Photo journal(2)

21 February 2012

Study!

This is the first DOF picture that i have ever taken in my 'photographic career'.

This was the view after a tutoring class at my house: so much homework to do and so much subjects to study ( going maniac!!!)

22 February 2012

My other camera!

That was another shot of DOF and i believe it would be called 'shallow DOF'?

That was a canon one and it has more features than the small canon i have now but it isn't comfortable to handle with.

 23 February 2012

My favorite dish ever!

Foodie picture! That was fried macaroni with beef and drizzle with lots of tomato ketchup. I just love eating tomato ketchup even though i don't like tomato at all, especially when it's raw!

 24 February 2012

 Duck paté!

Those were my sister's favorite food and were brought form Canada by my granny! Thanks to her my sister at least got something to eat when she can't deal with the whole family food!

25 February 2012

Traditional Hue dish!

My nanny specialty dishes are Hue food so she cooked 'Bun Bo Hue' that day and it was as tasty as ever! I believe that it was better than every bun be hue i have eaten because those were just 'looked' yummy, bot 'tasted' yummy!

 26 February 2012

                                                                      Another study mess!
Again, this picture also showed that how study can make you really worn out sometimes! But then i have to deal with it and have always been like that for 9 years of studying till now!

27 February 2012

My DIY kits!

I am so in love with the kits i bought from the online shop! Those designs were super cute and i can;t wait to make it but tests just keep coming up and fill all the timetable( oh man!!!). unfortunately, the rabbit kids didn't contain the instruction and i am still dealing with the shop to get it till now                                            ( what a troublesome problem!).

Photo journal

Missing Tuesday( sorry Ms Kris! "Valentine's day mesmerized me"-it was just my mind was blurry!)

15 February 3012

My yummy breakfast!

Homemade sticky rice with some Spam, fried egg and Vietnamese pork bologna.

My nanny prepared the meal in the early morning when i was still in my dream!

My delicious lunch
Soup with tomato, tofu and pork: Rice with stewed pork and some stewed fish bologna( chả cá)
My lunch of course was prepared by my nanny, simple but enough to fill up my stomach!

 16 February 3012

My drooling lunch!

Those are three courses lunch-for me! The pumpkin soup, fried bamboo shoot with shrimps and stewed pork belly.

What could be better than enjoying these everyday-dishes !!!

 17 February 3012

Breakfast!

Again, my favorite breakfast dish always is sticky rice as always. I had them with some meat bologna, fried pickled radish and meat wool? (chà bông)

18 February 3012

"Light snack! 

I had some fried wontons. Those were stuffed with some pork, fish( cá thác lác) , jew's ear mushroom and shrimps.

Can't deny the crunchiness and the moistness of the meat!!!Yum!!!

My Chinese-like lunch!!

That was a bowl full of wontons cooked in pig's bones broth-so good!!

Such great dish that reminds me of my origin!

19 February 3012

My Italian-like lunch!

That reddish sauce on top of the orange rice is actually the... spaghetti sauce! It was one of my favorite dish of all time! With just some beef , turkey bacon and sausage, the perfect  sauce was born! I also had it with a cup of Pepsi! 

What could make me resist such superb meal?

20 February 3012

The pretty healthy lunch!

The theme was green! Fired green beans with beef and again, stewed pork loin( love love those meaty and juicy meat). Finish the meal with some green vegetables soup.

Just have to spare some day to eat green veggies!!!

21 February 3012

                                              My so so Vietnamese-like breakfast!
Those were cooked purple sweet potato! A really traditional and country-like dish , except i cooked those in the microwave( when modern technology took place!) . It was not as earthy as it should be but anyway, eating those were simply delicious!!!
Thanks to my nanny again-reminds me of my childhood!

My brand new mirror!

I bought that cutie from the internet! 25000 vnd was pretty expensive-for me, of course but it has the puzzle that attracts me and i think it is a really good feature!

When kawaii creature took place in a 15 years old girl => $$$ is gone!

Green tea honey chiffon

When mention about chiffon, we always think about a cake that is super light, fluffy but moist like angel food cake because it uses vegetable oil,cake flour,... and the batter is folded into another batter of stiff beaten egg whites so it gives out a foamy, fluffy texture to it. I, especially like making chiffon because my family loves it and i also like eating it the most due to it fluffiness and not too dense like other butter cakes one which will tied me out after eating 1 little piece. So,since i have started baking the most popular dessert in my entire house is chiffon and it's green tea chiffon.

