SugarHighFriday! on a Saturday

Finally, I am on time with participating in SHF #31. I always seem to miss it or find out right after the due date for submissions. So this month's theme is Neutral Territory. So, naturally, I think of white chocolate, panna cotta, white angel food cake, bombe alaska? OKAY, so I was thinking they were things that were kinda 'been there, kinda done that'. I needed something that I have been been to try out, something that I was craving. I was really tempted to bake a lemon cupcake topped with a rich thick white chocolate frosting but I changed my mind.

So here's where I am with this whole 'white' thing. Almond Jelly. It's a Chinese thing (oooh it's one of those 'i wanna go home' days) and my mom likes serving it in thick cubes, swirling through some canned lychees and ice cubes, easy! Oh and it doesn't stop people from coming back for more. Normally ours comes from a packet-just add water. Most people's come from packets, it just seems alot easier.

Oh and I just remembered something funny. My sister loves all things under 'Chinese dessert' and so she bought heaps of the instant almond jelly and one day she decided that letting them sit in the fridge to set was wayyy too much torture to bear. she wanted to eat it NOW so she put it in the freezer. Not smart, we ended up with a block of almond ice sitting in the sink, slowly thawing.

OHWELL, Here's my sugar high! =)

2 cups cold water
1/3 cups caster sugar*
2/3 cup evaporated milk
1/2 tsp almond essence*
2 tsp agar-agar powder*

1) Place cold water and caster sugar in small saucepan
2) Sprinkle the agar agar powder over it and bring to a boil then simmer for 1 minute
3) Take off heat and add in the evaporated milk and almond essence
4) Pour into prepared container* and chill for at least 1 hour

*I used normal white sugar and because I only had 2 tbspoons under 1/4 of sugar in my ENTIRE HOUSE, I had to half the recipe
*I found that the almond essence wasn't enough so I added double the amount, well, I added enough to make sure that I could smell the almond more than the evaporated milk
*Agar-agar powder is from seaweed (i think) and it can be found in most asian groceries. I had no trouble finding mine!=)
*I poured it into those plastic take away containers just coz my mom always does that. It depends on how thick you want the jelly to be, I just mine substantially thick so I can sink my teeth in. YUMMMY!

I'm finally going for Vietnamese tonight. YAY! Damn these food cravings. I think I might bake me some Ciabatta tomorrow. Im a little skeptical about my baking skills...