Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Coconut Tarts.... It's easy and it's delicious!!!

Bites Tale : I still can't find the stray doggie... it's already more than 48 hours he went missing... i pray that he's being taken care of by some kind-hearted people... (So to the kind-hearted person : He is a well-behaved and very, very clever doggie ... do ask him to sit before you feed him.. you'll be surprised he listens.. if after u feed him and he sits again.. that's means he needs more.. if he stands up, looking at you and look at the floor, that's means he needs water.... and.... if he looks at your hand... give him your hand and he will lick it as a note of thanks!) I miss him so..o... much!!! :(


It's been years that i last baked coconut tarts.. my parents keep asking me to make them but i told them i can't remember the recipe... so in order to satisfy their cravings... they went through the trouble to find the coconut tart recipe and also bought me the coconut so that i've no choice but to make for them. (terrible huh?)

This recipe is slightly different than the recipe i used to follow (as far as i can remember, i didn't used rasberry jam and i think i used coconut milk before)... but the result is very good and is far more healthier, with the absence of coconut milk. You can also skip the rasberry jam if you want to, as the coconut mixture by itself is already aromatic and sweet enough.

Unfortunately, i do not have the step-by-step photos to show you this time as my camera was with my friend.. only get it when i was meeting her up for supper after i finished baking. Luckily, another friend came to my house to wait for me so she managed to snap the "finished products"..


Ingredients :-

Base :

185g Plain flour
3 tablespoons Icing Sugar
125g Cold Butter (chopped)
1 egg yolk

Filling :

150g Castor Sugar
3 tablespoons Lemon Juice
300g Dessicated Coconut
3 Eggs (beaten lightly)
60g Butter melted
3 teaspoons Baking Powder

Some Rasberry Jam


Method :-
Base :
  1. Sift the flour and icing sugar into the cake mixer bowl. Put in the chopped butter and mix until fine and crumbly.
  2. Add the egg yolk and 3 tablespoons of cold water. Mix till become a dough. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface, gather together into a ball, wrap in plastic wrap, chill for 20 mins.
  3. Cut the dough into smaller pieces and make into small rounds, put in the pastry tin and shape accordingly.
Filling :
  1. Preheat oven at 180 degree celcius.
  2. Heat castor sugar and lemon juice with half cup water until the sugar dissolves. Remove from heat, add in the coconut, eggs, melted butter and baking powder, mix well (use hand to mix, don't use mixer.. if not your filling will be too liquid form and got no "bite-ness"!).
  3. Put half teaspoon of rasberry jam in each pastry, then top with the coconut mixture and bake for 25 - 30 mins till golden. (If you like your coconut filling to have a drier texture, bake them longer, but i personally like it a bit wet!) ;)
It's really easy to make this.. and i bet everyone will love it because i've given to more than 10 people to try and all of them said they are very good... I love to eat it with plain tea (without sugar and milk)... simply delicious!!

Now my parents keep asking me to bake this again... (headache, headache...)























Pic : Ain't he adorable? Sometimes he prefer to be feed with hands instead of just leaving the food for him to eat..
(P/S : That's not my hand..)


Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Meme - Knowing meatball and yourselves better...

Bites Tale : I didn't see the stray cute doggie yesterday... waited for him during dinner time but there's no sight of him... there's not even 1 dog visible since i got home from work yesterday... i'm so worried.. i missed the way he sits when i asked him to sit.

Got tagged by Jo to do this meme quite sometime ago…

Did it at last … promise is a promise… better late than nevear!

Here goes:

Instructions :
Remove the first Blog and add your own blog last!

1. Something is Happening
2. Magicland
3. Abnerd
4. Jochoo
5. Meatball

Q1. What were you doing 10 years ago?

As always Eating… that time my favourite is butter milk buns and murtabak jawa

Q2. What were you doing 1 Year ago?

Eating… Eating… Eating… in my quest to find nice food…

Q3. What are 5 snacks you enjoy?

Donuts, Buns, Cheesecakes, Cup noodles and French fries (must be from Burger King / McD) (Sounds like main meal rather than snacks hor? Now u know why I am called Meatball lah!)

Q4. What are 5 songs you know the lyrics to?

Umm… Material Girl… and La Isla Bonita by Madonna… hehehe…. (Surprise?)

For other songs, I know the lyrics only when I hear the song… if not, I can’t even remember how the melody of the song is like…

Q5. 5 things you would do if you are a Millionaire?

Hmm… it should be all linked together…

1st, Count money (budget la… for the next 4 things to do and also keep for future use… need to do some charity also… is a must!);

2nd, Travelling (I wanna go everywhere… especially to Provence!!!)

3rd, Eating (so that I could taste all the delicious food available in this world),

4th, Learn some skills (I always wanna learn photography, cooking and baking… I wanna learn dancing as well…)

5th, Writing… (I wanna write all day about where I’ve been, what I’ve ate, what I’ve seen…. and what I learnt… so that I can share it with my loved ones…)

That’s what I called Life!

