chocolatesuze necklace & random jewellery
oh hai! lols quick post from me today but my necklace finally arrived in the […]
oh hai! lols quick post from me today but my necklace finally arrived in the mail! hee it’s a chocolatesuze necklace!
i scored it from mynamenecklace.com for $35 with free shipping (woot!) after spotting the carrie style necklace over at miss chaigyaru’s. it’s sterling silver and bcos it was longer than 8 letters i had to pay $15 extra. it’s shiny 😀 word of warning the 50cm chain is heaps long so stick with the 40 or 45cm chain or you’ll have to go and get it shortened booo
swirly lollipop ring to go with rainbow nails
and some awesome donut earrings from phuoc and cupcake earrings from fangirlish hee I heart candy jewellery! anywhos hope you guys have an awesome weekend!
Super Easy Blueberry Muffins
Check out this super easy recipe for awesome blueberry muffins!
I ♥ blueberry muffins. But they gotta be packed full of sweet, juicy blueberries or the muffin is deemed as fail which is what I experienced last week when I went hunting for a decent blueberry muffin in the central station area. A call out to both twitter and facebook peeps wasn’t promising and so I ended up baking these babies with a bit of tweaking of Exclusively Food’s recipe. Go forth and bake my friends! Oh and if you double the recipe you might want to use a stand mixer to mix or your arms will get tired. The crazy pink background is for Pinktober– support breast cancer awareness month yo!
Ingredients:
1 carton (300g) sour cream
1 large egg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3 Tbsp milk
55g butter, melted
2 cups self-raising flour
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries
Preheat (fan forced) oven to 170C. Mix 1 carton sour cream, 3/4 cup sugar, 1 egg, and 1 tsp vanilla extract in a large bowl.
Sift 2 cups self raising flour in same bowl
Add in the 2 cups of blueberries and toss them a bit in the flour
Add the 55g melted butter, 3 Tbsp milk and stir until mixture is just combined.
Divide mixture into muffin cases. Bake for 20-25mins.
Nawww mini muffins are so cute! Yeah couldn’t resist sneaking one to eat before taking a photo haha
Here, have a gander at my muffin innards. Packed full of blueberries oh yes
I’ve always wanted a bucket of muffins.
Deeeeelicious!
lunchie munchies
lunchie munchies
Lunch munchies of the week from my new work hood starts with the awesome roast pumpkin & halloumi with spinach wrap ($7.90) and a can of my new fav energy drink mango iced tea Tiki ($2) from Lovebite Cafe (66 Goulburn St, Sydney). I love roast pumpkin but oh boy do I have issues with sun-dried tomatoes! The wrap was a bit on the oily side but still relatively healthy. Relatively. Let’s not mention the rhubarb tart I scored for an arvo snack. Or the Caramello Koalas.
Was a bit late to lunch the next day so missed out on my usual wrap and so tried the corn fritter, swiss cheese and tomato wrap ($7.90) and a can of double shot cola ($2) which oddly tasted just like rc cola. And not in a good way. The corn fritter was more of a corn pattie, not crunchy but still filled with tasty corn nubbins.
Short walk over to Mappen (11/537-551 George St Sydney) near 85C for a super cheap bowl of ontama bukkake with udon noodles ($4.90). Normally I get another egg ($1.50) plus some assorted tempura but hey nothing beats a <$5 meal! Stab the perfect soft boiled egg and watch as its golden innards coat each strand of noodle. Interestingly Mappen now has a 1 spoonful of shallots policy!
Palate in World Square (Shop 17-18, 123 Liverpool St, Sydney) also has a takeaway section away from the main entrance of their restaurant. Displayed at the front are boxes of different types of salads and because I am uber indecisive when presented with pictorial menus and/or food displays I was stuck on the roast pumpkin, eggplant & zucchini salad and the salt & pepper calamari on greek salad ($7.90). So I asked for both to be combined and a short pause from the cashier and an extra $2 later I was all set for a super delish lunch woot each curl of tasty squid was coated in a light batter and there were enough of em to make me full along with the huge chunks of pumpkin and the slices of zucchini and eggplant hidden beneath.
