Pineapple Tarts for Beginners

I am not a huge Chinese New Year goodies gal, but I just love Pineapple Tarts.

The good thing is, in Singapore and Perth, you don't have to wait till Chinese New Year to find them.

Singapore's Bangawan Solo stocks a decent albeit soft batch all year round, and in Perth, you can always find some cardboard tasting ones in the Asian grocery stores.

If you want good Pineapple Tarts though, they usually only show themselves during the festive season, when that meek-as-a-mouse auntie suddenly unleashes her secret baking skills and rakes in $$$ with the sale of truck loads of tarts.

Since I am neither in Singapore, nor interested in eating cardboard, I have had no choice but to try and bake my own Pineapple Tarts for the last two years.  

Amazingly, Pineapple Tarts are incredibly easy to make with the right equipment.  I used my Breville Kitchen Wizz Pro.  If you have any sort of mixer than can churn out dough, you will be fine.  If not, you will find yourself slaving away at the counter trying to get the damn pastry mixed.

I found this recipe to be quite fail proof - the tarts taste yummy.  I doubt you will be able to make any money selling these though, because they are the ugliest Pineapple Tarts you will ever consume.

* * * * *

Easy Recipe for Beginners (adapted from Delicious Asian Foods)

> Sift into a food processor/mixer:

3 cups plain flour

1/3 cup corn flour

6 tbsp icing sugar

> Slice in 280g refrigerated butter

> Add in

3 egg yolks

3 tbsp cold water

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

> Mix together using the dough blade until it clumps into a nice ball

> Drop the ball into a cling wrap and refrigerate

The dough can stay refrigerated until you are ready to begin assembling your tarts.  

Simply microwave it for about 20 seconds, until it is soft enough to be flattened using a rolling pin.

Next is the pineapple jam recipe (my own)

> Skin 2 large pineapples 

 

> Mince the flesh (including core) using a food processor

> Throw the mixture and 2 cinnamon sticks into a pan on medium/low heat 

> Stir occasionally

> When it darkens, add in 1/2 cup brown sugar and turn heat to medium/high

The sugar will caramelize, causing the mixture to darken even more, and thicken.

Once it looks like a jam and you can no longer see any standing liquid, remove from heat. and cool. 

Now a lot of recipes will try to make this process super complicated, but really, it is up to you to decide what kind of texture you want your jam to be.  Mine turned out to be fibrous with a bite, and not too sweet.  Many of the recipes I've come across ask for just 1 cinnamon stick, and a lot of white sugar.  But sugar kills, so I just used 1/2 cup, and brown sugar. 

Once again, you can now refrigerate your homemade (be proud!!) jam until you are ready to assemble the tarts. 


I stored mine like this ^

 

I don't own any cookie cutters, so I selected this bottle mouth to cut out the round pastry shapes.

This particular opening is smaller than regular sized tarts, but your pastry will come out bite sized, less than 3cm across, and about 1cm high.

Switch on your oven and let it heat up while you cut your round pastry shapes.

Place the circles on a baking sheet and brush them with a mixture of 1 egg yolk + 1 tbsp water.

Then, using a teaspoon, heap as much or as little pineapple jam onto your pastry, and bake for 20 minutes.  You will know they are done when the tarts start to sizzle.

My Not-a-Baker Pineapple Tarts, ugly but adorable?

These tarts are not too sweet, with a buttery taste and a creamy texture.

 

I also experimented baking some tarts in my Philips Air Fryer

 

I must have put them in for less than 10 minutes, and when I checked on them, the jam was already starting to burn.  I had to take them out, but when I bit into one, I found that the pastry was not cooked through, even though the surface was dry.

I reckon this must be the easiest Pineapple Tarts recipe and hope that those Not-a-Baker out there will feel confident to try making your own Chinese New Year favorite at home.  Look at how small and cute they are! 

Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Our Weekend in Mandurah

Mandurah is located about about an hour south of Perth City.

 

It is one of the lovely places we head to on weekends, 

and a holiday destination for people with boats!

  Sitting on the water is Dolphin Quay, where you can find amenities, food and hotels.

Look at the number of boats parked, 

waiting for their owners to come to Mandurah to take them on a fishing trip.

We stayed at Quality Suites Crest Mandurah,

located at 1 The Pallodio.

