Chocolate Sponge Cups

My kids bring food for school recess almost everyday. They prefer homemade and homecooked food rather than eating canteen food.

I made these one fine afternoon and my kids raved about them. It's the first time I'm recording this attempt down as I always make them without a fixed recipe. I just put in whatever I feel like putting.

Torch Ginger Chiffon Cake

First of all, I know it sounds weird. Very weird to use Torch Ginger in a chiffon cake.

Few weeks back, I was in Taiwan, and I had my taste of ginger flower in a chiffon cake in Neiwan, Hsinchu. The flower I tasted was Hedychium coronarium known as 野姜花, and it's a type of ginger not found here. Maybe not that I know of, maybe some people do plant them in Malaysia, but I've just never seen it myself.

Banana Chiffon Cake with Cocoa Layering

3rd attempt

I experimented 3 times to get the right texture for me, with some height. So, my colleagues became my guinea pigs, of which they didn't mind. Bakes with bananas are always greatly welcomed.

I have a colleague who was pregnant at that time, and she loved this so much. It's been almost a year since she last ate a piece of this, and she still tells me she missed this.

Taisan Cake- AFF Philippines ~ Merienda Cakes #3

Taisan is a chiffon loaf, that is sugary and buttery, originating from Pampanga. It can be easily found at bakery chains like Goldilocks and Red Ribbon in Philippines.

I tried baking it with a recipe that was said to come from Goldilocks. The cake was moist and soft, salty and sugary at the same time. A delight to eat. But yet, I do not know how close it is to the original Goldilocks version. To compare a Goldilocks recipe, I think I need to eat one loaf made by Goldilocks to know.

And then my wish came true....

Inipit - AFF Philippines- Merienda cakes #1

Inipit is a specialty from the region of Bulacan of Philippines.,created by Eurobake bakery.
It's like a sandwich, made with chiffon cake layers and filled with a potato custard.

When I saw the video on how it's being sandwiched.. it seems that the cake is very thin. And the custard mixture was kind of brownish orangey... something like as if it's made with sweet potatoes or has hints of caramel. Oh well, I just followed some online recipes and made it. It may not look the same as the one from Eurobake, and I couldn't get a taste of the real thing, so I can't comment much about how close it is.

Nutella Chiffon Cake - Nutella Week #1

Sometimes..... I buy too much Nutella when it's on offer... that's when the expiry date is near. But I'm usually not bothered about it. It's cheap!

I just saw the price for a 750gm bottle yesterday and it was selling at the regular price of RM32.++.
So expensive.

Daffodil Cake - Bundts #1

I had been wanting to bake this cake for a long long time, almost 4 years, because I was so so drawn to the colour contrast of the cake, plus.. the usage of boiling water in the batter. Curious, simply curious to know.

I have been dragging and dragging this recipe for so long because I was waiting for the right eggs. Sometimes they are too pale, sometimes free range eggs (kampung eggs) are too orangey. I want yellow, bright yellow. And it so happened that my current tray of eggs are quite bright and I have no other bakes rushing to do, I made this for my kids.

This recipe uses quite a lot of salt, of which is crucial to offset the sweetness. I have reduced 1/3 of the sugar and still I think it might be sweet for some of you. I am not sure if any lesser of sugar will affect the batter and this cake was stable enough to be cooled upright. I changed the method for white batter slightly because I was a bit chicken to be folding all the sugar in with the flour instead of beating them in. So, I beat in part of it just to make sure the egg white is stable.

Tastewise, I found it quite eggy, but my hubby liked it this way. He said, full of egg flavour. Still a bit on the sweet side, but if you were to have this with coffee, Kopi-O to be exact, it’ll be great. This cake is a Siamese twin of angel food cake and the local bahulu. Best of both worlds : )

And oh yes, the cake slightly overflowed the pan… just a few tbsp of batter on the oven’s base.. so, take some precaution to put this on a tray to bake. I was silly and got myself more cleaning up work to do.

