Teh Si Puff Cakes

Posted in Muffins & cupcakes, Uncategorized by

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Teh Si, one of the most common drink we order at the coffee shops. During school term, i used to drink teh almost every morning for a certain period of time. It was so addictive. I love the combination of black tea and milk. Simply love the aroma of teh. I haven came across any Teh Si cakes before this. Seen earl grey or green tea cakes before, but Teh Si cakes? Nah. Tried to google online but can’t find any Teh Si cakes. Indeed an authentic asian flavor, surely worth a try right? I make several adjustments to the original recipe.These puff cakes are very fine and moist. (I call them puff cakes because they look so cute and puffy!) My puff cakes have a strong brown sugar taste. If i were to bake again, i will get  a stronger Teh Si than the average cups  to enhance the flavor. (Maybe Teh Si gao gao?) If you disklike the taste of brown sugar, use light brown sugar. I used dark brown sugar, so i guess the taste is slightly stronger. You can add cinnamon or nutmeg too. I didnt have any so i omitted them.  I’ll be submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #30: it’s Tea time! (April 2013) hosted by Food Playground. This is my 2nd time participating in Aspiring Bakers. My first entry was Healthier Honey Dew Sago for Aspiring Bakers #20: Asian dessert buffet 10 months ago! Wow, how time flies.

Recipe: (Original recipe adapted from “Cupcakes with Attitude by Benjamin Wong”  Makes 6 medium cupcakes)
Ingredients: 

Teh Si – 50 ml
Brown sugar – 50g
Butter- 62.5g
1 egg
Cake flour- 75g
Baking Powder- 3/4 tsp.
1. Preheat oven to 170 degrees celsius. Line muffin tray with cupcake liners.
2. Mix cake flour and baking powder. Sift them.
3. Cream butter in an electric mixer for a few minutes . Gradually add brown sugar and continue to beat until well combined.
4. Add eggs and beat until mixture is well plended, light and fluffy.
5. Add cinnamon and nutmug here if you are using, Mix well.
6. Fold in the flour. Stop immediately once all the flour has been incorporated into the mixture.
7. Add Teh Si into the mixture. Mix well.
8. Spoon batter into cupcake liners. Bake for about 18-20 minutes. Remove these puff cakes from tray and place on wire rack to cool. Enjoy!

 

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DSC_1023Look at how moist these puff cakes are. :>

 

Bacon and Egg Mashed Potato

Posted in Comfort food, Pot luck by

I remembered my first time eating this from my friend’s lunch box two years ago. It was fantastic. Probably the best mashed potato i had two years ago. Back then, I was avoiding potatoes as much as I could because they were the number 1 weight-gaining food. But these mashed potatoes were an exception. I couldn’t resist them. They were my favourite. Gotten the recipe from her mum and i just attempt to make them yesterday! Probably an ideal dish for potluck. They can be prepared in advance and keep well in the fridge for a few days. I guess the most important ingredient here is the freshly pan-fried bacon. Hey, dont underestimate them. It is really the bacon that makes this dish fantastic. I will be most willing to substitute bacon with anything else. At first, i wanted to substitute with sausages or ham (at least something which doesn’t seem as sinful as that pan-fried oily streaky bacon?). In the end, i still decided to give bacon a go. It was my first time frying bacon… and it can be improved.. I’ll work on that! Although the bacon might not be perfect, but they indeed give flavor and crunch to the mashed potato. Dont substitute bacon with anything! They are awesome! Do moderate your fish sauce. It depends how much bacon you add in. The more bacon you add, the more salty your mash potato will be, so do cut down your fish sauce.

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Recipe ( Original recipe adapted from Carolyn’s Mum)

Ingredients:  (serves: 2-3)

3 Russet potatoes
2 Eggs
5pieces Streaky Bacon
3-5 tbsp Fish sauce ( Depends. Add slowly and taste along the way.)
Parmesan cheese and Parsley (Topping, optional)

Steps:
1. Prepare Hard boiled Eggs.
2. Boil the potatoes until soft.Peel the skin and mash them up in a large bowl.
3. Pan fry the streaky bacon and cut them into small pieces.
4. Add everything together and season with fish sauce.
5. Top with some shredded parmesan cheese and parsley. Ready to serve!

Ham & Scramble Egg Croissant

Posted in Breakfast by

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I have been eating hot rolled oats with banana (banana craze) and nuts for the past few days. I shall have a more filling breakfast today – Buttery ham and scrambled Egg croissant.  Just cook some scramble eggs, toast few pieces of honey baked ham in the oven/microwave and apply some butter onto the croissant that you can buy at the nearest bakery or supermarket. Put everything together, add a bit of pepper and you are good to go! Well, I prefer the medium rare kind of scramble eggs. But since i am bringing them to school, i fear they might go bad if i leave them for too long. So i climbed out of bed as early as 630 am just to prepare this. Look at how discipline I am! If only i could be this discipline in studying…  Packed them into lunch boxes and I am off to school! On a side note, ONE MORE DAY TO SUMMER. YES YES YES!!

