bla bla
pizza (and it’s lack of picture) September 4, 2009
i didn’t get to take pictures of my pizza!!it was my nicest pizza ever! it had the perfect shape, if you overlook the fact that it is not the standard round pan size pizza. it was rectangular in shape due to my laziness when it comes to finding for stuffs. besides, it was time to break fast and the pizza was not even in the oven yet. so me being me and pressed for time, i grabbed the first thing i could lay my hands on and it happened to be my 9x10x1 baking tray. Hence the reason for a rectangular shaped pizza.
anyway, the crust was soft!superly soft. after my failed attempt at making a sourdough bread bowl, i sworn off anything that has to do with yeast. my sourdough was a total disaster. not only was it hard, it smelled….erm, too sour??i don’t know how to describe it but it is. i threw away the whole batch and ended up eating my clam chowder from a normal bowl instead. i prefer it that way so much more. 
back to the pizza. i made chicken pizza. alright, more like “Anythign-Goes” pizza. i ransacked my fridge to find for food i can throw into my pizza. since my mom was on a mission to clean up the fridge, the only way i can think of to efficiently get rid of all the food in the fridge is via pizza.
tomatoes?perfect.
pineapple?great.
onion? huh. who cares. let’s just dump it in.
mushroom? nice.
chicken? now that’s a must.
with all those on hand, i sliced, diced and chopped and put it on my pizza and topped it with mozarella. heavenly. the base sauce i used was ranch sauce and i used a different brand which i don’t really prefer. next time i shall stick to the old one.
crap, i just remembered that i can’t recall the brand of the previous ranch sauce.
Most of the time, when i post food entries, there would usually be some pics. sure, this photos have some pictures but sad to say, this post would have to make do without any tasty, drool worthy pictures.my family members could hardly control their stomachs for as soon as it was time to eat, my pizza got dissected even before i could take a decent photo of it. my sister was already holding out the cutter and asking my permission to do the honours.
of course i said yes but as soon as those words left my mouth, i just realized that taking proper pictures of my pizza would be impossible unless i was willing to stop everyone from eating and placed the sliced pizzas back together like a jigsaw puzzle but like my family, my stomach protested that idea vehemently with a loud growl.
oh well, perhaps next time.
this is all tha’s left of my 9x10x1 pizza. it’s for my dad. he requested that at least a slice of it is set aside for him.
i know. i know. it’s a mess. the toppings are everywhere. that’s the problem you’ll face too if you try to cram everything into a measly 9x10x1 inch baking tray.
color me bright September 4, 2009
Fondant (Noun): Candy made of a thick creamy sugar paste
“Let’s color this batch blue. No, no, no. Pink would go better with this cupcake.” With that decision in mind, I ransacked through my box of icing colors in search of the pink one. Of course the decision was not affected at all by my one-sided likeness to colors that happens to be in any shade of red.
Few minutes passed and I was still searching. Confident that I still had some left, I didn’t give up and continued on with the search. And finally, lo and behold! The bottle of pink color that has been hiding from me was found in the deepest corner of the box. Eager to put some color into my fondant, I was greatly disappointed to see not a drop left in the bottle. Nada. Zilch. Not even a measly one. Determined to have pink fondant, I went down to the baking shop to get it and the shop being only 20 minutes away from my house, I was a happy camper in no time.
Pink color? Checked. Fondant? Checked. Time to get down to business baby.
Alright, so before I played with the fondant, I did a lot of research on it. Some of you may laugh at this but hey, I’m a newbie. When it comes to me handling something for the first time, I want to know what to expect and avoid any mistakes.
Here’s what I’ve learnt:
- If fondant gets dry while in the middle of handling, rub both your hands together with shortening (or in my case, margarine for I had ran out of shortening that day)
- Flour the surface you’re working on with cornstarch
- If it helps, flour the stencils and cutters you are using with cornstarch as well.
- Flour your rolling pin if using
- If applying color, add drop by drop to achieve desired color (this should be a no-brainer for all the pros out there and besides, its common sense)
That’s all that I have learnt so far. Some may have different views on how to use fondant but this is my amateur version of it.
Oh yea, if you guys are the hardworking fondant newbie, unlike me, you guys could probably find recipes for making your own fondant. Of course I find that the store bought one meets my needs just fine. It’s up to the individual preferences really as to whether or not they want to take the extra effort in making their own or be as lazy as me and just grab a Wilton’s fondant. I usually get the white one because it lets me have all kinds of colored fondant that my heart desires. 
Pretty fondant. Colorful fondant. Me like it.
