Christmas parties

busy muffin

the good, the bad and di-vine (left to right)

fairy cupcake...

silver bells....

pretty on the outside AND inside...

the process is important...

ready for frosting ...

a dash of colours ...

ain't no mountain high enough...

thanks for the cupcake party Ah-mei !

Step 1: Presenting my gorgeous Berry Cheescake!!

Step 2: Sliced to reveal the inside

Step 3: Designed with berry coulis

Homemade Cinnamon Honey Butter

Step 1: Washing and sterlising the mini jars

Major ingredient : Honey (came from the mini jars)

Over bought ingredient: 3kg of butter when I only needed 1kg

Step 2: Throw all the ingredients with technology

Step 3: Primative labour

frutti yogurt

black forest cake

why?

This is LR's favorite cake and somehow I just never got around trying this recipe. So I invited SW over to experiment with me. She had a Western recipe(probably yielding a denser cake), but as for me I was searching through blogs to find an Asian recipe that would yield a chiffon type texture sponge. I finally decided on using the recipe from Lil's Wai Sek Hong's blog.

failure?

YES! Goodness, I took so much care to seperate my egg yolks from the white, cleaned the mixing bowl very thoroughly, made sure all my ingredients were at room temperate etc... I read all the comments of bakers who failed in their chiffon cake and made sure I would not go down the same path!
But, I still ended up with a cake that barely rose and cracked in the centre with a little 'mountain' that really resembled a volcano :( What went wrong! So because of the failure of my chiffon cake, I could only slice what I had into 2.
Then, SW suggested we try her recipe, and even though I was tired and disappointed, I gave in because she was so convinced hers works! But I hate to say this, her recipe was worse! The cake came out with a rubber texture, but that made me feel much better about my failure! Haha....

2 thoughts though:

1) I'm not perfect no matter how hard I try

2) Comparison can make you feel lousy or give you a false sense of pride, so why
compare?

success?
Layering my BFC and decorating with the shaved dark chocolate cake was my only saving grace :)

tang yuan

cranberry & apple pie

traditional chocolate cake

why?
Well... the year is coming to an end, and there are many ingredients in my kitchen cabinet that I hope to use up and not to have to dump them away! I decided that yesterday was a good day to use up half of my cocoa powder and most of my icing sugar. I searched allrecipes.com for a recipe that would use these 2 ingredients A LOT and this came up!

success?
This is the first cake I made that I managed to replicate the "cake-frosting-cake" layers technique and was glad that the cake turned out moist and spongy but not too light as the chiffon cake texture might not hold all that frosting. The taste wasn't overly sweet because I reduced the amount of sugar from the original recipe and added coffee to give the cake a tinge of bitterness.

failure?
There was also too much frosting, I guess I could have not slapped on so much frosting, but I was trying to not waste anything! When LR ate the cake, he had to remove the frosting and he commented it looked like cement! Grrrrr...... and I told him to be grateful he had cake! Haha.... Somehow the taste wasn't as refined as I would like for it to be, perhaps it could be the use of vegetable oil instead of butter in the recipe? If I were to bake this cake again, I might use melted butter instead. The recipe was called Extreme Chocolate Cake, but I didn't think anything extreme about it, to me it was a good and safe cake to make for birthdays and would suit most people's palate. Hence, I would rename this recipe to Traditional Chocolate Cake instead.

Traditional Chocolate Cake (9 inch cake pan x 2)

INGREDIENTS

350 g white sugar
220 g all-purpose flour
65 g unsweetened cocoa powder
1.5 tsp baking soda
1.5 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 eggs
235 ml milk
120 ml vegetable oil
2 tsp ml vanilla extract
235 ml boiling water with 1 sachet of 3 in 1 coffee added


170 g butter
130 g unsweetened cocoa powder
640 g confectioners' sugar
155 ml milk
5 ml vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C. Grease and flour two 9 inch cake pans.
2. Use the first set of ingredients to room temperature.
   
3. In a medium bowl, stir together the sugar, flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
   
4. Add the eggs, milk, oil and vanilla, mix for 3 minutes with an electric mixer.
   
5. Stir in the boiling water and coffee by hand.
   
6. Pour evenly into the two prepared pans.
7. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes in the preheated oven, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
   
8. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pans to cool completely.
9. To make the frosting, use the second set of ingredients.
   
