Hopefully next year we will be somewhere more exciting and far away from here for her birthday. Maybe getting authentic nachos from somewhere in the Americas….

This is how I ended up the post about Little B’s birthday last year. We are far away, but not even close to the Americas or authentic nachos.

And so we complete a year of birthdays away. We have had celebrations in Penang, Saigon, Kyoto/Hiroshima, Amritsar and now in Istanbul. With varied success.

Little B wanted to pick her own cake, so that is what we did, we took her to the delightful and full of colors and temptations patisserie nearby.  A horrible place, perfectly suitable for a little girl and her sweet tooth.

Later, deep into the night, Miss Fab and I were busy cutting up the free booklet they inserted into the bag with the cake. We needed to make cards, letters, decorate a box and wrapping.

A bit of glue, medical tape, scissor action, kitchen paper towels and creativity and we were ready for the morning.

Our creative, but simple wrappings were hiding equally unpretentious gifts – a new set of pencils for her love of drawings, the VW bug she wanted for her Mini Lego guys, a bunch of snacks and sweets, $20 cash to replenish her thirsty savings account and very little else.

It is the rule in our family that the birthday person is the boss of the day. They decide everything, what we eat, where, when…what we do and etc.

Breakfast is usually pancakes, so no surprises here.

For the rest of the day my not so little girl wanted nothing but to play and just stay home. So that is what we did. The catalog from the patisserie came in handy again, as well as a few other advertising leaflets we had gotten around town.

For dinner our boss ordered pizza, so Mr.Blab happily obliged and delivered us a delicious trio.

Candles adorned the simple chocolate cake, surprisingly chosen amongst the other glamorous looking ones.

To finish the day, I set up the kids with three big bowls of freshly popped corn and Little B’s choice for a movie: The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert . Yes, my daughter has loved this movie about drag-queens and a transsexual on a road trip across Australia for a few years now. I thought she had forgotten it, but I guess not.

You may think this birthday is nothing special and maybe you are right. We had no jumping castles, no piles of presents, no Disneyland or other such entertainment. I even wondered if this is enough at some point in the day. But right before settling in for her movie Little B ordered me not to enter the room. I did not. A few minutes later she asked me to close my eyes and bend. So I did. And she knighted me with a necklace adorned with colorful love-hearts, said “I love you”, kissed me and with a big grin exposing a few of her wobbly teeth ran away to her popcorn and drag-queens.

I guess it is enough.

Because even little girls can recognize love and care, even when they are wrapped in paper towels and recycled boxes.

Happy Birthday, you beautiful little soul.

©Snaps & Blabs, 2012. | Permalink | 10 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Homemade, Turkey Post tags: birthday, fun, istanbul

Snaps & Blabs

The living room was turned into a creative hub, read ‘upside-down”, and we joined in the fun of cutting up and making characters from what we can find in the otherwise useless publications.

Here are the submissions by Little B:

___________________

Next, Miss Fab took the stage.

________________

I had a lot of fun. I have been meaning to join in the new cutting addiction, but never got around to it. So I was enjoying finally getting my hands in the pages and thinking of what I can come up with.

My models were ready and entered the scene.

And, my pride and joy:

_____________________

Mr. Blab, having hidden behind the tree, shows up and wows us with his take on the brief.

This one, took my laughing breath away!

Savor in the genius of this work of art.

To finish up the parade, we made quick collection of each of our favorites.

Me and Mr.Blab:

Little B:

Miss Fab, who after seeing what Little B picked, wanted to add the Fish Cat Woman to her selection too, so just imagine its there:

$5 worth of magazines = much appreciated gift  + hours of laughter and priceless family fun time.

You have got to try this!

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | Still a monologue | Add to del.icio.us
Homemade, Life with loved ones Post tags: christmas, creative, fun

Snaps & Blabs

The kids have known for awhile that this year the holidays will be even lower key than usual. I think there was some parental apprehension in regards to the few presents we were contributing to the mix (read Mr.Blab). But we stuck to those guns, be it barely, and we still had a wonderful time, if not better.

