Two Cherries on Top

Butter cake with raisins – the best butter cake recipe

2011-10-10T00:00:00.000+07:00

Long time no postings. Family issues have stepped in and required all my attention. I’ve missed the "online kitchen", but sometimes we cannot do everything we want to…

Back to baking…

Shame on me, I don’t even know the difference between a pound cake and a butter cake. Maybe a butter cake recipe calls for more butter? I’m not sure, but I’ve always thought that they are the same: dense and a bit dry. But I have to admit that sometimes I like baking pound cakes because they are not difficult to put together.

Then I happened to see this recipe… What the author at Rasa Malaysia had to say about this butter cake made me eager to bake it. The making seems simple but the result seems satisfying.

And the result was, in fact, really satisfying. I baked it today. The cake looked lovely, and when served warm just out of the oven, it was so soft and fluffy and buttery. It smelled great too. The whole kitchen was filled with butter and vanilla aroma, fantastic.

I baked 2 mini loaves (20cm x 7cm each) and gave one to a poor old lady. So, that loaf warmed my heart too.

Recipe (source):

- 2 and 1/3 stick (250g) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 7 oz (200g) plain flour/all purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 7 oz (200g) castor sugar (I used 180g)
- 4 eggs
- ½ tsp salt
- 4 tablespoons fresh milk (I used 60g, I didn’t even know for sure if 60g milk is equal to 4 TBSP or not)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
- 1/4 cup raisins + 1 tablespoon all purpose flour (to coat the raisins) (I used 50g raisins, but next time I think I’ll use some more)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Lightly grease the pans with some butter.
3. Mix the flour and the baking powder and salt together and sift.
4. Use an electronic beater to mix butter and sugar until well combined or pale yellow in color. (Note: Sugar has not dissolved yet).
5. Add eggs, one at a time, beat well after each addition.
6. Scrape down the sides for even mixing.
7. Add in vanilla essence and mix well.
8. Fold in ½ flour mixture, and mix well.
9. Add in all the milk then the rest of flour mixture. With a spatula, fold in the raisins. Mix well.
10. Pour the mixture into the greased baking pans. Shake them lightly to distribute cake mixture evenly.
11. Bake until golden brown and cooked, about 45 minutes. Use a cake tester to test if it’s cooked.
12. Remove it from the oven and let cool on the wire rack for another 5 minutes. Serve warm.

Sweet Juillet apricots

2011-08-06T00:21:00.000+07:00

The box, after all the apricots have been eaten, is thoroughly washed and used to hold a couple of pieces of cake :)

This summer marked the first time I saw and knew about sweet Juillet apricots. I've always known the big and tart apricots from the US, which I always use to bake fruit cakes because they're not sweet enough to eat raw.

When first seeing sweet Juillet apricots, I doubted the word "sweet". But the box was just too in inviting so I decided to buy one [box]. There were 7 apricots in every box. The apricots looked very "summery" and clean and they were the same in size. I thought one more apricot cake would be baked.

But of course I wanted to eat one first to know how sweet or how tart this kind of apricots were. And the apricot impressed at the first bite. It was juicy and really sweet, so sweet that I decided that I and my son would eat them all instead of putting them in a cake.

Aren't they beautiful? I have also taken a close-up photo, but something went wrong when I resized it, and it vanished :(

Now I know that this kind of Juillet apricots are only grown in Washington (the US) and only available in July. Such a great kind of fruits. Those sweet Juillet apricots really don't disappoint.

Yes, life gives you apricots, which are sometimes tart and sometimes sweet, beyond your expectation, imagination and prediction, but eventually, life doesn’t disappoint. I do hope so.

Milk buns

2011-07-14T20:06:00.000+07:00

I'm baking buns and breads these days. Breads and buns are well served as breakfasts and suppers for my elder son. I owe my thanks to my bread maker, which helps me do the kneading and first rise job. Without my BM, I don't think I would make that many buns and breads, because:
- my arms would be really hurt from kneading and there would be no way I could still sit here typing this after all the kneading :).

- I wouldn't have enough time to do all the process as my daily schedule is pretty tight with 2 little kids always needing their mother's attention, and then my work requires time too.

Back to the milk buns. They were so very good. No, not just good. They were amazing. They were soft, fluffy and great-smelling. I don’t think anyone can resist that aroma of newly baked breads and buns. Even when the buns hadn’t been ready to get out of the oven, the wonderful aroma filled up the whole room.

My bread maker my great helper. It was bought at a discounted price

The below recipe is originally from here. It’s indeed a keeper.

