A s w e e t v i c t o r y

Hello there. Nina is back! I know I have been missing for quite a while J but I warned you guys before, so... no hard feeling alright? I started SWOT vac around mid June, finished my exams around early July, and I’ve been busy ever since with my netball tournament. Have I told you that we won GOLD? Yes, we did! I went to Melbourne for about a week for the tournament. It’s called the National Conference Games (NCG’s) and organized by the Malaysian Students Council of Australia (MASCA) and was held from the 4^th July to the 7^th July. I also represented SA for badminton and futsal, but no luck for us this year. J
Okay, let me get straight to the point. What you are about to read is a compilation of work from the past few months. There were more, but I’m showing the ones where I was able to take a photo. I baked pavlova when I was on my rural clinical placement in Whyalla, double chocolate chips cookies were made during SWOT vac, and recently... traditional Malaysian cake “kek lapis” also known as layered cake.
If anyone is wondering what pavlova is, feel free to open your google browser and type “pavlova”. Gheeee :D The only reason why I baked pavlova the other day was 1) it was damn easy, 2) I needed to get rid of my extra egg whites 3) I wanted to try it since it is a traditional Australian dessert. It turned out good. Some of my friends seemed to like it. As for me, I think it is too sweet :P Ouw, and here is the recipe.
Double chocolate chip cookies were specially made using a recipe from a cook book, which I got as my birthday present from my lovely boyfriend. Thank you Bunny! If anyone is interested with the recipe, I can put it up for you guys, but at the moment, I am just too lazy to type the whole lot out, maybe I should take a picture instead. Haha.
Last but not least, my favorite traditional Malaysian cake – layered cake! We used to eat this cake during the Eid celebration at my aunt’s house, when I was small. It is indeed one of my sweet childhood memories *sobbing*. Dear aunt, if you are reading this, I miss you, and your homey house at Hartamas. I also miss your hospitality every time we went to visit you. Here is the recipe. It requires a lot of patience, but trust me, it is all worth it.
Yeay! I’m done writing. Now for the pictures... look up for the headings guys, I’ll make sure it is clear for you guys to follow the sequence. Enjoy, till then! XO!

Pavlova

Double Chocolate Chip cookies

(365 Dish A Day 2007 Parragon)

Layered cake

p/s: nothing beats these moments! > <

::Credits to photographer Farina Ismail::

Red Velvet

It’s red and has a velvety texture.

The colour is bright, temptatious and yet full of secret.

It tastes like mmm… cake. There is a bit of chocolate, bitterness, acidity from the vinegar, lightness from the buttermilk and also cheesiness from the cream cheese and mascarpone.

I rarely bake something ‘big’ like this, but this time round, I’ve a strong reason to do so. It’s my other half’s belated birthday cake. It’s for you Haslo.

I know it may sound rather pathetic, the person was not even here to blow out the candles, there wasn’t even one candle to blow out, yet I was still worked hard on it, and hoped that he would see the thoughts that were running through my head the whole of April.

April. Ahahah. I know, its May already for God sake Nina! I was busy everyday the whole of April, and I didn’t have time to write, trust me. I’m telling you the truth :p  – although I seriously think it doesn’t sound convincing at all. I hoped that my other half, namely Haslo would be happy about this, and I promised this would be the last time he would see a picture of supposedly-to-be-your-birthdaycake abroad, as I will definitely come back to you this summer. Awwww..yes I am a super duper sweet person *vomit* (come on BF, back me up! heee)

Click here for the recipe *duh* of course the recipe is not originally from me, I have picked the best ever recipe for you guys (solely based on my first successful attempt, haha) and here are a few pictures of my red velvet. This is what you would get from my blog, more pictures of stages involved before the cake is complete, rather than pages of words which I myself won’t be bothered to read :P

I’m deeply sorry for being away for soo long, but just so you know, it will happen more often, as I will keep myself busy for the next few weeks for exams. Teehee, till then! Xo!

love you bunny ^^

Choux pastry

Hey hey hey! 
Its me again! It has been awhile since I last wrote/baked. O well, it’s my final year here in Adelaide,so I'm pretty busy with uni stuff, uni stuff, and more uni stuff. Ahaha, everything revolves around uni or should I say the hospital?

Okay people, so this time round I'm going to talk about choux pastry. Or to some people,they prefer to call em' profiteroles/puff pastry/cream puffs. Whatever you wanna call it. :P

I have had so many experiences with profiteroles, there were ups and downs, tears and giggles, and foremost joys from the hard work. Getting it right the first time, maybe possible if you're lucky, but one good advice for you is, don't give up even if you’re already up to your 10th attempt and still failed. Trust me, everything will pay off.

I actually got this recipe from my very first baking book, I bought it myself about 4 years ago, so the recipe is NOT originally from me. (Just thought I might need to clarify on copyright issue etc.) The recipe is pretty straight forward, but make sure you follow it carefully and get damn accurate measurements.

CHOUX PASTRY (Bake It, Murdoch book) .

