Being a wife

It's almost three months now that I'm married. Our adjustment to life in Indonesia wasn't as bad as we had imagined. God has been really generous in pouring His grace to us everyday. Both my husband and I had fallen sick this past month but through the experience, we learn to serve each other better. :) During these three months, we also had lots of fun and we get to know each other a little bit better each day. We love to laze around at home and spend some time with our families.

In order to mark our new married life, we decided to invite a few friends over for dinner at home. It turns out that I really like entertaining guests at home. I really enjoyed cooking and preparing the dinner. :) For the special occassion, I made a few Indonesian dishes and closed it up with my favorite Indonesian cheesecake. <3

Hopefully more of this kind of occassion will come up soon :)

Re-learning how to bake

I soon discovered that baking in Indonesia is very different than baking in the US... for many reasons:

1. The weather condition is different - mostly temperature and humidity level
2. The ingredients - different types of sugar, flour, butter, heavy cream, and even eggs!
3. The tools - the typical oven in Indonesia is not designed for baking because there's no way of setting the temperature steady throughout the baking process. For this, one would need to purchase the expensive convection oven.

With all these changes, I feel that I need to learn how to bake all over again. :p

These are some of the banana cupcakes that I made about a month ago during my re-learning process. Although it's the same recipe that I had used before, the process and result were quite different. It turns out that there are a lot of different types of bananas in Indonesia: pisang raja, pisang tanduk, pisang mas, pisang ambon, etc. Each of the different banana types have varying texture, smell, and taste. After a few trials with the different banana types, I think I prefer pisang ambon for this cupcake. It's the most similar to the banana in the US :p

That's it for now my friends :) There are more baking experiments to be posted and I promise I will catch up with them ASAP.

Got Cup-bread?

I'm now a married woman with a wonderful husband. :)

The wedding was beautiful and despite my efforts to not cry, the tears just flowed down on my face (see more pictures taken by my wonderful friends, the wagyu story, at their blog). I'm very thankful to God for allowing all things to happen; to my parents who love me dearly and gave their best for me; to my loving husband who has been very patient and caring towards me; and to my family and friends who made the day so unforgettable.

Alvin and I are now back from our honeymoon to North California and we are settling into our cozy home in Jakarta. Today is actually day 2 of being back home and I celebrated the day with baking! :)


I made these breads in cupcake liners for fun and they turn out rather cute :p I feel welcomed and at ease in my new home as I made these cup-breads. I'm still not familiar with the new kitchen and still stumbling around for my kitchen tools (finding out that I'm missing a few VERY important tools), but I really think that this simple baking exercise is a good start to begin my journey here.

I officially start working on Monday and I'm excited. I've been on vacation for far too long :p I do hope that I will keep on baking and creating/exploring new things in my new kitchen alongside my wonderful husband. :)

Apple Tart

This has been the longest absence I've ever taken in my blogging history. :p I must admit that I have only started blogging a couple of years ago, but I've been pretty constant in providing new entries and updates on my kitchen experiments.

Since my move to Indonesia, I haven't been baking as much. The kitchen is different (I don't know where things are stored), the oven is different ( we only have gas oven and the temperature can't be set), the ingredients are different (not many options are available - even raspberries are hard to find), and the circumstances are different (I'm no longer in my own place, but I'm at my parent's house).

I know... I know.. those are all excuses. :p Despite the many changes I encountered here, I managed to bake a little bit here and there. I took pictures of some of them but the slow internet connection here makes it challenging to post them up on my blog entry. However, I managed to pull it through and here I am sharing them with you. :)

Apple tart for the family :)

One for each of my family members, with much love!

I really want to thank each one of you who are still faithfully checking up onmy blog updates. You guys really motivate me to continue with my passion despite the despites. I hope to upload more for you all. :)

Cheers!

