Winnie the Pooh Mango Choux Pastries in Macaron Teacups

Mangoes are still cheap and plentiful at the moment so I hope you aren't tired of seeing more mango creations from me 🤣. Presenting my mixed genre creation that I was working on while we aren't allowed to bake for sale. Pooh bear mango choux pastries in macaron teacups, topped off with strawberry meringue Piglets!!

Here is another look of them without the distractions in front.

You may refer to my previous post for detailed recipe for the Piglet meringues.

The focus of this blog post will be for the new mango filling recipe that is yummy both frozen in freezer and chilled in the fridge. Up to you which way you want to serve it.

You may refer to this post for the detailed recipe of choux pastry batter with craquelin. I used a 3cm craquelin on 2.5cm piped batter for Pooh's head. I used a pinch of yellow powder food colouring and some white gel food colouring for both craquelin and batter.

Highly recommended to use perforated mat if you have it! Baking time is about 45-50min to thoroughly bake dry the cases. Temperature depends on your oven as each one behaves differently. As a rule of thumb, start off high but drop the temperature later on. This is to ensure nice puffy cases but minimal browning. 

I piped the ears and hands after baking the heads just to have a better gauge of the size of the small parts that need to be piped. You may pipe these on parchment lined baking trays. These just need to bake for about 15 min

Freshly baked ears and hands! Oops some pieces got blown away by the fan in my kitchen 😂

When choux cases are baked until dry, they can be stored for a week at room temperature while staying crisp, much like cookies. So take your time to dry out the cases if you like crisp pastries. Sometimes this can take up to an hour of leaving the cases in the oven.

You may refer to this post on how to make the teacup macarons. I just decorated it in a way to suit the Pooh theme.

Macaron teacups decorated and assembled with royal icing. 

I was cute overloaded by this sight even though it was still works-in-progress! The ears can simply be inserted into the choux cases but the hands need to be glued on using some royal icing. Do use a zester to grind off a little bit of the hands so that it fits nicely on the surface of the head.

I am a big fan of strong but balanced flavours without being too sweet in desserts. The lightened mango pastry cream is one of them. I inject fruity flavours by using a combination of cooked puree and chopped fresh fruit pieces. Do adjust the amount of sugar according to taste and sweetness level of the mangoes you are using. You may use more or less whipping cream as you wish.

Recipe for lightened mango pastry cream
Ingredients:
150 mango puree, strained
50g fresh milk (or coconut milk)
1tsp vanilla extract
2 egg yolks
10g sugar
A pinch of salt
20g cornflour
18g unsalted butter
80g dairy or non-dairy (or a mix) whipping cream
1 mango, cut into small pieces

Steps :
1. Place puree, milk and vanilla in a small saucepan and heat on medium low heat until steaming but not boiling.

2. In the mean time, sift cornflour into a heavy mixing bowl. Add sugar and salt and whisk together. Add egg yolks and whisk until a paste is formed.

3. While whisking the egg yolk mixture continuously, slowly pour in hot puree /milk mixture in a thin stream. Pour the mixture back into saucepan.

4. Heat saucepan over medium low heat while whisking continously. Once the mixture starts to thicken, remove from heat and continue whisking until smooth. Return to heat and continue to whisk and cook until desired consistency.  Some people prefer runnier filling, some prefer firmer. Remove from heat and add butter into the pastry cream. Whisk until butter is combined into the mixture.

5. Sieve the pastry cream into a bowl and press cling wrap onto the surface. Chill in fridge until cool, at least an hour.

6. Whip whipping cream until firm peaks. If using full dairy, be careful not to overwhip.

7. Take the pastry cream out from fridge and whip with spatula to loosen it a little. Add a little at a time to the whipped cream and fold it in. Add chopped mangoes and fold it in.

If you prefer the "ice-cream" version, freeze the lightened pastry cream in a thin layer in a container or lined baking tray. This is to ensure the cream freezes quickly and does not turn icy too much. You can also chill the cream in fridge until ready to fill. Always fill the cases just before consuming to enjoy the crisp cases with cold and yummy filling.

Folding in the pastry cream and chopped mangoes. 

Here is another look of the cute Poohs!

My kids love the ice-cream version so much they have been having it on consecutive days for a few days!

With love,
Phay Shing

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Piglet Strawberry Meringue Cookies

While I have the time to play around with content that is not requested by someone, I thought I better seize it. I had this outrageous idea of creating a mixed genre creation that involves macarons, choux pastry and meringue cookies. This blog post features the meringue cookie part. Presenting my first attempt at character meringue cookies --- strawberry Piglet meringues!

