rants

Happy Chinese New Year! Update: the year of the monkey! 🐒

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Going with the bandwagon.. Happy Chinese New Year of the Monkey!

So, what’s happening in my life at the moment. Pretty much not a lot, I am working a part-time job and looking for a second job in the barista branch. Nowadays it is hard to find a job where they would just take a chance and hire you.

General speaking: they are all looking for thé personnel with a degree and experience and even if you don’t have a degree you still need to have experience. Not much companies want to invest in their employees anymore.

So here I am in a city with lots of competition of finding a job, I’m also entering into a branch I am not familiar with. Therefore still in search for a starting place in my road to become somewhat successful. Not hard, just takes time and energy to find the one to work for and gain the needed experience.

I would work for free just to get the experience needed and continue to pursue the life/dream that I want.

To conclude, in the year of the Monkey 🐒 I wish you all prosperous year and may your dreams come true!

Keep Experimenting!

Panna cotta with mango puree

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The start of the year has not been good to me. Being sick and taking things slow (unproductive). Three months have gone by and I have more or less settled down in Amsterdam. Still I am nowhere near where I want to be. I am now at a crossroad where I can continue to do the things I am doing. (work, social life and living on my own) Or continue to aim for the things that I want in life. (the patisserie/dessert and coffee shop dream, being a barista/ sweetsmaker, cooking-enthusiast.) So, what is my next step?

It gives me a sense of happiness/fulfillment when I make things for the people around me. If the people I serve like it, ‘succes’ and if they don’t ‘too bad, next cooking experiment.’ This time I just picked a dessert which was easy to make and made it into the mess like in the pic. ;P

Ingredients

500ml cream
4 sheets of gelatin
30 grams of sugar
2 packs of vanilla sugar (8 grams a pack, it is sugar infused with vanilla flavour)
2 ripe mango

Start by getting a small bowl and fill it with cold water. When filled take out the gelatin sheets from the package and drown it piece by piece in the bowl of water. Let it stand and start with the cream. Light up a stove and put a pan on it, pour all the sugar and vanilla sugar in it and add the cream to it. Dissolve the sugar and let the cream heat up, up to the point before boiling. (it is when you start to see air bubbles starting to come up.) While heating the cream try to stir the cream for evenly heating.
After it is heated up, turn off the stove and remove the pan from the stove. The soaked gelatin should be jelly like, take it out of the water and squeeze out as much water from the gelatin. Add the squeezed gelatin to the warm cream and stir it in until all is dissolved.

Pour the pan with cream and gelatin into cups and let it cool off and refrigerate the cups. (cover the cups with foil before refrigerating) Let it form in the refrigerator for six hours or even a day.

The next day peel the mangoes and cut out the meat of the mango. Use a half a mango for mango cubes and the rest of the mango meat is used for the puree. This can be done with a blender.

The rest is to plate up. To get the Panna Cotta out of the cup is done by holding the sides of the cups against a running hot water tap. It warms the sides of the cups and melt the gelatin a bit but just enough to separate the cup and the panna cotta. Plate it up and done. Enjoy your Panna Cotta with Mango puree. Like, Share and Keep Experimenting!

Timed-out: holidays and health

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Happy new year!

It has been two weeks since I last posted. The holidays had taken most of my time to do any other thing than this blog. Also I have catched a cold and It doesn’t look like I will be feeling better anytime soon. I got sick during my stay of my Portuguese adventure in Lisbon. After Lisbon, I continued to work for two days until new years eve and went to my parents that night. So not much rest in between. The part of me being sick was spend in Zwolle, having a running nose and a sore throat. I came back to Amsterdam in the weekends to do some cleaning and prepping things for work.
The world doesn’t care if I’m sick. The worst part of being sick is behind me and I have been feeling a little tinsy bit better, but still not much rest. At the moment I’m still blowing my nose like crazy and time to rest properly is far to be seen.

