Coffee Cake & Checkerboard Cake

I am in love with this basic sponge cake from Cuoca... It is amazingly light and delicious, you can eat it on its own, and it works magically as any birthday cake base... The feel you cut into it is just as what you get from outside... and yet it is only achieved with pure eggs, sugar, vanilla extract, melted butter and cake flour! Yes, no baking powder, no ovalette, no additives, no enhancers AT ALL!!! 

I have been using the same recipe since the first time when I did the green tea swiss roll. And, it turns out beautifully each time! Almost zero shrinkage and the crumb structure inside is amazingly fine, yet is strong enough to withstand movement even after it has been sliced thinly. 

I have tried making checkerboard cake for orders and look at the black and white cake. Just play around with the basic vanilla sponge recipe and you can make a hundred flavours just by changing the ingredients. 

Look at the very fine crumb structure! Its definitely something that I have been searching for the past 2 years and finally got it!!! Sooooo very the HAPPY!

Easily handled... no breakage while maintaining its soft-as-silk texture

Viola~ Transformed into a Monchhichi cake! LOVE IT!!! Best thing is, everyone LOVES the cake! And has amazing compliments for it.... :) Contented....

Christmas Cake Bake-Off Crumb Boss : Cranberry Orange Cardamom Bundt

Cranberry Orange Cardamom Bundt   



Ingredients:

• 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 4 ounces cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cup packed light brown sugar
• 4 large eggs, room temperature
• 3/4 cup sour cream
• 2 tablespoons grated orange zest
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 1 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp ground cardamom
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 cups dried sweetened cranberries
• 4 ounces chopped white chocolate
• 3/4 cup toasted chopped walnuts
• 1/2 tsp powdered sugar
• 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C. Spray Bundt Pan with cooking spray and flour it, tapping away excess. Oil it very well so it doesn't stick to the pan after baking. Cream the butter, cream cheese, sugar and brown sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer on high speed until light and fluffy. Decrease the speed to medium and add in eggs, on at a time, sour cream, orange zest and vanilla. Scrape down the bowl as needed. Mix batter well.
Sift flour, cornstarch, baking soda, cardamom and salt together in a medium mixing bowl. With the mixer on low speed, add flour mixture to the butter mixture, mixing just to combine. Fold in cranberries, white chocolate and walnuts. Pour batter into prepared pan, pushing batter in all crevices with a spatula and smooth top. Gently tap the batter on center rack and bake 50-55 minutes, until a wooden pick comes out almost clean. There may be a few moist crumbs.
Remove cake from oven when done and cool on wire rack for 10 minutes. Invert cake onto cake pedestal or wire rack and cool completely.

Serving recommendations:
A perfect and gorgeous table centerpiece, this Cranberry Orange Cardamom cake is wonderful for breakfast, lunch or dinner dessert! It is fabulous with a dollop of fresh cinnamon spiced whipped cream or a scoop of vanilla bean or cinnamon ice cream.

 Recipe courtesy of Nordic Ware

There is a contest on Crumb Boss page for Christmas cake! And the prize is very enticing!

 

 And so I had my go at it....

 Hope I win! :)) Wishful thinking!

Eggless Chocolate Cake Base

 Filling: Dark Cherries filling, whipped cream.

Eggless Chocolate Cake - Gayatrivathillu.com
 

This is a super simple recipe and it taste absolutely great! Moist, fluffy and spongy... makes a great cake base...if only I had the chance to test it out and change it to vanilla...

Eggless Chocolate Cake - Gayatrivathillu.com

Ingredients for the Cake: (makes 1 x 7” cake layer or 4 standard cupcakes)

• Maida (AP Flour / Cake Flour) – 3/4Cup (110gms)
• Cocoa Powder – 1 1/2tbsps (15gms)
• Baking Soda – 1/2tsp (3gms)
• Icing Sugar – 80gms
• Salt – 1/4tsp
• Oil – 2 1/2tbsps (24gms)
• White Vinegar – 1/2tbsp (8gms)
• Vanilla Essence – 1/2tsp
• Chilled Soda Water – 1/2Cup or 100 ml

Sift dry ingredients together and ensure that they are well mixed in a large bowl with a whisk. add in wet ingredients (except the soda) and mix it well. DO NOT OVERMIX if using AP flour. Add in Soda last and stir till combined. Pour into baking tin and bake in preheated oven 180 deg C for 15-20mins.

http://www.gayatrivantillu.com/recipes-2/bakers-corner-1/egglesschocolatepastries

