Minny's 20th Birthday Cake

Fruity chocolate cake

I was tasked to make a chocolate cake. But I didn't want to make a chocolate cake. I was feeling very fruity that day. I dreamed of orange trees, strawberry shrubs and raspberry filled bowls. Then there was chocolate.

Thus, a weird cross breed was born.

Imagine this:
The first and the bottommost layer is a cookie, almond cookie to be exact. Followed by a layer of creme chantilly and quartered macerated strawberries.

Third layer a chocolate genoise. I did the genoise well this time, wheew! Brushed some lemon-infused sugar syrup onto it. Then another layer of creme chantilly.

Fifth and uppermost layer the other half of the chocolate genoise, soaked as well. And decorated with creme chantilly, strawberries and raspberries.

It was very fruity after all. haha, my appologies minny. Happy Birthday!

End.

20th Celebration

20th.

On my birthday, I cooked for my guests, all 25 of them. To make my own birthday cake would be the last straw. I do like cooking, really. I like cooking for small parties, being able to seat and dine with my guests. Casual, intimate. Which was the original plan until my loving mother decided that 10 was the weirdest party number ever; she thought 5 people on each side of the table was weird. Hence, I called some, she called more, and my brother brought back surprises, we settled for 25.

I freaked out in the afternoon. I was so afraid there wouldn't be enough food for the people. Had to do some last minute additions after I ransacked my fridge, which means more rush! I lost my head at about 6pm. I went to play the piano.

At 7pm, the food went out. Whew!

My salad spaghetti, maki sushi, garlic baked potaotes, honey mustard baked chicken, sweet sour prawns and freshly baked pizza (not in picture).

After the food, we had singing sessions with live accompaniment and all. That was enjoyable! Thank you Eddie for the beautiful playing, and my brother for your guitar show.

Chef Yamashita made my birthday cake! Thank you! I wished they could've made it to the party, chef and Ami-chan.

Obligatory birthday shots.

Brother, mother.

Cousins who I grew up with.

Cousins who I grew to adore.

My brother's best mates.

My best work mates.

Incidently, my brother and my mother thought it would be funny to smash the last piece of cake into my face. Ha. Ha.

Team Glace

Erm, thanks for the extremely adorable apron.

End.

Happy 20th.

When I was still schooling, there is this thing called the report card at the end of the year. The report card will tell you what have you accomplished in that year, it will reflect on how hard you have laboured for your grades and probably your general behaviour towards your peers and teachers. I dislike report cards immensely and I was a good student, mind you.

Birthdays have since taken the place of the report card. I sort of dread birthdays now.

20th is a significant number. It is a quarter of 80, which is the average life span of a human being. Which means a quarter of my life have passed. Gosh! What have I done so far?

By the way, I want to thank Chef Mashita and Ami chan for the cake. And my colleagues for gracing my party with their pressence. And my family and family's family for coming. And my brother, mother, and Aida for helping. Thank you.

Durian Mousse Cake

Ants just tried to eat my macbook. I found them crawling with their six spindly legs all over my keyboard. Ah, I see one, two on my screen now. But I shall ignore them. As long as they don't prevent me from typing, I am pretty fine with ants.

Saturday, was my cousin's birthday. On top of an interview at Glace Patisserie, I am also going to make a 25 pax birthday cake for her.

Flavour will be durian, since her mum is going to supply me with home-grown durian from her village in Kulai. The kampong durian has a fantastic, powerful flavour. It's beautiful, pungent smell permeates out of its container, seeps out of the fridge into the kitchen. My mum was mortified. My little chocolate tarts, which share the same fridge, all taste and smell like durian.

I used the normal genoise recipe for this, and baked them in ikea food trays, therefore the round rectangle shape. Then I soaked them in abit of molasses sugar syrup. I thought it would go well with durian. Next I prepared the durian mousse with semi-whipped cream and gelatine. The easy part was over.

