Mini-Haul, and LDD Day 3-4

Mini-Haul:
So~ a couple weeks back, I saw this polka dotted dress from F21 when I was just browsing around with my BFFs :) I told myself I didn't need to spend money, but I gave in and went back a couple days ago with my sister to get it!

Lemonade Detox Diet Start! :)

Hi everyone! Sorry for the lack of the update -__-;; My mom and I switched computers this past week because mine is so crappy I can't play [brace yourself] World of Warcraft. Yes yes, I'm an asian nerd -.-

Besides that! If you remember, I posted the recipe for the Lemonade Detox Diet about a week ago. Now that I've finished all the perishable items in the fridge... I've started! If you want the recipe, refer to that post Here.

The Lemonade Detox Diet

So.. how many of you have done the whole: "Man, I seriously need to loose weight/eat healthier/exercise/go to sleep early/drink lots of water/etc"--crap? Well, I certainly do it about every other day. -____-;; And I have finally decided over this summer, I will finally DO SOMETHING about it!!! +__+ *determined*

In the past, I saw my two sisters take this dietary supplement and loose a great amount of weight and fat... so I had bought the product, only to realize how terrible it was for my body. So I stopped taking it after about 3 days, and decided to do it the right way.

About a week ago, my sister and I were browsing Naver.com and came about a post of this girl who finally decided to "diet" aka eat right. Living in korea and being "fat" really SUCKS. Majority of the girls in Korea have absolutely beautiful porcelain skin, and THIN body parts. -___-;; The pressure!!! Anyways, I read her post and a couple other ones, and finally came up with a diet plan myself.

But before that...

I'm going to do the Lemonade Detox Diet!!

Recipe/Tutorial: Chicken Salad with Grapes and Nuts

Hi Everyone! As always, I apologize for my lack of posts -___-;; After my last post, (as was mentioned in the post) I was terribly sick for 2+ weeks after I made that post. Soon as I got better, I had finals, and juries for school. And 24 hrs after my last final, I had to completely move out of my school's dorm--back to California AKA halfway across the country!! -_____-^ I had to stuff everything into a storage before hanging out with my friend Ellen for a few days at her place and coming back.. NOW! I'm finally home, in my parents' new place :) after coming home, I had to unpack and unpack again. -____- unpack my stuff from NY, and unpack my stuff from my parents' old place. -sigh- As of now, I am happily settled in a new city, and just trying to get into a productive lifestyle!

What better way to start off that lifestyle than making regular posts on my blog again? hehe ;) (and a job lulz)

I haven't made a cooking tutorial in SO long! Well, here it is--Chicken Salad with Grapes and Nuts! It's really simple, and you can eat it without the sandwich part as well.

Ingredients:
-1 can of chicken (seasoned or non, it's okay. I used season)
-1/4 of a yellow/white onion
-1 stalk of celery
-handful of nuts (peanuts or almonds or walnuts) [I used peanuts just because it's what I had in the pantry]
-1 1/2 cups of Green grapes
-4 Sandwich bread of your choice [I used crescents]  
-1-2 tbs of mayonaise
-1/2 of a lemon's juice
-1-2 stalks of green onion
-salt, pepper, and garlic powder to season

You can always use whatever you have lying around, and don't HAVE to follow every single ingredient. I've had it with walnuts before, and it tastes great. I made it once forgetting the celery, green onions, lemon juice and it still tasted fine.

Okay! let's get started...

Tutorial: Scottish Shortbread Cookies! =-)

Hey everyone! :)) what the hell? someone is honking outside my house right now. wow, way to ruin my blogging mood. I swear, people in my neighborhood are rich, spoiled, RUDE people with tremendously nice cars =.=;; ANYWAY! ON WITH IT! >:l

