Hot Cross Buns

I made this for Good Friday sometime back, and have meant to post this up much earlier, but my laziness got the better of me - Hot cross buns have long been a symbol of Good Friday. Each bun has an icing cross on top to signify the crucifixion. In England, they were once sold by street vendors who advertised their wares with cries of "Hot Cross Buns! "Hot Cross Buns!". Their street cries eventually became the nursery rhyme as we know it today.

Hot Cross Buns!

Hot Cross Buns!

One a penny, two a penny,

Hot Cross Buns.

Hot Cross Buns!

Hot Cross Buns!
If you have no daughters,
Give them to your sons.

This nursery rhyme is actually quite addictive..while posting this, I can't seem to get the tune out of my head.

These hot cross buns offer an irresistible mix of sweet, spicy and fruity flavours. My only grouse was the glaze, which looked and felt a little plasticky to me. This recipe is from Donna Hay's Modern Classics 2.

Flour's Famous Banana Bread

I just realised that its been almost a whole month since my last post.  Time really flies when one is super busy at work.  Its not so much that I've stopped baking totally.  Its just that I've been feeling rather uninspired to write lately. My brain and mind blank out the moment I come back home from work each day.  Even my experimental baking is now limited to simple stuff like muffins...and...more muffins.

Anyway, taking off from my last banana post, let me return to my leftover bananas.  Being almost the kind of person that loathe tossing out any still edible food, I decided to try out Flour's Famous Banana Bread courtesy of Joanne Chang in her book, Flour.  The resulting cake is very moist with a deep banana flavor.  Definitely my go-to recipe for banana bread from now on.  By the way, I did not use a one-month old decomposed bananas for this - instead, this banana bread post is one month late :)

Banana Layer Cake with Caramel Cream & Sea Salt-Roasted Pecans

I'm not sure why, but this household has a super tendency to overstock on bananas.  But as with most banana eaters, we only like them at a certain time in their development, and particularly, when they are still aesthetically pleasing to the eyes.  So when the bananas pass their prime and go all spotty and black, what does one do ?  That's easy - recycle them into super yummy irresistible banana-ey desserts, be it the simple rustic Banana Bread, or the more elaborate and indulgent Banana Layer Cake with Caramel Cream & Sea-Salt Roasted Pecans, which I had stumbled upon in Bon Appetit Desserts by Barbara Fairchild, and adapted slightly.

Another Seventh Day Bake

This is the second installation of my seventh day bake.  Since its the Chinese New Year (CNY), I decided to balance the earlier Chocolate Layer Cake with something more colourful, as the Chinese has this taboo against wearing black or dark sombre colours during CNY, particularly so when the seventh day marks everyone's birthday.  I'm not sure if presenting a dark coloured cake falls under this category, but I'm not taking any chances, especially when gambling is involved, and all my aunts are so-called high rollers regular gamblers.  By the way, gambling is how we bond with family and friends especially during the CNY (or any time throughout the year !).

For this purpose, I decided to experiment with an orange layer cake, filled with mandarin oranges, peaches, blueberries and raspberries, and frosted inside and outside with lemon buttercream.  What a combo.  But it turned out to be such a refreshing cake, which is much welcomed after a full 9 course Chinese dinner.

The Seventh Day & A Chocolate Layer Cake with Caramel Ganache

The seventh day of the Chinese New Year (CNY) is traditionally known as ren ri 人日 (meaning "Birthday of Man", "Day of Man", "Day of Humanity" or "Everyman's Birthday”).  It signifies the day when everyone grows one year older. It is the day when people in Malaysia and Singapore toss a colourful raw fish salad, yusheng, and make wishes for continued wealth and prosperity.  I remember when I was young, one eats yusheng only from the seventh day of the CNY.  These days, yusheng has become so commercialised, and profiteers will take advantage and start selling it weeks before CNY.

Anyway, as the seventh day of the CNY is "everyman’s birthday", everyone is considered one year older as of that date. In traditional China, individual birthdays were not considered as important as this date. Everyone adds a year to his age from this date rather than on his actual birthday.  Gosh, I rather defer for as long as I can.

