22 Jul 20 (Wed) - Castella Sponge Cake

Have been practicing baking this cake since my first attempt back in early-June and failed many times over. Took a break from it for the past couple of weeks and decided to attempt it again.

Baked a one-egg portion cake based on the recipe from the first attempt using a smaller baking tin and baked in an oven. Then adapted the baking time (i.e., 1hr 15mins) and method (i.e., bake at 130 degree Celsius with water bath, aluminium foil over the baking tin and drop the cake a few times after taking out from the oven) from another recipe I found on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page.

One-egg Portion...

... with height about one small yogurt cup.

Happy to say that the result was satisfactory. The top of the cake was still wrinkled but at least not too brown or burnt. The cake managed to rise fully without sinking after taking out from the oven.

14 Jul 20 (Tue) - Lemon Yogurt Cake with Sakura

Have been practicing on baking castella cake for a while now but still unable to quite get it right. Felt a bit disheartened and decided to bake something familiar. Dug out the Lemon Yogurt Cake recipe and added some salted sakura that I have in the pantry. Now I will have cakes for afternoon tea over the next couple of days.

21 Jun 20 (Sun) - Stir-fry Kimchi Pork Belly

Watched this episode from "I Live Alone" featuring Song Seung-heon where he cooked for his friends when he was filming on Jeju Island. One of the dishes was stir-fry kimchi pork belly and he seemed to just really cooked with just the kimchi with pork belly and no other seasoning. It looked easy enough and I thought of trying it out myself. It was a few weeks ago and I finally got the chance to try the dish out today.

Bought a slab of pork belly from the market and sliced it myself. My knife-work needs more polishing. Tried my best to cut as thin as possible but still not thin enough I think.

Googled a bit about the dish and most recipes called for the pork belly to be marinated with light soy sauce and rice wine. In addition to marinating the pork belly, some recipes called for gochujang (Korean chili paste) and gochujang (Korean chili powder) to be added while stir-frying the dish. As I have neither the gochujang nor the gochujang, I just marinated the pork belly with light soy sauce and rice wine.

The cooking steps were simple. Just add in the pork belly to stir-fry for awhile till half-cooked and then add in the kimchi to cook till the meat is done. Taste-wise, I think the marinate overpowered the kimchi taste. Maybe next round I will not marinate the pork belly and also to use the shabu-shabu sliced pork instead. Nevertheless, it is still a taste of Korea. Hahaha...

After I was done with that, I went on to make the castella sponge cake again. This time round, I made them as cupcakes instead but forgot to lower the temperature some more compared to the previous round and hence, they became wrinkled again. Will need more practice.

13 Jun 20 (Sat) - Castella Sponge Cake

There has been a lot of posts on castella sponge cake lately on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page. My sis also makes quite a mean castella sponge cake using her airfryer. So follow their footsteps to try and make one. Found this recipe that bakes the cake in a rice cooker and gave it a try last week.

Unfortunately my cheap rice cooker wasn't able to bake the cake well. It kept jumping from the cook function to the keep-warm function. In the end, the edge of the cake rose well but the middle didn't. The fortunate thing was that at least it wasn't too dense in the middle either.

Not satisfy with the result and gave it another attempt today. This time I only played with one egg portion and baked in an oven. I tried baking it at 150 degree Celsius for 18 mins. As usual, the cake rose while in the oven and sank after it cooled down resulting in wrinkles. I guess I should have baked them as cupcakes instead because the cake turned out to be very short.

Wonder if it would be better if I bake it at 140 degree Celsius for longer time say maybe 20-25 mins. Shall try again.

Whole cake

One slice

26 May 20 (Tue) - Marble Butter Cupcakes (2nd attempt)

Attempted this recipe the second time with the suggestions received previously. The cakes didn't crack this round but they still sink and created wrinkles. Oh well... at least some improvements from the first round. Shall attempt it again to try and get cakes with smooth top.

