of the first buildings to use the flying buttress (arched exterior supports!) This stuck in my head as my of last exams for a structures course in university wanted us to analyze a flying buttress. None of us knew what the heck a flying buttress was and the only reason I got the question right was by playing with the units.

As with most cathedrals here, the entranc/interior is grand...

Best part for me was the stained glass windows. On a sunny day I am sure you can get some decent pics, but not so much this particular day. Let me just say they were beautiful and if I ever own a house I am seriously considering looking into it.

This waste end of my first day!

That night I slept a solid 12 hours! I stayed with one of my uncle’s cousins who were again super nice, to the point they were willing to spend their weekend shepherding me around Paris. Luckily I talked them out of it, but happily settled for a three course meal! Did I mention he was a chef?!

Where in the world...

2010-12-17T10:35:00.004-05:00

My office is clean (can actually see my desk!), my house is clean (some what!) and I haven updated this forever, so this can only mean one thing...yup I am on vacation. So Bonjur from Paris, my first stop. I walk around as much as I could in three days and spent more than I could afford but definitely not enough at the Louvre...I chose the paintings wing and of course the Mona Lisa being one. It is definitely better and different up close but there were much more impressive paintings I for my two cents.
Mona Lisa is behind glass with the people being a good distance away. Bit hard to get a proper picture. But there always seem to be a huge crowd there!
From Paris on to Lyon to meet up with my brother, then Annecy for a day trip and now am in Barcelona as I write this. Next stop Rome, to meet my brother again (It was a bit weird leaving Lyon couple of days ago and saying to the bro...see you in Rome! and meaning it!) Cannot download my camera into this computer, try to update when back in Lyon.

Winter sledding...

2010-11-26T03:08:00.001-05:00

It's been a while since I went sledding. I wanted to go last year, just didn't happen. Maybe this year. FYI weather gods - this is not, I repeat, not an invitation to pummel us with snow. I was doing a bunch of ornament cards when I spotted this image. While the image is super cute, I have a really hard time colouring it in. Hmmm...time to consult a 6yr old?

Reindeer...

2010-11-24T01:09:00.000-05:00

I don't know how I feel about this reindeer image, at time it reminds me of the Harry Potter Thestrals but I quite like the rest of the card! On a complete aside this is the first time I paid attention to the spelling of "reindeer. Ha "rein" deer, I get it! I get it! I always thought it was "raindeer" and was quite confused.
Now this one...I am still not sure if the patterned paper matches, but too late now!

Holiday trumpet...

2010-11-22T09:42:00.003-05:00

So one of the Ottawa stations has already started playing 24/7 christmas songs. Come on...it's still freaking November. Yeah the holiday spirit hasn't quite touched me yet, but at least I have some cards now. I have multiples of the same card this year, still this is at least better than when I thought I'd actually need to buy cards! I am not sure my stash is big enough but I may just squeak by in sending cards for the people in my list that will appreciate a home made card!

I am loving this Inkadinkado holiday set and the gold emboss just melts beautifully!

Simple...

2010-11-12T01:56:00.001-05:00

Every year I tell myself that I will keeps the cards simple and every year I seem to spend hours on one card. Not that it really shows in the final product. But this year I am a bit crunched for time. Things can't get any simpler than this!

An angel?

2010-11-09T12:43:00.003-05:00

Not me the card! I bought this set mostly for this image. I like to it with gold embossing at some point...for this particular one I am not too thrilled with the background. Starting again is painful!
I actually like the background in this, a teeny bit too busy but I can live with it. It's the other bits I am not sure I can live with...thought the coffee cup articulates my current philosophy...

i will add some glitter, glitter makes everything better I find. But I am saving that till I post it so I don't have to live with glitter residue for the next 6 weeks.

A big Petit-four...

2010-11-07T03:15:00.000-05:00

I don't want to jinx anything but I have hope that I may actually work my way through a cookbook. Don't ask...I've had this unexplainable urge to cook every single recipe in a cookbook. Hopefully it will be this layer cake book, Sky High...
The latest cake was for one of my dearest friend's bday. Let me just say, pear jam, home made marzipan, dark chocolate and almond cake! In an effort to save on the calories I only glazed the top. Though a teeny tiny bit dry (next time will have to remember to spray syrup!) the cake was fantastic, even if I say so myself. I hope she thought so too.

I can't wait to make this again, though I hope that is only after I finish all the recipes. Oh Max, the mixer, and I are getting along like gangbusters! (what exactly does that mean?!!!) He/it is enough to mix and fluff away while I do other stuff.

1st Shawl...done!

2010-11-05T04:01:00.001-04:00

It took a while, but I finally finished the shawl I started crocheting...umm...XX months ago!
On the plus side I am less than a month late for my aunt's bday!

This is a record for me...everyone knows my gift policy is +/- 6months...

First Snow and X-mas Line up...

2010-11-03T04:48:00.000-04:00

For all of you that keeps asking me (you know who you are!) yes Ottawa had it's first snow storm Oct 30 2010...
Apparently 6 cm...though it should be melted by the end of the week.

On the plus side got me in the mood for x-mas cards...

About time...I have a month left with 30+ cards to go...

For this particular set I really like the B&W with the red...

Up up and away...

2010-11-01T20:31:00.004-04:00

I needed a card to wish a friend well on her new job. Finally a good time to pull out my crafy stuff and sit down! Although the return was way too slow...many many mistakes plus 2hr later I had this...
I am not thrilled with this but not bad...if the 3D cut out was a bit more balloonish and less freaky eye, I would have been happier.

One card down, 30 or more x-mas cards to start...

Dill Bread...

2010-10-25T08:12:00.005-04:00

I had told myself no more buying bread once in my new place, it will be all home made. Of course I never planned to stick to this, this was the equivalent of I won't eat chocolate for a week, well after I finish this piece and the couple of bars in the cupboard.
Surprisingly, a month into my new place, after my first loaf (my mom bought it! Really.) I have stuck to the no commercial bread policy! But I have friends coming to dinner this week so needed to get cracking with Max (the mixer)

I attempted the Dill bread from Joy of Cooking but with pictures from Smitten Kitchen. It took some coaxing but the bread finally rose, all nice and pretty.

In the end, the bread was okay but nothing fantastic though. i thought with all that dill and onion there would be good flavours. But it was just an okay loaf of bread.

Back to the drawing board...

Apple Sauce Cake...

2010-10-23T05:24:00.000-04:00

One of my aunts had a birthday early October, making it the perfect time to put Max into action, use up some of the apples, then pretend the cake is a bit "healthy!"
In a number of firsts, I also pulled out the cake stand I got for my bday last year (do my friends know me or what?! Though I've known this particular frend for...urmm...15+ years. Yeah we are not counting anymore!)

I had a bit of an issue getting this cake to bake up well. I pulle it out, laid it on the rack, realized despite testing it was still a bit raw, managed to get it back into the pan and bake again. Amazingly after all this it was still very moist (thank you apple sauce!) and light (thank you Max!)

Recipe to follow....

Autumn in Ottawa 2010...

2010-10-20T01:07:00.001-04:00

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Autumn. Not so much what comes after but live for the moment right?! I am not sure why (I've been meaning to google) but the autumn colours this year in Ontario has been freaking fantastic! We went for a family hike and I went a bit snap happy. Sadly I didn't get to see the red leaves I wanted to, but the yellow/orange with the blue sky was still amazing. Here's a mini (yet yes probably too many) look...

Not the typical Apple Pie...

2010-10-17T21:37:00.002-04:00

So I had a full bushel of apples to use up. Easiest and fastest option seemed to be apple sauce and apple butter. I spent a couple of nights peeling, coring, and chopping apples (isn't my life full of adventure!) Threw it all into a slow cooker with cinnamon, nutmeg, bit of apple juice and a vanilla bean. Overnight made apple sauce, 8 or more hours on low heat made apple butter!

All this maybe used up half a bushel of apples. I branched out to pies. I used the dough from this recipe with slight changes. It's not the typical flaky North American crust. But in some ways I prefer this crust. It is definitely "healthier" than the flaky crust. It actually makes for a very smooth, supple dough and super easy to work with!
Tried a lattice for the first time! Came out okay I think, next time thinner strips eh?

I tried mini pies using silicone muffin inserts. They came out super well and I plan on trying this with a muffin tin.

Recipe with changes as follows:

Dough:
1.5 cup flour

4.5 oz butter (125 gr, just over 1/2 cup) at room temp

2 tbsp granulated sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 tbsp cold water

2 eggs

Apple stuffing:
7 medium apples (about 27oz – 750gr)

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/4-1/2 tsp cloves

Lime

Apple sauce

sugar

* Combine butter and flour. Add all other ingredients. Mix/knead till supple.

* Roll dough, transfer to pan, muffin tins. Refrigerate rolled dough with pan and remaining crust for 30 mins.

*Pre heat for 375 deg F.

*Peel, chop apples, toss with spices.

*Pour and sort apples on to the crust. Sprinkle couple of tbsp of apple sauce on top. My theory is that the apple sauce will help the apples soften a bit.

* Roll out top crust, place on pan. Brush top crust with egg white and sprinkle some sugar.

