My last day @105degree

It's amazing how time flies when you are keeping busy. Today is my last day at 105 degree academy. I've learnt a lot while I am here, I'm glad I had the experience.

We had to do a breakfast, lunch and dinner project for the course. I think this was what made it special for me because it allowed me to use my creative energy and create my own menu, not decided or controlled by anyone. Coming from a very limited background in cooking and preparing food, this was an interesting and challenging experience.

I wanted to work on a singaporean theme and prepare food that people at home can relate to and will eat, which is why i chose to make the singapore style carrot cake and the laksa, coz they are the perennial favourites of all singaporeans, not to mention the char kuay teow of course.....

so for my three course dinner menu, i had to make a char kuay teow for my main course. for my non singaporean friends, char kuay teow is fried flat noodles, the classic dish that everyone misses when they are away from home. never mind that it's cooked in lard and as unhealthy as it can possibly get.

but to convert that to a raw fried noodles is quite an interesting challenge. i decided on a "singapore style fried scallop vegetable noodles" gourmet style of course.

and this is what you get ->



for the first course, it was a tough call to think of a singaporean theme so i stole the idea from thai cuisine and made a thai green mango salad, a raw version of course, without the anchovies and the fried shallots...



for my dessert, i wanted to replicate something like an ice kachang or a chendol. but with raw being the main theme, that's out of the question since i cannot cook beans.

as a result, the original ice kachang evolved into coconut cream tropical fruit cocktail with fresh mint and organic white wine... yummy




we had a mini party with invited guests and the A-team (level 2 students and some of the staff from the cafe) so we had to plate our dishes. i had a lot of fun with that.


i'm satisfied with how it turned out.... anyway i am tired, going to get some rest now. have a beautiful day :-)

say cheese..... crepes anyone?

one of the experiences which i was looking forward to when i came to 105 was to make cheese. not just ordinary boring cheese but sexy mouth watering looking cheese. we did it! and yes it was sexy, mouth watering and it even tasted good! actually, it was really really good!


one of the nicest things about being at 105 i think is that we are given the option to decide what we want to do given a basic foundation on the recipe... meaning... russell taught us how to make a basic cheese recipe and then when we make our own, we could decide what variations we wanted to make.

i decided to make some blue cheese..



cheddar cheese - i only made a very small portion of cheddar cheese coz i wasn't sure if i would like it since i'm not crazy about the traditional cheddar cheese. it turned out alright.




and my special (which turned out to be my favourite and some of the girls like it too


and we also made crepes, sweet and savoury ones. i don't know what i was thinking when i made mine, that i made it too thin and it became too crispy to be used as crepes. so i couldnt fold mine nicely into crepes like russell showed us...


not one to give up easily, i decided to improvise and made my own version, sunny side up!




the yellow mushy bit is tofu scrambler which is supposed to be a replacement for the scrambled eggs.

i didn't make the sweet version coz at that point, i just had enough of food.... is that possible?

my sprouting project and collecting spring water

at LL, we had an opportunity to do some sprouting in a big glass jar but somehow the experience did not seem to register in my mind very well.

here at 105, we each had a mini sprouting project and mine was to do a spicy salad sprout.



so we each had a sprouting tray and fill it with compost from a big sack of compost. of course i used a glove!



when i was at LL, taking care of the sprouts seem like such a big responsibility, especially to those who had the experience with the soil grown wheatgrass.

for some strange reason, this was pretty easy... i wonder why?



so after a couple of days of watering and my babies are sprouting! :-)




did i mention that we even had a day out collecting spring water? it was fun. drinking spring water directly from the source is an experience. well, it was cold and very refreshing but i certainly didnt expect it to be coming out of a pipe!




it was a nice experience, especially for someone so used to just buying bottles of mineral water. so now, instead of buying mineral water, i can just fill up my water bottle!

recipe creation

this week seem to have flown by. i can't believe it's saturday already. so much has happened since chocolate day. it's been a very interesting and totally enjoyable experience though. i think i'm learning so much more here than i did at LL, for one i feel a lot more confident about preparing the recipes by myself.

midweek came and we were given instructions on creating our own recipes. what started as a very daunting task, which is to create our own breakfast and lunch item for the group to try. everyone were very excited and enthusiastic to do something. it's a very creative bunch of people in my class and we had so much fun!

i decided to have a singaporean theme to my recipe creation. i think the challenge of translating a raw healthy vegan method to the typically unhealthy fat laden favourites of every singaporean like char kway teow (friend noodles), chai tow kuay (carrot cake) and laksa makes it seem like an almost impossible task! well, i decided to take on the challenge to recreate a singaporean carrot cake recipe for a raw carrot cake recipe for my breakfast recipe, and for my lunch recipe, i decided to work on a raw laksa.

the original singapore carrot cake looks like this, the traditional style...



and this is my raw creation... no greasy lard, no eggs. it actually taste alright! i even managed to make a pickled "chye por" radish which taste very yummy!




and then the singaporean laksa...



this is quite a challenging task. laksa is one of my favourite comfort food from home and i like it pipping hot. i don't have eggs and chicken with it though since i am more geared towards a vegan diet.

so i decided instead of the eggs, chicken, bean curd, cockles and prawns that you will find in a typical laksa dish, i am making a raw vegan version with mung bean sprouts, broccoli and cauliflower, what you would find in a vegetarian curry i guess and i also introduced pineapple (stolen from the penang laksa version!)

and this is what i got....



the taster portions for my course mates and instructors...



everyone seem to like the raw versions, so i think i did ok :-)

have a great weekend!

chocolate day and more....

