Smurfberry Muffins

This week, I managed to catch the new Smurfs movie and I got to say, it was more pleasant than I expected! I loved the cast (especially Hank Azaria, he was a hoot doing Gargamel) and the little Irish smurf. Who's doing the voice-over for the guy does anybody know?

Anyway, it could have been partly subconscious but I suddenly really wanted to bake blueberry muffins. Or it could have not been anything to be related to the movie at all. Either way I still want my muffins.

Pop one in your mouth! Or two. Or ten.

It had always occurred to me that it's not that easy to get a hold of blueberries in Singapore. Easily possible, but not always accessible. I was so happy to find stacks of them in my neighbourhood supermarket!

You'll need about 3/4 cup. In my case it happened to be the around 3/4 of the box as well.

Mix batter well and fold in the blueberries.

I expected them to be messy as I had read stories of people making blunders because the juice was seeping out, but in my case folding the batter was a breeze! I suppose it had something to do with the thick batter, and also I had kept the blueberries cold (you can use frozen blueberries as well).

Using an ice-cream scoop or a spoon, fill the paper liners or greased muffin tray up to 3/4 full.

Dot the top with one or two more berries so you'll have them peeking out the dome when it's finished!

I managed to fill about 9 paper liners, but they turned out to be a little much. Try to fill it a TEENSY bit less than 3/4 if you can!

Done! Let cool or devour straightaway.

Check out the yummy purple juice pooling around the muffin.

Split one and butter your muffin. That's right. Butter your muffin gooood.

& half of the rest you pack into paper bags to give to your loved ones!

These were really very good and they weren't too tart or too sweet as I had thought they would be. The sweetness of the muffin complemented the berries, and I really wouldn't say no to pairing these with a good cuppa tea.

Mmm. Muffins & tea. That's the life.



Perfect Blueberry Muffins
Recipe adapted from Smitten Kitchen (Cook's Illustrated)

Ingredients:
71 grams unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
1 large egg
3/4 cup sour cream or plain yogurt
1/2 teaspoon grated lemon zest
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup blueberries, fresh or frozen

According to Smitten Kitchen:

Preheat oven to 190C.

Line a muffin tin with 10 paper liners or spray each cup with a nonstick spray. Beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add egg and beat well, then yogurt and zest. Put flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a sifter and sift half of dry ingredients over batter. Mix until combined. Sift remaining dry ingredients into batter and mix just until the flour disappears. Gently fold in your blueberries. The dough will be quite thick (and even thicker, if you used a full-fat Greek-style yogurt), closer to a cookie dough, which is why an ice cream scoop is a great tool to fill your muffin cups. You’re looking for them to be about 3/4 full, nothing more, so you might only need 9 instead of 10 cups. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until tops are golden and a tester inserted into the center of muffins comes out clean.

Lemon Crumb Squares

Hello everyone. It's been almost A WHOLE YEAR since I've updated this space and I am really sorry for disappearing on you! It's just that I've been busy with school and stuff and time really flies by. Recently though, I felt like I'm losing touch with everything I love to do and I remembered this blog and how therapeutic and kind it has been to me. I promise I'll try to update more!

Before I rattle on with my sob stories let's Hoover this place up and visually devour LEMON CRUMB SQUARES.

Pack first crumb layer, and then spread on the lemon mixture and sprinkle remaining crumbs on top.

I left my camera on the table to clean up the dishes while the pan was in the oven and my brother decided to photo-bomb. Great. Now you're on my food blog Fariz.

After baking, let cool for 30 minutes then refrigerate.

I couldn't wait till it completely cooled and decided to cut myself a piece!

Sweet lemony richness sandwiched between an oat-ey crumble. 

Pop pieces in between your afternoon tea or coffee. Yum.

Sorry for the different lighting! I was trying to get a good angle to photograph the baked good but it was getting dark and now my pictures have different colour treatments. But s'all good.

I used this recipe and dayum son it is delish! And easy. Really. I hardly broke a sweat making these babies.

And now you can too! (By the way my brother just asked for a second slice. Good news!)



Creamy Lemon Crumb Squares
Recipe adapted from The Pioneer Woman

Ingredients:
Crumb mixture

1-1/3 cup All-purpose Flour
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1 teaspoon Baking Powder
1 stick (1/2 Cup) Butter, Slightly Softened
1 cup Brown Sugar (lightly Packed)
1 cup Oats




Lemon mixture
1 can (14 Ounce) Sweetened Condensed Milk
1/2 cup Lemon Juice
Zest Of 1 Lemon

Preheat oven to 176C.

