Banana Oreo Peanut Butter Cupcakes

While pinteresting the other day, I came across a recipe for Oreo Peanut Butter Brownies.  They looked heavenly in the pictures and I decided I wanted to make them sometime.  This afternoon while HA was playing some war game on the computer, I decided I would give the brownies a go.  Unfortunately, I didn't have any brownie mix and the closest grocery store was already closed for the day.

After rummaging through my pantry, I found a banana cupcake mix I had bought a while back and decided that banana goes with PB and oreos, so why not give it a try.

The ingredients and recipe are pretty easy.

Cupcake ingredients

Mix everything together to create the cupcake batter

The next part is about figuring out how much peanut butter you want to use.  The original recipe I found said to put PB between the oreos and on top.  Australians aren't as fond of PB as Americans so I chose to only do half of the cupcakes with the extra PB.

Here's all the oreos ready for cupcake batter.

Now you have to add in the cupcake batter.  Because the oreos take up most of the cupcake holder, I had to put the batter in, let it sit so gravity would fill in the gaps, and then refill it until all of the cupcakes are full.

Put the cupcakes in to bake for 20 to 25 minutes and then let cool.

They smell really yummy.  I'm thinking the banana cupcake was a good idea.  After a bit of cooling, I hand them over to my taster - more commonly known as HA in this blog.

I got a thumbs up from HA and a comment that more peanut butter could have been used (I'm slowly turning him into an American!).  I was pleasantly surprised with my experiment.  I would definitely make these again!

Two more passport stamps!

HA's brother turned 40 in August and to celebrate, he and his wife hosted a party on the Indonesian island of Batam.  HA and I were invited to the party back in June when I originally thought I was moving back to the US.  I was very disappointed because I had been wanting to go to Singapore for quite some time.  Thankfully, I was extended in Australia and was able to make the trip with HA.

Singapore is an island in Asia which has a total land mass of roughly 249.5 sq miles or about half the size of Phoenix, AZ.  The average temperature is about 80 F with about 85% humidity.  The island of Batam, Indonesia is about an hour's ferry ride from Singapore.

HA and I arrived in Singapore on Thursday evening.  The one thing I will remember about the Singapore airport is that they have the EASIEST immigration I've ever encountered.  On both departure and arrival, I did not have to wait in line and not once did I feel like I was going to be arrested (unlike when I come in Australia where I'm constantly afraid I forgot to declare something). 

On Friday, HA and I took a later ferry to Indonesia so that we could explore Singapore a bit.  Unfortunately, nothing opens in Singapore until after 10am so we had breakfast at Starbucks and then enjoyed walking around Little India to admire all the closed shops. We eventually gave up and went out to Orchard Road to do some real shopping.  Orchard road is 6 km's of stores - including a number of American stores.  The prices weren't any different than what you'd pay in Australia so HA and I didn't really buy anything.

My observations on Singapore:

1.  It's super clean - like anally retentive clean
2.  It's super quite - you never hear sirens or construction
3.  It's significantly more green than I thought it would be.  I had it in my head that it would be all high-rises with no green space - I was wrong.
4.  You can get anything you want - there were a number of American and Australian stores and fast food joints (there was even a Long John Silver's!).


Rooftop garden on Orchard Road

From there, we hopped the ferry and headed out to the island.  This Indonesian experience was very different from my Bali experience.  There weren't as many people up in your face and it was a much more relaxed experience.  The resort we stayed out was quite nice and right on the water.  Our room had a view of the ocean and of the pool right in front of us.  We spent Friday evening hanging out by the pool and having a nice dinner with all of the guests.

For Saturday, all of the boys went off golfing while the women stayed back to watch the kids and have massages.  A good portion of GW and AW's friends have children as well so this meant alot of time hanging out by the pool to make sure they didn't drown. Once the boys were back, everyone started getting ready for the evening festivities.

AW, HA's sister-in-law, arranged for the party to be held on the pier which is a beautiful location.  The party was fantastic.  Everyone had a really great time.  AW did a brilliant job with the organization!

The pier during the day



The walk out to the pier



Beautifully setup

On our way to the party

Lots of dancing

And even a little karaoke

On Sunday, we headed back to Singapore and had dinner with HA's family at a beautiful Japanese restaurant.  On Monday, HA and I didn't have to leave until the evening so we spent the day doing a bit more exploring of Singapore.  We rode in the Singapore Flyer, took a Duck tour, visited the Terracotta Warrior exhibit and tried to buy some electronics (but the prices were not any different from Australia).

The Watts family in the Singapore Flyer

The famous MerLion

Terracotta Warriors

Pop Art Exhibit

A big warm welcome to Costco Canberra!

