Marble Butter Cake

 
This is gonna be a quick post, going off soon for appointment. I spotted this recipe when I was "flipping" through Eileen's blog, one of my favourite blogger, I love her photography, her baking / cooking and also her writing, simply love reading her blog post heeheehee.... This recipe is just nice for my Christmas baking since I have all the ingredients at home.

Can't wait for the event to be over, then I will have free time to do blog hopping, so gals wait for me ya, I am coming lol. 

 

Recipe adapted from eileenの记事本

Ingredients :
126 butter, soften
70g caster sugar
2 eggs
125g self raising flour, sifted
2 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp cocoa powder
adequate chocolate chips and chocolate rice

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 in 3 additions.
4. Add in milk and vanilla extract, use spatula to mix well.
5. Separate batter into two portions. In one portion of the batter, add in the cocoa powder and mix well.
6. Then spoon in plain and chocolate batter in the cake pan alternately until finish.
7. Sprinkle chocolate chips or chocolate rice on top of the batter.
8. Bake at pre-heated oven at 150 degree for about 25 mins or until skewer comes out clean.

Verdict?
This cake is soft and moist, very nice buttery taste with cocoa aroma, yum!

Grilled Tomato with Ham & Cheese

I am so busy recently, not even have time to play my Candy Crush lol! During this lapse period, the interest seem kind of "fade" off, really 3分钟热 度 hahaha...I also didn't get to have chance to visit my favourite blogs, not talk about dropping a comment so pls pardon me for that ok.

I stolen some of my lunch time to post this up, cos gonna be more busy due to the up-coming event at next week. I used to dun consume tomato at all, I afraid the soft and slimy interior, thus I dun eat lady finger and brinjal too. Not sure since when I started to eat tomato, probably due to dear daughter likes to eat tomato so got influenced by her or may be cos of age that's why more receptive to food lol. I am starting to eat brinjal too though still no lady finger yet.

The main purpose of preparing this dish is to participate in the event of Little Thumbs Up hosted by Mui Mui, I must give her some support :). I am not good at cooking thus more complicated dishes are not my cup of tea lol. Pardon me for the bad photos quality, it was taken at near 8pm and I was in rushed to serve a few hungry tummies lol. OK I shall stop here, going to have my lunch liao. See you!

Ingredients :
tomatoes
ham
cheese

Method :
1. Brush the baking tray with olive oil.
2. Slice the tomato into 3 pieces horizontally.
3. Top with ham then cheese.
4. Bake in pre-heated oven at 200C for 15 mins.


Verdict?
 This dish is simple and easy to prepare and yet quite nice to eat, still taste quite nice when is cooled. I guess tomato lovers will definitely appreciated this dish much more than me lol e.g. dear daughter, dear husband also gave good comment. I think this is a great party food, so this dish will definitely appear in my next party.

I’m submitting this to Little Thumbs Up that is currently hosted by Mui Mui @ My Little Favourite DIY. and Zoe @ Bake For Happy Kids.

Layer Biscuits Cheesecake aka Kek Lapis Cheese Persona

I can't believe I am hooked with game - Candy Crush! This may be norm to some people but for me, I never like to play games. Since my free time is so "precious", I rather use to reading, watching (drama), baking or blogging. I ever told my colleagues off  for being so crazy, they are always on the games, be it eating or even walking (so dangerous right). Little did I know that I will join them in this crazy group lol, of course I am still not as crazy but for the past few days (I started on last Friday), as long as I was able to squeeze out times (even when I was patting little kicker to sleep, my another hand was playing the game, never know I can be so multi-tasking hahaha....), I was on Candy Crush! I just got my Notes II as gift from dear husband, so I downloaded this game to the new phone as well. This was a bad move cos now I am playing Candy Crush with 2 phones, playing alternately when lives finished hahaha... I am thinking should I download to Ipad as well so that I can have 3 machines to play, oh mine I am so siao (crazy)! :P. I guess I can never insist of not creating facebook account any more, since I need to get tickets to continue playing the game heeheehee....

This Kek Lapis Cheese Persona apparently is very famous among Malay bloggers, at least when I google it, the url that popped out all are from Malay bloggers for the 1st few pages, not sure the rest of the pages since I didn't surf further lol. When I clicked to look out for the images, there are some Chinese bloggers had also tried this recipe :).

I called this cake as Layer Biscuits Cheesecake, dunno how else to translate it. The method is quite similar as Tiramisu, instead of using sponge fingers to soap with coffee and liquor, this uses marie biscuits to dip with milk.

I have some hiccups when making this cake. 1st, the cheese mixture is very thick that so difficult to spread it, I spent a lot of times on spreading the 5 layers. Next time, I will just increase the amount of milk to mix with the cream cheese to ease the spreading job. Secondly, the 500g cream cheese is not sufficient for the 7" square pan since I need more cheese mixture to spread the levels evenly, so I have to add in another 200g.

I replaced the top layer of biscuit crumbs with chocolate ganache to avoid the cake being too messy when slicing. Although the cake was not messy when slicing but look messy at the sides due to the sliding out the whole cake out from the cake pan.

Recipe from Home Kreation and 袅袅烘焙香.