Working and staying up late to work some more isn’t really the best way to get healthy again. I just cannot neglect doing the things that I have signed up for. Consistency is needed for growth and I cannot and do not want to stop when it gets tough.

I try to get my rest and become healthy again, but I will continue to do the things that I have to do. That’s it for now, I wish everyone a Happy and Healthy 2016. Have fun, enjoy the new chapter of 2016 and Keep Experimenting.

A quick update! 31 barista-course Lisbon

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This won’t be much of a post. Just some info or rants of what’s happening in my life. My journey to creating a life that I want continues and thus far I have made some steps. Moving out to Amsterdam and taking up the adventure of life. I have gained a level, I leveled-up from 30 to 31 in the past week. It didn’t felt any different from the previous leveling-ups. Just the number has changed and maybe some physical stats, but not much. I just gained a full year of experience of life.

After turning lvl 31, I was ready to attend the timely event that was set beforehand. The road to the barista-class was opened and I could acquire the class change. I moved to the area where the barista-job questline could be acquired. It was an easy travel riding the White-‘Sprinter’-bird to the east-town of Adam. Once arrived at the Roasting-shop I have met one of the quest giver and some companions to take up the challenge of the barista-questline. We had a nice briefing from the questgiver and could take the first few quest of cupping and answering a written-test quest. This was the First part of the barista-class questline. Together with my two other companions we defeated the Test-monster and was approved of receiving an Achievement certificate of the SCEA. It will be send in due time.

As happy as we were, the group split up and continued to work on the questline on their own.

I have been grinding some gold in between the barista-event. And continue to do so until my Christmas event starts. The plan is to ride the airship to another country and enjoy our exploration of the town Lisbon. One thing for sure is that I try to experience some ‘Pastei de nata’ and recover some stamina to continue my journey and my story.

This is what is awaiting for me in the coming days. 

Live the life that you want and Keep Experimenting!

Missing inspiration… The salad story.

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I am sitting in a coffee franchise, drinking a grande caramel latte and not knowing what to write about. Inspiration has been missing for the last two weeks. I have been pretty much settled in Amsterdam, working part-time, having social events and going to the gym two times a week. However at times I feel unfulfilled with what I have now. I know I am starting a new chapter of my life story, but I am a bit impatient to get where I want to be. This feeling of not going forward tends to occur when I’m having lots of free time to spare. I shouldn’t bitch about, because a lot of people are to busy to have time to spare.

First world problem, right? We should be more grateful for the things we have and I am grateful for having a warmhearted family, good friends and a good life up till now.

I have the future in my own hands and by being active and trying, I can create things that I like. So this dish was something I wanted after a Monday-morning in the gym. Something healthy and some ingredients that I still had stored in the kitchen.

Ingredients: (for 2 portions)

1 Lettuce
1 Red pepper (capsicum)
Halve a Cucumber
1 sweet and fruity Apple
200 grams of Feta cheese
50 grams of Cashew nuts
Quarter of a Lemon
20mL of Extra virgin Olive oil

(optional)
200 grams of Sliced Turkey breast meat
Some salt and pepper
Some oil or butter

Preparing the Salad

Take the sliced turkey meat and season it with salt and pepper. Heat up a fry or grill-pan, when it is hot enough add some oil or butter on the pan. Add the turkey breast in the pan and grill it till it is done. When ready put the turkey aside on a plate.

Get the lettuce and cut it in half from top to bottom and cut up each half of the lettuce from the top end to the bottom end in stripes. Throw away the bottom part. Take the Red pepper and cut it also in half from top to bottom. Remove the insides and the green top of the red pepper. Cut the red pepper also into stripes from top to bottom. Get the cut up veggies and rinse it in a colander. Wash the cucumber and slice it into disks. Take out the feta and cut it into cubes. Wash the apple and cut it in half from top to bottom. Remove the core, the top and the end. Julienne (a french name of cutting technique) the apple parts. Grab a big bowl and mix all the lettuce, red pepper, cucumber, apple, feta and cashew nuts all together. In a separate bowl add some Extra virgin olive oil and agitate it with the lime juice. Mix it well and the two liquids thickens.

