Chocolate Angel Food Cake

Baked this today, am tired of making pandan chiffon so I thought I will try this out. I got this recipe from here, it's a Martha Stewart clip. Another reason I made this is for my son, this is a yolk-free/oil-free recipe. To be honest on a scale of 1-10, I give it a 4. Don't get me wrong, it's a ok recipe....but I prefer my chocolate cake dense and full of chocolate flavor. On comparison, this is light and you can hardly taste or smell the chocolate. Like I mentioned before, I am very particular about cakes coz it is my all time favorite dessert ; ))
Anyway, here's the recipe if you like light cakes...

Ingredients

• 1-1/2 cups sugar
• Scant 1 cup cake flour (not self-rising)
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 ounce, semisweet chocolate, grated (about 1/2 cup)
• 12 large egg whites
• 1 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon pure almond extract
• Chocolate Hazelnut Anglaise (recipe follows)

Baking Directions

Preheat oven to 350° with rack in center. Sift together onto a piece of parchment paper, 3/4 cup sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. Add grated chocolate; set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks form. With machine running, add remaining 3/4 cup sugar in a slow steady stream, beating until fully incorporated, and stiff glossy peaks form. Add vanilla and almond extracts; beat to combine.

Remove from mixer. Gradually add flour mixture, gently but thoroughly, folding into egg white mixture until fully combined. Pour into a 10-inch non-stick angel food cake pan. Tap pan on counter to remove any air bubbles. Bake until cake springs back when depressed with a finger, 30 to 35 minutes. Cool, inverted, 1 hour before removing pan.

Coffee Coffee Cake

Simply the best coffee cake I ever had ; P and yes I am very particular about cakes...

What You Need:
3/4 cup sugar
200g Golden Churn butter (the best butter for making butter cakes)
1 1/2 cup cake flour
3 large eggs
1tsp baking powder
75g milk
3tbsp Nescafe instant granules + 2 tbsp hot water
2 tbsp Nescafe instant granules (set aside)
1 tsp chocolate/ coffee emulsico

What To Do:

1. Cream butter & sugar till pale and creamy
2. Add eggs, one at a time. Mix well
3. Add wet ingredients. The mixture will seem to curd at this point but don't worry, continue to fold flour.
   
4. Stop mixer. Fold in flour and baking powder gently.
5. Add in the 2 tbsp of Nescafe granules and mix gently....Like this,
   

6. Pour into a 8inch springform pan, bake at 350F (175C) for 40mins or till skewer comes clean
You can still see the coffee specks on the surface!

Pandan Chiffon Cake

What You Need:

170ml coconut milk
1/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 tsp pandan paste
8 egg yolks
70 g sugar
1 cup cake flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt


9 eggs whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
100g sugar

What To Do:

1. Preheat oven to 365F
2. Add coconut milk, vegetable oil, pandan paste. Mix well.
3. Add egg yolk, sugar and No. 2. Mix well using hand whisk.
4. Sift cake flour, baking powder and salt twice. Fold into mixture #3. Mix until smooth and set aside.
5. Beat egg white & cream of tartar, add sugar in 3 parts. Stop when whisks form S when lifted.
6. Add 1/3 beaten egg white to mixture No. 4. Mix using hand whisk.
7. Slowly fold in the mixture to the remaining 2/3 of beaten egg whites.
8. Pour mixture into greased pandan cake tin or Angel cake tin & bake for about 1hr.
9. Turn tin over on a cake rack IMMEDIATELY to cool before loosening cake.

Banana Cake

My son's exactly 10 mths old today, so I decided to make him a banana cake. I don't think there's anyone out there that doesn't like a banana cake...I remember when I used to be a student nurse I was attached to Toa Payoh Polyclinic and everyday I will walk pass this bakery (think it's Glory) at about 4pm and there will be trays of banana cakes waiting to be pack and send to various shops. If I am lucky there will be extras for sale...Many years on and I am no longer practicing as a nurse but the smell of baked banana cakes still lingers....Hmmmm....

