Japanese Biscuits

At the request of E, I baked these. He has a name for them- Japanese Biscuits.

I like them too. Crispy and light.

Hainanese Chicken Rice

Our Saturday dinner : Home cooked Hainanese Chicken Rice. A few more extra steps but it made a whole lot of difference to the chicken :)

Fish scooping again

E had no luck with the guppies and he figured it was more fun doing something else. He engaged himself in "longkang" hopping!. Thank God I was in time to hold him back as he was aiming to hop over a 3 feet wide longkang which I was confident he would miss. If it did happen, he would be soaked in fishy water with guppies in his pockets! :) Meanwhile, N had a fruitful 30minutes! She managed to scoop 7 fish while Rose helped with the remaining 12.

After being caught red handed, E went on with his other mischief. These 2 were more interested in "saliva bubbles". Father and son, what a matching pair. ;)

When we got home, the kids started fighting over the catch. We settled eventually. E was passionate about his new pet. He went and checked on them every so often to ensure that they were doing fine but unfortunately, they started flipping over and the innocent boy remarked " oh, my fish is sleeping. Dont disturb" He even offered his raisins to them :(........perhaps that was the key contributing factor??

Tiramisu birthday cake

My grandma and aunt are here for a visit. In celebration of grandma's belated birthday, I baked her a tiramisu birthday cake. Not much of a deco as it was not planned for.

A cottony vanilla sponge cake brushed with coffee and rum and layered/coated with just thin layers of lemony cheese. (my aunt dislikes the cheesy taste). The sides were lined with freshly roasted almond flakes. To finish it off, the top was generously sprinkled with cocoa power which gave it that extra kick. It was a mild tiramisu, having to cater to the junior eaters.

The kids were just interested in blowing the candles and cutting the cakes :) Nic had 3 big helpings while E shunned away. He didnt like the coffee taste albeit light.

Grandma

We were in the lift, heading for our dinner.

My grandma ("GM") remarked" Eh, Where is Lawrence? Isnt he joining us? "

Me " Oh, Lawrence has a meeting to attend. Dont worry, you dont need to walk there, I will drive you " (I could sense GM's concern. GM is 81 and her legs are not as strong as before)

GM " You can drive now? Wow, such a clever girl...finally, you drive"

Everybody was happy to be driven to the restaurant as it was a warm day. Poor me, as there was no vacant parking lot available and I figured it would be better for me to return the car and walk to the restaurant instead. (Even if there was one, I wasnt sure if I could wriggle it in cos they were all parallel lots :(). Thank god it was a short distance. I reappeared at the restaurant within 5 minutes!

Homemade Durian Ice Cream

Creamy homemade durian ice cream!

Sitting in the freezer are :

Durian ice cream

Chocolate oreo ice cream

Avocado chocolate chip ice cream

My handsome boy lapping up the last scoop of chocolate oreo ice cream :) The kids are spoilt for choices:)

"I Love You"

E can repeatedly say "i love you" to me over 50 times in barely 20 minutes. It definitely brings about an immense amount of heart warming emotion. But this little boy expects reciprocation. A standard reciprocation.

E " Mummy, i love you"
Me " Thanks, I hear you"

E " NO! This is wrong. You must say " I love you, son""

Me " oh Oh, I love you S-O-N"
E " No! Dont spell it, just say "i love you, son""
Me " Ok ok. I love you son"

E " I love you mummy"
Me " I love you Ethan"
E " No, dont call me Ethan, you can either say "son" or "cutie pie""
Me " but you are Ethan, aren't you?"
E " yes, but I am also your son!"

Me" Oh yes, I love you Cutie pie"

See his standard SOP? A real cutie isnt he?

Nicole

I dont know about other children but for Nicole, she is totally independent. She packs her own bag. She does her own homework, which I dont see very often. She claims that she is the fastest in her class and she finishes it all in school :)

Most of all, she studies for tests/spellings on her own, if she studies at all because I have never seen her do it, frankly :)

Her independence has allowed me time to pick up baking :) :) Thanks to N's indepedence, I am now a much better baker than 6 months ago. Well, the kids get to benefit from it too :)

I was on the phone with her teacher a couple of days ago as I would not be able to attend the parent-teacher meeting. This is what she said of N :

" N is such a joy to teach. She is very attentive and independant. She has neat hand writing and so I get her to help me with a lot of writing and copying. She is definitely a high performer. I know she does her own homework unlike some other children whose work is clearly assisted by parents/ tuition teacher as the answers are too perfect.

So what I did was, I got all the children to complete their homework in class and Nicole is usually one of the few who are able to complete them, without any problems. This is when I can detect the true performers. Those who complete their work with home assistance, would now struggle.

I am confident she is academically strong. I think she is an all rounder. She is strong in sports too. I was wondering if you would allow her to participate in the interschool swimming competition in July?........."

Well, I know N's competence and it didnt come as a surprise but of course, it was an affirmation that N is progressing well and I am thankful for it. As to the swmming competition, I am not too sure because our pool has been closed for a major repair since April and it will remain closed till end of June which means N would not have a chance to swim or to train at all, now that I know a proper training will take at least 3 months (heehee, I obviously didnt know earlier - for N's school swimming carnival in February....) Will have to see....

Good job sweetie, you have never failed to make us proud parents!

Straight to the point

E was glued to L's ipad.