Many thanks to a very talented baker, Kokoma, for the meringue recipe. Do checkout her Instagram account @kokomacake. She shared her meringue recipe and method in video tutorials on her Instagram account. I tweaked it a little to include strawberry flavour and added cornflour because it has been rainy here in Singapore lately. She uses Swiss meringue, which is more stable than French meringue as Swiss meringue uses semi-cooked egg whites. I made meringue mushrooms for a stump cake end of last year using French meringue and you can read about it here.

Important notes on meringue cookies. Do make sure that sugar is completely dissolved in the egg whites before piping it out. Otherwise your meringues won't have a smooth surface and the piped shapes will collapse a little or lose its definition. Always use a temperature of not more than 100°C to dry out the meringues as the meringues will crack if temperature is too high. If you have a dehydrator, you may use it instead of the oven. That was what Kokoma used. I don't have one so I used my oven.

Strawberry Meringue Piglet
Ingredients (makes about 25 Piglets) :
35g egg whites
60g icing sugar (preferably with cornflour already added)
1/8 tsp cream of tartar (optional, to stabilize meringue)
1 tsp cornflour
A pinch of salt (optional)
A little strawberry paste (less than 1/8 tsp)
Pink gel food colouring

Steps:
1. Prepare a template with 2.5cm circles and place it under parchment paper on the baking tray. Preheat oven to 90-100°C.

2. Combine all ingredients except strawberry paste and food colouring in a heatproof bowl. Set the bowl over a saucepan of water without the water touching the base of the bowl. Whisk and heat over medium low heat until sugar is all dissolved or temperature reaches 45-50°C. Take your time to heat the egg whites as you want to ensure all sugar is dissolved.

3. Remove bowl from heat and use electric mixer to beat until firm peaks form. Do not beat until stiff and dry. As long as meringue doesn't slide around inside the bowl when you tip it, it is ready. Add a few chopstick dips of strawberry paste into the meringue and gently fold it in. Do not add too much as you don't want too much moisture in the meringue.

4. Add some gel food colouring if the shade of pink is still too light. Portion out about 2tbs of meringue and add more pink colouring for Piglet's ears and nose.

5. Transfer light pink meringue into piping bag fitted with Wilton #12 tip and dark pink meringue into piping bag with a small hole cut at the end. Glue the parchment down to baking tray with a little meringue.

6. Pipe the head, followed by the ears. Change the tip for light pink to Wilton #4 or 5 and pipe the hands. Dap a small dollop of dark pink for the nose. You may use a toothpick to pull the meringue a little to shape the nose or any other part to your liking.

7. Bake for 2-3h or until dry. Store in airtight container if you aren't decorating yet.

Freshly baked! 

8. Make some black edible paint or in my case, I used black royal icing to add on the eyes and eyebrows. Let it dry again in the oven for about 15 min at 90°C. Remember to keep meringues at room temperature in airtight condition to keep them crisp and not sticky.

Wondering where Piglet is supposed to go? See this next blog post!

With love,
Phay Shing

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Mango Sticky Rice Macarons

Since homebakers aren't allowed to sell bakes for a period of time during this circuit breaker, I took the chance to experiment with a new flavour for macarons that I don't normally have time for - - mango sticky rice!

Are you feeling a little like Pooh and Piglet here, getting really tired of quarantine/ lockdown/circuit breaker? Hang in there, it will end one day! 

As this was a "do for fun" bake, I didn't think too hard about planning. I baked these along with a small batch of macarons for a friend which I froze. As a result, I didn't prepare enough batter and here was what I did 😂

Nobody looks at the bottom side of macarons right? 🤣

I used the Swiss meringue method and you may find the recipe over here.

Freshly baked shells! 

I used black edible marker to add on the facial features of Piglet and Pooh.

What I would like to share in this post is the recipe for this new filling. I drew on my experience working on pulut hitam (black glutinous rice) macarons 3 years ago to adapt a famous and well loved Thai dessert to a macaron flavour.  You could just slap on the coconut milk covered glutinous rice and fresh mango slice between 2 macaron shells. But this doesn't keep well. The rice is either too dry (if used as it is from the dessert) with storage, or too wet (if you make rice pudding) so it turns the shells soggy in no time. I came up with a sticky rice filling that still retains some glutinous rice bite, full of coconut and pandan aroma, and yet with a consistency of buttercream like regular macaron filling. My kids could taste all these elements when they bite into the macaron! The mango part is more straightforward as it is just homemade mango jam/compote. I like it not perfectly smooth. When cooking the jam, try to reduce it until the jam is really thick and chunky. Mine was just slightly a little too wet still. I would reduce it further next time.

The portion of recipe for coconut sticky rice and mango jam is more than enough to fill 20 macarons but it is easier to prepare these items in larger portions. You may freeze any extras for future use. We start by making the mango jam.