This recipe is to make Scottish Shortbr--wait. I wrote it in the title--WHAT IN THE WORLD? MY SISTER JUST CAME HOME FROM COLLEGE! HOLD ON FOLKS, BRB.

~~~20 min later~~~

what's with all these distractions today?! hahahaha. Anywho, this is a simple shortbread cookie--just like the ones that have chocolate or jams melted on em. Does that make sense..? sorry for the bad explanations... anyways, this is REALLY simple, AND made with ingredients most people have in their house. Scottish shortbread cookies are traditionally baked in thin cake pans, and cut into wedges, and eaten plain, but this recipe is the TINIEST bit bland to eat alone--but I did anyway :) Feel free to add in more sugar, or if you want to put your own toppings on it, go ahead and just use the recipe written here! It's absolutely DELIGHTFUL with tea or coffee. Really simple and quick! Whip out a batch before your friends come over for a cup of tea or coffee! Enjoy!

INGREDIENTS:
-1/4 cup powder sugar/confectioner sugar
-1/4 cup regular sugar--preferably superfine
-2 1/4 cup plain flour
-1 cup unsalted butter

OPTIONAL:
-Chocolate (white, dark, milk, anything) morsels to melt
-icing
-jam

I used Nutella as my topping on some of them... turned out a horrible idea. I don't know why I couldn't register in my head that Nutella was already melted LOL. So once I heated it up in a double boiler, it didn't melt much more, and on top of it, when I dipped the cookies in them, it wouldn't harden (duh). so it was ALWAYS moist, lol. Well, we learn from our mistakes ;)Plus, it wasn't that bad!

and...
WERE OFF!


Gather up your ingredients homefries!

Go ahead and melt your butter :) but that's the cheating way... go ahead and just leave it out overnight and use it room temp! You don't need it for this specific recipe, but normally when baking, save your butter wrappers since it has some of the residue left on it--and spread it on your baking pan!

But as I said, I cheated :)

Take a large bowl, measuring cup, whisk, and spatula.

Throw in the powder sugar...

Now time for the regular sugar!

Because I don't have superfine sugar, I used normal sugar, and just used my whisk to smash them inside the measuring cup. Better than nothing!

Add that in...

Add in your butter, and whisk away!

Now, sift some flour to cover it.

Go ahead and use your whisk, but soon enough, it won't be possible ;)

Getting thicker...

Do this many times as you need to! Use all of that flour!

Alright, It should be impossible to mix with the whisk now.

Take out the spatula and press it all down, mix it up, smash it, whatever!

Repeating the step one last time!

Finally finished :) If you're thinking, "what in the world? I put WAYY too much four in it.. now it's just crusty and falling apart..." That is absolutely correct!

Go ahead and preheat your oven to 270 degrees Fahrenheit.

Cover your cookie pan! You won't need to grease it up because there's so much butter in it LOl.

Cover an area with newspaper, magazines, w/e. Use a flat surface/large cutting board; as you see in the picture, I have neither covered my area, nor used a large board. Yeah. I learned my lesson LOL.

Dump out the mixture :)

Before you start smushing the dough together, just press the dough with your hands--the heat from your hands with melt the butter, and bind the mixture.

After you knead the dough for a bit, go ahead and shape/make your cookies. But work quickly! Touching the dough constantly will over melt the butter, and it will be a sticky dough, and hard to deal with.

I was in such a hurry I made mine ugly and super fast (I was taking too long, and the oven had already been preheated--and was yelling at me I was highering the gas bill..) Can you spot the one for puppy Sebastian? ;)

If you want more of a traditional styled cookie, go ahead and take a small fork, and poke holes in it :)

In they go for 35-40 minutes!

Pretty... I find immense pleasure in taking pictures of the food IN the oven. :)

DONE!

Let em cool off 8)

While they're cooling, bring out your double boiler, or that jar or jam! This part you can do anything you'd like. I decided to attempt at melting Nutella even more.

Covered some of em! DONE!

All this cookie smell and the sweet smell of nutella for over an hour was making me nauseated, so I made some instant Shin Ramyun Bowl :))

Hope you enjoyed this baking post! The cookies turned out really yummy with coffee! The only other thing I would not do the next time I make it would be: not dusting the board with flour (I ended up with too much, so the cookies were a bit powdery to the touch). Also, I wish I put in a liiiitle bit more sugar. ;) Next time, Ill increase the sugar level for powder sugar to 1/2 a cup instead of 1/4 ;)) This is all if you want to eat them plain, btw. If not, follow these steps (except that dusting flour on board part) and top it with w/e! Also, I wanted to thank everyone who is reading my blog and supporting me with such lovely and nice comments. Thank you! This was originally made for my own satisfaction of posting pictures of makeup and food, but somehow, others found out about it. :) Once again, thank you! If you guys have requests, go ahead!

Best,
Jinna =)

Tutorial: Strawberries 'n Creme Cake!

Long time no baking tutorial! 8) With the holidays just around the corner, I think this one is a good time~ I actually did this one quite a ways back, but never had the patience and time to post it. :P Well, here it is! It's just a simple 2 layered cake with strawberries and creme. Instead of strawberries, you can always opt for other fruits. I usually add in blackberries or blueberries, but because this cake was made within an hour for my cousin's birthday dinner, I was in a HUGE hurry. I was about 20-30 min late, but oh well~ the desert was good! ;)


Gather up your ingredients!

Pre-heat the oven to 330 degrees. I ended up putting mine at 350 degrees because I was running REALLY late. I had to risk drying out the cake or burning it, but it turned out fine! Lucky me :P

