Annual homebaker gathering 2013

Last Saturday, I attended a homebaker/food blogger gathering, initiated by Jane (Passionate About Baking). The last time all of us met was more than a year ago already! It's interesting how most of us got to know each other and "interact" through FB only; but when it comes to gathering, we had lots to chat as if we knew each other for a long time! Probably coz of common topics like cooking, baking and blogging. The gathering is sort of an extension to our online comments/chatting. The power of social media I guess.

Quite a few people couldn't make it for the gathering unfortunately. We have Jane (Passionate About Baking), Alan (TravellingFoodies), Rei (All That Matters), Annie (Annielicious Food), Veronica (Peng's Kitchen), Bee Bee (Honey Bee Sweets), Lynette and myself.

And of course, our homemade food, which I think taste better than those served at commercial high teas.

 Look at the spread (and that's not all)!

 Fried pumpkin beehoon by Jane. I never thought of adding pumpkin to fried beehoon, it gave a natural sweetness to the beehoon, gonna try it!

 

 Oriental salad by Jane. I love cucumber and naturally I like this salad!

 Kinako Mochi by Rei. Chewy and soft mochi coated with Japanese soy bean powder. Yum!!

 

 Plum sauce chicken wings. I love plum sauce and chicken wings, need I say more ;p Haven't tried cooking chicken wings using plum sauce, so gonna try cooking this as well!

 Fruit tart by Bee Bee. Crispy shortcrust pastry with pastry cream and topped with lotsa fruits!

Maple pork balls by Bee Bee. Lovely idea of adding maple syrup to homemade pork balls. I'm gonna try this the next time I make pork/chicken balls.

Falafel by Veronica. She made this for the Dec Asian Food Festival which is Middle-East theme.Very interesting, made of ground chickpeas and served with a tahini sauce.

Cheese & ham puffs by Veronica. Cheesy and savoury puff, onion was added which gave a very nice aroma.

My contribution - Kong Ba Bao. Pork belly marinated for at least 5hrs, steamed for 2hrs and then left overnight for full flavours to develop :) Will post recipe soon.

Another contribution - Hong Kong style pan-fried radish cake. This is the dim sum version where the texture is almost melt-in-the-mouth. I wanna use up the daikon that I brought back from Hokkaido so made a small tray of this. Have posted the recipe before.

Osmanthus jelly by Annie. Bouncy and fragrant with addition of osmanthus flower and goji. I tabao all the extras :p I must learn to make this!

Apom berkuah with kuah pengat pisang by Alan. The pancakes were fluffy and the sauce was so nice! Creamy, aromatic and not too sweet!

Was so full that I could only take a very light dinner that day! Really hope we could meet up more often coz there will always be lots of yummy food to eat and recipes to learn!!!