Plate up, add the turkey and the salad mix. Give it a few spoons of the dressing-like mixture and it is done.

It is easy to make and I hope you like it. Like, share and Keep Experimenting!

Where is the Holiday Spirit? Here, near Deez Nutz!

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I don’t like this time of the year especially in the Netherlands. The thing is that around this time in the Low-lands it is cold, windy and very wet; the days are short, getting up and going to work when it is dark, leaving work and getting back home in the same darkness. It is as if everything is telling me to hibernate and skip this time of the year. It really sucks to go outside, the grey-and-sad-looking sky, crying it’s many tears down on to the planes of our small, small ‘Kikkerlandje’ (A Dutch saying).

However it is also the end of the year with it’s Festive holidays and Joyable gatherings. The many birthdays of my family in these months, the Oh-so-critisized Traditional Childrens-holiday of ‘SinterKlaas’, The Commercially known holiday of the birth of Christ ‘Christmas’ and the End of the Year celebration of ‘Oud en Nieuw’ on the day of switching to 2016.

It is the time to spend some time with family and friends and I am blessed with them being in my life. So to have some ‘Yummie in the Tummy’ I present a triple recipe in one with some seasonal ingredients of autumn and winter. Prepare yourself Winter is coming!


Muffin-sized cakes: for 6 cups
Apple-Cinnamon-Pecan
Matcha-White Chocolate-Macadamia
Chocolate-Cream Cheese-Oreo-Hazelnut

Ingredients:

Apple-Cinnamon-Pecan
150 grams of Flour
80 grams of Sugar
100 grams of Butter
20 grams of Cornstarch
8 grams of Baking Soda
10 grams of Cinnamon
80 mL of Milk
50 grams of Pecan nuts
2 Large-sized Eggs
1 Apple
1 tablespoon of lemon juice

Matcha-White Chocolate-Macadamia
120 grams of Flour
80 grams of Sugar
100 grams of Butter
20 grams of Cornstarch
8 grams of Baking Soda
15 grams of Matcha (green tea powder)
80 mL of Milk
50 grams of Macadamia nuts
2 Large-sized Eggs
100 grams of White Chocolate

Chocolate-Cream Cheese-Oreo-Hazelnut
120 grams of Flour
80 grams of Sugar
100 grams of Cream-cheese butter
20 grams of Cornstarch
8 grams of Baking Soda
50 grams Cocoa-powder
80 mL of Milk
50 grams of Hazelnut
2 Large-sized Eggs
50 grams of Oreo-cookies

   

The Easy way of making these Cakes.

Have every ingredients out on the cooking table and have the butter and cream-cheese butter at room temperature. Measure the ingredients and set them aside. Peel the apple and chop it up into small cubical pieces, add lemon to it to prevent browning. Chop the chocolates, oreos and the various nuts and put them separately into small bowls for later. Pre-heat the oven at 180-190 degrees Celsius.

First up, take a mixing bowl and put in the butter. Use a hand-mixer to mix the butter to a soft and creamy substance. Add the sugar, milk and eggs and mix it again. The mix should be clear of lumps and mixed well. Next step is to add in the powders. Use a sieve and add all the powders: flour, cornstarch, baking soda and the recipe’s powder (cinnamon, matcha or cocoa-powder.) Sieve in the powders to prevent forming of lumps and mix it all with the handmixer. A thick batter-like substance should be seen. Final step is to add in the apple and pecan-nuts (or the white chocolate and macadamia-nuts, the oreo-cookies and hazel-nuts.) Use a spatula to mix in the Last ingredients.

When it is mixed in, lay out the cups and pour in the cake-mix. Put the cups with the mix in the oven for 25-30 min. Check up on the cakes at 25min with sate-skewer and depending on the mix type it can be done or need a little bit more time. (When you poke the skewer down to the bottom of the cup and pull it out; the skewer should be clear or a little bit oily. If it is otherwise, it isn’t done yet.)

