Pasta used to be a regular feature on tea noir until I cooked it too often in the first two years of uni that I began to see it as a means to an end. Freshly cooked pasta is a wondrous blend of parmesan, herbs and olive oil but one, two, three day-old pasta becomes goopy threads of its former scrumptious self. Leftover pasta became a symbol for frugality (not that being frugal’s a bad thing) but cooking and eating a week’s worth of pasta to pay off a shopping debt will never make the list of things I’d feel most nostalgic about.
This must be the most pessimistic I’ve been about food so I’m putting an end to this bashing since the problem here isn’t pasta per se, but my incurable health condition where I can’t seem to hold onto any cash for lengthy periods of time. And to finish this poor girl’s tale with a happy ending: after a year of skillful evasion, I am ready to embrace the durum!
What’s different about the way I cook pasta now is that I look for recipes which are more versatile – take my Poor Girl’s Vongole, for instance. I never got sick of it; I had it as a pasta on the first day, as a soup with homemade focaccia on the next, and had a ball picking out the last serving of mussels with a fork. It’s a relatively simple recipe if fresh clams are easy to find for you (i.e. you don’t live in Melbourne). But if you’re in the same sitch as I am, mussels would do just fine. I confess I’m not particularly fond of mussels but this recipe temporarily suspends my hostility towards the poor shellfish – that’s just how good it is!
Poor Girl’s Vongole
Adapted from The Food I Love by Neil Perry
Ingredients
400g dried spaghetti
1kg live clams or mussels
1/2 cup or 125ml extra virgin olive oil
1/4 bunch of flat-leaf (Italian) parsley, chopped
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
4 French shallots, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon chilli flakes (I sliced up a real chilli tho, yeahhhh heat!)
1/4 cup or 60ml dry white wine*
Sea salt and freshly ground pepper
*I used apple juice instead and I swear it worked out good. Actually, better than good. Apple juice is a Muslim miracle.
1. Clean the clams by giving them a quick rinse in water. If using mussels, you need to debeard them – this is a slightly time-consuming technique which I am no expert in, so give it a quick google and you’ll know what to do.
2. Heat the extra virgin olive oil in a large saucepan with a tight-fitting lid. Add the garlic, shallots, chilli flakes and white wine/apple juice and bring to the boil.
3. Add the clams and cover. Steam over high heat for 3-4 minutes, shaking the pan, until the shells open.
4. Meanwhile, cook the spaghetti in plenty of boiling salted water until al dente, then drain well.
5. Add spaghetti and chopped parsley to the saucepan and toss through. Season with sea salt and freshly ground pepper. Serve in four deep pasta bowls.
Note: Don’t freak out at the overtly generous amount of olive oil you’d have to use. 1/2 cup wtf, even I had my doubts (isn’t that heart suicide?) but the shellfish juices will be released into the oil, turning it into a beautifully light broth. I like it when my ingredients do all the work for me.
Poor Girl’s Vongole is probably best served with your favourite TV show, unwritten essay tucked out of sight and the same cheap bottle of apple juice/wine you used to cook the vongole with – nothing wasted!
Few things make me happier than salted caramel and chicken rice. Chicken rice, while very ubiquitous in Singapore, is something that I find very hard to make well. Salted caramel, that beautifully French combination that oscillates between savory and sweet? Not so much molecular gastronomy as adding salt to caramelised sugar and cream. Making something with salted caramel has been on my cards since I met one of my readers turned amazing friend, Sher Reen (miss you hon!), for coffee last year where we debated over who and who sold the best salted caramel cupcakes in Melbourne. That debate naturally turned into a web quest for the best salted caramel cupcakes recipe that we found and oohed over.
Still, I didn’t have an inclination to try the recipe out for myself. I may have become more enthusiastic about baking these past few months but I draw the line at cupcakes. They’re too much work for one lazy person and their nature as “perfectly portioned” treats (nobody stops at one, nobody!) makes them the best ill-disguised waistline trolls since donuts.
This salted caramel loaf takes the bitch out of making itty bitty cupcakes yet retains all of that luscious flavour. I was tempted to make a cupcake frosting for my loaf but went for the glaze instead since it’ll last longer and any remains would make an amazing spread over slices of toast. Also, frosting makes me do very bad things that I wouldn’t care to repeat post-sugar rehab. This recipe was based on a combination of two recipes: my matcha tea loaf recipe (no matcha and replaces the white sugar with the brown variant) and The Truffle Honey’s salted caramel bundt cake (the glaze).