Ingredients:

- 150ml milk

- ½ egg (beat an egg and use 1/2)

- 30g caster sugar

- 5g salt

- 250g bread flour

- 5g instant yeast

- 40g unsalted butter, room temperature

I always used butter to grease the pans/tins. But I've just bought this. It makes the greasing become much faster, and I think it helps save money too

Method:

1. In the BM’s pan, put the ingredients in this order: milk, egg, sugar, salt, flour, yeast (yeast should not touch the liquid). Choose “Dough” then let the cycle complete (my BM takes 90 minutes).

2. Punch down the dough to let out the air bubbles. Divide the dough into 7 equal pieces. Let the dough rest for 10-15 minutes.

3. Roll each piece of dough round. Arrange them in a well-greased 20cm round cake tin: one piece of dough in the center, and 6 around. Cover and let the dough proof for about 35-40 minutes.

After 2nd rise...

Some milk ready to be brush over the buns

4. Bake in a preheated oven at 190^oC for 30-35 minutes. My oven seemed to be too hot, so the surface of the buns got pretty brown after 15 minutes. I covered with a sheet of foil and let it be baked for another 15 minutes (30 minutes in total). Now the small buns stick together to make a big bun, which looks like a cute chubby flower. I just wanted to pinch it because it looked so lovely :). By the way, the bun was a bit over-brown, but my family like it that way, because the crust was crispy (thin though), but the inside was still really soft and fluffy, not dry at all.

Cute, cute...

So soft and fluffy and delicious

5. Take the bun out of the tin right away. Let cool on a wire rack.

Update: My younger son, who is quite “hard” on food (mind you, he’s still very little :)), seemed to like this bun too. He ate a couple of slices, which is really a compliment to me :).

Another update: Only one piece of the bun was left the next morning. I ate it and it was surprisingly good with obvious buttery flavor.

Will I bake this again? Definitely yes.

Chocolate spritz cookies

2011-07-09T14:48:00.000+07:00

It was written in the manual booklet that this was star shape. To me, it looks completely like a flower

Cookies in perfect shapes, especially when served during holidays, are a great attraction to everyone, even those who normally don't like cookies. That was the reason why I bought a cookie press, quite a long time ago, after having seen rows of beautifully shaped cookies.

Anyway, being among those who aren't so into cookies, I had delayed using it until recently. Another reason for the delay was that there were too many "tips" out there, that made using a cookie press did seem like a complicated job. And mind you, I’m not so confident in baking, so it took me a long time to decide to try out my own cookie press.

To be on the safe side, I used the very recipe that was included in the cookie press box. The chocolate version was chosen because my elder son, like any other boys, loved anything chocolate.

I read that to make the cookie press work, an ungreased flat tray, which must also NOT be the non-stick type, should be used. Oh my, I don't have anything like that. All I have are: 1. a tray that was included with my old oven, which was definitely not flat with some ridiculous and unnecessary decorations; 2. a Chicago Metallic's old jelly roll pan, which is non-stick (of course – because it’s a jelly roll pan). What should I do? I decided to go with what I have and see how things would turn out.

Making the cookie dough and shoving it into the cookie press were no hard work. The "frightening" part was to press the dough into the tray, carefully enough so the cookies would hold shape. I chose a simple flower disk to use with the cookie press. Surprise! Pressing the dough out was nowhere near the difficulty that almost everyone talks about. You just press the handle, release it, hold the cookie press still for half a second, pull it straight up. Voila! You'll see your perfectly shaped cookies. Sometimes the dough pressed out is not perfect because it sticks to the cookie press, just gather the dough to the bowl to spoon into the cookie press again.

So that was what I do with my oven's tray. It was not flat but the cookies were alright. Now it's the non-stick tray's turn. I put the tray in the freezer and the cookie press full of dough in the fridge, both for 5-10 minutes (while baking the first batch). I thought that would make it harder for the butter in the dough to melt, resulting the cookies holding shape better. Seemed like my guess was right. I had no problem pressing the dough into the non-stick tray. Phew!

What I have to say here is, you don’t have to buy a new aluminum tray just to bake cookies using your cookie press. A non-stick jelly roll pan, which I think is popular in most of the kitchens, works well too. Just don’t grease it and don’t line it with parchment paper and it should be fine. It’s even simpler than baking cookies using the rolling-and-cutting method, right? :)

The recipe I used, as stated, is from the booklet in the cookie press box. It’s a surprisingly good recipe and the cookies taste great, in store-bought style, just much better.

- 1 cup (2 sticks) of unsalted butter, at room temperature (225g)

- 1 cup granulated sugar (200g)

- 1 egg

- 2 TBSP milk, or water.

- 2 ½ tsp vanilla extract

- ½ tsp salt

- ¼ cup of unsweetened cocoa powder (24g)

- 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour, sifted (337g)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 375F (190C)

2. Combine butter and sugar in a large bowl. Using an electric mixer set on medium speed, beat until light and fluffy.

3. Beat in the egg, milk, vanilla extract, and salt. Using a spoon, stir in the flour and cocoa powder until well mixed.

4. Pack the dough into the cookie press. Fit with the desired disk design. Press the dough out onto ungreased baking sheet, spacing the cookies 1 inch apart.

