Reunion of Old Friends

Thank GOD for a wonderful time last weekend reuniting with two groups of old friends; one from my secondary school days and the other from our previous church.

My secondary school friends and our spouses met for steamboat last Saturday at Vincent's lovely home. We have known each other for about 33 years and thank GOD we are still in touch all these years. We had a great time reminiscing found memories with lots of laughter our friendship of 33 years.

Last night, it was the gathering of the ex Galileans. Majority of us have left our previous church and are now serving in other churches. For Peter, he knew this group of church friends when he was in the Children's Fellowship. As for me, I joined them when I was a teenager. We are grateful to have the opportunity to meet again, thanks to Louis and Christine who had graciously opened up their home and organized the reunion.

We are grateful that GOD has been with us all these years and even though some of us are going through tough times, we know that GOD will see us through because HE is a GOD Who never change and HE never fail. We know we can trust in Him.

Who gives the sun for light by day?
The moon and stars for light by night?
Who stirs the sea that waves may roar?
The Lord of Hosts is His Name.

Do you not know? Have you not heard?
He strengthens the weary, gives power to the weak
He will uphold you with His righteous right arm

The Lord of Hosts is His Name.

Sourdough Starter and Bread

These 2 huge loaves of Sourdough Bread just came out of the oven. Thank GOD it is a success! This is the first time I made my own sourdough starter (even though the first batch did not work out, the second batch turned out well.) I asked the LORD to please turn the culture into sourdough since He turned water in wine and He did ;)

I have not tasted sourdough bread before and I always hear others say they are delicious. Now that I have tried and tasted it, I agree :) I did a barter trade with Annabel - I gave her a loaf of my bread in exchange for one of the best minestrone soup I have ever tasted. So satisfying - time for a nap ;)

This morning I took out a cup of the sourdough from the fridge. It has been "chilling" for the past few days. I found a simple sourdough bread recipe from the Internet and I dumped all the ingredients into the bread machine, pressed "dough" cycle and went to do my BS homework.

This was how the dough turned out after 20mins of kneading.

I did not do much to the dough, just "punch" it after the "dough" cycle and divided it into two portions.

After resting for about 1 hour, it more than doubled in size. I placed some walnuts onto one of them and the other I left it as it is. Baked them in a 200 degrees C oven for about 25 mins.

A sourdough culture is a mixture of wild yeast and lactobacillus bacteria living in a mixture of flour and water. Over time, the culture will tend to become a mixture of one of three wild yeast strains, and one of five different lactobacillus strains. It is of particular importance in baking rye-based breads, where yeast does not produce comparable results. In comparison with yeast-based breads, it produces a distinctively tangy or sour taste, mainly because of the lactic acid produced by the lactobacilli; the actual medium, known as "starter" or levain.

This is my first batch of sourdough starter which has gone bad. On day one the starter was bubbling quite well and I thought it was okay. Unfortunately a bad bacteria got into the starter on day 2 thus causes the layer of water in between it, thus producing a bad smell - like vomit. I had to discard the two bottles and make a new batch below.

Sourdough Starter Recipe

1/4 cup water

3/8 cup wheat flour

Mix the two ingredients together and cover loosely with a hand towel.

Set it aside in a warm (not hot) place for about 12 hours. Take a look at your starter after 12 hours to see if it has started bubbling. If not, give it a stir and leave it for another 12 hours. After 24 hours, "feed" your starter with 1/4 cup of water, 3/8 cup of wheat flour. Continue to "feed" your starter every 12 hours. After the 3rd feed, remove about half the amount of the starter before adding the next round of water and wheat flour. After the starter is active for about a week, you can keep it in the fridge and continue to "feed" it once every 2 weeks or so.

Fondant Cupcake Class

Last Saturday I attended a Fondant Cupcake Class. This is my first cake lesson thus far in cake baking (besides the one I did at Home Econs during my Secondary School days). This is also my first experience at handling fondant. I won a S$80 voucher through a contest and I only needed to top up S$20 to join this class. Thank GOD for the opportunity to learn how to make Fondant Cupcakes at such a small cost :)

I met a church friend there who also won a voucher and selected the same class. We had fun decorating the cupcakes. This two-tier heart-shaped cake with the roses was the first one I made. I had this for tea yesterday.

This was the last one I made out of the four you see below. As there was not much time left, I did a very simple one. Peter ate this and said it was quite nice :)

VDay Slices

Valentine's Day is here again so I thought it would be nice to bake the above VDay Slices.

Come to think of it, I only bake this recipe once a year but this year I shall be baking it four times for 4 special groups of sisters and brothers in Christ who have been serving faithfully in the area of their ministry.

If you would like to make this VD Slices for your friends or loved ones, here's the recipe:

Wash clean and dry some Strawberries. Cut them into halves.

For the base, you would need 300gm of finely crushed Oreo Cookies and 150gm melted butter. Mix them and press the mixture onto the base of a 10" x 10" tray. If you do not have a glass tray, a normal baking tray is fine. Refrigerate it for about 20mins.

Excuse the direction of the photos. I tried to rotate them many times but have not been successful. For the filling, place about 2 1/2 tsp of gelatin powder in 150ml boiling water. Stir till the gelatin powder has been dissolved. Beat 250gm of Cream Cheese with about 70gm of sugar and 1/2 tsp of vanilla. Then add the gelatin syrup into the mixture. Pour the cream cheese onto the Oreo base and place the Strawberry halves partially submerged into the mixture.

Refrigerate for about 2 hours or until the mixture is firm.

Dissolve a box of Raspberry flavoured jelly crystals with 150gm boiling water and 100gm cold water. Cool the jelly syrup and slowly spoon the syrup over the cream cheese filling. Refrigerate overnight before cutting.

