Friday, May 14, 2010

Baking Up A Storm



During my trip to LA, I got myself some new toys (from Sur La Table) to play with in the kitchen, but I hadn't been able to find time to try them out till now ...

First up: My gorgeous shiny new egg beater!


While this is no KitchenAid, it definitely beats a whisk hands down! I remember helping my mom to bake cakes using this when I was little ... and given the different power voltages in the various places I've lived in, I decided against getting anything that need to be plugged-in till I found a permanent home. Besides, this new toy of mine needs only very little storage space - perfect for a small kitchen like mine!



Next up: My Potato Masher!


After bending my forks out-of-shape to mash my potatoes, I finally decided it was time to get a proper potato masher. And I must say that the Sur La Table staff were really wonderful in their recommendations. I told her I was looking for a potato masher, but a basic model cos I wouldn't use it on such a regular basis (we Chinese are afterall basically rice eaters), and she told me this was her favorite as it had a good grip - as evidenced by the brand "OXO Good Grips" :) Having tried it out mashing sweet potatoes AND whole canned tomatoes, I definitely second her recommendation! Excellent sales staff at Sur La Table, South Coast Plaza, California!



Lastly, my pastry cutter! Now, this isn't fm LA, but I had to post a pic of it, cos it really is quite wonderful for making cookies and tart crusts. This is a Japanese one which I'd mentioned here - it's from a little bakeware shop in Taipei.




What I made with my new toys:

Tiramisu! Using my brand new egg beater, I managed to beat my egg whites to soft peaks in less than half the time I took using my whisk! And managed to make this beautiful tiramisu :)

Was partly inspired to make this tiramisu cos I found a packet of half-chocolate ladyfingers at CitySuper - they really made the tiramisu soooo good!





And I also made a Sweet Potato Tart! I had seen some purple sweet potatoes at the market the other day, and wanted to find out if they tasted the same as other sweet potatoes, so I bought some. Initially, I'd wanted to put them in my teochew porridge, but decided against it, as I figured purple porridge may not look particularly appetising ... hahhaha .... so, I was wondering what to do with these sweet potatoes when I found a recipe in a cooking magazine "Taste". And here it is ... my Sweet Potato Tart!


Notice that the filling is purple? I only wish I had a deeper tart dish so I could heap more sweet potato filling in it :)



No comments:

Post a Comment