My Melody and Kuromi Macaron Carousel

 My friend requested for a My Melody and Kuromi macaron carousel and this was what I made!

I used my default Swiss meringue method recipe for the macaron shells.

Here's a video tutorial on how I create My Melody's lop-eared fold. A secret I have kept for many years! Some people asked how I did it way back in 2017 but I wasn't ready to reveal it yet.

The details are added on using royal icing and edible marker. I made royal icing transfers for My Melody's flower

I like to experiment and change designs along the way so this time round, I did something a little different for the carousel frame.

These are some of the standard pieces.

I included some small flowers piped using #2D tip from underfolded batter.

Blueberry ganache is the logical choice for filling to match the purple frame so that's what I used as the filling. The natural purple from fresh blueberries is lovely! I used a stiffer and darker coloured ganache for the middle of the carousel frame, hidden from sight by adding some freeze-dried blueberry powder to impart a stronger blueberry flavour without adding moisture. 

Blueberry yuzu ganache

Blueberry compote:

150g blueberries

15g yuzu juice concentrate (or lemon juice)

15g sugar

Light colored ganache:

150g white chocolate (finely chopped from bar or use couverture chips)

75g compote

15g unsalted butter, slightly softened at room temperature

Dark colored stiffer ganache:

150g white chocolate

45g compote

5g yuzu juice concentrate (or lemon juice)

20g freeze dried blueberry powder

10g unsalted butter, room temperature

You may not use all the ganache for the carousel but they cam be kept frozen for longer storage.

Steps:

1. Prepare blueberry compote. Cook over medium-low heat until reduced to about 140g in total. Press through sieve to remove the skins.

2. Melt white chocolate over double-boiler or using microwave at medium-low power in 10 second bursts, stirring between each heating cycle.

3. Mix warm compote with freeze-dried blueberry powder and yuzu for the stiffer ganache. Heat it up again slightly if it has cooled down after mixing.

4. Pour warm compote/compote mixture over melted chocolate. Stir in one direction until well mixed. Use an immersion blender if you wish.

5. Add softened butter and mix well. Press cling wrap onto surface and refrigerate for at least half an hour or until ready to assemble.

I added some chopped toasted hazelnuts coated in dark chocolate in the middle of the larger macarons like the base and the roof. I used a 1:1 ratio for nuts: dark chocolate by weight.

In order to support a softer filling than I normally use for load-bearing macaron structures, I piped a ring of medium-stiff royal icing for the central pillar pieces of the carousel frame.

I also reinforced the straw with royal icing so that the characters don't have the risk of sliding down the straw.

As usual, I let the weight bearing pieces rest overnight after partial assembly before adding on more load. This is to allow the royal icing time to harden fully.

I think the carousel frame looks lovely on its own 😍

Here's a reel of the assembly process:

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CttiocAAq95/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

with love,

Phay Shing 

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Sanrio Hanami Dango Vegan Macarons

I am finally done with the first draft of Deco Marshmallows! While waiting for the editor to get back to me with it, I have decided to work one something I have been procrastinating for years---vegan macarons! 

As Sakura season is here, I am inspired by the Hanami dango, which is a traditional Japanese confectionery that announces the arrival of spring. Of course I couldn't resist the chance to make it kawaii with Hello Kitty, My Melody and Keroppi! 

Matcha, strawberry and vanilla white chocolate ganache as filling to match the traditional colours 

Besides vegan macarons with vegan fillings, I took the chance to try out vegan royal icing for some of the fine details.

All credit goes to Meiyee (Instagram account: nm_meiyee) for sharing her vegan recipes. Her work is beautiful, naturally coloured and flavoured! I adapted from her recipes that are shared so I didn't follow exactly what she did but do check out her account for the recipes and to marvel at her work! 

I used bakeable matcha powder with no additional artificial green colouring for the matcha shells and ganache. I added freeze-dried strawberry powder and a tiny bit of bottled strawberry emulsion for strawberry. I used matcha Pocky sticks for the "skewer" (I know it's not vegan but I prefer having everything edible but I didn't want to make the biscuit sticks from scratch too 🙈)

Here are some photos of the process:

Freshly baked shells. I was working on a separate set for future vegan macaron class material at the same time.

