(Wine poached pear, sliced then arranged like a rose, above a layer of chocolate ganache – Adapted from a recipe from the book ‘The Seven Deadly Sins of Chocolate’ – Picture taken back in Summer 2006)

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Whilst doing the market for 3 years, there’s been variety of cakes & chocolates that have appeared upon my stall table. Most stay popular & remain in the line-up – like my Flourless Chocolate Cake that I have been baking since I started the stall. It’s a pure fixture, that one. I roughly make 4 to 8 of these 8-inch’ers each week, which must mean that I must have made about 800 of them by now?! (crazy number, crazy notion)
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But sadly, some get withdrawn (‘getcha crumbs & get out of ‘ere!’). Mainly because they didn’t sell well enough & I preferred to transfer the time making them to making the more popular ones instead.
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Indeed, there are also other reasons for pulling those products. For instance, cherry clafoutis (de-stoning mass amounts of cherries was cumbersome & it stained my fingers), opera (too time consuming to make all the layers & the costs became too expensive that I had to charge more), & the ‘wine poached pear rose & chocolate ganache tart’ – which got the people oohing as they see it, but only occasionally netted me the crucial sale…! They would say: ‘The tart looks too good to eat’ (they really do say this for real, not kidding!) & opt for safer options like ‘pear & almond tart’ instead. I still love this rose tart to bits though. The pear fruit goes really well with rich chocolate cream. I guess if I know that it can be sold in bucket loads, I would’ve stuck to it.
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(Picture of cherry clafoutis, the wine poached pear & chocolate tart & pear tart – picture taken back in Summer 2006)
(Cherry clafoutis, 8 inch’er – Picture taken back in Summer 2006)
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The tell-tell sign for me to be convinced that they remain in my line-up is obviously its sales numbers, but, also importantly, it is when & if there are specific customers that come back for more of that same product, week after week with great reviews. The ‘Summer Fruit sponge’ (sponge colourfully studded with lots of raspberries, blueberries & blackberries) & the ‘Caramelized Banana Cake’ (whole pieces of bananas were caramelized before incorporated in to the batter) that I had sold for over a year was not the case, it was delicious, & it sold well, but never had the crowd wowing, & eventually I also lost the love for it.
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Whereas this ‘Baked Cheese Cake’ I raved about sometime ago in an earlier post is. Totally is. I really have to let you know the recipe asap & spread this deliciousness! So stay tuned!!

(La Fromagerie on Moxon Street. – I sneaked this shot with my new iPhone camera!)

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Back in the beginning of June, I wrote a quick article on Jauntsetter about where to go & what to do in London. Jauntsetter is a weekly e-newsletter for New York women, packed with great travel tips & recommendations. Check their website out & see if your city has been featured!
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Here’s the article:
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Tamami’s Perfect London Weekend:

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Saturdays:
Well obviously, my first recommendation will have to be Broadway Market where I have my chocolates & cakes stall! It’s a once-a-week Farmer’s market in the heart of east-end London. It currently has about 80 stalls, a third of which are non-food stuff like cool vintage wear, independent designers’ hats, dresses, handbags, etc. Walk alongside the canal to get there or get a direct bus from Angel. You can buy goodies to take to the park opposite and mingle with the arty locals & young trend-setters. Soak in the bohemian atmosphere. Later, head to the pubs (on the market) where people spill out to the streets, sitting on pavements in the summer.

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Sundays:
Check out the British art galleries in style. First see what’s on at the Hayward Gallery (past exhibits include Bruce Nauman and Dan Flavin), then stroll alongside the river to Tate Modern. Head to the stylish top floor restaurant for lunch and insist on the window seat to enjoy the fantastic river view with St. Paul’s Cathedral opposite.

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Another Sunday fave is to go to Columbia Road Flower Market. Get down-to-earth mug of tea from a cafe in the courtyard on Ezra Street & enjoy the day.

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If you haven’t purchased any huge plants to weigh you down, head to Brick Lane (just a 10 minute walk away) to buy the famous bagels at the Brick Lane Beigel Bakery. It’s super cheap at 20p per plain bagel. People buy in dozens so that they can freeze them at home. The Salt beef bagel (£2.60) is also a legend.
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After you’re satisfied with a bagel, turn in to Cheshire Street off Brick Lane for serious bit of shopping in the small selection of independent shops such as ‘Shelf’ & ‘Labour & Wait’.  If you go to the opposite side of Brick Lane, you’ll find yourself in the world of early Georgian architecture with narrow cobbled back streets (Fournier Street area). Think, Jack the Ripper walked these same streets back in 1880’s!