Daffodil Cake
Source: Omnomicon 

White batter
6 egg whites (grade B)
½ tsp salt
½ tsp cream of tartar
20+80gm sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
50gm cake flour

Yellow batter
6 egg yolks
100gm sugar
¼ tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
75gm cake flour + 1tsp baking powder (sift together)
¼ cup very hot water

Butter for greasing
Bread flour for dusting

1. Grease and dust a bundt pan (12 cup capacity). Preheat oven at 170C (fan off)White batter
2. Sift flour twice and mix with balance of sugar.
3. Beat egg whites with salt and cream of tartar and beat until it is very very foamy. Put in 20gm of sugar and beat until soft peaks. Put in vanilla extract and beat for a while.
4. Pour half the flour mixture in and fold with a balloon whisk. Pour the remaining in and fold until incorporated.
5. Pour this white batter into prepared pan.
6. Beat egg yolks with mixer. Add in sugar gradually and beat until very thick and pale. Put in vanilla extract and beat for a while.
7. Add half the sifted flour in then with mixer running on the lowest speed, mix to incorporate. Then add in half the very hot water. Mix until combined then followed by the remaining flour and then hot water.
8. Pour this yellow batter over the white batter.
9. Bake for 50 minutes (I did exactly as per the recipe) and let it cool down to slightly warm.(I left it upright, didn’t invert at all).
10. Gently pry the cake from the mould with a plastic spatula. Invert onto a plate to serve.

It still looked so good under the sun... like a daffodil :)

Coffee Chiffonlets with Dulce De Leche Whipped Cream - DDL Week # 3

Recipe tried out in July 2011

Another post with the DDL that my brother brought back from Brazil.
SSB or Min, does this qualify for the cupcake month for Aspiring Bakers?

The cake in the book looked very pretty. I don't have any mini tube pans or anything like such. I only have lots of disposable aluminium muffin casings that I am dreading to finish up. So I used this in place of mini tube pans and made 12 cupcake sized chiffonlets ;p

Torta Dulce de Las Tres Leches - DDL Week # 1

Recipe tried out in March 2011.

Long fancy name huh, LOL. Simplified, translated it's a 3 milk cake with Dulce De Leche. Refer here if you want to make your own DDL.

I modified the recipe from Rose's Heavenly Cakes. I love the idea of a sponge soaked in milk, muahahahaha! So so sinful. Usually this cake is soaked with evaporated, fresh and condensed milk. But Rose's version ditched the evaporated milk and used cream. I love cream!!!! And I on ther other hand ditched the condensed milk and used DDL. Muahahahahah! I think by now non dairy lovers would have scrammed from my blog.

Black Glutinous Rice Chiffon - BGR Week # 1

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Recipe tried out Nov 2010

Last year, when I went to Homekreation to ogle at her onde-onde pulut hitam made from black glutinous rice (BGR) flour, I mentioned I am looking for this BGR flour and she was so so so so kind that she offered to mailed me some. I was so so surprised at the offer, and of course, a bit shy to accept it. In the end, I still gave her my address and it arrived just before last year's Eid ul-Fitr. I was so so happy that I could finally try out this recipe that I saw on DG's blog loooooooooooooong ago. Thanks Roz for your generosity. She also mailed me a bottle of browning essence.

Red Bean Coconut Chiffon Cake - Bean # 3

Just made this cake last week, so it's a 'fresh' post. LOL. FYI, I'm still posting a lot of back logs due to the theme thingy. If it's a cake week, I didn't bake all the cakes that week, they were collected over time. So, LOL, please be informed I didn't eat pancakes for one week nor cook noodles 3 times a week.

Blueberry Lemon Chiffon Cake - Berry Week #1

A bluish purple cake is such a pain the neck to produce without food colouring added. Natural pigments like anthocyanins found in fruits and vegetables seem to not remain prettily purple after baking. So, I tried to play around with its colour. The colour of the pigment can be easily altered by either adding an acid or an alkali. Acids like lemon juice, vinegar and alkali like baking soda.

