Saturday, October 24, 2009

Korean Pancake!

After much frustration, hair tearing, and general wailing about formatting and deleted posts, I've finally learnt to upload pictures first, BEFORE writing anything.

Ah. All is right with the world.

Anyhow, my Aunt and Uncle came to Australia on Wednesday to hopefully collect their visas. They're staying at our house at the moment, which has actually turned out to be quite interesting ;) (I often emerge from my room and notice that suddenly parts of the house seem a lot cleaner xD) Everyone knows that studies in China are krazeh, and in a country with that many people, getting into university is one step closer to job security and a happy lifestyle. They have university final exams that go for a whole three days that basically determines the rest of their lives. So you can imagine, everyone gets pretty stressed out.

Once they heard that I was doing my HSC, they shoo'd me away from doing anything. It was basically, 'Go study! Go study! GOOOOO study!' Which was kinda nice at first, cause they'd bring me fruit and water and do all the chores. But then, I realised I didn't want to study, and so I was basically confined to my room. Damn.

But teehee, I snuck out into the Kitchen at 11pm and stealthily prepared ingredients to make . . . (dun dun dun) KOREAN SEAFOOD PANCAKE!

Korean Seafood Pancake



Ingredients:
Korean Package Flour Mix (The yellow thing in the picture it tells you how much water to add on the back, but in Korean :P )
250g Pancake Mix
420 ml Water
Seafood: 2 prawns and 2 octopi (clearly, I didn't have a lot of supplies)
Your Choice of Vegetables:
Shallots/Spring Onions
Carrots
Capisicum
1. Mix the flour and water until combined.
2. Stir the other ingredients in.
3. Add oil into a griddle/pan and fry each side on medium heat for a minute or so
4. Serve with YUPPIE mayonnaise, and Okonomiyaki sauce (optional, but makes it ohsoyummy)


:) Can you spot the sideways smiley? (still doesn't know how to rotate pictures D: sigh.)

TADA!!! Pancake :)

Thursday, October 15, 2009

5 days and 24 cupcakes!

4 DAYS TO GO! And still not studying properly. (And Back on blog and baking, even after a super long hiatus) It's like the amount I get done is inversely proportional to the square root of the amount of time to exams (teehee, see if you can figure that one out! and apologies in advance for nerdiness.)

Yesterday was the first day I stayed home for the whole day in a long time. I think, during these holidays I've managed to go to every library in a 10mile radius. Carlo, Penno, Castle Hill, Parra, Epping, Eastwood, West Ryde, Hornsby ... and even Dundas (which really, is just one large room). So today also gave me the perfect opportunity to make cupcakes for Richard's 18th birthday! Spent three days doing this, baking the cupcakes, ganaching the cupcakes and then decorating them :)

Check it:
I know pink and yellow are a bit girly, but I thought it was a suitable match for his *ahem* bright shirts. And really, how can you make cupcakes manly anyway? It was also a good excuse for me to test run making cupcakes for Tiff and Geoff's Wedding :) (200 cupcakes in 2 days baby :P It's gonna happen)

Yes. A wedding. They weren't going to have a cake, so I offered to make them one. I was fully ready to make a three tier and gorgeous cake, but realised that making three huge cakes and fondanting them without any prior experience AND during my HSC was just asking for trouble, so instead I settled for wedding cupcakes. And forgoing the opportunity to make wedding cupcakes in order to study for HSC ? Nonsense :P What HSC? What is this HSC of which you speak?
Also, the picture quality is pretty shoddy, because I took them with my mobile phone, since Jen still has the camera in Europe. (sigh). However I'm really excited because I might be going to join her in January! EUROPE! Can you imagine? Think of all those lovely pastriesss :P Maybe I can run away to pastry school and not come back.





Anyhoo, though it's too late for me, STUDY HARD EVERYONE!


AZA AZA FIGHTING! (:P Just rewatched full house - great for procrastination)

P.S. Cupcake designs were also shamelessly ripped off from my idol Su Yin, (http://www.cookingismypassion.blogspot.com/) who incidentally, after finishing a bachelor degree in Sydney, went to America and did a pastry course before returning to her home in Malaysia and starting up her own designer cake business. Neat, huh?