Moments, moments.

The housemates reckon I get a little obsessive compulsive when it comes to baking. But I think it necessary to follow methodology to a tee to obtain desired outcomes, a little inflexible when it comes to baking? Perhaps

Relish! I shall, another 4 weeks, exams, and then, on to GP, Med and finishing the year with Rural.

Run Run Run.

This recent event
and the small nightmare that is having to deal with insurance and claims resulted in the urgent immediate need for an emotional garbage bin, something a bit more than hacking away on the keyboard and bearing my soul to the black hole that is the www could provide.

The acquisition of this
has facilitated emotional catharsis of a different sort.

The obsessing over a recipe, internalizing, planning, the measuring, the sifting once, twice, trice, the mixing, the baking. Things I have control over. With end products that give not only some sort of sustenance (of the naughty kind) but also warmth and joy to those gifted with them.

About the only thing I’ve been doing religiously this summer, collecting macadamia fruits that have fallen from our tree, every second day.

The husk is an almost impenetrable fortress, and these little round bastards sure make you work up a sweat for your rewards. After all the hacking, sawing and ripping apart of green, you still have to crack the actual nut open to get to the creamy jewel that lies within.

I have to say though, there is an inexplicable joy from harvesting one’s own produce.

The housemates did not take kindly to the suggestion of a chicken coop in the garden. Will have to device some cunning bribes over the next few weeks.

Sustainable living, you are not too distant a future?

Will report back on final product after drying and roasting.

I have yet to taste his little crisp pillows of texturized heaven, but friends who have tried them often recount their religious gustatory experience with that ubiquitous glassy eyed gaze coupled with a distinct high pitched excited voice. It is hard not to be envious.

One day Pierre Herme’s macarons and I shall meet, but in the interim, I am waiting with all the patience I can muster for the translated version of his book ‘Macaron’, currently only available in french (which costs a tidy sum). Pierre Herme generously shares 57 macaron recipes, reportedly long, lengthy, complicated ones, but, would you expect anything less from the master, really. Cannot wait to get my hands on a copy.

Macaron, J’adore!

Melissa is the owner of The Daily Scoop.

Melissa not only accommodated my request for a home delivery even though my purchase online was well below their $60 minimum policy, she made excellent suggestions of creating a gift pack as it was meant as a birthday gift (value added service!). She went out of her way to try and procure the green tea and red bean flavour from her other outlet as I had requested for it. I eventually organized for a pick up and when the lovely Mof dropped by to collect the pack on my behalf, she saw to it that she was there to personally hand the gift pack over (and kindly agreed to pose for a picture after some persuasion :p)

In a nation where its citizens need constant reminders (yes expensive campaigns!) to provide good customer service , Melissa is a breath of fresh air.

Oh! And her ice creams are nothing short of spectacular.

Do try her Lychee Martini, Durian, Chendol and avocado flavours

The Daily Scoop
43 Jalan Merah Saga
#01-78 Chip Bee Gardens
Singapore
Tel: +65 6475 3128

OR

41 Sunset Way
#01-04 Clementi Arcade
Singapore

To mark the end of his Masters, and what the brother hopes will be, the end of his life in academia, the family will be dining at Per se, which is Thomas Keller’s sister restaurant of his highly acclaimed French Laundry in Nappa Valley, a restaurant I hope to visit one day when I have oodles of money, and hopefully, still premenopausal when that day finally comes :p

After his graduation ceremony, and the dinner, they will be jetting off to Peru, to see Machu Picchu, then fly back and head to DC for a tour of the white house and back to NY for a tour of the UN, oh as well as the Statue of Liberty.

Not fair.

My only request was, that they get me some hot chocolate powder from Serendipity Cafe.

Bah.

Looking at the list, I must make it a point to try the Mandarin Oriental’s french patisserie when I head back in June, I mean, trained in the kitchens of Pierre Hermé! Good Lord! To be frank I’ve only done No. 10 on the list, I am ambivalent about their egg tarts, probably attributed to the fact that I prefer robust crunchy crusts as opposed to the melt-in-your-mouth flaky sort for egg tarts.

If memory serves, I think No.9 was the shop Sonny pointed out to me when we were on a jaunt round his ‘hood many years ago , but it was late and the shop was closed. Will make it a point to try them this trip back

From The Guardian.

Award-winning baker Dan Lepard reveals the best of Singapore’s many pastry shops and cake stalls, where you can indulge in everything from delicious Chinese custard tarts to delicate French macarons

1. Xi Di Li for sweet breakfast doughnuts

This stall faces on to Sims Avenue, and covers no more than a few square metres, yet somehow they mix, fry and serve up delicious cakes in this tiny space. Go in the morning, around 10am, and the first of the day’s sweet morning buns, called Ma Jian, will be hot from the fat and ready to eat. They taste like slightly sweet, firm and chewy doughnuts, deftly shaped into something looking like two oblong madeleines joined at the waist and sprinkled with sesame seeds before being plunged into the fryer. At 70 cents (about 31p), they’re a bargain for breakfast.
• Xi Di Li, on Sims Avenue between Lorong 27 and 25a Geylang

