Raya Cookies + Kueh

I would like to take this opportunity to wish my 3 blog sharing darlings Kay, Ummi + Nanie Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri, Maaf Zahir Batin. Hope all is forgiven... and my wish goes out to all muslims out there as well. :D

During the fasting month i had made and sold a fair amount of cookies to relatives and friends. Initially i intended to make 7 different types of cookies which are:

• Butter Cornflakes Cookies
• Chocolate Crunchies
• Almond Cookies
• Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Orange Sable Cookies
• Lemon Melting Moments
• Orange Chocolate Cookies
  

But i ended up with 6 because the last one didn't turn out the way it was suppose to and i didn't have time to rectify it cause i needed to meet the dateline of all the orders and also the fact that i was doing it on my own. I need a helper next year! :P
But alhamdullilah all the cookie orders were delivered in time.

Other than cookies, i helped my mum with a few variety of local nyonya kuihs and agar-agar. She loves making these local delicacies unlike me...hehe suke western je...


1. Butter Cornflake Cookies (baking away)


2. Chocolate Crunchies (ready for delivery)


3. Almond Cookies (fresh out of oven)


4. Chocolate Chip Cookies (my favourite)


5. Orange Sable Cookies (Z's favourite)

I just realised i don't even have a single photo of my lemon melting moment cookies. How sad! because it's one of the prettiest cookie out of all because it uses a piping bag and star nozzle to make a swirly shaped cookie....and taste good too....booooo now i feel down out of the sudden.

Sigh anyway...

here comes my mum's section :)


1. Currypuffs before going into the fryer


2. Onde-onde or some might call them buah melaka


3. Kuih Seri Muka (bottom:pulut, top:pandan flavour creamy custard)


4. Cekodok (banana fritters)


5. Biji Selasih 2 layer jelly


6. Mango flavoured jelly with cubes of brown sugar jelly inside

Glazed Mango Sponge Cake

Tak sedap sangat... :(

Okay, maybe that's an over statement... But to me, i think it could be better.

Reason behind making this cake is because Z's mum had purchased a new Reader's Digest hardcover thick baking book. I was browsing through and Z said why don't i make something from it. The thing is his sis had already tried couple of recipes and it didn't turn out that good so now it's my turn to test and see if the book was just full of bad recipes...hehe. I had lots of mangoes at home hence the mango cake.

Glazed Mango Sponge

1 ripe mango
170g (3/4 cup/6 oz) caster sugar
2 eggs, lightlybeaten
125g (1/2 cup/4 1/2 oz) natural plain yogurt
125ml (1/2 cup/4 fl oz) sunflower oil
finely grated zest of 1 lime
185g (1 1/2 cup/6 1/2 oz) plain all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
30g (1/3 cup/1 oz) desiccated (sweetened shredded) coconut
2 tbsp icing sugar, sifted

1. Use a 18-cm (7-inch) square, deep tin with a loose base or a 20-cm (8-inch) round, deep cake tin. Grease tin and line the base with baking paper. Preheat oven to 180 degree C (350 degree F/gas mark 4).

2. Peel the mango. Cut the flesh away from the stone and slice thinly. Arrange over the bottom of the prepared cake tin.

3. Place the sugar, eggs, yogurt, oil and lime zest in a large bowl and stir until smooth and mixed thoroughly. Sift flour and baking powder and fold into the mixture, alternating with the coconut.

4. Spoon mixture over the sliced mango and smooth the to. Bake for 50 minutes or until golden brown and firm to the touch. Check after 30 minutes and cover with foil if the cake is browning too quickly.

5. Leave cake in the tin for about 15 minutes, then turn out onto the rack of a grill tray, mango-side up. Peel off baking paper. Preheat grill. Dust cake thickly with icing sugar and place under the hot grill for 3-4 minutes or until the sugar has melted and is golden. Leave to cool on the rack.

6. Transfer the cake to a plate for serving. Any leftover cake can be covered with cling film and kept in the refrigerator for 2-3 days.

Verdict is it's just so-so. I wouldn't look forward to eating it and probably won't make it again. The texture is crumbly and dense. I think the mango just on top is not enough as you don't taste much of it. Overall i would rate it 5 out of 10. I'm thinking of using it as a base to make trifle, that is if i don't see anyone eating much of it.

Girls Day Out...

A day out together again with D, Kim and myself. Today we spent nearly 10 hours together starting at 10 in the morning. I went to pick D up in Subang and then we headed straight to Jalan Tunku Abdul Rahman. Megasale just started and it was perfect time for me to find some material to make my "baju raya". Kim was at a job interview in KL as well, while the both of us were busy hopping from one store to the other. After a couple of hours, Kim joined us at Jln TAR and after we were done the 3 of us proceeded to One Utama. D was gonna look for shoes, we had to eat lunch and catch a movie after.

Had a hard time deciding where to eat and we finally came up with 3 options. It was either gonna be Secret Recipe, Nandos or Cafe Delicious. And because Kim had gone to the launch of Delicious in the new Bangsar Village II the night before, she insisted we try it out because apparently the food was really good. So we did.