* Bake for 35-40 min till crust is crispy.

Apples...

2010-10-15T21:08:00.010-04:00

A couple of weeks ago...well sheesh practically a month ago, we picked the perfect chilly, rainy-ish day to pick apples...
The first place we visited didn't spray their apples and some sort of thing had infected the apples (aren't I the well informed nature girl!) Apparently what ever it was, was only skin deep and was perfectly safe. Though I got a second opinion on practically 80% of the apples I picked.

We also went on what turned out to be the last day of apple picking. So as they say the pickings were slim!

Four legged neighbours poked their heads into see the progress...all right fine, we may have bribed them with some apples. But aren't they cute? Cuter since they didn't chase me!

Still we managed to pick a full bushel of apples and let the poor guy tow it around!

All right full disclosure, I may have only picked about 1/2 of my bag. But it wasn't my fault...the camera is very distracting and the trees kept attacking me.

So half a bushel of apples all for me. My future (now past) was full of apple sauce, apple butter, apple pie and apple cake! Stay tuned...

Back to the land of the grown ups...

2010-09-24T13:19:00.005-04:00

The parents kitchen has been some what quiet (at least with regard to me!) and will remain so because I have, well almost, moved! Yup that’s right my own four walls and tall ceiling!
This time around I’ve been some what reluctant to live in my place until it is clean, neat and organized. Maybe because I have the option or maybe because the new TV season is starting and I am once again a hopeless addict. But I am finally ready. I have isolated the remaining mess to the guest room/craft room.

But really what you are interested in is the kitchen right?! When I first saw it I moaned that it was teeny tiny but I am a bit more used to it. I still moan at the lack of counter space and ugly fluorescent lighting...but hey my very own space.

But more importantly meet Max – the mixer my parents got for me a couple of years ago and have sat in a box for a couple of years (3-4?!) “until I got my own place!” Have I used him you might ask?! No don’t be silly, it took years to open the box, it will take a couple of weeks to actually turn on the power.

Though maybe this weekend. There is an apple cake I really want to try out!

Bit of a Ginger, Chiffon, Key Lime disaster...

2010-09-01T09:37:00.001-04:00

It was my father's birthday a couple of weekend's ago. I searched around for a recipe that is light, not too sweet and not chocolate. Seriously. The man doesn't like chocolate. I am tempted to say I am adopted but his genes are pretty well imprinted on me. So we settled on a Ginger Chiffon cake with Key Lime curd. Everything was good till, you know, I started baking! Actually that whole weekend was a bit of a baking fiasco!

First we held back on the ginger. Mom and I agreed 2 tblsp of fresh ginger would be too strong. FYI there is a reason why we don't have a cook book out there. Two I used my 9in diameter, 1in (maybe 1.5in) deep cake pan for the chiffon instead of the newly bought 8in dia, 3 in deep cake pans. Yes stupidity has no bounds. So the cake rose beautifully and w/o support on the sides just flopped! FLOPPED I tell you.

The curd was good except I burned it a bit (I have issues with custard like things!) and had to make a second batch since one batch was good only for one layer. Might have been a sunken cake issue.

I skipped the buttercream and just topped with more curd, but jeez how ugly could a cake get?!!

On the upside it did taste good. Obviously couldn't taste the ginger, but the cake was pretty light and the curd was good.

I will try this again, there is very good potential for this cake (yes even in my hands!) The recipe is from Sky High (highly recommend the book) but can also be found out and about the net, here and here.

90 dollar cake...

2010-08-26T06:20:00.002-04:00

My little brother's work auctioned off cakes to raise funds for Cancer research. After much debating we settled on the Lemon-Blueberry cake.
Filling was a home-made blueberry-lemon-ginger jam. As I was piling on the jam I wondered how to stop it from ooozing out. Luckily just before I layered the second cake I remembered the icing dam which probably saved the day!

I had extra icing so went a little crazy with the stars. Not quite what I imagined but not bad eh?

I was quite happy with the buttercream this time...

I wish the cake could have been a bit smoother, I am blaming my missing spatula on this. And yes there is a story behind the sign!

End of long story, the cake was bought for $90, only the second highest bid though. My cake's bum was kicked by another bought for $105 split between 20 some people. I bet it was chocolate...I would have bid on chocolate too! But the ladies who bought this sem to have enjoyed it!

Tarts...

2010-08-24T09:47:00.005-04:00

Imagine you are throwing a BBQ for 30 or so people. You get the brilliant idea to make mini butter tarts. These are great two or three bite finger food. Plus they are super cute.
I am a huge believer in cute food, unless of course it tastes SO good that the appearance means nothing. In these cases ugly might be a plus, more for you. But I digress…

So yes you are all jazzed to make these tarts. Spend hours on research to find the perfect recipe, because you lost the kickass recipe your friend gave you for Christmas. Quest - a good recipe sans corn syrup, because despite the commercial where happy people are frolicking in a park eating corn syrup based food you still think it is worse for you than straight up sugar. But again I digress…thus far you have – a good recipe, check. Ingredients, check (after a market rush to buy flour, seriously what kind of baker doesn’t have pastry flour in the house?!)

Then you realize you don’t have the 24 qty mini muffin pan. After all your pan is in one of the many boxes waiting for moving day and you didn’t make it to your friends to borrow hers. This is where my weekend fiasco serves as a lesson. STOP, make the drive to your friends or the shop and buy a 24 qty mini muffin pan. Two pans will not be too much and baking 100 some tarts 12 at a time is freaking insane!

Edible Faces aka Cake Pops...

2010-08-17T12:55:00.000-04:00

Cake Pops. Seriously.

How brilliant is this concept. It is small enough to eat in a few bites but big enough to satisfy your sweet tooth! I have been coveting this forever. FYI Bakerella- if your page view count went up by a couple of thousand the last couple of months…well that’s me. Clicking on this recipe weekly, no daily, no hourly…maybe not that bad, but definitely couple of times a day,

to drool,

to plan,

to plot.

Just to find an excuse and time to whip this up.
Some how I ended up picking one of my busiest weekends to do this and to top it off started sunday night.

The rolling wasn't as easy as I thought. I don't know why I thought it would be easy, after all I have issues making perfectly round meatballs. I used a small ice cream scoop as a starting point, but well let's just say the imperfections add character.

My second big issue was that I don't have access to edible ink pens. These are the times I miss living in the US. So I tried this gel thing that was meh, I would have prefered something thinner, but the problem is they take time to dry. I didn't have enough styrofoam to stick them in.

Plus, I forgot to heed the warning to stick these in just halfway, so my guys started cracking under the pressure aka gravity. Let's not mention the fact that I am supposed to be an structural engineer. I have been mocked enough by these guy. Yes yes they maybe sunny happy faces but their eyes say "hey moron I can't believe you didn't pay attn to basic physics and here I am paying the price for it!"

This is the point you chomp on them...

with out mercy...
If you attempt these, pay attention to the instructions here and here or buy the book here. Yes there is a book! I am trying to resist (stupid Canadian prices). It's hard cover and spiral bound. Hey stop taking bets on my downfall....

Zucchini Goat Cheese Tart...

2010-08-16T13:31:00.001-04:00

This is a bit of a success and failure...
I used the sautéed Zucchini recipe from Heidi wrapped it in

the tart base recipe from Smitten Kitchen (sans the sugar of course) with a base of goat cheese and topped with toasted almonds.

It looked pretty...

and after the first one (can you guess which one was first?!) got the hang of wrapping them...

But the taste was kind of meh. The Zucchini sauteed by itself was good, but I think it was a bit to delicate for a rustic type tart base. I think it really needed the puffy flaky base especially to highlight the goat cheese.

At some point (probably next Zucchini season!) i'd like to try this again when I learn how to make puffy flaky pastry! Oh well eat and learn right?

Smookies...

2010-08-08T19:16:00.014-04:00

I work in one of the typical sky scraper downtown government buildings with a basement full of food places. Most of it I can easily resist and more often than not I am disappointed at the selection available. But there are days I can't talk myself out of the giant oatmeal cookies topped with cranberries, peanuts, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, and pine nuts.

But here's the thing - I hate the cookie! It is too sweet, sometimes too oily and often it sits in my stomach like a stone all afternoon! I mostly buy it for the toppings, I will even admit to quickly counting the pine nuts before I make a cookie choice, but of course end up eating the whole cookie! Then I curse myself then promise myself it was the last time but a couple of days I fall...no jump off the wagon. So finally, in self defense I sent an SOS to my fabulous healthy baking friends (though I did leave out the friend that lives in my city. Sigh. don't ask me why.) I was rewarded with the a bunch of recipes, first for a try - Smookies.

Sorry...pictures middle of the night with crappy lighta and a flash surprisingly does not come out well. Go figure! I am not sure why they are called "smookies" I will have to ask. I did an online nutritional count and actually got an A for this recipe! First time ever, but this doesn't suprise me. The recipe originated from my west coast, everything natural but taste so much better than any junk food baker friend. These can of course be adapted any which way and I did, this is the recipe I used with my modifications....

