Nappy Cake

Once every blue moon I want to be slightly productive by making some art & craft stuff. I volunteered to make JW's baby shower nappy cake (non edible of course) and pretty pleased with my masterpiece. Let me proudly share my recipe of success in making nappy cake (this was my 2nd nappy cake project).

** suitable for beginners **

Ingredients:

• 1 pack of Huggies
• 1 round plate/ 1 cake base
• Ribbons
• Wrapping paper
• Rubber Band
• Clear plastic wrapping sheet
• Ready made ribbon for the top of the tier
• Double sided sticky tape

Steps:

Roll nappies tightly from the elastic side towards the rounder side & secure each nappy with rubber band 

Roll all 48 of them... yawnn boring

Getting the plate/ base ready for action

Place rolled nappies till you have an overall round shape, then secure them with large rubber band

For your 2nd tier, place rolled nappies on the top of the base nappies ... once you are happy with the shape, secure it with rubber band

To hide the rubber bands, wrap around each tier with wrapping paper, use double sided sticky tape for best results. The width of the wrapping paper = the width of Huggies.

Place a ready made jumbo ribbon on the top (secure it with double sided sticky tape), you can buy it from $2 shop

Decorate with ribbons - put double sticky tape at the back of the ribbon to stick the ribbon around the cake

Nappy Cake ... last step...wrap the whole nappy cake with clear plastic wrapping sheet to secure the construction

Buon Ricordo

Not sure why/ how/ when, but every time I go out with my friend X we either do something crazy/ something crazy just happened. Here's how we started...we had a long hectic day and desperado to go for dinner. Nothing planned , no bookings made, but we want to somewhere with yummy food, great service and we can sit down to chit chat without having to scream to each other when we talk (ohh noo is this a sign of early maturity for both of us?).

Getting a table on a Saturday in Sydney with no bookings? It was like pushing our luck down to the ground.
I rang up a couple places and no luck in getting table. My last phone call, rang Buon Ricordo and they said the only available seating is at 6.30pm and we have to leave by 8.30pm. Big nod from us..we can eat and go by 8.30pm for sure. For me, Buon Ricordo is the best Italian restaurant in Sydney and so far no one can beat it. I haven't been there for a while, and I hope my TDF truffle spaghetti is still available.

Our busy day has made both of us look a little run down (looks like we just get bashed out by some gangster, got chocolates splashed on my white t-shirt, wrinkly clothings, etc). At first we thought 'who cares about our crappy look as long as we can fix the bill'. Then we looked at each other ... and giggles 'Errr..I think we better buy some clothes now before we get kicked out when we enter the restaurant'.

Before the dinner we had to make a detour to Broadway shopping centre to buy some clothes. Then we made a bet, $100 budget to buy new gear to make us look a little decent within 30 mins.
X won by spending around $89 (new $20 Kmart shoes, $14 Kmart scarf and $55 Esprit shirt). I bought $89 Forever New lacey dress + $6 Forever New earrings. Pretty close results. We looked so much better after the upgrade 101 crash course. The dinner become exxie since we have to factor in our clothing upgrade =)

Spinach & Pork soup - light starter, super soft pork, refreshing

Pumpkin, Fish, Ginger bread, micro herbs and edible flowers - a really nice combination

The star of the dinner - fettucine with parmesan cream, fried truffle egg, creamy and cheesy, you dont need a whole lot, small portion is satisfying enough =)

Granita to clean our palate

Fish with some sort of salsa ? I only remember the fish was really fresh and naturally sweet tomatoes

Quail with tomato based sauce (cant really remember the exact sauce...sigh. I only remember it was tomato based)

Very tender and juicy, tasty quail, sauce was light and not overpowering the quail. I reckon they use real tomatoes not canned (judging by the less vibrant sauce colour and less concentrated taste)

Chocolate mousse, orange tart, nougat ice cream with pistachio sauce. My fave was the nougat ice cream, very unique coz you can still feel the crunchy texture within the ice cream, the sauce went well with it.

Ricotta canolli, Choc balls, and some pastry stuff - I love the baby canolli, crunchy & not too sweet. The pastry stuff and choc balls were average.

Full-O-Full

Saturday 17/09/11

Last Saturday I felt like a full time munching machine, I had full day of eating and my schedule started from 10am-10pm. What a day ... 12 hr of eating adventures. How did I do that?

Breakkie

Breakfast @ North Sydney Produce Market, I had bacon & egg roll with tomato relish plus banana bread courtesy of Theo from Fleur De Lys. He gave me 1 full loaf of his superb banana bread. I shared Theo's banana bread with a few friends...IkeMalada & Cupcakeholics...they all love it & impressed by how moist the bread is, thanks again for your kindness =)

If you are in the hunt for the best banana bread in town, please try Theo's award winning banana bread  (Fleur De Lys patisserie) - you wont be disappointed ! It is superb. Visit him @ Pyrmont market (1st Saturday of the month) and North Sydney Produce Market (3rd Saturday of the month), he'll be there rain, hail or shine to serve you with his big smile.

