Being a confinement lady

It has been a month since my last post. Wow! I have been really really busy.

My sis have just given birth to a baby boy last month. Well, what have that got to do with me being busy? My sis did her confinement at my mum's place. Since I have nothing much to do, I decided to go back to mum;s place and help her up. So there I was back home, helping my mum with simple chores - boiling water, hanging and folding clothes, cut veges etc...Then...mum injured her arm. How? She went to the market alone, and bought so many things - chicken, pork rib, pork leg, pig's kidney, pig's stomach, fruits etc (too heavy for her to handle). Then on that day, she need to 'treat' the chicken, pork (and parts) before cooking or storing in the fridge. That is too much for her to handle...she start to feel the pain, but the pain is bearable. The next day, she went to chinese sinseh for a massage. At night, about 9pm, her arm started to hurt so bad that tears start rolling down. She is in such pain that I insisted on sending her to the hospital. She was x-rayed, given a jab at her butt, took some medicine and was given a appointment to meet the specialist 2 weeks later.

So mum is not able to work. Me, have to take over all the cooking for the whole family, plus cooking for my sis (confinement dishes). I have never worked so much in my life. Now I know how tiring it can be to be fulltime housewife :P

Besides, I need to help take care of baby, so that my sis can get some rest to recover. I have learned quite a lot.

There is something that need to remember on handling newborn. Remember to wake baby up every 1-2 hours for feeding, even though baby is sleeping. Must wake them up no matter what - undress them, tickle, whatever.

Sis made a mistake by allowing baby to sleep 6 hours without feeding, ended up, baby's system does not work well and ended up with jaundice.

Baby's full moon was 10 days ago. Then only I have got a breather....and finally now have the time to sit and write. But then again, during the past 1 month, i have been baking almost everyday. But I too lazy to snap any photos. Hopefully I will take somemore photos and start posting again :)

Apple Sweet Bun

My Little Nephew

Little Precious was discharged from hospital today. So happy to see him. He looked so different from 3 days ago. He looked fairer and cuter haha

The photos i uploaded are taken when we try to wake him up for milk. When he sleeps, he sleep. Whatever u do, he will just continue sleeping

My Little Nephew

My sis just gave birth to a 3.55kg baby boy on 12 Nov. His daddy haven't thought of a good name for him, so they call him 'Baby'. I call him 'Xiao Bao Bei' which means 'Little Precious' in chinese.

He is such a cute darling. Only a few days old, he is already smiling :) He will stop crying when my mum sings to him (his dad tried singing but he kept crying). I guess that's because my mum sings karaoke everyday at homw while my sis rest on the sofa. So Xiao Bao Bei listens to mum singing since in tummy. He will look at my mum as if he is enjoying the song....so cute..too bad, i did not take a photo of that.

Little precious is admited to hospital today due to jaundice. Poor baby. Hope he will get well soon and i miss playing with him

Chocolate Peppermint Cake

My fondant creations

After creating the mouse fondant, I told my baby sis about it. She saw the mousy fondant in this blog...and was jealous coz she dun have it during her bday. So, to compensate, I did piggy fondant for her.


My elder sis say the piggy looks as if in shock haha

Then, the babiest bro of mine, whose bday was in Oct, i did this animal for him. coz i wasn't around during his bday. and, also to avoid him being jealous...haha so what animal do u think this is? some say looks like dog, some say bear...

it's actually a TIGER :P see below, got stripe. My baby sis say looks more like Garfield.

Then when I am back home and show my creations to my family, my 9 months pregnant elder sis say why dun have rabbit? well, she is born in the year of rabbit. I told her i dunno how to make the ears stand. But I try using toothpicks. So here it is. And...I use yellow to make the ear and eyes, should use pink, but i lazy to mix the colour, so just use the leftover from the tiger

Because I baked a chocolate cake, the cake will end up black and white (cake and mousy). elder sis say should have some red. so mummy suggested a rose, although a bit girly la...so i did this. looks ok ya...


this is how the final cake looks like


this is a smaller cake i made for my babiest bro. the Tiger supposed to be at the middle, but i forgot to snap the photo with the tiger :P


All my baby bros and baby sis are grown up (aged more than 20), but to me, they are still very young. Always still baby to me. Some will say the decorations that I made are for kids, but hey, to me, they are still kids :)

Mouse Marshmallow fondant

Made this mouse fondant as decorative for a birthday cake that i am going to bake later for my bro's bday.

the recipe as below:

Ingredients:

200g white mini-marshmallows
1 to 2 tablespoons water
200g pounds icing sugar
Some shortening