Dry Ingredients:

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup oat flour

1/4 cup wheat germ (bran)

1/4 cup multi grain flour

3 tbsp sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1 1/4 tsp baking powder and cinnamon each

salt, nutmeg

2/3 cup sunflower seeds

2/3 cup pumpkin seeds

2/3 cup dried cranberries

2/3 cup chocolate chips

2-4 tbsp ground flax seed

*this mixture can be anything you'd like. If adding raisins I recommend soaking in some water to plump them up and also to prevent them from burning or turning in to hard little bits (or is that just me?)

Mix together in one bowl:

2/3 cup quick oats

2/3 cup rolled oats (I didn't have enough yogurt so used 2/3 cups quick oats, otherwise use all rolled oats)

1 cup yogurt

+ grated orange zest

+ grated carrot (I used 2 med carrots, I imagine you could use zucchini too)

Wet Ingredients:

1/4 cup olive oil

1/4-1/3 cup peanut butter

2 eggs (original called for 3 egg whites)

Vanilla

1/4 cup maple syrup (or honey) I added maple syrup to the sweetness I wanted. This is flexible.

*If use all rolled oats, add yogurt, zest, carrots and mix thoroughly

*Mix all dry ingredients

*Mix wet ingredients

*Mix all ingredients till just combined. Less mixing the better!

*form into size of cookie you'd like. They don't spread, but do plump up a bit. I've been told these are good in mini muffin cups!

*Bake at 375 deg F for 10 mins

*I made 44 cookies, gone in 2 days, except for the ones I stashed in the freezer. Shhhhh!

Blueberry Lemon Cake...

2010-08-02T15:34:00.012-04:00

I cracked open the Sky High book once again to find a celebration cake recipe. In this case the occasion being the first visit to my friend's new house.
Since all the guests were the fruit type and one couple was not the chocolate type (yes yes I know, I don't understand either) I settled on the blueberry lemon cake.

The cake required only egg whites giving it a nice white cake base.

Middle of making the batter I realized I need the blueberry-lemon (+ ginger!) preserve/jam not just for the filling but also to mix with some batter to marble the cake. I swear I read through all the steps before starting! I obviously have issues! So I got started on this particular preserve/jam and realized the blueberry had little stems (I then remembered I was warned about this!) I so did not have time for this so, errm... pureed stems and all! Phish! No one would have realized. I was also supposed to strain to get rid of the skin and such but isn't that where the nutrition (and pollution) is?
The cake was supposed to have a butter cream icing on it. I figured the rustic (and less calorie) version suited an afternoon bbq.

Though I did attempt to make a custard from the left over egg yolks. Let's just say there is a reason custard powder exists. Though everyone was pretty gracious and slathered their cake slices with my goo! The Pistachio Petit Four cake (also from Sky High) next I think. I made marzipan today! Well my version of marzipan anyway!

An Evening with Sting...

2010-07-28T08:06:00.001-04:00

This is mostly for me, since my memory has more holes than a seive! I told a detailed story of the Sting concert to a friend and thought I so should record this somewhere due to the afore mentioned seive! These pics are not mine...I followed the no camera rule, though no one else did. Camera flashes were crazy! These were from one of my friends that I didn't even realize was there! Can get lost in a crowd of 8500...

Stings current tour is him accompanied by the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra. I was surprised to see that the orchestra was fully involved in the performance. There were a number of excellent solos, choreographed dancing (by the musicians!) and the conductor was so animated I could have happily spent the evening watching him! But Sting was a good distraction too! I realized most of Sting's song are meant to be accompanied by an Orchestra (not Roxanne, didn't like that version) not the sythesizers of the 80s.

For a bunch of songs he explained the origins and it was pretty interesting. These all apparently made an impression on me, I am surprised I remember so much!

He talked about a friend of his in New York in the '80s who was able to steal the satellite feed of Russian television stations, so the two of the m would get drunk and watch Russian children's programs late into the evening (they'd watch late night Saturday in NY which was morning Sunday in Moscow). When he saw how much care went into those programs, he realized that Russians love their kids as well, despite what the Cold War had taught him, inspired him to write 'Russians.' His only "politics" was to say it's too bad these ideals still aren't embraced by the world yet.

Talking about love songs he said "In my humble experience, there are two kinds of love songs. The 'I love you and you love me' variety, which are boring and don't really go anywhere. And then there's the 'I love you and you love someone else,' songs, which are far more interesting. Painful, but interesting."

He talked about his father, apparently his whole family was sea people - ship builders, seamen, etc. etc. but his dad was a milkman. The dad encouraged Sting to go to sea when you finish school which he took to mean go live a life filled with adventure. He joked that he really let his dad down by becoming a musician, but after he died, Sting wrote 'Why Should I Cry For You?' for his father (who knew!) He finally earn his seamen licence when he was a singer on a cruise ship and that he "f***ing hated it!"

He put on a vampiric, Victorian frock coat to sing a very haunting version of the 'Moon Over Bourbon Street' and with the orchestra it was very phantom of the opera type. Very cool!

Before 'I Hung My Head', (which was new to me) he said he LOVED TV westerns (his favourite: Bonanza), and lamented, "I tried to write country songs but I don't look good in hats." But that he earned his country wings when Toby Keith (?) covered one of his songs but his ultimate validation was when Johnny Cash covered "I Hung my head."

'The End of the Game' is based on the end of a couple of foxes; He said he found the English fox hunt disgusting and barbaric (he was more eloquent) but then when he became a farmer a fox got into the pen and "killed all of my goddamn chickens." At that point, he said understood the other side!

Oh final thing I remember, he said he gets asked all the time how he writes his songs and he's never been able to give a concise answer…but he noticed that for most songs he gets a tune and he sets up his music completely before ever thinking of the lyrics. Then he walks around and hope to god he gets a story to tell (this last pic is from a local news paper).

With 'Tomorrow We'll See' (a song I hadn't heard before) he said it was "extremely disturbing" because the story was about a "male transsexual prostitute." He went on about how he was so uncomfortable that he wanted to just move away but then his inner voice said who are you to judge, you could be me in another life, in another circumstance. I didn't realize this was part of this lyrics. He said writing the song, and exploring this darkness, taught him tolerance.

Check out the lyrics, it's very visual. Visual in terms of the plight of this guy...come on people this is a family friendly blog!

Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake

2010-07-26T09:13:00.015-04:00

I wanted to make a “congratulations on your first job and its such a fantastic stepping stone for you” cake for a friend. At least I think we are friends. Hey SZ we are friends right? All right we’ll assume we are friends, after all I made her a cake and my brother claimed it was the “best cake” I’ve made yet(yes he was quite sure to add the YET!)
So this started with flipping through my copy of “sky high.” The words peanut butter and chocolate just grabbed me by the taste buds. The cake looked simple and chocolaty enough, though my cakes didn’t rise as much as I thought. Then I did use a pan that was 1 inch larger than recommended, though I didn't think it would make such a big diff! Sadly the layers were a bit thin.

The ganache sounded lovely - peanut butter, chocolate and cream (sans corn syrup, I avoid corn syrup!) How could that be wrong? But the frosting was a little mind bending. Cream cheese + peanut butter and icing. Now I like cream cheese (kinda) and I love peanut butter but the combination just seemed weird.

Well…I was wrong…SO WRONG. They are the perfect combo for frosting. Somehow the cream cheese highlights the pb while hiding itself in the creaminess. The colour was amazing…I wish I had a better pic. I’ve tried to make pb frosting before and something was always missing…who would have thought it would be cream cheese! Go figure.

Oh yes this is not a cake if you are counting calories or hung up on the amount of fat, but if you like PB and chocolate this will blow your mind…all right full disclosure here…I have yet to have a piece of the full cake! My review thus far is based on the leftover frosting I’ve been savouring by the teaspoon!
Sadly there was a casualty in this effort. I guess there must be sacrifices for the "best cake!" But really it was my own idocy...for the first time I decided to take a short cut in making ganache by using the microwave. Ganache came out okay (not the best, it didn’t flow like I wanted it to…) but the bowl somehow fell, slipped through my fingers, couldn’t be halted by a hip jab and somehow fell at the exact angle to crack neatly in two. Right lessons learnt, no short cuts! Oh well, at least it’s only 75c at IKEA…

Oh right I didn't post the recipe here, but if you need it let me know...or google...couple other ladies made the cake and was nice enough to post all the details. Plus their pics are a lot better than mine!

How to make Jam...

2010-07-07T08:56:00.011-04:00

....step by step...well my steps anyway!
1. Get super excited about picking strawberries the second winter looses its grip on the world (for us this was march/april?) Be reminded that the strawberries must grow before you can pick it! Darn mother nature! Nixed again.

2. Wait patiently…stop chuckling, I can be patient.

3. Be reminded that the strawberries are ready for picking. This step maybe skipped I have some what of a short attention span.

4. Start scouring the internet for Jam recipes. Shake your head at the amount of sugar required.

5. Ask what you think is simple question from the resident guru…do you add the crazy amount of sugar for the sweetness or to make sure the jam sets?

6. Try not to be intimidated by the page long explanation, get introduced to pectin. Immediately research pectin pros/cons. In the end, meh if it is good enough for the above mentioned guru it's good enough for you!

