Chocolate Cinnamon Rolls

You won't believe the nightmare I went through to bake this. I made the dough last night and left it in the fridge, chiller to be exact. I figured there wasn't enough time to bake it last night as I was tired from a whole day's course. After the dough cycle was complete, I took the dough out, applied some oil on the surface and wrapped it with cling wrap. I left it in a disposable box and placed it in the chiller.

To my horror, when I took it out of the fridge tonight, the dough had grown to double it's size last night! I was at a loss, didn't know what to do as Rei had told me that extended proofing may cause damage to the bread's structure, resulting in a hard bread. I thought what did I have to lose anyway, why not just bake it.

So I quickly prepared the filling and got on with rolling the dough. Somehow, I thought the dough wasn't thin enough so I kept rolling and rolling. Finally, satisfied with the thickness, I brushed melted butter and sprinkled cinnamon and sugar on the surface. As I was afraid that it would be too sweet, I did not use the entire amount that I had prepared. Then I added the chocolate chips and began (swiss-) rolling the dough. After that, I sliced the dough and added even more chocolate chips. I didn't even wait for them to proof any more, preheated the oven and baked them for 25 minutes.

The smell of the cinnamon rolls was so alluring and sweet. The air was filled with the aroma of cinnamon. Thankfully, the rolls browned nicely. Of course, presentation has to be improved. Perhaps if the rolls were allowed to proof a second time, they would rise properly. This won't be the last time I'm making these anyway. Next time I would increase the amount of cinnamon and of course, let the bread go the natural course.

Oh, by the way, as of today I am a proud graduate of ...


This below is just a glimpse of magic, fun and creativity that went on for past 2 wonderful days ...

Butter Marble Cake

Hmm, I can still smell the aroma of the cake while it is cooling on the rack. I have some baking chocolate due to expire at the end of April so I had to bake something chocolate. I looked around and finally decided on the butter marble cake which Gina shared in the last baking class.

I am so proud of this result, it's been quite a while since I last baked a loaf. The aroma during baking was simply heavenly. I wonder if it's the butter (I used Anchor salted butter), the taste was not "buttery". But it's still quite tasty, overall. I'm happy with the result.

I was surprised that I still had the energy to bake after attending a full-day's course. Must be magic...

Cream Cheese Loaf

As there wasn't time to bake last week, I didn't make any bread for my parents. I only gave them half of the banana quick bread I made last week.

Since we didn't go out this afternoon, I devoted my time to this baking "marathon" of sorts. I first started the breadmaker to make the dough for the an-pans, then went to bake the chocolate cream cheese cake and finished off with this cream cheese loaf in my brand new pullman pan.

I'm not sure if I had done everything right. The bread didn't reach the top of the pan, hence the top was a litted rounded and soft. I had forgotten to break the dough into 3 parts, do the swiss roll, before putting it into the pan for second proofing. I rolled it into one big swiss roll after punching out the air. I waited and waited for it to raise to the top, and when it was about 80% the height of the pan, I got ready to bake it. I intend to bake another one tomorrow to see if breaking the dough into 3 parts would make a lot of difference. I was too full to taste the bread but mom told me the last time that the bread was delicious. Even my brother was surprised that I had baked that :)

My First An-Pan

This is my all time favourite bun, an-pan (bread with red bean paste). I remember that this was one of the earliest "fancy" bans I tried. If I'm not wrong, it was probably from Yaohan at Plaza Singapura. My mom used to bring my brother and I there when we were young. I remember that this was one ban I would pick. Now I can bake my own, I'm a proud girl.

I had originally wanted to use this Hokkaido Milk Loaf recipe, but I could not find any Bulla thickened cream at the Shopnsave near my place. (That's the touble when supermarkets try to make consumers stay loyal to them. Shopnsave issues stickers for purchases above $15, and for every 12 stickers collected within a month, they would give consumers a voucher for $9 off. Since I started taking MRT home on my own instead of waiting for hubs, I've been shopping at Shopnsave.) I had seen it at Carrefour yesterday, but thought I could get it on the way home.

Without the all important heavy cream, I went through my collection of to-try recipes. I had bookmarked Florence's Black Sesame Bun as reference. If only we have such cute bake stuff here, check out her black sesame fillings! I used the sweet bun recipe and it yielded exactly the same number of buns for me, 14.

I had overbaked the first batch, the round ones. The paper cup is also stuck at the bottom, perhaps I should have brushed the paper cups with oil before placing the dough in. These six buns turned out hard and dry, wonder if baking them before eating would make any difference. The second batch was placed in a loaf pan. Having learned my mistake, I reduced baking time and the buns turned out super soft to touch! It is really really soft when I bit into it, but I'm not sure why there is a hole between the bun and the red been paste. However, I'm not too worried about that as it happens to those commercially available buns as well.

I had cheated this time, I didn't make the Tsubushian (潰し餡, the red beans are mashed after boiling). I bought two packets from Daiso yesterday. I really like the location of my office now. I can go to PH at Bencoolen, Sun Lik at Seah Street or Daiso at Plaza Singapura. I should probably learn to make the paste on my own. Hubs tasted it, said that it's no different from the commercial ones. To him, convenience is top priority. I am not sure if it is cheaper to make our own an-pans although I know what ingredients I had used, NO PRESERVATIVES. But I like the satisfaction of making what I enjoy eating, too.