Every year, my aunt celebrates her birthday (according to Chinese calendar) on this day.  This year, I had the good fortune of serving my homemade cakes at the family dinner (read: making everyone my guinea pigs).  I took this opportunity to experiment on 2 different layer cakes, a Chocolate Layer Cake with Caramel Ganache, and a Fruity Orange Lemon Cream Cake.

Let’s start with the Chocolate Layer Cake with Caramel Ganache.  No surprise here, I love this cake, although I could really improve on the aesthetics.  I wanted to decorate the cake with white chocolate rings, but they ended up looking like onions rings.  From afar, I even managed to fool everyone into thinking that there were indeed onion rings.  Seriously, I really need to hone my piping skills.

The recipe for this cake is from Heavenly Cakes by Rose Levy Beranbaum.  The resultant cake is soft with moist tender crumbs, due to the  substitution of a little bit of oil for butter.  Yummy.  I did make a little boo boo though – I used mocha chocolate instead of the requisite unsweetened chocolate for the ganache, but no harm done, the ganache was still yummy.

Nián Gāo

Can you imagine it is already the last day of the Chinese New Year (CNY), and I have not updated my blog with a single entry.  I have been baking sporadically but too busy (and when I’m not busy, too lazy) to write.  Anyway, in the spirit of CNY (and before it ends at midnight today), I should at least blog about something traditional or CNY-related.

Nián gāo (or literally, Year cake) is a sticky cake prepared from glutinous rice and consumed in Chinese cuisine.  According to Wikipedia, it is good luck to eat nián gāo during the CNY, because "nian gao" is a homonym for "higher year." The Chinese word 粘 (nián), meaning "sticky", is identical in sound to 年, meaning "year", and the word 糕 (gāo), meaning "cake" is identical in sound to 高, meaning "high".  As such, eating nián gāo has the symbolism of raising oneself higher in each coming year (年年高升 niánnián gāoshēng).  In my opinion ? Boring.  I much prefer the legendary tale of the nián gāo involving the Kitchen God. 

You see, according to legend, one week before CNY, the Kitchen God returns to heaven to report on a family's behavior during the previous year. A negative report by the Kitchen God means a family will suffer from bad luck during the year to come.  In order to ensure a favorable report from the Kitchen God, the custom evolved of feeding him sticky cake i.e. the nián gāo.  This was either a bribe, or simply a means of ensuring the Kitchen God’s mouth was too full of cake to pass on an unfavorable report.  Smart huh ?  One can always trust the Chinese to devise such a cunning plan. 

Naturally after each CNY, we would have leftovers nián gāo.  The common way to eat nián gāo here in Malaysia is to sandwich it between slices of yam and sweet potato and to have it deep fried.  However, my all-time favourite is simply to steam it and eat it warm with freshly grated coconut.  It is definitely lighter on the calories, and easier to prepare too !

All you have to do is to cut the nián gāo into small pieces, steam it until soft (about 10 minutes), and toss it with freshly grated coconut.  Oh yes, do add some salt into the grated coconut - the contrast of sweet and salty is divine. 

Gong Xi Gong Xi

It's time to ring in another Chinese New Year.  This year, the metal rabbit reigns.  So, metal rabbit, I implore you, may you bestow us with your resilience, good luck and joy for the new year. 

Gong xi fa cai everyone.  Eat, drink and be merry. I, for sure, will not fail and disappoint in that :P

Vanilla Cupcakes

Little Missy had a pre-Chinese New Year party at her kindy today.  Since cupcakes are almost an obligatory item at any children's party, I decided on a cupcake project with Little Missy.  The best part of making cupcakes for children is to let them do the decorating.  However, do be prepared of the mess - frosting on their face, hair, and any orifice known.

The resulting cupcakes were a tad too sweet (although I reduced the icing sugar by more than half the original recipe !).  Gosh, I hope my cupcakes did not trigger any hyperactive reactions at the kindy.

 This recipe is taken from the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook by Tarek Malouf.

World Peace Cookies

These sables were created by French pastry maestro, Pierre Herme and was first recorded under the name Korova Cookies in Paris Sweets by Dorie Greenspan.  In her subsequent book, Baking: From my Home to Yours, Greenspan renamed this World Peace Cookies, as her neighbour became convinced that a daily dose of these cookies was all that is needed to ensure planetary peace and happiness.  When I first read this, I remembered thinking, hmmm...let's see.