Living in Jakarta

I've finally arrived in Jakarta, Indonesia about two weeks ago. Life has been full of activities here and being around my family is such great joy. Unfortunately, I haven't had the chance to bake very much here. The kitchen seemed very foreign and I have no ideas where things are located. :p

Oh well... I'll take my time to learn my way around my mom's kitchen.

I did make some pie crust this morning for an apple pie and I made some pastry cream for my cream puffs. :) Soo... look out for them soon!

Much love,

A Few "MIA" cakes

Many of you must think that I've abandoned this blog. It's been too long since I last posted something of my baking or even informed you all that I'll be out for a bit. Well, just to give an update of what had happened to me since the last post...

1. I quit my job at KPMG Houston
2. I've packed all my personal stuff and shipped them back to Jakarta
3. I'm now bunking at Jane's place (she's so kind to let me stay at her place these last few days I have in Houston)
4. I'm still in denial about going back home (Jakarta) for good in the next 5 days

That being said, I'm still baking. :) Although I haven't baked as much as I'd like to because of many reasons (my last month at work had been crazy long hours; all my baking tools have been boxed up and shipped off; I have no place to bake), but I'm thankful of the several chances I was provided to make cakes and other desserts. :)


This is a cake for Brian's birthday.

This is a cake for Donna's wedding meeting.

This is a just-for-fun shortbread cookies with fondant.

I can't promise that I'll be able to bake and post as often as I did in the past, but I'll continue to maintain this blog and post as much as I can. I have no idea what life holds over there in Jakarta, but I know that if I hold on tight to God, He will lead my life. :) I really hope and pray that I'll grow in Christ in Indonesia and be a blessing to others around me.

Thanks for being so encouraging all these while... :)

Lemon Butter Cookies

Thinking about baking makes me happy. Reading good cookbooks makes me happy too. Actually being able to bake something good makes me ecstatic! :)

That is the case with these little rounds of buttery goodness. Since I love my Baking From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan, I went ahead and purchased abother baking book by Dorie called Paris Sweets. This book is different in that there were no photographs of the desserts at all but instead, Dorie shared stories of the different pastry shops where the recipes were born. :)
Since work has been really busy these few weeks, I haven't had a chance to try the more elaborate recipes from the book. So I picked this lemon butter cookies recipe to try last Friday. The recipe is really simple and Dorie's instructions are always very clear. So I followed the directions step by step and I am VERY satisfied with the results. :)

The cookies crumbles pretty easily. They are not too sweet and when you bite into it, it almost felt like they were melting in your mouth. Yumm! I didn't have the book right in front of me now, so I don't have the recipe to share. But if anyone is interested, let me know. :)

PS: the pictures are courtesy of Alvin. :)

Opera Cake

As mentioned in my previous blog posts, I haven't been experimenting much with new cakes lately. I'm leaving my work soon (in 2 weeks, to be exact) to embark on a new journey in life. But there's just so much to do in this last weeks at work and the hours have been escalating. Auditing really takes a good chuck (if not most) of my time and I'm not sure if I'm liking the reality of this. After a very discouraging conference call yesterday morning, I really wonder if I have been giving work more time and priority than it deserves.

As I look around at work these past few days, I saw people giving a lot of their time, their life, and their heart away to work. Pushing themselves very hard to please others, to get the work done no matter what, to (somehow) get a little bit more sense of job security. And I wonder if it's all worth it. I believe that we all have one life to live and I hope that I'm living mine with no regrets. But sadly, I have to admit that looking back at life, there are things that I wished I didn't do and paths I wished I didn't take. :( But I'm thankful for my God who is able to make all things new and who will bring to completion the good works that He had started in my life. :) With that, I look forward to life in confidence - knowing that God is in control of every thing in my life.