Q6. 5 Bad habits?

1. Continuously looking down on myself;

2. Eating, eating, eating;

3. Shop like crazy when I’m upset;

4. Always say wanna lose weight but never take the initiative to start;

5. Keep checking on my blog whether there’s any comment from you guys lor…

Q7. 5 things you like to do?

Reading, Eating, Shopping, Sleeping and Trying out some recipes

Q8. 5 Favourite Toys?

Camera, Laptop, Oven, Cake mixer and a Radio

Q9. 5 things you would never wear?

Belly ring; sleeveless blouse/shirt/dress without cardigan/jacket; man’s undies; black lip colour and those really high high heels..

Q10. 5 things you hate to do?

Feeling lousy about myself (bad habit, hate it.. but still doing it helplessly); meeting deadlines; throw away whatever I bake (unsuccessful baking which even the cute stray doggie didn’t wanna eat); pay for lousy food and waiting for table (normally won’t wait.. prefer to take the opportunity to try others)..

Lastly, tagging others.

1. Sharonvy
2. Parisukat
3. Deana
4. Massy
5. Cocolulu


Monday, October 29, 2007

Tell u 2 funny incidents...

Bites Tale : I'll be doing "ingredient" shopping... ;)

Sharing 2 jokes with you here...
  • We went to supper with his friends after the Jesselton Philharmonic Orchestra's Debut Concert on 21 Oct 07. One of his friend was telling us an incident where the friend's brother has lost his camera so he and his wife asked their 5 year old son :"Can you help uncle to pray because he had lost his camera?". So happily the son starts praying :"Dear lord, would you help uncle to get back his camera?" Both parents were nodding their heads until they heard him said :"and would you please nail the bad guy on the cross?" (They laughed till they dropped.. so do us.. was lucky for them i didn't spit out what i drank at that time..)
  • This happened last sat, i saw my friend's glasses.. she's been using it for quite sometime, unlike me, i always broke my glasses.. so i said:"Hey, your glasses really not bad ah... can stand for so long... how many years have you been using it ah?"... blah... blah... blah.. then we went shopping and bought some donuts... suddenly she realised something... and she asked me :"Eh? Where is my glasses? Have you seen my glasses?" ... She searched the whole car and i searched the bags... but we just can't find the glasses..
Crappy huh?


















Pic : I baked some coconut tarts last week.. will post the recipe soon!



Saturday, October 27, 2007

Truth or Dare...

Bites Tale : Supposed to spend sometime with him last night... but i was too tired... slept at 8pm... must make up to him tonight... may be i should cook something special for him... since i'll be having dinner with my parents... how bout ratatouille for supper ? (need to buy ingredient then...)

I don't know why.... i feel like wanna start cooking... apart from baking...

I still love baking of course... but i feel like "venturing" into another area... cooking...

The truth is :-

The only thing i can cook is instant noodle!

I read alot of recipe books on cooking... but i never dare to try...

Now, i feel like i really wanna start cooking...

And ratatouille is the 1st dish i wanna try... it reminds me of the tagline "Anyone can cook!" from the cartoon.

But another side of me is telling me to stick with baking because i still have a long way to go in baking...

Should i just ignore my "desire" to cook? Or...

Should i just dare myself to try?

May be i should just catch a movie with him... instead of thinking of cooking...

Psst.... if i were to cook... can anyone tell me where can i find zuccini here??

See? I'm confused!

Friday, October 26, 2007

I'm not only forgetful... I'm stupid!!!

Bites Tale : Saw the widget and logos i added here? I must say it's nice and i really appreciate those who put effort in bringing up the "sabahan blogger-sphere"... don't know what i'm saying? Go see Ravejoint & giuk.net !

I got my camera back last night! Suppose to get it only on Saturday... but we got the chance to meet up.. so, i got it earlier... was so happy! (Noticed i use the word "was" here?)

I used to resize and watermark my pics one-by-one before i upload it here... but i remembered he told me that i can actually do "batch-convert/resize"... so i did... and i was too overly confident this time...

I found the button... typed in everything i thought were right.... and ended up with... Sigh... i really don't know what went wrong... and i can't even change them back to original... that's my fault, because i was lazy to rename the file names...

Remember i've wrote that i've so much things to blog about Here? Now i can't, because i ruined all the pics!!!! How to blog about all the things when you can't even see the pic ah? Sigh...

Wanna look at how bad the pictures became? If you are really interested... scroll down..