The verdict ?  Cookies are usually not my cup of tea, but these cookies are so incredibly and ridiculously good (and addictive too).  The combination of chocolate and fleur de sel (an exotic salt) makes these cookies so appealing.  I just love the salty burst of flavour and can't seem to get enough of them.  At the rate I am going, I may just be at risk of waging war with my skinny jeans.  Not so world peace after all.  On second thought, who needs skinny jeans when you have these cookies (and world peace, of course).  I am in deep trouble, aren't I ?

My First Bake Sale

Last week has been quite a lousy week for me.  Firstly, Little Missy tripped and fell while playing and chipped her two front teeth, and secondly, I've been a really busy bee at work, virtually working non-stop.  So, yup, lousy week may be an understatement.

However, all is not lost as the week also marks a historical milestone for cakes-et-al as I recorded my first bake sale.  My first bake sale ! How exciting.  And not one, but two ! *doing the victory dance*  Two fruit cakes.  Truth is, I kind of coerced my colleague into it when she made a passing comment of having to gift her relatives with some CNY goodies.  A hard sell, but hey, a baker's got to earn her keep :)  Its time to recoup the investment that I have expended so far on my baking equipment.  So, fruit cakes, anyone ?

Orange Cranberry Scones

Now that I have creme fraiche at my disposal, lets get cracking on all those recipes which call for them.  My first choice would be the orange cranberry scones that I have been eyeing for quite awhile now from flour by Joanne Chang.

Scones have a reputation of being dry and tasteless.  If you have not baked scones before, please do not take the seemingly easy preparation for granted.  If you do, there's a good chance that you will end up with cardboardy scones.  Two important tips to scone success are to make sure all your ingredients are very cold, especially the butter (heck, if you could ice your fingertips, do that too), and not to overwork the dough.  If you follow these two rules religiously, I guarantee you will have a very tender and fluffy pastry.

Anyway, did you know that there are two ways to pronounce scone ? One is "skon" (rhyming with "con") and the other is "skoan" (rhyming with "cone").  I have always pronounced it as per the latter, but skon or skoan, these scones have such a nice crisp crust with a light, buttery and fluffy texture.  And they are so good for breakfast or tea, especially when eaten fresh from the oven - I have this taboo that scones should never ever be eaten cold, they must be warm and fresh from the oven.  Perfect with a glass of cold milk or a cup of steaming hot coffee.  My only fault here is that I have may patted the dough out too thin.

Creme Fraiche

Recently, I seem to have come across various recipes which call for creme fraiche, which is sour cream's French cousin.  Although sour cream can be used as substitution for creme fraiche, most pastry chefs have strongly advocate the use of creme fraiche instead of sour cream, as side-by-side taste experiments have proven that pastries made with creme fraiche is much more sophisticated and superior in terms of texture and taste.

Creme fraiche may be hard to come by if you are residing outside of Europe (such as yours truly).  Even if you can find them in the larger supermarkets, they are expensive.  However, do not fret as creme fraiche can easily be made at home.  All you need is advance planning, some heavy cream and buttermilk or plain yoghurt.

Mom's Sugee Cake

Sugee cake is a traditional Eurasian cake made of semolina and almond, and is often eaten during festive and celebratory occasions such as Christmas, birthdays and weddings.  We are not Eurasian, but we do love this cake, and also serve it once a year, during Chinese New Year.  Thank goodness.  You’ll understand why in a minute when you read the recipe - this calorie-laden, artery-busting cake is so good, yet not so good for your heart, waist, hips, thighs, chin and what not.  Check out the number of eggs – definitely not for the faint hearted.  But as I say, it’s a once-a-year cake, so all is forgiven if you decide to hoard and eat half the cake by yourself…although I am not suggesting that I (almost) did just that…

Anyway, on to the recipe, which by the way, was passed on to me from my mom, via my cousin who got it from another cousin who got it via another cousin or aunt or something along these lines.  Long story regarding the recipe flow, and yes, my mom’s family tree is kind of all over the place.  And the mystery behind my mom’s almost 40-year-old handwritten recipe book ?  Still unsolved, but we suspect that her previous helper may have accidentally trashed it...it is after all a very very old book, with pages almost falling off.  Since then, we have been going round the family trying to recover some of her recipes !

