Confessions of a part time hawker

Completed kitchen

2010-05-30T06:38:00.001-07:00

Completed kitchen
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Finally a place to call my own.

Angry house

2010-04-18T09:12:00.000-07:00

Funny how I thought this place had everything I wanted. Close to work, MRT directly under the block, just outside the ERP gantry.

Since getting the keys, I have been making trips to peek at it after work before the contractors take a sledgehammer through the place. Every time I am downstairs, instead of feeling like I am coming home to my sanctuary, I feel agitated. The crowd downstairs, the smells the heat. So I decided to call it the angry house.

Today Bacteria Boy offered to help remove the butt ugly wardrobe with a circular saw and a crowbar. I think he had fun till he realized he had to slice a full sized wardrobe into 20cm strips so that it could fit into the rubbish chute. Heh

I really don't understand why interior designers and contractors are so reluctant to finish a floor with cement and forgo having tiles. I always liked the raw cement look. The excuses given are:

It will crack.

The house will lose value.

It will trap dirt.

It will not be waterproof.

It will get dusty.

My question is why is it that I am seeing so many cement floors in architecture books? How are they dealing with those issues?

What's wrong with having cement first and if it looks really bad later, I get to tile over and have 2 different floor experiences.

Oh yeah and there is always epoxy floor sealing.

Ok on a side note here are some links some frameless doors that I so love love love. Well not like I can afford them but a girl can dream can't she?

http://www.linvisibile.it/en/the-products/vertical-pivot-system/photo-gallery/;48

And here is another one by Porro

Chicken sandwich (home made)

2009-05-16T06:40:00.001-07:00

Chicken sandwich
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Not one of my better food pictures but my excuse was I was already starving and had to buy ingredients and prep and eat before I passed out.

Brown some olive oil, white onions, capsicums and sear some chicken thighs with rosemary and parsley in a sandwich maker.

When chicken is cooked, put some olive oil and toast the inside of your bread with the sandwich maker.

Arrange your chicken, capcicums, soft golden brown onions, shred some coon cheese on top.

Add your top half of the bread and toast the outside of the sandwich.

Finally add some salt, yogurt, sliced tomatos and rocket salad.

Chili Crab Claw

2009-03-08T06:47:00.001-07:00

Chili Crab Claw
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Had this at Bintan over the weekend. I would recommend the pepper crab instead but the chili crab looked prettier.

The sauce was not spicy enough for my liking but for those of you who find regular chili crabs too spicy, this might be for you. What I did like about the crabs were that they were not left sitting around suffering from mascular dystrophy and were meaty and filled their shells.

For some reason my d300 decided to die on me so all i was left with was the canon S70. After spending 2 hours packing all my camera gear, the camera decided to take a holiday too.

My Usual Breakfast

2009-02-08T04:34:00.001-08:00

My Usual Breakfast
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

This is my usual breakfast(oats with milk), today was extra special because I had some leftover strawberries and blueberries from making a cake. Oats and raisins, oats and bananas, oats and milo, oats and green apple, they are all just as good and my day wouldn't start right without a cold bowl of soaked oats.

Wow I actually got around to posting on the blog again. Running the store took that much out of me that I really didn't have the energy for anything ice cream related for a while. It has been 3 months since ice queen shut down and my life seems to be starting to get back to normal again. No stressing over stocks, ingredients, new flavors, workers not being able to turn up for work.

Okay thats enough of dipping my toe back into anything ice cream related for now.

One of the hardest decisions

2008-09-29T07:26:00.000-07:00

Of all the decisions I had to make, none was more difficult than the one I was faced with last week. We were torn between raising prices (something that we all felt so strongly against right from the start and fought tooth and nail against) and selling our last batch of gelato and bringing down the shutters at ice queen for good.

We priced our gelato to make everyone happy, but when we got feedback, we realized that people would be happier with a denser product, less air in the gelato. Stronger flavors, fresh fruit instead of paste, and we were happy to add as much as we could, because it gave us that much joy watching people appreciate the love that has gone into it. All the while never wanting to increase prices.

I didn't realize that our struggle to keep prices low from the start would cause that much unhappiness when we had to eventually adjust our prices so that we can continue this journey with our customers a while longer.

So yes to all the people out there who might be reading, have yet to try, have tried and our regulars, I truly apologize for losing the tooth and nail fight.