A side profile of how the tray of VDay Slices should look like.

Ending Well

I love to read through the bible because I love stories and even though I have read this BIG story book quite a number of times since I became a Christian about 30 years ago, I still find the stories in there new and very interesting (because I could not remember what I read most of the time.) But this time round, it is getting better because I am using the Precept method of circling, underlining and colouring. In this way, I read through the chapter at least 2-3 times and the story gets registered better in my mind.

Still, I like to read the bible at my own pace, which means I may take 2-3 years to finish reading from Genesis to Revelations. At the beginning of this year I was at I Chronicles and am now at the middle of II Chronicles. The message that GOD gave me thus far is "ENDING WELL".


I Chronicles 1-9 started with the genealogies of the nation of Israel -it is so boring. Aiyoh, so many chapters of who became the father of who and who is the son of who. What more it is not easy to pronounce those names :0 (frankly, if you ask me now, I cannot remember any of the sons.) Nevermind, life goes on... :)

Haha! finally, in chapter 10, the story starts... Saul and his 3 sons plus his household died in the hands of the Philistines. Vs 13-14 read "so Saul died for his trespass which he committed against the LORD because of the word of the LORD which he did not keep, and also because he asked counsel of a medium, ... and did not inquire of the LORD. Therefore He killed him and turned the kingdom to David, the son of Jesse."

I like chapter 10 v 9 "David became greater and greater, for the LORD of hosts was with him." If GOD is for you, who can be against you.

In chapter 13 David consulted with every leader to bring back the ark of GOD and then we have the story of how Uzza died just because he put out his hand to hold the ark and the anger of the LORD burned against him for his irreverence. Don't play, play with GOD. Even David was afraid of GOD that day. Our GOD is Holy and yet He loves us so much, so gracious, merciful, forgiving, etc. Where to find such a Wonderful GOD like Him?

Chapter 14 David realized that the LORD had established him as king over Israel.... for His people Israel and when David faces issues in life, he inquired of the LORD. I must learn to realize why the LORD allows certain things in my life and to go to Him first to inquire of Him for counsel.

I shall not go through the rest of the books as there's really so much to write about the lessons we can learn from GOD's Word. Coming back to why I said that GOD's message to me thus far is "ENDING WELL"... We all know in II Chronicles King Solomon started well, asking for wisdom and knowledge that he may rule GOD's people well. GOD being a generous GOD added riches, wealth and honour on top of what Solomon asked for. Then we have the building and dedication of GOD's temple, etc.

After Solomon passed away, his descendants took over the rule of Israel. Some of them started well in their rule, "did good and right in the sight of the LORD" but most of them did not end well in their reign. This was where the LORD highlighted to me that yes, everyone has ups and downs in life, certain period of our lives we may not be up to par but if we confess our sins, GOD is faithful and just to forgive our sins and we start all over again. Life goes on. Let's run the race, looking unto JESUS, the Author and Finisher of our faith and end well. So that when we face JESUS at the judgment day, we can look forward to hear Him say "thou good and faithful servant."

Clone of a Cinnabon with Glaze

If you like Cinnamon Buns but find those selling outside too expensive, you may wish to consider making your own. I use the bread machine to knead the dough thus it is quite simple to make. If you do not have a bread machine, you can also do the normal kneading by hand or use the mixing machine with the dough hook.

Here's the recipe for the dough:
1 cup of warm milk
2 eggs at room temperature
1/3 cup butter, melted
4 1/2 cups bread flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup white sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast

Do not spread the softened butter on the whole dough. Leave a small portion to seal up the roll.

Filling ingredients:

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/4 cup softened butter

Glaze (optional)

125gm softened cream cheese

30gm softened butter

50gm icing sugar

A pinch of vanilla

2 tablespoons of Lemon or Lime or Orange Juice

Method :

1. Place all the dough ingredients into the pan of your bread machine, select "Dough" and press start.

2. After the dough cycle has been completed, punch the dough to let out the gas created by the yeast. Cover dough and let it rest for about 10 mins.

3. In the meantime, prepare your filling. Combine the sugar and cinnamon.

4. Cut your dough into smaller portion so that it is easier to work with. Roll out the dough, spread some softened butter and then sprinkle evenly the cinnamon sugar mixture. Cut evenly the rolled dough, cover and let them rest for about 30 minutes.

5. Preheat your oven to 200 degrees C for about 10-15 minutes before baking your buns at 15 minutes or till they are done.

6. Remove from tray and place them on a rack to cool.

7. Now you can prepare your glaze. Cream together the glaze ingredients.

8. Drizzle the glaze over the baked buns and enjoy :)

No Knead Ciabatta and Croutons

I baked the above No-Knead Ciabatta Bread this morning and gave half to a friend. It's crispy on the outside and chewy inside. I used to be a bit intimidated when handling bread dough, especially those wet and gluey ones. After many attempts of breadmaking, am more confident and am now enjoying kneading, punching and shaping them :)

This recipe has only 5 ingredients - so simple too : 4 cups of bread flour, 2 cups of warm water, 1.5 tsp salt, 0.5 tsp yeast and some rolled oats. That's all :) The only thing you need is patience - time. I mixed the ingredients last night at 10pm and covered it in a pot till 7am this morning. Baked it at 250 degrees C for about 1/2 hour let it cool on the rack before slicing it.

I had some left over french bread which I bought from the bakery shop. So I cut them into small pieces, sprinkled some pepper, salt and olive oil. Baked it together with the No Knead Ciabatta bread and there I have my home-made croutons for Peter's salad :)

I ate some of these with my plate of Tuna Salad - crunchy and yummy :)