Kale Coconut and White Bean Tostadas

Lets just be real Mondays are hard.

Sometimes Mondays are hard because Sundays are hard.

Sometimes Sundays are hard because you pay $5.00 for a little container of organic blueberries, bake them into a beautiful Bundt cake, and flip the baked Bundt only to have half of the cake actually leave the pan.

Sometimes you flip a warm Bundt too soon because youre hungry.

Sometimes (ok, all times) PreNatal vitamins (for all their awesome hair growing and folic acid goodness) are not breakfast.

Sometimes you just need to regroup, put on neon pink lipstick, take another trip to Whole Foods, and hope you dont run into anyone you know because your bangs are greasy.

Sometimes you just need an easy lunch before any further misfortunes take place.

Sometimes you just need to bust out your dearheart Mother Mary plate and settle in with some good eats.

This is that.

I am forever in love with beans. Therere cheap, filling, and totally healthy! I love making my own beans, but in a pinch a can will certainly do. I dress them up with some good olive oil and fresh herbs. Anything and everything can be dressed up with good olive oil and fresh herbs.

Ooh this stack of fried tortillas. All I really want to do is butter, salt, stack and eat ! them. Ho w amazing would that be!?

Herby beans. Kale and Coconut (you know Im obsessed with this suff). Fresh cabbage. Sliced radishes.

The natural thing to do is stack these things.

Lime and hot sauce belong on any taco-esque situation.

Warm some beans. Roast some kale and coconut. Stack them all up on some crunchy tortillas.

Its an easy lunch. Its an easy lunch that could also totally be an easy dinner. No white beans? Try black beans! No kale? Try sauteed spinach. Add spicy salsa or pickled carrots. Make it your own just definitely eat it before you go flipping any Bundts.

Kale Coconut and White Bean Tostadas

serves 4

Print this Recipe!

12 tostada shells (or make tacos with corn tortillas)

1 lime cut into wedges

1 heaping cup shaved purple cabbage

1 bunch of radishes sliced

1 bunch dino kale

1/2 cup large unsweetened coconut flakes

1 tablespoons olive oil

1 tablespoon soy sauce

red chili flakes or sriracha sauce

1 14-ounce can white beans, drained and rinsed

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 tablespoons chopped c! hives

2 tablespoons chopped parsley

Arrange tostada shells, lime wedges, cabbage, and sliced radishes on a serving platter.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Rinse and dry kale leaves. Tear the dark kale leaves away from their stem and tear into bite-sized pieces. Arrange on a single layer of the baking sheet. Sprinkle with coconut. Sprinkle with olive oil, soy sauce, and a bit of chili flakes or sriracha sauce. Toss together with your fingers to ensure that all of the leaves are lightly coated. Place in the oven and bake for about 15 minutes, or until wilted and crunchy. Remove from the oven and place in a serving bowl

In a small saucepan over medium heat, stir together beans, olive oil, chives and parsley. Stir until warm and heated through.

Serve warm kale and beans with the tostada shell and garnish. Enjoy!

Snow Cones

These snow cones wont melt. Nope. Theyre not icy but they are frosted.

Theyre snow cone cupcakes and they were a lot of fun to make.

I decorated them in red, white, and blue so you can see how cute they can be for Memorial Day or the Fourth.

When I made them, I wanted more than just the tops to resemble snow cones though. I wanted the cupcake to be tri-colored too. But not the usual layered look you see from bottom to top.

No. These should be layered vertically to match the frosted tops, right?

Yes and Yay!

To be honest, Im glad it actually worked so well. I wasnt sure when I first started thinking about it, but they came out just like I had hoped.

And theyre an added little surprise when you bite into them.

Divide the cake batter equally and then tint a third blue and another third red.

The plain batter is good to go.

Now the fun part. Spoon each color of batter into a decorating bag and tie the end with a twist tie.For this to work well, you need the colors to fill the baki! ng cups at the same time.

I taped the bags together so I could hold them as one unit. The photo on the right is no good. Taping them at the top causes the tips to separate and youll make a mess trying to fill the baking cups this way. Trust me. : )

Instead tape the bottoms so the ends are closer together. Lay the bags on a flat surface and tape them so they are in a row. This will give you a lot more control when you pipe.