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Banana squares

Posted in Cakes, Healthy by

 

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Week 15: Exam week. But this is also the LAST week of school for Year 1 Semester 1! School has been so busy, especially towards the end of semester. There were endless project presentations and report deadlines to meet. I’ve been returning to school almost everyday for the past three weeks and i haven have proper time spent with my family for a long time. On the bright side, I am looking forward to FRIDAY (my last paper)!!! After which will be a looooooong SUMMER BREAK for about 2-3 months! Can’t wait for summer then i will resume my healthy lifestyle and spending lots of time in the kitchen, trying out the different recipes that i have bookmarked! I’ve been craving for bananas recently and this explains my sudden consecutive banana posts. HAHAHA. Talking about banana squares, I love those from fourleaves. Craving for them so i decided to bake them myself. I thought the cakes were a little too moist. I used 5 bananas but my bananas weren’t exactly very very ripe.

Recipe (original recipe adapted from here)

90g canola or sunflower oil
– 90g castor sugar (which I reduced to 70g)
– 1 large egg, lightly beaten
– 125g flour (plain flour is fine)
– 1/2 tsp baking powder
– 1/2 tsp baking soda
– 4 or 5 medium-sized very, very ripe bananas, mashed with a fork
– 25g regular or skimmed milk
– 1 to 1 1/2 tsp rum (enhance the banana flavor)
1. In a large bowl, mash the bananas with a fork. Leave some chunks if you want bits of banana in your cake.

2. Add milk, sugar, oil, rum and combine using a small whisk.

3. In a separate bowl, mix flour, baking powder and baking soda, and give a quick mix.
* Note: I only sifted the baking soda because it tends to be lumpy. Didn’t even bother with the flour or baking powder. 

4. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and whisk gently to combine (don’t whip and introduce air into the batter). As long as no traces of flour remain, you are ready to bake. Yes, 2 bowls, 1 fork, 1 whisk. That’s it.

5. Pour into a lined square tin.

6. Bake at 175°C for about 30mins, or until a skewer comes out clean. 

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Chocolate Rum Balls

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Hi! Sorry I took so long to post. I had been really busy with school. It’s week 12 of semester 2 now and everyone is busy rushing to meet assignments and projects deadlines. Insane madness. Made these rum balls a few weeks ago for my friends! Hardly can find bakeries that sell rum balls anymore. Well, the bakery famous for their toufu tarts do sell rum balls. But they are so expensive. They dont sell individual pieces so u have to buy 10 at one go for probably $9? i forgot the exact price but it’s just expensive! Why now make it yourself instead? Its pretty easy! You can use any chocolate cake recipe you want. I have been using this chocolate cake recipe for almost every cakes that has to do with chocolate because it has never failed me. I have baked chocolate Layered Cake, oreo Cupcakes, baileys cupcakes, chocolate devil cupcakes with this recipe.  (:

Ingredients:
Chocolate cake
5-10 tbsp of Rum (depends how strong you want)
4 tbsp Condensed milk (depends)
Milk
Chocolate rice

Steps:
1. Crumble your chocolate cake
2. Add condensed milk and rum and mix it w a spoon or your hands. I added the condensed milk 1 tbsp at a time until it is sticky enough to roll them into balls. Actually I think it depends what kind of chocolate cake you are using. If your chocolate cake recipe is pretty compact-brownielike then u can probably reduce your condense milk.
3. Roll your cake mixture into balls.
4. Coat them with milk and chocolate rice and place them on a plate.
5. Store them in an air tight container in the fridge.

Cinnamon Rolls

Posted in Uncategorized by

Bread. I love bread and i wish i could have bread everyday! Back to baking bread after a long time. Like the last time, i am still unable to achieve my fluffy and airy texture or rather, i have never achieved that. I am not sure if the problem lies with my technique or the degree of strength exerted. HMMM. Or probably i should sign up for bakingbread101? I wished i have a kitchen-aid machine. So, i can just let the machine run for a couple of minutes instead of sweating like a horse  hand-kneading for 40 minutes?! Oh well, even if i do have a kitchen-aid machine, i still want to learn the proper technique of baking bread. How i love the beautiful an-buns and the white fluffy and fruity loaf of bread sitting on the trays at bakeries. I would love to learn all about baking bread from somebody. If you have contacts, please let me know! These cinnamon rolls are best to be eaten while they are still hot. Keep them in an air tight container if you want to keep until the next day. Pop them into the oven before eating them! Hmmm and now i cant find the recipe. I’ll try to find and update again! Keep a look out at this space!

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