My birthday cake

'I thought you are done with baking' said my husband sarcastically as he saw me baking my birthday cake. I told him that I'm not going to bake anymore last week (and maybe several weeks before too haha) as we want to clear out the ingredients before we leave Malaysia, but the idea of me not having a birthday cake baked by me is kind of sad when I have baked for others for their special days.

So today, dear hubby, is the last day I'm baking before we are leaving to the Netherlands, officially!! (as if you are ever reading my blog)

We had a large pint of Greek yogurt thus I decided to make my favorite vegetarian cake with a twist - pandan flavor! I bought few pandan leaves couple of days ago and made pandan paste out of it. I combine it with my favorite vegetarian cake recipe and voila, delicious and moist vegetarian pandan cake. I decorated the cake with cream cheese frosting and made salted caramel cream cheese filling for between the layers. And yeah, I obviously had to decorate the cake purple - my favorite color!

Side view of my birthday cake - 6' tall pandan cake with salted caramel cream cheese frosting decorated in purple ruffles.

The taste was awesome! Just the way I like it - moist, not too sweet and refreshing pandan smell. I think I will miss baking this cake in Netherlands. The chance of finding fresh pandan leaves is slim, plus I don't like the idea of using the yucky and unnatural pandan flavoring.

Top and side view of the cake. Isn't it pretty? :)

For those who are not familiar with pandan, I would say that it has nice and subtle fragrance of rose. It gives out light and refreshing taste, and tastes well when you complement it with palm sugar :) I think most (if not all) of the Southeast Asian countries use it in their cuisines.

So yeah, happy birthday (more like belated) to me and hope I can make more delicious and pretty cakes in the future :D

Natural green color of the pandan makes this cake looks so yummy!

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Making memories

Okay, pretty schmaltz post title haha. So few more days before we are going to the Netherlands. At the moment we are spending our time at my parents house in Baling, Kedah. I feel a bit sad, knowing that I won't come back to this homey place for four years. I will miss this place for sure - the pretty environment, my loved ones and my mom homemade food! My parents slaughtered turkeys few days ago, knowing how much their daughter and son-in-law love eating them :)

I had spent some quality time with my friends and family. Having potluck party with the UCDavis peeps, lunch and tea party with UPM colleagues, lab mates and friends, meeting fellow bakers whom I adored (you guys know who you are ;) ), and yet there are more people who are meaningful in my life whom I am unable to meet due to my tight schedule :( . Sorry guys, hope we can still keep in touch.

Anyway, seems like I will be more active with blogging in the future *hooray* Need to hone my writing skills before it gets worst hoho.

Delicious desserts made by me for my farewell tea party held last week. Cute deco from my lovely sis Farah Munirah from @makeupbyferrarossa :)

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'Sabbatical' leave from baking in Malaysia until 2018

Received email for e-ticketing to Amsterdam today. Our flight will be on the night of the 1st of June. I haven't started packing yet, not planning to bring lots of things like I used too when I went to the States for undergraduate study. My feeling is a mixture of sad, happy, excited and scared. PhD will be a very different journey than undergraduate and Master, and I do hope that I can go through it.

Muniroh's Bakery has been a wonderful experience since me and hubby started it in 2012. I am not going to stop it, just that it will be like taking a 'sabbatical' leave from baking until I'm done with my study. I will still bake in the Netherlands though, just that it will be more like stress reliever than baking for order.

I have had very wonderful journey with Muniroh's Bakery. Made new friends, met up with lots of people, and had the chance to meet up with other talented bakers ;) I had sweet and bitter memories which help in making the business grow, and all I can say is thank you so much for supporting me and Muniroh's Bakery and hope we can meet up again one day <3

Me with the last wedding cake that I made before going to the Netherlands. Beautiful picture taken by my good friend who is also a very talented photographer, Peter Law (019-8844337). Thanks Peter :)

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