JAPANESE CHEESECAKE

Japanese Souffle Cheesecake 

Foraged-Blackberry No-Churn Ice-cream & Totoro Choux au Craquelin

What to do with the many buckets of FREE local blackberries you've picked along railroad tracks, parks and roadways in Vancouver? How about Foraged Blackberry No-churn Ice Cream?

Drip Cake: Chocolate Quinoa Layer Cake with Vanilla Bean Buttercream (gluten free)

Made my own Birthday Cake. Yes I did😆

6 inch GF Chocolate Quinoa Cake layers and Vanilla Bean Buttercream

This is my favourite part of making a cake

Decorated with my fave goodies: matcha macaron, Lindt chocolate balls, dragées, a mini KitKat and mini Coffee Crisp and crushed macaron shells

The chocolate ganache was perfect. I threw dragées on the side of the cake too and they stuck🙌

It's late November and the only thing blooming in my garden are these little purple Daikon flowers.  I just let the daikon go to seed and never did harvest the daikon (so bitter!)  The flowers sure are pretty...and edible

Scroll down past the recipes to watch a video of me assembling the layers

London Fog Pots de Crème

London Fog (Earl Grey) Pots de Crème with candied Cocoa Nibs

Crackle Crème, Vancouver

Duelling my 7 year old for the crackle!

Blueberry Milkshake

Blueberry Milkshake

My friend gifted me a HUGE ice-cream pail full of perfectly sweet local blueberries from a UPick farm in Richmond.  The blueberry season is here NOW! and I don't know about you, but I have blueberries starting to turn mushy and I'm heading to the freezer now with trays of them to save them for smoothies and baking.  

Aside from a healthy smoothy, a more decadent way to enjoy a nice heap o' blueberries is in a milkshake.  Here's my quick recipe:

Blueberry Milkshake

2 scoops vanilla ice cream (can be made dairy free with almond or coconut ice cream)

1 cup milk (can be made dairy free with almond or coconut milk)

1 cup blueberries

Combine all the ingredients in a blender and whizz until combined and no longer lumpy.

Matcha Milkshake (GF)

Matcha Milkshake

I'm cray cray about matcha recently as evidenced by my Matcha Madeleines (gf) and Matcha Coconut Mochi (gf)  recipe.

LAZY SUMMER LOCAL STRAWBERRY & VANILLA ICE CREAM TARTS

Fresh local strawberry & vanilla ice cream tarts 

In keeping with my "Lazy Summer" theme I started with my last post, I thought I'd show you a sneaky-delicious treat to use up those local strawberries that are so juicy sweet this month.  After we visited the driving range in Richmond, we noticed the blueberry & strawberry farm next door to it had a "U Pick" sign.  It didn't take much to convince the kids to pick berries.  They were half-way across the strawberry field before I could finish "Do you want to pick..."

COCONUT JELLY (GF)

Coconut Jelly (gluten free)

Hello Kitty Coconut Jelly!

COCONUT-VANILLA RICE PUDDING BRULEE (GF)

Coconut-Vanilla Rice Pudding...Brûlée

GF BANANA CHIFFON CAKE HEAVEN

GF Banana Chiffon Cake with Condensed Milk Drizzle and Organic Local Raspberries

Third time’s a charm with my GF  Chiffon experimenting!  The kids were happy to eat my failures because they were so tasty.  However, it was time for a flavour shift.  I had 2 spotting bananas on the counter and pureed them for the batter. 

The Condensed Milk Drizzle is my preference over an icing sugar drizzle.  It was way easier as I always have some in a container in the refrigerator.  The berries are a tiny tart and like jewels in the syrupy drizzle.

This chiffon is a winner and doesn’t taste GF.  See that crumb?  It was soft and moist but not gummy.  It hung upside down to cool and did not collapse.  It had good structure but was ever so slightly wobbly tender.

BAAK TONG GOH FROM NEW TOWN BAKERY

Lookit those great bubbles!

GLUTEN FREE TASTY TEENY TINY CHOCOLATE LAYER CAKE

Yeehah!  Gluten Free Cake Ecstasy!

Lookit me ma, I CAN bake a really good Gluten Free cake that doesn’t even taste Gluten Free!

GF EGGBALL WAFFLES! (GAI DAAN JAI)

The BEST Eggball Waffle recipe yet!  AND it’s Gluten Free!  Guten Tag!  Oh Joy!

EGGBALL (GAI DAAN JAI) WAFFLE IRON, WILLIAMS SONOMA

Eggball Waffles, a popular Hong Kong street food.  Visit the Night Market in Richmond or Vancouver’s Chinatown and you’ll find these made fresh in front of you.

CREPES

Crepes remind me of my trip to France in 2001.  Ahhh.  I lived with my penpal of over 27 years, V. and travelled throughout France with her and her now-husband, P.  I had the time of my life.  We lived for awhile in P’s brother’s home in Annecy for a while.  There, we made homemade crepes on a brand new specialty T-Fal pan that V. purchased at the T-Fal factory. 

You don’t know the pain I suffered as a foodie in France, visiting all those wonderful shops around France; woefully conscious of the lack of space in my luggage that I would have to drag up and down those imposing Metro stairs (no elevators!)  on my own on the way back home.  I had already purchased a huge copper pan from our travels and handmade bowls made by nuns in a convent we passed by.  I had no more room for T-Fal products, but I wanted wanted wanted!  The T-Fal nonstick crepe pan had a larger surface area than what we would find in North America.    It was also way shallower.   It even came with a handy wooden dowel to smooth the crepe batter.  The pan was a cinch to hold as it was light…and you could also flip the crepes easily this way.  In Vancouver, I looked high and low for these pans but alas, there were none. 

Here are some pics from France, of me trying my hand with the T-Fal pan.  The dowel allowed you to make a super thin crepe that wasn’t bumpy.

Here I am deftly flippy the huge crepe. 

In Vancouver, I purchased a similarly large crepe pan but it was made of cast iron and covered with an enamel surface.  There’s no flipping this baby.  It’s so heavy…but I think that’s designed to distribute the heat more evenly.

In France, my favourite filling for sweet crepes was Nutella, of course.   My favourite savoury crepe was ham and cheese.  My daughters, being allergic to nuts (too bad!) love crepes with jam.    Anything goes in my opinion. 

Interestingly, V. & P.  never used recipes when they cooked.   However, I have included one if you are inclined to try your hand at it.  Do use a nonstick pan and your life will be a lot easier.


CREPES

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• pinch of salt
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 2/3 cups milk
• 1 tablespoon melted butter
• 1/3 cup water
• butter, oil or nonstick spray for frying

1. Sift the flour, salt and sugar into a bowl and make a well in the centre.  Mix the liquid ingredients together with 1/3 cup water and pour slowly into the well, whisking all the time to incorporate the flour until you have a smooth batter.  Stir in the melted butter.  Cover and refrigerate 20 minutes or overnight.
2. Heat a crepe pan or a nonstick frying pan and grease with butter, oil or nonstick spray.  Pour in enough batter to coat the bottom of the pan in a thin even layer and pour out any excess.  Cook over moderate heat until the top of the crepe is dry and the crepe starts to come away from the side of the pan.  Turn the crepe on a plate with pieces of waxed paper between them and cover with aluminum foil while you cook the rest of the batter.
3. Serve with preserves, Nutella, butter/sugar/cinnamon, fruit & whipped cream, ham & cheese or whatever your heart desires.
4. Remaining crepes can be stored in the refrigerator for a few days.