11: Mole-y Pancakes

Just because I got hungry after reviewing for my Stat 1 midterm, I ended up making a batch of mole-y pancakes. Good thing we have an instant pancake mix in our cupboard and some chocolate chips in the fridge. So mathematically speaking, pancake + chocolate chips =

Moles everywhere!

The thing with pancakes dotted with chocolate chips is you have to watch it more. You don't want to end up with pancakes topped with burnt chocolate chips, right? :)

Pancakes!

Thank God for instant mixes!

 I always tell myself that I would try making pancakes from scratch but the lazy me keeps putting it off. From this moment on, I vow to myself that I shall make my next batch of pancakes from scratch! :)

xx

10: Shepherd's Pie

My sister and I constantly put off making shepherd's pie as it almost always slip our mind. But yesterday was an exemption as we set our wheels in motion and started putting together this pie. We have beef with mushroom as the first layer, buttered veggies as the second layer, mashed potatoes as the 3rd layer, a little of ground beef sprinkled over the mashed potatoes then ladled with gravy, layered with mashed potatoes again and lastly, a generous sprinkling of quickmelt cheese and cheddar cheese. We ended up having these:

 

Shepherd's Pie before going in the oven.

 

Shepherd's Pie Party! :) *Pardon for the messy table. Heehee.*

 After baking in the oven for about 20-25 minutes:

"Rustic-ity." :)

What's inside.

The messy look of the pies after baking made them looked rustic and downright homey. :) And for me, making this shepherd's pie is easy. All you have to do is start with leftovers. Leftover beef with mushroom (as for our pie), old potatoes to make your mashed potatoes, an instant gravy mix, some weeks-old frozen peas, carrots and corn kernels, cheddar cheese and quickmelt cheese- again. :)

I finished eating my share, paired with steamed rice, in just one sitting. This is also on the heavy side as it is loaded with layers after layers of goodness.

xx

9: Saba Crumble

Made these saba crumble a long time. I am also surprised to know that these are also easy to make and also requires only a number of ingredients. 

Sweetened saba without the crumble

Crumble :)

Saba crumble

Sprinkled with sugar for caramelization

SABA CRUMBLE! :)

xx

8: Smothered Pockchops

When my appetite calls for something western, smothered pork chop tops my list. These pork chops are slowly cooked with homemade gravy, bacon bits, diced ham and sausages. You'll also be surprised that this easy, unpretentious meal is also easy to prepare and yet you'll be surprised by the fullness of its overall flavor. My stomach surrendered easily as this meal is on the heavy side and is quite fulfilling.

Smothered pork chop TAKE 1

Smothered pork chops TAKE 2

Cooking this the second time made me think of pairing this up with popovers. The popovers cut the richness of the sauce and also completed the western vibe of this food. :)

"Popovers"

As seen on the picture above, my popovers didn't "pop" the way they should be. It should turn out like this:

True popovers :)

Mine turned out flat and resembles a muffin. :) Maybe I should buy a popover tin the next time. I read somewhere that the popover tin is specifically decide to be hollow so the hot air can circulate properly making the popover "pop".

Smothered 'chops paired with "popovers" and rice. :)

For me, this tastes better the next day as the flavors completely melded with each other.

Till next time! :)

7: Summer

Summer here in LB is insanely hot, trust me. And baking in our apartment's kitchen is also the same. So why did I then bake? Simply because I am bored. Bored to my marrow that I can't think of anything else good to do except produce some love from our oven. I've been craving for chocochip cupcakes since last week and I think that maybe this is the right time to bake these babies (I like referring to my cupcakes as babies because they are all a labor of love from me). :)

 

Chocochip cupcake batter

Chocochip batter again!

Before going in the oven

My prepared batter also yielded exactly 12 cupcakes. Lucky me I didn't have to worry again over what to do with my extra batter.

Half-baked.

After 20 minutes.

Compared to the pale batter it was once before, these cupcakes turned out golden brown (and a little bit overbaked I must say). Nonetheless, all is well. :)

Cooling down.

