existential reminders.

In the world's most romantic place, the world's #1 destination for honeymoons and the reputably the best sunset in the world, I nearly died twice.

Yes, in the gorgeous Santorini in Greece, riding that All Terrain Vehicle featured in the picture, I lost control not once, but twice. The first time left me with bruises all over my left arm and hopefully nowhere else. The second one left me shaken. Because you see, if not for the shrub on the far left of the picture, I would have crashed downwards, with nothing to cushion the crash. Down the rocks and into the beautiful, expansive sea in the background.

And all I could think about is why the hell the damn brakes weren't working.

But I shall play the Pollyanna game and find things to be thankful about. To be thankful that the shrub managed to act as barrier. To be thankful that someone up there was looking out for me. To be thankful that my parents were just concerned about my safety rather than the hefty bill that came with the wreck.

And to be thankful for still being alive.

inspiration+turning22

Jia turned 22 a couple of days back and we surprised her with cake+roshni. She was terribly un-cooperative, refusing to come by my place (when all of us were already waiting). To make things worse, she already suspected something was going on. Seriously. This is not fun at all! I'm going to start designating people random birthdays so the surprise element will always be there. Thank goodness Rosh arranged to come down a little earlier- one surprise beats none.

Was trying out various cakes throughout the week- Cake #1 was an apple crumble cheesecake- but cheesecakes and my oven really don't go together so I had to scrap it; Cake #2 was a chocolate raspberry cake with milk chocolate frosting which was gone in 2 days. Cake #2 was going to be THE cake.

But, when it came down to baking the cake on the day itself, I felt that I just didn't feel like making such a dense and heavy cake. Plus, I wanted a happy-looking cake (coz turning 22 doesn't mean you have to be all contemplative and serious ), if you know what I mean. And of course with the tiny little heaven-in-two-pink-discs as my inspiration, I just had to make the raspberry and lychee cake for her.

So, this happened.




















Happy birthday (:

Princi

Ever since Zar and I wandered into the amazing Princi on Wardour Street, I find myself craving their extensive range of food every single day. And more often then not, I cave in and then I find myself in the amazing place having their delish latte, or their lemon chibouse, or their mille feuille, or their aubergine pasta, or sometimes, a mix of everything. Yes. this is the only reason why I'm still hanging on to my gym membership.

People around me think I'm obsessed- its always an 'Again' I hear after people ask where I had my last meal. Well I think its just so difficult to find a place that does everything right, and when you find that place, why bother searching again? So i've actually never been there with the same people - because they would think i'm mad, wouldn't they. But I haven't gotten down to bringing jia there yet. I don't think she'd rave about it as much I am right now because she thinks my new obsession is (psychologically) unhealthy. Unhealthy in sugar terms perhaps, but there's always the GYM.

Needless to say, I had my daily intake of caffeine there as well today (: So you'll know where to find me in London.

























































Princi
135 Wardour Street, London, W1F 0UT

Midnight baking

With week 8/9 being essay week, I spent most of the week (as mentioned previously) in the library. But having wireless in your library is not a great idea. Because essay writing tends to be a rather slow and tedious process, and the innate procrastinator in me always triumphs somehow. Yea, so I have to do 4 essays in a week, that's doable (right?) - surfing the net for recipes to try out wouldn't take much time, non?

Obviously not, because one site leads to another site, and then another. And when you are hungry from all that thinking (or dreaming), looking at gorgeous stylised food photography is NOT the way to go.

I eventually fell in love with the idea of making the Pistachio Pound Cake (above). We had a bag of pistachios lying around in the kitchen for about a week or two now, and no one seemed to know who the pistachios belonged to. SO. into a cake it goes! Might I say that cracking those small pistachios were truly a pain, but ah, sacrifices for the greater good.

Unfortch, jia doesn't share my new fixation with pistachios, and because she was supposed to come over for supper, I decided to try a different version of the lemon poppyseed yogurt cake. I'm beginning to think that my oven has decided to be very kind to me lately- because everything came out great (i.e. no smoke emanating and no charred on the outside, squishy in the inside cakes)!

Yay! perfect way to end my non-library day. And sadly, I'll be back there tomorrow. But this time, there'd be no embarrassing stomach growling because I'll be packing these yummers there for me and P.

So take that- irritating guy-beside-me-that-looked-and-laughed everytime my stomach growled.

Borough, once more

Finding out that my darling new-library-partner, P, (yes, I hang out in the library these days) had not been to borough at all throughout her three years here shocked me (and other people who knew about this) beyond belief! So, with Saturday being our designated non-library day (yes we are that uncool), Borough market seemed the obvious destination. With me raving about the Apple+Strawberry Juice that the amazing Chegworth Valley Juice Company produces, she tried and bought a bottle of goodness. And not to mention the really tasty mushroom pate. Yumm.

Of course, no trip to Borough is ever complete without oohing and aahing at the amazingly perfect cakes, and wolfing down one block of the gi-normous brownie tower.

Can't wait to take the cousin there when he comes (: