4 ways to wear 

the everlane 

shirt dress

Style collab with Yuka Ohishi

One of the reasons why I love working at Pinterest is that I am surrounded by so many badass women who are passionate about their hobbies outside of work. Yuka is one of them, and creates beautiful videos on her YouTube channel in both English and Japanese. You can also check out her amazing sense of style on her blog and Instagram. Since we both love to create style content, we decided to get together to do a collaboration for Yuka's channel and for this blog. We designed the collaboration around this dress:

The Linen Shirt Dress 
in Medium Indigo
Everlane
$78 USD

The challenge? Take this simple, somewhat boring-looking dress and each create a dressy and casual outfit out of it.

The result:

The Sunday brunch

Way 1: dress it up
Styled by Yuka

To elevate the simplicity of the denim shirt, Yuka paired it with a gingham midi skirt and tied the look together with a western belt. To balance out the feminine skirt with a bit of edge, she added a pair of leather boots from Marc Fisher.

Shirt Dress (acting just as the shirt here): Everlane | Skirt: Stylekeepers| Belt: Zara| Boots: Marc Fisher

The lazy Saturday

Way 2: dress it down
Styled by Cindy

To give my outfit a nautical and preppy vibe, I layered a striped shirt and white wide-leg jeans underneath the shirt dress. The majority of white in this outfit also helps to bring out the vibrance of the indigo in the shirt dress. 

Shirt Dress: Everlane | T-shirt: Uniqlo | Jeans: Cheap Monday| Loafers: Modcloth

Now... onto some nautical-style shots we took at this "top secret" location.

When asked to describe our different styles, we agreed that it was important to the both of us to have balance in our outfits—whether it's from mixing feminine and masculine pieces together, or from mixing tight and loose tops and bottoms. Not only does this apply to clothing alone, but to makeup as well. If you're going to be wearing a super colorful outfit, you might want to consider keeping your makeup on the neutral side—and vice versa.

The outfit I put together was quite casual and leaned more towards the tomboy side. To bring some feminine energy into it, I put on a classic red lipstick (M·A·C Viva Glam I). I find that the red lipstick really helps the whites and blues in this outfit pop, and adds a Parisian-girl vibe when paired with the navy stripes.

I know I tend to wear red lipstick an awful lot, but the truth is: I do it simply because it helps me look awake. Because my skin can look washed-out sometimes, I tend to look rather tired when I'm not wearing any color on my lips. I find that the pop of red (or any color, really) on my lips helps give some warm undertones to my face and makes me look energized—even if I only had 4 hours of sleep the night before.

To bring balance to her outfit, Yuka countered the feminine midi skirt with some black boots from Marc Fisher. I personally love the midi skirt + ankle boot combo and have seen it all over outfits at fashion weeks across the globe. This can be a bit tricky to pull off for petite girls, but my advice would be to keep a good distance from the bottom of the skirt to the top of the boots so your legs don't get lost. I also did something similar in a previous post, where I paired some simple black sock boots with a not-so-simple midi dress.

Hamptons, anyone?

Are we still in San Francisco?

Actually yes, we are. I'm just never telling you where we shot these.

The 10Am Meeting

Way 3: dress it down
Styled by Yuka

To style this dress for a casual work setting, Yuka wore it as a light "trench coat" above a black and white shirt + trousers. Then, to balance the simplicity of the outfit, she chose a pair of leopard heels to tie everything together and to bring in a pop of color.

Shirt Dress: Everlane | T-shirt: Uniqlo | Pants: Stella McCartney | Heels: SLY (Japanese brand)

The 5PM happy hour

Way 4: dress it up
Styled by Cindy

To give this shirt a more feminine silhouette, I added a skinny belt to cinch the waistline and give the blue dress an unexpected pop of color. I layered a black mesh blouse underneath to add an interesting texture to the outfit, and to elevate the somewhat-casual feel that denim tends to give off.

