Chocolate Fondants

Take a look at this picture. It's a perfect soft centred chocolate fondant sitting pretty in the ramekin.

I was too tempted by how pretty it looks through the glass of the oven.

It looks so good and it's calling out to me, "Come, take me. I promise you, it will be good. Come, eat me, I promise you, it will be fun. Come, taste me, I promise you, it will be alright."

I was too eager.

I couldn't wait.

I wanted to eat it too soon.

I wanted to eat it so soon that I removed it from the oven when it wasn't firm enough to stand on its own.

Looks how it's turned out. Look how it fell apart when it was removed from the ramekin. It was simply hold up by the wall of the ramekin. I didn't allow enough time for it to establish the foundation. I was fooled by its looks, by the promise of many good things to come.

I should know better but most of the time we are weak when faced with such rich, dark and handsome looking chocolaty thing.

Chocolate Fondants

(Adapted from Delicious Magazine April 2008 issue)

Ingredients

200 g good-quality chocolate

240 g unsalted butter, diced

4 eggs

90 g caster sugar

30 g plain flour, sifted

Icing sugar, to dust

Method

1. Grease and line 2 baking trays with baking paper. Grease and line the sides of six 4cm-deep, 8cm metal rings with baking paper and place them on the trays. You can also use sex 3/4 cup (185 ml) souffle dishes that have been greased and lightly dusted with flour (shake off any excess flour).
2. Chop the chocolate. Put chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water (don't let the bowl touch the water) and allow to melt, stirring occasionally, until smooth. Remove from the heat and cool to room temperature.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs and sugar together until thick and pale. Fold in chocolate mixture, then fold in flour. Pour into metal rings or souffle dishes and chill for at least 2 hours (this helps fondants maintain their soft centre during cooking).
4. Preheat the oven to 200C. Bake the fondants for 10-12 minutes until set - they should be cooked on the outside but running in the centre.
5. Remove from the oven and allow to sit for a moment before turning out. If using metal rings, use a palette knife or spatula to carefully transfer fondants to serving plates, then remove metal ring and baking paper. Fondants cooked in souffle dishes can be served straight from the dish.
6. Dust with icing sugar and serve immediately with a scoop of ice cream.

WEIS Mango and Cream Ice Cream

WEIS Mango and cream bar has to be little Miss C favourite choice of ice cream. After many trials with the aid from my little critical taste tester last summer, I have perfected a recipe found on Not Quite Nigella and I can confidently say it now tastes almost 99.9% similar to the original.

Mango and Cream Ice Cream
(Loosely adapted from Not Quite Nigella)

Ingredients

1 2/3 cup of mango puree (about 4 medium sized mangoes)
2/3 cup of caster sugar
2/3 cup milk
2/3 cup mango juice
2/3 cup thickened cream

Method

1. Place 1 1 /3 cup of mangoes, milk, caster sugar and mango juice in a blender and whizz until smooth. Stir in cream.
2. Place in an ice cream maker and churn in an ice-cream machine following manufacturer's directions.

   

3. Swirl in the remaining 1/3 cup of mango puree.

Pandan Chiffon Cake

Do you have a kitchen disaster story? I have a lot. I had a total cooking disaster with this pandan chiffon cake. There were a few of my lucky twitter followers who had witnessed the disaster live on twitter as I was tweeting it away as it happened.

Pandan chiffon cake is something very nostalgic to a lot of Malaysians and Singaporeans. We basically grew up with it. We ate so much that sometimes we got sick of it. Now, many years later, I begin to miss it. I miss the smell of the pandan leaves flavour when the cake was baking in the oven. I miss the silky soft texture of the chiffon cake. I miss the shade of green that reminds me of home.

It was a last minute decision. It was a cold rainy evening. I was craving for pandan chiffon cake. I didn't have a chiffon cake pan. I didn't have a proper pandan chiffon cake recipe. I had never baked one before but I had all the ingredients in my pantry to make one.

I flipped to the page of vanilla chiffon cake recipe from an old trusty cookbook and started to look for a suitable cake pan. I thought bundt cake pan should do the trick but this was one of the two mistakes I made that day. It turned out that the bundt cake pan I have was smaller than I thought. Not that much smaller though. The biggest blunder I found out later was that I mistakenly used baking soda instead of cream of tartar. The two boxes were standing side by side in the pantry and I didn't know how and why, I picked the wrong box without realising it.

What happened to the cake as a result of my mistakes?

It kept rising and rising. How I wish I was making a souffle. It would be a mega success :) Nevertheless, the cake turned out to be as good as it should be. The smell of the pandan flavour was as good as my childhood. The texture was good except for some small air pockets caused by the use of baking soda.

