sunday small group

i hosted a lunch for my sunday small group. and it was a hit! :)
i wanted to make some comfort food but on a gourmet level! hahah.
so here's the menu.


organic field greens with avocado and toasted walnuts. a slice of grilled tomato drizzled with olive oil. don't forget the scallion. (it makes it taste so fresh!) dressed with maple balsamic sauce.


fresh baguette with a. black olive pate and b. olive oil/balsamic vinegar.


baked ziti (three cheese with ground beef, onion, mushroom)


and who can forget dessert!?
"after eight" cupcakes



mmmmmm.


i hope everyone enjoyed my meal.


oh!!
by the way!
have you met my new friend?




she's gorgeous, isn't she?

double chocolate cookies

very beautiful batter. it was very very nice to work with. :)


the first batch in the oven, i sort of over baked -- i followed the instructions and did 15 minutes. but that's way too much! i was busy washing the dishes, i didn't pay attention. 11-13 minutes seems enough for these cookies.


these were way better. :) yummmmmay!

Double Chocolate Cookies

makes about 3 dozen
recipe from i love milk and cookies

ingredients

1 cup all-purpose flour
½ cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp coarse salt
110g bittersweet chocolate (60-70% cacao)
110g milk chocolate, coarsely chopped
110g cup unsalted butter
1½ cups sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp pure vanilla extract

instructions

• Preheat oven to 180°C degrees.
• Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside.
• Melt bittersweet chocolate with the butter in a small heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water; let cool slightly.
• Put chocolate mixture, sugar, eggs, and vanilla in the bowl and mix until combined.
• Gradually fold in the flour in two batches until just incorporated.
• Fold in chocolate chunks.
• Using a 1½-inch ice cream scoop, drop dough onto parchment-lined baking sheets, spacing 2 inches apart.
• Bake until cookies are flat and surfaces crack, about 15 (i recommend 12) minutes (cookies should be soft).
Let cool on parchment on wire racks.

hiya

yeppppp
it's been a while.
i guess ive been quite busy, but quite frankly just plain lazy too. hehe.
this blogging thing is definitely not as easy as i thought it would be.
im not much of a journaler to begin with, so it's pretty hard to keep at it. but of course i will continue to try my best. :)

ANYWAY.
today i baked a whole lot of chocolate chip cookies for my mom to take to korea. i baked some for my cousins when i visited in december, and they loved it so much that i decided to send it over again. and incidentally, my mom is a huge huge fan too. hehhe.
she made sure i made enough so that she could enjoy them in korea as well.

i took a couple of pictures, but the camera is downstairs, so i'll post em up next time.

what i really wanted to write about is that i have an EXCITING new project at school! im taking Book Design and we got to pick our own topic, and of course of course, i picked a COOKBOOK! hehe. well, we don't want just any plain cookbook, of course, but something different, something unique. so what i decided to make was a cookbook that's more than just recipes and photographs, but a personal, narrative-like cookbook -- yes, much like a food blog! it'll be slightly cultural perhaps, say, with suggestions of various music to bake by, anecdotes for each recipe. and the best thing is that all the recipes are sarah's-test-kitchen approved!

i'm really excited to see what it would turn out to be. i really hope i do a good job.

anyways. that was a long post. i wonder if anyone would have read all that. haha.
oh well.

DAY 2

:)
what a delightful day!!
it was a full one too. lots of photos!

okay.. so my day started with a movie! at 10:30 am. haha. i went to the Gosok Bus Terminal (which has a huge shopping area, movie theatre, array of restaurants, book store and a lot more) but nothing was open at 9:30. so i decided to watch a korean movie called Fight. which is about a couple and their marriage. it's a romantic comedy, but not too funny. i give it 2.5 stars. i was so bored. :P

here is a photo of the empty movie theatre. cuz who comes to watch a movie at 10 am on a week day?



afterwards, i had some lunch. I went to a place called Omuto Tomato which serves Omurice. It's rice wrapped in an omelette. They have out of the ordinary omurice with a whole lot of different sauces and toppings and stuff. Their gravy sauce is delish. I ordered Smoked chicken leg omurice. it was very yummy.




after that. i went shopping. no photos for that tho. too busy looking. hehe. i got a nice pair of boots. SCORE!

and then i wet to a nice cafe to read.
the cafes here are soo well decorated and stuff. soo beautiful. toronto's got a lot to learn.

