Strawberry Cream Castle Cake

Two years back, my 4yo niece Arianna requested for a Castle Cake.

A castle cake!! Woohoo!! I've been wanting to make one for the longest of time, but both my girls never agreed to have one. I just don't understand why they won't want a castle cake. And my other nieces too, they didn't want one too.

It was quite a big project for me. I had to plan the execution properly. I didn't want to use fondant, or use plastic parts on it, and tried my best not to use food colouring to make this cake. The colouring on sprinkles were inevitable.

Strawberry Tunnel Cake

It was for Lydia's Birthday in 2015.

My MIL was around and will be flying off two days before her actual birthday. So, I made a 'less-cream' cake to suit the taste buds of the elderly family members. I brought the cake over to my in law's that night.

Strawberry Doughnut Cake

Two years ago, Lydia asked for a Doughnut cake on her 7th birthday.
Pink doughnut with sprinkles....
I made the cake earlier in the day. Did the strawberry syrup and reheated it to complete the glaze at night.

The only food colouring on this cake came with the sprinkles.

Princess Belle Doll Cake with Mango

*All photos are taken with my phone Iphone 4s

My 2nd girl, Lyanne was once crazy about all things yellow... and that makes Belle her favourite Disney Princess.

Back in 2013, I made her this cake to celebrate her 5th Birthday.

I do try my best to make cakes without food colouring and the best way to make a yellow princess cake, is to use mango. And the mango slices made a nice frilly dress..... I love the outcome of this cake.

Fruit Pie Cake, Frozen themed for my Lyanne

Happy New Year!

A last minute decision to bake. Her birthday was on 31st Dec, just few days back.

I celebrated Lyanne's birthday few days earlier with a red velvet snowflake cake (to be blogged next time) ... and when it was her real day.... I felt bad not making her a Frozen themed cake. She had been asking for an Elsa cake as well weeks before. I had a meeting until 4pm and rushed to the shop to get something related to Elsa or Frozen. I only managed to get these mini figurines at RM18.90. Plastic and so expensive. But thinking they can play with it after the cake was gone, I bought it.

I had 2 hours to get it done.
Now a Frozen themed cake... there must be snow. A quick cake with white snowy look..... so I made this cake that I once made for my niece.

Lydia's 6th Birthday Party

Around 3 weeks back, I organized a small party for Lydia who turned 6. Never before have I done a kid's party that is for kids. Well, I've done her other parties, but it was adult's majority, big majority. So the food had the adults in mind, more. This time, it was for 13 kids (5 didn't come), and a few adults.

I raced for days to clean up the house properly. I am quite a hoarder and it takes time for me to discard things, so this was a good push for me. And tried to bake some stuff that can be done in advance. So many things came to me that week, and each hour was sooo precious.

Bunny Cake - Kiddy Cakes #1

I made this cake last year for my dear niece.
She has been changing her mind a few times, made me buy a few stuff.... and I'm glad she finally settled with a bunny cake, just a week before her day.

Here's how the decoration went on.. you can use any cake base you like. Since this is going to be a bunny cake, I made a carrot sponge (I forgot how I made it, just add some grated carrot to your favourite cake recipe). The frosting is Italian Meringue Buttercream, and you can use Swiss Meringue Buttercream if you like

Au Naturel Rainbow Pancake Cake - Pancakes #3

My pretty, kawaii niece Arianna was going to have her first birthday and I'm in charge of her cake! Haha, as always, the favourite aunt of all my nieces, LOL. I do try to use natural colours and pigments whenever I can and am always excited to experiment.

Once during a tea party at Swee San's, she made a beautiful natural rainbow cake and it made all of us WOW! It was from her creation that I was inspired to try making mine, au naturel.

Reuben is 1 today!

Last year on this day, I gave birth to my only son.

It was a prayer answered. I prayed that I will have a delivery in the afternoon because for the 2 girls, I was hecticly rushed to the hospital at 5.30am.

This boy is nicknamed "Kim Soon" in Hokkien meaning gold grandson. LOL. The only male grandchild.

