thumbprint cookies

they are called thumbprint cookies cos of the way they are made. you roll the dough into a ball and u press your thumb in the middle of the indent, where the jam sits. i like raspberry jam....esp on french toast, or on a tart...so i decided to make cookies with jam!

they taste really good, really sweet and yummy....BUT they look like a mess. if i ever wanna open my own bakery or bake to sell, i have to work on consistency of the way my sweets look man. i cant frost, and i sure as hell cant make same size cookies. not only were they not the same size, i OD-ed on the jam and some overflowed while being baked in the oven. but not to worry, it's a yummy mess!

and i made teriyaki chicken. not with the pre-made suace, i made the sauce on my own. hur hur hur! my chicken was good, cos it's thigh...but the boy's chicken breast was way too tough. minus points. need to cut the cooking time for his chicken breast next time.

OH! and here are the wantons from tuesday's wanton factory. we made pork and veggie wantons. the wrapping is the easy n fun part, the chopping of ingredients was tedious. i saw stars at one point. think i made like 60 over wantons...but it's all good, you can freeze them up till about 1 month.

oh and sunset while i was making dinner.....pretty!

it's dim sum lunch today!!!!! YUMMZ.

chocolate cake

here's my very first cake. the frosting....er, let's just say it needs more work la. it tastes good but it looks like i slapped on the frosting. ha! well, i didnt have the right knife or spatula to smooth the frosting on the cake tt's why. the boy and i attacked it with chocolate ice cream after dinner n he says it's restaurant standard. LIAR!!!!! hahahahahahahaha!!!!

apart from the cake, i managed to grill lamb and have veggies too! all by 8pm. (cos the boy complaint last week tt i made dinner at 9pm twice n it's bad to eat so late, and he also complaint tt i dun cook enuf veggies....tsk tsk) more points for the gf!!!

and guess who secretly likes my dirty smelly stuff animal???

am off to make wantons with a fren today! and also to have coffee with her...and to deliver a slice of my chocolate cake. all this under 33 degrees of sunshine!

super sunshine!!!!!

the weather changed for the better! altho kinda drastic but we are loving the change! it was pouring from monday - thursday, the temp was around 12 - 14 degrees and next thing you know, it was 20 degrees on friday, super sunny, and it was 28 degrees on saturday and sunday!!!! it was sooooo hot. we couldnt even have brunch outdoor, we needed the air condition.

so saturday was perfect for a walk in the park, esp since it faces the river. the perfect combi of sun and wind!

we then went to MIT - Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where all the cool smart and nerdy kids are. it's a cool campus, way cooler than Harvard. we went for their student concert thingy, cos a co-worker of the boy was spinning. we then headed off to a nearby bar called science bar (see, nerdy). and i had a hooch-tasting drink called mike's hard lemonade. it was soooo good under tt sun, lemonade with a tinge of alcohol, yummy!!!!

after dinner the boy and i sat down here....under the lights, with a small crowd, with a man crooning away love songs. :o)

sunday was brunch at grafton, at harvard square. we love harvard square cos of the buzz and liveliness. we love it more than boston downtown. cos this sunday, we decided for the gang to pop down to where we are, instead of us heading to where they are. grafton was good! the french toast is awesome, i am so having tt the next time i'm there. and i told the boy he's getting the steak and eggs so i can have some meat with my toast. he thinks i'm nuts to think this far ahead. hahahahahaha!

oh and randomly, see what we saw on the train to harvard!

and everytime we are at harvard square, the boy needs to visit the tannery - shopping of cos. so he walked out with 2 pairs of converse and a bag that's reversible. he wanted me to carry the bag but it was big, no wait i mean huge! i think he can carry me in tt bag. so he got tt for himself instead. and i got 2 pairs of converse! i couldnt decide b/w the colors, cos i liked them both. and after a while, the boy got impatient tt i was taking so long to decide tt he decided for me, n tt is his way - buy both. so here are my new comfy walks! all our shoes were 40 bucks each, good deal!!!!

oh another random, see what we saw while walking to get coffee. someone connected the dots from chewing gum with chalk.

we grabbed coffee and decided to take a walk in harvard uni....and it's so beautiful, we're gonna have our coffee on their greens the next time!

on the way home, we salivated at our neighbours. this is our dream apt - right next to our apt...however, it's not for rent, only for sale. maybe tt's why i've only ever seen 2 apts lit at night.

the boy then went for a run and i went for a swim. and we had his famous bak chor mee for dinner again! this time round was better than last week, yummy!!!! next sunday he says he's making teochew muay. hur hur hur!

we loved our sunny weekend. :o)

mela

we had awesome indian food on friday night! it was so much better than the first indian restaurant we went with the gang last month. tt last indian place was recommended by the boys' indian co-worker, however, tt was disappointing. they had no idea what spice is.

anyhow...i made reservations for mela at the south end before consulting the boy cos i've been wanting to try tt out for awhile now. and he called after i made the reservation and said "how abt indian food tonight?"