Prepare baking cups Take a deep breath and cut the ends off the decorator bags at the same time. Try to hold the bags at the top so you can apply even pressure to all three and slowly fill each baking cup with batter. Move the tips of the bags back and forth as you apply pressure so they fill evenly with batter.

Then bake!

And voila vertically tri-colored cupcakes. Yippee!

All you have to do now is decorate.

I baked these in candy cups and then frosted and decorated them in sections. Middle first dipped in sugar crystals. Then blue with blue sugar crystals and then the red. I like sugar crystals for this project instead of sanding sugar because the size of the crystals are bigger and look a little more icy, but you can use either. And technically, if your frosting is tinted the right color, you could just sprinkle the entire tops with white crystals.

Once frosted and covered in crystals, use a toothpick to manipulate the frosting and make sure the rim of the paper cup shows. This will help pull off the look.

Snow Cone Cupcakes

Red white and blue cupcakes
2 2/3 cup all purpose flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
4 egg whites
1 cup whole milk
1 tablespoon vanilla
2/3 cup salted butter, softened
Three bowls
Red and blue liquid food coloring
Three piping bags
Twist ties
Candy cup baking papers (see note below)

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Sift flour, sugar and baking powder into a large mixing bowl and then mix together on low.
• In another bowl, stir egg whites, milk and vanilla together.
• Add butter to the flour mixture and mix together. As it starts to combine, slowly pour the milk mixture in and mix until completely combined.
• Divide batter evenly into three bowls. Add about 40 drops of red food color to one bowl and stir together until completely blended. Repeat with the blue food color and a second bowl, leaving the last bowl white.
• Stand decorator bags in tall glasses for support and spoon batter into bags. Tie off the ends of the bags with twist ties. (Note: Three bags will hold about half of the batter, so youll need to repeat for the full amount.)
• Lay the bags side by side and tape around the tops of the three bags to make it easier to hold them together in a row.
• Cut the end of the bags off and slowly pipe batter into paper candy cups using a back and forth motion. Use your fingers to apply more pressure to the center bag if necessary.
• Fill cups a little more than halfway. Bake for about 16 minutes or until d! one.
• Remove and cool. Makes about 16 cupcakes.
• Note: You can bake these in candy cups or regular baking cups. If you use candy cups, make sure you find the ones that arent wax coated on the inside. Here are some I found online that are meant for baking in. Most of the ones Ive seen in stores have the coating on the inside. And if they are hard to find, you can also just bake them in regular baking cups and place them in the candy cup before you decorate.

Frosting
1 cup butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 cups confectioners sugar
4 teaspoons milk
food coloring
Red, white and blue sugar crystals
Small plastic spoons

• Beat butter and vanilla together.
• Add sugar slowly and beat until combined.
• Scrape down the sides and add milk. Mix until smooth and creamy. You can also add a couple of drops cherry oil for extra snow cone flavor
• Divide the frosting into three bowls and tint two of the bowls with a few drops of red and blue food color so when you cover in sugar crystals, there isnt any white frosting showing through.
• Makes enough to frost about 8 cupcakes with high domes of frosting. Double for this cupcake recipe unless you dont plan on frosting your cupcakes this high.

To Decorate

• Pipe white frosting down the center of the cupcake, lining up somewhat with the white cake section. Then use a knife to pull the frosting down towards the edge of the cup. Make sure to leave the white rim of the cupcake paper showing completely. You can wipe off excess frosting if necessary.
• Sprinkle white sugar crystals on the frosting, letting the excess fall into a bowl underneath. You can then gently ! press th e cupcake down into the fallen crystals to fill any uncoated areas.
• For the red side, just use a knife to apply the frosting. Pull downward with the edge of the knife so the frosting meets at the base of the cup. Again, make sure to keep the rim of the cup free of frosting.
• Sprinkle with red sugar crystals over a separate bowl, and press red section into the bowl of crystals to fill any gaps. Repeat with the blue frosting and blue sugar crystals.
• When the cupcakes are coated with sprinkles you can easily, reshape the dome if necessary by gently pressing down any areas that look uneven.
• Finally, sprinkle more white sugar crystals over the entire cupcake to give it an even icier look and insert a small spoon right in the top.