The Long way of making these Cakes

I did not have the time to use this method, because it was already late at night and I did not wanted to disturb my house-mates with the hand-mixer noise. It would have made a more lighter and fluffier cake.

Measure the ingredients and prepare it like the first part above. (peeling and chopping.)

Next would be melt the butter in a pan to have melted butter. Separate the egg yolk and the egg white.

The egg-white would be hand-mixed to soft peak, then sugar would be added and mixed further to stiff-peak (meringue.) In another bowl are the melted butter, milk and the egg-yolks mixed together. When both bowls are ready, I would use a spatula to scoop up some of the meringue and gently fold it into the butter-milk-and-yolk-mix. Continue until all of the meringue are folded into the mix. Next part would be to add the powders gradually with a sieve and fold it in as well. It have to be added gradually or else all the work to add air into the mix will be done for nothing. Finally, add the last ingredients such as apples and pecan nuts and fold it all again. The added air and folding technique will make the Cake-mix more airy and gives it more of a rise in the oven. Because of the rise of cake, it is best to fill the cups half-full otherwise it might droop out of the container/cup.

Put the cups with mix in the oven for 20-30 min at 180-190 degrees Celsius and check up on it at 20min timer to see if it is ready or it need more time to bake.

I will have to try the Long-method in order to see the results for myself. But for now have fun trying, Like, Share and Keep Experimenting!

Update #4 Change of schedule?

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I have not posted regularly at a fixed day like in the past and it’s kinda bugging me.

To be honest I like chaos, but it’s structured chaos that I like.  As of now the structure of maintaining this blog is somewhat gone. So there will be a shift of schedule, since my weekly schedule has changed.
My new posting day will be on Tuesdays or Wednesdays instead of on Fridays. This has to do with my move to Amsterdam and my current job which takes up time in the weekend.

My workdays are mostly from Wednesday to Sunday, depending on my work-schedule. Not much time to do anything besides cooking, cleaning and groceries. Monday and Tuesday are currently my off days, but I am planning to work on these days as well with a second job.

Aside from work and blogging, I have been rather busy doing various things. Somewhat structured in my planning are the Monday and Thursday gym days and I would have done a third day but Saturday is already a packed day to do anything. If it is not work than it is time spend with friends. (Yeah, I started my social life again XD.)

So what have I been up to? Well, I have made steps for becoming a barista. And No, not changing into hipster or anything like that. Barista in the sense of actually developing skills for my own store. I have signed up for two barista-courses and they are with certificates if I pass and complete it.

Furthermore, I have been rekindling connections with some friends. “It was time again to be ME with positivity and a purpose in life. I hid myself in the past and was isolated from the world. It was a dark time, but now I feel more alive. Anxious at times, thrilled other times but I am having a blast the way things are now. I am finally tearing a hole in my wall of comfort, breaking the bricks of self-isolation one at a time.” Hmm, a bit philosophical in this part.

Social life happn’d. Saturday was just like I said a busy day. I went to a cooking-workshop in Rotterdam on Halloween. It started at 4p.m. I went a few hours earlier cause an old classmate had a one year anniversary of her own shop, also in Rotterdam. It was fun to see them again.

The workshop began around 4 o’clock at Het Zesde Geluk or The Sixth Luck translated. As the participants starting to arrive I looked on my phone and read the dishes that we were going to make. The dishes are listed in the picture below. (in Dutch)
After the workshop was over, some of the participants went for some drinks. It was not entirely a coincidence. I’m in a friend-group that occasionally do activities together and we planned to have a drink and going out that night. So that is what we did, a couple of drinks beforehand and clubbing afterwards. Sunday was also planned, it was to chill out and dimsum. ;P

That is it for now, Like or Share and Keep Experimenting!

Update #3 From too much time to busy, busy, busy.