week 3 started with a chocolate day. i like chocolates but i'm not crazy about them. we had a lot of fun making chocolate torte, choc chip cookies, vanilla macaroons (was supposed to be choc. macaroons but enough chocs...

we started off with scraping off the cacao butter from the big block....


and then put the metal container over a bowl of hot water to let it melt into fluid form....



we're doing the choc chip cookies recipe from matthew kenney's everyday raw book. that's my chocolate chip cookies dough... i've always wanted to make this but just never got round to doing it! it doesnt help that it's almost impossible to get raw cacao powder at home!




i forgot to take a pic when i was so busy prepping... so this is the cookies after being in the dehydrator overnight... looks yummy! :-)



i did remember the vanilla macaroons though....


we also made granola with the buckwheat sprouts we sprouted last week. this was the start of our training to create our own recipes. russell gave us a walkthrough of how to develop a recipe, which is really useful coz i dont think i ever did pick it up when i was at LL... so its like letting a kid run wild in a toy shop. we were allowed to do anything we want with our granola concoction.

i made mine with buckwheat sprouts, orange & lemon zest, 1 apple, 1 mango, 1/4 pineapple, 1 pomegranate, 1/2 cup of coconut flakes and a handful of goji berries. (i never knew what goji berries was since we call them wolfberries at home!) and we dont even eat them raw! for spices, i had a combination of cinnamon, cardamon, chai spice, clove, vanilla powder, cacao powder, 1/4 cup of tahini.

and this is what you get.... this is the "before" look, i.e before i put it into the dehydrator, i'll get to see the after look tomorrow...




did i mention we made savoury tarts too? we made this on friday (i think)



and we made crepes...





and finally the chocolate torte....





ok i got to go now... enjoy the pics!

Sunday Dinner

105 has a sunday dinner, either prepared by one of the level 2 students as part of their project or by one of the chef.

i was in for a treat this week coz dinner was prepared by Ladan, the academy director.


the first plate, which is the salad is heavenly. it leaves you wanting more.....


and the second plate was soooooo goood....


and the perfect dessert to complete the meal....


i'm sure you must have had meals where you left feeling totally stuffed and wished that you hadnt overeaten... well this dinner was just perfect. i left feeling like i'm in bliss, quite different from my experience at Bliss... and it leaves me wanting more... its a nice feeling!

Rawkstar Dinner @105

after one & half week of hard work :-) i decided to treat myself to the rawkstar dinner @105. performance by kyle dillingham, a world class violinist from okc. it was a nice dinner with my coursemates, 5 course dinner.


it was interesting for me to watch the pros at work, doing the plating...



our first course was absolutely delightful

Purple Cabbage Pierogies
Walnuts Sour Cream, Horseradish Mustard paired with Trenzo Rosado (a light rose wine) very palatable


this was followed by

Carta Da Musica
Micro Greens, Aged 'Goat' Cheese, Truffle paired with Colome Torrontes (I really liked this, i think its the tinge of the muscat grape)


followed by Tom Kha Gai - kelp noodles, shitake, sweet and sour coconut milk, mint, lemongrass, ginger, lime paired with Starmont Chardonnay (not my fav)



next was Red Beet Pave w Wild Mushroom Concasse Quark, Buckwheat Bread Crumbs. (by this time i was already stuffed!) anyway, i wasnt crazy about the red beet, i think my red beet ravioli was much better.... haha...

paired with Volpaia Chianti Classico (also not my fav!)


and by the time dessert came, i had to pack!

dessert was Citrus Quattro (Fragrant Cheesecake w Orang Zest, Mandarin-Ginger Gelato, Sesame - Lime Bar, Grapefruit cake)

paired with Michele Chiarlo Nivole' Moscato D'Asti (this was my fav of the lot, its a sweet dessert wine but reminded me of a sauterne, but i'm sure it doesnt cost anything like a sauterne!




and the damage....



have a great day!

sea vegetables & more

i think i'm still tired from the long drive from dallas. it didnt help that i had a double espresso before i started on my long drive, which meant i didnt sleep well on sunday (like 3am!) and it kind of rolled over till today. i'm going to try to catch up on some desperately needed sleep!

we made some really yummy food though (what's new!)

we started the week with an introduction to making wheatgrass shots. russell, our instructor made three different concoctions which was very interesting for us to understand the different effects of mixing different ingredients.

we had wheatgrass on its own, and then the second shot was mixed with apple juice (which was too sweet for my liking) and the third shot was with ginger juice (very spicy but really gives you the kick!)





and then we made a sea vegetable salad from the sea vegetables that we soaked on friday.


i was introduced to 2 new vegetables :-) can you recognize them?



and this was my lunch!



psst...the first one is a watermelon radish, the second one is golden beet.

and i had my leftover ice cream... plus some from two of my coursemates.



i'm trying to keep up with my blogging but having fallen behind, there's so much to say!

we started tuesday 13th april with a very tiring task... to open up a box of 9 coconuts and separating the meat from the coconut water. hard work! after what seem like forever, i finally finished opening my batch and then we went on to more interesting stuff, like making the wrappers for the next recipe...







then we did prep for the burger buns, which have to be dehydrated. we used the almond flour which we dehydrator when we made almond milk. i forgot to take pictures of the buns... see what happens when you are busy having fun! you forget serious work like taking pics of burger buns! :-)

anyway it turned out great... and we made portobello burgers today, i think i put too much salt & olive oil in my portobello marinade. it was swimming in oil when i tried to cut it. oh well that's why i'm here. to learn! i am still bloated from lunch.



after lunch, we did prep for tomorrow... more chopping and cutting, etc.... what are we making tomorrow... hmmmm.... give u a hint, we'll be using the wrappers!

check back and see!