7 April: An-pans are yummy and soft especially after being toasted for a mere 2-3 minutes. Even the round ones are soft. Recipe is a keeper though I find the tsubushian a little on the sweet side...

Chocolate Cream Cheese Cake

I came across this recipe when visiting Peony's blog, and remembered I had one block of Philly cream cheese in the fridge. I like the way the cake looked and since my boy specifically chose this cake over others, I had to bake it.

While it was baking, the aroma of chocolate was really alluring. I was then helping my boy with his chinese comprehension. We could hardly concentrate on the story at hand (the cycle of water: from liquid to gas to solid back to liquid, the whole works)

As I was multi-tasking when the oven beeped (ie, cake was ready), I could not remove the pan from the oven as my hands were covered with dough and flour. When I finally unmoulded it, I realised that I had not laid enough chocolate batter on the bottom. Parts of it actually broke.

Finally the taste test, I found the cake a little dry. Peony mentioned in her notes that she had reduced butter but I didn't notice it. I should have used more butter as we found the cake a little dry and lacking in taste. I had to buy chocolate ice-cream (my kid's fave brand and flavour) to go with it. Otherwise, the cake will still be around after many days.

I'm Back!

I was at home to settle some domestic issue today. As I had some time on hand, I heeded advise from kwf and happy home baking to make the yogurt bread again.

I remember this bread very well as it was my first attempt, baking the bread out of the breadmaker. It was very tasty and soft. Today I used a different flavour, peach flavoured yogurt and raisins. However, this time, it is not quite as tasty, but the buns are soft. You can see how soft it is, see the "dent" I caused when I used the spatula to lift the bread out of the pan.

Somehow this thought kept coming up: can bread be over-proven? As I had to bring my boy down to wait for his school bus, I kept thinking if the extra time given to second proofing would make any difference to the bread evenutally. I went back and baked them quickly and boy, dough in both pans rose beautifully.

Oh, now I recall what I did differently today. I didn't add any salt as I used salted butter. Could that be the difference? While today's bread was tasty, it wasn't as fragrant. I read the breadmaker's manual, that salt balances the flavour of bread, it is needed for crust colour. It also advises users not to reduce the amount of salt at will as baking may suffer. I also added more sugar today, 1.75 tsp instead of 1.5 tsp. Just surprised that it didn't turn out any sweeter :P

Egg White Cream Cheese Cupcake

This is what I baked tonight, after a weekend of mood-less-ness :P Perhaps the weekend was too action packed, which resulted in fatigue and so lack of mood to bake. I told myself, weekend was the only time to play with the pullman pan, but lazy bones just won't get moving. No matter how I pushed myself, gosh!

As usual, seeing everybody's blog and visiting Kitchen Capers' forum got me all charged up again. Then I remembered reading about aunty yochana's egg white cream cheese cupcakes, and thought I should give it a shot, and I did tonight.

I realised it was a mistake when I put the batter into a disposable loaf pan. Memories of a certain failure came flashing to my mind... I was worried that it would turn out the same way but my boy specifically said he didn't like cupcakes. Perhaps I should have transferred the batter into cups but what's done cannot be undone. I did not put shredded cheese on top but anyway, the top was crumpled. Luckily, I overturned them to cool them. That helped to maintain the cupcakes' height. It helped to keep the loaf "tall" but after unmoulding, it flopped. I was worse when I cut it, it was kueh like. Totally like what happened to the cotton sponge cake. The cupcakes, though, didn't fall. It was rather soft too.

Although the bake didn't turn out well tonight, it tasted quite good and light. Perhaps I would revisit this recipe again after attending Gina's chiffon class later this month. Oh, I did beat the egg whites till stiff peak, I dipped the mixer in and lifted it for a look, just to be sure. I must have over-mixed the chesse mixutre, butter and flour.

Banana Quick Bread

Interesting indeed. I didn't know that it was possible to bake a cake in the breadmaker. That was until I saw sweet-tooth's post on it. Of course, being the first time, I fumbled with the ingredients. In fact, I had forgotten to add sugar when the machine started. I added sugar only after close to 5 minutes of the cycle (when the cycle was supposedly for 7 minutes).

When baking was in process, the aroma of bananas was in the air. It was more fragrant than when I last baked banana cakes. So I wondered if it's due to the bananas that I used tonight. It's some smaller version of the del monte bananas from the Phillippines.

The cake or quick bread turned out ok, except it was a little dark. I should have chosen "light" for colour instead. It also turned out to be extremely crumbly, like the usual banana butter cake. It could use a little more sugar, as I had used salted butter. I'm also afraid that the edges would turn hard or dry tomorrow. We'll have to wait and see. When I tasted it earlier, it was ok, almost as good as the usual banana cake. I may try to bake the corn meal quick bread next.

I'm so excited as I have a new toy: it's a pullman pan! Yes, finally, I bought one from PH this afternoon. I'm not sure what bread I would bake but I don't have any more thickened cream, just meiji low fat milk and 3 tubs of swiss premium yogurt of various flavours. Boy, am I itching to bake but not sure if I'll have time this weekend.