Mango jam
Ingredients
2 mangoes, cut into chunks (about 330g worth of mango chunks for mine)
5g lemon juice
20g sugar (depends on taste and sweetness of mangoes)
1/8 tsp salt

Notes: I try to make my jams for macaron filling more tart as the shells are sweet, just to balance the flavours a little. Feel free to add less sugar or more lemon juice to make it really sour if you wish.

Steps :
1. Place all ingredients in a saucepan. Cook until reduced and thickened like jam, using a potato masher to mash the mangoes into smaller chunks. Use medium low heat and stir often.

2. Cool completely and store in airtight container. This can be prepared in advance and stored in fridge or freezer.

Coconut sticky rice
Ingredients:
1 cup glutinous rice
1  to 1.25 cups of water
1/8 tsp salt
A few pandan leaves, knotted
200ml coconut cream
40g full fat milk (you may replace with coconut cream but I didn't want to end up having a half-used packet opened)

Notes: I used a lazy way of preparing the rice that is faster and easier. Traditionally, the glutinous rice is prepared by steaming and those recipes call for longer soaking times of 2 to 6 hours. I just use the rice cooker since I have it. I adapted the recipe from here. I didn't add any sugar as the macaron shells are sweet and the sticky rice part will be mixed with a white chocolate base, which is sweet.

Steps:
1. Rinse rice until water runs clear. About several times.

2. Put rice, water, salt and pandan leaves in rice cooker. Let the rice soak for 30 min. Start the rice cooker. Let the cooked rice sit in cooker for 5 min.

3. Loosen the rice. Transfer into saucepan along with coconut cream and milk. Cook over medium low heat until rice absorbs most of the liquid.

4. Briefly blend the rice. Blend less if you prefer more bite, blend more if you prefer smoother rice pudding.

Blended sticky rice is super sticky! 

You may freeze the excess until you need to use it. Be sure to freeze in smaller portions as needed so you don't have to defrost everything.

This next part is the unique part of the filling. I didn't directly use the sticky rice as it is problematic with its high water content. I made ganache using the sticky rice puree with a 1:1.2 ratio of white chocolate base: sticky rice puree. The introduction of more fat into the filling helps to prevent the shells from turning soggy too fast.

Coconut sticky rice ganache
Ingredients (fills about 20 macarons) :
80g glutinous rice puree, thawed if frozen
40g white chocolate, chopped or use chips
10g cocoa butter (may replace with white chocolate)
15g unsalted butter or shortening
20g coconut cream powder
1/8 tsp salt

Notes: feel free to double or triple the portion if you find it easier to work with.

Steps :
1. Place white chocolate, cocoa butter, butter/ shortening and salt into microwave safe bowl. Heat on medium power for 10 sec and stir. Repeat until melted. You may use double-boiling method but be careful not to overheat.

2. Chill the melted chocolate mixture in freezer for 1 to 2 min and whip until smooth. Repeat until mixture has a light fluffy buttercream texture. You may use an ice bath and electric mixer if you wish.

3. Add coconut cream powder and mix well.

4. Add 10g of sticky rice puree at a time and fold in until incorporated before adding more.

Transfer into piping bag to fill the shells.

When you assemble, make sure you coat both top and bottom shells with a layer of coconut sticky rice ganache to insulate them from the wetter mango filling. Pipe a wall of sticky rice ganache to encase the mango jam.

Store in airtight container lined with paper towel to absorb any excess moisture released, in the fridge. Best consumed a day or two after assembly. Freeze immediately after assembly for longer storage. Always keep the airtight container closed and left to sit at room temperature for 15-20min before opening to prevent condensation from forming on the shells.

A peek at the insides! 

With love,
Phay Shing

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'Olaf, Piglet and Pooh on Scooter' Macarons on Chocolate Cake

Someone requested for a really chocolatey cake (no light and fluffy chiffon cake please), with a scooter themed macaron cake topper and with some of the birthday girl's favourite characters. This was what I came up with 😊

The chocolate cake is not just any chocolate cake. It's a wickedly dark chocolate cake with character! I made four layers of Rose Levy Beranbaum's German chocolate cake with a mixture of chocolate custard and whipped dark chocolate ganache filling between the cake layers, topped off with dark chocolate drip and a little salted caramel white chocolate whipped ganache on the sides of the cake just to give a little colour contrast and variation in flavour. Mdm Rose's chocolate cake recipe although chocolatey, is oil based and dairy free so I decided to make a richer custardy filling to compliment this dense in texture but light-on-the-palate sponge. Be prepared for a long post because of the many components involved in this bake.

And I haven't started on the macarons 😅. I will briefly mention what I did for the macarons since details can be found in other posts. I used the reduced sugar Swiss method recipe for this batch as I also made a small batch of hemispherical macarons for another request concurrently. I wouldn't use my swiss method recipe with significantly lower sugar for this as I need the stability for the many colours involved. Just to share some photos of the process...

Piping the characters. I piped Olaf’s arms separately and also added some cornflour to the batter to make it less prone to breaking.