10. Cream butter until light and fluffy. Stir in the cocoa and confectioners' sugar alternately with the milk and vanilla. Beat to a spreading consistency.
11. Split the layers of cooled cake horizontally, cover the top of each layer with frosting, then stack them onto a serving plate. Frost the outside of the cake.

caramalising

dusting and rolling

downside

upside... pear tartin!

Dusted Mochi with Azuki Beans

Rolling & Boiling

Dusting

mango mashie cake

why?

I saw this on Do What I Like's blog and thought it was a cheesecake, but upon reading further, I discovered that it is a 'pirated' cheesecake! The white layer is actually made up of mashmallows and whipping cream. I love cheap thrills and making this would be such an opportunity :)

success?

I brought it to class and most of them love it! Especially this girl who abhors anything cheese.

failure?

There were a few areas I would most definitely improve on. Firstly, I might bake the biscuit layer as pouring the second layer did make the biscuit a tad too moist. Secondly, I would also definitely not whisk the second layer because it became a little foamy and light and could not firm up nicely and did not produce a smooth consistency. Thirdly, I will never trust my springfoam cake pan to retain liquid again, it leaked and i had to wrap the aluminium foil and still quite a bit of both the second and third layers were wasted.

Mango Mashie Cake

Ingredients for Base:

200 gm digestive biscuits

80 gm melted butter

2 riped mangoes

Method:

1. Crushed digestive biscuits and mix well with melted butter.

2. Press into a 8” cake pan.
(I would bake this for 10min at 180 degrees in future)

3. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

4. Line the base with sliced mangoes.

Ingredients Marshmallow filling:

300g white marshmallow

150ml milk

300ml whipping cream

2 tsp of gelatine powder

Method:

1. Put all the ingredients into a pot.

2. Doubleboil over small fire until gelatine is dissolved.
(Stir gently and do not whisk!)

3. Cool for 20min, then pour it into cake base.

4. Chill it for at least 2 hours.

Ingredients Jello topping:

1 pkt of Mango pudding

Method:

1. Prepare the pudding as per instructed by the packet/box.

2. Cool for 15min

3. Gently spoon the pudding over the second layer.

4. Chill for at least 2 hours before serving.

apple crumble

Gre-int cake

why?

A birthday cake for a special lady in my cell group. Also, LR expressed how much he really loves those japanese light and fluffy sponge cake. So I searched the internet and came across a japanese green tea cake. Sounds exciting enough for me try it! But why the name Gre-int? Refer to 'failure' below for a better explanation :(

  

success?

Sigh... it was a disaster, read below for the details.

failure?

The recipe calls for green tea powder which I could not find. However, I did not want to give up, so I went to the beverage section in the supermarket, hoping to find something similar to green tea powder. Fortunately, or unfortunately, I found a box of ice green tea drink mix in powder form and at that point it seemed like a really good substitute. I got home and followed the recipe religiously. When the cake was baking in the oven, I decided to reward myself with some ice green tea. I took out a sachet, mixed the contents with iced cold water and as I took a sip my face turned green. I simply could not describe what I just tasted. I picked up the box, checked the expiry date and that was fine, then I saw a small fine print of the words "mint" next to these words "Iced Green Tea". OH NO!! But confusion quickly turned to anger. Angry at the manufacturer! Where is the green tea? All I could taste was mint, mint and all mint! Seriously, there was absolutely no green tea at all. If anything, the manufacturers of this drink should change the label to "Iced Mint Tea". I was duped!!!!! And what was more disgusting was I had no idea how the cake would turn out! A mint cake?? Hence the name Gre-int. Sigh... needless to say, the taste of the cake was weird and I think my decorating muse left me too, I don't know what came over me to simply scatter silver balls around the cake. The cake looked like something out of twilight zone and it should stay there and never return!

O0ooooreo cheesecake

why?

I had another priviledge to bake a birthday cake!! I initially was going to bake a strawberry cheesecake, but the strawberries at the supermarket looked yellow and withered. I guess I would probably bake one when the season comes around!

success?

