Florentines

Yesterday's moulded chocolates and I didn't even eat a single one of them. What resolve. haha.

Stella and I have come to an agreement. We shall make our own lunch on every school day. Eat-out lunches are simply to expensive. One plate of wanton mee costs about $8.50 here. So what if they serve extra large portion? We incur wastage and lack of taste since they give so much mee and so little sauce. I don't get the chinese food stalls here. The cafeteria in our school isn't any better. One main lunch costs $7.50. It is similar to what I get in canteens, only extra large.

I can't go blowing $10 everyday on lunches. It is very hurting to my wallet. Therefore, comes the solution of bento lunches. :D



Stella and I alternate our bento-making days. I make bento for one week, she makes bento for the following week. So yeah. Today's bento was quite yummy. I made stir-fry broccoli with pork, tamago and pumpkin rice. As you all know, I can't chew very well with one side of my gum swollen and bleeding so I cooked my rice and broccoli to extra soft and gave most of my pork to Stella. I am turning vegetarian. -_-

Florentines for today's lesson. Florentines originated from Italy. It is a cookie sort of chocolate. It has a wafer thin layer of almond cookies coated twice with couverture chocolate. And with the second layer of chocolate coat, it traditionally had that wave design. :) Sounds yummy? Unfortunately, I am to swear off baked and sweet goods for now. And more unfortunately, I broke my oath. haha. Half-way through practical, I got unbearably hungry and the baked Florentines aroma is just wafting about the room. (I originally planned to survive on 1 banana till lunch. haha. it is a bound to fail plan.) Then Chef Karin piped: eat the chocolates!

Yes! Why not? It is ridiculous for people in the kitchen to get hungry for food is all around you. So I grabbed one of my Florentines and stuff it into my mouth. Bad bad move. My gum swelled doubly, so much that when I close my mouth, I can feel my lower gum on my upper gum. Hallelujah. As a result, I gave most of my pork to Stella during lunch. I can't even chew past pork. Dammit!











Recipe
Florentines~ makes about 14-16 little tins

75g unsalted butter
75g caster sugar
20g honey
25ml cream
25g glucose
few drops vanilla essence
170g flaked almonds
15g mixed peel -omit it if you don't like
25g glace cherries -omit of you don't like
10g bakers flour


1. Cook butter, sugar, honey, cream, vanilla and glucose until boiling.
2. Add remaining ingrediants.
3. Fill a thin layer onto tins and bake at 180 degree Celsius for about 10mins or until golden.
4. When cool, coat one side with tempered couverture chocolate.

I omitted mix peels and glace cherries. I find them too hard and chew-resistant when I bite into them after baking. Also, I dropped the honey because I accidentally added too much glucose. Still works though. And traditionally, Florentines are coated with only one type of chocolate. It is not very nice to give two different coloured layers like we did. Owells.

End.

Moulded Chocolates.

I am officially down with a cold. Doctor certified and all. Forbidden to ingest any form of sweetness, fried-ness, spicy-ness and bake-ness. Yup, and we are doing chocolates today, the extreme sweet end on a dessert pastry scale.

Moulded chocolates. We prepared two kinds of ganache the day before: wattleseed ganache and coffee ganache, which are to be used as fillings for our moulded chocolates. Chocolates, chocolates. I used to be pretty scared of them. They are messy, hard to control and result in alot of wastage. (good chocolates are EXPENSIVE.) Yes. In Le Cordon Bleu, they only use couverture, a high quality, melt in your mouth chocolate that is made from cocoa butter, cocoa powder and sugar. Other kinds of chocolates, especially compound chocolate, are basically rubbish bin inhabitants.

We first tempered the couverture (dark, white or milk, your choice. I chose dark.), melting, setting and reheating, to wake our chocolates up so they can be easily handled. Tempering is not easy (for me personally) but if you get it, you get it. And I got it today. (yesterday was a mess) :D After you tempered your chocolates, the rest is quite easy. Coat the inside of your mould with chocolate, pipe in ganache and put the lid on.

This is the first coat of the mould. By Chef Karin.

Piping in the ganache. Chef Karin.

After you put on the lid, chuck it in a cool place for the chocolates to set. Then tap it out. Tadah! All Chef Karin's.

These babies belong to me and my bench partners. heehee. A success! Wooohooo!

