Posted by
u l a n
on
Saturday, June 20, 2009 at
10:58 PM.
I got my kitchen implements and my ingredients today for my lemon cake project. I'm using
Jamie Oliver's recipe which I found in his book
Cook with Jamie. =)
I wasn't able to get ground almonds, but a little Googling taught me how
using a knife and a blender. It was fairly simple, though a little tedious. Before you can even grind the nuts, you have to blanch them to loosen the skin (the brown stuff, according to what I've read online, is bitter).
So I blanched the almonds -- dunked them in boiling water for a couple of minutes, then plunged them in cold water -- and skinned them. It took me a good 15 minutes to get it done. Now to bash them up into tiny pieces, I tried to do it with a knife, patiently chopping them until they're tiny. After 10 minutes of doing that, I noticed that I still had a LOT of almonds left to chop. I brought out the blender and pulsed the rest. It work. The article I found online said it would, but I didn't trust my blender. Oops, sorry blender. Haha. But, there, it worked.
After that, I researched on how to measure butter. I have it in a 227g block. And according to this
guide, a 227g block is equivalent to 1 cup. The wrapper of the butter had guide lines to show where to cut, so that helped. I cut the block in half (my recipe needs 1/2 cup) and set it aside in the ref. Tomorrow, I'll let it out to soften it while I'm greasing the baking pan.
I sure hope all goes well tomorrow! I'm quite excited. It'll be a completely home-cooked meal for us tomorrow: F is making the pasta, I'm making dessert!
Labels: food, home
Posted by
u l a n
on
Friday, June 19, 2009 at
11:45 PM.
The pouch of Nera (my first Creative Zen Vision M) was a super cool Totoro pouch given to me by a friend. Alas, it got stolen from my bag while I was watching Pan's Labyrinth. Totally my fault. Damn my carelessness!
After my player got stolen, I bought another one; exactly the same kind. I got a nice orange corduroy pouch for it from Golla. It was mighty pricey for a sleeve. But, I loved it. I wanted to get another one so I could have it washed, but it was impractical to spend so much (700?) on a second Golla pouch.
Fast forward two years (my orange pouch has turned a dull, greyish color; no longer as vibrant as in the photo), I found similar pouches made locally! They were selling for Php224 each; some variants were selling for less because the material was thinner. I got one in a nice grey material. Yahoo!
Among the many many designs available, I happened to choose a design that's similar to my orange one haha! I'm so consistent. I love it. Now I can have the other one washed :-P
Labels: gadgetry, home, photographs
Posted by
u l a n
on
at
12:01 AM.
Finally had my short mid-year vacation.
Breaks are great — even the ones you don’t think you need end up being good for you in some way. That is, if you let the break work.
But, yes, in general, we all want breaks from our everyday lives. My 3-day stay in Baguio was refreshing, even if we didn’t do anything extraordinary. We stayed in bed when it was raining, we took walks when we wanted to, we browsed the market, we food-tripped. I loved it.
Brought just one camera for a change (not counting the one on my celphone), and 5 rolls of film. I will say it again. I love my LC-A.
Labels: lomo, photographs
Posted by
u l a n
on
Friday, June 12, 2009 at
12:18 AM.
Posted by
u l a n
on
Tuesday, June 02, 2009 at
11:36 PM.
I finally replaced the falling-apart office lamp i’ve been using as my bedside light with this nice
Knappa Tulpan lamp I got from the
store that sells Ikea stuff in Makati. It was on sale; I got it for Php 999. It was originally at Php1200, I think.
I’m still in my all-white-except-for-my-turquoise-accent-wall-and-red-sofa phase. It works really well for my small and sun-less unit. It brightens up the place and it looks really modern, too. I realize that I’m not a country or shabby chic-y kind of person. I like it modern or vintage modern (is that what you call modern design from the 60s? Well, that’s what I like.).
Anyway, I’m typing this by the light of the new lamp. When I took it home from the store, it came in a box very similar to a pizza box. Once you’ve attached the pole to the base, all that’s left to do is to form the shade. The shade consists of 12 pre-cut vinyl(? or whatever kind of plastic) flat pieces. You bend these and attach them to a ring with tiny knobs that go through the holes in the plastic sheets. Brilliant!
***
The next thing I’d like to do for my home is to either make or buy a headboard for my bed. I’m partial to those panels padded with foam and covered with a fabric. I’ve seen a few DIY articles on it on the web. But, it’s a very unwieldy project.
Another option I’m toying with is to put wall decals at the head of my bed, like these:
Better Homes and Gardens has a simple alternative to upholstering plywood. Using an artist’s canvas and covering it with fabric! It’s much simpler. 
Another option is to simply hang a group of similar photos, framed, above my bed. But for some reason, I don’t want to do that. Even though I’d have the photos for the project.
I’m leaning towards the wall decal and the fabric-covered artist’s canvas… The wall decal may be in off-white or in bright colors. I don’t know yet! =)
Labels: home
Posted by
u l a n
on
Thursday, May 07, 2009 at
12:46 AM.
yey for
1. mixed vegetables soup at Ludos
2. being able to go home at a decent hour
3. getting a ride home
4. rico's 'antukin' and the rest of the album
5. merciful sleep
Posted by
u l a n
on
Thursday, April 23, 2009 at
9:10 PM.
Had a bunch of new buttons made. I drew these with a marker, scanned them, colored and laid them out in photoshop; emailed the designs to my buttonmaker and voila! Happy happy buttons. I wore the bee today.
Labels: art, crafts
Posted by
u l a n
on
Tuesday, April 07, 2009 at
10:47 PM.
5 stars for:
1. Chowking's Nai Cha
2. Sunny summer weekends
3. Sketchcrawling
4. New pencils (and sharpening them)
5. Wai Ying
Labels: art, food, lomo, paperjournal, photographs
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