Amazing Kyoto...

Let me share some beautiful pictures of Kyoto from our short 11 days visit in February 2011.

Beautiful Arashiyama Bamboo Forest



Gion, The most famous Geisha District. Beautiful places,filled with shops, restaurants and ochaya (teahouses), where geiko (Kyoto dialect for geisha) and maiko (geiko apprentices) entertain.



Gion area is also famous with yummy Yakitori (Japanese Chicken Skewers)




The Rickshaw man around Kiyomizudera 



Fushimi Inari Shrine, The torii gates along the entire trail are donations by individuals and companies, you also can find the donator's name and the date of the donation inscribed on the back of each gate



Lobby at Sakura Ryokan, where we stayed during our visit to Kyoto. Highly recommended Ryokan, great service, friendly and very helpful receptionist and convenient location. 
(Address: 228 Butsuguyacho, Shimogyo-ku, Kyoto, Kyoto Prefecture 600-8347, Japan)



Nishiki Market. This is my most favorite foodie place in Kyoto. The narrow, shopping street, lined more than hundred shops, selling various kinds of fresh food, processed food, dried food and Kyoto specialties (e.g. Green tea, pickles, Japanese sweet foods, lots of snacks)



Interesting fish at Nishiki Market, Kyoto



Fresh Seafood and Cook Seafood at Nishiki Market, Kyoto



Sweets, lots of Sweets.. If you have a bad sweet tooth like me, you will spend most of your time here to choose these very interesting Japanese sweets. I wish I can try all of them and don't worry about the calories after.



More sweets.. Can you resist this cuteness? I honestly can't.. Just by looking at them, they already made me happy... 



Well, I finally choose one.. Anything that has a green tea flavor is my favorite.. I love love this Green tea sweet.. 



Very interesting Octopus... 



The cute lady selling Mitashari Dango (Rice Dough Dumpling with Sweet Salty sauce).



Oh my... This is so irresistible...



Ok Enough for the sweets, let's move on to the savory food..



Or maybe have some sake..



Or Having dinner with friends we met in Kyoto...



We spent our last night in Kyoto having great dinner with Kyoto friends at the restaurant closed to where we stayed, the restaurant called ichishun 瞬, which means a moment. 

Beautiful Japan...

First of all, I apologise that  I was missing in action for the past few weeks. I feel like I lost my writing mojo since I've got back from holiday. However, I promised in my last post that I will share my holiday story. To be perfectly honest, I am not sure how to begin with. Lots of things happen in Japan after we came back from the holiday. Every time we turn on television or radio, we hear the tragic news of tsunami, earthquake, nuclear radiation in Japan. My heart sank even more. Many families and friends are incredibly touched by this disaster. I encourage you to help them in many ways. Thousand of them have lost their love ones and left homeless. So, have a moment or two in this time of needs to head over to the links of the charity funds below and make a difference by donating in any way we can. Let us be their shoulder to lean on.

Japanese Red Cross Society

World Vision

Tea for Tsunami Appeal 

Japan Animal Welfare Society  

Other ways to donate

Salvation Army Japan

This was our 2nd visit to Japan and we always say that Japan is the most beautiful country and amazing people we ever visited. Lots of memorable experience and many happy memories, I said. Despite of the mother nature strikes in Japan at the moment, this will not ever stop us to revisit the country in the near future. In this blog, I just want to share my little story about our short 11 days Japan journey about food, amazing places we visited before this devastation happened and hoping by the end of this post, we will remember not to take things for granted, live life to fullest when you can... because you never know when you might not have a chance to anymore.

So here they are, our Japan photo memories in Kyoto, Takayama, Hiroshima, Tokyo and Osaka

Lychee & Strawberry Macaron Sundae Ice Cream

I feel it's been so long since I wrote my last blog. Ok, I have an excuse as I am still on my 4 weeks holiday. Loving every moment not to wake up to alarm every morning and eating an awesome dish from Japan and Indonesia, I promise I'll share my holiday story with you once I'm back in Melbourne. It's sad that it's only 1 more week to go until coming back to reality. Well, it's time of the month for International Incident Party, organised by Jeroxie. I am very excited when I knew that this month theme is going to be sundae. I immediately had a great idea for this theme and it's one of great reason to use my brand spanking new ice cream maker. I quickly prepared this dish right in time before we went on holiday.

