Freddy's Harajuku

S’mores Pie

This was on my to-make list for a long, long time. And what tipped the scales and caused me to finally bake a S’mores pie was that I had a surplus of Biscoff cookies and graham crackers. And I figured, if this is not a sign from the universe that I needed to make a…

Matcha Latte Cheesecake

I had an abundance of leftover matcha shortbread from a previous recipe, and while snacking on those is nice, I wanted to challenge myself to make another recipe entirely using the shortbread crumbs as a crust! I figured, why not blitz the shortbread into a fine crumb, then fold melted matcha white chocolate through that,…

Cajeta-Duvalin Layer Cake

This recipe was meant to be a celebration of my friend, Frances. Frances, or as I lovingly call her, Francois, is a longtime friend of mine, dating back to when we worked together at the Portofino Hotel and Marina in Redondo Beach in 2018. We were in the same department, and we were basically partners…

Kecap Manis Kouign Amann with Peanut Caramel

I have been trying to make more laminated dough recipes this year, since I discovered the wonderfulness that is Costco purchasing my butter – the sheer amount of butter I can stock up means that I can tackle the more classically French, butter-centric recipes that I usually stayed away from to conserve my butter for…

Burnt Honey Bee Sting Cake

Bee sting cake, or bienenstichkuchen as it is referred to in Germany, is a dessert consisting of a yeast leavened dough, similar to a brioche, topped with a caramelized almond topping, and filled with pastry cream. I wanted to do a take on it, as a nod to my winters spent in the German Christmas…

Peach-Osmanthus-Ginger Entremet

Hilariously enough, the three main ingredients in this entremet(French set mousse cake) form the acronym P.O.G., which is also used in Hawaiian cuisine to reference passionfruit-orange-guava juice. In this case, this P.O.G. refers to peach, osmanthus, and ginger, which happen to be three of my mom’s favorite ingredients. Growing up, we had a white peach…

Cajeta Banoffee Pie

Banoffee pie is a British dessert consisting of a buttery shortbread crust that is smeared with dulce de leche, slices of fresh banana, cream, and chocolate. It kind of reminds me of Million Dollar Shortbread, if you have ever had that before, but with bananas. Which is to say that it is delicious. For my…

Plated Yogurt-Semolina Olive Oil Cakes

I always have this craving for semolina-olive oil cake. Olive oil cake has this rich, dense crumb, while semolina gives it an almost corn-like flavor that is mild and pleasant. I came up with this dessert because I bought a gigantic 3 pound tub of yogurt, and while I love yogurt(nowhere as much as Terry…

Pomelo-Sesame-Blueberry Entremet

A while ago, I went to Tokyo for fun – we only had two full days in the city since flying to and from took a day each way, but we made the most of our two days, seeing Shinjuku, Shibuya, Tokyo Skytree, several Pokemon Centers, Harajuku(my personal favorite), and we also visited Teamlab Planets….

Lomo Saltado with Shishito Aji

Peruvian food is so special in that it is the intersection of Asian and Latin cuisines – because of the Chinese and Japanese immigrants that settled in Peru, Peruvian culture takes on so many of those influences, and I am here for it! With lomo saltado, it is a dish I thoroughly enjoy – seared…

Brown Butter Toffee Chip Cookies

I occasionally love to dabble and adjust my cookie recipe, because I love how tweaking an ingredient or a technique in the recipe can result in dramatically different kinds of cookies. In the case of these cookies, I was trying to go with this super toasty, brown butter-forward cookie studded with chocolate, cacao nibs, and…

Matcha Swirled Conchas

So I was not actually trying to make concha originally. These were going to be swirled matcha melon pan, but what ended up happening was that between how I was attempting to swirl my matcha and regular bread dough together and how my topping dough baked, I ended up with breads that looks like conch…

Miso-Milk Tea Chip Cookies

These cookies are on the verge of being an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink scenario – there is assam tea powder, miso paste, brown butter, and about four kinds of chocolate. As I was making these cookies, I started out with making a giant vat of brown butter, threw some miso into that, and as I was whipping that…

Mango Sunshine Petit Gateau

A while back, my mom gifted me with a mango, which is a fruit I admittedly don’t eat that often – I usually have bad luck with mangos, since most of the time, the ones I pick out are too unripe and sour, and I usually want super ripe ones for the kinds of desserts…

Black Sesame-Blueberry Swirled Baked Cheesecake

So I made the (can be seen as some as a) mistake of purchasing a Costco container of blueberries, and the consequence of doing that is now I have more blueberries than I know what to do with. I personally have always loved blueberry compote or jam on top of a baked cheesecake, so my…

Lilikoi Chantilly Cake

Contrary to what you may think, “chantilly” is a term for two different pastry components. The classic French version is just a sweetened whipped cream. However, in Hawaii, it means something a bit different. I was surprised a few years ago when I was in Oahu with my friend Lauren that she introduced me to…

Blue Yuzu-Elderflower Haupia Pie

A long time ago, I made a haupia pie that was a gorgeous blue color. It was a bit whimsical, with a purple ube crust, a blue haupia(thickened Hawaiian coconut pudding) filling, and these pretty spheres of haupia that were scattered across the top. I wanted to create that, but pairing the coconut with a…

Trio of Milkbread Shio Pan

So I had zero clue what shio pan was until the beginning of 2024 when I saw someone make shio pan and referring to them as “salt bread”. This whole time, I just thought that they were chubby croissants, and as someone who has studied Japanese for 5 years and lived in and visited the…

Vegan and Gluten-free Chocolate-Kumquat Cupcakes

I was lucky enough to receive a bunch of fresh kumquats from a dear friend, Celina, and I wanted to do something fun with them. I love pairing kumquats with chocolate, and it just made sense to go that route. It has been a minute since I made a cupcake, and I wanted to make…

Kecap Manis-Leche Flan Cookies

Kecap manis(pronounced keh-chahp mah-nee), is a sweet Indonesian soy sauce, made by boiling brown sugar with soy sauce, resulting in an ingredient that basically tastes like molasses. Typically it is used in nasi goreng(Indo fried rice), but based on the sweetness levels, it totally can be used in desserts. I was fortunate enough to be…