It is a 4.5 star hotel, ranked #1 on Trip Advisor,

although I would say it's more like a serviced apartment.

There is a regular kitchen with all the necessary equipment, 

2 double bedrooms with fully stocked bathrooms, a lounge with Tv, 

and a lovely balcony with a bbq, 

perfect for grilling that freshly caught fish!

 The apartment was very clean and nice, 

but the real selling point of this place is the fantastic location and views!

*****

Breakfast was at D'Lights Cafe, which was located by the water.

The food was extraordinary, and I'll let the pictures speak for themselves!

Pancakes with Maple Syrup

Big Breakfast

Poached Eggs Florentine

Poached Eggs Pacific

If you ever head to Mandurah, do give their breakfast a try.

In particular, I found the Poached Eggs fantastic, as well as the pancakes.

Kiri Japanese Restaurant

 My hubby and I have strolled past Kiri many Sundays but they have always been closed.

I have also tried to make a booking with them several times but was always unsuccessful!

We have been to most of the popular Japanese restaurants in Perth and Kiri was definitely on our list of must-trys! 

Last night, we happened to be in the area and saw that it looked quite empty so we decided to chance it and stepped inside.  To our joy, there happened to be a table for two available in the dining restaurant!  (The takeaway area is also available for dining, but we've always wanted to experience the dining section.)

The interior of Kiri is dark and romantic - too dark to get proper pictures unfortunately.

 The servers also looked pleasant and were friendly.

Unfortunately, that would be all the good things I can say about Kiri.

We ordered two dishes, which took what seemed like forever to come.

 

The first was this Nigiri Sushi platter. 

While the presentation was beautiful, I was shocked at the portion.  

 Really, 4 pieces of sushi, a spoonful of chopped prawn, 

3 thin, thin slices of salmon sashimi and a tiny bowl of boiled bok choy for $25?

Granted, the sashimi tasted fresh, but it is definitely overpriced 

compared to other Japanese places we have been to.  

Perhaps this is the standard for Shenton Park, but for someone new to Perth like me, 

the locality of Shenton Park does not mean anything special or exclusive.

 

The second dish we ordered was the Kiri Bento $33.

For a signature bento box, this was as ordinary as can be.

The only thing vaguely special about this was the potato croquette hiding in the corner. 

(I later found out that this was beef croquette, but I couldn't taste any beef in it)

My usual favorite, the potato salad, was dreadfully tasteless, 

with a huge un-mashed piece of potato sitting right in the middle. 

The karage chicken was tasty but soggy and terribly greasy.

In our favorite Japanese restaurant (keeping it a secret for now), 

something like this would cost less than $18, and would be DELICIOUS.

***

Now comes the worst part of our dining experience:

Halfway through the sushi in that dark, dark restaurant, 

I unfortunately spotted a COCKROACH scurrying underneath towards my feet!  

I let out an involuntary shriek, which was definitely heard by the server passing by in a hurry.  

Instead of attending to me, she stared as the cockroach ran past her to the next table.

The table next to us also spotted the cockroach and waved at the waitress to inform her.

Her response,

"Well, I don't know where it went so I CAN'T DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT."

.

.

.

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Business went on as usual.

.

.

.

.

Needless to say, I lost my appetite for the rest of the meal, and could not sit in peace, 

always watching out for that damn cockroach, 

WHICH IS WHAT THAT SERVER SHOULD BE DOING.

A little later, another table also jumped, having spotted the nasty roach.

The server was present to this, but just hurried away like she did not hear anything.

***

In our disgust and haste to leave, 

we also did not notice that the green tea we ordered together with the food was never served.

I was really looking forward to the "Beautiful Japanese Tea from Greentea House" 

(as stated in their menu)

For a restaurant that is always packed and charges premium prices, 

this was a horrible first experience.

What on earth is all the hype about on

???

My hubby came to the conclusion that Kiri is popular 

because it is the only Japanese in Shenton Park.  

Red Opium - My Birthday Treat

My husband decided to surprise me with a dinner date to the Red Opium, one of the hottest places to eat in Perth at the moment.

Red Opium features what they call, Thai Tapas.  Now I love tapas because I get to taste several types of dishes, while not getting filled up on any particular one, and I LOVE Thai food.  I would count Thai as one of my favorite cuisines, next to Japanese.