Our table number 6...i like their cooling concept colors of white, beige and blue...very relaxing and the motto here is Made With Love...


The menu consists of 5 main categories which are breakfast, all-day dining, afternoon tea, drinks and desserts. We were suppose to get desserts after because they look really yummy but ended not because we were just so stuffed after eating our meals...But i personally will definately go back to try their desserts...just look at it.



NEED I SAY MORE... :) So anyway back to our lunch.


I had the Thai Beef Salad (RM21.90). It comes in a huge portion of medium-rare pan-seared steak with mango salad. Well balanced taste of sweet, salty, sour and spicy. Refreshing and filling.


Kim had their Homemade Pesto Spaghettini (RM14.90) with added chargrilled chicken (RM4.90). Again with the huge portion and pesto was good. I tried some and loved it.


D had Carbonara Spaghettini (RM17.90). It is cooked with wild mushrooms, beef bacon, oregano and cream. Very generous with the bacon as you can see but according to D since she's a 'carbonara expert' that she prefers the one at Pizza Uno compared to here.

Overall, good ambience, good service and good food. Will definately be coming back for more!

Big Apple Donuts & Coffee

This new place just opened in The Curve @ Mutiara Damansara. First look at it and you say to yourself, "wow looks impresive, good crowd, and even just the signage and name somehow makes to think it must be a franchise from well NYC." But after sitting down for awhile and tasting the product, you somehow beg to differ. Hhhhhmmm well i still don't know for sure where this outlet originated from because i googled it and nothing came up.(maybe Ummi could confirm this for me once and for all) BUT IN MY OWN OPINION...i think it just started from here and then they decided to just use the name Big Apple AND use The Empire State Building for their logo??? Maybe the recipe is from NYC? I donno...


So anyway like i said first impression was good right? You're walking towards the open concept kitchen/counter/cashier with a smile on your face full of excitement and the second you step into the boundary of the queue line, all that dissapears.

1. No signs whatsoever for indicating types/flavours of doughnuts. Just a board with several random doughnut pictures in the background and then it just says : Doughnuts or was it Donuts RM2 each....and that's all...like WTH??? so fine.

2. Turn your head down towards where the dougnuts are displayed and you see many empty trays and what luck i had NO MORE CHOCOLATE....as in nothing with chocolate when they are suppose to have chocolate coated ones, chocolate with banana cream ones, choc with nuts, choc with rice krispies ones......and TAKDE....when i asked, they just replied with a selamba "finish". So like wtf??? finish?? i still see you guys making hundreds of doughnuts behind you and the most important chocolate finish???? what it's a thing to not carry stock now?? whatever la...

3. So i decided to get a box of 6 (btw forgot to mention i was with Z and our friend K) and guess what hahaha there were only 6 flavours at that time when there was suppose to be 16 or 17... sheesh.

4. Peanut Butter, Strawberry Filling, Blueberry Filling, Green Tea, Mango with Cream Filling and Vanilla Cream.

5. The drinks had to wait like forever...mintak hot bagi ice....mintak ice bagi hot. Then they said they will send it to us when their concept was suppose to be self-service. Don't even see any of their staff outside of the working counter. Waited and waited and waited....then i realised they had a condiment counter similar to the ones at Coffee Bean, Starbucks...etc. So i thought if they did ever send the drinks over, i still would have to get up and get my own sugar syrup and what not. SO WTH...walked all the way over and demanded my drinks...while they were ever so busy, queue is getting longer....sigh...sabarjelah....

6. Since they're new they were very generous in giving away free doughnuts. Can't remember how many different offers there were but i know there's a buy a drink and get 1 doughnut free and buy 1 dozen doughnuts and get 1/2 dozen free. Yeah, but the free doughnuts are only the plain ones which means it's their basic doughnut with original glazed sugar. You can't choose. So where is the logic in that? If all the doughnuts cost the same then why free ones are only the plain ones? Just imagine beli 1 dozen full of flavour and colour...and then dapat 6 plain doughnuts in a box... sedihnye...

7. Since there was Z,K and moi therefore we had 3 drinks and therefore dapat lagi 3 doughnut biasa...we ended up just bring those home.

8. Tell me, am i being to critical with this new place? Cause i realise i'm usually nice but not here :P

SO basically the doughnuts were okay...it's a total different texture from Dunkin. This one is lighter and somewhat weightless and fluffier. It depends on individual preferance how a dougnut texture should taste like.The thing is that there is no variety unlike Dunkin their doughnuts itself are different where you have chocolate or plain, then proceed to the topping. At Big Apple all the doughnuts are the same ONLY toppings vary. I think because it's still new that people just flock over there non-stop...most are by word of mouth. When someone starts saying it's the best doughnut ever then habis lah...majority will just follow blindly...will see how they do in a few months time. There also might be a chance that people might actually like it and it's just me who had the bad experience. Well can't blame them la, just imagine the only doughnut place we ever knew was Dunkin...now there's Big Apple and people will ALWAYS want something different.

I'll stick to my Dunkin's for now because there ain't no Krispy Kreme in Malaysia :)