7. Use the supposed research skills that the parents paid good money for aka order all canning/preserving related books from the library. Reading said books are optional. Just the large stack of books will make you feel confident.

8. Oh right go pick some Strawberries (avoid the whole being chased by horses experience)…and buy "no sugar pectin".

9. Attempt the first batch. Sterilize all bottles/jars, caps er not so much the baking gloves (don’t ask.)

10. Foolishly mix in your precious vanilla bean right at the beginning. I say foolishly since you have to skim the white froth stuff (what is the white stuff?) and find your vanilla beans in the froth.

11. Give up on de-frothing...think about the poor bean! Evidence exist, hear about it from mom the next day.

12. Bottle Jam, boil filled jars, wait patiently for the 24-48 hours.

13. Attempt a second batch, take a novice friend and her strawberries along for the ride. Sadly you are somewhat the expert in this relationship but luckily the friend is good at reading/following directions!

14. De-froth, then add vanilla bean! Feel adventurous add cardamom, remember you wanted to add basil well next batch…meh next batch (updated – next batch = next year I guess, strawberry picking season seems to be over)

15. Boil the full jars, again let rest. It’s okay to be stupidly excited when you hear the jars pop announcing the proper seal on the jams! It's probably not okay to call your friends at midnight when your last jar pops.

Wait a week or so (though 48 hrs is enough) rip into a jar. Verdict

Pretty good, a little more sugar would have been better but it is strawberry and delicious on oatmeal. Not too much guilt eating Jam on oatmeal since hey it’s low sugar.

Strawberry cardamom? Good if you like cardamom but end of the day it’s strawberries with cardamom and if we go by my family, it’s an acquired taste.

Though techinally I guess I made strawberry preserves not jam (I think)

Now that you've caught the jamming (oh right canning, gotta remember the lingo) figure out what else you can can! (ha ha can can!) and figure out what do with all the jam. Next up in the fruit picking...raspberries and blueberries. Mmmmm blueberry jam!

Note to self - explore strawberry mango jam next year.

All that said I used:

7-8 cups of strawberry, 1cup sugar, 1 pkg no sugar pectin and 1 vanilla bean

Happy Canada Day!

2010-07-01T14:20:00.003-04:00

No whinning today! I am in Canada more in the capital and I'll be spending the day with some of my long time friends that hung in there for me as I hopped through and out of the country!

I will be back to nit pick at these cupcakes though...I had issues!

Tis the season...

2010-06-30T02:49:00.009-04:00

...for Strawberries!
I didn't realize how many farms surrounded Ottawa! After a thorough search of the area farms (aka who had the most informative website or who answered the phone) I went strawberry picking twice so far.

My first trip included a trip to another farm to visit my friends horse. I feel some what posh saying I have a friend with a horse! They - horses - were cute and super soft to touch but I really could have done without being chased by two horses on a muddy field. The trouble started with me feeding them some carrots and them not understanding when I ran out.

Horse "Oh I am sure you have some in your many pockets."

Me "No no I really don't and come on my footwear is so not suited for this mud"

I am so not a girly girl, I don't mind mud, but I have to be in that frame of mind or you know at a spa! Still the horses were cute enough and the place was pretty enough that I am wiling to try again when it's dry and I have better footwear and of course someone else is feeding them.

Back to strawberries...both trips resulted in me getting eaten by bugs (I have no idea which ones, I just have bumps on my arms!) and all this just reinforced (and I am not ashamed to admit) Yes I am very much a city girl, thank you!

Still I guess some of the pain and suffering was worth it for the bright, juicy, red goodness of these berries. It's going to take some time for me to go back to eating store bought California or Mexico (wait are there strawberries from Mexico?) grown berries. These had maybe a full 20 min travel time from being picked to being in my mouth. Though I will admit some only had seconds to travel before being chomped up!

The 16L of strawberries made it to some jam (holy the amount of sugar that goes into home made jam recipes. I drastically slashed the sugar amounts, I am guessing the "jam" will be a bit tart, but I am hoping more strawberry flavoured!), a mango-strawberry pie and a decent quantity for my snacks. Today I am hoping to start my small batch of strawberry vodka.

All in all, a spring tradition I am hoping to continue!

Lime Yogurt Cake with Raspberry and Blueberry something...

2010-06-24T21:51:00.010-04:00

Went to a friend's bbq last weekend bearing a lime cake. Lime seemed some what fresh and crisp for a summers day. Again I cut the sugar by more than half of the original. I joked that one of these days my cakes will just not set due to the lack of sugar!
Instead of frosting I made a raspberry syrup, sauce (what ever it's called) and actually laboured through the straining process. Again I tried to minmize the sugar...maybe should have added some more...

Also made a blueberry sauce which was marginally better I think. Didn't bother straining out the skin...maybe next time...yeah probably not, I am lazy like that...

I added extra lime zest (must buy a zester, must buy a zester, or a micro plane) hence the green viny things in the cake.

The recipe was from SmittenKitchen with slight changes due to my lime and low sugar obsession.

One 9-in cake...

1 cup whole milk plain unsweetened yogurt (this is apparently the ideal; I used plain old 2% then 1% yogurt)

1/3 cup Olive oil

1/2 cup sugar (bit less than half, original called for 1 cup)

zest of 1.5-2 limes

1/4 cup lime juice (bit more)

2 eggs

1 + 2/3 cups cake flour (original - AP flour)

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon salt

Heat to 350F.

Mix together wet ingredients including zest. After adding each egg blend well.

Sift together dry ingredients, add flour mix to wet mix. Stir till just combined.

Bake 30-40 min

More detailed (and really better) instructions here.

For the sauce I blended/pureed fresh raspberries and blueberries individually with some lemon. Next time maybe add some sugar.

Rainbow cake out East...

2010-06-17T06:00:00.003-04:00

I've made this rainbow cake a number of times before but first time for my EST friends. I think I added a bit too much colour to this. I also meant to do a green tea flavour but forgot! So it's back to Lime, Orange, Lemon....

Blackberry (I saw versions with grapes. Hmmm...Grapes in a cake?!), blueberry and raspberry (no extra colour in the raspberry!)

My buttercream icing fizzled, but meh hit it with fruit, though I wish I had some other colour to add to the decor...

And the inside...

The cake looked good, but this particular cake recipe was way too sweet, even after i cut the sugar by half!

Magic Cupcakes...

2010-06-15T07:13:00.003-04:00

...well...more boozy cupcakes I guess!

My little brother went camping a couple of weeks ago. Being the good sister that I am (aka I like to bake and I like to get him to do stuff for me!), I offered to make him some cupcakes. Somewhat of a family characteristic is that we will try almost anything at least once. Though it did take some convincing to get him to try the tea eggs (these are delicious!)

Still baking for him means experimenting and I headed straight to the stout cupcakes one of my friends raved about.

In a salute to the old country, the kid got some Sri Lankan stout. At some point I’d like to try this with the real Irish stuff, or as real as I can get at the beer store.

Now what kind of sister would I be if I didn’t fill the cupcakes with some boozy filling. Hello bailey laced ganache. My ganache, for the first time, actually worked out. All shiny and pretty.

Adding baileys was funny,
I'd add a bit,
we'd taste
the bro – “meh add a bit more”,
repeat scenario 5-6 times.

I am not surprised if we added half a bottle (of a 200ml bottle!)

Oh I usually cut holes in the cupcake with a knife but last night I used an apple corer. SOOOOO much easier. It was a blog suggestion (from smitten kitchen?), a brilliant one!

THE Cake - DONE!

2010-04-25T14:02:00.004-04:00

15 cups flour

11 cups butter

7 cups sugar

5.5 cups milk

6 lbs fondant

40 eggs (and some egg shells, I admit it!)

some lemons, limes, raspberry and mango

+ 16-20 hours of work (not counting research!)

gets you...

and

to answer one of life's great questions: How many engineers does it take to make this?

3 and an engineer's mom!

This cake looked a lot better as separate layers than stacked together. If I stack a cake again I will pipe icing around to cover the gap between cakes and I probably won't use fondant...will just try to smooth out the buttercream.

Would I do this again? Hmmm...depends on how much I love you and if you catch me at a good moment!

THE Cake - Cut, Filled and Coloured...

2010-04-24T14:34:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was d-day. I decided on the butter cream as per the smitten kitchen. I've never had butter cream from scratch...some how what they teach you at M's classes with meringue powder and icing sugar doesn't come close to the taste, which is just straight up yummy! It seemed simple enough and despite the advice not to panic, of course I did. It looked liked this for a while. "Whip, whip, whip" I kept telling myself.

But then magically a minute later it turned to this....

I sadly don't have pictures of the cake filling, but these are the cakes filled waiting to be iced. We covered the cake with piping gel to keep the moisture and crumbs in...

I had two friends help with this...my mini Martha (honestly there is nothing she can't do!) and other mainly for her artistic talent, but really she ended up pitching in all over the place!

Fluorescent light does not make for good pictures! But we wrapped the cakes with a gold ribbon and painted with purple food colouring!

THE Cake - is born!