French Lemon Yoghurt Cake

This cake came about one working night when I was raiding my fridge for a late night snack. My eyes caught a tub of yoghurt, and it didn't take me more than a minute to recall this recipe (where else but from my baking bible, Baking: From My Home To Yours by Dorie Greenspan).  Since I had everything on hand, I decided on cake for breakfast.

This cake is a little bit tangy from the yoghurt, a little bit nutty from the ground almonds, has a silky texture and is very moist. In one word - yum.  Plus this is such an effortless bake, which is something I truly welcome to satisfy a weekday baking urge.

Pecan Crunch Layer Cake

Following on from my last post, this is the other cake that I had baked for my mom's recent birthday.  The insurance cake (or back-up plan), as I call it.

This started off as a simple whipped cream layer cake with caramel frosting, from Nick Malgieri's Modern Baker.  Halfway when I was caramelising some sugar for the frosting, I decided to add some nutty crunch into it.  Unknowingly, I ended up with 2 different themes for the birthday cakes i.e. a fruitty cake (the berries layer cake) and this nutty cake.  Which was a good thing, as half the guests liked the nutty cake, while the other half opted for the more refreshing fruitty cake.

By the way, caramel making was not as easy as I had imagined, I had burns on my fingers, and hot cream splattered on my face !  Partly due to my own fault really, as I wasn't paying attention and was dreaming about how to make some pecan brittles for the cake.

Berries Layer Cake

A couple of days ago, my mom asked if I was baking any cakes this weekend.  I replied yes, and absent mindedly said that I was going to complete my fruit cake bakes for the coming Chinese New Year.  It took me about 20 seconds to decipher the look on her face after my last statement.  Gosh, it was her birthday weekend, she was hinting for a birthday cake for her birthday party, and her ever so filial daughter had totally forgotten all about it !

Panicked, I started to comb through my recipe books for the world's most perfect and awesome celebration cake.  Such a tall order, I know, but you see, my family can be quite merciless when it comes to birthday cakes.  I was tempted to bake something familiar to be on the safe side, but in the end, I decided to go for something new, which can hopefully put a wow on everyone's face.  And, not one but two cakes ! Madness, I know, but I like to call it insurance, in case one turns out to be an utter failure !

The result ?  I am so glad to have received rave reviews on both cakes.  Half the guests preferred the berries layer cake and the other half, the pecan crunch layer cake, so it was pretty balanced.  I guess it really depends on whether you are a fruitty or a nutty.

Happy Birthday Mom, I hope you enjoyed your special day, your birthday party and your cakes.  They may not qualify as the world's most perfect and awesome celebration cakes, but they came from your most perfect and awesome daughter, so that should count for something :)

Cakey or Fudgy ?

Did you know that there are 2 types of brownies ?  The cakey ones and the fudgy ones.  I am strictly on the fudgy camp, so when my attempt at this new brownie recipe resulted in cakey brownies, I was kind of disappointed.  I should have known better, judging by the ratio of butter and chocolate to flour in the recipe.  But I was sold by the call of sour cream in the recipe, so I decided to test it out.

Oh yes, over the last few days, I also did little survey which tells me that team fudgy outnumbered team cakey, like almost unanimously.  Yay, team fudgy.  So tell me, where do you stand in the great brownie debate ? 

Now, if you are one of those who are diehard fudgy gooey brownie fans, then you can stop short here (and refer to my other brownie recipes here and here), otherwise, this may be a good cakey brownie recipe for you.  This recipe is taken from the Modern Baker by Nick Malgieri.  Truth be told, I am unlikely to attempt this cakey brownie recipe again, but if you were to try this, I would advise you to add one or two tablespoon of cocoa powder to the batter, as the chocolate flavour in this brownie is somehow lacking.  But I may be bias, having come from team fudgy.  But please, it's not like these are bad brownies or anything - they just don't fit my criteria as the ultimate or world's best brownie.

Puff Pastry Chicken & Mushroom Pie

I just made this chicken & mushroon pie.  No biggie, but what I really want to share with you is the instant puff pastry.

Now if you have made puff pastry before, you should know that the classical way of making puff pastry is quite daunting, and very time consuming.  Not anymore.  Making this instant puff pastry was so easy.  No multiple rollings of the dough, no multiple chillings in the fridge, and most importantly, no half a day wasted preparing the dough !  Just pulse some flour, butter, salt and water in a food processor.  Turn out onto a well floured surface.  Some pressing here and there, a single 3-fold, a quick roll (sounds a bit like a massage), and voila, puff pastry !  All in less than 15 minutes.

