Of Trifle and Custard Galore

A colleague of mine left a comment on my Facebook, on how I am becoming quite domesticated these days. All because I told the world that I made Chicken Rendang for dinner (which turned out to be surprisingly quite good!).

Actually, I am quite domesticated. There you go. Confessions of a Desperate Housewife. Haha. Well actually, domesticated only comes to mind whenever I am a housewife. Therefore, when I was serving my 2 year term in Sakhalin, hubby would be absolutely thrilled whenever I am rotation holiday. (I used to be on a one month on Sakhalin Island, one month off in Malaysia rotation.) Rotation holidays would mean shiny mopped floors, freshly laundered clothes, ironed working attires, squeaky clean toilets and most importantly, hot delicious dishes for dinner. Furthermore, due to the time difference (Sakhalin is 2 hours ahead of KL) and jet lag, during the first week home I would be up by 530am, doing house chores and bidding hubby goodbye at the door when he heads off for work.

Memories of rotation holidays have faded since I moved back to sunny ol’ KL on a regular 5 day week work routine. However, Aiden came into the picture and maternity leave kicked in. And I find myself wandering around the house finding things to do to keep me occupied. I enjoy being a lady of leisure, yet I grumble to hubby on being bored at home. Since Bibik has covered the housework, therefore I create things to do – such as placing my wedding pictures in albums (yes, laugh all you want, but I never found the time during the past 3 years), organize all important mail into separate colour coded folders, create a database of Aiden’s clothes, try out new recipes from the internet, post entries on my blog, and the list goes on and on.

The trifle was yet another of my domesticated attempt, recipe courtesy of the internet of course. Well, I was going through a few flogs (food blogs) and hubby suddenly exclaimed “Yang! Sedapnyer yang tuh... you try buat lah...” while pointing at a picture of a trifle on the laptop screen. So the next day, I got to work. First and foremost, a text message to my most reliable and expert baker in the whole wide world, who also happens to be my maid-of-honour, sister-for-life. (If you happen to live in Dublin and would like a taste of her to-die-for brownies, click here.)

Me: Gurl, where can I get fresh cream to make trifle? Tesco, Giant tuh semua ada ke? Dia tulis apa, fresh cream? In box? In can?
Yay: Yup, fresh cream and it’s in a bottle. Slalu band Avonmore kaler biru. And they should be at the fridge area near susu tak silap I.
Me: Do I have to ‘putar’ it until kembang like this recipe suruh, or can just use straight away?
Yay: Kena ‘putar’ la. Mana ada jual dah siap putar.

So after a trip to Tesco plus a frantic call to Dublin due to the fact that Tesco did not carry that brand of fresh cream, I piled all my newly bought goodies and read the recipe again. I measured all the ingredients for the custard, and got Bibik to stand guard by the saucepan, stirring slowly until the custard thickens. Hunted for my mixer in the kitchen cabinet and started to 'putar' the fresh cream. The cream turned all white and fluffy. Unfortunately, my ingenious fingers seemed to have a life of its own and refused to stop the mixer. Plus my mind was miles away thinking about the gulai ayam rebung I was going to cook for dinner. Suddenly the cream......... curdled, disintegrated and became all watery!!!!!!

Another call to Dublin. Man my Maxis bill is going to go rocket sky high this month!

Me: Yay! The cream has curdled! I think I dah terlebih putar!
Yay: What is curdled?
Me: Alahhhh... yang macam if you have a mixture of cake batter, and you put eggs into it - that mixture looks like it has curdled!
Yay: Huh??? *confused* Kalau you ada webcam kan senang, tunjuk kat I jer!

I did not have a spare pack of fresh cream, so I had to make do with what I had. Drained the watery stuff from the cream, and putar again. In the meantime, the custard thickened, but unfortunately it was a tad too much and a tad too sweet. Thank god this trifle is for home consumption only!

So this is a picture of the trifle (first layer):

On top of that comes the horrible looking cream 'putar' plus the overdose of custard. *fail habis!*

I hereby solemnly swear that I shall not pour this much custard and shaving, oopppsss whipping cream on to any trifle I make ever again!

Trying to hide the apparent failure with lots of grapes and strawberries:

The end result, served with Gulai Ayam Rebung:

After dinner, me and hubby plopped ourselves in front of the TV and had a bite of the chilled trifle with some strawberry milk.

Me: Yang, after eating the trifle, even the strawberry milk tastes less sweet. I think I need plain water to drown this sweetness away...

Hahaha... so that is the story of my failed attempt with the trifle. Yay, come back quick! I need to berguru with you on how to 'putar' cream!