5. Bake until lightly golden, about 10-12 minutes (I baked for 10 minutes, turned the tray around, the baked for another 2 minutes). Gently transfer the cookies to wire racks to cool. Sprinkle with vanilla sugar, if desired, or decorate with colored sugars. Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 4 days.

Make about 4 dozen cookies.

I halved the recipe and made quite a lot of cookies. But all were consumed so quickly that I only had 2 left to take pictures (I actually had to ask my son to leave me those 2 cookies :)).

Tech in the kitchen: Ctrl-Alt-Delete cup set

2011-06-29T23:50:00.000+07:00


They're not the keys from a computer keyboard...

See? I told you they're not keys :D

This is not really a tech gadget. But decoration-wise, it’s just too cute to ignore, especially for someone who loves both the kitchen and tech like me. Maybe I’ll drink from the “Delete” cup when I’ve got some problems and I want them to go away. The “Control” cup will be used in situations that get a bit out of control, or when I need more self-control. The “Alt” cup will be for, well, other situations.

This Ctrl-Alt-Delete cup set is sold @ 11.99USD @ ThinkGeek. Now I'm going to add this set to my wish list :).

Donuts

2011-06-29T00:53:00.000+07:00

My elder son likes donuts. In fact, he likes almost every kind of cakes and breads and buns. He used to ask me to buy donuts from bakeries for him. But I did not like that idea because those donuts contain too much oil and I’m not even sure what kind of oil is used or if they [those who make the donuts] use the oil again and again just to reduce the cost. In short, those donuts don’t seem to be healthy at all. So my son kept asking and I kept reasoning and refusing.

Now that I’ve got myself a bread maker and discovered its fantastic ability to make dough, I decided to make a batch of donuts for my son. It’s not difficult to make donuts with the help of a BM, the only disturbing thing is that you’ll have to suffer from the heat when deep frying the donuts. In a summer day when temperature goes up high, and in a small kitchen without an air-conditioner, frying donuts becomes a tough task. Anyway, the way my son enjoyed the donuts made me think that it was all worth it :).

Recipe (from here)

Ingredients: (about 25 pieces with diameter of about 6cm)
- 150g bread flour
- 100g cake flour
- 10g milk powder
- 3/4 tsp baking powder
- 30g sugar
- 5g salt
- 1 3/4 tsp instant dry yeast
- 1 egg yolk
- 70ml cold water
- 70ml cold milk
- 25g melted butter

Sugar for coating:
1/2 cup sugar

Method:
1. Put everything in the bread machine according to what your machine's manual said (normally liquid first, then dry ingredients, then yeast last) and start the dough cycle. Once the dough cycle is complete you can start to shape it.
2. On a floured surface and with floured hands divide dough into 23g pieces and shape it into a ball. Pat it flat to about 1.5cm high and make a hole in the middle of the dough. To make the hole in the middle of the dough, I used a small O shape cookie cutter. You can also use a bottle cap. The dough you cut from the holes could be gathered then be made into some more donuts.
3. Prove the shaped dough for 30 minutes on a greased tray covered loosely with glad wrap in a warm environment.
4. Fill the wok with oil about 2.5 inches deep and fry the dough for 30 seconds on each side or till lightly golden brown. Drain well and pat dry with absorbent paper towel before coating them in sugar.
5. Serve warm.

Notes for those without bread machine:

- Mix all ingredients in a big mixing bowl except butter (do not melt butter but use room temperature butter). Mix well to form a dough.
- Add in the butter and knead into a smooth elastic dough. Prove in a covered mixing bowl for 60 minutes. The rest of the process you can follow step (2) from above.

I know, I know, this picture looks weird. I just want to show the texture of the donuts :)

To play it safe, I fried the donuts to the point that they turned a bit brown (not just light golden brown like the ones at the bakeries). They were soft and good when eating right after that, but they became harder (just a little bit, though) the next day, maybe because I fried them too much :-\. I did not coat them with sugar because I didn’t want my son to eat too much sugar, so the donuts were not too sweet.

I’m submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #8 June 2011(BREAD SEDUCTION) hosted by Jasmine @ Sweetylicious.

Braided bread with your favorite filling

2011-06-27T00:16:00.000+07:00

As I’ve always admitted, I love baking but making breads and buns frightened me with the long time for the dough to rest and rise. When Jasmine @ Sweetylicious, who is hosting Aspiring Bakers project for June, chose the theme to be BREAD SEDUCTION, at first, I was taken aback. I did not know what to bake to submit (while I’d love to submit at least one bake). After reading a lot of posts @ many blogs, I realized that in most cases, I could make things easier for myself by letting my bread maker do the kneading and first rise. Now I’m so interested in trying many kinds of breads and buns with the help of my lovely bread maker :).

