my day

It's been a while since my last post. So what happened in those weeks?
I celebrated my nth birthday. Thanks to Pearl for the post you made in your blog. I really appreciate it.

Before my birthday, I got sick. And this added to my tiredness and exhaustion that I was experiencing in those days. In spite of my sickness, we had a simple party here with some of our relatives. And of course, with cake with candles to blow with. But nobody had a lighter or match to light it. We just pretended that it has.

The best part: I made a blueberry cheesecake. I think It's better from what I did before in cheesecake. And did not last long. My eldest was complaining that she did not even had a piece.

it's been a week

It's been a week already since my last post. I did not have the chance to write since Thursday last week because I picked up my son from school at noon. He had a bad headache and he's not feeling well. He didn't go to school last Friday so he stayed with me the whole morning. No chance to write. I just read blogs and leave comments. Weekend? Rest from blogging, family duties first. And I don't want my hubby see what I write. And today after reading Sandra's comment, I finally had the drive to post again.

So what's new? Well, just updates and changes from the older posts. From the invasion, the dark elephants are nowhere to be found in our living room but were replaced by two great elephants to whichI finally agreed with hubby. :) The dragon and horse stayed. Lucky to this two. Finally, my hubby was satisfied to his "pets" already. I'm done with the search of a good decor a.k.a. good luck charms in our small dwelling.
Isn't it weird my hubby is really concern of the displays. And as usual I don't always agree. :)

Now ,my throat hurts, maybe because of the weather, but I'm baking my second attempt of carrot cake. I baked the first attemptlast Sunday afternoon. And I don't even had a chance to take a picture of it because my family was so excited to taste and eat it. And it's so hard to concentrate on baking if all of them are here. I baked half the recipe on muffin cups and half on a square pan. As it turned out, the cake was not that moist as my hubby said but the cream cheese icing was great. The girls really liked it but my son was not impressed. He's a cheesecake fanatic.

I decided to bake again because hubby and the kids missed the taste of carrot cake. So here it is...

Finishing the icing and I'm done! Time to rest...

crinkles

Browsing through my pictures, I saw this one. This is my 2nd attempt to bake choco crinkles. Now i'm craving for one!

cheesecake

i love cheesecakes especially the blueberry one. Ever since I came here in Canada I think I just ate cheesecake only twice because it is expensive. The first cheesecake I bought was from Fortino's (a grocery chain here) and it's the house brand, President's Choice. It costs I think CAD$7.00 for a quarter of a 9-inch round pan.


I also tasted one from Karpaty/Euromax (Polish Grocery) but I don't like their version of cheesecake because it has gelatin in it, not pure cream cheese.

Since I really crave for blueberry cheesecake, I decided to make one last weekend. But first I have to buy the ingredients, cream cheese, filling, sour cream. I bought first also a baking pan from Winners. I really have to do this because I have a pan already. We went to NO Frills last Sunday, bought cream cheese, blueberry filling (No Name brand since it costs less but the same quality), 14% sour cream, Graham for crust, all these from the recipe "Philadelphia New York Cheesecake Squares."

I did not follow the exact recipe since it calls for a square one, so I used a round pan, reduce the measurements in half (I'm on a budget!), and it's my first time to do it so making a small cake is OK in case the output will no be ok. But I'm really hoping it will...

Ingredients complete, measuring cups, spoons, checked. Oh, the mixer! We dropped by at my sister-in-law's house to pick up the long overdue of picking up the mixer. She gave me the mixer because she's not using it for a long time. Did I mention that my husband's family are experts in baking? Yeah, my mother-in-law and her daughters. I think they grew up baking since they make good money out of it. And they made good cakes as I have heard. I tasted the rolls, macaroons and chiffon cake, and they are right it's really good!

So I had the mixer and I'm ready to roll. I made the cake last Monday, so tired already last Sunday.

Read the recipe over and over, then started. Crust first, then mixing the ingredients, cheese, sugar, sour cream, eggs. and i forgot to add vanilla. It's not on my list when I did the shopping. Hmmp, one ingredient out. What the heck, with or without vanilla, I will finish the cake!

After preparing for about 30 minutes, baked the cake for an hour (the recipe said 40-45 mins.) Cooled it down and refrigerated it. I reminded my kids not to touch the cake because it's not yet done.

I came home that night from work and excited to finish the cake. I opened the blueberry filling and put some on top of the cake. Wow, I can't wait to taste it...




Not bad for the first time, even though the sides are not perfect. My craving for cheesecake is satisfied now. My husband and kids liked it and they want me to bake one again...
And the cheesecake only lasted for 1 day...





Next for my baking, carrot cake (I did this before!), Mommy Fely's famous rolls(only tried once) and crinkles (as inspired by my friend Duch back in college).