Mandarin Orange Chiffon Cake

 So moist & soft!

The Chinese New Year celebration has come and gone over a month ago, and believe it or not, I still have a basketful of Mandarin oranges left sitting in my fridge! When I found out this month's Aspiring Bakers' Challenge hosted by Jess of Bakericious is themed Fruity March  (details here), I quickly took up the challenge. What better way of disposing those oranges than to bake a delicious citrusy cake with them. Talk about killing 2 birds with 1 stone. Heh.



Mandarin Orange Chiffon Cake
(Recipe from "My Kitchen Snippet" here.)

Ingredients :
(A)

1 3/4 cup Self Rising Flour

1/8 tsp of salt

(B)

6 egg yolks

1/2 cup of sugar

3/4 cup Mandarin orange juice

zest of 1 orange

1/4 cup of vegetable oil

(C)

3/4 cup of sugar

6 egg white
1 tsp of cream of tartar

Method:

1. Pre-heat oven to 325 degree F / 165 deg Centigrade. Sieve all the (A) ingredients in a mixing bowl until well combined.
2. Mix (B) ingredients  until well blended and then add in ingredient (A) and mix until smooth. Set aside.
3. Beat (C) ingredients using a mixer on high speed until stiff peak. It should not fall out when you turn the mixing bowl over. Fold 1/3 of the egg whites into the egg yolk mixture to loosen the mixture, then fold in the rest of the egg whites. Remember to fold in gently until well mixed.
4. Pour batter into ungreased 10" tube pan and bake for an hour. Use a bamboo skewer to test the cake for doneness.
5. Remove from oven and invert cake (in pan still) and leave to cool completely. When completely cooled, loosen the edge of the pan and remove cake from pan.

Butter Cake AGAIN!



Yup Vanilla Butter Cake again (recipe from here)!  Made just to satisfy my Daughter G's incessant request for this cake.





This time I used premium (read pricey)  ingredients. Instead of the usual block of  Anchor New Zealand Butter, I used the tinned Golden Churn Butter. Instead of the common vanilla essence, I used vanilla seeds from 1 whole vanilla bean. Instead of the usual round cake, I made dainty square cupcakes.

I've got to say, it PAYS to use quality ingredients! Yup, pun intended. :)

Vanilla Butter Cake

 

Vanilla Butter Cake from the Australian Women's Weekly Cake & Slices Cookbook. This is one good ol' recipe that my family like and praise everytime. Tender and moist this butter cake uses a different method of mixing unlike the usual creaming method where the butter is beaten with sugar till fluffy. Instead, in this recipe, the eggs are beaten with sugar and the butter is melted before incorporating into the batter.



My Daughter G's favourite kinda cake! 





 

Vanilla Butter Cake Recipe

(Australian Women's Weekly Cake & Slices Cookbook)

Ingredients:

125g Butter
3 Eggs
1 Cup Castor Sugar
1 Tablespoon Vanilla Essence
3/4 Cup Milk
1 1/2 Cup Self- Raising Flour

Method:

1) Grease a deep 19cm square cake pan, line base with paper, grease paper.  (I used 8" round pan)
2) Combine butter and milk in saucepan, stir constantly over heat until butter is melted. Remove from heat; cool to room temperature.
3) Beat eggs and vanilla essence using electric mixer until thick and creamy; gradually add sugar, beat until dissolved between addition. (I beat until very thick & fluffy ribbon stage)
4) Transfer mixture to a large bowl, stir in half the sifted flour and half the butter mixture, then remaining flour and butter mixture. Pour into prepared pan. Bake in 190° C oven for about 45 mins. Stand 2 minutes before turning on to wire rack to cool.

Note:

1 Cup = 250 ml
1 Tablespoon = 20 ml

Blueberry Hearts



A quick bake using a batch of cream cheese dough leftover from the Pineapple Tarts here. Topped with blueberry jam, these delicious little hearts were very addictive. It was impossible to restrain myself to just one piece. I had another and another and another ... until the guilt sank in! By then I had probably eaten 10 pieces. To heck with calorie counting! Haha!



Just as good plain!



Self imposed challenge - Pineapple Tarts!

This post was originally planned to be published during the Chinese New Year season. Ah well, better late than never. Haha!

Here's my crazy self- imposed challenge in making pineapple tarts from scratch. All in all I've made 3 batches of pineapple jam and tried 4 pastry recipes for the tarts! Talk about madness!

Cooking my first ever batch of pineapple jam, it wasn't as hard as I imagined it to be and I enjoyed inhaling the heady aroma of spices (cloves & cinnamon) and sweet pineapple lingering throughout the house. I've got to say, the hardest part in making homemade pineapple jam was peeling the thick skin and digging out the eyes from the pineapples, more laborious than grating and cooking itself! 

I'm very pleased with the final outcome of my pineapple jam. Not too bad for a first timer eh? Dry and sticky enough for rolling into balls and fibrous enough like how traditional pineapple jams should be.  It was also not too sweet with some pineapple tang just the way I like it. This pineapple jam recipe adapted from 'Food-4-Tots' is a keeper! 

