Oscar Night

So tonight was the Academy Awards so we decided to host an Oscar's night with food inspired by the nominees. Among the best picture nominees, we couldn't think of anything for "The Fighter" but I think we fared pretty well for the most part.

For "Inception", I made spelt cheese crackers with an imprint of a maze:
"True Grit" was turned into these polenta (or grits) cakes topped off with a roasted grape tomato:
Choux pastry swans made black by black sesame paste is probably the easiest to guess for "The Black Swan":
"The Kids Are Alright" took a while to think of so these are marshmallow "boobs":
For "The King's Speech", we did tea sandwiches with a crown imprint:
A blue raspberry mix with 7up made this "Blue Valentine" drink:
The main thing in "127 Hours" is the scene where he cuts off his arm. We did full chicken wings:
These ribs were "Winter's Bone". More of a literal approach:
"Toy Story 3" had Mr. Potato Head so we had mini baked potato bites with sour cream and bacon chips:
"Alice In Wonderland" has magic mushrooms and the Queen of Hearts so these are mushrooms stuffed with a shrimp mixture and topped off with a ham heart:
These are spelt cupcakes topped off with a coffee buttercream and a Facebook disc for "The Social Network":

Overall, I think it was fairly successful. Definitely lots of fun:)

Butternut Squash Soup

Creamy butternut squash soup with a dollop of sour cream and crumbled chestnuts.

Roses are Red

The timing of this cake is very fitting since Valentine's day is just 2 days away. Although it is for an adorable girl's birthday, it can easily be adapted for your valentine. Bright pink and red roses all over a subtly pink background is very fun and beautiful at the same time. Underneath all the buttercream roses is a chocolate cake with ganache and chocolate buttercream.

Happy Chinese New Year!

The Year of the Rabbit is upon us again! I'm not really too enthused about Chinese New Year but I do have a soft spot for the food during this time so I took a stab at making Turnip Cake, or Lo Pak Goh. I looked up a few recipes online and kind of combined them all in one, changed a few things to taste and hoped for the best!

The result was way better than I expected. I do hope it's not beginner's luck though. Eating it pan-fried was the best! Crispy on the outside, and warm and soft on the inside. The flavor of the turnip was prominent enough and the bits of chinese sausage and dried shrimp? So good! Here's the recipe (for the flour/water mixture, when I made it, it looked like too much paste to daikon so I just measured out the 600g to mix in. You could probably calculate it out so you don't have to waste it):

Lo Pak Goh

800g grated daikon
200g water
1 tsp salt
300g rice flour
60g tang meng flour (wheat flour)
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
1/3 cup dried shrimp, chopped
3 shiitake mushrooms, chopped
2 chinese sausages, chopped
2 green onions, chopped

-bring the water to a boil with the daikon and cook till soft
-drain the daikon and press and reserve the liquid
-saute the sausages, then the mushrooms lightly
-measure out 600g of the reserved liquid and heat up.
-mix the flours together with the salt and pepper
-pour the hot liquid on top of the flour and mix till combined
-measure out 600g of this mixture and add the remaining ingredients
-press into a cake pan and steam for 1 hour
-cool, cut into slices, and pan fry
-serve with oyster sauce