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After my last post of having a lot of free time and looking for stuff to do, then *BAM* An 180 degrees turn of events happens and a fully planned week in a blink of an eye.

So what happened, I was searching for a job and looked into projects that I had on my bucketlist. I had all the time in the world, a day was planned in the weekend for a games festival in Utrecht. I went there with high expectations, however it turned out to be so-so. We left the event for down-town food and (window)-shopping. I even bought a book at a bookstore in (fore-sight of spare times.) Later on I went back to Zwolle for the weekend, in order to pick up some leftover stuffs back to my new place. Last weekend went by steadily, I traveled back to Amsterdam and proceeded with my plan of monday’s workout at the gym, however I got a call on sunday for a job that I applied to, to come by at wednesday.

Thus, this week started relaxed with monday workout and easy-cooking, tuesday exploring Amsterdam and easy-cooking, then things started to change on wednesday. I started to get busy and with ‘busy’ I mean work. Don’t get me wrong I like to work, I rather work than doing nothing. However the instant change of lots of free time to no time to spare is unimaginable quick, which made my time flew by before I could comprehend what just happened. And right now it is already monday 1 a.m. Today on sunday was a planned dimsum with my families and the time flew by.

While I am writing this post, it daunt me that it will just get busier and busier from now on. I still got stuff hanging around that I want/need to do. Like getting my SVH certificate, reading the book I got on saturday (last week), writing my business plan for my pastry/dessert-café, blogging and writing recipes, social-media, a few little projects, planning the holiday and many more. I’m getting tired and excited at the same time. Oh well,  I’ll keep posting about my journey, so give a like, share or do whatever  you want and Keep Experimenting!

Wing

Update #2, Finaly moved to the big city of Amsterdam.

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It has been a long time since I last posted.
So what happened thus far. I had worked the last days at my previous job until my contract ended and didn’t do much. I was looking for a room in Amsterdam and it took some time to find one. Amsterdam is too damn packed and hell of expensive to live. But still I found my place and moved out. This is my first week in Amsterdam since I moved and it takes some time to settling in. A lot of stuffs are bought and I joined a gym.

I had my first workout, which was the big three from youtuber Bart (Justkiddingfilms), plus a 20 min cardio-run. I got real tired after the training.
(it was supposed to be a 30 min run, but I dislike running. weak-minded? perhaps.)

So what are the coming posts or things from me? Well I am still looking for a job at the moment. I would be great if it is in the direction that I want to do, but I can not be too picky about a job right now, need the money for living out here.

In time when I get inspiration to cook some good meals, I’ll post the recipes.
Till then, Like or share and enjoy experimenting.

Escapeism, procrastination, self-sabotaging and dealing with it.

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Ever had the feeling of not wanting to do stuff that are semi-important. The things that are not immediately your top priority, but are still important in the long run. Or having the discipline to do stuff regularly but neglecting it instead, because it is not fun and tiresome to do. Well it happened to me.

So, what happened? Well I am on my way to move out and leaving the job where I am currently working. The things that need to be happening is that I have to find a place to stay in Amsterdam and getting new job to make a living. It is not hard but not fun to do and with that, I started to wander off to do things that are “fun” to do but not very productive or helpful for my upcoming adventure.

I escaped into the world of gaming and alternative reality of youtube and manga. These are things that I like to do in my spare time but I can over do it by neglecting the things that are important. Which result into procrastination or simply laziness.

When I first started writing this blog it was great, it was exciting and fun, but after a while, it became more like work and for work you need to have the discipline to follow it through and here is where I started to neglect and the self sabotaging began. It is to delay a blog post at start and beginning to procrastinate and doing other stuff instead of getting post done in a regular, disciplined and timely way.

Yeah so, what the F is wrong, nothing… but laziness and that’s not a good way to go through with this. Need to work, to play hard.

In a way I have to redeem myself in updating this blog regularly. In a way I have to continue work hard and be disciplined to write every week.

ps. I do not know how  daily bloggers can do it, they must like to blog very much.