Salted Caramel Sugar Loaf
Recipe adapted from Spoonful & The Truffle HoneyIngredients
Brown Sugar Loaf
1⁄2 cup (1 stick or 113g) unsalted butter, softened, plus more for pan
2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pan
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature
1 cup sour cream, room temperature (or yoghurt if you’re out of sour cream)
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extractSalted Caramel Glaze
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 stick of butter
1/4 cup whipping cream* (Not really an accurate measurement since I kinda eyeballed this, the trick is not to add too much or you’ll end up with syrupy sauce instead of a glaze so be careful when adding the cream!)
Sea salt
1. Preheat oven to 350 F/180 C.
2. Butter a loaf pan. Line with a piece of parchment paper that covers bottom and long sides (leave some poking up from the pan to facilitate lifting the loaf out later). Butter the parchment paper.
3. Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Put the butter and sugar into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes. Reduce speed to medium. Mix in eggs, one at a time. Mix in flour mixture in 3 batches, alternating with sour cream. Add vanilla, and mix 1 minute.
4. Pour into loaf pan and bake until a cake tester inserted into center comes out clean, 50 to 55 minutes. Let cool in pan on a wire cooking rack for a few minutes. Lift cake out by the parchment handles and allow to cool completely on rack.
For the caramel glaze:
1. Pour the sugar into a medium sized sauce pan and heat on the stove over medium-low heat, allowing the sugar to melt, whisking often. This will take forever. Just kidding – it’ll take about 5-7 minutes.
2. When the sugar becomes slightly sticky and golden brown in color, add the butter and whisk quickly and constantly. Once the butter and sugar are well combined, which will take about 5 minutes, remove this mixture from the heat.
3. Add the cream to the pot with the caramel and stir well until the caramel is thick and creamy. Pour the glaze into a bowl and set aside to cool a bit.
4. Pour the caramel glaze over the cake (the glaze can still be warm when you do this, but it shouldn’t be burning hot), and sprinkle with sea salt.
A cautionary tale for like-minded finger-dipping taste testers such as myself: Do not attempt to dip your finger into the caramelizing sugar! Even though it doesn’t look like it, trust my blistered forefinger that it is pretty damn askldjsakdlj hot.
Sorry you haven’t seen an entry from me in over a month, guys! There comes a few moments in a semester when assignments are timed to be submitted in the same week. It is a sly and terrible thing to do to university students but such is life. Happy Eid by the way!! I’m a little sad Ramadhan’s over but oh my gosh yes food, hello! Before I say goodbye, here’s some extra delicious reading material from the New York Times: How Caramel Developed a Taste For Salt. Don’t say this blog ain’t educational.
GROAAAANNN. I did it. I heeded the siren calls of my oven, made a mess in my kitchen and despite wanting to stab something every time I spotted a new renegade flour spot on the table, I have to confess I want to do it all over again. Fine, you got me: it is pretty damn satisfying getting a beautifully risen loaf out of the oven, smoothing nutella over the first slice and welcoming it in your tummy.
Apart from having a room door strategically located in front of the oven (BAKECEPTION thoughts being planted in my subconscious everyday smh), there was one other catalyst that spurred me to embrace the rolling pin: a forgotten canister of matcha buried behind my tea collection. Drinking matcha in the morning used to be quite the breakfast ritual for me but this year I’ve ditched the green tea for its more hipster cousin, the spicy chai HAHA! Soy milk chai lattes are amazing btw, especially made with this soy milk I found in the super last week. I used to love soy milk as a kid but got sick of its cloying sweetness….a bit much coming from a girl with a terrible bubble tea fixation LOL. Anyway, that soy milk I’m drinking now has a thicker consistency and is sweetened with barley and pear juice. It’s even got kombu in it 
Really good stuff, I hope you guys can find it in Singapore!
