My dear future kids,

I heard from our neighbor’s daughter, (insert name here), that you’re envious of her mom’s cheesecake pops and hope that I’d make some myself. I regret to inform you that your wish won’t be granted anytime soon.

You see, when mommy started her food blog, she also joined this spanking network called The Daring Bakers. Every month, there’s a challenge members have to complete and come month end, they have to post up about it. Mommy’s first challenge were cheesecake pops. Remember those really yummy Toblerone mini cheesecakes I brought to school on your 5th birthday? Well I thought I’d ace my first challenge since I’ve been making cheesecakes since I was 12. Halfway, I realized that I was oh so wrong.

I didn’t have a roasting pan bigger than 10″ so I used a small wok instead and placed a little rock so that it errr wouldn’t rock.

I followed every instruction and measured to death. Based on the recipe, the cheesecake cooks up between 35-45 minutes. This is how my cheesecake looked like in 30 minutes (and her thermometer was accurate):

Bibingka or NY Cheesecake? Hmmmm

I had to scrape off a thicker than the usual (NY cheesecake) top to reveal what’s underneath. When I was balling up after chilling overnight, everything seems to be melting off still! Mommy blames the summer heat in the tropical islands for this! This made coating six hours after balling up a PAIN! The choco dip recipe that called for 1 pound chocolate + 2 tbsp. shortening was similar to your favorite (which I hope you’ll cut down pretty soon) Nutella spread when it’s supposed to be “dippable”! *sigh* After coating 8 balls, I slept everything off and thought that “shells” were better options.

Shells and sous chef to the rescue!

So are you ready to see what mommy and her sous chef made? heeeheeeheee

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Pop quiz my dear gourmets and foodies: Do you give bad restaurants second chances? Remember that small joint near your flat that served really good couscous but the waiting time just took forever? How about that really posh place that you love going to but serve hot soup cold? If your answer to my first question is yes, what are your dining “negotiables”?

You see, before I construct a review and hit that (WordPress) publish button, I try my best to dine in a “reviewee” twice before posting. I only have two exceptions:

• I wouldn’t be able to come back and dine anytime soon (like out of town/country dégustations)
• The reviewee has swept me off my feet on first bite

That said, let me share two Saturday dinners spent in one restaurant: Murray’s New Orleans. The steak we’ve had almost caused me to publish pre-maturely but my date, who loved the same piece of meat, has been bugging me to dine there again hence gave me some room to accept “negotiatiables.”

MNO’s al fresco bar at night

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