A little something to drool over..

Well hello!

Today I’m going to show you a little recipe I discovered a little over a month ago. It’s rather healthy and VERY tasty. A little time-consuming but impressive yet simple and you need surprisingly little.

General Tso’s Chicken

Serves 4

Ingredients:

• 250ml rice
• 60ml corn starch (4 tbs)
• 500g snow peas, trimmed and halved
• 500g skinless, boneless chicken cut into pieces
• 4 garlic cloves
• 2 tsp. fresh ginger, peeled and grated
• medium carrot, peeled and julienned
• 3 tbsp. light brown sugar
• 2 tbsp. soy sauce
• 1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes ( I used sweet chilli sauce)
• 2 large egg whites
• salt and pepper
• vegetable oil for frying
• optional 2 egg yolks and 1 whole egg

Whatyagonnado:

1. Cook rice according to instructions, for an even healthier version, use brown rice. Meanwhile in a large bowl, stir together 1 tbsp. corn starch and 100ml cold water until smooth. Add snow peas and carrot, garlic, ginger, sugar, soy sauce, red pepper flakes(or chilli sauce), toss to combine and set aside.
2. In another bowl whisk together egg whites, remaining 3 tbsp. corn starch, 1/2 tsp. salt and some pepper. Add chicken, toss to coat.
3. In a large non-stick skillet, heat 1 tbsp. oil over medium-high heat. Cook the chicken pieces golden, you might have to do this in batches. Shake off the excess egg white mixture before adding chicken to the pan. Set the cooked chicken aside.
4. Add snow pea mix to the skillet. Cover, cook until snow peas are tender and sauce has thickened (3-5min). Return chicken, toss to coat, adjust the flavours as you like.
5. This step is optional as you can serve it with plain rice as well. I wanted to use up the egg yolks, so I added it to the rice. Whisk together the yolks, egg some extra salt, pepper and chilli and make an egg scramble. Add cooked rice to the scramble et voilà, you are done.

So while I was browsing online, I noticed the Tom Ford Metallic Beauty spring 2012 collection pictures. Gosh, the Tom Ford make up line looks so freaking good, so effortlessly classy and elegant. Not to mention super expensive…

Pictures via Google of course.

 

I don’t really adore the whole look of the models, not really a fan of the heavy cheeks and golden lip, but the eyes, they are mesmerising. All thanks to the cream eye shadows of course. My personal favourite is Platinum, just to die for really.

And well, being a sucker for nail polish, I also have to show you the 4 little cuties for this season. I’m going to go with the silver one called Silver Haze, well obviously, I will not be able to buy these due to the ridiculous budget I’m on, but a girl can and well, should dream.

Hope you enjoyed this little post.

Stay amazing, my friends.

With love,

Janne.

FOTD 11/07/11 and the best cookies ever

Well hello, lovelies!

Here is my face of the day.

Products used:

Face

• Oriflame beauty Skin Perfect foundation in Natural Beige
• Grimas Fixing Powder
• BeYu blusher 115
• Bourjois Delice de Soleil in nr 14 Olive/ Tanned skin

Eyes

• GOSH waterproof eye shadow base
• Rimmel London Glam’ Eyes quad eye shadow in 002 Smokey Brun (move over Loreal Paris Quad Pro in 303 Beige Taupe! The Rimmel quad is really worth buying!)
• Pierre René Precision Ink Eyeliner in Black
• L’oreal Volume Million Lashes Waterproof in Black
• Manhattan Eyebrow pencil in 99W

Lips

• L’oreal Paris Glam Shine 6h Volumizer in 003 Pure Addict

And that’s it for the FOTD. Now for the cookies. Someone tried them and you should have seen his face when he tasted them. Hah, to die for. He was super impressed that something could taste this good.

           Alfajores de Dulce de Leche

Here’s what you need to make a bit over 20 sandwich cookies.

