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Black Star Pastry (Strawberry Watermelon Cake)

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Some of you might know about the desperate attempt I made last year for the Strawberry Watermelon Cake (see previous post at  Black Star Pastry ).  Yesterday I had the privilege of tasting this cake at a party. I got super excited as I’ve been wanting to try this for almost a year now. I was so tempted to just skip the mains but I patiently waited for dessert time and made sure I left space for the cake :P In the meantime, I went to take a close look at the cake (could not resist, for obvious reasons) and I was amazed at how magical it looked. It was constructed beautifully starting with a layer of almond  dacquoise followed by cream, then a slice of watermelon with cream,   almond  dacquoise and cream again. Finally, it was topped with strawberries, pistachios and dried rose petals. It was a quite a delicious cake but unfortunately, it did not meet the expectations I had. I liked certain elements, such as the lightness of the cream layers, f...
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Wholemeal date and walnut loaf

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Happy Monday everyone! It has been a while since I baked a loaf so thought I'd make one :) Recipe adapted from http://daa.asn.au/recipes/wholemeal-date-and-walnut-loaf/ Ingredients 2 eggs, lightly beaten 100 g pitted dates, chopped 45 g margarine 1/2 cup brown sugar 1 cup water 40 g walnuts, chopped 1 cup self-raising flour 1 cup wholemeal flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 2 tablespoon LSA oil to spray Method 1) Preheat oven to 180 °C. 2) Combine dates, margarine, sugar and water in a saucepan. Stir and boil gently. Set aside to cool. 3) Sift flour, baking powder, LSA. 4) Add in walnuts and eggs  5) Add in date mixture and mix well. 6) Lightly spray a loaf tin pan. Line with baking paper. 7) Pour mixture into pan 8) Bake for 45-50 mins. Skewer should come out clean.  9) Remove from oven and cool for 10 mins 10) Turn out on a cooling rack. Slice and serve with yoghurt, if desired.
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Fabulous February

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I did not write properly last month as I had a million things on my mind. There is so much that has happened, and there is so much I want to write. But I can only write so much in this one post. So I will write the main updates here and save the rest for future. As some of you would probably know from Instagram , I got married earlier this month! I would have liked to have made a big announcement but I decided to go into hibernation instead as I was feeling very stressed. I was starting to crumble under a lot of pressure leading up to the wedding as there were many unfinished tasks (both work and wedding related). Having to work right before the day of the wedding was no easy task, but I managed to get through with a lot of support from my parents, family and friends. I am so grateful for the people in my life who went out of their way and travelled long distances to be here for me. I won’t say too much about the actual wedding in this post as I will blog more about this lat...
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Adamant August

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This month was a one hell-of-a-month for me. I still had a lot of work left to do from the major revisions of one of my old papers which took me a really long time. I was trying really hard to finish this because we had a deadline. But then, I got caught in the last wave of flu. I don’t get sick very often, but when I do, it’s really bad. I would’ve liked to take some time off to recover, but I knew I needed to push myself to meet the deadline. Working during that time wasn’t easy, it was tough. There were times where I struggled a lot, but I refused to give up. I ended up working from home for two days which helped me work and recover at the same time.  The next task was revising my other paper which was nearly done. I hadn’t worked on this for a while, so I had sort of forgotten what I was up to. The good thing was I did a writing workshop this month where I used this paper as an example. I found this to be incredibly useful because it helped me get into the mindset again...
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(Un) Organised October

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This month has gone by way too quick! (Okay, I know I said that last month too but this month went even quicker) It started off with me madly writing my results, then doing discussion. Discussion took me about a week :/ I was rushing to finish my draft because I had to send it to my supervisor and leave enough time for feedback. I allowed myself two weeks time (which I thought was too much, at the time!) But I was so glad I did this later because it can take a couple of days to get feedback as supervisors are too busy to read it in one go. Anyway, now let me move onto the other fun things I did. Starting off with the most important highlight of the month: I WENT TO CENTRAL PERK!!!! I was so bogged down with writing, I almost didn't realise it was finishing and made it in the last weekday after handing in my draft. I had to wait for about an hour but I would say the wait was worth it because I'm such a 'friends' obsessed freak. Getting my butt on that cou...
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Kale chips

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I've been thinking about making kale chips for a while now; it was one of those things I thought would be too complex. Normally, I use kale in a smoothie or a salad but I can never get through a whole bunch without it going yellow. Recently, I've had a go at making kale chips. It's actually not that difficult, but it's just very delicate. You need to have the right temperature and time setting. Otherwise, you end up with burnt or soggy chips (like I did for the first few times!) I've adapted this recipe from some recipe sites and personal experience :) Recipe is as follows- Ingredients 1 kale bunch Paprika Cayenne pepper Lemon pepper Sea salt 4 Tb Extra Virgin olive oil Method  Preheat oven to 150 (fan-forced) Remove stems from kale and tear leaves into bite sized pieces) Wash kale thoroughly Dry kale with a salad spinner (this step is important!)  In a bowl, mix olive oil and herbs/ spices (amount to your liking) Line tray with baking paper U...
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Daddy's birthday 2015 | Buttery fruit cake

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Happy birthday daddy! This perfectly describes how he continues to inspire me! And he always is!  In the past, I always used to purchase cakes because I did not trust my baking skills enough to be able to pull off a fancy cake for a special occasion. But this year, I've been a bit of an experimental baker so I thought I'd give it a go.  I asked him what he wanted for his birthday. Initially, he said plain cake again (probably because he did not want to trouble me during my final days of thesis writing). After I pressed further, he gave me buttery fruit cake as an answer.  I was happy with this because I had never baked one so it'd be fun to do one. I started my recipe hunt. Most traditional recipes use alcohol but because I don't drink, I had to look harder to find one that didn't so I could eat it too :D Eventually I found this. I've followed this recipe pretty closely with some little changes.  Normally I would not use ...
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Post-thesis celebration

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So I handed in my thesis today!!! After three months of solid hard work, it's finally all done! I'm so excited because I've been waiting for this day for a very long time. I know I shouldn't get that excited because I technically haven't finished my degree yet (got a presentation next week) but it kind of feels like I'm done! The thesis does make the bulk of my marks so that's definitely an important milestone and worth celebrating :P So now let me give you a rundown of what I did today- I started off my day skimming my thesis one last time. Then I nearly killed off a forest printing about 140 pages (poor trees!) Next stop was binding. My stomach had started grumbling from all the waiting around so we hit Ralph's Cafe for a celebratory lunch. We had to wait a while because it was lunch hour. But that was okay because we know their food is worth the wait! The Ralph's burger with chips (~$14) After this came, we just went silent as we...
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Joyful June

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I had one of the most adventurous months, ever. As some of you would already know, I was away for most of June. I flew to Canada to present my first ever oral at an international conference. I had been to an international conference in Melbourne last year; however, it didn’t quite feel as international for me (flying there from Sydney). But I knew this conference was going to be an entirely different experience. One of the biggest challenges I faced before leaving was having to pack for a range of weather conditions and ticking off the tasks I urgently needed to finish before I left. As usual, I ended up leaving my packing until the very last day (this always happens). It felt a little strange to be leaving home for almost three weeks which is a long time for me because I rarely go anywhere without family. Nonetheless, I was also super excited for the adventure that awaited on the other side of the world. The International Society of Nutrition and Physical Activity (ISBNPA) c...
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