Moist Chocolate Cake

Out of the blue suddenly mum wanted a chocolate cake for Raya.
So I whipped this up in a jiffy, as you can see the result is not so good but the taste it!
That is important! LOL
This time I chose an rectangular cake tin instead of the usual round one.
As it is easier to cut to smaller pieces, lagi pun most people just want "A small piece"!!

Want to try the recipe? 
The recipe for this is here

For the icing I opted for a different one, as I didn't have any cream at home.

Icing

Ingredients
4 oz of icing sugar (sieved)
1 1/2 oz  butter (at room temperature)
1 1/2 oz cocoa (sieved)
enough milk

Method
In a bowl combine all ingredients except for milk.
Mix well to form a paste, then slowly add the milk until the icing is smooth and spreadable.
Once the cake is cooled, cover the cake with the icing and decorate as you like.

Happy Baking.

Apam Karamel or Apam Gula Hangus

I actually made this yesterday but didn't have time to get it down. It was on the spur of the moment kind of thing.
It was quite late and Mum wanted to eat apam. She loves all sort of apam and enjoys trying out various recipes of it. At one time, she made so many that we all had a hard time eating all the apam.
So back to the recipe, this time Mum wanted a gula hangus apam.
I checked the usually blogs and found an straight foward one by Mat Gebu.

The recipe is easy to follow and tastes very good too. Trylah, you might not like apam but let me tell you this apam is not like the usual beras ones, in fact it is almost like a sponge cake. Best eaten on the day it is made and better still with freshly grated coconut with a pinch of salt!!

Like all steam cakes, get your steamer and cups ready. It is best even when not mentioned in recipes to steam the cups a while before pouring in the batter. Don't know why, but Mum says so, I just follow.
I used medium sized porcelain cups that were greased lightly. You may also line the cups or what ever mould you are using with paper cups.

Apam Karamel or Apam Gula Hangus
source: Dapur Tanpa Sempadan

A
1 cup sugar
3/4 cup water

B
2 eggs
1/2 cup of oil (I used cooking oil)
2 Tbsp  condensed milk
2 Tbsp butter or margarine
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 1/2 cup of all purpose flour (he added another 1 Tbsp, so did I)
1 tsp vanilla (I added this)

Method
First in a pot, caramelized the sugar over low heat. When the sugar starts to burn and turn amber slowly swirl the contents of the pot. Be careful not to burn the sugar. When almost all the sugar is brown, carefully pour the water. Allow the sugar to all melt before switching off the fire and leave the caramel to cool.

Next in a bowl beat eggs, milk, oil and margarine using a whisk. You may use a blender or hand mixer.
Then slowly pour in the cooled caramel, soda bicarbonate and beat again. Add in the vanilla.
Lastly add the flour in batches while whisking until it is smooth.

Pour the batter into the warm cups and steam for about 10 to 15 mins.
**make sure the water of the steamer is bubbling.
It is cooked when the apam is springing to the touch.

Happy Baking.

more biscuits for Hari Raya

Just when I thought I could keep all my baking stuff, Mum tells me all the cookies are dark.
She wanted a variety, so I dragged out all my stuff and feet to start baking again.

Today I made Biscuit Dahlia.

Feeling rather rajin I decided to measure out the recipe for sugar cookies.
They are basically plain butter cookies and it is up to you to decorate it.
I got the recipe from BBC and it was a Christmas deco but edible cookie.

This year I egg washed it and sprinkled some purple coloured sugar and pink, red and white hearts and named them The Love Bears! I think they are so adorable and cute plus yummy as well!

The recipe for Biscuit Dahlia can be found here.
The recipe for the Bears of Love can be found here.

Happy Baking.

Pineapple Tarts

No way I am getting away with NOT baking pineapple tarts!
It happens to be my mum's all time favourite.
But at least now I don't have to make the jam anymore, it is easily available at all supermarkets and
baking goods shops. One less chore for me!

Through out the years, my mum and I experimented with a lot of recipes for pineapple tarts.
Once upon a time ago, we even made our own jam. Yep buy by the lorry load from the market.
Peel, slice and then grate it all before the slow process of cooking the jam. Let me tell you, if my poor fingers could talk, they'd probably tell you how many times they got burnt and oh... the jam too, occasionally!

We did the pineapple tarts, the ones where you just use a cookie cutter and press the jam on top, another version was clipping the edges finely! Hated that one!
There was the one shaped like a pineapple, hmm... if my poor thumbs could speak! I endured painful fingers holding that tiny scissors clipping away the pattern of the fruit! Then came the pain staking process of shoving a clove as stem of the fruit!  Horrible! I hated that one even more.