Of the bread/bun recipes I’ve been collecting, there’s a kind of breads that’s so eye-catching: braided breads. A braided bread looks like a princess on its own. It’s also great because you can have various kinds of fillings. Since I’ve got a block of Philadelphia cream cheese and an opened jar of blueberry preserve (of which one third was used to make blueberry madeleines the other day) in my fridge, I went for braided bread with cream cheese and blueberry preserve filling.

This was the first time I made a braided bread, and actually this was among the first few times I made breads, so I had to read the recipe and instructions very carefully. King Arthur Flour has a great recipe and also step-by-step instruction, which was really helpful. Really understanding the recipe did help, because when making this bread, I realized it was not as difficult as I had thought. Yes, it takes time to do that braiding job, but your efforts will pay up. The result should be a beautiful bread, which looks like a work of art.

Well, my bread may not look like an expensive work of art, because this was my first time, remember? :) But I liked it a lot. This is the only photo I have, taken with my phone, because all the bread was quickly consumed, as dessert, as supper and as breakfast :). That's why I couldn't take a better photo with a real camera.

Recipe (adapted from King Arthur Flour)

Sponge:

85g warm water (I used room temperature water because it’s summer here)
1 teaspoon sugar
½ tablespoon instant yeast
29g AP flour

Dough

all of the sponge
85g plain yogurt
57g unsalted butter, softened
1 large egg, beaten
50g caster sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
302g AP flour
egg wash for brushing braid

Cream cheese filling

70g cream cheese, softened
25g caster sugar
28g sour cream
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
15g AP flour
57g blueberry preserve

Sponge

Dough

all of the sponge
6 ounces plain or vanilla yogurt
4 ounces unsalted butter, softened
2 large eggs, beaten
3 1/2 ounces sugar
2 teaspoons salt
egg wash for brushing braid

Cream cheese filling

5 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 3/4 ounces sugar
2 ounces sour cream
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
4 ounces prepared lemon curd

Directions

In a small bowl, combine the sponge ingredients. Stir well to combine, loosely cover with plastic wrap, and set aside to proof for 10 to 15 minutes.

1) Pour ingredients to the pan of your bread maker, in this order: sponge, yogurt, egg, vanilla, sugar, flour, salt. Choose “dough” program. After 5 minutes, add butter to the pan. Let the cycle complete itself.

2) While the dough is rising, prepare the filling (I made the filling early in the morning and put it in the fridge to use later the same day. Take it out of the fridge about 15 minutes before use so it can soften). Combine all the filling ingredients (except the preserve) in a small bowl, mixing until smooth and lump-free (I did this with a wire whisk). Reserve the filling and preserve until ready to fill the braids.

3) When the bread maker completes the task, take the dough out (with lightly greased hands) and gently deflate the dough. Let it rest for about 5 minutes. Roll it out into a 25x38cm (10x15 in) rectangle. Rolling on parchment paper makes moving the bread to the baking sheet much, much easier. Lightly press two lines down the dough lengthwise, to divide it into 3 equal sections. Spread the cream cheese filling down the center section, and top with blueberry preserve, leaving 1" free on all sides of the filling.

4) To form the mock braid, cut 1" crosswise strips down the length of the outside sections, making sure you have the same number of strips down each side. Beginning on the left, lift the top dough strip and gently bring it across the filling diagonally. Repeat on the other side with the top dough strip, so that the two strips crisscross each other. Continue down the entire braid, alternating strips to form the loaf.

6) Set the braided loaf aside, lightly covered, to rise for 30-45 minutes, or until quite puffy.

7) Preheat the oven to 375°F. Brush the loaf with egg wash (one lightly beaten egg, 2 teaspoons water and a pinch of salt), and sprinkle with coarse sparkling sugar, if desired. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the loaf’s golden brown. Remove from the oven and cool for 15 to 20 minutes before serving.

I'm submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #8 - Bread Seduction (June 2011) hosted by Jasmine from Sweetylicious.

Coffee buns - or Mexican buns

2011-06-23T23:58:00.000+07:00

I should pipe the topping on the buns more generously next time

Several months ago, I saw a new shop, named “Pappa Roti – the father of all buns”, in the city where I lived. Every time I passed by, I was attracted by the coffee aroma, but there were always a crowd surrounding the small shop, so I didn’t stop. In a cold winter day earlier this year, seeing that there were not so many customers, I decided to try whatever they were selling at that Pappa Roti shop. Turned out they only sold one kind of buns, called “coffee buns”. The buns tasted so lovely that I returned to the shop pretty often to buy those buns not only for myself but for my kids too (just occasionally for my kids because I don't want them to consume too much coffee).

