Rose Rose...

It's Rose again! I promised myself I'll make the Rose Chiffon Cake again after I have bought my Rose Water. And here is my own promise! Without hesitation, I tried that Rose Chiffon recipe again. This time, I was very very happy with the result. The taste of the chiffon was really good, especially with the rose petals. Even I've adjusted the temperature of the oven. I realised the temperature should have been reduced since I was using the fan oven.




Recipe modified from "Chiffon cake is done" by Kevin Chai.

Rose Chiffon Cakes

Ingredients:

6 egg yolks
50g sugar
1/4 tsp salt
4 tbsp cooking oil
8g mini rose, washed and mix with hot water
60g rose tea water (extracted from above)
1 tsp rose water (extract/essence)
110g self-raising flour
7 egg whites
1/2 tsp cream of tartar
110g sugar

Method:

1. Lightly wash the mini roses, then place them in hot water and leave it to cool. Pluck out the rose petals after measuring enough rose tea water.
2. Combine egg yolks, sugar, salt, cooking oil, rose petals, rose tea water and rose water in a mixing bowl.
3. Fold in flour and mix together to form batter.
4. Beat egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks. Gradually add in sugar, beating at high speed until frothy and stiff peaks form.
5. Scoop 1/3 of the beaten egg white foam into the yolk batter and gently mix them.
6. Then pour the mixture back into the egg whites and fold until blended (no more white streaks).
7. Pour batter into ungreased 9" tube pan and 6" tube pan/or 3 3" tube pans. (Combination is 9" with 6" or 9" with 3 3" tube pans).
8. Bake in preheat oven at 160C for 45mins for 9", 35mins for 6" and 25mins for 3" pans, or until cooked.
9. Remove from oven, invert cake on a wire rack until completely cooled before removing from the tube pans.

You can purchase the mini rose from bigger Fairprice. They are under the dried goods section. I also noticed Sheng Siong carries dried roses too!

Festive Family Fusion @ Kitchen Culture

Some few weeks ago, my sister asked if I would be interested to attend some food demo organised by Food & Travel magazine in Kitchen Culture. Seeing that it cost only $25/- and include some very healthy goodie bag items, without hesitation, I told her I want to sign up.

For the sake of the goodie bag, she also signed up together with her colleagues, even though she is not into cooking or baking!:p So she signed up on my behalf. So today was "D DAY"! The venue was held in Kitchen Culture at Thye Hong Centre. The place sells VERY expensive kitchen cabinets and kitchen tools. I won't have stepped into it if not for this cooking demo. Today's session is called "Festive Family Fusion", using mostly brown rice and olive oil from Naturel. Isn't that healthy?

The demo was conducted by Chef John See. A regular chef at Kitchen Culture. He used to have a restaurant, but I think he no longer owns a restaurant now, he is free-lancing and teaching cooking & baking as his passion.




Anyway, the food demonstrated today were:
1) Healthy Organic Brown Rice Turkey Salad Apple-Pear and Cranberry


2) Seafood Bouillabaisse (pronouced as bowl-la-base) with Spring Onion Tortilla Bread Toast
This was my favourite! It tasted like lobster bisque, but so much more flavourful!! The tortilla bread toast went very well with the soup! Yummy!!


3) Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting


Not forgetting what I got for my goodie bag- 2kg organic brown rice, 500ml Olive Oil (Cold pressed), 1kg Canola & Sunflower oil and 1L Low Sugar Soya Milk. Very worth the price paid for - $25!


After the demo session, my brother-in-law dropped me off at HV. Without delay, I popped into Shermay's Cooking School to buy my Rose Water! Yippee! And of course, I picked up the vanilla extract again since it was cheaper by $10! Really worth the buys! :) What a fun Saturday, without baking for once!

Orange Centrepiece Cake

With the mood to bake this week, I made chocolate tarts the night before, and last night, it was Orange Centrepiece Cake, as I called it.

It was quite a while since I had oranges at home as there was no promotion at the supermarket for oranges. :p Usually, my hubby buys oranges in tens when there are promotions. However, lately, there wasn't much promotion, so we didn't have them at home. Yesterday, we managed to buy 20 oranges from Giant as they were having promotions for this weekend. As I have always like to bake with oranges, I decided to bake an orange cake. And I suddenly found the passion to do some frosting and the inspiration to decorate the cake.

Initially, I wanted to caramelise the orange slices for decoration. Then I realised they don't solidified in the sugar solution. So I decided to grill the "sugar-coated" orange slices in the oven. Then after a while, I realised they don't browned. So I gave up and took them out of the oven. While I was whisking the whipped cream, I didn't wanted to waste the "orange-sugar syrup" which I used to "caramelise" my oranges. So I poured the syrup into the whipped cream. They really taste good!