Mix butter and brown sugar. Sift baking powder, flour and salt into the cream and add in oats. Mix until it form fine crumbs. Press half of crumb mixture into bottom of 8 x 11 pan. In a separate bowl, mix lemon juice, zest and condensed milk. Spread over pressed crumb base and sprinkle the rest of the crumb mixture on top (do not press).

Bake for 20-25 mins or until golden brown.

Allow to sit for 30 mins to cool, cut into squares but pop it in the fridge first! When it is nice and cold you can take out a square and enjoy it with your favourite beverage.

Enjoy!

Pâte à Choux - Cream Puffs!

It's been quite awhile since I posted up a recipe! Usually it'd be because I'm always coming home late from school and by the time I remember to buy stuff most stores are closed, but then I came across this cream puff recipe and was utterly delighted to find I had all of the ingredients at home! ..Cept eggs. There's never any eggs in the fridge. Geez.

I use a star tip to pipe on the choux pastry - cos it'll look prettier than plopping it on by the spoonful. Unless you're going for the rustic look then go on, rust away. Or. Something.

Pipe 'em neatly then stick it in the oven. I wish I had made my puffs much bigger though.

When puffs are nice and golden, let them cool, split them in half and then pipe on the delicious custard onto the middle, then pipe the rest directly into your mouth. *guilty*

The custard tastes divine.

Finished product lookin' pretty for momma

Bite into one. Lick up the oozing custard. Then bite into another ten.


Enjoy!



Cream Puffs
Recipe adapted from Allrecipes.

Ingredients:
Custard:
1/2 cup white sugar
5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 pinch salt
2 cups milk
2 egg yolks, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract



Choux pastry:

1/2 cup (104g) shortening
1 cup water
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 pinch salt
4 eggs


Custard: In a small saucepan, combine 1/2 cup sugar, 5 tablespoons flour and a pinch of salt. Stir in milk, a little at a time, until smooth. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. Boil 60 seconds, then pour a small amount of hot liquid into the 2 egg yolks, and stir. Then return now heated egg yolks to saucepan and stir, over heat, until mixture starts to bubble again. Remove from heat, add vanilla. Cover and chill in refrigerator.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).

For the pastry: In a medium saucepan, combine shortening and water and bring to a boil. Sift together 1 cup flour and a pinch of salt and pour all at once into boiling mixture. Stir vigorously until mixture forms a ball. Remove from heat, and add eggs, one at a time, stirring vigorously after each addition. Drop by spoonfuls onto baking sheet, or pipe into desired shape.

Bake 10 minutes in the preheated oven, then reduce heat to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C) and bake 25 minutes more, or until golden. Cool completely, split, fill with custard, and replace tops.

Cherry & Chocolate

Munching on Starbucks cherry chocolate muffin for supper :) Initially I brought it into the cinema to snack on while watching The Social Network(interesting movie) but didn't remember to eat it. I can really absentminded at times.

Check out my teapot set for one in the background! I bought that in Perth and have been using it to drink my strawberry cream green tea (as seen in top left of picture) frequently. Isn't it just precious? I love it so much that I use it to eat ice cream as well. Teapots are just so quaint and adorable! I have a lovely teapot ring I bought from my Perth trip as well:

Unfortunately the top part of the ring has popped off, and I need to superglue it back but as I have already told you, my absentminded mind prevents me from remembering to buy some. Which reminds me I have to get a new set of contact lenses... Ugh. I need an organizer.


Check out these Mrs. Potts cake pops as well. SO INGENIOUS. I love Beauty & the Beast.


Haven't been baking much lately. Been pretty occupied with work and my sister's new baby whom I absolutely ADORE. I'm an aunt!

Look at Little Miss Pudgy-Cheeks here. Her name is Alya and she's three weeks old. How is she so small?? I can nuzzle and sniff her alllllllll day and I go crazy whenever she responds to me. I sometimes even yelp when sniffing because I can't contain the overwhelming adorableness. Yea.. I'm pretty weird.


Oh! My workplace which I work after school hours at is closing in December.. &Faizah (my colleague and best friends since our preteens) and I are a little saddened by it because we like the place and the people. I'm trying to fit in as many hours as possible before December so that I don't need to scurry for another job after it closes. Government taking over the land :/ Whut.

I didn't realise but my senior colleague pointed out that I have worked there for a whole year! The months have whizzed past so fast.. geez. It's really a nice place to chill out because it's open air so come on over before it closes! I usually work on weekends and I'm door host (or b*tch HAHA).

Or you know, just come and say hello to me:)



Oooh, currently watching Otis Redding videos on Youtube:

I love old music.

xoxo