Recently, we added a (power) blender to our kitchen inventory because the Signifant Other wants to make some smoothie. So we bought one, which according to the salesperson, has the most powerful and sharpest blade in the market. Ok. The next time this laptop crashes on me, I'm gonna throw it into the blender.

I was excited that we can make soy milk with it. Alright, it's not new, but it is to me! The pack of soy beans I have finally can be put into use. For every 125g of beans, I need to add 1 litre of water. I happily told dear that we do not have to buy soy milk anymore. It is so cheap to make our own and 500g of beans only cost a dollar. Which means for 40 cents, we can make 1 litre of soy milk. Right? Wrong.

I only ended up with 2 glasses of soy milk. The rest of the liquid just went to blending and ended up with the residue. Perhaps I did not sieve thoroughly too. In any case, I happily gulped down the soy milk, the smell of the beans and the goodness is irresistable. Those that we buy are really no where near. I'll make a second attempt soon and try to squeeze more out of my 1 litre of water.

In the afternoon, we went to watch THIS IS IT - the latest Michael Jackson movie which opens in cinemas yesterday and we had bought the tickets as soon as ticket bookings were open a few weeks ago. It shows clips from his latest rehearsals before he passed away. I had wanted to watch the very first screening but I had my cake decoration class, but that doesn't matter. Go and watch guys. It was just like watching his concert. I remember earlier this year, when I heard that MJ is making a world tour, I told dear we had to go and watch no matter how expensive the tickets are. His Thriller and Billy Jean acts never fail to impress me, and of course the rest of the songs too. His movements are so crisp and sharp, yet so fluid, it's simply perfection in caps. I had the urge to go pick up some hip hop moves after watching the show, but I shall stick to my pilates class first. All the dancers go through pilates too anyway :p 

I remember a cookie I made. It wasn't initially made with MJ in mind. I was thinking of the intials of my friend and her hubby. But after watching the show yesterday, I was a little filled with sadness and nostalgia. It's hard to believe that he is history already. MJ, this is for you. With love.

Random ramblings

I've been attending Wilton decoration course for the past few weeks. I was a little apprehensive about the course because I have already acquired self-taught piping skills. But I wanted the certificate, so after much thought and contemplation, I went ahead.

I already knew most of the piping basics in the past, through trial and errors, lots of research and through the godsend Youtube. But the course is good to correct some of the mistakes I make or to make me more aware of some important points to note. I was particularly looking forward to piping a rose. Seeing how roses always look perfect on Wilton website make me drool. I had tried it on my own before and got quite a good result. However, the Swiss Meringue buttercream I used was not stiff enough to stand tall and high like Wilton's. The class buttercream recipe provided to us for piping the flowers did not yield the same results. And the class buttercream tasted....not suitable for my palate..and many others'. For one, I do not like to put shortening into my body. Swiss Meringue buttercream will taste real nice, but it will not withstand our temperature. We really cannot have the best of both worlds isn't it? That leaves not much choice but to make roses with royal icing or fondant.

I am honestly, pretty disappointed by how my roses look today as compared to the ones I taught myself  by watching Youtube. Not that I am saying the course is no good though, don't get me wrong. My instructor reminded us not to get too distressed when we do not achieve perfect roses. Well, my fingers are cramped from the squeezing the stiff buttercream already, ok, I accept that the world is not perfect. Wilton's buttercream roses have "perfect" as their middle name and that probably does not belong in our normal imperfect world.

On a happier note, I bought some new stuff after class today. Went to a place which sold lots and lots of ribbons and they were so pretty! I saw how a simple ribbon can make a whole lot of difference to a plain looking box and thought I should try someday. Hope I don't get caught on a ribbon bug and stock up rolls and rolls of ribbons from now on.......

New paper liners as well....in polka dots as well....though polka dots and pink colour have never been me! As far as fashion is concerned, I do not have a single pink clothing. I'd rather fuschia. But these were seriously hard to resist.

Now...off to find some recipes to use that polka dot paper liners...

