Coffee Marble Cheesecake

Tried out another recipe from 孟老师的100道小蛋糕. I don't have much choices when it comes to making cheese cakes. Remember my disaster for my peach cheesecake? I haven't got any springform or loose base pan yet, so I wouldn't want to attempt any cheesecakes with a biscuit base. That's why I picked this cheesecake recipe without a base!


Making this cheesecake is indeed simple. No need mixer at all. No need to beat egg whites. Perfect for beginners.

The steps go roughly like this: Double boil the cream cheese and sugar. Stir till the mixture is smooth and no lumps. Add milk and cornflour, mix well, remove from heat and cool. Add eggs and vanilla essence, mix well. Scoop 1 tsp of the batter and mix with instant coffee powder. Pour the remaining batter into the tin. Drop teaspoons of the coffee batter on top and swirl marble patterns with a skewer. Steam bake in hot water bath. You can replace coffee with cocoa powder or green tea powder.

Sorry, recipe will not be provided here cos I don't want to publish too many recipes from the same book.


I have no problem with eating any type of cheese cakes. But my mother thinks it's a bit too cheesy and prefers the Japanese type of cotton-soft cheesecakes. It was 1 year ago since I baked it. I miss it too! :)

Toblerone Ice Cream

What is the best food to have when you are feeling down?


Chocolates of course! Chocolate (Wikipedia) contains a variety of substances, some of which act as stimulants. It is said to have 'love chemical' which makes you feel like you have fallen in love and has a mood-elevating effect. Hm...

Here's my treat of Toblerone Ice Cream. Excellent dessert during the hot weather these few days. This is so delicious! Ice-cream making is truly fun! :)


Toblerone Ice Cream (From 冷冻甜品)

Ingredients
3 egg yolks
40g sugar
1 tsp corn flour
170g fresh milk
1 tsp vanilla essence
100g toblerone chocolate (or cooking chocolate)
220g non-dairy whipping cream
50g chocolate chips

Method
1. Beat egg yolks, sugar and corn flour until sugar has dissolved and pale.
2. Add in fresh milk, vanilla essence and toblerone chocolate. Double boil the mixture and stir and cook at low heat until chocolate has melted and slightly thicken. Remove from heat and leave to cool.
3. Whisk non-dairy whipping cream until stiff and fold into the cooled milk mixture.
4. Stir in chocolate chips and mix well.
5. Pour into a container and freeze overnight. Whisk the mixture again until smooth and freeze until set.

Devil's Cupcakes and A Surprise Reward!

The Devil's Cupcakes


Did these cupcakes quite some time ago as my mother requested me to bake something for her friends. I was scratching head and trying to recall something good enough to let people try. I looked through my archive and saw this Devil's Food Cake. Suddenly remembered that I had tried scooping some out to bake as cupcakes the last time and they tasted very very soft and delicious.


So using the same recipe, I made them into Devil's Cupcakes, topped with chocolate chips ;). When she was back, I received the best feedback ever. I could see she was pretty happy and proud to hear people saying that the cupcakes were good. Sigh... I have probably never done anything great to make her feel proud of me. Very sad.


The Surprise Reward!

It was merely a week since I joined and added the widget from the Foodie BlogRoll. To be honest, I knew this website since a long time ago, but I didn't join it because I find that it slowed down the loading of the websites. But the new widget looks pretty cool and I decided to join in to add some colours to my blog. Weird reason right? Haha! I never knew that because of this simple addition, the readership of my blog increases and I am very surprised to be one of the featured blogs in FFF. FFF means Finest Foodies Friday, which is a weekly Friday post in The Left Over Queen featuring favourites from The Foodie Blogroll. Read here.

It's totally unexpected. I have set up this blog just to record my baking experiences. I have baked some good ones and also numerous unsuccessful attempts. My bakes are not really that outstanding... the photos are very ordinarily taken... my English is poor and I don't write well (I sometimes need to check the dictionary to make sure that I have used a word correctly, blah)... and there are better baking blogs out there who have not had the chance to receive the attention yet.

I would say it's some kind of reward for my persistence in baking and blogging. I'm kind of feeling down lately. It does give me a boost and brighten me up a bit.

Mashed Potato Cheese Muffins

When I first flipped the book 孟老师的100道小蛋糕 borrowed from the library, this is one of the many recipes that I bookmark and must definitely try. Because I have never heard of making mashed potatoes into muffins!


This is my first time trying out savoury muffins. And it is the tastiest and easiest muffins to make. A good change from the usual sweet muffins, it's just like eating mashed potatoes with strong black peppery taste and the extra kick with the oozing cheddar cheese. I don't know what else to say to describe it. You've got to try it out!

* There's another "Curry French Fries Muffins" in the same book. I must try it out one of these days!! (when everyone has recovered from the flu spreading around the house :( )


Mashed Potato Cheese Muffins 薯泥起士马芬 (From 孟老师的100道小蛋糕)

Ingredients (I make 10 pieces - 5cm cups)
120g potatoes (without skin)
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper powder
20g sugar
1 egg
50g oil
40g milk
75g cake flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp baking soda
1 slice of cheddar cheese

Method
1. Cut potatoes into small pieces and steam until soft, about 15 minutes. Use a fork to mash the potatoes when still hot. Add salt and black pepper, mix well, and set aside.
2. In a bowl, mix sugar, egg and oil until well blended.
3. Add in milk, followed by the mashed potatoes in step 1. Mix well.
4. Sift together the cake flour, baking powder and baking soda. Add into the mashed potatoes mixture in step 3. Stir lightly with a spatula until just combined. Do not overmix.
5. Tear the cheddar cheese into small pieces and add into the mixture in step 4. Mix lightly.
6. Scoop mixture into paper cups until 8/10 full.
7. Bake in preheated oven at 180 deg C for about 20-25 minutes (I took 15 minutes). Serve warm.

Strawberry Chiffon Cake

Before you thought that I have just made a perfect chiffon cake, look at the photo below...


This is the sunken part that I have cut away before taking photographs. Haha!

Wait, I shouldn't sound too happy. This has been the Nth sunken chiffon cake that I have made. My previous orange, lemon, cheese and pandan flavoured chiffon cakes had all failed. All of them had the same problem of a sunken top after cooling. Everything was fine during the preparation, including beating the egg whites. The cake rose nicely in the oven, but when I unmoulded it from the pan, I always ended up in great disappointment.

Rei's Chiffon Cake Tips and Trouble II Tip #4 states that:
"If the cake's top (overturned, previously it was the bottom) is sunken in (like a small groove), the oven temperature is too high. If the oven temperature is too high, it will cause the cake to over-expand. So when the cake relaxes after cooling, it will cause this effect."

I might try stepping down the temperature to prevent the oven from getting too hot when making chiffon cakes again.

Strangely, my first few chiffon cakes did not have this problem. Is it me or my oven getting worse?

Recipe from Peng's Kitchen.