Chasing dream

I had tried many cupcake recipes and I am still looking for the best recipe. Up till now, I can say that my own vanilla cupcake recipe is better than the rest but still, it did not reach my expectation. What I'm looking for is a buttery, moist, tender and not too fluffy cupcake.

I was browsing the net when I chance upon The Ultimate Vanilla Cupcake Project . I was overwhelmed by the postive responses and I had to try baking it. Well, it said U-L-T-I-M-A-T-E!! How can I not try that?!

Sad to say, I did not find the cupcakes tasty. Yes, the cupcake is fluffy but not in a cupcake way? It's like eating eggy sponge cake? It uses vanilla bean and vanilla extract but the smell is still not strong enough. I used my vanilla sugar that I grounded few days back too. Maybe it's just me since I have a ultra high expectation and the result is just a lil disappointing. Not my favourite but it might be yours!

* I halved the recipe

RECIPE

Yield: 16 cupcakes

1 cup (225 grams) granulated sugar (i used vanilla sugar)
1 vanilla bean
1 3/4 cups (175 grams) cake flour, not self-rising
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup (57 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 large eggs, room temperature
1/3 cup (75 grams) full-fat sour cream
1/4 cup canola oil or vegetable oil (60 ml)
1 tablespoon pure (not imitation) vanilla extract
2/3 cup (160 ml) whole milk

1. Preheat oven to 350 F (175 C).
2. In a small bowl, combine sugar and seeds from the vanilla bean.
3. Using the back of a spoon, move around the bowl and apply pressure to break up any clumps of seeds and to better infuse the vanilla flavor into the sugar. Set aside.
4. In a medium-sized mixing bowl or bowl of a stand mixer, mix together cake flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
5. Add the vanilla bean sugar and mix until well combined.
6. Add butter and mix on medium-low speed for three minutes. Because there is so little butter, you'll end up with a very fine crumb texture.
7. In a small mixing bowl, whisk together eggs, sour cream, oil, and vanilla extract until smooth.
8. Add the egg mixture to the flour mixture and beat on medium speed until just combined.
9. Slowly add milk and mix on low speed until just combined. The batter will be liquid. (Don't worry, you didn't do anything wrong. It's supposed to be that way.)
10. Fill cupcake liners just over 1/2 full.
11. Bake for 14 minutes and then test to see if they are done. They are done when a toothpick comes out without wet batter stuck to it. The cupcakes should appear white with specks of vanilla bean. They should not turn a golden brown. If they are not done, test again in two minutes. If they are still not done, test again in another two minutes.
12. When the cupcakes are done, remove them immediately from the tins and leave them on a cooling rack (or just on your counter if you don't own a cooling rack) to cool.

Homemade vanilla extract

Vanilla extract can be a lil expensive here hence I have to try making my own vanilla extract. All along in my fridge, I would stock up some vanilla beans and I had been dying to make my own vanilla extract but I didn't have vodka on hand. I did even think of using dry gin but I tried googling and found out that not many people used gin.

Well well well, I found a bottle of vodka in the cabinet last week or so and voila, my own vanilla extract! My vanilla extract is now sitting in my baking cabinet and after 6 months, I'll have my own homemade vanilla extract.

It's really easy to make the vanilla extract, all you need are vodka and vanilla beans. You can use any brand of vodka that have 40% alcohol content. As for the choice of vanilla bean, use the best that you can find, such as Madagascar.

I will update consistently regarding my vanilla extract and I'm soooo excited for the result!

I SEE RAINBOWWWW! That's how excited I am.

And I finally got nielsen massey vanilla extract and vanilla bean paste from Phoon huat. They are the cheapest I can find in Singapore. I think it cost $11.50 for the extract and $13.50 for the bean paste.

RECIPE

1 cup vodka

3-5 vanilla beans

1. Sterilize your glass bottle before pouring in the vodka

2. Scrap and chop the vanilla beans

3. Pop them into the vodka

4. Store them in a cool dark place and shake them once a week.

5. Your homemade vanilla extract will be ready in 6 months time!

Late night baking

What can be the best thing to do on a quiet night?

Baking chocolate chip cookies that uses the method of browning the butter! The nutty aroma of the brown butter is incredible and the cookie dough is to die for!

RECIPE

1 3/4 cups (8 3/4 ounces) all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
14 tablespoons (1 3/4 sticks) unsalted butter
1/2 cup (3 1/2 ounces) granulated sugar
3/4 cups (5 1/4 ounces) packed dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1 1/4 cups semisweet chocolate chips or chunks
3/4 cup chopped pecans or walnuts, toasted (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 375°F or approximately 190°C
2. Whisk together baking soda and all-purpose flour
3. Heat 10 tbsp of butter over medium-high until melted. Lower the heat and swirl the pan occasionally until butter became golden brown and have a nutty aroma. Transfer melted brown butter to a medium heatproof bowl
4. Add in the remaining 4 tbsp of butter into the brown butter and stir until melted
5. Whisk in sugar, salt and vanilla.
6. Add in the eggs and continue whisking until mixture is thick, smooth and shiny
7. Fold in the flour mixture with a spatula and add in the chocolate chips
8. Arrange the cookies (3 tbsp of cookie dough) 2 inches apart to prevent the cookies from sticking together when they spread and bake for 12-14 mins (depending on the cookies size)

Enjoy your late night snack with a cup of warm milk!

