Coffee Chiffonlets with Dulce De Leche Whipped Cream - DDL Week # 3

Recipe tried out in July 2011

Another post with the DDL that my brother brought back from Brazil.
SSB or Min, does this qualify for the cupcake month for Aspiring Bakers?

The cake in the book looked very pretty. I don't have any mini tube pans or anything like such. I only have lots of disposable aluminium muffin casings that I am dreading to finish up. So I used this in place of mini tube pans and made 12 cupcake sized chiffonlets ;p

Dulce De Leche French Toast, 2 versions - DDL Week # 2

Someone went to Brazil and got me 2 tubs of Brazillian DDL.
After I tasted this, I understood why they use so much more DDL in their recipes of which I find to be so sweet. These from Brazil is less sweet compared to homemade ones. I can be more liberal with it when I'm using this original stuff.

Torta Dulce de Las Tres Leches - DDL Week # 1

Recipe tried out in March 2011.

Long fancy name huh, LOL. Simplified, translated it's a 3 milk cake with Dulce De Leche. Refer here if you want to make your own DDL.

I modified the recipe from Rose's Heavenly Cakes. I love the idea of a sponge soaked in milk, muahahahaha! So so sinful. Usually this cake is soaked with evaporated, fresh and condensed milk. But Rose's version ditched the evaporated milk and used cream. I love cream!!!! And I on ther other hand ditched the condensed milk and used DDL. Muahahahahah! I think by now non dairy lovers would have scrammed from my blog.

Dulce De Leche Ice Cream

Oh yes... I made this again. I mean, I made Dulce De Leche again.

This time I used Sweetened Condensed Filled Milk, of which is inferior than Condensed Full Cream Milk, but definately better than  Condensed Creamer. If you ask me to compare the taste, definately the real thing tasted better. This looks like it, but taste wise.... hmmph... not there. Maybe 70% there. But better than nothing. Oh ya, if you want to know what brand I used, F&N's Sweetened Condensed Filled Milk, so far, I've only seen it in supermarkets, grocery shops don't seem to carry this. Even "The Store" has it.

Actually I made the DDL for this cake, a request from Lydia's nanny, so the balance, I made into ice cream.

Dulce De Leche Ice Cream, No Maker Recipe

140gm Dulce De Leche

3 egg yolks

200ml whipping cream

250ml fresh milk

1 empty vanilla pod (or use ¼ vanilla pod or 2 drops of vanilla extract)

1. Bring milk whipping cream and empty pod in a saucepan to a boil on medium heat. Let it sit for 5 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, beat egg yolks with sugar. Put in DDL and mix until well combined.

3. Fish out vanilla pods and pour ¼ of hot cream mixture into egg mixture. Whisk it immediately to prevent cooking. Pour in another ¼ and whisk. Lastly pour in the balance of cream mixture and whisk.

4. Sieve mixture back into saucepan. Cook on medium low heat until mixture thickens and coats the back of the spoon (I measured and it was 75C, definitely hot enough to kill salmonella). Do not bring it to a boil or else you’ll get gritty ice cream.

5. Pour everything into a bowl, let it cool down. Put in freezer.

6. When a ring of ice has formed, bring it out and whack it with your hand held mixer. Put it back into the freezer.

7. Repeat the whacking and freezing a few times until the ice cream is very thick and creamy,

8. Spoon ice cream into freezable containers (Tupperware freezermates) and freeze until hard.

The warm wind was blowing hard when I was taking pics on my window sill, and darn!!!

My ice cream started to melt in a blink of the eye.

I blinked too much that day anyway, cos the wind was blowing straight into my face while taking pics!!!

Individual Banoffee Pies with Chocolate Biscuit Crust

I’ve seen HomeKreation doing banoffee pies. Her kids loved this to bits and oh my, I just got to try this banoffee pie some day.

But I was worried that the crust might go soggy, cos we don’t eat that fast!!! So, I came up with adding melted chocolate into the crust. It makes it slightly waterproof, and the crust is definitely sturdier with some chocolate in it. And dark chocolate is a good contrast to the sweet dulce de leche.