I also found that South American blueberries tend to have a redder hue, compared to the ones planted in US. When I cooked the blueberry paste, I found that it turned magentaish, something like the colour of Barney the Dinosaur because I made it with SA blueberries, grown in Chile. I tried another batch with Argentinean blueberries and they too, turned to the colour of Barney. When I made my Blueberry Ripple Yogurt Ice Cream last time with American blueberries, the colour was more bluish. Which was why I realised the colour difference. Your opinion may differ from mine, this is purely my own opinion. So, in order to turn it to become more purplish, I added some baking soda bit by bit to turn it into the colour I want. Don't get it too blue as when it gets made into a batter, it turns bluer. Which might explain why some blueberry bakes turn greyish. Too alkaline already. I guess that is more rampant with northern blueberries. To counter that, add in some lemon juice.

Actually at first I didn't think of turning this into a lemon flavoured chiffon. But when I mixed the blueberry paste with the yolk batter, it turned blue!!! Oh.. now I'm starting to worry that it'll turn grey instead when baked. And that was why I added in some lemon juice and zest in the end to counter it. This chiffon cake was bluer when fresh out from the oven, I peeked at the crack. But as it cooled down, it turned to be a soft lilac coloured chiffon. Oh well, better than a grey chiffon. Hahaha!

The pictures do not look sharp with high noise due to my hubby adjusting the ISO to the highest and I didn't know.

I only knew he clicked on the settings after I complained that all my pictures weren't sharp with weird light exposures and they all gave me a hard time editing and he checked the settings. A lot of up coming post with high noise problems were all taken during this period of time.

Blueberry Lemon Chiffon Cake
Recipe source: Wendyywy

Blueberry paste
125gm blueberries
50gm water

Cook blueberries in the water over low heat until it turns mushy. Puree the cooked berries together with the liquid. Set aside to cool down.
The cake
4 egg yolks
70gm corn oil
50gm sugar
135gm blueberry paste
125gm cake flour
½ tsp baking powder
1tsp (packed) lemon zest
½ Tbsp lemon juice
(some baking soda for colour adjustment)

4 egg whites
1 tsp lemon juice
90gm sugar

1. Preheat oven to 160(fan)/180C. Prepare a clean 22/25cm tube pan. Do not grease it.
2. Combine the yolk, sugar and oil and mix. Mix in the blueberry paste.
3. Sift flour and baking powder. Mix into (2)
4. Mix in lemon zest. Use lemon juice to adjust colour. If it turns too pink, add some baking soda. It the batter is too blue for you, use more lemon juice. It's hard to say how much as natural pigments varies in different berries.
5. In a clean bowl, beat egg whites until frothy. Put in lemon juice and beat until soft peaks.
6. Gradually put in sugar and beat until stiff peaks.
7. Put 1/4 of the egg whites into the batter. Fold. Repeat with another 1/4 of the egg whites.
8. Pour batter into the egg whites and fold.
9. Pour folded batter into prepared tube pan and lightly shake it left and right to level it.
10. Bake for 40 minutes or until done.
11. Invert immediately upon removal from oven and let it cool down totally before removing from the mould and slicing to serve.

I am submitting this to Aspiring Bakers March 2011 Fruity March

Peach Chiffon Slice - Fruit Week #3

I have 2 pieces of canned peach left over from Lydia’s carousel cake (this cake was made in Aug 2010). I don’t feel like eating it just like that.

So, I used it to make this, a sudden idea.
The peach flavor was just so so but texture is very soft, as all chiffons are.
I wonder if fresh peaches will taste the same when used to make this.

Peach Chiffon Slice
Recipe Source: Wendyywy

2 pcs canned peach halves, pureed (about 80gm)
80gm cake flour
20gm sugar
4 egg yolks
50ml corn oil

4 egg whites
50gm sugar
¼ tsp cream of tartar or 1 tsp lemon juice

Buttercream for filling

Method
1. Preheat oven at 160/180C. Fully line a 10 inch shallow square pan or a swiss roll pan
2. Combine egg yolks, 20gm sugar and peach puree. Mix until well combined.
3. Put in flour and combine, then oil and combine.
4. In a clean bowl, beat egg whites until frothy.
5. Put in cream of tartar or lemon juice and continue to beat until soft peak.
6. Gradually add in 50gm sugar and beat until stiff
7. Fold ¼ of egg whites into yolk mixture. Repeat with another 1/4 of egg white.
8. Pour (7) into beaten egg whites and fold.
9. Pour batter into prepared pan. Level surface and bake for 30 minutes or until golden and springs back to touch.
10. Leave cake to cool in pan for 5 mins. Remove cake from pan and place on rack. Pull away baking paper from the sides and let cake cool completely on the rack
11. When cake has totally cooled down, cut into half and spread with butter cream. Top with the other half and slice to serve.