Got this recipe from Aunt Yochana but I changed the self-raising flour to cake flour for a softer texture...It was great! It's soft and moist, only thing is if you are using very riped bananas you may want to use 350g sugar instead. Do refer to her site for recipe as it is not right for me to post someone else's recipe without permission ; ))

My Favourite Butter Cake

I have tried so many butter cake recipes and this is my favourite by far, it is everything I like in a butter cake. It's light yet the smell of butter is strong and I just love the yellow on the cake ; ))
Give it a try...recipe from Auntie Yochana

Japanese Strawberry Shortcake

My son is 8 months old today and for the past few months I will bake a cake to mark each of his 'month day'. In a way I am also trying to practice on my baking skills so that hopefully I am confident enough to bake his 1st birthday this May. If you have been following my blog, you should know by now that I am lousy at baking (except bread making which I just pick up) and the main reason is that I am not discipline enough to follow the recipe to the T...If it says mix for 3 mins, I will just do 2 mins...if it says add nuts, I will add raisins too...I can't explain why. Hub says because I am stubborn but I reckon it's because I believe in going with the flow (or mood) in cooking...

Back to the cake, I love Strawberry Shortcake especially the ones from Bakerzin. And I was so delighted when Daniel Tay decided to disclose the recipe for this cake in his book (Just Desserts and other baked treats) and I just have to bring it along to US ; ))


Verdict: It's really good! Taste exactly like the one they sell, I admire Daniel Tay for disclosing this recipe ; P.
P.S. It will look better if you use a cake ring to assemble the cake with the chantilly cream. I forgot to bring mine to US so have to do it free-hand....Well it looks rustic isn't it ; p

Ghirardelli Pecan Brownies

Managed to squeeze in a quick bake this morning during my "Me-Time" while baby's still sleeping. It was a gloomy morning and it is finally turning cold after 1 month into Fall ; ))
I love the cool weather!

Decided to make comfort food this morning and this is something which I will always stock up in my pantry for that last minute potluck or coffee with mummies.

So far this is the best brownie premix I have tried....I mean how difficult can it be to bake this right?! Minimal washup too....Me likey ; )))
Just add 1/3 water, 1/3 oil & an egg and give it a stir (instruction says 40 stirs!) Even a 5 year old can do it.....Well I added 1/2 cup toasted pecans and raisins for that extra kick...

Serve with my favourite Haagen Dazs Baileys ice cream which is dirt cheap here ; P

Kueh Lapis

Have put this off for so many years...It's one of my Sister's famous must-bake for Chinese New Year. Hence her secret recipe ; p

Decided to bake this yesterday because I reckon this is the only "free" time I will ever have before the Little One arrive in June. Thing is I can't find Golden Churn butter here in NC.

Verdict: I still need practice in terms of layering as you can see the first few layers were quite uneven. Taste-wise almost there but still not fragrant enough, guess I have to try with Golden Churn butter the next time...

Simple Butter Pound Cake

Pardon my crumbly cake, I like to eat my cake whilst warm so I did not wait for it to cool completely before I cut it ; p
Here's the simple recipe:

1 3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, softened
1 1/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup whole milk
2 eggs
1/2 vanilla (I scraped mine from vanilla pod)

What to do:
1. Preheat oven to 350F
2.Cream sugar and butter together till creamy
3. Add in all the ingredients gradually
4. Transfer to a 9"x5" loaf pan
5. Bake for about 60 mins

Non-Sticky Date Cake

Made this 2 days ago with my new mixer. No, it ain't a KitchenAid. I was disappointed when I found out that the KitchenAid mixer here can't be used back home : (
So I bought a cheaper alternative mixer from Euro-Pro and I decided to try out with this cake.

The first time I had this cake was at The Vine Restaurant (just opposite Novena Church), the first impression I get when I was served was 'What an ugly cake' but boy I was wrong......It was rich, soft and buttery.....It's really yummy...

This is supposed to be a sticky date pudding, but I minus the sticky part and thus it can't really be called a pudding right? ; P

Christmas Tiramisu

Christmas is one of my favorite festive seasons of the year.
This is going to be the 3rd Christmas Hub and I am going to spend in Singapore since we came back from Perth. I really miss those days in Perth, the quality of life there, those road trips….the Christmas light up along the houses in Joondalup and of course the best Peking duck in Warwick…Happy Belly loves roast meats.

I am really blessed to be able to spend the first 3 years of my marriage life with Hub in Perth; we really spend a lot of our time doing things together, picking up golf, catching abalones, going on long road trips to Esperance, the scenery is really breathtaking! And of course the friends we have made in Perth ; p

As usual, we are invited to Christmas party at my Sister’s place. I offered to make Tiramisu and Ham salad. I didn’t manage to take any pictures of the salad as they were gone in a flash! I already got request to double the size of the salad for next Christmas!
Happy Belly is happy ; P

The tiramisu got thumbs up from Hub and my family. But I will definitely add more rum next time.