Friday 29 April 2016

Barnyard Themed Macarons & Brown Sugar Cookies (recipe for strawberry white chocolate ganache included)

Here are some barnyard themed macarons and brown sugar cookiepops!


It's my second time making these cutsies so I decided to combine these two bakes into a single blog post. Please refer to this post for the macarons and this post for the brown sugar cookies. I filled the macarons with dark chocolate ganache and strawberry white chocolate ganache (which is new so will share recipe here). Both ganaches are firm enough to be left out of the fridge for several hours. Perfect as gifts in hot Singapore! Feel free to adjust cream:chocolate ratio for the level of firmness you like.

I will mainly share the photos of all the hard work that went into creating them :).

Here are some photos of macaron making!

Piping out sheep!

Piping out cow!

Piping out chicken!

Piping out pig!

Baked shells and decorated with black edible marker and some royal icing.


Filling with strawberry ganache.

Recipe for strawberry white chocolate ganache
Ingredients:
100g white chocolate, chopped
25g heavy cream
7g unsalted butter
1tsp strawberry emulco
1/8 tsp salt
1/4 tsp rose water (optional but enhances the strawberry flavour)

Steps:
1. Place white chocolate and butter in a microwave safe bowl and melt it by heating using medium power for 20 seconds. Stir well and repeat until fully melted.

2. In a small saucepan, heat cream until it starts to bubble. Pour over melted chocolate and stir with spatula until well combined.

3.Add salt and mix well. Add rose water and strawberry emulco gradually, stirring after each addition.

4. Let the ganache sit at room temperature for half an hour or until firmed up to toothpaste consistency. Transfer to piping bag and pipe onto macaron shells. Refrigerate for at least 24h before serving.

Here are some photos of cookiepops making!

Freshly baked cookiepops!

Tracing outline using template and edible marker

As the design is simple, I finished icing in a day!

Packed cookiepops!

Packed macarons!


With love,
Phay Shing
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Tuesday 26 April 2016

Creative Baking: Deco Chiffon Cakes with Marshall Cavendish (Chiffon book 2)

Newest!
(15/10/17) New Step-by-step Deco Chiffon Cakes Basics Cookbook (Chiffon book 3) launched in Singapore and other countries! Rated bestseller by Kinokuniya. #verythankful


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Deco Chiffon Cakes (Chiffon book 2)

(Oct 2016) Very excited to announce that my new Creative Chiffon Book 2, titled Creative Baking: Deco Chiffon Cake is available at all bookstores in Singapore (Kinokuniya, Popular, Times). This is the original English version.



*Second print run (17/1/17) Deco Chiffon Cakes also sold out its first print run in around 3 months! Thanks for your support!

Online webstore: Free shipping within SG and also ships internationally at Localbooks.SG.

MalaysiaNaiiseKinokuniyaMPHonline, selected Popular

IndonesiaPeriplusBooks & beyond, Kinokuniya

Thailand: Books at Kinokuniya and Asia books

Philippines: Books at Fully booked from mid Dec 2016, and National Bookstore from mid Feb 2017

Book depository: On discount and free shipping worldwide!

Amazon: Books will be available from mid- Feb 2017.

e-book: Kindle version is available at Amazon.

(27/4/17) Chinese (traditional) edition of Deco Chiffon Cakes! For Hong kong, Macau and Taiwan from May 2017. 
Free shipping worldwide on YesAsia.
Also available on Hong Kong Popular online.
Hongkong: All major bookstores eg Popular.
Macau: 澳門星光, 澳門文化, 宏達


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Other Events/Updates


(31/1/17) Super honored to be featured on Russian NTV! Watch the catch-up TV program here.


(4/10/17) Honored to be on YES93.3! I shared about the new Basics cookbook and we had a challenge! Catch the facebook live here.

(28/9/17) Featured on Korea's major site Naver!


(18/9/17) Honored to be interviewed by Radio channel JIA88.3 FM on my cakes. Catch their facebook live here.

(18/7/17) Interview with Shin Min Daily on 18/7/17. Article link here.

(12/7/17) My humble interview with Straits Times on Straits Times Video!
Also on AsiaOne and HerWorld =)

(7/7/17) Very thankful to be featured by The Straits Times! Nothing like being appreciated at home! <3  Read full article here. Pictures from my Instagram@susanne.decochiffon.


Some other news features of my cute Chiffon Cakes around the world: Kitchen.nine.au (Aust), Gusto.tv (Canada), ChinadailyYoupouch (Japan), Tg (Italy), CleoYoungparents,  NowThisEntertainmentMy Modern MetYahoo news and Inquirer! ~ very thankful!

(4/7/17) Thankful and honored to be interviewed by Daily Mail Online from UK!

(30/6/17) Very honored to be featured on Mashable, a popular US media website!
Mashable full write-up here.

(22/6/17) News features on Mothership.sg!

(4/6/17) Iced Gems Chiffon Cakes from the cookbook to be featured on Food & Travel magazine, both on their website and June 2017 print issue. Recipe video here:

(10/12/16) Popular Bookfest event


(3/12/16) Media feature on Channel 8 news 《流行挖哇 WOW》! It was a challenge for me to speak mandarin but thankful it turned out well =p. Full video here.

(23/10/16) Book launch event. A live video of my demo can be found here. Below are some sneak peeks, I was really touched some Indonesians even flew in specially for the event!

(2/10/16) Kinokuniya Bestsellers
Super excited that Deco Chiffon Cakes is in Kinokuniya's bestseller list for non-fiction this week!!

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Book Preview

The second chiffon book covers more innovative 3D patterns, cutie animals and festive cakes! With an extended 6-page troubleshooting FAQ section for creative chiffons, as well as free basic chiffon recipe for beginners to try. Another highlight are new trending flavours like salted egg lava chiffon cake!
*Reviews have been that this 2nd book is very detailed and offers lots of helpful new tips! More testimonials below!

Video tutorial for Passionfruit/Yuzu Chiffon Lollipops from the book!



The sneak peeks of the 3-sections are below. It's roughly divided into:
(I) All Creatures Great & Small (cutie animals eg panda, camou soldier, 'crab' salted egg yolk lava cake, 'moo moo' cake etc.)
(II) Come on & Celebrate (festive cakes eg Christmas snowman, CNY 'ji' cake, surprise Mother's day etc.)
(III) Sugar & Spice (sweet treats for kids, eg. lollipops, ice-cream, iced gems, 6-flavours Asian flavours cake etc.)

The photos for the sneak peeks are below:

(27/5/16) Here are the sneak peeks of the photoshoot for Creative baking: Deco Chiffon Cakes, taken over 1.5 months and over 3 photoshoots spaced 2 weeks apart. It's fulfilling to see the hard work made so beautiful by the talented team at Marshall Cavendish!

'Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice' - Chapter (III) - all the pretty cakes!

6-flavour Asian-inspired flavours chiffon cake, Matcha Turtle Seawaves and Lavender Hydrangea flowers chiffon cakes..

Yummy Ice cream Chiffon pops with Vanilla Centers! We couldn't resist taking a bite! ;)

Group shot for 'Sugar and Spice' Section

'Come on and Celebrate'  - Chapter II - all the festive cakes! 

Do you want to build a snowman? Or an iced gem? =p

Group shot for 'Come on and Celebrate;

3D Patterned flower with Surprise flowers Raspberry Jelly Chiffon Cake

Do you want to build a snowman? *music playing* =p

And my favorite... 

All Creatures Great and Small - Chapter (I) - all the cutie animals!


Azuki-Black sesame Ladybird Chiffon Cake pops

Mummy and Baby Pandas Japanese Cream Cheese Chiffon Cake

Lemon-Charcoal Stripey Bee Chiffon Cake

Moo moo Cream Cheese Chiffon Cake

A big thank you to Phoon Huat and Chew's eggs for their generous sponsorship of the finest ingredients in the making of these chiffon cakes!!


With lots of love,
Susanne


**First chiffon cookbook, Creative baking: Chiffon Cakes.


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Testimonials

#susannedecochiffon
So happy to see more try out recipes from Deco Chiffon Cakes!
Do tag me and I will try to feature from time to time!