Red theme seems to be popular colour for this month, with chinese new year celebration on the first week and valentine's day. So I decided to use lots of strawberry flavour for the macaron and combination of strawberry and lychee for ice cream. Honest truth, me and hubby finished the ice cream in one day. Guilty! The flavour is very refreshing, it's just the perfect one for summer. The result of my macaron is not as great as I expected, don't worry I didn't throw them away, I crushed them instead for decoration. It is indeed a great combination between the lychee, strawberry and crushed macaron. It's just one of the great sundae flavor I can not resist.

Lychee and Strawberry Macaron Sundae Ice Cream

Ingredients 

250g Strawberries

165g Caster Sugar

565g Lychees Syrup

375ml Milk

500ml Cream (whipping)

6 Eggs, at room temperature

Strawberries Sauce
Crushed Walnuts

Macaron, (you can find macaron recipe, here)

Method

1. Reserve 50g of the strawberries for decoration. Hull and roughly chop the remaining strawberries and place in a bowl, along with any juices. Sprinkle with 1 tablespoon of the sugar and set aside for 30 minutes. Drain and finely chop the lychees, reserving 125ml of the syrup.

2. Put the milk, cream and remaining sugar in a saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring constantly for few minutes  and the milk is just about to boil. Remove from heat. 

3. Whisk the egg yolk in a bowl for 1 minute, or until combined, then add 60ml of the hot milk mixture. Stir to combine, then our into the remaining milk mixture. Return the saucepan to low medium heat and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, or until the mixture thickens and coats the back of the spoon. Do not allow the mixture to boil. Strain through a fine serve and set aside to cool.

4. Gently stir the strawberries and any juice, lychee and lychee syrup into the custard to combine.

5. Transfer to an ice cream machine and freeze according to manufacturer's instructions.

In the meantime, prepare the macaron, you can find the macaron recipe here and create the heart shape or any fun shape for your fun sundae.

Once the macaron and ice cream ready, this is when the fun begins assembling the sundae and let your imagination out. Place 2 -3 scoop on your ice cream dish/bowl, crushed the macaron, swirl the strawberry sauce and repeat the same process until you reach the top of the bowl and garnish with heart shape.

You can check out my previous International Incident Party from the previous month, here

Citrus Poppy Seed Syrup Cake with Lemon Icing

I am now officially on my 4 weeks holiday. Yet, I have backlog of food blogging stuff that I haven't shared with you as I was busy with work and lots of to do list before we went on holiday. Today we are just relaxing at my in law's house, so I have all time in the world to catch up with my blog. Finally, yay....

What do I love the most about this cake? The perfect balance of the sour of the citrus and sweetness of the icing. Anyway, here's a story behind this Citrus Poppy Seed Cake, I specially baked this cake for my lovely neighbours, who is currently looking after our house when we are away and have been a great neighbour to us for the past 4 years. The sad news is they decided to sell their house in a few months. So this cake is our appreciation for the last thing they do for us before they move away.

Here's I present you, Citrus Poppy Seed Syrup Cake with Lemon Icing

Citrus Poppy Seed Syrup Cake with Lemon Icing

Ingredients

50g Poppy Seeds

60ml Milk

185g Butter, Softened

1 tablespoon finely grated orange rind

220g Caster Sugar

3 Eggs

225g Self Raising Flour

75g Plain Flour

60g Almond Meal

125ml Orange Juice

Method

1. Combine Seeds and Milk in a small bowl, stand for 20 minutes

2. Preheat oven to 160°. Grease deep 22 cm round cake pan, line base and side with baking paper.

3. Beat butter, rind and sugar in a small bowl with electric mixer until light and fluffy, beat in eggs one at  a time.

4. Transfer mixture to a large bowl using wooden spoon, stir in flours, almond meal, juice and poppy-seed mixture. Spread mixture into pan, bake about 1 hour.

Okay, I must admit for some reason, the cake turned out like an evil face. I promise I wasn't planning to do so. Therefore, the icing on the top would be a great idea to cover it.