Shirt Dress: Everlane | Mesh blouse (underneath): Styleaddict | Belt: Modcloth| Heels: Sigerson Morrison

I had a blast doing this style collab with Yuka! It's so fun to discover different people's styles and look into their thought process of constructing an outfit. I'm really hoping that the two of us can collaborate again in the future, and show you more of these collab posts!

If you want to follow Yuka:

YouTube: blossomlink by Yuka
Instagram: @0oyukao0
Blog: blossomlink.me
Pinterest: @0oyukao0
Twitter: @0oyukao0

Also, kudos to me for creating 2 posts in 2 days. I'm going to pass out now, good night.

♥ Cindy

I recently went on a weekend getaway to Los Angeles with two friends from school—Ren and Annie. Within less than 72 hours, we were able to hit up some of the most scenic places in the city while eating some of the most delicious foods along the way. Here are 13 highlights from my trip that I highly advise you check out while you’re in L.A.!

Have brunch and dessert at Bottega Louie

With over 14,000 Yelp reviews, high ceilings, dainty Parisian decor, macaron Christmas trees, and picturesque pastries, Bottega Louie should be at the top of your list of things to do in L.A. Grab your besties and sit down at one of the marble tables for brunch on a weekend morning. Knowing that this place was super popular, Annie and I were a bit worried that we would spend a long of time waiting in line to get in. But because this place has a huge dining room, you'll find yourself seated immediately with plenty of empty tables left to spare.

Bottega Louie

700 S Grand Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90017
Downtown

bottegalouie.com

Annie and I decided that we wanted both sweet and savory dishes, so we shared the smoked salmon Eggs Benedict and the plain beignets with raspberry sauce on the side. Bottega Louie's beignets are a bit like donuts—except they're fluffier and lighter.

Visit The Last Bookstore

After stopping at Bottega Louie, stay in the Downtown area and explore The Last Bookstore. Not only can you find cheap used books and records in the store, but you'll also stumble upon lots of art installations constructed out of books scattered throughout the building. Amongst them is a book tunnel, a circular book "window", and a bookshelf that looks like it's defying gravity. This bookstore also has a dedicated booth where you can drop off your old books and sell them to the store.

The Last Bookstore

453 S Spring St
Los Angeles, CA 90013
Downtown

lastbookstorela.com

Explore the Bradbury Building

Just a few blocks away from The Last Bookstore is The Bradbury Building. This building has made cameos in a number of movies and television shows and is known for its beautiful orange and green interior that draws from the Italian Renaissance Revival. The elevator is exposed, so you can see all the gears in action as the lift moves from floor to floor. Its open center, lit naturally from a large window in the ceiling, is surrounded by different offices on different floors. It reminds me of the 888 Brannan building in San Francisco—which is a much more modern version of The Bradbury that houses several tech companies. The two buildings are so uncannily similar that I wonder if 888 Brannan took inspiration from this older building. But then again, because this building is so famous… it must’ve inspired a dozen other buildings along the way. Anyways, it’s free to enter, and a super photogenic place that your camera will love.

Bradbury Building

304 S Broadway
Los Angeles, CA 90013
Downtown

thebradbury.com

After visiting the Bradbury Building, make sure to stop by the Blue Bottle Coffee right next door for a cold brew and to sit within the beautiful Scandinavian-inspired decor.

Take photos at picturesque walls in Beverly Hills

L.A. is literally the Instagram capital of the world—not only does it have gorgeous food, but it is also filled with hundreds of murals across its many neighborhoods. Melrose Ave in Beverly Hills is a street that houses dozens of artsy walls, and is home to the famous pink Paul Smith wall (which also has a wall of painted flowers right across from it), and the “Made in LA” wall, which is actually the side of a furniture boutique. Even if you don’t plan to do much shopping at the luxury stores here, there are plenty of picturesque alleyways that will catch your eye as much as the expensive clothing.

