Wake Up and Smell the Cake

The feeling of guilt is back again. Not the ate-too-much guilt, but the guilt of not teaching or exposing my child enough. I am still refusing to send him to school because I need to force myself to teach him. I haven't repeated finger painting with him, and I haven't been introducing much things to him. How bad a mother I have been :( Tomorrow lunch time I shall forgo exercise, and I shall head down to Popular to get some sticky board, blue tack, vanguard sheets and glue. And I need to make some busy bags for the weekend trip too. Hope I can get creative enough!

For the first time I halved a recipe. I need to start reducing my cake recipes or spread the fats so it won't all end up at my butt. The weekend was filled with weddings, began on Friday night, went home late, whole day Saturday and two weddings on Sunday. Despite that I still managed to squeeze time to bake yesterday morning with my little boy. I let him mix the butter, which he gladly touched and spread on the floor (!!), and he refused to give me back the ladle when he was having fun 'creaming' the butter and sugar together. I decided to make them in cupcake form rather than a 7 inch cake pan so that it'll be more interesting for Junior. This recipe makes exactly 12 cupcakes, just nice. Instead of the normal butter cake, I used ground almonds too so that I can reduce my stock and at the same time get a nuttier cake. Ingredients 125g butter 50g ground almonds 100g flour 1 tsp baking powder 100g sugar 1 tsp vanilla paste 3 eggs 12 tsp nutella Cream butter

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 a

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

It's only Monday but I'm looking forward to the weekend. Just had a great weekend which started off on Friday with a long overdue date with Other Half. In our daily routined lives and busy work schedule, we tend to forget how to have fun and dates like these are meaningful and necessary reminders :) Back to planning for this weekend! Besides weddings (yup the season's here again), I have thought of a couple of things to do, especially with Junior. 1) Apple cupcakes. I have like 7 apples at home, 5 of which are green and bought for the sole intention of baking no way am I going to eat them raw haha, so off as apple cakes they go! I'm going to repeat the recipe I used before since it was a success. Since I'm going to chop the apples, I think I'll get Junior involved so he can play with the apples and batter :) 2) Go to the library. I have to get for us travel books on Lombok. Have not done much research as a dutiful travel planner and besides, I would real

Been a long while since I blogged. Made red velvet cupcakes for sister-in-law's birthday yesterday! Decided to try a different recipe, one which doesn't use butter. Reason being I didn't want to wait to thaw the butter hurhur. Anyway below will be a whole lot of buttermilk recipes cos I have a carton of buttermilk. Haha. Went to Universal Studios before that, with my family. There were too many people cos there were 2 family days there, one my dad's and another is a big shipping co. The waiting time is seriously crazy. We gave Transformers a miss. It rained too, in the afternoon. Thank goodness we weren't at at queue for outdoor rides. Anyway not much time to blog so here's the red velvets! It's a really moist cake, I read the reviews and some people found it too oily but I think it's perfect cos I hate dry cakes. I came across this when I was googling for "red velvet cupcakes oil". The tips were good, and turns out it's Paula Deen'

Was randomly looking for Casey Abrams' performance and I came across his album songs instead. Exciting!! The first song I listened to, Hit The Road Jack . Omgomgomg it's a collaboration with Haley Reinhart! Another of my American Idol faves! Haley & Casey should do a duet album. Haha. Anyway that song is like the best evaaa. Best version at least. Okay I'm totally sold on this album. It's good ol' jazzy stuff that makes you all fuzzy inside. Ordered one via fishpond cos I'm lazy to go to a CD shop. I thought of buying from iTunes but it's always nicer to physically own an album so I placed an order for a CD. I can't remember the last time I bought a CD haha. Can't wait can't wait!

