birthday food

another year, another birthday.. this time around we optioned for the not so tiring approach. we bought food from a few different places... and we ended with a cake for dessert.

roasted wings and drumsticks from super tanker

hor fun from sg nibong the pickled sliced chilli for the horfun the chilli sauce for the roasted chicken i actually skipped this because the chicken already taste great by itself. the black forest that elpea made

Buttercream Icing

This is iced and designed by an expert - someone who ran a cake house for > 10 years. She did this in less than 20minutes. Cool. She is my Cikgu Santhi.My 1st attempt. Honestly I dont really like it coz I think it is old fashion. However I amazed with my piping skills. Truly and originally my creation. I love the color combination. This design is me :)

Oreo Cheesecakes

Baked this for GL's birthday. The initial plan was to bake my normal cheesecake until I saw this recipe the other day. It turned out well. Hope she likes it.

For some of the cakes, I removed the oreo's cream fillings as I thought it would be too sweet but without the cream, the base turned out to be too dry (commented by E). So next time stick to the recipe ...hahahahhahaha.

dis is the cake

Ry helping me wit the cake decorations - topping it with sprinkles. Lovely heart for the kids tomorrow.

Well, hope the kids like it. When I told Ry that I was baking choc cake for his school's party tomorrow, he reminded me that his frens dont like anything dark coz they said it is yucky. I told him we will have colorful sprinkles on top and I am sure his frens will like it. Will see tomorrow.

Moist Chocolate Cake

There was no plan to bake today due to the weather (very hot lah). I dont know what hit me and I suddenly thought of baking choc cake around 6pm.

Baked 2 cakes with different method of toppings. Both are topped with choc ganache - 1 plain and the other with sprinkles.

Ry ate 2 pieces. I like the plain one better.

Recipe for Pandan Chiffon Cake

I just realized that I did not post the recipe for this cake earlier because I failed and when I finally succeeded, I was so excited that I totally forgotten about posting the recipe.

I am thinking of baking one this coming Chinese New Year.

For previous post on my success click here

Here is the recipe and tips:

The recipe is from Little Corner of Mine

(A) 1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour, sifted

1 Tbp. baking powder

1 tsp. salt

1/2 cup sugar

(B)

1/2 cup vegetable or canola oil

6 egg yolks

3/4 cup coconut milk

1 tsp. pandan paste

(C)

6 egg whites

1/2 tsp. cream of tartar

3/4 cup sugar

Steps

1. Preheat oven to 350'F (175'C).

2. Combine (A) in a bowl. Stir well to blend. Add (B). Beat with an electric mixer until smooth.

3. Beat (C) until moist peaks formed. Gradually add 3/4 cup sugar, beating until stiff and shiny peaks are formed. Fold 1/3 of the egg whites into the egg yolks mixture, fold to mix and then add the rest of the egg whites. Fold gently but thoroughly. Turn batter into ungreased 10" tube pan.

4. Bake for 60 mins or til a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Invert cake and cool completely in pan. When cool, loosen the edges and shake pan to remove cake.

Some tips:

1. make sure the egg whites are beaten really well

2. Separate the yolks from whites, make sure not even one bit is mix - else the white will not whip to stiff peaks

Orange Choc Chips Cake

i have 2kg of self raising flour and 3 oranges - so what do you do with them? of coz, bake a cake :)

the thin dark layer on top of the cake is actually choc chips. Ry loves it.

Pandan Chiffon Cake Finally!

Just look at the pictures. I made it. My chiffon cake rose very well and did not deflate .. yippee.

I am so happy. I am going to do it again on Saturday to bring back to Prai for my mum. Heheheheh show off lah.

Well... this is my 7th attempt! ... sorry it is 8th attempt actually...

Me and my persistence :) (or stubborn?)

Oops after reading thru my previous post on chiffon cake... correction, this is my 8th attempt!

See link for previous post on my attempts at this:

http://chiak3.blogspot.com/2009/05/chiffon-cake-me.html

Star Shaped Cake

This year, Ryan asked for star shaped cake. Last year was elmo. Gosh... i went looking for all the shops in pg island for a star shaped baking pan but could not find any. So.. the engineer in the house got to cut the cake.

I wonder what he is going to ask for next year....

Hari Raya Cupcakes

Initially we wanted to buy chocolates for our Muslim frens during Raya open house. Then I thought why dont I bake some cupcakes... it is home made. Had to make do with 2 icing tips that I have on hand. Misplaced 2 tips. Sigh. So typical me. I am thinking of getting the box with 26 tips... coz I cant do much with 2 tips - limit my creativity nia... hahahahah

I mixed a few colors for the icing... green (as the official hari raya color), pink and purple. The green did not turn out to my liking. So end up.... masuk perut Ryan and Ed.

