Fondant Birthday Cake

My friend called me on Saturday night if I could and would make a birthday cake for two friends in her bible study group for Monday. I just couldn't say no although I had the whole day planned already for Sunday. Since I need to bring the cake to work, and before work, I have a class, the cake needs to be something that doesn't need refrigeration. I will leave the cake in the car for 2 hrs. under the sun. It wouldn't be pretty if I make some mousse cake and it all melted.

So, since all her bible study group loves the Indonesian classic cheesecake that I make many times before, I decided to go with this one again, and of course she didn't mind.

Instead of the usual 3 layers of yellow vanilla sponge cake, I use one pandan sponge cake for the middle layer, so when cut, you can see the pretty green and yellow cake color.
But this time, I don't want to decorate it the same way as the other ones before. I decided using fondant to cover the whole cake. I didn't have much time to decorate this cake at all. I started decorating it on Monday morning before I went to school and work.

So here's what I came up with. I wanted to cover the bottom border with fondant pearls but I just didn't have time. I don't have a larger satin ribbon, so I had to go with the small one :(. The piping is not so nice either (it was piped in such a hurry). It's not smooth at all.

The end result looks more like a bridal shower cake rather than a birthday cake. I think it's because the ivory color and the flowers. I need to practice more with fondant to get a very smooth surface.

Mocha Chiffon Cake with Cheese Topping

This is the other snack to accompany the pudding last time. I made this kind of chiffon once for church's snack, and this lady liked it a lot, so she asked me to make this. She couldn't decide which one she wants more at first, whether she wants this cake or pandan chiffon cake. This is the first time someone prefer something else rather than the pandan flavor.

I dusted the cake with a mixture of cocoa powder and powdered sugar for additional flavor.

Strawberry Shortcake

I made this 6-in strawberry shortcake for my co-worker at work. He's often bringing me fruits and veggies, such as strawberries, cherries, peaches, corns, asparagus. He lives in Brentwood, where most of the farms are.

He told me once that he likes strawberry cream cake so much. Just a plain white cake, with lots of whipped cream and strawberries (he's very American). So, I decided to make him one to say thank you using the super sweet strawberries I bought at farmers' market.

This is the same as the strawberry shortcake I made, but I brushed the cake with Grand Marnier to moisten the cake a little although the cake itself is soft and moist already. I used Cointreau before, but this time, I'm using Grand Marnier to flavor the cream. Both are French orange liqueurs.

Again, I was in a rush when making this cake. I started decorating it I think about 45 mins before going to work. It seems like a long time for such a small cake, but combine with other things I did, it wasn't much time at all. You can see clearly that the whipped cream is not smooth, but he told me that he liked it so much. So, that's enough for me.

Pudding with Creme Anglaise

This pudding is for one of the member of our church. She was going to go out of town for a weekend gathering and she wanted to bring something. So, she asked me if I could help her with it and she decided to bring a pudding a a chiffon cake.

It is a chocolate and vanilla pudding with fruits inside. I only had strawberries and cherries on hand at that time, so that's what I used for the middle part of the pudding. The chocolate layer was made using both bittersweet chocolate as well as cocoa powder, making it very chocolaty. Egg yolk was added to both layers of pudding for a smoother texture.

Accompanied the pudding is an espresso and rum creme anglaise. I said it so many times before that I love this combo so much. And I hope she will like it as much as I do.

As much as I wanted to decorate the pudding, making it look nice, I can't. She asked me if I could just leave the pudding in its mold because she will be driving for 1.5hrs, thus making it easier for her to transport.

These pictures are not the best one in the world. I was in a complete chaos trying to finish everything else, but it's better than nothing :).

Taiwanese Bread

I haven't updated this blog for a while now. My life is still as busy as a horse (if not more). I hardly have time to just sit and relax. There are too many things to do. But during all my activities, I managed to bake some bread for my niece's and nephew's breakfast.