2010-04-22T22:29:00.000-04:00

...well kinda. It's on life support at the moment. I had the worst luck baking these! This is why you don't get to see a top view, it's quite ugly but hey that's why there is filling and icing.

I took the day off to bake and really didn't expect to take that long. I pretty much went from 8am to 7pm, including the making of the filling and such. Now I can knda understand why wedding cakes start around $500. Not that I in any way claim to be a professional!

I don't think I will be able to make it as some sort of professional at this! I pretty much used up every glass dish we owned and that's before I cleaned up and restarted on the fillings!

Still end of the day I have cake and the foundation for hopefully something pretty but more importantly tasty!

Plus I managed to sneak in a cake for my mother. It was her b-day on my day of baking! She's not the type that will let you make her a cake if she knows that's what you are doing...hence the sneaking of the cake.

THE CAKE - Home made Fondant...

2010-04-13T06:41:00.000-04:00

My grand plan from the beginning was to cover THE CAKE with fondant. Few problems...I've never worked with fondant and I don't remember the taste of fondant, I am sure I've had some at some point. Psshh minor issues I thought. Wilton sells them by the bucketful, I've watched foodnetwork, they roll it out, smooth it over the cake.

Well I started research. Working with it seems doable, plus I have a friend who worked with the stuff. Biggest problem was there was a majority online that hate the taste of commercial fondant. I mean hates the taste with a passion! Michael's not being taste and buy kind of store I looked for alternatives.

I found a number of sites for home made fondant recipes but the best was here. How can you beat step by step pictures?! I tried a batch, I think it was sucessful (haven't rolled it out yet) and only took about 45 min to 1 hr. Assuming this rolls out well, I'll make a couple of more batches. As for a the taste, well it was straight up sugar with a bit of a vanilla taste. After all it's icing sugar, glucose, corn syrup, gelatin and vanilla. Still I think the effort was worth it, no chemicals preservatives compared to the commercial stuff. Assuming it works of course!

Tiramisu...

2010-04-11T06:37:00.000-04:00

Taking a mini break from THE CAKE, I attempted Tiramisu from scratch. The Daring Bakers had a challenge while back and I was intrigued. Despite the multiple parts (Zabaglione, Vanilla Pastry Cream, Whipped Cream, Mascarpone Cheese) it looked esay.

My problem was that I started this on a busy week and at last minute! All the components worked just took a bit more effort than it usually would have! The Mascarpone cheese did not curdle like it was supposed to. I ended up adding lemon and vinegar finally said it's custard like and pulled it off the stove and cooled and well it turned to cheese despite the no curdling. I didn't even have to drain this, due to over cooking I think.

One failure was the Savoardi biscuits (lady fingers). It defintiely did not give the quanities I expected. I wonder if it was because my egg whites weren't at room temperature. I ended up using the few I did get and a combo of store bought biscuits.

Still the verdicts were good. Practically the whole pan was gone in one night!

THE CAKE - White Cake with Lemon Curd...

2010-04-09T07:26:00.000-04:00

Over the weekend I tried another white cake recipe and threw in some poppy seed because i had it. Try not to stare too hard at the top of the cake (that's where you are staring isn't it?! Stop it!). I tried the cake in a 10in pan and well the middle didn't set it in too well. I forgot the magi strips (I am not sure that would have helped though) and I forgot to reduce the temp by 25 deg F. I read somewhere that will help make it cook evenly. What I did remember was a youtube video where the lady took out her unbaked top cake and scooped out the bit of crust of top to make it cook. She of course then leveled it (destroying evidence) but meh I tried to cover it up with curd...a test cake after all.

I also tried the lemon curd. Lemons, sigh, must find better ones. I don't miss much about California, but I do miss the California lemons. Could easily get half a cup of juice from two lemons!

I threw in the pulp, the zest, everything the lemon could give me. Though they recommend straining, I think I will keep it that way.

So the final half of the cake....

It's funny I've tried all these test versions, but I the actual cake will only have a slight resemblance and will be a giant three tier experiment of it's own! For example I read after I made the lemon curd that adding lime will kick up the taste...so guess what I am trying? I am still undecided on the whole white cake...I like the texture/taste I am just a bit worried about the structure being able to support the other tiers even with dowels. Next Fondant, the home made variety!

THE Cake - White Cake and Raspberry Curd....

2010-03-28T15:15:00.000-04:00

I have come to the conclusion that I need to stop looking at cake recipes, at instructions on how to make cake, stack cake and mostly at things that can go wrong! I am getting a little panicky and I have a month to go before this becomes a reality.

Anyway I tried a white cake this weekend with raspberry curd. I don't really have a recipe for a Raspberry curd, I used components of the mango curd and a lime curd and damn have to say this tasted great!! I wish it looked a bit more raspberry-ish but I'll take this! Now I am trying to decide if I want to filter out the seeds or not...leaning towards not, any thought?

Overall, this combo was a winner, but I am a bit worried about the strength of a cake without egg yolks to hold up 3 tiers. So am leaning toward the yellow cake but the curd definitely made the cut!

Next cake decision To Fondant or Not to Fondant!

THE Cake - Butter Cake and Mango Curd test...

2010-03-23T07:54:00.000-04:00

Thank you for the emailed suggestions and the cake recipes! I bought some magi strips yesterday, it'll fit my 6in and 9in pans. But the 12in I guess I'll go with the homemade paper towel and foil version.

So I have made some progress. I have decided on the layers and the flavours. Sort of.

I pretty quickly settled on the base layer being yellow or white cake with mango curd.

I was originally thinking chocolate for the middle layer but neither of them are chocolate crazies (I KNOW I can't believe I am friends with them either!)

Now I am thinking middle layer will be raspberry. I can’t decide if it should be a white cake with raspberry curd, or a raspberry cake with lemon curd or raspberry cake with raspberry curd. I am soliciting opinions.

Final layer will be lemon or yellow cake with lemon or raspberry curd (depending on what I decide for the middle layer). Hence the, I have “sort of” decided.

Well there is only so much research you can do, must jump into the kitchen and test out a couple. So over last weekend I tested out the yellow cake and the mango curd.

The mango curd wasn't great, but then I started with not so ideal mangos. Hopefully by the time April comes around I will get some good ripe magos, I think the recipe is a keeper.

I am not a huge fan of the cake, it was a bit too sweet, even after I cut the sugar. I am not sure how much sugar I am allowed to cut before having an effect on the structure. So back to the drawing board...this weekend a new cake recipe and raspberry curd.

On the plus side it was a beautiful sky out sunday night.

ETA: After many many bites the cake is growing on me. Plus my office crew thought it was great. Although it was also a bunch of guys and they'll like anything edible homemade! Still I am thinking this one could work. Will decide after I try the white cake. I read a couple of articles that recommended mixing buttercream icing with the curd...plus I wonder if there is such a thing as mango extract...hmmm....

THE Cake - The Start...

2010-03-21T20:03:00.000-04:00

I will soon be tackling my Mount Everest, so to speak. I am going to attempt to make a wedding cake for a friend. I am calling it a wedding cake; she might not as they are wise and not doing the huge wedding/reception thing but a more fun/humane post celebration.

So here’s how I came about to my Everest. A couple of weeks ago they announced they were getting married. Well in the excitement I volunteered to make their cake! Well that's a lie; I pretty much demanded to make the cake. I am pretty sure I said congratulations first. I hope I did. Let’s just say I did shall we? I did mentioned I was excited right?! Plus I show my love with food. But sigh, sometimes I really need to think, filter before speaking.

Couple of weeks later, in a moment of panic I tried to back out. "A professional will actually deliver what you want,” I said. The operative word being "deliver." Who knows what Murphy will do to me! Still they are super sweet and said they are doing a low key celebration so if I want to make the cake still they'll be happy to use it as a the cake. Urrmmm okay. I considered volunteering to pay for a professional cake and well that seems a little tacky at this point.

I am obviously daft, never made anything more complicated than a one (maybe two) layer cake and now I am doing a 3-tier cake! Yes 3. If I am going to do a cake, damn it I want it to be a proper wedding cake and don't they have a 3 layer minimum?! I wonder if I can do a cake sacrifice or some sort of ritual beforehand to ensure good karma for the actual cake?

Anyway being the proper post grad student (grad school was a while ago, but I have yet to loose that feeling!) that I am, I started my research. Internet pointed me to a wealth of people here, here, here and here. I realized am not all that crazy, though these people are a lot more food/cake-wise accomplished than I. Then I ordered a number of DVDs but I am afraid they won’t make it in time. I ordered this book from amazon and got the Martha book of wedding cakes. Books, especially the high of the new book smell, always makes me feel better.

I am also hoping to two friends (my own Martha Stewart, a mini Martha, if you will and a straight up artist masquerading as an engineer!) At the end of this project I will be able to answer one of life’s burning questions…How many engineers does it take to make a wedding cake?

Hopefully the answer is two, maybe three, maybe three and a non engineer because really I don’t know any more people. Of course, the one person that could totally help is the bride and I’ve banned her from this blog for the moment.

Watch I will crash and burn and end up doing a one layer chocolate cake from a box!