Miss Fab had gotten me an iPad!

..which was promptly stolen by the little dude that runs around the house.

Our reusable gift bag kept on being carried away into the various rooms where gifts were being hidden and coming back with things, mostly handmade.

A dancing Michael Jackson for a die-hard fan?

Priceless.

Basketball hoop, player and ball for a crazed game fan? But of course.

This year, I was dreaming of and got a pile of… prosciutto di Parma! You should have seen my eyes, popping out of my morning haired head. I love prosciutto, but avoid buying it often because its just so expensive and I finish it in no time. This was a heavy load of thinly sliced heaven, accompanied by Gorgonzola and double Brie cheeses, as well as olive oil mini bread crackers.

(All of it gone in less than 30 hours. )

A very much appreciated gift by the girls was the heavy selection of magazines we collected from the op-shops and library rejects. Who said that fun and thoughtful gifts are expensive?

When all was said and done, and there was not a whole lot of it, the gift that left huge sparkles in the kids eyes was the most basic.

Cookies made and decorated with love.

The boxes were carried around like babies, cuddled, stroked and protected by wondering hands. Cookies were taken out and admired only to be put back in a hurry.

In the end pleasure took over.

And they were all gone within 30 hours. The best present, as voted by everyone, including Mr.Blab, who of course got a box of his own.

(See, there are advantages to not giving family cookies – you can wow them when the need arises).

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | Still a monologue | Add to del.icio.us
Homemade, Life with loved ones Post tags: christmas, creative, fun, gifts

Snaps & Blabs

I promise you, you will get sick of cookies by the time I am done with Christmas. I know I am.  But since I put so much effort into the things, I think I deserve to show off and milk the situation as much as possible. So this is me, milking.

I had Swedish cookies left over from the batch I sent off to family and friends. Then I baked two more types of cookies. One of them is a somewhat traditional Bulgarian honey cookie. Searching for recipes and ideas, I stumbled upon some mind blowing decorations. One of them appealed to me a lot – check out these creations. Being a kind of person that thinks she can do anything, I ventured in the deep end with zero experience.

Without the right tools, I ended up just making a hole in a bag and using that for most of the work. I had no plan, which is rarely a good idea with these kind of things, but luck was on my side and I only had two duds – the first one was where I realized I dont have the right tools; and the last one, when I realized I was over the whole process.

Having done the hard work the night before, on Christmas Eve I had to pack the cookies, so they are ready for the morning fun.

I liked the effect of sparkle that was given by the sugar I decided to sprinkle on the cookies, about half way through the baking process.

But the all time favorites of all the cookies I managed to produce this festive season were the Mexican wedding cakes – round balls of roasted nuttiness generously dusted in sugar and favorite for everyone; the pecan shortbreads – that managed to melt Mr.Blab into pleasure oblivion.

And last, but not least, definitely not least, the chocolate wafers.

They may not be the pretties cookie, but those little fellas are the most wonderful, full of chocolate flavor, light and crunchy beauties I have ever made.

And to top it all off, they are very easy to make.

The cookies safely nestled in their boxes, I was ready to welcome the morning.

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Food pleasures, Homemade Post tags: christmas, cookies, decoration, gift

Snaps & Blabs

I went a bit bake crazy this year. For a person that doesnt really eat cookies or bake sweets very often, I sure got myself deep in trouble in the kitchen. I think I lost my mind somewhere along the way. It was not enough to just whip up a huge batch of the things, I had to make variety of cookies.

There is one thing for sure, I dont know when to stop.

I baked and cursed some, and had a few floppers (which got eaten by my in-house tasting team), I wanted to cry at some point, I am sure, and in the end I had more cookies than I had ever been in the presence of in my whole life.

Then came real life, or the life where you have to think of how to send off those piles of carefully baked items to people all over the world. I hate that life. It always ruins the fun I have in my head.

I put on my thinking cap and went  to work. Since the intended recipients have now gotten their gifts, I can share with you the results.

Creativity is a messy business, no way around it.

I got a few boxes from the “two dollar stores” and luckily they had a selection that was not sparkly or shiny with bright offensive colours.

