the carrot cake

Yes, this is getting a little obscene- i really shouldn't be baking and blogging twice in one day. But, it is the carrot cake, and there's never such a thing as too much baking in a day. Especially when my oven has decided to be nice to me today.

According to Pau, the center of (raw) carrots are really sweet, but being a real big non-vege lover, I think the only way I'll have carrots are in a cake.

Maybe its the generation gap, or maybe its my daddy being traditional. But it never fails to amuse me when he would look at the cake in deject and say 'This is not carrot cake!'. Sorry daddy, the day I can make Chai Tow Kuei (The Chinese-style white turnip cake), will be the day I can take over the world.

Well J did tell me that it's not difficult to make the Chinese version, so I shall attempt it one day. Watch out world, mwahha.

Still, I insist that my (amazing cookbook's) version of the classic american carrot cake is pretty decent, and it'll only be complete with a layer (or two) of cream cheese frosting. And unlike the Chinese-style version where people actually have debates over whether the white version or black version is better- the carrot cake's perfect just like that.

No debate required.

Sand-ies

I woke up today feeling like I had to bake something. ANYTHING really. After pulling an all nighter to write my rather depressing essay on Genocide, I simply had to reward myself with something sweet. Something that would take my mind of all the atrocities. It helped, of course, that one of the flatmates had friends over for a game of pro-evo, so baking the Blondies did mean that not all of it would end up around my waist.


The idea of Blondies- Blonde Brownies intrigues me. Yes, don't laugh. When I told a friend about its existence, she went 'That's racist'. That left me in stitches. I mean, why would anyone want to make a non-brown brownie? All the fudgy, dense, chocolately goodness of the quintessential should never be substituted with anything else (What Blasphemy!)!

Or so we think.

Perhaps it was because I started the day baking these little squares of goodness- on an empty stomach, but the batter distinctly smelt like the cookie dough in B&J's Cookie Dough Ice Cream. I highly doubt that I was hallucinating, or that the lack of food in my stomach was playing tricks on my brain (just in case you're wondering). And if the batter alone could conjure up such perfect images, it can only be a good thing, oui?

Of course, I cheated and added copious amounts of chocolate chips and walnut pieces (yumm) which definitely gave more texture to the Blondies! The chips melted as I stirred them in my end product turned out to be a rather sandy-coloured Blondie. Not that I'm complaining really.

Nothing like a petit pick-me-up to perk me up after a terrible night (:

Sand-ies anyone?

Pancake Day (:

Can't believe Lent starts tomorrow- time is really going by too quickly!

I couldn't bear to leave Singapore in January, but now, I just can't help but wish I had more time left in London. I'm truly going to miss hanging out in my flat with the flatmates and friends- all the sleepovers, the dinner parties, the parties-till-potential-eviction.. everything. Technically, I still have a good 5 months- plenty of time, oui?

Well, because it's Shrove Tuesday today (and because I really don't want to do my readings) I decided that we had to make pancakes. None of those thin crepe-y kinds. While those are good, they simply cannot compare to the warm, fluffy, thick American pancakes! I am obviously a proud product of the Golden Arches Era- pancakes=hotcakes (happy meal).

Unfortch, due to our conflicting schedules, only tannie and I could do lunch together- so I made a stack of pancakes. Chocolate Chip pancakes to be exact. (: And we finished them ALL. Yes, that stack. Between 2 of us.

And. Because the other 2 will be free for dinner, tannie decided that we should have pancakes for dinner as well (we never get sick of this I tell you)- complete with a side of bacon. sinful sinful sinful. I tried protesting - ain't that too much pancakes for one day? Okay, I pretended to protest, because as I write this, 2 batches of pancake batter are sitting in my fridge.

Gym anyone?

world domination

It's been rather fashionable lately for everyone to ask what my plans for the future are. and unfortunately, i've given up trying to articulate my big grand plans into words. so, the answer has always been 'unemployment beckons'. I really do believe that i'll go home to be unemployed- except the duration of the stagnation and 'gap year' (so they euphemistically call it) will be determined by me and me alone. Well.. till then, me and shun have grand plans. big grand plans.

shun and i decided tonight, that spinsterdom, like unemployment awaits us. We'll rent a 4 room hdb flat/condo when we turn 30 years old, be the kind of aunts that take annual sabbaticals from december through to feb to avoid giving out christmas presents to our nieces/nephews/god children. And of course, we'll avoid the eternal question that will potentially plague us for the rest of our lives. Yes, the predictably annoying 'not married yet?' speeches.

and with all the money saved from renting/no-show during xmas/savings from not having to give out ang pows (hah), we'll either (a) buy a pretigious duplex in hongkong and get involved in businesses of unknown nature, or (b) start a joint private swiss bank account and prepare for world domination.