Having tea with a slice of cake is a better mood lifter than drinking tea by itself (tho drinking tea alone is better for skinny jeans but I have since moved on to chinos so fork that) so I wanted to bake something that was slightly crumbly and light. I found this matcha tea cake on Spoonful and almost every ingredient in the recipe I had in the pantry so ++ points for frugality! Except I didn’t have baking soda and had to lug back half a kilo’s worth because that was the smallest size they had .____. Half a kilo……when I only needed one teaspoon GDI. Yes, I did think of breaking the packet open and stealing a teaspoon’s worth but ultimately, I am a god-fearing Muslim! (yes, really). Also this means I should bake more to get my money’s worth, oui?
A few changes I made to Spoonful’s recipe: again, like my truffles, I used Splenda instead of white sugar and instead of setting aside 1/3 of the batter to mix with the matcha, I increased this and used half the batter instead for a stronger tea flavour. You know I love my green tea so I upped the matcha measurements by er..a lot. I didn’t take any precise measurements but I was very generous: I just heaped it on and stirred until it became a shade of green I liked HAHAHA 8D Also if it’s your first time doing a marble cake like me, don’t worry about the marbling so much. My marbling didn’t turn out as pretty as Spoonful’s but I suppose one gets better with practice? Otherwise, temporarily shut the perfectionist in the laundry room and repeat to self, “AS LONG AS CAN SEE, CAN LIAO” (translated in standard English for readers outside Singapore: as long as you can see it, it’s good to go).
Matcha Tea Scented Loaf
adapted from SpoonfulIngredients
1⁄2 cup (1 stick or 113g) unsalted butter, softened, plus more for pan
2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pan
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar or 1/2 cup Splenda
2 large eggs, room temperature
1 cup sour cream, room temperature
1.5 teaspoons matcha powder or more, if you’re matcha-obsessed like me
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1. Preheat oven to 350 F/180 C.
2. Butter a loaf pan. Line with a piece of parchment paper that covers bottom and long sides (leave some poking up from the pan to facilitate lifting the loaf out later). Butter the parchment paper.
3. Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Put the butter and sugar into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes. Reduce speed to medium. Mix in eggs, one at a time. Mix in flour mixture in 3 batches, alternating with sour cream. Add vanilla, and mix 1 minute.
4. Portion out 1/2 of the batter into a small bowl. Mix in matcha powder, stirring well to combine.
5. Spread 1/4 of the plain batter into prepared pan. Use a small offset spatula to ensure an even, flat layer. Dollop with 1/4 of matcha batter and use a spatula to gently spread the matcha layer on the top of the other. Spread another fourth of the plain batter on top, followed by another fourth of the matcha batter. Repeat one more time so that the final layer is the rest of the matcha batter. Run a thin knife through batter to marbleize. Run spatula over top to ensure the batter is flat in the end.
6. Bake until a cake tester inserted into center comes out clean, 50 to 55 minutes. Let cool in pan on a wire cooking rack for a few minutes. Lift cake out by the parchment handles and allow to cool completely on rack.
K no more food entries until I write a beauty one LOL, thanks for reading guys! x
p.s I almost died taking that second photo (I had to stand on a very high chair), so please appreciate it more now that you know my neck nearly got snapped in half. WE MUST DIE FOR ART, or I should really get a damn tripod.
When I saw this recipe on Bakerella the night before my final essay was due, making these truffles went straight up the list of Things To Do When I Get My Life Back. I am that person who enjoys eating cake batter more than the actual cake itself (well, sometimes) so I say with no exaggeration that this IS the recipe I’ve been waiting for all my life. I also noticed that all my dessert recipes on this blog, including this one, have strictly no baking involved and I wonder if it makes you think if I really am against baking rofl. Well, I don’t hate baking per se; I just hate the inevitable mess: the fine rain of flour/sugar/cocoa powder on the table, cleaning the baking sheets crusted with butter and washing the damn mixer and all its attachments – no, thank you, I’m happier buying my cakes and cookies from real bakers, knowing that somewhere out there, someone’s kitchen is being dirtied and it ain’t mine TROLOLOL. What I love about this recipe is that cleaning up merely involves eating whatever’s left in the bowl – genius.
I didn’t have enough chocolate on hand to coat these truffles completely but I’m thankful I didn’t because I only had milk chocolate so drizzling it lightly on these rolled balls of cookie dough was sweet enough. If you intend to coat the truffle entirely in chocolate, I would suggest using dark chocolate instead. Oh yes, I also used Splenda in place of the white sugar, my feeble attempt to shave off a few calories from this bowl of MOTHER OF GOD goodness. So if you want to use Splenda or EQUAL, cut only the white sugar measurements in half.