The Pink Wall at Paul Smith Los Angeles

8221 Melrose Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90046
Beverly Grove

paulsmith.com

Made In L.A. Wall at Cisco Home
Cisco Home
8025 Melrose Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90046

For a more comprehensive summary of L.A.'s walls, please refer to this article by The Los Angeles Magazine.

Grab a snack at Grand Central Market

If you’re looking for a quick snack, coffee, or a casual lunch in Downtown LA, visit the Grand Central Market. Within this market that spans half a block, there are numerous street food vendors featuring Mexican, Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai, and Japanese cuisines (I may also be missing some here…). Yes it can be hectic and lines can get quite long (especially for Eggslut), but it's super fun to walk through and marvel at all the different cuisines in one place. Instead of Eggslut, my friend and I resorted to getting the egg-shaped gummies instead, just because we were so damn curious about what it tasted like. And no, it did not taste like egg. Bummer.

Grand Central Market

317 S Broadway
Los Angeles, CA 90013
Downtown

grandcentralmarket.com

Shop at unique stores in Abbot Kinney

If you’re around the Venice Beach area, make sure you make an effort to walk inland to discover Abbot Kinney Blvd. This street is filled with all sorts of cute storefronts and cafés—some of them without roofs because... why do they need one anyways, it’s always sunny in LA, right? Even more established brands like rag & bone have adapted to this aesthetic and designed their storefronts to look like one that's owned by an indie brand. I would say that this street is the equivalent of Hayes Valley in San Francisco, only it’s much bigger and contains more stores.

Abbot Kinney Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90291
Venice

Dine at Cassia and shop in Santa Monica 

It’s definitely not difficult to find good places to eat in L.A. The difficult part is deciding which one to eat at. I discovered a place on Yelp called Cassia which specializes in modern Singaporean and Vietnamese cuisine that was just a few blocks away from the Santa Monica shopping center. We ordered the Seafood platter which contained some of the most unique and creative seafood dishes that I’ve ever seen, the chickpea curry flatbread, and the bone marrow stewed in pho broth. After dinner, we headed a few blocks west to Santa Monica's shopping center to walk it off. 

Cassia

1314 7th St
Santa Monica, CA 90401

cassiala.com

Explore The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios

For those who grew up with the Harry Potter books and movies, Universal Studios has now given us a place to geek out—The Wizarding World of Harry Potter. The Hogwarts section of the theme park has two rides while the Hogsmeade portion is filled with restaurants and shops where you can purchase merchandise from scarves to wands to broomsticks. A tip for those who want to drink butterbeer: don't wait in the long lines at the carts around the park! Cut your wait time by going into Hog's Head Pub (connected to the main restaurant) and enjoy your drink in a dining hall that resembles a Hogwarts common room.

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

Universal Studios Hollywood
100 Universal City Plz
Universal City, CA 91608

universalstudioshollywood.com

Have a casual Breakfast at Eggslut

If you plan on visiting Venice Beach, there is an Eggslut located conveniently right at the edge of the boardwalk. Since lines of the Eggslut located in Grand Central Market can get insanely long, try your best to visit the one in Venice instead. I can't guarantee that there won't be a line though—when we went early on Sunday morning, we still had to wait 5-10 minutes to enter. But if you want to sit down to enjoy your egg sandwich, or take it to go and enjoy it on the beach, the Venice location is the place to go!

Once you're there, try out "The Slut" (oh dear this sounds so wrong), which is a soft poached egg on top of a bed of mashed potatoes which you eat with crunchy toast drizzled in olive oil. The egg sandwich is incredibly messy to eat, since the eggs (even the scrambled) are extremely runny—but so delicious, of course. So prepare to grab a few extra napkins. Also worth mentioning is their biscuit, which comes with a honey butter that is to die for.

Eggslut (Venice)

1611 Pacific Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90291
Venice

eggslut.com

Check out the view and ride the slide at Oue Skyspace

The Oue Skyspace skyscraper is located in Downtown, right across from the L.A. Central Public Library. For $35 you can take the elevator up to the top floor to ride the sky slide: a transparent glass slide on the side of the skyscraper that goes down to the floor right underneath. Once you're on the second highest floor, go outside to get some shots of an angel's view of Downtown L.A., and to take some photos with a set of watercolor angel wings created by Colette Miller.

