Black Box kills your curiosity

By chance i saw a friend reviewing about this & indeed just by a glance at the box itself, i was really curious what could be hidden in it. So without much consideration, i decided to subscribe to it! And finally my Black Box reached me!

Here's my very own 1st Black Box.

Very simple designed box yet able to make you wanna open it up immediately!

There you go! Shopping vouchers, healthy snack bars, toothpaste, body wash, hair mask, concealer, facial wash etc. The feeling of looking at all these really makes me so much happier! It's like they really cover every aspect in your lifestyle. What's best is that, there will always be things for him & her.

Very thoughtful, isn't it? Besides this, they also included a list for you in case you would like to know where exactly you can get these items from. Prices also included!

The best of all is that Black Box is absolutely FREE. They deliver every bi-monthly. What more can you expect when something is totally free & comes with wonderful products? :)

Get your very 1st Black Box now!

p/s: i can't wait for my 2nd box *excited* 

xoxo,

Queen

Ondeh ondeh recipe

Back to the my younger days, i have always loved the way how my grandma made her ondeh ondeh. The filling instantly oozed out right after the 1st bite, the tenderness of the skin of ondeh ondeh; beyond words of description.

I woke up one day craving for it badly. Checked all the wet markets & coffeeshop for it but to no avail. Feeling so disappointed & then i decided to do it myself & headed back to the wet market to buy all the ingredients. :D

Ondeh ondeh is 1 of the traditional peranakan kueh, either made from sweet potato or glutinous rice flour. These cute small balls are covered with pandan juice & filled with "gula melaka" (palm sugar), then rolled in with grated coconut.

These are the ingredients that you will need for the whole process.

Recipe as follows: (around 20-25 balls)

• 250g glutinous rice flour
• 200ml pandan juice
• 150g gula melaka (finely chopped)
• 100g grated coconut
• A pinch of sea salt

Chop up the pandan leaves & blend it with 220ml. Squeeze out the juice into a bowl. Some people choose to use green colouring as substitute however i would prefer to use panda juice instead. As pandan juice will help to give off a very nice smell & goes off well with the gula melaka & coconut. 

Then combine the glutinous rice flour with pandan juice & knead lightly. 

Pinch a small piece of dough (about 40g) & dropped it into a pot of boiling water. When the dough rises to the top of the water, remove it & shake off the excess water. 

Put it back into the main dough & knead until you get a smooth, soft dough. Leave the dough aside for 15 minutes, use a wet cloth to cover it to prevent the dough from drying up. 

Add pinch of salt to the grated coconut & let it steam for 2-3minutes after which let it cool off completely.
Pinch a small piece of dough, about 15-20g each & flatten it lightly. Fill the center of the dough with the gula melaka then roll them up to form a ball shape. (Note: This step can be left chilled in the fridge, boil them only when ready to serve. Try not to keep those balls in the fridge for more than half a day.)

Boil another pot of water. Place these glutinous rice balls into the boiling water. Remember to stir the boiling water gently to prevent the balls from sticking to the bottom of the pot. 

As you can see some of these balls have small cracks on them & to the extend that the gula melaka was leaked out. I was terribly horrified by them! But it was a good experience. Nonetheless, there were more good ones than the bad ones. :)

Please do not leave it on a plate like me after you remove them from the boiling water as it will stick to the plate. Just coat it with grated coconut & serve instantly. :)

I served it to my best friends & received compliments on it. I was super happy however i know i have to improve on it, like prevent the balls from leaking. Each time after i've completed working on 1 recipe, i feel so good. I didn't know cooking & baking can be so therapeutic. :) 

I'm gonna try different kind of food recipes, hopefully it will turn out good too! And for now, i hope you like this recipe.

Get your hands moving & maybe you can surprise your relatives with this traditional kueh for CNY! :)

xoxo,

Queen

Food review; Little Pancakes

When i was a little girl, i remember how i always pester daddy to bring me for mcdonald's brekky because i have a fanatic liking for pancakes. And every time i will pour the maple syrup all over that 3 slices & eat it while it's hot!

While i've been always trying different places for pancakes, i've been told by a few of there's this place whereby it serves pancakes in miniatures. Just by listening to it, makes me super excited. Where can you really find such interesting looking food around in SG? 

While i've decided that i should go down there to take a look someday & since we're out to celebrate my BB's bday. Oh wait, in this case the term "BB" don't refer to my boyfriend (which i don't have). She's a close girl friend of mine. Since she's a shy girl, i shall keep her mysterious & will only refer her as my BB. :)

So finally we're here.

