breakfast wraps

Instead of the usual weekday bread toast with peanut butter and jam, we start off our weekend with these simple breakfast tortilla wraps.

This delicious breakfast treat is so easy to throw together on a lazy Sunday morning...even if your are only half awake ;)



Breakfast Wraps
(serves 4)

Ingredients:

4 tortilla wraps (I used wholemeal wraps)
4 slices of breakfast ham
4 slices of cheddar cheese
some butter
some dried parsley flakes

Method:

* Cut tortilla wraps into halves.
* Cut breakfast ham and cheese slices diagonally.
* Place one piece of ham and one piece of cheese onto the wrap (as shown). Fold into half. Repeat with the rest of the wraps.
* Heat a frying pan on medium-low heat.
* For each folded wrap, spread some butter on the surface. Sprinkle with dried parsley flakes. Place buttered surface down on the hot frying pan. Spread the other side of the wrap with butter (facing up in the pan), sprinkle with dried parsley flakes. (You could also skip this step and simply put some butter in the pan and pan fry the wraps, but I find this method helps reduce fumes, due to the low smoke point of butter, to the minimal.)
* Flip over the wrap and cook till both sides are golden. Repeat the same for the rest of the wraps. Serve warm.

Recipe source: adapted from Good Morning! 每天都要吃早餐: 10分鐘就能上桌的小確幸早餐提案'

cranberry orange chiffon cake

I have a leftover egg white from making a batch of cookies, what better way than to save it for a chiffon cake!

I am back to making an orange cointreau chiffon cake using the same recipe as these chiffon cupcakes. The only difference is, I added in some dried cranberries as I love it in my bakes, be it cookies, bread or cakes.

To prevent the dried cranberries from sinking to the bottom of the pan, I poured a small amount of the finished batter into pan, just enough to fill the base of the pan. Then I mixed in the dried cranberries with the rest of the batter before pouring everything into the pan. The cake was baked to a nice golden brown, and upon unmolding, I knew this extra effort did help. The dried cranberries did not sink to the bottom (now the top of the cake).

This cake is very light and has a very refreshing taste. The orange flavour is distinct yet subtle while the tangy-sweet dried cranberries gives a perfect balance to the sweet crumb. This recipe is definitely a keeper, I will certainly be making it again and again!




Cranberry Orange Chiffon Cake

Ingredients:
(for 17cm tube pan)

3 egg yolks
25g caster sugar
35ml vegetable oil
60ml orange juice
1 teaspoon Cointreau (I used 2 teaspoons)
zest from 1 orange
80g cake flour

4 egg whites
45g caster sugar

40g dried cranberries
some cake flour for dusting

Method:

1. Chop dried cranberries into smaller pieces. Coat with cake flour and sieve to remove excess flour. Set aside.
2. Place egg yolks in a mixing bowl. With a manual hand whisk, whisk the yolks a little. Add in sugar and whisk to combine.
3. Add in vegetable oil gradually, whisk to combine. Add orange juice, cointreau and orange zest, whisk to combine. Sieve over the flour and whisk till the flour is fully incorporated. Do not over mix. Set aside.
4. In a clean, dry mixing bowl, beat egg whites with a handheld electric mixer on low speed until mixture becomes frothy and foamy. Add half of the sugar amount and turn to high speed and beat the mixture. Continue to add in the remaining sugar and beat until the egg whites reaches the soft peak stage.The soft peak stage is reached when the peaks of the whites curl over and droop slightly. The egg whites should appear smooth and glossy. (Do not over beat the whites still stiff, it is better to beat the whites still soft peaks for easy folding with the yolk batter.)
5. Add the beaten egg whites into the egg yolk batter in 3 separate additions, each time folding gently with a spatula until just blended. 
6. To prevent the dried cranberries from sinking to the bottom of the pan, first pour a small portion of batter into a 17cm tube pan (do not grease the pan), just enough batter to fill the base of the pan. 
7. Add the prepared dried cranberries into the remaining batter in the mixing bowl. Fold with a spatula until just blended. Do not over mix. Pour batter into the pan. Tap the pan lightly on a table top to get rid of any trapped air bubbles in the batter.
8. Bake in pre-heated oven at 180 degC for 30 mins, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean, when lightly pressed the cake will spring back. Invert the pan immediately and let cool completely before unmould. To remove the cake from the pan, run a thin-bladed knife around the inside of the pan and the center core. Release the cake and run the knife along the base of the pan to remove the cake.