That's right folks - there is a Costco Canberra.  And yes - that is an American Costco.  Canberra has been introduced to the goodness that is Costco.  In fact, Costco also opened in Sydney this past weekend as well.  They've been getting all kinds of press coverage as Australians try to figure out exactly what Costco is.

Looks like an normal American Costco

This morning, HA and I decided to go out to Costco and have our first visit.  This was HA's first visit to a Costco but he's heard about it from me, Max, and LB.  Of course, I have let my membership run out as I didn't think I would ever be able to use it in Australian and it seemed silly to pay for a membership that I wasn't going to use.  So, this meant that we had to get a membership first thing this morning.

This was the line to get a membership

Adam and I got there to what looked like at least an hour long wait for a membership.  However, as we were standing there, a woman came around saying that if you had gotten your membership online, you could go to the front.  So, I pull out the Iphone and promptly do our membership and we get pulled to the front of the line.   Gotta love the Iphone. I don't understand why other people weren't doing this.

The one thing I wasn't counting on is that you have to have the same address on your driver's license that you do on your application.  Of course, HA's driver's license hasn't been updated in years so we had to scramble to find a bill we could produce on our phones to prove that we lived there.  I don't remember having this rule in the US but either way, the Iphone came to the rescue once again!

Once inside, it's exactly like an American Costco - exact same setup and variety of stuff to buy.  The prices may be a bit more expensive but they are quite a bit cheaper by Australian standards.  We shopped mostly for everyday stuff that you can buy in bulk and it won't go bad - razors, brita filters..things like that.  The best line of the day was at the table which had bagels on it.  For the non-Australian's reading this blog, you should know that it's very hard to find bagels in this country.  Which led to an Australian man being overheard to say "Bagels?  I've never had one.  I wonder what they taste like."  WHO has NEVER had a bagel?

Buying Australian wine from a Costco in Australia doesn't feel as exotic as it did at home.

The one thing I was super excited about was Stacy's Naked Pita Chips.  These are my favorites and you can only get them at Costco in the US.  I was secretly hoping they would be here but I didn't want to get my hopes up as they're an American product.  But, happy day, they had them!! We bought two big bags!!  They also have some other American products like Skippy peanut butter....and cheese....

Now you may be asking yourself what's so special about this cheese.  Well, let me tell you...there are two very special things about this cheese.  1) on the far right, you will find a Pepper Jack Cheese.  I have been unable to find Pepper Jack anywhere in this country. To my Australian friends - if I'm wrong, please let me know. And 2) there is ORANGE cheese!!  All Australian cheddar cheese is white, which is natural - I won't argue that.  But I will argue that their white cheese does not melt properly.  We now own this particular cheese packet.  Hopefully HA will agree about the tastiness (not to be confused with Tasty cheese).

We ended up spending quite a bit of money - as you do in Costco.  But it was a fun day - like a little piece of America in the middle of Canberra.  I suspect I won't have to go again for awhile but it's nice to know its there if I ever need a taste of home.

Self-Portraiture

As part of the Project 52, one of the activities was Self-Portraiture.  I've attempted it twice now and I've learned quite a bit.  Self-Portraiture is much harder than you'd think it would be.  I learned a few things that are applicable to both self-portraits and portraits of other people.


1.  Lighting is key.  This is important for any picture, but after my experience trying to take a picture of myself, I understand even more.
1a.  I've learned my apartment does not have good lighting - especially at night when you have to use the overheads and the flash.
1b.  Overhead lights do nothing to flatter a person in a portrait.  It causes very odd shadows.


2.  You have to figure out your good side.  I always thought this was a figure of speech but, alas, it's true.  You have to be able to understand a person's face to make sure you get them at the right angle.


3.  Backgrounds are important.  In my first series of self-portraits, I just used our wall as the backdrop.  It's a white wall so I thought it would be ok.  Unfortunately, with the lighting, the wall looks gray and gross.  The next time, I used a chair as the background and it turned out better.  You can buy special backgrounds for your studio or use nice fabric.  It's important to look at all your surroundings when out take portraits.

4.  Make-up is important.  No amount of photoshopping will fix an oily face (or maybe it will and I just don't know how to do it).

5.  Be creative.  When you're behind the camera, it's easy to be creative because it's not you in the picture.  You're not putting yourself out there.  With self-portraiture, it's much more personal.  You want to make sure you look good (especially if you'll be sharing on your blog) but sometimes that impedes you from experimenting.  I didn't experiment as much as I could have.  Maybe one day I'll talk HA into taking me out of the apartment so I can experiment in some fun locations.