Bakerella’s truffles are elaborate versions of what I have here, with little ice cream sticks in them so check out her site if you want to make her version ;D The recipe she uses is from a book called..wait for it..The Cookie Dough Lover’s Cookbook OMG SHAKING AND CRYING AT ITS INGENUITY! The author is the blogger behind my newly-discovered food read of the week: Love and Olive Oil. I don’t know her but I think I’m in love. Anyone who has the artistry to make an egg-free, safe to eat chocolate chip cookie dough and then turning it into an entire cookbook deserves all the love in the world. Thank you Lindsay, thank you.
Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles
adapted from The Cookie Dough Lover’s Cookbook & BakerellaIngredients
1/2 cup (1 stick or 113g) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/4 cup granulated white sugar
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
2 tablespoons milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips + some chips for drizzling
1. In a large bowl, beat butter and sugars with an electric mixer until light and fluffy (about 3 minutes). I didn’t have a mixer so I used my poor hand and whisk instead. Be prepared for aching hands and make sure you have some patience. Everything clumped together in the whisk so I had to clean it each time with a spoon. A wee bit irksome but it’s k, the results are well worth it.
2. Mix in milk and vanilla.
3. Add flour and salt and mix on low until combined.
4. Stir in chocolate chips.
5. Chill dough in refrigerator for about 30 minutes until firm enough to roll or scoop into 1-inch balls. Place rolled balls on a wax paper lined baking sheet (I just sprinkled parchment paper with some flour) and place in the freezer for at least 15 minutes.
6. Heat some chips in a bowl in short bursts of 30 seconds in the microwave, stirring each time. Drizzle over the rolled balls and place in the fridge to firm up.
I think this recipe makes about 25-30 truffles, depending on how big you make them. My roommate and I polished off 10 last night while watching movies wtf. I passed some to my girl Amy and she is equally enamoured: “OMG DUDE THESE ARE SO GOOD!”. I have about 10 left and roomie’s gone off to get some vanilla ice cream now…yep, we’re going to do just that ;p
P.S HOW PRECIOUS ARE MY TEASPOON AND CAKE FORK?! They’re from Daiso :3
I think Japanese shrooms tend to get overlooked here in Singapore since it’s readily available all year, you can find it anywhere, and a packet is just under a dollar (if you know where to look). Most people tend to go for the meatier, more expensive field or portobello variety which I’m also obsessed with and I’m lucky to be living in Australia where these shrooms cost half the price they get sold for in Singapore. The bad? The ‘specialty’ Japanese shrooms are expensive and should be avoided when you’ve spent half your allowance on things best left hidden away from the mothership LOL. Every time I fly home I make sure I eat my fill of Japanese shrooms until I can’t stand the sight of them anymore.
I like the idea of having Japanese food for New Year’s because it makes me feel like I’m one with my people HAHAHAHA RIGHT! The Japanese have this ritual of eating certain foods during New Year’s and while I’m not entirely sure whether they actually eat soba then but what the heck let’s pretend they do! I hope you guys like this recipe, it’s simple and clean eating – what the Japanese do best.
Tsuyu is essentially the dipping sauce that comes with your soba noodles and you can get it at any supermarket with a Japanese food aisle. Muslims might have some trouble finding a bottle without mirin or sake in it so here’s a recipe I always follow. Just replace the mirin with a little white grape or apple juice and add less sugar since juice is inherently packed with fructose ;p And because we’re already eating the soba noodles with the exact same tsuyu we’ve made/bought, I’ve added a couple of twists for the tsuyu simmering sauce so everything doesn’t end up tasting the same 
Tsuyu Simmered Shimeji Mushrooms with Cha Soba
Ingredients
Chilled tsuyu
Cha soba (or normal soba if you prefer)
1 packet shimeji mushrooms (enoki works great too!)
A squeeze of lime juice
1 tablespoon soy sauce
Shredded seaweed1. Cook the soba according to the instructions on the packet. Drain the pot when done and if you like your soba chilled, plunge the soba in ice cold water. Drain again and put it in the fridge until ready to eat.