** The worst part of the disaster is cleaning up the aftermath. The cake dough overflew from the bundt cake pan. Burnt bits sticked to the wire rack and bottom of the oven. It took me a good couple of hours of scrubbing to get rid of them.

There was nothing one can't do with some clever knife work to give the cake a good trimming. Looking at these pictures, you won't have a clue about the disaster.


Pandan Chiffon Cake
(Loosely adapted from The Good Housekeeping Step-By-Step Cookbook)
Makes 16 servings

Ingredients

2 1/4 cups cake flour (not self-raising)
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
5 large egg yolks
1 tbsp pandan essence
1 tsp pandan paste
7 large egg whites
1/2 tsp cream of tartar

Method

1. Preheat oven to 325F. In large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt and 1 cup granulated sugar. Make a well in center and add oil, egg yolks, pandan essence, pandan paste, and 3/4 cup cold water; whisk into flour mixture until smooth.
2. In another large bowl, with mixer at high speed, beat egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks form. Beating at high speed, gradually sprinkle in remaining 1/2 cup granulated sugar, 2 tbsp at a time, beating well after each addition, until whites stand in stiff peaks when beaters are lifted. With rubber spatula, gently fold one-third of whites into yolk mixture; fold in remaining whites. Pour batter into ungreased 9- to 10-inch tube pan.
3. Bake 1 1/4 hours, or until top springs back when lightly touched. Invert cake in pan on funnel or bottle; cool completely in pan. Carefully run metal spatula around side of pan to loosen cake; remove from pan and place on cake plate.

Baklava

When I was 10, I wanted to grow up and be free.

When I was 20, I wanted to earn enough money and see the world.

When I was 30, I was busy making money and had a jet-setting lifestyle.

When I was 40, I have seen most parts of the world. I am ready to settle down. Be a good wife, be a good mum and pursue my love for cooking.

I am in a very good place of my life now.

"True happiness, is being able to be content rather you have a little or a lot. It’s being able to appreciate what you have and where you’re at in life, even when your goal is to reach, or obtain something greater." - Kimberly Lily

Baklava is a rich, sweet pastry featured in many cuisines in the area once controlled by the former Ottoman Empire, in Central Asia and in the lands in between. It and its variants are thus popular in Turkey, the Balkans, Cyprus, much of the Arab world, Iran, the Caucasus, Afghanistan and the lands of the Turkic peoples of Central Asia. It is a pastry made of layers of phyllo dough filled with chopped nuts and sweetened with syrup or honey.

Rick Stein: "I have already mentioned the impressive furore of activity at Imam Cagdas, the kebab restaurant in Gaziantep, and this was especially so on the first floor where they were making baklava. There must have been 50 or 60 people preparing the paper-thin pastry and the bright green pistachios, building up the trays of baklava and baking them in the huge, wood-fired ovens. But only two people, Burhan Cagdas's ageing father and one other, were allowed to apply the boiling hot syrup after baking, which had to be at just the right temperature and consistency. There was so much flour in the air where the pastries were being assembled that everyone seemed to be working in a dream-like haze. The most distinctive elements, apart from the perfect pastry, were the vibrantly green pistachios, harvested when young, and the butter made from ewe's milk. This is their recipe and is still very good even when made with ordinary butter and pistachios, and is just perfect with a cup of strong black coffee - Turkish, of course."

Baklava

(Adapted from Rick Stein's Mediterranean Escapes)

Makes about 20 pieces

Ingredients

500 g filo pastry sheets

150 g clarified butter, warmed (* see note below on how to make clarified butter)

250 g shelled pistachio nuts

For the Pastry Cream:

300 ml milk

40 g Semolina

For the Syrup:

600 g granulated sugar

1 tsp lemon juice

* To make Clarified Butter: Place butter in a small pan and leave it over a very low heat until it has melted. Skim off any scum from the surface and pour off the clear (clarified) butter into a bowl, leaving behind the milky white solids that will have settled on the bottom of the pan. The butter is ready to use.