Oue Skyspace

633 W Fifth St
Fl 2
Los Angeles, CA 90071
Downtown

oue-skyspace.com

Pig out in Koreatown

Koreatown is home to the largest Korean population outside of Korea, and its food is no joke. We were originally planning to go to Sun Nong Dan, a restaurant specializing in galbijim (갈비찜)—a hearty short rib stew—one of my favorite dishes. But because there was a huge line outside of its tiny storefront, we decided to go to the place next door—Hangari Bajirak Kalgooksoo—which also had over a thousand reviews and a 4.5 star rating. The bossam (보쌈)—boiled pork belly lettuce wraps—were definitely my favorite.

Hangari Bajirak Kalgooksoo

3470 W 6th St
Ste 9 & 10
Los Angeles, CA 90020
Wilshire Center, Koreatown

People-watch at the Venice Boardwalk

Unfortunately L.A. was quite gloomy on the weekend I arrived. So it was pretty cold and windy at the beach in Venice. Still, it was worth visiting to see all the unique street art, performers, and personalities. Because it got so chilly, we stopped by a nearby café called Menotti’s for a delicious Spanish latte.

Ocean Front Walk
Venice, CA 90291

Visit Mansur Gavriel and its café at Melrose Place

Mansur Gavriel has come out with some fantastic handbags in the past year. The minimal shape of the bags, paired with their eccentric colors, really helps to create a very unique look for the brand. The store itself, like its handbags, is absolutely stunning. There is even a lily pond inside the store! But because their handbags are on their higher end of the price spectrum, Annie and I decided to sit down at its in-house café for a light lunch instead. We shared the pesto orecchiette and the almond cake, which was the perfect portion for a light lunch before heading on the plane back to San Francisco.

One thing I forgot to mention was that we also passed by a farmer’s market outside Mansur Gavriel on Melrose Place selling street food, jewelry, baked goods, and fresh produce. I’m assuming that it happens every Sunday. Get the best of both worlds by doing luxury shopping in Melrose Place, and then doing your flea market shopping at the many tents outside.

Mansur Gavriel and Café Flora

8475 Melrose Pl
Los Angeles, CA 90069
Beverly Hills

mansurgavriel.com/pages/los-angeles

A huge shout out to Ren and Annie for enjoying the best of L.A. with me! It was so nice going on a trip with an all-female crew and not feeling ashamed of going shopping, or being a little too *basic* by taking photos inside a bookstore.

All photos were taken on the iPhone X and edited on VSCO.

♥ Cindy

Do you remember the line in The Devil Wears Prada that Miranda Priestly says when she sarcastically replies to the fashion editor who suggested doing an editorial on florals for spring? "Florals? For spring? Groundbreaking." Miranda's snarky comment was what came to mind when I was composing this post. Okay, so it might not be the most novel idea to do a post on florals for spring (especially while posing against a floral backdrop), but whatevs, Miranda. Florals and spring are a timeless match, and we're all thinking it.

Because I've been so obsessed with minimal fashion these days, I've resorted to this simple mom jeans and white blouse combo multiple times when I have a creative outage and can't figure out what to wear. Another way to elevate a minimal outfit is by adding statement jewelry. I added these rose gold dangling hoop earrings to give the outfit a more feminine vibe. I've been in love with minimal and geometric jewelry lately, specifically ones of this nature. I feel that they add a super chic element to the outfit without being overly-gaudy or attention-seeking.

I am such a big fan of biker jackets because of how versatile they are and how they seem to work for every occasion. Throw one over a casual jeans + T-shirt outfit to elevate it, or put it over a feminine dress to make it edgier. I love mixing different style elements together—masculine with feminine, classy with street—and a biker jacket really helps out with that. In this outfit, I layered a rather outlandish and flashy embroidered biker jacket on top of a minimal white button-up and mom jeans to give a modern spin to this classic combo.