I must have made close to a million of these tarts, for sale and our own consumption. Frankly it is not my favourite kuih raya.

Then one fine day, we discovered the nastar or pineapple roll. I love this, easy and fast. The hard part is rolling the jam into small balls and of course refilling the mould! I have several moulds but strangely I just like one, it is my favourite one and works wonderfully! But after a few hundred, favourite or not, my poor thumbs ache!

Here are some of the types of moulds that can be used for this recipe, just use the one that you are comfortable with.

The recipe I have is by Amy Beh from her book At home with Amy Beh (vol 1)
I didn't follow the recipe for the jam as I bought mine. Roll the jam into small balls, believe me it makes life with the pineapple tarts a whole lot easier!!

pic courtesy of Google.











Pineapple Tarts
source: Amy Beh

Ingredients
Pastry
150g buter
100g margarine
75g icing sugar
2 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp salt (I didn't add this)

350g all purpose flour
100g corn flour

For the glaze: (I didn't follow this, I egg washed mine with just a whole egg and a bit of water)
1 egg yolk
1 tsp condensed milk
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp water


Method
In a bowl, combine both butter and margarine with the icing sugar.
Beat in the yolks. Add in vanilla.
Gradually add in both flours until it becomes a firm dough.

Put enough dough into the mould and using both thumbs, gently press it out.
Leave about a few inches long, enough to put the balls of jam and to roll later.
After rolling the dough with the jam, cut off the excess and place on a well greased
baking tray.
Brush lightly with the egg wash and bake for 15-20 min at 175C or until golden brown.

Once cooked allow to cool before removing from baking tray.
Sometimes, the egg wash makes the cookie stick to the tray, using a butter knife gently pry it from the
tray. Be careful, the tart is fragile at this point and breaks easily.

The balls of pineapple jam

Pipe out the stripes of dough and place the ball of jam and roll.

Place them on the baking tray and brush the egg wash.

Bake until golden brown - yummy!

Happy Baking.

Samperit

Yes, yes Hari Raya is almost here. Kuih raya is a must in most household if not all. It doesn't matter whether it is bought or homemade, you definitely will find several decorative balangs of kuih during Open Houses.
We do celebrate Raya but rather low key, if compared to the norm.
To me it holds too many memories that aren't that memorable but that's me.
It is the festive season after a month of fasting, so feasting is inevitable although better avoidable ... LOL

There's an additional cookie to my list of kuih raya this year. Samperit! I haven't baked any in ages.
But my sister nak makan, so I searched the blogs for a yummy and good looking one.
After going through several, I came across one LiNa Pg's blog recipe for the samperit/dahlia kuih raya looked good. Terima kasih banyak-banyak, kak!

In her recipe, she used another acuan and made kuih dahlia. I used another and left out the cherries.
I used the acuan for muruku, the one that looks like a T. I pressed out long stripes before cutting it shorter.
See pics, the muruku acuan I meant is the brown coloured one. You could also use the white smaller one, but it would take longer to finish.

The biscuit is crunchy yet delicious. Very addictive, you'll find yourself eating several at one sitting!
Beware, if too thin the biscuit is very fragile.
Sprinkle some edible coloured sugar on top just before baking for some variety or colour, leaving it as it is fine too.

The recipe is as follows.

Samperit/Dahlia
source: Teratak Mutiara Kasih, Puan LiNa_Pg

300g butter
160g icing sugar (sieved)
2 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla
240g all purpose flour
100g corn flour
160g custard powder

Method
Sieve all three flours and put aside.
In a bowl, I used a wooden spoon and combine the sugar and butter.
Do not over mix, as the dough will spread when baked and the patterns cannot be seen.
Mix just until the sugar dissolves.
Add the yolks and vanilla. Mix again.
Lastly add in the flour in 2 batches.
Mix until the dough becomes firm.
Form into balls and put into desired acuan.
Bake at 140C for 20 min or less. It depends on your ovens.
The yellow dough would turn slightly brown when cooked.

Happy Baking.

Agar-agar Marble - Chocolate and Milk

The preparations and ingredients for the all time favorite dessert is rather easy.
All you need is the patience for the jelly to hardened before you can eat it!
I am sure every family has their own favourite and secret version of this recipe. But I got the recipe from Kongsi Resepi, but I can't remember who the blogger was. But anyway thank you very much!


