From the begining, I had wanted to bake the Hokkaido Milk Bread, then there is the yogurt bread. But eventually, I thought I would start off with a really, really safe recipe. It's non other than Happy Home Baking's Crunchy Peanut Butter Bread as she has described it as soft and fluffy.
While it was baking, the air was filled with the aroma of peanut butter. I was worried that the colour of the crust was a little light, but it turned out alright. It's the first time I could sit down and watch tv while baking. The machine took care of everything, how nice.
I was so impatient, could not wait to remove it from the pan. I had some difficulty removing the pan, and almost burnt my finger. Finally, I managed to lift the pan. Waited a few minutes till it was cool enough to remove the loaf. Eventually, I was able to cut it. The crust was ... crusty, acutally, quite cripsy. When I saw the inside, I was elated. I thought to myself, success, wow! But I was too full to taste it. Guess it would have to wait till tomorrow.
Hubbs then asked for something to eat. I suggested the bread of course! I spread some orange marmalade and butter on the last slice, very crusty piece. I took a small bite and boy was I disappointed. I don't know how to describe but it was a little plasticky, although the loaf was soft to touch. Not sure if the teaspoonful of flour which I added in the last minute as quite a bit of flour didn't make it into the pan. May be that was a mistake, also I had accidentally over-poured oil into the pan as well. Guess that's too many mistakes to guarantee a successful looking AND tasting bread huh?
Update (15 Mar at 8.52 am): Kids tried the bread this morning after I had the bread toasted. Son complained that it was bitter after hubbs made the comment. I remembered that the bake king instant yeast had a strong smell when I opened the cap. Could it be that? Which yeast do you use and where do you get it?
I am so excited about making bread, the bread maker is sitting quietly at home. Had pilates last night and could not bake anything. I also took the time to read through the manual and researched on forums and inspirational blogs. I think I will start with Happy Home Baker's fully automated bread recipes. That should be safest.
In the process, I came across this page where it shows different methods of mixing flour. Thanks to JY who put the link on her blog.
In this age of technology, we have machines to help us with many tasks. For me, that would be the bread making process. I had been hesitant for so long, now there are no more excuses. Also, the internet is one huge resource centre full of whatever one needs.
Well, well, another tart at Yuri's Bake Journal. When I first saw the photo of this tart on Happy Home Baking I was sold. It looked absolutely inviting and the steps looked easy enough. After my relative success on earlier attempts at tarts (or pies) I was rather eager to try more.
Also, I found the secret of getting the aroma of almonds during the baking process. Previous experience of using this ingredient left me wondering if almond powder had any aroma at all. This time, I followed HHB's instruction to bake the almond powder for 10 minutes prior to using it. Wow, while the crust was baking, the aroma of almond was in the air. It was even more aromatic when baking the filling. This confirms what I thought earlier but was just too lazy to do. The tart tasted good too, although to me, it was a little sweet. I'll find out more when I send it for taste-test by the regular tasters.
My sister-in-law came over to learn HHB's Mango and Peach Charlotte Cake tonight. She had tried it previously and she loved it. She described it as refreshing and different. As we both did not enjoy the taste of Vitagen (I drink it but don't like the taste of it in this cake), I used mango flavoured yogurt drink instead. I think I may just make another one as there is the whole carton of whipping cream ...
I was impressed by Rei's inaugral post on the Japanese sweet treat, Warabi Mochi and wanted to give it a shot. Since I was on leave yesterday, I made it a point to go to Daiso at IMM to pick up the ingredients for the mochi. All the ingredients are in the photo above. Cool, I thought, I can get started with this treat. Mochi is one of my favourite.
As I was stirring the mixture, I was reminded of my several attempts to make the water chestnut pudding. When I first saw it on Florence's blog, I told myself that I must try this. Sad to say, I am too shy to post any photo of the failed attempts at making these QQ treats. However, that's not the end of it. I will continue to try although it is not cheap to keep trying...
Another exciting news, I was planning to borrow my friend's bread maker (that is sitting idly in her storeroom). I wasn't sure how to ask as hubbs may think it's ridiculous. My sister-in-law will pass me one that is sitting in her storeroom tomorrow! It's on loan from our brother-in-law. Both of them did not succeed in their breadmaking attempts. Now, they are relying on me to solve the mystery of their failed attempts. But I shall do the safe thing of reading the manual first. After that, I may try the famous Hokkaido Milk Loaf :)
I was blog surfing when I went to Cooking Momster blog and saw an entry on Snapbomb. Looks like there are opportunities to earn some bucks while blogging. Very interesting. I signed up and was looking for stuff to write about but was unable to go to page. Maybe the poor comp is sleepy too. So, those of you who are reading this, do visit Snapbomb to find out more. It will definitely give me some ideas what to write about sometimes. Have fun!
I cannot remember when found this recipe from Florence's (Do What I Like) blog. I'm sure it was in the early days when I first started blog-surfing and getting inspired. I was really keen in non-baked recipes as I wasn't sure that my Sharp microwave's convection function would work with cakes. Besides, I had tried so many times to make steamed cakes (probably also called soong ko in HK) and failed.
