Orange Carrot Cake

Remember me mentioning that hubby do not fancy cakes? Well, he does eat certain types of cake though not really indulge in them and I'm on a 'journey' to discover his prefered taste...(^_^). One of them is Carrot cake. On his previous deep sea fishing trip with his buddies, I  baked a carrot cake and put some inside a container as I know my children and I will not be able to finish them. When he came home from his 3 days 2 nights trip, he said he & his buddies finished up the whole lot in seconds and it was not enough to share ...:-)) Hmmm....makes me wonder if it was because they were too hungry or rather, nothing to eat on a fishing boat in the middle of nowhere.

Few days later while eating an orange, he asked me if there's such thing as Orange Carrot cake. I told him that there should be and will try and bake one. I actually fogot all about it until I was reading other blogger's webpage yesterday and saw this recipe from  http://anncoojournal.blogspot.com/

Ingredients:
160g Brown Sugar
3 Eggs
1/2 cup Corn Oil
150g Carrot, Grated
100g Raisins
1 tbsp Orange Zest
4 tbsp Orange Juice
180g Plain Flour
1 tsp Baking Soda
1 tsp Cinnamon Powder

1) Line a 7' square pan at all sides.
2) Gently mix brown sugar, oil, orange juice & eggs till combine.
3) Add carrots, raisins & orange zest. Mix well.
4) Sift flour, baking soda & cinnamon powder together. Fold into the wet ingredients.
5) Bake in preheated oven at 175degree C for 40 - 45 mins.
6) Leave to cool before frosting with your favourite Cream Cheese frosting.

Chilled Ribena Marble Cheesecake

This recipe has been in my collection for quite sometime. I felt like making a chilled/non bake cheesecake as its been quite sometime since I made a non baked one. I have most of the ingredients at home and this is a very easy cake to make. You can go to this blog to check out the step by step instruction.
http://happyhomebaking.blogspot.com/2009/02/yummy-delight.html

Ingredients for Crust:

150g Digestive biscuit, crushed
60g Butter, melted

1) Line a 20cm/ 8 ' round pan with removable base.
2) Combine crushed biscuit with melted butter and press to base of pan.
3) Chill in freezer for at least 1 hour.

Ingredients for Filling:

250g Cream Cheese, room temperature,
75g Castor Sugar
250ml / 1 cup PlainYogurt
75ml Ribena Cordial / Syrup
100ml Water
2 tbsp Gelatin powder

1) Sprinkle gelatin into water. Do not stir. Let gelatin swell (about 10 mins) before setting bowl over a pot of simmering hot water. Stir well till gelatin melt. Remove & set aside.
2) Beat Cream Cheese & sugar till smooth. Add in gelatin & yogurt. Beat till smooth.
3) Divide mixture into 2 bowls and add ribena cordial/syrup to one of the bowl.
4) Spoon 4 tbsp of plain cream cheese onto the middle of prepared biscuit base. Spoon 3 tbsp of ribena cream cheese over it.
5) Continue altenately until the cream cheese is finished. Do not tilt the pan, it will spread by itself.
6) Chill in refrigerator for at least 4 hours.

Ice Cream Cake for Father's Day

The 3rd Sunday of the month of June is dedicated to fathers all over the world and this year, I made the cakes for my father and also hubby. For my father, I made a carrot cake frosted with cream cheese as he loves the carrot cake I bake minus the walnuts...:-) Previous years, he would request me to get him either a Black Forest cake or a Fruit Cocktail cake from the local bakery. I'm glad this year I get to bake for him.

For my hubby, he actually do not fancy eating cakes but once in a while indulge in them. I baked him a chocolate cheese cake for his birthday in April so I thought of trying out the Ice Cream Cake recipe I had from the baking class last year, hence the Yogurt Mango Ice Cream Cake.. I still need to have more practice on decorating and handwriting...(^.^)

Yogurt Mango Ice Cream Cake

Sponge Cake Ingredients: -
(A) 4 Eggs                                        
      120g Castor Sugar                                                
      1 tbsp Ovalette (I omitted)                 
(B) 100g Superfine Flour (or low protein flour)
       15g Corn Flour
       1/2 tsp Baking Powder
(C) 40g Water
      1/2 tsp Mango Essence
(D) 50g Corn Oil

1) Whisk ingredients (A) till fluffy. Add in (B), use high speed to whisk till thick and light.
2) Pour in mixture (C) & (D). Stir well and pour into 9" round pan. Bake at 160 degree C for 30 - 35 mins.
3) Let cool and slice into 3 layers.