Friends who tried out the Moo Moo Jap cream cheese-charcoal Chiffon Cake from Deco Chiffon Cake successfully and gave good reviews in terms of taste and texture!

Rabbit-in-burrow Chiffon Cake from Deco Chiffon Cakes!

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Instagram
My Instagram is updated faster than blog! Do follow for updates =)


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Classes
(25/4/17) New class open on June 3rd. Surprise and 3D patterned Flowers Raspberry Jelly Chiffon Cake from Deco Chiffon Cakes. Registration link closed.

(3/3/17) New workshop on April 22. Surprise and 3D patterned Flowers Raspberry Jelly Chiffon Cake from Deco Chiffon Cakes. Registration link closed.


(2/2/17) Upcoming Creative/Deco Chiffon Cake workshop on March 17-18. Vanilla-pandan two-tone wavy deco-chiffon made into a pretty field of flowers! Fully hands-on and bring home one chiffon cake. Registration/details: http://www.bakeking.com.sg/classes


(17/12/16) Moo Moo Chiffon cake workshop with BC!


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Black Glutinous Rice Chiffon Sponge and Pudding Cake

I have been dreaming about making this cake since last year and have made countless attempts just to get the pudding right. Presenting a new flavour of sponge and pudding cake that I came up with. Pulut hitam!


Here's a closer look at a slice...



You may think what's so difficult about making pulut hitam flavour of this cake since I had no issues with other flavours. Due to the thick starchy consistency of bubur pulut hitam, the pudding either becomes too sticky and refuses to set or is not flavourful enough. Then there's the matter of choosing the right gelling agents in the right proportions. Thanks to Kenneth Goh, I have added mung bean flour (Hoen Kueh) as one of the gelling agents that compliments the starchy base of pulut hitam well.


I have made black glutinous rice chiffon cake before using black glutinous rice flour which is only available from Bake King in Singapore. I find the flour not as fragrant as Indonesia's so I decided to make the chiffon sponge from the porridge itself. Black glutinous rice on the other hand is easily available. It took me three tries to get a satisfactory chiffon sponge that is soft, moist and full of pulut hitam flavour with a nice balance of coconut fragrance. One of my attempts tasted more like coconut cake! I think I lost track of how many times I attempted the pudding :p. So here I am sharing with you the fruits of my labour. Here's a pulut hitam cake that is flavourful with a good balance of flavours, refreshing, cream-free, dairy-free, low in gluten content, not too sweet so even older folk like my parents love it. Please acknowledge the source if you ever attempt this and publicize your bake. Do be patient and wait for a day before eating. It tastes better the next day!

Black glutinous rice porridge (bubur pulut hitam, adapted from here and here)
Ingredients:
200g black glutinous rice
1L water
3 Pandan leaves, torn into pieces
115g gula melaka, chopped (adjust according to taste. Mine is less sweet)
100ml thin coconut milk (adjust amount according to taste)
1/3 tsp salt

Steps:
1. Wash the rice and drain before soaking for 2hours. Drain away the water and wash and drain again.

2. Place the rice in a saucepan with water and Pandan leaves. Bring to a boil. Simmer for about 15 minutes before removing the leaves, stirring now and then.

3. Add gula melaka and salt and stir.

4. When the porridge starts to thicken, add coconut milk and stir. Bring to a boil. Boil for another 10-15 minutes or until porridge is thick, stirring now and then to prevent rice grains from sticking to the bottom of the pot.

Piping hot bubur pulut hitam!

5. You may be tempted to have some of this aromatic porridge now but make sure you reserve 360g for the cake and pudding if you are making a 6-7" cake. Reserve more or less according to size of cake. Serve with more thick coconut milk or vanilla ice-cream if you like.

6. To prepare the porridge for sponge and pudding, blend the porridge until as fine in texture as you can. You may freeze it in ziplock bags if you are preparing the cake another day.