A few ribbons – simple to go with the boxes – again from the dollar stores, and gift bags that were on sale from the craft store, was all that I had to purchase. I dug out some papers I had in the house and wondered what else I can come up with.

Since I had a few types of cookies, I thought I will make tags to go with each. Those tags were meant to hang on the boxes or gift bags. Then I thought to make labels, and I liked that option better. Since all the work was done at night, I called it my Night Bakery.

With the logo ready, simple informal writing indicating the type of cookie inside, finished the labels and I printed them all out.

The blue ribbons were an accidental idea. I was cutting up the papers that go under the printed labels and I had a few thin pieces hanging around. When I started playing with them, I came up with those beautiful little ribbons.

The bagged cookies are packed like that: cookies inside are tightly enclosed in clear kitchen wrap; paper gift bags with removed handles and thickened inside part; over the opening I draped the blue paper; over that went the smaller printed label; stapled together and on top of the staple I glued the ribbon.

The mexican wedding cookies were a bit more challenging. I cut up a piece of dotted blue paper to go on the bottom; on top of that I put some baking paper to prevent the oil from soaking in to the bottom; the clear material is just cellophane (cello wrap), which I aired for a day outside to remove any residual smell; that is gathered and tied with a ribbon and on top is the same procedure as the bags.

The boxes held a variety of cookies.

I wrapped each variety of cookie in clear wrap, to keep it fresh and to avoid any mix up in the box.

The best option to keep the boxes of cookies nice and secure in their shipping box is…popped corn. I had read about this packing material idea awhile ago, but never had a chance to use it, until now.

If you want to try this, pop the corn yourself and dont add anything to it. Certainly no butter

After days of work and heavy brain usage, this process was over. I cannot tell you how good it felt to have those boxes leave the house. A feeling only eclipsed when I heard they had gotten to their new home and are being enjoyed by family and friends.

I dont think I am doing that again any time soon. Although, now that I am a pro…oh, who am I kidding.

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Food pleasures, Homemade Post tags: christmas, food, picnic

Snaps & Blabs

So I thought I will raise the cultural level of the place, for a change. Art is always good for the soul and for reaching the upper levels of blog visitors – and with this post, I am aiming high, baby. I am talking A.R.T.

I have searched far and wide for the latest fashions, ran up mountains, fed goats, ate grass and risked my life for a lot of insider information, the kind you dont just get willy-nilly. All this just so you can look your best when you step foot outside your door. Talk about self-sacrificing, its probable I overdid it, maybe. (translation: the girls have a new fun activity of chopping up magazines and creating funny characters and then calling us for a fashion show; I took pictures and now I claim credit for it).

Drum-roll….fancy shmancy, new-age, but not too much music fills the hall and in enters,Robert, the MC:

The show is opened , by a positively glowing familiar face in a beautiful pink dress:

You didnt think I will hire just any models to present this, did you?

No, no.

NO!

If pink is too weak for you, George will present the red bombshell of a dress, sure to impress.

Big head?

No problem, high fashion is just for you, with a Christmas touch.

Baby, with diamond studded nappy, I am sure.

Or…stolen?

Robert’s wife, in a white stunner, comes to carry off her husband in the seam of her flowing skirt.

Marvelous.

Brad in silver, wondering where his daughter has gone.

Red for the Wiggles and…her, the soy milk chick.

Some of my favorite looks for the season – dog head and Keith Urban in feathers.

George is back in black and yellow.

Summer Brat and Brat looking at his butt – in pink again. Dusty pink.

Those two are just adorable.

Sophisticated Brad.

And for a suitable ending, who else, but:

Dont dispair, there will be more.

But for now enjoy some carefully chosen entertainment to the stars for the Intermission. All the way from Mywomb – The flying Dod!

*gasps in the crowd*

*deafening applause fills the room*

Welcome to the second part of our show, specially compiled by the most talanted Little B.

Babies feature heavily next season, make sure you have at least one on hand.

Same goes for wigs, big lips, boobs, flowery dresses and hairy arms.

