Have been eyeing on this recipe for a long time and i finally get my hands on it. I had some left over cream cheese in the fridge so i decided to make some bailey's cream cheese frosting. I will usually cut down on the amount of sugar. However, there is no need to cut down on the sugar level. The cake isnt too sweet because of the volume of coffee and bailey's. Well, I will personally prefer a stronger bailey's taste. One more thing, I halved the recipe and still baked in an 8X8 inch cake tin because i didnt have enough butter. Just that the cake is slightly lower than the one in the original recipe.



The powdered sugar frosting seemed to seep into cake or sth. It turned brown the next day.

Ingredients ( Adapted from here)

125g grams plain flour

5/8  teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
47.5 grams natural cocoa powder
150 grams sugar
125 ml (1 cup) brewed strong coffee, can be hot or at room temperature
112.5 grams butter, chopped, can be cold or at room temperature
187.5  ml Baileys Irish Cream
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 160 degrees Celsius. Butter a 8 x 8 x 3 inch tin and line the bottom with baking parchment / paper. Set aside.

Measure the plain flour, baking soda and salt in a small bowl. Whisk the mixture with a wire whisk to distribute the baking soda and salt evenly.

In a small pot, measure the cocoa powder and sugar. Add in the coffee and butter. Heat the mixture on medium heat, and whisk frequently until all the butter has melted, and the cocoa powder and sugar has dissolved. Pour the cocoa-coffee into a large mixing bowl and let it rest for 10 minutes to cool down.

Stir in the Baileys. Crack in one egg into the cocoa-coffee mixture and whisk it in until it has been fully incorporated. Whisk in the second egg then whisk in the vanilla extract.

Sift in the flour mixture and whisk in gently until all the flour has been incorporated. The cake batter will be thin (very liquidy) and bubbly (because of the reaction between the baking soda and the cocoa powder). Pour the cake batter into the prepared tin. Lift up the tin and drop it on the table counter-top gently 3 to 5 times to remove excess air bubbles.

Bake the cake for 1/2h. Cover the top of the cake with aluminum foil and continue baking for 15 minutes until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake come out with very little crumbs.Place the cake tin on a wire rack and let it cool completely.

Slice, dust with icing sugar, and serve!

Ever heard of the stall yummy chiffon? I always buy yoghurt chiffon cake whenever i patronized the stall. I am a fan of yoghurt and yoghurt chiffon cake is definitely something i have always been wanting to bake since a long while. Instead of the usual chiffon cakes like Pandan and Orange chiffon cake, i decided to try something new and I ended up with a Cranberry yoghurt chiffon cake. however, i found this recipe slightly too eggy for me. The original recipe called for lemon zest and lemon juice. But i didnt have them on hand. So i substituted with orange zest and orange juice.

Recipe: (Original recipe adapted from here) :

5 Egg yolks
40g Caster sugar
65g Canola oil/salad oil
2 tsp orange juice
130g Natural yogurt
130g Plain flour (sifted)
orange zest from one orange
7 Egg whites
90g Caster sugar
95g Dried cranberries (cut to small pieces & sprinkle with 1/2 tbsp flour)

• In a large bowl, mix egg yolks, sugar and oil well with a hand whisk. Add lemon juice, lemon zest and yogurt into it, mix well again.


• Whisk egg whites till frothy, gradually add in the sugar in batches, mix well. Continue beating till egg whites are stiff but not dry.


• Use a hand whisk to mix 1/3 egg whites with mixture.


• Gently fold in the rest with a rubber spatula till well combined.


• Lastly gently fold in the cranberries pieces into mixture.


• Spoon batter into the cake mould up to 3/4 full evenly and bake at 180C for 15 mins, then lower temperature to 160 for another 20 mins or skewer comes out clean.


• Invert cake immediately on a wire rack to cool completely before unmoulding.

 

Red velvet cupcake is one of my favourite cupcake of all time. Loving the cream cheese frosting. So far, the best red velvet cupcake i've tasted is the one from 12 cupcakes. I've baked red velvet so many times, yet i still cant get it right. Tricky one indeed. This time round is pretty different from my previous attempt: Red velvet cupcake with cream cheese filling. The texture of the cake for the previous attempt is more like a sponge cake, this time round's was slightly more compact than the previous time. Got my recipe from baking addiction this time. Oh well, both are not what i am looking for. But the frosting this time round is able to stand more firmly than the previous time. I substituted part of butter in the frosting recipe with shortening. Still very sweet  though. i am always unable to get te cream cheese frosting right.  For some reasons, my frosting is always not white. It is somehow slightly yellow (and idk why. Is it because of the butter?). If you have any tips or good recipes for red velvet cupcakes, i'll be more than happy if you will share with me. Thank you! :>

Specially baked this for Woon's birthday. Decided not to waste my left over heavy cream that i used to make the chocolate ganache since i have to finish using them in five days. Really easy recipe. No oven involved. All you need is the fridge.

