didally.com
Of Food and perhaps a little about me
Archive for Bakes
October 13, 2007 at 10:46 pm · Filed under Bakes
A few months just after our first baking session of the year, we had the second one. This time, we have little Chevelle joining us. I had fun playing with her. I found it rather amusing that we were busy baking in the kitchen and she was in the living room stuffing her mouth full of potato chips. Haha…
As usual, we planned a list of goodies we wanted to bake and head to the supermarket to shop for the baking stuffs. We wanted to take it easy this time, so it’s just muffins and cakes. Since we made orange chocolate chip muffins in the first session, I suggested making savoury muffins instead. So we decided on Bacon and Cheese muffins. AC suggested that we make Marshmallow Cake. And I am glad we did. It was delicious!
Fret not, if you noticed that this savoury muffin recipe calls for more liquid than dry ingredients. It’s not the typical muffin batter where it’s lumpy. I learnt from Gina(Kitchen Capers Forum) that this one has less butter(fat) content and is healthier. Muffins that are made from lumpy batter have to be cooled to room temperature before you eat them. Whereas, muffins(like this one) made from watery batter, enjoy them fresh out from the oven. Once cooled, they don’t taste good. We were worried because the batter was so watery, and added more flour than required. I got the tips from Gina only after we did the muffins. The muffin texture didn’t turn out great, but taste wise, it’s not bad. Something different for a change from the usual sweet muffins.
You can start your day with some Bacon & Cheese Muffins and a glass of milk. I think it’s great for breakfast or tea. You can make some extra muffins and keep them in the freezer. When needed, just heat them up in the toaster.
The Marshmallow cake was buttery, moist and very tasty indeed. And the colourful marshmallows make the cake so pretty looking. Recipe is from AC’s cookbook, so I won’t be posting the recipe here.
I am glad our friendship is going on strong and I wish we could still do this often in our years to come.
Bacon & Cheese Muffins
Recipe Asia Cuisine, from Gina Choong (Kitchen Capers Forum)
Makes 12 muffins
375g self-raising flour
200ml milk
125g cheddar cheese, diced
8 pcs streaky bacon, cut into smaller pieces
60g butter, melted
1 egg
50g light brown sugar
1. In a mixing bowl, add butter and sugar to mix. Add egg and milk to mix together.
2. Add flour to fold in gently. Add diced cheese, stir to mix evenly.
3. Add bacon pieces on top of the batter.
4. Baked in preheated oven 180C for 20 minutes. Serve warm.
June 27, 2007 at 2:18 am · Filed under Bakes
Apart from baking simple cakes and muffins from recipes in cookbooks, I’m accustomed to searching for recipes online. I first discovered the wonders of food blogs about 11/2 years back when I was looking for recipes. I remembered the first one that made me so impressed was Shiokalicious.com, a local food blogger. She even had some of her recipes, along with other countries’ foodies’ recipes published in a ebook. But sad to say, it’s no longer around. So along the way, I found more food blogs, and from each food blog, finding my way to even more blogs. And from all these blogs, I learnt new ingredients and how they can be paired up with other ingredients I would never thought possible.
When it comes to baking, I realized there is also a trend. Back then it were the cupcakes craze. Home bakers busy piping and decorating their cupcakes, and selling them too. Remember? A while ago, I joined in the trend to learn how to make cupcakes taught by Kuidaore.
Macarons. Yes! It’s the in thing now. And you start to see these colourful pastry popping up at the cafes. And home bakers too, are now busy learning how to make this oh-so-delicate cookie. Kuidaore is now teaching you how to make the perfect macarons at Shermay Cooking School. Smart move eh? They sure know what home bakers want to learn. And why the need to master this skill? Cos it’s so expensive to get the commercially made ones. I got mine at Bakerzin as I am curious how they taste like after I see Aunty Yochana happily making her own macarons too.
So would I even dare to think of mastering this skill? Well, for a start, maybe. But nah, I can’t even pipe properly. It’s like doing fine arts you know.
Macarons are not to be confused with coconut macaroons. They are 2 pieces of dome-shaped cookies sandwiched together with buttercream. Underneath the cookie, is a chewy, cake-like layer and there is this skirt called the feet. Obsessed you may think, but many home bakers struggle to achieve the perfect feet in their macarons. I was warned that it’s sweet. Ironically I could accept the sweetness maybe due to the really nice and light crisp cookie. And it makes me craving for more. I bought only 3 assorted flavors to try out. Bluberry, Lemon and Pistachio. And I think it’s the Pistachio craze now. Haha. You know just like a few years back, it was everything green tea, wasabe, then seaweed.
I know why they are expensive due to the difficulty in making them well. The best macarons are said to be from Pierre Hermé. If you know Pierre Hermé, you are probably familiar with their most known creation, Ispahan. Evan from Bossa Café recreated it. I think it really looks gorgeous. You can order some from Evan too.
Can I have a box of macarons for my birthday? Haha…
June 10, 2007 at 2:27 am · Filed under Bakes
Pineapple tarts. What do they remind you of? Yes! Chinese New Year! How can we resist this buttery, melt-in-your-mouth pastry, chock-full of pineapple jam? My Chinese New Year will not be complete without them. In fact, I never understood why everyone is so crazy about these tarts when I was younger. Our taste for food and things changes as we grow. There are so many I-do-not-eat food when I was still a kid. Eg. red bean paste bun, and I still don’t eat them now. When adults were going gaga over how delish those tarts are, I didn’t know what I was missing out.