I am in good hands. :)


Okay. Now about the cakes. :)

Alvin's cousin had asked me if I'd be willing to bake some thank you cakes for them to give away to friends. After several discussions on the type of cakes, they decided that they wanted something mocha. :)

But I don't really feel like making a simple regular mocha cakes, so I decided to experiment with Opera cakes. I got my inspiration from Joe Pastry and started to build my own components for my Opera cake. For those of you who are not familiar with Opera cake, it's a french gateau that's made of 4 layers of Joconde separated by coffee buttercream and ganache and topped with a layer of chocolate glaze. Since it's coffee + chocolate, I figured it's close enough to a mocha cake. :) I was supposed to make 8 of these, but since work had been demanding more and more of my time, I was only able to make 4 this week. I've got 4 more to make this coming week. Yay! Practice makes perfect.

Anyways, here are the recipes for the components that I used.

Joconde (adapted from Joe Pastry)

100g egg whites (approximately 3 egg whites)
15g granulated sugar

110g powdered sugar, sifted

110g almond flour

3 eggs, at room temperature

40g all purpose flour

25g unsalted butter, melted and cooled

Preheat the oven to 400F and line a 11" x 15" cake pan with parchment paper.

In a clean mixing bowl, whisk the egg whites until soft peaks. Slowly add the granulated sugar and continue to whip the egg whites until stiff peaks.

In a separate mixing bowl, mix the eggs, powdered sugar, and almond flour using a hand mixer with paddle attachment at medium speed until light and ribonn-y thick (about 3 minutes). Switch to a spatula and mix in the flour, being careful not to overmix the batter. Fold in the meringue followed by the melted butter.

Pour the batter into the pan and bake for about 7 minutes or until the top is light golden brown. Let cool in a cooling rack for a minute and then unmold into a parchment paper. Let cool to room temperature prior to using.

Coffee buttercream (adapted from Alice Medrich)

1/3 cup water

2/3 cup sugar

1 egg + 1 egg yolk, at room temperature

8oz (230g) unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
2 tbs instant espresso powder dissolved in 1 tsp hot water

Boil the sugar and water in a heavy-bottomed pans until it reaches 242F. Meanwhile, in a mixing bowl, whisk the eggs until thick and pale yellow. When the syrup reaches the desired temperature, slowly pour the syrup to the egg mixture in a thin stream while continuing to whisk at medium speed. Continue to whisk until the batter reach room temperature. Start add in the butter, one piece at a time, until the buttercream is smooth and silky. Pour in the coffee paste and mix well.

Dark chocolate ganache

75 g dark chocolate, chopped into small pieces
75 g heavy cream

Bring the heavy cream to boil and then pour over the chocolate. Leave it for a couple of minutes and then stir in a circular motion from the inside out until all the cream and chocolate is well combined. Leave to cool at room temperature until the desired consistency is reached.

Chocolate glaze

150g dark chocolate, chopped into small pieces

85g unsalted butter
1/2 tbs corn syrup

Combine all ingredients in a heat proof bowl set over simmering water until the butter and chocolate starts to melt. Take if off the heat and stir until all is melted and well combined. If necessary, put the bowl back on the heat but being careful not to burn the chocolate.

Coffee syrup

100g sugar

150g water

2 tsp instant espresso powder

Bring all ingredients together to boil. Let cool before using it on the cake.

Assembly of Opera Cake

Divide the Joconde into 4 equal pieces and if you prefer, you can brush the bottom one one Joconde piece with melted chocolate so that it's easier to cut the cake when it's done. Brush the first layer of Joconde with coffee syrup and then slather a thin layer of coffee buttercream. Place another layer of Joconde on top, brush it with coffee syrup, and then apply a thin layer of ganache. Place the third layer of Joconde on top, brush it with coffee syrup, and put a thin layer of coffee buttercream. Last, place the last layer of coffee syrup soaked Joconde on top, apply a very thin layer of coffee buttercream and pour the chocolate glaze on top. Trim the sides to get a clean view of the layers. :)

I hope that you'll enjoy experimenting with the cake as much as I do! :) Four down, four more to go!