Ingredients: ( makes about 14 truffles) 

250g of good quality chocolate

1/3 cup of heavy cream

1tbsp of sugar

Steps:

- Heat up the heavy cream.

- Add sugar and chocolate into heavy cream when it is simmering.

- Stir with a spoon until the mixture is well blended and smooth. Pour in a bowl.

- Refrigerate for 4-5 hours/overnight until set.

- use a spoon to roll them into balls and coat with cocoa powder or any desired topping like nuts etc..

- Best: Serve cold.

Been ages since i last used the oven. Up till now, i am still baking with my broken oven. The front piece of glass came off so I have to get someone to fix it back. I was thinking of using 3M tape to stick it back but ... HMMM. I have been wanting to try making chocolate ganache for forever but too lazy to buy heavy cream since i have to travel ALL THE WAY TO PHOON HUAT just to get heavy cream. I have tried to make chocolate ganache for a few times but they were pretty fail. My very first time: COMPLETE FAILURE. Although this time isn't perfect yet but at least there were improvements. The trick is to use heavy cream. NOT thickened cream. I used thickened cream for my first attempt and that explained why it was so liquified. To make ganache, you should get cream of at least 38% fat content.  But supermarkets hardly sell heavy cream. I have never seen heavy cream sold in supermarkets, even the higher end ones. So do not  just simply substitute thickened cream for heavy cream. Abandon that misconception. They are DIFFERENT. To double confirm, check the fat content, you'll never go wrong with that. Made this with my favourite chocolate cake recipe. So far, i have been using that chocolate recipe for my chocolate cupcakes. Just make some slight changes here and there.



Recipe: 

Cupcake: [ Makes about 12 small cupcakes or 6 medium cupcakes]

45 grams all purpose flour
10 grams good quality Dutch-processed cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking powder ( As this is a really low cake, I added slightly more baking powder )
Pinch of salt
55 grams good quality dark chocolate, roughly chopped
100 grams unsalted butter, can be cold or at room temperature
90 grams caster sugar
2 eggs

- Preheat the oven to 175 degrees Celsius.

- Measure the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt in a small bowl. Use a wire whisk and whisk the dry ingredients together until they are all well-mixed and evenly distributed.

- Measure the dark chocolate and unsalted butter in a large heatproof bowl and melt them over a pot of simmering water, stirring occasionally. Alternatively, you can microwave them under medium high heat at 15-25s interval. Stirring during each interval.

- Remove the heatproof bowl from the pot/microwave. Add in the caster sugar and whisk gently – not all of the sugar will dissolve. Mixture’ll be a little grainy Let the mixture stand for 10 minutes to cool down slightly (the eggs will scramble if added to a hot mixture).

- Crack in one egg into the chocolate mixture. Whisk the mixture (yes, same wire whisk!) for 30 seconds until it is fully incorporated. Whisk in the second egg, and then whisk in the vanilla extract.

- Sift a third of flour mixture into the chocolate batter and folding gently using a large metal spoon or rubber spatula. until all the dry ingredients have been incorporated

- Bake for about 15 mins ( for small size cupcakes).

- Let it cool before you top with the chocolate Ganache.

Chocolate Ganache:

Ingredients: ( I'll update this when i get home) 

Heavy cream

Chocolate

2 tbsp of honey ( optional. For glossy appearance)

 

Chocolate is our all time favourite but at times when we are going for something lighter and refreshing, do consider strawberry cupcake! I baked this together with Green Tea Cupcakes for Wanping's 19th! I love this cupcake. Its moist, light and fluffy. The strawberry frosting tasted like icecream.

Recipe ( Adapted from Cupcakes with attitude- makes 12-13 cupcakes) 

cupcake
Cake flour- 165g
Baking powder 1 tsp
Salt 1/4 tsp
Strawberries 100g
Full cream milk 4 tbsp
vanilla extract 1 tsp
Butter 125g
sugar 180 g
Egg 1 large
Egg White  ( from 2 large eggs)

Steps:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees celcius
2. Sift flour, baking powder, salt tgt
3. Process strawberries in a blender to get 100g of puree
combine milk, vanilla extract and strawberry puree in a small bowl and set aside
4. Cream Butter in an electric mixer for a few mins and gradually add sugar and continue to beat until well combined
5. Add egg and \egg whites
6. Add half the mixture prepared in 2, followed by strawberry mixture in 4. COntinue beating and add the remaining flour mixture and continue to bat until batter is well mixed.
7. spoon batter into cupcake and bake for 20-25 mins.
8. Remove cupcakes from tray and place them o a cooling rack to cool.
9. Pipe strawberry buttercream on top of cupcakes and top with slices of strawberries.

