bucket list (1)

Nickhun

Hi!

i know i've been MIA for a really really long time, it's mainly because i have nothing to say anymore. I have become one of those boring people that i always knew i would become. 

anyways, happy boxing day!

merry christmas! =)

christmas was the usual, lunch with really really yummy food. this year though spent christmas night with Jie-en, Shuk Pui, Si Jun, Kai Zhuang and Andrew at Pui's place. We had dinner there and then headed for a midnight movie. first row seats for Sherlock Holmes, haha yes, we're crazy that way. XD

Presents for christmas were okok, totally grateful to everybody who got me something though. =) thanks.

guess what i got from Pui. hahahahah *points below*

one word. XD

xoxo

Joanna

tea at milk & honey =)

hey peeps!

nothing much going on lately, just incredible urges to bake, and go shopping.

other than that, nothing much

owh! and i finally quit my job! =)

so basically, my first final exam is in 8 days time. am i stressed? yes, i am.

so if i'm grumpy, snappy, etc lately, blame it on the stress.

and i'm sunburnt too. == blame the australian sun.

and the light in my room is spoilt, so instead of studying in semi-darkness, i went to one of the computer labs to study. turned out the one i went to wasn't 24 hours. so by 10.30pm i was asked to leave TT. and when i went to check the 24 hour labs, they were full. so now im back in my room, and studying by hot table lamp light. ==. tomorrow, i am determined to block a seat at the 24 hour lab to study. LOL

errr, basically, nothing else going on i think. other than the usual tiredness and all.

=)

xoxo
Joanna

hey peeps!

so nothing much has been happening, just been really busy with studies/movies/clubs and activities/work/friends etc. but its all fun =)

hmmm, pretty much writing to destress now.

watched pride and prejudice (2005) a few hours ago, even though i've watched it a couple of times, i can never get too tired of it.

My affections and wishes have not changed, but one word from you will silence me forever. If, however, your feelings have changed, I will have to tell you: you have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on.

i know it's not the really authentic, follow the book of movies, but i watched the BBC pride and prejudice series before, and i love both equally. =)

hmmm so nothing much new in my life, just i'm quitting my job this week, i might dye my hair one of these days, im craving a hair cut (can u believe it, i'm actually craving it == ), i just joined a new club and am part of the committee and i have awesome friends =)

other than that, life is pretty much the same. oh yeah, i'll be moving rooms next year! =) same building, different rooms. haha

and i'm trying to cut down on expenses, so pretty much mass cooking and freezing. XD

okays, i shall go attempt to study now.

byes! =)

xoxo
Joanna

Before you quit, TRY

hey peeps,

yes, totally guilty as charged. I know i haven't written in awhile, been really really busy with assignments and celebrating birthdays (i no kid, at least one every week), as well as juggling trying to convince myself to study and work. 

Union Court

the couple of times i brought my camera out, got some shots that i'm quite happy with =)

awesomely yummy from a friend =)

although spring is here, the weather is still pretty cold on rainy days, although today it was blindingly sunny and just perfect =)

Burgers for lunch~

everybody's been really nice lately, gotten closer to a couple of friends, and also been trying to wake up for all my 9am classes XD

mooncake festival!

the flowers at floriade were gorgeous, so got some shots that i'm pleased with, although the day we went it was so hot i was sweating a lot o.o but when i went for the nightfest it was cold instead. lols

spring is here!

yes, i know theres a cat sitting half on my shoulder. well, the story is one of my friends, couldn't make it, and instead of writing her name on a sign and carrying the sign around, we included her in this pic! =)

Floriade 2011 with Ponta!

came back from a not so happy day at work, to discover mail from a certain someone, really just made my day! =)

pressies from the bimbo =p

okays, i don't quite know what to write at the moment, and yes! new blog layout. i'll be posting some recipes soon though i think, once i pass up my assignments next week and so on so forth, so maybe just expect a post at the end of the month? =)

xoxo
Joanna

Recipe : Apple Pie

Hi! so the post that i promised i'm finally going to deliver. Anyways, note that this recipe is just a work in progress kay, in the future i might make small tweaks to it, but ill repost this recipe if i do that =)

Anyways, there are two versions of this recipe that i did. yes, two versions. and i did both versions yesterday in one day cause i wasn't too happy with the first result. 

so the first recipe is here! http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/19422/apple+pie tadaaaa. and to make life simpler, i shall copy and paste that recipe here as well. XD. 

Ingredients (serves 8)

• 1 cup plain flour
• 1/2 cup self-raising flour
• 1/2 cup cornflour
• 125g butter, chilled, chopped
• 1/3 cup caster sugar
• 1 egg, separated
• whipped cream, to serve

• Apple filling

• 10 medium (1.25kg) granny smith apples, peeled, cored, cut into thin wedges
• 1/4 cup caster sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice

Method

1. Place flours, butter and 1/4 cup sugar in a food processor. Process until mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add egg yolk and 1/4 cup cold water. Process until pastry just comes together. Turn pastry onto a lightly floured surface. Knead gently until smooth. Wrap in plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 30 minutes or until firm.

   
   





2. Meanwhile, make apple filling: Place apples and 1/3 cup cold water in a baking classics saucepan. Bring to the boil. Reduce heat to medium-low. Simmer, covered, for 5 to 7 minutes or until apples are tender. Drain. Return apples to pan. Stir in sugar, cinnamon and lemon juice. Set aside.

