7 Apr 2013
Custard Puffs
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| I decided to bake some choux pastry some time ago, hoping that my lousy oven would not fail me. These were unfilled puffs which I manged to bake and they were hollow and light. A couple of them did not raise well while 95% was enough to delight me. As for the filling, I was still deciding whether to fill them with pastry cream or custard. |
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| I made the custard cream the following day, and it turned out rather rich and had a creamy consistency. I felt that it was a little bit on the sweeter note that could easily be corrected next time. I was rather lucky that the amount of custard made was sufficient to pipe all the puffs. Sharing these little puffs with my family and friends was the best past of baking as they enjoyed biting into them, allowing the custard to ooze out slightly while savoring the sweetness that linger in their mouth. |
7 Feb 2013
Pineapple Tarts
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| Chinese New Year is just around the corner and nothing excites me more than collecting 'hong baos' (Red packets with notes inside)! I have seen many bombardment of pineapple tart recipes of different variation appearing in many baking blog posts and I was tempted to just follow the crowd. I am considered a baker anyway, a newbie one to be exact. I searched the web randomly and landed on a blog called foodismylifeand here is the link of the recipe which I had followed. It was my first attempt baking pineapple tarts and it was a success. The recipe as follows: 500g pineapple fillings (I used Poon Huat's) 400g plain flour 1/4 tsp salt 2 tbs corn flour 63g icing sugar 250g unsalted butter (room temperature) 2 no.s egg yolks (40g) + 1 no. egg yolk (egg wash) 1 pcs of pineapple tart has 6g filling and 11g dough Total amount of pineapple tarts I made: 67 pcs Oven temperature: 200 Degrees Duration: About 15 mins Soft, crumbly, melt-in-the-mouth, buttery, fragrant, a bit sweet, proportion just right. |
31 Dec 2012
Orange Chiffon Cake
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| An orange chiffon cake I baked before my term 1 exams! It was like almost a month back and I finally made the effort to post this up! It did not seems to raise enough but still, the chiffon was soft and spongy while the orangey flavor was rather prominent as I juiced an entire large orange. I admit that this was my second attempt because I screwed up in my first attempt. I folded in my meringue into the dry ingredients and realised that my bowl of wet ingredients was still sitting patiently on the other side of my table. Wth right? A really dumb mistake that caused me to waste my ingredients and effort! Let this post be the last for the year 2012 as in a couple of hours time, it would be a brand New Year of 1013! My blog will once again change its focus and new goals awaits me! |
28 Oct 2012
Vienna Cookies (Sable)
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| My first practical test in school had finally passed last week and a part of it was to bake these Vienna Cookies (Sable)! Sable is French for ''sand'', which refer to the sandy texture of these delicate cookies. I have been practising to make these cookies at home as I needed to get used to making them. The shape was not supposed to be that way as I gave them additional loop (I only realised that after my test! Noooo....). I made 4 batches in total, 2 batches were vanilla (original) and I experimented with cocoa and milo version too. |
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| The Original Cookies freshly taken out of my oven! My practical test was on a Wednesday and I started practising baking these cookies on the previous Fri, Sat, Sun and Tue which was the day before my test! So hardworking right? |
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| The size affected the baking timing and I tried to standardise all the sizes to be as similar as possible. About 180 degrees for 12 to 15 minutes. |
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| This batch was the one I tried with 50g of cocoa powder. I felt that 50g was a bit too much as although it had a really strong dark chocolaty taste, it was slightly bitter. (If adding cocoa powder, you would need to replace the flour with it.) |
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| This batch was with milo powder. Next time I need to reduce the amount of icing sugar used as milo powder was already sweetened in the first place. The taste was not that off anyway. Another thing to take note was that milo powder cloyed rather easily and quickly when left exposed. It was difficult to mix once they cloyed and they ended up showing up as little lumps within my cookies. Take them as 'chips'! |
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| I also tried sticking in glazed mocha beans (chocolate) into some of my milo cookies. They definitely boost the taste, making the cookies more flavorful. The beans melted slightly when being placed in the oven though. |
The recipe that I followed:
30g egg white (1 egg)
200g unsalted butter
225g cake flour
75g icing sugar
26 Oct 2012
Challah Bread
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| Challah Bread is a Jewish braided bread eaten on Sabbath and on holidays. It was the 1st bread which I leaned and baked, and it was done in school! It was a challenge for me to braid the bread as I got rather confused with the 3 layers, not knowing which over which. Not my fault as I do not have long hair which many girls do to practise with. Anyway, I took sometime before figuring that out. |
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| This was after baking to a golden brown and the bread were left to continue its carry over baking process. |
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| White sesame seeds were normally sprinkled on Challah Bread and sometimes raisins can be added too. The photos were taken from my course mate Hinna's camera. |