But he ain't going to be pampered, not by this tyrant mom. I promise him he'll wash dishes, sweep the floor when he is old enough for it.

Mocha Checkerboard Cake - Caffeine Cakes #3

It was my hubby's birthday. Last Nov.

My hubby loves chocolate and each year, I'll think of something chocolate for him. 2011 was Chocolate Enigma Cake, 2010 was German Chocolate Cake. 2009 was..... a failed mango baked cheesecake that he told me to dump after blowing candles because it smelt and tasted like grass. And before that... nothing.

Random Sunday - Angry Bird Cake

My friends have been asking me, where's the angry bird cake?
It's announced in my personal FB looooong ago
Ok,ok, here it is...

Kumquat Blueberry Orange Cake and an Elephant for Lyanne - Kumquat #1

Lyanne turned 3 last Dec 31st. Phew! She's 3. Time flies. She's not as chatty as Lydia, special in her own way. Handy in the kitchen, loves podding beans, peeling chestnuts and make cookies! And once she comes in to help, she stays until the end. Sweet girl. She just started Kindergarden, in a 4 year old class, but she's just 3 years and 5 days old. I worried..but I think she's doing fine. She loves school.

She loves elephants. So, I made her an elephant cake. I was hoping it'll be something like Elly of Pocoyo. It wasn't very much like Elly, but haha, a cousin of mine said it's Elly the moment she saw it. So, I think.... I think... I think I am successful .. I think.

Lydia's Rainbow Cake - Birthday Week #3

Remember I asked Lydia what cake she wanted? Her first answer was rainbow cake. So, I thought of making her an upright rainbow cake. The rainbow will be nestled on clouds on a bed of 'sky'.And the cake will be brought to kindergarden to be shared with friends. Only kids will be able to take on so much 'colours'.

Lydia's First 4th Birthday Cake - Purple Sweet Potato Chiffon- Birthday Week #1

 

My dearie Lydia turned 4 last week on 28th. This year she has grown a lot, luckily vertically. A lot of her clothes can't fit already. Turning from one of the shorter ones to one of the taller ones in class.

As usual I make her 2 cakes. I can't let the presense of baby Reuben to change anything. I asked her, what cake she wants... Rainbow cake. 2 weeks later, she asked for Flower Cake. But too bad, I already had something in mind as her first cake.

Hannah's 2 Minnie Mouse Birthday Cakes - Cheesecake Trio #1

 

I made 2 cakes for my dear niece to be cut n day 1 and day 2 of Chinese New Year.
She requested for a Minnie Mouse cake and gosh, a Minnie Mouse cake? She must have caught the bug on her trip to Disneyland last Nov. I turned down her request as I can't figure out how to do that just before CNY. As you all know, fridges are stuffed so so full during this period that keeping a cake with cream in a stuffed full fridge is CRAZILY difficult.

But I felt so bad letting her down. Really felt so so bad. So I googled for Minnie Mouse cake and then I got the idea of instead of making Minnie's face, I could just use her trademark, polka dot ribbons as my deco theme. And use chocolate cut outs to make the Minnies. The cut outs have no facial features, but with those ears and ribbons, no one couldn't recognise it's not Minnie. And further more, she has told me before she loved my Strawberry Mirror Cake and would want to have it again this time, and I also turned her down because I don't want to make repeating cakes for the same person. Well, this request was 2 months before the Minnie request. So, I made up my mind to make 2 cakes for her. One oreo cheesecake to be cut at my mom's and the strawberry mirror cake to be cut at my sis in law's parent's house, since they've never had this cake before. A pink cake is perfect for Minnie. Both are gelatin set cakes, as I didn't want to do frosting and worry about getting them smudged when I shove them into the stuffed fridge. Cake rings are there for a purpose. : p

I went around town scouting for suitable ribbons. It was only at an old shop that I could get it. Those popular fast moving art and gift shops carry only the latest designs and these polka dot stuff are infact, quite old. I've been seeing them around since my school days!!! I finally found one that is suitable.