Freshly baked shells!

I filled them with matcha white chocolate ganache or dark chocolate ganache, both whipped versions for a lighter texture.

I forgot to mention that the details were added on using black edible marker or royal icing.

Here's a peek at the feet on macaron shells! Olaf's arms are stuck into the filling.

And of course, it is really satisfying to see the fully constructed piece! I glued the pieces together with stiff royal icing.

The German chocolate cake recipe is adapted from Rose Levy Beranbaum's Heavenly Cakes recipe book. I used smaller sized pans (7.5" diameter) but baked four layers of sponge (instead of two 9 x 2" pans in her original recipe) so I scaled the ingredients accordingly. I took the liberty of adding a coffee liqueur and reduced the sugar by about 7%.

German chocolate cake
Ingredients (makes four 7.5 x 1.5" round cakes):
80g alkalized cocoa powder
144g boiling water
130g canola oil
88g egg yolks (about 5)
216g egg whites (about 7)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp Kahlua coffee liqueur
90g cake flour
90g plain flour
330g caster sugar
2.5 tsp baking powder
1 and 1/3 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

Steps:
1. Preheat oven to 175℃. Line base of baking tins with parchment paper. Mdm Rose suggested using cake strips for the baking tins. I just place a tray of water at the base of oven to create steam and a similar effect of slowing down the temperature rise of the cake tins.

2. In mixing bowl, whisk cocoa and boiling water until smooth. Cover with plastic wrap to prevent loss of moisture through evaporation. Leave to cool to room temperature. About 30 minutes.

3. Add yolks and oil into mixing bowl. Use electric mixer to beat on low speed. Gradually increase to medium speed and beat for 1 min or until smooth and shiny like buttercream. Scrape down and beat in vanilla and coffee liqueur for a few seconds.

4. In a medium bowl, whisk flours, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Sift the mixture. Add half of flour mixture to chocolate mixture. Beat on low speed until dry ingredients moistened. Scrape down the bowl. Repeat with remaining flour mixture. Increase mixer speed to medium high and beat for 1 minute. Batter will be thick.

5. Add egg whites and beat on low speed until incorporated. Increase to medium high speed and beat for another 2 min. Batter will be like thick soup.

6. Transfer batter into prepared baking tins. They will be filled till about 1/4 full. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean and cake center springs back when pressed in the middle. Immediately unmould the cakes and cool completely upright on wire rack.

You may trim to tops of the cakes with a long serrated knife if there's a dome after cakes have cooled. Store between parchment paper in airtight condition until ready to assemble. I bake the cakes a day before assembling with filling.

Chocolate custard
Ingredients:
250g fresh milk
2 egg yolks
30g sugar (use more if you prefer sweeter)
20g cornflour
15g cocoa powder
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp Kahlua coffee liqueur (substitute with vanilla if you don't have)
15g unsalted butter, cool but softened
1/8 tsp salt

Steps:
1. In a heavy mixing bowl, whisk egg yolks with 1.5 tbs of milk from the portion above. In another bowl, sift together cocoa, cornflour, sugar and salt. Add the sifted mixture to the egg yolks. Whisk until a smooth paste forms.

2. Place milk, vanilla and coffee liqueur in a saucepan. Heat until it just starts to bubble at the edges.

3. Carefully pour the hot milk in a thin stream into the egg mixture while whisking continuously. This is to temper the egg yolks. Pour the mixture back into the saucepan.

4. Cook the mixture over medium low heat while whisking continuously. Once the mixture thickens, remove from heat and whisk vigorously until smooth. Return back to heat and continue whisking until custard is thickened to your preferred consistency. I usually cook for about a couple of minutes more. For this cake filling that is going to be mixed with whipped chocolate ganache, I cook until it is able to form soft peaks. For Choux pastry fillings, I cook until it is able to hold firm to stiff peaks.

5. Remove saucepan from heat and add butter. Whisk until butter is incorporated.

Adding butter to custard

6. Reserve about 100-120g custard for coating each layer of sponge. Reserve 180-200g of custard to mix with 200g of whipped ganache. Press a piece of cling wrap on surface of custard to prevent a skin from forming. Chill in fridge and whisk to loosen before using.

Whipped dark chocolate ganache
Ingredients:
75g bitter dark chocolate couverture* (73.5%)
75g dark chocolate couverture (56%)*
150g heavy cream

*You may choose to use one type of couverture

Steps:
1. Place everything in a heatproof or microwaveable bowl, depending on how you want to melt the chocolate. You may use double-boiling or microwave to melt the chocolate slowly. Stir until all chocolate is melted and the ganache is smooth.

2. Chill in fridge for 15-20min or leave out in air-con room until scoopable consistency. Whip with an electric mixer or spatula until lightened in texture. Be careful not to over whip or it will become grainy.