01 May 20 (Fri - Labour Day) - No-mixer Double Chocolate Banana Cake

There were three very ripe bananas at home so put them to use by baking a banana cake. Googled for easy recipe and found this no-mixer double chocolate banana cake recipe by Foodie Baker. The top of the cake was rather hard but fortunately the inside of the cake was moist and soft. Probably need to reduce the temperature and bake longer instead.

I reduced the amount of cocoa powder and it was a good thing I did because otherwise the cake would be rather bitter. Overall, it was quite good except that I will need to reduce the amount of cocoa powder some more the next time or omit it totally since the recipe already called for chocolate chips/chunks.

22 Apr 20 (Wed) - Marble Butter Cupcake

My sis found this marble butter cupcake recipe by Kimiya Lim and told me to give it a try. The steps seem simple enough to follow so gave it a try.

Don't know why my bakes always rose and crack in the oven then sink after cool. Posted on the Facebook group "Home-cooked Delights 家常便饭" page to ask for advice and some members told me to try to lower the temperature and bake longer as well as to only fill 2/3 of the baking cup.

Shall give this recipe another try with the suggestions given.

20 Apr 20 (Mon) - Easy Jam Doughnut Muffin

Have been craving for doughnuts for a while now so googled for a simple recipe to try to satisfy my craving. Found this easy jam doughnut muffin recipe by Baking TaiTai and gave it a try. Didn't have any jam around but I have some chocolate chips so improvised as I go along.

Taste-wise, I should have increased the sugar level by a little given the lack of jam. Fortunately, I added chocolate chips, at least not too bland. The doughnut muffins are very crispy though. Hee...

10 Apr 20 (Fri) - Cotton Cheesecake

More time at home due to the circuit breaker so decided to use the time to try and do more baking to improve my skill. Found this cotton cheesecake recipe by Josephine's Recipes and gave it a try. Don't know why the top crack. Wonder if it was because the oven temperature was too high.

Fortunately, the cake still tasted good and soft. Happy!

21 Jan 18 (Sun) - Salted Egg Bittergourd and Durian Butter Cupcakes

Was tidying up my drawer of recipes last weekend when I saw a newspaper cutting on a recipe called "Salted egg white bittergourd". Recalled that I still had two salted eggs sitting in my fridge so went to Giant supermarket last Friday to get two mini bittergourds. As white bittergourd is hard to come by, I had to settle for the green ones.

Followed the recipe as closely as I could, however, I didn't know what is red finger chilli nor green bird's eye chilli so I replaced with three red chilli padi instead. And because I didn't have enough garlic, so I added a shallot. Was happily cooking and excited to see the whole dish coming together nicely. After I had assembled the dish on a serving plate, then I realised that I had forgotten to add a dash of ground white pepper at the end of the cooking. Oh well... Not sure how soft the bittergourd was supposed to be for the dish, mine still retained some crunchiness which I rather like. Taste-wise, fortunately, it still tasted good without the ground white pepper. Heh.

In the short write-up that accompanied the recipe, it was mentioned that the dish goes well with rice or porridge. Therefore, I cooked some brown rice porridge and added some seaweed that I bought from my last Okinawa trip to eat as lunch. What a healthy meal.

Still had some leftover durians in the fridge and decided to use them to bake durian butter cupcakes since the durians weren't of very good quality. The preparation was easy and very happy that the cupcakes turned out very well. A good start to the first bake of the year. Ate one while it was still warm together with a dollop of chilled durian and it was heavenly! My healthy meal was, therefore, spoiled by the unhealthy dessert. LOL.

