Off to Cebu Again

Last Tuesday, we went to Cebu again to have my father's heart checked. My brother, Jonathan, was there ahead of us as he was already doing his share of job hunting. Upon arriving there, we met up at a pension house that I ended up hating. I kept repeating that I'm never going back there ever again. It was noisy and so uncomfortable.

Anyhoo, enough rant. Let's go to the good stuff. Our schedule was early the next day so while we were waiting,  we went malling and had dinner at Sunburst. They're known for their fried chicken and my parents claimed it to be the best. So when the opportunity arrived, I went for a go and grabbed it. We ordered molo soup, chicken drumsticks, their version of chopsuey and their lumpia shanghai. I must say, I loved the chicken...not too salty and the skin is thin and not starchy.The Molo soup was good. The lumpia is so-so but the chopsuey is not good. It was something [I thought to myself] that I could figure out cooking at home.

Molo Soup, Fried Chicken and Chopsuey

Lumpia Shanghai

We went home after and prepared for the check up the next day. To make the story short, the check up went fine and the test results were okay. My father still has a healthy heart. After the check up, we went to another mall this time and had lunch there. Sorry, no photos. I was too hungry. Anyhoo, we just had it at the Food Court. But my visit to Cebu is never complete without paying a visit to Leona Cakes and Pastries. I bought my favorite Choco Chip bread and a slice of Mocha-Choco Mousse to take home. 

this one tasted good... :) soft, creamy and not to sweet.

I also got to use my Green Bag Lady bag there. :D

Brownie and Mocha Chip Oatmeal Drop

I've been meaning to do this before but never got the chance until last night. I saw this post from Ate Claire's site and I remember commenting that I will make some soon... and from scratch. I made them but not really soon soon. :) You see, I've searched for a good brownie recipe and decided on one last night from Diamonds for Dessert, a new site I found at Tastespotting.com. And to make it a little easier, I used the remains of the Mocha Chip Oatmeal cookie/bar dough I made days ago.

So here's the end product.

I made two batches. One Brownie batch and one Brownie Mocha Chip Drop.

Here are the real end products.

And here are the brownies... very good tasting ones.. :D

Mocha Chip Oatmeal Bars

I super love the Apple Cinnamon Cookies from Quaker Oats and I was inspired to make my own version.[though not Apple Cinnamon.] I made use of the ingredients I had in stock. I tried baking the mixture I made as cookies but with the size of my oven, I never found a cookie sheet that fits in it perfectly. So I used aluminum foil instead and end up having imperfectly shaped but still good tasting cookies. This one though, didn't work with the foil as the cookies were gooey and sticky thus making them hard to remove. I ended up baking them as bars in a loaf pan.

Here they are.







Mocha Chip Oatmeal Bars

1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 1/2 cup flour
1 1/4 cup rolled oats
a pinch of baking soda
a pinch of baking powder
1 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup mocha chips

1. Preheat oven at 350F.
2. Sift together all dry ingredients.
3. Cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
4. Add egg and beat well.
5. Add vanilla and milk
6. Mix in the dry ingredients and the mocha chips.
7. Chill the dough for about 30 minutes.
8. Bake for 13-15 minutes.
9. Cool for about 10 minutes then cut into desired sizes.

Enjoy! :)

Limited Edition

Today was quite a busy one. In the morning, I went to church to participate in the remaining parts of the workshop that was meant to prepare us for the activities this summer. I didn't get to finish though because I had some baking to do. I made for a cousin what I call a LIMITED EDITION cupcakes. It's a mix of two flavors in one cupcake. I rarely ever do them because they take me a lot of time to make but if a close friend or relative really wants one, I think twice and mostly end up making the cuppies for them. So here goes.

My camera's with my brother so I took the shots using my phone camera.

Cookies and Cream under Chocolate

Another View


Here's a pretty GUMAMELA I found at my Lola[Grandma]'s garden.

Is it just me or is Blogger acting weird lately? I'm having a hard time editing my post.

Almost Forgotten

Would you believe we almost forgot that it was our parents' anniversary yesterday?

