Busy as a BEEEEEEEEEE

I've had not been baking AT ALL for the past 2 weeks and have a very valid reason for doing so...

I've moved out of my house and is now temporarily staying in a SMALL rented apt... and when i say small, it really is! Basically I've only the kitchen and bedroom as living areas. i would say the greatest achievement is that I still managed to set up my oven and even my mixer in that small space... at least there's still a space for me to destress... or else i think i'll really go crazy. However, I'll be trying to bake tmr (being a PH)... but i've not tot of wad i shd attempt.

For now, it's back to work and trying to rest my stiff muscles! muahahaha....
excuse

DRATS rats....

YAY! the rat finally got caught! erm... no pics hor, hahaha... to spare everyone (including myself!). I dun even dare to go near the cage when i found it closed this morning. DH had the privilege of getting rid of it... (dun ask me HOW also.... i dun wanna know)...

will still keep the cage set in the kitchen.... juz in case.....

Spongecake Round liners....

Muahahaha.... abit lame i know... but i was thinking wad to name this post and suddenly "spongebob square pants" somehow popped up!

I wanted to use the paperlined spongecake recipe and cook it over the stove using my teddy-bear mould to see how it'll turn out. However, the cake when cooked turned out way too soft. I can't even remove it from the mould without breaking the bear into 2. So into the paper liners it went.... here's the pics....

Paper-lined sponge cakes

When i saw leelee's post of the paper-lined sponge cakes, it reminded me of the pack of paper cups i bought mths ago from daiso, wanting to bake the exact same thing! but somehow it got pushed back and the paper cups are still sitting in the cupboards. So deciding not to procrastinate further, i took out the cups and baking papers, getting it ready in 10 mins. went ahead to make the batter as well... resulting spongecake was so fragrant, soft and yummy that i have to stop myself for eating another one! here's how it looks....

ps : the rat has mysteriously disappeared! hmmmm....

An Update....

There's a HUGE rat in my house rite now... so I will not bake as much till I get that rat caught... wish me luck!

Baileys cheesecake....

Me bro came home one evening with a bottle of Baileys cream, with about 30% left. He passed it to me saying I can do wadever i wanna do with it... hm.... i'm only a social drinker... and in fact, hadn't touched alcohol for ages! (that only goes to show how my social life has been! hahaha)... anyway, back to the cheesecake....So looking thru' tons of recipes available on the net and forums, I came across a baileys cheesecake recipe. Well, it seems easy enuf for me to take on....

Everything went well enuf till it's left in the oven to cool down after baked. Was told that it's best to leave it in the oven till the oven cools down completely.... so 1 question popped into my mind... i tot it's only logical to leave the door ajar while cooling down... but i dunno if tat's the reason that caused a HUGE crack in the middle of the cake!!!! argh... there goes my perfect-looking cheesecake! so wad i did next was to loosen the sides of the cake, hoping that the crack will somehow "heal up" on it's own... i'm sad to report that.... it hadn't. so now i'm left with a cake with a huge crack... ok nehmine, since it was oredi like 10pm at nite (and i needed my beauty sleep). i decided to take it out and put in the fridge... so i took the cake out and it was still warm... i placed a clingwrap on the top, as i dun wan a harden cake surface the next day... who knows! my butter fingers decided to show it's powers. the clingwrap slipped from my fingers and fell rite onto the surface of the still-warm, wobbly cake surface!! argh x2! so now i have a crack on my cake and a severely de-faced cake too! SHITE... anyway, i proceeded with the wrap and went to bed.

8 hours later... i decided to be indulgent and have a slice of the cake for b'fast... also to take some pics and taste for myself how alcoholic it is.... due to the warm cake and clingwrap, water droplets had formed on the clingwrap... as much as i tried to be GENTLE in removing the wrap, water droplets had fallen onto the cake... sigh.... BUT it does taste good! and i'm not consoling myself here... the cake DOES taste good. and for that, i'll like to thank Stefanie for posting this recipe in IK. Thanks stef!

It's been somewad of an "adventure" baking this cake.... but it's a good lesson learnt! I did reduce the amt of sugar used... but it's juz a tiny lil' bit... i guess it's not a critical issue on the success of this cake.

Blueberries muffins

Needed to clear the fridge and found 2 boxes of blueberries in the freezer! So, blueberries muffins it shall be..... love the smell of blueberries when it's baking... makes me so hungry!
Recipe is again modified from the strawberries white chocolate muffins... here's how....

what you need

• 200gm plain flour
• 20gm corn flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 2 large eggs
• 120gm sugar
• 110gm butter
• 1/4tsp salt
• 2 tbsp yogurt
• 50ml milk
• 1 tsp almond extract
• blueberries.... the more the merrier!

what to do

• Preheat oven to 180C.
• Sift plain flour tog with corn flour and baking powder. Set aside.
• Mix milk and yogurt tog in a cup. Set aside.
• Cream the butter with sugar and salt till fluffy.
• Add in eggs one at a time.
• Add in almond essence. Mix till well combined.
• Fold in 1/2 of the flour into creamed butter.
• Add in 1/2 of the milk.yogurt mix and mix till combined.
• Fold in 1/2 of the remaining flour mix and combine.
• Pour remaining milk/yogurt into batter and combine.
• Lastly, add in last bit of flour into batter and combine.
• Also add in yr blueberries into the batter.
• Place batter into liners/muffin cups till 90% full.
• Bake at 180C for 25 mins.

Edited to add : Me Bro resurrected the camera! there's only one shot of the muffin now... more pics will come tmr.

I'm so in love now.....

