which is not to say i eschewed cakes of other colours. never! of course, cake in a wide range of hues was eaten during our long-gone holiday. (long-gone when i began to write this, and now, weeks later, long-long-long gone.)

these charred and glisteny things were had in malaysia, in the house of my grandmother. ang ku kueh (lit. red tortoise cakes) — glutinous rice pastry, moulded to look like the shell of a tortoise, wrapped around sweetened mung bean paste — has a tendency to be mouth after mushy mouth of mush. leftover ang ku kueh, lightly pan fried so a crusty, caramelised skin forms, is a whole other level of sublime. this simple process has made me see ang ku kueh in a new light. but then, when has frying not made a thing better?

here: a homemade curry puff, another in the long line of tasty treats to come from my grandmother’s kitchen (this one by way of a particularly talented aunt). the filling is a basic potato curry, comforting and familiar. the star is the pastry: two doughs — one of oil and the other of water — folded together; they separate as they bake, into layers of crispy-flakey. my mother said something about each curry puff being the equivalent of a day’s requirements of cholesterol. that day i had three.

we also came away with a small supply of mee ku (lit. tortoise bun — what is it with the hokkien people and their predilection for tortoise-shaped comestibles?). simple airy white bread, painted pink and steamed, it is an all-round canvas to all manner of topping, from a lick of kaya to a slab of roasted pork belly stewed in thick black soy sauce. also: a crunchy condiment (also from my grandmother’s kitchen) of spicy dried prawns. the bread goes first, almost dissolves in your mouth, leaving the little crunchy bits of prawns and garlic to be nibbled on for a little longer.

here’s another savoury cake. to be precise, a bento of snacksized portions of glutinous rice from yonehachi okowa, into which flavouring ingredients like red beans or seaweed or salmon or glisteny, oily pork, or sweet, toothsome chestnuts have been mixed. the vats of rice are located just by the takashimaya food hall escalators, and i passed them by on many an occasion (always casting them a longing gaze) before i finally bit at the sampler. i should have bitten sooner! each nugget was lip-smackingly tasty, and almost convincing as a wholesome meal, instead of the pile of glycaemic-boosting, oily sticky rice which they collectively comprised.

at the other end of the food hall we found sapporo petit doughnuts. these are cooked in moulds much like obanyaki (the puck-shaked pancakes filled with bean paste… or laughing cow) or taiyaki (the fish-shaped ones)… and therein lies my problem with them. i like pancakes, i really do. but when i’ve been led to expect doughnuts, then a bland, spongy, little nubblet — albeit doughnut shaped — stuffed with a mildly sweet (overly starchy) strawberry-flavoured pink custard just isn’t going to do it for me. the sperical ones with a milk custard filling were equally uninspiring.

is it because we didn’t eat ‘em hot? they weren’t even packaged up straight from the pan. alas, i shall never find out, as i will not be giving them a second chance.

i thought i might get another go at the coconut pandan bagel, from NYC bagel factory (baked fresh every day in bedok north). i don’t know if mine was baked fresh the day i got it, in a sealed bag in the bread aisle at our local supermarket. fresh out of the bag, it was promisingly fragrant. look at those toasted coconut shavings!

i toasted it, and then because my mother’s fridge was lacking in suitable condiments, i had it with a mere smear of margarine. this is of course, a more “authentic” topping, though not as authentic if it’d been scraped from a monster tin of planta. still, i think i’d much rather have had a swirl of kaya, or condensed milk… maybe even some of those sambal dried prawns. next time…

i had not been to toast in some years, partly because i could never remember how to find my way to the secret hidden corner in ngee ann city. but my memories were of a sweet pink cafe, with a scallop-edged logo, a homely sandwich called “sardine istimewa” — the special sardine, and a host of cupcakes. it’s much more sleek these days, and there is not a sardine sandwich on the menu (you can get tuna instead), but the cakes are pretty much the same. or are they?

after a big, fat egg & cress sandwich, the kid chose the s’mores cupcake. what a beauty! there is toasted marchmallow, and chocolate, and…

a graham cracker crust! amazing. we wondered at the architectural feat, and the kid devoured the marshmallow topping, and then the cake more of less crumbled into a pile of dry crumbs. huh. well, that was disappointing.