I am proud to boast that Bruno agreed to join this extravaganza of taste we have prepared for you.

Wow, he has never looked better, except that thong maybe…or was it a bag? Suspenders?

See, big lips. Get lipotized®, people!

Drunker John showed up, in cheap pink viscose dress…

..and caused some disturbance.

But some controversy never hurt the publicity of such an important event.

We fix the mood with a flying number. Oh, the grace.

To finish this bonanza of style – Brad in pale blue and pooddle, is it a bag?, struts his long perfect legs to the owe of the audience.

Now you are all ready to win every battle of images. Just pick a few of the tricks presented and you will be the talk of the town, guaranteed.

And this blog? We are now in the strathosphere of sophistication. No, that is for amateurs…we are in the exosphere, baby. A.R.T!

You are welcome.

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Homemade, Life with loved ones Post tags: creative, fun, performance

Snaps & Blabs

This post is going to be very…cakey. This means, lots of sugar, lots of butter, lots of all sorts of very unhealthy stuff. So be prepared.

I mentioned this cake in the post about Mr.Blab’s birthday and did say I will have to get back to it in a separate post. Why, you will  find out in a minute. First, a bit of prelude.

We have a show here that is kind of like Survivor, but what the contestants need to overcome are difficult recipes, surprise ingredients and hungry crowds – Masterchef. We love watching it. All of us, kids included (especially the Junior Masterchef, which was a big success in the house).  There is a segment in the competition, where the budding cooks have to recreate a difficult recipe by a well renowned chef. Its called the Pressure Test.

When it came down to choosing a cake to make for Mr.Blab, I knew I wanted something more special than the usual ones I make. I needed something with a wow factor, so I went looking at the Pressure Test recipes on the Masterchef site. And I found it, I found the cake that answered all the requirements – hard, rich with lots of chocolate.  And this is how I came to making

.

Adriano Zumbo’s

Chocolate Mousse Cake

The recipe for the cake can be found on the Masterchef site, and the cake is supposed to look like this:

image: MasterChef website

I am not a baker, which makes this undertaking even more bizarre. Take that as a disclaimer for how I am going to present to you the process that went into this monster.

Reading other people’s experiences with making the cake, I get an idea that it takes about 4, or so, hours. I can only work at night and decide to split the time in two and make few layers the first day, and finish the rest the next.  I chose the ones that need to be well chilled/frozen and get on with the cooking.

Night 1

Everyone says that the given quantities are too much, except for the chocolate mousse, so I cut the recipe in half (except for the mousse) and set off to make the

Texture apple tatin insert

PART A
2   granny smith apples, peeled & diced
175g   caster sugar
90g   butter

PART B
1.5   granny smith apples, peeled & diced
5g  butter
0.5   orange zest
3g   fresh ginger (leave in large bits)
25g  caster sugar
5ml   calvados (I didnt have that, so I used vodka)

Those are supposed to be pretty straight forward to do, that is, if you have ever melted butter, which I had not. Months ago I tried to make an upside down apple something that involved making a caramel and gave up. Now it was time to go for it again.

I put a bit of sugar in the pan and hoped that something will happen.

Got busy with peeling and cutting the apples.

And eating the last bits of the baklava sitting next to me. Making this middle-eastern delight has been the latest tool in my cooking skill-set. Dreadful for the waist.

And then my patience was rewarded with the glossy brown bubbles coming from the sides of my sugar pile. Eureka!

That was not the end of it, though. I had to keep on adding sugar to this until the whole quantity became caramel. This may sound easy to the bakers out there, but to this novice, the whole process was a bit of a stressful monitoring and worrying that the whole thing is burning.

Once the caramel is all melted, I added the butter, which cause a big angry bubbling to happen and then the apples went it too. This looked delicious.

Part one was ready.

This second bit made me suspicious from the beginning, just didnt sound like something I would like to eat, but trusting the genius of Mr.Zumbo , I ventured forward.

1. Peel & dice the apples. Add butter, orange zest, & ginger to a pan and cook until aromatic. Add sugar & apples. Cook over high heat for 1 minute, add calvados & flambé. Cool mixture.