Durian Butter Cupcakes (Makes 5)

Ingredients:

58g self-rising flour 63g butter - soften 43g castor sugar

pinch of baking soda                                                      63g durian flesh                                                      1 egg

Method:

1.  Preheat oven to 160 degree celsius

2.  Place the butter and sugar in a large bowl and whisk till light and fluffy

3.  Add egg and beat thoroughly

4.  Stir in durian flesh

5.  Fold in self-rising flour and baking soda

6.  Fill cupcake cases till 2/3 full with cake batter

7.  Bake for 18 minutes or until cooked

8.  Do the toothpick test, if the toothpick comes out clean, transfer the cakes to a wire rack and allow to cool

9.  Serve cakes with dollops of chilled durian or eat them on their own

15 Oct 17 (Sun) - Matcha Pound (Birthday) Cake

Tried to bake a matcha sponge cake earlier this month as a birthday cake for a friend. The cake didn't rise enough but I still went ahead to frost and decorate it with fresh strawberries. For the rest of the day, I was contemplating whether I should give the cake because obviously it was a failure, even though it was still edible. However, I got cold feet at the very last minute and didn't give the cake to her, just whatsapp her a photo of that cake.

For the rest of the day/month, she reminded me about the cake whenever she has the chance and I felt bad about it. So decided to make another matcha-flavoured cake for her since, at the same time, I needed some baking therapy as well after a crazy two weeks. Searched the Internet for a good recipe and an idea struck. Since I wasn't confident enough to attempt another sponge cake, I thought why not try a pound cake instead. Shouldn't be too far off from the butter cake that I'm quite good at baking now.

So searched and searched, read a few matcha pound cake recipes and decided to use the one by Japanese Cooking 101. Reduced the recipe amount to that of using one egg. Initially, I was still thinking if I could skip that extra yolk in the recipe but in the end, I still went ahead to follow the recipe. And because I didn't have cake flour, I had to DIY my own using a cake substitute guide I found on The Gracious Wife. And since this was a make or break attempt, I added a pinch of baking soda to make sure the cake would rise.

Put in a lot of effort by making sure that I got every step right, not cutting corners and so on. Underestimated the amount of batter that I would have before I started the process and went to prepare a 4" baking tin instead of the 5" one. So in the end, I used a 4" round cake tin and a small loaf pan for all the batter. The one in the loaf pan was baked through after 20 minutes, but the round cake tin one had to bake for 40 minutes.

The round cake managed to rise to an acceptable height so I went on to modified an old buttercream frosting that I had used before into a matcha-flavoured one while waiting for the cake to cool. It took me another 20-30 minutes to frost the cake and still it wasn't as smooth as those sold commercially. Sigh... Next was to decorate the cake and because I had a few ideas tucked away during the sponge cake attempt, I didn't have to spend a lot of time cracking my brain over it. As I had some frosting left, I half the other cake and sandwich it with the leftover frosting.

All in all, the cake looked nice and I probably give it a 51/100 mark. Taste-wise, I will have to wait for my friend to give me the feedback after she has eaten it. Packed the round cake into a proper box with a proper base and the other cake into a clear plastic box before putting everything into the fridge.

Match Pound Cake (adapted from Japanese Cooking 101)

Ingredients:

1 egg, room temperature 1 yolk, room temperature 75g butter, room temperature 84g caster sugar

1 tbsp water                    1 tbsp matcha powder                     67g cake flour*                     pinch of salt

* 58g plain flour + 9g corn flour

Method:

1.  Preheat the oven to 170 degree Celsius.

2.  Grease and line a 4.5" x 2.5" loaf pan and a 4" round cake tin.

3.  Mix egg, yolk and water in a bowl.

4.  Sift cake flour, Matcha powder and salt together in another bowl.

5.  Beat butter for 2 minutes then slowly add sugar in 3 batches while beating, until the mixture become light and fluffy.

6.  Slowly add in the egg mixture in 3 batches while mixing and until well combined.

7.  Fold in the flour mixture in 3 batches until well combined.

8.  Pour the batter into the prepared pan and tin, smoothen the surface and bake for 20 minutes and 40 minutes respectively.