• 250ml corn starch
• 200ml flour
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 100g butter (room temperature)
• 150ml sugar
• 3 egg yolks (if you have large eggs, use 2)
• 400g can of condensed milk
• icing sugar

1. Put the can of condensed milk (the kind with real sugar and milk) into a cooking pot, covered with water. Boil for 2,5-3 hours to make it more solid. Be aware that the water will evaporate so be sure to add water from time to time. Let the can cool.
2. Sift together corn starch, flour and baking powder.
3. Cream the butter and sugar. Add egg yolks one at a time.
4. Add sifted powder ingredients into the butter mixture with an electric mixer.
5. Preheat oven 180* Celsius.
6. Roll dough 6mm thick, use a cookie cutter or a cup to make even circles, mind you this dough is quite difficult to operate with, well at least for me. And stick them into the oven. Bake for 10-15 min, until bottoms are golden, yet the top is pale.
7. Put a teaspoon of condensed milk between the cookies, sift some icing sugar on top and you have a gorgeous super-delicious treat. Don’t make them ahead, as the cookies will get too soft.

Stay cool,

Janne.

Caaake!

I wanted to share a cake I made to my best friend. I couldn’t find a recipe good enough for her, so I thought it out myself. To make it as fantastic as she is, I incorporated everything I love.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And this came out.. Chocolate cake with creme caramel frosting and filling with bananas, decorated with pistacio nuts and Mars bars.

Karoliina, I wish you the happiest birthday you could ever imagine!

I love you more than any word could describe or any cake be good enough!!!

Now I’m off to make balloon animals(and I’m serious..)..

Christmas look 'n stuff

Hello everybody, so I'm gonna post the first post on this blog. Hmmm..
Anyway I wanted to show you my look for today. I have spent this day with just my bro and mum for as long as I've lived on this Earth, so it doesn't matter what make up I wear or if I have washed my hair. This year I did both and some extra(I also wore nice clothes and did a mani). My brother just put on his good wifebeater for a festive look.
Anyway here's the make up. As you can see, it's unbearably subtle. Just some glittery eyeshadow and liner.













For my face I used Bourjois Fond de teint Princeau brush foundation in Beige clair, Bourjois bronzing powder 76 Soleil Cuivré, Artdeco Camouflage Stick in 7.
For the eyes, I applied L'oreal Paris Quad Pro Doutzen Kroes shade nr 2 all over the lid, then covered it with the glittery shade in the quad. Then I rimmed my eyes with MaxFactor Kohl pencil in Black, smudged it a bit and for a little more dramatic effect, added a thin line of Bourjois Volume Clubbing liner in ultra Black near my eyelashes. I used Bourjois Liner Effect mascara for my lashes and that was it.

And now for the manicure.


The stickers didn't stay very well, so I had to take them off, as the ends started to get stuck in clothes and hair. So the mani was kind of a fail.






And a little extra for people who enjoy cooking. I made a Banoffee Pie, at first I wasn't really sure about the idea, but oh my god was it good. The pie just disappeared, brother ate 3 slices in the first 5 minutes and now, 3 hours later, it has been eaten completely.


For the dough:
4 dl plain flour
250g margarine
4 tbs cold water
2 tbs brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla sugar

For the filling:
1 can (nearly 400g) condensed milk, or Dulce de Leche
3 small ripe bananas

To make the dough, cut the margarine into small cubes, add flour and sugars, knead it until the mixture resembles bread crumbs, then add the water, one tbs at a time, until the mixture forms a nice solid dough ball. Cover with cling film and place in freezer for 30 mins.

It would be so much easier to make the filling with Dulce the Leche, but since there was none in the supermarket, I had to make it myself. You just have to put the tin can (tags removed) into a pot with enough water in it to cover the can and boil it for 2 hours. Allow it to cool, then mix with chopped bananas.

Place the dough into a cake mould, cover with the filling and it takes about 15-20 mins in 200 degrees Celsius.
Some recipes recommend topping it with whipped cream when done.

So that's it for today folks, hope ye enjoyed the first post.