3. Fold in 200g of whipped ganache into 180-200g of chocolate custard. Reserve the rest of the ganache for frosting the sides and top of the cake. Transfer the portion of ganache for frosting the cake into piping bag with a small hole cut.

Dark chocolate drip
Ingredients:
50g dark chocolate couverture (56%)*
30g bitter dark chocolate couverture (73.5%)*
65g heavy cream

* You may choose to use one type of couverture

Steps:
Follow step 1 of whipped chocolate ganache above. Make this only after the layers of cake have been assembled and you are about to apply the drip on the cake. Transfer ganache into piping bag with a small hole cut when you are ready.

Salted caramel white chocolate whipped ganache
Ingredients:
80g salted caramel chips (I used Hershey's)
20g white chocolate chips
35g heavy cream

Steps:
Follow steps 1 and 2 of whipped dark chocolate ganache. Be even more careful not to overheat this as it's white chocolate based.  Chilling in fridge should require a shorter time than the dark chocolate ganache as the chocolate to cream ratio is much higher here. Transfer to piping bag with a small hole cut.

Assembly
1. Place an 8" cakeboard on a turntable and apply a small smear of whipped ganache in the middle. Place a sponge on top.

2. Apply a thin coat of pure chocolate custard with a spatula. This will help to moisten the sponge.

3. Pipe the mixture of chocolate custard and whipped chocolate ganache on top.

4. Place another layer of sponge on. Repeat until all four layers of sponge are assembled. Gently but firmly press the top of the sponge downwards to squeeze out any air spaces between filling and cake layers.

5. Apply some whipped dark chocolate ganache to fill up any gaps at the sides of the cake where the filling layers are. Use a bench scraper to scrape off any excess ganache. You may choose to frost the top of the sponge with a thin layer of whipped dark chocolate ganache if you wish.

6. Pipe some whipped salted caramel white chocolate ganache as you wish. You may pipe the lines in a discontinuous fashion if you wish.

7. Use a bench scraper to scrape off excess salted caramel ganache and to smoothen out the frosting on the sides of the cake. I go for a rustic semi naked look so I don't have to care too much about being neat.

8. Apply the dark chocolate drip along the circumference of the cake. Try to turn the turntable and pipe at the same rate so that the spacing between drips is more or less even. Some drips can go longer than the others. I made sure there is sufficient space for the name near the base of the cake. Quickly cover the top of the cake with more ganache and smoothen it out with a spatula.

A close up view of the cake...

I don't work with fondant so I used vanilla chiffon sponge which I baked concurrently with an earlier request and used alphabet cutters to cut the name out. I used a little salted caramel ganache to glue the name on.

Do store macaron cake toppers and naked or semi naked cakes separately in the fridge as the moisture released from the cake will turn the macarons soggy quickly. Only if the whole cake is frosted with buttercream that doesn't contain too much liquid content should be placed in contact or same confined storage space as macarons.

Just to share what I do in the kitchen when I work on bakes sometimes...I smeared some leftover chocolate custard on chocolate sponge trimmings to have a try...😋😋😋. Wickedly chocolatey! Do wait for a couple of days before eating the assembled cake to let the sponge and filling come together. It becomes more fudge-like and rich with storage! Let it sit at room temperature for a few minutes before enjoying all that chocolate goodness!

Thank God the cake and macarons were very well received!

With love,
Phay Shing

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'Piggy Family' Homemade Honey Marshmallows

The Piggy family having a relaxing and warm reunion =). Don't they look happy?

This is the last of my Piggy bakes (technically not a bake, because no baking is required =p).

I tried this because my kids love marshmallows. And these marshmallows are so soft and compressible! And less sweet unlike those bought from shops! They are also made from honey so that it is healthy and vanilla flavored =).

Hope you like this creation! The recipe is shared below. I made some adaptations, especially with the addition of egg white which helps to stabilize the marshmallows.


Piggy Homemade Honey Marshmallows

Group 1
30g Cold water
7g Gelatin

Group 2

30g Cold water
100g Honey (please use light colored)

1 tsp Vanilla extract

1/4 tsp Salt
Red gel food color (I used natural red coloring from PME)

Group 3

1 Egg white

1. For Group 1: mix gelatin and cold water together in a mixing bowl and set aside to bloom. 

2. For Group 2: mix Group 2 ingredients (cold water, honey, vanilla extract and salt) un a pot and heat till 115°C (please use a candy thermometer). 

3. Slowly pour the hot mixture from Group 2 into Group 1 mixture, use stand mixer or hand mixer to mix quickly, then quickly add in the egg white from Group 3 (must add while this is still hot). 

4. Beat on high till white and fluffy. Test when the mixture is ready by using the spatula to drip the batter to form number 8, if the shape stays, you can start adding gel food color. Mix well with the spatula.