9.  Cool slightly and remove the cakes from the pan and tin.

10.  Cool the cakes completely on a cooling rack.

Matcha Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients:

30g butter, room temperature 50g icing sugar

3/4 tsp water                    2 tsp matcha powder

Method:

1.  Whisk all ingredients till smooth and creamy.

--------------- Edited on 16 Oct 2017 ----------------

Gave the cake to my friend and she was very happy. She even took a photo of herself (her hand) cutting the cake. Asked her to take a photo of the inside of the cake because I was curious. Hrm... the cake looked crumbly, wonder if the texture was supposed to be like that or because I substituted the cake flour and added baking soda. Taste-wise, her feedback was that the matcha taste was just nice, not to the extend of being bitter and she liked the brownie-like texture of the cake.

2 Jul 17 (Sun) - Castella Cake

Recently my sister was telling me how there is this new bakery shop from Taiwan called "Le Castella" at the basement of Tampines One is making headlines on food blogs and newspapers. She said there is always a snaking queue early in the morning even before the shop opens for business. Googled a little and found out that the shop sells castella cake, which is a type of Japanese sponge cake that is moist and bouncy on the inside.

Last Saturday, we went to the shop at 10:30am to try our luck but there was already about 15 people in the queue. We learnt that even though the people were in the queue, the collection could happen in the late afternoon. So we gave up the idea and sis said she may try again on a weekday after the school reopens.

So last Thursday, she went to queue since 10:30am, second one in the queue and she finally managed to get two original flavour cakes after 30 minutes. Her verdict: "古早味蛋糕 so-so, nice but nothing fantastic. Smell good when hot, not very sweet and as fluffy and soft as steamed sponge cake. Maybe because it's baked. Don't think will go back for second round..." Read some other reviews from famous local bloggers and their verdicts were kind of similar - original a bit bland with eggy aftertaste, recommend to try the cakes only after the hype dies down.

The following day, my sister tagged me in a Facebook post with a video that shows how to make castella cake. Watched the video, copied the recipe and decided to give it a shot today. Didn't want to make big batch so reduced the amount of ingredients to that of one egg portion. Also replaced cake flour with plain flour as I didn't want to have too many types of flour sitting in my pantry. Was kind of worried how the cake might turn out as I have tried making Japanese cheesecake and it shrunk after coming out from the oven.

Followed the steps as closely as I can and had to wait for 50 minutes before I could see the result. The cake looked presentable, didn't shrink but didn't turn out to be as high and as jiggly as I had expected it to be. Texture-wise, it wasn't as smooth but fortunately, was soft. Taste-wise, a bit bland for my liking. Maybe a dash of vanilla essence will be nice for the cake.

Conclusion, can try again but with addition of vanilla essence and maybe slightly more sugar. And maybe, just maybe, can up the portion to two eggs instead.

Hehe... for the record, this is how small the cake was. =p

22 Apr 17 (Sat) - Japanese Cheesecake

It had been a stressful few weeks and I really needed some cooking therapy. So researched  on what to cook or bake over this weekend. Saw a friend posted her Japanese cheesecake photos some time back and decided to pluck up my courage to give this cake a try.

Search the Internet for recipes and a few came up. So narrowed down to only three: one is by Dr Leslie Tay of ieat ishoot ipost, one is by Bee of Rasa Malaysia and another one by Nami of Just One Cookbook. Out of three recipes, the first two call for cream of tartar which I do not have. So in the end, I decided to adopt the recipe by Nami and halved the portion. Out of the list of ingredients, I do not have cake flour and heavy whipping cream, so use the substitutes as suggested by Nami.

Followed the steps as closely as possible and all seemed fine... until I was done beating the egg whites. I had underestimated the volume of beaten egg white that I would get with three egg whites. I started to panic and made worse when I was folding the egg whites into the cream cheese mixture. My mixing bowl was full to the brim. Did my best to fold the egg whites in and pour the batter into the cake tin. Alas! The cake tin was not enough to hold all of the batter. In the end, I had to use six cupcake cases to use up the rest of the batter.

