Camera happy...

Borrowed my dad's new camera and went camera happy at the Zoo...

Oh...and at home too...

oh my...it's been too long..

Alright, so I've been neglecting my blog..so much for setting goals. *FAIL*

So you would think a person that's only working one day a week should be able to accomplish a lot of things. Well, now that I'm not on a schedule and don't HAVE TO do things if I don't want to, because it's all my own goals and hobbies, it's really hard to get things done. I guess I'm just not very self motivated, I need my environment or people to get me to do things...*sigh* that is so sad if you think about it. I really wish I can be more hard working when it comes to accomplishing goals:P

You might be wondering what the heck have I been doing...well...I've been Youtubing. I don't have TV(cable) at home, so....that's what I get, is Youtube. And surprisingly you can spend way more time watching Youtube videos than watching TV. There's just so much STUFF to watch.

Okay, enough chit chat...

It's Saturday and J and I went to Galaxie Diner (1413 11th St. SW Calgary, AB) for a late lunch. They have great all day breakfast and lunch there...there's always a line up.

Here's my attempt at a nice photo:) they have the best chocolate milkshake!! DA BEST!!

J's turn..what was I looking at??

I ordered an Eggs Benedict with smoked salmon on a toasted croissant....hm...so good! and unlimited hash browns...Leo would love this!

J ordered a Chicken Club House. Too Much food...

hm...can you tell we enjoyed our food?!?!?

I think this should hold my persistent reader *S.Ng* over for a while:P:P

Until next time...(who know when that will be=)

I'm sooo tired...and...Mmm...cake pops

ok, so i just spent the last 4 hours doing work on the computer. It is now almost 1am. My brain is a little slow, my eyes a little dry, and I'm making lots of mistakes while typing which is making me more annoyed at my tiredness.

In my last post I said I would post about my clam chowder...well I'm very Very sorry to disappoint, I totally forgot to take pictures..:(..What I can tell you is that it was yummy.

I did take pictures of my ice cream cake pops or cake pop ice creams..what ever..I'm too tired to think. Just know that they are NOT real ice creams...apparently one of the youth thought it was ice cream and was sadly disappointed when he ate it.

The pictures below are ones I made for my students as a year end present. I also make a big batch for YAC on Friday, with the help of G.Hung, E.Wong and P.Tsui. Oh..and S.Ng and H.Wong who helped sampling to make sure they were alright:P And A.Tsui who supervised the whole process.

That's all for now...my brain need sleep...

Steak Meat Pies

A while back I made steak meat pies from scratch. I forgot that I had taken pictures of them. I got the recipe online. Unfortunately I didn't make a note of which website it was from, and it was a while ago so I can't remember. But if you search meat pies in google I'm sure you'll find a good recipe to use.

For the filling I just fried together carrots, potatoes, celery (you can use what ever veggies you like) and green peas(eww...). Add steak (or what ever meat you preferr). Combine with beef stock and cream of mushroom soup.

I used a regular pie crust recipe. Bake until golden brown. I will definitely make this again, it was fun to make and yummy to eat!

Stay tune for my clam chowder and ice cream cake pops post coming very soon....

Top 5 things I want to accomplish this summer...

Summer is here, that means the school year is ending very very soon:) <---- How do you do a really big smiley face? Having two months off with no work is pretty sweet. I've been thinking about all the projects that I want to do this summer. And I've put them all in a list, so at the end of summer I can see just how much I didn't accomplish and feel very badly about it<----for those that know me,I'm a bit of a procrastinator...we'll see how this goes:P

My Top 5:

- Bake something new each week

- Cook something new each week

- Organize my kitchen<---every baker/chef need a well organized work space!

- Build a giant book shelf for my book collection <---my book collection is starting to grow with more baking/cook books

- Finish renovations on the house

I'll try to post updates or even better "before and after" pictures, like those home magazines.

If you have good ideas for organizing kitchens, or what I should bake/cook, leave me a comment:)

hm...off with their heads!

I was away at YC(Christian youth conference) in Edmonton this pass weekend with some friends from church. It was my first time at YC, needless to say, I am no longer a youth, so my verdict for the weekend.....*drum roll pls*

It was awesome!!! No one can party it up the teenagers! The bands were pretty awesome. The speakers - awesome! The people I went with...well the girls were pretty awesome,as for the boys...if they would only stay awake they are pretty awesome too. My love for Starfield has now been rekindled!! Thanks to Dana;)

Hold on a minute...isn't this blog about food? Yes, yes it is. (did I just answer my own question?!?! weirdo!) Honestly, I have not baked or cooked anything that is worthy of a post. Unless you want to see the deluxe gon jai mean(comment if you like instant noodles!!) I made for lunch today:P

These are cupcakes I made a while ago for Jackson's work, some project got cancelled and they were having a "memorial" for the project. They may not look very nice, but they sure were tasty:)

Chocolate Cupcakes with Coconut icing and Peach penguins

until next time...

Flowers and Body Fat?

Alright, so this post is not really about food. well kind of, it's about what happens to your body if you eat too much food.

A few days ago, Jackson received a Withings body scale from work. It can accurately measure your weight to the nearest 100 grams, your muscle mass and fat mass. It also has wifi, so it sends all the info to the Withings website so your can track your weight gain/loss. Good idea right? NOT! This scale just reinforces the fact that I don't exercise enough. I know that already, I don't need a scale that measures my the fat in my body to tell me! >:(

Anyways, Jackson is slightly obsesses with it. He uses every morning and night, even after he unloads in the washroom, just to see how much weight he'll lose.