1. Melt marshmallows and 1 tablespoons of water in a microwave or double boiler: Put the bowl in the microwave for 30 seconds, open microwave and stir, back in microwave for 30 seconds more, open microwave and stir again, and continue doing this until melted. (or use double boil and keep stirring until melted)
2. Place 3/4 of the powdered sugar on the top of the melted marshmallow mix.
3. Grease your hands GENEROUSLY with shortening- palms, backs and in between fingers (i use disposable plastic gloves, which reduce it from sticking).
4. Then heavily grease the counter with shortening and dump the bowl of marshmallow/sugar mixture in the middle.
5. Start kneading like you would bread dough. Keep kneading, this stuff is sticky at this stage! Add the rest of the powdered sugar and knead some more.
6. Re-grease your hands and counter when the fondant is sticking. If the mix is tearing easily, it is too dry, so add water (a little at a time then knead it in).
7. You should have a stretchable texture.
8. Its best if you can let it sit, double wrapped, overnight (but you can use it right away if there are no tiny bits of dry powdered sugar). If you do see them, you will need to knead and maybe add a few more drops of water.
9. Prepare the fondant for storing by coating it with a good layer of shortening, wrap in a plastic- type wrap product and then put it in a re-sealable or Ziploc bag. Squeeze out as much air as possible.

Sourdough bread

during my honeymoon to Italy 2 years ago, we were served bread almost every meals. At first, we dun really like the bread served there, coz its very hard on the outside. As hard as rock. But after a while, we kinda luv the bread. Hard outside but soft inside, yum yum. Good with coffee.

we can't really find such delicious bread in china. they dun bake such good bread. i found this recipe and gave it a try. yes! it's hard outside and soft inside.

when i make it, i tried with nutella chocolate filing and also blueberry jam filling (kept some as plain bread)

the texture is good, hard outside (not as hard as rock). but i guess i should bake it slightly longer, so that the skin will be as hard as rock.

See below for the recipe:

Ingredients:

STARTER
100g high protein flour (bread flour), sifted
1/8 tsp yeast
130ml water

Method
Put all the ingredients in a clean mixing bowl and mix into smooth thick pancake batter. Cover with a piece of clean cloth and keep aside for 48 hours (do not need to keep in fridge)

SPONGE
200g STARTER
120g high protein flour (bread flour), sifted
180ml water

Method
Mix all the ingredients together and leave tightly covered for 12 hours

DOUGH
500g high protein flour (bread flour), sifted
1 tbsp salt or to taste
1 tbsp sugar
2 tsp instant yeast
500g sponge
90-120g water
50g butter

Method
1. Put all the ingredients into a mixing bowl. Use a dough hook and knead into a smooth and elastic dough. Form into a ball and leave to rise until it doubles in bulk, about 1 hour
2. Punch the dough down and knead for 3 minutes until smooth again
3. The dough is now ready to be divided and shaped into loaves or buns (up to your liking)
4. After shaping into loaves or buns, leave to rise for half hour.
5. Spray some water on the buns and leave to rise till double
6. Bake in pre-heated oven for 10 minutes at 200C
7. Remove buns from oven and spray with water and bake for another 10 minutes.

Note to remember - do not fill up the buns with too much filling or it will spill out (like mine)

Slendid China and Folk Culture Village, Shenzhen

Slendid China is a place where u can see all places in China in miniature. For those that dun have the time and money to visit various places in China, Spelndid China is the place to visit. The best thing is u get to take pictures of the places - helicopter view :)



This is my husband taking photos of me and me taking photos of him


Once we stepped in, we are greeted by this mini motor, which you can rent to ride around. The rent is quite expensive, by hour. But if u have extra to spend it is a good idea to rent it. It took us 5 hours to walk around, that also because we took a quick walk and chose to miss all the performances.



This is a place in Dunhuang where there are many paintings in the caves. I have been to the real place, but unfortunately photos in the caves are not allowed to protect the paint. Over exposure to light will destroy the paintings.



This is the Nine Dragon wall in Beijing




Some tourist trying out the tradisional games.




The Great Wall of China. It's a nice place to go.



Mr Mao is worshiped by the Chinese. Portrait of Mao in the living room is a common sight. I do see such living room in real chinese' house.






This place was destroyed by foreign power.



This is Leshan in Sichuan. I gave it a miss during my visit to Sichuan. Not because it is not worth visiting. Simply because i dun have enough time. The real one is so huge, we are not even as tall as the toe of the statue.


Putalagong in Tibet. Visiting Tibet is still in my wish list.


Suspension Temple of Shanxi. The whole temple is suspended in the mid air against the high and steep cliff of Cuiping Peak. The whole building is a wooden structure and have more than 40 halls and pavilions. There are statues of the great founders of Buddhism, Toism and Confucianism.


Tradisional grinder powered by hydraulic mill.


This is the hydraulic mill which powered the grinder


Due to lack of choice, this is what we have for lunch. The minorities' food.


Sugar Art