Cute signage with a boy & a girl. I especially love the slogan, "little pancakes, where everyday is a pancake day!" Now i really wished i actually live nearby so i can have pancakes everyday! 

Push open the door, on the general it looks plain. With their simple concept, everything looks just neat & tidy.

I'm pretty amazed when i found myself to be the 2nd group of customer. Just when i started to wonder, there came in 3 more groups of customers. Eventually, it's still not that bad. 

They have quite a variety of pancakes, catering to different age group.

They are quite creative when it comes to naming the pancakes. And all these flavours you probably not find it at any normal cafes or restaurants. The prices are also relatively reasonable.

And if you would like to add on extra toppings to your pancakes, you could do so only at an additional cost of $0.80 for each topping. Less than a dollar for topping? It is really cheap!!

I was contemplating over Big fan of all day breakfast & Strawberries or me. And when i asked BB what's her choice, she actually told me that she was deciding over the same 2 sets as me! So we just ordered 1 each. And our Mr K ordered Ape about Bananas. 

So while waiting, i was like thinking why didn't the waitress pass us the utensils. Not until i saw this uncle walking over to a trolley & helped himself with the ice water & utensils, then i realized it's self service for that. Hah! Kinda embarassing!

Then there it came, my cafe latte.

I don't really know anything about latte art however it looks perfectly nice to me(as long as i get to see the heart shape *bimbo mode*) Lol! It tastes nice anyway. 

Finally there comes my pancakes. Introducing, Strawberries or Me.

Big Fan of All Day Breakfast

Ape About Bananas

Each plate has about 10 mini pancakes. Honestly, i really thought 3 of us could finish up everything easily. But we definitely looked down on them. Me and BB could barely even finish up 1 set let alone 2 sets! The ice cream definitely played a big part in making us feeling so full. 

When we are like finally done with our food, i looked at my latte with a reluctant expression. For the first time, i dreaded to drink my favourite coffee. =\ 

All these only cost us like $40. Pretty reasonable for 3 pax where all of us actually ordered a drink each. I love the way how they come up with those different flavours for their pancakes. I am definitely coming back for more to try the other flavours. 

The only flaw i would say is their location. They are located at upper thomson road whereby it's pretty inconvenient for those who lives all the way in the east area. It would be good if you could drive there.

Little Pancakes

200 Upper Thomson Road, 

#01-04, Thomson Imperial Court

Singapore, Singapore 574424

t: 6258 8515

http://www.littlepancakes.com.sg

Opening hours

Monday - Friday (closed on Tuesday): 1pm - 11pm

Saturday: 11am - 11pm

Sunday: 11am - 9pm

Open on Public holidays too!

Get your pancakes now! ;)

xoxo,

Queen

Recipe for Rainbow cake; Spread the Rainbow love. :D

From the title i guess you probably would have already know what's this post all about. Yes! Rainbow cake! Not that i bought it but i MADE it. YES! I MADE IT! Hahahaha! I know i know, i don't look like someone that bakes. BUT i do have this little secret, i really LOVE baking. :D

It took me around half a month to do a thorough research on how i should go about doing this cake. It wasn't an easy job, i swear. There's far too many recipes online for me & in order to know which one to follow, i really have to sit down & brainstorm how do i want my final product to look like. Then i came upon kaykay's post on her rainbow cake recipe. It looks amazingly gorgeous & i am so determined to do the same! And so.. here's my 1st try on my very own rainbow cake. :)

Firstly, i must say i'm a little lazy to whip up my cake mix hence i used 2 boxes of Betty Crocker. Please take note that it has to be in light colour in order for the colour gels to be mixed into it. You can get them from any supermarkets out there. However if you would like to do your own mix, by all means. :)

After adding all the necessary ingredients needed, this is what you will get. Then you will have to separate them into 6 or 7 different batches. In my case, i used 6 colours.

After separating them, it's time for you to add colours to your mixture! I chose to use gel colours because the results of them mixing with the mixture will turn out to be more vibrant than those liquid food colouring.

You can get these gel colouring from phoon huat. So added colour to your batches until desired result & stop. This is what i get..

Aren't the colours vibrant?? Hehehe! Simply love it so much!! When i got up to this step, i was like... FINALLY... I SEE COLOURS! :D And you think this is the end? NO! Here comes the tough part. You will need to start baking 6 times before you get all your layers done. And seriously, it's no joke to keep repeating the step for 6 times when you have only 1 baking tin to use. FML!

So you will need a 7.5 inch baking tin for this. Preheat the oven to 160 degrees celsius. Pour each individual batches into the baking & bake separately for 15mins. For those who are worried that you will not get a flat top, you could actually lower your temperature by 25 degrees else. And to test if it's done, all you need is a toothpick. As long as it comes out clean from the layer, it's done!