About pineapple tart making :























About hari raya dinner at my friend's house :


















About the prettiest cats i've seen :


















About the cutest stray dog i've found (Now he waits for me to come home and feed him everyday.. but he don't stay with me.. mum doesn't allow it, but agreed me to feed him lah!) :























About yum cha-ing at Olde Town Station Kopitiam :


















About the green tea latte at Starbucks :


















And about step-by-step instruction how to put on false eye-lashes (that's not me in the pic ah! :P)... :


















Sigh.... these are the better ones i can show you... others are just... sigh...

Thursday, October 25, 2007

A note to my friend...

Bites Tale : The debut concert by Jesselton Philharmonic Orchestra is a great success... lot's of the audience were asking about when is the next concert... i heard it should be sometime near christmas.. dunno how true is it.. didn't managed to take any photo as my camera is not with me.. another 2 days and i'll get my camera back... can't wait!

Received a call from my friend, she sounded differently... i guess she was holding her tears... she cried not long after...

Dear friend,

If you feel like crying.... just cry...

But, never do anything that will hurt yourself and also others...

He made a choice...

And you should respect it...

That way you'll gain his respect... and also you respect yourself...

You've your dignity...

Stop calling or sms him... he will hate it if he already said he wants to stop the relationship...

Though he said you'll still be his friend... but you need to give sometime to him and to yourself...

Like what you've told me, he sounded rude and impatient when you called... all you get to hear from him is "i'm busy now"then put down the phone... there, you should get the message..

I know i'm harsh in the telephone... but all this while... you've been trying to "secure" the relationship while he .... stray...

It's not worth it... although u think that he's unfair to you... but still... what's the point of forcing him to be with you while his mind or even heart is with another girl?

Let him go and give yourself an opportunity to find another better and suitable guy.... give others a chance to find you and get to know you too...

Remember,

Before you can love others... you must love yourself 1st!

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Go Pink! October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month...

Bites Tale : No more salmon for me... :(

After deana's contribution, it's my turn to do something on the this awareness campaign before October ends.

I went online and found this from http://www.breastcancer.org... think it's a useful information for everyone, so i copied and share it here.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - An analysis of the results of several studies confirm previous reports suggesting that chemotherapy offers little or no survival benefits for young women with estrogen receptor (ER)-positive breast cancers and, if given, it should not be the sole second-phase, or "adjuvant" therapy.

"Developing breast cancer at a young age is very worrying in terms of survival," lead researcher Dr. Jos J. A. van der Hage, from Leiden University in the Netherlands, said in a statement. "But some young women may be undergoing not only unpleasant but also unnecessary chemotherapy."

In the current analysis, the researchers examined data from 480 women with early-stage breast cancer enrolled in one of four EORTC (European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer) trials. All of the subjects were premenopausal -- younger than 40 years of age -- and the average follow-up period was 7.6 years.

During follow-up, 155 patients died or experienced a distant recurrence, according to the report appearing in the current online issue of Breast Cancer Research.

Patients with ER-positive cancers were significantly more likely to have a longer overall survival than those with ER-negative cancers, the team reports.

Among the patients who received prolonged adjuvant chemotherapy, however, the difference in survival rates was minimal (70 percent versus 75 percent, favoring the ER-negative group, and rates of metastasis-free survival were 59 percent versus 70 percent, respectively.

These results suggest that chemotherapy had a beneficial effect for women with ER-negative tumors, but had minimal or no effect on ER-positive cancers.

Similar survival differences were noted for women with or without progesterone receptor-positive tumors, the report indicates.

"Adjuvant chemotherapy is a well established, but ineffective treatment in ER-positive breast cancer patients aged 40 years or less," van der Hage emphasized. "Hormone responsiveness is the key to tailoring therapy in the future fight against this disease for young women."

SOURCE: Breast Cancer Research, October 10, 2007.

I've spread the words and now passing the message to Sharvy & Jo


Tuesday, October 23, 2007

Can't blog until ....???

Bites Tale : At last, i went to MV Doulos last night... bought myself a Low Fat recipe book... my friend also got me another recipe book on baking when she went there on Sat, she said it's for my birthday (thank you! thank you!)... gave it to me early so that i won't get the same recipe book...can't wait to try out the recipesss!


I've got so much to blog about!

About making pineapple tartlets with my friend...

About hari raya dinner...

About the prettiest cats i've seen...

About the cutest stray dog i've met...

But i can't.... because i left my camera with my friend...

Very forgetful lah me!

Sunday, October 21, 2007

I'm sorry - A note to him

Bites Tale : I wish i could do more...

I'm sorry for being over sensitive over this...

I'm such a lousy girlfriend.

I'm sorry...

All i could say is i'm so lousy that i shouldn't deserve having a boyfriend...

Saturday, October 20, 2007

Think and Drive!

Bites Tale : There will be a Debut Concert by the Jesselton Philharmonic Orchestra, a newly formed orchestra in Kota Kinabalu, at Tun Raffae Auditorium, 7.30pm tomorrow. For more information or ticket purchase, please click Here.

