Such a long cooking time

Hey everyone, quite a few of you have mentioned to me that some of the pictures here in my blog is taking such a long cooking time for them to load and I think it’s high time for me to consider other (free) image sharing sites even though it’s loading just fine over at my side. Currently I’m using imageshack.us and contemplating whether I should use tinypic.com (but tinypic.com has a trial period?!) so if anyone of you knows any good, reliable, FREE! image sharing sites do let me know will ya? Photobucket, I tried before but there’s limited bandwidth.  Thank you!

M&Ms and Pasta

If you're wondering why things are a little quiet here and also on my Twitter, it's because my notebook is once again sent in for repair. First it was the cracks on the casing and next my windows decided to die on me (well actually more like I killed it trying to reformat the notebook on my own bleh). So anyway I'm notebook-less *again!* but it's nice to have nothing to distract me or take up most of my waking time (aside from Ashley). I spent the past few days cleaning up my room, clearing all the backlogged tasks; writing down those recipes I've collected from newspapers and magazine over the year, amongst other things. But the one thing I missed most is reading all the Project Food Blog entries.

So anyway the hubs went to work today and I finally can use the PC without having to fight with him over it plus a few friends asked for the recipe of Ashley's lunch today after I shared the picture on my Facebook Page I decided to post it up before people start forgetting the existence of my blog I forget. Today I made something really special for the lil picky eater , meatballs with mash hence M&Ms and hubs told me at the last minute that he wants to have his lunch at home before heading out for work so luckily I had some leftover pasta with newly bought tomatoes and I found a can of tomato puree in the pantry. So I whipped something up real quick for him.

Pictorial Tutorial in making Kourabiethes

As promised, since some of you have voted for me , Efxaristo! here is the pictorial tutorial for the Kourabiethes. You can get the recipe here
The ingredients     How To

Mommy dearest!    

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Celebrating my little win with Kourabiethes

Yes I’ve made it to the second round of Project Food Blog! And it’s all thanks to you, yes you who voted for me. No words can described how happy (and surprised) I was when I saw the tiny trophy on my profile, especially when I woke up at 3.30 in the morning to use the toilet and as always a habit to check for any new updates on my laptop, to see that I’m still in the run to be the next Food Blog Star! It took all my willpower not to go wooooottttt since both of my darlings were still in slumber land. So once again thank you so so much for voting for me! Also special thanks to the judges who actually took their time to read my post! Golly imagine having Dana Cowin ( Editor-in-Chief of FOOD & WINE Magazine ) Nancy Silverton (Founder La Brea Bakery, Co-owner Mozza ) and Pim Techamuanvivit  (Author of ChezPim.com and The Foodie Handbook) reading your blog!

Then after all the excitement starts to die a bit I started to feel nervous because, 1) I was going back to my parents place which is 2 hours drive from my house for the weekend and 2) I’m supposed to prepare for the second challenge: The Classics , to pick an ethnic classic that is outside my comfort zone or are not as familiar with and submit over the weekend! Somehow I had the impression we would only need to work on the next challenge when the week starts and not over the weekend. I did think of a few dishes for this challenge but it would need me to be at my own workplace with my own cooking equipments, so with a few hours to spare I started to look around for an exotic dish I can do at my parents place and also using ingredients that are readily accessible as well because Malacca is pretty limited when it comes to exotic ingredients. So in the end I settled for a dessert, a Greek dessert to be precise called Kourabiethes (sugared almond shortbread cookies). Why Greek you ask? Well I think it’s a sign because for the past few weeks we (read Ashley) have been watching Percy Jackson and The Lightning Thief non-stop everyday and also I’ve always been fascinated by the Greek mythology and of course the all famous blue domes against white background. Having never been to the country or eaten any Greek cuisine before I have no idea how this dessert taste like but from what I’ve read and seen on the internet is enough to convince myself to try making it.

