Cookies and cream cookies

This is not your average, typical cookie. It's a cookie, IN A COOKIE. 

 Cookies and cream; one of my favourite ice cream flavours. I am also obsessed with anything cookies and cream flavoured. I love my oreos alright! 

 These cookies give off the best aroma. Every bite is full of oreo chunks; perfect for any oreo lover. 

I adapted this recipe from Kirbie cravings 

*I made this with about 1 and 1/4 cup sugar, but next time I'll reduce it under 1 cup, but not too much, otherwise there could be a drastic change in the texture.

Cookies and cream cookies
Yields: 2 dozen

Ingredients:
2 3/4 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup butter, softened
1 1/2 cups white sugar *see note
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract 
14 oreos (or more. I put about 18) 

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 350 F/180 degrees Celsius with parchment paper. In a small bowl, stir together flour, baking soda, and baking powder.
2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in the egg and vanilla. Gradually blend in the dry ingredients until dough is formed. Add oreos directly into batter and beat on medium high speed until oreos are crushed and blended into dough, Roll dough into balls about 1 inch to 1/12 inch (2.5 cm to 4 cm) in diameter and place onto ungreased cookie sheets lined with parchment paper.
3. Bake about 11-12 minutes in the preheated oven, or until golden around the edges. Cookies will be initially puffy when taken out from oven, but will flatten after they cool

Gallivanting in Melbourne

I went on a food adventure in the city with my friends whom I've known since primary school, and also with their friends. I go to a different school to them, so I rarely see them! 

First we tried Harajuku Crepes in Melbourne central. I shared a chocolate crepe with strawberries and some chocolate drizzled and ice cream! My friend, Anika doesn't really fancy cream, and neither do I, well in a huge quantity. So we didn't get the cream. The crepe tasted pretty good, obviously the combination of strawberries and chocolate always work. The only thing is, I'd say that the place is over-priced for what you get. Average price for a crepe is about $6-7 dollars, but I suppose that's the typical pricing for crepes around Melbourne. 

While they went to Starbucks, I went to the small Cacao Green next door (there's one on Bourke street which is the bigger one.) and I tried a new flavour, mango! It is probably the best flavour I've tasted so far. Pomegranate is pretty good as well, but I prefer the mango. It reminds me of mango pudding! I had some mochi as the topping.

I had Malaysian food at Mamak. I was surprised, because I honestly don't expect much of Malaysian food in Melbourne. Sure, there are some good restaurants, but they will never live up to my reminiscent taste of authentic KL-style food. Since I didn't expect much, I just shared roti canai with my friend, Nikita and the roti canai. What can I say? Probably the best I've tasted in Melbourne! The roti was very flaky, crispy and dough-y. Amazing. Definitely coming back sometime soon, probably will get some teh tarik along and even roti tissue! I highly recommend this place for Malaysian food.

My friends had nasi lemak. I tried some; a good typical nasi lemak. I love the ikan bilis (anchovies) with it!

The works of roti.

We shared a dessert pizza at 39+ pizzeria. A pizza with nutella, strawberries and ice cream! Bellissimo! (Totally just Google translated that). Though, to be honest, I think it's only because of the combination. The pizza base was way too hard and burnt, we were struggling with our fork and knives to cut through. I think I could easily make that at home myself. I have learnt how to make pizza dough. All you do is bake the pizza crust, then slather with Nutella and fruits. Dust with icing sugar. Simple.

Anyway, it's quite weird, considering the raving reviews about it online. And we found the service rather quite, I don't know, kind of rude? Maybe it was just on that day.

Then we went back to Kingsway, and we went to some random Japanese restaurant (I forgot the name, will be updating soon once I find out the name of it) that just opened. 

Some noodles yumm!

I tried a yakatori skewer and a chicken skin skewer.

I shared the matcha creme brulee and some cheesecake! A spin on the classic French creme brulee!Very interesting, and of course, TASTY.

I also had a bit of my friends' mochi.