I have been wanting to try my hands at Taiwanese bread for a while now. It is made with different bread making process than usual bread. You have to make the pre-dough, the sponge, and the main dough. I started making the bread at 10 in the morning and finished at 4pm. It is very time consuming and very labor intensive. I expected this bread to be super soft, but the result is the same as the Soft Bread I made before even though this one is much harder to make. In fact, the soft bread has a slightly softer texture compared to this one. But, they're pretty much the same.

I filled them with Nutella (chocolate hazelnut spread), bananas, choc. sprinkles/choc. rice, cheese, raisins, and almonds.

Black Forest Cake with a Twist

It's been a while since the last time I updated this blog. I've been super busy being a full-time student, an employee, and a soccer mom for my niece and nephew. It's just way too long if I have to describe my responsibilities. Not to mention the preparation for the upcoming big event in a couple of weeks (more of this later) and other stuff. I feel dizzy just thinking about it.

I made some stuff during these past couple of weeks, but didn't bother taking a picture or blog about it. They're just regular stuff, such as chiffon cake, swiss roll, etc. But I made a birthday cake yesterday.

So, I just realized on Tue afternoon that my sister-in-law birthday is on Thursday the same week. I freaked out a little. Usually, it takes me a couple of days at least to think about what cake I want to make, size, decorations, timing, and everything. I always try not to make the same cake over and over again, so I can practice and experiment more, unless it is an order from someone else and they want the cake I've made before. So, not being able to decide quickly and doing tons of other stuff at the same time, I decided to make black forest cake. She likes chocolate, and besides, she's never tried my Black Forest cake before. But this time, I added a twist to it. I added a thin layer of blueberry preserves in between the layers. So, the components of the cake are chocolate sponge cake, rum simple syrup, blueberry preserves, rum whipped cream, black cherry, and chocolate cream. The whole thing is then covered with rum whipped cream and decorated with dark chocolate fence and red maraschino cherries.

I haven't tasted the cake though since I was so full last night and wasn't in the mood of eating chocolate stuff. But judging from my family's responses, my niece and my brother had second (and he's not a big fan of chocolate either), I think I did a pretty good job (self-appraisal :)) .

Oh and by the way, I experimented with different decoration for chocolate cake with the mini version. Hmm....I think I should let the chocolate sheet cover up the whole cake rather than leaving a space in the middle. I'll try that next time.

Raspberry Swirl Cheesecake

I bought 5-lbs of cream cheese about two weeks ago. I've already planned some desserts that I will make with it. I kept the leftover 3-lb cream cheese in the fridge. A couple of days later, I found that there was some liquid coming out from the cream cheese package. It's not that it's going bad, I didn't see anything suspicious with the color or the smell. I tasted it and it tasted kind of salty. It looked like the cream cheese had separated into curd and whey, just like if you put yogurt in a cheesecloth and strain it overnight. The cream cheese texture was dry and crumbly. I didn't know why it happened. When I bought regular 8-oz package of cream cheese, the leftover stays the same as before, but not with this one. One possibility is that I kept the cream cheese on the very top shelf of my fridge and it's cooler that the one in the middle. Maybe it had gotten too cold, just as if you put it in the freezer. This is just my guess though.

So, not wanting to just throw the cream cheese in the trash, I decided to use it anyway. What is a dessert that uses a lot of cream cheese? cheesecake! and that's what I made. Not a fancy cheesecake with a whole lot of toppings, sauce, etc., but just a very standard New York cheesecake. The cream cheese just wouldn't get smooth even after beating it for 15 minutes and mixing it with other ingredients. There were a lot of small granules (whatever you call it) in the batter. However I beat it, it just wouldn't disappear. When I put it in the oven, I knew those small bits will still there even after baking.

So here it is. You can see the texture is not as smooth as a good cheesecake should be. But tastewise, I think it was really good. I put some lemon zests in the batter, vanilla (of course), and raspberry swirl on the top.

I'm still not giving up though. I'll bake a better one next time