chocolate & ginger

I was worried that I wouldn't have anything to give to my awesome, lovely, wonderful, fantastic, marvelous, amazing, other good things etc, mom for her birthday...until I borrowed a miracle (Donna Hay's Flavours) from the library.

but for now, here's yesterday's brunch.

Lady Brunch Burgers, from the food network.
I'm slightly bad at estimating patty sizes, so I made the first one too small. Had to adjust the 2nd patty's size to even it all out. The leftover meat (mixed with onions and garlic) will probably rot in the fridge.

burgers with tomato and cucumber and passion fruit tea.


well, not really a burger. Bread layered with easy over and burger patty haha.


After exam (which I bombed, stupid math D< ), I dragging shampoo, mary and janice to the library to find a recipe for chocolate cake.
They can't deny the funniness of "Geography and Physics is the original rock and roll" (credit to typetees).
I was planning on going to loblaws and buying some lemons since mom likes lemon cakes the best. However, the store was closed due to mysterious reason (ohhhh~) so I was stuck with the only abundant ingredient that I have: chocolate.


melted dark choco chips with butter. smells heavenly, but hell-like for your arteries.


janice especially separated the eggs for me. lawl @ 2.5 eggs. Both the egg yolks and whites are HAND whipped, grr.


all mixed together~


the lovely finished product. The only time the family ever uses this glass plate is when I make cakes in the loaf pan haha.


close up. Yummy Nutella frosting. Mom said the sweetest was perfect! It's surprising that even though I added too much flour and probably not enough egg yolks that it turned out so well. I'm one step closer to hosting dinner parties ("and 10000 more to go")!


Since I felt that one cake wasn't enough to compensate for the zara giftcard and paper flowers, I decided to cook her dinner. On the menu: chicken poached in ginger broth.


All nice and chopped up. Took me forever to cut the gingers into perfect, thin strands.


Into the wok it goes.


as well as the chicken


then you remove the chickens and add the spinach. The recipe originally calls for snake beans, but those are ridiculously expensive in Toronto. Impressive how the huge pile wilted down to a single layer.


Doesn't the bowl just bring out the colour of the dish (I'm not hallucinating)!


I must say, it turned out delicious. +1 domestic skillz!
Everything was nicely seasoned even though I only rubbed salt on the chicken, no wonder the recipe didn't call for additional salt. The ginger gave it a very nice kick, yummm.