I had never thought of making the coffee buns, because the buns at Pappa Roti shop were good enough already and they weren’t expensive. Until one day, I saw the recipe in a local magazine for kids (yes, for kids!), and it didn’t seem like a heavy task (it was in the kid magazine anyway :)). The recipe was written by my friend so I asked her all kinds of questions. With her encouragement, I seemed to be determined enough to bake a batch of Mexican buns (as my friend called them and I think that’s the right name). The only obstacle was the time required for the dough to rest and rise. So I chose a hot day to make the buns, hoping that the dough would rise quickly. Unfortunately, a hot day in the summer here also means a humid day. So the dough was ridiculously sticky, though I added more than two tablespoons of flour.

Recipe (written by my friend, published in a local magazine for kids)

Ingredients:

A. Filling: 50g salted butter, cut into 8 small cubes. Keep them in the fridge until ready to use.

B: Coffee Topping:

- 1 large egg, beaten

- 40g icing sugar, sifted

- 65g unsalted butter, softened

- 65g AP flour, sifted

- 15ml coffee (about 5g instant coffee and 1 TBSP hot water)

Method: Beat butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Add egg and beat until combined. Add flour gradually and beat until well combined. Add coffee and beat well. You’ll get a paste. Spoon it into a pastry bag and refrigerate until ready to use. My friend said you could make the topping ahead and it can be kept in the fridge for 3 days.
Note: I did this all with a wire whisk, though my friend recommended using a hand mixer.

C: Dough (yields about 8 medium buns)

- 250g bread flour

- 40g caster sugar

- 3g salt

- 5g instant dry yeast

- 30g unsalted butter, softened

- 1 egg, beaten

- 120ml milk

Method:

1. Combine flour, salt, sugar and yeast in a large bowl. Add butter and combine with your hands.

2. Add egg and milk, knead so everything is well combined. Lightly flour a surface and put your dough on that surface to knead (with light floured hands) until not sticky, smooth and elastic. It took me 30 minutes to knead by hands and resulted in two hurtful arms :(. Put the dough in a large bowl, cover with a damp towel and let it rise for 1-2 hours, until double in size.

Before...

...and after. The dough looked different in colour just because I took the photos in two different places, under two different kinds of light

3. Lightly knead the dough. Divide it into 8 pieces, roll them round like balls. Cover and let them rest for 15 minutes. Flatten each piece, put a salted butter cube in the center, seal and roll them really well again to make sure the butter wouldn’t be leaked during baking. I didn’t seal them well enough so the butter leaked and the buns looked really weird in the oven. Take the topping out of the fridge so it will be softened a little.

4. Preheat oven at 170-180^oC. Line a baking tray with parchment paper. Arrange the buns on the tray and spirally pipe the topping on the buns, starting from the center. The topping should cover about half of the bun. Bake for 15-20 minutes until light brown. I baked them at 180C for 22 minutes, turned the tray, then baked for another 5 minutes.

5. Cool on a wire rack. Better serve warm from oven. The buns can be reheated in a preheated oven at 120-150^oC for 5 minutes.

I took this photo next day. The buns were left at room temperature for a day so the topping melted a bit

My coffee buns were good enough but not as soft as the store-bought buns. Maybe I did not let the dough rise enough :-\. Well, actually I don’t know if there was anything wrong but the buns were eaten up anyway. The problem was that my arms hurt for a couple of days :(. I guess next time I will let the bread maker did the kneading job, stupid me why did I not think of that sooner...

I'm submitting this recipe to Aspiring Bakers #8 - BreadSeduction hosted by Jasmine at Sweetylicious.

Coconut chiffon cake – something soft and sweet

2011-06-14T00:30:00.001+07:00

Soft and sweet, isn’t it something you always want to give your loved ones? I guess everyone (except the people who are allergic to coconut) would be so delighted if received this cotton-soft coconut cake, which has a very nice coconut aroma. Believe me, this cake is awesome. Surprisingly awesome, that I know I’d make it again and again right when I tasted it. I should call it “love at the first bite” :).

I ate a piece with red flesh dragon fruit, just because I had a dragon fruit. Else the cake was so delicious on its own.

The texture of the cake was really smooth and moist. It included coconut milk but it did not turn sour at all though I kept it [in a big air-tight box] at room temperature for two days. Again, I’m not sure if it could be kept longer because my cake was eaten up within two days, but to be on the safe side, any pieces of cake left after two days should be kept in the refrigerator. I believe the cake would still be moist and soft that way.