I actually rushed through the decoration and didn't manage to finish as I had to go out of the house. This is the works-in-progress decoration with vegan royal icing. Could have been better if I didn't rush

Strawberry, matcha and vanilla vegan white chocolate ganache before whipping it up to lighten the texture.

Filling up the macarons and inserting a matcha Pocky stick

Experienced macaron bakers will be able to tell that I had issues with one of the colours of batter and they would be right! I knew what went wrong and but am confident I can rectify it for the class. After all, this is my first attempt and it was rather ambitious of me to try three colours/flavours of macaron shells in a single batch. The flavour that I left to the last to work on had issues because the meringue needed to be whipped stiffer again and I should have trusted my instincts to do so. Can you tell which one it is? 

I am excited to be able to include vegan macarons as part of my class content after this experiment. Stay tuned for class announcements July onwards for vegan macarons! But note that I won't be teaching the Sanrio characters. 

Check out my Instagram reel for some video snippets of the aquafaba meringue and macaron batter!

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CqSmIVIAWfe/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

with love,

Phay Shing

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My Melody Burger Chiffon Cake

 

Food meets fun this CNY! My Melody-inspired burger chiffon cake coming fresh of the grill!
 I've shared the assembly video here on my IG. 

Some other updates in response to some messages. My new classes here: 

Valentine's day Beary Cute Duo Roll Cakes 

Baby Lamb Chiffon Cake 

Happy CNY in advance!! 

With love, 

Susanne 

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My Melody and Keroppi Roll Cakes

 

Cute Sanrio Animal Roll Cakes! Which one is your favorite? Keroppi or My Melody? 

Watch the video here on the BTS (behind-the-scenes) of making of the rolls! 

I created this recipe using Suncorefoods natural food powders! 

Recipe
4 egg yolks
20g sugar
40g oil
40g milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
60g cake flour
@suncorefoods red radish, yellow safflower, blue spirulina for the colors

4 egg whites 
50g sugar 
1/4 tsp cream of tartar 

Filling 
200g whipping cream 
Surprise: star chocolate 

Whisk egg yolks with sugar, followed by oil, milk and vanilla. Whisk in flour and divide the batter into 2(red) : 2(light green): 1(plain): 1(dark green). Add food coloring and mix well. 

Whisk egg whites till firm peaks. Divide the meringue as above and fold in. Pipe keroppi the frog and my melody rabbit designs in 8” pans and bake at 150C for 20mins. 

Whip cream till medium peaks. Spread over the cakes, arrange the surprises and roll up. Decorate with chocolate. Enjoy! =) 

With love,

Susanne 

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My Melody Watermelon Chiffon Cake

 

My favourite fruit is watermelon! What's yours? 

Another watermelon-inspired bake, here's my My Melody masquerading as a watermelon! 

Wishing you a blessed week! 

Love, 
Susanne 

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My Melody Winter Chiffon Cake

Hello December! Please keep yourself warm🥰 

Does she melt your heart?❤  

Just a simple My Melody chiffon cake, Christmas version. Hope you like it! 

With love, 

Susanne

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Around the world with Sanrio Chiffon Cake

This special creation "Around the world with Sanrio" chiffon cake is a special collaboration with Sanrio Singapore to celebrate International Peace day amidst these difficult times 💖.

Our lovable Sanrio characters, Hello Kitty, Little Twin Stars, Keroppi, My Melody, Pom pom purin, Bad batz maru, Cinamaroll, and Gudetama join forces to spread love, peace and unity during these hard times. 

The "Sanrio characters x Susanne Deco Chiffon" online classes were also borne during the difficult COVID times to spread love and family bonding during the stay-home period 💖.  We hope to encourage everyone.

Which Sanrio characters will you hope to see next in my online class? 