Then I got pretty excited about the whole decoration. So I started frosting the cake, layer by layer, bit by bit. In the end, I was quite happy with my own decoration. However, the frosting needs real improvement. It was...er... still not up to standard yet. The overall taste & look of the cake (from far) was pretty good! I'm very happy with this "production"!



These were the chocolate tarts that I made the day before. I made into three different tastes: Chocolate & Almond tartlets, Chocolate & Strawberry tartlets and Irish Creme Caramel Chocolate Tarts.

Rainbow Swiss Rolls

I have been quite slackened in updating my posts this week. Mainly because I have been baking everyday, till I have no time to update. Otherwise, usually I baked alternate days so that the following day, my post will be up. So now, I'm updating for the bakes that I made for this week.

I made the Cookies & Cream Ice cream earlier this week. Unfortunately, I was too eager to mix them up, that I didn't wait for the custard to be cool before I added the whipped cream. Ended up, the mixture was like "curds". Not a good sight to see and have. The texture, of course, was affected by that. My eldest son helped me in the preparation. A good helper to have for simple tasks! ;)


The following day, I made Rainbow Swiss Rolls. I used the emulsifier cake as the base, then separated them into three containers and added colours to two of them. As there was still half of the batter left, I made them into cupcakes and frosted them with chocolate ganache. For the swiss rolls, I filled them with whipped cream and strawberry jam. They were really good! ;) Even I like the rolls.

Rainbow Strawberry Swiss Roll


Rainbow Cupcakes

Hot Milk Sponge Cake

I'm still looking for a foolproof sponge cake which I can bake for any birthday cakes. So far, I've quite successfully baked Alex Goh's Sponge Cake, traditional sponge cake, and emulsifier cakes. The easiest cake to bake is the emulsifier cakes. They also stay soft for a long time. However, I tried to avoid baking that if possible as emulsifier is, afterall, a chemical.

Today, I decided to bake "Hot Milk Sponge Cake" from The Cake Book. I read through this a couple of times, but each time, I ended up using other recipes. This cake is described as "gloriously moist and tender all-purpose sponge cake with a fine crumb and lovely golden colour." So here is my version.


I was quite happy with the result. However, I didn't think I want to eat a plain sponge cake. With plain butter cake, I still think it was alright, but plain sponge cake, errr... better not. So I decided to frost it with chocolate ganache, topped it with pine nuts and silver dragees. In the end, it looked quite pretty, I thought so. ;)




Recipe extracted from "The Cake Book" by Tish Boyle.
Ingredients:
133g Sifted cake flour
1 1/4tsp Baking powder
1/4tsp Salt
120ml Whole milk
57g Unsalted butter
3 Large eggs, at room temperature
150g Granulated sugar (I used 125g)
1 tsp Vanilla extract

Method:
1. Sift together the cake flour, baking powder, and salt two times. Set aside.
2. In a small saucepan, combin the milk and buttr and heat over mediu heat just until the butter is melted. Remove the pan from the heat and set aside.
3. In the bowl of an electric mixer, using the whisk attachment, beat the eggs at high speed until blended, about 1 minute.
Gradually add the sugar and vanilla extract and beat until pale and tripled in volume, about 6 minutes.
4. Sift one-third of the flour mixture over the egg mixture and gently fold it in with a rubber spatula. Repeat with the remaining flour mixture in two more additions.
5. Reheat the milk mixture to just under a boil. Add it all at once to the egg mixture and gently fold it in.Scrape the batter into a greased 9" cake pan.
6. Bake the cake at 180C for 20-25minutes, until it springs back when lightly touched and a cake tester inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cool the cake in the pan on the wire rack for 10 minutes.
7.Run a paring knife around the edge of the pan and invert the cake onto the wire rack. Reinvert the cake so that it is right side up, and cool completely.

Frostings (Optional)
Chocolate Ganache
Pine Nuts (lightly toasted)
Medium Silver Dragees

Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days, or refrigerate for up to a week.

One Choux, Three Tastes

I was entrusted with two packets of durians last weekend to produce durian puffs this week for my sisters. I made my choux since Thursday and added the durian fillings last evening. Initially, I wanted to topped it up with white chocolates, however, I realised I didn't have white chocolates at home! :p I had milk chocolates and all kinds of dark chocolates, but not white chocolates. Hmm...wonder why I don't have white chocolates.