Yep, I flambe-d! But that was the extent of my excitement with this mixture. I was still not sure how this could possibly be nice and very reluctantly mixed the two apple mixtures together, poured the result in the silicon shape and sent it to the freezer.

_____

Salted Caramel Layer

150g caster sugar
30g glucose
60g water
110g cream
3g gelatine leaves
60g butter unsalted
1g sea salt flakes

I found no gelatine leaves, so I followed the suggestions of other people and used 5g of gelatine powder, which I dissolved in a bit of hot water first.

This step involved more caramel making. Just a different kind. The sugar, water and glucose melted together nice and quick and started slowly bubbling…and bubbling…and bubbling. I wondered if this thing will ever turn color. And then something happened, and I had caramel!

The smell! Whatever your stance is on sugar, the smell of caramel is irresistable. Mr.Blab was commenting from the other room and then I heard him sniffling through the crack of the door. Its not easy to be on the other side of the caramel door.

To that mixture, I added the cream. Because I didnt warm it, it again caused a violent bubbling, but it worked and after some good mixing, I had a delicious looking creamy caramel.

Add the gelatine, cool a bit, add the butter, mix well, pop in a silicon mould, grate some sea salt on top and wham in the freezer.

_________

Chocolate blackberry sabayon mousse

Blackberry ganache
125g blackberry pulp
12g inverted sugar
50g caster sugar
6g caster sugar
3g pectin nh
200g 64% dark chocolate
35g butter

Sabayon mousse
60ml liquid strained black tea
50g sugar
50g egg
145g blackberry ganache (see recipe above)
60g 64% chocolate
400g whipped cream soft peaks

No, I didnt find inverted sugar, nor did I bother making it, which one can, apparently.  I just used glucose. Not sure if that made any difference, but the mousse worked, so at least it didnt ruin it.

To get the blackberries, I had to buy two boxes of frozen mixed berries and pick the big juicy fruits from there.  Then the fruits went into the pan and melted into a mush to which I added the first batch of sugar. After a bit, I added the pectin (since the pectin I found was mixed with sugar, I didnt add the second bit of sugar). The warm red liquid is poured on top of the chopped up chocolate and mixed well. Then butter is added and you are supposed to whizz it with a hand mixer. I have none of those, so I just mixed it well by hand.

The second part of the mousse was much less clear. I made one batch of the sabayon mixture on top of the water bath. The mix kept on changing on me – liquid, frothy, glossy frothy, less frothy, until it became like a glossy cream. I kept on waiting to feel when is the right time to take it off, but I felt nothing except confusion.

So I left the pan on the counter and went on to find out what in the world is sabayon meant to look like. I find a few videos and get a general idea of what exactly I am after.

I start off again and whip a new sabayon (zabaione).

Whip the cream and then mix it all up. It looks horrid as I mix, the chocolate doesnt really mix well with the cream, the ganache doesnt make it any better…but I mix. Then I plop in the sabayon and things just magically come together and make a wonderful chocolate mousse.

I cover the bowl with wrap and send it into the fridge.

The kitchen is messy, but not too bad.

I feel accomplished, clean up and take pleasure in crossing off the layers I managed to make and go to bed.

Night 2

The second night I start from behind. During the day I get out the caramel layer from the fridge and find out that its too gooey, it will be impossible to move it when I need to assemble the cake. Miss Fab helps me scrape (and lick a lot) the yummy sticky mess into a bowl, which I plan on using with the new batch I will be making.

I am now a pro and whip up the creamy caramel without a glitch, mix the old one in it while its still hot and let it cool.

Then I prepare the rented pan. I decide to achieve the dents on top of the cake with caps, but since I dont want to use glad wrap to cover them I find three nice smooth ones and plop them in the bottom of the pan.

I put down a layer of mousse, which is by now nicely set. I would say too nicely, as I found it a bit hard to spread smoothly and evenly. I put the mousse layer in the fridge for a few minutes, because I need it hard for the next step.