Any suggestion to get me over the hump?

The Afghan...

2010-03-11T13:31:00.000-05:00

It is done! The squares I crocheted non-stop (well except for life breaks) has finally come to an end and morphed into this...
I admit, I meant to make it bigger, but really those squares were haunting me day and night and I was getting a bit bored doing same once over and over. There are times I wish I wasn't so anal about geometry and symmetry, so I could crochet willy nilly and just join them, but really my brain and my OCD doesn't work that way...

So long Montreal...

2010-03-05T15:00:00.001-05:00

My second last day in Montreal we stopped by the crepe shop around the corner from the hotel. This was pretty much a hole in the wall with a small seating area. But wow they had the best crepes! First day I had pear (with real pears she peeled and chopped in front of me) and second day I had the strawberry banana and nutella one! YUM!

Old Montreal...

2010-03-05T14:57:00.000-05:00

I spent a sunday morning walking through old Montreal. I had a recommended tour mapped out but couldn't find this one street that was the beginning and end of the tour! In the end I gave up and walked up and down, after all old Montreal is only two or three streets. It reminded me a bit of Cambridge...

This store did have everything maple, but expensive too!

Old Montreal end up at the St. Laurent (uhm...that's correct right?!) The old harbour still has some of the old HUGE sailing vessels.

Notre Dame...I like the angels out front...

I assumed the courthouse. I liked the figures...

I looked in on a crepe house...one I wasn't too hungry and two the prices were stupidly expensive! More on crepes later...

Montreal...

2010-03-05T14:54:00.000-05:00

I was in Montreal for a course, took some time to walk and eat through the city. This is a pic of the downtown area or at least as much of the down town as can be seen from the lounge window. If you look to the left of the picture you can see the Olympic torch from...uhrm...1976?
I of course took the worst possible day to take my camera up!

I stayed one weekend just to explore and first stop was at Schwartz...it's an old dress shop turned into a smoke meat shop.

I had a smoke meat sandwich (duh!) with peppers that was to be spicy but really wasn't. Sandwich was worth the walk though!

The next night I had bbq, I was told portugese bbq was the best and Coco Ricco was the best of the best. I am not really a connoisseur, but this left me feeling meh.

Next old montreal...

A card and a shadow...

2010-02-01T17:10:00.001-05:00

Finally a card! It's quite the process to bring out all the supplies and actually do something as I am still living out of boxes! After much procrastination I finally made some cards, totally off of Nichole Headley. Now just have to sit down for some birthday cards and get some original thoughts!

I also got a new camera...my shadow came out pretty well I thought!

Squares....

2010-01-18T13:13:00.000-05:00

I've been meaning to make a couple of cards, desperate need of thank you and birthday cards but I just don't seem to have the time. Lately I've been crocheting up a storm, need to finish thisblanket before March. Despite working on it practically every night this is all I've managed to finish. Not even a quarter yet! Bah!

Happy 2010!

2010-01-04T10:43:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year all! I have to admit I am a bit disappointed. Way back when we thought of 2010 we thought the world would be a much better place...peace through out, climate well controlled, all of on one page to move the world fwd. Okay those might be pipe dreams, but really where are the stuff that could totaly have been a reality? Flying cars? What happened to super-sonic flights? Ottawa Europe in 2 hrs. I will contain myself from starting a US vs the Concord rant.

But alas 2010 is a reality and my year started out with good friends and good food. So can't complain too much. I made a cake to celebrate a friend's baby boy's 1 yr birthday (he was the first baby of 2009 in Ottawa! Cool eh?)

Winter Wonderland...

2009-12-30T07:26:00.000-05:00

Though I guess the correct term would be winter iceland! It was freezing rain, snow, freezing rain, rain, and more freezing rain on boxing day! I didn't particularly mind, I was nice and warm inside having done my boxing day shopping inside. The next day was warm (how sad is it that we are calling +1 warm?!) so I stepped just out the front door in my pjs to take a pic.

Close up at the iced branches!
I wish I had been smart enough to take a walk...the trees in a clump was beautiful and even the ice hanging off sign posts. Oh well. On the plus side (kind of) this is Ottawa, i am sure I'll get another chance at pictures....

Tis the season...

2009-12-24T08:29:00.000-05:00

Yes yes it is Christmas (hey if you are celebrating Merry Christmas!), but in my kitchen (mom's kitchen at the moment) tis the season for baking! This year I've decided to give most of my friends baked goods and something home made instead of just dust catchers. This a push towards my "no more stuff" scream I had a while ago...seriously the no more stuff filters in loud and clear when you move for the 4th time in 5 yrs.

Anyway on to the biscuits. This is my second batch of baking...unfortunately I don't have pictures from the first batch of goodies where K and I baked for half a day saturday! We both agree next yr it'll have to be a full day event and I vow to be more organized! Second batch was much easier and I love all the goodies. Not the typical Christmas flavours but everyone has had enough sugar biscuits right?!!!

So from below, both are a bit short bread like biscuits. The white are Cardamom Pistachio I discovered from the wednesday chef. These were delicious even if I say so myself! The brown are Chocolate Mexican biscuits from Lottie+Doof. It has a bit of coffee, bit of chilli power (I admit I may have overdosed a bit) and bit of cinnamon! Sounds weird I know but really really good. The coffee usually highlights the chocolate and the chillie powder adds an extra layer. I can't explain it, you have to try it!

I also tried Rugelach. K baked a batch and I really liked how the dough and the final products looked so had a go myself. Though I have to admit, these took a while and i only clued on to the perfect roll up on my third tray. K made it look too simple!!! The dough was bits and pieces from a bunch of recipes from the net. I only added a tablespoon or two of sugar to the dough. Filling was what I had on hand, mostly nutty. Starting bottom left and heading clock wise...Cardamom, Brown Sugar Pistachio, Chocolate Almond Pistachio, Brown Sugar Pistachio and finally Red Current Jam, Poppyseed, Almond and Pistachio.

Most of the red current jam oozed out, must find out how to fix it. Plus can you tell I had Pistachios?!

Cardamom was a family favourite. Will have to make more for the luncheon my little brother, his gf and I are prepping (more details on that later!) for Jan 2nd My dad had a cardamom while sipping his tea and claimed it was like having chai due to the lingering taste. I think that was more of a way of scamming another but hey a compliment is a compliment!

The Ballet Slippers...

2009-12-14T07:25:00.001-05:00

I spent friday night decorating a cake for my friend Lucy's daughter. Out of all the cakes I've done this was fairly simple. One colour mostly just stars. But sheesh it was a bit of a fiasco. My first batch of icing was too thin, second batch was a bit too thick. I was afraid to thin it out so worked with it but make it so much harder to pipe it out!! Plus I forgot how hard this was on my wrist. Overall I think it came out okay not my best but okay (better than the picture shows!)
Luckily Lucy came by and she was quite the piping genius! My hand was cramping quite a bit by the time!

I debated showing this picture! Nothing like greasy hair, no make up, in apron picture to throw out on the net, but since I posted Lucy's pic... oh notice the little finger on my right hand...yep I lost my iron ring...again!!! Sigh.

Now that I look at this pic I think my wrist issues are just the very bad way I hold the bag!

Orange and Oat Scones...

2009-11-23T09:39:00.000-05:00

I LOVE anything with orange in it...orange chocolate, orange champagne dressing, orange cake etc. Though gotta admit I am not a huge fan of eating an actual orange! I think it has something to do with peeling the actual orange and also that you may bump across the sour orange in the pile!
Anyway last week Heidi of 101cookbooks.com posted a recipe for Orange and Oat Scones. I've mentioned my fathers' thing for scones. Between that and this having orange in it I of course gave it a try. I didn't have the fancy sugar (fancy for me anyway) to dot the scones but these were lovely. They were light and feathery (if that makes any sense) and the oats added a nice texture to it. Now I wonder if I replaced the orange zest with lemon zest would it be just as good?

Definitely worth a try, advance warning you will be addicted....

Me...me...me...

2009-11-22T09:45:00.000-05:00

Last Saturday I was another year older but I can’t claim to be any wiser. Had a great day/weekend though! Went to a hockey game – Ottawa vs. NY Rangers. Didn’t pay attention when I got the tickets and it turned out to be a Saturday afternoon game. I forgot I had my camera for most of the time and just took pics out front and during the player warm up....
The guys played like it was a Saturday afternoon game too! I shouldn’t call it a game really, it was more a “lets take a couple of lazy strolls through the rink…oh wait what is that black thing in front of me? Hmm…maybe I should speed up and do something with it…oh never mind the other guy got it. Oh hey man…how is the big apple? Hasn’t the weather been wild? I can’t quite get into this hockey thing with the temps being above zero. Oh look gotta head back to the bench, catcha later!”

Sens lost in a shoot out (a long one too). While the game was ho-hum, the company was great! It’s still a little wild to me that I can drop in on my friends any time I want to without planning a cross-country trip!

Following the game we went for Ethiopian food. In case you haven't tried it before, they bring the food out in a big platter lined with Ethiopian bread (injera) and drop the meat/veggies right on top. You are supposed to break the bread or use the extra pieces to scoop up the food. We, of course, forgot to take a picture of the food (I took a pic below from the web…the bread looks the same, rest of the dishes not really!)