And I chose to use Cavendish bananas, as they don’t brown that easily compared to local varieties. If you do not know what is Cavendish bananas, just head to your nearest hypermart and find Dole or Del Monte bananas. Cavendish is the variety and Dole and Del Monte are the brands. It’s just like Navel or Valencia oranges that comes with the brand Sunkist or whatever name. Cavendish to bananas is the equivalent of Navel and Valencia is to oranges. Well, if you can’t find Cavendish bananas, try tossing your sliced bananas in lemon juice to prevent them from browning, but I don’t want the tang of lemon to be in my pie. Do what you think is suitable for you.

Mini Banoffee Pies with Chocolate Biscuit Crust Recipe
Recipe source : Wendyywy
Inspired by: Home Kreation

80gm butter
80gm dark chocolate
160gm digestive biscuits or graham crackers, pulverized
4 large Cavendish bananas, sliced
½ cup Dulce de Leche, more or less
Some cocoa powder for dusting

300gm whipping cream + 2 Tbsp sugar

1/2 tsp gelatin
1 Tbsp water

1. Melt butter and dark chocolate together. Stir in pulverized biscuits. Press firmly into small tart tins. Freeze for 30 minutes or more. Pie crust is ready when it falls out from the tin when overturned (you might need to pry it slightly with a toothpick, but it should fall out with the slightest prying). Remove all crust from tins. Keep them chilled before use.
2. While waiting for the crust to firm up, sprinkle gelatin over water and let it sit for 5 minutes. Zap in microwave on high for 20 secs or melt it over a pan of hot water. Leave to cool. Freeze your mixing bowl now.
3. When crusts are ready, spread 2/3 tsp of Dulce de Leche into pie crust. You can put more if you like it sweeter
4. Slice bananas thinly and arrange in crust. Place pies back into fridge.
5. Remove mixing bowl from freezer or put your bowl in a basin of ice water and whip the cream and sugar until soft peaks. With the mixer on, carefully drizzle in the gelatin mixture and whip until stiff.
6. Pipe or spoon cream over bananas and dust with cocoa powder.
7. Keep chilled until time of serving, but not more than 12 hours, just in case the crust turns soggy (I've never kept these for than 4 hours, all gobbled up, so I don't really know).

As usual, I share my bakes with my neighbours. Hehe, neighbor Maria shared the pie with her co workers and after eating only 1 quarter of this mini pie, asked me, “How much do you charge if I want to order this?” That shows it’s really good.

Here's what I made for Maria. A big banoffee pie, since it's cheaper than small ones. Small ones more work hence, higher cost :)

One last pic :)

Dulce De Leche Coconut Macaroons

I've forgotten where I got this recipe. I copied the wrong link when I typed out the basic recipe into my MS word. And thank you Quinn for highlighting to me that these are not Macarons, but Macaroons. One "o" different but it made a hell of a difference, as Macarons are those round cute things like a sweet burger that Tartelette is famous for and macaroons are these.

I had some balance from my DDL cake and made this macaroons. They smell so lovely when fresh from the oven, smell like those CNY egg rolls (kuih kapit) and crunchy. But one thing, they soften and gets really chewy quite easily when exposed to the air, so please store them into an air tight container.
If they do soften, just reheat them in the oven :)

Recipe:

30gm egg white (1 egg white)

Pinch of cream of tartar

100gm dulce de leche

½ tsp vanilla extract

200gm angel flakes /sweetened coconut flakes

1. Preheat oven to 160/180C. Line baking sheets with either silicone liners or non stick baking paper.

2. Mix the coconut flakes with dulce de leche and vanilla.

3. Beat egg whites with cream of tartar until stiff. Gently fold them in to the coconut mixture.

4. Place heaped teaspoonsful of coconut mixture onto baking sheet.

5. Bake for 15 minutes or until sides of macarons are brown and crisp.

6. Let cool for 10 minutes. (I do this in the oven, door ajar, so that the heat of the oven will further dry it up. And I did it for 30 minutes)

I found that the egg white content was a bit too little. All went deflated when I folded in with the coconut. Maybe you would like another egg white to it.

And another DDL cake that neighbour Maria ordered..... remember I said that she did after tasting my 1st DDL cake???

Making Dulce De Leche from Sweetened Condensed Milk

Pronounced, Dool-say De Leshay. It’s in Spanish and it means, milk caramel. You might have heard about it (U can't have missed it if u read my Dulce de Leche cake post) or you might have not. It’s not a common ingredient in the local baking scene.