Before putting into the oven, I already know that the cakes would not turn out well because I could see that the egg whites was not incorporated well into the mixture. Still, I got to see the whole process through, hence in the oven they went. The cupcake size ones rose nicely in the oven, however, the big one was lope-sided. Sigh...

Did the toothpick test and it came out clean. Left the cakes to cool in the oven as instructed in the recipe and then took them out much later. They all shrink to half the height. The big one had a darker top than the smaller ones. Guessed it was because it was nearer to the heat source. Put them all into the fridge to chill overnight. Too disappointed to do any taste test.

5 Mar 17 (Sun) - Passion Fruit Butter Cake

Since I have some fresh passion fruit juice left over from yesterday, decided to try to use it on a butter cake recipe. Turned out that the butter taste overpowered the passion fruit taste. So as a work around, made some passion fruit glaze using own estimation and brush on top of the cake to enhance the passion fruit taste.

Ingredients:

50g self-rising flour 50g butter - soften 50g castor sugar

1/3 tsp vanilla extract                                                      15ml passion fruit juice                                                      1 egg

Method:
1.  Line cake tin with baking paper and pre-heat the oven to 180 degree celsius
2.  Sift the flour and set aside
3.  Place the butter and sugar in a large bowl and whisk till off white color
4.  Add the egg and mix well
5.  Add vanilla extract and passion fruit juice then mix well
6.  Fold in the flour
7.  Pour the batter into the cake tin
8.  Bake for 20-30mins until risen and firm to touch
9.  Do the toothpick test, if the toothpick comes out clean, transfer the cakes to a wire rack and allow to cool
10.  Brush the passion fruit glaze on the top of the cake

The mango and passion fruit ice cream from yesterday turned out to be slightly icy. Guess it was due to the juice from the passion fruit. Taste-wise, it was a bit on the sour side instead of the usual sweet as expected from mango ice cream.

---------------- Edited on 8 Mar 2017 ----------------

Brought a tub of the ice cream to office for my usual group of tasters to try and received positive feedback. Most of the comments were that they like the tartness of the passion fruit in the otherwise sweet mango ice cream.

23 Oct 16 (Sun) - Buttery Sour Cream Muffins

Had some leftover sour cream and wondered what to do with it. Googled for recipes that use sour cream and self-rising flour and this "Buttery Sour Cream Muffins" by Taste of Home popped out. Tried the recipe and made two muffins. This was the first time that I made savory muffins. I think it will be better if they were in bite-size instead of muffin size because it was very filling. And because it was so buttery, I ate it with a dollop of sour cream to balance the taste and I ate it as a meal.

16 Oct 16 (Sun) - Pumpkin White Cake

Today I did an experimental bake using pumpkin and egg whites. Modified my usual butter cupcake recipe and the result was a bit unexpected. Basically I substituted one egg with the egg white of the same weight and added pumpkin puree. Instead of baking in cupcake cases, I used a springform cake tin plus one cupcake case.

Baked at 160 degree celsius for 20 minutes like what the recipe calls for but the centre of the big cake was still wet while the smaller cake was moist. So baked for another 5 minutes before testing again. This time, the toothpick came out clean for the smaller cake but not so for the big cake. Got a bit impatient, so took out the small cake, left the big cake in the oven and set it to bake for another 10 minutes at 200 degree celsius. This time, the cake was done but the top was browned and slightly crispy. Wondered if it was due to the egg white.

Let the cakes cooled down before trying the small one. The cake seemed to be sweeter than usual and instead of pumpkin taste, the cake tasted more like carrot cake. Wondered if there's something wrong with my taste bud.

Packed the big cake in tupperware box to bring to office tomorrow for taste test. Hope reviews will be favorable.