 

Frosting:

Strawberries- 50g
Butter-62.5 g
Shorterning 62.5g
Salt a pinch
VANILLA EXTRACT 1/4 tsp
ICING SUGAR 200G

1. Process strawberries in blender to get 4 tbsp of strawberries puree and set aside.
2. Beat butter/Vegetable shortening for 2-3 mins and set aside.
3. Add icing sugar and mix until ingredients are well combined.
4. Gradually add pureed strawberry 1 tbsp at a time and stop until you achieved the desired consistency.

Last week was insane- when midterms, presentations and assignments was all due at one go. Work really drained my energy away. I was desperately in need of sleep for the past week. After mid terms ended, my first to-do-checklist was to bake something for wp for her birthday that was long overdue. Flipping through my books, i decided to settle with some Green Tea Cupcakes ( since my new green tea powder is going to expire in a mth) and strawberry cupcakes. The frosting was made of mascarpone cheese which was pretty interesting yea. Mascarpone cheese was often used to make tiramisu but frosting? This is my first time coming across such stuff. I am sure to bake this again, but with some slight changes to the recipe the next time. I want my frosting to stand stiff on the cake and not so "fluidish". Thinking of adding some heavy cream to the frosting. Oh well, i am not so sure too but i shall update this again when i re-make. Nevertheless, my friends finished all of them in no time.!!


Recipe- ( adapted from Cupcakes with attitude- makes 11-12cupcakes)

Cupcake

Self Raising flour - 175g
Green Tea powder- 2tsp
Salt- a pinch
Caster Sugar- 125g
Vegetable Oil- 125ml
Eggs- 2 large
Vanilla Extract- 1 tsp
Full cream milk- 4 tbsp

Frosting: 

Mascarpone cheese 125g
Icing Sugar 50g

Steps: 

1. Preheat Oven to 180 degree Celsius. Line Muffin tray with cupcake liners.
2. Sift flour, Green tea powder and salt together in a bowl and set aside.
3. Beat Sugar, oil and eggs in an electric mixer until smooth. Add Vanilla extract.
4. Gradually add flour mixture prepared in step 2, alternating with milk. Do not overbeat-stop immediately once everything has been well combined.
5. Spoon batter into cupcake liners. Bake for about 20 mins or until a toothpick inserted into the centre of cakes and comes out clean.
6. Remove from oven and let cupcakes st in muffin for 5 mins.
7. Beat mascarpone cheese and half the sugar in an electric mixer until soft and creamy. taste and add more sugar as desired.
7. Slather a thick layer of mascarpone frosting on top of cupcakes and dust over green tea powder.

As promised, the recipe for these raspberry friands. I made about 20 mini friands with this recipe. My raspberries were pretty sour but they kinda balanced the slightly overpowering sweetness.

Recipe: ( original recipe )

• Melted butter, to grease


• Plain flour, to dust


• 90g (1 1/2 cups) pure icing sugar, sifted


• 37.5(1/2 cup) plain flour, sifted


• 77.7 (1 1/2 cups) almond meal


• 1.5 eggs, lightly whisked


• 90g unsalted butter, melted, cooled


• 50g frozen raspberries


• 1 tbs flaked almonds


• Icing sugar, to dust

1. preheat oven to 180°C. Brush thirty 40ml-capacity mini muffin pans with melted butter to grease. Dust with plain flour.
2. Combine the sugar, flour and almond meal in a bowl. Make a well in the centre. Add egg and butter. Stir until well combined.
3. Divide among the prepared pans. Divide the raspberries among the centres. Sprinkle with the flaked almonds.
4. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until light golden. Set aside in the pans for 5 minutes to cool slightly before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.
5. Dust the friands with icing sugar to serve.



Packed these to sch for my friends. ^^

I hv been pretty busy with school lately that i haven been baking for eons. I remembered that i used to bake at least thrice a week and sometimes even at strange hours at night despite having work the next day. I could spend the entire day at home or journey home from work googling for recipes on safari, food blog hopping and bookmarking the mouthwatering recipes. But now, i hardly step into the kitchen.

I dont know where my sudden enthusiasm came from, but i decided to bake tonight. Knowing that Johnny loves raisins, i decided to bake a Raisin Butter Cake for him. My raisins still sank to the bottom despite coating them with a table spoon of flour. Anyone knows where problem lies? I guess i'll probably try mixing the raisins with the sifted flour and fold them into the batter together the next time. Some people suggested to soak the raisins in water/any juice or alcohol ( rum/brandy) for a few minutes to plump these raisins up. Please let me know how it goes if anyone attempts this! I only realized that i missed out the milk only when my cake was sitting in the oven. Well, such things didnt happen for the first time. There was once i forgot to add yeast to the bread batter and left it to proof for a good 2-3 hours. My mind crashed when i discovered that the volume of the batter did not double. I managed to somehow salvage it, not entirely though. But it was still edible. Thankfully, the cake still turned out pretty good with the absence of milk. It wasnt dry at all. I guess if you are going for a super moist butter cake, you could substitute the milk with yoghurt.