Serve with little plastic spoons for full effect and see who you can fool!

Galaxy Macau Tsui Wah

deconstruct has added a photo to the pool:

Tsui Wah is a chain restaurant in HK.

Jasons Food Hall @ BSC

Replacing Cold Storage and O Gourmet at Bangsar Shopping Center, this upmarket supermarket seems to be a cousin of Market Place by Jasons _ related in some fashion to Cold Storage _ which has branches in Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan.

No shocks within this cheerfully sleek space; Jasons stocks the essentials, from crustaceans ...

... to cheese ...

... to chocolate. Not as big as Ben's Independent Grocer, but as comprehensive as Cold Storage.

A! highlig ht here: sumptuously creamy handmade chocolates by the KL-based confectionery of chef Matthias Schuebel, a Culinary Olympics pastry gold medalist.

Fun and flavorsome combos like caramel and Szechuan pepper or vanilla and ginger root, alongside dark, milk and white varieties stuffed with apricot, rose essence and spices. Outrageously expensive? Nope; this mix of 10 pieces cost about RM25.

Continuing our chocolate theme, imported cookies by the UK's Fox's company. Milky and crisp.

Too many temptations; we restrained ourselves and escaped before buying much more.

Jasons Food Hall,
Bangsar Shopping Center, Kuala Lumpur.

Recipe: Fresh buffalo mozzarella homemade tortellini with vegetables, tomato sauce and basil

As promised, here is the first recipe from Chef Igor Macchia's cooking class in Mandarin Oriental KL.

Fresh buffalo mozzarella homemade tortellini with vegetables, tomato sauce and basil

This was my first time making pasta, but with clear instructions from Chef Igor, I managed to make a decent looking tortellini which he used in his demo dish.

To make pasta at home, you need a pasta machine to roll out the dough.

Here's a recap of some useful tips that Chef Igor shared with us during the cooking class:
Tip #1 - when working with your dough, put the dough into the pasta machine gradually to form a thin sheet. This will give a nice texture to your pasta.

Tip #2 - always work in a cool environment or else the dough will dry easily.

Tip #3 - when cooking pasta, always use boiling water and salt.

Tip #4 - how do you know when fresh pasta is cooked? They will float to the top of the water. If you choose to freeze your pasta, you do not need to defrost them before cooking. Just place the frozen pasta into the boiling water and cook.

Tip #5 - To make your own sundried tomatoes, just place quartered tomatoes with olive oil in a preheated oven at 70C for approx. 3 hours.


Fresh buffalo mozzarella homemade tortellini with vegetables, tomato sauce and basil
Serves 4

Ingredients
F! or the f resh pasta dough
230g flour
100g egg yolk
5g water
4g salt
10g olive oil

For the filling
50g buffalo mozzarella
5g salt
3g pepper

For the sauce
200g tomato sauce
40g black kalamata olive

For the garnish
10g fresh basil

For the vegetables
40g green beans
40g cherry tomato
20g butter
Salt and pepper
Fresh parsley and basil

1. Mix the ingredients for the fresh pasta dough until you have a nice firm dough. Put through the pasta machine gradually to form a thin sheet. When required thickness is achieved, cut out a circle (approx 8cm diameter) using a cutter. Brush some egg white onto one side of the circle.

2. To prepare the filling, cut mozzarella into cubes. Blend it with fresh basil and season with salt and pepper. It should have a liquid consistency, place into piping bag.

3. Place a small amount of filling onto the pasta "circle" (in the centre). Fold the circle into half. Fold again from the circlular end to the straight end. Bring the tips together, and there you have it, a tortellini.

4. Blanch the vegetables in boiling salt water until cooked. Cool the vegetable quickly in ice water to stop the cooking process. Heat butter in a pan, add vegetables, season with salt and pepper and add fresh parsley and chopped basil leaves.Remove from heat.

5. In boiling salted water, cook the tortellini until al dente (you will know they are cooked when they float to the top). Finish with extra virgin olive oil and salt (if needed).

