Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Tossa de Mar, Sant Jordi day

For Easter holiday, we took a small relaxing trip to Tossa de Mar. Luckily we had a nice sunny weather on Saturday. If you just wish to visit the old town and the castle, an one-day trip is enough.
Again Sant Jordi day...:D And again...I complained about why men can get a book. All the chocolate figures in the show window are lovely. I took a picture of this pinky HelloKitty. It just pops out from all the footballs and Messi(s).
Talking about the football, I love the joke about the suicide cup (Copa de Rey).

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Happy Birthday and gelatine chocolate cake

Happy Birthday!!!
I prepared a gelatine chocolate cake for today. My own invention!!! The original idea is to have the chocolate cake as the base. Later I will pour the gelatine on the top with bosque fruit inside. Hmmm...you know...plan is one thing and the reality is the other thing. After I pour the gelatine liquid over the cake, the cake started to float inside...Ok...maybe another unsuccessful baking attempt. Juan is one eye-witness for my many attempts: the poor muffin bounced back when it hit the ground.
Hmmm...it tasted not bad at all. But it is heavy though...like spacecake...quoted from Phil :D

The famous apples

Here I quote this funny Chinese message: 历史到今天为止有三个最著名的苹果:一个诱惑了夏娃,一个砸醒了牛顿,一个现在握在乔布斯手中~这三个苹果说明了,性爱、求知、装逼,是人类进步的阶梯…我们已然进入欲望膨胀的最高境界.


Through the human history, till now there are three most famous apples: one seduced Eve, one hit the head of Newton, and the other one...now in the hands of Steve Jobs. They symbolize the three steps of human progress: sex, knowledge, and snob.

Monday, April 11, 2011

Lazy Sunday and Bangkok cafe

Bangkok cafe is still the best Thai restaurant on my list. This Sunday we went there again for lunch. Really nice curry sauce! Unfortunately I forgot my camera. But...next time


Bangkok cafe
Calle Evarist Arnus 65
Barcelona

Raspberry-mousse-pie

Here is a nice recipe from http://et-laine.blogspot.com/. The orignial post has a loverly photo of the cake. Now I just copied it here so that I could try it later by myself.
Crust:
250 grams of flour
125 grams of sugar
150 grams of cold butter
2 grams of baking powder
3 egg yolks

Mix the flour with the baking powder in a bowl. Make a whole in the middle in which you put the butter in pieces, the sugar and the egg yolks. Mix these last three ingredients with a fork without mixing them with the flour. When this mixture is homogenous (you will have butter flakes), mix it with the flour. Do this as quick as possible to prevent the butter flakes to get too soft. Cool for at least 1 hour in the fridge.
Roll the pastry with a rolling pin to a 5 mm thick sheet. Transfer it to your buttered cake tin (I used a 26 cm diameter round tin). Put in the freezer for about 15 minutes. Heat the oven to 180 °C. Butter a piece of parchment paper that will fit in your cake tin while covering the sides. Put in buttered side down on the pastry and fill it with for example dried beans. This is to prevent the pastry to fall down from the walls of the cake tin when it bakes. Bake the pastry for about 10-15 minutes, remove the parchment paper and beans and bake until the pastry starts to get color. Remove from the oven.
Raspberry mousse:
600-700 grams of raspberries
150 grams of sugar
50 grams of flour
3 egg whites
optional: some dinner spoons of raspberry liqueur
Cook the raspberries with the sugar on a medium fire under occasional stirring until they have fallen apart completely. Reduce the volume a bit by letting it cook for some minutes. Remove the seeds by pressing the raspberries through a sieve. Add flour (and liqueur) and stir well. Beat the egg whites to snow and mix them with the raspberries. Fill the pre-baked crust with the raspberry mousse and bake in the oven at 180 °C for 15 min.

Gnocchi! 手工馬鈴薯麵疙瘩

Recipe:
  • Potatoes 2 (0.5 kg)
  • eggs 1 (or no egg)
  • flour 1 cup (200 g)
  • salt
I tried to make Gnocchi before. Here I corrected the recipe from using 3 eggs to 1 eggs. It was quite successful. :D
I will make a lot of them and freeze them for my lovely work-lunch.
Tip from Andreas: bake the potatoes instead of cooking them...

PeixBlau and Kukades

Needlecraft course
I am taking a needlecraft course at Patchwork-Kukades shop. It is fun. :D Kukades is a catalan word, something like mono...You can say Kukada to little cute things. I learned some new embroidery technique! :D And...my first cross stitch work.
New books
Fish motif, from a book (Scandinavian Needlecraft by Clare Youngs), sewing machine, zigzag stitch
Made in France: Cross-stitch and Embroidery in Red, White and Blue