So, how to make it? Few methods I’ve listed them here

Method (A)
Milk , sugar, baking soda and maybe some flavourings like vanilla or cinnamon.
1. Traditional simmering
http://www.uruguayuruguay.com/dulce-de-leche-recipes.htm
2. Slow Cooker
http://www.glutenfreeturtle.com/2008/01/09/slow-cooker-dulce-de-leche-cajeta-gluten-free/

Method (B)
Opened can of condensed milk:
1. Bake in oven: http://www.davidlebovitz.com/archives/2005/11/dulce_de_lechec.html
2. Microwaving : http://southamericanfood.about.com/b/2010/01/31/microwave-dulce-de-leche.htm
3. Double Boiler: http://southamericanfood.about.com/b/2009/01/16/easier-dulce-de-leche.htm

Method(C)
Unopened can of condensed milk.
-I don’t see how dangerous this as, as canning is also done with unopened jars/cans in heated in boiling water for an amount of time. Just don’t leave the pot dry and the heat on. Read: http://www.mykitchensnippets.com/2008/05/dulce-de-leceh-cheesecake.html
1. Simmering a can of sweetened condensed milk for 2-3 hours http://notwithoutsalt.com/2009/09/12/dulce-de-leche/
2. Pressure Cooker : cook a can of unopened sweetened condensed milk for 30-40 minutes, everywhere on the internet.
3. Simmering in slow cooker/crockpot: http://www.mangiodasola.com/2010/01/crockpot-dulce-de-leche.html

I tried out method (C)1. Simmering the can unopened.
I’m not sure if this will work with Malaysian “palm oil based” sweetened creamers.. I might experiment making this with full cream evaporated milk and sugar next time, cos I don’t get these real milk goo everytime from Singapore.

Updated 7/3/12: There is Sweetened Condensed FILLED milk (take not it's not full cream, and it's partially made with palm oil) on the supermarket shelves in Malaysia (after this post came out). Comes in 3 brands, Teapot, Marigold and F&N. Results are acceptable, I've made DDL using these few times before, not as fragrant, but texture is there. Better than nothing, right?

My dear Malaysian friends, you can't find "FULL CREAM SWEETENED CONDENSED MILK" on the shelves anymore. There is Milkmaid, yes, but it's Sweetened Creamer. Please scold the government for price controls which forced the manufacturers to sell us palm kernel oil creamers. Palm kernel oil is not the same as palm oil. Palm oil is the oil from the mesocarp(the outer flesh), whereas palm kernel oil is from the "nut", just like coconut oil. Oh ya, non dairy topping creams are made using palm kernel oil too. I saw that on the labels. So, I do try to use dairy or buttercream now, unless I can't avoid it but use non dairy topping cream.

Actually I prefer the non High Calcium version of this milk. Having more added calcium to it gives it a metallic taste, just like any other Hi-Calcium drinks, something that I will avoid if possible. But since this milk is a gift from Lydia's Nanny, I have no choice lor. After making it into DDL, the metallic taste is not obvious anymore.

I put it in a pot, on an overturned steaming rack. Brought it to a boil (lid on) and lowered it to a simmer. I had the water 1.5 inches above the can. I simmered the can for almost 4 hours, cos I forgot about it. I was doing my blog. I was supposed to do it for 3 hours only.

Don't worry, my the pot didn't lose much water and there was still 1 cm of water over the can. As long as the pot didn't dry up, you'll be alright.

I let the can of milk cool down in the pot until the water is warm. Then I fished it out and let the can COOL COMPLETELY before opening it. Do not attempt to open a hot or warm can!!!!

Tadaah!!! Pretty caramelly goo... Taste so good. You can use it to spread on your toast or make something with it, like what I did with my Dulce de Leche Cake. I'll do something else later, stay tuned.

I read from the internet that the best Dulce De Leche are made from Goat’s Milk and.. they’re from Argentina. If only someone would send me some… I won’t mind if it’s from somewhere else other than Argentina , as long as it’s dulce de leche. Canned ones like Nestle are gladly welcomed too 
I’ll send u something in return.

Finally 100,000 hits and a Dulce De Leche Cake to clelebrate

100 000 hits.. took me almost two and half years to get this. Sometimes I do feel embarassed. There are so many newer blogs than mine that have long ago achieved this, and some few month old blogs are already half of where I am.

