Baby shower

It is REALLY not too long to go until we meet our baby girl!!! I am super excited and can't wait to see her! :D

Yesterday, we had a baby shower which our dear friend, Nneka organised for us. Thanks to her, we had great fun with baby games, music and even some Karaoke games...;)

Nneka also brought us her delicious strawberry cake! As a baker, I'm normally that one who makes a cake, so it was really nice to receive such a treat! (Oh and not only was it yummy, but also it had two of my favourite things on a cake, Cream! and Strawberries!) Thanks Nneka, mini me must have enjoyed it too:)

Although being heavily pregnant and knowing that Nekka would bring a cake for us, I couldn't help baking something myself too... So, I made a strawberry tart. (What a coincident that Nneka made a strawberry cake too!) Making a tart base by hands is actually quite therapeutic especially when I'm feeling "heavy" with my mossive belly and also a good exercise for a pregnant baker. :D

So, two treats with strawberry and cream went down heavenly, and of course I went for another slice each for the little person in my belly... hehehe, excellent excuse to eat more cakes...

Thanks to everyone who came to the baby shower and for the lovely gifts! She is almost there to meet you guys!

三色だんご？Sanshoku Dango?

There have been really warm days and flowers are blossoming everywhere in London, which makes me smile and want to "hop hop hop". :D I think we can now officially say... "goodbye Winter and welcome back Spring!"

So so so... today, I made a Japanese dessert called "三色だんご (Sanshoku Dango, seen my other post?) that has very Spring feeling to it... Huh? well ok, I said "Sanshoku Dango", but those who know what Sanshoku Dango looks like might think "What! that's not it!" Yeah ok... I admit the shape of those Dango aren't nice even balls... But that's "my style". Let's call it "Deconstructed Sanshoku Dango".

The truth is I made the dango a little softer than it should have been, so the ball-shape didn't hold well when I cooked them.

Anyway, it all comes down to taste, and... It did tasted just like authentic Sanhoku Dango! (believe me! I'm Japanese after all!) This Japanese dessert certainly satisfied my Japanese food cravings. ;D

Apple & Cinnamon cheese cake

There were apples and cream cheese that had been sitting and looking at me every time I open the fridge..., so I came up with this recipe to finally use them up. ("Fridge clearing cake" that's what I'm going to call it!..;D).

After having left the cake in the fridge to chill, it got very moist and the taste of apple and cinnamon seems to have really sunk in. It was like having apple pie and cheese cake at the same time in my mouth... yum yum....

Although it's a sort of cheese cake, it's not as cheesy as normal cheese cake like my New York cheese cake. In fact, it's more like in between cheese cake and pound cake.

I cut the cake into small square pieces and had them with a nice milky cup of tea... Hummm, "one more piece" led to another and another, and before I knew the cake was gone... Hummm, it was... bit too good....

Ingredients:

Plain flour 150g

Baking powder 1 tsp

Salt pinch

Cinnamon powder 1/2 tsp

Cream cheese 300g

Brown sugar 15g

Egg 2

Apple (grated) 2

Honey 2 tbsp

1. Grate apples.Preheat the oven to 180ºc. Sift flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon together.

2. In a bowl, beat cream cheese and sugar together until it's fluffy.

3. Add eggs into 2 one at a time and mix well.

4. Mix grated apple and honey into 3.

5. Fold flour mixture into 4.

6. Pour the mixture into a cake tin. Bake in the preheated oven (180ºc) for 40-45 minutes.