6. To plate, place tomato sauce on plate, then top with ravioli and vegetables. Garnish with fresh basil and micro greens.

Livery Hall Ceiling

Livery Hall Ceiling

The ceiling detail of the Livery Hall in the Vintners Hall, spiritual home of the wine trade in the UK, the Vintners Company, one of Londons famous livery companies. Despite the halls long history this ceiling dates from a remodelling in 1932.

Just a sampler of the room in which Naked Wines held its latest Zero to Hero tasting where customers selected the Bolney Estate Cuve Ros Brut from a huge line up of still and sparkling wines from the UK to be added to the companies list

A full set of photos taken during the tasting featuring more of the Vintners Hall, (I happened to be the official photographer of the evening), are on the Naked Wines flickr page.

Livery Hall Ceiling details the latest in the regular Sunday Wine Snapshots series highlighting photographs with a wine related theme, whether bottles, glasses, vineyards or the back scenes of wineries.

Spittoon.biz - A UK Wine Blog - We Spit... So You Can Swallow

Simple and Homely Feel Food At Restoran Pan Heong Batu Cave

Every Sunday I will look for homey comfort foods around Klang Valley area. One it that grab my attention recently is the much spoken about Pan Heong located at Batu Caves. Few weeks back, Ah Bok receive and invite from his friend to sample the food here and without much hesitation I follow him there since he invite me as well.

When we arrive, food were ordered by his friend since he was the regular there.

The famous Wat Tan Hor

Though the taste were not bad, still I prefer the one in Penang. In Penang, the koay teow (flat noodles) used is much different. It is pretty much like chee cheong fun but thicker. Then it is cut to a 5 to 6 cm wide then wok fried in a big fire with just superior soya sauce till it has some charred edges on the flat noodles. Then it is laden with starchy seafood mix or plain eggs starch mix.

See so many people are queueing for tables.

Jam packed to the brim in the restaurant.

The restaurant used to operate under a big tree and as time goes by they got their own shop lot at the current location. The foods served here were suitable for all ages.

Fried Rice

Next we got ourself fried rice which nothing much to shout about. At least it got a decent WOK HEI and flavor.

Fried Kau Yuk Rice Vermicelli

This is a plate of noodle you should pay attention to. The pork that used to fried this plate of mee hoon has a perfect lean meats and fats. The sauce of the pork were coating the mee hoon really well which made it really smooth.

If you do not have much appetite would like to have something light, the best option would be going for their famous range of porridge.

Silky smooth bowl of porridge serve piping hot. Perfect food when you sick.

You can choose pork, fish and also century eggs for the porridge condiments.

Stir Fried Ice Berg Lettuce with garlics

Fermented Bean Curd Pork

The bill come up to RM103.40 for 6 persons.

Restaurant Pan Heong Batu Cave is located at :

2, Jalan Medan Batu Caves 2,

Batu Caves

Tel : 03-6187 7430

Business Hour : 8.00am till 3.30pm

Pierre Herme Paris Best Macarons and Pastries!

Hello and greetings from Europe!
If you dont already know, Im currently on myFrance (Paris) Netherlands (Amsterdam) Belgium (Antwerp) 16th 24th May 2012 escapade!

Presently on my 4th day, Im a bit exhausted but still thrilled with the new sights and experiences everyday. The 6 hours difference was only felt at night, especially around 8pm Amsterdam time (which is equivalent to Malaysian 2am). I just had to sleep after 8pm!

Anyhow, I transited via Paris and had one day to sight-see in this beautiful city. Ohhhh, I love Paris. It took a while for me to get my bearings, but I was lucky to meet a few kind souls who helped me as I moved around the city.

Theres much to share, but being a dessert lover, I had to share this first!
I had finally tasted the famous macarons from Pierre Herme! *jumps for joy*

Simply put, theres no macarons in Malaysia that could came close to this. Not even the famous Nathalies or Le Deux Garcons Ptisserie Bangsar,both of which are acclaimed to be the most authentic macarons outlets in KL; and not any home bakers or in any hotels.

I now understood the hype about Pierre Herme.

To be fair, Im no baker so I do not know if its the weather or the flour and raw ingredients, but our bakeries in Malaysia has a long way to go to match the macarons and pastries in Pierre Herme.