Pineapple Jam

Ingredients:

2 half-ripe pineapples, grated
200g granulated sugar (adjust according to your preference)
4 cloves
1 cinnamon stick (5 cm long)
1 tbsp lemon juice

Method:

1. Skin pineapples and remove the “eyes”. Cut each pineapple into quarters lengthwise.
2. Grate the pineapples until the core (the tough centre). Discard the core.
3. Cook the grated pineapples, half portion only of the sugar, cloves, cinnamon sticks and lemon juice in a large heavy bottom pot under moderate heat until it begins to boil.
4. Reduce the heat to medium low and continue to cook, stirring occasionally.
5. When the mixture start to look almost dry, reduce the heat to low. Add the remaining sugar bit by bit until the desired sweetness is achieved. Keep stirring until the mixture is sticky and caramelized with a golden-hue. This will take about 1 hour or more (or less if you use a very wide pot).
6. Remove cloves and cinnamon stick. Set aside to cool. Store in an air-tight container.

Here's my stash of baking tools all ready for making the pineapple tart pastry. I couldn't decide which type of pineapple tarts to make - the open faced ones or the rolled ones or the enclosed covered ones. In the end, I made all 3 types! Haha!

The rolled type also known as Nastar. I used Agnes Chang's recipe. The pineapple rolls somehow deformed after baking (though they looked pretty fine because I took pictures of the better looking side!). Tastewise the pastry was very short and melt-in-the-mouth but was bland eventhough I used salted butter and it has a slight floury taste which bugged me. 

Agnes Chang's Pineapple Tart Pastry Recipe

(Taken from her book, "Baking Made Easy")

Ingredients:

250 g unsalted butter (i used salted butter)

50 g icing sugar

2 egg yolks

360 g plain flour

2 tbs custard powder

1/4 tsp salt (omitted this)

Method:

1. Preheat oven at 160°C. Line a baking tray with baking paper.
2. Cream butter and icing sugar until light.
3. Beat in egg yolks, one at a time.
4. Add in salt and beat until fluffy.
5. Fold in sifted ingredients in bathches and mix into a firm dough.
6. Leave aside for 30 minutes.
7. Put the dough into a pineapple roll pastry press/mould, and then press out into a strip of 5cm length.
8. Place pineapple filing at one end and roll up the pastry, as in a Swiss roll, enough to enclose the jam. Do not overlap the pastry. Cut off the excess pastry.
9. Put the rolls on the baking tray. Brush with egg wash.
10. Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes and turn the baking tray 180 ° and continue to bake for 2 minutes or until golden brown.
11. Leave to cool before storing.

I made the enclosed type using this rich pastry recipe which calls for cream AND cream cheese from 'Table for 2 or More' here.   The inclusion of cream indeed gave a very fragrant dairy aroma and the cream cheese though not so prominent gave the pastry some edge which was really delicious and the pastry was very very tender. I couldn't stop myself from eating the remnants of raw dough stuck to my mixer paddle. It was so good. Handling the dough was a nightmare though. It was really really soft and took a lot of time, and if handled too much it oozes oil; this knocks off some brownie points for this recipe.  I've also added 1/4 teaspoon salt for more flavour. I'd suggest chilling the pastry dough in the fridge and only take out a portion at a time when shaping the tarts.

The open faced tarts. Recipe taken from 'Greg & Nee' here. This is the simplest pastry recipe amongst all. The result was very short & melt in the mouth fresh out of the oven but once cooled down and kept overnight it wasn't so.

These are made from using Amy Beh's recipe copied from 'My Culinary Journal' here. This recipe is meant for the rolled type (Nastar) but I wanted to experiment to see whether it can be used for open-faced tarts. The dough was very soft and it must be chilled to firm up before rolling between 2 sheets of clingfilm or wax paper. Quick hands were indeed required as the dough softens quickly once rolled out!



Simple Mushrooms & Leek Stir Fry

My Daughter has taken a liking to mushrooms ever since we had a simple mushroom dish served in a restaurant. It was shitake mushrooms simply stir fried in butter with garlic & black pepper. Here's my recreation with leeks and parsley added.

 Simple Mushrooms & Leek Stir Fry

Ingredients:

Mushrooms (Any type or combinations, sliced)

1 -2 Leeks

1 Tbs Garlic

1/4 tsp dried Parsley  

Salt & Cracked Black Pepper, to taste

1 Tbs Butter

1 Tbs cooking oil

Method:

Heat 1 tablespoon butter and 1 tablespoon cooking oil together in a pan. Saute garlic on low heat till fragrant but not brown, add leeks, stir fry till leeks are half cooked. Add in the mushrooms, season with salt & cracked black pepper, add a little water if necessary and stir fry until fully cooked. 

Simple, simple, simple!

German Potato Cookies

These cookies have been popping up in blogs everywhere lately and being 'kiasu' (a Hokkien phrase which literally means scared of losing out) I didn't want to get left behind and  jumped in the bandwagon too! Haha!

Sandy, melt in the mouth and at the same time light & tender with a buttery potatoe-y taste. Reminds me of melting moments cookies.

Recipe taken from 'Small Small Baker' here.


Ingredients:

125g butter
40g icing sugar, sifted
125g potato starch
80g superfine flour

Method:

1. Beat butter and icing sugar till fluffy and pale in colour.
2. Sift in potato starch and flour, mix to form a soft dough.
3. Roll into small balls (about 2cm in diameter), arrange on lined baking pan and press lightly with a fork (dip the fork in water after each press to prevent cookie dough from sticking to the fork).
4. Bake in preheated oven at 170 deg C for 15 mins.