Black glutinous rice chiffon cake (makes two 7" layer cakes, adapted from here)
Ingredients:
2 egg yolks
10g gula melaka, finely chopped
22g coconut oil*
120g bubur pulut hitam (black glutinous rice porridge)
10g coconut cream (thick coconut milk)
46g cake flour
1/4 tsp charcoal powder (optional)
Pinch of salt

3 egg whites
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
30g caster sugar

* if unavailable, you may use other vegetable oil like corn or canola. But do replace 20g of bubur pulut hitam with coconut cream for a stronger coconut aroma. Ideally, coconut oil should be used for that extra coconut fragrance without compromising the pulut hitam flavour.

This stuff is seriously fragrant! And seriously pricey too!

Steps:
1. Line base of two 7" round or square tins with baking paper. Set oven rack to second lowest position. Preheat oven to 160°C.

2. Prepare egg yolk batter. Whisk egg yolks and gula melaka until pale and thick. Add coconut oil and whisk until well combined. Add bubur pulut hitam and coconut cream and whisk until combined. Gradually sift in cake flour, salt and charcoal powder and whisk until no trace of flour is seen.

3. Prepare meringue. In a clean metal bowl, beat egg whites with cream of tartar until foamy. Gradually add caster sugar and beat until firm peaks are formed or just about to reach stiff peaks.

4. Fold the meringue into the egg yolk batter in three additions quickly but gently. Pour batter into prepared tins. Tap the tins on the table to release trapped air bubbles.

5. Bake at 160°C for 13-15 minutes or until skewer comes out clean. Immediately flip the cakes onto baking sheet and cool with another sheet over the cakes.

I was doing a trial so I actually halved the recipe and used cookie cutter to cut out two 4" circles.

Checkout the specks of black glutinous rice grains!

I actually prefer the texture of this black glutinous rice chiffon cake made using the porridge to the one made with black glutinous rice flour. The texture is smoother with specks of black glutinous rice bits that add that burst of flavour and bite to an otherwise smooth and soft cake. The black glutinous rice flour version has a grainy texture.

Pulut hitam pudding
Ingredients:
A)
240g Pandan water (boil 500ml of water with a few Pandan leaves)
20g gula melaka
15g caster sugar
40g coconut cream
3 tsp agar powder
B)
2 tbs mung bean flour (hoen kueh)
40g Pandan water
C)
220g bubur pulut hitam

Steps:
1. Mix ingredients in B) in a small bowl and set aside. If you are using frozen bubur pulut hitam, make sure it is fully defrosted and at room temperature or warm.

2. Place all ingredients in A) in a saucepan and bring to a boil, stirring frequently. Let the mixture boil for a couple of minutes while stirring continuously. This is to ensure that all the agar powder is dissolved.

3. Stir B) again and pour into A). Bring to a boil and stir continuously. Keep stirring after mixture boils again for a couple of minutes.

4. Add C) and bring to a boil, stirring continuously. Keep boiling and stirring for a couple of minutes. I must stress that you have to take time to stir and boil for a while at each mention of this step otherwise the agar and mung bean flour will not get incorporated fully and your pudding will have a grainy texture and not set properly. I learnt this the hard way with many failures along the way.

Prepare to assemble.

As I did not want to waste too much resources, I used a really small springform pan (4.5") for my trial. The recipe I wrote here is for a 6-7" cake.

Assembly
1. Pour some pudding into springform pan.

2. Place a sponge cake over it.

3. Pour more pudding, taking care to fill the sides.

4. Place the second sponge over and pour more pudding around the sides.

5. Refrigerate for 2 hours or until firm. Gently unmould. Store in fridge overnight before consuming. It tastes better the next day.


I actually made this while assembling the unicorn macaron carousels so I kept the decoration simple and minimal.



Really happy to finally come up with a working recipe for a cake I dreamed about :). My dad who does not have a sweet tooth loved the cake so much he finished most of it by himself!

Updates: Victoria of Victoria Bakes highly recommends this recipe! Do check out her post on her attempt at this flavour of cake. Checkout the cake I made for my mum's birthday with chiffon sunflowers brightening up the whole dark coloured cake!

With lots of love,
Phay Shing

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