Steamed Moist Chocolate Cake II

After I made the steamed moist chocolate cake and I love it a lot, I made another one again a week later to bring along during my weekly visiting to dear mum's place.

For this cake, I added chocolate chips but I added when the batter was still hot so the chocolate chips actually melted, so when cake was sliced, some parts were very moist cos of the melted chocolate chips but very chocolaty delicious.

I am submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #25: Steaming Hot Cakes (Nov 2012), hosted by Miss B of Everybody Eats Well in Flanders.

For Cake :

Ingredients :

180 g butter
180 g caster sugar 
200 g full cream evaporated milk 
 2 eggs, slightly beaten with fork
100 g plain flour
50 g cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp vanilla extract or 1 tsp vanilla essense
1 tbsp of rum 

50g chocolate chips

Methods :

1. Combine caster sugar, evaporated milk, vanilla extract or essense, rum and butter in a saucepan. Stir over low heat until sugar is dissolved and butter is melted, turn off the fire and keep warm.

2. Add the beaten eggs into the slightly cold evaporated milk mixture and stir till well mix.

3. Sift the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and baking soda into a large mixing bowl, then pour the eggs mixture over the flour and stir till well mix (cake batter should be runny - mine is like the batter for brownie)

4. Heat up the steamer.

5. Lined and greased a 8" round baking pan.

6. Pour half of the batter into the lined pan and sprinkle chocolate chips on top of the batter and pour the remaining batter.
7 Place the pan into the steamer and cover the top of the pan loosely with a piece of aluminium foil.

8. Cover the steamer and steam over medium heat for 45 mins. (I steamed for nearly 55 mins, until skewer came out clean)
9. Cool the cake in pan before turning out for further decoration. 

For Frosting :

100g chocolate, chopped into small pieces

25g milk

Method :

1. Double boil the chocolate and milk until chocolate is melt.

2. Pour onto the cake and chill the cake.

* This amount of chocolate ganache is not sufficient to coat the whole cake, you need to increase the amount of chocolate if you want to frost the entire cake. 


Note :
** One of my department gal likes this cake a lot, she actually made one for her husband. She said she omitted rum as she has none at home, her comment is the cake is tasted so so much better if with rum.

Cheddar Cheese Butter Cake II & My Wedding Anniversary

If not because of Jessie blogging about her wedding anniversary, I nearly forgot about mine lol. Actually I am also too late to blog about it since my anniversary was over for a few days :P. Times flies, I already married for 12 years (my R.O.M was exactly a year before my customary wedding).

Jessie asked whether she has any chance to see my wedding photos, initially was too shy to show but since she asked liao so must at least show something to her :P. So I decided to post up 2 photos that can't see my face too clearly, not as pretty as Jessie so better do some hiding hahaha....I guess you might not be interested to view as well since such old photos :P. Well, perhaps next time if there is a chance, I will showcase the rest.

The photo quality is not good since I have to scan from hard copy, the samples that given back by the studio. There was no digital copy for studio shooting during my time, revealed my era again lol.

Alright, enough of 献丑, now back to my bake.

This cake was baked so long ago that I nearly forgot about it, hesitated whether to post it up since so "old" but decided to go ahead to document down all my bakes if possible, be it nice or not, fail or success since this is a platform for me to refer on all my bakes and cooking.

Recipe adapted from Passionate About Baking.

Ingredients: 2 x 8"x3"x3.5"
250g butter
170g sugar (I reduced to 150g)
4 eggs, lightly beaten
85g cheddar cheese (I used 6 slices shredded)
1 tsp vanilla extract
100ml milk
280g plain flour 
1 tsp baking powder

Method:
1. Cream butter and sugar till light and fluffy.
2. Add eggs one at a time and mix till incorporated.
3. Add cheddar cheese and mix till well combined.
4. Add vanilla extract and mix well.
5. Sift flour and baking powder together.
6. Add 1/3 of the flour into the mixture, followed by milk. Alternate flour and milk and end with flour. Mix till incorporated.
7. Pour into a loaf pan and sprinkle some cheddar cheese on top.
8. Bake at 180C (160C fan oven) for 55mins.

Verdict?
The cake is soft and moist, salty sweet and full of cheesy fragrance, really nice. All my colleagues likes the cake, IK (gave a loaf to her for helping me to queue to buy bak kwa (Chinese-style pork jerky) said her cake finished within 2 days. I much more prefer this recipe compared to another one that I tried before.