2. Pour some tsuyu into a pot and throw in some shredded seaweed, lime juice and soy sauce.
3. When the tsuyu reaches a light boil, it’s time to dump in your shrooms!
4. Let it simmer for about 5-10 minutes or until all the shrooms are cooked.
5. Drain the mushrooms but don’t throw away the simmering sauce! You can pour it in a bottle, chill it and voila – dipping sauce for your next soba meal!
6. Get your soba out of the fridge, pile your shrooms on the noodles, garnish with more seaweed and roasted sesame seeds! Pour the rest of your chilled tsuyu in a small bowl and you’re all set! ME GUSTAAAAAAA
Happy 2012, everyone! Thank you for reading this tiny speck of space on the web, it means so much to me! 
I was thinking of changing my layout but I remembered how torturous it was for me to recreate all my graphics last year so I’m scrapping that idea LOL. I did, however, change the typefaces for my entry titles and headings so everything looks more streamlined now – that counts right? 8D I also just renewed my web hosting for another 3 years so I guess tea noir’s not going anywhere. Here’s to a beautiful and fulfilling year for everyone!
Uni started this week and my mind still hasn’t adjusted itself to the escalation of thinking required when attending classes. The first week after spring break is customarily filled with “how was your holiday?”-type questions and I’m always happy to oblige. Against a background of my friends recollecting their adventures in Sydney/Queensland/Monaco (k the Monaco tale did make me a lil green), I was one of the few who would say unashamedly, “I did absolutely nothing and it was beautiful.”
Okay, that was a semi-lie. I spent the last two weeks getting my body back on track: I threw away all the junk food I had in my house, even my roommate’s emergency bags of crisps when she wasn’t looking. Just kidding. It took all of my powers of persuasion (“It’s not food wastage if it isn’t real food to begin with!”) and she finally relented in the end. I also ate more complex carbs and at some point, the only form of protein I was consuming was tofu so in some ways, I became a pseudo-vegetarian LOL.
This was unintentional to be honest, I couldn’t be arsed to go to the market to get fish and meat ;p But the two week meat purge did me some good: I’ve lost 3 kilos so far WHOO /o/ Anyway, my fridge is now fully-stocked again so I guess that’s the end of my stint as a vegetarian haha! It feels great to be eating healthy again though and I can’t remember why I went down the dark path of evil processed food – Oh right – school, the elitist institution responsible for nurturing, not bright minds, but weight gain.
The irony in this entry is that I’m about to share a seafood chowder recipe which isn’t exactly on top of the healthy food list since it’s loaded with one of God’s greatest gifts to female thighs: cream. But one can always make healthy adjustments to the recipe by using lite cream and skim milk, yes? I take no credit for the recipe, it’s actually my roommate’s which is why I’ve named it after her ;D Thanks Nini! <3
Nini’s Seafood Chowder
Ingredients
1 teaspoon butter
1 onion
2 gloves garlic
1 potato, boiled and grated
1 cup fresh milk
1/2 cup cream (YEAAAAHHHHH)
1.5 cups of seafood marinara mix
1 tablespoon parsley, chopped finely
A pinch of salt and black pepper
Instructions
1. Melt the butter in a heated pot and throw in the garlic and onion until fragrant.2. Add in the grated potato and stir.
3. Pour the fresh milk into the pot and let it heat up for a bit.
4. Add the marinara and cream into the mixture and make sure you stir well!
5. Season according to taste with the salt, black pepper and parsley.
6. Serve with bread or with pasta!
I actually like it enough on its own ;D Bon appétit!
And because I’ve been a proud Apple advocate since 2005:
The man whose computers and applications I have to thank for allowing me to create beautiful things like tea noir and the many other design projects I was involved in during my days as a design student and subsequently, as a working designer. Thank you Steve, and goodbye.
Image credit: Time.com
P.S about the Apple logo: It wasn’t designed by Steve Jobs or anyone under Apple for that matter. It was designed by a man named Rob Janoff who says the story of Adam and Eve had nothing to do with the bite in the famous apple. Here’s my favourite quote from an interview he did:
I’m probably the least religious person, so Adam and Eve didn’t have anything to do with it. The bite of knowledge sounds fabulous, but that’s not it. And, there is a whole lot of other lure about it.