WOW! I mean I would definitely boast that THIS IS THE BEST cake I have ever made! Firstly, it looked so gorgeous, I learnt the technique of 'dripping' the chocolate on the surface of the cake from Nigella's FEAST and the mini oreos by the side added a touch of cuteness to the oh-so-sophisticated cake! Secondly, the texture of the cheesecake was soooo smooth and the bits of oreo cookies not just from the crust but the middle of the cake gave such a crunch to each bite. My only concern was that the cake would turn out too sweet, but the marriage of the oreos and cream cheese was perfect. I was really impressed at the taste and texture! Haha... I told LR, after we left the restaurant that I was supressing my immense excitment and joy the whole night. I wanted so badly to shamelessly boast but I guess I would have to settle for shamelessly declaring the wonders of this cake here!

Oreo Cheesecake

Ingredients

200g oreo cookies, with centre cream removed and crushed

100g unsalted butter, melted

55g soft brown sugar

910g cream cheese, softened at room temperature

250g white sugar

80ml whipping cream

15g plain flour

1 tsp of vanilla essence

4 eggs

160g oreo cookies, crushed with the centres

400ml sour cream

100ml whipping cream

50g white sugar

1 tsp of vanilla essence

100ml whipping cream

200g dark chocolate

1 tsp vanilla essence

mini oreo cookies for decorations

Directions

1. Combine 200g of oreo cookies, melted butter and brown sugar. Press firmly the mixture onto the bottom of a 10-inch spring form pan. Bake in a preheated oven for 5 min at 175 degrees.

2.Beat the cream cheese until smooth. Gradually mix in 250g of sugar, 80ml of whipping cream, flour and 1 tsp of vanilla. Beat in eggs, one at a time.

3.Pour half of the mixture on into the pan with cookie base, then gently sprinkle the 160g of oreos and carefully spoon on the top the remaining mixture.

4.Bake at 175 degrees for 45 min at the centre rack and at the bottom of the oven, place a roasting tray with water.

5.Mix the sour cream, whipping cream, sugar and vanilla essence. Remove the cake after 45min and carefully spread this mixture on the top and bake for a further 7 min.

6.Turn off the oven and allow the cake to 'rest' in the oven for 1 hour.

7.Combine the whipping cream and chocolate on low heat to melt then stir in the vanilla essence.

Using a spoon, spread the chocolate mixture in a horizontal direction then vertically to form a pattern as the picture above.

8.Decorate the cake with the mini oreos.

9.Refrigerate at least 8 hours before serving.

failure?

This cake failed in the affordable department! The cost of all the ingredients came up to just over $40 and I spent 4 hours making this cake. Gosh, if I ever had to sell this cake commercially, it is going to cost ALOT.

low fat chocolate cake

Carrot Cake

why?

I wanted to make something to bless my classmates at YWAM(Youth With a Mission) and of course an excuse to bake. Why not? Haha

failure?

I should try to make my cakes thicker like those sold in the shops. Purely asethetic :)

success?

Wow, even I was surprised at how moist and yummy this cake came out! I should have baked more. I baked 2, stored 1 in the freezer, took it out a week later, thaw and heated it in the microwave for 2 minutes, and amazingly, it was still 'juicy'. This one is a keeper, so here is the recipe that I tweaked a little from allrecipes.com.

recipe...

Ingredients

4 eggs

177ml vegetable oil

118 apple sauce

200g white sugar

200g brown sugar

3 tsp vanilla extract

250g plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

3 tsp ground cinnamon

330g grated carrots

120g chopped pecans

1 can of crushed pineapples (drain out the liquid and use a food processor to blend briefly)

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees. Grease flour and pan.

2. In a large bowl, beat together eggs, oil, white and brown sugar and 2 tsp of vanilla.

3. Mix in flour, baking soda and powder, salt and cinnamon.

4. Stir in carrots and pineapples.

5. Fold in pecans and pour in the pan.

6. Bake for 40-50min. Cool in a pan for 10min and then unto a rack to cool completely.

Frosting

1. Beat -

115g of butter, 225g of cream cheese, 300g icing sugar and 1 tsp of vanilla.

nutella banana cupcakes

apple pie