With lots of love,

Susanne

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My Melody Sweet Chiffon (Online Class)

Thankful to be collaborating with Sanrio to launch a series of online Sanrio classes and baking kits! We hope to bring some joy and bonding during this period! =)

The first class in My Melody Sweet Chiffon cake. It's vanilla-almond flavoured as My Melody loves almonds! The video class is also available worldwide! And there is a also specially-designed My Melody baking kit with giftcard if you are in Singapore, as well as options to add on baking pans. Sign up link here if you are interested!

And thankful to God for providing and the support of family and friends! Here are some links you can find out more. Thankful for their features! <3

Mothership   

  

8days

Enjoy baking!

With lots of love,
Susanne

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My Melody Macarons with Mango Ganache (New filling recipe!)

I love bakes that challenge me within reason. This is one of them :)

My friend requested for some full-bodied My Melody macarons that are to be given away as gifts. She wanted some filled with dark chocolate ganache and some with mango flavoured filling. While the dark chocolate filling is a no-brainer, the mango one is a challenge in hot and humid Singapore. I am happy to say that my experiment with making a mango flavoured filling that is full of fresh fruit puree but stable at Singapore's hot room temperature is a success! And this is the new recipe that I would like to share in this blog post.

I used the reduced sugar recipe for the macaron shells here. Both regular and reduced sugar recipes can be found here. You may refer to my Creative Baking: Macarons book for a systematic presentation of the basics and complex shaped macarons. You may refer to my video tutorials for macaron basics and piping of complex shapes on the blog too.

Just to share some pictures of the piping process...

Freshly baked shells!

I created the flowers on My Melody using royal icing. The templates for the macaron shells come in handy for this too. Be sure to let the icing dry thoroughly before attempting to remove them from the baking paper.

Decoration was done using a combination of royal icing and black edible marker.

Checkout the feet!

I googled for a mango white chocolate ganache recipe suitable for macarons and found this, which I used as my reference. I found the proportion of puree used a little low and I was wondering if cream could be omitted totally without risking the whole mixture separating/chocolate seizing. The ganache needs to be firm and omitting the cream allows more puree to be added without making the ganache too soft.

I bought some Thai mangoes and made a puree by blending one mango with 1tsp of lemon juice. The lemon juice is added to prevent browning. I sieved the puree to ensure that it is smooth.

Mango puree

Recipe for whipped mango white chocolate ganache
Ingredients (fills about 16-20 macarons):
55g white chocolate, chopped
10g vegetable shortening
10g unsalted butter
1/8 tsp fine sea salt
25g mango puree
1/4 tsp mango flavouring

Steps:
1. Place white chocolate, vegetable shortening and butter in a microwave-safe bowl. Heat at medium power for 20 seconds. Mix well with a spatula. Repeat until mixture is smooth. Add salt and mix well.

2. Freeze the bowl for 2 minutes and mix well with spatula. Repeat freezing and mixing. As the mixture thickens, start to beat it with the spatula. You will notice that the texture will lighten up and become creamy.

3. Add a teaspoon of puree and whip the mixture with the spatula until well combined. Repeat until all the puree has been added. Add mango flavouring and mix well. The texture should be like buttercream

4. Transfer whipped mango ganache into piping bag and pipe onto the shells. Store assembled macarons in the fridge in an airtight container for at least 24h before serving.

I filled some shells with dark chocolate ganache.

I am really excited about discovering this new filling as it opens up new options for flavours that are suitable for macarons which need to withstand longer storage away from the fridge in hot and humid Singapore.

With love,
Phay Shing

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Baby 'My Melody' Vanilla Chiffon Cake

Making this sweet cake made me really happy because the Baby My Melody is so sweet!

The cream light yellow base chiffon cake below is a 9-inch Vanilla Chiffon Cake. My friend said it was super yummy! As I was afraid the base chiffon cake colour would clash with the Melody (also cream colour), the base chiffon cake is not a reduced egg yolk version, and I added a few drops of natural Queen’s turmeric-based coloring to give it a tinge of sweet pale yellow. 

