May Discovery

Hello, welcoming the month of June.

May had been great!

Discovered something that really makes me... what do I call it? Happy perhaps. All smiles whenever I think about it. Like a girl in love. Hah

Hence, the supposed to be a busy month of May, I get a little distracted on my obsession for BAKING again.

Not sure 'again' is the correct word but this obsession never really stops before. It still frequently appeared in my mind whatever, whenever or wherever I go. ;)

Then why do I say I discovered it during the month of May?

Here's why.

I did mentioned that I work part time in a pastry shop starting April right?

FYI, my last day of work at Shervone Cakes & Pastry are on 13 May 2016. So I approximately worked there for about one and a half month only.

To be honest, I've learned quite a lot of stuffs while working there. Gonna miss baking there though.

If I'm not wrong, I said before that this work might either make me love baking even more or the opposite, hate it! Oh yes, it really did project much more obvious traits in me than ever and guess what?
LOVE or HATE? (obviously you know the answer already)

A definite LOVE!

Anyways, most of the time when I was working, all I do was baking, baking, a bit of decorating and more baking.

This is where I started to get really attracted to decorating cakes and getting creative ideas of beautiful cakes in my mind. Inspirations came flow in as if I just break into a beehive. Haha

Plus, I realized that in baking industry, I don't think I could work for someone else because it really limits your own creative ideas. Especially when decorating cakes cause you'll need to follow orders as in what you need to do and what you cannot do. (I don't mean the customers though)

Let's make an assumption, if I work for myself and I don't like using fondant in deco (nobody eats it anyway), then I could find better alternatives like modelling chocolate. (Nobody will ever say no to chocolate right?) But you cannot say NO if your boss say you gotta use fondant right? Of course the consequence is that the modelling chocolate will be way more expensive than fondant which is purely sugar.

Now I know why there's so many homemade cakes out there. You can only really enjoy the baking and decorating process if you work on your own.
CHEERS to own creativity, flowing inspirations, no limitations etc.

By the way, do you know how keen I can be towards the addiction to bakery? Ask the boyfriend to see how crazy I am. Heh

Or I'll just tell you la.

For example, when my boyfriend and I go dating and we do some shopping, I rarely go to any shops/boutiques selling apparels, cosmetics or even the heels/shoes like a normal lady would go to. Besides, I'll go for bakery shops, Daiso, Tesco etc. all just to shop for baking ingredients and baking utensils. I did it as if it's like my collections. My only limitation is there's no space for me to put all my collections. (Dad would be furious) All in all, I'm getting addicted to it I admit. ;)

Also, I did went into shops like SenQ, Harvey Norman, SEC, Ban Hin Bee (electrical shops) etc to just have a look at all the electric mixers and ovens. I need to own one electric mixer like seriously. I currently owning a hand mixer only so there's kind of a limit to the pastries I could bake. My dream is obviously to own a Kitchen Aid but it's really expensive for me right now. Unless, you plan to surprise me one. Haha Anyways, I think I'll go with the cheaper ones first. 

On top of all that addiction, I started stalking/following lots of beautiful cakes' accounts in Instagram and even Snapchat.

Nah, proof ! Hahaha

In conclusion, I know you geddit already, I'm really quite into this. Haha

That idea even passes my mind. It is to start selling beautiful and delicious cakes after I done experimenting the best kind of recipes. Just to fill in the past time, of course.

Will you be interested to buy cakes that costs not little (maybe ranges about RM 30 - RM 100) from an amateur baker? Not cheap you know all the ingredients plus the effort of experimenting the best one before selling it. Of course it would be beautifully decorated. Heh

But first, I gotta really remain focus on my coming ACCA P7 exam on 6 June, which is just only a few days away. Oh gosh.

And yes on April, I did said that I did not even start revising yet. (The-last-minute-kind) Obviously, I'm not in the same condition la now abo ma die liao.

I'm actually quite prepared for it already but still.... not really ready to face it yet but I think it's pretty normal cause nobody will be entirely well prepared and ready before an exam. Unless you know what's the questions are already Hah.

So best of luck to me and I'll see you again after this terrifying exam.

Toodles,

Christmas Chocolate Chip Cookies│Crispy yet Chewy

Hello hello hello

I know it's a bit late for this post and I've been away for like way too long.

I baked this on the 25th December 2015 which is Christmas. Yeah, I spent my Christmas baking the entire day, enjoying the process and all.

*If you realize, I'd set the date for this post all the way back to 25th. Heh I know I cheated*

This chocolate chip cookies was requested by my 'tamchiak' sister (hahah) who is officially back from KL to Penang for like a month?! then she'll fly to Singapore for gosh, I don't know how long.

and since my baking mood is back, why not?

I was also craving for my chocolate chip cookies already la actually. Hehe

The first few times I baked chocolate chip cookies, I made it crispy like the ones they sell in Famous Amos (literally okay) Many who tasted it also agreed. Hah 

but it's different this time cause the other week when my sister and I went down to Singapore, we ate Marks & Spencer chocolate chip cookies and it's actually crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside. The most captivating thing about the cookie was not the chewy part but the moist and melting chocolate chip on the inside, so good I tell you.

So yeah, this time I decided to bake something similar like that. 

First, prepare the ingredients.

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 Eggyolk
• 2 cups Semisweet chocolate chip (to have the melting texture I mentioned, get good quality)

*I mistakenly bought 'not-so-good' quality chocolate chip so turns up, there's no melting chocolate chip on the inside* Sigh...

Of course, you'll need the tools and materials too

Yeah, that should be about all you need to have

Let's begin!

Directions :

1) Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease cookie sheets or line with parchment paper.

2) In a medium bowl, cream together the melted butter, brown sugar and white sugar until well blended.

3) Beat in the vanilla, egg and egg yolk until light and creamy.

4) Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt.

5) Mix in the sifted ingredients until just blended.

6) Stir in the chocolate chips by hand using a wooden spoon.

7) Drop cookie dough 1/4 cup at a time onto the prepared cookie sheets.

8) Cookies should be about 3 inches apart. (I made mine smaller in order to have more cookies in one batch) 

9) Bake for 15-17 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the edges are lightly toasted.

10) Put aside to let it cool down before placing it in a cookie jar or perhaps you may enjoy while it's still hot and fresh. 

11) Take out your camera and start shooting. Heh

Tasting Section

The cookies were as predicted, crispy yet chewy. However, if you leave the cookies out until its fully cooled, it will turn to crispy only. (To get the chewy part, once the heat has cool down, put it in the cookie jar instantly)

The chocolate chip is not melting on the inside as I'd mentioned cause I did not used quality chocolate chips.

Flaws

- Chocolate chip doesn't melt on the inside.

- Not exactly the same like Marks & Spencer's. (The cookie dough should do larger in size)

Other than that, it's all great and tummy-licious. Add on to that, it's definitely smells awesome.

Have a try on this recipe and hope that you'll love it as I do.

BON APPETIT !!

 and a very

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Sincerely,