Turing, the famous supposed father of computer science who committed suicide in the early 50’s, was British and was accused of being homosexual, which he was. He was facing a jail sentence so he committed suicide to avoid all that. So, I heard one of the legends being that the colored logo was an homage to him. People think I did the colored stripes because of the gay flag. And, that was something really thought for a long time. The other really cool part was that apparently he killed himself with a cyanide laced apple. And, then I found out Alan Turing’s favorite childhood story was Snow White where she falls asleep forever for eating a poisoned apple to be woken up by the handsome prince.
Anyway, when I explain the real reason why I did the bite it’s kind of a let down. But I’ll tell you. I designed it with a bite for scale, so people get that it was an apple not a cherry. Also it was kind of iconic about taking a bite out of an apple. Something that everyone can experience. It goes across cultures. If anybody ever had an apple he probably bitten into it and that’s what you get.
It was after I designed it, that my creative director told me: “Well you know, there is a computer term called byte”. And I was like: “You’re kidding!”
It’s strange. It’s never occurred to me to try my hand at making sushi despite it being a staple food I buy when I don’t have time to cook. I have made onigiri before to great success but never its more elegant sister, the maki roll. It’s a combination of factors that draw me away from making the maki: 1) I don’t have a bamboo mat. 2) Rolling sushi seems to be an art form that should be left to the professionals. 3) What if I screw up somewhere?
But one becomes brave enough to take a whack at making sushi when one spends too much on ASOS. If like me, you’ve fallen on hard times but aren’t willing to give up on your weekly Japanese dinners – I bring you THE NON-DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO MAKING SUSHI /o/
You should only use medium or short-grain rice to make sushi. Long-grain or the ever popular Singaporean favourites, jasmine and basmati rice, should not be used at all! They aren’t starchy enough to hold up the shape of the sushi.
Sushi vinegar
The recommended ratio for sushi vinegar is 5 parts rice vinegar: 2 parts sugar: 1 part salt (I used a tad more sugar tho)
Whisk the rice vinegar, sugar and salt in a bowl until everything has dissolved. I made a huge batch and stored in the fridge for future FOREVER ALONE sushi parties. I can’t say how much sushi vinegar you should put in your cooked rice because it depends entirely on your concoction and the amount of rice you’ve got. I eyeballed my measurements as per usual which on most days works pretty well but the universe decided my overconfidence towards cooking needed a shake-up so I ended up adding a little too much vinegar to my rice. Bleh ._.
Thankfully I discovered this was easily remedied by adding a few tablespoons of water to the rice. Of course as I type this, I can already imagine the many Japanese sushi chefs sharpening their knives, ready to make sashimi out of me for smearing their craft. The big deal? Well, you’re not supposed to add too much liquid to the sushi rice or it’ll get too sticky, making it hard to work with. But whatever man, as explicitly stated in my title this is totally not the real way to make sushi ;p Plus: sticky rice >>>> sour rice. Yep, I am clearly not striving for perfection LOL.
Rolling without a bamboo mat.
Honestly, after coming up with my method of rolling makis without the prerequisite bamboo mat – I don’t think I’ll ever invest in one haha! It’s just so easy to do it this way, this might actually be the start of a new way of making maki rolls 8D All you have to do is leave a gap at both ends of the seaweed square as seen in the first photo (when making rolls with a bamboo mat, one only leaves a gap at one end) and you can start rolling! Just tuck in the clean edge of the seaweed in and rollllll bb. Ah, I desperately wanted to make a lame joke about a particular Adele song but I shall refrain from doing so.
Cut your roll!
Take a very sharp knife, wet it to ensure the rice doesn’t stick to the steel and trim off the edges. Then simply cut your roll into pretty maki circles!
VOILA! My spicy salmon, avocado and furikake maki roll!
Best served with some awesome raspberry lemonade, of course. Get some rice, rice vinegar, seaweed squares, your filling of choice and start making your own maki rolls! It’s really not that hard as long as you don’t try to sell them 8D
I haven’t been here in more than a month, omg. I just got a little caught up with my mid-terms, such a killer D: I have missed this blog terribly though, hopefully no one’s thought I’ve abandoned it. But I’m sure you guys are used to my disappearing acts, non? ;p They’re not pleasant but it’s something I have to do when school morphs into a clingy, possessive boyfriend. Anyway, I’m not feeling well so I’m going to cut this entry short. Good night and stay safe, everyone! x
P.S In other news, my bff got invited to the exclusive Louis Vuitton opening preview party at their new Maison store at the Marina Bay Sands, SO JEALOUS OMFG WHAT IS THIS. Read about it on his blog here! Admittedly, I am not a die-hard LV fan like he is but that’s a place I’d love to check out when I fly back in December!