Vanilla Chiffon Cake (9-inch chiffon tin)
7 egg yolks
47g sugar
89g vegetable oil
97ml water
140g cake flour
12 ml vanilla extract

9 egg whites
105g sugar
1/4 tsp cream of tartar

1. Preheat oven to 160°C. Prepare a tray of water at the bottom of the oven (I used the lowest rack to bake the cake). *You may omit steam baking; I like to use it to control my oven temperature rise.
2. Beat egg yolks with sugar with whisk till pale yellow before stirring in oil, water and vanilla extract.
3. Add in sieved flour and whisk till no trace of flour found.
4. Meringue: Beat the egg whites with ¼ tsp cream of tartar till stiff peak, mixing in caster sugar in 2 additions.
5. Fold in the meringue gently into the batter 1/3 at a time.
6. Pour the batter into the chiffon tin from a height.
7. Gently tap the tin on table 3x to remove air bubbles
8. Bake the chiffon cake for 15 min at 160°C and then at 150°C for 10 mins and 140°C for 20 min, then 130°C for 15 min.
9. Invert immediately once out of the oven to cool
10. Unmould by hand after the cake is cool. Gently pull the cake from the sides of the tin at each angle and push the removable base up to unmould the sides. To unmould the cake from the base, gently lift up the cake from the base using hands, repeating this at each angle before turning the base over (see 'Hand Unmoulding Chiffon Cakes for a Smooth Finishing' video tutorial).

The pink My Melody is made by prepiping the white vanilla chiffon batter in a bowl, and then baking strawberry batter over it (similar to Hedgehog but replacing the cocoa powder with few drops of strawberry paste). The ears were cut out from strawberry chiffon similarly. The body required additional small round bowl cake and 4 cake pops (for limbs) using the same vanilla chiffon cake recipe.

Happy belated birthday to Renae!

With love,
Susanne

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My Melody & Piano Raspberry White Chocolate Macarons (Tsum Tsum series part 2)

This is the second post in my series of Tsum Tsum macaron bake. My Melody and Piano!

I made My Melody macarons a few months ago but with a different version. This is the first time I am trying out a new non-refrigerated filling - raspberry white chocolate! I bought some dried raspberry powder from Phoon Huat a couple of months ago on a whim, thinking I can use it as a natural source of colouring and/or flavouring.

You may refer to this recipe for the basic batter and steps, and my newly made macaron video tutorials just in case you need more visuals :).  Just some points to note...

Divide the batter into ratio of 2:2:1 for dark pink:light pink:white. Use Wilton #10 tip for the heads and My Melody's ears. Use Wilton #5 tip for the face, hands and Piano's ears. Wait for the head base to dry for 15 minutes before piping on the ears, face and hands. Use a toothpick to pull the white batter for Piano's ruffled face. Remember to bang the tray hard on the table after piping the head and various parts.

Freshly piped!

Bake at 130°C for 17-20 minutes, rotating the tray halfway through baking. If the shells are stuck to baking sheet, reduce temperature to 120°C and bake for 5 minutes more before checking again to see if the shells are still stuck to the baking sheet.

Freshly baked shells!

Make some royal icing and pipe the bows using the same template for the heads. Oven dry at 60°C fan mode between each step of piping the bows to create 3D features. Dry thoroughly before attempting to remove the royal icing bows. Attach them to the shells with a bit of royal icing.

Royal icing bows

Icing the face!

Raspberry white chocolate  (fills about 12-14 macarons)
Ingredients:
80g white chocolate, chopped (I used Meiji)
10g unsalted butter
2 tsp (4g) dried raspberry powder (more if you prefer. Mine is nicely fruity.)

Steps:
1. Melt butter in a small saucepan and add sifted raspberry powder into it. Stir well.
2. Melt white chocolate by double boiling or in the microwave oven at 10 second bursts using medium power, stirring between heating bursts.
3. Add melted butter with raspberry into the melted white chocolate a little at a time. Stir until well combined between each addition. Let the mixture sit for a while at room temperature to firm up a little until desired piping consistency, a bit like toothpaste.
4. Transfer to piping bag and pipe the filling on.

5. Store in airtight container at cool and dry place.

With love,
Phay Shing

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Tsum Tsum (Sanrio) Rainbow Chiffon Cake

Sanrio plus Tsum Tsum = Cuteness overload! All the Tsum Tsum Sanrio characters here are made from soft chiffon cake. My heart melted when my friend sent me pictures of these cute fluffy Tsum Tsum Sanrio plush toys! The characters are Little Twin Stars, Tuxedo Sam, Piano, My Melody and Cinnamaroll (some of them I only learnt now LOL).

