The Great Butter Tart Experiment of 2009

I'm not yet sure if it's been successful or not. My pâte brisée seems actually really flaky and delicious, but I haven't taken the tarts out of the mould, so I don't know if the bottom is properly cooked (one of the perils of cooking with a microwave/convection oven -- but it's all I've got!). Also, I put a bit too much filling in some of them, and they bubbled over.

Now to let them cool off a bit and see if they're worthy of taking over to E's place. ^_^;

ETA: They're cooked through and the crust is indeed flaky and buttery and delicious! Yatta! I will never fear baking in the microwave again. The top of the filling caramelized a bit, which it shouldn't do, but they look good... Can't sample any, as I only have 6 to take with me, but the other half of the recipe is sitting in my fridge, so those of you going to the picnic tomorrow will get to have a bite or two. :d

I meant to write this 5 years ago, when I first listened to To Love...

Whenever I see one of those "Name your top 20 favourite albums" memes, I'm always at a loss, because I can never think of more than ten or so albums that I truly love. There are lots of individual songs that I like, but I'm not that much of a music lover, it seems. Still, there's one album that always surprises me with how much it affects me, each time I listen to it. It's an album* that I think I could listen to on repeat for weeks on end without tiring of it. I don't know if it's that I only partly understand the lyrics (it's in Mandarin), or that Faye Wong's voice is so hauntingly beautiful, or that it's so évocateur (of... I'm not sure -- rain-slicked streets at night, gentle longing, quiet reflection in solitude), but it causes my heart to squeeze up a bit whenever I listen to it.

The first five songs on Fable have that effect on me too, but because the second half of the album is so radio-friendly fluffy pop, and even though I love 笑忘書 to bits, I can't truly love the whole album.

It's also mostly why, I think, I was so disappointed by To Love. While it's by no means a bad album, and many of the songs are quite good, as a whole it just feels like Wings of Light all over again, but falling a bit short. Whenever I listen to it now, I always think, "Hey, this isn't half-bad!" but the initial let-down still hasn't completely dissipated, because 5 times out of 10, I put on Wings of Light, 2 times out of 10 I'll put on Fable, 2 other times will be Only Love Strangers and the last will be To Love.

* Faye Wong's 2001 self-titled album, often called Wings of Light