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Shopping:
Marylebone High Street is great fun. Browse Skandium designer furniture store and Divertimenti kitchen store, dream that you have hundreds of pounds to spend here and then do lunch with your girlfriend at La Fromagerie (2-6 Moxon Street, off Marylebone High Street) where you sit at tables amongst the delicatessen.

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If there’s room in your tummy, buy yourself a very decent hot chocolate from Paul and head towards Wigmore Street to check in on Margaret Howell clothing store. Then cross the road to St. Christopher’s Place to drop in on Marimekko to see if there are any good offers on their fabrics.

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The best time of the year to come to London:
…is definitely during the Open House event (this year’s dates are 19th & 20th of September 2009). There will be 700 buildings of architectural interest across the capital opening it’s doors, completely for FREE! You get to go in to places usually never available to public viewing! Dream-come-true for one nosy person like myself!

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And talking of being mentioned in other places, sometime back in February, this blog got mentioned in Time Out magazine! I was so proud. (Check out the article in their online archive). Many thanks to Lady C!

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& God knows when the last time I sold out without giving any discount…!

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Recently in London, the weather is hot hot hot, reaching 25 to 30 degrees, every day. – It’s proving a bit hazardous for me, as last week, my chocolate tarts melted despite being in the shade of the tarpaulin sheet roofing. – So this week, I skipped making them, & concentrated on making more fruit tarts instead (x1.5 more than usual). This decision obviously payed off! – Phew!! Otherwise, what am I supposed to do with all them fruit tarts??
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I also didn’t make lemon tarts at all because of the eggy-cream which would spoil too easily in such a hot weather. And I made slightly less of the brownies too, because I recently noticed that people seem to lose appetite for gooey chocolate in extreme weather like today. Funny old thing about the relationship of hot weather & food is that even “I” wanted to eat healthily – opting for the veggie salad lunch from a few stalls to my right. I also bought a big bottle of water to keep hydrated.

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Today, MORE bloggy visitors came by – like the American lady from Berlin, mother & daughter who BOTH read my blog, & a Japanese lady. TTTTThank you!!
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Last week I finally changed my mobile, after using the last one for 8 years! (This time I got the fancy new iPhone. C’mon, I deserve it…) My old phone has many old text messages that I couldn’t bring myself to delete – for example, there’s one that was sent from my D when our first child was born & I had to stay over night at the hospital without him. – The one below is another that I kept – sent to me from D all the way back in ’01. I just love the way he spelt coffee! As if like Al Pacino in his gangster movies!!

(Image courtesy of Ms.M – I always had problems photographing my chocolate bird tart – but look how beautifully Ms.M shot it!)

(Image courtesy of Ms.M – Apparently these serveware (from Boleslawiec, Poland) are hugely popular with the Japanese crowd recently. I can see why! It is soo rustic-cute!)

(Image courtesy of Ms.M – And this is my new tablecloth. It is natural linen with blue stripes)

(Image courtesy of Ms.M – And look! There’s the new cheese cake!)

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More & more I seem to write less frequently here – I don’t know exactly why not, because I actually have tonnes to write about!

Like…

I’ve been wanting to write about how I came to perfect my new ‘Baked Cheese Cake’ by slightly adjusting it week-by-week, 10 grams of this & that one week & oops, let’s go back a 10 gram another week, until I finally settled to its best ingredient ratio (It took 6 weeks of tinkering to perfect the creamy texture). And I want to write about how my regular customer (body builder with heavy tattoos) have been buying these cheese cake slices from its week 1 debut. And about how he ONLY buys cakes from my stall…!
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And then I want to tell you about how I came to sell wooden rabbits alongside my cakes, &, &, &… the article I wrote for somebody else’s website about London, & about the little mention about me in a very famous weekly magazine… &, &…
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& as for this ‘Baked Cheese Cake’, now that it is publish-ably good, I’ve been meaning to post the recipe here on my website, but yep, you know me folks! There’s probably going to be a looo-ng wait ahead ’til we see that post…! (Just like how it took me 6 months to post the Lemon Drizzle Cake recipe!)
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Well… instead, I’m gonna tell you about my bloggy visitors. I’m starting to get a fair number of you guys visiting me at my stall now – it is so totally amazing! THANK YOU! There’s been Londoners, aswell as people from outside London – & quite a number of French people using the Eurostar, some Germans, & a few Americans! They all mention this blog & say that’s how they made a point of scheduling Broadway Market in their visit! THANK YOU! – If there are any readers who would also like to come to the market in the future, please come by the stall & let me know that you’re a reader – I’m always up for a chat!

