Cuisine & Culture the Chinese Family Way
For many people, coffee is an essential part of their daily routine. It’s often more important than breakfast or getting to work on time. But, whether you start your day with a hot cup of coffee or enjoy a mid-afternoon pick-me-up, many factors influence the flavour of your coffee.
What is kopi? Or do you mean ‘copy’? No! Kopi means coffee in a Hokkien dialect. If you are a coffee drinker, then you should know the different types of kopi meaning, especially in Singapore and Malaysia.
These days more and more people begin to make their own coffee at home. However, they immediately face a lot of challenges on their way. How to make coffee? What to use? What do they need to have or to learn? Lots of questions run through a person’s mind once they start shopping for coffee appliances and more. So let’s start with the obvious here. There are dozens of ways to make good coffee at home. You’ll just have to find which method suits your taste most.
Let’s us do our part for the environment! It is time to ditch those disposable plastic coffee cups and single-use microwave containers that you used for your office lunch or school meal by using these gorgeous sleek looking Hydratem8 cup and food pot!
Hydratem8 products are the perfect solution to be plastic free for everyday life! I am so pleased to have received the Hydratem8 reusable coffee cup and food pot to test out.
Judge Cookware have recently launched 8 new Cafétieres and clever double-walled stacking coffee mugs which together will create the perfect home brew. We were so lucky to put them to the test! Have you seen these stunning coffee gadgets yet? Not only do they make the best brew but they also add a WOW factor to your home too.
The mention of a garden tea party triggers many things in people’s minds. Do you think of certain scenes from Alice in Wonderland, blue-haired ladies, the British gentry, pinky fingers floating in air or Victorian décor? Since the old days, tea parties are elegant affairs held in the late afternoons. However, customs have changed over the years and a tea party can start as early as mid-day.
Originally intended to entertain business clients, biscuits or scones, savory, bite-size sandwiches, sweets and, of course, a good tea pot, are typical of tea parties. Unlike dinner parties, tea parties aren’t involving. Whether you’re planning a retirement, baby shower, birthday or bridal party, or just organizing a casual session with friends, you won’t go wrong with a tea party.
Do you want to know how Italians make the best coffee? One of the secrets of their brewing success is using a Stove Top Espresso Maker. Using such a simple tool to create the ultimate Italian espresso is seamless.
I asked my friend what to bake next and she gave me a few suggestions. I decided to bake coffee and walnut cake which I had not baked before. After a few searches on Google, I found Nigella’s recipe and I made it last week. It was very successful. It is a typical English style cake with thick icing. So I decided to modify the recipe slightly to make the cake nuttier!
After the long summer break, this week I finally have a bit of time to start baking again! So I decided to bake coffee cupcakes and make use of some mascarpone that had been sitting in my fridge for weeks! This recipe is almost like a Victoria sponge cake recipe. This Coffee & Mascarpone Cupcakes recipe makes 12 cupcakes.
Last week, I was invited to attend the first-ever Genuine Thermos Brand Coffee Masterclass. Taking inspiration from the huge success of the ‘Overnight Coffee Challenge’ that took American coffee lovers by storm, I was invited to experience the remarkable heat retention capabilities of Genuine Thermos Brand Stainless King™ Vacuum Insulated Beverage Flasks.
They have partnered with the renowned Prufrock coffee house (in London) to allow for one-on-one engagement with the expert baristas to provide a truly immersive environment for an in-depth introduction to the perfect home brewed coffee and share some insider tips on how to buy better coffee – from decoding coffee bag label information to understanding just how important the quality of the beans really is. Besides that we also learnt how to froth the milk and make espresso! I have no clue in coffee tasting despite drinking a fair bit of coffee! It was a very interesting class from smelling to swirling to sipping the coffee with a loud noise (like eating a bowl of noodles). I am a sweet tooth and normally add a lot of sugar and milk into my coffee. Having to sip it as a black coffee almost killed my tongue! The aroma was great but too bitter to taste after tasting 10 different types of coffee. But it helped me to appreciate the different brands of coffee and where they are from play an important part too!
Whenever I meet friends in town, more often than not, we will meet at a coffee shop for convenience and also for a good coffee. Nowadays though, good coffee isn’t just exclusive to the coffee shops as there are a number of ways to make good coffee at home:
