Strawberry-mochi crepe cake

Continuing on with my gluten-free desserts, I made this one actually out of curiosity. I used to love going to Harajuku Crepe in Beverly Hills(RIP, because they’ve been closed for years now), and they specialized in gluten-free crepes made with mochi. Now, I could NEVER get the same consistency, no matter how hard I tried,…

Vegan baklava with pistachio ice cream

Baklava is one of my absolute favorite Middle Eastern desserts. Layers of flaky phyllo(or spelled filo as well, but same thing), with a toffee-like filling of caramelized nuts, and a delicious spiced syrup that soaks through everything and really brings it together. The really cool thing, for me anyways, about Middle Eastern desserts is the…

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…

Kouign amann egg tarts

When I was figuring out some Easter themed desserts, one thing I couldn’t get out of my head was the idea of doing something egg-themed. It was either that or something rabbit themed, but I’ve done that for the past two years and kind of wanted to change it up. So instead, I went with…

A very berry (vegan) layer cake

Now I really wanted to make this cake for a couple of reasons. The first being, a lot of people have been complaining that Swiss meringue buttercream is hard. Personally, I don’t think that it’s hard, it’s more about knowing how to make it. To give a little explanation about meringues, we have three kinds….

Feelings of make-pretend: a plated dessert

I came up with this dessert half out of needing to get rid of my leftover vegan macaron components, and half because I just wanted to do something playful and elegant. With what I already had made, being the ice cream and the gelee, I was able to come up with a couple different ideas,…

Vegan coconut-sticky rice soufflé with mango creamsicle sauce

So this is the recipe I actually made on Instagram Live with Shari from my season on Masterchef. We were doing soufflé demo’s, and we each did a different flavor, hers being chocolate, while mine being this one. I didn’t want to go traditional to begin with, since I wanted to conserve eggs, and because…

Stay gold: a plated dessert

I recently purchased some dulcey (blonde chocolate) and was thinking of different things I could do with it. Blonde chocolate is basically a slow-roasted white chocolate that tastes like dulce de leche. It’s very much caramelized and nutty, and I wanted to play around with that flavor profile. So looking at some of my older…

Pistachio mille crepe

Before I worked at Milk Bar, I never was a particularly huge fan of pistachios in desserts. I typically used them in things like dhukka or in salads, and I preferred using hazelnuts or almonds in my desserts instead(I did make pistachio desserts, but removing the damn shells also annoyed me and my fingernails to…

Pistachio-lemon tart

In honor of Pi Day, I knew I had to do a pie or a tart of some kind. So I went with the tart route, and made some mini pistachio-lemon tarts. The flavor combination was inspired by the lemon-pistachio brioche we sell at Milk Bar, but also my need to get rid of an…

Ivory Spring: a petite gateau

I feel like it has been a while since I brought out the wooden sake cups, well that, and I knew that I wanted to make something green in the spirit of St. Patty’s day, so that’s where the idea to make a matcha-misu (matcha-flavored tiramisu) came from. I had some really cool flavors of…

PB&J Layer Cake

So I came up with this concept after a quick chat with my friend Sam (you might remember him as the lawyer from my season of Masterchef). His son Jude’s 2nd birthday was coming up (it will actually be when I post this, so go and wish his son a happy birthday if you’re reading this!)…

Rainbow of illusion: a mirror glaze cake

So the name of this dessert stemmed from the lyrics of a harmonicblend song, “Auf Wiedersehen”. When I was trying to conceptualize this dessert, I wanted to make something that can be made into a rainbow, and I wouldn’t necessarily say deconstruct it, but rather, emphasize aspects of the rainbow that I wanted to. When…

Meyer Lemon-Elderflower-Meringue Beignets

I love a good beignet. Fluffy doughnuts are honestly my favorite thing ever for munching on, especially when they’re stuffed with something. In this case, I had a ton of Meyer lemons sitting in my fridge, and I wanted to use them up. Immediately, my mind went to lemon curd. And with lemon curd, you…

Thin mint-Oreo Doughnut Creams

I really love making Doughnut Creams. I don’t make them as often as I used to, but I do still like their aesthetic. A seemingly perfectly glazed doughnut with cute toppings, but when you bite into it, it’s not fried dough. It’s a set mousse with fluffy cake on the bottom. Sometimes, two mousses. Sometimes,…

Basque cheesecake with chocolate chip sable crust

Now I have been dying to make Basque cheesecake for quite a while now. For those of you who do not know what these are, they’re basically a Spanish-styled cheesecake which is airy and light at the edges, with a almost blackened, if not burnt top, and a gooey, creamy, and oozy center. They’re basically…

Pineapple upside down layer cake

So with all of the recipe-testing I have been doing, not going to lie, there’s been a LOT of leftover components here and there accumulating. One of such leftover items were the tea-smoked cherries from my earl grey-spumoni dessert. So I wanted to get rid of them bring them back in another dessert! Rummaging through…

Love like you: a mirror glaze cake

When I was thinking of my quintessential Valentine’s Dessert, I had to go this route. A mousse cake would be perfect, since they are gorgeous, and almost resemble a box of chocolates in a way. I decided to go with a classic and simple combination of raspberry and vanilla, just because the contrast is sharp,…

うつろい(utsuroi): a plated dessert

I really wanted this dessert to be the sister counterpart to “kakawari”, as it is based on yet another song by TrySail, and almost a given here, another theme song from Magia Record. The name roughly translates from Japanese to English as “waning” or “fading”, or an unfortunate kind of change. Since my other dessert…

Let this feeling go: a plated dessert

So continuing with my Valentine’s/Singles Awareness Day desserts, I wanted to make something with berries, cream, champagne, and chocolate. But I didn’t want to do just the obvious strawberries with champagne and white chocolate combination. I wanted to be a little different, so I opted for ruby chocolate and raspberries, and for my cream component,…