No bakes last weekend boo. I happily took out my butter and cream cheese with this cream cheese butter cake in mind but then I realised. I have. only. TWO. eggs. Baaah. So back into the fridge they went. I did find eggless chocolate cake and brownie recipes but didn't bother to do any. It was quite a packed weekend with raya, cousin's engagement and a little bit of work yesterday, and to top it all off, dear Junior decided to wake up at 4am this morning all fresh and happy. So I did laundry & ironing while he was awake. He only slept back at 6.10am and as much as I wanted to sleep back, it was a bit too late. Darn. There was talk of school for Junior and those montessori of sorts, Husband is convinced Junior needs school once he's 18 months old but I'm kinda refusing it. If the purpose is for the activities then I think we can have our own little school at home. I refuse to pay for something which can be done at home. It's like going to a baking school t

New addition to the work table! Parfum! Using bamboo scent we bought from Taka, I can't remember the brand. The Husband was compelled to buy from this auntie cos she gives good customer service. She can even guess what kind of scents we like, and she's almost correct all the time! This was a bit pricey, 60 bucks per bottle, and we bought the refill as well, $40. An impulse buy for me, cos it was The Husband who wanted it and on the spot I took one as well haha. But now my nose is half-stuck. Bleah. Made brownies last Friday. Was on childcare leave, my poor baby was having fever. I managed to cook too haha. Made nasi goreng for myself with leftovers on Friday, and spaghetti goreng yesterday! I is amazed with what I can do when I have no menu restrictions. So for the brownies. It was the first time I made brownies from scratch! Yes! I've been too reliant on brownie mixes haha. This time I tried a safe bet, Nigella's everyday brownies. It didn't need any mel

I went to the gym yesterday! 2nd time. Last Friday I just followed my colleagues out of curiosity and then they got me to do some stretching exercises which are no joke by the way!! My legs were so sore I really needed to take full care when bending my legs! And that too, I did in my jeans. Haha. Wasn't dressed for it but oh wells just gave it a try. So yesterday I joined them again, this time I brought proper clothes and shoes and I was all psyched to get myself in shape! It was also my first time on the threadmill hurhur I know so suaku right. I don't go gyms and when I do jog (not run), it's at the park near my mum's house. And me and my lack of balancing skills, I was kinda scared so I held on to the handles when I started for the first 5 to 10 minutes or so. One good thing about the threadmill is that you have to force yourself to keep up with the speed. If you're in a park running, then you will tend to slow down or walk and that kills momentum. I didn't

I made curry puffs last Saturday. Wasn't much of a success, Husband didn't gobble them up and now I am eating the final one. Haha. In my opinion though I think it's a decent start. It's my first time making them on my own. The filling was good, but the dough sadly I forgot to add salt and I could have made the dough thinner. I always forget the salt. Or even if I do remember, it's so scant that Husband thinks I didn't put any at all. I'm not a big fan of salt anyway haha. The curry puff was filled with boiled potatoes, minced meat and quarter of a boiled egg. Below is the recipe for the filling: 6 medium potatoes, boiled, peeled & diced 5 boiled eggs, cut into fours 400g minced meat (I like lotsa meat in my curry puffs) 1 tsp salt (too little I guess?) 2 medium onions, sliced 1 tsp ground black pepper 1 1/2 tsp chili powder 6-8 tbsp curry powder? I didn't measure About 15 curry leaves I had some filling leftover, but I guess if I

Finally baked today yippee! Made pandan muffins this morning, cos muffins are the fastest and easiest way to get your baking craving fixed. And I can bring bring these muffins to work too for snacking. I got the original inspiration from My Muffin Lab , but I made my own adjustments. So here's what I used against what is the original recipe: 2 cups cake flour (2 cups self-raising flour) 3/4 cup sugar 1 1/2 tsp baking powder (NA because they used self-raising flour) 2 eggs 200ml Kara coconut cream (1/2 cup coconut milk + 1/2 cup milk) 1 cup canola oil (3/4 cup vege oil) 2 tsp pandan kaya paste (1 tsp pandan paste) Mix the dry ingredients in a small bowl and the wet ingredients in a big bowl. Surprisingly the coconut cream and oil mix together very well! Haha. Add the dry ingredients into the large bowl and mix only till combined. Transfer to muffin cups (abt 2 tbsp of batter per cup), I got 12 muffins! Bake at 180 degrees Celsius for 27 minutes. Ahhh so prett

