Assorted Buns

Assorted buns again using Basic Sweet dough from Alex Goh replacing 2/3 of cold water with whipping cream.

This time round i try the method of putting another baking tray on top of the bun to create the look of the Cream cheese bun from Barcook.... the effect was not bad... got the look but the center of the cinnamon bun was not thoroughly cook so i bake for another 5 mins which ended up the crust slightly hard.

For others like cinnamon rolls, cheese & sugar buns & Bakkwa buns, the texture was very soft when out of oven.. still soft after cooled down. But it does not stay soft the next day... need to warm up for better serving.

Fruity Birthday Cake for Mama & Papa

On 20 Nov, Sat, we had a small birthday celebration for my mama & papa at changi with some yummy homecook & take away food including homecook noodles, fried rice, mix veg with tofu, satay, seacucumber duck, grilled chicken wings & some finger foods & the 1st birthday cake that i made for my parents .... wishing them 身体健康

Though my mama health is not good, i can see that she is happy to see all kids around to celebrate with her.

Evan is all excited when come to birthday cake session. .... as if is his birthday.. haha... can see from the pic that he is eyeing on this pretty birthday cake ^-^

Cranberry Muffins & Bacon Roll

These are the the recents bakes from my oven.

Cranberry Muffin - receipe was from Alex Goh receipe book.

I am very happy with these muffins as they came out with a nice dome though some still with the weird "dome" towards one side. It will good if the outer crust was slightly softer. The crumb texture was soft with the light sweetness of cranberry, blur berry & raisin.

Bacon roll - Dough from Wonderful soft bread (Do what I like).

I actually over baked these buns as i didn't keep a look out when they are baking in the oven... where am i ? .... in the bedroom trying to get little prince to sleep. The crust ended up dark & hard when out of oven. luckily it turned slightly softer after cooled down. Texture was soft for the bacon but not for the porkfloss & plain buns. It could be due to the dough adsorbed the oil from the toasted bacon during the final proofing. I shall try again with reduced temperature or shorter baking time.

Carrie Birthday Party

This was the 1st interesting & fun birthday party that Evan ever attended. Though he does not know the birthday gal (DH huddy daughter) & other kids, he still enjoy himself very much.

The first thing that attracted him was the Fondant Strawberry Shortcake & cupcakes. Infact, all kids are so tempted to lay their little fingers on this cake as it look so pretty & yummy.

The interesting & fun part of the party was the artwork paintingt with teachers guidance. All the childrens get to choose either a wooden box, Halloween Latern or a Face mask. They all sat down for McDonalds Kiddy meals followed by the painting & pull string for the Sunflower pinata ... all kids are jumping ard for the sweets that dropped down from the pinata.

Little prince behaved very well thoughout these activities & he constantly keep a lookout for us while eating & painting..... scare that we left him there alone. We are considering to bring him for such artclass during weekend as he like it so much.

Cream Cheese Bun

Barcook's popular Raisin Cream bun has always been our favourite buy whenever we happen to be ard Fook Hai area.


I have been talking with collegues abt how did they makesuch a soft, fine & delicious Raisin cream bun. I had tried to search for the recipe online some time back but didnt manage to find one. But just this week, shirley & I found a recipe which was from the same source called e-pan baking studio.


I found this link from Do What I Like - cream cheese bun & from this e-pan site, i found another recipe which output looks exactly the same as Barcook Raisin cream Bun.


Since i can't read Japanese, i try the recipe from Do What I Like. While shirley will explore the recipe from the Japanese e-pan baking studio.


Well, maybe i am not good enough at baking buns & also didnt follow the recipe to the dot, hence the bun texture was not as soft & fine and then cream cheese filling was not smooth as i expected. I also use chicken ham for some of the bun specially for my prince & also pork floss for my DH. I shall wait for shirley's experiment on the other recipe before i give another shot on this cream cheese bun.

Milo Chiffon cake

Another chiffon cake.. this round the texture is much better... no more dense & damp. Prince had 1 & half slice of this yummy Milo Chiffon ... yippe....

I saw Kitchen Corner's nice & tall chiffon pics so i follow her adding in corn flour into the egg white mixture as for my Milo Chiffon cake.

Ingredients: (6-inch chiffon tin)
2 egg yolks
20g caster sugar
1 tbsp Milo
25ml milk
20ml cooking oil
40g self-raising flour

2 egg whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
40g caster sugar
5g corn flour

Method:
1. Whisk egg yolks and sugar. Stir Milo and milk until the Milo dissolves.
2. Add the Milo mixture and oil into the egg yolk batter until will combine. Fold in the sieved flour.
3. Beat egg whites till foamy, add in cream of tartar. Gradually add in sugar slowly at soft peaks & finally add in corn flour and beat until stiff peak form.
4. Gently fold 1/3 of beaten egg white into egg yolk batter until well combine. Repeat the same for the balance egg white in 2 batches until well combine. Do not over fold to deflate the batter.
5. Pour batter into ungreased 6-inch chiffon tin. Bake in pre-heated oven at 180 deg C for 30mins.
6. Remove from oven and invert cake immediately until it is completely cool.