i had an enormous plate of three delicious salads, and then i went back to the counter and ordered this enormous slice of apple pie. it should have been good, dammit. how could it not? a thing of beauty, and mostly apple. i suppose the apples were fine. the pastry, however, was not light or crisp. it was just a little bit flabby and flaccid.

but this was a lesson i learnt a while ago: in singapore, the taste of western-style cakes rarely lives up to their appearance.

now, in the display case of fruit paradise, where the choices are fruit tarts, fruits tarts and fruits tarts — the singaporean take on the japanese take on french fruit tarts — the actual cakes are placed side by side with their plastic counterparts. when i first encountered them a couple of years ago, i couldn’t tell the difference between the two. i suspect the only difference is that the edible one is softer: each tart is composed of mainly creme patissier and whipped cream, maybe a bit of light sponge, topped with a variety of picture-perfect fresh fruit. we picked the blueberry tart, which had fresh blueberries as well as cubes of blueberry jelly. it made for a nice five minutes, as we stood at our kitchen counter late one night, eating it far too quickly. after all, we didn’t have to chew.

also not requiring mastication:

a scoop of salted caramel ice cream, from salted caramel. i’d just come from a dinner of a monstrous sardine murtabak a couple of doors down, so i only had a tasting portion of the house speciality. it was, as you might expect, sweet and salty and creamy. which is fine and all, but i wanted more from it! they named the shop after it, no? i imagine it would’ve been more memorable had it been “saltier” and more “caramelicious”. maybe my expectations were buoyed by the logo, so striking; in contrast, the ice cream, so beige.

close to the end of our trip, i still had not paid a visit to the ice cream uncles of orchard road, with their soft rainbow bread, pink wafers and blocks of cheap, airy ice cream from which they’ll cut you a slice for your $1 ice cream sandwich. i didn’t regret it. instead, i steered the proceedings to the wellness group.

[ now. does this bit of packaging from not remind you of mariage freres? it wants you to believe the maison was fondeed in 1837, but this refers to the year the tea trade was made official in singapore. TWG is in fact only a handful of years old, co-founded by a man who, yes, did work at mariage freres. ]

there are a couple of branches of TWG at marina bay sands. from the one where you can eat on a bridge over the indoor canal and watch the gondolas go past, you can also buy ice cream by the scoop and stroll along the promenade. this is superpremium stuff, as evidenced by the $5 per scoop pricetag, all infused with a range of TWG teas. my cup of white night jasmine tea ice cream was quite delicious and lush, voluptuous on my tongue.

i wish i could show you the ice cream i had at the daily scoop, at holland village, which was avocado, a vision in pale green. however, i was too busy eating it. i’d felt a bit squeamish ordering it — a sweet-savoury-anticipatory issue, which turned out to be unfounded: it was all pleasant verdancy.

i wish i could have posted this weeks and weeks ago, when i started writing it. however i was too busy… i dunno. working? there is a bunch of money in my bank account, so the time must’ve been spent productively.

i wish i could be somewhere else. figuratively, literally, anywhere but here.

my habitual first stop in singapore, muji, yielded a two-pack of black muffins. the little dessicant packet and the goodness of humectant created the perfect sealed-in-plastic micro-climate for a perfect, moist cakelet. i seem to remember that one of the ingredients listed was “carbon”, although it was mostly black sesame. also: soft and spongy, sticky and sweet, and a little bit otherworldly. i did become quite obsessed with black sesame cakes while we were away. it was easy: in singapore, they are everywhere.

from mushiya steamers in the ion foodcourt, a kurogoma mochi kintoki steamer. doesn’t it just look like a package of good fortune? inauspiciously, as the shopgirl tonged the cake into a plastic bag, she sneezed. all over it. “um.” i said incredulously. “you just sneezed all over it.” she was nice enough to fetch me a fresh one (i had to ask), although it didn’t taste particularly fresh. it turned out to be much like a local huat kueh — steamed spongey bready cake made with a variety of leavening agents; my grandmother favoured a can of creaming soda — just drier around the edges. the cake was somewhat bland with the gentlest hint of black sesame flavour; the embedded jewels — assorted beans and a fat chewy mochi artfully arranged over the top– were slightly more compelling.