 

So after looking at the recipes, I packed the ingredients I have here to bring back to my parent’s place and during the journey I kept thinking how I should go about on this challenge, should I go all documentary or should I just go with the flow while injecting myself in the post. Especially when we are required to write a compelling post on how we came about to choosing the dish we are making. Well continue reading and see which I’ve decided on yea (evil I know tempting you to read on).

From what I read, Kourabiethes pronounced koo-rah-bee-YEH-thess are usually found during celebrations in Greek and of course it fits right, me advancing to the next round is indeed a celebration and I always feel extra good whenever we go back to my parents place and with all my uncles being back as well it’s definitely a call for celebrations! As I read further, I find interesting enough it’s one of the few desserts usually served during The Great Lent, like how dates are associated with Puasa. How they come about to creating this dish, I’m not sure but to me it looks like snow-peaked mountains, don’t you think? So anyway I was just having loads of fun catching up with my family that I only started making this on the day we were to drive back! How typical of me, leaving things to the last minute (I’m actually writing this with less than 4 hours left!). But I didn’t feel panicky at all, to my great surprise because I’m always over the edge whenever time is running short, instead I had fun making this with my mom, sis and of course my lil sous chef.

 

Although I did feel slightly out of place because I almost never cook whenever I’m back at their place, my mom would always make our favourite dishes so I supposed it’s fulfils the criteria of  are not as familiar with and the fact that I’m a baking goddess in baking, yeap till today I’m still trying to figure out why my cake is always dense at the bottom or the fact that this is my first cookie-making in years!

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My daddy and granny giving their approvals (my granny is pretty fussy when it comes to food!)

Anyway, lets go back to the recipe (THE recipe that will determine if I could be one of the lucky 200 bloggers left to stand a chance in being the next Food Blog Star ), ladies and gentlemen, I present you the recipe for this wonderful melt-in-your-mouth cookies which is now one of my favourite things to make.

(Yields about 3 dozen)

You Need

(Adapted from About.com)

1 cup (2 sticks butter/250g) unsalted butter
2 eggs
1/4 cup confectioners' sugar
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup toasted, ground almonds
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract (I substituted  the brandy usually called for in most recipes)
Confectioners' sugar

How To
1. Using an electric mixer, cream together the butter and sugar until light (pale yellow in color)  and fluffy. Beat in the eggs and vanilla extract. Mix the flour and ground almond together.
2. Add flour mixture a little at a time, and then work well wit your hands.
3. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).
4. Shape the cookies into small rounded balls and flatten lightly or you can also roll out pieces of dough to the thickness you want and use a cookie cutter

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5. Bake on ungreased lined with parchment paper trays at 350°F (175°C) for 20-30 minutes but do check at the 20 minute because the cookies is cooked when the bottoms turn light golden.

6. Remove from oven, while still hot, and sift confectioner's sugar over them. Don’t skimp on the sugar, it’s meant to cover the cookies in glorious mounds of powdered sugar.

By the way, I’m holding each and everyone of you hostage if you wish to check out the pictorial tutorials until you vote for me. No I’m serious, like dead serious . Oh just watch out for the next post.

Voting opens 6AM Pacific Time September 27th through 6PM Pacific Time September 30th.

The Voting Is Now Open

Hey everyone, the voting is finally open! And I'm so excited about it, because I'm also revealing a brand new look for the blog! Hope you guys love it, it was an impromptu decision as I want to create a more friendly site for everyone to enjoy my blog even more :)So remember to click here to vote for me. Voting ends 6PM Pacific Time September 23rd.You would need to sign up with FoodBuzz only for the voting purpose but I promise it won't be a hassle. Only 400 out of 652 food bloggers will advance so remember to vote vote vote for me ya! Much love!

How To Vote for Me 
Click on the link here http://www.foodbuzz.com/project_food_blog/challenges/1/view/473 and you’ll come to this page shown in the picture below. Click on the heart shape. You would be prompted to join FoodBuzz, it’s a simple procedure and fret not, they won’t spam your inbox. That's it, you cast your vote, I'd be in the running to be the next food blog star and a step closer to my dream; my own catering business! And all you need to do is just click and vote!