For the Strawberry Mirror Cake, instead of having the mirror on top, I set the mirror on 2 separate pans.
When they were set, I half froze them. Then I made the bavarian cream filling and sandwiched the mirror layer between the bavarian cream. So altogether there was 3 layers of cake and 2 layers of mirror sandwiched with bavarian cream. Haha, if you have no idea, this is the layout from bottom to top:
Cake, Cream, Mirror, Cream, Cake, Cream, Mirror, Cream , Cake, Cream.
I planned to do white polka dots for the cake, Minnie's trademark, but then I was too tired to do that step. A choc cut out is good enough, Haha

I can't get a picture of the interior as the I didn't see the cake being cut. But the reviews I got was that it was fabulous! Yeah with almost 1kg of strawberries in that cake, how can it not be fabulous! Haha. But the actual fact is that, it's not a common cake. The relatives on my SIL's side have never eaten such a cake, and some of them requested for the recipe.

Ok, now about the Oreo Cheesecake. Well, don't know why I came up with the idea of using Oreos and stacked them to make the cake. But then, initally, I wanted to do a dome with Minnie's ears and ribbons on top. Which was why this cake was so short. But in the end, I ran out of cream. I didn't want to do an empty dome, was worried it'll soften and collapse during the 1 hour journey from KK to Kampar, so, no cream, no filling, no dome, no Minnie ears and ribbon. In the end, I made cut outs and hand sewed the ribbons. I didn't have proper Minnie cookie cutters and had to make do with my bear cookie cutter. The ears where smaller than Minnie's but no one realised it until I told them, it's actually a bear's cut out, not Minnie's. It was totally acceptable for those who saw the cake. Hahaha!! That means, the ribbons did a very good job in portraying Minnie.

I concocted my own formula for this cheesecake, threw in whatever I fancy and used lots of oreos for some stacking effect. I could only do 3 layers as that was all the batter that I have. If I used a smaller cake ring, then I could do more layers.

Oreo Stacked Chilled Cheesecake

Recipe Source : Wendyywy

250gm cream cheese, softened
100gm sweetened condensed milk, room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract
300gm whipping cream, cold
1 Tbsp + 1tsp gelatin
50gm water
3 tubes of Oreo (more or less)

1. Separate oreo cookies. Discarding all the cream except for 25 pieces of halves.
2. Finely mill the 25 pieces of cookie halves with cream.
3. Press the milled cookie crumbs into a cake ring on a cake board /springform pan. Keep chilled.
4. Put water into a heat proof bowl and sprinkle gelatin over the water. Let the gelatin sit for 2 minutes. It will bloom. Then melt the gelatin either in the microwave (30 secs on high) or over another bowl of boiling water. (method seen here). Let it cool down.
5. Beat cream cheese until smooth and put in condensed milk and vanilla and beat again. Beat in gelatin solution until just combined.
6. In another clean bowl, beat cold whipping cream until soft peaks.
7. Fold the half the cream into the cream cheese mixture using a large whisk. Repeat with balance of cream.
8. Put in slightly more than half cup of cheese mixture into prepared pan. Spread it out. Arrange oreo halves (no cream) all over the cheese.
9. Repeat step 8 twice. You’ll have 3 layers of cookies.
10. Gently pour all the remaining cream cheese over the cookies and level the “cake”
11. Put into fridge to chill for at least 5 hours before unmoulding.

The Minnies were all ripped off by the kids.

Fresh Black Forest Cake - Fruit Week #5

 

I'm so so happy that cherries are getting more affordable here each year. This season (southern hemisphere's), the lowest was RM8.99 for 250gm at Tesco.

I grabbed 4 punnets when I saw it at this price because my mother's birthday was coming up and I want to make her a Black Forest with fresh cherries.
Why use canned ones when fresh ones are available? No doubt it is far far more pricey, but fresh ones still have nutrients in them, it's worth it. And I never scrooge when it comes to baking birthday cakes for family members.

