Birthday cake for my mother

I seldom succeed in getting a homemade birthday cake ready on time for that special day of anyone... however this time, I delivered the cake to her on the day of my mother's birthday! I am so proud of myself. Haha.

This is a very simple all in recipe, so I gamely try it out as a birthday cake. The recipe asked that all the ingredients be thrown into a food processor and then just bake and decorate. Sounds so easy right? But I do not have food processor and I think the KA can do the job. The recipe is for a 4 layers cake and I half the recipe since I wanted to make a 2 layer one (* struggling to keep awake *).

Even though the butter is relatively soft, after some mixing, there are still cubes of butter not blended into the batter. I chose to leave it because I am worried about the gluten forming when flour is over beaten. But this recipe uses self raising flour .... does this applies to self raising flour too? I am also too lazy to lay the baking paper properly, so I just simply fold and tug to cover the 8 inch tray. I thought the batter would turn more "watery" and then will press out the folds but I was wrong.

The "naked" cake ended up looking like this.

Then I happily (dozed off for a while while writing!) prepare frosting. I did not use the recommended buttercream since I wanted to finish my whip cream in the freezer. I beat the whipping cream with my hands, so tired but I push myself and when finally done, I pour cooled melted chocolate into the cold whipped cream. I am sure all of you know what happens after that. This mistake is the 2nd time. The first time, I pour cool melted chocolate into the whipped cream when I served them ice cream like that of chocolate syrup... but the melted chocolate hardens upon touching the cold whipped cream. I can not imagine I can forget the mistake and made same one again. So in the end, the frosting was a whipped cream with bits of chocolate. Well, 另類 frosting then.

The cake was very sweet. I dare not reduce any sugar as I am afraid the cake will taste bitter if there was not enough sugar to compensate. The inside looked presentable but the cake is on the dry side and crumbly. However, it taste very good with the whipped cream. This is how my decorated cake looked like.

The recipe is taken from BBC Australian Good Food April 2011

Layered Easter Chocolate Cake 

Serves 12 Prep 20 mins plus cooling

Cook 35 mins 

Super Easy, Family favourite

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups (225g) self raising flour

1 1/4 cups (275g) firmly packed brown sugar

250g unsalted butter, softened

75g dark chocolate, melted

1/2 cup (50g) cocoa 

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

4 eggs

16 mini Easter eggs, to decorate

Ganache icing

1/2 cup (80ml) cream

160g dark chocolate, chopped

buttercream filling

375g unsalted butter, softened

500g pure icing sugar

1/2 cup (80ml) milk

1. Preheat oven to 180C or 160C. Grease and line two 20cm round pans.

2. Place flour, sugar, butter, chocolate, cocoa, baking powder, vanilla, eggs and 2 tbsp water in a food processor and process until smooth. Spoon into pans, level surfaces and bake for 35 mins, until a skewer inserted into centre comes out clean. Stand for 5 mins, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

3. Meanwhile, to make icing, heat cream in a small pan on medium. Bring to boil. Remove from heat and add chocolate. Stand for 2-3 mins, until chocolate is melted. Whisk until smooth. Stand for 20 mins. until cooled slightly and thickened. 

4. To make buttercream filling, use an electric mixer to beat butter until as white as possible. Alternately beat in sugar and milk, starting and finishing with a little sugar.

5. Using a bread knife, split each cake into two layers. Sandwich together all four layers with buttercream. Top with ganache and decorate with Easter eggs. Serve.

For those interested in the texture inside, I hope the picture can help a little.

Phew, I have finally managed an easy birthday cake on time for someone's birthday!

Supporting AB again - chocolate cupcakes

I did "Individual Milk Chocolate Cupcakes" (what a long name!) this morning with my girl. I started at around 10am and finishes at 12pm, with her help! But it is suppose to be very very simple.

Since she started PM session, she has not much chance of baking with me, so when I came across this recipe from this book I just borrowed from the new Clementi Library, I knew I just have to do it. However, I find that this recipe is rather familar. I cannot recall where is the similar recipe. Anyway, that is not so important. The important thing is, this recipe is easy, uses the ingredients I have on hand and also very much want to "get rid" of due to the soon to come expiry date.

The recipe goes like this :-


Inidividual Milk Chocolate Cupcakes (Makes 12)


75g (2 and 3/4 oz) unsalted butter
75g (2 and 3/4 oz or half cup) milk chocolate chopped
80g (2 and 3/4 oz or 1/3 cup) firmly packed brown sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
60g (2 and 1/4 oz or half cup) self raising flour, sifted


Ganache
80g (2 and 3/4 oz or heaped half cup) milk chocolate chopped
2 tablespoons thick (double/heavy) cream


1. Preheat the oven to 160 dC (315dF/ Gas 2-3). Line a flat-bottomed 12-hole cupcake tray with paper cases. Put the butter and chocolate in a heatproof bowl and place over a saucepan of simmering water - make sure the base of the bowl doesn't touch the water. Stir until melted and combined. Remove the bowl from the heat, add the sugar and egg and mix. Stir in the flour.