PHWOAR. spot on. 5 points for the gf. :o)

we had the non-vegetarian set for 2 that was only 45 bucks in total. and this set had:

- some potato thingy, a soup and this other fried dumpling thingy as appetizer

- 2 curries of our choice, so we had beef and chicken

- rice and garlic naan

- a platter of tandoori grill

- dessert

we were sooooo full from it. i was so stuffed becos i stuffed my face with the naan. i love naan. the boy told me to stop midway thru dinner but no, i didnt listen. i finished it all and regretted it on the way home. the naan grew in my stomach and i almost died from a stuffed stomach. hahahaha!

i think we're gonna lay off indian food for a while. like maybe 2 months. cos the boy complained tt he's getting a heart burn from all the food we've been eating and he blames it on the hearty indian food. *see who's being drama*

too late!!!!!!

if you haven't heard...matthew williamson has a collection for H&M this yr. and his first spring collection was launched on thursday, in selected stores. and boston, was going to have 1 store carrying that collection.

when i spoke to the boy abt this on wed night, he said to go check it out since i like his clothes. and i said nah, i will go on friday cos i dun think bostonians are fashion crazy enuf to go crazy over his clothes like how london went crazy over kate moss for topshop.

so friday 5pm, i stepped in (after having coffee opp H&M for 2 hours) and there was his stuff...on 1 rack. so i asked where the other stuff were and the sales person said they were all out by thursday morning. BOO HOO HOO!!!!!

i called the boy and he laughed. he said too bad for me and i should go at 6am come may 14 cos that would be his summer line. so yes, i've agreed with a gf here to go queue super early. ok, maybe at 8am....with coffee....and hot cross buns!

the coffee table is turning into another "bed"

the coffee table we bought (actually, the boy went ahead to pay for it even before we agreed on it, but nvm, tt's the past) - has a defect and it's the last piece (thank god, cos i wasnt fond of it, i think tt table is nice and big enough to be used as a bench to sit on when you put on your shoes). so we cancelled that order and we're now looking for another one. so i've watched the boy browse thru many many coffee tables and we saw 2 that we really like. one that has an odd shape that i love, and another which is clean and simple.

and now, the boy is still looking at many many tables, changing his mind abt the tables we agreed on initially. i'm fine with looking at more just to keep our options open. but the boy has a way of agreeing on something, really really liking something n the next day he sends over more options (and i dun mean 1 or 2 more, it's like 8 more) that he likes alot too!

i duno if tt's being fickle or indecisive, but it can get a bit frustrating. esp cos i'm the total opp, once i see something i like, and i agree on it, i get attached to it and i dun look around anymore, n if i do look ard, everything else pales in comparison. so i'm not saying tt he's wrong in looking ard, but it often causes us to go ding dong back and forth and i really dislike that exercise.

n the painful part (for me at least) is he comes up with the oddest analogy for the new options n why he likes them. for example:

- we should get a big round table cos now everything else in the house has corners
- i'm a big fan of the designer tt's why
- i see the world in shapes and color balances

sigh....i dun blame him, but this is the creative bone kicking in wayyyyy tooooooo muuuuuch again.

BUT - i am going to let him go thru this exercise of seeing a thousand and one tables until we buy the ultimate coffee table that he loves. cos i am not abt to go thru another episode of the bed where we buy something tt he likes so-so only and i hear abt him wanting to change it for the next 4 nights.

let's hope it wont take longer than 2 weeks for me to share what our new coffee table looks like.

butter cake for the boy!

since he made bar chor mee for me (and now is forced into making mee tai muk), i decided to bake his fav.....butter cake. the boy who loves all sorts of exotic food and yet his fav cake is good ol' fashion butter cake.

i was abit nervous cos the cake is simple, and tt means i gotta have the right butter! and i was afraid tt it would be either too buttery or worse, bland and dry. i even bought a cute lil loaf pan for it!

it was delicious!!!! i never had a thing for butter cake, never ever did. and i thot i was baking a cake all for the boy but i had half a slice and i ate another slice!!! n thank god the boy loves it, i had to stop him from eating half the loaf before dinner. n i made him swear he wont finish the other part of the loaf for breakfast today. hyuk hyuk!!!

and i made simple salmon for dinner. garlic, butter, lemon, dill weed, pepper and salt. n left it in a skillet for 20 mins. easy peasy. n it was good! cos sometimes salmon can be made rather dry and it makes it rather difficult to finish the whole piece, but i had enough butter and lemon to make it juicy and yet light tasting. yummz yummz.

i didnt garnish the food, the boy does it for my photo-ops. looking at the fish now, it looks like chicken. hmmmm....