I thought it was just the three of us for dinner. Proof that I haven’t gotten any wiser. Really I don’t know what made me think that for my first birthday back home it’ll be a quiet dinner with just two friends! I’d show a picture here, but I haven’t gotten permission from all of them to post their picture! So you just get a not so great picture of me (the Sens wear was a gift from my brothers...they actually went shopping, I am still shocked!) and will just have to take my word that it was a really good night/dinner! K made an incredible chocolate cake. Before I realized she had brought a cake I joked that if she did bake “it’s all mine, mine and mine!” Not so surprisingly, once the cake came out, no one listened to me and I had to share the glorious chocolate…sadly we don't have a picture that does it justice!

The cake was gone by next day. I had a measly piece once I got home but between brothers and cousins I was lucky I got another piece. Why did I move home again...oh right so K could actually bake me a cake!

Basic Grey - Part 2...

2009-11-20T14:00:00.000-05:00

Another scrappy card. I just realized I really should have shown the first couple of cards to show where the scraps were coming from! Oh well.
I apologize for the picture quality too...my room, 10pm, flourecent light...'nuff said right?

Basic Grey - Part 1...

2009-11-19T08:02:00.000-05:00

I still have my stack of Basic Grey paper from last year or maybe even the year before! I can’t remember what it is called though. I am not sure if I was hording or just without ideas on how to use it. But I was determined to use it up this yr! Not quite done but I made a decent dent to it. Next couple of cards are the same image just different paper. If I were smart I would have taken pics at the same time and made one post but meh. Still need to glitter it up a bit and add a greeting, but I figure I’ll do that while I am writing out the cards…bit more personal that way!
This card "design" came out becasue I had some scraps to use up, they were just too pretty to be thrown out!

Wedding Wishes...

2009-11-09T07:26:00.000-05:00

So after much procrastination (nothing like the last minute for me!) I got together with a friend to make a collegue (well my ex-boss from 2 jobs ago, but my friends' collegue) a card. Used the fancy folds tutorial here. I had a hard time getting the fold right. Tutorial is great, I just had a hard time with math saturday night.
Colour scheme was just because I had Old olive designer paper!

You can't really see it, but I did go a bit glitter crazy on this card!

M has one of those Michaels' pregnant women stamps. She joked we should stamp that on the back. I was so tempted, but then she would have had to take responsibility for it. I stuck with rings. Though I do kinda regret not using the stamp!

You can see the full fold here...

Pie + Candy =...

2009-11-04T21:04:00.000-05:00

Ever looked at a recipe or the final result and been grossed out but seriously intrigued?! This was my reaction to the Halloween Candy pie. I thought "who's crazy mind comes up with these things...I bet it's the same mind that thought to deep fry a twinkie that's stuffed with a snicker."

But yes you all now that while I may not be crazy enough to come up with these things, but I am always intrigued. Though usually I am grossed out enough that I won't actually take the trouble to make. Then I mentioned this little culinary nugget to my little brother and his response was "hell ya, when are you making it?!" Well...today (or well really yesterday.)

This is one of the things I love and hate about living at home. My brothers (especially the little guy) is willing to try pretty much anything. So experiments that I may have bookmarked but passed by now actually see the light of day or the light of oven!
On a somewhat healthier note I tried this Morccaan Stew and it was excellent!

To Soda or Not to Soda...

2009-10-28T12:14:00.000-04:00

These pictures shocked me. Yes I knew soda/pop/soft drinks, what ever you want to call them contained sugar. But to actually see straight up visual from sugarstacking.com was a bit shocking.

I gave up soda 6-7 year ago. That summer we were had work BBQs every two weeks. Ahh good times. The meal of course came with a soda and I used to sip a can (or very rarely two) the whole afternoon. During my regular check up a few months later the doctor found cavities. I had been free of such things the prior visit. “Cavities” I moaned. But I brush, I floss obsessively and for good measure I use the hated mouthwash. What more is there left to do?

So we tracked the changes in my life the last 6 months. This was pretty easy, my life wasn’t anymore exciting back then! The big neon light flashed on my soda habit. Not only did I drink in a regular basis but I sipped! Constant sugar in my mouth for hours. This may have a coincidence, I was looking for a cause and this was a good scapegoat. Or at least this is what Coke’s CEO would like me to believe.

Whatever the truth, I have in most part given up soda. This article suggests it was a good thing all around. Still I will still sip, yes sip, a soda once in while but that is a pretty rare occasion. Now my drink of choice is water, no ice, lemon if you have it thank you…well except for mornings where I seem to have become a coffee addict…again…but that’s another rant.

In case you don't make it to the full article, here are some highlights from a study done in California...

1. Over 10.7 million Californians over the age of one drink at least one soda a day (or other sugar-sweetened beverage).
2. 41% of children ages 2-11 drink at least one soda or other sugar-sweetened beverage every day.
3. That number goes up to 62% of adolescents ages 12-17.
4. Only 1 in 4 adults drinks pop though.
5. Adults who do drink one or more sodas or other sugar-sweetened beverages each day are 27% more likely to be overweight or obese.

6. Almost half of the additional calories growth in our diet since the 1970’s come from soda.
7. Each American consumes an average of 50 gallons of sugar sweetened soft drinks per year.
8. Soda is the #1 source of added sugar in the American Diet.

9. The average size of a soda increased from 6.5 oz in the 1950’s to 16.2 oz today (149% increase!)
10. Milk consumption, on the other hand has decreased by 33% in the last 30 years.
11. Each additional daily serving of soda increases a child’s chance risk for obesity by 60%.
12. In the last 25 years, the obesity rate in California rose from 8.9% to 24.3%. That’s one in four Californians!
13. The cost in medical and health expenses to the state is estimated at $41 billion.

Snowflake...

2009-10-28T07:53:00.000-04:00

Bah talk about being an inconsistent blogger eh?! Sadly I do have cards...well kinda...I have bits and pieces of a bunch of cards but in every design I am missing a bit of something here and there. Hopefully I'll get all parts before x-mas!!

I bought the snowflake punch especially for this card, but I am not sure I like the results! I like the blue part and the snowflake, maybe it would be better on chocolate chip or something...hmmm will try a modification...

Rustic Apple Pie...

2009-10-21T06:50:00.001-04:00

One of my friends went apple picking and brought a giant bag of apples for me. Best way to use it up??? Make apple sauce and apple pie. Pie that much better since I ended up using half of the crazy amount of apple sauce I made the day before.

My issue lately has been pie crust. I was afraid to attempt it, the whole thing off "rubbing in the butter" properly, but don't let it get warm, don't over mix etc. etc. worried me. First time I tried it, I left in butter chunks (obviously didn't understand how fine this had to be!) and my pie literally cooked on a cushion of oil as the butter melted.

So I bought a pastry cutter. It's bigger than I wanted but the store didn't have many options. This didn't quite work out as i still had to get my hands in there, the butter stuck to the cutter a bit.

Finally on saturday I sat down with a whole lot of butter and flour and thought if it doesn't work this time I am going to be buying from now on. I used my hands to work the butter in and totally worked! Sadly I ended up burning the bottoms of post of my pie, but that's another story in incompetence!

Elves Noel...

2009-10-19T08:46:00.000-04:00

I don't know how I feel about these cards. I really liked the image and really enjoyed colouring it. Then I took the cards out to the natural light and all of a sudden wasn't too impressed with my efforts. Meh maybe they'll grow on me!

Hunt for the Chocolate Chip Biscuit...

2009-10-17T06:30:00.000-04:00

I am still on the hunt for the perfect chocolate chip biscuit. Not too sweet, not crispy but soft, not cakey and good chocolate ratio. The mesquite chocolate chip from Heidi Swanson was pretty good, but it not the traditional straight up chocolate chip.

So I gave Claire Clarks a whirl. It wasn’t bad. Though I am convinced half of the yumness comes from the actual butter I used. They flattened well, remained soft, but it is too sweet for me. Brothers liked it though and pretty my gobbled up the stash!
I’ve been told the recipe in the Hershey cookbook is good, so that might be next…

First Time Bread!

2009-10-15T06:46:00.000-04:00

I got a bread maker late spring. Procrastinated opening it…first it was “well I am moving home soon, no point in opening it now”, then it was…actually I don’t know what maybe pure laziness. I didn’t realize how simple the actual process was. Well there is also this niggling fear that I will explode in size…I confess I LOVE bread and have little control in the “enjoy a bit in moderation” concept. I indulge (not binge, not that bad!) and then avoid for the next couple of weeks. But now that I have two brothers in the house, I finally dragged out my bread maker.

The first loaf came out great. I added a bit of onion and herbs to the flour and could taste it a bit.
So I thought I need a bit more onion and herbs. Even as I was sautéing all this an errant thought was that maybe I should just get the bread machine to make the dough I can bake it up in a loaf pan. I am not a huge fan of the size of the cake. But then I thought meh and went with just the bread machine.