On a completely different note. I went to the Golden Acre garden center last night. I love flowers, and now that spring is finally here, there are so many to choose from. Every spring/summer Jackson and I will always grow some cherry tomatoes and experiment with a few different types of veggies or fruit. Last year, we planted zucchinis, strawberries and garlic. Let's just say none of them worked out except for the tomatoes. I'll spare you the details, because it'll just dig up some old anger issues I have with my garden.

Every year I always buy herbs, usually Basil. I like to have fresh herbs on hand so I can use them when i cook. Hopefully I'll take better care of them than I did the previous year:P

That's all for now...

Bakery tour of Calgary

Ok, so it' no secret that I like food. One of the things I like other than baking is buying baked goods.

One of my favorites is Eclair de Lune. This is a little French bakery located just off Northmount Drive.

They are open six days a week, but they sell out of the good stuff really quickly, so you have to go early if you want a good selection.

One of our favorites things to get when we're there(yes, Jackson likes it there too, I think he likes this bakery more than me:). Is the three cheese croissant. They also make this spinach and ham quiche that's really good:)..

For the sweet desserts, there's too many to choose from, and they change each time we go. I got this Lemon Meringue Tartelette from my last bakery trip.

More Bakeries to come...enjoy:)

The GREAT bake Xchange of CPC

Well, it's been a while. Sorry to all those who keep checking my blog and gets sadly disappointed because I've been so...um...busy.

A few weeks ago, I organized the Great bake Xchange at my church with a few of my friends. The result was a lot of sweets and slightly hurt stomach at the end from eating to much.

I decided to retry this mini shortbread fruit tart that I made a while ago for my husband's work bake exchange they didn't turn out too well:P Sorry husband's co-workers...:P

To my relief, the mini tarts turned out fine. Good thing too, because I didn't start baking until 12am. If they didn't turn out, I really don't know what I would do.

Some of you might be wondering why I was so crazy to wait until midnight to bake. Well, let me tell you, driving from grocery store to grocery store at 10:50pm at night looking for whipping cream because everywhere you go tell you they are sold out, is not fun!! Not at all!!

Mini Shortbread Fruit Tarts

Shortbread Crust:

yields about 20-24 mini tarts
1 cup butter, softened
3 tablespoons and 1 teaspoon light brown sugar
3 tablespoons and 1 teaspoon confectioners' sugar
1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

Lemon Curd Mousse:

1 cup heavy whipping cream

4-5 TBS lemon curd

Whip heavy cream to medium peaks.

Shortbread tart directions:
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Using your stand mixer,

mix butter, brown sugar, white sugar and flour together in a large bowl. Work dough until it holds

together. Chill slightly...enough where the butter solidifies again.

Take a small chunk and place it into each mini tart. I'm using a mini cupcake pan. Bake for 10-

12 minutes, or until lightly brown around the edges. Keep an eye on them after 8 minutes or so. Depending how thick the dough is, the baking time will vary. You don't want them to burn. Let cool slightly and make an indentation with the back of a teaspoon. This will help hold the filling. Cool/chill completely.

Lemon Mousse directions:

Whip heavy cream into medium peaks. Fold the lemon curd into the whipped cream. Place the mousse in a plastic bag ( or use a piping bag) and cut a small hole. Pipe lemon curd mousse into each tart. Or just use a spoon like me:) Top with berries and you're good to go!

Enjoy...:)

Creamy Caramelly

My attempt at posting regularly has ended in a fail! It's not my fault, I've been really sick, with pink eye and everything. I'm sure people would love eating pink eye contaminated cookies. Who wouldn't?

A few weeks back I made Creme Caramel. I loved it. It was actually a success. Sadly I was so eager to eat it that I didn't take any after photos. *Tear* Sorry Guys. You can enjoy these wonderful photo of me melting sugar. *hahaha* The recipe is listed below...enjoy:)

this is what the creme caramels looked like pre-oven.

Creme Caramels

Makes six 6-ounce creme caramels

2 cups sugar

3 cups milk

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

4 whole eggs

2 egg yolks

Preheat the oven to 325 °F. Using 1 1/2 cups of sugar, prepare the caramel (see method below). Pour just enough caramel into six 6-ounce ramekins to cover the bottoms with a think layer. Avoid getting any on the sides of the ramekins. Bring the milk to a simmer in a heavy-bottomed saucepan. Add the vanilla. In a bowl. whisk the remaining 1/2 sugar with the eggs and egg yolks for about 2 minutes, or until the mixture is slightly pale. Use a whisk to stir the hot milk into the egg mixture and stir until the eggs are completely combined with the milk. if you see a lot of froth on the mixture, skim it off with a pastry scraper. If you see specks of egg int eh mixture, strain it through a fine-mesh sieve.

Pour the mixture into the caramel-lined ramekins and arrange the ramekins in a baking dish with sides at least as high as ramekins. Pour enough hot tap water into the baking dis to come halfway up the sides of the ramekins. Bake for about 50 minutes, or until the surface of the custards stay still when you wiggle them back and forth.

Allow to cool for 1 hour at room temperature and then refrigerate for at least 2 hours. Run a knife around each of the custards to loosen them. Put a rimmed place over a creme caramel and, holding the ramekin firmly against the plate, flip the whole thing over. Give it a quick up and down shake while still holding firmly and lift off the ramekins. Serve cold.

Caramel

Makes 1 cup of caramel

2 cups sugar

To make 1 cup of caramel, place 2 cups of sugar in a heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium to hight heat and stir continuously with a heavy wooden spoon as the sugar melts and turn colour. The caramel is ready when it is smooth and deep reddish-brown in colour. Use immediately.

On a completely random note. This is what I had for lunch the other day. Grilled cheese and ham sandwich with avocado. Mmm...it was delicious. Needed more butter though:P

Until next time....