Bake It Yourself - Walnut raisin bread

Baking is the latest craze ongoing in the family. Even with the little boy on tow, Milu (Manu's sister) managed to go for baking course and now she is baking incredibly wonderful cakes! It was a great motivation for me. 

I had always wanted to bake my own bread. I had scoured a lot of recipe books in search of an easy and interesting recipe. But, all f them had listed bread making as a very complicated process. So, I had not pursued it through, until last week when she showed me this beautiful and impressive cake she baked. Finally, my motivation levels shot up high and conquered my laziness. I read more about baking and got a basic understanding of the concepts like proofing, kneading and most importantly, the role of yeast. I always thought it was just another ingredient like baking powder and could add it to the dough. I was surprised to learn that even the dried yeast is a live organism, just waiting to be 'activated'. Luke warm water and sugar acts as the feed and brings it to action!

And over this weekend, I finally baked my own two loaves :-) 

Good news! I have adapted the recipe to make it as easy as I could. The process as such is not complicated, it just needs a lot of resting(rising) time in between. So, I just went on with my weekend chores simultaneously.

Ingredients:

• 375g bread flour
• 125g wholemeal flour
• 2 tsps fine salt
• 330 ml water (I used a pet bottle for the measure)
• 75 g walnuts, chopped
• 150 g raisins (Manu wants me to add more next time)
• 2 tsps dried yeast (itz marked Ragi instant yeast in my bottle)
• 2 tsps sugar

How To:

1. In a small cup, take 100 ml of the water and add 2 teaspoons of sugar. Mix the yeast to it, stir and leave for 5 minutes.

2. In a big  bowl, combine the flours and the salt.

3. When the yeast mixture turns frothy, make a well in a center of the flour bowl, and pour in the yeast mixture.

4. Using a spatula, draw enough of the flour into the yeast mixture to form a thick paste.

5. Cover the bowl with a tea towel, then leave to ‘sponge’ and risen. (About 20 minutes)

6. Pour in a bit more than half of the remaining water into the well and mix in the flour. Then stir in as much of the rest of the water as needed to form a firm, moist dough.

7. Turn the firm dough out onto a work surface. Knead, with the base of your palms, until smooth and rubbery. (I had to do this for around 7 minutes.) 

8. At the end of the kneading process, add the walnuts and raisins and mix well.

9. Put the dough in a bowl and cover with a tea towel. Leave to rise until doubled in size – around 45 minutes.

10. Take the dough out of the bowl, poke holes and punch the air out of the dough and divide it into 2 loaves.

11. Shape the dough into your desired shape.

12. Place the shaped dough on a baking sheet and cover with the damp tea towel.

13. Preheat the oven to 190 degree Celsius.

14. Proof – or let the loaves rest and rise – until doubled in size. This takes about 30 minutes.

15. Bake in the oven for 30-35 minutes, until baked. One test of 'done-ness' is a hollow-sound when tapping the loaf underneath. 

16. Wait for a bit for  the loaf cools down, take pictures if you are interested, round up the members of the house :)

17. Feel mightily proud, slice, share and enjoy the warm steaming bread !

My beautiful neighbourhood

Even though I am a big fan of the cityscape and other vibrant parts of Singapore, I have to admit this - Lower Peirce reservoir is the most beautiful and serene place in this island. I know that writing more about this tiny reservoir park would make it famous and people would come to visit and it might eventually spoil the beauty of the place. But, it feels almost criminal not to share this place. This place gives a very different view of Singapore - no HDBs, no skyscrapers and not even cranes.

We have visited this park on numerous occassions – rainy evenings, sunset hours and mornings runs. This place never fails to impress us! We have developed the habit of visiting this park when we have free evenings, just to watch the sunset colors. Don’t be mistaken. It is not possible to see the actual sunset from here. The still waters here, which capture the sunset colors brings magic to this place!