Mr Bauer admittedly, is not a fan of Thai food, and only eats it to satisfy my craving, so this "review" would be a good balance of both of our tastes.

The first thing about Red Opium, is that it is located in the basement of the most nondescript building, but once I entered, I was swept away by the dark, red & maroon interior that made me feel like I was in Old Shanghai.

By the way, it is almost impossible to get a table at Red Opium, and we were very lucky to be seated due to my husband's perseverance and charm.. haha.  We were among the first to be seated and by the time our first dish came, the whole restaurant was filled.  Perhaps it was the dark, mysterious decor of the place, or the fact that aside from us, and a German couple, every other patron there consisted of Asian women with Caucasian men, but we soon felt like we were out of Perth and had flown right into Bangkok.

 

First order of the day, Cha Yen - Thai Milk Tea!

It was full bodied, with a rich tea taste that wasn't overpowered by milk.

Best thing, for $4.50, it came in a huge jug that lasted us throughout dinner!

My sweet hubby and I, waiting anxiously for our food.

Interestingly, apart from a lone Thai server, all the other servers had a distinct Singaporean accent.  

I'm guessing they were either from Singapore of Malaysia.

The service was very very good!  

We were always checked on and asked if everything was to our liking.  

This may seem like nothing, but think about it, these days, where can we go that would give us such time and attention?  I only recall such service on the Business Class flights with Singapore Airlines.

The first starter, Yin and Yang Dips absolutely blew me away!

The dip in the background is a spicy minced pork tomato dip and the one in the foreground is the creamy prawn and minced coconut dip.
Both were so fragrant and exploding with different tastes, especially the coconut one!
Mr Bauer, who usually does not enjoy many, conflicting tastes in his mouth, gave this the two thumbs up.  The only problem is that the serving size was too tiny!
I seriously need a hugeass bowl of that creamy coconut dip, pronto!

 

The second starter, Salmon Ceviche $17.90 is my favorite dish of all.

 I love sashimi, and words cannot describe how beautiful this tasted, 

with a mix of lemon, onions, chillies, and a generous drizzle of truffle oil, topped with caviar.  

The serving size is also respectable, I had enough to keep eating it throughout dinner!

Our third starter, is an old Thai favourite, Larb Gai (Thai Chicken Salad).

I always order this whenever we go for Thai, so I've tasted a fair number of different sorts of Larb.

I found this so-so, preferring to have a stronger blend of spices in my Larb,  

but Mr Bauer was raving about this particular Larb, saying this is the best he has ever had.

 

Our fourth and final starter, Son-in-Law Eggs, or double-fried eggs drizzled in sweet sauce 

are a traditional favorite.  

Apparently, they were named such because moms would cook it as a 

warning to their future son-in-law to behave or have their nuts served up next.  

I found this dish interesting, but too sweet for my taste.  Plus, I am not a fan of hard boiled eggs. 

 We ordered two mains, and the first was this deep fried fish dish.

It was pretty ordinary, and I found the taste of fish overpowered by a thick tomato taste and the deep-fried batter.  

I also did not enjoy the chunks of peanuts they threw over it.  

To me, it tastes more like something I would eat at a local, Singaporean Zhi Char (cheap, home-style cuisine) and was not worth the price.  

Mr Bauer seemed to agree, because we each too one piece, and took away the rest.

 

It is a good thing we did too, because the final dish that came 

demanded all of our remaining stomach space - The F-Duck.

This is a crispy-skinned, roasted duck leg sitting in a pond of thick coconut red curry filled with veggies, pineapple and lychees.  

It was divine.  Mr Bauer's favorite dish that night.

Now, the interesting thing about this dish is that, when you eat the duck, 

you go... ok, good duck.  And when you sip the red curry, you go... ok, nice red curry.

But when you have the duck TOGETHER with the red curry, something amazing happens.

It's almost like the fat from below the duck skin melts into the hot red curry and creates this buttery, creamy texture, that swirls around the crispy duck skin and envelopes the tender duck.

All the reviews you might have read, raving about The F-Duck?  True.

*****

We truly did not have space for dessert, but we were told that the choices for that night were Mango Sticky Rice, a trio of ice-creams, or a Chef's Surprise. The dessert menu changes every night.