Lunch

IkeMalada cooked for me yayyy...she cooked Indonesian style chilli beef, freshly pounded chilli with shrimp paste sauce, and sayur asem (Indonesian style tom yum, with corn, french beans and peanut).

Indonesian style chilli beef, tasty & really tender. It was surprisingly not that hot. I like the idea of nothing is wasted..according to Ike the remaining oil from the chilli beef can be used to make chilli fried rice. I have registered myself as the guinea pig for the chilli fried rice.

Chilli sauce with tomato, coriander, shallots, shrimp paste - freshly pounded by her mom

Sayur Asem - Indonesian version of Tom yum - with french beans, corn, cabbage, peanut - sweet, sour, salty, and a little chilli kick

Dinner

We went to Made in Italy in Pyrmont before our movie. 

Bring on the carbs ...

I was hoping they have Spaghetti Vongole (white clams with olive oil and garlic) and guess what... they didnt have it on that night, ARRGHHH. I nearly burst into pieces when the waitress told me 'it's not available - and it's been a while'. When are you going to be available again spaghetti vongole? I miss you badly, please call me when you are back from your holiday trip =(

Pappardelle with porcini and italian sausages, I am not sure whether I was full or whether they have generous portion but I struggled to finish the whole plate for once. Pappardelle was light and tasty.

Fettucini Marinara

Ricotta Cake with Vanilla ice cream and sponge finger biscuit

Macaroons Photos

I had a day full of macaroons world - making it from scratch, taking photos, testing different flavours etc at friend's house. I pretended to be a food stylist for a day with idontcryieat and Ike Malada. Lots of fun and giggles!!

It was such a fun things to do but....it is not as simple as I thought, you need loads of imagination, trial and error, different props, background, arrange different colors, perfectly shaped macaroons, colour balance etc. Is there a special school to be a food stylist/ is there a course? Let me know if there's any...and please have a sneak peek of our macaroons in action (done by amateur aka myself, using my baby pocket camera)!

All macaroons are hand made by Ike Malada with 1000% TLC and if you are interested to order her yummo macaroons click here.

Photo 1 - simple and clean but I think we need vibrant colors, a little dull for my liking =(

Photo 2 - too much yellow...

Photo 3 - Bird nest idea by idontcryieat...i wish we use a completely flat plate

Photo 4 - Bird nest style by idontcryieat, same comment as photo 3 - arrghhh why did we use this plate =(

Photo 5 - Natural style - me likey

Photo 6 - not bad..but why there's some shadow hehehhee...

Photo 7 - We aded some beetroot powder to give extra oompphh to the overall color combo

1945 Indonesian Restaurant

 Updated 12/04/13 - 1945 is no longer operating, what a pity !! =(

*************************************************************************
Most Indonesian restaurants can be found around Eastern suburbs (Kingsford, Randwick, Maroubra, Kensington). I am a little surprised to find an Indonesian restaurant, called 1945 ** in Pyrmont area (near Star City casino). It is actually a really good news for me, if  I need to get my Indo dose fixed I can jump to Pyrmont after work.

I describe 1945 as Indonesian style tapas, dishes come small and we can order as many as we like to try a bit of everything from the menu. If you are unfamiliar with the dishes, I will recommend the Rijsttafel menu (set menu) to save you time in deciding what you want.

The menu is listed in old style Indonesian (talking bout my grandma's era, Dutch time) & English. At first, I was reading the Indonesian titles, it was kinda fun and exciting to read old style Indonesian....then my brain seems to be digesting the meaning of the titles at turtle speed. It was hard hahaha, I read it perfectly then I need extra minutes to translate the real meaning of the titles. So I gave up and read the English titles instead.

Apologies for not taking fantastic photos, we actually ordered many more but the rest of the photos are quite blurry, blame my baby camera for posing a strike.
If anyone got good tips on taking food photos @ night, please share it with me/ email. Thanks....=)

** 1945 is a very special year for Indonesians, it is the year of our independence after a long period of Dutch colonialisation. Our independence day is 17/08/1945. Several Indonesian dishes are influenced by Dutch.

1945 menu

Tahu Isi - Fried stuffed tofu (vegies inside), fried to perfection, crunchy & using fresh oil (yeah..I am a little paranoia when it comes to fried stuff hehehe, somehow I can tell if they use recyled oil)

Sayur Asem - Indonesian version of Tom Yum soup, sour, sweet, salty & fresh, suitable for vegos

Emping - Indonesian bitternut crackers, served in a traditional basket, it's not bitter at all

Sambal Udang Petai - Chilli prawn with Quail Eggs and Petai

Nasi Putih - Steam rice served in basket, really cool, feel like dining in traditional villages

Babi Kecap - Pork in Sweet Soy Sauce, I best describe it as Indonesian stewed pork, can we add boiled egg?

Urap - Salad, a little different from Gado2, sauce contains tumeric, I personally prefer urap than gado2

Ayam Bakar - Grilled Chicken, really tender and tasty