Cafe Ish (Shop 1, 82 Campbell St, Surry Hills) is but 1 block away from where I work and the soft shell crab omellete features quite heavily in my lunch schedules. Unfortunately their famed all you can eat ribs will be ending this Wed and will return next winter so make a booking if you want to eat some delicious meat!
And something not edible- check out my new cupcake earbuds!
Super easy lemon cupcakes with lemon curd filling and lemon cream cheese frosting
Super easy lemon cupcakes with lemon curd filling and lemon cream cheese frosting from Isabella from Junior Masterchef
Mmm innards shot baby yeah! So who’s been watching Junior Masterchef? I have to admit I’m not a regular watcher partly because their cooking skills puts mine to shame! But I do love how the show is positive and upbeat and it is refreshing to not hear the kids say how much they hate their job!
Anywhos so a while ago they had a mystery box challenge and Isabella mentioned that her cupcake recipe (found on Masterchef website here ) used cream instead of butter and immediately I was like woah dude that’s awesome! No creaming of butter equals win! So I set off to make the cupcakes with a lemon curd filling and lemon cream cheese frosting instead of lemon meringue. The components themselves are pretty easy but the amount of washing up will make you sad. But the cupcakes are awesome trust me!
Ingredients for the lemon cupcakes- (ignore the butter!)
1 cup thickened cream
1 cup caster sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 1/2 cups self raising flour
Finely grated rind of 1 lemon + juice
Preheat oven to 180’C. Place 1 cup cream, 1 cup sugar and 2 beaten eggs in a large mixing bowl and whisk until smooth.
Grate lemon rind and add juice to the mixture.
Sift 1 1/2 cups of self raising flour into mixture and whisk until batter is thick and smooth. Divide mixture into cupcake patty cases and bake for 15-20mins.
While the cupcakes are baking it’s time to start the lemon curd! (I tweaked Isabella’s recipe a tad.) Ingredients:
1/2 cup lemon juice (approx 3 lemons)
120g butter
1/2 cup + 2 Tablespoons caster sugar
1 egg
3 egg yolks
Heat lemon juice and butter in a saucepan and simmer until butter has melted. Add sugar and whisk until dissolved then turn off the heat.
Lightly beat the 1 whole egg plus the 3 egg yolks in a bowl. Pour a bit into the lemon butter mixture and whisk continuously. If the egg starts to cook, leave the mixture to cool for about 2mins before continuing and slowly add more egg and whisking continuously until mixture becomes thick and glossy.
Leave the mixture to cool in the saucepan before pouring through a sieve and transferring to an airtight container.
Dig some holes into your cooled cupcakes. Taste test mmm nom. If your lemon curd is cooled down enough go ahead and fill the holes.
Forgot to take an ingredients pic for the frosting oops my bad! Ingredients:
250g cream cheese, room temp
125g salted butter, room temp
Finely grated rind of 1 lemon + juice
Icing sugar (use your judgment)
The trick with frosting to make it easier to pipe is to make sure the butter and cream cheese are nice and melty! Not microwave melty but you know, soft. With the icing sugar I always taste as I go so I’m not too sure about measurements but I reckon maybe 1 cup? Beat everything together till it’s super light and airy.
And tadah! Beautiful babies!
Mmm lemon threesome 😛 Oi get your mind out of the gutter! Lemon cupcake + lemon curd + lemon cream cheese frosting! If you want you can top with candied lemon slices. I cbb and just sliced normal uncandied lemon lol
Innards shot again!
Of course whenever I made cupcakes I tend to always double the recipe cos I give the cupcakes away and then I can have an extra big cake for myself heh heh have an awesome weekend dudes!