For the cake, I used Rose Levy Beranbaum's chocolate cake base for her Designer Chocolate Baby Grands that doesn't harden in the fridge. I've also used the same chocolate cake recipe for my Chocolate Hidden Banana Cake. And all the cakes turn out lovely and soft, direct from the fridge. I made 1.5 portion of the cake and baked in a 8 inch cake pan. Cut the cake into 3 layers and then I prepared the rest.

I pitted 2 punnets of cherries using a chopstick, as seen here in this post. Then I halved the pitted cherries.
Kept the cherries in the fridge while I whipped the cream. And I also froze a block of chocolate at this point.

As always, I try to use dairy cream, and then stabilized it by using gelatin. I filled each layer with cream and pitted cherries, generously : )
Made a crumb layer, and chilled it.
Then I covered the whole cake with cream.

I looked for my serrated comb....................but it's no where to be seen! Yikes! Comb, please don't treat me like this, please don't. In the end, I used my zigzag jelly knife to comb the cake. The effect was different. The grooves were wider. But then, sigh, had to make do.

Then I piped ugly dots of cream around the cake, top and bottom. Piped small mounds of cream to attach more cherries on the top
I then grated the half frozen chocolate and sprinkled them on the cake. And top each mound of cream with a cherry.

Phew, cake done, and now, in the fridge it goes until it's time for dinner.

Verdict:
Everybody except my eldest brother enjoyed the cake. My eldest brother said, he cake texture is different, like a choc moist cake, he prefers sponge. But the rest felt that this cake taste better than sponge. With a better mouthfeel. The cherries also made the cake very very moist. Cakes with fruits are best chilled for a few hours before serving so that the juices will soak the cake.

Pizza Cake

This is Lyanne's 2nd Cake for her 2nd Birthday. Read about it from yesterday's post.

Please find your own way to make the pizza more realistic. I have failed big time when even Lydia cannot figure out it's a Pizza Cake. Hahaha.

Pizza Cake
Recipe source : Wendyywy

“Tomato” Sauce (Can be done few days ahead)
200gm strawberries (hulled weight)
50-100gm sugar (depends on how sweet your strawberries are)

1. Slice strawberries and put into a saucepan, put in 50gm of sugar(add more later after tasting if strawberries are sour) and on low heat, cook until strawberries turn mushy.
2. Cool to room temp and pour into a container and keep chilled until time of use.


The “Pizza crust” (if using 10 inch shallow pan, please reduce the ingredients by 40%, say use 3 eggs, 48gm sugar......)
5 eggs
80gm sugar
80gm cake flour
20gm corn starch
½ tsp baking powder
50gm melted butter
5 Tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Prepare a 14 inch round baking pan (3cm tall only). Line the base and do NOT grease the sides.
2. Preheat oven at 170C (fan)/190C.
3. Beat eggs and sugar until ribbon stage (for hand mixers, beat on the highest speed for 10 minutes minimum), then slow down the mixer to beat for 1 minute. Put 1/3 of beaten eggs into another bowl and set it aside.
4. Sift flour, baking powder and cornstarch into eggs into the remaining 2/3 of eggs and fold using a large balloon whisk, fold, do not whisk or beat.
5. Combine milk, melted butter and vanilla and put in a few tablespoon of the batter (no.4) into the butter mixture. Mix (no need to be gentle) until well combined.
6. Pour mixed butter mixture back into batter and fold.
7. Pour back the earlier reserved 1/3 of beaten eggs and fold.
8. Pour batter into prepared pan and tilt it left and right and all around to let the sides of the pan get as much batter as possible.
9. Bake for 20 minutes.
10. Remove from oven immediately and leave on rack to cool. Do not loosen the sides of the cake. The center will sink, leaving a ½ cm thick crater in the center of the cake.
11. When the cake has totally cooled, carefully peel off the lining paper and place the cake back onto the peeled paper. Place cake with paper underneath on either a pizza box or a decorative tissue lined large square pan (like mine)

“Cheese”
200ml whipping cream
1 Tbsp sugar
1 tsp gelatin
1 Tbsp water

1. Place water in a heatproof bowl (ceramic rice bowl will work fine) and sprinkle in gelatin. Let it sit for 2 minutes. Melt gelatin(refer here for method) and let it cool down.
2. Freeze a ceramic/glass mixing bowl or a minimum of 10 minutes or prepare a large bowl of ice water and place your stainless steel mixing bowl in it.
3. Put cold whipping cream into prepared mixing bowl and beat until soft peaks, put in sugar and whip for 10 seconds, then pour in cooled gelatin mixture and beat until stiff.

