Antoinette does a really good Mont Blanc... love the burst of chestnut & fresh cream.
Happy weekend x
I felt like having a vegetarian bento : Panfried tofu & chilli ladyfingers with rice!
Hope you had a good weekend, i was out rediscovering Singapore xx
Good times...
We stayed late talking about the past year while I was gone, the things that happened in Singapore, friends who fell sick, the social tensions, the changes in our once-excellent infrastructure & the strains of keeping up with Singapore's development.
It was a sober wake-up call to us, the pampered middle-class with our designer stuff, frequent holidays & penchant for complaining.
I love sitting at the outdoor cafes on dempsey hill at night... we moved from one cafe to the next, till they closed one after another & we almost wanted to just sit in the car talking haha.
Eating my first 粽子... glutinous rice dumplings filled with meat & chestnuts, traditionally eaten during the Dragon Boat Festival.
Have a great weekend! xx
I'm sorry I haven't been replying to your emails... you see, I've been in a food-induced lull since I got back.
Most Singaporeans, when overseas, miss local food alot as Singapore is a melting pot of cuisines from all over the world thanks to its immigrant history... We grew up having delicious & cheap food readily available.
Just a little snapshot of what I've been piggin out on, when I remembered to snap instead of diving head-first into the food:
Clockwise from left: Steamed gooey custard buns from Nanbei Imperial - basically a balloon of melted butter & salted egg yolk which stole my heart out of all their excellent dim sum.
Strawberry shortcake from Antoinette. My friend and I used to be on a quest to find the best strawberry shortcake in Singapore... There's something about fresh cream & sponge cake & a cup of coffee that makes lazy afternoons oh-so-languid.>
Starbucks' green tea cream, finally - I used to drink it at least twice a week before I left & stupidly thought Starbucks in Paris had it too. (Imagine my horror when they didn't - "One green tea cream. No? Oh sorry, i meant a matcha frappuccino. What do u mean, no green tea?" T_T)
Roast chicken rice set with vegetables & peanut soup from an open-air coffee shop. So good.
Bak kut teh, a strong peppery pork-based soup which often comes with salted vegetables & braised pork trotters. It sounds rather unappetising but it's unbelievably delicious. xx
Lunch yesterday was rice with panfried salmon, tamagoyaki or sweet egg roll, edamame beans. C'était délicieux!
But I think... i'll leave the kitchen to the experts for a while... is it quite possible to get cooking burnout already? haha xx
I made cookies for one of my favorite friends... but couldnt help munching on them..
Love the smell of bergamot wafting around me... just take any cookie recipe, cut up 4-5 earl grey teabags & add it to the dough!
There wasn't much left for her in the end. (T_T)
Can you tell that i'm on a cooking roll these days lol? Am I making up for lost time? My mum is adamant that it will be a passing fancy. We call it 三分钟热度 in mandarin. I think so too.
These days I spent more time in the kitchen than I ever did in my whole life.
When my brain refused to absorb any more information (my head was literally hurting), I put on Snooze's Americana & went into the only area of the house with no books.
I was hungry & I had to do something with my hands instead of flipping pages & writing.
While my friends whipped up delicious dishes & my japanese classmates shared their intricate bentos for lunch, I hated the idea of dirtying my hands & touching raw food.
But when I'm avoiding my notes & books & there's great music, I realised it's not all that bad & could be quite therapeutic for a frazzled mind. A bit like washing dishes.
As you can see, I miss Japanese food alot.
Thank you for all your emails... I will reply them soon. Been busy these few days as exams start tomorrow... last exams i'll ever take in french. Analysing Proust & then switching to criticisms of the euro debt is mentally straining to say the least... So food is where I turn to for comfort!
My favorite cheap Japanese takeaway place... Aki Boulangérie where you can stop for a coffee & enjoy Japanese pastries too. On that rainy day, I had a tonkatsu (fried pork) sandwich & a matcha cream custard roll. I loved custard rolls when I was young & bakeries in Singapore still stuck to tradition... Nowadays, it's almost impossible to find this near my place.
