I have been seeing a ton of pie-art types of posts on Instagram lately, so I wanted to give it a try as well. For my pie, I did a bee pollen pate sucre with brown butter-cinnamon poached apple slices, and instead of a lattice, I did more of a ribbon type of crust with…
Tag: dessert
Tale of two princes: a plated concept
This dessert is a literal translation of who I am. It features two princes in the form of desserts, being the Prince of the Sky, and the Prince of the Snow. The Prince of the Sky represents my hometown of Palos Verdes, where wild fennel and peacocks foam; fennel is featured in four applications in…
Matcha-vanilla checkerboard cake
I love making checkerboard cakes. For TasteBUds, I actually prepared a chocolate-vanilla one inspired by Lady M. Since I love making them, I figured I would share a different recipe from that one, this one featuring matcha, and using chiffon cakes instead of genoise. While genoise are sturdier and can hold up to being cut…
Samoa Cupcakes
Samoa, coconut dreams, whatever the hell they’re called, they’re arguably one of the most delicious Girl’s Scout Cookies of all time, unless you’re an evil bitch and hate coconut, chocolate, or caramel, in which case, go step in front of a bus. Since I had already prepared one dessert inspired by Girl’s Scout Cookies before,…
Passionfruit Souffle
Passionfruit is easily one of my favorite ingredients of all time. My dad has fond memories of eating a ton of them in Taiwan, mostly because they grow quite frequently there. For me, it is a reminder of my heritage and I just love the sweet-tart flavor of the pulp coupled with the crunch of…
Thick Mint Bars
These were obviously inspired by the popular Girls Scout Cookie, the Thin Mint. A thin, dark chocolate cookie with a minty chocolate glaze. They’re delicious, to say the least. Since Girl Scout Cookies are not available year-round (while they do have knock-offs available, it’s just not the same), I figured I would try to recreate…
Banoffee Sticky Buns
I love banoffee pie. For those of you who do not know what that is, it’s a British dessert consisting of shortcrust pastry, fresh bananas, dulce de leche (caramelized condensed milk), grated dark chocolate, and whipped cream. It’s pretty decadent, like a lot of British desserts (trust me, that’s not a bad thing. I personally…
Blue mallow marshmallows
The inspiration for this dessert came from a play on words, being the “mallow” from blue mallow tea and the “mallow” from marshmallow. Yes, it’s original. I know. I flavored the marshmallow with elderflower liquor and bee pollen, just because I had those in my pantry to give it a very unique flavor profile. Blue…
Chocoholic naked layer cake
Now I have been watching a lot of Christina Tosi’s cooking videos on Youtube lately, and I have seen so many people do the funfetti birthday cake. However, I personally do not want to do that. When I think of birthday cakes, I typically almost always have a fluffy, moist chocolate cake. Now to challenge…
Red velvet-raspberry entremet
Now you cannot deny the beauty of a mirror glaze cake. You can try, but you are just kidding yourself. Since my last attempt at a mirror glaze cake, I have decided to have at it with another one, this time, a raspberry infused red velvet entremet. The design was actually inspired by my friend,…
S’mores gateau
I have done quite a few s’mores desserts in the past, but this one is different in that it is a cake-based dessert. I used graham crackers in place of 75% of the flour for the cake, and for the chocolate components, I did both a chocolate ganache and a chocolate panna cotta. I have…
Lapis Lazuli fruit tart
The inspiration behind this fruit tart came from the lapis lazuli gemstone. It is a naturally blue mineral studded with gold and white streaks. I wanted to also make this dessert an homage to my hometown of Palos Verdes, where wild fennel grows, and that’s where the inspiration to use fennel pollen came from. I…
Fruity ube layer cake with ube mini doughnuts
I’m too lazy to write a foreword for this, so I will keep it very short, sweet, and to the point. This cake was inspired by Momofuku Milk Bar, and I wanted to incorporate tropical ingredients, so that’s where the coconut, banana, and ube came from. I used blackberries as well, because they add a…
S’mores panna cotta: a plated dessert
This dessert came about two summers ago when I was really bored. And I mean REALLY bored. Although that summer, I learned how to do a lot of things, specifically in terms of plating beautiful desserts and tackling ingredients I have never used before. The inspiration for the dessert came from a couple different things….
Khanom buang: Thai street crepes
Khanom buang are Thai crepes, which can be either sweet or savory, and are typically found in stalls served as street food. The first time I ever heard about Thai street crepes was actually watching Iron Chef America, Battle Tamarind. The challenger, Hong Thaimee, was making these with her dessert, although she prepared a baked version….
Wind chime in dirt: a plated dessert
I was inspired to make this dessert when I saw a Japanese wind chime, also called 江戸風鈴 (edo fuurin), just laying on my desk, and thought “maybe that would be fun to create a dessert from.” After deciding that I could replicate the entire wind chime using sugar for the glass dome and either white…
Dreaming Sea Angel: a tropical dessert
The inspiration for this dessert came from a game I saw on YouTube, called Dreaming Mary. It’s a side scrolling indie horror game about an innocent little girl named Mary who was heavily implied to be raped by her pervert uncle, and it focuses on how she manages to escape from being imprisoned by finding a…
Banana (milk) pudding with misugaru wafers
This recipe is inspired by my dear friend, Ellie. She is one of the smartest, wisest, and funniest Korean Americans I have ever met, and she also makes a mean banana pudding. Seriously, she could put Magnolia Bakery out of business. However, Ellie recently moved to New York, aka the home of Magnolia Bakery, so…
Prickly pear-blackberry sorbet
I love using cactus pear (also called prickly pear or xoconostle) in sorbets. One of the first ice creams I have ever made was actually a prickly pear-orange sorbet back in my sophomore year of college (where I didn’t even have an ice cream machine, just an immersion blender). For this recipe, I added in…
Strawberry mirror glaze shortcake
This recipe came about because I wanted to do some sort of take on strawberry shortcake, but I didn’t exactly know what kind of dessert I wanted to do. Then I started to remember this dessert I had at Melisse in Santa Monica a few years back, and it was this pain per du (French…
Freddy's Harajuku 