Red Opium is rated #8 out of 1496 restaurants in Perth www.tripadvisor.com

 Their website claims that the restaurant accepts cash only, 

but we were able to pay with MasterCard.

Red Opium is BYO.

Things Women Can Learn from The Bachelor

So over here in sunny Perth, we have just concluded a season of The Bachelor Australia, where 25 heavily made-up girls compete for the affections of one tall, tanned piece of deep thinking, beach strolling muscle called Tim.

In a painfully typical ending, the final episode came down to two girls - the Blonde vs. the Brunette, the Sweet and giggly girl vs. the Sexy, seductive siren... Anna vs. Rochelle.

Anna eventually won.  And all the relationships gurus around the world gave a huge sigh of relief.

Now, what can we learn from Anna the victor?

1)  Men don't seem to mind a bit of chubbiness.  In Tim's case, he preferred it.  Anna's double chin featured quite a lot during the season.  She was obviously one of the bigger girls in bikini.  Other than shots of her chest deep in water, or running into the water, back to the audience, the camera didn't really love bikini-clad Anna.  Rochelle on the other hand, had the body of a super model.  Wait, isn't she a pageant winner?  Rochelle's body didn't sway The Bachelor Tim.  I guess his body would be enough for both of them.

2)   The saccharine sweet smiles where your eyes crinkle up at the edges and husky giggles while flipping hair in any random space actually works!  Doesn't matter if your usual face is quite serious, even mildly fierce, in the presence of you love, make sure you melt down in a serious of uncontrollable chuckles.  It doesn't matter how you are actually feeling, men absolutely love it when you hide honesty behind those ever enduring shy giggles.

3)  Never, never tell a man you love him unless he either 1. tells you he loves you, or 2. asks you to say it before he does.  Why you would want to be with no.2, I'm not sure.  Ask Anna.  She was indeed the last of the final three girls to tell Tim that she loves him, and she got the man.  Playing hard-to-get has never been better exemplified.  Men love the chase, even if it is obviously an illusion, as in The Bachelor.

4)  It is absolutely essential to stoke a man's ego.  However, you should only do it when absolutely can no longer stand it and starts pouting his lips and stomping his feet, demanding for a list of things you love about him.  In fact, go ahead and put every attribute you love about him on paper and present it to him along with point 3) of this list.  He will love it.  Doesn't matter if you thought at first that this was rather "superficial", especially after only knowing him a couple of hours a week for 13 weeks.  Just block out your intellect and do it anyway.  You will Win!

and finally,

5)  Declare and repeat your virginity loud and often.  Make him feel like the only one.  Constantly remind him that if he choses you, he would have gone where no other man was ever important enough to go.  Even if you've had ex-lovers, call them "guys", never use the term "boyfriend" in front of your love, unless you are referring to him.

So now you know how to win at True Love.

Read the news report here.

God is So So Good

This is the story of how God provided a home for us.  It is a long and probably boring story, but I hope it will give you some insight into looking for a place in Perth

Since the last entry, it has been a journey of faith and prayer second guessing and desperate begging for God to help us!!

For the last three months, we had been spending every weekend going to Home Opens and every weekday searching for listed houses we might like. We had a budget that restricted us to certain parts of Perth and did not even bother looking at prime areas as that would just be much too expensive. 

Well, to be honest, I  didn't like any of the locations we had been searching around because I just found them much too ulu (deserted) for me.  Of course, this was only because I've only been here for  five months and am only familiar with areas around my university, my rented place, church, and town.  Any other part of Perth just seemed very foreign.  The two houses we put down offers on were also not in the ideal locations, to me, because it would take me ages to get to uni or town, but we thought that was all we could afford.

Thankfully (now), those offers got flatly rejected by the sellers.  Of course, when it happened then, we had to lick some small wounds and wonder if we should have increased our offer or go with what we believed was the value of the houses.  There was really a lot of self doubt and each time we made a decision, we had nothing really to go on except that we had committed this search to God and that He was smarter than us.

Neither of us had much experience in real estate, with me being a total foreigner, and Mr Bauer being practically a tourist himself, and while we did try our best to do some proper research googling, we could never be very sure if we knew what we were doing.  