To assemble
Toppings:
1 Red Dragon fruit (Pepperoni)
2 Green Kiwi (Capsicum)
2 or 3 Canned Pineapple slices
10 Black Grapes, impaled with a chopstick (olives)

1. Place cake onto cake board(then no need for the paper to be underneath) or pizza box or large tray.
2. Spread a thin layer of “cheese” over pizza crater.
3. Spread “tomato” sauce over “cheese”.
4. Place remaining “cheese” into a plastic bag, snip of a small corner, about 3mm in diameter.
5. Then squirt the “cheese” all over the “tomato sauce”.
6. Put cake into fridge to chill, while you prepare the toppings.
7. Peel and half kiwi fruit. Discard whitish core and slice it lengthwise.
8. Run a chopstick through the grapes and slice it about 5mm thick.
9. Cut pineapple into chunks.
10. Peel and slice dragon fruit thinly, about 5mm thick. Cut with cookie cutters if preferred.
11. Remove pizza from fridge and arrange toppings starting with the largest to the smallest.
12. Chill until time of serving.

This seemed to be a big slice of cake, but don't worry, it's not filling at all.

It was delicious, those who ate said so :)

Lyanne's 2 Birthday Cakes at 2

Lyanne turned 2 few days back on 31st Dec 2010.

I made 2 cakes for my kids usually, one to celebrate at myside, the other cake at Mike's side. As both families live about 80km away from each other, it's best that we do it twice, rather than to have everybody travel.

Since Lyanne's birthday is so near to Christmas, and there's definately the most people on this day at my home. So, her birthday cake for my side of family will always be on Christmas.

Celebration No.1
Unfortunately, few days before Christmas, both kids, Mike and I all fell sick. Nothing serious, just flu. Runny noses, tired and sleepy. I couldn't travel down to Ipoh to get the stuff I planned to use for her cake this year. Well, lately, she's on pizza craze. Not that she loves eating pizza, but everything flat and round, she will call pizza. And she will say pizza pizza non stop. It's a humourous scene to see her being so "pizza crazy". So, it gave me the thought of making a pizza cake. But since I got sick, or the whole family got sick, I can't drive 40km to get my ingredients. So, I tried to find them in KK, sadly, I can't even get red dragon fruit during those few days. I know it's quite a common fruit nowadays, but it seems the bad weather and bad timing made the fruit unavailable where I lived.

I couldn't decide on the theme for her cake, since my mind is sad about my "canceled" pizza cake. Plus flu don't seem to make my nose stuffy, but my mind too. Anyway, I just simply baked 3 cake layers. I literally mean simply. I made the sponge layers by just throwing in ingredients. Hahahahaha. The layers are Brown sugar sponge, chocolate sponge and vanilla sponge. Don't ask me what I used that day, I can't remember. Hahaha. Looking at the sponge layers, its 8pm on Christmas Eve. What shall I do??? Besides her pizza craze, she is crazy about flowers. But the problem with KK is that fresh flowers are not easily found. I can't make her a flower pot cake. The next best thing will bugs,spiders and butterflies. Then I suddenly thought of using candies and chocolate to make the bugs, and set them in a garden. Immediately I called out to Mike to get downstairs and buy me some peanut M&M's. Yes, it's really "go down and buy". Haha. There are 3 grocery stores few doors away, still open at that time, 8pm!!! No M&M's, but only local copycat versions called NIPS, and well, it's just the look that is important, tastewise, set aside first!!