Orange Syrup

Ingredients

220g Caster Sugar

160ml Orange Juice

80ml Water

Method

Using wooden spoon stir ingredients in small sauce pan over heat, without boiling, until sugar dissolves. Bring to boil, reduce heat, simmer, uncovered, without stirring for 2 minutes.

Stand Cakes in a pan 5 minutes, before turning. Pour hot syrup over hot cake.

Lemon Icing

Ingredients

50g Salted Butter

60 g Icing Sugar

2-3 tablespoon lemon juice

35g walnuts, chopped

Method

Combine Butter, sugar and lemon juice in a bowl and beat with an electric mixer until pale and fluffy. Spread over the top of the cake and sprinkle with walnuts. Yum..

Here's for closer look

Grilled Bananas with Chocolate Sprinkle and Melted Cheese on Hot Dog Bun (Pisang Bakar)

I am very excited to say that I am joining monthly theme food bloggers event called International Incident Party, organized by Penny, from Jeroxie. I will be looking forward every month to create something different for the event. This month's theme is Hot Dog and I think it would be a great idea to introduce the traditional dish from Indonesia, where I came from. I'll give you a bit of background of this dish, we called them Pisang Bakar, you can easily get this snack from food street vendor. People don't normally eat this dish with hot dog bun but I do and people normally eat this for midnight snack but I eat this for breakfast therefore for some reasons, I love to eat them with hot dog bun. Well, I guess I sort of made my own modification here.

If you follow me on Twitter, you would have known that I am looking forward for upcoming holiday in 2 weeks to Indonesia for 3 weeks and 11 days trip to Japan. I can't wait to eat this dish in person and experience other traditional dishes from both countries. I promise I will take lots of picture and share them with you. I must say making this dish is easy enough to fulfill my craving for Indonesian dish, as it goes higher and higher everyday as the days goes closer. Grilled Bananas topped with melted cheese and chocolate sprinkle. Yummmm..

Grilled Bananas with Chocolate Sprinkle and Melted Cheese on the Hot Dog Bun

(Pisang Bakar)

Ingredients

1 Banana, cut them half length way

Chedar Cheese, for topping

Condensed Milk, for topping

Chocolate Sprinkle, for topping

Unsalted Butter or Margarine

Hot Dog Bun

Method

1. Melt the butter or Margarine on the grill and cook banana until golden brown and cook the hot dog bun on the grill. (I like the bun nice and warm)

2. Serve the grilled banana on the warm hot dog bun. Add the chocolate sprinkle and grated some chedar cheese. Swirl with the condensed milk all over.

There it is, Yummy and Easy Grilled Bananas with Chocolate Sprinkle and Melted Cheese on Hot Dog Bun.

Winnie The Pooh Cake

A good friend of mine, Adina, asked me to bake birthday cake for her son's birthday, Lachie. I was thrilled and stunned at the same time. I made birthday cakes for adults but never ever made for kids before. She requested to be a theme birthday cake and also left it up to me to decide on what kind of character I should bake.  As she mentioned a lot about Winnie the pooh, so I did lots of research to make the perfect Winnie the pooh cake for Lachie. It was his 1st Birthday after all and I wanted to give my friend something memorable for her son. Well, it was a challenge indeed. 

At the end of the day, Three things were really my saviour, My husband as always, who helped me to shape the winnie the pooh character and the honey jar, Secondly, the cake cook book called Planet Cake by Paris Cutler, which explains in details on the basic of making perfect decorated cake, hints and trips on trouble shooting and the tools required, Lastly, the cake decorating shop on Flinders St on Melbourne CBD called Cake Deco (Address - Shop 7. Port Phillip Arcade, 232 Flinders St, Melbourne), which supplies any kind of  tools, ingredients and decoration you need. 

I decided to bake 2 layers of cake with combination of dark chocolate mud cake for the 1st layer and white chocolate mud cake for 2nd layer, covering with dark chocolate ganache on the top, which gives better texture and moist for icing.  It was a fun challenge and I must say thank you for my friend, Adina, to give me this opportunity. 