Red Bean Cake for a red bean lover

This was ordered by a customer for her sister who loves red beans to death. The top pic is my creation and the bottom one is the picture she has sent to me... something that she might like... I was planning to do 100% like that... She wanted a 7" one, but somehow I only have a 10" cake square "ring", so I decided to do the 10" and trim off the rest for the others to taste. I did a trial beforehand and used a 7" round mould, and used half a packet of red beans. Yesterday, when I was doing the actual cake, I actually didn't notice that its alot bigger and I used about abit more than half pack of red beans... it didn't turn out to be enough! So I decided to fill the bottom with the red bean paste, and the top to be red bean mousse... turns out quite nice actually! So here's the recipe! You will basically need a vanilla/yellow sponge cake and to cut it into 2 layers for this. Can always use the yummilicious crumb boss's vanilla cake! Bake it in a 10" cake tin.

Red Bean Red Bean I love you Cake

Ingredients (For a 9" Square)

About 300-400g red beans (soak overnight, cook until soft abt 2hrs, drain and save the soup for jelly use, add sugar to taste and fry the red beans in the pan until little liquid left - almost dries up)

1 x 10" Vanilla cake cut into 2 slices


Red Bean Filling
Coconut Milk                      200ml
Jelly Powder                        2 tbsp
Agar agar powder                2 tsp
Sugar                                    2 tbsp or to taste
3/4 of the red bean paste

Hoon Kueh flour                 60g
Red bean soup                     100ml

Red bean mousse: 
Whipping cream                  1 cup
Gelatine powder                   3 tsp melt in a little cold water in microwave (do not boil!)
1/4 of the red bean paste

Red Bean Jelly: 
Reserved red bean soup        500ml
Sugar                                     To taste
Jelly powder                          80-100g (if you like it softer or harder)
Red colouring (optional)       1 drop

Mix coconut milk, jelly powder, agar agar powder, sugar together and bring to a boil. Mix hoon kueh flour with red bean soup and stir it in to the boiling mixture and continue to boil for about 30 sec till thick. Add in 3/4 of the cooked red bean paste and stir till well combined. Leave to cool.

Put the gelatine into a small bowl and put in a little water, just enough to cover the gelatine and let it bloom for a few seconds. Put in microwave for about 10 sec to dissolve. DO NOT BOIL. Gelatine will lose its power once its above 60 deg C! Whip up the whipping cream until stiff, add in the red bean paste and gelatine and continue to whip till combined.

Assemble the cake. Put first layer of cake into the cake ring (place a cake board underneath!), scoop the cooled red bean filling and spread evenly. put on the next cake layer, and fill in the red bean mousse and spread very evenly, leaving space for red bean jelly to come on top later. Cover with cling wrap and put into the fridge to chill until set and mousse is firm to touch.

Put in all the ingredients for Red Bean Jelly and bring to a boil. Once it is not so hot, remove cake from fridge and pour it over the top of the cake and let it set further in the fridge, about 3hrs at least.

Unmoulding - put a small sharp knife in hot water and then run it through the insides of the cake to separate it from the mould. Slowly remove the ring. Trim off the sides with a sharp and warmed knife, cleaning the knife after each cut and rewarming it in hot water (to ensure clean cut). Decorate as you like. I made red beans and deco out of fondant as per pic! Its all up to your imagination!

Its soooo delicious!

Enjoy!

Hokkaido chiffon cupcakes 北海道牛奶蛋糕

Saw this Hokkaido Cupcakes on sale and they look interesting... I searched the internet and was so glad to find this from nasi lemak lover. I tried it immediately... Followed all the ingredients closely and wahlah... the eventual product is divine!!! It puffs up alot during the baking, and I was expecting it to sink alot during cooling... however, the shrinking was really minimal... perhaps I beat the eggs really well... since there was no levening agents or baking powder used. I changed some of the descriptors from the nasi lemak lover version though.

Hokkaido chiffon cupcakes 北海道牛奶蛋糕
(recipe source: adapted from Forbidden Garden with minor changes)
*makes 9 cupcakes

 

Chiffon cake

3 egg yolks

20g sugar
35g corn oil
60g milk
70g cake flour

3 egg whites
25g sugar


Filling
60g dairy whipping cream
10g sugar
1tsp instant custard powder


Icing sugar, for dusting


Method
1. Pre-heat oven to 170C.
2. Arrange paper liners on baking tray.
3. Whisk egg yolk and sugar with electric whisk till pale in colour.
4. Add in corn oil and milk, mix well.
5. Sift in cake flour, stir to combine.
6. Beat egg white until foamy, gradually add sugar, and continue beat till soft peak forms.
7. Take 1/3 of egg white and use a hand whisk to mix into egg yolk batter.
8. Fold in the balance egg white with a spatula/whisk till well combine.
9. Scoop batter into pre-arranged paper liners to about ¾ full.
10. Bake for 20-25 mins at middle rack.
11. Beat whipping cream with sugar till firm and stiff (over a bowl of iced water).
12. Add in custard powder, mix well.
13. Pipe custard cream into fully cooled cupcake and dust with icing sugar. Refrigerate before serving.