I was driving to work and stopped at a junction.

A 4-wheel drive came up and stopped next to me, totally covered my view.. (so fine... let the driver go 1st).. but then he (a man, with his wife and kid in the car) drove out the junction then made a U-turn to get to the opposite road.. and it was illegal to do that... and there were cars coming to his direction.

And yes, he made the turn safely and drove away... (he must be thinking he is smart that time).

I hate it when i met this kind of "brainless" driver... already there're news on the paper about car accidents everyday... and yet there are still people out there who "purposely" risked their lives and their passengers' lives...

Sigh...

Friday, October 19, 2007

Bak Chang.... Dumpling

Bites Tale : No more shopping for me! Did a lot of shopping... but... i'm still unhappy :(

I think the best "Bak Chang" i.e. Dumpling (this is how the hokkiens call dumplings) i've eaten are the ones my parents made. But, it has been years that they have made it... they said it involved too much work... so we normally just buy from a lady in one of the stall at Foh Sang now a days. Her bak changs are quite good actually... And when it's "Bak Chang Festival", we ordered from friends who know where to order nice bak changsss... but still i missed my own home cooked bak chang! By the way, i like having my bak chang cold, i mean, at room temperature... instead of hot.

K, back to the story... i always have a special feeling toward bak chang... although i can't eat much because i have gastric... buying and eating bak chang are like a "tradition"... very old-dated and kampung-ish... although i know hypermarkets in KL like Carrefour is selling them during the "Bak Chang Festival".. but i never have thought that bak chang can get so "commercialised"...

Here's what a friend of my mum get for us from his KL trip!

Nice packaging huh? Let's see what we have inside...

The taste was very nice too! (Sorry for the blur pic!)

Everything is turning to be so commercialised nowadays... wonder when can we have outlet like this selling Yam Pork!


粽 - 传统粽家小食店
YY Famous Dumplings
Headquarter
8G, Jalan Pandan Jaya 3/9
Pandan Jaya
53100 Kuala Lumpur

Tel : 03-9284 5325


農圃食家
Restaurant Kampung Ah Soh
Puchong Branch
No.19, Jalan Puteri 1/4
Bandar Puteri
47100 Puchong

Tel : 03-8068 2388

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Avena Cake House

Bites Tale : To all, my friend is selling her own self-handmade earrings through her blog... she is based in Kota Kinabalu... if you are interested, do drop by HERE! I know more designs are coming!!!

I love buns. If you, like me, love extra soft buns.. then this is the right place for you!

I'm in love with the tuna bun (RM1.30 each) and tuna cheese bun (RM1.80 each) from here!

They are simply delicious!

By the way, this cake house is also very famous for their durian swiss roll. The swiss roll are selling like hot cakes and sometimes they will be gone within 15 mins, especially during lunch time. There are times where my friend needs to fight with me for the last one... really not bad, even my family love it.

But, I prefer their cheese roll (RM4.50 for 5 pcs)... and donuts (RM 0.70 each)... and egg mayo buns (RM1.20 each)... and cream puff with peach (umm.. either RM0.80 or RM 1 each)... and even their sandwich bread (RM1.90 per loaf)... and.... (brain jammed!)

(stomach making noises) Feel like going there again soon! Wei, wei (you know who you are), wanna go again tomorrow?

Avena Cake House
Block E, No. 19, Ground Floor
Sri Kepayan Commercial Centre
88200 Kota Kinabalu

Tel : 088-236516/265516


Wednesday, October 17, 2007

French Toast Cheddar Cheese Sandwich

Bites Tale : I had a great time at my friend's raya open house... she invited me to her house again for candle light dinner tonight.. since there's only 2 of us! I am a happy meatball.

This is the 1st time I made French toast.

It’s so easy.. but damn fattening… hehehe… I let mum try and she asked me to make for her again next time… she said it’s better than those at “Hong Kong Recipe” at Warisan Square.

You can spread some mustard on the bread, it will taste better, that’s for sure… but I didn’t…. because I forgot to buy it!

Here’s the recipe:

Ingredient:

2 large eggs

1 small cup of milk (i used full cream milk)

1/2 tsp salt

8 slices of sandwich bread

Some cheddar cheese (depends on your likings.. i cut it very thick!)

Some butter to be spread on bread and for frying


Method :

1. Beat eggs and beat slightly in a bowl, add milk and salt, set aside;

2. Add milk and salt, set aside;

3. Spread some butter on the sandwich bread;

4. Place cheddar cheese slices on 4 slices of bread, then cover with the remaining bread;

5. Heat 1 tbsp butter in a skillet

6. Dip each sandwich into the egg mixture, coating both side of bread fully;

7. Cook both side until browned;

8. Indulge.

Next time if I’m making this again… I will put lots and lots of mustard… I love mustard!!