Green tea uses in chiffon comes in powder type and has a very fragrant tea smell to it. It is not hard to find but costs quite a lot ( for me and as some bakers i now in my country as in another countries) but it is worth to buy because of it nice smell and also very healthy for our body so green tea always is one of my favorite flavor when it comes to baking a cake.

This recipe especially added in honey and even thought i couldn't smell the honey scent but i am very sure that it gave out a very nice natural sweetness to the cake so this cake is a perfect combination of green tea and honey.

Anyway, here is the recipe that i have always followed for making this delectable cake :

A)
-4 egg yolks
-25 g icing sugar
-a little amount of salt
-20 ml honey ( i increased the mount to 30ml and deduced the amount of sugar. -1 tsp sugar +1tsp honey.)
(B)
-4 tbsp corn oil, heated until it reached lukewarm temperature
-80 ml unsweetened milk(+15 ml if you don't have or don't want to add rum)
-15 ml rum
(C)
-100g cake flour
-2-3 tsp green tea powder
-3/4 tsp baking powder
(D)
-4 egg whites
-1/2 tsp cream of tartar
-40g caster sugar
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 170 Celsius
1. Whisk all the (A) ingredients till the sugar is dissolved.
2.Add (B) in order ( incorporated well before adding the next ingredients) .Mix well.
3.Sift (C) together and sift into the (A)+(B) mixture and mix till there aren't any lumps.
4. Whisk the egg whited until frothy and add in cream of tartar and continue beating till soft peaks stage and slowly sprinkling in sugar and beat until stiff.
5. Spoon 1/3 of the egg whites to the green tea egg yolks mixture and whisk in well.
6.Pour the egg yolks/whites mixture back to the egg whites one and carefully ,slowly fold it in.
7. pour the batter into chiffon pan and put it in the oven for 35-40 minutes.
8. When it's done baking, transfer it into the rack and turn upside down and let it cool completely. Then use knife and run around the pan to get the cake out. 

Recipe adapted from:

dtklinh. 2009. Green tea honey chiffon. Recipe. Available from: http://my.opera.com/dtklinh/blog/green-tea-honey-chiffon [Accessed 10 January 2012].

Here are some pictures of green tea chiffon cake :

LILY'S WAI SEK HONG. 2010. MATCHA /GREEN TEA CHIFFON CAKE. PICTURE. AVAILABLE FROM: HTTP://LILYNG2000.BLOGSPOT.COM/2010/06/MACHA-CHIFFON-CAKE.HTML [ACCESSED 10 JANUARY 2012].

Anncoo. 2010. Green tea chiffon cake. Picture. Available from: http://www.anncoojournal.com/2010/11/green-tea-chiffon-cake.html[Accessed 10 January 2012].       

This is my not-so-gorgeous-outfit-but-good-taste picture :

I think if people who are looking for a light, fluffy but moist cake, you should try making this cake and it will be a big winner!

macaron

Have you ever heard about this fancy dessert? The dessert that is being seen as one of the toughest dessert to make and only professional patisserie like the popular and talented Pierre Hermes can create a perfect macaron. Well, it seemed like that for the first time that this is like a challenge for advance bakers or higher level bakers to overcome and i didn't mean to say that all beginner bakers can't afford this dessert but this is my true experience. I did have a really hard time at first attempting to make this dessert. In facts, i have tried 4 times i all attempts just completely disappointed me. Even though i have been trying many recipes and read a lot of tips from many trustworthy websites such as: 

http://notsohumblepie.blogspot.com/2010/04/macarons-101-french-meringue.html

http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2008/09/making-french-macarons/

http://www.seriouseats.com/2007/10/introduction-to-french-macarons.html

http://my.opera.com/trungbong/blog/macarons-gac and blah blah blah ....

But still, there weren't any signs of success.

I was depressed at the first time but the passion and the fetish for this dessert just kept urging me to try making it again so i eventually continued my passion. It was the time that i realized i couldn't take any more failures as it was a waste of time and money$$$$$$$(my bucks!!!) . I tried to find out the reason why i failed and it was then revealed that the macarons weren't let to dry out the surfaces enough so while baking those in the oven, they just kept turning into 'flat almond meringue cookies' ( i'm sicked of trying to eat those!). Then while surfing the net for a more reliable recipe, i found out that macaronfetish.blogspot.com which was the most beautiful macarons'heaven i have ever seen in my "baking career". Then i rapidly tried the basic recipe and guess what... i succeed!!!! Yah!!! I was overjoyed when the "feet" started to raise up, so relieved and joyful!!!!!!!

Those are marvelous and so so beautiful and just perfect!!!!