My move to Melbourne has not helped my sometimes frivolous fixation with bread. Well okay, my blog is an obvious testament as to how much passion I have for food but mmm bread, I just go crazy for bread. I could be heading to one of my dream locations in the world: the Louvre or the Blue Mosque in Turkey, but if by some half-baked chance (baha a pun!), I see a bakery just short of entering the Louvre – sorry Titian, Caravaggio and Da Vinci, you guys gotta wait 15 more minutes before I get my art appreciation skillz on.
It gives me the kicks to pick a loaf of bread from the local bakery I’ve never tried before. I guess I’m still not used to the exceptional range of breads we get here. It’s a nice change from the mass manufactured sliced white bread I get back home. Singapore definitely needs more artisan bakeries that don’t extort money for a simple loaf of rustic sourdough. It’s just one of life’s essentials, you know? Pick a beautiful loaf of bread and already, the thought of waking up early for breakfast becomes quite appealing.
Cut two slices off your pane di casa, melt some tasty cheese sprinkled with italian herbs (cheap and quickest way to making your own herbed cheese!), bulk it up with some baby spinach + rocket leaves and top it off with slices of smoked salmon. I was introduced to sliced beetroot here and while I would normally shirk at the idea of stuffing a vegetable I’m unfamiliar with in a sandwich, dayumm it tastes fine. My Singaporean readers, you should try it some time ;p I always find it hard to limit myself to one slice of smoked salmon per sandwich but when money is tight, you gotta do what you gotta do girl.
Still, I must confess: even when I’m down to my last few dollars, I will fork out everything I’ve got for a small bottle of Japanese matcha powder. Once you’ve figured out the right ratio of matcha, sugar and milk – you can say goodbye to Starbucks forever. A cup of warm green tea latte and a sandwich made with my bread du jour. This is my ideal breakfast, what’s yours?
A recipe post, as promised! I know, I know – I can hear your “pasta, A-GAIN??” groans from my bedroom. Listen up mmkay, pasta is a staple in any student’s pantry because they’re cheap, they don’t go bad, add in some olive oil and they make a far better couple than Blair Waldorf and Dan Humphrey are being made out to be.
I really ought to stop watching that show since it’s evident from the degrading quality of the past seasons that the writers have been at each other’s throats, trying to think of more ridiculous situations that would never happen to even the most filthy rich of New Yorkers. BUT IT’S SUCH A GUILTY PLEASURE GUYS D8 I like watching each episode, scoffing at the unrealistic tribulations that plague Ms Waldorf (obvsly the only character worth watching) and asking my friends, “Did you see that episode? What were they thinking?!”
If I could distill the entire Gossip Girl narrative into a pie chart:
It’s a little sad to laugh at your own jokes but HAHAHA SO TRUE NE!
Thankfully, I have other shows to distract me from the fall of Gossip Girl:
Not so serious: The Big Bang Theory (love Sheldon!!), Community (Jeff is SO hot!), Doctor Who
Serious-serious: FRINGE, Burn Notice, The Mentalist
I was so upset when Ugly Betty and Pushing Daisies got cancelled some time ago, they were such good shows! A lot of my friends enjoy watching Grey’s Anatomy and I’ve tried getting into it but I have this unfortunate thing against medical dramas. My mother works in the medical industry so I find hospitals utterly repulsive. This doesn’t apply to my brother though, he’s been watching Grey’s since he was 14? IKR, SO INAPPROPRIATE LOL. I asked him how he got introduced to it when I first caught him watching the show and he said, “Dad downloaded it for me.” I don’t even know where to begin.
Anyway, back to the main point of this post:
My friend, Amy, takes up kickboxing and the people she meets at her gym have rather colourful personalities that’s all I’m gonna say ;p She’s close to this girl, Ching, who has been a secondary savior in my life. I say secondary because we don’t know each other personally but this girl has changed my life forever! She taught Amy how to cook this pasta dish, which is both easy and tastes absolutely divine, delicious, amazing etc. It doesn’t really have a name so I’m calling it Ching’s Pasta and you gotta admit, it has a nice ring to it.