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About a month ago, a Japanese blogger came by my stall (early in the morning!^^ な〜んてね!また来てね！) & took Ah-MAZING pictures. Seriously good. When I saw these images on her blog page, I thought to myself “I want these…”. So I asked for her permission to use it on here. I’m sure you’ll all agree that this Ms.M has huge talent!

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Ms.M used Nikon D70 for these but recently upgraded to D90. Since then I’ve been pondering on getting myself a SLR camera like hers (I currently have Canon G9 – & now & then sneakily use D’s D80 for my blog pictures). What sealed the deal for my shopping conviction was when Ms.T, another blogger, came by my stall & showed me her Lomo LC-A camera. I’ve been a huge fan of her nostalgic-looking pictures on her blog – & so my thought turned to getting Lomo LC-A instead of SLR which would be alot pricier at £800+.

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Also, the thought of going back to old-skool 35mm film made the idea twinkly romantic – it may be cumbersome to have to go get it processed everytime, but there’s that magical moment of getting the prints back – tangible, to hold in your hands, not the digital RPG representation on your computer screen.
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Then! (yes, the story continues!) My cheap-skate mindset got hold of me when I read on the interweb that Olympus XA2 is a good & cheaper alternative to Lomo LC-A.

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So from considering an 800 quid SLR camera to then a 150 quid Lomo, settling on a 10 quid 80’s camera from ebay (it should arrive next week!) …
… That, my friends, is how one can ride this recession…! I mean, I just saved myself 790 quid! (in principle…)

I bought 6 types of jams last weekend. They are made by the French Jam Queen – Christine Ferber. I’ve been a fan of hers for ages. My two books on her I treasure to bits. And oh boy, the jams…, it’s so heavenly I tell you, the jar we had last time was finished in no time – despite me fending off family members – getting seriously upset if they were to dip in their dirty butter knives, which could spoil it. (There is nothing more disheartening to see old toast crumbs & a smears of butter in your jam jar!)
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At 7€50 (around £6.70) for a 220g jar, it certainly is at the highest end of the market. But, its oh-so-loose texture that you’ve never ever encountered before & its bursting fresher-than-fresh fruitiness should convince you that it is one of those purchases that justifies itself, if you weigh out the price tag to the numerous happiness you will get out of it.

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The flavours I got this time are:

• Gelée de cassis et groseilles d’Alsace (Jelly of blackcurrant & Alsatian red currents)
• Framboises d’Alsace et kirsch (Alsatian Raspberry with kirsch liquor)
• Rhubarbe d’Alsace, fraises d’Alsace et fleurs de sureau (Alsatian rhubarb with Alsatian strawberries & elder flowers)
• Rhubarbe d’Alsace, ananas, mangues et fruits de la passion (Alsatian rhubarb, pineapple, mango & passion fruit)
• Cassis d’Alsace (Alsatian blackcurrant)
• Gelée de pommes d’Alsace à la cannelle (Jelly of Alsatian apples with cinnammon)

I was battling with the little French I know to take a wild guess at the flavours written on the jars in the shop – so it’s kind of news to me now that I’ve translated them! ^^ Now I know what they are!! Oooohh, which one shall be my first victim??
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(She is also famous for her tarts!)

(The cute packaging kills me.)

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During our Paris trip, we also went to a cafe/ tea room called Mamie Gâteaux (66 rue du Cherche-Midi 75006 PARIS). I have their Japanese recipe book & I always wanted to go there, so I was so happy to finally go! It was really nice. Loved the decor, the food, the atmosphere, everything. The hot chocolate came in a Café au Lait bowl with mini madeleine! Ahh, Le Paris!