Anyway, I piped my choux pastries into small tiny mini puffs. So there was more than enough to go around. I made some with chocolate whipped cream fillings for my colleague's daughter, who did well in her PSLE! I did the rest with durian fillings. Unfortunately, there wasn't enough. So I used pastry cream and made the rest into chocolate cream puffs. I like the puffs as they are very light and fluffy. The inside was almost "empty", therefore, I don't even have to remove the pastries inside!



I also did cinnamon rolls this morning. I've always love cinnamon rolls. Too bad most of those cinnamon rolls have closed down. I miss eating those! The recipe for my cinnamon rolls was extracted from Yochana's Walnut Cinnamon Rolls.

玫瑰,玫瑰, 我愛你 (Rose Rose I luv u)

"Rose rose I luv u, with your almond eyes!" Oh, Rose is actually the name of a lady. The rose for me, is the mini rose that I used for my Rose Chiffon Cake.

I saw this packet of mini rose in Fairprice one fine day. Somehow, it was so pretty I just had to buy it. I had hesitated for so long before I bought. After I bought, I made Rose Tea with it, and it was very fragrant. I told myself, I just have to use it to bake. Finally last evening, I use the Orange Chiffon Cake recipe by Kevin Chai to convert it into my Rose Chiffon Cake! It was quite exciting though. I was hoping the rose taste will somehow be there since I torn up the petals and add it into the batter. Luckily I added some vanilla essence.

In the end, the cake turned out to be quite "flavourless"! Hahaha... I really don't know how to describe the taste. It doesn't has any distinct flavour like pandan or orange. However, it also doesn't taste like eggs only. It wasn't very sweet, was just alright for me. There wasn't much vanilla taste also. It still taste quite nice because of its softness and fluffiness!

This Kevin Chai, use 7 eggs but for 9" pan! Aiyo, my 9" overflowed with the batter! Finally, I had to use one 9" pan and one 6" pan. For the 9" pan, I baked first in my Delonghi oven while the 6" pan, I put it into my Sharp 3-in-1 convection oven. I haven't been using Sharp since I had my Delonghi. Sharp was my "ex". In the end, the chiffon cake baked by Sharp looked much nicer than the one from Delonghi. I wondered if I had filled up too much batter in the 9" tube pan to cause it to expand so much and cracked!

I've decided to go to Shermay's to buy the Rose Water. I'll be trying this recipe again, this time with the Rose Water mixed with the rose "tea" water and rose petals. I supposed it will be nicer looking and taste better too!

甜蜜蜜... (honey)

It's Sunday! It's another day of fun bakings! I had some sponge cakes left from my Checkered Cake. So I decided to transform it into something nicer to give away. This was what I did, and gave it to my sister-in-law. My niece commented that it looked like a big cookie because it was pretty flat! ;p


I flipped through my Alex Goh's "The World of Bread", looking for some breads to bake. Then I found "Honey Oatmeal Bread". Feeling quite happy that I can finally use my multi-grains, I decided to bake this recipe. As the recipe called for rolled oats, I thought I could separate the oatflakes in the multi-grains to use.

My daughter and I spent 45mins rumbling through batches and batches of the multi-grains for oatflakes just to extract 80g. However, I realised that we only have 40g!! Goodness. I don't have the luxury to go through another 45mins to get about 40g! It was so time consuming. Finally, I made the decision to use multi-grains as it is! Hahaha... So I turned it into "Honey Multi-grain Bread" instead of "Oatmeal"! This recipe can make two loaves. Initially, I thought it's only one loaf based on the quantity. However, as I made, I realised it really can make into two loaves. Luckily I followed the instructions to put it into two loaf pans, otherwise, the bread would have burst from one loaf pan!!



Extracted from Alex Goh-The World of Bread, (modified by me).
Ingredients:
Sponge Dough
320g Bread flour
2 tsps Instant yeast
180ml Cold water
Main Dough
(A) 80g Multi-grains, 60ml Cold water
(B) 6g Salt, 25ml Honey, 25g Brown sugar
(c) 30g Butter

Method:
1. Prepare sponge dough: Mix all the ingredients to form a dough, then let it rest for 3 hours.
2. Prepare the main dough: Mix the (A) multi-grains with the cold water till well combined, then add mixture into the above sponge dough with (B) and knead to form a dough.
3. Add (C) and knead to form a smooth, elastic dough.
4. Divide dough into 4 equal portions.
5. Mould them into balls and leave to rest for 10 mins.
6. Flatten dough balls and roll them up, as if they were swiss rolls. Then twist 2 rolls together and put result into a greased loaft tin (L20cm X W10cm X H8.5cm). Makes 2 loaves.
7. Leave to proof for 45mins or till they double in size. Brush them with water then sprinkle some multi-grains on top.
8. Bake at 190 for 25mins. Remove them from the tin immediately they are baked.