another food court, another steamed bun. from food republic at vivocity, a pair of black sesame buns. these were fresh out of the steamer — lovely, pillowy soft dough wrapped around a rich, sweet filling of black sesame paste. it’s the kind of thing where after you eat it, you must check your teeth to make sure that there are not pockets of black tucked into the crevices. once in new york i snacked on black sesame crackers on my way to meeting my sister at her supercool lower manhattan publishing house. i met all her supercool colleagues. i smiled and chatted. and then after we’d left, she caught a glimspe at the side of my smile and exclaimed, horrified, “what is that!?”

masticated black sesame seeds, nyup nyup.

on to more pleasant memories. the black sesame society, from bread society at ion. soft, slightly sweet bun studded with sesame seeds. a fat ribbon of black sesame buttercream. a dusting of fine sugar. it was probably the best in show (the easter holiday black sesame show), but then i am particularly partial to a cream bun. regretfully, i never made it back for another. the end of our holiday came upon us far too soon.

even so, there had been enough time for five or six trips to muji. on my last, wistful jaunt, i finally gave in to a large bag of individually packaged black bean and barley biscuits, which i packed into my luggage along with a dour pile of stripey shirts-socks-dresses in sombre shades of grey and greyish blue. somewhat sympathetically, these bite-sized biscuits are barely sweet, decidedly savoury, and taste of healthfood. they are a sturdy crunch which gives way to a sandy mouthful. the blackbeans do not crumble of course. they resist, challenging your molars. they are by no means horrible, but i can’t have more than one at a go. no doubt they will last through this cold, cruel winter, giving me sustenance at my desk, one humourless bite at a time.

and finally, yes, the black baumkuchen. the muji incarnation is not a charming ring of cake carved from a log on a spit. instead, it is a black slab (cut from said ring) industrial enough that it was mistaken for a newfangled cleaning product by another member of the household (like, i would buy a cleaning product! ha!). do not fear. i rescued it just in time, and so can tell you that, even two months past its best-before date, it only needs a few seconds in the microwave to freshen up, forming part of a demure sunday morning breakfast, with a side of gingery daufufa and a crackle cup of genmaicha.

it wasn’t quite as moist as the aforementioned black muffin, due, i suppose, to its cooking method of being roasted one thin layer at a time. the flavour was black sesame with a slight smoky edge. truly a post-apocalyptic cake appropriate for this time in which i live.

sometimes you just gotta.

case in point: late sunday morning, we popped into the breadtop in the mall (post-chinatown-roast-meat-shopping and en route to brown rice nori rolls) for a bun or two. we ended up with four, and one of them was this golden brown spring roll bun.

a filling of peppery minced pork with carrots and bamboo shoots encased in a soft white bun, wrapped in spring roll skin, then deep fried. you couldn’t have resisted either, could you?

the wrapper was still crunchy, the bun a little chewy from its time in the deep frier. the filling was five-spicy, and almost like that of an old skool australian-chinese spring roll. could’ve done with a bit of shredded cabbage though.

i kind of wished i had another one, once this was gone… but the fact is i did have a taro bun to attend to.

now. where were we?

ah yes, singapore. singapore, where the daily forecast of thunderstorms will overshadow any plans one may be so bold as to make.

one day, we planned for cake. while the sun shone, we walked to the local mall. we peered into each toy capsule machine; we dined at mos burger. and then, just as the kid started getting twitchy, and the clouds rolled in, we pulled up at the icing room.

the icing room is a vision in pink — from the overwrought filigreed signage to the dainty mosaic tileage underfoot all the way to the shopgirls in their japanese fantasy waitress outfits. up front, there are mini gateaux (pink, but also in colours other than) and biscuits and macarons, and a small sitting area in which to eat them.

in the back of the shop is a row of professional rotating cake stands (and a tower of ikea stools for perching — i expect the kids’ workshops are quite well-subscribed). this is where the magic happens. so, you can just rock up, and for under $12 you get a small cake — iced in white, a perfectly primed canvas — and a tray of coloured buttercream and gels and tiny sugar flowers. for bigger bucks there are more elaborate decorations on offer, and bigger cakes, but for us, a modest start.

the kid put down a squiggle of pink. “wait,” i cautioned. “do you know what you are going to do? have you got a plan in your head of how you want it to look?”