Embroidery has become super popular thanks to Gucci in the past year. I'm usually not a big fan of bold patterns or prints, but seeing them show up on more masculine items like loafers, jackets, and jeans has really gotten me obsessed with this trend. Yes, florals might be trite when it comes to putting them on feminine dresses and blouses. But when you put them on a pair of ripped jeans or sneakers, they suddenly turn into something very badass and unique.

In spite of how versatile biker jackets are, this one in particular was a bit tricky to style. I decided to go super minimal and basic underneath and tried to balance out the masculine and feminine elements of the outfit as much as I could. The sheer blouse and the hoop earrings can be considered feminine, while the pair of baggy jeans and black leather loafers can be considered masculine. (Now that I think about it, the sheer white blouse could actually work as either masculine or feminine... It's very hard to tell with such a classic piece like this!)

Makeup: Lips (M·A·C Viva Glam I) | Brows (Anastasia Beverly Hills Brow Wiz in Dark Brown + Glossier Boy Brow in Brown) | Eyeliner (Clio Kill Black Waterproof Pen Liner) | Under-eye Concealer (Nars Radiant Creamy Concealer in Custard)

I want to mention that proceeds from every purchase from M·A·C's Viva Glam line is donated to the M·A·C AIDS Fund. All the more reason to buy this lipstick... plus it's the perfect classic red lipstick that even Jeanne Damas recommended.

Location: These photos were taken in front of a mural in a secluded alley in downtown Los Gatos. Contrary to San Francisco, Los Gatos is a very residential and quiet neighborhood, it was difficult to find grungy and artistic backgrounds to shoot at. Luckily, we found this colorful blue wall a few blocks past Main st., which also happened to be super close to a bakery that sold the most delicious maple pound cake (which was the best part of the photoshoot, hands down).

Apparel: Embroidered Biker Jacket (Found at Buffalo Exchange) | Sheer White Button-Up (H&M) | Mom Jeans (Topshop "Petite Mom Jeans" in 24/28) | Black Penny Loafers (ASOS MOVEMENT Leather Loafers) 

Don't you think the addition of florals on more masculine pieces and the trend of making embroidery look more edgy kind of alludes to how women are feeling these days? Like, let's throw all of the traditional perceptions we have about women out the window, just like how fashion is throwing out all the traditional perceptions we have about flowers. 

If you liked reading this post, keep up with me on Instagram, and see what inspires me on Pinterest!

♥ Cindy

April, like March, was a tough cookie to tackle because of the millions of tasks that were shoved into a short time frame. But as the month came to a close, I felt relieved and accomplished after (1) having a semi-successful gig at PianoFight, (2) finishing up a huge project at work—a big chunk of it at least—and (3) presenting a successful session about making the most out of a studio apartment for my Pinterest Knit con session.

4.

Lots of K-pop/J-pop in this one, and a combination of my old and new favorite artists. Tom Misch recently came out with his new "Geography" album which contains fantastic songs one after the other (my favorite has to be "Lost in Paris," which I've been obsessively listening to). After doing an IU cover, I started revisiting a lot of her songs as well.

listen

Sleepless rainy night

(잠 못 드는 밤 비는 내리고)

IU

I am so in love with IU's rhythm section these days because they tend to keep things very simple but tasteful. They're really good at making space for IU when she's doing more vocally-interesting things, but they also play some super melodic fills to take up the empty space. This song is a really good demonstration of that. Also please marvel at IU's belting of that high G at 4:10.

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Before Paris

Tom Misch

This intro track to Tom Misch's new album Geography (also an intro to the next song, "Lost in Paris") is so much more than just an intro track. I love the spoken part in the beginning where the musician explains that he will go out to "jam sessions regardless of whether [he's] getting paid or not", and the part where he goes on to talk about how "art is a mirror of society" and so forth. The cool guitar part following that is extremely funky and catchy and always stays in my head after I listen to this song.

