Overkneaded Dough

All the cookbooks keep warning about not over-kneading dough, but I've never seen what that actually looked like. And I never knew if my own hand-kneaded dough was actually over-kneaded or under-kneaded.

Well, one fine day, I was attempting to make a 100% wholemeal bread, since I had managed to buy wholemeal BREAD flour.

Instead of trusting the fact that the BREAD flour would develop gluten beautifully, albeit speckled with the wholemeal bits, I put it through THREE rounds of the bread-maker kneading, making this a total of 1 hour's worth of machine-kneading.

At the 40-min mark, the dough had looked beautiful. Greedy for perfection, I hit the button for another 20 minutes worth of kneading - only to be greeted by this!

The bread that came out was flavorful, but well, it tasted like Little Pixie's teething ring.

God is a Matchmaker! (Part 2 of 2)

Lasik and I have known each other for, er... 18 years. (!!!!!)

She first knew me as a flirt (I think). Perhaps one of the class muggertoads (hey! This was Muggertoads Girls' School what!)

I don't know if she was also a muggertoad. But I first knew her (and remembered her!) as the tall girl at the back who complained that my cough (real) sounded fake!

Lasik is the most conscientious and precise person I know. You can really depend on her to see things through. And I mean, REALLY see things through. And she is a dear friend to me. And she has been through some really miraculous times as well. And, after 18 years, she still looks like the way she did 18 years ago!

Meeting Mr Corny-and-sometimes-bad-Jokes for the first time was a funny experience. He's one of those folks who makes you feel that it's okay to make jibes at him about his erm, physique. But he is a very deep guy as well, as I found out over the past year or so.

Even though his jokes can be really bad, he does seem like the Creator's perfect "let your hair down" complement to Lasik's "we MUST get it RIGHT" style.

Congrats, Lasik & Mr Corny-and-sometimes-bad-Jokes !!!

God is a Matchmaker!! (Part 1 of X)

Do you believe in miracles? I do. This is one of them.

I've known Miss Sweet-and-Gentle-Spirit
since, er, 2001. She is the prettiest, er, school chaplain I have ever seen, and she has the most beautiful heart too. Full of compassion, empathy, and all the good things you can ever think of.

Our Prison Group was very sad to see her go when God called her to the mission field. I supposed she was one of those that Paul referred to in Corinthians about "making eunuchs of themselves" - because whilst I had never doubted her attractiveness as a potential mate, I had never heard her mention anything about desiring marriage. So I assumed that she, well, wasn't interested.

Indeed, Miss Intellectual told us that when she went to the mission field, she "gave up", because you couldn't imagine finding a mate in that particular field. Turns out, God had other plans. It sounded exactly like what I read about in this book.

Guess what, the Honest Guy whom our Matchmaker had prepared for her (and her for him) appeared miraculously in that place, for a medical appointment that never happened! Instead it was an appointment with the Master Surgeon - who was showing him the "rib" that had been taken out of him!

Each was all that the other had been praying and waiting for all these years. And more.

Can you imagine waiting for "the one" till you are 37 or 42? She who had never believed in whirlwind romances has been blessed by our humorous God in the "twinkling of an eye".

We are all so excited!

Cookie Making with Gremlin

It's been a long while since I've last blogged - lots have been happening on both sides of the extended family, and I've been sick with allergy for more than a month.

8-year-old Gremlin is here from yesterday (ok, sorry for the bad grammar) till tomorrow. (Phew!!!)


He belongs to the "me-me-me" generation. In his world, things get tidied up by invisible house-elves (you know, those things that wear pillow-cases in Harry Potter movies), and these are the ones that clear up after him when he eats, drinks or messes up the place, whatever.

I've realised that these "Me" kids really expect to be entertained all the time. And I mean, ALL.THE.TIME. They are quite incapable of self-entertainment. Then again, what do you expect, when they've been brought up on a daily diet of 8 hrs of TV, doing nothing but waiting for the next show to make them laugh??

I really believe that TV deadens the mind.


I have to say I wasn't too pleased about being his house-elf for these 2 days. Look at the products, and try to imagine the hours spent cleaning up.

P/S - besides those featured here, we made another batch of Baking 911's Chewy Chocolate Chip cookies which had me washing up till 11pm at night!

The recipes were from Nigella Feasts 'Fun Foods' episode. I must say, I was impressed by their simplicity and ease!

Cut-Out Cookies
Ingredients

• 1/3 cup / 90g butter
• 1/2 cup /100g sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 1 egg
• 1 1/2 cup / 200g flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• Pinch of salt

Instructions

• Cream the butter and sugar, adding the vanilla when fluffy.
• Add 1 tblspn of flour, before breaking the egg into the bowl.
• Continue the creaming, and gradually add in all the flour, a tablespoon at a time, baking powder and salt.
• Get the dough into a ball, add more flour if desired.
• Cover with cling wrap, and chill for half-hour. (I didn't bother sticking to the half-hour, I went jogging and then took a walk to West Mall before continuing).
• Preheat oven to 350 deg F / 180 deg C.
• Shape with cookie cutters.
• Bake for 10 min (I had to bake them for 15 min) to desired colour.