“yes,” she said, after a pause. she added another squiggle.

and so it went.

blobs, then squiggles, then a considered placing of sugar flowers. bunting ’round the side. blobs on blobs.

and then…

it was quite amazing! so much for the modest start!

we walked home then, pleased, and it didn’t even drizzle until the very last few steps. later that night, we unveiled the cake for dessert.

it was the very best kind of light, fluffy, innocuous sponge, layered with whipped cream and tinned fruit cocktail. unexpectedly delectable. there were seconds all around. the kid may have even had thirds.

how quickly a fortnight goes by. well. how quickly four weeks goes by — the time we were away, and then yes, how quickly the two weeks since we returned have whizzed by too. it’s not a great feeling being back. i’d rather be… anywhere but here i guess, a situation not so easily remedied because here is a state of mind, not escapable by simply shutting the door behind me past midnight and walking a quick stretch of my street, in pyjamas and socks, in the new cold. how can i extricate myself from this tangle?

fuck it. let us go back to where it was all colour and light…

…art and play.

behold. a pompom workshop, at artplay, housed inside the handsome brick building on birrarung marr. moomba weekend, there was a queue up the ramp to get in, and no wonder. when we finally made it inside, it was like the aladdin’s cave of yarn. there were balls of it everywhere, and people winding it all around the most high-tech pompom machines i’ve ever seen. whatever happened to two flimsy rings cut out of cardboard?

the kid spent… an hour? is that possible? in perpetual motion, building layers and layers of wool around her plastic bits, and made a magnificent pompom that she wore strung around her neck for the rest of the afternoon. by the end of the day, it had unravelled into an armful of string… but it’s all in the process, no?

the first time we came to artplay, last spring, it was the weekend of the big draw. there were stations set out around the room, each one offering a different drawing material and exercise: tracing a maze with pastels, or filling a grid with pencilled patterns, that sort of thing. and then, in the centre of the room, there was sticky tape.

here was the objective: to create drawings by taping and stickering the floor.

it was quite compelling! we do like sticky tape!

and then last weekend, we worked our way through a visiting maze from singapore…

…an exploration in pattern and textiles.

there were buckets of textas, and sheets of calico, and once you tired of making pattern, you could customise the maze by rearranging the removable fabric panels. the kid fashioned herself a little cubicle and kept on drawing.

while on my knees, i walked harlan through sunlit polka dots.

that afternoon i felt better, then worse, and by midweek, well, so there is a place that’s worse than worse.

but right now i have a pot of green soup to last me days, and work deadlines that will take me through the next fortnight, and maybe it’ll be ok, for now.

we should all be so lucky, should we not, to have a big, light space in which to hide away, with warm floorboards, and balls of yarn, and buckets of markers, and endless rolls of sticky tape? sometimes you need it, even if you are not a kid anymore. if you are looking to lose yourself, transforming passages — the maze — is on again this weekend.

we’re off to the tropics! back in a month!

i was in the city so early the other day that my go-to sushi roll place at melbourne central was only three rolls into their display. cupcakes then.

cupcake central recently launched their autumn collection, which includes this adorable butter popcorn cupcake. why so bashful, little cake? you’re an exceptionally moist creamed corn cake, topped with a pouf of vanilla frosting, a drizzle of caramel sauce and a crunchy cluster of caramel popcorn. yum! it darned near knocked the black velvet off its preferred cupcake perch.

the hot chocolate was pretty good too, served in a fetching blue cup of sturdy china and topped with shaved chocolate. do i even need to mention the tidy little wooden snack tray on which cup and cake are delivered? surely one of the more agreeable ways to rid yourself of that five dollar bill in your purse.

ice cream is my favourite.