My classmate who is a pastry chef made these chocolate macarons for all of us... so gooey n yummy.. he even wrote little french phrases on them!
//
I've always been very susceptible to cold weather... even sitting in an air-conditioned room easily gives me the shivers & i always have cold hands & feet.
When i was flying, my colleagues would often bring home-cooked ginger tea onboard for long flights... that way when we landed in winter, our tropical & sleepy bodies would be all warmed up by the ginger. It's very easy - just cut a few slices of ginger & steep in hot water.
But when you want more to keep or a stronger brew, you can cut up 1 fresh ginger and boil the slices in a pot of hot boiling water for 15-20mins.
Just before serving, add honey to taste. The rest keeps well in the fridge for the next day.
Keep warm xx
Before the weekend starts... another lovely cake I discovered recently on my red-bean craze. A short while ago I was into everything earl grey... cakes, macaroons, cookies! Which was how I discovered the exquisite pastries of S. Aoki.
With all my odd intense cravings, my friend demanded if I was pregnant. To which another replied: 'Pleeeassse... haven't you seen the dirty looks she gives to kids??? I never saw her playing with one single kid in her years of flying!' Errrrmmm guilty as charged lol. But hey I don't dislike them... just that they are not my cup of tea.
Hope you are doing something fun this weekend... I have tons of work to get thru but at least it finally stopped raining!
Nikujaga which means meat & potato in Japanese, is a popular beef stew cooked in Japanese homes, especially during winter. My friend gave me this easy recipe & insisted that i try it at home. So I decided to venture out of my comfort zone today by attempting this dish!
1. Peel the potatoes & chop them up together with the onions.
2. Slice the beef & pan-fry in oil.
3. Add the potatoes & onions & sauté all of them for a few minutes.
4. Add water, soya sauce & brown sugar to the pan.
5. Add white wine or sake - I used chardonnay which was perfect.
You can vary the seasoning according to your preference. For 2 portions, I used 100g of beef, with 300ml of water, 100 ml of wine, 2 tablespoons of sugar & 3 tablespoons of soya sauce.
6. Let them simmer happily until the potatoes are very soft... about 30 minutes!
Serve with rice. The soft potatoes & tender beef slices were delicious ♥
Lovely tulips from my neighbour... yest evening i had a dinner party for all the four neighbours in our apartment building.
It was such a great evening i forgot to take pics! We laughed & chatted & ate till midnight, then everyone returned to their respective floors.
Before, they were only names on the letterboxes & shy 'Bonjour's but we got along so well it was decided we would make it a habit to hang out in each other's houses... the cool thing is we dont need to travel very far to say hello :)
My failproof party go-to dish - chicken curry with rice!
I've fine-tuned the recipe to the easiest possible cos I hate spending time cooking in the kitchen, but most French people I know love Asian food like curries.
Just add vegetables (tomatoes, aubergines & red peppers), chicken pieces, a packet of Thai red curry paste & coconut milk.
Voila, a taste of Thailand right in your kitchen.. & everyone I've cooked for loved it, including my mum :)
When I wake up too late for breakfast but it's still too early for lunch....
Brunch has to be salty for me... Cubes of feta cheese with cherry tomatoes & a dressing of olive oil, red onion & vinaigrette.. totally yummy! x
Today's dinner! We first tried this at Stan's home as an aperitif, & then later at the Artcurial restaurant as a starter.
Burrata is similar to mozzarella but I find it alot tastier as it has cream inside a firm mozzarella pocket. However it's often only found at Italian delis. On a day when I'm too lazy to cook, this is perfect for a meal.
Drizzle some olive oil & balsamic vinaigrette or pesto. Smear on warm bread or eat it on its own. You can bake the tomatoes as well if you like.
I love their individual strong tastes & the combination was so delicious we ate everything straight off the board!
