Strawberry Tart: 2nd Attempt

1st attempt: Used a cake pan, tart shell was too thick at the side (click here for recipe)

2nd attempt: Bought a tart pan this time and tried rolling out the dough with a rolling pin but was unsuccessful because the dough was too crumbly. At the end, had to put the dough in the pan and just tried to press evenly to prevent thick sides.
The tart came out better than the first time but there is still room for improvement.

One easy to make and delicious tart :)

Thanksgiving

During thanksgiving, I went to Ann Arbor to have thanksgiving dinner at Huey Shann's place. It was a potluck and I spent quite a long time deciding what to cook. After some research online, I went with the garlic and sage pork tenderloin and sweet potato cannelloni from Martha Stewart's website.

I took a very long time to prepare the cannelloni. The recipe requires cutting the sweet potatoes into thin slices; boiling it in hot water for about 2 minutes; and then rolling it up with some filling inside. The potato slices would snap into halves when I try to roll it. In the end, I gave up on rolling it and made a sandwich style instead.

Siew Gee style "sweet potato sandwich"

The one and only cannelloni that I managed to make

Compared to the cannelloni, the pork tenderloin was sooo much easier to make. The prep time is no longer than 10 minutes and after that, I just have to put it in the oven and...

ta-da....it's done

Now that I look at this picture, I think I might have slice the pork a little too thin

The pork turned out pretty good, but the cannelloni was just ok and I thought that it did not worth the prep effort. I'm still holding off on trying to roast a turkey. Maybe next year, I'll try to make this thanksgiving must have dish.

Lastly, I hope everyone had a great time during thanksgiving :)

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving this year was not very eventful (no travelling)...yet it was a great one. I did some shopping online...had dinner with a few colleagues and their families...and also had some friends over my place for dinner.

For the thanksgiving dinner at my home, there were 12 people in total. It has been a while since the last time I cooked for so many people. I was very excited. I was torn between Western and Malaysian food, so I ended up having a mixture of both. It took me a while to research online and decide on what to include in the menu. Also, I was not sure if I should roast a turkey since it requires a lot of time and I don't really like turkey. Finally, I decided to roast a chicken as a substitute of the turkey. Together with the main dish, I eventually came up with my complete set of menu as below (click on the dish name for the recipe):

Starters

Thai-style Mango Salad

Chicken Satay

Entrees and Sides

Grilled Asparagus

Roast Chicken

Roast Potatoes (baked together with the chicken)

Jambalaya

Dessert

Kek Batik

That was the first time that I try cooking the dishes above. I am very happy that everything turned out well. A whole day of work was worth it because I enjoy cooking and eating a lot.

Lastly, I would like to thank everyone for coming and hope you guys had a great time too :)

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ps. Thanks for the feedbacks. I'll keep them in mind. Hopefully the next time, we'll have more satay and more games available :P