JL Donuts...

New donut branch in Singapore again? Must be an imitation to JC Donuts! Heehee... JL is none other than... moi! My initial is JL. One fine day, I told my son I wanted to bake donuts. He said he wanted Oreo donuts. Spread the donuts with cream, then put crushed oreos on it. Yummy. I thought that sounds good. I would like to have one too! Hesitated for quite a while. I simply refused to fried the donuts. They will be nice, but it'll be a lot of oil wasted. In the end, I didn't bake them because I couldn't get my hands on baked donuts recipes. *haiz*

Initially, on Saturday morning, I wanted to bake the Rosemary & Garlic Focaccias. However, I woke up feeling really unwell & giddy. I was quite disappointed as I would be unable to bake. Subsequently, I rested in the morning. Feeling much better, I decided to have my first attempt at donuts. The recipe from Chocolate Galore seems really easy. It's for deep-frying, but I decided to try to bake it instead. I must say, I'm quite happy with the baked donuts! They are really soft. Although it's not as nice as the deep-fried donuts, I knew I can eat without much guilt! ;)

As I didn't have Oreo, I just frost it with whatever ingredients I have. They are: Freshly Grated Coconuts, Pandan Kaya, Chocolate Rice, Rainbow Rice, Chocolate & Walnuts and Chocolate & Strawberry Jams. I like the fresh coconut dounuts. It's very rich & nice!



I'll share the recipe with you.
Extracted from Chocolate Galore by Caroline Barty, (modified by me).
Ingredients:
Makes 8 Donuts (I made into 21 small donuts)
225g plain flour
7g instant yeast
pinch of salt
50g caster sugar
24g butter
150ml milk
2 egg yolks
oil, for deep-frying (if you want to fry)

Method:
1. Mix the flour with the yeast and salt. Add the caster sugar, then rub in the butter until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.
2. Heat the milk until it is warm. Whisk in the egg yolks, then add the liquid to the flour. Mix to form a soft dough. Cover the bowl with cling wrap and leave in a warm place for about an hour or until the dough has doubled in size.
3. Knock back the dough on a well-floured surface for 5-10mins. Roll out the dough to 1cm thick and stampout rounds with a plain pastry cutter. Make a hole in the middle of each round with your finger. Place the doughnuts in a greased tray and leave to double in size.
4a. Deep-fry the doughnts in hot oil for about 5 mins or until they are golden brown. Drain on kitchen paper and leave to cool. Or,
4b. Bake it in the oven at 200C for about 8-10mins, or until they turned brown. Remove from the tray immediately.
5. When cooled, frost it anyway you like.

Also sharing my Friday's bake: Checkered Cake.


Saturday's instant fun: Popcorns with salted buttery sauce!
Popcorns are very easy to make. Just buy the corn seeds from supermarket, pop them into the microwave and see them pop! Then melt salted butter in the microwave and pour it over the popcorns! They give...simple pleasures! Cheap & good & satisfying! Who says popcorns are for movie-goers only?

Unwell but still playing with Meringues

Yes, I'm unwell, but I'm still playing with Meringues! How dare me! Shouldn't I be resting and sleeping? Oh no, not when I'm home. I just can't keep away from Kenwood & Delonghi! I think there's some magnetic in me, which gets attracted to Kenwood & Delonghi. Unless I'm kept away from home, otherwise, with a whole day at home, and I can't even bake??? You must be joking then!

Meringue No. 1: Chocolate Swiss Rolls
Initially, I used Yochana's Blackforest Swiss Roll sponge recipe. Unfortunately, I overfolded the flour & oil and burst all the bubbles! I'm really very bad at folding flour to fluffy eggs. Then, I had to redo the sponge again. This time, I used the recipe from my baking school, which is chiffon style, separation of yolks and whites. The result was much much satisfactory! ;)




Meringue No. 2: Decorated Cookies alias Royal Cookies
With the leftover royal icing in the fridge, I really had to decorate the cookies that I baked last weekend. Since I have more time today, I explored with more colours. It's quite a tough job decorating the cookies! However, I'm quite happy with the beautified cookies.