Introducing Two Bites

October is nearing to an end and if you look at the number of blog posts I have this month, it looked like I haven't been baking much at all. Although it is true that I've been trying to cut back on the amount of time I spent baking, I still baked a fair share of cakes and cookies. But since they're simple cakes (like Chiffon or pound cake or black forest cake) that I've blogged about before, I decided to keep them to myself. :p

During the low period in October, several major events happened to the baking aspect of my life. First is the wedding favors that I made for our Pastor's 25th wedding anniversary:


I made about 200 of these cupcake pops as their edible wedding favors. :) This was a very interesting task for me because of many reasons: (a) we're talking about quite a large quantity, (b) it's for my pastor's 25th anniversary, and (c) it's my first "experience" of what it would be to open up my own place.

I started preparing for the cupcakes pops one week before the anniversary. My work had been demanding a lot of my time then (and now still) and so I had no choice but to bake late at night and pull 2:30AM nights in order to finish the order. The strange thing is that I didn't feel tired a all baking the cakes, making the frosting, crumbling the cake, rolling them into cake balls, shaping them into cupcakes, dipping them into chocolates and wrapping them up in their plastics. :) In fact, I felt very energized. It felt like my endorphin levels are high! By the time I wrapped the last of the cupcake pops (with the help of Alvin), I felt very accomplished. :)

Alvin and I couldn't make it to the party since we had to fly to San Jose for our bridal shower; so I didn't get a chance to gauge people's reaction to the mini delight. I just hope that my little pops were well received and well loved. :p

The second big thing that happened this month is two bites.

For now, two bites is an idea, a concept, and a dream.

The idea is mini bite-size desserts that are irresistible.

The concept is two fold: is a small cozy shop that serves mini desserts that are to be enjoyed with a good cup of tea and an ounce of conversations as well as catering for edible favors for weddings, anniversaries, birthdays, and more.

The dream is for me to bring the idea and concept together as a reality in my life. :)

I need to be praying about this more seriously. I need to be planning about this more realistically. I need to be practicing more often.

If you have any comments/suggestions/ideas about this, please let me know. Your thoughts are greatly appreciated. :)

Pistachio Butter Cookies

I've recently bought a cordless cookie press from Michael's using my 40% off coupon and I am very excited to put it to use. As soon as I get home from Michael's I searched the internet for Spritz cookies recipes and found plenty to experiment with. I started with a recipe from Epicurious and then branch out to make my own recipe. :) And because the holiday season is coming soon, I made snowflakes!

This one is for a Pistachio Butter Cookies:

115g unsalted butter, at room temperature
70g sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp almond extract
1 egg yolk
140g all purpose flour
25g finely ground pistachios


Preheat the oven to 325F. In a bowl with an electric mixer cream the butter with the granulated sugar until the mixture is light and fluffy (about 2-3 minutes). Then, mix in the salt, vanilla, and egg yolks until the mixture is smooth. Add the flour and pistachios to the mixture and mix in until it is just combined. Pack the dough into a cookie press fitted with the snow flakes disk and press cookies about 1 inch apart onto cool, ungreased baking sheets.

Bake for 8-10 minutes or until the edges of the cookies are golden brown. Transfer the cookies to the cooling rack to cool.

I brought these little snowflakes for Alvin's nephew and he likes it a lot! :) It makes me feel very happy when he devours the cookies in seconds and then immediately ask for another one. He hasn't learned how to talk yet but he sure knows how to make his parents (or Alvin and I) knows when he wants something. :p

I am very grateful for Alvin's cousin and her family. Ko Yohan, Ci Lia, Ethan, and Andrew have really brought an extra layer of warmth to our relationship. They make us feel at home and have always served us yummy food after work. :) I'll surely miss them when I move back to Indonesia at the end of this year.

I packed the cookies in goodie bags and brought some to church as well to share with my dear friends who always welcome my homemade goodies. :) I am truly blessed to have so many encouraging friends and "family" around even when I'm far from home.

XOXO