Love in action

I'm glad that my mum is visiting at the moment. I miss her. I miss my family in Perth. 

She deserves to be pampered. This was a simple gesture to show my love. 

Happy Birthday, Jo!

Last evening, Cindy & i had a lovely catch-up with Jo (My Wey of Life) 

at Senoji Japanese Restaurant, Vic Park.

green tea at Senoji

curry croquette (front) crispy! & tori karaage (back) juicy!

grilled Kingfish head & wing -fresh!

love these drawings on the ceramic plates from Japan

We had prepared a mini birthday surprise for Jo. Her birthday is coming up soon so we thought it would be lovely to celebrate it before she goes on her holiday.

ta-da! 

Tweaked all together 'birthday' cake (recipe adapted from 'Afternoon tea' by Frankie magazine.)
cute cake toppers handmade by Cindy.

and yes, amazingly Jo finished most of the cake! Thumbs up*

(check out her blog to read about her birthday awesomeness)

birthday girl, Jo

it was a memorable evening.

Here's to all the laughter and things we shared together. Cheers!

 Thank you again, Jo for the chocolate treats. They were so yummy! Well done!

made by Jo xoxo

Macarons & Christmas tree

Yesterday i made some macarons for a Christmas dinner party at Jo's (My Wey of Life). I was rushing so i didn't get to take any pictures. Managed to baked all the trays except for one. So after i came home from the party, i baked the last tray of macarons. One good thing about macarons is that you can leave the piped domes for a couple of hours and they will still have perfect feet. haha.

The party was AWESOME! Meeting many new people. The table was filled with absolutely delicious food all cooked by Joe & Jo and also their friends. Really enjoyed the food & the super-cool games! Wish i could stay longer but i had to go earlier. Got a hairdryer from my secret Santa! nice! Thank you.

So this morning, I experimented with the filling. I made some cream butter filling and added crushed pistachio and sandwiched them with the macaron shells.

Gave some to a lovely couple who lent me their bean bag. Thanks so much, Jin! =)

The rest went to my mum's tummy. haha. 

Found my Christmas tree cookie cutter few days ago. Planned to bake some cookies but didnt get around to do it. Instead, i had fun playing with it for my breakfast.
Made myself a peanut butter & sprinkle Christmas tree toast. haha!

and a Christmas tree watermelon was just perfect for a hot summer day.

Hope you have been enjoying these few days. If you have been busy, i hope you find time to rest and be refreshed now. New Year is on its way!

Much Love Monday: Cloud Cookie Cutter & Ghostbird by Zee Avi

Today i am joining the fun of Much love Monday. Head over to Much Love for more lovely posts!

Lately i am obsessed with

my cloud cookie cutter,

& 

i love playing Zee Avi's new album 'Ghostbird' 

while driving on the freeway.

Favourite track is 31 Days.

Last weekend baked goods

I found myself back in the baking mode once again. 

Bought some overripe bananas and decided to bake a banana cake, using Poh's best banana in the world recipe. This time is a great success. I used chocolate glazing & crushed peanuts instead of hazelnuts. 

Cake is meant for sharing so bringing it to church on Sunday was simply the best idea. =)

made some butter cookies too, played with the icing and alphabet rubberstamps. Perfect little gifts for friends when we do catch-ups. Maybe it's a good idea to bake for this Christmas. 

page from Inspire quotebook.

Cloud Cookies

Cloudy sky today.

Janice gave me a shoebox full of goodies for my birthday when she visited 2 weekends ago. One of the surprises was a Cloud cookie cutter!! I was psyched! Been hoping to get it and it's on my wishlist. Amazing how she knew about it! 

So thank you, Janice!

Today i made a small batch of simple butter cookies.They are very easy to make.

Recipe:

Ingredients:

75 g butter

• 165 g all-purpose flour
• 65 g raw sugar
• 1 egg
• 
  
• Preheat the oven to 175 degrees C.
• Melt butter or margarine over low heat. Remove from heat and add the sugar and the egg until it is all blended. Slowly add in the flour. Mix all together thoroughly.
• Form the dough into a ball and wrap in cling wrap and chill in the fridge for half and hour
• Then, roll out the dough on a floured area to a thickness you fancy. Cut out the cookies using cookie cutters Place the cut outs about 1 inch apart on the cookie sheet.
• Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until brown on the edges.

