Officially "Desserted"

It has been quite a long while since I blogged anything about my bakes. My busy days are over and I am finally able to take a breather... whew! All these while, I have not stopped baking completely. The only thing that is stopping me from coming to this sanctuary are the finer details in life that I am occupied with, other than work. 

I am so looking forward to the end of November and the entire December. This coming lull period means that I can bake wholeheartedly for all I want. Sounds like a buffet? Just that this is one in which I help myself to my bake-books, recipes and a great deal of kitchen trials.  

Since it has been a good 3 months of non-blogging, it is time to get back my momentum. For a 'warm-up', I will be sharing my dessert hunts. I have been craving for some mouth-watering, exquisite desserts ever since I was exposed to some reputable patisseries by friends through word of mouth and the internet. 

On last Thursday afternoon, me and my best bud K decided to head down to Duxton Hill where a homely looking cafe - Flor patisserie, is quietly tucked in. The cafe maintained a simplistic look, with only a couple of small tables and chairs, ideal for a quiet afternoon chat. 

For a start, we chose 3 of their gorgeous looking dessert showpieces at the counter - Fromage Blanc, Strawberry Napolean and Mango Pie. 

The Fromage Blanc consists of a cream cheese mousse layer topped onto a cakey pie pastry base. I was rather intrigued by the texture of the pie base - buttery, cakey yet crumbly. It was distinctly cake-like in the middle and towards the edges it was firm and crumbly like a shortcrust pastry. I am definitely curious to know what this pastry is termed. For the cream cheese mousse, the tartness of the cream cheese shone through with a smooth mouth-feel.

K greatly recommended the Mango Pie, exclaiming how it wowed him on his last visit. From my first encounter with this very mango pie, one thought sprang to my mind: "This dessert does not resemble a pie at all, let alone a mango pie". Despite the unusual appearance, the taste and texture took me by surprise. The pie base (somewhat similar to that of the Fromage Blanc) worked brilliantly with the topping (I couldn't recall if it was pastry cream or whipped cream) and the vibrance of the firm, sweet mangoes which was accompanied with a slight tartness.  

When I was browsing through the dainty little cakes at the display counter, this Strawberry Napolean grabbed hold of my attention. Looking somewhat similar to a Japanese Strawberry Shortcake, this pastry cake comprise of buttery-crisp puff pastry layers, melt-in-the-mouth sponge cake layer, fresh cream, strawberries and strawberry gelee. The puff pastries remained crisp and non-soggy even though they were filled with fresh cream, a feat that requires skills and the understanding of the technicality required to assemble this cake. Be warned though, it can be a messy affair indulging in this cake, for the cake will break apart when a fork is dug into it.

Craving for more desserts to satisfy my sweet-toothed palate, I ordered an additional Wakakusayama that looked like a slice of a matcha log cake. The cake seemed dense but it was soft and nicely-moist. I have expected the green tea flavour to come across as being grassy, but the cake was nothing like that at all. The adzuki beans that were incoporated into the cream were too firm for my liking and it would have been better if they had added more red bean fillings, similar to that in texure of the red bean topping sitting on the matcha whipped cream.

With a satisfyingly sweet experience at Flor, I will be back for more pastries when I happen to drop by the Duxton Hill area, to re-visit the memorable Mango Pie and Strawerry Napolean and at the same time try out their other offerings.

Bakertan's Food Hunt: Fat Boys and Make-It-Yourself Burgers

Before I started baking, I have always been fascinated by food. I feel thrilled whenever I come across a food outlet (mainly cafes, eateries, hawker centres and sometimes restaurants) serving great tasting food at decent prices. Once in a while, me and my buddies would go on food hunts for affordable treats across this little island.

menu in the form of a large coaster

Last Sunday, me and my boardgame kakis hopped over to Fat Boys for dinner. The interior decor of this food establishment is sort of punk and street-art inspired, with black as the main element. Cosy and dimly-lit, the eatery makes an ideal place to chill out and have a nice chat. They do offer a limited range of alcoholic beverages but the main highlight would still be their in-house special - burgers. Fats Boys is afterall, a burger joint.

For the starters, we ordered a chili-cheese fries and deep fried calamari. The heat and spices were nicely balanced in the chili cheese sauce and it was'nt overly cheesy on the palate. I found the batter for the calamari to be too thick; the exterior of the batter was crisp but towards the interior, it was soggy and mushy. The calamari was nicely cooked though, soft and chewy to the bite. Accompanying the calamari was a wasabi mayo dip. The wasabi mayo was a little watery and appeared harmless on the first taste, but a brief moderate sharpness gushed up the nose afterwards.

Instead of choosing from the range of ready-assembled burgers available from the menu, four of us decided that we would assemble our burgers the way we liked it.

My make-your-own burger consist of a soft and fluffy homemade honey oat bun, juicy grilled chicken, flame grilled bananas and emmenthal cheese (the holey kind that mice love)  topped with curry remoulade. The curry remoulade surprised me quite a bit. It was neither reminiscent of chinese, japanese, malay nor indian style curry. It tasted more of a mixture of herbs and spices instead. Not exactly my favourite but it was'nt horrid either. 

V ordered a burger made out of Honey oat bun, beef patty (medium for all beef patties), fried egg, grilled banana and pineapples topped with honey mustard suace. The honey mustard sauce is similar to that of Subway's, nothing surprising out of it and it did'nt really bring out a different dimension of the burger. Adding the fried egg was a good choice but going with the pineapples did not make much of a difference.

Honey oat bun, beef patty, portobello mushroom with guacamole.

White sesame bun with grilled chicken. I can't recall the toppings and sauce.  

The burgers gave a decent run for their bucks but the fish and chips was at best average in taste. The fillet lacked a firm flaky bite and could have done better with a fuller flavour.

Overall, each main course would cost about 14 -16 SGD. Gst and service charge is not applicable here, if I did not recall wrongly. Not a shabby place for some decent burgers when you are craving for it.

Location: 187 Upper Thomson Road