I made several changes from the original recipe. The original recipe makes double of this. Double of this recipe requires 40 mins. However, when i checked mine (half of original recipe) at 20 mins, it was still uncooked. I suppose butter cakes take a longer time to cook. I once attempted a marble cake and it failed terribly because some parts were undercooked and the liquid batter literally oozed out when i sliced my marble cake into half. In all, my Raisin Butter Cake took about 30-35 mins.

Edited Recipe: ( Original recipe adapted from Rasa Malaysia )

Ingredients: Makes 1 loaf

125g unsalted butter, at room temperature
100g cake flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
80g castor sugar
2 eggs
4 tsp salt
2 tablespoons fresh milk
1/4 teaspoon vanilla essence
1/4 cup raisins + 1 tablespoon all purpose flour (mix together)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 190°C
2. Lightly grease the pan with some butter.
3. Mix the flour and the baking powder together and sieve. Add in salt and mix well. Set aside.
4. Use an electronic beater to mix butter and sugar until well combined or pale yellow in color. (Note: Sugar has not dissolved yet).
5. Add in the first egg. Beat well after each addition of egg until creamy.
6. Scrape down the sides for even mixing.
7. Add in vanilla essence and mix well.
8. Fold in the flour into the mixture and mix well.
9. Finally, add in the milk and fold in the raisins. Mix well.
10. Pour the mixture into the greased baking pan. Shake it lightly to distribute cake mixture evenly.
11. Bake until golden brown and cooked, about 30-35 minutes. Use a cake tester to test if it’s cooked.
12. Remove it from the oven and let cool on the wire rack for another 5 minutes. Serve warm.

Besides oreo cupcakes, I baked bailey cupcakes for my colleagues on my last day of work. I found them a little too sweet for my liking. Nevertheless, they were all gone within mins! But again, cupcakes are meant to be sweet right? HAHA. I baked them the day before and the cakes were still pretty moist the next day. If you dont really fancy sweet stuff, I recommend that you reduce the sugar level of the cake. Dont forget that the bailey frosting is sweet too. Sweet cake + sweet frosting= MEGASUGARKILL.


CAKE
Ingredients: ( Makes 6 medium cupcakes)
45 grams all purpose flour
10 grams good quality Dutch-processed cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking powder ( As this is a really low cake, I added slightly more baking powder )
Pinch of salt
55 grams good quality dark chocolate, roughly chopped
100 grams unsalted butter, can be cold or at room temperature
90 grams caster sugar ( I cut to 75g and it's still too sweet for my liking)
2 eggs
Bailey Irish cream ( Up to own preference.  I cant rmb how much i added but i added them in tablespoons and tasted them accordingly to achieve desired taste.)

- Preheat the oven to 175 degrees Celsius.
- Measure the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt in a small bowl. Use a wire whisk and whisk the dry ingredients together until they are all well-mixed and evenly distributed.
- Measure the dark chocolate and unsalted butter in a large heatproof bowl and melt them over a pot of simmering water, stirring occasionally. Alternatively, you can microwave them under medium high heat at 15-25s interval. Stirring during each interval.
- Remove the heatproof bowl from the pot/microwave. Add in the caster sugar and whisk gently – not all of the sugar will dissolve. Mixture’ll be a little grainy Let the mixture stand for 10 minutes to cool down slightly (the eggs will scramble if added to a hot mixture).
- Crack in one egg into the chocolate mixture. Whisk the mixture (yes, same wire whisk!) for 30 seconds until it is fully incorporated. Whisk in the second egg, and then whisk in the bailey irsh cream.
- Sift a third of flour mixture into the chocolate batter and folding gently using a large metal spoon or rubber spatula. until all the dry ingredients have been incorporated
- transfer the cake batter into the lined muffin tin.
- Bake for 18-20 minutes until the top bounces back when touched lightly and a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Baileys frosting:

Ingredients:
- Veg shortening 60g
- Butter 40g
- sifted Icing sugar  100g
- Baileys Irish Cream ( prolly about 3-6 tbsps? it depends on your own preference)

- Beat veg shortening in electric mixer for about 2-3 mins on medium speed.
- Add in Bailey Irish Cream
- Add icing sugar and continue beating until all ingredients are well combined
- Gradually add water to achieve desire consistency. (optional)

 Ops. The frosting is almost the same height as the cake. HAHAHA.