(blog spot is being weird right now. so i can't upload them. but here is a photo of the delicious yogurt ice cream i ate. hehe)




i came home afterwards and relaxed a bit. then got a phone call from my cousin for a dinner date. :) he took me to a nice street called garosu street, where they have lots and lots of nice restaurants, cafes, wine bars, pretty shops and art galleries. we stopped at one gallery/bar place that his friend owns.

after we had dinner at a cool fusion korean restaurant. the food was good and i loved the atmosphere. (again, i will upload these photos later)

lastly, we went to a nice cafe called cafe byul (which means cafe star).
SOOO beautiful. it had a whole lot of cool mix-match furniture with a kind of antique and eclectic atmosphere. they had cool chairs -- always a sign of well designed place -- and little trinkets here and there.


upstairs interior.


really pretty details.


super cool mix of chandeliers. so pretty. pictures don't really do justice. especially at this size. heh.


store entrance. and you can see first + second floor by the stairs.


cool tables.



so after all this. i came home sooo tired and feet SOOO sore from my new boots. (but no pain no gain, right?)

i had a great day.
and i have so many more to go! :)

DAY 1

So here I am! In Seoul, Korea for the next three weeks!
I am so very excited for this trip, even if I've come this past summer!
But last summer was spent mostly at home being sick, so hopefully this time it will be a lot more enjoyable. :)
One thing for sure though, I want to visit lots and lots of nice restaurants and cafes and take lots and lots of photos! And this blog is perfect!

I'm usually horrible with journals and whatnots, but I'm thinking this blog will be handy. :)

Anyways, to start off,
I got here at 4 am which is 2 pm in Toronto time. I was lucky enough to get some more sleep, so I'm feeling very refreshed and not jet lagged one bit! Feels like it's gonna be one good trip.

I don't have photos of today yet,


so in the meantime I will post up the cookies I have baked to bring with me for this journey. :) I baked them to bring to my cousins who always wanted to try my cookies, but I ate a couple too since I've gotte here. hehehe.

recipe:
Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
(thanks to the Best Recipe)

ingredients

2 cups plus 2 tbsp all purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt3/4 cup butter (12 tbsp), melted and cooled until just warm
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups chocolate chips

directions

1. Preheat oven to 325F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda and salt.
3. In a large bowl, whisk together butter and sugars. Beat in the egg, egg yolk and vanilla. Stir in flour mixture, followed by chocolate chips.
4. Drop by (scant) 1/4 cups onto the baking sheet and pat lightly so the cookie is an even thickness, not a ball shape. Cookies will spread as they bake and this ensures a more even spread.
5. Bake at 325F for 15-17 minutes, until just turning light brown all over. The edges should only be very slightly more brown, if at all, from the rest of the cookie. Allow cookies to cool before removing them from the baking sheet.
Makes 18-24 large cookies

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I'm not sure if I made them properly or not, cuz the cookies didn't turn out as chewy and soft as I wanted them to. They tasted great, but it wasn't quite what I was going for. Using chocolate chunks instead of chips, however, made them much more luxurious. ;) I use ghiradelli baking chocolate bars, which are pretty expensive, but I don't think they are as good as Valhorna or other good brands that they don't sell in our Toronto markets. I wonder where I can get them... I also find that vanilla makes a WORLD difference for cookies. I used up all my good vanilla, so I think I'll head to Williams-sonoma to buy some Nielsen Massey vanilla extract. :)

(wow. super long post. i won't do this again!)