this two new potential careers definitely seemed more enticing then what we had planned last year, after our very devastating Political Theory examination (read: wedding planner for specialised weddings at Sungei Buloh and a catering services for weddings).

but yes, we have it all planned. students of history will learn about all the causal factors that drove shun to dictatorship and all that history, of course, will be constructed by me. history, after all, will be what I make of it. we'll let you think what we want you to think.

oh kay. maybe it's the poppyseeds in the lemon-poppyseed cookies doing the talking, but we are allowed to dream, non?

the unromantic romantic

while the world went giddy celebrating the day of love with everything pink, sweet and hearts, the bffs and i spent pretty much of 13/14 watching brainless chick flicks and engaging in (very helpful) retail therapy.

for some reason, none of the pink or the love has found me (yet, i hope) - i ended up baking the very wholesome and very practical and not to mention unromantic banana loaf.

i'm not in a bah hambug mood really! i love vday and all its loving fuzziness. and although to many, the banana loaf may seem the complete antithesis of romance, i happen to think practicality is sexy. and of course, the familiar comforting smell that diffuses throughout my kitchen keeps me happy all day long.

so there. the unromantic romantic (: with the picture courtesy of my Holga

the fifteenth day: east meets west

i would've completely forgot that it was the fifteenth day if tannie didn't remind me this morning. well something along the lines of: cher, do you need to buy some clementines to throw into the river?

Apparently according to some old chinese legend, the young unmarried women would throw oranges into the river on the fifteenth day of the lunar new year and the men who managed to retrieve their oranges would be their destined one. Well, i can't imagine anyone who would jump into the river thames for an orange in this freezing weather, and I certainly do not want any random guy (or sewage collector) retrieving my orange, thank you very much- so I decided against it.

Because this week is a terrible week for all of us- it being essay onslaught, us essay writers had to spend a quiet night in. Dinner was spaghetti with meatballs (: i made huge ones tonight- self indulgent really. and of course, the fifteenth wouldn't be complete without tangyuans.

blueberry muffins and lazy days

I skipped lecture today (again) to have a longer lunch break with zar :) we headed to Primrose, the new cupcake bakery just behind Novello theatre for tea. Pictures of Primrose are on my handphone - so till I figure out how to upload the pictures from the phone to the computer, I'll just have to hope that we'll Primrose again soon!

And because I was so inspired by all things cupcakes/muffins, and because I had very very ripe blueberries in the fridge, and because I was feeling bored - I decided to bake blueberry muffins. They taste strangely healthy, but it has been long since my oven decided to work well, so I'll take whatever it decides to give me. Essay week is rolling by soon, which means more baking to be done. sigh, procrastinator me.

of multiple cuts and school's out.

I cooked dinner for a group of friends last night to celebrate 人日. Apparently, on the 7th day of chinese new year is supposed to be everyone's birthday. I've never celebrated this ever before, but since I felt like cooking, this day was self-declared a must-celebrate :) Together with jia, we cooked up a number of dishes, but it really wasn't my day at all. I got stuck in a massive human jam in chinatown trying to buy tofu, got caught in really strong winds that pushed me backwards and then the accidents started occuring. We do not have a knife holder over here in our flat, and because the boys usually inserts our small fruit knife blade up into the to-dry container, the blade blends in with all our forks and spoons and other butter knives.

Guess what happens next? lol. that's cut number one. cut number 2 was when I was happily chopping the soft bone of the chicken wings. Not sure what exactly happened, but next thing I know, I get 2 cuts on the same finger. O, plus a couple of burns here and there.

whoever said you get to enjoy your (shared-with-entire-chinese-population's) birthday. hah.

but thank goodness, someone up there must've liked me- coz it snowed so heavily (7 inches thick to be exact) that school got cancelled! Best news I've heard in ages really (:(: It felt like a waste to stay at home when the grounds outside look so marshmallow-y and fluffy, so we went out. shopping. yes. we had brunch at muffinski's near covent garden, hung around the area and shopped. Covent looked especially pretty today, covered in a thick sheet of white.. okay, everything looked so much better covered in snow.



























































but because i do not own a single pair of waterproofs, my suede boots turned into nothingness at the end of our 5 hours of random strolling. Right up til the point where i couldn't feel my toes at all - not that fun at all. the boys at home thought we went shopping at Westfields, because its an indoor (big) shopping mall over here. But with 11 out of 12 tube lines closed, that really didn't cross my mind. The look on their faces when i told them we went shopping outdoors- priceless!

On a side note, i've found a new attraction to the Lomography Holga 135. And i think im going to get it- once i get past setting up a paypal account and all the additional paraphernalia. my love for vintage and old school just went up two notches!

And YAY! school's still out tmr! whoo hoo!