Ching’s Pasta
Ingredients – No real measurements, sorry!
Pasta of your choice (I used linguine!)
A few tbs of olive oil
Garlic (I used a LOT)
Italian Herb Mix – you can get this at any supermarket
About 1/2 cup Chicken Stock (or vegetable, if you’re vegan/vegetarian)
Mushrooms, as many as you prefer
Basil*
Freshly grated Parmesan*
Chili flakes
*I didn’t have basil on hand so I used coriander/cilantro leaves instead. I happen to be a huge coriander fan so all the better!
*Also, Parmesan cheese wasn’t included in the original recipe but you can’t make pasta without the cheese, that’s my philosophy. Can I insist that you buy REAL Parmesan cheese (like the actual wedge!) and not the pre-grated ones? It does make a difference, trust me.
1. Cook the pasta in a pot of salted boiling water until al dente.
2. Slice the garlic evenly, DON’T dice as you normally would (Ching’s special instructions k take note!)
3. Heat the pan with the olive oil and add in the sliced garlic
4. Once the garlic’s been cooked, add in about 3 heaped tablespoons of the Italian Herb mix (again, depending on the intensity of your herb mix – adjust accordingly)
5. Add the chicken stock and the mushrooms, stir!
6. Dump in the cooked pasta and add the chili flakes, coriander and possibly 2/3 cup of grated Parmesan.
So fricking good. Thank you for the recipe, Amy and Ching! It is now immortalized on tea noir and ready to be passed down to my children.
A shout-out to Amy who has been inflicted by self-confidence issues as of late: Girl, stop over thinking things – you are a beautiful person and I refuse to let you believe otherwise COS BABY YOU WERE BORN THIS WAY AND GOD MAKES NO MISTAKES (What, you trying to defy HIM now?)
School is killing me, guys. I have so many essays and a presentation due in the next two weeks, someone please volunteer yourself and write them for me ;__; BUT! I’m so excited for school tomorrow. They’re screening Star Wars (The Empire Strikes Back, I think?) for my Hollywood lecture and we’re sorta having an impromptu snack party in the lecture theatre as well. I don’t think food is allowed in there but whatever, you can’t watch Star Wars without popcorn and crisps! Hope everyone’s had a brilliant week so far! <3
AND BEFORE I FORGET: Check out Cat's BLOGSALE FOR JAPAN! She has some really great cosmetics up for sale and it’s for a good cause!
Marshmallow Pie
Ingredients
16 graham crackers, crushed
1/3 cup butter
30 large marshmallows
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup hot milk
1/2 (1 ounce) square semisweet chocolate, grated
1. Mix crushed graham crackers with butter or margarine. Reserve 2 tablespoons of this mixture for the top of the pie. Press remaining mixture in pie pan.
2. Cook milk and marshmallows in a double boiler until marshmallows are melted.
3. Cool marshmallow mixture. Fold in whipped cream, and add grated chocolate.
4. Pour chocolate marshmallow mixture into graham cracker pie shell, and put reserved crumbs on top. Refrigerate several hours or overnight.
Recipe taken from here.
You can be sure it’s mostly guilt that drives me to post food recipes on this blog. It’s my way of saying “Hey guys, sorry for disappearing but I’m still here, werqing what my momma gave me.” You guys are probably used to my disappearing acts anyway, try 12 weeks of intense essay-writing and you’d probably want to do as I do on my free weekends: lie in bed and pretend you have a life outside school.
The story behind this lurid pink marshmallow pie is quite simple: I was watching Nigella’s new show, Kitchen, and in one of the episodes, she makes a “grasshopper” pie out of marshmallows and some green-tinged Crème De Menthe. I was transfixed the whole time, fascinated by the almost tacky inclusion of marshmallows. Marshmallow…pie? DUH! My childhood fantasies and cotton candy dreams in a pie; easily the best thing ever. Plus, there’s no baking involved which means no mess! I must confess that I didn’t follow the recipe too strictly: the marshmallows we get here are small and come in pink & white which sheds some light on why my pie is pink lol (too lazy to separate the whites from the pinks!)
Classes are done for the year, I just submitted a couple of essays (7,500 words in total what the flying f-) today and I have an exam in about 3 weeks. But really, why delay the celebrations? I’M FREEEEEEEEE. Now I just need to get my life back but first, some pie for the road.