Yeah, we quite almost did. Even my mom almost forgot. We really didn't make a big fuss about it before because they never told us the date when we were young. We only took note of the date when we were browsing through some documents and found their marriage contract. That explains why we almost always forget about it.

And so yeah, better late than never. I whipped up and decorated a chocolate cake, again from the microwave since we had little time left. After that, on to some picture taking and then some eating. :D

here's the finished product

and here they are. :)

Something 'Green' and Cake Balls

Yey! :D My 25th Post. [Nothing.. just happy about it. :) ]

And I have a few reasons to celebrate too apart from this being 25th and I'm so excited to share them with you. I have to warn you though that these are just little things that I'm very happy about.

Number 1: I got my green bag from Green Bag Lady from the mail yesterday. It's not literally green but the fabric and colors are pretty. Its size is just right and fits a lot of things. Ooooh I'm loving it. Definitely a keeper.

Just so you know, Green Bag Lady is an artist from the US who makes bags and sends them as gifts to spread the word of using fabric instead of plastic bags to minimize the negative impact of plastics to the environment. Her dad and some volunteers help her out in making and sending the bags. I just happened to stumble on her page sometime ago through Ate Claire's blog. I saw a bag I liked and so I commented. Later, her dad a.k.a Bagette Dad sent me an email to tell me that they'd like to send me a bag. So to make the story short, I got the bag yesterday from the post office.

Here are some photos.

Here it is. On top of it is the envelope that held it.

authentic :)

guess I'm the first one in the country to have her bag.

*happy smile :D

And on to Number 2: I made some smoother cake balls last night. Thanks to the video I found on Ate Claire's site. They're still made of the microwave chocolate cake recipe but with Peanut Butter Buttercream this time as inspired by Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.

oh look at those beauties... :D

here's one for me.

[okay, I lied. I ate three last night ;) ]

and you won't know it has peanut butter until you get to take a bite.

sorry I didn't get a shot of the insides. i was totally lost in it that i forgot. :D

Awesome April

has just begun.

I woke up early yesterday to prep my Pop so we could go to our little fishermen's warf to witness the first harvest our our fish-friends-now-food, the Milkfish better known at our place as BANGUS!

harvesting mode.

[It was really fun watching the men trying to catch the fish with the net only seeing the fish fly over them. They did rounds of catching but still never finished until today. The had to stop at high tide.]

fresh from the sea.

[aren't they lovely? Some bones got stuck on my throat today. I'm okay now and I ain't giving up eating them at all. ]

Next Topic.

Family gatherings are just plain fun. I like having little chitchats with some cousins and aunts... I also like seeing little children run around, shout and speak like big people do... making negotiations using their toys and making their own game rules. It makes me miss those days when I was just a kid playing house with my older cousins and allowing them to feed us petals. Last night was one of those fun gatherings because it was a joint graduation party for some of my cousins and it was kinda sad too because one of them is leaving us and no one can tell how long she will be away. Anyhoo, enough for the sentiments.

I was busy yesterday but it's not the kind that gets me ranting. It's the fun kind of busy because it's for the said family gathering. My cupcake tower also made its show again last night... the same chocolate cupcakes but different owners this time. My aunt asked me to make them and you can imagine what I went through making those. Baking and frosting about 48 cupcakes in about 5 hours? But I don't want to complain because I must admit, I had fun. I also think that baking for family or close friends add an additional amount of pressure for perfection. So yeah, I did my best and thankfully the batches turned out really great. I also baked some cookies days before as my present to the kiddos who graduated from preschool.

On to some pictures. I didn't take much because I was to tired to do so. I only chatted my way through the night with an old college friend.

Here we go.

girly cookies

boy cookies

[Both cookies were inspired by Bakeat350 and Sweetopia]

I know, they scream for more practice. :D

And here's the cupcake tower and the cookies laid out on the dessert table. :D

Now, my cousins have left and there are a few still staying.

Oh, did I tell you that we don't have water right now? Our water pump broke so we have to ask [or buy(?) ] water from our neighbors.

And I burnt a small part of my left hand yesterday with the glue gun. Arggh.