Think big

I love writing posts about things I have enjoyed, and I finished reading 'Think big' by Ben Carson who is a world renowned neurosurgeon, and his book is really inspiring. I did a presentation about him in English class, and well, he is extraordinary, starting out literally at the bottom of his class in primary school, and was pushed by his mother to do the best because she wanted him to have the opportunities she never had. He made medical history when he separated conjoined twins (The Binder twins) and he's the director of pediatrics neurosurgery at John Hopkins.

I really do love motivational books because it makes me really think and reflect carefully. One of my favourite quotes from the book is“I am convinced that knowledge is power - to overcome the past, to change our own situations, to fight new obstacles, to make better decisions.” 

I would recommend this book to literally anyone.My mum has read it, and she enjoyed it. Anyone would be able to learn and take something away from this book. I think even people who dislike reading might find this quite nice to read! 

I have had a few hectic weeks of tests and assignments, but tomorrow is my official last day for  my core subjects  which are English, maths, science, health, geography! Then the next four weeks, I have a 2020 program which is an environmental kind of program that is compulsory for year 9s. I still have my electives though : French, cooking and visual communications design, but I won't have such a hectic workload. I am so glad, because guess what that means? BAKING AND COOKING! I have been missing out on working in my kitchen, making a mess with the mixer and the oven. But this weekend, and for the next few weeks, I shall be cooking and baking up a storm (like Hurricane Sandy) and posting recipes and eateries and oh la la! It's also 1 and a half months away from Christmas, and I shall be getting festive. Watching Christmas movies that are in New York (pretending like you're in New York when you're really not) and baking some cookies? I SAY YES! 

So watch out, a food storm is coming your way.

Mount Dandenong

 I've raved about different food places, but this blog post is not a rave unfortunately.

Last week, my family and I visited Mount Dandenong to visit a tulip farm! Very pretty, but I don't have a huge interest in flowers so I was like meh. There were some sculptures around and the price tag/value of them are ridiculous. One thing I will never get: why art is so expensive. I'm just not an artist or into art-sy things.

The weather was pretty bad that day. It was raining!

Macaron madness

Sometimes, I wonder why I eat so much and it's not necessarily always healthy. Take for instance, one day I might just have a really bad craving. The next thing you know, I'm rummaging the pantry looking for some milk chocolate. And then finishing the whole block.). It's actually quite scary if you ask me.

You should even see me during breakfast time. I basically eat breakfast like a queen.

I made some quiche with my mum for dinner and I ate so much AND one of my mum's lemonade scones. Her scones are literally the best scones I've ever tasted. Of course, filled with whipped cream and jam! What is a scone without whipped cream and jam?

This was taken last year. I can't be bothered taking pictures now.

The other day, my second sister brought home some macarons from my favourite macaron shop, La belle miette! They are absolutely the most perfect macarons. I obviously couldn't eat the whole tube (though I'd like to) because my sister bought it for my whole family but I ate a raspberry one and a blueberry one. I loved the blueberry one. There was a sudden burst of blueberry jam in the middle.

They have the cutest boxes!

C'est parfait.

Macarons aren't exactly the cheapest baked goods you can buy, pricing typically at $2.50 AUD per macaron. So I am always so appreciative of my sisters.

  So, remember how a few months ago (REFER), I said that I wish I could master the macaron? Well I'm not exactly a master at macarons, BUT I can make decent ones!! Turns out, they are not impossible to bake.  Now I have sort-of-successfully made them twice! One was green tea and I just recently did pistachio ones.But they're just not that pretty.

Hello Ugly Macaron that tasted delicious. 

Tips

- The stiff peaks of the egg whites. You whip the egg whites until you have glossy, stiff peaks. To make sure, you hold the bowl upside down, and nothing should move.

- Leaving the macarons for about half an hour to harden their shells. I cannot stress how important that step is. The first two times, I didn't leave my macarons out to harden their shells long enough, and it completely failed!

I got the recipe off Tartelette. Helen from Tartelette is known as the 'Queen of macarons'. I've used her recipe twice, and her method and tips are excellent!

I know these macarons don't look pretty, BUT LOOKS CAN BE DECEIVING! I haven't got the technique just right, but I'm on the path.

UGLAY. Compare it to La belle miette... 