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Lost in Paris

Tom Misch

Now, onto the actual song after that insanely cool intro. This is probably my favorite song in the album because (A) it's really simple and catchy and (B) there are really distinct sections of the song that keep it interesting (including a rap and trumpet solo section). I really love how Tom Misch will layer complex guitar melodies under a really simple and repetitive melody that he will sing. This makes his melody sound sophisticated even though it's super singable and memorable to the listener.

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Make Me complete - unchained ver.

BoA

I applaud BoA for singing a full song in English and pronouncing her lyrics really damn well. Plus, this is one of the few times where the English lyrics in a J-pop/K-pop song actually make sense. I'm sure you're aware that a lot of K-pop songs these days are littered with what Koreans think are cool-sounding English catch phrases that make no sense in the context of the song. Luckily this song didn't adhere to that. I also love the addition of the acoustic guitar that cuts through the funky groove that rest of the rhythm section is playing.

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Fool for you

Snoh Aalegra

Spotify suggested this song to me on multiple weeks' worth of Discover Weekly's. So by the time this song showed up again, I was already familiar with it and already knew all the lyrics. I found it too catchy and simple not to listen it over and over again this month.

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Dreamin' - live

Raelee Nikole

Loved this song ever since I listened to the original for the first time, mostly for its simple vocal + acoustic guitar paring, and also for its lyrics which I relate to so much in my life right now:

so if I'm dreaming please don't wake me up
because I feel so much better if I go to sleep
and if I'm breathing
faster than usual please
just let me be

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Each day

Cyrille Aimee, Matt Simons

Because I'm going to see Cyrille Aimee in May at SFJAZZ, I've been listening to her quite a lot these days. Her live scatting is probably some of the most insane that I've heard, and her unique twist on classic jazz standards and 80s pop songs are so fun to listen to. For this song in particular, I really love the layering of vocals at 2:27. Matt starts singing first, and then Cyrille comes in a few bars later, offsetting the melody. Another highlight in the song to point out is the contrast of the electric guitar solo on top of the acoustic guitar at 2:00, which creates such a cool texture.

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Something divine

Sam Ock

Boy do I love trumpets and this song is full of them. Not to mention they're perfectly in sync. Since they're not playing super high notes or super melodic passages, these trumpets lay a smooth foundation for the vocals to go on top of. Also, the lyrics to the rap part is just so. damn. good:

call it theory but I want to call it life math
call it melody but I call that my soul's path
call 'em chords and let 'em pluck the heart strings
call 'em instruments but they're with what the heart sings
the semiotics and semantics of a man's life

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change ya mind

Mac Ayres

I've really started appreciating music that is simple these days. It's surprising because a while ago I was all about music that was complex and sophisticated. But after writing a few songs that were full of unnecessary complexities, and listening to musicians play complicated passages to purely demonstrate skill, I started getting a little sick of that complexity and looked to music that had fewer instruments and less note-y melodic phrases. I just find that simple music is more likely to make me feel the emotions that the song is trying to convey. This song is a really good example of a song that's super simple, but manages to convey a whole lot of emotion. The vocals paired with the muffled piano leave a lot of silence in the middle of phrases, and the simplicity really conveys the sadness and the helplnessness (?) of the lyrics.

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Fly - unchained ver.

BoA

Here's another pick from BoA's Unchained album, which is basically a compilation of acoustic, jazzier versions of her existing songs. The layering of acoustic guitar sounds so damn good in this (i.e. the fills that one guitar will play at the end of some phrases). The chord changes at 1:23 are also just so tasty.

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Friday (Ft. Yi-Jeong of HISTORY)

IU

I was listening a lot to this song because my friend Anna and I decided to do a cover of it. Also because I just love IU so much. Who doesn't? Head on over to this post to listen to it, and to check out the cake that we were waiting to bake while we were making the cover!