Nutella Cake

 Did I ever mention that I am an nutella craze? I can hug a big tub of nutella and gulp down non stop using a spoon while watching TV drama or reading books. I quit this bad habit many years ago ever since I need to watch my waistline. 

However during my maternity leaves at home, this bad habit came back and haunt me. I picked it up again and within 3 days, I can finished the giant tub of nutella which I think is 750g, scary right! Of course I dun do it anymore, I cannot afford to load more fats on me  hahaha...

Since I still have 2 big tub of nutella at home, I am looking for some recipes to get rid of it. Recalled that I ever saw this recipe in one of my baking books collection, quickly flipped through all the books to hunt for it lol. This cake was baked almost 1/2 year ago, I still have 1 tube unopened nutella and 1/3 tube opened one in the fridge now, need to find chances to get rid of it.

Recipe from Agnes Chang I CAN BAKE

Ingredients: (for 9"/22cm round cake pan but I used 8" and a few cupcakes)

250g butter, softened

200g soft brown sugar

4 eggs, lightly beaten

300g self raising flour, sifted

5 tbsp milk

6tbsp or more Nutella chocolate hazelnut spread

60g hazelnuts, chopped coarsely (I used walnuts)

Method:

1. Put all the ingredients for cake into a mixing bowl and beat until light and fluffy.

2. Pour 2/3 portion of the cake mixture into a greased and lined round baking tin and spread evenly to level. 
Spoon the Nutella chocolate hazelnut spread in six blobs (I put more).

3. Top with the remaining 1/3 portion of the cake mixture, swirl a few times with a skewer, then smooth the top.

4. Sprinkle chopped hazelnuts (I used walnuts since dun ve hazelnuts on hand) on top of batter and bake in a preheated oven at 180C forabout 45minutes to 1 hour or until cooked and golden brown. (Pls cover the cake with aluminium foil if the cake starts to brown too fast)

5. Remove, leave to cool before serve.

Verdict?

The cake is soft and fluffy, tasted so good with the nutella. This is so easy to whip up that you can have it 
anytime when you are craving for butter cake.

Cempedak Butter Cake

For the past few nights, there was very nice baking aroma came from my neighbours, must be Indian neighbours baking for their Deepavali. It smell so nice that made me miss my baking, although I have the urge of baking but I am too tire and of course, too lazy to take any action hahaha....

This cake was baked on August 2012. I am a big fan of jackfruits but not cempedak, even if I see cempedak in supermarket or fruits store, I seldom have the urge of purchasing it. However when I saw this cempedak butter cake and the rave from 鲸鱼蓝蓝蓝, I decided that should give it a try.

I remember I saw cempedak in the supermarket quite a few times but when I wanna buy, I can't locate any :(. Thus, this recipe was shelved it for quite awhile until I saw a few packs of cempedak at my mum's place that bought by my sis! I quickly "snatched" 2 packs from her hahaha...

Recipe adapted from here.

Ingredients : (for 7" square cake pan)

225g butter
90g castor sugar
4 eggs
240g cake flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
4 tbsp milk
110g cempedak meat (mashed)

Method :
1. Beat butter and caster sugar until light and fluffy
2. Add in egg, one at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition.
3. Fold in sifted flour, using spactula.
4. Add in milk and cempedak meat, mix well.
5. Pour the batter into the cake pan and bake in pre-heated oven at 180C for 35-45 mins or skewer comes out clean.

Verdict?
The cake is very moist and tender, strong aroma in smell but tasted not as strong.

Steamed Rainbow Cake

 
There are quite a no. of us are excited today, we are having our 1st PLP (portluck party) in our office. I initiated this event and got one of my department gal to organise it, invitation opened to our division and glad that most of them are participating, except those who are on leave or out-station. I saw a lot of food on the table when I reached office this morning, can't wait for the lunch time heeheehee... Hope able to share the photos with you soon :P.

This cake is not for the PLP, I didnt bake for this event, I cooked fried mee hoon instead. This cake was done many months ago, the 1st steamed cake that I had made, before steamed moist chocolate cake.