Remembering that day....

2008-09-25T03:21:00.001-07:00

Ice Queen on a stick
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

As I was looking at the wonderful photos everyone has posted on their blog(BIG thanks people! for the lovely photos), I couldn't help but wonder how does one keep track of where all the photos were taken unless they spend some effort categorizing and adding tags and keywords. So this is what I came up with. TADA!!!

Would love to get some feedback before I go ahead with this.

We have been burgled! Can I go on holiday now?

2008-09-23T06:49:00.000-07:00

Work is like a badly rolled popiah(bursting at the seams)
I have to apologize for not being current with my posting but taking three weeks leave to get this little store started has resulted in real work piling up and bursting at the seams. But there is nothing better than some excitement at the store to add to our list of experiences.

9 missed calls from the ice cream store on a monday(we are closed on mondays). I thought the hibernating gelato must have been disturbed by a power trip. But we were in for more excitement. It appears that we had a surprise visitor the night before. We have been burgled!

We have been burgled and what's the first thing that came to my mind?
My immediate thoughts went along the lines of, "have I got enough leave left to take a holiday if we cant continue operation?". Yes, being a hawker takes that much out of you. Even a part time one. So kids, your parents were not lying when they said "you will have a hard life being a hawker if you dont study". Parents if your kids don't believe you, IM them the link to this blog. On the other hand, I studied like a book worm on crack and here I am hawking.

Then came the realization that, it took 10 china nationals 3 hours to get the gelato display cabinet over the bolted down hawker centre tables to where its currently sitting and 3 people to heave the gelato maker to it's current position. All hopes of a holiday immediately vaporized.

Poor guy robbing the wrong store.
Okay why would anyone burgle a gelato store that charges 2 dollars a cup? Don't they realize that all the money would have gone into the ingredients, the workers salary and the crazy electricity bill that at the end of the day, It's the other job thats subsidizing the ice cream store? Okay I guess if I fell on hard times I probably won't be thinking too straight too.

Anyway the guy who left his converse shoe prints(on the chest freezer) must really need the money to go through all that trouble. But I am thankful that he is not a malicious burglar who could have gotten upset after prying open an empty cash register and created bigger mess. Guess he is just someone who just happens to need some money, and who doesn't these days.

We don't make enough money to be worth any burgler's while but we are rich with experiences gathered and the people we have been able to come in contact with from all walks of life is invaluable.

Whoever he is, I hope he gets his life sorted out.

Inhaling food

2008-09-13T19:31:00.000-07:00

Having always had a special relationship with food, I have been asked many times howcome I do not have a food blog or doccument the food that makes its way past my table.

I could never exercise the restraint needed. If the food looks as good as many of the photos shown at ieat or skinnierthantheoriginal, it wouldn't last long enough for me to whip out the camera.

If I were to have a food blog it will most probably look like this.

Kok Kee wanton noodles(whats left of it). It was so good that I could not help gobbling it down before remembering to take a photo. But hey it really is that good.

There you go. I really doubt anybody wants to be reading a blog called "food that survived 2 mins on my plate". Plus readers never get to see the amazing food but whats left over.

Ah Tee Ko Ko Noodle

Golden Mile Food Centre

I asked for extra chili and vinegar and it came drowning in sauce and I added some. I guess for me anything drowned in vinegar is yummy.

Here is another confession, my friends feel that its a waste of money to take me to expensive places because of the way I "inhale my food" and don't get to taste it before it goes down.

When someone smiles and says "hi", say hi back.

2008-08-17T23:28:00.001-07:00

side walk chalk drawing
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Okay here is a quick post. Day three we took the menu to the sidewalks in chalk. There were a few friendly people who dropped by stared and said hi which was nice.

There were others that gave strange looks and didnt know what to say when I smiled and said hi.

This brought me back the conversations I had waiting for sets at the line up when surfing with Jonni the owner of school of surf . One of his many recycled jokes included how he was telling me when he used to do visa runs to Singapore, people would dress in black and not know how to react when you smile at them and started to look at your all you weird. Something I always dismissed as one of his many recycled and overused jokes.

So next time if someone says "Hi" just say "Hi" back.

The first day! Hawking the sweet stuff.