Ingredients : for 7" square cake pan
700g cream cheese in room temperature
15ml milk
115g castor sugar (you must increase if you have sweet tooth)
1 packet of chocolate marie biscuit (I used 2/3 packet of 350g)
200ml warm milk (I left with half portion so next time won't be preparing so much)

Chocolate Ganache :
100g chocolate
70g milk
30g butter

- Boil the chocolate, milk and butter until mix well and smooth.

Method :

1. Beat cream cheese and sugar until smooth. Add in 15ml milk and stir well.

2. Line tin with plastic/parchment paper. (you may skip this step if you are using cake pan with removable base)
3. Crush 80g marie biscuit and mix well with 30g melted butter, press onto the cake pan.

4. Dip the biscuits in warm milk for 1 second and arrange in the cake pan.

5. Spread a layer of cream cheese and level it. (I weighed the cheese mixture and divided into 5 portions)

6. Repeat layering until finish, ending with cream cheese.

7. Pour the chocolate ganache onto the cake.

8. Chill 6 hours before slicing.

Verdict?
The cake is like those classic rich cheesecake, very thick and creamy, taste very unique with the layers of marie biscuits. I received a lot of compliments, even dear daughter who dun fancy on cheesecake likes the cake, she even asked for 2nd serving and requested to tabao (packet) some of the balance cakes back home lol. I will definitely make this cake again, may be turned into rum & raisins flavor, perhaps chocolate flavor, oreo flavor, coffee flavor or even coconut flavor... wow so many flavors to play with hahaha....

These lovely awards are awarded by a pretty lady Mui Mui of My Little Favourite DIY. Mui Mui, thank you so much for remember me and my little blog, thank you so much for liking my blog and bakes. Your nice gesture has brighten up my day and is like a booster to boost up my morale of blogging. I am now even more hesitate to quit blogging, not easy especially when knowing that there are someones out there appreciated and like my blog :).

There are so many nice blogs and talented bloggers that I wanna share these awards but I need times to sort them out. Thus I will post it later so pls excuse me me for the pending.

Almond Coffee Pound Cake

I am not sure is it due to the stress recently, I started to crave for coffee frequently after stopped drinking it for 20+ years. I used to be a loyal coffee drinker, forced to stop due to the overdose caffeine symptoms such as accelerated heartbeat and jtteriness, which I was badly affected. 

I am not a coffee cake lover, although I like coffee but not any bakes with coffee, be it cake, bread or cookies. This is the same like 2 of my colleagues, love to eat durian but simply just refuse to eat anything that make with durian, they only want to consume fresh durian lol. I will not be interested at all if I get to know that the bake is coffee flavor, I usually will not consume too as I do not want to load additional calories to my body for the food that I dun really fancy lol.

During Christmas, I baked some cupcakes as give away to my colleagues and also for my Christmas eve dinner at my place. At the night when I was baking, I decided to bake more varieties rather than just to stick to 2 flavors. But that was a so last min decision, I was not sure are there sufficient ingredients in my pantry. Thus I decided to look out for recipes with easy and simple ingredients but of course cannot compromise on the taste as well. I remember I saw this almond coffee pound cake that Ann was raving about and Jessie had given good review as well. Quickly checked my pantry, luckily I still have ground almond but no almond flakes, never mind I can replace with oreo biscuit :D.

Recipe from Anncoo Journal


Ingredients

150g Butter
120g Brown Sugar

1/2 tsp Salt

3 Eggs (60g), lightly beaten

1/2 tbsp Instant coffee powder (Nescafe classic) 

1 tbsp Kahlua/rum

170g Plain flour + 1 tsp Baking powder,   sifted

 2 tbsp Ground almond

1 tbsp Fresh milk

Amond flakes for topping (I used oreo biscuit)

Method:
1. Cream butter, sugar and salt at medium speed until light and fluffy.
2. Gradually add beaten eggs little by little until combined and add coffee powder and kahlua it and mix well.
3. Sift the plain flour and baking powder the second time directly to the batter with ground almond and gently fold well with a rubber spatula. 
4. Then add 1 tbsp fresh milk into it and fold the batter to smooth.
5. Pour batter into prepared cake pan or cupcake cases and sprinkle almond flakes and oreo biscuit on top.
6. Bake at preheated oven at 190C for 10 minutes. Then reduce temperature to 170C and bake for another 25 - 30 minutes or skewer inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. (I baked for about 20 mins or less for cupcakes)
7. Leave cake to cool in cake pan for 10 minutes and remove cake, then place on to rack to cool completely.

Verdict?
I totally agreed with Ann that coffee lovers will not resist having a slice or two of this almond coffee pound cake. Even a non coffee cake lover like me, I must admit 100% that this cake is so yummy, it is soft, moist and flavorful with very nice coffee fragrant. This cake has totally changed my concept on coffee cake, I do not mind trying other coffee cake in future lol. I wish to have more but I need to share half of the cupcake with dear husband since the rest had distributed, I had left one for photo-shooting lol. Dear husband also given thumbs up on this cake, definitely a keeper! 

Take a peep at the cupcakes galore that served during Christmas Eve dinner , can you spot the almond coffee cupcake?