I admit,
1. I had been lazy, not updating my blog as often as I should, making my bank of drafts getting bigger and bigger by the day. Facebook's Restaurant City took up much of my 2009.
2. I've been very passive. Haven't been reading much blogs, only the handful, and when I do read blogs , I rarely comment. Guess it's a two way thing. People won't know I exist unless I tell them that I do. Well, not that I'm insincere with what I say about their food, I am very sincere, just that if it's good, tell them. Now, I no longer keep the "Good job, Well done, Thumbs up" in my heart, but I will really tell them through comments.

Since I changed my blog's interface(after Surprise Egg), it definately changed my reader's perspectives to stay on. I got a lot lot more hits than before. Maybe due to the bigger pictures (errr... lots of blogs have much smaller pics and they get lots f hits), or maybe due to the pinkish theme now.. makes things seems sweeter :)
But the real fact is that, I've got a lot more linkups to blogs than few months back, and now my 2/3 of my traffic comes from referring sites, compared to 2009 where 60% came from direct traffic.

Statistics based on Mac1-Mac31 2010 and Nov29-Dec-28 2009
Daily visitors on average : 92-256 (now), 30-80 (2009)
Returning visitors per month: 2863 (now), 1098 (2009)

See the difference?? It's just a matter of 3 months and I'm very surprised and at the same time very happy.
Here, I'd like to take this opportunity to thank

(in no special order)

Happy Home Baking
Nasi Lemak Lover
Blessed Homemaker
Excuse Me, Are U a Nurse
Happy Flour
Cherry Potato
HomeKreation
Testedandtasted
Full-timed Housefly
RachelHei
Simply Annes -she's the first food blogger to link me to her blog :)
ChVoon
Sze-Min
Sakura-love baking
Sweetaeration
My Kitchen Snippets
Mylivemylife
bake4fun
wombatmama -Not a public blog
sugabakes-inc
ibakewhoeats
kymkymthelittlebear
jesbakewithlove ----Not a public blog too.  To both private blogs, I know both of you have been following my blog for quite long, I would love to pay your blog a visit, unfortunately I can't access your blog.
findingquietwaters
ladybird8738
ttxy
chengyeelee
cookingmemos
charlotte0107

And not forgetting my dear followers (I won't repeat your name if you have my blogs listed above)
1. Sarah Naveen
2. Leeling Lai
3. Pete
4. Dante
5. Jonathan Ho
6. Doria Robert Kawen
7. Foong Mun Yeong
8. Bear with Me
9. Kavitha
10. Charissa Ho
11. Joanne
12. Shy Kitchen
13. Tony
14. Sing Yin@ Sherene
15. Jo Chiak
16. Maxivelasco
17. My Coach Bags
18. Mia
19. Oilai
20. Tan Wei Hong (Derek)
21. Roy Erol
22. Ellis
23. Michael C.. my husband :)
24. Luke
25. Jenn
26. Khim
27. Heide
28. Greenapple4sale
29. Goofy
30. S L Wong
31. 鬼首
32. Melody
33. WC Chuen
34. Kristy of My Little Space
35. Chuah Zong Yuan
36. Sam Sam
37. Jeffery Chin
38. Haslina Abd. Majid
39. Lisa Rodney
40. Whee Teck
41. ctzm
42. Grace Yip
43. Janei Chong
44. Daniel
45. JC
46. Totoro
47. Sherli Wong
48. Cheryl Lee
49. Emi
50. Esthermation
51. Cheryl Lim
52. Shirley Goh or Kokken69
53. Tracie Moo of Bitter Sweet Flavours
54. Angie of Angie's Recipes


And  also to my anonymous readers. Thank you, thank you.
Did I miss anyone??? Sorry, but I would like to thank you too.

I can't make it to 100 000 without all your support. I might have left out some others, I just derived this information from my google analytics for March 2010.

Thank you everyone!!!!

And with this, Mike asked me to make a cake to celebrate 100 000 hits.

Dulce de Leche... oh what????? Do say the leceh (Do say about the troublesome, leceh is troublesome in Malay)... hahahaha.. nola..joking.
I'll write another post regarding this DDL.