As it turned out I should have listened to the errant thought! I am not sure exactly what went wrong but the dough exploded, burnt on the element, on the side of the bread basket, every where really and left the house filled with smoke.

Did the yeast somehow touch the liquid and rise too much? Should I have reduced the amount of flour because I added the onions and such? Did I not measure the ingredients properly? I don’t know yet, I haven’t read my book to see if there is an answer. But sometime this week I will try again.

As much as I don’t like the size of the bread it is the perfect shape for the grilled sandwich maker. One slice pretty my cover the area, so this is perfect for my borthers.

Red Wine Chocolate cake...

2009-10-13T08:02:00.000-04:00

This was a weekend of baking for me. Friday night I made the Red Wine Chocolate cake for a friend as a place holder for a house warming gift. I’ve known she’ll be buying a house for months, I’ve know she’s bought a house for 2 months, I’ve known we’d get together for 2 weeks and yet I didn’t have time to get her a gift...I didn’t want to get her a crappy dust catcher at the last minute so it was the Red Wine Chocolate cake.

Anyway back to the actual making of the cake…didn’t really pay attn to the actual volume of quantities…i.e. the amount of batter is small compared to the bundt pan. When it came out, while it looked nice, all I could flash was to the scene in My Big Fat Greek Wedding where the parents bought teeny a bundt cake for this huge family. Having said that the cake size wasn’t too bad for my friend as it was for her and her guy. Unfortunately no picture of my first cake but this is what Claire Clark’s cake looked like…
The more I stare at this picture the more I think, her cake is not that high either, so maybe it is meant to be a small cake. After all it is a rich decant cake, so maybe you indulge in smaller pieces.

Still for my brother I thought I’d double the quantity. Always a little iffy prospect in these types on cakes, especially if the chef doesn’t expressly state that you may double it. In this case the chef didn’t forbid doubling so I took a chance. This was the result pre-soaking and pre-red current glossiness. The little dark bits are chocolate!

And post-soaking and post red current spread:

Yes yes it doesn’t look quite like Claire’s cake. I blame the lack of glossiness to having tempered the red current spread twice, plus maybe it should have been a bit more warmer for my second coating.

I also used chocolate wafers instead of chocolate discs. I couldn’t find the stupid discs in the couple of shops we looked in and I haven’t quite mastered the art of chocolate tempering so didn’t attempt to make my own.

All in all, presentation was a bit iffy, but I was told the taste was quite good. Success I think!

My Kingdom for a Scone...

2009-10-06T07:21:00.000-04:00

...this would be my father's mantra if he, you know, had a kingdom! He is crazy about scones and a while back I bought him a scone from Sconewitch (one of the must visit places in Ottawa!) and kicked his "are you going to make me scones?" request into high gear. The first batch I made flattened out to look like cookies. He wanted the puffed up flaky sconewitch like scones! So I went with full butter and kinda full cream (shh don't tell him) and finally found a recipe in Indulge: 100 Perfect Recipes written Claire Clark.
Claire is/was (not sure her current status) the pastry chef at the French Laundry. I loved this recipe...all the measurements were by weight. I think all recipes should have ingredients by weight, very hard to screw up, no judgement involved. Funny part of the recipe is that in the list of the ingredient it lists sugar but in the actual recipe it doesn't. So I was paralyzed...do I add sugar or not...finally added a bit not enough to make it sweet enough but not bad. Apparently dad eats it with jam no matter what anyway so it worked out.

This weekend I am trying a red wine cake...the batter contains red wine, and later soaked in red wine!

Snowman fun...

2009-10-01T07:21:00.000-04:00

I really like this card (well not so much the brads, but once you make a hole...) but I can't claim credit for the idea. The top sheet, the window was all a friends brain wave, during the sat stamping madness.
But hey I bought it to "life", so maybe some credit there??

Smoky Biscuits...

2009-09-30T09:15:00.000-04:00

We did start the cooking through a cookbook adventure yet a bit into it I think we all hit a roadblock. I moved (haven't quite settled back down yet) and I'll hazard a guess the rest of us hit the summer block. Still I made biscuits a while ago (took the picture, procrastinated, lost the camera...for a couple of weeks, finally found the camera!)
These are Mesquite Chocolate Chip from Heidi Swanson. Super delicious. Mesquite flour I found in bulk barn of all places (expensive but available). Highly recommend the recipe and that you add a bit more than the recipe calls for, I found that it gives a nice smoky flavour. Oh the flavour I didn't notice till a couple days afterward...so bake, hide, then eat.

Christmas panic in September...

2009-09-29T07:07:00.000-04:00

Wow well it's been a while since I picked up an stampy items or for that matter typed a post! Luckily(?) the Christmas card panic set in and I got together with two friends to stamp away a saturday afternoon. As usual end of almost 7 hours and I walked away with two cards and some stamped images. Sad...yes but that's me. This yr I have decided to stick to simple cards...simple and elegant would be a bonus! I also realized I haven't really gotten back for my mojo...as simple as these cards are I needed help to figure out I should texturize the background etc. But hey at least my friends are crafty!

THE Lemon Cake...

2009-08-10T23:57:00.000-04:00

I found the recipe for the Ultimate Lemon Cake. Seriously, THE ULTIMATE! Original recipe here. I am sure the fresh California lemons right off my cousins tree made a difference. Will have to try it once I get to Ottawa see if the taste is any different. This is a very forgiving recipe too...there were some issues with the oven, but it still came out great...though the top maybe a bit darker than I would have liked.
Batter
2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 cups sugar (I used 1.5 cup)
4 extra-large eggs, at room temperature (room temp makes a difference!)
1/3 cup grated lemon zest (6 to 8 large lemons)
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 cup fresh lemon
ETA 1/8 cup fresh lime I have recently learnt that lime kicks up the taste of lemon! Thank you Shelly Yard!
3/4 cup buttermilk, at room temperature (I used milk but mixed with lemon and set aside for a bit to make fake buttermilk)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Topping
1/2 cup fresh lemon
ETA 1-2 limes
1/2 cup sugar (next time I think I'll use 1/4 cup)

Glaze
3 1/2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour two 8 1/2-by-4 1/4-by-2 1/2-inch loaf pans or one bundt pan, and line the bottoms with parchment paper (no parchment paper if you’re using a bundt pan).
2. Cream butter and 2 cups sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment for about 5 minutes, or until light and fluffy. Mixing at medium speed, add eggs, one at a time, and lemon zest.
3. Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl. In another bowl, combine 1/4 cup lemon juice, buttermilk and vanilla. Add flour and buttermilk mixtures alternately to butter and sugar mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Divide batter evenly between loaf pans or one bundt pan, smooth tops, and bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour, until a cake tester comes out clean.
4. Combine 1/2 cup sugar with 1/2 cup lemon juice in a small saucepan, and cook over low heat until sugar dissolves.
5. When cakes are done, carefully Invert them onto a rack set over a tray, and spoon lemon syrup over cakes. Let cakes cool completely.
6. For glaze, combine confectioners’ sugar and remaining 3 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice in a bowl, mixing with a whisk until smooth. Pour over top of cakes, and allow glaze to drizzle down the sides. (I like skipping the glaze, just sift some confectioners' sugar on top)

Made this in Ottawa middle of winter. Definitely no fresh off the tree lemons but it was delicious and gone before I could get a 3rd slice!!

SF - Fortune Cookies and Things...

2009-08-07T11:07:00.000-04:00

On my way out of San Diego, I am spending a few days in San Francisco. I gave up any thoughts of pretending to be a local and embraced my inner tacky tourist...camera in one hand, map in the other. My first stop was China town....

Random buildings that I thought were cool...

I can't figure out of China Town is actually a large area super stuffed or a small area super super stuffed. But end story being it is stuffed with shops with barely any room to move...

I am surprised at the really bright colours...

I had planned to have a proper meal in China Town. I am not sure what I expected but most places were Dim Sum. I just wasn't in the mood for one...I am not sure if it's because Dim Sum always makes me think of hanging out with a bunch of friends so Dim Sum for one is just odd. I ended up hopping from one bakery to another for buns and such. First was this one...

It was just a hole in the wall, not sure what made me walk in. Inside there was a to do about Bill Clinton having visited and had "the best BBQ Pork buns." I had one too and gotta say I've had way way better. But what I was amazed at is how rude the store people were. It reminded me a bit of the soup nazi. I was afraid to step up for my order...

After I headed to the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory. Again the guy was very rude. The demanded 50 cents if you wanted to take a picture of the ladies making the fortune cookies and then very pushy about how long you had to watch. He made it seem like he couldn't speak English but had no problem demanding money or telling you to buy something or get out...

I managed two quick pictures. The cookies come out in flat round disks...you can see them in the mold in the picture. I am guessing the whole thing is some sort of oven. While they are super hot and still malleable the ladies grab it, stuff a fortune, twist it into shape with a little molder in front and set it to cool.

Can see the molder to twist into shape a bit better here. It's one of the pipes sticking out in front of her.

Not sure if the do all this by hand or if this bit is just set up for show...asking questions wasn't an option.

Saw these guys in front of a store...I think these are the new version of garden gnomes!

Fishermen's Wharf next...