L " Ethan, I am home. why didnt you come and hug me?" (hoping that E would drop the ipad for him)

E " because You didnt ask me to " (with his eyes glued to the screen and little fingers moving the cursors)

L just rolled his eyes... haha

Ben 10 & troop

This is what my little boy would do each morning before heading for school. He would line them all up and admire them :) Isn't he adorable?

Chocolate raisin swissroll

The kid's favourite chocolate and rasin swiss rolls. This is such a joy to make as it only takes me 25mins including baking time. So, whenever the kids ask for a quick snack and if I am too lazy to think, this will automatically come to mind...:)

Ethan is 4

This is E's 4th Birthday cake - the one I baked for his actual birthday! He was delighted to see a change from the standard round cake. I was pleased that my effort paid off despite having to rush through the job, after work.

It was a simple chocolate cake layered with chocolate fresh cream, and topped with chocolate chips. Can't go wrong with more chocolates, right? The entire cake was devoured in 5 minutes :)

Nicole just reminded me " Mummy, E has 4 birthday cakes for his 4th birthday, then I shall have 7 birthday cakes for my 7th birthday....yeah!!"

Ben10 Wanabe

We had a mini home birthday celebration for E, at his request.

I tried to imprint a BEN10 image onto his cake but it was ruined as the butter cream melted. I had to do immediate damage control! There was a box of strawberries on standby. Quickly, I washed and soaked them in salt! The leaves were kept deliberately. I literally laid them over the disfigured character,,,,,and in return, I stuck E's Ben10 figurines on the cake plate....da....da....still a Ben10 cake in his eyes :)

Well, he was more interested in his Omnitrix than the cake :( the moment I permitted him to upwrap our present to him. The watch was something that he has been asking for but we decided to keep it for his big day and he was absolutely thrilled! Of course, he also received a Buzz Light year wrist band - his past favourite..., amongst other presents.

The girls were engrossed in pizza making and the only boy was running about with his Omnitrix and eventually his battery went flat before the party was over!

Express Kaya

For recipe, please click here

Chocolate mango mousse cake

A slice of tasty chocolate mango mousse cake for our Sunday tea.

I kept the mousse layer to the minimum in order not to introduce excessive fats to our diet. As usual, E only picked out the chocolate portion and left the rest behind. N was quick to offer to eat up the rest for him :) A win-win situation here :)

Chinese salted vegetables (Giam Chai)

It was 100% flavoursome with 0% chemicals! All I needed were : water, brown sugar, salt, and apple cider. The vegetables were even more seasoned after 2 days. Above was just after 5 hours of hibernation.

Now I can enjoy my favourite pickles without worrying about the added chemical agents!

Cottony milk buns

These buns were absolutely fantastic! So soft and cottony! They were not very white as I use organic unbleached flour. They definitely left an everlasting impression on B when she came for a visit from Australia! She jokingly remarked that I should consider a change in my profession and I told her I would need to bake hundreds and hundreds of buns a day to set off my opportunity cost :) :)

Muffins or buns?

A long overdue post. One of my earlier attempts in bread baking.

What do they look like to you? Muffins? No, they are custard buns shaped in muffin moulds!

This is a convenient shape. It is easy to pack into the kids' lunch box. Each will take one on top of the extras e.g. home baked chocolate chip cookies (their all time favourite), strawberries or a banana.

Auntie B & Auntie Wei

My little handsome boy with his adoring Auntie B and Auntie Wei, visiting from Australia. See how happy he was? Both Aunties showered him with more BEN10 stuff, adding to his forever growing collection!

Thanks, B and Wei for your generousity! You really didnt have to :)

Pre Birthday Cake - Chocolate Peach Cake

My second trial, consecutively. The kids were still in their PJs and they insisted on cutting and eating the cake at 9am!

I must say this was much better than the first spiderman cake though there was still much room for improvement! The piping, the lettering and the creaming!

The cake texture was good. I layered it with fresh cream and chocolate chips! Can't go wrong with chocolate for kids right?

Due to my inexperience, the kids got to have multiple trial cakes prior to the actual big day! Lucky or unlucky them?

Pre Birthday Cake - Spiderman Cake

I thought I needed to run a couple of trials prior to the big day, in order not to disappoint my little boy!

He was delighted to see his favourite spiderman cake despite not being in its best shape! He simply couldnt resist the chocolate! It was a mini chocolate tiered cake layered wtih raspberry mousse!

I definitely need to work harder on creaming the cake, wheather with fresh cream or chocolate ganache! The Web could be thinner and the creaming could be smoother... Wish me luck!

Combo

Nutritional combination wholemeal buns - Ham & Cheese, Salad & Cheese. Within split seconds, all the ham and cheese combinations were gone leaving behind the greens! No prize for guessing who the cuplrits were!

Oxidation

Out of the blue, E turned to me.

E " Mummy. What is oxidation?"
Me " Er.... let me think " (i was scratching my head for a simplified explanation)

E " I know, when your apple turns yellow and brown, that is oxidation and you cant eat the apple anymore. You have to throw it away. It has turned bad"

Me " Oh! That is absolutely right. You do know what oxidation means eh! Smart boy!"

I thought to myself, I didnt know what oxidation is till I was about 10 I guess. Now, this little boy is not even 4 and he has been taught already. :)