Kim. 2010. " Festive choco-spiced macaron to celebrate the end of 2010." Photo. Available from : http://macaron-fetish.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2011-02-05T15:15:00-08:00&max-results=5. [Accessed December 13 2011].

Here is the ultimate recipe from a talented baker:

FOR THE MACARON SHELL
1 room temperatured egg white(39-40g)
50g icing sugar
30g ground almond
30g castor sugar
1/4 teaspoon red food colouring

Method:
1. Put ground almond, and icing sugar in a food processor or a small blender. Blend them finely.
2. Sift the blended mixture and set aside
3. With an electric beater, Beat the egg white, start from low speed and increase slowly to maximum speed. Beat until frothy (you will see lots of fine bubbles)
4. Now it's the time to add in the castor sugar, add half of the sugar, continue to beat in maximum speed for around 2 minutes, add in the other half, continue until you get very stiff peak.
5. Mix the dry ingredients into the egg whites. This process is called Macaronage. Start folding with a rubber spatula. Mix just roughly combine.
6. Scoop out a spoonful of macaron mixture into a small bowl, add in red colouring, fold till mix. Set aside
7. Continue to mix the white mixture until you obtain a smooth lava flow batter.
8. When you get smooth shiny mixture, stop folding, lift the mixture with spatula, if the mixture falls back slowly in the bowl means you're good to go. You could also check if the lines formed from the lifted mixture, they should slowly disappear in within 30 seconds. At this stage you're good to go. Do not over fold, it will be too liquid and becoming very hard to pipe.
if you're unsure, you could refer to my basic macaron recipe as a guide HERE
9. Pipe the macaron on a baking sheet over baking tray. Hit the bottom of the baking tray with your hand to flatted out the macarons slightly.

10. Using another piping bag with a small nozzle, pour in the red coloured mixture. Carefully draw 5 petals on the shells.
11. Tap the bottom of the baking tray so the red mixture sits into the white one.
12. Let your macarons sit for about 30minutes. This will depend on the humidity in your house and the day. Try touching the macaron softly, after 30mins. it should not stick to your hand.
13. Heat your oven to 150 C on the (heating on the top only). When the oven is ready, put your macaron at the very bottom shelf. Bake for 12 minutes, check them in the mid time of 6 minutes, the feets should already start forming. Turn the baking tray to the opposite direction to allow even baking. When the 6 mins is up, change the heating setting of your oven to Bottom only. Reduce heat to 130 C. This will help cooking the macaron and rise the feet more. Bake for another 6 8 minutes.
You can test if the macaron is cook, touch softly on the shell and when the macaron doesn't slide on the feet, it's cooked. if it's not add another 1 mins each time and check.
Bewared that white colour macarons turn 'brown' easily, if doubt the oven is too hot, reduce the heat and prolong the cooking time by minute.

Kim. 2010. " Macaron with raspberry and dried cherry." Website. Available from :http://macaron-fetish.blogspot.com/2010/09/macaron-with-raspberry-with-dried.html. [Accessed December 13 2011].

And...here is my 1st time succeed macarons:

Another pics :

Those aren't bad at all-taste and appearance!!!

Chocolate chip cookies

-Last weekend i decided to make this simple-but-delicious dessert to be as a picnic snack for my family. On Friday night , i measured out the butter and took out flour, chocolate chips, baking soda.... for a good start tomorrow morning. Unfortunately, after being left for a whole night in the fridge, the butter turned rock hard and i had to wait 30 minutes for its to softened. While the butter was in the process of softening, i prepared other things like measuring flour, sugar... taking out bowls,stand mixer, wooden spoon...It was the time that i realized the butter still remained as rock hard as it was and i was near to the deadline time so i determined to use the last method -melt the butter in the microwave. At first i did read the recipe and it said that the butter had to be melted but then it said cream the melted butter and sugar. I got confused at this step cause when the butter is melted, how can you suppose to cream it together with sugar and egg?But still i microwaved them in a little amount at a time and finally the butter was softened and nearly melted. Anyway, let's get on with the work.After about 20 minutes i finished making the batter and trued my 1st batch. The cookies came out good but  because i didn't have time to let them cool down so they weren't crispy at all but they tasted great!!! Those cookies were the sweet snack for my family to Dam Sen Park!! Fun amusement park, good dessert!!!

Lauren. 2008. "Best big fat chocolate chip cookies." Photo. Available from : http://bakingaway.blogspot.com [Accessed November 29, 2011]

Recipe adapted form at www.allrecipes.com. This recipe would yield about 18-20 cookies for me.

