Carrot Cake

Made this carrot cake with marzipan carrots for York Peng's birthday.
Had fun making the carrots - like playing with plasticine!
Sorry, no photo showing the two layers of carrot cake sandwiched with
the cream cheese icing - too busy cutting and eating the cake!

Ingredients

• 1 cup (150g) plain flour
• 1 cup wholemeal flour
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 1 ½ cups raw sugar
• ¼ tsp salt
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 1 cup cooking oil
• 3 cups grated carrot
• 1 cup sultanas (optional)
• ½ cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Icing:

• 60g unsalted butter, softened
• 250g cream cheese, softened
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• ½ cup icing sugar, sifted
• 1 cup chopped nuts
• 1 tbsp lemon juice

Method

1. Preheat the oven (not fan-forced) to 180°C. Grease a 23cm square cake pan and line the base.
2. Sift and mix dry ingredients.
3. Add oil and stir well.
4. Stir in beaten eggs then add carrot, sultanas and walnuts. Mix thoroughly.
5. Pour into the prepared pan and bake for 40-45min or until cooked. Remove from the oven and cool in pan for 5 minutes, then turn out on a wire rack to cool completely.
6. Meanwhile, beat all ingredients for the icing, except the nuts. Ice cake when it has cooled. Sprinkle chopped nuts on top of cake.

Chocolate heaven cake with chocolate truffles and chocolate glaze

Don't look too closely! You'll see the defects! Had a couple of 'mishaps' in the kitchen after decorating the cake. Won't tell you what but I managed to 'save' the cake.

The things a wife has to go through for her hubby's 50th birthday ........ I don't know......

Siew Pau

Ingredients
• 1 cup (150g) plain flour
• 1 cup wholemeal flour
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 1 ½ cups raw sugar
• ¼ tsp salt
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 1 cup cooking oil
• 3 cups grated carrot
• 1 cup sultanas (optional)
• ½ cup chopped walnuts (optional)
Icing:
• 60g unsalted butter, softened
• 250g cream cheese, softened
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• ½ cup icing sugar, sifted
• 1 cup chopped nuts
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
Method
1. Preheat the oven (not fan-forced) to 180°C. Grease a 23cm square cake pan and line the base.
2. Sift and mix dry ingredients.
3. Add oil and stir well.
4. Stir in beaten eggs then add carrot, sultanas and walnuts. Mix thoroughly.
5. Pour into the prepared pan and bake for 40-45min or until cooked. Remove from the oven and cool in pan for 5 minutes, then turn out on a wire rack to cool completely.
6. Meanwhile, beat all ingredients for the icing, except the nuts. Ice cake when it has cooled. Sprinkle chopped nuts on top of cake.

Teochew Yam Paste Moon Cakes

Ingredients
Filling:
1 kg cooked yam, mashed – I microwaved the yam
300g castor sugar (reduced fm 500g)
180ml oil
25g melon seeds (kuaci), toasted
25g olive nuts (lum yan), toasted

For the flaky pastry:

Water Dough (A):
375g plain flour, sifted
50g castor sugar
150g corn oil

Combine:
165ml water
1 tsp lime juice – I used lemon juice

Oil Dough (B):
280g plain flour, sifted
150g shortening - I used butter
Method
To make the filling: Cook mashed yam with sugar and oil until mixture turns dry and leaves the sides of the wok. Add in melon seeds and olive nuts and mix well. Leave to cool.

Divide paste into equal portions. Roll each lump into a small ball to be used as filling.

To make the pastry:
For water dough(A): Mix flour, sugar, corn oil and water. Knead into a smooth dough. Leave aside to rest for 30 minutes to an hour. Divide into 100g portions.

For oil dough (B): Combine flour and shortening into a dough. (add 1-2 tabsp water to combine) Leave aside to rest. Divide into small portions of 60g each.

Wrap oil dough within the water dough. Flatten and roll up swiss-roll style. Flatten length-wise and roll up swiss-roll style again. Cut into halves. Leave aside for 20 to 30 minutes.

Press the spiral centre lightly to make an indentation and flatten out the sides with a rolling pin (you should get a dome-shaped pastry).