2. Thye Moh Chan Cake House for peanut brittle

In a slightly rough and vaguely alarming ramshackle setting, this sweet shop makes really good peanut brittle, a very traditional Chinese sweet. The morning I went everyone was wrapping gift boxes of brittle for the weekend. Very little English spoken, so pick and hand sign for the amount you want.
• Thye Moh Chan Cake House, 53 Lorong 27 Geylang

3. Hock Khong for coconut buns

This large, cool open dim sum tea house is very basic, with red plastic garden chairs, ceiling fans and formica tables, and the kitchen area appears to be dotted among the seating. Come 10 in the morning they start to serve soft coconut yeast buns and sweet red bean puffs. Go up to the counter, choose what you want then go to a table and the staff will bring it to you.
• Hock Khong, cnr Lorong 27 Geylang and Sims Avenue

4. Loong Fatt Eating House for Wife’s Delight

My friend Jiong took me to this large old cafe that has been making these cakes since the 1970s. A vast open kitchen is set back 10 metres from the seating space at the front of the shop, strewn with odd tables and chairs, while a line of customers snakes down the middle. The cakes, Tau Sar Piah, are a bit like an Eccles cake would be if it were cooked on a griddle, and the flaky pastry used is curious. It’s made by taking two walnut-sized balls of dough, one loaded with lard and the other plain, then they’re patted together, rolled up, patted and rolled again to make a bespoke puff pastry to cover each cake. A sweet paste of cooked winter melon and sesame is spooned inside and the dough wrapped around it à la Eccles. Baked in a blazing hot plate and flipped once to scorch both sides, the cakes are served piping hot.
• Loong Fatt Eating House, 639 Balestier Road

5. Kim Choo Kueh Chang for Peranakan sweets

Pea flower cake. Photograph: Dan Lepard
Do ask about the sweets and cakes in this family shop, bakery and museum as some of the staff speak excellent English and know the history in detail. The first floor is home to a small museum and restaurant accessed via a narrow staircase to the left of the store, while the ground floor shop feels like an apothecary with biscuits and pastries in tall screwtop jars. Look out for the soft rice cakes swirled with blue, a Peranakan wedding sweet called Pulut Tai Tai. Though it looks as vivid as a dye from a bottle, it’s actually the extract from a native blue pea flower. Their version of a chocolate muffin, made with a complicated overnight cornstarch ferment is gluten-free and soft textured with a rich, deep chocolate flavour.
• Kim Choo Kueh Chang, 109 East Coast Road.

6. Regent Hotel for yuzu soufflé

The ground foyer of the Regent Hotel is quiet and utterly calming, so even if you’re tight for cash this is a very pleasant and refreshing oasis to visit. The Regent Hotel’s pastry chef, Phillip Lee, adds to the vast banquet on offer with a delicate soufflé that combines the sharp mandarin flavour of the Japanese yuzu fruit folded through a rich custard. Lee often takes traditional Chinese flavours, like the ingredients from a Chen Teng soup – dried longan, pandan leaves and rock sugar – and uses them to flavour an afternoon tea cake, or turns black sesame or red bean paste into delicate French macarons. Inventive and remarkable baking.
• The Regent Hotel, 1 Cuscaden Road

7. Mandarin Oriental for classic French patisserie

Patisserie in Singapore is vastly better than in London, and young pastry chef Ruben Jan Adrian, fresh from Pierre Marcolini’s chocolaterie in Brussels and the kitchens of Pierre Hermé in Paris, is one of the chefs making this happen. Last Christmas he had the most beautiful spiced stollen on sale and a curious and excellent pannetone studded with crimson-stained sugared almonds. This Easter he had hot cross buns and handmade Valrhona chocolate eggs. If you take a seat in the fourth-floor Axis bar, you can watch the stonking great build for the Marina Bay Sands casino complex: think Meccano construction on an epic scale. Sitting in cool bliss with a stand of delicate tea cakes, tarts and a pot of tea, you can become a tranquil James Bond gazing at Casino Royale being built.
• The Mandarin Oriental, 5 Raffles Avenue, Marina Square

9. Puteri Mas for durian puffs and jackfruit muffins

The best place to buy durian cream puffs is at Puteri Mas, situated in one of the restored colonial buildings in Joo Chiat Road, an area that is calm during the day and a bit more racy at night. The shop is nothing special, fluorescent lit with almost no seating. But these puffs will challenge your taste buds. I quite like durian, the armadillo-skinned fruit with a weird rotted aroma, on its own or in ice cream. But these cream puffs filled with durian pulp, though undoubtedly fine, I find too hard to swallow. Whereas the jackfruit muffins they sell here, with a deep golden yellow crumb and flavoured additionally with freshly grated coconut, can be eaten without effort.
• Puteri Mas, 475 Joo Chiat Road

10. Leung Sang Hong Kong Pastries for custard tarts in Chinatown

There’s some debate about the best sweet egg custard tarts in Chinatown. Leung Sang tends to feature often in the top list, and their thick crisp pastry is lovely, not too oily, and the filling gently puffed. But if you walk around the corner, maybe two or three shops back into Chinatown, there are a few pastry shops that make tarts where the filling is more dense, with a creamy texture. Sago Street and the area immediately around it is great for takeaway food, and there are tables out the front of many shops to eat at.
• Leung Sang Hong Kong Pastries, 18 Sago Street

Warm salty eggy mess on a cold morning.