I bring you... FAILCAKE

You've seen Failboat. Failtruck. And now... Failcake!



They were meant to look like little muffins, not mushrooms. I think the containers were the wrong size... they went in looking like chocolate cups, expanded, then all the batter in the cup shrunk. *sigh* At least they taste okay, but they look bizarre. Next time, I'm definitely doing this as an 8" cake.

Do the maths

I love my new tiny silicone mini-muffin cases. They're brightly coloured and cheerful and will forever remind me of this year's tax refund.

However, I should have realised that 24 tiny little cases will take a lot longer to fill with batter than 12 large ones. I turned the oven on before I started making the batter, and quite frankly I could have waited until the batter was made and had plenty of time.

I'm making some chocolate chili mini-bites (possibly the most insanely calorific recipe I've ever tried) to take to German tomorrow to celebrate the end of Kurs 1 and beginning of five weeks of revision. My fellow students will also be getting the remaining cherry ricotta muffins.

The rest of the day was spent monitoring emails, applying for a job that I've realised I probably don't want and would not be a good idea, and making flashcards for German revision in Anki, which I can use on my phone. When I can get the files to the right place on the flash card. I need to get a new notebook tomorrow to write up more grammar notes too. At least something progressed today!

Now that's how you do it

Success!

Something was wrong with the first batch. The two big suspects are a) the baking soda had been open for too long and was no longer active? and/or b) I noticed while washing up my measuring spoons (a kiddies' set shaped like little fish) that the smallest one was 1/4 teaspoon. I had thought the smallest was 1/2 teaspoon. So I may have put in 1/2 +1/4 teaspoon of baking powder instead of 1 + 1/2 teaspoons. Oops.

Anyway, they're quite heavy, smell delicious (the ricotta mixture smells lovely even when it's being prepared, especially after the vanilla goes in) and are very tasty indeed!

In other good news, I did my tax return over the weekend. As I've been freelancing for over a year, I am now in the "payment on account" system in the UK where I pre-pay 50% of my estimated tax bill for that year in advance every 6 months. I did the tax return to check if I owed Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs the full figure for the second payment on account for the year - only to find that they owed me! It's a combination of the agency I worked for overcharging me on Pay As You Earn (always happens, I regularly got large tax refunds when I worked as a temp), not having my personal allowance taken into account... and business not having been so good this year. But I will be getting both the overpaid tax and the whole of the first payment on account back! I went out and bought a new mixing bowl (keep using our salad bowl to make cakes), cooling rack and some multicoloured silicone mini-muffin cases to celebrate.

Other than that, it's cool and overcast and I'm still waiting for progress on the permit. My accountant has advised me to wait until one week before the deadline from the Immigrationsamt and then chase the national insurance people and ask Immigrationsamt for an extension. There is still a possibility I will have to create a GmbH and employ myself, so I'd better sit on the money until then!

Empty, full

Yesterday was a bit of a write-off. After a very poor night's sleep on Thursday night, we both went to bed at 1am on Friday night... and slept until 1pm on Saturday. I felt awake enough when I got up, but shattered again about two hours later. I headed out to buy some things at Nishi's - who were on holiday - and book an appointment at the Hirano hairdresser's next door - who were closed at 3:10pm despite their opening hours being until 4:00 on a Saturday. And I lost one of my headphone earpieces, leaving me unable to listen to any music. After wandering through Globus and Marinello in search of some chili powder (they had nothing more interesting than what I could get at the local supermarket) I headed back to Sihl City for an "It's a Boy!" card for a friend and some food shopping. I was telling myself that the quality of Co-op's fruit and veg was better than Migros' (especially the avocados) when I saw this:



Can you guess what it is? An aubergine (eggplant) with two enormous holes and who knows what inside. *sigh*

Today was much better. Emails cleared. Washing done. Tax return done - and they owe me! Now if I can just get my Summer Greetings ready to email out to my Japanese friends and business contacts, I'll be happy...

See?

The photos from our travels around Switzerland with himself's parents are up! Pilatus, Lucerne, Schaffhausen, Rhine Falls and Bern for your viewing pleasure.

Back to baking

After himself's parents left, I had about 1/2 kilo of cherries left in the fridge that we hadn't eaten... so I looked for some recipes! These cherry ricotta muffins are cooling off and should be ready to have for desert soon...

Rheinfall!

I'm not going looking for these, honest

But there seems to be no end to the 戦国BASARA news! Now on Kotaku is an article about a 戦国BASARA attraction in a theme park at the base of Mount Fuji... Hope it's still there next time I'm in japan!

Hello from Lucerne!

Because that was too healthy?

The frankly hysterical 戦国BASARA food tie-ins continue, and this time it's Pizza Hut!

These are the boxes:


And this is the "Adult Half & Half" pizza, "Super Delicious Bulgogi" and "Dijon Mustard Sausage":


Gigazine describes "dijon mustard sausage" as like a spicy potato salad, and the "super delicious bulgogi" as strongly flavoured yaki-niku (grilled beef). Pizzas the way only the Japanese seem to like them.

Original post at Gigazine (Japanese)

For your amusement

Here's something I found while sorting through some books today - getting them repacked into plastic bags and moved into storage in crates in the cellar instead of having them in damp cardboard boxes in the garage. It should be particularly amusing to anyone who met me after around 2002 when I started having my hair short!



This is a sketch of me from 1999, done by one of the students at Akechi High School in Japan where I worked as an assistant English teacher. Happy days.

Things that make me laugh out loud

Just spotted this on Gigazine: the city of Ueno, Nagano is collaborating with the computer game/anime 戦国BASARA to market apple wine and cake!

How could you resist this box of biscuits?

By the power of steam!

I can't believe it's July already.

Last Sunday was spent steaming steamed breads - three batches, two green tea and one cocoa - and then heading out for an amazing steam train ride out of Zurich up into the countryside and back!

And I've finally got the photos organised. Enjoy!

In other news, I got a registration card from the AHV, but no confirmation yet that they consider me to be a freelancer. But it's another piece in the puzzle. There is no point in thinking of this process as an orderly progression along some kind of path.

David's office party is tomorrow, there's a Japanese fundraising bazaar on on Saturday, Friday to Sunday is a festival in town, and next Saturday there's a showing by a small Japanese boutique in town. Things to do!