Pistachio macaron recipe but I used chocolate ganache instead of whipping up the buttercream. Chocolate ganache is seriously so easy to do!

And for heaven's sake, IT'S A MACARON NOT A MACAROON. I saw a Women's weekly recipe book at a bookstore that had the title "Macaroons and biscuits." #facepalm

Cupcake central

One of my favourite baked goods to eat are cupcakes. Cupcakes are somewhat special and meaningful to me; they were the first things I baked. I remember excitedly running the kitchen mixer, making a vanilla cupcake batter from scratch. I remember I used to put some sort of runny, glaze sugary icing. I used to like that but now my tastebuds have changed and I find it way too sweet, and I much prefer a fluffy buttercream or my favourite: cream cheese frosting!

My oldest sister gave me a voucher from her Entertainment book (this kind of coupon book), for Cupcake Central. She said "I'll give this to you if you buy us cupcakes one day." and so I agreed. The coupon is 50% (up to 10 dollars value) off any cupcake purchase. I could get the boxes 50% off! 1 box of 4 regular cupcakes is normally 16 dollars and 1 box of 10 babycakes is normally 20 dollars. I decided to go with the babycakes because I wanted to try a variety of flavours. 1 big cupcake is $4 and 1 babycake is $2.

My sisters have brought home cupcakes from Cupcake Central numerous times, but I've never tasted some of these flavours before. I love their cupcakes because they are not overly-sweet, and the cupcakes are very moist.

I bought French vanilla custard, dulce de leche, cookies and cream, salted caramel, nutcase, cookie dough, vanilla vanilla and devil's food chocolate.

The Baked brownie

I don't bake brownies often because I've always had the trouble with getting the texture that I like. I've either ended up with way-too-cakey brownies or a hot fudge mess.

I've been eyeing on this recipe for months. I haven't been able to do so because

1. I always run out of good quality chocolate.... My family eats them up.
2. The recipe is very rich and indulgent, not to be made regularly (unless if you have an extremely high metabolism but I would still probably not recommend it hehe)! This recipe calls for five eggs. *here comes the bad type of cholesterol, aka LDL * 

But enough about how this recipe is not so good for health, let's talk about how your tastebuds will feel.

Apparently Baked is superb, renowned for their cookies, granola and of course brownies. According to Oprah, it is one of her favourite brownies, and when something gets Oprah-fied, that something becomes real famous (companies that sponsor her giveaways, Dr.Phil, Rachael Ray, Dr Oz etc).

5 things (featuring fruits)

1. Blueberries

I used this recipe.

I eat blueberries (from the frozen box) on a daily basis. Usually with Greek yoghurt or in the form of a smoothie. Blueberries are cancer-fighting super-foods and can even improve memory!

Today, I baked some blueberry muffins. They have a lovely, fluffy and moist texture. I think it is due to the creaminess of the Greek yoghurt! I used half whole wheat flour and half purpose flour. So you can say, it's kind-of-healthy. So delicious, I had about three when they came out of the oven. I have been on the Greek yoghurt kick lately. I prefer it to normal yoghurt. It is so creamy and hey, it has more protein than normal yoghurt!

2. Peanut butter, bananas and strawberries combo.

Here you have wholemeal toast, with some smooth peanut butter spread topped with bananas and strawberries. 

Not that I didn't like it before, but I have a real obsession with peanut butter right now. My dad was telling my mum not to buy so much because I'm eating too much and it's not good for you.. Truth is, I've been using a lot of peanut butter for my baking. I bake for my friends (so I can fatten them instead of me). But now, I've actually started eating it on toast and also by its own (occasionally). But did you know, peanut butter is good for you, in moderation. I don't know whether it is an Asian thing, but I hear constantly from my parents and Asian friends that their parents don't buy peanut butter because it's bad. BUT IT CONTAINS PROTEIN AND MONO-UNSATURATED FATS, the good kinds of fats that can lower the risk of heart disease and type 2 diabetes. Same with avocados. People used to think "Oh avocado, lots of fats and high in calories" , but they contain good kinds of fats! I'm planning to make avocado pasta one of these days. I do love a creamy pasta.