Use this to wrap a portion of filling by pleating the edges together. Tuck in the edges neatly.

Place pleated side down on a greased baking tray and bake in a preheated oven at 180ºC for 25 to 30 minutes or until pastry is cooked.

Pandan Chiffon Cake

Beating the egg white



Mixing egg yolk /pandan mixture into flour



Egg whites folded into the egg yolk mixture



Batter in tin prior to baking



Baked chiffon cake, straight from the oven, before turning over the tin



Chiffon cake baked in kugelhopf tin

Sliced pandan cake (sorry pix didn't turn out well!)

PANDAN CHIFFON CAKE -this recipe has been adapted fm the original which uses 9 egg whites and 6 egg yolks as my chiffon tin is not big enough - the batter overflowed from the tin when I used 9 egg whites

6 large egg whites
½ tsp cream of tartar
125g castor sugar
4 egg yolks
80g vegetable oil
½ tsp pandan essence
¾ tsp vanilla essence (optional)
85g coconut cream
135g cake flour
1 ½ tsp baking powder (heaped)
½ tsp salt

1. Whisk egg whites and cream of tartar till stiff.
2. Gradually add sugar and whisk for another 5-7min
3. Combine yolks, oil, cream and essences in a bowl and beat lightly.
4. Sift flour, baking powder and salt into a large bowl.
5. Make well in centre of flour and pour in egg/oil/coconut cream mixture.
6. Bring flour in from sides and beat till smooth.
7. Fold in 1/3 of the stiff egg white mixture and blend well. Then, add the rest of the egg white and blend.
8. Pour batter into ungreased chiffon cake tin
9. Bake at 160C for 50-60 min till cake springs back when pressed with finger.
10. Remove from oven, invert cake tin over lid and leave for ½ hour before transferring to a wire rack to cool.

Pandan Muffins

choc chip cookies, sour cream cheesecake and pandan muffins - all made in one morning

Recipe adapted from American muffins recipe that I copied from somewhere ages ago.

AMERICAN MUFFINS

Ingredients

• 225g (1 ¾ cup) plain flour
• 3 ½ tsp baking powder
• 100g sugar
• pinch of salt
• 250ml (1 cup) milk
• 1 egg
• 120ml (1/2 cup) corn/sunflower oil
• ½ tsp vanilla essence

Method

1. Preheat the oven (not fan-forced) to 200°C.

2. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl.

3. Add the sugar.

4. Mix egg, oil, essence and milk together, then pour into dry ingredients. Blend quickly (mixture will be a bit lumpy)

5. Spoon into paper cases placed in patty tins (3/4 full) and bake for 15-18 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool in pan for 5 minutes, then turn out on a wire rack to cool completely.

6. Makes 15 medium or 12 large muffins

Variations

Blueberry and lemon

1. Add 200g blueberries and rind of ½ lemon
2. Chocolate chips

Use 175g flour and 40g cocoa

100g choc chips

½ tsp vanilla essence

3. Breakfast muffins

100g wholemeal self-raising flour

125g plain four

75g sugar

100g chopped apricots (dried)

1 tabsp honey

4. Cranberries/Raisins

Add a handful of dried cranberries/raisins

5. Pandan

Add a few drops of green pandan essence instead of vanilla essence and substitute part/all of the milk with coconut milk/cream

a

Baked cheesecake with sour cream topping

chocolate chip cookies

2 cups plus 2 tbsp all purpose flour (2 1/8 cups)
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
3/4 cup butter (12 tbsp / 170g), melted and cooled until just warm
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/4 - 2 cups chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 325F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda and salt.
In a large bowl, whisk together butter and sugars. Beat in the egg, egg yolk and vanilla. Stir in flour mixture, followed by chocolate chips.
Drop by (scant) 1/4 cups onto the baking sheet and pat lightly so the cookie is an even thickness, not a ball shape. Cookies will spread as they bake and this ensures a more even spread.
Bake at 325F for 15-17 minutes, until just turning light brown all over. The edges should only be very slightly more brown, if at all, from the rest of the cookie. Allow cookies to cool before removing them from the baking sheet.
Makes 18-24 large cookies.