I wanna bake  I wanna bake  I wanna bake! Didn't bake at all last weekend even though I had three days, and now I'm itching to bake though it's gonna be a busy weekend. Hmm. There's just too many things on my to-do list that I can't decide if I wanna make cocoa brownies or pandan cheesecake or pandan muffins or red velvet cupcakes!! Of course the easiest and fastest is the first option but I do love pretty red velvets. Options options! Sigh. Okaybyebye. Oh before I go, here's Junior! He doesn't really like bananas anymore, current favourite fruit is plums and grapes. And thank god plums are in season!

Hello hello! Dropping by for a short note on blueberry muffins I tried last Sunday. Although the recipe is To Die For Blueberry Muffins , I think the other blueberry muffin recipe has a more muffin-ish top, this was more cake-like. But I can't deny this is healthier because it uses milk instead of sour cream. Haha. No photos! Here what I used, note it defers a little from the original recipe: 1 2/3 cups flour (because I wanted to finish the whole packet) 3/4 cups + 3 tbsp sugar 2 tsp baking powder 1/3 cup vegetable oil 2 eggs 1/2 cup milk 1 cup blueberries Mix wet ingredients together in a small bowl, and the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until combined, transfer to muffin cups (I got 8) and bake for about 25 minutes at 200 degrees Celsius. I'm finally finishing most of my baking ingredients, time to get new ones!! Plain flour's cleared, brown sugar, walnuts. Now I shall aim to clear my optima flour and co

Had a superb weekend which means I'm sooo having the Monday blues. I love "just us" weekends. Husband had to attend a two day convention but skipped some sessions. Me and Junior was at home the whole time except Saturday afternoon where we went for early dinner and walked around Vivo. Vivo was quite an experience hahaha. I know it's family and children friendly but Junior wasn't keen on walking around on his own yet so we didn't really take note of such places until last Saturday. We have tried to let him walk around but he was choosy with the places. We first went into Toys R Us to get him warmed up, and warmed up he was! He couldn't wait to get out of the stroller! Once out, he happily roamed free, trying out this toy and that, wanted to make friends with GIRLS omg Junior you're too young, and when we carried him, he wanted to be put back down so he could walk. We literally had to scoop him up, hold him tight because he was squirming around

I went KL a week ago for a work conference invitation. I was just an observer, so it was relaxing for me hehe. Free trip! But it was a dreaded trip. Because for the first time ever, I was going to leave behind my precious breastfed (albeit partially) baby, and that is heartwrenching for both baby and mother. I don't know how heartwrenching it is for baby but definitely for mommy! I have become so used to the pattern of cuddling him while feeding him to sleep, then I get sleepy too from all those sleepy hormones released while breastfeeding, and bedtime for me is 10-ish. But being away from baby, I couldn't sleep! Like really tossing and turning on the bed. Both nights I slept after midnight, close to 1am. It was tiring. Pumping was okay, I woke up in the wee hours of the morning to pump, wasn't really sleepy after that. It has been ages since I can't fall asleep quickly. The conference was good, food's good. Food's almost always good in Malaysia haha! I

I have three green apples leftover (granny smith? Can't remember) and what better way than to turn them into apple cake! And it was the best fruit-to-cake decision thus far. There was a weird one I tried before, jackfruit cupcake and I have some longans at home and I'm thinking of some longan dish but since longans are more difficult to pit, so I left it as that. Anyway! Apple cake. I was in the kitchen and lazy to google some recipes, so I checked my two cake recipe books and settled for apple cake by Tish Boyle. The original recipe has more spices and maple cream cheese frosting which would be ultra yummy but I skipped that. I didn't follow the batter-making process either, I just added as I go. Apple Cake/Cupcake 150g butter, softened (recipe says 116g but I was lazy to accurately measure) 1 cup brown sugar, compressed 4 tbsp sugar (I added cos I thought the batter wasn't sweet) 6.4 oz flour (I used 6-ish, 7 not very sure)  1 tsp vanilla essence 1 ts