28 Feb 2010

1 dough 4 flavours

I've become very lazy or maybe exhausted from school? Friday afternoon I came home early with an intention to make some cake but I didn't. I made some pizza instead.

Borrowed this Taiwanese pizza recipe book from the library and tried to make a pizza dough. My Chinese skills aren't that great, so I after I guessed what the ingredients were, I followed the picture instructions on the page instead. The water I used was most likely too hot, so I guess I killed the yeast...thus why the crust is so flat.

Didn't stop by at Coles for some pizza ingredients, so I just made use of what I had at home.

Teriyaki chicken pizza

When I told my sister and dad I was making teriyaki chicken pizza, they cringed and gave me the most memorable expression ever. I wished I'd taken a photo after all, it lasts longer.

The flavour was alright, but the sauce was a bit strong for my liking.

Japanese curry beef pizza

Had some leftover curry from my uncle's place and I decided to use some for experiments sake. There was a mix of celery, potatoes, carrot and tender beef chunks. I really didn't think this one would work out as the fat of the curry was already seeping to the sides.

Fortunately for me, this pizza was the best of the four I made. Who knew curry and pizza were a match made in heaven.

Probably can't buy this anywhere in Australia XD Maybe it's a regular flavour in Japan?

Breakfast special pizza

As my sister and dad were already calling me crazy when I was making the first two, I decided to make a "normal" flavoured one. I had leftover frankfurters, pizza sauce and pineapple in the fridge so I just chucked everything in. I thought the eggs would taste rubbery, but it turned out great.

By the time this came out of the oven, the sun had already gone down :(

The last pizza was just cheese and more cheese. It looked really boring and wasn't as innovative as the other three, so I didn't take a photo. Besides the natural light had all gone and I am not a big fan of using flash in photography.

17 Feb 2010

university camp

My room

Earlier last week, the Year 12's in my school participated in the compulsory camp at University College near University of Melbourne. Apparently the camp was branded "life experience" I don't think it was...

FOB Key

Met up at UC at 0900 where we were went through the whole process of a welcome speech, room arrangements and unpacking. At around 10 we left for Princess Park to do sport activities which was very annoying as it was a hot day. As you can imagine, most of us were complaining and exhausted after 1 hour of exercise.

Day 1 Lunch - Pizza

Cleaned up ourselves when we returned to UC and headed to the dining hall for lunch. Pizza was served and I quite enjoyed it. I liked the pizza crust, it was soft :)

Reminds me of Sir Thomas More (A Man For All Seasons)

After our lunch break we had another place to go to! - University of Melbourne. We had a lecture and tour which was kinda repetitive as we had something similar the past year.

Something I was always curious about University of Melbourne was answered in the lecture though. I've heard that graduates from top universities in the states are guaranteed employment. Well, the theory applied to my cousin Yumi, who is a graduate from Univeristy of Sydney. Apparently UoM has a 4 out of 5 graduate employment rate.

Pretty good. I'm gonna work hard to get into their Arts course! I don't want to be travelling too far away from home.

Our dorm is behind Ormond College (the castle looking building in the back)

Returned for some free time and a motivational speech from Lorin Nicholson (The Blind Guitarist). He was pretty inspriring and played some awesome music :D

Day 1 Dinner - Fish and vegetables

We had a choice for dinner and it was either roast lamb or some kind of fish. Apparently the lamb turned out to be beef!

Dinner turned out to be interesting watching A stop Mrs. Roddick sprinkling salt on her potatoes. You'd stop her too if you saw how much she sprinkled on XD

Peach and apple crumble with vanilla ice cream

To me, crumbles look pretty disgusting and gross, but after hesitation I decided to get just some. I really like it and it paired up well with vanilla ice cream.

Another motivational speech by an interesting guy, Archie Fusillo. He was pretty intersting like last year's accounting teacher, he used language that clicked well with people our age, which made it fun. Humour helped.

We watched a film that gave us background information about Maestro but I didn't get the movie. I also found it too bloody and violent. Not an ideal movie to watch at night.

Had a good night's sleep but I was concerned about the brown patches on the linen on my bed. Not an attractive sight.

Day 2 Breakfast - Apple and custard danish, apricot yoghurt, peanut butter toast, orange juice
Day 2 started off with a very sweet breakfast :) I didn't want eggs and tomato so I got all these sweet foods instead :) Breakfast was great!

Had a workshop regarding Maestro and I was near falling asleep as the guy talking was really droning and I thought he went off topic too much.

Outside the dorm area

Day 2 Lunch - Burger

Everyone clapped exceptionally loud when the lecturer finished the speech and we rushed to the dining room for lunch. The burger was tasty, but because of it's size I had trouble eating it. I ended up cutting the burger in pieces.

After lunch was more repetitive lectures and workshops which ended at around 1500 where we were dismissed and left UC for home.

And here are the interesting things you find in rooms:

This was in my room

And lucky Murasaki had a fan in her room!
We loved it especially after the sport activites on Day 1

Home will always be the best place in the world!