Ingredients:

50g butter - soften

50g castor sugar

50g self-rising flour

54g egg white

15ml milk

1/3 tsp vanilla essence

65g pumpkin puree

pinch of salt

Method:

1.  Preheat the oven to 160 degree celsius

2.  Line a 4" springform bake tin and 1 silicon muffin case with cupcake case

3.  Mix egg white with milk and vanilla essence with a fork till just blended

4.  Beat butter and sugar till fluffy

5.  Sift flour with a pinch of salt

6.  Add to butter mixture alternately with milk mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture, mix on low speed till blended after each addition

7.  Stir in pumpkin puree till well combined

8.  Pour batter into cake tin and cupcake case

9.  Bake for 30-40mins until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean*

10. Transfer to a wire rack and allow to cool

* For cupcake size, bake for 25 mins

---------------- Edited on 17 Oct 2016 ----------------

Brought the big cake to office for the usual group of testers to try. Didn't tell them the flavour and ask them if they could tell after eating. Just as I thought, they couldn't tell. After I told them it was supposed to be pumpkin flavour, they all suggested that perhaps I should up the pumpkin puree amount and down the sugar and butter amount. Worth a shot. Maybe on next try.

13 Mar 16 (Sun) - Steamed Beetroot & Banana Cupcakes

Last night I copied the “Steamed Banana Cupcakes” recipe, halved the portion and modify it to use beetroot instead of banana. So went about preparing the ingredients and realized that I did not have enough beetroot residue. Didn’t know what came over me and I went straight for the banana that I have in the kitchen and used it to top up the balance. The result was a very unique flavor of earthly-sweet. Texture wise, they were not as fluffy as normal steamed cakes. Either the beetroot residue and banana were too heavy or there wasn’t enough rising agents to help the cakes to rise or I didn’t incorporate enough air into the cake mixture. Nevertheless, they were still edible though texture was dense.

Ingredients:

1 egg

45g caster sugar

95g sweeten beetroot residue

30g mashed banana

75g self-rising flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tbsp cooking oil

Method:

1.  Sieve flour and baking powder then set aside

2.  Whisk egg and sugar till white and fluffy

3.  Add sweeten beetroot residue and mashed banana and mixed well

4.  Gently fold in the flour followed by the cooking oil

5.  Spoon into cupcake cases

6.  Steam over high heat for 15 minutes

Beetroot-themed desserts for the weekend. How that?

Happened to see this particular article “This Genius Sunday Prep Idea Will Help You Lose Weight All Week” on the Internet and after reading up as well as seeing a few of my friends eating overnight oats, I finally pluck up the courage to try. Bought the ingredients listed and prepared four bottles for the week and will start my first bottle tomorrow. Hope it tastes good! 

Since I had time, I cooked some steamed pork balls too for today’s meals. A yummy dish that my folks used to make.

---------------- Edited on 15 Mar 2016 ----------------

Brought a couple of the steamed cakes to office for CC and TYY to try. As the cakes were based on a modified recipe with the main ingredient being beetroot, told them that if after one bite and they don't like it, don't force themselves to finish. Turns out that CC loves beetroot while TYY not so much, like most people. Despite that, both gave positive feedback and CC even nicknamed the cake as "BB Cake". Haha...

CC: Very strong beetroot taste. I like beetroot but maybe not accustomed to it being in a cake. Not enough banana. Very nice moisture but a bit dense.

TYY: I liked the cake! It tastes like a denser version of the colorful steamed cakes. the banana and beetroot actually goes quite nicely. I don't actually like beetroot taste itself, so for me mixing it with banana lifts it slightly and made it much more enjoyable.

1 Nov 15 (Sun) – Lemon Lime Bitters and Lemon Lime Cheesecake

After the mostly successful cheesecake making last week, I got somewhat excited and went to get myself a mini springform baking pan on Tuesday.  Then I started to brainstorm on what cheesecake to make since I still have half tub of the Philadelphia cream cheese left.  Searched my pantry couple of nights ago and found a bottle of angostura aromatic bitters which I bought during my UK trip last December.  Recalled that I bought it because I wanted to make lemon, lime, bitters (LLB) after having first tasted it while on a Great Ocean Road day trip during my Melbourne trip last November. Then an idea struck, how about a lemon, lime cheesecake? Searched the Internet for recipes on LLB and recipes on lemon, lime cheesecake that I can adapt and modify.

