So every month we go to my dad's graduate club for a meal to use up the monthly credit.
We've been going for years and have pretty much picked out our faves to order, deviating from the regular menu only when the restaurant has a promotion for roast duck, Peking duck or lobster. *winks*
This year I've been working on perfecting some family faves. Like the French custard tart.:)
Apparently, the Yams really love it. Especially nephew #1. He would have 1 slice before he leaves for school and then raids the refrigerator the moment he gets home to have another. *LOL*
It is not difficult to make but requites a lot of patience. *winks*
The pastry cream needs to rest at room temperature than refrigerated overnight for best results. The pastry needs to be made, rested, rolled, rested, par-baked with beads, then without beads, cooled then baked with custard. The baked tart needs to cool to room temperature before having a 12 hour overnight chill in the fridge but you can slice the tart and eat it.
I like using a Pâte Sucrée base with some almond grounds for texture. It works well for the long bake in the oven.
Just lots of fussy-cut bits, stickers and washi tape. :)
Well friends, you know this gal HAD to use the new signage ASAP right? How apt that we just celebrated nephew #1's birthday! *winks*
Let's ignore the fact that my sister and dad gave lacklustre smiles despite knowing that they will get to eat cake...and just focus on the new signage shall we? *LOL*
Check out this random photo of nephew #1 as a baby that I found in my stash...he was so chubby and heavy that it was very tiring to carry him!
Unless it's your first visit here, you would know that when this gal gets obsessed with something, her blog pals are bound to find out. *LOL*
Currently, this gal is a tad obsessed with making galettes. Last week, she made a savoury one - tomato and also a sweet one - apple. :)
Playing along with Stick It Down.
So I am currently trying out recipes that can be made ahead for busy days...or when I'm back to my regular travelling.
Today I tried out a salmon quiche and it was well-received by the family. It was not hard to make but I probably need to make my dough earlier next time. I made my dough at 4pm today and served the quiche at 6.45pm (which is waaaaaayyyyyy past the usual dinner time of 6pm and people were "dying" already....*LOL*) because the dough needed to rest for an hour before rolling and another 15 minutes after.
Do you have any ideas of food to prep in advance for quick execution on busy days?
On this week's Make Stuff Monday, I'm sharing a layout using some packaging materials. :) I'm sure you can guess the pieces I've repurposed. :)
Here's a clue. *winks*
You know how I love to fussy-cut. I think the circular shape makes an interesting photo mat. :
The layout features some of the food that are on rotation in our household because everyone loves them.
(L to R: Sticky braised pork ribs in dark soy sauce, steak, salted egg yolk chicken, pan-fried pork loin in tomato sauce, pan-fried bean curd with minced pork, salmon teriyaki)
Lots of random bits from the scrap pile as usual.
Last Friday, I woke up in the morning and decided that it was going to be a bad bun kind of day. I've made the meat buns several times (they were yummy but really ugly because your gal hasn't quite gotten how to pleat them properly yet) and also did the sweet custard buns. But I never tried making the flat sandwich bao buns.
And apparently last Friday was the day to try. Yep...your gal can be spontaneous sometimes. And also because her bao flour was expiring soon. *LOL*
Anyway, I did time it so that I could serve them for lunch..which included two proves and time to steam the bao buns in batches in my really small steamer. You would think that I own one of those bamboo steamers with several layers right? Nope. I can only steam 5 buns at each time. They need to steam for 12 minutes, then the fire is turned off and the buns have to stay in the steamer for 5 minutes with the lid on. Apparently if you open the lid too soon, you would get flat buns. Instead of fluffy soft ones.
I did have trouble getting them to be the same size because the dough stretched during handling. But I was really happy when I opened the lid to see fluffy buns!
(I know you will share in my excitement friends...*winks* my family will just be like, "why didn't you just buy the frozen ones from the supermarket?" *hahaha* Yep, they will eat the processed stuff if I gave it to them but I like to make stuff from scratch..with better ingredients...and no preservatives).
I used the steaming time to stir-fry my pork loin and cut the cucumber and tomatoes. And make my sticky gochujang sauce to go with the filling. They turned out really yummy. And I would say make the buns...they are so much better than the frozen supermarket ones.
Have you tried making bao buns?