Tin Hang Zai preferred the more browned version (15 - 20 min) whilst Gremlin preferred the pale-looking cookies that were baked for only 12 min.

Icing

• 1 1/4 cup / 150 g icing sugar
• 2 tblspn hot water

Mix, and colour as desired. You need to buy only the primary colours (red, yellow, blue) - the rest can be made from these 3.

Creative Input

• Get from the gremlin or whoever you are baking with.
• Obviously if you are the house-elf, you are going to be too tired to have any creative juices flowing out of you at 11pm at night!
  

60s' Live Seafood

View from 60s' Live Seafood

Seeing that the Gnome was in poor spirits and the Goose couldn't stop her grumbling as a result, the Pixie Family decided to take the G-Folks to this nice hangout.

Are all Cantonese critical? Ever the critical Cantonese folks that they were - they didn't like it at all. Gremlin and little Goblin were making such a din - they got scolded by the Pixie.

The Pixies still love this place. And Lasik and Mr Ching Wan-Timberlake got hooked too.

Baking Class at Civil Service Club

The Pixie decided to take the affection-starved Gremlin to a Baking Buddies Hands-On Baking Class at the Civil Service Club for an afternoon of bonding and undivided attention.

Gremlin was so excited about it that he fantasised about the class constantly for the one month before the class.

It turned out to be a very fun experience. For $38 per adult-plus-child pair, the two of them got to bake this Monster Cookie just in time for Father's Day. Tin Hang Zai and Little Pixie both got very cute cookies at the end of the session - whilst Gremlin took the Monster Cookie to share with the adults-who-ignore-him-and-keep-putting-him-down.

The Pixie got her chance to finally ask Judy Seah (the lovely little girl who was the 'teacher' for the session) some burning questions like:

• There is no way to substitute vegetable oil for butter in a cookie recipe. The effect's just not going to be the same.
• Brown sugar makes cookies soft - white makes it crisp. Adjust proportion to taste and preference.
• Addition of more flour to the recipe makes the dough less sticky and easier to manipulate - but the cookies will be crisper. Adjust to preference.
• Dough can be frozen for future use.
• Eggs make the cookies rise.

This was definitely a better value than the Phoon Huat class - but then again - this is hands-on, the other was a demo class. Can't compare apples with oranges. And of course, this is in a different league from the Imp's type of classes.

Judy's good with kids. (Gremlin kept talking non-stop - and she never lost her patience with him.) And she has her own website! Check this out - Baking Hobby Club.

Baking Classes at Phoon Huat

Desperate to learn from the experts 'once and for all' on how to make proper muffins, the Canton Pixie finally succumbed to signing up for a baking class at Phoon Huat.

The menu for the day was Cranberry Muffin and New York Cheese Cake. She was probably the only attendee there for the muffin. The other 43 people were there for the cheese cake.

The Phoon Huat experience is definitely highly recommended for an afternoon of cheap laughs. At $10 per session, redeemable for Phoon Huat products, it's a real steal!

Francis (the chef) speaks in really broken English ("nebber mind lah, got no white sugar, blahhun sooger also can. If no cake crumbs, just use biscuit crumbs. Anything will do, cheap cheap") and his Mandarin is peppered with lots of English words.

The Pixie was astounded. There were people of literally all shapes and sizes! From petite teenage girls to full-fledged rounded Aunties, my goodness! There was even a guy who came with his mother!

One Auntie kept shouting instructions to Francis. "Francis ah, if you beat the egg longer, I think your cake will be softer." "Francis ah, must add more water else not moist enough". "Francis ah, blah blah blah".
You so clever then be the chef lah!

One woman was rushing to catch the 4pm flight! (Class was from 2 to 4pm). There were more than 10 digital cameras zooming in at any one time. One woman even used her handphone to video the whole process. (Can't you bozos refer to the Internet!?!?!?)

The muffins (remember - this is a "cheap laugh" kind of baking class) were actually cakes in disguise. Urgh!!!

However, the cheese cake was GOOOD!!! And Phoon Huat sells Anchor butter at half the price of Shop n Save.

Tong Shui Cafe (TSC) @ Changi Airport Terminal 2

Gold Fish Dumplings in Nasty Soup

It has been a hectic month for the Pixie Family and connected Veterans. The Veteran had a knee operation - and Airport and the Canton Pixie had been stressing out trying to provide homecooked lunch and dinner for the whole of TWO WEEKS.