I didn't even try one though. Cold, stupid cold. My gums are bleeding, my throat is infected and I am having an internal fever. haha.

End.

Korean Kimchi Soup

I have thought it through. I am going to take up digital photography lessons at National Art School of Sydney, Australia.

I've realised that I need to learn how to at least make my products look good in 2D. I sucked at photography. haha. These are the garlic shoots that I am growing.

Today was a long long day. We went to an organic farmers' fresh market at Chatswood in the morning. There was nothing much. Veggies look like they were dying or already dead, and were priced at sky-rocket prices. Normal purple grapes cost $13.95 per kg. What a joke. A complete waste of time and effort. Good thing we stumbled onto a Hong Kong cafe which sells decent, almost authentic Hong Kong cuisine.

Stella had braised pork knuckles with rice, $7.50, while I emptied the whole plate of braised e-fu noodles ($8.80). This place is really not bad. The 港式奶茶 I had here actually tastes like the 港式奶茶 in Hong Kong. Don't we all judge the ability of a Hong Kong cafe by the 港式奶茶 they serve? (they should pay me for advertising their cafe)

I think I measure the length of the day by how much money I spent. My total expenditure today came up to almost a hundred dollars. Ahh, that's why I feel so drained. It is the stress caused by excessive usage of money. Every time money flies from my wallet, energy seeps out too. -_- Then again, I don't waste money like water on unnecessary stuff like make-up or clothes. I buy practical things like gardening supplies and tool box for my kitchen tools. See.

Dinner, I made Kimchi Soup. My Korean classmate taught me how to. And now, I will pass it on to you. :D You'll need:

1/4 clove of garlic (crushed)
1/2 large onion (sliced thinly)
250g of beef or pork (sliced thinly)
2 cups of kimchi
250g of silken tofu (cut into whatever shape you desire. Koreans normally have it rectangular.)
A handful of beansprouts

1. Heat a bit of oil in a pot.
2. Saute the onions and garlic on medium-high heat.
3. Add beef/pork
4. Add kimchi. Cook it till juices of the kimchi are forced out.
5. Add water till it covers the kimchi and bring to boil.
6. Add tofu and continue on a light boil until the soup had thickened.
7. Taste it. If you like the thickness of the soup, add the beansprouts to it. Let it boil for a minute of two, then ladle it out onto a bowl.

Serves 2. Goes with rice. Please, do use a bit of commonsense when cooking. This is a very basic recipe that most Korean families use at home. So feel free to alter it in whatever way you like. Just don't overdo it. :D

Gardening after dinner! I was doing handicraft for the rest of the evening. Cutting boxes, decorating boxes etc etc. I call gardening handicraft too.

See, I told you I could grow poppies here. No kidding yeah. haha. I bought tomato seeds to grow too. I also bought 5kg of soil for $3 and stole some from my school. Enough soil to last me for quite some time.

I went on handicraft-ing and made a make-shift table stand. This is supposed to act as table legs. But I think I got abit carried away.

This photo was taken by one of my Korean classmate, Soek. He carries a really big professional camera everywhere and this is one of the many wonderful pictures he has taken without permission. I don't even know when this was taken. haha.

End.

Nilagang Mongo't Baboy (Pork with green bean soup)

I requested Stella to make this soup again for dinner. I simply love it! And here's the recipe for it.

Nilagang Mongo't Baboy

Green (Mung) Beans: 1 cup/ depending how much of a green bean lover you are.

Yellow Onion (chopped): 1/2

Pork ribs (cut to bite size): 250g

Garlic (crushed): 1/2 clove

Horseradish Leaves (Malunggay): a handful

Salt: to taste

1. Soak the green beans overnight for it to sprout a little. (we want to get as much nutrients as possible don't we? :D)

2. Saute the pork ribs on medium-high heat to seal the juices.

3. Add water to cover the meat completely and bring to boil.

4. Once the water has started to boil, add green beans, onion and garlic.

5. Continue to boil until the green beans have soften and the soup has thickened.

6. Add horseradish leaves to the soup and correct with salt.

Serves 2. Slop the soup with beans and all over a bowl of rice. Traditional Philippino eat this with a mug of cold beer. Bon appetite!

My mum requested me to post whatever kitchen supplies I had bought. So here it is. Mini tongs for $3 each.

And a scraper, decorating cutter, multi-purpose scissors, mini sieve, spatula, big whisk and a cooling rack. I am waiting for my Kitchenaid!