Recipe source: adapted from 好吃戚风蛋糕轻松上手, 福田淳子

首尔的cafe时光

我把首尔的cafe时光带回家了。。。

一向来安排自助旅行都非常贪心，总是把行程排得满满，搞得自己像导游，带着鸭子从一个景点赶到下一个景点，势必要 cover as much as possible, 这种怕输的心态不是一朝一日可以培养出来的，呵呵！

去年的首尔～釜山～庆州自由行，虽然行程有点像行军（我穿着球鞋脚都会被磨破，其中一个脚指甲回来后还脱落了！），不过这次终于有机会在首尔的江南区，新沙洞林荫大道附近的一个好小好小的cafe，喝下午茶，la kopi！

这家Banana Tree cafe是我无意中在某个网站发现的。一看到那宛如盆栽的甜点和可爱的小‘铁铲’汤匙，立刻把它列入我的‘die die must go’ list！

有了GPS， Google map，这间躲在一个好不起眼的街边小店，并不是很难找。

那天下午，小小的cafe就我们三人，感觉好像包下整个咖啡馆！其实咖啡馆就只有那三，四张小桌子。。。

看，这个被店主命名为paap的甜点，其实是把布丁盛在花盆里，上面的‘土壤’是oreo粉末，再加上巧克力石子和假花作点缀，就变成一盆可爱的小盆栽。

有闲情喝咖啡，吃甜点，对我们来说真的很难得。。。

在冷冷的冬天，坐在小小的，温馨的露台，來杯热热的latte，甜甜的香蕉布丁，幻想着有朝一日能开一间这样的小cafe，感觉非常非常好。

我特地向店员买了小花盆回来，只可惜小铁铲汤匙不卖，要不然买来当手信也不错。

小花盆带回来就一直搁着，直到有一天心血来潮，在网站上找一找，发现原来这种盆栽甜点除了布丁也可以用雪糕来代替。做法很简单，只虽放一个纸杯(马芬纸杯）在花盆里，填入雪糕，再插入一段吸管（用来插花）放入冰箱冷冻。要吃之前，撒上捣碎的oreo cookies，再插上鲜花或假花，以巧克力石子点缀，我的DIY花盆甜点就完成了！饼干里面的馅要不要拿掉可以随意，不拿掉的话，‘土壤’会很像好多天没浇水，变干硬，结块的泥土 ;)




我的花盆甜点：Oreo加雪糕，好像变成oreo mcFlowery了啦！

没有小花盆？ 没关系，小花也可以‘种’在小玻璃杯里， 一样能在家享受拥有视觉, 味觉，来自人气cafe的甜点！


This post is about my last trip to Seoul...the relaxing time we spent at this little cafe, Banana Tree, at Shinsha dong, near Garosu-gil. I was drawn to this cafe simply because of their cute flower pot dessert! We had a great time sipping latte and enjoying the .banana pudding (paap) on a cold wintry afternoon.

I had wanted to recreate this lovely dessert when I got back home, but as usual, I procrastinated. A couple of weeks ago, I was so inspired by The Pioneer Woman's springy flower pot dessert that I wasted no time to get my hands 'dirty' creating my own flower pot dessert. I made a simplified version, that is, I didn't use any pound cake as base. Instead, I lined my flower pots with a paper muffin cup (which happened to fit in nicely into the flower pot) and filled it up with ice cream. I topped the ice cream with crushed oreo cookies and colourful chocolate stones. If you do not own any flower pots, this adorable dessert can be made in small glasses too. These are great after dinner dessert and I am sure they will surprise any guests young or old.