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You're on my mind

Tom Misch

This is another one of my favorites from the Geography album. I love the choice of acoustic guitar for the majority of the song, which is a little different for Tom Misch (who has a very signature sound with his electric guitar). Because the song is very simple and sparse with just vocals and acoustic guitar in the beginning, when the electric guitar comes in with its solo at 2:54, it just sounds way more dramatic and sophisticated. I also love the addition of female background vocals, which also kinda diverged a bit from Tom Misch's usual sound.

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I love these artists and these songs! If you love them too, let's talk :) Also if you have more suggestions on artists or albums I should be listening to, please let ya girl know!

♥ Cindy

Cover of "Friday" (금요일에 만나요) - IU with Yi-Jeong of History by Anna + Cindy

Last week I got to hang out with a friend from UCSD (also from the a cappella community and a K-pop lover!), Anna, and we made a little somethin somethin for y'all listen to! Kudos to her for editing in the bloopers as well, so stayed tuned until the end for those ;) Make sure to subscribe to her YouTube channel, and to check out her Japan and Korea vlogs!

It feels so good to come back to my K-pop grind and to sing all my guilty pleasure songs again—especially because I've mostly been singing English Jazz standards in preparation for gigs lately. I actually powered through a lot of my early days of learning guitar by using K-pop guitar tutorials to learn the chords to my favorite songs. Shout out to the Caffeine Guitar channel and this video for teaching me how to play this song in particular. 

But... that's not it! We also baked an entire cake!

How badass are we for making an entire cover while before our cake finished baking? This day was really a creative and productive stay-at-home day. It feels therapeutic to create something like music or food, which is nearly not as stressful as creating code, for example.

The story behind this creative day? After posting numerous posts about my baking adventures on Instagram, I found out that Anna loved to bake and cook as well. So we decided to get together to bake this Blood Orange Black Sesame Loaf Cake, courtesy of this recipe I found on Pinterest.

I'm really loving the pink color that the blood orange juice creates for the icing of this cake. I've seen so many bakeries around San Francisco incorporate black sesame into their items these days. I recently tried the Orange Sesame Cake from Tartine Manufactory and the Black Sesame Banana Bread from Provender Coffee. After realizing that sesame gives an interesting (even savory, I would say?) flavor to balance out the sweetness of baked goods, I was eager to come back home to try it myself.

Aren't you proud of me for composing two blog posts in under two days? <rant> This is because I finally finished a big chunk of a project at work and now I'm finally spending some quality time with my hobbies rather than coding until 4AM on weekends. (I'm still typing this blog post at 2AM on a Sunday, but it somehow feels more reasonable) In other words, my job is too stress-inducing and maybe I should try to transition into a role that's better for someone who has bad anxiety issues already. </rant> Whatever. Good night y'all.

♥ Cindy

Follow me on Instagram @cinders_zhang for more cooking demos/recipes!

With spring here in full action, and 3284323576 of my colleagues and friends jetting off to Tokyo and posting photos of their Japanese treats on Instagram, I found myself craving mochi and matcha all the time. I was also bombarded with photos from Third Culture Bakery in Berkeley, which specializes in mochi muffins and Japanese sweets. So with cravings came curiosity, and I decided to do a little bit of research on desserts I could make with the Mochiko rice flour I had lying around.

I attempted to recreate the mochi muffins at home—though I consider them to be "mochi cupcakes" because of how dainty and light they are. Several recipes online suggested using coconut milk instead of regular milk, and I found that the lighter, more refreshing flavor of the coconut was a great match for the heavier, more intense flavor of the matcha.

I tried a total of four different flavors. At the very top you can see the matcha mochi cupcakes with no filling. The plain ones were stuffed with passionfruit jam, guava jam, and cookie butter.

Prior to baking these, I happened to stop by Trader Joes and brought home a jar of cookie butter. If you haven't had cookie butter, well, what are even you doing reading this blog? You should be rushing to TJ's right this moment to buy a jar and experience your life change. Anyways, since I had an entirely new jar of cookie butter at my disposal, I couldn't help by try to incorporate it into these as well.