You might have noticed that the 'jelly moulds' are actually cupcakes pan! Yep, just got them and I wanted to try them out so much, I poured the jelly into them. Very happy to report they were truly worth every sen!
Small bowls or cups or the usually jelly moulds also can. It is entirely up to you.

Right, back to the recipe. The actually recipe calls for the agar-agar mixture to be divided into two, one for chocolate and the other for milk. But I didn't do this instead for the milk I took out about a cup while the rest of the agar-agar I mixed it with cocoa powder. It is really up to you how you want your jelly to look like, more chocolate, or milk or equal parts. Or you could just make it an all chocolatey agar-agar!


Chocolate Agar-agar
source: Kongsi Resepi.com


A
1 packet agar-agar (It is strips of dried transparent strips of agar-agar, in a long clear packet)
1 cup sugar

B
1 medium egg
1 tin of evaporated milk
2 Tbsp custard powder
750 ml water
1 tsp vanilla

C
4 Tbsp cocoa powder or Milo



Method
Put A into a pot and bring to a boil. Turn the heat to low.
Next in a bowl, beat the egg and milk. Separately, combine the custard powder and 2 Tbsp of water first
before adding the rest of the water. This is to prevents lumps. Add the custard mixture and vanilla into the bowl of egg and milk.

Pour the milky mixture into the pot of agar-agar and mix well. Stir to combine all. Turn up the heat again and boil. Don't boil too long or it will be lumpy.

Next divide the agar-agar to the portions you want. Leave one plain and the other add the cocoa powder or Milo.

Pour one portion into moulds leaving it to slightly hardened, about a few minutes. Keep checking, if the jelly is slightly shaky is the best time to marble it or if you prefer to have 2 layers instead, wait a bit more before pouring the other portion.

Happy Baking.

Bingka Cheese

Bingka Cheese, mmm.... aparently I, once again and not surprisingly missed this band wagon.
I just only found out about this delicious and rich delicacy.
To me bingka was often ubi kayu or tepung with the variety of it being made with either white sugar or palm.

My mum yang wanted to taste it, so I went 'digging' around various blogs and sites searching for the most promising one.
Me being me, lazy, opted for the easy, simple not too many steps recipe. But there were sooo many!
I had a tough time deciding and pondering which one, which one. The bingka is rather costly and I can't afford to make experiments or mistakes. Some gave precise instructions and measurements and then there were some who didn't! Some merely posted pics!
Kepala pun sudah sakit, the mouth watering pics were no help either!
But eventually I did found an interesting one, relatively easy too. Terima kasih banyak-banyak Puan Izah of Izah Muffin Lover
But nothing is easy, and I re-read the recipe several times and followed the instructions carefully. Thanks to God I made it and the masses had a cheesy feast!

Puan Izah got the recipe from HaSue, another blogger with fantastic recipes but she made some changes to the original HaSue's. Check out both their recipes and see the difference. In Puan HaSue's recipe, she used HongKong Flour and agar-agar, where else Puan Izah used Tepung Gandum and powdered agar-agar.

As HongKong flour is difficult to find and expensive, I opted for tepung gandum and agar-agar powder instead. But the result is satisfying, I can't say which is better as I have never tasted or seen the HongKong  flour version of this bingka. But I'm happy with mine.

The recipe should you want to give it a try is as follows.

Bingka Cheese 
source: Izah Muffin Lover

A
10g of agar-agar powder or 1 packet of  Swallow brand agar-agar powder
3 cups of water
1 cup of sugar (I lessened it a bit)

B
250g of butter (1 block, I used Farm Cow) (at room temperature)
250g cream cheese (1 block,  I used Fatura)
1/2 tin of condensed milk
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla or 1 tsp lemon juice
1 1/2 cup of all purpose flour (I used Tepung Gandum Blue Key)

Method
In a pot combine A and boil until the sugar dissolves. Put aside.

Using a hand mixer, beat eggs until light and fluffy.
Add in the butter and milk. Beat again to combine.
Add in flour, cream cheese (cut into small pieces, easier to mix) and vanilla.
Beat well until the batter is smooth.

Next, pour the warm agar-agar liquid into the batter and beat again, at high speed.
Sieve the batter into a grease cake pan. (I forgot to do this, but the bingka turned out ok)
Bake at 175 C for 1 hour.

Happy Baking.