The peaches I used here as props weren't used to make the cake. They tasted YUCKS!!! They were peaches from China and I so so so so so regretted buying them. They totally didn't taste sweet and there is no fragrance at all. Maybe they were very very under ripe when they were picked for export. I don't know and I don't want to know. This is my first and last purchase ever. But somehow, China's nectarines are fine and fragrant. It's just the peaches. Ignore them if you ever see them.

Oreo Chiffon Cake

I wanted to try out this new pan that I’ve got. I didn’t know what this pan was for, but the curved base attracted me to buy this. So, the day before I made this, I looked and looked at the pan, wondering if I can invert it after baking, the removable base was small and in the middle only and with a curved base, I can scrape the sides of the cake if I can’t get it out, and with a removable base, there won’t be condensation problems…

Hmm.. so what chiffon flavours can I try out this time? I lazy to get out and buy stuff.. Yeah!!! I remember I saw an Oreo Chiffon cake before in Cherry Potato’s blog, yeah!!! That’ll be it. And I have a tube of oreo at home. Perfect!!!

True enough, yup, the chiffon cake stayed put, and here’s how it looked like after I got it out from the pan. There’s an indentation there, but hey, that’s ok… compared to having a hole in the middle.. when one uses a tube pan. But I need to practice taking it out from the pan.

I then decided to mask its ugliness by giving it some makeup. Slather on some foundation and dabble on lots of powder, tadah!!!! Pretty leh!!!!

Oreo Chiffon Cake Recipe

Adapted from CherryPotato

(A)
65gm oreo (half a regular tube), lightly pulverized together with cream


(B)
5 egg yolks
50gm sugar
60gm milk
60gm corn oil
100gm cake flour, sifted


(C )
5 egg whites
½ tsp cream of tartar or 1 tsp lemon/lime juice
60gm sugar

1. Preheat oven at 160/180C.
2. Mix yolks and sugar together. Then put in the oil and milk. Then the sifted flour. Combine with a whisk until smooth. (Do not whisk or beat but just combine)
3. Beat egg whites until frothy, put in cream of tartar and beat until soft peaks. Put in sugar gradually and beat until stiff.
4. Fold ¼ of egg whites into (2) and then another ¼ of egg whites.
5. Pour egg yolk batter into the remaining egg whites and fold (no need to be too thorough).
6. Put in pulverized oreos and fold until well combined.
7. Pour into a clean ungreased tube pan (22 or 25cm will be fine) and bake for 45 minutes.
8. Invert immediately upon removal from oven. Wait for it to cool down totally before removing cake from pan.

Oh..... this is very delicious!!! Thanks Cherry Potato!!!!

Coffee Walnut Chiffon Slice

There’s one thind very funny about this cake. Rachel adapted this cake from Happy Flour, and both were trying to finish off their nuts when they made this cake. Rachel wanted to get rid of her mix nuts and Happy Flour had her walnuts in the fridge for months.

But I’m not trying to clean my fridge of nuts, but buttercream and my 2 in 1 Nescafe (still have lots, and I don’t drink this, only buy for baking). I made this buttercream for my soft pumpkin cake, and can’t finish it, so I kept it in the freezer. 4 months later, still as good as new.
(as of the time of this bake. Yaya, made this long ago).