Thank god for The Modern Baker by Nick Malgieri, without which I would not have learnt this technique.  Now that I've attempted this, I am almost certain that I will never use any store bought puff pastry again.  So, if you are still buying frozen puff pastry, you should really give this a try. Trust me, it's really easy, and further, you'll be assured of eating good quality butter, which is the key ingredient in puff pastry.

Eggless Carbonara

My family and close friends would know that I have an immense fear of eating raw or even slightly uncooked eggs.  I mean, I do love eggs, but as long as they are still runny (even the slightest), you won't see me eating it.  I have caused many delays in the breakfast buffet lines as I would insist that the chefs flip my omelets over and cooking them a few extra minutes so that they are cooked throughly both sides. Of all the food phobias in the world, mine is runny eggs.  Weird, I know.


Which brings me to this post.  I wanted to make some carbonara as I had plenty of bacon stocked up in my fridge.  But since partially raw eggs are not my forte, I decided to create my own version of the eggless carbonara.  I know I know, proponents of the true carbonara would argue that the eggs will be cooked from the heat of the pan and the pasta, but I'm not taking any chances :P.


The result ? You won't tell the difference, I promise you.

Mom's Fruit Cake

I am pretty sure that everyone has their own rendition of mom's cake that holds a special place in their hearts.  For my family, this would be my mom's fruit cake and sugee cake, usually made for Chinese New Year (CNY).

This coming CNY, I have been tasked by my mom in undertaking the two cakes.  Suffice to say, I am honoured.  But at the same time, I saw this as a baking challenge, as I had to not only pass my mom's taste test (my mom's a great baker, by the way), but serve other family members who are super critical about their food.  Through my more than 10 years of being an investment banker, I have successfully structured and implemented multi-million dollar deals, so it's really funny to be stressed up by a fruit cake.

The result ? I may not have mastered it exactly like my mom but since no one is complaining, I think I am close enough.  Phew. I am so excited that I can make the same cake for my family and friends just like my mom did, and this is one tradition I plan on carrying over for the CNYs to come.  Next up, the sugee cake.

For fear of being admonished by my mom or any of her hardcore fruit cake followers, I followed her recipe religiously.  Ok, ok, almost.  I couldn't resist adapting it here and there to give it my personal touch.  Now, do you have your Mom's special cakes that you wish to share ?

The Best Roast Turkey, Christmas or Any Time

The turkey is always the highlight of any Christmas or year end party.  This year, I made a sudden decision to sail into unchartered waters with the turkey - My first attempt with roasting a turkey, all by myself.  Except that E had helped to reserve the turkey from the deli, and mom had helped to bathe the turkey.  Boy, I tell you, a turkey sure looks intimidating.  I've never cooked anything which requires two days of thawing time so I did find the fowl a bit daunting in the beginning.  And mine is only 5 kg.  I can't imagine having to cook an 8 to 9 kg turkey,  I'll probably need to use Little Missy's old bathtub to clean it, for it will not fit into my sink.

Days before the cookout, I poured through my cookbooks in search for a perfect recipe.  I only found one which is agreeable to my palate and that is from Cook with Jamie by Jamie Oliver (JO).

This is sort-of a non-conformist roast turkey, where the stuffing is not exactly stuffed within the cavity of the turkey, but tucked nicely between the turkey’s skin and breasts !  JO had come up with this idea to increase the thickness of the breasts so that they will cook evenly with the legs.  I quote from JO "One of the biggest challenges when cooking a turkey is the legs take longer than the breasts. The breasts dry out in the oven while you’re waiting for the legs to cook. I like to push stuffing between the turkey’s skin and breasts, increasing the thickness of the breasts so they take the same time to cook as the legs. The result? Juicy turkey all round!"

What a great idea. 

By the way, no SOS signals were sent out during the process of roasting this turkey, although the only thing I wasn't too certain was how to truss that damn turkey.  E must have been not very convinced about my turkey skills and had stopped by for an inspection check.  The result ? I am glad to report that my first attempt was a resounding success; look at her, what a beauty.