say cheese..

I have to say every baker must have a good cheesecake up their sleeve. Since trying this recipe, I haven't been tempted to try anything else. Sour cream really elevates the flavor and gives it a really creamy soft texture. for those who love 'dense' cheesecakes, this is not for you. but i like this one as you can eat a whole slice and not feel queasy. and to make it even more decadent, I baked this with chunks of brownie in the batter.



This is my first experience with tempering chocolate. Of course, you can use plain melted chocolate, but it won't set and it just won't shine (or heaven forbid, chocolate cake covering) I don't know why I was so hesitant to try it before; it really wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be. For these chocolate dipped berries, 200 g of chopped dark chocolate couverture was used. 2/3 of that goes into a glass bowl over simmering water and melted to past 105 F. Upon reaching that temperature, remove from the heat and stir in the remaining chopped chocolate into the melted chocolate and start stirring like mad. When your temperature gets between 88 to 89, you are ready to start dipping. My biggest worry was whether the temperature would spiral down too quickly but I was quite surprised to find that the chocolate does maintain its temperature for a while. If it dips down below 88, simply place it over the simmering water but don't let it get above 90. Sounds tricky I know, but it wasn't so bad.

Pie it.

I must admit I'm not a fan of lemon meringue pie, but it is a classic and I like to master the classics. I hate the strong eggy taste of traditional lemon curd so for these tarts, I used a vegan recipe stiffened with agar. It turned out divine, without that dreadful eggy taste, but I would probably dilute the lemon juice next time; I like my lemon desserts verging on the sweet instead of the puckeringly sour. For the meringue, I used the italian method. the last time I used the french, the meringue collapsed in a matter of hours in this humidity.



These caramel and chocolate tarts were done for a recent order. I was very happy when a customer gave me some positive feedback, saying these brought her right back to Paris. I was initially quaking in my boots when I learnt that she was there for many years. She must have had the best of the best, and here I am - still an untrained pastry novice, what hope did I have? Lol. but thankfully she loved them.

lately.

I can't believe I've neglected this blog for quite a while now. yes, I've busy in the kitchen as usual but sometimes I'm so lazy to write about what i've been doing, you know? anyway, these are some of my projects lately.



The recipe for these brownies comes from the BAKED: New Frontiers in Baking Cookbook. The batter called for both cocoa powder and expresso powder to be added so the resulting brownie is very dark and rich. Out of all the brownies I've tasted, this one came out the least sweet, a plus for those who like less sweet things but I'll probably add a bit more sugar next time..



I've always wanted to attempt an opera cake, but i didn't want to do the classic coffee version, so I thought of matcha. I was surprised by how easy it was to do and how delicious the results were. Normally, I'm a big hater of buttercream but it paired really well with the green tea joconde and bittersweet chocolate ganache. One word though - when the recipe calls for soaking the cake layers with syrup - make sure to do so liberally - these type of cakes really come alive with moisture. I will definitely do this cake again and Im thinking of a caramel and white chocolate version this time... I also thought the cake was kinda tall, Upon further reading, I found out that an opera cake should not be more than 3 cm in height, so I reduced the quantity of the batter the second time round and this is the result.





These are some recent macaron orders. The purple-black ones are filled with olive-oil and vanilla ganache - a pierre herme recipe I always wanted to try. If you love olive oil, you'll be over the moon. But the taste wasn't really for me, I guess. It tasted good right after being made but the olive oil was so overpowering..



Am I the only person obsessed with the perfect pie crust?? I've found a combination of shortening and butter gives the flakiest results (I don't like the idea of using lard). The recipe for this pie crust comes from http://www.food.com/recipe/the-flakiest-pie-crust-333273. It will be my go to pie crust recipe from now - it's so delicious! The only thing that wasn't delicious were the granny smith apples I used - it was so sour; I think I'll do a sweet-tart apple mix next time. And the crust turned out to be soggy and uncooked on the bottom. so the second time, I baked - i placed the pie pan directly on the bottom of the oven, brushed egg white over the crust and sprinkled cookie crumbs before piling on the filling. this time, it worked like a charm :)

addictive.

Making macarons can be addictive. oh dear.



Since switching to italian meringue, I've been having more success with my shells. my last batches with french meringue - the batter settled into misshapen blobs and I've no idea why. The only thing I found is that with italian meringue, the shells take longer to mature. The macaron must really be aged for 2 to 3 days before it is at its best. My favorite flavour is the purple one... cassis. The red one is chilli chocolate; most people would balk at the idea of chilli in sweets, but rest assured I use the littlest amount to impart a slight tingle to the palate - in fact, most people won't know there's chilli inside until I tell them.