5. Transfer the marshmallow mixture into a piping bag. Use a larger piping tip to pipe the body and a smaller tip (size 0 or 1) to pipe the features. 

6. Sift corn onto a baking tray and pipe out the design quickly.

7. Allow to set in the fridge for at least 6 hrs. Once set, sift more corn flour over to remove the stickiness.

8. Draw on the facial features. I was lazy so I used a food marker. You can also use melted chocolate or a thin brush dipped in charcoal paste.


Hope you had a wonderful time of reunion with your families too! Happy CNY!

With lots of love,

Susanne

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Piggy '拜年' Chiffon Cake

Ushering in the Year of the Pig 🐖💕.. Wishing everyone a Blessed and Fruitful New Year!! Gongxi Gongxi!!

I love pigs so really enjoyed making all the cakes for this Pig year! This is my 4th Piggy cake hehe. I promise you it's the last! =p

I really enjoy this time of reunion too.. Time with our dear family and friends.. Always always treasure your loved ones! 💓👫👭#新年快乐

新年快乐！ 身体健康！步步高升！

With lots of love,

Susanne

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'Piglet Hugging Pineapple' Chiffon Cake

Those who knew me in school know that Piglet was my favorite character when I was young! This Piglet hugging an "Ong Lai" (Pineapple) is so apt for Chinese new year too, because the Year of the Pig is coming and 'Ong lai' which is translated to prosperity come in Hokkien and Taiwanese lol. The pineapple is actually made from lemon chiffon cake, and the piglet from strawberry chiffon cake. Quite a bit of sculpting was involved, and thankful cake was very well-received by my friend =). Someone on Instagram actually PM me and asked if this was a stuff toy or cake lol.. this is chiffon cake =).

Wish you all 生体健康，富贵平安 in advance!

With lots of love,
Susanne

More creative chiffon cakes here. The 2nd book Deco Chiffon Cakes features a CNY cake section:

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Pink Piggy Golf Ball Pineapple Tarts

I also made these Pink Piggy Pineapple Tarts as I was curious about the many colored pineapple tarts that have been trending. These are made similar to my previous post, Salted Egg Yolk Piggy Pineapple Tarts, with the following changes:

1) Reducing the butter to 125g.
2) Using a pale-colored butter eg Anchor or Lurpak (previously I used SCS which is very yellowish).
3) Replacing the vanilla extract with 5g cold water with drops of pink food coloring mixed in.
4) Omitting the salted egg yolk crumbs.
5) Baking at a lower temperature of 150°C for 20+min (in contrast to 180°C in previous recipe).
6) Omitting the egg wash.

Summary of the cookie dough is as follows:

Cookie Dough (for 60 golf balls):
250g of plain flour, sifted
125g of cold butter cut into small pieces (use pale colored butter)
30g icing sugar
One egg (lightly beaten)
1 tsp cold water with some added pink food coloring
A pinch of salt

You may follow the instructions of the previous post but omit the egg wash and bake at a lower temperature of 150°C for 20+min.

I did not need to use any egg white to stick the 2 balls together as the dough is already sticky. The same is the case for the previous post.

So which type of pineapple tarts do you prefer? The pink or the golden brown version?

Personally I still prefer the golden brown Salted Egg yolk pineapple tarts that are more crusty and shiny! Looks more delicious in my opinion hehe. My kids gobble up anything cute though! =p

Hope you like it and happy CNY in advance! =)

With lots of love,

Susanne

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'Melt-in-the-mouth' Salted Egg Yolk 'Piggy' Golf ball Pineapple Tarts

What a mouthful for a title =p. I've always been a fan of salted egg yolk! Recently I saw some being sold, and just had to try my own version! I like 'melt-in-the-mouth' type of pineapple tarts, so this is adapted from my previous post, with yummy added salted duck egg yolks!

'Melt-in-the-mouth' Salted Egg Yolk 'Piggy' Golf ball' Pineapple Tarts

Pineapple jam: I used Premium Redman pineapple jam (nice blend of sour and sweetness that I like!)

Cookie Dough (for 60 golf balls):
250g of plain flour, sifted
175g of cold butter cut into small pieces
30g icing sugar
One egg (lightly beaten)
100g salted duck egg yolk crumbs
1 tsp vanilla extract
A pinch of salt

600g pineapple jam (divided into 60 pineapple jam balls of 10g)

Method:

1. Mash the egg yolks of the boiled salted eggs and pass through sieve to obtain fine salted egg yolk crumbs. One salted egg yields around 14g of salted egg yolk crumbs for me. I used around 7 salted eggs to make 100g salted egg yolk crumbs. See previous post for more details.

2. Divide into the pineapple jam in to 10g balls with cling wrap separating the layers of balls (remember to wet your hands so they don't stick). Keep in the refrigerator until use.