Anyway, as mentioned in my previous post, we were on route to yet another disappointing Home Open (It was probably the worst one! They posted 2 bathrooms, but one of them was located OUTSIDE the house!!! ??!!) when we spotted a tiny sign showing a Home Open in the prestigious and sought after Murdoch Chase area.  We decided to just take a look for fun because we definitely could not afford something here.  It was very spacious, with large bedrooms and a huge back yard.  The only problem was that it was not furnished, but that was perfect for me because I would love to be able to design the interior myself!  (Mr Bauer would disagree, because he likes to be able to just move in.)  When Doug, the agent selling the house passed us the price guide, we were like meh.  It was completely out of our price range, as expected.  In fact, when Mr Bauer told him what we were prepared to pay, he almost had to scoff before telling us that that would probably not be considered by the owners.  Yes, house hunting in Perth is a very humbling experience.

I don't know what exactly happened in the next day, but somehow this much-too-expensive house was still on our minds and Mr Bauer, specifically, couldn't stop talking about it.  My practical side came out at this point and I just one-ear-in, one-ear-out to pacify him, but apparently, he had done some research on this area after seeing the house and told me excitedly that it was actually a VERY GOOD BUY in terms of value for money, location, investment etc. etc. and some other financial stuff that was too boring for me to remember. 

Anyway, the next day, we came up with a figure to offer.  It was about $50,000 less than what the owners expected, but that was really all we could afford.  The agent accepted our offer and told us that he will let us know what the owner thought.  We waited in agony for the next 48 hours before receiving a call from Doug, who annoyingly could not tell us over the phone but needed us to come down to his office the next day.  

We kept praying for God's will to be done.

The next day, while in the car, just before going to see Doug, we decided that if the owners counter-offered with an increase in $5000, we would be VERY HAPPY (jumping for joy type), if they increased by $10,000 we would not be jumping for joy, but we would still accept it.  And with heavy hearts, we promised each other that if it went any higher, we would both accept that it was not the house God wants for us and go back to hunting.

To our wonderful joy, Doug told us that the owners would like just $5000 more.  My jaw literally dropped.  I had to pull the offer papers towards us to make sure he was right.  Mr Bauer almost could not keep his poker face and flashed me a tiny smile.  

Being two people who were crazy in love, we thought that that was the end of it and the house would be ours once we got our finance approval sorted.  Having gone to many Home Opens and left our contact details in several places, we got approached by a Mortgage Broker who wanted to help us to find the best loan rates for the house.  We were probably too overjoyed that we naively and lazily went ahead with him without doing more research.  He presented us with the latest bank rates and told us that NAB was the lowest and that we should go with NAB.  He was also super confident that we would get the loan based on our stats and kept buttering us up saying the "banks would jump at us".    We really thought everything was alright and we would have no problems getting the requested loan amount approved.  He really made us believe that we did not have a thing to worry about.

FOUR days later, we got a call from this broker telling us the horrible news that NAB had rejected our loan application because of some inflexibility they had regarding documents needed.  We were obviously upset and thought that it was now over for us, that no bank would want us because we simply could not provide the required document.  My six sense only kicked in when the broker sent us a text saying "nothing can be done.  there is no other option.  so what are you going to do?"  I was quite taken aback by that text.  What do you mean "what are we going to do?"  Isn't it his job to give us more options?  Even if the major banks wouldn't lend us (yet to be proven at that point), surely you can find independent lenders or give us some other options???

I told Mr Bauer to screw him and we decided to look for our own lender.  But we didn't have much time.  According to Perth ruling, buyers only had about a couple of weeks to get finance approval before the house would be put up for offer again and it takes time to redo all the paper work, and wait for approval.  And that stupid agent had already wasted some of that time.  The next couple of days we were just emailing lenders and trolling forums to try and get some direction.  On top of this, both of us had final assignments to hand in!  It was quite a stressful time, but thank God, Mr Bauer managed to get a contact from Westpac who was willing to help us.

Not only did he give us a solution to our missing document problem, he revealed that Westpac's rates were MUCH lower than the NAB one that idiot broker offered!  He even threw in the Black Altitude Credit Card with 40,000 bonus points that could be used as Frequent Flyer miles!!!  When we were searching for a credit card, we could not even consider the Black because it was just way too expensive and we thought we did not meet the criteria.  Needless to say, we were very thankful and could only hope that Westpac would approve our loan in time for the offer and acceptance period.  