The texture was so smooth and not dry at all. The light was good, thanks to the Sun :)

This recipe is originally from here . Jo @ Jodelibakery was so kind to send me a quick reply about “coconut powder”, so I knew what to use for the cake.

Ingredients: Makes one 8" round tube

- 5 egg yolks

- 50g castor sugar

- 80g cake flour

- 1 tsp baking powder

- Pinch of salt

- 50g coconut powder (ie coconut milk powder)

- 60g vegetable oil (e.g. soy, corn, sunflower) (I used canola oil)

- 70g coconut milk

- 5 egg whites

- ¼ tsp cream of tartar

- 50g castor sugar

Method:

1. Sift flour, baking powder and salt into a mixing bowl. Set aside.

2. Combine egg yolks and castor sugar in a mixing bowl. Use a hand whisk to mix until light and creamy.

3. Add all the remaining ingredients in A, sifted flour mixture, coco nut powder, vegetable oil and coconut milk. Mix until a consistent and smooth mixture is obtained.

4. In another mixing bowl, using medium speed, whip egg whites and cream of tartar in B (using whisk attachment of mixer) until foamy. Add sugar in B and whip at high speed until soft peaks form. Reduce speed of mixer to medium and continue to whip until stiff peaks form.

5. Fold 1/3 of whipped egg whites into mixture of Step 3. Then, pour this mixture to the remaining egg whites in the other mixing bowl. Fold lightly to combine both mixtures.

6. Pour batter into a 8 inch round tube pan. Bake at a preheated over at 170 deg C for 40 minutes (I baked for 43 minutes) or until skewer inserted into center of cake comes out clean.

7. As soon as the cake is removed from oven, quickly invert the pan and let it cool completely.

8. When the cake is completely cool, run a knife around the sides of the tube pan to remove the cake. Take the cake out of the pan together with the tube portion. Run knife at the bottom of cake to remove cake from the tube portion of the pan.

The tall cake when just cool and inverted. The picture was taken with my phone so it looked pretty weird.

Note: I recommend using a hand mixer to whip egg whites, because with a stand mixer, it’s very easy to overbeat and the egg whites will become dry. I have a Philips stand mixer but I take the motor part out of the “stand”/base and hold it in my hand to beat egg whites. It’s faster too.

Ham and cheese bun rolls

2011-06-07T23:53:00.000+07:00

I had always skipped bread and bun recipes, because the required time for the dough to rest and rise seemed to scare me. With two little kids, I can never make sure that I would have time to shape and/or bake the breads/buns at the exact time the dough doubles in size. And if I cannot shape and/or bake the breads/buns at the exact time, the dough will be spoilt, won’t it?

But this recipe required only 30 minutes for the dough to rest. I had read it many times to make sure it was ONLY 30 minutes, nothing more. And since it was my first time [making buns], I had a bunch of questions. Thanks to very kind Peng @ Peng’s Kitchen, I got my answers. I think I would have never made these lovely buns without her help/advice. Many thanks to Peng.

The buns turned out fabulous. They tasted really great, although the dough-resting time was only half an hour. I made a couple of cheese-only bun rolls for my elder son because he did not like ham. He ate one right away and another for the next day’s breakfast. He said it still tasted really good the next day (we got it microwaved). For the bun rolls with ham, I think they should not go into microwave because the processed meat does not like being microwaved. It [the processed meat] will produce some kind of very unhealthy chemicals, so the ham bun rolls should go to the [convectional] oven if you want to re-heat them.

Just out from the oven. My tray was small so the buns sticked together.

Recipe – adapted from Peng’s Kitchen:

Ingredient (8 buns)

300gm bread flour
10g instant yeast
5g baking powder
70g caster sugar
20g butter, soften
120ml water
8pcs ham
8 cheese slices
1 small egg, lightly beaten

Method

1. Place flour, yeast, baking powder, sugar & butter into a mixing bowl. Mix lightly with hands till butter is combined with the flour mixture.

2. Pour in water gradually and mixing at the same time with hands. When all the water was poured in, take the dough out to a slightly floured surface, or a silicone mat, then knead till smooth for about 10mins (I kneaded for 15 minutes).

3. Divide dough into 60g each. This should depend on the size of the ham pieces. My pieces are quite large, a bit bigger than a sandwich cheese slice. On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough into a rectangular shape, a bit larger than the size of your ham pieces. Place ham over the dough and a cheese slice over the ham, and roll up like a swiss roll. Using a dough scrapper, makes criss-cross patterns on the surface. Leave to rest for 30mins.

4. Brush the rolls with beaten egg. Bake in preheated oven at 160 deg cel for 25-30mins until golden brown.

Note: For the bun rolls without ham, I used 2 cheese slices.

I took the photos the next day without re-heating the buns so they looked a bit dry and we can't clearly see the cheese. But they were still soft and delicious.

