.::. We ♥ Singapore .::.

We had a cooking competition to celebrate Singapore's 45th Birthday this weekend. Thanks to Jo, who's always churning out all sorts of interesting ideas (can't imagine what goes on in her mind). This time round, 4 of us were supposed to choose an ingredient, then draw lots. We were supposed to cook a dish with the ingredient we were given. We will be graded based on categories like creativity, taste, presentation and theme, which is National Day.



I was given 'Portobello mushrooms'. I marinated the mushrooms for an hour before grilling it in the oven. After that, I cut them up and wrapped them into dumplings together with cheese. I was hoping that the dumpling would be filled with mushrooms and melted cheese. I even bought a red tray and cut the cucumbers into 'star' shapes to adhere to the theme. The sauce of chilli and tar-tar sauce is Joel's contribution. Although it didn't turn out as heavenly as I imagined (the mushroom shrinked and the dumplings were quite empty inside), I won the cooking challenge. I think I won because of the presentation and theme, since none of them really worked on that part.

The dinner. Ju made steamed toufu with minced meat in Marmite sauce (the ingredient which was given by Jo). I've never tried Marmite sauce, but I like egg toufu! Jo deep-fried the eggs in flour and stir-fried it with salted egg. I was the one who came up with the ingredient 'egg' because it was so common and difficult to score on creativity and taste. I thought her dish was quite creative though I'm really not a salted-egg person.

It was a great dinner!

Chye made dessert with her given ingredient - 'black tea' (Ju chose that ingredient). It's so challenging, but she made quite a few desserts with earl grey tea, and I really liked it! My favourite is iced earl-grey tea with earl-grey jelly. It smells so nice, and I love earl-grey!

Her 'official' competing dish was 'Earl-grey-misu'. She used earl grey tea to make tiramisu and it must have been alot of work since she grinded the tea leaves to mix it into the mascapone cheese to bring out the earl-grey flavour. Although I felt that the texture wasn't smooth enough (because of the grinded tea bits), I really liked the smell and I think it'll taste very good with a few more tries and some improvision!

Chye even made Lavander ice-cream!!! I found it too creamy, but it's a good try! At this rate, we'll be able to open our dessert shop in a few years' time!

I miss those baking days in Sweden, trying out diffierent recipes with Emma every week. *sigh! My kitchen is a very incondusive place for baking here, since it's so cluttered and there's no empty space anywhere! For me, mood and the heart plays a big part in cooking. Without which, nothing would taste good. Since my kitchen is so cluttered and messy, it's hard to make anything that tastes good inside it.

*sighsigh. I shall try to make time to bake something delicious soon! I really want to try the ice-cream recipe book that Joel got for me from U.S.'s Ben and Jerry's. =)