Ingredients

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 egg
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease cookie sheets or line with parchment paper.
2. Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.
3. In a medium bowl, cream together the melted butter, brown sugar and white sugar until well blended. Beat in the vanilla, egg, and egg yolk until light and creamy. Mix in the sifted ingredients until just blended. Stir in the chocolate chips by hand using a wooden spoon. Drop cookie dough 1/4 cup at a time onto the prepared cookie sheets. Cookies should be about 3 inches apart.
4. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the edges are lightly toasted. Cool on baking sheets for a few minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool completely. 

ELIZABETHBH. 2001. Best, big, fat, chewy chocolate chip cookies. Website. Available from: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/best-big-fat-chewy-chocolate-chip-cookie/detail.aspx [Accessed November 29 2001].

Tiramisù

Have you ever heard about this dessert? I think the answer should be yes for all food lovers.  This dessert is well-known all over the world and being given the nick name as " Love Cake" for its look and also the taste. Tiramisu originated from Italy-that can explain why it has a romantic nickname. I decided to make this dessert because last time i had made mascapone cheese(last post) and i really want to use it up ASAP because it would not be good after a week so i chose tiramisu as my target. I know it's an easy dessert but it confused me a lot when i searched for it . Many websites showed a lot of good images with different recipes and i totally lost in 'Tiramisu recipes sea'. But then i made my final decision and i think it's a good decision to follow this food lover who is popular in Vietnamese blogers: kokotaru.

Here are some images of Tiramisu :

Linhihi-Mrlee1912. 2008. "Tiramisù." Photo.Available from: http://kokotaru.com/vn/2008/11/tiramisu/(November 22, 2011)

This recipe doesn't require whipping cream but it's being replaced by choux filling ( I'm not quite sure but the steps and ingredients are 99% equivalent to the pastry cream-except it replaces the vanilla extract for the Rum). The result is... well the texture of the cream layer was not as what i expected it to be . It's kinda grainy in texture-i think it's the mascapone cheese homemade(another failure). Anyway, a big loaf of tiramisu is still sitting quietly in my fridge and no one in my family is willing to eat them but i will try to persuade them to take a bite everyday!!!

Linhihi-Mrlee1912. 2008. "Tiramisù." Photo.Available from: http://kokotaru.com/vn/2008/11/tiramisu/( November 22, 2011)

Those pictures above are to far from my realistic tiramisu!!!

Egg Tart ( Dim Sum)

Last 2 weekends i made these yummy egg tarts as a childhood memory morning treat. When i was young, my family used to have breakfast as a Chinese restaurant and we had "Dim Sum" . at the very end when all the savory dishes had been served up, the dessert came out and it was these egg tarts. The warm egg tarts with eggy smell and the buttery crust was just perfect as a breakfast sweet. I could hardly forget the flavor and the scent of those little egg tarts till now.

As i was searching in the internet, i found a great recipe and tutorial video by a Hong Kong baker so i think it's pretty realiable:
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OA1N6dA_dlY&feature=related

I will write down the recipe for easy viewing :

This recipe yields 12 of 3 inches egg tarts ( if you don't have tarts mold you can use small cupcakes tins instead.)

1.  Tart crust:
+140g butter, cut into small cubes, should be soft but not as melting state though
+ Half an egg, slightly beaten
+100g plain flour
+ 70g sugar

Instructions:
-First , combine flour and sugar then add in butter and cut by hands or dough blender of a fork. After that add egg in and work till it form a dough. Sprinkle some flour onto a table surface and continue to work the dough till it's really hold together( don't work to much or else the butter will melt and leave a big mess!). Refrigerate for 20-30 minutes .

2. Eggy filling :
+ 4 eggs
+ 140 caster sugar
+  300 ml water
+ 80ml evaporated milk( you can replace it by milk but the flavor and the scent probably different as not as good as using evaporated one)

Instructions :
-Cook the sugar and water over medium heat. Don't stir or touch it, just leave it there until all the sugar is dissolved and becomes like sugar syrup. Leave to cool down.
-Pour in evaporated milk and egg to the sugar syrup and stir till combined . Pour through a sieve for a smooth mixture.
- Take out the refrigerated dough and start taking a little dough and mold into the tart tins. Try not to have a thick bottom and even sides for even cooked time.
-Pour the filling into the tarts till 80% full and bake immediately. Bake at 200 degree Celsius preheated oven for 15-20 minutes depend on your molds or by inserting a toothpick into the middle of the tart, if it stands, the tart is cooked.
- When finish baking, leave the tarts to cool down and then enjoy.