I bought this cute little lunchbox today at $4. haha.

I went and got myself a piano today. haha. Stumbled upon this little shop near my school that sells piano. I rented mine at $550 for a year, including delivery. :D

End.

Nazimi

I have officially started to exercise. Woke up at 8 in the morning to run round the neighbourhood. Though I am skeptical about those horror stories of LCB students turning into vast lipid containers when they graduate, I do make it a policy to be safe than sorry. So run Heidi run!

How hard is it to pay your school fees? I never thought about it until today. It is annoyingly difficult to pay our school fees. Le Cordon Bleu accepts four kinds of payments, Travelex the preferred form of payment, credit card with a 3% surcharge, direct debit or cheques. It does seem very convenient to pay right? Well, it should be, but it is not. First I tried Travelex. It turned out to be only compatible with foreign currency. Credit card payment is definitely out of the question with its 3% surcharge. So I went to the bank to get a direct debit transfer. When I finally got to the counter, they lady told me that a direct debit to a different bank costs $28 and I have to go to the customer service department to get the transfer slip before coming back to her to get it finalise. The bank was packed with people. Cheque was out of the question too since I have to return to school to submit the cheque (it costs $5 plus for one!) on the same day to avoid the fee increase. Conclusion: I never did get to pay my school fees today, therefore I will be required to pay a higher fee as there will be a fee increase after the 15th. A fruitless morning.

After the whole bank business, Stella and I went to Kitchenware House at Albion Street to get some of our kitchen supplies. After which, we got back to Elizabeth Street (opp. Central station) to grab some lunch at this cafe.

I had orange poppy muffin. $2.50. My muffin craving was so strong that I thought I was pregnant. haha.

A mocha to go with it. $3.50. Mocha was good, not too sweet.

Stella had this home-made chicken mushroom pie with salad. $7.90. Underneath the short pastry is actually a gooey chicken, mushroom soup. Looks like dog food to me though. heehee.

We then walked to Queen Victoria Building, which on the way I bought some TCM (my body is burning inside), to continue our hunt for kitchen supplies. SALE= big buy= happy Heidi. :D

QVB's exterior and interior.

Sights along George Street.

Kinokuniya for the next two hours. I love books, especially cookbooks. My most recent cookbook acquisition: Professional Baking by Gisslen, at a whopping $89. It's a must-buy since it is a recommended reading by LCB. Big hole in the pocket. Dinner at Nazimi restaurant, which is advertised on Ja's blog. I decided to check it out. It is not bad really, similar to our Sushi Tei in Singapore without the conveyor belt. Located on York Street, opposite QVB. 141 York Street. Easy to find with its big signboard and pretty lights.

Like I said, Nazimi is not bad. It is one of the more authentic Japanese restaurants I have tried in Sydney (not that I have tried many). It even has Japanese waitress. Green tea, $2 refillable.

Volcano Rolls, on Ja's recommendation too. I agree with Ja on her critique of this dish. The fusion of thai sweet chilli to maki sushi although is not unpleasant, it does bring about some sort of strangeness to the tongue palette. They could have used their own tonkatsu sauce if they want to recreate the lava-flow of the volcanoes on the sushi. The mashed avocado and salmon on top of the maki sushi, on the other hand, is a great idea. $15.

Dragon roll, Stella's choice. It is not unlike Sushi Tei's own Dragon roll. I would appreciate more if they could use less rice in the maki. $14.50.

Wafuu steak, on Stella's insistence. I was almighty full after the two maki, so I can't really taste the steak. Well, it is juicy and tender. Well seasoned too. Yeah, it's good. $16.50 if i am not wrong.

End.

Wholemeal Bread, Pepita bread.

Today's lesson on bread, I nearly fell asleep. I didn't think it possible to fall asleep during demonstration class previously, but i very nearly did today. Breads are that boring huh? It seems that we have been repeating the same skills from Monday till now on different recipes. And listening to three lengthy lectures on three different ways to derive the required water temperature. The thing is, they all work. The three formula all gave me the final dough temperature of 27 degree Celsius. So what is the point of explaining all three formula to us when one is sufficient? It is confusing you know.

Chef Michael's Wholemeal Babs.

Our Pepita Babs. Hallelujah no more breads. We've got enough breads to last us for a month even when we gave half the lot away.

End.