After my first bite, I noticed that it lacks the sweetness I am used to in my usual sweet fix. To remedy this, I thought I would just frost my cupcakes with brown sugar frosting. Good thing the ingredients I needed were all available. :)

Brown sugar frosting 1

Brown sugar frosting 2

Brown sugar frosting 3

I have to admit it, I first thought that making this frosting would be hard and tedious but I was wrong. It only took me approximately 30 minutes to make this frosting (cooling time included).

Chocochip cupcakes with brown sugar frosting.

I just used a normal spoon to frost these babies because I am too lazy to use my piping bag. :) I also topped it off with chocochips so it would not look boring. :)

This recipe is adapted from reciperoll.com thought I added a little more milk than the recipe calls for. The brown sugar frosting recipe was taken from this. I just reduced the recipe to half to avoid wastage.

6: Piece of cupcake

Last Tuesday, my sister and I did some sisterly bonding and baked some cupcakes. Since this is our first time, we opted to just bake the basic cupcake: good ol' chocolate cupcakes. :)  As mentioned, we originally wanted to bake plain chocolate cupcakes but since we have these very, very, very ripe lacatan bananas sitting prettily on our table we decided to bake chocolate banana cupcakes instead. Here's some of the pictures:

 

Chocolate banana cupcake batter. *the yellow thing "peeking" underneath are the mashed bananas.*

 We made the usual chocolate cupcake batter and just mixed the mashed banana to make chocolate banana cupcakes. :) At first, we thought that our cupcakes might not turn out good and end up a waste. But boy we are lucky as these babies turned out well. :)

 

Chocolate banana cupcakes!

We also tried our hand in frosting cupcakes. Good thing it also turned out fine:

 

Topped with buttercream frosting, M&Ms and banana slices.

 

f

Different toppings!

We also thought of topping our cupcakes with different toppings like KitKat, peanut butter, M&Ms and banana slices. We also dusted our creations with cocoa powder. :)

 

Cupcakes dusted with cocoa powder.

I truly enjoyed baking cupcakes and it's really a good thing that all turned out well. I hope that my next baking attempts would turn out as good as this, or maybe better. :)

5: 13th

Second post of the day and I'll keep this short. Today is our 13th month together so we decided to go out and celebrate a little. Since I am craving for Wicked Oreos for almost a week, we decided to hit Flaming Wings along Katipunan. My boyfriend, JM, ordered PB and Banana Panini while I ordered their infamous Wicked Oreos.

Freshly made Wicked Oreos with vanilla ice cream!

:)

I forgot to take a picture of JM's panini because I'm too busy devouring these Wicked Oreos. Too bad. :|

So that's it. Cheers to our 13 months of togetherness. Looking forward to the next coming years and years and years. Forever! <3 :)

4: Ice Candy yo.

What pops into your mind every time you hear the word summer? For me, hearing summer means a number of things: Sweltering heat. Bikinis. Sweaty shirts. Swimming pools. The ever-famous black salbabida. Beach. Grilled tilapia. Halo halo. Blah blah blah. And of course, ice candy. :) Yum. Who wouldn't want having an ice candy in the middle of one hot afternoon? Not me for sure.

Ice candy has always been a part of my childhood. I grew up selling ice candies every summer at our home in Pasig for 1 PHP. Mine was made of different juice concentrates that's why I sell it for a peso only. But hey, they sell like crazy and at the end of the day our freezer was almost empty except for some unsold ice. Lucky for me, my generous lola buys my juice concentrates and didn't ask me for any part of my sales. Haha. Soon enough I upgraded my ice candy and used fresh fruits with milk. My lola also taught me that in order to have that "creamy" texture, you have to boil your mixture after packing them individually. Cool, yes. :)

Last night, I made some ice candy to celebrate my childhood. Haha. Well, not really to celebrate my childhood but just because I saw some over ripe mangoes on our table. :)  I blended the mangoes together with milk and sugar, a little bit of slurry (this is just cornstarch mixed with water) and there, I'm done. Here's the finished product:

ICE CANDY!

Btw, the slurry makes the ice candy "creamy" and almost soft. Just like ice cream. :)

That's for today. Happy Palm Sunday everyone! :)