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Headed over to Italiannies at Empire Shopping Gallery on Wednesday for a nice dinner as it was dad's birthday. It was practically empty when we got there but people started coming in later. Next door, Chilis was already packed with customers.

Complementary bread with olive oil and vinegar.

 Strawberry Colada, RM8.90

Wanted to get a cup of warm water but they only had bottled water which cost about RM15 for it. RM15 for water?! Don't know what brand that was, but no thank you.

Kilkenny, RM19.13

Tomato Bruschetta (set meal with pasta)

Love the generous topping of tomatoes, pesto sauce and parmesan cheese. Yum!

Stuffed Mushroom, RM30.90

Used to love the stuffed mushroom when Italiannies first opened. But now, the stuffed mushroom wasn't as tasty as before :(

Roasted Chicken Italiannies, RM38.90

Penne Bolognese, RM26.90

This was pretty bland I must say. Meat sauce over penne pasta, nothing much to shout about.

Filet Mignon with Portabella Mushrooms, RM48.90

The BEST dish out of all we've ordered. Well done, perfectly marinated and grilled beef. Nomz :)

Fettuccine Amatriciana, RM27.90 (set meal)

It was pretty salty, I'm guessing it's because of the olives and beef bacon with tomato sauce that made it saltier.

I was invited to the Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia along with a few other bloggers last Saturday. Thank you Edwin from Click Click Culinary for the invite.

Chef Guillaume Lejuene, Director of Pastry Arts for the Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia was to demonstrate on making a gingerbread house. I was looking forward for the session as I've never made a gingerbread house before!

Recipe for the gingerbread house (measurement in grams). The dough is to be refrigerated overnight.

Roll and cut the dough  in rectangular shape according to the size you want to house to be and also use molds to cut out shapes for your window and door. Bake the pieces and then assemble them when cooled down.

Icing is not only for decoration but also to hold the gingerbread pieces together.

Apply the icing on the sides to hold the gingerbread house together.

After the icing from the base sets, apply icing on the top for the roof.

Place the roof and apply icing in the center to seal the roof. The ginger bread house is now done!

The next step is decoration. Using the remaining icing, Chef Guillaume Lejuene explained to us the method on creating icicles. Squeeze the icing out and shake off the edge to give a sharp edge which is to achieve the look of an icicle.
   

Line the icicles on the roof and flatten the tip of the icing on the roof to make it even.

That's not it! Chef Guillaume Lejuene said that it's up to our creativity on how we want to decorate our gingerbread house. He showed us an example by gluing on candies using the icing. The gingerbread house reminds me of the children story Hansel & Gretel. Back to the topic, you can fill the gingerbread house with as many candies as you want. After that, create a 'snow' effect by sifting icing sugar over the house. Viola! The gingerbread house is now complete!

Soon after, it's us bloggers turn to decorate mini gingerbread houses which has been prepared for us.
Clockwise from left: Edwin, Jason, Kash and Chris all working hard on decorating their gingerbread house.

Before and after of my gingerbread house. The icicles I did were pretty much a failure. LOL

Clockwise from left: Jason, Chris, Kash and Edwin's gingerbread house.

A group photo with Chef Guillaume Lejuene.

We were brought over for tea at the lounge area after completing our decoration. All the breads and pastries in the theme of Christmas were done by Chef Guillaume Lejuene and his students. I was in awe with all the pretty looking pastries and breads especially the macaroons. But the macaroons were not meant to be eaten, only for decoration purpose.

Cinnamon Lemon biscuits and Cardomon Honey biscuits.

Passionfruit Petit Four & Strawberry Petit Four
As small as the name 'Petit' goes, do not underestimate this dessert as it's truly amazing with it's sweet and savoury taste. Petit Four is made of chocolate shell,  whipped ganache (passionfruit or strawberry), biscuit joconde and guimauve (marshmallow made out of whipped jelly).

Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia is offering classes on making Petit Four in December!

Stollen bread which is usually baked with dried fruits and the Chocholate Moelleux which is baked with rich chocolate filling and topped with raspberry. The gold piece on top of the raspberry? It's not foil, though at first I thought it was. It's actually edible gold leaf :)

Chef Guillaume Lejuene sharing about the Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia with us.


Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia was established four months ago offering everyone the opportunity to learn the art of bakery and pastry making under the guidance of award winning pastry chefs. Even though you're from a different walk of life, Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia welcomes you with open arms!

Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia offers four main courses which are:
Certificate in Pastry and Bakery (9 months)
Certificate: Art of Intermediate Pastry Program (3 months)
Certificate in Bakery Arts (3 months)
Continuing Education (Short term courses which usually takes up to 2 days or 5 days)
Ingredients and uniform are included in the fees. 10% discount is given with full payment on the spot.

If your schedule does not allow, fret not! Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia also offers half day classes at RM125 per class during the weekend which you can check out the schedule here. Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia accepts up to a maximum of 15 students for half day classes so that each student fully understands and is guided by the chef.

The spacious, bright and clean interior at the Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia

Pei Minn, a graduate who enrolled in Academy of Pastry Arts to further improve her skills in pastry and bakery while awaiting her internship .

A chocolate opera cake done by a student in Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia.

It was an eye opening day at Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia filled with fun experience and delicious pastries & breads.

If you're interested in bakery and pastries for this Christmas, Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia will be having a 2 days class at RM500! The schedule is available here.

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Email: info@academyofpastryartsmalaysia.com

Academy of Pastry Arts Malaysia next intake on their 3 month, 6 month or 9 month Certificate program will begin on the 8th of December 2010!

It was a public holiday yesterday as it was Hari Raya Aidiladha, so I decided to head off to KL again. Yesterday marked my second visit to UNIQLO since their opening. I had 2 more RM20 vouchers left to spend so I bought a tee and my mom bought a jegging. Not much choices of tees left, most were pretty crappy and in huge sizes. All the nice ones were sold off already. Bumped into Inessa and her mom in UNIQLO :)

Walked around Fahrenheit 88 after shopping in UNIQLO and had lunch at Room Eighteen. The service was really slow as they were understaffed and had to wait for about 20 minutes even though there were 3 empty tables which were not cleaned yet.

Seems that Christmas has arrived early this year with all the Christmas deco up at Fahrenheit 88 and Pavilion respectively. But of course, the ones at Pavilion is spectacular as always.

(L-R) Christmas trees at: Fahrenheit 88, Pavilion KL, Shu Uemura's Christmas tree inside Pavilion.

Many people were taking pics of the X'mas deco in Pavilion so me and my mom camwhored :P

This year's theme is really well done and it's as though you're transformed into the magical and glorious land of Christmas :D

Mistletoe Berries

Angel

Overexposed the picture and loved the effect :)

Exhausted after walking around Pavilion, so we headed for coffee at Espressamente Illy. Dad came and joined us after his meeting.

Watched Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 and found the movie pretty alright. Not as exciting as I thought it would be, perhaps part 2 would be intense. The show is saturated with dialogues and also showed some great sceneries and with less action this time.

Christmas lights are up at night so headed for another session of photo taking :P

More mistletoe berries.

I'm pretty obsessed with those white colour trees decorated with 'frosts' around because they are just so pretty! :D

I really need to create my bokeh shapes kit soon!

More deco along the walkway.

Deco at Lavender

Random editing...

Looking at these photos made my Christmas spirit hyper. Feeling so excited already even though there's still about a month away. Happy Early Christmas :D