Orange Chiffon Cake

One of my favourite flavours, orange! The tang just feels.... awakening!
From Alex Goh's basic recipe, I adapted it into any flavour I want. As long as I maintain the ratio of ingredients.

Iris, hope this step by step Chiffon cake will be of help to you.
All the best in ur chiffon cake adventures.

Step-by Step Orange Chiffon Cake Recipe
Ingredients:(A)
115ml fresh orange juice
4 egg yolks
75ml corn oil
100gm sugar
150gm flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 Tbsp orange zest

(B)
4 egg whites
90gm sugar
1/8 tsp cream of tartar

Method:

1. Combine egg yolks, oil, orange juice and sugar. Mix well.
2. Sift flour with baking powder and put into (1)and combine.
3. Stir in orange zest. Set aside



4. Place egg whites into a clean bowl and beat on low speed until it froths. Add in cream of tartar and continue to beat at high speed until soft peaks.


5. Put in sugar at 3 intervals and beat until stiff peaks.


Hmmm...not stiff at all


Stiff..... not not stiff enough


6. Lift up beaters.Ok.. see... It's stiff, very stiff and pointy. But the peaks are fat, not short and thin. If they are short and thin, you have overbeaten them, and you cake might fall out from the pan when you overturn it.




7. Put in 1/4 of egg whites into (3). Fold the egg whites into the batter. Repeat step (7).
8. Pour the whole of batter onto remaining egg whites and fold well.Please don't stir, must fold.



9. Pour (8) into a (22 or 25cm) ungreased clean tube pan. Lightly shake it left and right to level cake


10. Bake in a preheated oven at 170/180C for 40 minutes.


11. Invert pan immediately after removing from oven. Leave cake to cool down totally this way.


12. Overturn the cake.


13. Remove cake from pan. (Method in picture)

14. Overturn cake onto serving plate.


15. Cut cake with a sharp knife and serve.

Roselle Cake

Roselle, or some may call it Rosella or even Hibiscus. And some malaysians call it Ribena Flower, because it can be used to make a red coloured cordial that taste a bit like Ribena, due to the tartness. Roselle is from the same family as the Malaysia national flower (Hibiscus) and the okra, which is Malvaceae. And what is used here, is not the fruit, but the calyx. It's just like the green fingers that hold the rose bud, the green fingers form the calyx. What is in the roselle is the ovary or seed pod, and the seed pod is used to derive pectin, used in jams.

Mike's cousin bought 1kg of roselle at the Sunday Farmer's Market in Kuala Kangsar, so, I asked her for some. 1 kg is alot!!!!! I took about 18 roselles, and it was almost 100gm. Tried making some of it into a drink, and the balance, why not search for a rhubarb recipe and adapt to my roselles..... they're both tart and pink (roselle's a darker pink of course, almost red)

After tasting this cake, I found that baked roselles taste like dried sweetened cranberries. Hmm, maybe next time I'll use roselle to substitute cranberries to bake my white chocolate cookies, and roselle's much cheaper than cranberries here.


(A)
110gm flour
½ tsp baking soda
100gm sugar
55gm butter
1 egg
120gm yoghurt
½ tsp vanilla essence

(B)
2 Tbsp sugar
¼ tsp cinnamon powder

(C)
10 roselles
1 tbsp flour

1. Peel the calyx from the roselle. Discard seed pod. Snip into small pieces and mix with 1 Tbsp flour. Set aside.
2. Combine ingredients in (B) to make cinnamon sugar. Set aside.
3. Preheat oven to 170C(convection)/180C (conventional)
4. Sift flour with baking soda (sodium bicarbonate)
5. Beat butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.
6. Add in egg and combine well.
7. Put in vanilla essence and yoghurt. Mix well.
8. Fold in sifted flour into batter.
9. Sprinkle in floured roselles and give it a gentle mix.
10. Pour batter into a lined baking pan (that fills the batter at 1 inch height).
11. Sprinkle (2) onto batter and bake for 30 minutes or until golden brown.


The sugar topping is fragile after baked ..... Giving it a light crunch...

Fruit Ring Cake 水果圈蛋糕

My brothers and I usually celebrate Mother's day late, because on the actual day, eateries are crammed with families celebrating their mothers. We did it yesterday, and I made this cake for my mom.

It's an orange chiffon cake with canned peach, fresh kiwi and strawberries. The fillings consist of the same fruits aranged in the same order.

Mom liked the cake.... well, my mom likes everything I bake for her. She loves all my bakes, just the way she loves all of me.

Cantonese Rice Dumpling 广东咸肉粽

It's almost Duan Wu Jie again!

This time I made the real Cantonese version of savoury rice dumpling.
Just the way Grandaunty used to make.
Cantonese Rice dumpling doens't use soy sauce in its rice, and neither it is fried.
If u want to make it easier to wrap, u can stir fry it a while to make it slightly sticky, but bear in mind, no soy sauces. It's fair and much softer than the Hokkien version of which the rice is stir fried, therefore, can be packed real tight.

(A)
2kg glutinous rice
2 Tbsp salt
1 tsp sugar
3 shallots , chopped
Half cup oil

Soak rice at least 3 hours, or overnight. Drain well. Fry shallot in oil until slightly golden and fragrant. Mix shallot oil, rice, salt and sugar together.

(B)
600gm peeled mung beans
2 tsp salt
1 Tbsp sugar

Soak mung beans for at least 4 hours or overnight. Drain well and mix with salt and sugar. Leave to marinate for 1 hour or more.
** U can mix this with rice after marinating. Or use it on its own as filling.

(C)
1kg pork belly, no skin
1 Tbsp salt
2 Tbsp sugar
2 Tbsp light soy sauce
2 Tbsp dark soy sauce
1 heaped tsp 5 spice powder
good dash of pepper

Mix everything together and marinate at least overnight. Best 2-3 days.

(D)
24 salted egg yolks, halved
48 pcs Chinese mushrooms, sliced
Soaked and washed large bamboo leaves
Soaked grass strands or cotton parcel strings for tying the dumplings

Method to wrap: Read my Bak Zhang recipe

This year din make gan sui joong with fillings, cos my mom just made a big pot of yummy kaya So I made plain ones to eat with "Mui Che Kayeang".

Video on how to wrap(updated 6/6/13)

Old Cucumber Soup 老黃瓜汤

My mom bought me a lot of dried octopus for my confinement, and there’s still a lot left. They’re really good in soups, I add in some every time I make soup now.
Pork loin taste much better than bones, so, less is used here. More for less…. But the meat will be dry and bland in the end, after all the simmering.

1.5L water
150gm pork loin, cut into cubes
2 octopus tentacles, plus a bit of the body (washed, cleaned and cut 1 inch lengths)
1 old cucmber, about the length of my palm
8 white peppercorns (smashed)
½ tsp salt
1 tsp light soy sauce (a tip from grandaunt on how to make this soup better)

Cut old cucumber half lengthwise. Discard 1 inch from top and bottom ends. Cut into chunks and use a spoon to discard seeds. Do not remove skin.

Bring water to a boil. Put in cucumber chunks, pork, octopus and peppercorns. Simmer on low heat for 2 to 2.5 hours. When time is up, season with salt and light soy sauce.

If u wanna know how good this soup is, ask Lydia.