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.

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!

Tomato and Mushroom Linguine in Cream Sauce

Serves 1

100g dry linguine or pasta of your choice
1 tbsp butter
1 clove garlic, chopped
5 button mushrooms, sliced (I used canned)
1/4 cup chicken stock
1/4 cup heavy or whipping cream
1/4 tsp dried oregano
1/4 tsp dried thyme
1/4 tsp dried parsley
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1/4 tsp salt
1 tomato, roughly chopped
1/4 of a lemon (a wedge)
1 tbsp grated Parmesan or Romano

1. Boil pasta in salted water according to package instructions. Drain pasta 2 mins short of what it says on the package. Reserve the 1/4 cup of the water you boiled the pasta in.

2. In a frying pan, over medium heat, melt butter and add garlic. Cook for a minute.

3. Add mushrooms and fry for another minute. If you’re using fresh mushrooms, cook it a while longer, until it’s soft.

4. Add chicken stock and simmer for 2 mins.

5. Add heavy cream, stir. Add in oregano, thyme, parsley, pepper and salt. Stir. Let simmer for about 3 mins, or until sauce is slightly reduced and looks thickened.

6. Add about 2 tbsp of the pasta cooking water to the sauce, stir. Dump in pasta and spread it around the pan so it’s mostly immersed in sauce. Leave it to simmer and cook for another 2 mins. If the sauce becomes too thick, add more of the pasta cooking water.

7. Remove from heat. Add in tomatoes and squeeze in lemon juice. Toss to combine.

8. Plate it and top with grated cheese of your choice. Enjoy while it’s hot!

I’m submitting this to Presto Pasta Nights #108, hosted by Marye of Baking Delights. The round up will be available this Friday. Can’t wait to check out more pasta dishes. Can’t believe I only found out about Presto Pasta Nights (created by Ruth of Once Upon A Feast) recently. Which cave was I living in?!?

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.

Double Chocolate Layer Cake
from Smitten Kitchen, originally from Gourmet, March 1999

Makes 2 10″ layers. I used 1/3 of the recipe below to make 2 6″ layers.

3 ounces fine-quality semisweet chocolate such as Callebaut
1 1/2 cups hot brewed coffee
3 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups unsweetened cocoa powder (not Dutch process)
2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
3 large eggs
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 1/2 cups well-shaken buttermilk
3/4 teaspoon vanilla
Preheat oven to 300°F. and grease pans. Line bottoms with rounds of wax paper and grease paper.

Finely chop chocolate and in a bowl combine with hot coffee. Let mixture stand, stirring occasionally, until chocolate is melted and mixture is smooth.

Into a large bowl sift together sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. In another large bowl with an electric mixer beat eggs until thickened slightly and lemon colored (about 3 minutes with a standing mixer or 5 minutes with a hand-held mixer). Slowly add oil, buttermilk, vanilla, and melted chocolate mixture to eggs, beating until combined well. Add sugar mixture and beat on medium speed until just combined well.

Divide batter between pans and bake in middle of oven until a tester inserted in center comes out clean, 1 hour to 1 hour and 10 minutes.

Cool layers completely in pans on racks. Run a thin knife around edges of pans and invert layers onto racks. Carefully remove wax paper and cool layers completely. Cake layers may be made 1 day ahead and kept, wrapped well in plastic wrap, at room temperature.

Coffee Buttercream

Okay, this is actually quite silly because I used 1 egg and made 2 recipes out of this. I used the egg white for Swiss Meringue Buttercream, and used the egg yolk to make a coffee buttercream from here. Then I just mixed the two buttercreams together and flavoured the entire thing with a coffee syrup and a drop of vanilla extract. I made the coffee syrup by dissolving 2 tsp instant coffee in 2 tbsp water, and just adding it to the buttercream to taste. I probably added about 3/4 of the syrup into the buttercream.

I just didn’t want to waste either the egg yolk or egg white and that was why I did what I did. The resulting buttercream was delicious though. I put a bit of leftover in a bowl and my sister just ate it straight from there.

Cake was randomly decorated with walnuts and silver dragees, courtesy of my sister. (:

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.

The components were simple – 2 layers of basic yellow cake, a filling of swiss meringue buttercream with chopped strawberries, a frosting of non-dairy whipped cream, and the entire thing is topped with chocolate-dipped strawberries and a shower of chopped dark chocolate.

It took me about 3.5 hours to put the entire thing together.

1-2-3-4 cake from Smitten Kitchen
Makes 3 9″ layers or 24 cupcakes

1 cup butter, room temp
2 cups sugar
4 eggs, room temp
3 cups self raising flour (1 cup self raising = 1/2 tsp salt + 1 1/2 tsp baking powder + enough AP flour to make up 1 cup; whisk together)
1 cup milk, room temp
1 tsp vanilla extract

Oven: Preheat to 350F or 180C.
Prep: Spray 3 9″ round cake pans with non stick spray, or butter them; line with parchment, and spray/butter the parchment.

1. Cream butter for 30 seconds. Add in sugar and cream on high until fluffy, about 3-5 mins.

2. Add in eggs one at a time, making sure one is combined before adding another.

3. Add in flour (in 3 additions) and milk (in 2 additions) alternately, following the flour-milk-flour-milk-flour sequence. Beat on low until just combined after each addition.

4. Mix in vanilla extract until just combined.

5. Divide batter evenly among prepared pans. Bake for 25-30 mins. For cupcakes, start checking at the 15 min mark. Use a toothpick to check for doneness.