I purchased my guava and passionfruit jams from Nijiya Market. Before I discovered that Nijiya carried guava jam, I resorted to amazon to purchase guava paste and guava jam (which I used to make these guava pastries). Now I can simply make a trip to Japantown and find not only guava jam, but also the other exotic pineapple, passionfruit, papaya, and strawberry-guava jams by Hawaiian Sun.

Before adding the top layer of batter to cover each cupcake, I scooped a teaspoon of jam and cookie butter into each the plain mochi cupcakes. I found that the passionfruit and guava also worked really well with the faint coconut flavoring from the milk to create a tropical flavor. As for the cookie butter, well, I think we can all agree that goes with everything.

Instead of going out of my way to buy actual matcha powder, I cheated once again with an instant latte mix. If you've read my previous dessert posts, you'll know I'm quite a big fan of instant coffee and latte mixes and find them to be an easy but creative addition to a lot of different baked goods (you can see how I incorporated a cafe latte mix into my chocolate cheesecake cupcakes). I added a total of 2 small packets of instant matcha to my batter and I found it to be a bit less scary than adding raw matcha due to its strong flavor and coarse texture that may easily overwhelm the cupcakes.

The matcha flavored cupcakes had a nice, subtle green tint to them when they came out of the oven. To add a little more pizzaz to them, I dusted powdered sugar on top. The color scheme reminds me a little bit of Christmas. In fact, I'm sure you could just add a raspberry or strawberry on top to make these work for the holiday season. I know, I know, we still have a long ways to go till Christmas—but I'm letting you know in advance just in case.

Unfortunately, I ran out of cupcake liners and had to add the batter directly to the cupcake pan—so a few of plain ones turned out a bit flatter and more golden on the sides than the ones at the start of this post. But no worries—just remember to spray your cupcake pan with cooking spray before you add your batter. Also remember to wait for your cupcakes to chill before you flip them out of the pan. Difficult, I know, especially because these smell so damn good when they first come out of the oven. The cookie butter ones were the most popular amongst my family and friends, whom I ended up gifting these to.

Mochi Cupcakes

Ingredients

Plain Mochi cake:

• 3 cups Mochiko Rice Flour
• 1 1/4 cups sugar
• 3 cups coconut milk (can replace with regular milk)
• 3 eggs
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1 tsp vanilla extract (optional)
• Powdered sugar (optional)

Fillings:

• 2 packets of matcha (optional)
• Passionfruit jam (optional)
• Gava jam (optional)
• Passionfruit jam (optional)

Takes 45 min, Makes 12 for a standard cupcake pan.

Instructions

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350˚F (148˚C).


2. Line a standard cupcake/muffin pan with baking cups. If you're adding the batter directly to the pan without the baking cups, make sure to grease your pan with cooking spray or butter so the cakes come out easily after baking.


3. Combine all the wet ingredients (sugar, coconut milk, eggs, butter, and vanilla extract) together. Slowly add the Mochiko rice flour and mix until fully combined


4. (Option 1) If you're making a batch that are matcha flavored, add in the two packets of the instant matcha latte mix and mix well.


5. (Or, option 2) If you're planning to add fillings, fill up the muffin 1/2 of the way with the batter. Add 1-2 tsp of jam or cookie butter to each cup, then add more batter to cover the filling, until each is filled 3/4 of the way.


6. Bake for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.
 

7. Do note that they are very delicate when they first come out of the oven, so wait until they're cool before taking them out of the muffin tin. Finish by dusting with powdered sugar.

Recipe adapted from Sugar and Cloth

For more cooking:

Sorry about my inactiveness this month on the blog! Work being a hot mess and practicing for various gigs has got me sleeping at around 2-3AM every night. So finding time to compose posts like this is quite the challenge. Hopefully May will be a better month :)

♥ Cindy