If there’s one word to describe how I feel today it would be

Content.

 

View from my bay window in the evening overlooking quite a rough mountain biking trail mostly frequented by serious bikers.

That scotcheroo recipe

 

Scotheroos

Ingredients

1	cup light corn syrup
1	cup sugar
1	cup peanut butter
6	cups Rice Krispies®
	or 6 cups Cocoa Rice Krispies®
1	package (6 oz., 1 cup) semi-sweet chocolate morsels
1	cup butterscotch chips

Directions
1. Place corn syrup and sugar into 3-quart saucepan. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, until sugar dissolves and mixture begins to boil. Remove from heat. Stir in peanut butter. Mix well. Add KELLOGG’S RICE KRISPIES cereal. Stir until well coated. Press mixture into 13 x 9 x 2-inch pan coated with cooking spray. Set aside.

2. Melt chocolate and butterscotch chips together in 1-quart saucepan over low heat, stirring constantly. Spread evenly over cereal mixture. Let stand until firm. Cut into 2 x 1-inch bars when cool.

Here’s the recipe since some people were asking. I used Lyle’s golden syrup which looked like this:

Or you could get Karo that looks like this:

I bought the Lyle’s syrup from Phoon Huat. I’ve seen it at Cold Storage, and no they don’t sell it at Giant (I just checked, sorry for giving you wrong information Sheerin!).

Since its close to midnight, I won’t go on about the erm unhealthy benefits of corn syrup and where else to buy it. How did these candies taste? Well its a layer of crispy peanut butter rice crispies layered with bittersweet chocolate. I skipped the buterscotch bits because I felt the rice krispie layer was sweet enough. I didn’t dare mess with the sugar:corn syrup ratio in case they didn’t set.

Some problems people had on the net were that the bars were too hard to cut. One way was to just bring the syrup and sugar mixture to a boil then take it off the heat immediately and stir in the peanut butter. If you leave it to boil for too long they may get a little hard. Even then, serving these at room temperature is best, straight from the fridge they tend to be a little rocky. I kept mine in airtight containers in the fridge and they kept well for a week, well that’s as long as it lasted. I managed to give a few tubs away because this recipe makes lots and well, its candy, how much candy can you eat? Hmm. Don’t answer that.

Things I’ve learnt..

Putting in sliced bananasin the pan before the pancake batter makes it a nightmare to flip. Sliced bananas on top of the poured batter on the pan creates round pancakes.

 

Other random things I’ve learnt:

1. Jif really gets rid of the brown spots that appear like rust on your cooker hob.

2.Accidentally breaking eggs in the carton after buying groceries yourselves is preventable. Go shopping with the huisband

3. Keeping that broken egg uncovered in the fridge for a few days results in a hard crust forming over the yolk.

4. This egg can still go in unharmed into a pancake batter and is hardly noticable.

5. Freezing bananas with their skins on is a sure fire way to make them impossible to peel.

6. When they’re impossible to peel, you’ll have no way to dip them in Valrhona and bring them to a dinner party.

7. When that happens, bringing left over gelato is an alternative.

8. When storing gelato in those styrofoam boxes they come in, never throw away that plastic liner that is used to cover the top of the gelato. Throwing this layer away will cause the gelato to stick onto the box and make it impossible to open.

9. Making everything Giro detuctable saves you from paying like 10 bills: handphone, internet, TV, electricity, conservancy, home loan, car loan.. Having internet banking helps you keep track of what comes out. Balancing what goes in and what comes out is beyong the scope of random things I’ve learnt this week.

10. Making your own chilli paste with a pestle and mortar is a potential disaster when wet things are added like tomatoes, they can splash onto the kitchen walls. Washing the pestle should be done by just rinsing without touching it and sponging than rinsing again. There is still a risk of having burning hot chilli hands for the rest of the day.

 

I’m not sure of anyone else would find this useful, but at least it’ll be a note to self!

You know you’re friends when..

..you can..

..steal photos from blogs without telling them..

 

I’m looking for a sunny day to photograph what’s in THAT box.

 

And thanks Yati, Liz, Farah for the lovely housewarming gifts!

Gelato party

In attendance: a gaggle of gals and a baby

The menu: pizza delivered, chips and dip (french onion and sundried tomato), gelato with condiments- bananas, Korean strawberries, almond slivers, hazelnuts, homemade scotheroos, white chocolate chips, chopped maltesers.

