Stuck

I’m stuck. Stuck in a baking and cooking rut. Nothing has been coming out of my kitchen recently. Serious.

Okay, correction. Nothing GOOD has been coming out of my kitchen.

There was the occasional quick pasta, and a few failed attempts at sponge cake. Plus another few more failed attempts at different types of bread.

Work has been busy, and I’ve been busy preparing to start university in a new environment and I don’t like change. >.< School will start next week. I’m feeling apprehensive but I do hope it’s good. Been fiddling with matriculation and exemptions and forms and loans and it’s just been a little too much cause I didn’t set aside extra time for all these.

Anyway, all these will be over soon.

I hope inspiration and my baking touch will be back soon too. I miss being in the kitchen.

Tomato and Mushroom Linguine in Cream Sauce

That’s a long title. Hmm, maybe I should just name it Yummy Pasta. But then again, pastas are always yummy to me.

Coming from an Asian family with rice as our staple, I have no idea how I fell in love with pasta (or baking, or any other cuisine for that matter). Must be the work of food bloggers from all over the world.

But never mind about how I fell in love with pasta. I now think about it on a daily basis. Mostly, I think about pasta before bed, so I can make it for lunch when I’m all alone at home in the afternoon the next day. No one will ever know about my crazy obsession with pasta.

This was today’s lunch. It has no meat in it. Um, let’s pretend it’s healthy!

Click below for the recipe!

Mocha Cake with Coffee Buttercream

I made this, with some help from sis, for Dad’s 45th birthday.

Over 20 years that I’ve been his daughter, I think this is the closest we’ve ever been. I can only remember snippets of the past – riding on his shoulders when I was a toddler, being caned by him for not doing too well in exams in Primary school, me being distant and indifferent during Secondary school years, not talking to him for 2 months during the course of the divorce between him and Mum, the screams, tears and struggling that followed after… And of course many other little details that really made us who we are today.

He’s both my dad and my mum, all rolled into one. I know, I was already 19 when the divorce happened. I subconsciously took on the role as little Mummy to my younger brother and sister when my Mum moved out. It wasn’t difficult, since I had been the bossy older sis all along. But for Dad, he not only had to be a better Dad, he had to play Mum too… More for me than anyone else. I was the most attached to Mum before the whole fiasco… And honestly, I can’t care less now. Dad’s the only one I need.

While divorce breaks some families, it made mine stronger. Thanks Dad, for being all that you are.

Recipe after the jump.

More than just Strawberry and Cream Layer Cake

I’ve been waiting tables for three years now at the same restaurant, and in the most recent year, the company has been hiring full timers from the Philippines, China and Myanmar. It’s probably because no one in Singapore wants to work in the restaurant industry full time as servers or kitchen staff, or even as Supervisors or Restaurant Managers. I have to admit, although I’ve been in this for three years, I can’t imagine myself in restaurant operations as a career. The hours are long, and weekends are burnt.

Jenny turns 21 this year – my age. She’s one of our newer full timers from China, and she came over to Singapore alone. She’s bound by contract for three years, and this is only her first year here. It’s also her first birthday away from home, and we – the people at the store – tried to make it something special for her. It’s not easy for her, afterall. Hopefully it will help to take her mind off home for a bit.

We planned a surprise for her at work, involving tea lights, a cake, a bunch of flowers and various gifts from different people. It wasn’t difficult, she is well-liked at the store and people are more than willing to pitch in to help out. (:

Here’s my bit… I made her a strawberries and cream layer cake.

Chocolate Crinkles

They looked so pretty, and so I made them. Taste and texture wise, it was rather disappointing though.

The cookies were soft and not too chocolatey. I would have preferred a slightly more chewy or even crispy texture, but these aren’t meant to be crisp.

Perhaps I’ll replace some white sugar with brown, and sub some cocoa powder for the flour the next time. I still think they look fabulous, just not as tasty as I would have liked them.

Recipe right after the jump.

