A steadier love affair with matcha and brown butter

Griglia, mental health is like Ikea

chewy, sweet crags below

Food of the week:

I was gifted a gorgeous tin of Pete’s Place tiramisu, which according to ChatGPT is ‘the best tiramisu in Singapore’ (or more specifically what the gifter searched as input to streamline this decision), and it truly lives up to a name: fluffy without the buffer of cream, coffee-soaked sponge, but watch out for the inches of cocoa on top that will make you cough. While you’re at it, you’d be amiss not to try the strawberry cheesecake at The Shop nearby, which has everything from (now-closed) Mezza9 in tact. On the note of sweets, I’m deliriously excited about today’s cookie recipe below, and the brioche with soy glaze and a potent seaweed butter at Odem is a must to soak the makgeolli flights you’ll inevitably have alongside it…

Science of the week:

Now we have more studies linking gut health to pain perception, which makes sense because the parts of the brain that influence pain perception are also linked to that of mood and emotional regulation, all of which are directly regulated by the balance of bacteria in our gut, specifically B. longum, L. plantarum and now there’s more and more focus on Akkermansia municiphila. Isn’t the gut seriously just the most fascinating organ ever?

Insight of the week:

Wandering about in Ikea over the weekend made me realise: mental clarity and emotional balance are a bit like Ikea furniture – built, one intentional piece at a time. Mental health awareness month may be over, but the reminder remains: your inner world deserves maintenance and care year-round. You don’t need to overhaul everything (and I’m practicing this too)… just start with one shelf, one breath, one really honest check-in. The rest can be assembled slowly.

Recipe of the week:

Matcha has found me and not let me go. It’s become my steadier, less jittery mistress – unlike coffee, that thrilling but unreliable boyfriend whose taste I still, admittedly, prefer. A friend’s been sampling high-grade matcha straight from Japan, and I couldn’t resist slipping some into a baking experiment. The white chocolate softens the matcha’s bite, its volume calibrated to avoid too much sweetness. And then with some well-browned butter… well, that needs no explanation.

Brown butter matcha white chocolate cookies (makes 6-8 cookies)

Ingredients

150g (1.25 cups) all-purpose flour

10g (a couple heap tbsp) matcha powder (I used my friend’s matcha powder)

0.5 tsp baking soda

0.5 tsp salt

113g (half cup or one stick) butter

50g (0.25 cup) white sugar

50g (0.25g) light brown sugar

1 egg

100g (a whole bar or thereabouts) of white chocolate

Optional: additional chocolate to top

Directions

Preheat your oven to 180C and line a baking tray with a piece of parchment paper. In a saucepan, brown your butter by letting it melt on medium heat, letting the top foam after all the butter is totally melted. You know the butter is browned when the scent is undeniably there – strong notes of toasted caramel, sweet and nutty. Skim off most of the foam and then set that aside to cool.