Then I set off to make the jaconde, aka. almond sponge cake.  And here is where the nightmare of a night starts for me.

I have seen cut up pictures of the original cake and dont remember seeing white layers through it. Reading the recipe it sounds like this step is basically making the decorative side part of the cake (the one with the light swirls).

Biscuit decor jaconde

Cigarette decor paste
52ml cream
25g egg white
25g icing sugar
15g plain flour
10g cocoa

Biscuit jaconde
30g plain flour
20g butter melted
100g almond meal
100g icing sugar
3 eggs
90g egg whites
45g caster sugar

I am not sure what exactly, but I mess something up and have to start over. The decor paste is very easy and straight forward to make, just mix the ingredients. I spread it on the back of a pan with indented bottom I have, make the decorative swirls on it with a finger and plop it in the freezer for a minute.

The biscuit jaconde is fairly simple as well. Whip the eggs, icing sugar and almond meal. In a separate bowl whip egg whites and sugar til stiff peaks and fold those into the almond mixture while putting in the flower and butter slowly as well.

The chocolate layer is hardened by now and I pour the almond mixture in a thin layer on top. Then into the oven.

A few minutes later I check on the jaconde and shock-and-horror, its dripping everywhere. Its hot, I am trying to save it, to prop the pan with something so its level…finally pull out the pan and look at the disaster that it is.

Clean it up, use some ingenuity and its ready to be going back in the oven to finish baking.

Then I quickly make the biscuit base in the food processor.

Pate sable cinnamon

160g cold butter cubed
95g caster sugar
190g plain flour
1/2 egg
1g ground cinnamon
1/4 scraped vanilla bean

This happens quick and I am not really sure how. Everything gets whizzed in the machine, and then the egg goes in at the end. Quickly put together on the counter and then I shaped it into the silicon mould and it was ready for the oven.

By now the kitchen is starting to look unpleasant. But this is not the end of the story.

The decorative jaconde is not looking great. Because of the mess up, the swirls are not clear, actually, they are barely visible. But the thing itself tastes nice, so I dont worry about it.

The first layer of mousse is more than ready by now. So I get it out, I put the jaconde on the sides of the pan and cover the rest of them with more mousse. Now I have mousse all over the bottom, and the sides are made up of the sponge cake and more mousse. I pour the caramel next. I have given up on the option of putting it in as a manageable layer. Now with its sides and bottom two layers, the pan is back in the fridge.

I go back to read the recipe and realize that I most definitely dont have enough mousse for all the layers. Holy cow!

Then I read more and I am still suspicious about the jaconde. Look around, see what other people’s cakes look like and realize that, yes, indeed, I do need two layers of it for the cake itself. Double holy cow!

Luckily, I had baked the rest of the extra mixture of the almond cake in a pan, just because it looked like too much of a waste not to. It was thicker than I needed and in the wrong shape, but beggers cant be choosers.

I make more mix – both the chocolate and the almond part. By now I am barely measuring things, the plan is escaping me and the night is progressing fast. I still dont even know if that cake will stay upright when I turn it over. Holy cow!

The biscuit and the jaconde wait for me to catch up with the happenings.

In the mean time, I quench my sorrow with some chocolate-almond jaconde left overs dipped in some caramel left overs. It almost does the trick.

Its frantic. You get no pictures, because this was the last thing on my mind.

I have no more blackberries, so I quickly figure out that I can make a chocolate mousse without the ganache. Figure out implies that I knew it will work, which is not the case. I hoped, thats all. I really hoped.

So I basically whipped 200g of cream and then mixed in with 100g of melted dark chocolate. I made a new sabayon and mixed that in with the first mixture….It looks good. I taste…and it tasted great. That is enough for me. I have enough mousse to finish the monster.

The cake pan is filling up.

I pile in the layers, press nicely to make sure there are not big air pockets. And then I put it in the fridge for a minute to settle a bit.

I wrestle with the kitchen and all the unpleasantly dirty remnants of the late night cook-off.

Then it was time to turn the cake over.