As I have mentioned before, I love rainbow cake. I just can't take my eyes of on colorful bakes, it just will brighten me up. Occasionally, I will google to search for rainbow cake and this steamed rainbow cake was found during one of the net surfing. It was kept in my recipe collection for longest time and was been noticed again recently when I was hunting for some inspiration.

I am submitting this post to Aspiring Bakers #25: Steaming Hot Cakes (Nov 2012), hosted by Miss B of Everybody Eats Well in Flanders.
 

Recipe from Aunty Yochana.

Ingredients:
6 eggs
250g superfine sugar
2 tsp. vanilla essence or 1/2 tsp. vanilla bean
280 gm. cake flour - sifted
1/4 tsp. salt
200 ml. coconut milk
3 drops of green colouring
3 drops of red colouring
3 drops of yellow colouring

Method :

1.          Prepare steamer and a 8" round tin.

2.          Whisk eggs with sugar and vanilla until mixture is thick and pale in colour.

3.          Using spatula, fold in flour, salt and coconut milk in small amounts till well mixed.

4.          Divide mixture into 3 equal parts. Stir in red colouring into one part, green into one part and yellow colouring into the 3rd part.

5.          Pour 1 ladle of green colouring mixture into tin and steam for 5 - 10 mins. Repeat with red mixture, followed by yellow mixture till mixture is used up.

6.          Steam cake for another 15 - 20 mins or until a skewer inserted into the centre of cake comes out clean. Remove cake to a wire rack and leave to cool before unmoulding it. Serve. 

 

Note:

1.          What I did was to divide each colour mixture into 2 equal part to make it 6 layers, each layer steam for 5 mins, except the last layer I steamed for 20 mins. The batter weighs about 1kg, you may divide the batter according to the number of colours/layers you want to achieve.

2.          Bang the batter on tabletop before steaming to release any big bubbles.

3.          The colour of the batter is what you get after steaming, so adjust the colouring according to your own liking.  

Verdict?
I must have over steamed the cake, the cake was a bit dry and I can't really taste the coconut at all. However, the cake tasted so much better the next day.

Banana Sponge Cake

Hurray! After a long period of waiting, I am finally out from "maidless" day! So glad that at least I have some leisure times rather than busy all the way.

I cannot make any comment on this helper too early but so far so good, at least she is obedient type so my mil is happy with her. And she has more patience with the kids so I won't get to hear any high pitch voice like my previous helper. Most importantly, I am happy and stress-free to be at home all time since I won't get to hear any complaints and fights :D.

I didn't bake for a month plus, getting lazy after stop for a period lol. I have many backlog to clear and I wish to post some of the food that prepared for my little kicker birthday party but lazy to clean up the photos hahaha...



This cake was baked a few months ago when I had too many bananas sitting in my freezer (the bananas are accumulating again lol), so I decided to bake a banana cake. Well, although my heart was ready to go for my all time favourite banana cake but my mind telling me that I should give other recipe a try.

I first saw this banana sponge cake was when Wen submitted to Aspiring Baker : Fruity March 2011 hosted by me. As during that period, I was still glued tightly to my all time favourite, so didn't pay much attention on this recipe. When I decided to try other banana cake recipe and this recipe immediately caught my attention. Beside this is Wen's all time favourite, and also the 2 bloggers that I admire, HHB and Sonia given good review on it.

Recipe adapted from here which originated from Richard Goh Baking Class Stage 1.

Ingredients:
3 eggs (medium)
130g sugar
200g banana (ripe & cut into small pcs)
150g cake flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
100g vegetable oil
1/8 tsp vanilla extract

Method :
1. Preheat oven to 160 degree C.
2. Grease and line a 8" round tin with paper.
3. Sieve flour, baking powder and soda together. Sieve twice and set aside.
4. Whisk eggs, sugar and banana at max. speed till stiff/ribbon stage. (For Kenwood Chef - approx 10-13mins)
5. Fold in flour and mix well. (Can use spatular or hand to mix)
6. Add in oil and mix well till batter is shiny and flowing.
7. Bake for 40 - 45mins

Verdict?

The cake is soft and spongy, much lighter than butter cake. If you are looking for a lighter and healthier version of banana cake, this is the recipe for you. I will definitely bake again if I want a lighter banana cake. Although dear husband and brother think the cake is nice but they still prefer this banana cake, well they have "heavy" taste bud lol.