No photography were allowed within its wall; and its only for take-away. Service was 1st class, warm and friendly and they allow you to browse around to your heart s content. Though it was busy throughout the 30 minutes I was in the shop, the service staff was helpful and took time to explain about the items that I pointed out (all descriptions were in French) and even recommended some according to my preference.

In the end I bought 2 macarons and a croissant, simply because I know how difficult it is to get good croissants in Malaysia, and also because you cant walk into Pierre Herme and not sample his macarons!

For the record, I hate macarons. I wont eat it even if you give it to me for free. I wont eat it unless you pay me to. Yes, thats how much I detest it. For tasting purposes, I had grudgingly sampled macarons from a lot of bakeries and shops in KL, but I never took more than a bite.
Macarons are ridiculously empty shells of plain saccharine.

Pierre Herme macarons: MACARON GRAND FORMAT MOSAIC (Vanilla macaron biscuit, pistachio cream flavoured with cinnamon, morello cherries) and MACARON GRAND FORMAT MOGADOR (Macaron biscuit, passion fruit and milk chocolate ganache). Each 1.95 Euro and it was the best money I have ever spent on macarons!

MACARON GRAND FORMAT MOSAIC A circular shell, crisp outside, moist and tender inside, garnished with a rich pistachio cream flavoured with cinnamon and containing pieces of morello cherry.

My friend who went to Paris before once told me that the macarons in France are nothing like the macarons in Malaysia. I had not believed her then, after all its essentially still diabetically sweet right? Oh no, she said. In France the macarons are actually not so sweet!

Well, I believe her now. The shells were airyand the outer layer wonderfully crisp and crumbly. The almond nuttiness were distinctive and its not all just sugar and air. The insides of the shells were airy andpillowy soft. Overall its sweet of an enjoyable level rather than the usual diabetic inducing sweetness that commonly plague the macarons we have in Malaysia. The pistachio filling were lovely; fresh, full of the intended flavours and matched very well with the shell.

Pierre Herme says:

Macarons only weigh a few grams, but thats enough to leave your senses quivering with pleasure. Their thin, crisp shell, slightly rounded shape, tempting colours and tender interiors draw devotees to devour them with their eyes, and caress their smooth surface. Their flavours solicit the nose and, when one bites into that crisp shell, the ears tingle with pleasure and the palate is finally rewarded.

And I concur!

MACARON GRAND MAGADOR. This was just as good! The chocolate passionfruit filling was perfect. The sour and fruity sweetness of the passionfruit paired very well with the chocolate which was milky and not too sweet.

For pastry, Ihad this one: Croissant Ispahan. 1.80.

http://www.pierreherme.com/products/viennoiseries/croissant-ispahan.html
Buttery-rich puff pastry, rose-flavoured almond paste, compote made with raspberries from the Haut-Vivarais region and litchis. Upon the first bite, one finds it difficult to resist its rose and almond paste delicious flavour highlighted with raspberry and litchi compote. Its all topped off with rosewater glaze and a sprinkling of small raspberry pieces. This croissant will have lovers of Ispahan melting with pleasure.

The description says it all. I love this and I wont mind having such wonderfully made croissants everyday! The almond and rose paste was distinctively fragrant; emitting all feel and thoughts of pink, flowers and rose.The fruity raspberry filling was very nicely sweet with a tinge of sourness , but very well balanced!

And just as Im a fan of Pierre macarons, Im now convinced that his croissants are just as marvellous as his reputation made it to be. I never knew such perfect flaky wonders in a croissant. Layer after layer was crispy and light. Even the internal layers, though not crisp; are not overly oily or sticky wet.

While most croissant I had before tend to overglaze it with butter for the aroma and buttery texture, Pierre achieved that without having to do so.

And thus the reason why he reigns as one of Frances best pastry chefs.

Pierre Herme,Paris.
72 rue Bonaparte in the Saint Germain des Prs.

Note: 1 Euro is +- RM4.00.

Todays another day in Europe, and Ill be sightseeing in Amsterdam.
You can follow me on Twitter and visit my Fanbook as I update them daily with pictures whenever Im back in the hotel!