Caramelised Peach Fragipane Tarts

I made the Caramelised Peach Fragipane Tarts on Sunday evening. It was supposed to be Peach Fragipane Tarts. However, I decided to have my first try of the new blow torch I bought at Shermay's. Looks like the heat was too hot for my fragipane! Not a good first time though. So with the charred dots on my peaches, it's now renamed to Caramelised Peach Fragipane Tarts! :p


Playing with my blow torch...trying to be a pro!

Green Tea Macarons

I tried macarons again on Saturday since I still have some egg whites. I added one teaspoon of green tea to the recipe which I had previously. Somehow, something is amiss. The feet didn't really turn up, and it was very vey soft and almost break when not handled properly. However, the taste was really good, except a bit too sweet. I must've forgotten to reduce the sugar! :p


These were just a few better ones, the rest just cracked like nobody's business!!


I am very honoured to be tagged by Happy Home Baking. I need to provide '7 random facts about myself' meme. This is my sharable list:

1. I have always love baking and cooking, though the former is my first & endless love.
2. I wanted to take up "Home Econs" when I was in Sec One, but my mum made me take "Technical". Desperate, I joined the Home Econs Club when I was in Sec Three, and became the Chairman when I was in Sec Four.
3. When I was in Sec. Two, I went to my girlfriend's house to cook our first dish - "Gong Pao Ji Ding" (Dried Chilli with Diced Chicken)!
4. I started learning driving when I was 16 years old. Took advance theory four times & failed. Gave up. After 15 years later, finally took up the courage to take the test and learn auto-car. Passed my advance theory first time, passed my practical theory first time! Driving lessons all sponsored by my beloved hubby!
5. I was very lucky to have the opportunity to stay and study in Melbourne for almost two years.
6. My first house was a 4-room Design & Build HDB at Jurong West, next to Boon Lay MRT station.
7. I bake almost everyday. If I don't bake for a few days, I will feel something is amiss.

These are the 7 bloggers that I'm passing on the meme. I hope they will have fun too!

1. Laureen at Eat & Be Happy
2. Mandy at Fresh from the Oven
3. Small Small Baker
4. Rei at All That Matters
5. Gina at Taste of Time
6. Amanda at Held by Love, Baked from Scratch
7. Anne at Simply Anne's

Here are the rules for tagging:
Link to my blog (tagger) on your blog.
1. Give seven facts about yourself.
2. Tag another seven bloggers by leaving a comment on their blogs and letting them know they were tagged and listing them (and their blogs) on your blog.

Sweetie has grown up...

My dear sweetie pie, my precious daughter, has told me some weeks ago that she wanted to cut her hair short. This was the conversation we had one night, while we were lying on the bed.

Sweetie: "Mummy, when my front hair (fringe) is long, when you want to cut, I want to cut my hair short." She pointed to below her ear.
Mummy (surprised): "Why? I thought you have always love your long hair?"
Sweetie: "Ya, but I want to cut so that I don't have to tie my hair when I go to school."
Mummy (persistently): "But why? Did someone tell you to cut your hair short?? But I love your long hair."
Sweetie: "No, I want to cut it myself."
Mummy (still didn't give up): "How about cut it till your shoulder, at least you can still pin up both sides?" Pointing to her shoulder.
Sweetie (nodding her head on her pillow): "Okay."

After this conversation, I kept prompting and hinting her that she should not cut her hair. However, it seems that her decision was final! She went around telling my helper and her grandparents that she wanted to cut her hair till shoulder length. Gee...it's not easy to change her decision.

Finally, last afternoon, when I saw that her fringe was long, and was due to cut, I snipped off her long hair too! As I'm not a pro stylist, of course the hair length didn't turn out too straight. It was slightly slanted from left to right at the back. However, she refused to let me trim further. She said she like it this way. She's got style!! Hahaha... My sweetie has grown up!

By the way, she was really patient, sitting there to let me cut her hair. She didn't move a bit, while I was struggling to trim the bits of hair straight...straight...but still, it wasn't straight!

Japanese Chocolate Cheesecake

After my first successful attempt on Japanese Cheesecake, I was so tempted to try again with another flavour. I was comtemplating between Chocolate or Green Tea. I finally decided on Chocolate since I have chocolate milk.

I replaced the milk with chocolate milk, using my favourite brand-Marigold. I also replace 10g of flour with 10g cocoa powder to give more chocky flavour. The rest of the ingredients remained the same. I also change the pan to one 7" and one smaller pan, both squeezed into the water bath pan. Total baking time was about 37mins.


I brought in our dear little friend for a treat. Guess who is that??


Oh! My little friend is Pikachu! He must've come after Rayquaza told him about my Japanese Cheesecake!


Woah! Trying to take a bite when I was busy taking pictures?? Aiyo-yo!