I quickly made some buttercream, as I am really worried about tinting dairy cream and frosting, as what happened with my Carousel Cake, the cream won't stand the heat from my hand as I pipe it for a few minutes. But still, real buttercream(not shortening or margarine) laden isn't all that too friendly too, especially when the cream was pushed through fine nozzles. Friction and force seem to melt it too!!! But that's almost at the end of it where my hand has been squeezing and squeezing the piping bag. Grass is no easy feat to do! I used to think that grass is easy peasy. But hahaha, it's not. Mine looked like they've been runned by a crazy lawnmower, left and right. And then, I ran out of buttercream, with a patch in the middle!!!! Aiyayaya!!! What to do? Make a pond then!! But using what? Jelly? Piping gel? Nah, no time for those, and all shops are closed by now. I then remembered a cake deco method in book I read, coloured sugar!!! It's just regular sugar rubbed with gel food colouring. Simple and pretty.

I finished the cake by 11pm. Just in time to clean up and send the kids to bed. I had to catch a good night's sleep, waking up a lot earlier than usual to travel home for Christmas.

Here are some of the bugs

A bee

A Spider, Lyanne's favourite bug on the cake

Dragonfly

Butterfly, LOL, wings too short

And wordings on her cake,

The next day, after the family Christmas Luncheon, we planned to head to my Big Aunt's place for presents time, and cut the cake there. But my mom insisted we cut the cake at the restaurant, cos my mom's sis in law happened to be there, so, she wanted to pass her some cake. Everybody was so so full with food, so, oklor, just sing song and blow candles. The kids were "Aww" and the adults went "This is a last minute cake??? Can't believe it". Lyanne could recognise all the bugs I made, which means, not a too shabby job. Hahahaha, well worth the effort :p

But the kids insisted on eating the cake after the candles. The kids didn't eat much of the proper food, so, they had room for cake, but not the adults. In short, everybody loved the cake, but found the brown sugar layer a bit dry, maybe I guess I chilled that layer in the fridge without covering and there was no liquid in that sponge, the other layes I added some milk.

Celebration No.2

One week later, I planned for another celebration on Mike's side. Last year, when Lyanne turned one, I didn't do her a proper birthday party with food and guests. It was just a simple candle blowing session as my sister in law came back, and everybody so so busy, every weekend booked full and there was no time to squeeze in anything. I felt bad that somehow Lydia's 1st , 2nd and 3rd had few parties to go with it. I must give Lyanne a party this time. She might be born at a time where everybody is busy, but that's no excuse for me as a Mom. So, I called up their ex-nanny, Mike's close relatives and a good friend of Mike happened to be in town. A simple party it maybe, but better than none.

Ee-Sync, u better buckle up, Alfred is your stiff competitor!!

Lyanne is playing with Bernice

I made a few simple dishes for her party
1. Curry Fried Rice Vermicelli
2. Dried Scallop Fried Rice
3. Roasted Lemongrass Chicken
4. Grilled pork cocktail sausages
5. Pomegranate Cream Cheese Orange Salad
6. Osmanthus Konnyaku Jelly
7. Taro Sago Ice Dessert
8. Homemade Roselle Rose Cordial (skipped the rose as some may not like it)

and of course, a cake, a PIZZA CAKE!! Finally.

But to my dismay, my super imaginative girl, Lydia couldn't figure out the cake. Usually she will give names to cakes when she looks at it the first time, but not this one. She looked and looked and kept quiet. Urrrghh!!!
Somehow I felt I failed this time, if Lydia cannot figure out the cake, so can't Lyanne. Truly enough, when it's time to blow candles, Lyanne wasn't screaming "Pizza" when she saw it. Urrghh!!! Fail, fail, fail. Even until today, Lydia won't call the cake Pizza cake. She will say dragon fruit and kiwi cake. Even the guests who were present, they only knew it was a pizza when I told them. See how badly I failed in my mission of creating a pizza cake that would make my girl scream with delight. Taste wise, everybody loved it. A bit sweet from the "tomato" sauce, but still ok. The "tomato sauce wasn't that sweet when I made it, but somehow gotten sweeter as it cooled down. Weird right?