You will need to allow the layers to cool down. Then it's time for you to do your frosting!

Recipe as follows:
8oz(250g) Cream cheese
2oz(80g/4 squares) Semi-milk chocolate bars
120g Soft butter(salted in my case)
500g Icing sugar
1 tablespoon Vanilla extract
1-2 tablespoons Evaporated milk
A pinch of salt
1 cup Dark chocolate rasps (optional)

You will need a hand mixer, mixing bowl here.

• Mix the cream cheese until fluffy. 
• Melt the 4 squares of semi-chocolate bars until soft. Beware of overheating. You might wanna use double boil method to melt it. For those who aren't sure of double boil, all you need is 2 different size of pots, 1 big 1 small. Fill the big pot with hot water & allow the small pot to float on it. Place the chocolate in the small pot. This will melt the chocolate bars & will not burn it. :)
• Add the melted chocolate into the cream cheese & mix them. 
• Once it's combined, add vanilla extract & salt. Mix again.
• Next, you should add in the icing sugar SLOWLY, in batches. Like really a few batches. The more icing sugar you add, the stiffer your frosting will be. Hence you can add more! Runny frosting is really irritating! 
• Add evaporated milk to the frosting. And i added dark chocolate rasp as well.

And this is what i get..

Now that your frosting is done, spread it with spatula between each layer of your rainbow cake until you are happy & then around and over the entire cake!

Chill the cake in the fridge for around 2 hours. Bring it out to touch up wherever you need to. As for me, i went over the entire cake with the frosting again. Then... decorate your cake! Top of the cake was filled with Kinder Bueno & topped with little red hearts.

I left the cake in the fridge for 8hours before the surprise.

I was a lil' worried that the cake may topple off when cut. However it didn't disappoint me. :D

Happy happy! Look how yummilicious it is!

Can't believe i actually succeeded on my 1st try. I think i am so good. Hahahahah! So what do you think? I am gonna try something else very soon.

But for now, you girls better go try doing it & have some fun! If you have questions, drop me a message. Enjoy! :))

xoxo,
Queen

It's the PH!

It's national day eve today & i believe most of you are just like me, counting down your hours during work & can't wait to party/meetup with friends for the rest of the night. However it seemed sad to me that as year goes by, the feel of celebrating Nation's birthday is getting lesser. Is it just me? Or are you feeling the same as me too?

I believe as we grow, we see things in a different light. We'll not be as easily excited anymore. What happen to all those hanging flag outside your house & painting/pasting merlion logos on our hands & cheeks. Gone were the days where we will grab our favourite red & white combination of tshirt & short/skirt and rush to school excitedly, where we will still sing our patriotic songs & national anthem with our heads up high.

And as i'm feeling excited no more, i've been hearing news/rumours which claimed that xxx is seriously ill or pass on. But hey, seriously do you really think that SG govt will not say the truth just because like what you all said, it may affect the nation's morale? But i say otherwise. He's the great leader, he's the pioneer, he's the reason why we are here as Singaporeans. Respect is the upmost criteria you need for someone like this. We should be mourning instead of celebrating. Makes no sense to me at all. 

I don't know what to say but just stop it. I was having lunch at this japanese restaurant earlier & i overheard this girl sitting next to my table, gossiping to her lunch mates about this. Can we all just enjoy our PH eve in peace & not talk about some stupid rumours like this? Spoils mood, seriously. But nonetheless i still salute you for taking effort & "publicize" it. And to make it worse, i've seen some comments in fb like "who's LKY?" 

A-R-E Y-O-U K-I-D-D-I-N-G M-E ? ? ?

Did you really grow up in SG? If not, you must be in your own world all these while. Pardon me for this but i still have to say, it's pretty obvious what LKY stands for unless you haven't been following social media. Having that said you're still commenting on fb, this goes to show you're pretty much following what's going on. So how can you not know what does LKY means? I hope by now you would have already know. =\

Anyway as much as i wished i could watch NDP tomorrow, i can't. I've got an event to attend & gotta reach the event venue by 7:45pm. I want to watch how the uniform groups march with all the singing and reformation of the squads and all. Sighs!! I know xin.msn have this catchup tv, always have the recorded version of tv shows. Wonder if they will have it for NDP as well? *crosses finger* 

Okay my lovelies, i know it's PH which also means party time. ;) Please please please party hard & enjoy yourselves tonight HOWEVER don't drink drank drunk & drama kays? Be safe & take care. :) 

There will be a mascara review coming up very soon. So stay tuned!

Love y'all! ♥♥

Laters.

xoxo,

Queen