Ego is a dangerous thing

Hah, remember that choux pastry I made ages ago, I finally took it out of the freezer today to bake it, and for some reason *cough*cocky-mai*cough* I managed to under-bake 50% of the patch, and there was nothing I could do to save them, in the end I had to throw them :'(, note to self : never freeze stuff unless you become a pastry chef, and leave you stupid ego out of the kitchen next time

I remembered to take a shot this time after I started to munch away, and this bit of eclair in the pic was my last bite, I took the shot and threw the yummy thing in my mouth XD.

I love chili

Today cooking lunch was on me, so after a minute of thinking I decided to go for Thai+ Vietnamese with a bit of Indonesian cuisine thrown in, I made my list that had : rice noodles, bean sprouts and many other ingredients... after preparing every thing I was craving some chili, and so I made a lime-chili dressing to drizzle on my bowl of noodles, since none in my family like spicy food I made a small amount of it. I have to say that I ended up putting a bit too much chili, and it was OH-lord-have-mercy-on-me hot.. it was hot hot hot hot, I never in my life eaten anything that is so hot before (and I ate my share of chili for the bast five years) I thought I was ready for this, but no! sitting next to my mum I couldn't talk to express my discomfort, all I was able to do is to groan and stick my tongue out, then I ran to the kitchen to grab some sugar to put down the fire in my mouth ;_;. while I'm writting this I had to stop a capule of times to wipe tears, say soothing words to my grumpling stomach, and to supply my brunt tongue with sugar. But still, I love chili!

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Slow days

I thought once eid is over I'll be busy doing things, but *sigh* I couldn't even wake up when I was supposed to, I feel so drained because I had so few sleeping hours in ramadan - that's 3 hours each day- and now, no matter how long I sleep I never wake up refreshed and energetic... and I have a manga contest deadline (arugh) guess I'll pass and try next time, I won't be able to make it in time anyways TAT.

Also I picked up a new hobby, I listen to daram CDs all day, I managed to put my hand on a few CDs that are on loop for 12 hours daily and let me tell you, this Keiji Fujiwara is so augh talented I heard him doing so many roles but it's NOTHING like the drama CD, ah~ all day I'll be laying in bed under covers and giggling ...my sister thinks that I'm losing my cool because I'm tired XD.

Battle wounds

Lately I have received some small injuries, and every time I didn't feel pain (yes yes, I didn't even feel a thing). Maybe I got stronger, or maybe I'm just too busy to feel anything. Yesterday I was dressing up to go out, and while I was fighting with a hairpin to put my hair up the forsaken thing sliced my thump open, five minutes passed and I didn't feel anything until I was applying mascara, after I lifted my hand off my face I saw a big blood stain... I freaked out, really, I was running all over the room like a headless chicken!

Today because the whole eclair making thing made me really in a good mood, and I was craving for more tonight, so I decided to make another patch and leave it in the freezer. Everything was going OK, no knifes used so basically I was supposed to walk out of the kitchen in one piece... Oh, I was so wrong. While I was beating eggs into the dough with a wooden spoon, a very hard task if you tried it yourself, I started thinking that I might end up with a blister on my hands, to check I stopped mixing and looked at my hand... oh NO blood! the spoon pulled a small patch of skin and now I have a small hole in my hands that stings. I didn't run or scream I just looked at it, took a picture and then continued beating the eggs.

and now I'm typing this post with bandage on my right hand and another on my left thump, I guess I should be more careful, tehe.

Pierre Herme Eclares

Not long ago I ordered number of cooking books as a very late graduation gift for myself - I needed a reason to justify the splurge-, and to me the highlight of the package was the amazing chocolate desserts book by Pierre Hermé; just flipping through the book and looking at the pictures is satisfying as eating chocolate. It didn't take long until I tried a recipe, and since I'm a big tart-lover I went for the nutella tart, it was a treat from me and my sister since she loves nutella so much, and what can I say it was yummilicous and also easy to do, the result was sensational, a light biscuit layer, thin layer of nutella and the best melt in your mouth ganache, and it looked amazing, it was just perfect -too bad I didn't take pictures-. One day I was invited for a dinner/ftoor in my uncle's house and I thought this tart will be perfect to take with me, little I knew that abit-low quality chocolate will give me some hard time, actually it was a nightmare, the ganache spilt while in the oven and I was in despair, and a thick layer of shredded coconut saved the day.

And because there is no Pierre Hermé pastry shop where I live, and I wanted to eat good eclairs, not that cerme-filled ribber found in the pastry shop I know covered with an awful dark stuff they call chocolate , the challenge was to make at-least-edible eclairs. In my life I tried to make the choux pastry three times, and it seemes that I made a major progress since my first eclairs were flat as a pancake; but, many years passed since then and I'm stronger in the arm and have more Patience. The recipe was straight-forward and easy to follow, and Mr.Hermé gives the steps in details so there are no "what-to-do-now" moments, every thing went smoothly and the my smile grew as I saw the eclairs puff and rise. So, the eclairs came out perfect from the oven, but because I started cooking on impulse I didn't make sure what kind of chocolate I had, and it was too late when I discovered that I had a very-sweet milk chocolate, but I had to do the chocolate glaze anyways. The result was OK, not perfect, but it put a smile on my family's faces; to me that's good enough. One thing I know for sure, next time I have some of my Friends around I'll make eclairs.

~Mai

Note: the picture isn't mine , as you know (or don't) I don't own a good camera, but I'll consider since I'm thinking of taking food blogging seriously.