I will be lying if I said that I was not worried. I was very, very worried. Very. I flipped the thing upside down and gave the pan a bit of a push up. It didnt budge. I pulled a bit harder and part of the pan started lifting up, but not all. With a lot of tugging and heart racing, I finally free the cake from the pan.

Its a bit messy and some parts are flopping over, but nothing that a bit of a knife smoothing doesnt fix. The smooth caps that were supposed to lift off easily, are stuck and leave wonky holes when I take them off, but I am happy. The cake is standing and is not looking horrible, just messy.

The recipe calls for an air gun to cover the cake in tempered chocolate. The newbie baker that I am, I had no gun on hand, so that was out. I needed some kind of cover though, as the mousse just didnt quite cut it. I decide to go for cocoa cover, which should give that matte look and hide some of the low quality finish. The top is easy, I just sift it on. The sides are more tricky, but I just use a bowl and then hold it to the sides and lightly blow in it, which send cocoa everywhere, but it get to the intended surfaces, so I dont mind the clean up.

The last part of the recipe are the tempered white chocolate decorations on top of the cake. I wasnt sure I was going to do them, but looking at my not so amazingly looking cake, I decided it could definitely use with some beauty works and decide to give it a go.

I have no thermometer, so I read around for a more straight forward way of getting tempered chocolate. Then I try a few. I warm slowly the choc until its just melted, just. Then I smear a bit of it on a baking paper and put it in a shape around a cup and put it in the fridge. I do the same another time. Then I try a different way, which is basically melting the choc, then adding to it cold chopped up one and mixing it in to melt. Make a few more smears.

Surprisingly, most of them work and I have something to work with.

And then the cake is officially finished!

The recipe is looking exactly as I am feeling – battered.

The time of birth is:

__________

The Verdict

Thank goodness, the cake tests wonderful. Even with my modified mousse and extra fat jaconde layer. Look at the top four layers – blackberry mousse, salted caramel, jaconde and mousse again – they were divine. The apple layer didnt do it for me, as I expected. The ginger apple just rubbed me the wrong way. The biscuit took a day to soften up, so I am not sure if my hurried preparation was to blame. Still it tasted very nice and was Little B’s favorite.

The cake was gone in two days.

If I ever make this again, and the chances are very low (close to none), for a 10inch cake:

Even though it was hard, I found this was a very nice learning experience. I now know how to make caramel, sabayon, almond sponge cake, blackberry mousse and tempered chocolate.

Whether I will put those skills into use any time soon.. is another question. There is only so much sugar a person can take at one time.

I am thinking of making Croquembouche for Christmas…

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | 5 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Food pleasures, Homemade Post tags: birthday, cake, masterchef

Snaps & Blabs

We are growing a few new things at the moment. Sugar snap peas, which were an overwhelming success, none of them made it to the house or even a few meters away from the plant.  Garlic, because we eat the stuff like its essential for air to enter our lungs, and we all know how important air is to living. Interestingly, I had never considered growing it before, as I always thought it will be quite complicated and definitely not for someone without a green anything on their body, let alone a thumb.  But paying $30 per kilo for garlic does something to a person, something that inspires them to grow it themselves.

It turns out its not that hard. We basically bought a bulb of organic garlic – to avoid them being sprayed and killed – and then broke it into cloves and stuck those in the ground. So far it seems that they are doing great, and Mr.Blab admitted to digging into the roots the other day and seeing quite a big bulb growing there. I cannot wait to try them.

And carrots.

I got a pack of various carrot seeds and now we seem to have orange and white ones. The white ones, well, suck. I dont know if they didnt like the amateur care they got from us, or they just generally suck, but that is what seems to be happening. The one we tried a week ago was stringy and bitter. The orange ones, on the other hand, have been wonderful.

Trust me. Ignore the visual.

And there is something so wonderful in having the carrot whole, with its greens still attached. I always liked that about baby carrots and now we get to enjoy it fully – in its whole bushy glory.

I loved taking these photos, and I took a lot, believe me.

But then my model decided to just go and do something more interesting.

Like eating the prop with his sister.