Coffee Walnut Chiffon Slice
Adapted from Rachel Hei who adapted from Happy Flour

2 sticks of Nescafe 2 in 1 (no sugar), or substitute with 2 tsp regular Nescafe with 6 tsp creamer/coffeemate

50ml hot water

3 egg yolks

20gm sugar, (If using nescafe 3in1, can omit this sugar)

45gm corn oil

70gm self raising flour, sifted

3 egg whites
¼ tsp cream of tartar or 1 tsp lemon juice
65gm sugar
Some buttercream for filling
Roasted chopped walnuts for sprinkling

1. Preheat oven at 160/180C. Line a 10X10 inch shallow square pan.
2. Mix Nescafe and 20gm sugar with hot water.
3. Mix egg yolks with oil. Combine with (1)
4. Mix in sifted flour. Leave aside.
5. Beat egg whites until frothy. Put in cream of tartar and beat until soft peaks.
6. Gradually beat in sugar until egg whites turn stiff.
7. Fold in 1/3 of beaten egg whites into (4).
8. Pour the batter into remaining egg whites and fold.
9. Pour batter into prepared pan and level the surface.
10. Bake for 25 minutes.
11. Remove cake from pan to cool on rack, peel away the side liners and let it cool down completely.
12. When cool completely, slice into half.
13. Sandwich with some buttercream.
14. Spread some buttercream on top layer and sprinkle on roasted chopped walnuts.

And here's another full sized cake with the same recipe for my neighbour. I jacked up the recipe by another 66% to a 5 egg recipe

Upside Down Apple Sponge with Demerara Caramel

I saw this recipe online for more than almost 2 years, and never attempted it because I could not find demerara sugar. And I finally got my pack of demerara sugar at Jusco’s organic shelves. Actually, the Chinese herbal shop which is walking distance from my house also had it!!! Darn! Stupid me.

First bite: So sweet!!!! Urgh
2nd bite: hmmm….the cinnamon is good… caramel is yummy
3rd bite: I’m in heaven………..
This is my ultimate comfort food. I really felt "uummmm" when I ate this, my mind just went bumping on the clouds...

That was me, only me.

Mike didn’t like it, due to the cinnamon, so did the rest of his family. The caramel was so good with the cinnamony apples…. 1 slice is not enough for me. I want to have more..but it was too late, those who ate the rest of the cake somehow scraped the top away…………Wasted!!!

I adapted the recipe by avoiding the ginger and cinnamon in the cake, even the cinnamon on the apples were too much for Mike’s family, but I love it. I only made half the caramel in the recipe, and it’s enough for me. I don’t know how to eat an overly sweet cake. MIL asked me to make it next time totally w/o cinnamon.  The next time I did it the same way, but she ate all of it.

Apple Sponge:
1 Tbsp softened butter
2 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, halved, thinly sliced
½ tsp cinnamon powder
120gm demerara sugar (pulsed to a finer grain, use 2 Tbsp of this to toss the apples)
4 large eggs

100gm cake flour, sifted together with ½ tsp baking powder
60gm butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla essence

Demerara Caramel:
125ml or ½ cup heavy/whipping cream
100gm or ½ cup demerara sugar
½ tsp vanilla essence
1/8 tsp salt (makes the caramel oh-so-much better)

1. Preheat oven at 180C or 170C (convection)
2. Generously butter a 9 inch baking dish with butter.
3. Toss apples with 2 Tbsp of pulsed demerara sugar and ½ tsp cinnamon powder. Arrange nicely on the buttered dish.
4. Beat eggs with the rest of the pulsed demerara sugar until thick and pale, abt 5-7 minutes on high speed.
5. Fold in sifted flour in 3 additions until no lumps are seen.
6. Fold in melted butter and vanilla essence.
7. Pour batter over arranged apples.
8. Bake for 30 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.
9. While cake is baking, cook on medium heat cream, sugar, vanilla and salt until it boils, and continue to cook on med low heat maintaining a rolling simmer until mixture visually looks thickened, about 6-8 minutes. Remove from heat and leave to cool slightly while waiting for the sponge to be ready.
10. When sponge is baked, remove from the oven, and loosen the sides with a sharp knife.
11. Overturn cake onto a plate and pour warm caramel over cake.

Serve cake warm.

The rest of the pictures are my 2nd attempt and only this pic is my first attempt with the cake. I didn't like how the 1st attempt pictures came out because I haven't discovered natural light photography :) The bounced flash were too much for the caramel.

Soft Pumpkin Cake 松软南瓜蛋糕

Pine nuts. First time tasting this and it is so so good. My MIL got me a small pack of pinenuts when she came back 6 months ago. It's pretty pricey here. I don't think I'll buy it here, because it's really expensive.. but come to think of it, it's almost like the price of blueberries.. oh... I don't know. Maybe I will, maybe I won't buy. I don't know yet.