Found a website called HubPages that shows how to make LLB in different ways and decided to go for the easiest one which is the bar recipe.  Then I found another website called taste,com.au that shows how to make no-bake lemon lime cheesecake.  Read all the comments and found out that some people modify the recipe to make lemon cheesecake while some modify it to make lime cheesecake. Being ambitious, I decided to make a lime cheesecake and top it off with a thin layer of lemon-flavored jelly.  Since I have never made jelly using gelatin powder before, I had to search for recipe on that.  It was not easy and in the end, I had to modify from another recipe by Anncoo Journal.

Went to get the necessary ingredients during the week and was looking forward to Sunday.  The LLB tasted great!  And I finally got to know how LLB gets it tint of pinkish color.  The angostura aromatic bitters was actually brownish in color.  As for the cheesecake, I did not add enough sugar for the jelly so it was quite sour and sort of overpower the lime flavor in the cheesecake.  Also the jelly melts very fast so it got quite messy if the cheesecake was left outside the fridge for too long.

Lemon, Lime, Bitters (LLB) [Bar Recipe]

Ingredients:

Lemon-flavor 7-Up 15ml of lime juice

6-8 dashes angostura aromatic bitters

Method:

1.  Rim the inside of a tall drink glass with angostura aromatic bitters

2.  Add ice and swirl until the inside of the glass is evenly coated with aromatic bitters

3.  Top up the glass with lemon-flavor 7-Up

4.  Add 15ml of lime juice

5.  Garnish slices of lemon &/or lime

Lime Cheesecake with Lemon-flavor Jelly

Crust ingredients:

75g digestive biscuits (finely crushed)

28g butter (melted)

8g castor sugar 

Filling ingredients:

125g cream cheese (soften, room temperature)

45g icing sugar

75g silken tofu (mashed)

1 tsp gelatin powder

9ml lime juice

zest of 1 large lime (save some for garnishing)

Jelly ingredients:

20ml lukewarm water

150ml lemon juice

24g sugar

1.5 tsp gelatin powder

Method:

1.  Combine crust ingredients in mixing bowl

2.  Use back of a spoon to press the crumbs firmly to the base of the springform baking pan

3.  Chill in freezer for 30mins

4.  Warm up the lime juice in a bowl, then sprinkle the gelatin powder over it (do not stir)

5.  Let the mixture stand for 10mins for the gelatin powder to bloom

6.  Set the bowl over simmering water, stir with a spoon till the gelatin melts and let it cool

7.  Use an electric mixer to beat the cream cheese, tofu and icing sugar till smooth

8.  Add lime zest and gelatin mixture and beat till well combined

9.  Pour batter onto crust and sprinkle some leftover lime zest over it

10.  Put cake into the fridge to set

11.  Place warm water in a bowl, then sprinkle the gelatin powder over it (do not stir)

12.  Let the mixture stand for 10mins for the gelatin powder to bloom

13.  Set the bowl over simmering water, stir with a spoon till the gelatin melts and let it cool

14.  Place lemon juice and sugar in a pot, cook over medium heat till sugar dissolves

15.  Add gelatin mixture when juice boils, stir till they are well combine and let it cool to room temperature

16.  Remove cheesecake from fridge and carefully strain the jelly mixture over the top of the cake

17.  Put the cake with jelly top back to the fridge and refrigerate for 4-5 hours or overnight

Finally, I think I need to improve my skill on lining the springform baking pan.  I had big problem unmolding the cheesecake from the base and I think I will have to bring the whole cake with the base to office instead.  Hrm... or perhaps next time instead of using baking paper to line the base, I should try using foil to wrap the base.  Since the gelatin melts so fast, I decided to put the whole cake into the freezer so that it becomes frozen cheesecake!

