Back in high school, my “signature” cupcake was a blue velvet cake with orange curd, blackberry Italian meringue buttercream, and white chocolate “stems”, with the entire cupcake designed to resemble a flower with the shades of an oceanside sunset. It was inspired specifically by the oceanside sunsets that I would see growing up in a…
Tag: butterfly pea tea
Milky Way Yokan
I love Tanabata. For those unfamiliar with it, Tanabata is a Japanese holiday where they have a star festival, celebrating all things wishes! It is held to commemorate the one day in the year(July 7th) where two lovers, Orihime and Hikoboshi, who were separated by the Milky Way can see each other. Tags with wishes…
“Butterfly Skies”(blueberry-yuzu) entremet
Now I would be lying if I said this recipe was easy. Or very doable. Or simple. I would not be lying if I said this recipe takes multiple days to execute without a blast chiller or liquid nitrogen. This is the kind of cake you would only make for special occasions. Between the techniques,…
Tsuki no Hikari wagashi
I really came up with this dessert because I was inspired by snow globes initially. I wanted to make this pretty snow globe wagashi situation, and that was what this would have been originally. But on the night I was making it, I looked up and saw a full moon peeking out of the clouds,…
Sanctuary: a mirror glaze cake
When I was conceptualizing a dessert for “Sanctuary” by Utada Hikaru, I wanted to make something that represented the aesthetic of Kingdom Hearts, specifically the all-white aesthetic of Castle Oblivion and the tropical feeling of the Destiny Islands. I wanted a mirror glaze cake with a clean white exterior, blue and white-swirled interior to represent…
Diamond dust: a petit gateau
When I was thinking of different, winter-themed desserts, I knew I had to do something with a reference to diamond dust. What diamond dust is, for those of you who aren’t familiar with it, is very light snowflakes that form and fall during clear skies. It’s very beautiful, and something I remember seeing on occasion…
Prince of the Sea Angels: a plated dish
So even though I was eliminated in top 10, I actually did have dishes in mind for the finale. The amount of thought you saw put into the crab lantern dish, trust me, a lot more were put into these. So while it is a shame I could not make these dishes for the judges,…
Sunshine, funshine: banoffee eclairs
I’ve been seeing so many eclairs with mirror glazes on my Instagram feed lately, so I figured I should try one of my own! I had a ton of bananas in my freezer, with the intentions of making them into vegan milkshakes, but I decided to spare two for this particular recipe, since I was…
My matcha dreamscape: a green tea-coconut layer cake
So before the cake replication challenge during MasterChef’s Sweet Week, we actually did get hints that we would be making a layer cake! So thinking we could make our own, I went ahead and thought up of a matcha and coconut layer cake. For the inspiration, I just imagined my trips to Taiwan and Japan,…
Moonlight dust: a mirror glaze cheesecake
The name of this dessert came about from a song by harmonicblend of the same name. I adore harmonicblend and their aesthetic and fantasy-driven soundtracks, and Moonlight dust was no exception. For the dessert itself, obviously, I needed to incorporate the moon into it somehow. So I went ahead and went with the most iconic…
Stormy seas, clear skies tart
This was loosely inspired by a smoothie bowl aesthetic, but I wanted to that take and make a pie out of it. I don’t know. That’s just how I was feeling. There was something about round things being placed into swirly things that looks really cool. So I went ahead and made a purple ube…
YUMEKATARI: buckwheat soba with butterfly pea and mushroom broths
I have always wanted to make my own soba noodles, because it looks really cool and I just love being able to make my own pasta or dough from scratch. The trick behind buckwheat flour (besides the fact that I had to go to five different grocery stores to procure it, so thank you Wholefoods…
Waiting for the rain: a plated concept
The inspiration for this dessert came from Maaya Sakamoto’s song, “Waiting for the Rain”. It was a song I first listened to my senior year when I was going through some serious shit. Maybe not the best thing to listen to, because it was a beautiful, but sad song. The lyrics really stood out to…
Perfectly blue macarons
So it turns out that the majority of the time I have been making macarons, I have been measuring out my ingredients incorrectly. Whenever it was supposed to be 3/4 cups almond flour and icing sugar, I would do 1 cup. Which definitely would explain why mine would come out so overtly browned, lumpy, dry,…
Blue skies, blue water mirror glaze cake
The inspiration for this cake was from a song by the same name. Go figure, that’s like half the shit I post here, and I love it because my music is so “out there” and not mainstream that you all would not know that unless I told you in the first place. Bitches. As you…
Sea salt ice cream with coconut cream
I really love doing different renditions on the iconic sea salt ice cream from Kingdom Hearts 2. There is just something about it that reminds me of summers at the beach…oh wait, that’s just the summer for me, because I’m from Los Angeles, and I happen to work nearby the beach. But anyways, it just…
Blue dreams doughnut cream
When I was thinking about a summery dessert, I was inspired by both sea salt ice cream from Kingdom Hearts and salted coconut-butterfly tea lattes. There is just something about that blue-white contrast that really reminds me of sunny skies and blue seas. The name “blue dreams” came from a song of the same name….
L’eclipse: the blue cheesecake
While I was sick with bronchitis, all I could think about was what I would bake the moment I stopped coughing my throat out. I thought back to my old cupcake-making days from high school, where I remembered one of the very first desserts that I have ever thought of: a blue velvet cupcake with…
Swan song Boston cream pie
This dessert was inspired by two things: my friend and (sadly, now ex-)coworker Christine, and Boston, the city I have come to love in the past four years, but had to part ways with. Christine and I would often talk about Boston, because she’s wanted to go for quite some time. Additionally, her nickname at…
Eternal memories: a plated concept
I was inspired to create this concept from a song by Crystal Kay of the same name. The chorus talks about finding yourself, despite how difficult that may be to do so. The song just reminded me of my own culinary journey so to speak, coming up from being a vegan cupcake baker to a…
Freddy's Harajuku 