Caramelized Apple

These caramelize apples are meant to be slightly sweet, not over-tart and thoroughly warming. They are wonderful addition to ice cream or cracker, or just eat them alone! :)

You just need 4 ingredient, which most likely you already had it : apple, sugar, cinnamon and butter.

Melt butter in a medium skillet over medium heat, throw (well, throw gently, of course) sliced apples in the pan, I use granny smith. Sauté for couple minutes, then add sugar, stirring frequently until they just get tender. Sprinkle cinnamon over the cooked apples, toss the mixture gently for another 2 minutes, until the sugar begin caramelized and the apples are crisp-tender.

There's no precise recipe for this, just cook according to your feeling. You can try it with brown sugar, which I am sure is ummhhh.. or you may splash lemon juice over it for more tangy flavor. Again, go by your feeling :)

Grilled Mustard Salmon with Mashed Potato and Asparagus

Sunday lunch with J. He cooked and I made dessert. He suddenly got an idea to cook for lunch, while I try to fulfill my colleague's dessert crave : mango pudding, but more on that later. As you can see in the title, yes, he made Grilled Mustard Salmon with Mashed Potato and Asparagus. It was pretty easy and somehow it looked wonderful, not to mention healthy :)

Serving for two

Grilled Mustard Salmon with Mashed Potato and Asparagus 

Ingredients (there is no exact proportion, cook according to portion you serve)

Salmon Fillet

Dijon Mustard

Italian Seasoning

Olive Oil

Asparagus

Potato

Butter

Milk

Oregano

Salt and Pepper

1. Prepare for the marinate first : in a small bowl, combine dijon mustard and italian seasoning, enough to cover your salmon. Add salt and black pepper. Cover with cling wrap and leave it in the fridge until you ready to cook.

2. Meanwhile, you can prepare your side, mashed potato. Peel the potatoes and cut in medium size, then pop them in a pot filled with cold salted water. Cook them until soft when you can easily part the potato with fork, about 20mins. When potatoes are done, strain the water and covered the pot with tea towel for 5mins, so it can absorb the steam. 

3. Mashed to potato with masher (or fork), add room temperature butter and milk, combine them well. Season with oregano, salt and pepper to your taste. Mashed potato done. 

4. Preheat your grill skillet, add olive oil. Grill the fish on medium heat until desired doneness. Do not overcook or it will be dry and unpalatable. Salmon is done when it feels firm when pressed gently with the back of fork. If you like your skin crispy, turn the salmon to skin side on the skillet and hold it with spatula for about 2-3mins. 

5. While your salmon is almost done, add asparagus on the side, season with salt and pepper. Cook for about 3-4mins, stirring often, until the spears turn bright green. Remove salmon and asparagus from heat. Serve it immediately. 

The best part : crispy salmon skin

Banana Whoopie Pie with Chocolate-Peanut Frosting

At some weekend, J asked me to bake pie. Out of nowhere.

Well, because he's gonna cook for the weekend, I asked him if he want me to bring some dessert. And pie is what he asked for. Why pie? I don't know. Really.

Anyway, and so I search "pie" at Tastespotting and Foodgawker. But another "pie" came out. And I kinda like this "pie" better. You know, with the frosting and the cakies (cake-cookies, yeah I just created that word). I mean, who doesn't like frosting, you just gotta ignore the calories and you're good to go for it. Go. Now.

Wait.

I haven't share the recipe yet. It's from Martha. The Banana Whoopie Pie.

And about the chocolate-peanut frosting, err.. I kinda forget where I got it. Basically, I just put a tablespoon of butter, sugar and a lot of sugar to the chocolate-peanut spread. Mix them together. Done.

Enjoy :)

Side note : I'm thinking to change my header. A lot of ideas in my mind. But I'm not sure which one suit The Butterism. You have an idea?

Chopped-Chocolate Coffee Cookies

Finally! My own recipe, after adapted from here and there, experienced a lot of errors, and goodness too, I present my own chocolate chip cookies recipe. Tadaaaa.....

Butterism Chopped Chocolate Cookies

make about 25 2" cookies

110 gr butter, room temperature

55 gr caster sugar

55 gr brown sugar

1 egg

3/4 tsp coffee essence (if you want a lighter version, you can change it to vanilla essence)

200 gr all purpose flour

150 gr chopped dark chocolate (not chocolate chip, trust me it's so much better if you go with the chopped chocolate)

nb: I change my recipe's name halfway writing this post, as I realized it doesn't involve chocolate chip at all.