3. In a big mixing bowl, use the fork or finger tips to rub the cut butter cubes and sifted flour together until it becomes crumbly. Add in sifted icing sugar, salt and salted egg yolk crumbs and continue to rub until well mixed.

4. Add lightly beaten egg and vanilla extract and gently work until it becomes a dough. Chill in the refrigerator for 30 mins (makes dough easier to handle and makes clearer imprints).

5. Roll out the chilled dough to about 5 mm thick. *I rolled the dough between two pieces of cling wrap to prevent dough from sticking to surfaces.

6. Remove one side of the cling wrap and use a circle cutter (5-cm) to cut out the dough. Wrap the dough around each pineapple ball and roll into a smooth ball. For the piggies, use an oval cutter to cut out the nose from the dough and stick onto the face. Cut more ovals, dividing the ovals into 2 for each ears and limbs.

*Tip: If you cannot work quickly enough, I will suggest to remove the dough from the chiller in batches to shape and bake for best shape and results.

7. Prepare the egg wash. Lightly beat 1 egg yolk with 1 tbsp water and a few drops of oil.

8. Lightly brush with egg wash and bake the piggies in the middle rack at 180°C for 15 min.

9. Leave to cool and store in airtight containers until consumption.

*Can keep up to 14 days outside in a cool, dry place, and months in the fridge.

*Other tips:
If you like milky flavour, you can substitute some of the flour with milk powder (10g).
Some recipes also call for cornflour or custard powder (substitute 10g flour with custard powder) for extra melt-in-the-mouth, but final tart may be more crumbly and harder to handle.

My Piggies!

Cross-section... yummy!

Hope you enjoy the tarts too! Happy CNY in advance!

With love,

Susanne

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猪饱饱 Piggy Chiffon Cakes

Cutest 猪饱饱 piggies from @ch8sg for CNY2019. Loved them so much💕, just had to make a chiffon cake version of them! Which is your favorite among the 3? 🐷🐷🐷💕

There is the “富贵饱” (prosperity), “幸福饱” (happiness) and “健康饱” (health) lol. I saw the stacked piggies trio at Popular and was so tickled by them! =)

The recipe and technique is similar to my previous post Bandung Piggy Family Chiffon Cake pops, so you can refer to it. The only difference is that I baked the piggies in bigger molds, bowls, instead small cake pop molds (baking time increased by 10 min).

I also achieved the gold effect on chiffon cake "gold ingot" and "weights" by dusting gold powder on the chiffon cakes. Previously I had tried baking with the edible gold coloring or dust and it didn't work.

Hope this adorable stacked trio made you smile as it made me!

Very thankful and honored too that my previous Bandung Chiffon Cake Piggy Family was featured on Channel 8 news om 13th Jan (630 pm and 10 pm news)! News video here.

Wishing you a happy, blessed Lunar new year in advance!!

With lots of love,

Susanne 

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Piggy Family Chiffon Cakepops (Bandung Chiffon Cake) – also an experiment comparing French, Swiss and Italian Meringue for Chiffon Cakes

My first post of the year! =) Here is my family of chiffon Piggies wishing everyone a Happy New Year!! And Happy Lunar New Year in advance!

The Piggy Chiffon Cakepops are Bandung-flavored (a new flavour) and no additional pink coloring needs to be added. We all loved it very much.

I also tested out the new Bandung Chiffon Cake flavour using 3 different types of meringue - French (the normal one, Swiss method and Italian method - using hot syrup). This was an experiment on my to-do list for a long time. 

Usually French meringue is used, where raw egg whites are whipped with cream of tartar and the gradual addition of sugar. However it is known to be not very stable. So I tested out the Swiss and Italian meringue (which are supposed to be more stable) to see its effects on the texture and volume of the cake, as well as pore structure and stability of final cake batter. 

For the experiment, I baked Bandung Chiffon Cake in three 6-inch tube pans, one for each method.  In all 3 methods, the amount of sugar and cream of tartar were kept constant (so that the cake would not be too sweet using the different techniques). Finally, I made the chiffon cake piggies using the best recipe, which ended up being still the French (normal meringue) method. 

VERDICT of experiment:

For the Swiss meringue, I dissolved the sugar with egg whites first at 65-70°C in a bowl above boiling water (not touching), and then adding cream of tartar and whipping up the whites quickly. The meringue was very glossy and a little more stable, but of lesser volume than the normal French meringue.

For the Italian meringue, I prepared hot sugar syrup (115°C) and then pour into egg whites while whipping it up. The Italian meringue was even more silky, but denser, and the final volume less than both the Swiss and French meringue.