Method

1. First make the pastry cream. Put the milk and semolina into a small, non-stick pan and slowly bring to the boil, stirring. Simmer for 1 minute, then transfer the mixture to a bowl, press a sheet of clingfilm onto the surface to prevent it from forming a skin and leave to go cold.
2. Preheat the oven to 160C. Cut down the filo pastry sheets if necessary so they will line a 20 x 30-cm shallow, rectangular, non-stick baking tin. Brush the base and sides of the tin with some of the clarified butter, then line the base with 15 single layers of pastry, brushing each one lightly with butter before adding the next. Don't butter the last sheet of pastry.
3. Mix the pastry cream until smooth, loosening it slightly with a little milk if it seems stiff, then spread it evenly over the top of the pastry. Sprinkle over the chopped pistachios in an even layers. Cover the top of the baklava with another 15 layers of filo pastry, lightly brushing with butter between each layer.
4. Using a larger, very sharp knife, cut the baklava into portion-sized pieces - make 3 evenly spaced cuts lengthways down the tin and then cut across at an angle to make small diamond-shaped pieces (Note: I prefer to cut them into square pieces, less wastage). Drizzle over any remaining butter. Bake the baklava for 1 hour until crisp and richly golden.
5. Meanwhile, for the sugar syrup, put the sugar and 350 ml water into a pan and leave over a low heat until the sugar has completely dissolved and the mixture is clear. Then bring to the boil and simmer vigorously until it reaches 107-108C, the 'thread' stage - you will need a sugar thermometer to check. Add the lemon juice to the syrup and set aside.
6. A minute or two before the baklava is ready to come out of the oven, bring the sugar syrup back up to the boil. Remove the baklava from the oven, quickly and carefully run a knife along the cuts to check the pieces are all separated, then immediately pour over the hot syrup. This will look like a large amount, but it will gradually be absorbed by the pastry as it cools. Leave the baklava to go cold, then carefully remove from the tin to serve.

Cinnamon Churros with Real Hot Chocolate

Rick's Stein's "Mediterranean Escapes" is the first cookbook Mr J ever bought for me. He never bought me a cookbook before because I have the expensive habit of buying cookbooks as soon as I "need" them! A nice little Christmas surprise from him, two years ago. He bought this cookbook for me because he genuinely likes the recipes in it. He hoped I would like the recipes and cook some for him.

Yes, I like this cookbook very much indeed. Rick Stein's recipes are always workable, very reliable and the end results are often picture perfect. I have made Sicilian Orange Cake, Greek Style Pot-Roasted Chicken, Kefta Mkaouara (Spicy Egg, Meatball and Tomato Tagine), Blakava and I made this Cinnamon Churros with Real Hot Chocolate today.

Rick Stein has written a nice piece of story to accompany this recipe:

"In the mid-sixties I spent about a week in a youth hotel in Seville just by the railway station. I shared a room with a Swedish chap called Jonas. He had the best pair of worn patched Levi's I'd ever seen, brown cowboy boots, a blue striped cotton shirt, a cool beard, a battered leather Gladstone bag and a tobacco pouch. I swear he did his rollies with one hand. He must have been all of 19 at the time. I had not a whisker of a chance with any of the girls in the hostel. Life just ain't fair. And the make matters even worse, as well as being so cool he was also very nice and introduced me to churros with chocolate sauce. You had to be up sort of early for a 19-year old to get the first of the day when the oil was clean and fresh. But I never forgot them, any more than I forgot about him. You don't, do you?"

Cinnamon Churros with Real Hot Chocolate Recipe

(Adapted from Rick Stein's Mediterranean Escapes)

Serves 4

For the Churros:

Sunflower oil, for deep-frying

100 g plain flour

150 ml full-cream milk

2 medium eggs, beaten

50 g golden caster sugar

3/4 tsp ground cinnamon

For the Hot Chocolate:

225 g good quality plain chocolate with at least 60% cocoa solids

200 ml full-cream milk

Method

1. For the churros, heat some oil for deep-frying to 190C and preheat the oven to 150C.
2. Sift the flour onto a creased sheet of greaseproof paper and set to one side. Bring the milk and 150 ml water to the boil in a pan, take the pan off the heat and add the flour all at once, beating vigorously with a wooden spoon until the mixture forms a thick paste - but don't worry about any small lumps. Leave to cool slightly and then gradually beat in enough of the eggs to make a smooth but still stiff, glossy mixture that drops reluctantly off the wooden spoon. Spoon the mixture into a piping bag fitted with a large star nozzle.
3. Hold the bag over the hot oil and gently squeeze out a few 10-cm lengths of the mixture. Leave them to fry for 4 minutes, turning them oven halfway through, until crisp and richly golden brown. Lift them out with a slotted spoon onto a baking tray lined with lots of kitchen paper and keep warm in the oven while you cook the remainder.





4. For the hot chocolate, break the chocolate into a heatproof bowl and rest it over a pan containing about 2.5 cm just-simmering water. Lave until completely melted. Bring the milk to the boil in a small pan. Remove the bowl of chocolate from the heat and whisk in the hot milk. Pour into tall, narrow pots.
5. Mix the caster sugar and cinnamon together in a shallow dish, add the churros a few at a time, and toss them gently until lightly coated. Pile alongside each pot of hot chocolate and serve while still warm.