Cream Puffs with a message

A colleague of mine from the restaurant ordered these from me to surprise her boyfriend. Yay my first order!

“I <3 U, HAZIQ”

How sweet of her!

She actually saw the ones I made for Ronna’s birthday previously and wanted these to just give her boyfriend a little something.

It was a fun project, and the extras I made were gone within the hour I made them.

I used milk chocolate instead of the usual dark to top the cream puffs cos it was all I had, but sis and bro seemed to think that milk chocolate worked better, so that was a lucky thing. And they were filled with stabilised vanilla whipped cream – a bigger crowd favourite than pastry cream, which some people don’t seem to like as much. Whipped cream also made the cream puffs lighter in taste, so the my colleague and her boyfriend could finish the box on their own.

The heart was outlined in chocolate, then flooded with a royal icing that I coloured red. The red heart was a special request from my colleague. I personally think that royal icing doesn’t match with cream puffs that well, but I was stumped and that was the only idea I could come up with as yet. Perhaps white chocolate with red food colouring instead? But I don’t know if the chocolate will seize up or not. Hmm.

Soft Pretzels

I suck at making bread.

Yeast and I just don’t get along very well.

But things changed. Boy, did they change. And I’m damn glad it did.

I saw these soft pretzels on sugarlaws. The recipe only made 6. So I thought, what the heck, I’ll just give it a try. I won’t be throwing out too much food if it fails anyway.

These were the best things I had in a while. I made them a second time yesterday and yes, the first time wasn’t an illusion. These soft pretzels are real! They’re truly good! And failproof!!

Here’s the recipe from sugarlaws.

INGREDIENTS:
1 tsp active dry yeast (I used instant)
Pinch of sugar
1/3 cup warm water
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 tbsp white sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp canola oil

3 tbsp baking soda
1 cup hot water (as hot as your tap can get)
Sea salt

DIRECTIONS:
Dissolve yeast into water with a pinch of sugar, let stand 10 minutes, until the mixture is creamy colored. Mix the yeast mixture with flour, sugar, salt and canola oil, and knead until combined (a few minutes, not even 5). Let the dough rise in a greased bowl until doubled in size, about 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. When the dough has risen, pinch off a handful and roll it out into a long strand. Set aside. Repeat with the rest of the dough, about 6 times. Once all the strands are rolled out, pick up the first one and stretch it out again (the gluten will have relaxed and it should stretch further now). Twist it into a pretzel shape and place it on a baking sheet lined with silpat/parchment or cooking spray. Repeat with the rest of the strands.

Dissolve baking soda into hot water and stir until dissolved. Quickly dip each rolled pretzel into the mixture and place it back on the baking sheet. Sprinkle all the pretzels with sea salt, to your preference. Bake for about 8 minutes, until pretzels have browned.

Makes six medium-sized pretzels, but please double or triple this recipe, because they disappear quickly!

Chocolate Chunkers

I got hit with a massive chocolate craving a while back, and after looking at countless pictures of Dorie Greenspan’s Chocolate Chunkers on FoodGawker and Tastespotting (it was Chocolate Chunkers week for TWD), I pulled out my cookbook and made my own too.

My version of Chocolate Chunkers
adapted from Baking: From My Home To Yours by Dorie Greenspan

1/3 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking powder
3 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into pieces
2 oz unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
4 oz semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
2 large eggs (at room temperature)
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
6 oz semisweet chocolate, chopped
3 oz white chocolate, chopped
3 oz milk chocolate, chopped
1 cup dark raisins

Center rack in the oven and preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment.

Sift together flour, cocoa, salt and baking powder. Melt butter with unsweetened and semisweet chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. The chocolate should be smooth and shiny. Set on counter to cool.

Beat eggs and sugar on medium high speed until mixture is pale and foamy. Reduce speed, add vanilla. Then add cooled melted chocolate, and mix only until incorporated. Add dry ingredients. Do not over mix. Dough will be thick and shiny.