I'm submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #8 - Bread Seduction hosted by Sweetylicious.

Mango yogurt chiffon cake – worry doesn’t help

2011-06-03T00:30:00.001+07:00

A chiffon cake. Mango. Yogurt. All are my favorite. That was why I wanted to bake this mango yogurt chiffon right when I read the recipe in HoneyBeeSweets’ blog. It sounded like a great cake, not only delicious, but healthy too. What worried me was that HoneyBeeSweets wrote many of her mango cubes sank, which made a part of her cake collapsed. Many a time my chiffon cakes shrink too – though I have never experienced cake collapsion… yet – so I really wondered how my cake would turn out.

One big mango was used for this cake. One cheek was chopped into small cubes. The other was blended to get mango puree. The rest of the mango? Of course I ate it all :).

I followed the steps in the recipes, stirring in mango cubes to the egg yolk mixture before adding the flour mixture. I baked the cake at 170oC for 30 minutes, then lowered the temperature to 160oC and baked for another 20 minutes.

The outcome made me think that I had wasted my time worrying. I’d been worried for a few hours and now, here came one of the most delicious cakes I’d ever tasted. The worrying didn’t help. It just made me unable to focus that actually I almost overbeat the egg whites.

The cake stood tall and had a light sweet mango aroma. It was moist, and it still was within two days (I don’t know how long it could be kept because it was eaten up within two days). In fact, I could eat several slices at once as it tasted so fruity but I had to restrain myself because it wouldn’t be healthy to eat that much. This mango yogurt chiffon cake makes a good breakfast (together with some milk or some more yogurt) since it was light, soft and had both yogurt and fruit. The recipe is truly a keeper. Thanks HoneyBeeSweets for sharing.

Chocolate layer cake with strawberry jam filling – simply good

2011-05-30T17:00:00.002+07:00

Many times in life, I see that the simple things are the best. Jeans and tee’s are the best kind of clothes. A plain loaf of bread is one of the best food. This chocolate layer cake with strawberry jam filling is also a simple but very good cake. Who doesn’t like the combination of chocolate and strawberry jam anyway?

Actually, the recipe called for cherry jam, but I had some left-over strawberry jam, which was my elder son’s favorite, so I used strawberry jam instead, and it was a hit.

Recipe – adapted from the book “500 cakes – the only cake compendium you’ll ever need” by Susannah Blake (I got this book thanks to a good friend):

Ingredients:

- 113g butter, room temperature.

- 93g caster sugar.

- 2 eggs.

- 93g self-raising flour.

- 2 TBSP (12g) unsweetened cocoa powder.

- ½ tsp vanilla extract.

- strawberry jam.

Method:

1. Preheat over to 180oC (350oF). Grease two 16-cm round cake tins and line the bottoms with parchment paper. Sift the flour and cocoa together and set aside.

2. With the mixer, beat the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time. Beat in vanilla.

3. Fold in the flour mixture with a silicone spatula.

4. Divide the batter equally into 2 tins and spread out evenly.

5. Bake for 20-25 minutes until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. Turn the cakes out onto a wire rack and leave to cool completely.

6. Reverse one cake (so the flat bottom looks up) and spread strawberry jam (or any kind of jam or cream you like) over the cake. Top with the second cake. Dust with cocoa powder if you like.

With simple ingredients, I got a delicious cake with warm cocoa aroma. It’s not as “heavy” as a pound cake, so I could eat a very big piece.

I’m submitting this to Aspiring Bakers #7 – Chocolate Delight (May 2011) hosted by DG from Tested and Tasted.

Zebra cake and animal prints fashion trend

2011-05-27T00:31:00.000+07:00

Sometimes you see something and you like it at the first sight. You may not even know much about it, but you just like it because it looks too cute. Zebra cake is one of those things. When I saw a zebra cake photo, I knew right then and there that I would soon try to bake it. I’m not a fan of animal prints fashion trend, but a cake that looks like a zebra? It’s just too cute to ignore, and one important thing: it’s made of very simple ingredients. I didn’t have to buy anything else to bake this cake, great!

The one and only problem seemed to be making those alternative circles. Some recipes were read, some videos were watched, and I was still not that confident. But in all the recipes, no special tips were noted. So I thought: “Just go on and see” :).

With no special skills, I went on with the zebra cake. The making of those concentric circles was more simple than I had thought. Just one big spoon of vanilla batter and one spoon of cocoa batter, and repeat, and repeat. You’ll see that they work out on their own. Finally, it turned out, phew, a zebra cake.

When I took the cake out of the oven, the surface reminded me of a tiger, not a zebra. It was golden brown with dark brown circles. But when a piece was cut out, you can see why it’s called “zebra” but not “tiger”. Yes, my piece of cake did look like a zebra after all.