I've include below a few of the pictures I took.  I'm not happy with any of them but I've learned alot from them that I can hopefully carry forward into some other shots that I might do.

No Make-up, bad background - not good

After some post-processing.  I look like I've been fake baking.

This one is for Mom so she can see I do this even when I'm by myself.

Lesson learned - do NOT lean back.  Chin always up - I'm not 18 anymore.

Looking up and into the camera is always universally flattering.  However, the overhead lights creating shadows under the eyes is not.

The Happiest Place on Earth

My little sister Gene got married in May.  HA and I flew out to Colorado to help her celebrate (which is another blog post).  We booked a flight back to Oz to leave Monday night after the wedding.  We booked a flight from CO springs to LA to leave at 7:30 at nigh and the flight out of LA then was scheduled to leave at around 10:15pm.  I've taken this series of flights before and never had any issues - especially since they were all United flights and you on't have to change terminals in LA.


Unfortunately, our flight leaving CO Springs left nearly an hour late which meant that we arrived in LA right at 10:15.  We jumped off the plane and the monitors said that they were still boarding so we hustled our way to the gate.  When we get there, the gates are closed and they're no longer letting anyone on the plane.  So after talking with the gate woman (we got a very nasty "Where were you?  Why didn't you board the plane?"), they booked us into a hotel and rebooked us on the flight for the next day.  Consequently, our from MayDay was meant to be on that flight with us as well.  As it turns out, he missed his flight in Indianapolis so he was still able to join us the next day.


Hmmm...so a whole day in LA?  What do you do with yourself?  Well, naturally, you go to the Happiest Place on Earth!  Especially when one of the folks in the group has never been!  Adam and I checked our bags with the bell hop the next morning and grabbed a tourist bus to Disneyland.


Because it was a Tuesday and school was still in session, there was no one there!  It was FANTASTIC!  We were able to hit all of the big rides with very minimal waiting time.  It got to the point where we were doing our bottom tier rides.  I highly suggest Disneyland in the middle of the week during school.

Jedi Training

Our celebrity sighting - Santa on vacation

HA trying to be Prince Arthur

Hmm..Should I be worried?

The lady behind us couldn't take very good pictures.

We had a really great time and then also got to meet up with MayDay at the United Red Carpet lounge for a few drinks prior to our 14 hour flight.

Bali - Part 3

Alright, lets finish this Bali series. I've been slacking in the blogging department. We've only got three days left for the Bali trip. We left off on Sunday where we visited the south part of the island and got to see one of the temples on the island.

The rest of the week was fairly quiet. I decided not to organize anymore trips, and to be honest, the rest of the folks I was with are not organizers. On Monday, HA and Boris decided to rent mopeds to tour the island. I was a bit worried for them but they wore their helmets (I wish I had a pictures of HAs - it was hiliarious). HA did have a run in with the law however. Apparently, it's illegal to be over the white lines in Bali so at a stop light, he got pulled up by the police. It is apparently illegal to drive a moped in Bali without an International Drivers license. The police officer told HA that he could pay 750k rupiah or go to court. HA wisely (in my opinion) decided to pay the bribe...I mean fine. While the boys were touring the island, the rest of us hung out at the pool and then decided to do a bit of shopping. Later that night, HA took me to nice dinner just the two of us. You can get fantastic food for very little money in Bali - one of the perks.

HA and Boris at Potato Head

On Tuesday, we hung out at the pool at the house all day. Then HA booked me, Boris, and himself into a spa for a two hour treatment. When we got there, we were told that two of us would have to do our treatments together in the couples room and the other would be seperate. I promptly told Boris he was either on his own or with HA. Wisely, I think, the boys decided the didn't need to do the treatment together. HA and I decided on a massage and then a scrub. I had a coffee scrub which was fantastic. The experience was a bit different than I'd experienced before but good - I won't go into the details here. Later that night, we had drinks at a beach club called "Potato Head" which was very cool. Unfortunately, we weren't able to have dinner there as they were fully booked, so we decided to have dinner at "The Living Room" - which again, was fantastic.

Dessert from The Living Room

Wednesday was our last day. We woke up to breakfast from Made, hung out in the pool and then went to the markets in Kuta. The markets were disappointing and none of us bought anything. When we got back from the markets, we headed out to an early dinner at Sardine. Sardine was highly recommended by multiple websites and the Lonely Planet book and I can completely understand why. The setting was more than beautiful and the food was fantastic. If you ever get to Bali, I highly suggest making a booking.