* You can also use your favourite sponge cake recipe. 

Ice Cream Filling: - 
((A) 3 Egg Yolk
       80g Castor Sugar                  
 (B) 200g Mango Puree
      200g Plain Yogurt
      1/2 tsp Mango Essence
(C) 300g Whipping Cream, whipped                                              

1) Double boil ingredients (A) till sugar dissolves. Remove from heat and add in ingredients (B). Mix well.
2) Let it cool and stir into (C).

To Assemble:-
1) Arrange a layer at the bottom of the cake board inside a cake ring. Cut another slice into 4 to cover the sides of the cake ring.
2) Pour in the ice cream filling and cover the top with the last layer of sponge cake.
3) Put in freezer overnight.
4) To decorate, remove the cake ring and deco with fresh cream.

Cinnamon Rolls

My youngest brother had been asking me to try baking Cinnamon Rolls since his visit back home from Kansas, USA last year.  He knew I love any food that has cinnamon in it. I really love the smell of cinnamon  during baking like carrot cake or apple pie. I looked up on the various cinnamon roll recipe from the cooking books I have and also google the net  but I still find this recipe taken from 'Agnes Chang's Baking Made Easy' the easiest.

Ingredients A
300g High Protein Flour
1/2 tsp Salt
50g Castor Sugar
1 tsp Instant Yeast

2 Eggs, lightly beaten
60 - 75ml Milk
60g Soft Butter

Filling:
60g Soft Butter
50g Soft Brown Sugar mixed with 2 tsp Cinnamon Powder
50g Ground Almond

1. In a mixing bowl, mix ingredients A. Add eggs, milk and knead to form a soft and pliable dough. Add butter & continue to knead till smooth and elastic. Cover and prove till double in bulk.
2. Knead again till smooth. Rest for 15 mins.
3. Roll into a 36cm/14" square, spread soft butter on dough, leaving 2 cm border all around empty. Sprinkle cinnamon mixture on top of the buttered area and roll up like a swiss roll.
4. Cut the roll into 4cm thick and put them close together (cut side up, 9 pieces in 3 rows) on a greased 20cm/8" square tin.
5. Cover & prove till double in bulk (about 30 mins).
6. Bake at 190 degree C till golden brown about 15 - 20 mins.
7. Cool and drizzle top with your favourite glaze/ frosting. (I used 1/2 cup icing sugar mix with 1-2 tbsp milk)

* You can also add raisin before rolling up.

This is also the first time I'm joining the Aspiring Bakers - a monthly baking 'challenge' hosted by different bloggers with different themes.
I'm submitting this entry to Aspiring Bakers #8 - Bread Seduction (June 2011) hosted by Jasmine from Sweetylicious.

Raisin Bread Pudding

I 'm a  fan of bread pudding and found a cafe that sells the bread pudding just the way I like it in town. This cafe ' Fook Yuen' has many outlets but only the one in Jalan Gaya (Gaya Street) sells it by the 'loaf'. I surf the net to find recipe for bread pudding and found one from 'Kuali' that 'looks' similiar to the one sold in the cafe.

Previously I attempted one using the 'Nestle' recipe card but I found the texture to be rather dry. You can see below  the first bread pudding I made.

Now, the one below is more like pudding texture. If you want it to be drier, please cover with an aluminium foil when baking a little longer to avoid the top from becoming dry & darker.

Ingredients

16 slices bread
1 cup Raisin
2 can (12 fl oz) Evaporated milk
4 Eggs
55g Butter
3/4 cup packed brown Sugar
2 tsp Vanilla Essence
1 tsp ground Cinnamon
1/2 tsp Nutmeg

- Preheat oven to 180 degree C. Grease a 12 x 8 baking dish. (I baked in 2 aluminium baking loaf foils)
- Combine bread & raisins in a large bowl.
- Combine evaporated milk, eggs, butter, sugar, vanilla essence, cinnamon & nutmeg.
- Pour liquid mixture over bread mixture. Combine well.
- Pour mixture into baking dish and let stand for 10 mins.
- Bake for 35-45 minutes or until a knife inserted in cake comes out clean.