A twilight moment at Lower Peirce [Photo by Manu]

Each frame showing the gradual change in colors from sunset through twilight to nightfall was incredibly beautiful! It was so awesome that even I was silent for the hour and Manu started asking me if I was all right.

The park is quite small, with a few trails. A total of just about 2-3 kilometers inside the park. But, we have seen a lot of monkeys and sometimes wild boars(Yes!) in these grounds.

The reservoir and the track around it

The red track shows the whole trails and the outer perimeters of the park, which we scouted. Foodies, this is a neighborhood which you should not miss! Those green blobs in the map are especially for you.

The prata shop – Casuarina is right at the end of the trails. This is a great stop to replenish all the calories you lost with the walking and wow-ing. If you are coming to watch the sunset, explore out to the cozily tucked in Awfully chocolate and IceCream chefs just within 10 minutes walk.

If you live in Singapore or are on here on a vacation, do visit the Lower Peirce on a beautiful afternoon. The view is so awesome that you will come back to this post to thank me :-)

How to get here : 

If you are not driving, the easiest access is through bus.
Board any of these bus services - 132, 163, 165, 166, 167, 855 or 980 which ply along the Upper Thomson Rd. Get down at 53099 (BusStopID) or the one in opposite direction 53091. You would be able to see the board pointing to the reservoir entry.

Nearest MRT stations are Ang Mo Kio (NS Line) and Marymount (Circle Line). You would need to further transit to any of the above listed buses. From AMK interchange, you can board 132, 165, 166 and 169 to alight at BusStop 53091. From Marymount MRT, you need to walk 5-7 minutes to get to the bustop Opposite Shunfu estate - 53021 to board 132, 163, 165, 166, 167, 855 or 980.

Varnam - An exhibition by Kaledio Arts club

If I am asked to describe “Varnam 2013” in a single statement, I would choose to say that it was an astonishing play of colors! It was an art exhibition conducted by Kaleido, an arts club led by the Singapore Malayalee Association Youth wing. Kaleido was set-up with a goal to nurture the artistic talents within our community – may it be photography, paintings, videography or 3d modelling. With the energetic forerunners and organizers, Kaleido has sprung into action in the very early days of formation itself.

Varnam 2013 (henceforth referred to as Varnam), was the first attempt by the Malayali community here in Singapore to organize an exhibition of this nature. As the plans were being hatched for Varnam, entries started pouring in from our various artists. Judging by the quality and intensity of the works, it was hard to believe that most of our artists were amateurs. Eventually we decided that the theme for Varnam 2013 as “diversity”. We ended up short listing around 85 artworks from 11 artists. The collection displayed at the SMA building on 26-27th Jan 2013, were the most comprehensive and varied collection I have ever seen in such a proximity.

Our artists had boldly ventured into most of the creative styles that could be represented in paper and canvas - acrylics, water colors, pastels, oil paintings, charcoal art and pencil sketches. You name it, we had it on display! The result was an astounding and vibrant collection of landscapes, portraits, mural influences, still life and abstracts.

A sample of 10 pictures from Varnam!

Our creativity wasn’t limited to two dimensions. The 3D figurines and animations on display ensured that we held the interest of our young visitors.

         

           The famous "Jarawa" - Clay model 

Shazabi- Scaled model of Japanese Anime

            And this was my favorite moment from the whole exhibition :-)

If it was in my capacity, I would start a Mexican wave each for Nikhil, Lijesh and others who dedicated a lot of time, energy and thought process to make Varnam a huge success! Well, I believe that a Mexican wave is the highest honor a person can get from an enthusiastic crowd :-)

My role was to be a volunteer at Varnam. What I did the whole weekend was hanging out with my friends and family who came to the venue, make new friends and majorly, have loads of fun! I thoroughly enjoyed the weekend and am looking forward to the next event by Kaleido.

A Rainy Weekend

Like most people from Kerala, Rain is an integral part of my life.