100 g unsalted butter
1 teaspoon caster (superfine) sugar
140 g plain flour
3 eggs
250 ml water


Preheat oven to 200^OC. Lightly grease or line a baking tray with baking paper. 
Put water, butter, and sugar in a small saucepan and heat till the butter has melted and the mixture has just come to the boil. Add the flour and, if possible using a wooden spoon, stir over medium heat until the mixture comes away from the side of the saucepan, forming a ball.
Place the mixture in a bowl and allow to cool slightly. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
Mixture should be thick and glossy. The pastry is now ready to use, you may piped, spooned, or shaped according to the recipe you are using.
Bake for 20 minutes, then reduce the heat to 160^OC and bake for a further 20 minutes or until puffed, golden and dry. Open the door slightly and leave the pastries in the oven until cool. 
(you can use the same recipe to make `eclairs!)

Few tips:
- You have to measure all of the ingredients accurately. Like seriously. Duh.
- Make sure the water is simmering before you put the flour in.
- Add the flour to the boiling mixture in one go. :)
- Leave around 4 cm between the piped/spooned dough.

You can make a coffee cream filling (use pouring cream + mascarpone), creme patissiere (pastry cream), or other different types of fillings. Be creative peeps! (hint: croquembouche *drooolllllinngg*)

Here are the few pics I took right after I got them out of the oven. Yum!

Macarons!

*Warning*

This post is devoted to all macaron lovers out there, who are dying to eat them, but unfortunately it will cost you the earth to buy them. For those who don’t have a sweet tooth, you might want to skip this post or else you will die from a sudden sugar attack/diabetic attack from just reading this post. HAH!

Sooo..

Have you ever tried to make macarons?

Have you  tried it before but failed?

And you don’t know what went wrong?

Here are some answers to your problems!

I’m not a big fan of macarons to be honest. The first time I had them was last year, when a senior offered me one of her pretty macarons. And my first impression was,

“Woaaa, too sweet!”

Oh well, I don’t blame macarons for being sweet, and that is not the reason why I don’t eat them that much, it is just me. I bake a lot, but I don’t often eat them.

Let me remind you, that everything you are about to read, is based on my experience ONLY, and this is my first time making them, and they turned out good!

Lesson number one: find a GOOD recipe. I rarely use recipes from the internet, cause I just don’t trust them, most of the time you will end up wasting all of your ingredients for nothing. This time... I had no other choice that meant browsing through a few websites to pick the right one. So I picked this one Martha Stewart

Lesson number two: FOLLOW the recipe. When it says, fold..it means fold, NOT beat. I have to admit, making macaroon is not an easy job. You need to know when to stop whisking the egg whites, and when to start piping.  Basically if you follow the recipe from the above link, you should be right. Trust me.

Critical steps:

• Whisking the egg whites: use a high speed electric mixer till there is no “liquid” present. Everything should be foamy. You should be able to hold the bowl above your head and don’t have to worry about anything.
• Make sure you sift the confectioner’s sugar together with almond meal for a few times. I did it twice, but I was being very, very thorough.
• Folding:  Fold the sugar and almond meal and the whisked egg white until the sugar and meal is just incorporated. I separated them into two batches, mixing the two slowly, and I stopped once the powdered streaks were gone. Remember, you don’t want to lose the volume of whipped egg whites.
• Piping: I have an advantage because I have a few years experience piping whipped cream/buttercream/royal icing, in short anything that can be piped. My advice to a new beginner is start slow, it’s okay if they are not perfectly round, but make sure there is no air trapped inside each blob. Make sure to tap HARD on the tray and use a tooth pick to prick each air bubble that appears on the surface, by this you eliminate cracks and uneven surfaces due to expanding trapped air.
• The texture of batter should be in a thick consistency and a bit runny once you have piped the small blobs on a tray.

Here are the few pictures of the final products;

p/s: confectioner’s sugar means icing sugar, and granulated means castor sugar. Remember the temperature used in the recipe is in Fahrenheit, if you convert it to Celcius, it will be around 180^O. If you have questions, feel free to leave them in the comments box! Thanks!

My very first entry ^^

Hey everyone! Ghee, I have been wanting to write a blog for so long, long enough for me to grow wrinkles I must say! For those who don’t know me YET, my name is Nina and I am a final year student who likes to bake, and now I am sharing my experience with you. Yes, you!

So what made me want to start writing? ... The truth is, I don’t know. ahahhaa > <

What are the things I would be writing? … Probably random stuff like troubleshooting steps, I’ll teach you guys how to play with fondant, and basically what I have learnt so far. 

I started this journey as a baker about 4 years ago, when the only thing I knew how to bake was a basic chocolate muffin recipe, and believe it or not the only tool I had was a muffin tray. No whisk, no spatula, mixing bowl or whatsoever. But I survived!

I can still remember my first batch of cupcakes... they weren’t that great, they were all soggy :P. Ahahaha, but the good thing was, I had lovely housemates/close friends who willingly offered themselves to eat my soggy cupcakes (sadly.. they are all now in Malaysia working).

So yeah, I think it is not about how well you bake for the first time, instead it is about how you take failure as a challenge, and want to do better the next time.

Hee, em em em..I wanted to write more, but let’s save it for the next entry shall we? Plus my eyes are only half open at the moment, it’s not the best time for writing..

I want to end this entry by putting a lot of pictures, weee! You should have seen these pictures if you are a friend my Facebook page. Nothing recently, these are all old pictures (up to February 2011). Have fun guys! *tell your friends about this blog if you like it!*

    

       

.THE END.

p/s: kudos to acis and irene! ghee