It turned out to be one of my most difficult cakes so far. I learnt a valuable lesson here that chiffon cakes are too soft to stack LOL. These are now stacked lying on the cake as they get squashed when stacked upright so I had a difficult time trying it out. All these characters are made from patterning chiffon in small bowl cakes in combination with layered chiffon cakes of various colours to cut out their features. She also requested for a rainbow cake, so the base is a pretty sweet 9-inch Rainbow chiffon cake (can't be seen clearly from here).

Thank God for really helping here. I’ve never been so happy and relieved the cake was well-received =p.

Happy birthday to sweet Megan!

With lots of love,
Susanne

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My Melody & Piano Strawberry Shortbread Cookies (icing-free)

Presenting My Melody and Piano strawberry shortbread cookies with no added icing and minimal artificial colouring! The kind of cookie for those who love the buttery aroma without the sugar overload :).

Ingredients (makes about twelve 6-7cm shortbread cookies):
Pink dough
50g icing sugar
100g unsalted butter, cut to small pieces (use good quality butter!)
135g plain flour
15g cornflour* (may replace with plain flour)
1/8 tsp salt
1/4 tsp + 1/8 tsp strawberry emulco/paste
2g Queen's natural sourced pink powder (optional)

White/yellow/black dough
15g icing sugar
30g unsalted butter, cut to small pieces
40g plain flour
5g corn flour (or plain flour)
Pinch of salt
1/8 tsp vanilla extract
Gel food colouring (if no natural sourced ones available, e.g. white colour)
1/8 tsp Queen's natural yellow color butter (optional)
1/8 tsp charcoal powder (optional)

* cornflour is used to make the cookie less tough but is optional to use.

Steps:
1. Prepare the pink dough. Sift together icing sugar, flours, salt and pink powder.

2. Cut the butter into the dry mixture and knead to form a dough. Add 1/4 tsp strawberry paste. Divide the pink dough into two. Colour one portion with another 1/8 tsp strawberry paste.

3. Prepare the white, yellow and black dough in a similar way. Portion out about 10g for yellow dough, 10g for black and keep the rest white or uncoloured.

4. Roll the pink dough to thickness of 5-6mm between two baking sheets. Roll the rest of the dough to 2-3mm thickness. Chill the dough in the freezer or fridge for at least 30 minutes or overnight.

5. Begin by cutting out the pink bases using  the homemade template. You may find it helpful to use freezer packs as your work surface to keep the dough firm for a longer time in hot Singapore. Place the cutouts on baking tray lined with baking sheet. Chill the whole tray in the fridge.

6. In a separate baking tray, cut out the white faces using plastic template. Chill the white bases in the freezer for 15 minutes before proceeding with cutting out the facial features and sticking them on. I made an "O" mouth for My Melody at first but the requester wanted it changed to a smile. I managed to make the change after baking. You may find the mouths too fine to cut out from the dough. Piping them in after baking is much easier as I have found out.

Freeze the completed faces until firm.

7. Carefully transfer the face onto the pink base. Add on the flower for My Melody.

8. Preheat the oven to 150°C and set the rack to second lowest position. Freeze the tray of dough cutouts until oven temperature is stable. Bake for 15-17 minutes, rotating the tray about 10 minutes into baking time. Keep a close eye on the cookies! Once the bottom appears a little brown, remove from the oven or the cookies will appear brown. I accidentally browned a few cookies and had to rebake.

9. Cool the cookies on the tray for 5 minutes before transferring to cooling rack.

10. Prepare a black paste made of about 1tsp cocoa powder, 1/2 tsp charcoal powder and enough hot water to get a toothpaste consistency. Transfer to piping/zip lock bag with a small hole cut. Pipe out the smiley mouth. Dry in oven at 60°C fan mode for about half an hour. Cool completely on cooling rack before storing in airtight container.

Looking sweet!

With love,
Phay Shing

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