Raspberries

Went to the supermarket just now and saw these gorgeous ruby-red, perfectly formed raspberries, releasing their soft, sweet perfume-y scent to lure people like me into buying them.

Aren't they just beautiful?

I love the way they're basically many many little seeds/sacs joined together. they look so pretty. and they're delish too. yumyum.
I really do wish i lived in a place where fruits like these don't cost half an arm. For a punnet of i think 100g, these organic berries cost more than $10. goshhh!!! the only reason i actually got them was cos i was with my mum, who, whilst she doesn't like berries because she thinks they're sour, was also unable to resist the way they looked.

Chocolate Chunk Cookies

I recently discovered this website, which features really cool cooking videos. Not that i think people really need guidance to this extent, but it's fun in the sense that you can watch a sort of food tv on your computer. So anyway, they had a really nice-sounding/looking recipe for chocolate chip cookies, the chewy kind, here, and the comments were all very positive. I also liked the fact that they explain why certain things are done, which satisfies my inner 'why why'.
So anyway, i decided to give this recipe a try, but to substitute chocolate chunks instead of chips because i wanted that decadent meltiness in my cookies.
Then, i got home, and realised that i didn't have any brown sugar, but i remembered reading somewhere that most brown sugars are just white sugars with molasses added. No, i didn't have molasses, and no, i don't know if that is actually true, because if it is, then all those people who avoid white, refined sugar and eat brown sugars instead are sure not getting the whole picture. but anyway. i found the remnants of a jar of black treacle that i used to make Gingerbread Men, so i figured, with a few changes, i'd be good to go.

The end product was, well, not as good as i'd expected it to be, but that's probably in part due to my changes, because the cookies are too sweeeet. probably should have put less sugar, and not used the chocolate i did—cadbury milk chocolate. as a chocolate it is rather sweet, so next time i'll definitely use a different one. the good thing about this cookie is that it is quite chewy in the middle, as advertised, so that makes me happy.

Well, for those interested, here's my recipe:

• 3/4 cup butter, (converts to about 168g)
  
• 1 cup white sugar (better to use 3/4 cup)
  
• 2 tbsp black treacle
  
• 3/4 tbsp. vanilla extract
• 1 whole egg
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 cups plain flour
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda (aka bicarbonate of soda)
  
• 1 1/2 cups chocolate chunks

Melt butter in microwave and let it cool til it solidifies. This part takes quite some time, so i let my melted butter sit in a big bowl of cold water with some ice.
[melting the butter and letting it cool is what gives the cookies their chewiness, according to the recipe. watch the video for more info.]
Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 160ºC and sift the flour and baking soda together.
Scoop the butter into a big bowl and cream it with the sugar and the black treacle until fluffy.
Add the egg and egg yolk, and vanilla essence, and continue to beat until well incorporated.
Add the dry ingredients and mix til a soft dough forms, then fold in the chocolate chunks.
Use a tablespoon to scoop heaping spoonfuls of dough, roll into mounds and place on nonstick or oiled trays and bake til golden brown. Don't bake for too long or a crispy top will form and it gives the cookie a rather strange texture.

Just wondering, if the suffix -ies is generally to 'pluralise' words that end with -y, then why do we write many cookies and one cookie, not one cooky?

The purple container is a Tupperware container that is totally cool.
It expands and collapses accordion-style, so that storage is really easy.

Cravings

Am currently experiencing terrible food cravings. severe and terrible.

1) Japanese food!!!! this is all the fault of that Lonely Planet Japan book. all that talk about tofu, abura-age, miso paste, green tea and all that. oh god. i want to get my hands (and mouth) on some:
a) Sashimi from that Japanese restaurant at Chijmes—seriously the best sashimi I've ever eaten, ever. especially the swordfish. oh. my. god. firm, chewy/bouncy, juicy and creamy, and oh so fresh. mmm. the green tea here tastes excellent—the sort that has roasted rice mixed into it to give it an earthy, roasty fragrance. mmmm.
b) yakitori from Shin Kushiya at VivoCity. They serve a type of yakitori that is not dipped in the sauce when they grill it. Instead, it's seasoned with salt, so that the outsides are dry and crispy, and the insides are just bursting with juice. They also grill their skewers with real charcoal (and apparently a special sort of charcoal too, for prolonged high temp), so there is a very nice hot-coal sort of fragrance to the skewers.
c) the scallops with miso paste from Megumi at Siglap. the best baked scallops ever. really. it's lightyears better than the whole cheese sauce baked shellfish. the miso paste is salty, creamy, a litte sweet, and has this fantastic flavour that is totally out-of-this-world good. ohh boy.
d) reverse California Maki roll from that Japanese restaurant at Paragon—i just can't remember the name. this is a really really good maki roll, rolled with the rice outside instead of inside and then rolled in crushed salted seaweed and toasted white and black sesame seeds. then topped with those little orange egg roes. totally divine. the sushi chef here is very skilled, because the sushi is well rolled and doesn't fall apart, and the rice is deliciously flavoured with that vinegary taste: just right, not actually sour, but fragrant. the green tea here is also good.

2) Breakfast food!!!
a) the pancakes from New York New York: need i say more?
b) sticky cinnamon buns—chewy, sweetandsalty, cinnammony goodness. mmm.
c) scrambled eggs—the kind i make: creamy, cheesy, with lots of 'juice' because of extra milk and butter. also heart-attack inducing.
d) grilled tomatoes. the ones in my pesto pasta at the Wine Garage were fantastic. halved cherry tomatoes griled til soft inside so that they just burst into a flood of warm tomatoe-y goodness in your mouth. mmm-good.
e) chocolate chip cookies. this i am totally going to bake this weekend.

3) Cremé bruleé: for some reason i am totally craving this, completely out of the blue.

okay, i think i'd better stop here before i drive myself insane.

Earl Grey-Lemon Teacakes

I've been toying with the idea of earl grey-lemon as a cookie or cupcake flavour for some time now, and when I discovered this recipe, I figured with a small change, I'd have what I wanted. The basic cake recipe is a really really good one, in more ways than one. the flavour and texture are fantastic, and the cakes have a bouncy, springy texture that is really excellent. plus, it's a very forgiving recipe. i made two separate batches (because my mother, the earl grey fanatic, loved them), and the first time, i accidentally forgot to beat the eggs into the butter and sugar before adding the flour and milk. so, i actually added them after about a third of the flour and milk had gone in, but the results were still great.
i'd most definitely make these again, but the only thing i would do differently the next time is i'd probably not add the frosting. It's a little too creamy and thick for my taste, and i think the cakes on their own are nicer. If I had madeline moulds, I'd make them in those instead, too.

These'd be great as breakfast, or tea, with a steaming hot cup (or pot) of tea. something warm and vanilla-scented, i think, would be great. or a blisteringly hot cup of black coffee.

looking lovely and golden brown, sans frosting