a few weeks back, the kid and i thought it would be a good idea to roadtest the coppa di gelati at brunetti, a sundae for two to share. it was only on for the summer, and the summer was fast tumbling to its end. i wonder if many coppe had crossed the pass in three months — it had been spruiked on the brunetti facebook page, but the only onsite publicity was a small placard on the counter, turned halfway to the wall. even the countergirl was momentarily confused when we ordered one.

but she seemed excited, and asked us to sit while she prepared it. “it will be a few minutes,” she said. so we sat and waited, and watched — amused — as she walked back and forth between the gelato outpost and the main cafe section to fetch the necessary ingredients: a special dish, a couple punnets of fresh berries… at one point, even the guy from the drinks station was summoned with his siphon of whipped cream. we’d picked the berry coppa (there were two others to choose from, on the themes of “chocolate” and “nuts”).

the kid was excited as well, dancing before the counter to watch the scooping of gelato and the assemblage of… well, you shall see. after quite a few minutes, the countergirl walked slowly to our table, bearing a silver tray. she seemed at once reverent, and proud. she’d done a great job! we may even have applauded.

so. here we have five scoops of ice cream and sorbet: raspberry, strawberry, berry cheesecake and vanilla. whipped cream, berries, coulis, wafers. maraschino cherries. we ate it so quickly, matching each other spoonful for spoonful. in the glow of late afternoon sunshine, it was gone much too soon.

it’s a crazy notion, of course, that a sundae should be just a summer fling. surely a judicious curation of stewed fruit, crumbled cookie crumbs and warm sauces in a coppa would see us safely through the winter.

choukette, down the road, plies a trade in little french treats. a black sesame macaron is a fine treat on any given day, pleasingly chewy with its buttercream filling all subtly nutty. (a rose macaron is also a fine treat, as is one filled with salted butter caramel…)

but what of the chouquettes, for which the shop is named? you can get a dozen in a large paper bag, corners twisted as they do in paris (i imagine), for five dollars, and you can eat them as you head back up the street. they are just balls of choux pastry, dotted with large sugar crystals, but they are strangely compelling. by the second set of lights, you will suddenly realise that you’ve gobbled down four.

stop.

save some for when you get home. slice them open, and fill them with ice cream and berries. i suppose it defeats the purpose of a simple little pastry, but daymn, it makes for a perfect mouthful — surely the finest treat that day.

shortly after harlan was born, a box arrived at our house. it was one in a flurry of packages — i’d recently bought some books from book depository, and my reasoning that buying them all in one go would save on air miles and cardboard was negated when they all arrived as individual parcels over a couple of days — but this one seemed special. different. it wasn’t especially large, but it was heavy. it was covered in important red stickers. i opened it carefully, and extricated a flagon — almost two litres! — of maple syrup. of course, it was from my crazy sister.

i had long been entertaining the idea of a waffle maker in my head, and really, who doesn’t want a waffle maker in their head, specifically the cuisinart waffle machine i’d seen at the good food show last year, all brushed steel and vintage spaceship aesthetic. shortly before harlan was born, i’d been in that monster kitchen place next to the south melbourne markets with my mother, and i’d shown her the waffle machine.

she pursed her lips and shuddered. “waffles are so unhealthy,” she said. “why don’t you get the kitchenaid?”

“huh.” i said, “what do you think i’ll be making with the kitchenaid?” i was genuinely curious why she thought i wouldn’t be whizzing up cake and the buttercream frosting to go with.

that day, we returned home with bags of fruit and vegetables and fat fillets of salmon, but no waffle machine (or, alas, kitchenaid). to be honest, it was as good as mine, in my head. i was happy just biding my time. and then the syrup arrived. the maple syrup in a jug as big as a baby pretty much sealed the deal.

i had wondered if a waffle machine would be a white elephant. there was definitely a concern that it would end up being one of those appliances that sits in the back of the kitchen cupboard, taking up valuable space that could be used to store… some other appliance. turns out, having a waffle machine is just great! we’ve had waffles for sunday breakfast three times already — the last batch, yesterday, was even spelt waffles — with blueberries, with raspberries, with strawberries, with aerosol cream, with a river of maple syrup.