The rainy school days, the upside down umbrellas, splashing in the muddy waters, rubbery wrinkled toes, paper boats and much more all are part of our lives .
I can't express how much I used to miss the heavy downpour when I was living in Japan. To make up for that loss, we have enough rain in Singapore. Though the showers here aren't decent enough to get organized into a monsoon season, it scatters throughout the year. The rains don't last longer also.

There have been only two instances where I got troubled by the rain. Come to think of it, both were during bike rides.
Once in India, when I went for a movie with Dad & Anup, I had conveniently forgotten that I had my passport in my handbag. While we were riding back home, I had the handbag slung over my shoulders. I didn't realize the consequences until the passport officer got quite angry when I filed a reapplication &, to my utmost regret, told him the true reason. He made me read out the declaration by the President of India, in front of the whole office and waiting crowd! He made me promise that I would never neglect my responsibility towards the passport & the President! To this day, I keep my passport very safe. Am not bothered much about the President part after APJ's term ended.

Second is a more recent bike accident. As always, I was talking to Manu oblivious of what was happening on the roads. When the bike started moving horizontal on the road rather than the usual perpendicular stand, and I was thrown to the middle of the road, I imagined a big trailer at full speed had knocked us out and is coming to run over my head. Why else would the bike fall? Can you give me one good reason? In reality, it was just a tiny skid on the wet roads that started the slide. Results were patchwork on my knees and losing my precious linen trousers. The momentum finally stopped and when I finally sat up on the road, I saw that the bike was lying there in one piece, Manu was up and about & I still had my full head.
To Manu's intense horror, I was laughing when I saw my knees bleeding badly. It did hurt when the doctor cleaned up the bits of tar from my wound & I couldn't bend my knees for a week. But, my joyous mood of escaping from the (imaginary) trailer was more than enough to distract me from the pain.
// If you are curious, send me emails and I will share with you the pictures of Red Africa on my knees. Manu found it too irresistible to take a photograph of it.

Anyways, back to the good stuff about the rain. I still love the rain and can't resist playing in the rain. If am headed home from work or anywhere and it starts raining, I never use the umbrella.
Last Friday evening, when we were riding home, it started raining. After the accident, I get a bit freaked out when it starts raining while we are on this bike. But then, this was Friday evening (only very few things can make my Friday evenings dull) and the rain wasn't that strong. The best part is, it steadily increased through the night, and continued raining. We left the windows open and slept to the music of the rain. When I wake up in the midst of the night I could still hear the rain. And the most beautiful way to wake up on a Saturday morning(when you have no specific plans) is to the sound of the rain. It beautifully rained throughout the day. Later, around six, when the rain was lighter, we went out for a walk. We scouted around a reservoir and the rainy muddy tiny forest alongside it. The following cloudy Sunday kept up the feeling of the monsoon season.

I haven't had such a beautiful perfect rainy weekend for such a long time.
I can see the nostalgic faces of my Malayali friends while reading this, coz that’s what I feel now while writing this.
Honestly, it did not feel like we were in Singapore. The weekend was as refreshing as a short trip to Kerala. In a way, this rain saved Manu a lot of money on air-fares ;) Now, he can spend that on the earrings which I wanted!

Kite Runners

Flying kite is an image which I always associated with visiting my mum's house during summer vacations. Back then, I ddn't own a kite and I never knew how to make one. So, I just enjoyed clapping and running behind the people who maneuvered the kites.
Manu knows to fly kites and we usually go for kite flying sessions. I did not deviate from my policy - "Do not attempt anything more than my old skills."
This weekend, we went to Marina Barrage with T.J. and my dad. Oh, Teena and Jai are the T.J., so named to respect Teena's extreme knowledge and love for abbreviations.
Thanks to the excellent navigation skills of our shotgun and driver, we reached the destination in just 50 minutes (usual drive time is 20 minutes)

Consequences - sky was getting ready for sunset colors, wind was dying out and the place was crowded enough. Our skillset dramatically shrinked, with a man-down situation. Manu gets easily distracted with the sunset, impending blue hour and his new camera. I know him well enough to walk away when that glazed look comes over his face and he starts talking sentences which have filters, shooting modes and cloud patterns.