Look at this!!!!! I L.O.V.E crusty breads... more so when it's just fresh from the oven!Made this country loaf for lunch as DD is down with flu. So I had to take urgent leave to take care of her. And she simply loves dipping her bread in soups... so why not a homemade loaf and some soup as a meal??

Here's the recipe with some adaptations of mine... original recipe is from Jo of Jo deli's.

What you need

• 400gm bread flour
• 100gm plain flour
• 60gm castor sugar
• 1tsp salt
• 20gm milk powder
• 5gm dry yeast
• 1 egg
• 220gm milk (i used low fat)
• 1tsp bread improver (i omitted this 'coz it had been so long since i last baked bread that my bread improver's gone mouldy!!!!)
• 60gm butter (soft, room temp)
• 1/2 cup raisins (plump up in some hot water)
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Topping

• coarse granulated sugar
• butter

What to do

• Combine both flours, castor sugar, milk powder, instant yeast, egg, milk and bread improver in a mixing bowl. Use the dough hook of yr mixer to knead the mixture at low speed (speed 1 for KA).
• When the ingredients are just combined, add in the salt and continue to knead for abt 8 mins until a smooth dough is formed.
• Add in butter. Use a medium-low speed (speed 2 for KA) to continue kneading the dough for 10 mins. Increase to a higher speed (speed 3 for KA) for another 10 mins. Dough shd be smooth, elastic and pull away from the sides of the mixing bowl.
• Form dough into a bowl. Grease the mixing bowl with butter and leave the dough to poof for 60mins or until double the size with a clingwrap cover.
• Punch the dough down and divide into 2 portions. Roll out dough into a rectangle and spread the raisins and walnuts on it. Roll up swiss-roll style.
• Do the same for the other portion and place the dough into greased baking tins and again poof for another 30mins.
• After 20mins, preheat yr oven to 220C. When dough is ready for baking, spread some butter on top of dough and sprinkle coarse sugar on it.
• Place baking tins in oven and lower the temp to 200C. Bake for abt 30mins.

Enjoy yr country loaf .....x'cuse me while I enjoy go my lunch now!

Egg sponge cakes aka. 鸡蛋糕

The mould for these little cuties is from Taipei. Can be used over the stove top or oven-baked. The recipe given on the box, however is in japanese... so I went searching on the net to find another recipe I can use... meanwhile, I'll copy the jap recipe and ask my friend if I happen to meet her!

Here's some pics.

I'm not posting the recipe here as it has a bitter aftertaste... I really can't figure out why it is so.... does sponge gel taste bitter? .... hmmm... I'll probably have better luck with the recipe on the packaging.

Edited to add : I made some again this morning, minus the sponge gel and vanillin in the recipe. Instead I added vanilla essence. The texture turned out to be dense, unlike the previous attempt which I used sponge gel. And the bitter taste is not there anymore! well, well... guess I've to keep on experimenting! who knows a simple recipe like this needs so much looking into!

Finally, it smiled!

My last attempt on making fa-gaos wasn't successful... tho' taste-wise it was good... soft and fluffy. But seeing so many other forumers friends managed to make theirs so beautifully, I decided I must give it a try again.

This time round, I decided to use the mixer to ensure that the ingredients are evenly distributed and well combined.

Here's the recipe that I used... tho' I still added abit more liquid than specified here 'coz the batter looked abit too thick when mixing and I'm sorry that I din make any measurements but added some tap water to it to "diluted" the batter abit more.

What you need

• 250gm self-raising flour (sifted)
• 140gm brown sugar
• 240gm coconut milk

What to do

• Sift self-raising flour with brown sugar into yr mixing bowl.
  I was super kaisu, so I actually sifted the mixture twice!
• Turn on mixer and mix the flour and sugar together.
• Add in the coconut milk to the flour. If you see that the batter is too thick, add some more liquid. In my case, I bought a small pack of coconut milk, but it din measure up to 240gm, so I added UHT milk to it, to bring the weight to 240gm. However, I added MORE liquid, in the form of tap water, to the batter along the way, as it look abit too thick. In the end, I achieved a ribbon-stage for the batter.
• Pour batter into cups or liners 90% full. Steam at HIGH fire for at least 10 mins. DO NOT OPEN COVER of steamer in the process. You can check the fa-gaos after 10 mins.

My fav brownies.....

Altho' I like eating brownies, I dun set about looking for a fav recipe.... and in my opinion,brownies go best with ice -cream or a glass of milk, tho' I seldom do that, I just pop one into my mouth as and when i feel like it! hah...

I chanced upon this brownies recipe in the Hershey site long-time ago, and it always dun disappoint. The recipe is so versatile and easy to work on... u dun even need a mixer! The resulting brownie is the cake-like type, with fine crumbs and u can juz addd anything u want into the batter, be it nuts or raisins or chocolates! For this batch, I added walnuts and white chocolate chips... yum!

What you need

• 1 cup butter (melted)
• 1 cup sugar (original recipe called for 2 cups!! i found it way too sweet)
• 4 eggs
• 2 tspsvanilla essence
• 3/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1cup chopped nuts (optional)
• 1/2 cup white choclate chip (optional)

What to do

• Preheat oven to 180C. Line a 8x8in baking tin with greaseproof paper (u can also use a 13x9in tin and resulting brownies will be short).
• Melt butter over the stove or microwave oven. Stir in sugar while butter is still warm. Add in vanilla essence at this stage too.
• Add eggs, one @ a time and mixed till incorporated.
• Add in cocoa powder, beat till well blended. (I used an egg beater thru'out).
• Sift flour with baking powder and salt, beat till well incorporated.
• Stir in nuts and chips at this stage. Then pour batter into prepared tin.
• Bake @ 180C for abt 35mins. Frost (with chocolate!!!) if desired.
• Cut into desired size.