14 Feb 2010

新年快乐!

Source: clipartof

恭 喜 发 财 !

希 望 大 家 的 新 年 过 的 开 开 心 心 !

身 体 健 康 !

万 事 如 意 !

今 年 考 VCE 的 学 生 一 定 要 步 步 高 升 !

大 朋 友 , 小 朋 友 记 得 去 拜 年 拿 你 们 的 红 包 哦 !:)

13 Feb 2010

peanut butter cookies

The combination of two of my favourite foods - cookies and peanut butter.

***
peanut butter cookies

oven:
150 degrees Celsius
fan forced

ingredients:
makes 40 cookies
  • 1 1/2 cups rolled oats
  • 1/2 cup plain flour, sifted
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder, sifted
  • pinch of salt
  • 100 grams unsalted butter, softened
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup caster sugar
  • 1/2 heaped cup crunchy peanut butter
  • 1 large egg
  • 1/2 - 3/4 cups toasted peanuts, crushed
method:
1. Put oats, flour and baking powder in a small mixing bowl and leave aside. Cream the butter and sugars until pale in colour and turns light and fluffy.

2. Add in the peanut butter and beaten egg and stir until combined.

3. Add in the crushed peanuts and oats mixture. Stir to combine.

4. Roll 1 Tb of dough into a ball and flatten with your hand. Place cookies on a lined baking tray.
5. Bake for 13-15 minutes or until golden brown in colour.

12 Feb 2010

grub in a newsletter

Hate it when the mail gets all crinkly! Mail box is too small...

A fair few months ago, I was asked by Tsunagaaru staff if I could allow them to publish one of my articles I posted on the forum (which they will shorten) in a newsletter. It was nothing bad, and my net friend on Tsunagaaru had already said yes, I said yes immediately to stop any delays.

Saying yes, we both had to fill in a questionnaire and survey about our experiences of the forum. It was actually pretty easy to do.

Message - click to enlarge

I was really surprised to see a letter from The Japan Forum with a thank-you note attached to two copies of the newsletter. Actually, I was going to go online and have a look, but it was really nice that they sent me hard copies of the magazine.

Although has nothing to do with this blog, I hope it's a small step to future publications.

Part of my article - click to enlarge

My article was about Australian schools which my net friend found interest in and decided to post a comment, which followed a series of comments after.

Tsunagaaru is a really good place to study Japanese especially if you're in school (since you need to be a student to participate). You can read about Japanese student's lives, read about other students living in other countries and even post your own story! A bit like blogging, however there are a few rules to abide to.

I highly recommend you join this forum to learn Japanese :)

Grub was featured in The Japan Forum's 国際文化フォーラム通信 No. 85 2010 January Edition page 13. If you are interested, the newsletter can be found and read here.

9 Feb 2010

coconut ice - coincidentally the italian flag

It was a Friday afternoon, and I remembered I promised Magster that I'd bake her something from last year. Unfortunately exams and homework was in the way and never had the chance to do so.

I have free periods on a Friday afternoon which means I can go home during lunch. I didn't feel like baking, so I decided to make her coconut ice instead.

See the Italian flag? Hint: Look back right.

Coconut ice is like a 2 coloured layer confection consisting of desiccated coconut, icing sugar and condense milk as it's core ingredients. I didn't want to make the traditional 2 coloured layer coconut ice, so I made a 3 layered one! Coincidentally I only had pink and green food colouring, so the Italian flag it was (only the real Italian flag is red on the side and not pink).

I reduced the sugar by half as I thought it was too sweet if I added the whole amount in. Note that condense milk contains sugar as well. Also didn't want my friends to overdose on sugar and go hypo in class and I felt that it was sweet but not over whelming sweet. Feel free to adjust to your taste buds.

***
coconut ice
adapted from quick and easy coconut ice

ingredients:
makes 20 x 20 cm cake tin
  • 1 cup icing sugar
    (originally 2 cups)
  • 1/4 tsp cream of tartar
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
  • 395 mL can condense milk
  • 4 cups desiccated coconut
  • few drops of food colouring (optional)

method:

1. Put icing sugar, cream of tartar, vanilla essence in a mixing bowl. Add in condense milk and stir to combine. Add in the coconut and stir to form a ball.

2. Divide the mixture into 3 parts and knead in food colouring to your own liking. Knead until colour is evenly spread.

3. Line a 20 x 20 cm cake tin with baking paper and press one coloured mixture at the bottom until even. Repeat for the remaining colours.

4. Wrap and refrigerate until firm and cut into desired size.

***

Lizzie said the coconut ice looked like mini water melons.

What do you think? Italian flag or watermelons?

6 Feb 2010

バーニングブックス - burning books

音楽と人 August 2007 Ongaku to Hito - Mr.Children on the front cover @ $5.00

Ever since I have discovered Burning Books, run and owned by a lovely Japanese lady by the name of Noriko, I have been going there again and again.