Winnie The Pooh Cake

Basic White/ Dark Chocolate Mud Cake 

(For one 22 cm round cake or 20 cm square cake)
(Make one for each white and dark chocolate mud cake)

Ingredients

300g Unsalted Butter, Chopped

300g White/ Dark Couverture Chocolate, chopped

300g Plain Flour

150g Self Raising Flour

400g Caster Sugar

3 Eggs, lightly beaten

1 1/2 teaspoon, natural vanilla extract

Method

1. Preheat the oven 180°. Grease the tin and line the base and sides with baking paper. Put the butter and 270 ml water in a saucepan over medium heat and stir until the butter has melted. Turn off the heat, then add the chocolate and stir until it has melted and is well combined.


2. Sift the flours together in a bowl. Add the sugar, a pinch of salt and make well in the centre.


3. Pour the chocolate mixture, egg and vanilla into the well then stir until well combined.


4. Pour into the cake tin. Bake for 1 hour 40 minutes or until the cake is golden brown and skewer comes out clean into the middle of the cake. (If the cake is browning too quickly, cover the foil halfway through baking).


5. Leave to cool completely in the tin on a wire rack.


6. Cut the cake and shape to number 1.


(I forgot to take a picture for the white chocolate mud cake, I only have this picture for dark chocolate mud cake)

Dark Chocolate Ganache

Ingredients

1.2kg Dark Chocolate, finely chopped

600 ml Pure Cream

Method

1. Put the chocolate pieces in a large bowl

2. Put the cream in a sauce pan and bring to boiling point. Pour the cream over the chopped chocolate and mix with a hand whisk until the ganache is smooth. (Do not use an electric whisk, as you will create too many air bubbles in the ganache, Also make sure you use pure cream and do not use thickened cream as thickened cream contains gelatine.

3. Allow to cool completely, spread to cool cake and let it set until it is firm to the touch

4. Once the cake is set and smoothly ganache, cake is ready to covered with icing.

I used Ready to Roll Icing to cover the cake and Flower Moulding Paste to shape the Winnie the pooh and Honey Jar, which I got them from Cake Deco Shop on Flinders St, Melbourne CBD.

Once the cake is covered with icing, the fun part began. This was the part that we can go as crazy and creative in decorating the cake and let the imagination out.

The birthday boy finally enjoyed his winnie the pooh cake.  One happy client.

I must say that this is the epic cake that I ever baked and really was a fun challenge. Happy Birthday, Lachie.

Lemon Curd Melting Moments

First of all, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!. Hope you have an awesome time with your love ones. Well as for me, It has been a crazy and fun week with family coming over from overseas, no time off from work and celebrating new year's eve with great friends.


This is actually a late Christmas post which I should update on the Christmas week but I didn't have a chance to do so. I do apologize for this. This melting moments is actually my small Christmas gift for work colleague and friends. I have to say a big thank you to my hubby for creating lovely packaging for my christmas contribution. I had a great fun making these dainty little short breads and I have to say my friends and work colleague loves them, which really made my day and motivates me to do something similar and more creative for next christmas. The most great feedback i've got was 'they are really deliciously melt and the touch of lemon curd are refreshing'. So here it is,  My late Christmas gift to you, Lemon Curd Melting Moments.

Lemon Curd Melting Moments

Ingredients for Shortbread

250g Salted Butter, soft

40g Icing Sugar

1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract

185g Plain Flour

65g Corn Flour

Method

1. Preheat the oven 170° and Line a tray with a baking paper.

2. With an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Add the vanilla and beat briefly. Stir in the flour, cornflour and salt. 

3. Spoon the mixture into a piping bag fitted with fluted nozzle and pipe 3cm rosettes onto prepared tray lined with baking paper.

Leave 2 cm and space between each rosette.

4. Bake them for 10-15 minutes or until golden. Cool on a wire rack.

Handle gently when storing as they are very delicate and crumble easily.

Lemon Curd

Ingredients

1 teaspoon finely grated Lemon

160ml Lemon Juice

310g Caster Sugar

250g Unsalted Butter, diced

4 Large Eggs, lightly beaten

Pinch of Salt

Method

Add all ingredients in a sauce pan over medium heat and stir with a wooden spoon or whisk until thickened. Strain, cover with plastic wrap and chill.

Once the shortbreads and lemon curd are cool, sandwich them together.

With the lovely packaging created by hubby and wrap with bit of ribbon will make a great Christmas Meting Moment.