To my surprise, AFTER the meringue was folded into the cake batter, there was little difference in the stability of the final cake batters. They all bubbled after a while sitting out. This means that the folding in of the egg yolk batter affected the stability of the meringue in all 3 methods. So the Swiss and Italian method of making meringue did not help chiffon batter to become more stable. They were also more cumbersome to make. And that is not all. There were great differences in the structure/texture of the cake.

Volume of French meringue was greatest (meringue was light and fluffy), followed by Swiss Meringue (fluffy but lower volume, due to addition of sugar at early stage) and then Italian meringue (meringue was very silky and shiny but the densest). 

Indeed this shows up the final cake structure where the normal chiffon cake by the French method (most RIGHT) is very light, airy and fluffy and rose the most, followed by the Swiss meringue method (MIDDLE, texture in between, a little like sponge cakes, still fluffy but not as light and airy), and lastly the Italian method (most LEFT) yielded the densest structure.

In all, the taste of the cake was similar, only the texture was of different softness and density.

So in conclusion, French method still yields the best texture, and Swiss method and Italian method didn’t really help the stability of the batter after folding. But in all it was a good experiment to get it off my chest finally =). 

Moving on, I used the French method of Bandung Chiffon Cake to make the chiffon cake Piggies. The exact same recipe was used earlier in the 6-inch tube pans.

VERDICT of Bandung Chiffon Cake Flavour:

We all loved the Bandung Chiffon Cake. I thought the flavour of Bandung was fragrant and just nice (usually I am not a big fan of rose syrup). But my hubby who likes Bandung prefers it to be stronger. If you like it to be stronger, you can add in rose essence (found in baking sections). My kids found it addictive even without the Rose essence. 

Here goes my recipe sharing! You can also use this recipe for a 6-inch tube pan =).

Bandung Chiffon Cake Piggies (using normal French meringue)

2 Egg yolks 

5g Castor sugar
27g Vegetable/corn oil
33g Bandung
40g Cake flour, sifted
1 tsp Rose essence (optional, do add if you like stronger Bandung flavour)

3 Egg whites
30g Castor sugar
Pinch of cream of tartar

Bandung, a popular Asian drink with evaporated milk flavoured with rose cordial syrup

1. Preheat oven to 140°C. Prepare a 5-cm cake pop mold or egg shells (2 cavity or egg shell each for 1 body) and a 3-cm cake pop mold for limbs (1 cavity can cut into 4 limbs).

2. Prepare egg yolk batter:

a. Whisk egg yolk with sugar using hand whisk.

b. Add in oil, and Bandung and mix well at each step.

c. Whisk in sifted cake flour and mix till no lumps are found.

4. Prepare meringue:

a. In a grease-free, dry metal bowl, using electric mixer, whisk egg whites with cream of tartar till frothy.

b. Add in castor sugar for meringue gradually and whisk at high speed till firm peaks form.

5. Gently fold in meringue into egg yolk batter 1/3 at a time.

6. Fill the cake pop molds (or egg shells). Bake for 25 min (for 5-cm cake pop) and 20 min (for 3-cm cake pop) or until skewer comes out clean. If you are using egg shells, bake for 35 min or so. Pour leftover batter into cupcake liners (around sheet cake thickness to cut out nose snouts later). These are also baked for around 20 min.

*individual oven conditions may vary so do please check with skewer inserted into centre of cakes to see if it comes out totally dry.

7. Allow the cakes to cool completely on wire rack before unmolding by hand.

8. Unmould by popping the cakes out from the mold or cracking the egg into small pieces using the back of a teaspoon.

9. Assemble the pig chiffon cake pops using melted marshmallow similar to Deco Chiffon Cake Basics (or you can refer to Pegasus Pusheen Chiffon Cake pops if you don’t have the book). This is made by popping some marshmallows with a sprinkle of water and microwaving on high for 30 seconds.

10. Both lying down and sitting up versions involve stacking 2 cake pops together but different ways, slightly adjacent (like my 3D panda in Deco Chiffon Cake Basics), or on top of each other (like my 3D Snowman Workshops). For the limbs, use a bubble tea straw to cut out mini limbs from the 3-cm cake pops and stick using melted marshmallow. The ears are cut the same way. You can pinch the straws to make them more pointed.

11. Similarly cut out the noses using straws and glue them on using melted marshmallows. I used yakult straws to punch out the nostrils.

12. Decorate the facial features with charcoal sheet cake cut outs (refer to Deco Chiffon Cake Basics for picture tutorials of all the techniques), or pipe on using melted chocolate.

Hope you found the experiment comparing the different meringue methods interesting and liked the Chiffon Cake Piggies and Bandung flavour!

Happy New Year and CNY in advance!

With lots of love,
Susanne

Super honored and thankful that these Bandung Chiffon Cake Piggy Family was featured on Channel 8 news 630pm and 10pm on 13th Jan! More here.

More picture tutorials are found in my cookbooks below, which are also available worldwide on Book depository:

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