This cake is very very light and yummy. For pumpkin lovers, this is a must try. For no pumpkin lovers also must try. My husband who doesn't fancy pumpkins was cheated into eating this. My brother who is watching his cholesterol levels, didn't know that it's pumpkin in it, and thought it was egg yolks, still ate it cos it is so good. And when he knew it's pumpkin, he gave a sigh of relief and ate even more. There might not be any pumpkin smell or taste in this cake, but the texture is marvelous. And the pinenuts added a wonderful aroma to the cake. Feel free to subtitute with flaked almonds or almond nibs if you don't want to use pinenuts.

Soft Pumpkin Cake

(Source: XiaoMeiZhu)

(A)

4 egg whites

Few drops vinegar

50gm sugar

(B)

4 egg yolks

50gm pumpkin puree

50ml milk

50ml Corn oil

80gm cake flour

(C)
Handful of pinenuts
Buttercream for filling

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 140(fan)/160C
2. Combine pumpkin puree with milk. Then add in egg yolks and oil. Mix till well blended and put in flour ad mix til smooth.
3. Put egg whites into another bowl and beat until frothy. Put in vinegar and continue to beat until soft peaks. Put in sugar and beat until stiff (pointy stiff)
4. Fold 1/3 of egg whites into (B) . Pour (B) into remaining egg whites and fold.
5. Pour into a 10 inch lined square pan, level the batter.
6. Sprinkle some pine nuts over cake and bake for 25 minutes.
7. When cake is done, remove from oven. Let it sit in the pan for 5 minutes, remove from pan (be gentle) and tear down the side liners. Let cake cool down totally.
8. Overturn cake and peel off lining paper and cut into half. Spread one side with butter cream and top with another side of the cake. To make slicing nicer chill cake for 30 minutes before slicing to serve.

Palm Sugar Chiffon Cake

I know I may not have invented this palm sugar chiffon cake, but this is my own version, adapted from Alex Goh’s chiffon cakes. Palm sugar or Gula Melaka Chiffon Cake.

This cake is rather sturdy, I’d say. I was away when this cake finished baking. I forgot about time.
When I came back, the oven was off, and luckily the chiffon cake stood still in its pan. I quickly inverted it. That’s why I have that dense line in the middle of the cake. If I did invert it immediately, it will have a perfect texture.

The gula Melaka smell isn’t that strong, coconut milk smell also seem sublime. If I don’t tell u that this is made with palm sugar and coconut milk, I don’t think u’d be able to guess. But Mike's relatives loved this and found this to me very aromatic. Different noses.. maybe I sniffed this cake to much while handling it, I was numbed by it. But whatever aroma it exudes, it has overpowered whatever eggy smell that high egg content cakes have. So, it’s still ok.

I will make this again.

Palm Sugar Chiffon Cake Recipe
4 egg whites
1/8 tsp salt
½ tsp cream of tartar
80gm sugar

4 egg yolks
2 Tbsp corn oil
200ml coconut milk
100gm palm sugar, cooked on low heat with 50ml water until dissolved.
150gm cake flour
1/3 tsp sodium bicarbonate

1. Preheat oven at 180/170(fan)C.
2. Combine cooked palm sugar with coconut milk. Set aside
3. Combine egg yolks with oil and half of (2).
4. Sift half of cake flour and sodium bicarb over (3). Mix well with a wire whisk.
5. Sift remaining cake flour and sodium bicarb over batter and mix. Whem mixture is all smooth, put in remaining (2).
6. In another clean bowl, beat egg whites with sugar until frothy. Add in Cream of tartar and beat until stiff. Add in sugar gradually and beat until really stiff.
7. Fold ¼ of beaten egg whites into (5), fold.
8. Repeat step 7.
9. Pour the whole batter into remaining egg whites and fold to combine.
10. Pour batter into a tube pan and bake for 40mins.
11. Invert immediately after removal from oven. Leave to cool overturned completely before removing from mould

Malaysian Palm Sugar or Gula Melaka, dark and aromatic.