Wake Up and Smell the Cake

Oh goddd I hate stomachaches. All that churning and squirming and not knowing why! Anyway. I'm back from Lombok and back to office sadly hahaha. Lombok deserves a post on its own so I'll save that for later. Made a vanilla bean bundt cake on Christmas after a dry baking spell haha. To my horror there were no vanilla bean cake recipes in my recipe books so I googled and use this recipe by butteredup . Vanilla Bean Bundt Cake 3 cups all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 2 sticks butter, softened (I reduced by 1/4 stick) 1 3/4 cups granulated sugar 2 vanilla beans, halved lengthwise 5 eggs 1 cup + 2 tbsp milk + 1 tbsp vinegar (original recipe is 1 cup buttermilk) Preheat oven to 170°C. Generously butter pan and dust with flour.  Whisk together dry ingredients: flour, baking powder and baking soda.  Beat together butter and sugar in an electric mixer at medium speed until pale and fluffy. Scrape seeds from vanilla beans with tip of ...

Nothing on food today. I wanna talk about Junior. He's growing so fast. In a few weeks' time, he'll turn 18 months. He's grown so much, so tall. Junior pretty much understands most of the things we say to him cos he knows when to shake his head if he doesn't want something. But he hasn't learnt to talk yet. I am kinda worried about that, but then Husband didn't talk till after two and that didn't stop him from being a debater. I'm trying to console myself by saying maybe he's a little late, that's all. Not like he has some deficiency or something. Junior keeps changing his preferences. Like now he likes panda bears (he loved Kungfu Panda on okto yesterday!), he doesn't want to solat but he aminkan doa . Things that aren't seasonal are his love for fruits, climbing, biting me (yes, it's been going on for the longest time), and the most sweetest thing, helping out with housework. He will pull the laundry basket out of our room a...

Second post in a day! I'm alone at home, that's why. No baby to disturb me wahahaha. Haven't done as much houswork as I thought I would, I wish I could clean the fan, vacuum the floor, iron next week's clothes, but all that is pretty much impossible within a couple of hours. Anyway! I wanted to blog about lunch! I had no idea what to cook, but I know I wanted something soupy. So I boiled angel hair pasta (mee sua would have been my first choice but I'm out of that) and decided to marinate chicken first. Teriyaki chicken with pasta soup. With very few basic ingredients! Perfect for a kitchen that doesn't have much ingredients stocked up. I have now mastered the art of cooking for one, my estimations have improved. Sliced thin strips of the chicken breast that I always use for Junior's porridge, and got started on lunch preparations. Chicken Teriyaki (for 1) 1 portion of chicken, sliced thinly 2 tbsp light soy sauce 1 tbsp sugar 2 crushed & cho...

Apple cupcake/mini cakes in the oven wee!! Finally FINALLY got to use all the apples. I loosely adapted the recipe from here , with alterations. I made 1 1/2 times the batter so that I could use all 6 apples. Am not sure what they will turn out like, but here's the recipe anyway! I'll update in a few minutes' time when the 1st batch is out. Moist Apple Cake 6 apples, diced 1 1/2 tbsp cinnamon 4 1/2 tbsp sugar 2 1/2 cups flour 1 tbsp baking powder 1/2 cup canola oil + 2 tbsp butter 1 1/2 cups sugar 1/3 cup apple juice 2 tsp vanilla 3 eggs 1/2 cup milk walnuts Mix the diced apples, cinnamon, 4 1/2 tbsp sugar together, make sure the apples are coated well. Mix the butter, oil, apple juice, sugar, vanilla together well. Add in eggs one at a time, incorporating into the batter. Add in the flour and baking powder. Because I thought the batter was too thick, I added the milk here haha. Add in the apples and walnuts and mix well. Bake at 180 degrees Celsius for...

While waiting for Husband to end his meeting, I shall blog. We're going Toys R Us later to look at, well, toys. HAHA. Feeling under the weather a little, my throat felt weird yesterday afternoon and when it was night time I felt like I was swallowing a golf ball. Very painful. Now it's much better, with slight fever, am thinking if I should go to the doctor or not. And the office is freezing cold!! These people aren't wearing any jackets or anything either! It's already midweek but I'm gonna blog about the weekend haha. Made butter almond cake for dearest Husband who has been complaining I have been baking everything under the sun except his favourite, and on Sunday we had family day by the work place! It was fun :) Games, mingling with staff, and Junior had his first sea play. Haha. He wasn't quite fond of walking on sand but he really loved to be in the sea with his daddy. Thank goodness the weather was alright, not too hot and no thunderstorm. It did dr...