1. Preheat the oven to 180 ^oC

2. Beat butter and both sugars in a mixing bowl, whisk until fully incorporated and the mixture's color turn into lighter brown.

3. Crack in the egg and add the essence, keep whisking until mixture is thick, smooth and shiny with no sugar lumps.

4. Stir in the flour, whisking just until half-combined. Stop the whisking and using spatula continue the mixing. Stir together gently, don't overmix the dough.

5. Add the main ingredient, stir in the chopped dark chocolate, and giving dough final stir to ensure no flour pockets remain.

6. Using tablespoon or cookie scoop, drop balls of cookie dough on an ungreased cookie sheets. Don't flatten the dough.

7. Bake it for 5 minutes, and then take the cookies out (don't forget to close your oven lid!) flatten the cookies with fork, and get them back where they should belong. Bake for 15-17 minutes more, until the cookies are golden brown and start to smell like heaven.

I think everybody has their own characteristic of chocolate chip cookies. Me, I like it crisp and thick, rich and chocolaty, and I found it already :) How do you like yours?

Raisin Roll

I've been wanting to bake cinnamon roll since like...I don't know when. But the problem is nobody like cinnamon in the house, nobody except me, myself. And then I saw one of my friend post her cinnamon roll on facebook, and I can hear myself saying "It's time, baby!"

As always, I will do some research before actually bake them. Just read and keep reading. Then I decided I'm gonna try her recipe. Her step by step photographs really taught me well, I know how the dough will look like, the instructions is very detail, and she convinced me to bravely pour a whole lot of melted butter. I quote her, "This is not non-caloric".

And because no one like cinnamon, I change it to raisin and brown sugar for the filling.

What makes me happy is, just when I'm done baking them, everyone's home from work and the smell of freshly baked bread is just the most comforting smell after long day working. You just gotta eat it right away!

I make some in the cupcake form

Butterism on Tea Party

Strawberry, Lemon and Mint

I always love Chartreuse, this apple green color

Yayy~ I was so excited when my boss ask me to join her little showcase party. So the idea was several designers gather in this one event showing their artworks, and sell them, of course. There's clutch, accessories, shoes, dress, toddler clothes, and me as the pastry designer (that sounds good, isn't it? pastry designer :) )

I was a little bit worried, though. This is my first time trying to sell what I b

aked. So far, I just baking for my own happiness and relatives birthday. Oh, and for my boss' anniversary too. Wondering and asking myself, am I capable to organize my little showcase? Here's the thing, I'm a pessimistic, but on the other hand, J's annoyingly an optimist and positive person. Then he convinced me that I definitely can do this. So, what the heck, let's do this! :)

After couple days of research and research, I decided to bake :

1. Margarita Cupcake. which is basically a vanilla cupcake, with lemon cream cheese frosting, plus lime and straw for garnish.

It supposed to be a key lime with white pulp.

I accidentally grab the wrong lime -.-"

2. Saint Honoré. I was so intrigued to bake this when I saw this LV's video ad and this post. I never bake this before, and I didn't have time to practice. I just depend on luck, and hoping I can do this right :D I adapted the recipe a bit, still using the Chiboust Cream though, but I combine this delicate pastry with Mango preserve.

What a messy assembly

Chiboust Cream and Mango Preserve

3. Mini Cream Puff. Because I baked a lot of mini cream puff for Saint Honore, it's better if I sell them as well. I filled this mini puff with mango custard. It has a kinda hard shell, but when you bite it, the creamy custard is balancing the shell.

Sugar glaze on mini cream puff

4. Cookies. Too bad I didn't have enough time to bake this, so I asked

one of my friend to fill in this one job.

5. Cake Pop. Now, this one is a hit at the showcase! I read and read and practice and more practice. Why the cake fall off? How to melt the chocolate? Which cake is better for the cake pop? And so on.. I got them all, but still, practice makes you better.

Inside the cake pop

And I tried to make macaron. But it didn't succeed. Too bad :( I think it'll be a hit too.

Anyway, this event take place about err... 3 months ago. Yea yeah, i was so lazy updating my blog. But here's some of the pictures!

Whoops.. one of the cream puff fall off!

Little Bianca confused, pink or the blue one?

Blue it is!

aww... look at her chubby cute face