What's in the kitchen on 30 June 2013?

Lunch

Today's a Sunday. A day of minimal cooking and a day to get rid of almost-overdue-food :P

Garlic Bread

I was left with 4 Okara sesame breads which I had baked 3 days ago. One of the best way to salvage the stale bread was by making garlic bread. Spread with thick layer of garlic butter, the melted butter percolated  through the bread leaving behind garlic chips waiting to be baked to golden ~

Mushroom Soup

I had a tray of sliced button mushrooms sitting in the fridge veggie compartment turning brown soon. I decided not to waste these delicious mushrooms and to churn them into mushroom soup.

I steamed one potato, one medium carrot and half an onion in the rice cooker till soft. The sliced mushrooms were toasted in the toaster oven till fragrant. I blended all these cooked ingredients in a food processor.

In a warm pot, I melted 10g of unsalted butter and add in the blended ingredients. Add in fresh milk, water, salt and black pepper. Ta-ta~ the soup is ready :)

No good food should be wasted unnecessarily, a little effort could give them a second lease of lives :)

What's in the kitchen on 29 Jun 2013?

Lunch

I cooked this Korean tangy spicy chicken thighs for lunch. They were so juicy that my hubby's first bite on the meat resulted in the juice squirting out of it o.0

To avoid burning the chicken skin, I spent almost 45 minutes grilling and basting the meat using low temperature. All worth the effort ^^

Recipe link: http://mymindpatch.blogspot.com/2013/06/tangy-sweet-spicy-chicken-thighs.html

Dessert

I love this cool aloe vera cubes in light brown sugar syrup. The slice of lime really adds zest to the plain aloe vera dessert ~

Recipe link: http://mymindpatch.blogspot.com/2012/06/aloe-vera-cube-in-pandan-black-sugar.html

What's in the kitchen on 28 Jun 2013

Lunch

Stir-fried rice pasta with garlic, omelette, green veggie, sweet soya sauce, sweet chili sauce and fish sauce. 

I like it sweeeet ~

Dinner

Chicken vegetable stew. An all-time favorite for the family. 

Potatoes and carrots were first steamed in rice cooker. Chicken thighs were marinated with salt, pepper, oyster sauce  and sugar. The meat was added to the sautée onion in the pot. When the meat was semi-cooked, oyster sauce, sugar, salt, pepper and about 100ml of water was added. When the mixture started to boil, add in cooked potatoes, carrot and tomato wedges. Simmer till soft ~

Baking

I baked this pumpkin honey loaf with chia seeds.

Chia seeds are the superfood seeds rich in omega-3 fat, fibre and antioxidant. 

Love this soft and tender loaf 💕 yummy 😋

Is the haze episode over?

Singapore has been blanketed by haze starting from 14 June 2013. It's The island worst haze episode since the year 1997. The haze PSI hit a record high of 401 on 21 June.

However, the blue sky returns after 1 pm on 22 June without any warning. No rain, no strong wind. I came out of the kitchen, and was greeted by the pale blue sky when I looked up through the hall's bay window. Astonishing!

In the midst of people queuing frantically for N95 musks, the haze cleared off without leaving any trace or smell Amazing nature...

Never Give Up ...

20 June 2013

I baked a butter marble cake by steaming. I went wrong in one of the steps. I supposed to soften the butter, but ended up melting it after leaving it in the warm rice cooker for too long 😔

I was uncertain whether I could still carry on the process. I may end up with a flat cake.  However, I decided to take the risk, by counting on the baking powder to do the leavening job. 

During the first 10 minutes of steaming process, the cake didn't show much height increase. My hope of getting a raised cake was slim. However, towards the last five minutes of the steaming process, the cake amazingly trying to gain height like a normal cake. I kept my finger cross that the cake wouldn't collapse when it left the steamer.

It was a beautiful small cake with fine texture. I was glad that I didn't gave up on it :)

An achievement

I'm so happy that readers from far away lands have clicked on my blog. 

Hello my friends :)

Thank you so much for stopping by.

Have a wonderful day, my friends :)

Captured a flying bird through iPhone 4S

I've tried several times in capturing the flying birds outside my window using iphone, but failed. 

Sometimes they flew out of my camera range;

Sometimes they just appeared like a black spot, without any shape of the bird;

Or sometimes, they just blended with the background, and you couldn't tell there's a bird in the picture :(

Today must be a lucky day for an amateur photographer. I captured TWO perfect pictures with clear outline of the zipping bird silhouette :

Picture 1

Pictures 2

 

What a lucky day despite a hazy day :)

Father's Day 2013

Home baked pizzas for the family lunch

Home baked pizzas are less heavy than those sold by the pizza restaurants. It's nice to enjoyed it with a cup of warm lemon tea :)

Black sugar winter melon coral jelly

A nice cooling jelly to enjoy on a HOT day...

Emicakes 

Cakes which the children bought for their dad on Father's Day. Yummy

*\(^o^)/*

Mr Bean Soya Milk Sundae

Everyone loves this soya milk sundae. Especially in an evening with temperature soaring to 32 degree Celsius :P

Celebrated 2013 Father's Day with a wide array of nice food. Satisfied ~

Rice Cooker Zebra Cake

I baked this simple zebra cake using a rice cooker. Yummy *\(^o^)/*

 

Visit to Garden By the Bay, Singapore

Garden by the Bay is a new Singapore iconic attraction. Its unique two-dome 'Green House' structure has won the title of World Building of the year 2012.

Singapore is a hot tropical island which has temperature ranges between 27 to 33 degree Celsius on a normal day. The garden provides its visitors a gallery to view temperate vegetations housed in the air-conditioned cool greenhouse.

The garden comprises of three main exhibitions : outdoor garden, Cloud Dome and Flower Dome.

The Cloud Forest

 

The waterfall and misty environment are the main two attractions of this exhibit.

 

 

 

 

The Flower Dome

The huge varieties of flora from around the world are displayed here. Once you enter the place, you can't stop snapping your camera. My son's and my iphones went flat before finishing walking round

:(

We will definitely come back for more photo shooting :)