Few months back I bought this nice cupcake box. Cute leh. To all my Muslim frens, Selamat Hari Raya!

Swiss Roll Attempt # 4

Finally found the right recipe for swiss roll. The texture is nice, soft and spongy. I just need to improve on the filling. Thinking of making Macha swiss roll tomorrow.

Need to find out why the skin stick to the cloth when I rolled it.

Here is the recipe from http://sakura-lovebaking.blogspot.com/2009/02/yam-swiss-roll.html

Recipe

Ingredients:

A)4 Large eggs whites

35gm castor sugar

4 Large egg yolks

35 gm Castor sugar

1/2 tsp or 2 gm baking powder

1 tsp vanilla essence

10gm cornflour(sifted)

70gm cake flour(sifted)

1 gm salt

B) 40ml Melted butter/canola oil40gm milk

Method

1)Pre heat oven at 350F.

2)Beat egg whites cream and sugar(add gradually)till stiff.

3)Add in 30 gm sugar and continue beating till thick and glossy.

4)Beat egg yolks,ovallete and 30 gm sugar till light and creamy.

5)Lightly fold in sifted flour,corn flour,baking powder,milk and oil into the egg yolk batter.

6)Gently fold in egg whites.(Do not overfold)

7)Pour batter in shallow tin lined with waxed paper.

8)Bake for 15-18 minutes.

9)You need to roll it immediately while it's hot,then let it cool. Unwrap and fill your favourite filling and roll back up.

Swiss Roll

My first attempt at swiss roll. There is still room for plenty of improvements in terms of texture, taste and shape. Found another recipe and going to try it this weekend.

Mini Orange Cupcakes

Saw these beautiful mini cupcakes cups at Tesco last Friday and I could not resist but to buy them. Since I have bought them I need to use them, right. :)

So I end up baking these mini cupcakes on Sunday morning after I dropped Ry at Maths 4 Kidz. Teacher Jimmy is so dedicated. He gave the kids replacment class as he cancelled last Saturday's.

Back to the cupcakes. I baked some normal size ones too and he called them baby, papa & mummy cupcakes. Seriously, I dont know how he differentiate between the papa & mummy. LOL.

Chocolate Cheese Cake (My invention)

This is my invention. It was supposed to be a layer of chocolate cake alternate with a layer of cream cheese and so on... there shud be 2 layers of each - that's what I had in mind. Well, it turned out to be 1 thick layer of choc and very thin layer of cheese. Well well at least it tasted good.

Chiffon Cake & Me

Chiffon cake and me has come a long way. These are the attempts:

1. Cake was not spongy. It raised. Taste good.
2. Cake still not spongy.
3. Spongy but did not rise well.
4. Cake fell down from tin when it was inverted. It end up in the dustbin.
5. Cracked on the surface and did not rise properly.
6. Deflated after taking out from oven.

I have not given up yet. Picture of attempt # 6.

Chocolate molten cake

Was watching one episode of Ramsey’s kitchen and he was making this choc molten cake, where when you cut into the cake, melted choc ‘flows” out like lava and I was very intrigued.

Then I saw the recipe in a magazine and it was pretty simple: choc, sugar, eggs, flour and the overall process was not very complicated. Start to fin in 30minutes.

Filled up 3 big ramekins and 3 small ones. I didn’t grease the ramekins enough and some of the cakes actually stuck to the bottom of the ramekins so they didnt “pop” out nicely..

Texture wise, it was a 3 layer experience, the outer crust was a bit chewy, the inner part was quite soft and the middle was basically “melted choc’ and it did really ooze out when I cut into it.. cool

Taste wise, it was super sweet, even for me and I had to finish practically all of them. Also it was supposed to be served with vanilla ice cream and I believe the creaminess of the vanilla ice cream would have balanced out the sweetness of the cake. But I didn’t hv any ice cream so I don’t really know. I would make them again but with some changes. Things to remember the next time…

-Cut down sugar by 40% to 50% -Only cook it when i hv enough people to finish it, as it needs to be served fresh and hot. Does not taste good once in fridge and microwaved.. -Grease ramekins properly

choc cake & ice cream @home

my aunt made some chocolate cake and she gave me a whole 1/2 kg cake

so i made my own chococake-vanillaicecream-combo..
(reminiscent of brownies and ice cream...eh...)

you will need:
-chocolate cake, 2 slices preferbaly around 1 inch thick (can use quick bites as a substitute)
-vanilla ice-cream, 2-3 scoops, to your liking
-microwave

assembly instructions:
-microwave the cake for 20-30seconds till warm
-place cake on plate.
-scoop ice-cream on top of cake
-eat..


2 slices of warm moist chocolate cake

topped with vanilla ice cream
heavenly
yummy