Tin Hang Zai has travelled thrice this month - and whilst picking him up from T2 past Friday, the Pixie Family decided to have dinner at this quirky place that looks high-class but serves Hong Kong street grub.

Hungering for hot soup - we ordered Gold Fish Dumplings in soup. The soup smelt like goldfish water!!! I bravely attempted a spoonful, and nearly spat it out! (Not that I have ever reared goldfish or gone near them - but the soup smelt and tasted as foul as I imagined goldfish water would smell and taste.) Urgh!! The dumplings were made of some cheap-tasting orange-coloured fish meat with bits of carrot and suspicious red cubes for its eyes. I couldn't stop laughing because this was such a funny experience!

The fish and chips (OK, I think this place obviously doesn't understand the concept of "core competencies") were drenched in some TSC-special "red and white" sauce - which turned out to be ketchup and mayo! Urgh! This felt like a high-class Pasar Malam fish-Ramly. And the battered fish smelt extremely fishy. (*gag*)

French Toast with Strawberry Ice Cream

Highly amused, I decided to give the desserts a try. This was ok (I mean, you can't go wrong with French Toast and what tastes like Magnolia ice-cream, can you??).

Overall - I gave the experience 8/10 for the quirkyness and the laughs (there were workmen carrying wheelbarrows of soil in and out of the restaurant through the tables at 7pm on a Friday night)

Food-wise
The usually lenient Tin Hang Zai gave the dumplings a 2/10 and the ghastly soup a 0/10.
Fish and Chips - 2/10 (for $9.88++ I'm sure we can find a better-tasting deal elsewhere)
Dessert - 7/10 (I can do this myself)

I'd probably go back just for the laughs

Doesn't this look pornographic!?!?!

Airport asked me to collect this from his demure-looking friend who works in Fei Yue. This is actually a bicyle gel-pad - AKA Jewel Protector!!

I didn't know that such things exist!

Nice visitor to Pixieville!!

RGS Banter

Lasik and I had a good laugh over the following:

1. We both have the 'irritating' (as described by Airport) RGS accent. (please don't ask why, because both of us are from Mandarin-speaking homes).
2. We both perpetuate the 'brainless girl' stereotypes because our favourite computer game is that Bubble Game. (Miss Intellectual, another fellow RGS girl, is not impressed by this!!)
3. Everyone who is not a girl is considered a "non-girl".
4. Both our SAHMs have bought all the stuff that only guillible SAHMs seem to buy - AMC and that Japanese U-Like Steamer.
5. We both can't stand people lying on the bedsheets in outside clothes.
6. We both like corny jokes.

MILO Godzilla

Pixieville hosted another Prison Group gathering last Friday.

We were extremely honored to have Mr Timberlake grace us with his presence. Sans paparazzi. I decided that Timberlake reminds me very much of Lau Ching Wan. So Lasik, it's Timberlake-Ching Wan. :)

I made everyone Tin Hang Zai's trans-fat free version of the McDonald's milkshake. Despite using stuff like corn oil, REAL milk, and non-stick cooking spray, Timberlake-Ching Wan and Lasik felt it tasted like a sorbet, and more specifically, a MILO-Godzilla!!!

I still can't figure out what caused the sorbet-texture.

What are your values?

The typical Pixie image was that of a busy bee, running around like a headless chicken, feeling stressed out doing lots of things and accomplishing nothing.

After I read this book, I understood that the feeling of mounting desperation about not spending time on 'things that matter' (despite functioning like a hummingbird) was because the activities I used to splurge my time on weren't really reflecting my values.

So here's the template I followed:

• What issues do you get on your soapbox about? What values do they reflect?
• What makes you cross? What value is being violated to make you feel this way?
• If you asked your family and friends to describe you, what words would they use? How do these descriptions reflect your values?
• What is something that you would never do, lines you would never cross? Which values would you be violating by crossing those lines?
• In the past, when faced with tough decisions, what actions have you taken? What values did these actions reflect?

Sneak Peek:

Tidiness is NOT one of my values, but I think it IS one of Lasik's.

Epicurean (but NON-Ascetic!!!) pursuits is definitely one big value of mine. The Sun, the Sea, the Stomach and the Shops.

Smashed Pomfret Rice Set

Can't resist blogging this. Lasik's look-good-but-lousy lunch at Marina Food Court. Urgh!

I burnt my Chinese Wok!!!

Oh man. So much for trying to make my own gluten-free, additive-free, wheat-free tortillas. (which, thanks to Miss Intellectual, I learnt that they are pronounced "tor tee yas" and not "tor tee lahs".

I followed some dumb instructions and tried to fry them dry by lining my wok (lovingly seasoned by the Goose earlier) with corn flour. The flour got welded onto my wok, I tried to scrub it off and now the patina is gone!!