I know... a LOT of eggs huh?

Wisk it with an electric mixer for about 5-10 min. It has to be really bubbly! Mine wasn't quite there, but because I was in a hurry, I was out of time. It's VERY important to have the eggs really fluffy and bubbly, because there is no yeast/baking powder involved in this cake. This is what's going to make this cake rise!

Measure up the sugar!

And add it in with the eggs. Continue to mix!

Go ahead and add in your vanilla extract...
and your honey! Mix it very well.

Measure up your flour and prepare a sifter with it.

You can stop mixing after the mixture is very opaque and thick. This picture is nowhere near thick enough, but once again, I was in a hurry.

Now, TURN OFF THE ELECTRIC WISK/MIXER. DON'T USE! This part, we will be mixing it by hand. So prepare a plastic glove. Go ahead and sift some of that flour we just prepared over the top of the mixture. Just enough to cover it. I couldn't take any pictures of this part, because I needed both hands to do this, and I don't really have a third arm to take pictures. Basically, using your hand, fold in the flour, but at the same time, make sure your rub your fingers together through the flour. It has to dissolve completely (this is very important--you can't leave any flour un-dissolved, or you'll have a powdery cake!) Repeat sifting and dissolving until you're completely done with the flour.

Go ahead and melt your butter. But remember, it CAN'T be hot, or it'll cook the eggs in the mixture! Room temperature is the best. Add in a bit of milk for a smoother texture. I like to pop my butter in the microwave (since I keep mine in the fridge) for a couple of seconds, and let it cool. Now, take a handful of the mixture, and put it directly into whatever bowl/cup you melted your butter in. Mix in the butter with the mixture. It'll be really gloppy. Now, take that handful of buttered up mixture and combine by hand back into the rest. We do this, because the oils from the butter will naturally deflate the mixture. If we take a smaller bit, it creates a base, or medium for the butter to stick onto.

Butter the pan. Taking a spatula, pour the mixture into a cake pan. Don't worry, you only need one cake pan.

Now pop it in the oven!

While it's baking, clean up the big mess you've made, and do the dishes! If you wait till the end, it'll be too much to handle! :P After you've done that, wash the strawberries.

And cut off the stems~

Cut them up like this! Chop chop chop...

When your cake is finished, leave it out to cool. To check if it's done, poke it with a skewer, or toothpick (chopsticks work ;D). If it comes out clean from the center of the cake, it's done.

While the cake is cooling, let's make the cream! Just take out your carton of whipping creme. It's in the form of milk--you just have to wisk it up.

You need your electric whisk/mixer for this part. Take the bowl and place it in the sink, since there's going to be a lot of fly-away.

Add in 3-4 tbsp of sugar, and mix it for about 5-8 minutes. Yes, it's going to feel like FOREVER, and you'll start to feel it in your arm... but it'll be all worth it for a great cake! You'll know when it's done when you flip the bowl upside down, and the mixture won't even fall out. Taste it once in awhile to see if you need more sugar. But make sure you don't over mix! If it passes the peak point of firming itself, you'll just turn it back to the milk form (which you can't mix up a second time!)

Your cake should be cooled by now... so go ahead and prepare a large surface. Take a knife, and gently go around the edges of the cake--CAREFUL NOT TO SCRATCH THE PAN!

Tap the botton of the pan a bit, and it should slide right out.

Taking some sort of bread knife, cut the cake into to layers. This is a great trick so that you don't bake two separate cakes to make a two story cake. Plus, you can never finish one! This way, it's more.. realistic? :p

Take another rounded edge knife to cream the cake. (the tools I'm using were specially made for this) Spread some of the cream onto the bottom layer of the cake. A good amount--but not too much! You need to save it for the rest of the cake.

Throw some of the strawberries onto the cream! yum... Put the majority of your fruit in the center, because that's where it tastes the best.

Take a little bit more of the cream, and spread it over the fruit. With whatever is leftover, spread it onto the inside of the top layer. Now, flip the top layer over back onto the cake (so that it looks like the way it did when it first came out of the pan--bottom up!). Completely cover the top and sides with the cream--finish it! Decorate the cake whatever way you'd like. Throw the rest of the fruits on top, or line them up anyway you'd like. Whole strawberries... or get a ziplock, cut a corner, fit your icing stencil, and cream out a cool pattern on it.

I decided to just cut the rest of my strawberries up, and throw 'em into a heart shape. I tried to make a floating trail.. but failed miserably.

Because this was for a party, and I needed to move the cake, I had prepared a cake box from Tous Les Jours (Korean bakery). But because the cake was too big, I had to cut it into a square shape!

I was sort of upset I had to cut off the cake, but... then I looked again--you can see the fruit from the inside layer! It looks absolutely stunning!

The cake was a huge success, from such a small amount of time. It's a great desert, and makes a terrific bday cake! ;) Hope you enjoyed it!

This cake is a secret my mother passed onto me--the cake recipe is actually a recipe for a custard. Normal cake mixture was just too bland for this extraordinary cake. Having the bread a custard adds tons more flavor, and makes it a bit more sweet. But don't worry, it's not the type of cake with frosting on it; it's cream. It won't be overly sweet for adults.

EDIT: Holy Moses, I didn't even write up the ingredients or anything! Jesus Christ. I'll do that asap.
This is my absolute favorite cake. I hope it will become yours too!
Best,
Jinna <3