Sardine Restaurant

After dinner, we headed to the airport to catch our midnight flight. In order to leave the country, we had to pay a fee of 50k rupiah a piece - yes, we had to pay to leave the country. We also had to go through security with our luggage before even checked in. As we were leaving and we passed inspection, they put a security sticker across our zipper. We were also told that we either had to lock our bags or wrap them in plastic. It was a very strange airport experience. This is because of the Schapelle Corby story - google it to get the details. Either way though, I now have a Bali security sticker on my suitcase that won't come off.

We then got back to Brisbane and barely made our flight to Canberra - but we did. We all went home, took a shower and then headed into work. I'm glad we went to Bali but I don't think I'd do it again. There are many more interesting places to visit and Bali just wasn't that special.

Rice Patties near our house

The street we had to take to get into town

Bali - Part 2

I know it's weeks later, but I thought I would finally post Part 2 of my Bali series.  I hope you enjoy!

We left off on Saturday night when we got left in the not so great part of town and I wanted to buy a hooker.  The next morning as Made (pronounced Ma-Day) made us breakfast, we talked about what we wanted to do.  I really wanted to see the Ulu Watu temple.  The Lonely Planet book raved about it as did multiple websites I had read.  LP specifically suggested visiting the temple at sunset to get some great pictures.  The rest of the group agreed to go to the temple with me but they wanted to do something else beforehand as well.  We decided on doing some water sports in the afternoon then heading out to the temple.  Made sorted out a car for us and we all headed off.

We directed our driver to the general area where we wanted to go and just told him that we wanted to snorkel.  He dropped us off in an area that is surrounded by very fancy resorts.  All of the pools and bars were only open to hotel patrons so we were having a hard time figuring out what to do.  We finally came upon a water sports "hut" (for lack of better word - it was two guys running this operation out of a shack) and signed up for snorkeling, a glass bottom boat, and a trip to Turtle Island.  The guys sorted us for masks and flippers (I saw them sanitizing everything so I felt much better about it).  They pull up the boat and it looks like it's about to fall apart.  It was a glass bottom boat but you really couldn't see much - the water was very murky.  Our boat driver spoke no English and just kinda pointed and grunted to tell us what to do.  Everyone except for MayDay tried the snorkeling.  I didn't stay in very long.  The water was murky and dirty.  After snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef, not much compares. 

All of us snorkeling



More snorkeling

 Then we hopped back in the boat and it proceeded to take us Turtle Island.  Turtle Island is apparently a small branch of the Bali zoo.  As we got off the boat, we were met by a guide who showed us all the animals and then sat with us as we ordered a beer.  I very much got the impression that he batted for the other team as he thought HA and Boris were a couple (see picture below and you'll understand why) but then when he found out that Boris was single, he made a few comments about "liking boys too".  I wouldn't suggest Turtle Island - the animals seemed cramped and it was very clearly a tourist trap.


Boris with a snake

 

Aren't they a cute couple?



All of us at Turtle Island

After Turtle Island, we high-tailed it back to the car b/c it was getting close to sunset and even though it was only 20 km to the temple, it was going to take 40 minutes.  Our driver finally gets us to the temple and it was about a $3 fee to enter the temple - with this fee, we also were given rental sarongs as you can't enter the temple in short pants.  We were also advised that women who are pregnant or menstruating cannot enter the temple - I haven't googled why yet though.  As we enter the temple we greeted by an older guy that advises us that he'll be our guide.  We just go with it as we have no idea what's going on.  The "guide" walks us around and saves a shoe from a monkey (the monkey's steal things).  Then he gets us into the Fire Dance and finds us all seats.  It's at this point that the "guide" tells us that it was $50k rupiah per person for the guide.  WHAT??  We couldn't really argue with him since he was like 70 and there were a ton of people around so we shelled out the $300k rupiah (just over $30USD).  I figure, he probably needs it more than we do.  This is where we get to see a traditional fire dance.  It was actually really nice and I'd suggest seeing one if you can.

In our sarongs - notice no one has glasses on - the monkeys would steal them.

One of the temples

Another Temple

Part of the Fire Dance

More fire dance

After the fire dance, we told our driver that we wanted seafood for dinner so he suggested Jimbaran Bay.  He picked a restaurant and dropped us off.  As we walk outside, we see that the tables are set up right on the sand by the water and it looks absolutely stunning.  You feel like it's so secluded and intimate.  Then you look to your left and right and realize that there are twenty restaurants in either direction doing the exact same thing and you don't feel so special anymore.  But we ordered some really good fresh seafood (the lobster was delicious) and enjoyed the scenery.



Couldn't get a great picture but this kinda shows what the beach was like

I just realized how long this blog is.  I think we'll have to continue with a Part 3 for the rest of our week - stay tuned!  

Quick Note - some of the pictures are from Finola - Thanks!