I tried to put the patina back, but the re-seasoning process caused all my laundry (hanging in the kitchen) and the whole house to stink of corn oil, and as a result, I had to do damage-control by boiling a pot of vinegar for half an hour.

Duh!!!

This Subway sucks!!!

Subway is the Pixies' choice whenever we crave junk food and don't want to go the full-trans-fat way of McDonald's or KFC.

Usually we go to the one in Holland Village but I think we won't go there anymore!!!

Canton Pixie: Can I have my cheese packed separately?
Waiter: NO
Canton Pixie: huh? *shocked look cuz never had such a response before*
Waiter: We don't allow cuz not in our operating procedure.
Canton Pixie (firm voice): No, THAT's not true, cuz the last time I came here you did it for me!
Waiter: *shrugs* ok, actually not allowed
Canton Pixie: *rolls eyes*
Waiter: Why do you want to separate the cheese?
Canton Pixie: Because I want to eat it separately? *sarcastic tone*
Waiter: *sniggers*

This place really sucks. I've seen the male boss before - never smiles at anyone, never serves customers even when there is a long queue and all his staff are busy. Just stands behind them and stares. Even put up a sign reminding all customers to help them by clearing their own tables.

Time Management for Manic Mums

I like this book! It works! And it's funny!

I think I was mean!

As much as I wanted to think of myself as being the confrontational sort, I don't think I am really all that confrontational. I just don't have the guts!

We were in the Cry Room during Easter Service. There were two other families. One (a man) was trying to concentrate on the proceedings. The other (a woman) was not.

For some reason, when the singing stopped and the sermon started, the woman started conversing very loudly with the trying-to-concentrate man about kids and stuff.

I bore with the din for a while. Fine, this IS the "CRY" Room but hey, people here are trying to listen to the sermon! After what seemed to me like a long while (hey, I didn't want to miss out on my sermon! Easter comes only once a year!), I decided that I didn't have the guts to tell her to shut up.

So, I walked silently to the volume control in the room and turned up the volume so that I could hear the speaker above her din.

After that, her child started screaming non-stop and she left the room.

Directions to Pixie Ville

If you are travelling via MRT, pls get off at THE MRT station. Once you are out of the station, please turn left and STOP THERE- you will see THE Mall on your right and a single block of condo units on your left. And in between the two, in the far distance, you should see some point blocks, one of which is mine. Just walk towards there. I've attached a picture of THE Mall and THE MRT station from my window - so hopefully you can figure out where I live!

If you are not the visual sort - here's the wordy instructions.
Once you get out from the station, turn left and walk straight along the station - you will pass an NTUC. Walk past the NTUC and take the escalator down. Once at the bottom of the escalator, turn right and walk towards the nearest traffic junction. Cross that junction and immediately turn right and walk along the path. Once you see a basketball court (which should be brightly lit, unless you are arriving at midnight), turn left and walk along the pathway straight towards the point block. There are 2 point blocks - one is right next to the community centre, and mine is the point block that's further away. At this point, if you are lost, you should look upwards and give me a ring. I should be able to see you from my window.

Another interesting debate I follow...

ST Forum March 28, 2007
NZ govt took heed of public views in setting pay

I AM rather disappointed with the Government's insensitivity in raising the issue of ministerial pay at a time when many ordinary Singaporeans are still trying to cope with rising living costs.
In 1994 when the then Prime Minister urged Parliament to approve the formula for setting ministers' pay, he suggested that paying $22 million a year for his team was a small price, compared to the cost of having an incompetent and corrupt government.
However, according to the TI 2006 Corruption Perceptions Index, there are four other countries which are less corrupt than Singapore. New Zealand is placed No. 1 (together with Finland and Iceland) whereas Singapore is ranked No. 5. Does this mean that the salaries of NZ ministers should be many times higher than those of Singapore ministers?
This doesn't seem to be the case. In a 2003 article by the NZ Herald, it was pointed out that even though the Prime Minister had the 'toughest job in the country' and an equivalent private-sector position would command a seven-figure salary, this would not be acceptable to taxpayers. Her increased salary of NZ$305,000 was deemed reasonable as US President George W. Bush earned only about NZ$330,470 a year.
In setting the remuneration packages of its ministers, the New Zealand government was sensitive to the perceptions of the public (whom it described as 'paying customers') and benchmarked figures against those of its Western counterparts.
As Singapore is an Asian country, should we not be benchmarking our figures against our Asian counterparts'? Even if we consider ourselves as a Western country, our ministers are already being paid many times more than President Bush himself.
So far, the impression we have been given is that serving our country is like any other financial transaction or commercial project; money is the primary focus and motivation. There is no altruism or patriotism linked to the discussion.
I hope that Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and his Government can take a different approach to this issue.
Vanessa Teo Toon Lin (Ms)