As I didn't want to bake tonight, I remembered all the great non-baked recipes that I had collected. I zoomed into Florence's 7-up Pastel Steamed Cake immediately. Actually, it's more accurate to say that I had most of the ingredients required for this, more than the other cakes. Ok, I did NOT have 7-up and used ginger ale instead. I used 200g of sugar, which proved to be too little. Guess it would be perfect for mom, I plan to give her the bulk of this anyway. She's always so supportive of my adventures, sweet lady.
Perhaps I should have gone with the original intention to halve the recipe as there was just so much! Should have known that 300g of flour would yield so much... I will eat this cake with half boiled eggs tomorrow morning. I love eating soong ko this way, when I was young as they were almost always dry. I'm glad this one is soft and fluffy. Alright, I cheated. The centre of the cake was not that done. Had to return it to the steamer, recipe said 10 mins but guess I should have doubled the time or more. Not sure, same thing happened with the steamed moist chocolate cake, those were a little under-done too. I will try this again, but the recipe uses SP and I'm not so keen because of this ingredient. May be I should try another ma lai ko recipe without SP...
Wow, it's been so long since the last post! I had not stopped baking, in fact, I was baking almost every night last week! I was mainly baking tried and tested recipes -- Chocolate Chip Cookies, Banana Cake, and Gina's Cranberry Yogurt Cake (I used dried blueberries and it was so much better!)
Then I went on a pie/tart frenzy! Must be Happy Home Baker's Triple Almond Tart. For some reason, that made me want to make a lemon pie. So I set about looking for a suitable lemon pie recipe and remembered seeing one delicious recipe on Baking Bites, that's the Meyer Lemon Curd Tart. So I don't know what's a Meyer lemon, I used regular lemons instead. Also, according to the recipe, there's no need to use baking weights when baking the crust. Somehow, I would use weights of some sort in my next attempt. I'm quite into pies/tarts now I think.
Because I did not use any baking weights, the crust rose and I was afraid that it won't hold the lemon curd on top. I went to get another deeper pie pan (the earlier crust was baked in a disposable pie pan). Still, I didn't use any weights for the second try. Wrong again! But since the pan was deeper this time, I was able to pour the lemon curd in without much difficulty. Somehow, the curd did not set so well and I thought may be I should add some gelatin next time. Over the days that followed, I found MORE lemon pie recipes! Some didn't even need any eggs, like Aunty Yochana's Lemon Curd Cheese Tart.
As for the other crust, I used another Baking Bite recipe, her Chocolate Ganache Tart. As I had excess ripe bananas that day, I added bananas to the tart. Boy, was the chocolate thick or what? Everyone who tried the chocolate tart loved it! However, they could not detect the bananas. Next time, I shall coarsely chop the bananas and add it to the hot chocolate mixture. As for banana essence, that remains to be seen...
Tag: Pass It To The Front
Here are the rules:
* First copy and paste it.
* Do not remove any content.
* Just add One word related to your blogs.
* If you don’t like the concept Pls! say no?
* Our main goal is we are going to circulate our number of friends.
* The more people join the “pass it to the front” the more links we generate.
* Lastly write only one word “short” for your blogs.
* Keep it simple and short, I know some of you have more than one blogs.
* The color is only black, gray, or white plssss avoid using any color okies.
Let me show you:
1.Filipina, 2.Darling allen, 3.Abroad, 4.Halfway, 5.life, 6.culture, 7.interracial, 8.pinaystories, 9.pinaysinglelooking, 10.health 11. Miscellaneous 12. Children 13. my experience 14.family 15. milestones 16. Home 17. shopping 18. wonderland 19. memories 20. bliss 21. awesome 22. japanese 23. bake n knit 24. baking
For this I'll pass to:
Happy Home Baking
Oh, how could I? I had forgotten to take a photo of the egg whites! I wasn't sure till I turned the mixing bowl. Hmm, didn't move, should be about right. I remembered Gina's instructions to not over-stir the egg and flour. I guess I had under-stirred! I could see specks of flour in the cake *shy* As the square pan was too small, I had to use another loaf pan.
Somehow, the loaf pan mixture cracked. I wonder also if it was due to cooling in the pan inside the oven, the bottom of the cake looked weird. Also, I'm not sure if the waiting had caused some layering at the bottom. I had given both pans a bang or two prior to putting them into the oven. Oh yeah, small oven, so loaf pan had to wait.
I love the taste of this cake, I ate one piece too many! There goes my daily dietary limit for the whole week! Well, to console myself, I thought about the small amount of flour used. But the sugar... hmm, as they say, if you want to be on a diet, eat steamed dumplings instead. Back to the look of my cake, it's way off what it's intended to be, lots of room for improvement. LOTS.
I also got adventurous and marinated some bacon to make BBQ bak kwa. I've also soaked some glutinous rice. Also on my to bake list this weekend, Meyer Lemon Tart ok, for us, just simply Lemon Tart. I remember my mom talking about some lemon pie long ago. I hope this is close to what she has in mind, albeit my very first attempt. We'll see. Busy busy weekend, *sigh* have to work all weekend next week, sux!