This is my new flavor: key lime pie. I initially wanted an edge of coconut to it so I added some coconut cream to the ganache filling too only to find out later I couldn't taste any coconut! I prefer to use ganaches for fillings as curds will reduce the macaron into a blob of goo in no time.

I also used to have a problem with hollow shells; I used every temperature setting but the problem remained. But this lovely lady, Thip (www.namthip.com) solved my problem. She told me that my batter was not deflated enough during the macaronnage process and I had to keep pressing the batter down against the side of the bowl with the spatula. since taking her advice, I've found out that the air pocket problem was resolved although I still get them on bad days.

lately..

After a recent 2 day stretch of baking non-cooperative macarons, I decided to throw in the towel for the time being and turn my focus on doing other things, before I pull out all my hair in angst :(
I'd been wanting to make financiers for a while, after acquiring this silicone financier pan. The only thing was I had no idea how it would taste like. the recipe called for two forms of butter: plain melted butter and clarified brown butter to be added to the batter. I have never made brown butter before (made by heating butter till the milk solids settle to the bottom and the mixture turns brown) and as I took a whiff, notes of caramel, coconut and vanilla came wafting up my nose. Whoa.. pretty intriguing stuff. So this is the end result - it tastes like an extremely rich butter cake, though I'd probably use pistachios or hazelnuts next time.



Meanwhile, I was in the mood for some Japanese style strawberry shortcake but I was wondering what to use for the cake. The biggest problem I always have with making sponge cakes is achieving a super light and tender texture. I liked the texture of bakeries where the crumb was tight, but the crumb of all my foam-cakes, regardless of whichever recipes I use, always turn out very loose. I'd been told that commercial bakeries actually use a lot of emulsifiers to make it soft, so probably achieving that texture is difficult (?) at home, unless one uses Ovalette or other emulsifiers. Anyway, I decided to make a genoise, as seen here. While it came out soft and wobbly on the day of baking, the next day it was a different story despire soaking the cake in a tonne of syrup, the texture left much to be desired. I would try the whole recipe again using Wondra flour, if I can find it!



So this is what I've been working on for today.. salted caramel and chocolate tarts. This is really one of my favourite desserts and a little goes a long way. You can't really see it from here but it has 3 layers: the caramel at the bottom, a chocolate cremeux in the middle, and a glaze on top. If anyone wants the recipe, i got it here: http://www.farine-mc.com/2010/02/chocolate-tarts-with-salted-caramel.html
I followed the recipe to a T, but doubled making the amount of caramel and I would probably reduce the glaze recipe by 1/4 next time and it would just yield about 12 individual tarts.

model.

If pastries can be models, I guess macarons can fit the bill. I can never resist taking pictures of these vividly coloured beauties (albeit with my crap phone camera).



These purple macs are cassis flavored. I'd initially toyed with the idea of an entirely jam filled macaron but decided I didn't want it to taste too cloying so I just added 3 tbsp of blackcurrant preserve to my regular white chocolate ganache. These have been aging for about a week now, and the interior tastes just like heaven.



The light green ones are pandan, my most popular flavor to date. the darker ones are pistachio and rose. I guess what makes all my mac fillings so nice is that I only use natural flavors. that means: real pandan leaves not fake extract. I use rosewater, not the artificial extract. Real preserves and real fruit purees, never chemical essences. I've been toying with the idea of getting fruit powders (to flavor the shells), but they can only be got online and is rather expensive. They've an amazing range of fruit powders though ranging from banana to raspberry.

The only thing I don't like about macarons is the amount of food color that goes into making them; I just don't like the idea of using anything artificial but with macarons - it really can't be helped as you need something vivid to bring out their attractiveness. Again, there are organic and natural colors available online but once again, they are horribly expensive.

basics.

I haven't been in the mood to bake any complicated cakes lately, but yet I've been craving for cake. good old-fashioned cake without any complicated layers or fussy embellishments so I decided to whip up this orange cake. This is one of my favourites, after the simple sour cream pound cake is baked, a hot orange syrup is poured all over the cake and the cake is left to absorb the goodness. A slightly damp, very moist crumb is the result. This cake is very dangerous to the waistline; I've never met anyone who didn't ask for seconds!



This is my first time making a whoopie pie. I've never had one before so I really didn't know what to expect. I used the recipe from Rose Levy Berenbaum's 'Heavenly Cakes' but used a plain 7 minute frosting instead. While it was tasted just ok, I thought next time, I would use a more decadent filling to bring out the taste - perhaps cream cheese, caramel or a chocolate ganache.