Recipe adopted from Cook's Illustrated

Okay, I shall end my post here and continue reading my new baking book, 'Baking with Julia'. Geez, I'm still waiting for my two other books to arrive!

Easter Baking

Decorating these cookies took me 2 whole days as I need to allow the base icing to dry before adding on the details. The sugar cookies are so buttery but it can be a tad fragile as the cookies are quite soft.

RECIPE

2 1/2 cups butter (at room temperature)
2 cups sugar
2 large eggs
seeds from 1 vanilla bean (or 3 tsp vanilla)
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt

1. Cream butter and sugar until incorporated. Note that over creaming the butter will cause the cookie to spread and lose it's shape
2. Add in vanilla and eggs. Mixed until incorporated
3. Add in sifted flour, baking powder and salt. Mix on low for 30 seconds until the dough comes together
4. Rest the dough in the fridge for at least 1 hour
5. Roll out the dough and cut into desired shapes. Pop these into the fridge for another 15 mins to chill as it will hold their shapes better.
5. Preheat oven to 176°C and bake for 8 to 12 mins depending on the size of your cookies
6. Allow the cookies to cool before decorating.

Recipe adopted from Sweetopia.

Down on my luck

I wanted to make a cake for my friend's birthday but it was a complete disaster This is what i did in advance. Pretty aright for my first try. My friend love leopard print so i decided to make a colourful fondant leopard print bow. Stuffed some cotton wool on the bow to keep the shape while the fondant is drying.

I baked a lemon cake, filled with lemon flavoured swiss meringue buttercream and covered it with chocolate ganache.

I was in a rush as I had school the entire day, waking up at 4.30AM to 4+PM! I was dead tired when I reached home but I had to finish the cake!! Wearing heels and serving in a cafe is no joke! Oh well, it's a compulsory module and I'll need to bear with it! Okay, back to the cake..

The disaster began while I'm covering the cake with fondant. The colour wasn't striking enough so I painted the fondant with edible colouring + vodka. The colour started slashing on the fondant covered cake board and it was terrible! I wanted to remove the cake from the board but the cake was stuck to the sticky fondant. IT WAS A COMPLETE DISASTER!! I was so tired and pissed so guess whatttt, i decided to throw the cake away! Psssss.

Better luck next time!

Experimenting with brownie

My definition of the best brownie is melt-in-your mouth kind of brownie. I'm not a big fan of cake-like or over fudgy brownie but just give me brownie and I'll polish it off!

Brownie is an easy dessert that you can whip up in 10-15mins (excluding the baking time)?? I've tried using a recipe that uses only cocoa powder and no melted chocolate and the result was just like some plain chocolate cake that does have much chocolate taste. After trying recipes that require melted chocolate, I've concluded that GOOD QUALITY MELTED CHOCOLATE IS SOOOO IMPORTANT IN GIVING THE FULL FLAVOUR!!

I did mentioned that brownie is a somewhat easy to make dessert but I do have failures too like adding too much salt to my batter?! Sometimes it was really hilarious thinking back on what I actually did. Once, i actually converted the brownie into brownie pops as I couldn't slice them as they were just way to fudgey and wet.

This time, I tried tweaking my brownie recipe a little. The result is not what I like but overall, the texture and the flavour is there. I suggest measuring your ingredients accurately as it really makes a difference!

RECIPE

75g melted butter

180g good quality chocolate (Valrhona, cacao barry etc)

130g sugar (I reduced the sugar)

2 large eggs

1tsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp salt

20g all purpose flour

20g cocoa powder

1. Preheat oven to 160°C and line a 6" square baking pan.

2. Melt butter by using a double boiler. Add in chocolate and stir occasionally to remove any lump.

*(Time to multi task!) While melting the butter and chocolate, whisk the eggs until it triple in volume.

3. Stir in sugar using a whisk and add in vanilla. Set aside.

4. Fold in the eggs slowly.

5. Fold in salt, cocoa powder and flour. Stir until just incorporated.

6. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake for 25-30 mins.

**You may add any nuts, chocolate chips, swirl of peanut butter etc.

HAPPY EATING!

Chinese New Year Cookies

I loveeee Chinese New Year as I get to receive Ang Bao from my relatives and snacking on all the CNY goodies!

My melt-in-your mouth cookies recipe had been sitting in my notebook for years and it was only until last year that I decided to try out the recipe and they are awesome! Buttery, melt in your mouth and full of vanilla flavour! Why didn't I dig my notebook out of my drawer earlier?! I had been baking tubs and tubs for my relatives during the CNY period and earning some extra moneeeyy!

I can't share this recipe but you can always try to make sugi cookies that taste awesome as well!

RECIPE

250g QBB
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
500g plain flour
2 teaspoons bicarbonate soda
170g icing sugar
3/4 teaspoon fine salt

1. Melt QBB over low heat and cool.
2. Add vanilla essence to cooled ghee.
3. Sift flour, bicarbonate soda, icing sugar and salt into mixing bowl.
4. Pour ghee mixture in flour mixture and knead well to form a firm dough.
5. Preheat the oven to 180°C .
6. Roll dough into melt-in-your-mouth ball sizes and place on greased tray.
7. Bake for 25 - 30 minutes till cooked but not brown. The cookies should be white and crumbly in texture.

Recipe adopted from QBB