I wanted to do a special cake, not anything fruit related, something exotic(Oh yes from South America, how exotic that is!!!), something not usually seen in our local baking scene. I bumped into the cake while searching for something to do with my almost expiring can of milk goo from Singapore.

Initially I wanted to do a wavy look frosting on this cake, the mound it with chocolate shavings. But do u know how hard it is to make pretty uneveness???? Making it ulgy and uneven is easy peasy, but not pretty and wavy. In the end, I gave up and chuck the cake into the freezer for 10 minutes and did a comb effect on it. My first time using a comb on the surface.... love it. Will use it again.

Recipe from this blog. I reduced the portion size and cut down on the sweetness. You should go there and see ALLLLLL her stuff. Mouthwatering indeed, and they make me want to make them all. Will I be hitting 80kg soon??? I hope not :)

Sponge Cake

6 eggs

170gm brown sugar

170gm cake flour

45gm butter, melted

1 tsp vanilla

1/3 tsp cinnamon powder (Mike hates cinnamon, so I just put some... original recipe called for 1tsp)

1. Preheat oven at 180C. Prepare an 8 or 9 inch baking pan. Line the bottom.

2. Beat egss and sugar over hot water until light and pale, for 12 minutes (hand mixer, stand mixer will take less)

3. Sift cake flour and cinnamon powder. Fold into (1) in 3 additions.

4. Mix vanilla with butter. Take a few tablespoons of batter and put into butter mixture. Stir to combine, no need to be gentle.

5. Pour (3) into main batter and fold.

6. Pour into prepared pan and once the pan goes into the oven, close the door and adjust temperature to 160C. Bake for 35 minutes or until done.
7. Remove from oven and let it cool down totally.
8. Remove from pan and slice cake into 3 layers and chill (wrapped) until time of use.


Dulce De Leche Cream
350ml whipping cream, cold
140gm dulce de leche (about ½ cup), cold
2/3tsp gelatin
1 Tbsp water

1. Double boil gelatin and water until melted. Or u can use microwave. Leave to cool.
2. Freeze mixing bowl and beaters for 5 minutes.
3. Put dulce de leche into mixing bowl and put in a bit of cream. On low speed, mix to combine, adding more gradually. When all the whipping cream has been added in, turn to high speed and beat until soft peaks.
4. Turn to low speed. Add in gelatin mixture slowly while beating, and beat until stiff.
5. Use immediately to frost cake.
Please keep everything cold while you do the cream, freeze bowl and beaters before you start, and if the day is too hot, keep the bowl (used to whip the cream) in a basin of ice water to keep the temperature low. This applies to all cream made with dairy whipping cream in our tropical room temp. It should take no longer than 5 minutes to prepare this whip this cream.

Syrup:
30gm brown sugar
70ml hot water
Dissolve brown sugar in hot water. Leave to cool down.

Assembly:
1. Slice cake into 3 layers.
2. Place 1 layer onto cake board/plate. Brush on syrup. Spread with 2/3 cup of DDL cream. Brush the topping layer of cake with syrup and place the surface with syrup onto cream. Repeat with another layer.
3. Top with final piece of cake. Brush with syrup. Spread DDL cream all over cake. I used a serrated comb to create the effects on my cake. Top with shaved dark chocolate in the center.

This cake is heavenly!!! The DDL cream was so so good. It has a whiff of coconuttiness(like coconut candy) in it, but it doesn't contain any, could be due to the caramelised milk. If I were to make this again, I'll put in some baking powder to the sponge, so that I can have slightly more fluffy cake. This one is fine.. but I'd like to be be fluffier. One regret tho, I used regular dark eating chocolate for the shavings. If I used Lindt 90% dark on it.... Wooohooo!!! Super Yummy!!!

Oh yeah, and I didn't put in enough DDL cream for the fillings, cos I was worried it won't be enough for the covering. And now I have an extra 2/3 cup of DDL cream in my fridge. Any regrets about that, yeah....... :(

My wish for today:

May I have more and more thousands .. not Ringgit or Dollars, but hits and visitors please :)

*this cake was made few days in advance to anticipate my 100 000 hits.

8/4/10- Neighbour Maria told me that she kept on thinking about this cake after she has eaten this. She commented that the cream was incredible. She thought so much about it that she ordered a DDL Cake for this friday.
So, blogger friends, to try out DDL.