I usually buy manga and secondhand magazines, but sometimes there are interesting things up for sale as well. As I am only buying these for reading material and practise recognizing kanji (and for entertainment), they need not to be expensive, unlike the ones I buy in Kanga Kanga for purely entertainment purposes.

Yep, I mostly only spend my money on books, Japanese magazines and manga :P What a nerd right?

香港 マカオ 2004-5 Hong Kong, Macau @ $3.00

Bought this as there is a slight chance I will be going to Hong Kong. Problem is it's an old edition and everything in there looks so old. Might get myself an updated version at the international airport...if I end up going. +1 for the map included. Hopefully the roads haven't changed much.

ヴァンパイア騎士 10 巻 Vampire Knight volume 1o @ $13.95

I think this is the only volume I have with the main girls on the front cover :) I want a Kain x Ruka cover xD

***

Burning Books
122A Buckley Street
Footscray VIC 3011
(1 minute walk from Middle Footscray Station)

Opening hours: Tuesdays and Fridays 10 AM - 5 PM or by appointment.

Telephone: 0412-283-060

Website: http://www.burningbooks.com.au/

Email: info@burningbooks.com.au

5 Feb 2010

面煎粿 - just an asian peanut pancake

A variety of names for this particular dessert? depending on where you live. If you are Singaporean you are most likely familiar with mee jian kuih, mian jian kuih, ban jian kueh etc. Whilst if you are Malaysian it's named something similar ; apom balek (balik?), ban chang kuih, man jian kuih, jin long bao (that's what I call it) etc. I reckon it's just how you pronounce the Chinese name 面煎粿, but to me it's just an Asian peanut pancake.

I lived in Malaysia when I was a kid for a year or so and fly there on a yearly basis. One of my favourite street hawker food was this peanut pancake. You can pretty much get them in any pasar malam (night markets). If you live in Malaysia, you should know that there is a famous peanut pancake stall on a Wednesday night? (I don't know if it's this night, but it's the biggest pasar malam of the week) It's so famous there's a massive queue every time! But the wait is worth it :D

Makes me await going to Malaysia in less than 2 months :)

When making local food from a particular country, I prefer to looking for the original recipe, meaning someone who lives in that country made it (does it make sense?) I stumbled across Piggy's Cooking Journal's recipe and decided to use her recipe.

It wasn't that hard after all and tastes almost like the real thing, just missing those crispy edges!

Adding the batter to the pan

I let the pancake set too much before adding the fillings in :(

Should be easy to flip if you greased the pan properly

Perfect for a family of 4 :)

I didn't have plain flour so I used self raising flour and added the raising agents which is probably why mine looks thicker that the one in Piggy's Cooking Journal. I reduced the sugar and didn't grind the peanuts that much.

Tastes almost like the real thing, highly recommend it and will most definitely will make this again and again and again! It's so yummy :D

Recipe used <- click!

1 Feb 2010

cheesy vegetable and bacon slice

This was one of the recipe featured in the leaflets available in Coles. As it is nearly back to school for Victorian students, Coles teamed up with Nutrition Australia (Not For Profit Organisation) to create healthy box lunches under $3.

Well, I had a look at the leaflet and had go at the cheesy vegetable and bacon slice which turned out quite nice, frittata like. I had all the ingredients on hand so I just mixed everything in. As it finished baking, I suddenly realised I forgot to add in two ingredients - milk and flour! I also halved the recipe, so the mixture was quite watery therefore not spoon-able like the recipe says.

But it still turned out edible which was all it mattered :) It was hearty eaten warm, but tastes just as good when it's cooled.

I should read the recipe more carefully, because I doubt the next time I will be lucky. But I don't think I am going to add in the ingredients I forgot for next time :P

Here's the original recipe, if you are interested:

Cheesy Vegetable and Bacon Slice
reproduced from the Coles recipes leaflet

Preparation time: 5 minutes
Cooking time: 30 minutes

Delicious and easy, this recipe tastes even better the next day.

Ingredients:
serves 8
  • 1 Tb oil (olive or canola)
  • 1 medium brown onion
  • 3 rashers bacon, chopped (fat removed)
  • 1 1/2 cups frozen carrots, peas and corn
  • 5 extra large eggs
  • 1 cup self-raising flour
  • 1/4 cup light milk
  • 1 cup light tasty cheddar cheese, grated
Method:
  1. Preheat oven to 170 degrees Celsius conventional/ 150 degrees Celsius fan forced.
  2. Heat oil in a frying pan and cook onions and bacon for 3-4 minutes until softened and bacon is slightly crispy.
  3. Add peas and corn and cook for 2 minutes, stirring to thaw. Remove mixture to a bowl.
  4. Mix remaining ingredients in a large bowl and mix in bacon/vegetable mixture.
  5. Season with pepper and spoon into a greased and lined 28cm x 18cm brownie/slice pan.
  6. Bake for 25-30 minutes until golden and puffed.
  7. Remove gently and cool in fridge.
  8. Cut into slices