2. Transfer the mixture to a measuring bowl and pour into the paper cases. Bake for 20 - 25 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in the centre of a cake comes out clean. Leave in the tin for 10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool.


3. To make the ganache, place the chocolate and cream in a heatproof bowl. Place over a saucepan of simmering water, making sure that the base of the bowl doesn't touch the water. Once the chocolate has almost melted, remove the bowl from the heat and stir until the remaining chocolate has melted and the mixture is smooth. Allow to cool for about 8 minutes, or until thicken slightly.  Return cakes to the cold cupcake tin to keep them stable while you spread one heaped teaspoon of ganache over the top.


Recipe taken from Great Tastes Little Cakes published by Bay Books (sorry no author)

See, that is the end. Easy isn't it? I let my girl stir the chocolate and butter while I prepare lunch. I use dark chocolate couverture instead of milk chocolate by the way, dark chocolate healthier ya? Then I poured in the sugar first (to melt them with the heat),  after that wait for the mixture to cool down before I poured in the egg (incase the egg gets cooked). The mixture is pretty warm and I did not bother if the bowl touches the simmering water. What is the rational for not allowing bowl to touch the water? Can anyone tell me?

The batter consistency is not too runny, but it has alot of bubbles, so not sure if it is from the raising agent in the self raising flour or due to my constant vigorous stiring.  So, pretty straight forward, but after filling my 12 mini cupcakes I still have some left. I guess the recipe is for a 12 hole big muffin tray? After a round of 25 minutes, I baked the rest (6 only). Not sure if it is due to the batter not covered,  I noticed the batter turned alot stickier and thicker, and not so easy to pour the second round. Anyway my girl and I used spoon to scoop, thus we took a long time to fill the tray.

The resulted cupcakes are very nice and soft when warm, but looked very ugly because of the holes on top (perhaps resulted from the airy batter). After cool down, has a hard top and I feel that it is a little to the dry side. Perhaps I over baked. Should try again and bake only the standard mini muffin timing like 10 to 20 minutes.

Here's how ugly they looked.

the "solid" inside :-)

I am participating Aspiring Bakers #7 - Chocolate Delight (May 2011) hosted by DG from Tested and Tasted with this entry.

p/s : I am sorry I have to type degree Celsius in dC and fahrenheit in dF .. and the fractions ... sigh, cos I do not know how to enter special characters.

Brown sugar mini muffins

Wao, seems like I am very free? Not really, just that there is a need to have some breakfast for some days, and also I am only doing fried rice for simple dinner on some days. Ironing was done over weekend so I had the chance to bake. This is baked shortly after the cream cheese chocolate cookie.

I had wanted to try this - Brown sugar mini muffins ever since I see it in this blog. The recipe uses simple ingredients, esp one that I wish to "get rid" sooner - brown sugar. I had this pack of brown sugar for a long time. It has harden despite the fact that I put it in the fridge (in a container somemore!). Can anyone tell me how to keep the brown sugar from hardening?

I feel that this recipe is not that sinful and a little healthier because it is half fat to the flour used and it uses brown sugar instead of white sugar. Brown sugar is better isn't it? The method is also easy, everything throw into mixer in order. The only thing is, how to cream the sugar to pale and fluffy when I am using brown sugar. The creamed butter still seem brownish. Anyway, 無驚無險，the batter is mixed and then scooped into mini muffin paper cases lined inside my 12 holed mini muffin pan. The baking process is also not very eventful. The mini muffins rose as desired and browned as desired too. Very soon, the mini muffins are out. The recipe I referred to can make 14 mini muffins, but I am able to make 12 mini ones, plus 12 heart shaped one.

Yes, I bought a new pan, like the mini muffin pan but in heart shape. I cannot find heard shaped liner, thus I baked the muffins direct in it (since it is non stick pan). The end product is not so "heart" looking because I "squeeze" too much batter into each "heart" as I did not want to bake another half pan.

Here are how my mini muffins looked like.

No price guessing why is there a hole in each muffin :-)

I wondered, this recipe calls for 1.5 tsp of baking powder with 110g cake flour but how come the mini muffins are not puffing up very much?

The muffin is very soft when just out from oven but it taste good (and not too sweet)) when cooled. I feel that it is rather plain looking so perhaps when I serve the kids this, I will spread a layer of kaya or nutella on top. It will also served as a cover for the brown dotted surface. Why is the surface dotted? Brown sugar not melted?

Anyway my family big and small, all liked this muffin ..