Brownie Bear on a picnic

A good friend from out of town gave me a packet of instant brownie mix when she was here recently, after 10 years of being away. I am so glad that she visited as she had been a very dear friend and I missed spending time with her. We even got to meet her 6-yr-old boy for the very first time. :)

I have not baked in ages and just couldn't get the engine going. But I had to start somewhere, and what better to bake than instant something. I have another 3 packets of mixes but this one was calling out to me, and I've also been wanting to make use of these bear silicon cups, no they are not new, just thought they'd be perfect for the brownies. I made two of those, one for Princess and the other for her bff, the one I've been making bentos for lately. It's finally Friday and I can take a break from bento-making, yippee! While I was at it, I even made cheese cutout biscuits. What a fulfilling day it was. :D

The main character in the bento was the bear so all I needed was to place everything around it. Princess' box had a lot more food items compared to J's. There was golden kiwi, blueberry, baby corn sticks and cherries. They both had apples, chicken nugget, homebaked cheese biscuits, a snail made from mantou for the body and half a cocktail sausage for its head, a Daim chocolate and a small container of tiny sweets below the bear's head.

Playdate

We were invited to our first ever playdate in a classmate's home two weekends ago. However, as we already had plans, little one was very disappointed not to be able to go. So this mummy had to be thick-skinned and call up the friend's mum to request for another playdate for last weekend. She agreed to it so last Saturday right after ballet, we made our way over. I made these at the last minute, only that morning before ballet class and the chocolate wasn't even set before we had to leave for class. I was afraid that the ballerinas would topple over but they stood tall all throughout till we made it there. I used Maya's brownie recipe & topped them with some chocolate sauce and some fairy sprinkles which Sis got me. I love the pearly colours on those sprinkles. Thanks Sis.

Choconana brownies

What a name! Haha! I came up with these today. I guess it's a mix of disillusionment as well as boredom. There's a banana cake recipe which I've been trying out. The first time it failed as it turned out very dense, not like the one I tried at the funfair. A mum had made it and because it was so yummy, I asked her for the recipe. Mine turned out nothing like hers. So just this morning I tried baking it again. Everything was perfect till the cake went in the oven and goodness! I had forgotten to add the oil! Another failure. I wanted to try it again but didn't have enough bananas. So since I had promised to bake brownies for princess and hubby, I thought, hey banana and chocolate go hand-in-hand. *Ding* (lightbulb moment). So I experimented and came up with this creation. I have yet to try it as super full from breakfast. But I hope it's good. ;)

All you have to do is use your favourite brownie recipe and cut up a banana into tiny bits and mix it in then bake.

Brownies & lunch

I seem to be in a baking frenzy. :D I guess I've been inspired by the few of you with all your yummy-licious bakes. Just couldn't stay away from my oven for long. Thanks gals for inspiring me. My next bake will be the sesame and wheat biscuits once I get hold of some wholemeal flour. ;)

I've been itching to bake these brownies ever since I laid eyes on them and here they are. I didn't do a ganache to go over the top but they were delicious on their own. I would have liked them to be a little more chewy and more chocolatey so will make some adjustments to the original recipe the next time I bake them.

For lunch yesterday, my only day at home this week (thanks to cleaner coming), I prepared a noodle dish for lunch. I usually like these noodles done in dark soya sauce but my little one does not like 'black' food. That is the opposite of me. I love black food myself. Ingredients included fishcakes, crabsticks, thinly-sliced pork fillet, bean sprouts, egg, sliced carrots and yellow noodles. I made a stock with dried anchovies to 'sweeten' the dish.

Oh dear, got to go... Michael's calling. More about that later... ;)