As for recipes, some of my guests asked me whether these will be on my blog. I cooked like a mad woman that day as I had to care for my girls, make them nap, bathe them, clean them, feed them. So, I didn't measure my ingredients, didn't weigh nor using proper spoons. I just dumped stuff in. I had to rush for time. Even the cake could only be done on that day itself, as the dragon fruit will stain everything if I made it too early. The cake couldn't be baked earlier as well as there is no where I can keep a 14 inch cake without drying it out or exposing it to ants. My DH, where was he? He just did his own stuff, napped as he pleased. Men, men, men.

Some were old recipes and some were new, like the curry rice vermicelli and the salad. The salad was very good, even my almost-carnivore Mike ate 2 platefulls of it.
It was a super tiring day and I blacked out the moment I landed on my bed. I'm not the regular woman that I was, I'm more lethargic now. I may be at 18 weeks now, but the 2nd trimester doesn't seem to give me that much of energy compared to the previous 2 pregnancies.
But it was all worth it.

Recipe for Pizza Cake will be out tomorrow. This post is getting too long!!!

Happy Birthday Lyanne

Dear Lyanne,

Every calendar year is another year for you.
Born on the last day of the year, you will always the baby of the class.
I have always been worried about you entering 4 year old pre-school when you will only be barely 3. The baby of the class, always, forever.

Have been worried you won't be able to be toilet trained by school time.
Have been worried that you won't catch up intellectually due to late birth date in the year, you have to grow up faster

But this year,
You've been kissing me non stop at every opportunity
You've learnt to call me, papa, popo, Lydia and Ah-Mah
You've been welcoming me for every thankyou said
You've been recognising 1-10 by 21 months, even 1 and 10
You've been stacking stuff to everybody's astonishment, including the paedatrician's. It shows the concentration that you can give and the determination that you have.
You've been showing me you have good memory by finding your favourite page in a 200 page book, knowing whether you are too far ahead or too far behind
You've been singing songs on tune (very accurate!!, with just one or twice of singing), and it makes me want to start you on music class ASAP
You've been showing me how courageous you can be when you insisted to swim without the float!!
You've been showing me your social skills when you jumped into to join the crowd in Sunday School, not disturbing others, but following instructions and followed suit with the 5 year and above kids.
You've been telling me you want to ease yourself, not accurate every time, but at least you are trying
You've been sitting on the adult toilet and not feeling scared of it. Very brave!!!


I guess I shouldn't worry about you anymore
I know you can do it, even though you may be disadvantaged due to your late birthdate,
but I'm glad God has blesed you tremendously and reassuring me that you'd be well,
Young you may be, but I'm sure, you'd be able to make it.

Happy Birthday
God Bless You always my dearie


From Mommy

Happy New Year 2011

See you on Monday!

Chocolate Enigma Cake

It’s Mike’s Birthday (last month) and every year, it’s going to be chocolate. When I saw this cake on Hearty Bakes, I totally loved how dark it looked and it seemed I can smell the chocolate from the screen, very very delicious looking. I’m not really an all chocolate girl, but I do eat chocolate once in a blue moon. But my hubby lurves this dark looking confectionary that I’m just so so with. Any chocolate cake, he’ll say, hmm,.. now this is what I call cake. Hahahaha!! So, how can I not make him chocolate cakes for his birthdays ??

I also had a can of black pitted cherries and I might as well use that to fill the cake, since the cake is rather short Well, I baked the cake in a 9 inch pan rather than a recommended 7 inch..
But when I opened the can of cherries, the colour is totally not what I expected. So, I’ve learnt my lesson not to buy Red Man’s canned cherries. The syrup didn’t even cover the fruits! In the end, I threw in some cubed strawberries into the filling. Might be weird to have an adult looking cake with some bits of strawberries in it, but, it’s nice to have some fresh fruits in it.