Add semisweet, milk, and white chocolate chunks and raisins. There’ll be more chunks than dough. It’s ok. Drop dough by tablespoons onto baking sheets. Leave an inch between dough. Bake for 10-12 minutes, but start to check your cookies at about 7-8 minutes. It’s very hard to tell if a chocolate cookie is “done,” and burned chocolate tastes terrible. Dorie recommends baking until the “tops of the cookies look a little dry.”

Slide the whole sheet of parchment off the cookie sheet and cool as it is on wire racks. The cookies are a bit soft when hot, and will set a little when cooling. Makes about 25-30 cookies.

One thing which I might change is to leave out the raisins, and add in the nuts which I originally left out (cos I didn’t have any). I’m thinking that chopped, toasted almonds will be great. The raisins added a touch of sour which I didn’t like.

The chocolate chunkers received rave reviews even with the raisins inside anyway. They were fantastic. Super chocolately and exactly what I needed when the chocolate craving hit.

Vanilla Vanilla Cupcakes

Vanilla Cupcake, adapted from BakingBites
Makes 10

6 tbsp butter
3/4 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 1/3 cup all purpose flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350F.
Line 10 muffin cups with paper liners.
In a large mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar. When light and fluffy, beat in the egg.
In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder and salt. In a measuring cup, combine the buttermilk and vanilla extract.
With the mixer on low speed (or by hand), stir one third of the flour mixture into the butter mixture. Blend in half of the buttermilk, followed by another third of the flour mixture. Stir in remaining buttermilk/vanilla and the rest of the flour, mixing only until no streaks of flour remain. Divide evenly into prepared muffin cups, filling each about 2/3 full.
Bake for 22-24 minutes, until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean and the top springs back when lightly pressed. Cool in pan for 2-3 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before frosting.

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1-2-3 Swiss Meringue Buttercream, adapted from DyannBakes
Makes enough to lightly frost 10 cupcakes

1oz egg white, at room temp
2oz sugar (I used 1.5oz)
3oz butter, cut into 1″ pieces, cool but not hard

Place egg white and sugar in a heat proof bowl place bowl over a water bath on the stove.
On low heat, whisk until all the sugar is dissolved. Test by rubbing a bit of the mixture between your fingers. It shouldn’t feel grainy anymore. At this point, it should also be sticky, thick and glossy.
Scrape the mixture into a stand mixer bowl, or use a hand mixer.
Whisk the mixture until it is cool to the touch, then add the butter in piece by piece. Keep whisking. It might look curdled for a while, but it will come back together.
Do not refrigerate before frosting the cupcakes with it. It will harden in the fridge and become difficult to use. It sits fine at room temperature in Singapore (about 30 degrees Celsius).

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I tried piping the frosting on, but my piping skills just don’t cut it. In the end I just smeared the frosting on instead and topped the cupcakes with a drizzle of chocolate glaze which I had sitting around in the fridge. You could just use melted chocolate too.

I made the mistake of storing my cupcakes in the fridge. The turned hard after that. Should have just kept them at room temperature. Perhaps that problem occurs when butter is used instead of oil… Oh well. I’ll know better next time!

Dulce de Leche

My workplace introduced a series of US cakes to the dessert line up recently. There are 7 cakes, and there was one which particularly caught my attention – Dulce de Leche Cheesecake.

After looking up Dulce de Leche on the internet (I love the internet and I can’t live without it), it sounded like just the thing I would love. I’m a great fan of caramel, and homemade Dulce de Leche seemed too easy to resist.

Now, I saw many which had the instructions “Boil a can of condensed milk”. I’m a chicken. I’ve got no guts to do that, however much assured that it will not explode. Nuh uh. I went for the method of boiling half a litre of milk with some sugar and a pinch of baking soda until I got nice, carmelised colour.

I used this to top Dorie Greenspan’s Classic Tall and Creamy Cheesecake which I had made earlier on in the day (forgot about photos). Pretty damn tasty imo.