Marinated Guava

I came across a recipe using orange peels to marinate the guava ..... can imagine how refreshing & tastely it will be for these 2 combination.

This is really easy to make with just 2 simple ingredients: 2 Guava & 10 pieces Orange peels.

Method:

- Peel off the Guava skin & remove the seeds.

- Cut into slices abt 0.2cm thick.

- Cut the orange peels into thin strips (advise to soak for a while as i find it too sweet even i wash & rinse the orange peels)

- Mix the guava & orange peels & chilled it in freidge for few hours.

Simple & yummy.

Recent Bakes

It has been a while since i last blogged. I was busy & lazy to do it though i still bake. The followings are the 2 new receipes i had tried.

Chicken Pie

I used to get the ready made roti prata dough to make the chicken pie. But this time i made the dough from the scratch because i had tasted a home-made yummy chicken pie made by Shirley.

However, I used the another recipe from http://myculinaryjournal.blogspot.com/2007/10/chicken-pies.html instead of hers which uses the water & oil dough as i left my shortening at my mum's place. I shall try her recipe for my next chicken pie beacause i don't really like the yogurt taste for the crust.

Japanese Souffle Cheesecake

This is another bake that i had wanted to try for a long time. But i wasn't successful for the 1st time on the presentation as the cake started to crack for the 1st 15mins of waterbath. It could be the baking pan that i use. I didn't follow the instruction to use 8"x8" baking pan so i guess there is not enough space for the cake to raise.

However I am very happy with the soft & cottony texture. It's really taste yummy especially after refrigerated. My nephews wiped up the portion i brought for them..... Me & hubby finish off the balance the very nite we got home.

I adopted the recipe from http://mybakingcottage.blogspot.com/2008/01/japanese-souffle-cheesecake.html. Pls see below for recipe:

Ingredients:

125 g cream cheese

20 g butter

40 ml milk

3 egg yolks

32 g cake flour

8 g corn flour

1/4 tsp salt

1 tbsp lemon juice

1/2 tsp grated lemon rind

3 egg whites

55 g caster sugar

1/4 tsp cream of tartar

Method:
1. Preheat the Oven to 160°C.
2. Melt the butter, cream cheese, and milk on a double boiler, leave to cool slightly.
3. In a large bowl, beat together egg yolks, salt, lemon juice, lemon rind, and cake flour together until well mixed.
4. Add cheese and milk mixture into egg yolk mixture until well mixed.
5. In a separate clean bowl, beat the egg whites with cream of tartar until foamy. Slowly add in the sugar and continue beating until soft peaks form, and the mixture is glossy.
6. Slowly fold in the egg white batter into the egg yolk mixture, 1/3 at a time, until incorporated. Pour into an 8 inch springform tin and bake in a waterbath for 30-40 min or until cooked when inserted with a skewer.
7. Remove from the mould immediately to prevent the cake from sinking.
8. Refrigerate after cooling

Pain Crème (Whipping Cream bread)

This is another recent baking adapted from http://dailydelicious.blogspot.com/2008/05/pain-crme-whipping-cream-bread.html

I read the comments & decided to give it a try since i have a small pack of whipping cream at home. So after i reach home, i quickly take out & measure all the ingredients. Used the mixer to knead the dough & let it proof for 1.5-2hr. It really worries me when i notice the dough didnt raised to its double size.. so i let it proof for a longer time, punched out the air & put into the fridge for overnite as per the recipe instruction.

The following day, after i reach home from work, i quickly take out & shape it with bakkwa, porkfloss, ham & some plain buns & final proofing for 1hr before sending into the oven for 15mins.

Wow.... these buns are sooooo soft that i can't wait for it to cool down to try a small piece. It is really a good recipe to keep. I gave 2 to my in-laws & my MIL called me just to tell me the buns are really nice & soft especially when it still warm. You must really try this recipe.

Snow Skin Mooncake

This was my 1st homemade snow skin mooncake. There are so many recipes from all the blogs so i choose the one that looks & sound nice & yummy - rainbow ice-cream soda snow skin mooncake.

My sis & I brought ingredients from phoon huat & we started the project last sun at my mum's plc. It was really fun wrapping, moulding & knocking these mooncake. As the dough was still very sticky, we used lots of kou fen during the process as it makes it easier to unmould.