Here, the “tiger” right from the oven:

I put a piece of cake on a plate but then it looked so like a lonely zebra, so I added another piece. Now they looked like a zebra couple. Eat some golden kiwi, zebra couple, eat!

But I can’t figure out why there was a big hole under the surface of my cake. Seemed like there was a big air pocket in the batter. I must be careful next time, that’s if I bake this cake again. I’m saying that because the taste of the cake is nowhere near its good look. Despite the impressive appearance, the cake tasted just so-so, nothing spectacular. Maybe this is a bit like fashion trends. They may look very impressive at first but nothing about them is really special. Trends come and go, so if we can’t afford to follow the trends, there’s nothing to be frustrated about. Just save more money and be ready for the next waves :D.

Anyway, I’m just thinking that if I bake another zebra cake, I may use matcha powder in place of cocoa powder. Not that I’m so into matcha taste, I just think a zebra with green stripes may look even cuter :).

Now since this zebra cake included cocoa powder, I’m submitting this to Aspiring Bakers #7 - Chocolate Delight (May 2011) hosted by DG from Tested and Tasted.

The original recipe is from King Arthur Flour. I halved the recipe to make a 16cm round cake. Below is the halved recipe (adapted):

Ingredients:

- 100g caster sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 120ml whole milk
- 120ml vegetable oil (I used canola oil)
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
- 135g All-Purpose Flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 9g Dutch-processed cocoa powder (I think natural unsweetened cocoa powder is fine too, I like the smell of natural cocoa better than Dutch-processed).

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175^oC). Butter a 16cm round baking pan. Line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper and butter the paper.

2. Use a hand mixer to blend the sugar and eggs until lightened, about 2 minutes (I blended for 3 minutes at medium speed). On low speed blend in the oil, milk and vanilla until well combined and smooth.

3. In a separate bowl, sift the flour, baking powder and salt. Whisk to combine.

4. Add the dry mixture to the wet ingredients. Combine on medium speed 1-2 minutes or until the batter is smooth and lump free. Be sure to scrape down the bowl halfway through mixing.

5. Remove 1 cup of the vanilla batter and place it in a bowl. Sift the cocoa over this batter, and stir well to combine. Be sure to use a sifter to avoid cocoa lumps in the batter. (Now the cocoa batter gets thicker than vanilla batter, and I realized that the cocoa powder didn’t dissolve so easily in the batter. So I guess next time I’ll mix cocoa powder with a little hot water until dissolved, then I’ll add this cocoa mixture to the separated batter. That is, if I bake this cake again).

6. Now you should use 2 large spoons, about 20-25ml each. Pour one large spoon of vanilla batter into the center of the cake pan and let it spread slightly on its own. Next, pour one large spoon of the chocolate batter into the center of the vanilla batter. This causes the vanilla batter to spread out. Continue to alternate batters, in bulls-eye fashion until all batter is used. You will now have thin rings of each batter on the outer edges of the pan, thicker rings towards the center. Note: Don’t tilt the pan to “help” the batters spread out.

7. Bake in the preheated oven for 35-45 minutes, or until the cake is lightly browned and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool the cake in the pan for 10 minutes, and then turn out onto a wire rack to finish cooling. Dust lightly with confectioners sugar or frost if that strikes your fancy.

Chocolate chip madeleines and my second attempt

2011-05-25T16:39:00.001+07:00

This is the first time I tried baking madeleines. Well, OK, it was actually not the first time. I baked the first batch almost a year ago and they never turned out madeleines. They were just some lumps of batter as hard as rocks but the insides were still wet, although I baked them for more than 30 minutes (and they were mini madeleines, can you believe it?). After a lot of consultations, I decided that I had beaten the egg whites completely wrong (yes, that recipe called for separated eggs and egg whites beaten till stiff, and I used a hand whisk to beat egg whites – I can’t even believe it!). I hadn’t collected enough courage to try madeleines again since then.

Until recently. The sea-shell shape of madeleines attracted me, once again, and with some experience in beating egg whites, I determined to bake another batch of madeleines. I found a good simple recipe at great Technicolor Kitchen blog without separating eggs. I followed the recipe pretty closely but just used Hershey’s semi-sweet chocolate chips instead of bittersweet chocolate chunks (because the chips were all I had on hands). The madeleines turned out really fine and my family loved them, although I think I overbaked them a little bit, because I didn’t realized that my madeleine pans were pretty shallow. Anyway, the texture was good. The cookies were soft and sweet and they were all eaten up within a day, so quick that I could just snap a small ugly photo with my phone – didn’t have time to bring out the real camera :).

I'm submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #7 - Chocolate Delight (May 2011) hosted by DG from Tested and Tasted