2008-08-16T09:14:00.000-07:00

Another batch of gelato to be churned
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

It was an amazing first day and the closest comparison would be to that of participating in a flea market. Neighbors taking an interest in you and your product, everyone enjoying themselves sharing a laugh with you. In our case probably at and not just with. But it was still an overall great experience.(anyone feels like stepping into different shoes for a while, let me know. Exchange your Manolo Blahniks for a pair of gumboots for a day)

Animal Sacrifice to the Hawker Center Deity

I have always wondered if there was some animal sacrifice to the hawker center deity ritual or some other superstition that needed to be observed. Well that didn't happen and we are still a vegan ice cream store. With no eggs, animal parts or animal sacrifice.

Concerned Neighbours

Quite a few hawker neighbors came by, genuinely concerned that our sign looks too dark, being a blackboard and not a back lit light box, they felt that we shine a FEW spotlights on it. Great and all if we aren't already contributing our fair share of heat and raising the ambient temperature in the hawker center. So I am really hoping we don't sell out and contribute more unnecessary heat. Other tips include pushing the gelato display cabinet further out so people can get better view.

Hawker Thoughts

Hawkers are constantly thirsty and can't get enough water.

Your feet hate you!

My bed has never felt so comfortable since I became a hawker.(No its not a case of sleeping better from lack of stress that all you office types with stressful jobs are thinking, but more a case of making gelato and sorbets till 5am before heading home.)

What do hawkers do after work?

I have always wondered what hawkers do after work. Is there some hangout that they all go to. Perhaps a favorite coffee center for a debrief , or some networking and exchanging tips. Its 1:09 am Sunday morning and I am going to spend my first after work hawker day like the rest of you. I am assuming that most of you would be sprawled in bed with your powerbook playing a downloaded television series. Okay I am going to go watch an episode of WEEDS(brilliant show about a suburban housewife who is a weed dealer. She also happens to be a single mom coping with raising her kids in between gang turf wars. Not as dark as it sounds.)

Work starts at 5am. Getting up to make batches of durian and chocolate gelato(with less vanilla essence*wink* ) . Thats 3 hours of sleep, 1 hour of hanging out with Nancy Botwin(weeds) and yes its back to assuming my hawker responsibilities.

A Quick Orange Sorbet

2008-08-11T04:52:00.001-07:00

Orange Sorbet In Cup
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Made Some orange sorbet today. I am quite happy with this batch. It has just the right amount of sugar to inhibit the formation of ice crystals without being too sweet.

Ingredients
2 1/2 cups water
1 cup sugar
Orange rind strips from 2 oranges
2 2/3 cups fresh orange juice
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice

Combine water and sugar in a small saucepan, and bring mixture to a boil. Add orange rind strips; reduce heat, and simmer 5 minutes. Remove and discard orange rind strips. Remove liquid from heat, and let cool completely. Stir in orange juice and lemon juice.
Pour mixture into freezer container of a 4-quart hand-turned or electric freezer. Freeze according to manufacturer's instructions. Pack freezer with additional ice and rock salt; let mixture stand in freezer 1 hour before serving.

Things I didn't know before today

Adding a little milk powder helps prevent your sorbet from becoming icy

Chalking the board

2008-08-08T21:02:00.001-07:00

chalk sign
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Finally got around to having the time to chalk up a signboard. Anyway its half completed but here is the work in progress. I am sorta stuck with what color should the ice cream in the cup be. Black ice cream doesnt seem appealing although the idea of black sesame is heavenly.

The board is made with plenty of messy scribbles when viewed close. So I guess it gives people something to look at if they are close to it and waiting for their ice cream.

Chalking tips (I didnt know before today)

1. Layer a base coat of fixative before working.

2. Spray fixative as you work to prevent your colours from blending as you lay down different colours.

3. Workable fixative while you work and a sealer when you are done.

4. Put down the dark colours before the light colours.

ice cream sign board
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Painted this today

2008-08-05T00:22:00.001-07:00

coffee cup art
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Coffee chalk board style. My attempt at doing a chalk sign with corel painter. Well its not really chalk but it allows you to mix you mediums very well and push your colours around like oil paint. Anyone thinking of getting into painting but put off by the price of paint and canvas should have a go at this. I am using the 30 day evaluation copy and you can download it from their site.