Till one day, a few years ago, my cousin gave us a tub of homemade pineapple tarts. It’s not the commonly tart, where the pineapple jam are exposed on top. This one has the jam wrapped inside. I guess I was in an adventurous mood that day that I decided to give it a try. The jam was not too sweet, with a tint of sourness. And the crust does not crumble when you take a bite. So that was it. I was hooked! And now I have to control myself whenever the festive arrives. Ok, I tell myself 2 will be the max for today. At the end of the second one, I just thought, one more doesn’t hurts. Woohoo… counting all the calories.
So it’s already June, and why am I still talking about pineapple tarts? I just wanna share some pics I took during Chinese New Year when we girls were having a baking session. There isn’t many times where you can really do girly things with your girlfriends, other than shopping, chatting over coffee. I thought why not do something more fun. Let’s have a bonding session while baking. Since it was near Chinese New Year, baking pineapple tarts would be so appropriate.
We baked up a storm at AC’s house. I love baking sessions like this cos everyone shares the bakes. And shares the calories load too! Hehee…
Since we had a whole afternoon to spare, we added 2 more items to the bake list. Orange Chocolate Chip Muffins and Chocolate Chip Cookies. Orange goes so well with chocolate and this one has orange zest in it which really brings out the flavour of the fruit. In fact, chocolate goes hand in hand with so many other ingredients like, mint, hazelnut, bananas. And yes, there are even chocolate durian cake!
Look, whose the greedy one with lots of chocolate chips mixed into the muffin batter.
Next is the Chocolate Chip Cookies. The original recipe didn’t call for cocoa powder. Being the choc lovers, we added some to the batter for a even more chocolaty cookie.
It was really fun churning out the pineapple tarts, which took up most of the time. Luckily PS had made the pineapple jam in advanced, else we wouldn’t be able to finish baking by nightfall. It’s not easy working with the buttery dough, really needs some skills rolling them. It’s soft and thus we had a hard time pushing it out from the cutter. We made some berry jam tarts out of the very nice and cute flower cookie cutter as the pineapple jam are all used up. Looks so pretty.
Orange Chocolate Chip Muffins
Recipe adapted from Fonia at Kitchen Capers
Makes 12 Muffins
Dry Ingredients:
½ cup plain flour
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
½ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (coated with 2 tsp plain flour)
Wet Ingredients:
½ cup butter, melted
½ cup sugar
3 tbsp (45g) melted cream cheese
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1½ tsp grated orange rind
¾ cup orange juice
½ tsp rum (optional)
- Preheat oven to 190°C. Sift the dry ingredients (except the chocolate chips) into a large bowl and mix well. Make a well in the centre. Set aside.
- Melt butter in microwave at HIGH for 30 secs or till totally melted; Add sugar into the hot butter, stir till sugar dissloved; Add in the rest of the wet ingredients & stir till well-combined.
- Pour the wet mixture into the centre of the dry mixture. Using a whisk or a spatular, stir till just moisten (mixture will be lumpy). DO NOT OVER STIR! Muffin batter are supposed to be lumpy. Sprinkle the chocolate chips into the batter, stir lightly with 1 - 2 strokes.
- Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin cups (¾ full). Bake for about 20 mins or until tester inserted to the centre comes out clean.
We are planning another session soon. So stay tuned!
April 12, 2007 at 2:16 am · Filed under Bakes
Got’cha! Nah, no sexy lady parading with a C cup bra here. Haha..
C is for Cupcake. Lovely-looking and delicious cupcakes. I love them for their petite size topped with colorful and interesting ways of decoration. They look so cute and you can decorate each little one of them with different variations. But sad to say, the icings and buttercream are laden with loads of sinful sugar and cream. Yes, I agree, they are for aesthetic purposes. Even my nieces find them too sweet.
I made these cupcakes in a lesson I attended last month at Shermay’s Cooking School, taught by Joycelyn Shu. Have your been to her blog? The food she creates is simply stunning. And she’s self-taught.
Being a novice in baking, let alone cupcake decorating, I couldn’t do the piping steadily. But I had fun rolling and shaping the marzipan and chocolate putty. They gets soft easily and would be hard to shape, so you got to work fast. I am pretty happy with the flower I’ve shaped.
The Valrhona Dark Chocolate cupcake was rich but not too sweet. I guess using good quality chocolate and vanilla extract/paste does makes a difference. I was tempted to get the vanilla extract but hesitated as I wasn’t sure how often I would bake. I didn’t bake as often as I wish I could as I only have a few supporters. Any extras will go into the bin eventually, what a waste. There are so many to bake and cook on my list.
Have been thinking of having a sinful rich brownie with vanilla ice cream for some time. Put it in front of me now and I will chomp it down with no regrets! Talk about my growing waistline. Haha..
Oh yeah, I didn’t know Cafe Cartel sells their cakes at 50% off after 9pm. Only for dine-in orders. We had 2 slices of cakes for the price of one. Yay! But service attitude is not that pleasant. We placed our order. And when the waiter served us the cakes, we told him they got one of the order wrong. He gave a pissed look. I know he’s not pissed at us, but with his colleague. I just thought that he shouldn’t have done that. Yes, he may be busy or stressed, but in the service industry, your smiles and attitude matters.