And I also copycatted Hearty Bakes in the way I decorated this cake. Just hop to this post  of hers and you can see how much I copied from her. Her cakes all look so well made.

Bitter Choc Chiffon
Adapted from Hearty Bakes

Ingredients:

(A) 100g Bittersweet chocolate (chopped)
10gm butter

(B) 5 egg yolks
20g sugar

(C) 40ml water

(D) 60g Cake flour
10g black cocoa powder (it looks like charcoal powder)
1/2tsp baking powder

(E) 5 egg whites
½ tsp cream of tartar
40g sugar


Choc Ganache:
100g Whipping cream
100g Dark Chocolate

Frosting:
400gm dairy whipping cream
3 Tbsp sugar
1 tsp gelatin
1 Tbsp water
1 cup chopped strawberries



Method:

Cake
1. Sieve Cake flour with cocoa powder and baking powder. Set aside
2. Preheat oven to 170deg C
3. Double boil to melt (A). Stir till smooth
4. In another bowl, whisk (B) till pale in colour
5. Add in melted choc (A) mixture, add (C) stir till combine
6. Add in (D), fold till mixture well-mixed.
7. In another bowl, whisk whites(E) till frothy, add cream of tartar and beat until soft peaks and add sugar. Whisk till stiff peaks
8. Fold gently 1/3 whites with chocolate mixture
9. Fold the balance of whites
10. Pour batter into 7" cake pan (I used 9 inch springform pan)
11. Baking time around 40mins
12. Insert skewer to check if cake is done
13. Overturn cake tin to cool cake
14. Unmould cake

Ganache
1. Break chocolate and put into a bowl.
2. Bring cream to a boil, stirring all the time, it's ready when it has small bubble on the side.
3. Pour scalded cream onto chocolate and let it sit for 1 minute.
4. Stir until smooth. Set aside.

Frosting
1. Freeze bowl for at least 15 minutes before use. If using stainless steel bowl, prepare and ice bath for use later.
2. Place water in a heat proof bowl and sprinkle gelatin onto water. Let it sit for 1 minute and melt it in the microwave(high for 30 secs) or over a hot pan of water. Let it cool down.
3. Remove frozen bowl from freezer (place in ice bath if stainless steel bowl) and pour in cold whipping cream.
4. Beat on low speed until it starts to thicken then increase to high. When cream has reached soft peaks, put in sugar and beat until almost stiff. Pour in melted gelatin and beat until stiff.
5. Use immdiately to frost.

To assemble
1. Slice cooled cake into 3 layers
2. Place 3 Tbsp of ganache over the bottom layer and spread evenly. Put 1/2 cup of cream over bottom layer and spread. Sprinkle half the strawberries over.
3. Take another piece of cake and spread 3 Tbsp of ganache and another 1/2 cup of cream. Then put the creamed layer on top of the strawberries on bottom layer.
4. Spread 3 Tbsp of ganache onto the 2nd cake layer (now on top of bottom layer) and then repeat step 2 and 3. Now you will have 3 layers of cake sandwiched with 2 layers of filling.
5. Spread more cream all over cake and freeze the cake for 10 minutes
6. Prepare a piping bag with a 3 mm plain nozzle. Pour in all the remaining ganache.
7. Remove cake from freezer and pipe ganache to cover cake sides and lastly top with Ferrero Rodnoir.
8. Chill for few hours before serving.

Verdict:
Frankly, The cake was wonderful when it was unchilled. Lovely and chocolatey. Soft and moist. But once it was chilled, the cake somehow turned dry. Maybe it was due to the melted chocolate content that made it harder when cold. But when the cake was left overnight, the moisture from the strawberries seeped into the cake, and made it much better. I strongly recommend that some sort of fruits be added into the filling to avoid the dry mouthfeel when the cake is eaten chilled.
Mike said the cake is nice, and the only thing not nice is the Ferrero Rodnoir. He told me to use Rocher next time if I ever want to use Ferreros for his cakes. The Rodnoir somehow turned chewy after being chilled for some hours.