After we let it set in the fridge, it taste really soft & yummy. Thereafter, we happily packed & brought back home & i kept it in the fridge. As i wanted to bring it to the office to share with the folks on wed, I took out from the fridge to check on the texture on tues nite. To my horror... the snow skin already turned dry & hard.... sob.. sob :'(

Wondering what went wrong... could it be i used too much kou fen during the wrapping & moulding, or was it due to the proportion of the ingredient from the recipe?

This sat Ii shall try using the other recipe since i still got some paste in the fridge. We will not be making the baked mooncake as we have got mooncakes from nanny, plus i ordered 1 box of during mooncake.... will be too much for us to finish.

Sept Bbs Birthday Celebration

Finally, the 3rd birthday celebration for Evan together with his Ah Gong, Jek Jek & Kor Kor. They are all Sep babies... so is really fun to get them celebrate together... hehehe.. and this was also the Ah Gong, Jek Jek & Kor Kor 1st & the last AEROPLANE Birthday cake (from eCreative).

We had lots of BBQ foods catered from BBQ wholesaler - chicken wings, kebarb, satays, sting rays, lamb & other dishes like porridge, beehoon, roast duck, siewmai, cream puffs.. etc.

Everyone was happy & busy eating & giving ang baos to all the birthday boys & gal....

Prince 3 yrs old Birthday celebration - 2

15 Sep - actual Birthdate for Evan. I had long prepared to celebrate for him in the child care centre with his friends.

This round, i ordered the Bob the Builder cake from Polar & prepared the gift pack for his to distribute to his friends.

When i reached the centre, he just woke up from this afternoon nap. He was delighted when I showed him the cake & all the gifts. The teachers are busy arranging the tables & chairs after all kids woke up & tidy up their mattress, pillows, towels etc... except for 1 little boy still sleeping soundly .... & he actually slept throughout the whole celebration ;D

While all other kids were sitting at other 2 tables together, the birthday boy sat by himself at the other table... hmm.. he must be so happy & feeling so special that is his turn to sit on that "Emperor Seat"... haha.

After all the birthday songs, he kept blowing & blowing the candles but they just won't go off.... all the kids & teachers were laughing. Everyone was happy with the gift Evan distributed out & they happily eat their cake for the tea break except for 2 twin classmates because they are allergy to eggs... so i must take note to order eggless cake for his next yr Birthday.

Thereafter, we brought him to Downtown East Kids Explorer, Mini bowls, Mini Ferris Wheel ride, Train ride & he was so excited when we bumped into a Dinosaur & Elephant giving out ballons. We are happy that he enjoyed hisself on his birthday.

Prince Birthday Cake - Humpty Dumpty

This was my 2nd layered birthday cake. I used the same recipe as the 1st chocolate birthday cake with Chocolate ganache Bananas as the fillings. The sponge cake & the ganache recipe was from http://auntyyochana.blogspot.com/2008/01/chocolate-fudge-cake.html.

The most challenging part was for me to draw the Humpty Dumpty on the cake - special request from my Prince. With all the tools & ingredients i bought such as the colorings, piping jelly, whipping cream & the decoration nozzels, i started this project on the Fri night before this Sat celebration.

The chocolate sponge cake turned out to be fine though it sank after out of oven. I prepared the ganache, leave it to cool, slice the cake into 2 layers, spread a layer of ganache, assemble the sliced bananas & topped with 2nd layer of ganache. Covered the whole cake with whipping cream & finally the most challenging & fun part of the drawings.

Well i would say it was pretty good & cute with the Humpty dumpty holding ballons instead of falling off the wall ... ^-^

Prince was so happy when he first saw his Humptt dumpty cake & shy when everybody sang him the birthday song.... The cake was soon distributed out & i almost forgot to take a pic of a slice.

Evan has got lots of presents... got baseball set, fishing toy, another fishing toy, learning latop toyset, balls, wooden clock blocks, Lego etc... wow... i am wondering how to clear his old toy & keep all these new toys. These are not the last... there are more to come for his actual day birthday & 3rd celebration at the great-grandma hse this cmg sat.

Cinnamon Roll & Assorted Buns

I have not been successfull in making bread or bun recenty because the dough just wouldnt raised during proofing. I finally know who was the culprit... YEAST.

My both attempts got the same problem so i recall shirely told me about her stone bread due to the "inactive" yeast. This means that the yeast already "dead" so it doesn't proof at all. but my yeast was all the while kept in the fridge right after use unless it died during a power tripped happened abt 1-2 mths ago.

So i went to get a new instant yeast for my assorted buns.

I used Alex Goh's Sweet bun dough for Cinnamon rolls, Bak kwa/floss buns, Melon Pan & 1 suasage bun.

I was happy when i see the roll & buns raised & turn into BIG rolls & buns. This seems to be the most successfully attempt of my bun making.

Hub love the cinnamon roll & bak kwa but not for the melon pan because my top pastry was too thin & little after the buns raised almost triple its original size (once during the 2nd proofing & once during baking).