Cream Puffs with Chocolate Pastry Cream

What does going to Pantry Magic mean to you? For me, it's feels exactly like a 5-year old kid going to Toys R' Us, there is so much to play with! And going in also means spend, spend and spend. I see the colourful silicone baking tools and colourful melamine mixing bowls and just drool. What's the fascination over pots, pans, baking trays..which I have and see everyday? I don't know. The grass is always greener on the other side. I am a big sucker for nice (and sometimes expensive) kitchen stuff. Even if it means not owning them, I have to look at them. I can go to a department store and look at the expensive pots, knives, crockery for the umpteenth time and not get tired of them. But I told myself I do not need a sixty bucks mixing bowl. Therefore, todays's trip to Pantry Magic was a highly disciplined one. I went in without a shopping list, which was very dangerous, but I managed to spend only a little.

I was in high spirits, and still am. My mind is still at my niece's birthday party over the weekend. I reckoned that during parties, anything bite-sized moves the fastest ( at least I personally would rather grab bite-sized food than hold a plate all the time). Moreover, she already had a birthday cake so I decided to make some bite-sized cream puffs filled with chocolate pastry cream.

I had initially wanted to make eclairs. Well, the pâte à choux is the same anyway. But somehow, when I made them into eclairs, the centers did not dry out 100% and my piping skills sucked. They did not look as nice as I wanted them to be. So I made a second batch of the pastry dough and made them into small cream puffs, or also called profiteroles.

The pastry dough was easy peasy. Initially, the instructions for the pastry cream did not go well into this little scatterbrain of mine. I had to read it over and over and over again and all I got was "pour into here...and then pour into there...and then pour in here again...". But once I got into doing it, I wasn't that scatterbrain after all.

The recipe that I used was not the same as I had used in my first attempt. This time, both the pastry and cream recipes are from Pierre Hermé, one of the most famous pastry chefs in the world. It was one of the Daring Bakers' challenges (which I have been dropped as a member since I did not follow their baking schedule), you can do a google search and find it on the blogs of numerous Daring Bakers. I did some slight tweaks on the recipes to suit my guests' palate and my oven's cooking time. I also did not do the chocolate glaze as the Daring Bakers, I used my own recipe and squeezed them out of a squeeze bottle.

Two people found the pastry cream a little too sweet, the others all said they were delicious! They also look a lot better than my first two attempts on cream puffs. This recipe is a keeper!

Chocolate Chiffon Cake

Chiffon cakes.

My family is not a big fan of them. Simply because even after eating a few slices of chiffon cakes, they feel like they have eaten nothing.

Me? I like them...even though I have to agree that chiffon cakes cannot seem to make me feel full. I've always wondered why chiffon cakes are usually the cheapest cakes sold at local bakeries. To me, they are the underrated ones. They are not that easy to master and they use a lot of eggs, yet they are only worth two bucks.

A few years ago, I made my first chiffon cake attempt. I remember I bought a pack of pre-mix since it was my first try. I had actually contemplated a long time before buying because it required something like 8-10 eggs? Eventually, I decided to risk 10 eggs. It turned out disastrous. At that time, I did not know how the egg whites are supposed to be. I remembered the batter was still very liquid when I poured it into the pan....and slowly, the batter seeped through the bottom of the pan and made a mess of my oven. It was a nightmare. That sort of gave me a phobia and put me off another attempt for several years....until this year.

3 months ago, I finally plucked my courage for a second shot. I found a recipe for Lemon Chiffon Cake which required much less eggs. It was a good try. The cake was yummy, in fact I would say honestly that I prefer it to this chocolate one below, though this is also yummy. The only problems were (1) my pan was too big for the recipe, thus my cake was not that high and (2) I did not manage to get a good shot of the cake. Therefore, I did not blog about it.

I got the recipe for this cake from a fellow blogger's blog. Generally it was nice, but I think I still prefer chiffon cakes to be pandan flavoured, and I think the amount of baking powder used could be reduced, since there are 4 egg whites. My guinea pigs said the cake was soft and fluffy enough but everyone prefers pandan flavour. It is just like a default flavour for chiffon cakes.

The cake turned out very high, because my pan was a little too small this time. The pictures managed to hide a few cracks but it was a satisfied and good attempt.

My next attempt will definitely be pandan flavoured.