In the midst of my comprehensive exam, I took a break and co-hosted an Indian food dinner party for my fellow special ed coursemates. I made tandoori chicken, tikka tempeh (my own invention), and tikka paneer. Just one week ago, I had no idea what paneer was. I needed to make a vegetarian tandoori dish, so my Indian coursemate suggested making paneer, and I was like, “Paneer? What is that?” It’s actually a block of fresh cheese Indian-style. Here’s the menu (top right going clockwise):
1. Jeera rice (wonderful spiced basmati rice)
2. Kasoori methi mushroom (mushroom, fenugreek, cream sauce)
3. Tikka tempeh (strips) and tikka paneer (the mess; tandoori marinated cheese)
4. Aalu gobi matar (cauliflower, potato, peas dish; I love this)
5. Rajma (red bean curry soup)
6. Samosa and Dhania chutney
7. Tandoori chicken
8. Raita (cucumber and yogurt)
9. (Not in picture) Mango ice-cream made from coolwhip and mango pulp (absolutely delicious ice-cream made by my Romanian coursemate).

I watch a lot of Food Network and the chefs are always talking about setting the dinner table, coordinated table-cloth and dinnerware, and a floral centerpiece. I look at this picture and I see the messy uncoordinated containers and no table-cloth! But I like it, it’s a big welcome sign that says “just dig in and enjoy!”

In two weeks time, our group will be having a Slavic dinner party. That should be interesting, let’s see if the Slavic chefs do a better job presenting their cuisine

I was thinking of getting myself a nice not-my-birthday cake at Vegan Treats, but at $6.50 per piece they are quite pricey, so I got some nonvegan treats at the local grocery store instead. Whoopi pies = whipped cream sandwiched between two vanilla cakes. They are pretty good.

This morning was bad. I was awaken at 8am by apartment-mate’s loud animated phone conversation…uhhhh!!! And then the building’s fire alarm went off at around 8:20am and I really had to get out of bed and leave the building…. AHHHH!! We were finally allowed back into the building sometime after 9am. There wasn’t any fire or smoke, no idea what happened to trigger that alarm.

Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka!

And make sure you shout “merdeka” eight times only, not seven times, not nine times, but 8 times, or else you might be fined RM1000 for doing it wrongly or worse – you might be deemed unpatriotic!

Tada! Here is my Merdeka celebration cake. Since I’m such a law abiding person, I couldn’t decorate my merdeka cake with the Jalur Gemilang, so I decorated the cake with the Bintang dan Jalur (Stars and Stripes) instead. Actually I like the name Jalur Kebintangan better.

I guess the PM’s department foresaw the onslaught of similarly badly decorated flag cakes that they tried to prevent the mayhem from ever happening. I have to say the law saved me and other novice cake decorators from attempting to produce a 14-point star with the yellow icing. I think that feat is impossible.

Just as I was about to eat this for lunch, I thought “Wow, this food looks pretty good. I better take a picture of it.” It looks like what I would get at the economy rice store, except that this is all home-made. I need to work on the presentation though, none of the dinnerware matches.

This has got to be my favorite vegan treat – brownie chunk cheesecake. Brownies and cheesecake, definitely the ultimate comfort food dessert. Much better than the chocolate strawberry shortcake or the peanut butter mousse bomb.

Another cake from VeganTreats!

The mousse is made from tofu! I’ve actually made something similar, but my peanut butter pie didn’t look as good as this one.

I first came across hummus at the cafetaria. They were having a hummus sandwich special. I didn’t know what hummus was then…it sounded like it’s related to something-soil or something-fungus..so I didn’t get the special sandwich. But after the initial introduction, I kept hearing people say how much they love hummus. Hummus? I don’t think so.

One day when I was at a friend’s place, she served a platter of a variety of hummus, so I finally had some hummus. It was ok, not great, not bad either. But I never gave hummus much thought after that. Never sought it out, never thought of eating it at all.

During the Smokies trip, Becky bought a small container of hummus, and with only a limited choice of food items in the cooler, I started to eat the hummus with baby carrots. And I grew to like it. Not that I really really like it, but I like it enough to try and make my own hummus following this recipe.

So what is hummus?

Hummus is that beige paste-like substance in the small round container. It’s Middle-eastern and slightly Greek. It consists of mashed up chickpeas/garbanzo/kacang kuda, tahini (sesame paste), lemon juice, garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper.

Vegan Treats is this vegan bakery here in Bethlehem. I’ve heard about the place but never ventured there until recently. Here’s their bestselling cake… chocolate-encased strawberry shortcake. Unfortunately, their black forest cake does not come in the smaller 4-inch size. If I am to satisfy my black forest cake craving, I’ll have to get the 9-inch which cost $35.

I’ve mentioned before that all the kimchi that I’ve made always turned out not so great. So following the advice of my Ampang friend I decided to go back to the basics. No more following elaborate and complicated recipes from the internet and kimchi cookbooks. For this latest ampang-style kimchi, I only used nappa cabbage, diakon radish, green onions, hot pepper powder, ginger, garlic, salt and sugar. I left out:
1. expensive korean pear
2. korean anchovy fish sauce
3. salted tiny shrimp
4. sesame oil and seeds
5. sweet rice flour (starch mixture)

It tasted quite good, sort of fresh tasting.

I finally baked the easter ham that I won in a raffle months ago. I used a pineapple juice and honey glaze on it. Many baked ham recipes use whole cloves (bunga cengkih) but whole cloves cost like $5 for a small bottle so I left it out. I gave away some of the ham, freezed a whole lot, and chopped up some for pineapple fried rice.