And...

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.

.

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.

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Just seven hours ago, we got a call from Westpac informing us that 

Hurray!! Our loan has been approved!!!  

 

Leaving things with God has helped us to get things we originally thought were impossible for our current position - a home in a fantastic location (It is a walk to Murdoch University!!!), a low low interest rate on the loan and a great credit card that can save us travel money!  We are absolutely thankful for his tender mercies to us, even though we had doubt in our hearts.  Indeed, Jesus is our Great High Priest who perfects our imperfect prayers to God the Father.  All we had to do was pray!

Going Public

My partner starts his new job in Perth City this week, so we could no longer put off our promise to try out the public transport system. You see, I haven't got my driver's license yet, so once he starts work, I would need to be able to get around on my own for errands or entertainment. Also, because it is so expensive and crowded to drive to the city, he will be driving to a train station, and riding the train to the city.

Nobody we know takes public transport in Perth, and I'd already become used to the bewildered stares I get whenever I ask our friends questions like "is it close to the train station?", or "do you know what bus I can take to the library?", so I was bracing myself for the worst. I'd expect it to be really *dodgy, with broken seats and poor ventilation. But hey, I come from Singapore and taking the bus is second nature to me, so it shouldn't be anything I couldn't handle ;)

We walked about 3 minutes in the blazing sun, following the newly, and thankfully reinstated Google Maps to get to our bustop. When Mr Bauer pointed out that it should be just ahead of us, I squinted in puzzlement, because all I saw was a field with what looked like an ad for a mayor of sorts. 

"It looks like an ad, babe." I commented. 

"Honey, it's a bench. This is it, our bustop."

Thankfully, that would be the last of our surprise, and I made a mental note to bring my UV protection umbrella next time I need to take a bus.  The bus we took was clean and the bus driver was so helpful in explaining the ticket and fare to us. The train was also stunning! Extremely clean and well maintained, with front facing cushioned seats. The commute to the city took us about 30 minutes in total, and cost us under $4 each; probably about the same as parking, but we can stay in town for as long as we like, and we could skip the rush hour traffic jam, and travel fatigue.

We spent the time in the city setting up our Transperth SmartRider card (ez-link) and activating autoload with our bank account to get 25% reduction in fares (hurray!), and also having this:

Tsukemen - literally means "dipping noodles"

And I spent the entire time jabbing Mr Bauer for having never taken the public transport before and being a complete tourist like me!

*dodgy

adjective

1. (Brit., Austral., & N.Z) nasty, offensive, unpleasant, revolting, distasteful, repellent, unsavoury, obnoxious, repulsive, objectionable, repugnant He was a bit of a dodgy character.

2. (Brit., Austral., & N.Z) risky, difficult, tricky, dangerous, delicate, uncertain, problematic(al), unreliable, dicky (Brit. informal), dicey (informal, chiefly Brit.), ticklish, chancy (informal) Predicting voting trends is a dodgy business.

3. second rate, poor, inferior, mediocre, shoddy, low-grade, low-quality, substandard, for the birds (informal), pants (slang), end-of-the-pier (Brit. informal), rubbishy, piss-poor (slang), bush-league (Austral. & N.Z. informal), half-pie (N.Z. informal) cheap hotels and dodgy food

Fremantle

The Perth locals call Fremantle, Freo.  Go on, give it a shot.  After awhile it will come naturally :)

Freo is one of my favourite places in Perth.  Here, it is cool in the blistering summer, with a continuous, gentle breeze, and warmer in the cool winter.  The people here are always chilled out and walking with a bounce in their step.

One place I love alot in Freo is the New Edition Bookshop on High Street.  I've always wanted a dining table with different chairs (I hate store bought sets! Gaah!) and I think they do it very nicely in this book shop :)

 

Houses in Freo are also quite lovely.  There are many Italians living in Freo and they certainly brought their style and charm along.  Some of the streets we walked reminds me of Florence, Italy.

A stop at Freo's famous Little Creatures Brewery ends the perfect sunny, breezy saturday.

I tried the Dark Ale, which was extremely smooth and yummy!