Just Desserts, Tomislav Darlinghurst – Closed
When it comes to creativity, the name that first pops into mind is Tomislav Martinovic. Combining his creativity with his love of desserts, Chef Tomislav has teamed up with Black Star Pastry’s Christopher The to present “Just Desserts” ($125), a six course degustation dinner with 4 desserts and only 2 savouries as part of this year’s Sydney International Food Festival. When the event was first mentioned on twitter I knew I had to go and so after some frantic calls in the space of 8 minutes I rounded up a posse of food bloggers
EDIT: Closed.When it comes to creativity, the name that first pops into mind is Tomislav Martinovic. Combining his creativity with his love of desserts, Chef Tomislav has teamed up with Black Star Pastry’s Christopher The to present “Just Desserts” ($125), a six course degustation dinner with 4 desserts and only 2 savouries as part of this year’s Sydney International Food Festival. When the event was first mentioned on Twitter I knew I had to book fast and so after some frantic calls in the space of 8 minutes I rounded up a posse of hungry food bloggers we rocked up to Tomislav (Level 2/13 Kirketon Rd, Darlinghurst).
To kick things off, a pair of test tubes arrive, 1 filled with Violet Granita and the other with Delamotte Champagne. We are told to mix the two together and instantly child-like glee shines on our faces when the mixture bubbles and froths upon contact with each other. The resulting fizzy drink is sweet, zingy and oh so pretty.
First to start off the desserts is Grilled Strawberries with Mint & White Chocolate and the presentation has us gazing in awe. Seriously does this not look like a work of art? Mmm edible art. This dessert had an element of customising one’s dessert to own liking where you dip a grilled strawberry into as little (or as much) white chocolate as you like, a swipe of intense mint powder with a side of cream and a swirl of the yoghurt sorbet.
hee gratuitous chocolatesuze shot nomming!
When I spotted the Goats Curd Cheesecake with Elderflower & Pistachio on the menu I was initially wary as I have issues with goat’s cheese but luckily the taste wasn’t too overpowering as it was only the foam which was goat’s cheese. Under the cloud of ethereally light foam hid a quenelle of creamy vanilla and paired beautifully with the slightly sour cubes of pink elderflower jelly and slivers of grapes. I see Helen sneaking glances at my plate and before she can ask whether I like goat’s cheese I manage to demolish the dessert and scrape the plate clean.
Caramel Ice Cream with Toasted Peanuts. I think there was only 1 stand for these cones in the entire restaurant as we were instructed to select a cone which caused us to moan about photo presentation bahahaha luckily the night was winding down and we got to take some quick snaps with the stand.
This was my favourite dessert of the night! Wafer thin and super delicate, the cornets were topped with nubbins of peanuts and the added hidden surprise of pop rocks! The sounds of crackles and pops filled the air and we laugh at the unexpected flashback to childhood arvos of buying candy from the corner shop. The caramel ice cream was smooth and delicious and at the bottom of the cone was another treasure trove of peanuts. Just like those ads- there’s no boring bits!
Warm Chocolate Mousse with Olive Oil & Sea Salt has me staring dubiously at the brown pile/deposit swirl flecked with salt. I tentatively taste a spoonful of the white powder atop the sorbet to realise gasping, that it was horseradish! Definitely sinus clearing! The chocolate mousse is rich and comforting like a warm hug and the mulberry sorbet is a refreshing but what I loved most were the butter soaked biscuit crumbs hiding beneath! Seriously I could’ve totes eaten a whole bowl of the stuff!
Beef Mince Pie with Grilled Onion & Tomato Sauce. Sadly that was the end of desserts and the beginning of the savoury. I reckon I could’ve kept on going with the dessert onslaught! The pie was good with flaky buttery pastry although the beef innards were a tad on the salty side but was easily tempered with the crazy awesome tomato sauce ‘soil’.
Tomislav’s signature side of Rice Crackers with Sea Salt & Vinegar rounds up our dinner and we happily spritz the paper thin crackers with vinegar till we’re fighting for the last of the crumbs. Side note, they only had 20 slates in the whole restaurant which meant after each course they had to quickly wash and dry them!
The neon glow of the infamous Kings Cross sign shimmers as we leave, clutching a goodie box filled with Black Star pastries. I had fun with the interactive aspect of the dinner and would love to return for the caramel ice cream!
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