Hello Taylor

2008-08-04T09:41:00.001-07:00

Hello Taylor! This was a pleasure to use although setting it up initially seemed quite daunting with a collection of 21 parts to assemble and sterilize before reaching for the power button.

After running two batches through the machine I realized that I was still not getting dizzy from holding my breath hoping that the ice cream will freeze or constantly wondering if I needed to alter the recipe just to keep the batch freezer happy.

The way this thing dismantles also means that it can be thoroughly cleaned ensuring that no nasty leftover bits are caught in between some corner.

The machine lost points on the amount of ice cream that gets trapped in between the blades and needs to be manually removed. Well it's not a large amount but considering this is a low volume machine, the little bits that gets trapped in the blades ends up being a significant proportion.

It really does make ice cream at 8 mins a batch. Seems almost instant after messing with some china made batch freezer.

Scoop or Spade

2008-08-03T01:08:00.001-07:00

Coffee gelato on cone
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Was testing different ways of presenting the cone. Spade or scoop. After numerous attempts with the scoop, decided to go with the spade as it looked more organic and freeform, compared the the perfectly round scoop.

K took a look at the photo and the first thing he sad was "That's got to drip". Second thing he said was "Call it the minute scoop". Guess there is a trade off between me wanting it to look organic and generous and the practicality of it since being in tropical Singapore its not the most friendly weather for gelato stability.

On the other hand, having such hot weather and the speed at which Singaporeans do things, it might get eaten before it has a chance to melt.

Lychee Sorbet

2008-07-29T08:51:00.001-07:00

Lychee Sorbet
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

A quick lychee sorbet test batch after work today.

Raspberry Granita

2008-07-28T08:44:00.001-07:00

Raspberry Granita
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Things You’ll Need:
Groceries
Blenders
Saucepans
Strainers
1/3 c. water
1/2 c. sugar
1 tbsp. fresh lemon juice
1 1/2 c. fresh raspberries

Step
1
Heat the water and sugar until the sugar is dissolved. Avoid letting it come to a boil.
Step
2
Remove from heat and add the lemon juice.
Step
3
Puree the raspberries and strain them into the sugar mixture. If they're very soft, you can simply place them in the strainer and force them through.
Step
4
Stir the mixture together and place in a shallow container.
Step
5
Place the container in the freezer and freeze for several hours.
Step
6
Stir with a fork as the mixture freezes, every 20 minutes or so, breaking up any frozen surfaces and crushing any lumps. This creates granita's texture.
Step
7
Serve when the granita is almost completely frozen and can be scraped up into a ball.

One large or two small scoops?

2008-07-28T08:12:00.001-07:00

Zeroll 2.5oz ice-cream scoop
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

How would you like your gelato to look? One large scoop or two small scoops if both were the same volume?

Bought this 2.5 oz Zeroll ice cream scoop. Love the way it curls the gelato into a nice compact ball without too much effort and the sound of the anti freeze in the handle when you shake it.

Coffee Gelato

2008-07-28T08:05:00.001-07:00

Coffee Gelato
Originally uploaded by gelato.maker

Whisk the egg yolks and half the sugar together until pale and creamy. Place the milk, coffee and remaining sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Pour over the egg mixture and whisk to combine. Clean the saucepan, pour back the mixture and cook over low heat, stirring continuously until the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon. Do not allow the custard to boil. Strain the custard into a bowl and cool over ice. Stir in the coffee liquor.

Pour the mixture, making sure it is already cold, into the container of your ice cream maker and freeze it following the manufacturers instructions. When done, the gelato is ready to eat.

6 tips for using the cusineart ice cream maker

2008-06-15T01:39:00.000-07:00

1. Chill your mixture. Preferably overnight. This allows the mixture to be properly hydrated.

2. Turn on the aircon or churn it when the surrounding ambient temperature is cool. It helps your ice cream freeze faster.

3. Dont try to make too much ice cream at one go. Small batches tend to freeze faster and tend to be less icy. The longer your mixture takes to freeze, the higher the chance of your ice cream being icy.

4. Take the whole aluminum tub out and freeze in your freezer. This prevents the mixture from melting while you are transferring it into another container.

5. If you need to remove the frozen ice cream stuck to the aluminum bucket, soak the already frozen and set ice cream bucket in hot water. This will loosen the sides and bottom and allow the ice cream to slide out.

6. Turn in on and let it get cold before pouring your mixture in.