Dinner at Rockpool

Janice was here over the weekend and we went to Rockpool Bar & Grill for dinner on Saturday night.

Janice had My steak tartare with chips

for starter, i had Roast squid, smokey chilli and pork belly (very generous serving!)

Janice had Fillet minute style with Cafe de Paris butter & potato puree as side.

I had Confit Tuna with braised zucchini bucatini with chilli

So it was really great to catch up with Janice again after our USA trip 2 weeks. This dining experience brought us back to the many foodie experiences we had in New York.

Thought we should try some nice fancy food while she was here visiting, so i checked out the various websites and reviews on restaurants and listed out a few options like Rockpool, Nobu & Modo Mio. But because i pushed it too late to the time to book, by the time i called Rockpool, it was all booked out. So we tried Nobu and it was full too given it was a Saturday. We ended up going to Burswood Entertainment Complex anyway just to see if we can walk in to any of the restaurants. So we walked into Rockpool, which had an elegant corridor with candles on the sides. There's tables at the bar and serving same menu, so we were delighted!

The atmosphere was quite romantic although the kitchen area was bustling, full of steam. The service was top and friendly, the entrees/starters we ordered were actually quite big generous servings. The mains were good too and we thoroughly enjoyed them. And we were feeling so full that there's no room for desserts!

For more juicy review on the restaurant, please check out Jo's blogpost on Rockpool cause honestly after i saw the review & pics, i wanted to go there too! So thank you, Jo for your reviews and recommendations!

happy birthday (ii)

My family and i went to Tsunami, a japanese/infusion restaurant at Mosman Park for my birthday dinner.

Enoki Gyu
Fresh Narrogin enoki mushrooms wrapped in Wagyu beef with lotus roots.

Geko Roll
Seared salmon outside, unagi & avocado inside, topped with salmon roe & wasabi mayo.

i had char-grilled salmon girded with a sash of green tea noodles (interesting) with sweet potato mash and zucchini. Tsunami signature dish.

Plantagenant Pork Rack
bro had this organic and free range pork dish with herb infused, teppan roasted with sweet potato mash, bernaise sauce and salad.

The restaurant has nice atmosphere with music playing in the background. Service was quite good. 

Thanks to Jo's recommendation, it was a good dining experience. Read about her review on Tsunami over here.

Tsunami

18 Glyde St
Mosman Park

After dinner, we went to my sis place to cut the birthday cake.

Sis bought me a chocolate mud cake. It was super rich & went so well with vanilla ice-cream! yum!

A rich, moist chocolate cake baked on a shortcrust base and covered in dark chocolate shavings and icing sugar from Chez Jean-Claude Patisserie.

I feel so blessed to receive many birthday wishes from my family and friends. Thank you everyone for making my birthday so special and memorable! xoxo

9/31: freshly blended

9/31: freshly blended

i blended some fresh strawberries with milk, honey & homemade yogurt for breakfast today. yum.

{31 days project}

Party Pictures

So my dear friend, Janice has been sending me photos of her birthday party via mms today. And i just wanted to share the pictures here! They looked so good! =)

the wooden spoons for the Beeramisu they made!

the paper bunting & the pom poms *she made some gorgeous ones too

the drinks looked so GOOD with the paper straws!

and i sent her this... lol.

To the Awesome Duo, J & J

i have a pom pom hanging above my bed. =P

Pick of the day: Strawberries

6/31: Strawberries. red juicy sweet strawberries. In season. yum.

{ 31 days project }

baking spree

Today i went on a baking spree!

turkish delight

chocolate & green tea macaron shells

I baked a batch of around 40 macaron shells in 3 different colours. I am quite happy with the result! This time i used the Italian meringue technique instead of the French (uncooked sugar) technique which required more tedious steps. But it is all worth the effort & time!

watermelon macarons

heart shaped macarons

 I attempted piping in other shapes like heart shapes which were really tricky! i managed to pipe mini ones.

oh, and i made some mini blueberries cupcakes too.

More photos at my Flickr.

Made with love. xoxo