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.