 

Inspired by donna hay. Have your own ice cream/gelato party!

Dinner tonight

Monday night dinner

Slices of tenderloin cooked quickly on the griddle pan, russet and local potato salad, sweet corn on the cob.

Both the salad and the corn were prepared on Sunday. The corn preboiled and kept in the fridge. Then warmed on the griddle pan with a touch of butter when ready to eat.

Of sunsets and dustbins

We were drawn by the orange glow in the balcony

The sun was setting among the towers of flats we live in.

Our eyes were drawn to the spectrum of colours across the sky

And we realised it ended with a rainbow at the opposite end! The largest we’ve seen this year.

Today we went out looking for dustbins. I know, we’ve lived in the house for some time with a paucity of dustbins much to Mel’s horror. We were looking for a covered footstep bin which wouldn’t break after a few months of stepping. While we would love to get a brabantia with a 10 year warranty, lets just say we’re not willing to waste (no pun intended) a few hundred dollars for something we throw banana peel in. So after weeks of looking for the perfect bin, I think we found it. Simplehuman products are sold at Home D.I.Y in Tanglin Mall. We bought a solid black step bin for S$25 which is good considering how great the mechanism was and how heavy the bin is. I think D.I.Y shops are one of my favourite shops besides baking supply ones. We bought a disposable BBQ pit to tide us thru till we buy our bbq equipment and a cool night light. I was eying a really cool battery operated “tealight” which will never blow out and would look great in our Moroccan lamp but it was S$20 and I think it’ll look better grouped then lone. I bet I can find them cheap in Mustafa. Anyway, we went to Tanglin mall for iwannagohome’send of season sale which was disappointing as they were only seling their large pieces of furniture at a discount and almost none of the accessories.

That’s how Saturday went, I’m looking forward to Sunday and deciding on the weekend bake.

I’m lucky to have..

Crafty friends..

And a beautiful housewarming gift, both from one of my favourite people, Quizas! Can you guess what’s in it? Clue: its an item which I am collecting..

And guess where I got this handmade Morroccan style lamp from? Mustafa! (Not sure if any of you guessed) It was S$18, much cheaper than at furniture shops. I also bought some woven rugs for the kitchen floor which they also sold at Ikea. It was S$2.90 each and really a steal! I’ll take a picture some day.

 

I had lots of fun with Quizas and her beau. We had my first attempt at Malay style fried noodles or mee goreng and that brown sugar cake with vanilla bean ice cream. Come again ok?

The recipe

The texture of this cake was moist, buttery and coarse crumbed with the grit of the ground almonds. Its got a high ratio of fat (butter) to flour so it has a moist heavy texture with a loose crumb rather than a tight crumbed pound cake which has milk or other liquid in. Its good on its own and would be great for a packed lunch or picnic.

Brown sugar and almond cakes

100g brown sugar

90g self raising flour (sifted)

50g ground almonds

1/2 tsp baking powder

1tsp vanilla essence

3 eggs

160g melted butter

Put all the dry ingredients into mixer, mix on low speed for 1 min or by hand in a bowl. Add eggs one at a time and continue to mix to combine. Add melted butter and mix. Bake at 170 degrees C for 35-40 minutes in small mini loaf pans (mine were roughly 8×3in) or as little cupcakes for 25-30 mins. Transfer on to a wire tray to cool.

The accidental cake

The cake that was made with brown sugar because I was out of white and self raising flour because I was out of plain flour. It rose like a souffle and tasted like sugee cake. The elusive sugee cake I’ve been trying to master for the last few months. Did I accidentally create one in an series of accidental replacements? Was it the method? Its my first cake in 6 years without a kitchenaid since my machine is in the other house. Just a bowl and a wooden spoon were used to make this cake. But the washing up sure wasn’t fun.

I made this cake in mini aluminium disposable loaf pans, brought it to my mom’s for my brother’s birthday party, sliced it up and plated it with eggnog disguised as a creme anglaise. I cheat, I know. But you should have tried washing all the butter off the bowls and getting the butter out of the sink then scooping up the solidified bits because it occurs to you it may clog up the sink then TRY to get that buttery smell off yourself and your kitchen. You wouldn’t want to be slaving over the stove after that! Lucky for me my little cat who loves eggnog, H, bought tins and tins post Christmas and hoarded them in our kichen cupboards. Its a nifty little dessert treat.

Recipe to come.