Margherita Pizza

I'm all about adding as many ingredients into a dish as possible. As long as the ingredients are complementary, the dish is only gonna taste better. But! when it comes to pizza, I'm a minimalist. My rules for making pizza: use quality ingredients and use just a couple of them.

I'm in Toronto for the weekend and I can stay at Anna's boyfriend's place under the condition that I make dinner. That sounded like a pretty good deal to me. We made pizza and it was delicious because I used water packed mozzarella and fresh basil. I'm still trying to figure out if 8 dollars for a piece of mozzarella was really worth it. If there is a cheaper way of getting them then I would be making pizza everyday. The basil is from my herb garden that I had planted about a month ago. They are still babies but they were the best!

I made two kinds of pizza last night, a Margherita pizza and a sausage and cheese pizza. Obviously Mike loved the sausage pizza and ate a chunk of it before I could get a picture. 

Bear Cake

This is my first "official" post since school's over, since I started my internship working 9-5, and since I ended my 3-year relationship. I'm still in the process of finding a new camera but for the time being, I'm borrowing one from a friend.

This cake was SO last minute. I was marking exams when Tyler told me that it was Jordon's birthday. Obviously I had to make a cake. Jordon is a big, big guy so Tyler suggested making a bear cake just to be funny. Another frustrating baking event because I had no idea what I was doing, and had to figure it out along the way.

I left all my baking stuff in Toronto so I had to improvise. First mistake, baking a HUGE cake in a 9 by 13 inch pan. The outside was almost crispy and the middle was still in liquid form. I think the cake took something like 90 minutes to bake I'm extremely impatient.

Quick Update!

Well, I made the top 25 for the MasterCard internship so that's something to look forward to!

Sorry I've been neglecting this blog lately...I just finished exams and now I have to mark exams and move into another place for the summer. So it's been a little hectic...career wise and relationship wise... and I really don't know what I'm doing right now. It's that gap between the chapters when you are kinda stuck and not know what to expect.

Also...Chris is leaving for an engineering job far, far away and I no longer have the camera that takes pretty pictures. I gotta find one before my next project...possibly a graduation present?

That's it for now...I really do hope I find more time to update this in the future.

What Does Cashless Mean To You? - MasterCard Internship (FREE GIVEAWAY!)

When I saw this internship opportunity, the first thing that came to my mind is-- I can bake a cake! Not only is it a way to distinguish myself from other applicants, it's my opportunity to show off what I love and how a cashless society can make it convenient. This will also be my first attempt shooting a video of the baking process (with a few cashless twists of course).

(Go to the YouTube page and comment for a chance to WIN)

So what does a cashless society mean to me? Well, I never realized how much I depended on my credit card until I had to go without it for a week due to fraud. I never used cash because I like to collect those bonus points, but also because I like to spend before my monthly cheque. To me, my credit card is the buffer zone between when I spend and when I get paid. By the end of the week, I had 15 dollars left in my bank account and was forced to cut down on my spendings because I realized my buffer zone no longer existed.

The topic of a cashless society has been an on going debate. Yes, there are less people using cash these days but what about public transits? Daily coffees? Downtown Parking? Maybe it's by chance that I'm one of "those" who don't drive a car, walk to school, and make my coffee at home, but my life style proves that it's possible to go cashless. Think back to the last time you used cash...Was it because you were going to a "cash only" stop? And wasn't it a hassle? The MasterCard definition of a cashless society is a wallet-less one. Not even credit cards; only your phone. To me, that sounds like an efficient and secure society.

I chose to demonstrate the possibilities of a cashless society through the process of baking. It's a passion of mine and I trust that every one of you out there have a love of your own. If there is service that could make life easier so you can spend time doing what you love, then why NOT go cashless?

So I will be giving away a FREE Wilton Basic Cake Decorating Set!

In order to qualify for the draw, you must:

1. Follow @Mastercard on Twitter

2. Join this blog

3. Comment on the youtube video what CASHLESS means to you.

I will be listing people as numbers and then use a number generator to determine the winner.

Carrot Cake with Cute Carrot Decorations

I have made Carrot Cupcakes on the blog before and the recipe hasn't changed other than a little addition of milk. You can visit my other post for the recipe and if the batter is too thick, like I found it to be this time, then add a few tablespoons of warm milk. I'm doing this post more so for the decorations that I had done and I thought they were extremely cute. If you know me, you'll know that I don't like to do the same recipes twice, not only for my blog but also in real life. But this is an exception because someone requested carrot cakes to go with the Easter bunny theme.

Piping the carrots were much easier than I thought. I used a medium sized round tip and just piped a line then dragged it at the tip. I wasn't completely happy with the greens because I originally wanted to use parsley to make it look more realistic. I used a cream cheese frosting for the cupcakes and a butter cream frosting for the carrots. Cream cheese frostings usually come out softer than a butter cream and can't be stiffened with the addition of icing sugar. The butter cream holds its shape much better and it's important that the carrots don't lose their shapes and smudge all over the place.

Vanilla Cake with Cream Cheese Filling and Butter Cream Frosting

This is one of my biggest project yet, and I'm so proud of it. I should have, and could have, spent the day studying for my 100% finance final but it's a week away so I'll be fine right? I had the intention of getting some work done that day and my intentions translated to : flipped open my book, read the first question, wrote down the equation for it then thought...maybe I should try out that vanilla cake recipe.


If you read my blog post for the Easter cupcakes then you would know that I tried a cupcake recipe from "Hello Cupcakes" and it was a complete fail. I've been skeptical about trying other recipes until I saw this youtube video. It's a vanilla cake recipe from Crumbboss and the batter had a nice consistency so I thought I'd give it a try. As a rule of thumb, I judge consistency by dipping a spatula in the bowl and scooping up some batter. If it falls in a ribbon, then it's good. If it comes off in big dollops then it's too thick.

Anyways, the cake turned out absolutely amazing and I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a white cake. It was moist and didn't have a strong eggy flavour that you get in some vanilla cakes. I'll post the recipe but click here for the link to the blog that I got it from if you are interested. The recipe makes 2 8-inch rounds but I had 2 9-in pans so my cake was flatter and bigger. Also I just purchased these pans from Wilton and they are amazingggggggg! They are aluminum and the cakes bake perfectly even so you don't get the odd dom in the center.

The techniques that I used was from a combination of 2 cakes that I've seen in the past. The rose technique I had seen on "I heart baking". The petal technique is from "The hungry housewife" and she has a great tutorial on how you do a petal cake.

Oven-Baked Jalapeno Poppers

These Jalapeno poppers are simply delicious and I have no idea why I haven't tried this earlier. They are not the healthiest for you but I'd like to think that they are health-ier than the deep fried versions. I've seen these done with bacon wrapped around them but that's almost too much for me. I like the bread crumbs because they provide a nice crunch and there's enough richness from the cheese filling alone.

Chris and I demo-ed that batch of poppers in no time and it's always a good sign when he asks me to make it again some time soon.

There are great as a dinner party appetizer and in fact, that's what they were supposed to be. I was going to bring them to a potluck but they were so good and I couldn't stop eating them. So no, I didn't end up going to the dinner party but I was content with my poppers.

The jalapenos were surprisingly mild after they were baked. It was only slightly unbearable when you get closer to the stem so naturally Chris ate all the tips and I had all the ends. I had also used cayenne and chipotle in the filling as well as the bread crumbs but I didn't think it was too spicy. One way you could cut the calories is to use the low fat cream cheese and a skim-milk mozzarella. I only had the regular cream cheese because I normally use them for frostings and I don't buy the low fat versions cause they never work.