Strawberries are in season now! After a bitter, probably one of the coldest winters and strawberries were expensive, THEY ARE NOW UBER CHEAP. My mum has bought a few boxes. I've been eating them everyday. They are a good source of vitamin C, experts even say that strawberries can result in healthier, younger looking skin (no wrinkles for me?)

3. Dippin' dots

I went to the Royal Melbourne show with my friends, and I bought one of these.I bought the bubblegum flavour (right). These are called Dippin' dots and they are made by freezing some ice cream with liquid nitrogen. They're super cold, and they're quite fun if you ask me.

4. Mooncakes

My mum has been busy in the kitchen, baking batch after batch of mooncakes! She has been selling this to friends. It's for charity, and she did this last year as well. You would not believe how many left over mooncakes were sitting in our containers last year... I'm not really a mooncake fan, so I don't eat them.

5. Christmas

Courtesy of Urban 75 blog

My favourite time of the year is just a shy 3 months away. This festive season includes Michael Buble's Christmas album, stuffing myself with food such as pudding and shortbread, Home Alone, presents, Santa hats, decorations! The only thing I wish for is snow. I've always fantasised of having a white Christmas in New York. I've seen the pictures; Rockefeller centre and Central Park, the atmosphere there just seems lovely.

Nostalgia

Nostalgia: A bittersweet longing for things, persons, or situations of the past.

Damien was the only dog I ever had. My sisters have had other dogs before, but Damien, oh Damien. He was a mischievous, disobedient and playful dalmatian. Such a handsome dog, but he died a month after we moved to Melbourne.

Being 7 years old. Or frankly, just being a kid. Being a teenager is so overrated. 

 My friends in KL. My summers spent in Malaysia have been unforgettable because of them. They never fail to make me smile, and are seriously hilarious!

I have fond memories of my old house in Malaysia. I'd play around the garden, talk to neighbours from the house behind, swing on our old, rusty swing set. My family would host pot lucks where I'd play hide and seek with kids my age.

And of course I had to post a picture of food! But I do miss cupcakes. I only make them on special occasions because otherwise, no one will eat them (unless if I bring to school for my friends, but that's a hassle). I like the colours on these. It was my first time baking rainbow cupcakes. I baked these with my best friend. 

The Black Toro take II

Take two at The Black Toro! Yii-May was kind enough to take us to dinner at The Black Toro again, and I was like yayayayayaya! My dad and Yii-Vern didn't go last time, so it was their first time. 

Instead of getting the $45 set per person (because it's just TOO much. In my opinion anyway. But you get a good taste of pretty much everything), we ordered some poco plates (small plates) and two mains. OH AND WE GOT DESSERT! 

We ordered a lot of the things we had last time:

So the oyster actually has like some lime and TEQUILA, which I am not exactly supposed to drink at this age, but hey, it was only a small amount. As long as I'm not drunk lol.

Wagyu beef sliders!

Wagyu rump. Some people may think that this is too raw, but I like it!

Baby chicken! The sauce with it was SO delicious, and the chicken was so soft and yummy.

My mum had grilled corn. 

Pulled pork tacos. Very nice. 

We also ordered some triple cooked potatoes with paprika salt and garlic aioli. I don't think the picture is worthy enough of posting because my hand shook and well, to be honest, a bowl of potatoes with some sauce doesn't look that great on picture... But let me tell you, the taste was wowers. I was like okay, potatoes. But no, it's been boiled, roasted and fried. With some really nice sauce, and extremely crunchy.


AND since we weren't too full, we ordered two desserts. 3 words; to die for. The pictures aren't that great, but they're decent I guess. I didn't have much time taking these pictures, my sisters were telling me to hurry up because the dessert just looked so great!

De-constructed peanut butter cheesecake with honeycomb and chocolate sorbet. I love peanut butter. I love cheesecake. Bang those two together, wow. And the honey comb is very crunchy and adds texture to your palette. It doesn't look like cheesecake, hence the name ('de-constructed peanut butter cheesecake'), which was funny because my dad was all like "CHEESECAKE? How come like that wan?" He also did not know what a brownie was until today. Or maybe he just didn't know the name for it.