And looking at this set up, I find it amazing and quite self-gratifying that I, me,  grew both – the model and the prop.

…and the sister, while we are at it.

Yes, that was me blowing my horn. I bet you didnt see that end for this story

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | 6 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Homemade, Life with loved ones Post tags: Dodman, food, fun, produce

Snaps & Blabs

With titles like that its no wonder I am not getting any traffic thanks to SEO (search engine optimization).

Its the truth though, I will attempt just about anything. You wont find me hiding in a corner, biting my fingers about how I will be terrible at something. I may very well be terrible at it, but I will at least give it a go and find out for myself. Call me a skeptic, thats me.

So awhile ago when Mr.Blab jokingly asked me to cut his hair, cause he was too lazy to go to the hairdresser, I said “Sure, dude, have a seat and hand me those meat scissors over there”.  I said it jokingly too, but he turned out to be even crazier than me, because he handed his mane to my completely lost for words hands and the rest is history.

I have had my hair cut, I have watched other people do it, many times; I knew the proper technique to hold the hair, and who doesnt know how to use scissors?! It cant be that hard. And the truth is that even after I was done with him, he was safe for public viewing and didnt miss a day off work, to both of our surprise.

I still have no clear idea what I am doing when I grab the scissors, which now are proper hair-cutting ones and I even have thinning blades to complete my professional tool set.

Yours truly is now the official family hairdresser, which not only makes  my man unappealing to other females, but also saves us not a negligible amount of money. (The kids get good doos, because of the blood connection)

My problem is that after every time I cut Mr.Blab’s hair, I forget how hard it is and next time he asks me, which is usually right before he looks like Big Foot, I agree to do it. And as soon as I stand there with my comb and scissors and try to moisten that mountain of hair, I feel half of my life run past me. The dread overcomes me, because ladies and gentlemen, he has way too much hair; I am certain, in fact, that he is the reason so many other men are bаld around the world.

I snap with the scissors and nothing seems to change. I have no idea what I am doing is what comes out of my mouth every once in a while with a nervous laugh. Its ok, as long as I have some hair – calmly responds my client and we usually laugh a lot. He pretends to be scared sometimes and is not appreciative of my assistant/s, which might be spraying him with a bottle or piling his cut hair on his pants, for example – what is this place?!

Oh, no worry, mistur, its all in bill…oups, that your ear?

By the end of it, my hands are falling off, and I am sure I patch up the last bits barely, barely. But he is always happy, bless his lazy heart.

Dodman, approved my work too.

And that is all that matters sometimes.

And then he is put to work.

I wonder who can make a blanket from all of that cut hair.

Or two.

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | Still a monologue | Add to del.icio.us
Green tinge, Homemade, Life with loved ones Post tags: fun, homemade, skills

Snaps & Blabs

Here is another idea for you. Make a bag from a lovely woolen scarf. How? Follow these directions.

1. Go to the local op-shop and find a beautiful long woolen scarf.

2. Pay the $2

3. Leave the scarf in the laundry, so you dont forget to wash it, before letting the kids wear it.

4. Get yourselves a Mr.Blab (dont skip this step!) and let the said person loose around your house.

5. (this step is automatic, so dont worry about it) Mr.Blab will need to do some whites and will grab the scarf and chuck it in with the rest of the stuff, thus felting it.

6. It will take you a few minutes to figure out what in the world is the stiff woolen rectangle on the drying line.

7. Laugh.

8. Now you can dispose of your copy of Mr.Blab.

9. Toss around the piece of what looks like unusable use-to-be-scarf. Looks nice, but what can you do with it? Fold here, fold there – a hat, a collar, a weird short vest…a bag?!

10. Crochet handle out of wool and felt it.

11. Stitch the sides of the bag. Sew a button and cut a hole for it.

12.  Put a bar of chocolate and a book in it, wrap it and give it as a gift.

___

As I always try to remind the kids, mistakes can often turn into great things.
All it takes is for us to look for them.

©Snaps & Blabs, 2010. | Permalink | Still a monologue | Add to del.icio.us
Homemade Post tags:

Snaps & Blabs