"Bow Ties" (蛋散)

Sorry for not posting anything but Christmas was too busy. Here's the first post of 2012!!!

I'm guessing South African Chinese decided to translate "dan san" (蛋散) to "bow ties" because they look like bow ties. They are amazingly good, at least the ones my mom and grandmother made. The ones at bakeries are greasy or the dough is too thick so I no longer buy even if I'm craving them.

Anyways let me introduce you to my family's bow ties. They are light pastries that are deep fried and covered with a syrup coating. They are shaped into bow ties, hence the name bow ties.

The dough is simple to make. It's just sifted flour and baking powder. You can use vegetable oil but my mom said lard makes the dough more crispy and flaky.




Then four eggs are added.

Candy Cane Sweet Bread Braid

I borrowed Debbie Macomber's Christmas Cookbook from the library because it was a new cookbook. I don't know who she is but as I was looking for a picture of the cookbook cover to put on this blog, I realized that she is an author.





I decided to try two of the recipes in the book and this is one of them.

Cake Pops 2

I decided to make more cake pops since I had some store bought icing left from last time. I thought it was suppose to last 3 months but read the label again and it said 30 days. Darn! Had to throw it out.

Luckily the cake was kinda moist that it held together as a ball so I didn't use any icing. I didn't go out to buy because the icing would be wasted since I'd use less than 1/3 of the icing.

I crumbled a cake that I froze previously and made into balls. I put them in the freezer to firm up.

Roasted Squash Soup with Apple and Brie

I love soup...doesn't matter from where or what country. Give me a bowl of steaming hot soup and I'm happy!! I think it's because I grew up having soup after supper every night and if there wasn't homemade soup, well, instant was better than nothing. I don't have soup after supper all the time now and miss that so soup is a big treat!!

I'm not so into creamy soups because they are too rich. The only creamy soup I like are New England Clam Chowder and Mushroom soup. Unfortunately I don't know how to appreciate rich soups.

Recently I noticed in the last 5+ years, butternut squash soup and roasted red pepper soup are really popular. I've been wanting to make this type a soup for a long time.

What stopped me was when I looked at the recipes, many asked for cream or sour cream to be added to the soup. I know that adding the dairy product will make the soup silkier and smooth but also more calories. One big pot of this would be too much for me to enjoy.

As well most soups are pureed. I didn't own a blender until recently and Magic Bullet for a big pot of soup would take forever. So that was a major deterrent.

So when I discovered this recipe called "Roasted Squash Soup with Apple and Brie" in my The Rest of the Best and more, I was excited.



Even better was that it required ingredients I already had at home. To make it rich and creamy, the recipe asks for Brie, which seemed optional to me.

Nails

I just wanted to show my nails. I went to Bloom Essentials to get a pedicure. At Bloom Essentials, they have a pedicure called Picasso Pedicure, where they draw pictures on your nails.

I've posted my Skull nails before and really liked it. I was pretty sure I was going to get the skull one again.

The esthetician showed me the Christmas designs and I ended up also really liking the snowflake one. I couldn't decide on skull or snowflakes. The esthetician suggested doing both so I had snowflakes AND skulls.








The blue was really cool and wanted to paint my finger nails too at home but Bloom Essential sold out on their OPI "Roadhouse Blues" nail polish. They suggested to go to another spa close by to buy it. But I was walking in flip-flops in the cold that I decided that I just wanted to go home.

Now that my Christmas party is over, I probably won't be buying the nail polish. I don't wear nail polish on my fingers because I bake too often and usually touch the dough. So I didn't want people to accidentally eat nail polish in my food when it starts to flake off.




Bloom Essential's website is http://www.bloomessentials.com/
You'll love their Picasso Pedicure!!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Fascinator 2

At work, we decided to have a Secret Santa gift exchange. For those of you unfamiliar with this, we pick names out of a hat and buy gifts or write notes to that person. In school, we called it Kris Kringle. Anyways for work, to make it easier, we only did one gift exchange. The gift price limit was $10.

Now I hate buying gifts under pressure and dreaded this. I looked around at shops and couldn't find anything decent for $10. Then I decided to make a fascinator for the person I got.

At first I was going to use a hair comb to make the fascinator but since I was making a small fascinator, I decided it was too big.



I found a smaller hair clip that was unused at home. I decided to use that as my clip.

Meat & Bread

A friend took me to this place around springtime and I LOVED it. I couldn't blog about it then because my phone battery was dead. I was determined that I would come here again because it was is delicious and also to share with my readers.

Unfortunately I tried coming here on a Sunday and found out they were closed. So this time, I went on a Saturday. They were busy!

The name of this sandwich place is simple. It describes what they serve, Meat and Bread.

2011 New Year's Resolution update- FAILED

I just broke my 2011 New Year's Resolution. After working so hard on keeping my resolution for 11 months, I finally failed. I was so close!!!

ABC Restaurant

At the suggestion of an anonymous comment, I went to ABC Restaurant (愛彼茜餐室) to try out their souffle.

The One

After supper, I was very thirsty and didn't want to go home. So where did I go??? Bubble tea!!!

Went to a place called The One Restaurant (美味x係-can't replicate 3rd word)