---------------- Edited on 2 Nov 2015 ----------------

Brought the mini lemon lime cheesecake to office and put it in the fridge. Informed my usual group about it and at the same time warned them that it could taste rather sour. They ate the cake during tea-break and the overall comments were:

1.  Too sour for most
2.  Lemon taste overpowered lime taste
3.  Cake too soft
4.  Crust improved from last round

Hrm... will need more practice!

25 Oct 15 (Sun) - Pumpkin Tofu Cheesecake

It is October again! One of my favourite months in the year because I love the mood of Halloween and I love pumpkins! Googled for recipes using pumpkin and came across this Pumpkin Tofu Cheesecake Jar by Baking Taitai. So went to get all the necessary ingredients and made it today. 

Instead of using jars, I made it into a small cake and into some tarts. It came out quite nice for the cake but I cannot say the same for the tarts because I had problem pressing the biscuit crumbs to form the crust. Taste wise, unfortunately, I could not really taste the pumpkin, instead, I could taste more of the tofu and the lemon. Perhaps I should rename my blog post as Lemon Tofu Cheesecake/Tarts.

Making no-bake cheesecake is not as difficult as I initially thought. Still have half tub of the cream cheese left, perhaps next round I can do a basic no-bake cheesecake instead.

Anyway, Happy Halloween in advance!

---------------- Edited at 9:28pm ----------------

Could not figure out what went wrong as I had followed the recipe closely. Read and re-read the recipe from Baking Taitai and finally saw the problem. Instead of using just 100g silken tofu, I used the whole box instead. No wonder the tofu taste was stronger than the pumpkin taste. Oh well... At least the look of the cake turned out well.

---------------- Edited on 27 Oct 2015 ----------------

Brought three tarts to office for my colleagues to try. Generally the feedback was good even though they knew I had made a BIG mistake of adding one whole box of tofu instead of just 100g. They commented that the tarts were not too sweet. Crusts and fillings were a bit soft. I guess the reasons are that the crusts were not baked and I had added too much tofu.

One of them commented, "I liked the tart. It's not too jelat, and had nice texture. I was initially a bit surprised at how the tofu and pumpkin made the tart not as smooth as what I expected of cheesecake, but it works. it leaves the mouth with a very clean finish (cleaner than say a pure cheese tart)."

Phew! Glad that my mistake did not turn into a disaster. 

A Review: Cake Spade

Googled about bakery shops near Tanjong Pagar area and "Cake Spade" popped out as one of the results. Checked the website out and browsed through the list of cakes, brownies, crumbles and tarts. The cakes looked yummy, plus the price seemed reasonable so shortlisted some cakes to buy during lunchtime. The shop is situated just below the Orchid Hotel. Small shop space with a few small tables for people who want to dine in.

Bought a slice of Hummingbird Cake, a slice of Chocolate Blackout Cake, a slice of Peach Tofu Cheesecake and a slice of Lemon Meringue Cake to share with my colleagues and all have different preferences.

Hummingbird Cake (Below) and Peach Tofu Cheesecake (Top)

Chocolate Blackout Cake (Below) and Lemon Meringue Cake (Top)

CC voted for the Hummingbird cake while TYY seemed to prefer the Peach Tofu Cheesecake. As for me, I find the Hummingbird cake very flavourful and it is one of the cakes that I had planned to try out one day. The Peach Tofu Cheesecake and the Lemon Meringue Cake were very soft and light. As for the Chocolate Blackout Cake, I didn't find it special, perhaps because chocolate cakes are quite common.

Most of the cakes are priced at $5.90 per slice except the Lemon Meringue Cake which cost $6.20 per slice. Given the size of the slice, I find the price rather affordable. Maybe next time I will try their brownies and tarts.

Name: Cake Spade

Address: 1 Tras Link, #01-06, Orchid Hotel Singapore, Singapore 078867

Opening Hours: 12:00-21:00 (Mon-Thu) and 12:00-22:30 (Fri-Sat)

Tel: 6444 3868

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cakespadesg

Wesbite: http://www.cakespade.com/index.html