Assembly was more tricky. I realised, with shock, that I am a poor cream-whipper at home. It is never perfect the way I want it. It is either too soft, too hard, and when I'm irritated, it turns to butter. But I try my best. So, after the mousse is nicely sandwiched between the two genoise sponge layers, I attempt to mask the cake.

Masking (the cake) is without a doubt the most tedious process in the production of a proper celebration cake, for me. Got to wait while the cream harden slightly in the freezer. Got to make sure the cream is smooth and flawless looking on the cake. Got to have even layer of cream on all sides. Got to find something to do while you wait for the cream to harden...

The fun part- decorating. With fruits and mint leaves from the garden. Voila! The Birthday Cake is completed!

The birthday girl, my cousin. 21st birthday.

My family and her mum.

I cut the cake.

End.

Sooey's Birthday

Yes, it's Sooey's birthday. An invitation to Overeasy, without informing us of the time nor the address, that's Soo. And because it is Soo, our very dear broccoli, we try our best to make it to her party, even though we're hell as pissed that she's one hour late for her party.

Then again, knowing Sooey will disappoint us yet again, the rest of us went to eat dinner first, hence were also an hour late for her party. (thus we arrived at almost the same time) Another reason being we, the non-partying, non-clubbing people, are not entirely sure if Overeasy were a restaurant or a pub, though we did strongly suspect the latter. Therefore, better to be safe than sorry and hungry, we vote for dinner first.

Crystal Jade La Mian Xiao Long Bao.

Sawee has two smiles: one wide (above), one long (below).

It's been a long time since we got together like that, Joee was always missing due to her many commitments. Sometimes, when we meet up like this in full attendance, it feels kind of awkward. When I see my friends grow and change in ways that bewildern me, I become uncomfortable. Then again, who am I to judge? For all I know, I might be the weird one.

For this dinner, we ate as if we were still in secondary school, pubescent with the apparent disregard for table manners.

Then slowly, we made our way to meet Soo, the birthday girl.

"Sooey dear, Happy Birthday! Do read those books! I hope they can help you in finding your passion back!"

After 45 mins, we headed home.

End.

Birthday dinner

Hello! I just came back from a 3 day trip to Hunter Valley. It was an enormously enjoyable trip which will be up in the next post. Here are the pictures of my dinner at Samurai. All free of charge thanks to Stella.

While we were waiting for the bus. Stella and I are like sisters. I guess we are in a weird way. She is the family I have in Australia. :)

Watching cars swish pass us while waiting for the bus.

We brought a bottle of botrytis with us and we finished it all. haha, just the two of us. The stuff we ordered were not too satisfying compared to the previous time. I guess Samurai is just not too good in tempura and sushi.

End.

Present

This video is a gift from Seok.

I was so touched. So so touched. Thank you!

A very birthday surprise.

Today, I have realised I have really good friends. Friends who support my ups and downs. Friends who inspire me almost constantly. Friends who come to your house while you are away and set up a surprise party just so because it is your birthday. That's what friends are for. :)

I was tremendously surprised. I didn't see it coming at all. No, I didn't even dream of it happening. Yeah. When I entered the house, I saw shoes. Many pairs of shoes. Then I noticed the balloons, the streamers. Then I thought: did I enter the wrong unit? Then came the party poppers. POP! POP! POP! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Ahh, it's my birthday.. hohoho. I was still birthday-struck. Food came. KFC, nachos, fries, all the junk food imaginable. And god I was hungry. I missed breakfast this morning because of the isomalt lesson we signed up for. It had to start at 8:30am and I had to sleep at 1am. Therefore, I naturally tried to oversleep as much as possible, so much that I compromised my breakfast time. haha.

I was informed that the cake used as the birthday cake was mine. Remember the sacher? hahaha. Pretty convenient huh? Bloody using my own cake as my birthday cake... -_-

Not that I mind! I still have three more in the fridge!

Happy ninteenth! Presents! The guy from the photo frame is supposedly my boyfriend. He even got a name: Nickolas. Other than that, the rest are absolutely lovely!

Happy 19th Birthday~!

End.