6. Cool in pans for 5 mins, and invert onto wire racks to cool completely.

* My notes on this recipe:
- I used only two thirds of the recipe to make 2 9″ layers and 4 cupcakes, because I wanted thin layers.
- The thinner layers took only about 20 mins, and the cupcakes took about 15 mins.
- I used 3 eggs because mine were small eggs. Worked out fine.
- This is the second time I’ve baked this 1-2-3-4 cake and it was drier the first time. Do not overbake! As long as the toothpick comes out totally clean, the cake is done, even though it might seem a tad soft and custardy.
- Otherwise, this is a great basic yellow cake. Very tasty and easy to work with.

Strawberry Swiss Meringue Buttercream Frosting (1-2-3 SMBC)
(enough to fill 1 9″ cake, and 4 cupcakes)

1.5 oz egg whites, room temp
3 oz sugar
4.5 oz unsalted butter, cool but not hard, cut into tablespoon pieces
1 cup chopped strawberries, mix together with 2 tbsp sugar and set aside (less sugar if your strawberries are sweet enough. Taste first!)

(Basically, use a ratio of 1 part egg white, 2 parts sugar and 3 parts unsalted butter for the buttercream)

1. Using a double boiler, or in a heatproof bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water, whisk egg whites and sugar together until the sugar is totally melted. I don’t own a candy thermometer, so I don’t know what temperature that is, but I just dip a (clean) finger into the meringue and rub a bit of the mixture between two fingertips. If you don’t feel any grainy sugar, it’s done. It should look thick, shiny and sticky, like marshmallow cream. It took me about 10 mins of constant whisking. Don’t stop whisking or else you’re gonna get bits of dried egg white on the sides of your bowl.
2. Leave the meringue on the counter top to cool off, until the meringue feels cooler than your hand when you touch it. You don’t want it melting the butter when you add it in. You could also whisk it until it becomes cooler than your hand. I use the lazy way of waiting (while watching TV).
3. Using an electric mixer, beat in the butter piece by piece into the meringue. You want to fully incorporate 1 piece before adding another. At a point in time, the buttercream may look curdled/like soup, but no worries, just keep beating and it will come together.
4. Strain the chopped strawberries of any extra liquid, and fold it into the buttercream.
5. Store at room temperature. Use on same day if possible. Do not refrigerate before filling your cake or it will harden in the fridge and become very difficult to use and spread.

Whipped Cream

1 1/2 cups non dairy whipping cream, very cold
3 tbsp powdered sugar, sifted
1/2 tsp vanilla extract (optional)
1 1/2 tsp non flavoured gelatin, sprinkled over 1 tbsp water to soften (optional – this is to stabilise the cream  so that it doesn’t collapse so quickly at room temp. Singapore is hot; average temperature is about 30C.)

1. Chill your bowl and beaters for 30 mins. They should be cold.
2. Place gelatin/water in microwave and zap on medium at 10 sec intervals until gelatin is melted. Set aside and let it cool to room temp.
3. In your cold bowl, use an electric mixer and beat the cold cream until foamy and slightly thick.
4. Beat in the sifted powdered sugar until soft peaks form. At this point, add in flavourings (e.g. vanilla extract) if using.
5. With your mixer on, slowly pour in the gelatin and beat until cream reaches stiff peaks.
6. Store in refrigerator until ready to use, and also to let the gelatin set.

Assembly is easy, just sandwich the filling using the two layers, leaving a half-inch border so that the filling doesn’t squish out. Frost with the whipped cream and decorate as desired. I piped a circle of cream around the top, placed a ring of chocolate dipped strawberries around the cake, and dumped some chopped chocolate in the middle. I tried piping Jenny’s name in the middle, but failed miserably. Oh well. (: Adds on to the “charm”. Riggghhtt.

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.

Chocolate Crinkles from joyofbaking.com

4 tbsp (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
8 oz semisweet/bittersweet chocolate, chopped
1/2 cup white sugar
2 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder

1 cup powdered sugar, for rolling

1. Melt chocolate and butter in a heat proof bowl in the microwave, or over a water bath. Set aside and let it cool.

2. Using an electric mixer, beat the eggs and sugar together until fluffy. When you raise the beaters, the mixture should fall back into the bowl in thick ribbons. It took me about 5 mins with my hand mixer.

3. Mix in the vanilla and stir in the melted chocolate.

4. In a separate bowl, whisk the flour, salt and baking powder together.

5. Stir the dry ingrdients into the chocolate/egg mixture, stirring until incorporated.

6. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and chill for 4 hours or overnight, until the dough is firm enough to roll into balls.

7. Preheat oven to 325F or 170C. Centre rack in oven and line baking sheets with parchment. Dump the 1 cup of powdered sugar into a large, shallow bowl.

8. With lightly greased hands, roll the dough into 1″ balls. (I made them half the size for bite sized cookies.)

9. Toss the balls in the powdered sugar. Make sure it’s completely covered and no chocolate shows through.

10. Place on baking sheets about 2″ apart and bake for 8-10 mins. (I baked mine for 8 since they were smaller.)

11. Cool on wire racks. They can be eaten both warm and at room temperature so just dive in!

Notes:
- I made half the batch and had 35 cookies, BUT only because I rolled them into half inch balls for pop-in-your-mouth sized cookies. (:
- Original recipe for 1″ cookies makes 36.

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.

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!

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.”

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.

————–

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).

———–

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!

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.