Eggless Caramel Pudding

Pretty hot these days, leaving us feeling parched and amazingly what comes to mind or to be exact what your tummy needs is something really cold and sweet. The answer is ... ice cream!!
But after that nice coldness comes the warmth again, it doesn't last long and another helping is well a little too much eh?
After all how much ice cream can one eat? It depends on who you're asking, an ice cream lover who definitely say endless tubs, where else some might say depends on the flavor!
Me personally, a few years back I enjoyed Swensen's Earthquake despite shivering, teeth chattering and all as I bravely finished every last scoop, but now I would say about 2 scoops is the most I can eat. But then again it depends... on many other things! LOL
Enough ramblings and back to the puds. Puddings, hmm... most of us have each a fair share in our life time.
Bread puddings, steamed puddings, sticky toffee puddings dan lain lain. All my life I have eaten caramel puddings that had eggs.
I am not a fan of eggs, unless of course it is well mixed in the food. I know this sounds snobbish but I only eat the caramel puddings made at home, that has lots of vanilla and not too sweet.
So when I came across aku bukan master chef's Eggless Caramel Pudding in his blog I was naturally intrigued and immediately wanted to try it out.
But alas, time was not on my side nor the ingredients so  I had to wait and shopped for the stuff first.

Just look how smooth the texture of the pudding is, mmm... delicious! But wait before I go into the recipe let me say that this wasn't my first attempt.

I'm human too, and to err is human.
My first attempt at the eggless caramel pudding was a awful, it was a disaster. I admit in my haste I didn't read the recipe carefully and as a result a simply pudding turned out wrong. It didn't hardened and was way too sweet (the result of misreading measurements!!), so sadly it ended up in the bin.

I waited for a few days to calm down before tackling this pudding once more. I told myself that if I failed again this time, I'd move on to another recipe or find a better one.
I have tried several of abm's recipes before and they turned out well, so all mistakes are mine and mine alone.

This time around, I read and measured everything very carefully, took my time to do it and thanks to God I made it! Yay!
It was very well received by the masses, even mum said it was delicious! Now pleasing my mum, who is a perfectionist and a very picky and fussy eater is very difficult. So, we have a saying -  if mummy kata sedap, sedaplah tu! 


Don't go through the hassle of weighting the agar-agar powder. In the shops I found out that there are 2 brands selling agar-agar powder, one is Nona and the other is Swallow.
They are both yellow packets.
I got this on Google, the label isn't so clear but it looks like this.

Don't use the Konnyaku Jelly, that is completely different.
Read the labels carefully, Nona is only 8g but Swallow is 10g. So as the recipe requires one packet of Swallow is enough.
Another thing, make sure you pick the one that says CLEAR, don't pick the colored ones or you'll get a colorful pudding.
Don't add the custard powder all at one go. Mix the custard powder with one cup of the four cups of water before adding it to the pot to avoid lumps.

This pudding also doesn't require any baking! Just a little cooking over the flame, pour into moulds or tins and chill in the fridge.

Here is the recipe and I hope you'll enjoy it as much as we all did!

Eggless Caramel Pudding
source: Aku Bukan Masterchef

A
4 Tbsp sugar

B
10g agar-agar powder
1/2 cup sugar
4 cups water
1/2 cup condensed milk
1 tin evaporated milk (about 390g)
but abm used 400 ml fresh milk. I used 400 ml low fat milk.
3 Tbsp custard powder
1 tsp vanilla


Method
First pour A into the cake pan you intend to make the pudding in.
I used a round 22 cm cake tin. Over a low flame slowly caramelized the sugar.
This requires patience, be careful not to burn the sugar or you'll end up with a bitter pudding.
As tempting as it is, don't stir the sugar. Some parts might burn faster, so just slowly tip the tin
a little to help the process along.
Once all the sugar has turned a deep amber color and melted, it is caramelized.
Switched off the fire and remove the tin. Put it aside and let it cool, the caramel will hardened but don't worry.
Next in a pot, you'll need a medium size pot and put in all the ingredients.
Cook over medium heat and whisk slowly. This pudding burns easily so don't leave the pot.
Keep stirring until the mixture thickens up.
It'll take a few minutes, the mixture will start to thicken. Keep stirring to avoid lumps and when it starts to bubble switch off the fire and immediately pour into the tin with the caramelized sugar.
abm recommended using a strainer but I forgot and just poured the whole thing in.
Leave the pudding to cool slightly before chilling it in the fridge for about 3 hours.
After 3 hours, to serve ...
Use a plate larger than the tin and place it over the tin. Slowly turn the tin upside down and allow the pudding to slip out. Be careful of the syrup that flows out with it. This pudding cuts beautifully too.

Happy Baking umm.. eating!