Jai has enough knowledge on how to fly kites, from watching movies. Dad has seen the it live in Rajasthan. With the solid theory backing, we started. It was fun, not for us, but for our on-lookers. They circled around us and started giving suggestions on what step to take next. The kite somehow had an affinity to the ground and never wanted to defy gravity. How much ever we ran with the kite and released to the sky and envisioned it to soar high, the kite did not understand the concept. It just insisted on falling nose first to the ground.

Photos (almost always) never lie !

(ഇത് ഇപ്പോ എങ്ങിനെയാ ആകാശത്ത് എത്തിക്കുക? പണ്ടാരം  ! ഞാന്‍ പുലി ആണെന്ന് പറഞും പൊയി ) 

Being an expert, How do I make this thing fly ? 

അവന് അറിഞ്ഞൂടാ , ഞാന്‍  ദിപ്പൊ ശരി ആക്കി തരാം ! 

I will fly this kite in a minute!

Jai decided that the kite ain't good and went to buy another kite. Feel free to imagine my un-surprised face when he came back with cola & chips and a flying rubber band with lights. He named it "Shashi"! (പേര് ശശി)
Dad said that the wind has died and suddenly cultivated an immense interest in functioning of a reservoir and water purification!

Me and Teena decided to learn from scratch. In practical terms, it means to watch how others are launching the kites & duplicate it. Close inspection revealed that our experts had assembled the kite wrongly! So, we re-assembled it and started running around. The draft was stronger now and the kite started soaring high :) We got too excited and forgot to thread it. It came back at double speed! Once we had mastered the technique we were ok to fly it again.

Workers Me & Teena with Senior PM

After a while we noticed that our kite ain't flying higher even though when we were threading it quite generously. We tried to bring back the thread and realized that our kite was in a love triangle - A Donald duck kite and another rainbow beauty. How much ever I hate to interfere in an entangled relationship, this was a must do. We rescued the kites and relocated to another space in the park. When the sky was getting darker, we gave up the air space to kites with lights and retired to enjoy the beautiful skyline and the light show at the Super tree groves in Gardens by the Bay(Google for 'Garden Rhapsody' until I write about it one day and link it here).

It was a great evening peeps. We should do this more often with more kites and friends. Hereby, I officially declare Marina Barrage to enlisted be in my "Fave Five Spots in Singapore" list.

Note :
How to reach Marina Barrage, if you are taking public transport - Board the North South(Red) Line, go to Marina Bay and take Exit A. You will see MBS on the left side. Don't get distracted. Walk straight to the bus stop and board SBS 400.You will see the Barrage right after the Gardens by the Bay.

My experiment with the wax!

When our parents were here, Dad found this beautiful book on candle making. He was browsing the library for a good candle making book, as Mom is very interested in this. On a weekend, we went "arts shopping" and made beautiful gel candles. I was so thrilled about it that later they sent me a big block of wax, to work on. Then on, making a square candle for our room has been in my to-do list. 

As part of making the weekend eventful, I attempted it yesterday. 

Since I don't trust myself to continue candle making, my thrifty mind does not want me to invest on 'must have' items like double boiler, wick holder or dedicated molds for candle making. 

I was saving the empty bottle of olive oil for quite a while to use as my square mold. I used a long tooth pick as wicker. Double boiler was an old sauce pan strategically held in place to get enough heat from boiling water in another bigger sauce pan! (Everyone says, never heat the wax directly on stove top)

If I continue to practice and perfect this, I will surely buy the gadgets soon. 

The only causalities were my last minute panic and screams to get assistance to keep my dummy wicker straight in the center. Of course, instantly Manu engineered a technique to solve the on-site technical glitches! (I think I made the right choice by marrying him)

It was fun making this beautiful little turquoise candle :)