Chocolate brownie with vanilla ice cream and caramel popcorn. The popcorn was sensational and well, brownies are always good, especially with vanilla ice cream.

So after my second visit, what do I have to say? Simply, wow. Get the set if you want a taste of everything, but you may be a little bit too full. What we ordered today was just nice since we had room for dessert. Oh note about dessert, do not miss dessert. I have yet to try their creme catalan and perhaps mandarin sorbet? The peanut butter cheesecake is a must must. And my favourite sides are the pulled pork tacos, wagyu beef sliders and the triple cooked potatoes. Next time, I want to try their other sides like the zucchini and corn fritters!

Greek yoghurt strawberry banana bread

It's a Wednesday, a day off from school due to the teacher's strike, and the weather is going wild. Blustering winds, powerful enough to topple bins over. Yesterday's weather was the perfect spring weather. Breeze, with sunshine. Today, well, let's just say that Melbourne can unexpectedly change at any time.

Today, I wanted to bake something warm and nutritional, yet tasteful. I didn't want to bake anything with too much sugar. I baked a batch of double chocolate peanut butter cookies over the weekend..They tasted so fudgey and yummy, and I just could not resist. And it had lots and lots of chocolate in it.

But anyway, the healthy solution: banana, dark chocolate, strawberry and walnut bread. One might say (for example, my mother) 'strawberries don't go with banana'. But have they ever tried that combination in the form of banana bread? No.

* Update: I changed the picture because I recently just made a new batch and the pictures look MUCH better. Though the top is a little strange, I guess I put a little bit too much baking powder.

  I found this recipe online, at 'No sugar sweet life'. I have slightly adapted it, reducing sugar and adding walnuts and chocolate. This is somewhat similar with the banana bread you'd see in a bakery, or even in my school's cafeteria, which is delicious but I know it has actually a mound of sugar in it. This recipe uses wholemeal/whole-wheat flour, so it keeps you more filled. It's very moist and not too sweet at all, so even the non-sweet tooth people will enjoy it!

I have to admit, the pictures doesn't do the justice of making it look scrumptiously delicious, but looks can be deceiving.  I have eaten 2 slices,tastes like a slice of heaven. And it's healthy. Could this get any better?

Sunny Gold Coast

 First of all, Happy Father's day!

My dad is my role model, he is so inspiring. He can be scary at times, especially when I don't get a maths problem right, but I still love him no matter what! Some of my friends think he's funny, which I think my whole family can agree on. Once, at my piano lesson, he started practising his golf swings outside, and my piano teacher and I could see. She found it very amusing!Anyway, I wouldn't have gone across the world at such a young age if I didn't have him.

So, this morning, I made him breakfast! Soft boiled egg, banana waffles with ice cream and maple syrup, his normal white coffee, an orange and kiwi fruit.

I've been to the Gold Coast, about three times. One; when I was still living in Malaysia (I think 5 years old?), two; when my family drove up to Sydney and then from there, Gold Coast , which I absolutely do not recommend, because
1. The countryside here is so boring and dull (unlike Europe). All you see is dead grass and cows.
2. Every town seems to be the same (unlike the U.S), not to mention, it is COSTLY.
3. The number of hours it takes to get there, is ridiculous! From Melb to Sydney is 9 hours, then from Sydney to the Gold Coast is TWELVE HOURS.

The third time I visited with my whole fam (except for my oldest sister), was last year in July.

Gold Coast in Queensland is the perfect place for a relaxing beach holiday (I have yet to visit Hawaii though hehe) , the weather is always sunny. Queensland in general is really tropical. That's where our mangoes and bananas come from. However, in 2010-2011, there were terrible floods, which led to almost a year of limited supply of bananas, which meant sky-rocketed prices. If you were the kid who brought a banana to school earlier last year, everyone would go "You're so rich!"

We stayed at an apartment in Coolangatta. From the beach in Coolangatta, you can see the otherside, which is Surfer's Paradise. It's about 25 km away. For the week, we ate, slept, visited family friends, cook (my mum made minestrone soup and pancakes during our time there!) and shopped at a factory outlet which strangely reminded me of Desert hills.