Posted by: hyacinthus | November 11, 2009

Pizza, Bread, Pineapple Fried Rice and Tom Yum Seafood Soup!

Tired day… Made pizza, bread, pineapple fried rice and tom yum seafood soup!

Posted by: hyacinthus | November 10, 2009

Vancouver Cheesecake

It was 16 years ago that I had eaten a delicious cheesecake in Downtown Vancouver. However, I forgot the cafe name.

Today, I tried to reproduce it using the recipe from Wikibooks.

The cheesecake is currently in the cooling stage. Not sure if it’s the right recipe though :D

Here’s the cake!

Immediately out from the oven!

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After 30min… notice the crack on the top? It’s a little jelly like what the recipe says. I was shaking the tin too much. In the end, I scooped a bit from the centre and ate a little… hehe…

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All ingredients are halved and I used a 18cm round springform baking tin.

Ingredients

  • 500 ml cream cheese, softened to room temperature
  • 125 ml ricotta cheese
  • 6 large eggs
  • 250 ml whipping cream
  • 80 ml white sugar
  • 5 ml of lemon juice
  • 10ml pure vanilla extract

Method

  1. Preheat oven to 160°C
  2. Beat the cream cheese and ricotta together until smooth, continue beating as you mix in the sugar, then the eggs.
  3. Slowly beat in the whipping cream
  4. Add lemon juice.
  5. Add vanilla extract.
  6. Pour into 8″ springform round baking tin.
  7. Bake at 150°C for 45 minutes or so, slightly less time in loaf pans. The cake should still be jelly-like in the centre when done. Remove and allow to cool, then refrigerate for a minimum of 4 hours.

Do you know how much fat is in this cheesecake?

Let’s count using the nutrition facts found on the packagings,

Total estimated fat in this cheesecake (I’m only using half of the stated ingredients above) = Cream Cheese (34.4g x 2.5) + Ricotta Cheese (13.3g x 0.5) + 3 Eggs (5g x 3) + Whipped Cream (35.1g x 1.2) = 149.77g!

For simplicity, 150g of fat translated to 1,350 calories! :p

Should I eat it???

Edit: I regret making cheesecake after reading this article “Don’t Say Cheese”. Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) said that Cheese is giving Americans a heart attack.

Just discovered that there’s Philadelphia fat-free cream cheese which will reduce amount of fat to 64g! How come it’s not available in Singapore’s Carrefour? :(

Posted by: hyacinthus | November 9, 2009

Orange Chiffon Cake 2

I baked Orange Chiffon Cake again! This time, rum was added instead of vanilla, baked at 170ºC for 55 minutes and I patiently waited an hour for the cake to cool before removing it from the tin :)

Orange Chiffon Cake

Not easy to remove the cake from the tin if you didn’t lubricate the sides with corn/peanut oil.

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Tada!

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There’s still a slight depression towards the centre. I guess it’s today’s humidity. Raining all day!

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Have you tried baking it? :)

Posted by: hyacinthus | November 7, 2009

Espresso Walnut Cake

Espresso Walnut Cake

This is simple to bake. Asked my dad and sister-in-law to try as they are coffee-drinkers. Both commented that the coffee taste wasn’t strong enough. Hmmm… I may need to add more espresso (it was decaffeinated cos I don’t drink coffee) in future. Overall, I thought this cake is nice and not too heavy like Pandan Chiffon Cake (Using original recipe containing 9 eggs and 300ml coconut milk!).

Ingredients

(A)

¼ cup brown sugar
3 tbsp finely chopped walnuts
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp instant Espresso

(B)

70gm or 5 tbsp butter
¼ cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs

(C)

²/3 cup plain fat-free yogurt
2 tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt

(D) – Sieved

1¹/3 cup flour (leveled)
2 tsp instant Espresso

Method

1. Melt butter on high, 1 minute in a microwave

2. Preheat oven at 170°C

3. Coat a 8-inch round / square pan with some flour

4. Combine (A) and put aside

5. Whisk (B) for 4 min or so

6. Add (C) in the batter and whisk again for 2min

7. Blend (D) in the batter till a consistent batter is achieved

8. Spread half of the batter in  the baking pan and sprinkle half of (A) mixture over

9. Spread the remaining batter over and sprinkle remaining (A) mixture over

10. Bake for 28min at 170°C. Cool on rack for about 10min before serving.

Espresso Walnut Cake

As I’m using a Panasonic microwave to bake, your results may differ from mine…

Have fun baking! :)

Posted by: hyacinthus | November 5, 2009

Pandan Chiffon Cake – First Try

I wonder how I can achieve a healthier version of Pandan Chiffon Cake without compromising the taste?

By gut feel, I changed the recipe and got this as a result of less eggs, baking at 160ºC, using 200ml coconut milk etc…

Got a 2-in-1 cake! haha… It tastes like Pandan Chiffon Cake anyhow. Texture wise the top is like the usual Pandan Chiffon Cake while the bottom part tastes like kueh! hahaha… My brother tried and said this is better than bakery’s cos it’s more solid. :D

Pandan Chiffon Cake or Kueh or 2-in-1?

Pandan Chiffon Cake or Kueh or 2-in-1?

This is my quirky recipe…

Ingredients (For a 23cm Chiffon Tin)

1 ½ cup cake flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 packet of 200ml Kara UHT Natural Coconut Cream (It claimed that it contains no cholesterol! Do you believe?)

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½ cup of fresh Pandan Juice from lots of Pandan leaves (Bought 50 cents worth of Pandan Leaves)

6 egg yolks + 50g castor sugar + ¼ tsp salt
6 egg whites + 50g castor sugar + 1 tsp cream of tartar

Method

1. Boil coconut cream with pandan juice.

2. Whisk egg yolk until creamy and light in colour. Add (1).

3. Add flour and baking powder (sieved) into (1) lightly.

4. Beat egg white using electric beater till big bubbles are formed. Sprinkle cream of tartar and beat till white. Add 50g sugar (a little at a time) and beat till stiff peaks are formed.

5. Pour 1/2 egg white into flour mixture in (4) and blend well. Fold in the remaining egg white mixture.

6. Bake at 160°C for 50 minutes.

7. Invert the chiffon cake tin to cool before taking the cake out of the tin.

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It’s not easy to remove from the cake tin even after it’s cooled. Wonder what did I do wrong? Didn’t follow the original recipe, I guess ;)

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Going to try again tomorrow! :p

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