No Fail Sturdy Sugar Cookies

I needed a sturdy cookie recipe to make this diabolo cookie...

 

It wasn't really meant to look like this as I planned to connect the 2 pieces with a straw and then cover that part with modeling chocolate and then cover it with silver edible dust. However, after coming back from JB grocery trip in the morning, I was left with little time to accomplish the project. Finally, I couldn't even have enough time to wait for the chocolate coating to set... and instead of packing into separate bags, I can only put it into the cake box. However, from there I found this amazing sugar cookie recipe... which is super delicious and sturdy, and really can withstand stress. No chilling of the dough is required and it can be used immediately. Its not a sticky dough and I would recommend you do not over-mix the flour. Recipe adopted from here. Its a damn good recipe and I'm definitely going to use it again and again...

No-Fail Sugar Cookies

6 cups flour
3 tsp. baking powder
2 cups butter
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract or desired flavoring (I like almond myself)
1 tsp. salt

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla. Mix well. Mix dry ingredients and add a little at a time to butter mixture. Mix until flour is completely incorporated and the dough comes together.

Chill for 1 to 2 hours (or see Hint below) - I don't find this necessary.

Roll to desired thickness and cut into desired shapes. Bake on ungreased baking sheet at 350 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes or until just beginning to turn brown around the edges. This recipe can make up to 5-dozen 3” cookies.

HINT: Rolling Out Dough Without the Mess -- Rather than wait for your cookie dough to chill, take the freshly made dough and place a glob between two sheets of parchment paper. Roll it out to the desired thickness then place the dough and paper on a cookie sheet and pop it into the refrigerator. Continue rolling out your dough between sheets of paper until you have used it all. By the time you are finished, the first batch will be completely chilled and ready to cut. Reroll leftover dough and repeat the process! An added bonus is that you are not adding any additional flour to your cookies.

The cookies are decorated with Royal Icing.

Royal Icing

3 3/4 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
3 T meringue powder
6 T warm water

Beat 4 to 5 minutes.
By hand, stir in optional flavorings and desired tints.

Experimenting with Optima Flour

I finally laid my hands on a pack of this Optima flour. Its a flour with all the industrial use leveners, emulsifiers, chemicals etc in it. And it was labelled as the legendary NO FAIL Sponge cake mix. 

It contains everything... even sugar... so there's no need to even add sugar. 

What we need to do is... add eggs, water, and oil. I followed the swiss roll from AuntyYochana's blogsite... where she has famous swiss rolls made to perfection. I have never stopped exploring how to achieve the soft and fluffy texture of the Polar Sugar (Swiss) Roll...After doing loads of research long ago and never been able to confirm my hypothesis, I decided to try it out.

Opened and the flour is white and sparkly... I guess its from the sugar crystals? And I smelled it... it smells kinda weird... like baking soda and a little plasticky?? Other than that it looks OK.

Directions were to add eggs and water to the flour mixture, with yochana's recipe, a teaspoon of ovalett is required, so I put as per recipe. Then, whisk the mixture until its white and thick... and then add in the oil and vanilla essence and bake it... for the swiss roll, I'm doing it at 200 deg for about 11mins. 

That's the resultant sponge sheet. Not expecting it to be that super fragile, I tried flipping it over onto a sugared baking paper, and it crumbles into pieces. I fixed it and decided to make another one. I made 1/3 batch of buttercream and used it for 2 rolls.

My knife wasn't that good so I didn't manage to do such a clean cut...and I didn't put as much sugar cos scared too sweet... I took a bite and chewed... instantly... POLAR SUGAR ROLL appears right in my mind. That is it. Mystery solved. That is EXACTLY what the sugar rolls taste and feels like. Its nothing like what we can do at home with the natural ingredients without putting in all these chemical agents. The flour was crazy priced at $5 a pack (compared to $2.25 normal flour). As I eat and enjoy the wonderful texture, I can't help but picturing how much chemical goes into this...and other pastries in the commercial bakeries... I will definitely carry on making cakes and pastries the old fashioned way.