   



3. Preheat oven to 180°C/160°C fan-forced. Grease a 3cm-deep, 20cm (base) round glass or ceramic pie dish.

   
   
   

4. Place two-thirds of the pastry between 2 sheets of baking paper. Roll out into a 30cm round. Line base and sides of prepared dish with pastry. Trim edges. Spoon in filling. Brush edge with a little eggwhite. Place remaining pastry between 2 sheets of baking  

   paper. Roll out until large enough to cover dish. Cover filling with pastry. Press edges together. Trim excess. 

5. Make 2 cuts in top for steam to escape. Brush with remaining eggwhite. Sprinkle with remaining sugar. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes or until golden. Serve with cream.

ok. so this is the result from the first recipe, and i made some little tweaks to it. i used apple cider vinegar instead of lemon juice for the filling as well as cubing the apples and not peeling them instead of peeling and slicing. i'm not altogether too fond of the pastry for the first recipe, this pastry tastes awesomeee. but it's a bit fiddly, like really hard to roll out properly without it cracking as well as hard to judge whether its too dry or not. and due to it being hard to roll out, i ended up with awesome tasting pastry that broke apart easily, and hence, it was broken apart or 'artistic' apple pie. XD

being me, i wasn't satisfied much with the result. so i asked uncle google and came up with an alternative pastry recipe for the second apple pie that i made that night. lols! i used the apple filling from the first recipe, but for the second pastry recipe, this is it. 

Ingredients : 550g plain flour, 250g unsalted butter, pinch of salt, pinch of sugar, 3-4 tbsps of water

1. sift flour with salt and sugar. add room temp butter to misture and use knife to make cutting motions before using finger tips to rub in butter to flour mixture. add 3 tbsps of water and use wooden spoon to mix in before using fingers again. if mixture does not form a ball, add water until it does. do not overadd water because the dough will become too sticky to work with. roll into ball and store in clingfilm in the fridge for at least 30 mins up to 3 days. 

so that's the second recipe that i used. and to be honest, the dough from the first recipe was much tastier compared to the second recipe. and yes, the dough for the second recipe was so much easier to work with that i managed to cut up shapes of elephants for my pie. LOL i know i'm extremely lifeless. XD

so i guess it's up to personal preference in this case. if you prefer a tastier dough, go for the first one. and using a food processor to do it could be a little tricker cause its hard to judge how much water to add. and if your lazy like me, go for the second recipe. although before adding the filling to the pie, if you prefer a crunchier base, you could blind bake the base first. its just puttin the base in the pie pan, and adding weights such as beans or rice and baking it for about 10-20 mins till slightly golden, then only adding the filling. 

so yeah, that's about it. =)

xoxo

Joanna

my head's stuck in the cloud

okays. first off, sorry i've been away so long. =( mostly cause i cant figure out what to write. and the post i promised bout the apple pie recipe? gonna be a long time coming, cause haven't bought apples these two weeks. ill do it next week maybs kays =)

what have i been doing? mostly going through the motions during the week as well as planning my meals. nah, im not that health conscious, when i say planning my meals is mostly trying to figure out what to cook for lunch and dinners. haha. brekkie doesn't count, cause most of the time i wake up too late to eat brekkie so i substitute with brunch instead. =)

studies are going ok. =) slowly learning new things and letting my rusty brain relearn maths i might have forgotten. slowly doing my notes as well.

so the most exciting things that happen in my life normally happen when im working lately. all kinds of people order food all the time. so the most often characters that visit are the teenagers after school, working people in need of quick lunches, the chronic drunk or high people and other people. the chronic drunk/high people scare me the most, cause if your not fast, or if you get the order wrong, they might start shouting at you or stuff, and it gets kinda scary. o.o but other than that, work's good. got lotsa awesome work mates who make it fun, and we're always helping each other out so its all good. =) my managers are pretty cool too. =)

hmmm, so the most exciting thing that happened this past week? i went skiing! yes. Joanna went skiing. ok, maybe this isn't news, like if you have facebook and your my friend you would have seen pics. and no, theres no snow in canberra. we had to wake up at 5 am and sit the bus about 2 and a half hours to mount perisher. hahaha. and we sorta had the irish luck on our side cause it was snowin when we were there! like an actually heavy snow storm kinda thing. it was freezing, but fun at the same time. and we had awesome company. =) oh don't get me wrong, i still can't ski after that day. hahaha =)

group pic on the top of the mountain, it was snow storming then. so the story was, u noe you get those chair lift thingies that bring u to the top of the mountain and u ski down? well, you should only do that if you know how to ski. == basically due to peer pressure, most of us who couldn't ski, decided to go to the top of the mountain, to take a picture, and basically fall the whole way down. yes, fall the whole way down. hahahah! but we started walking, and halfway down, a good samaritan ski-ed me and my friend down. hahaha. but the rest of my friends had to walk down, kinda pity them, good calory burner though. =)

and i came back with war scars! ok, that was too dramatic. so the ski boots that i wore were tight around the calves, and i thought i was normal. until i took them off, and felt pain on both my calves. lo and behold, blisters. =( 

so thats my left leg, and i took the picture today which is er 4 days after the ski trip. =s. i have blisters on both my calves. lols. and scratches on my hands as well. does it hurt? yea, sorta, when i take a hot shower, it stings a bit. and since i'm used to sleeping on my side with my legs pressed together, im having a bit of trouble sleeping like that at the moment. o.-. but other than that, alls good =)

i still recommend going skiing though. just go with someone who knows how to ski, or go for lessons. =) 

ok, i think thats bout it, gotta go figure out some commercial law notes now. baibais

=)

xoxo

Joanna