Apple pie

Baked apple pie yesterday. 

Sunday while preparing the crust for the strawberry tart, I made two more. And so, decided to use it for making apple pie. Turned out pretty good c: Here's how it looks like:

Looks great huh? It tastes good too! (Yes, my friends asked me to stop torturing them)

Hey it was torture for me too, baked it on Monday and only got to eat it on Tuesday morning! I know it doesn't look like it but I'm trying to lose weight and get a flat belly. 

Told myself that I should stop baking for awhile too. But 'one does not simply stop baking.' It's an addiction, or a drug maybe. Especially that I've been on low spirits lately baking helps me keep busy or 'feel good' and 'satisfied'. What do you do when you are not feeling good? 

Else, if you want I could write a post on the details on the different steps of making the crust and pie. I'm open to any request.

Have a nice afternoon,

Kim

Strawberry tart

Yesterday I tried making strawberry tart from scratch, and here's how it looked like:

Been wondering whether I should post the procedures and recipes on this blog, but then I thought I'd just post my experience about this. :lazy person: I didn't take photos while making it too so...:excuses:

I tried making pies and tarts many times before and I never got it right.. Got discouraged so bad and got into a war with pies for almost a year. Then recently I stumbled upon Laura Vitale's youtube videos on pies and tart and it got me re motivated again.

 The hardest part about pies is making the pie crust;

First to get the consistency right when rubbing in the flour and butter, and adding water(some 5-6 tsp) little by little.

Next is the blind baking, I remember trying to make this a year before and not blind baking it correctly.

The result? Well it was horrible.

This time I was patient and did the blind baking correctly. Baking it for 10 minutes or so with an aluminium foil with beans on top of the crust, then another 15-20 without the aluminium foil and beans.

Does that make any sense?

Else the egg custard(which is the filling) isn't that hard to make. Beating egg yolks and sugar, corn flour, then slowly adding scalded milk, and cooking the mixture at low-medium temperature till it starts thickening. When it's thickened, you should let that cool down completely before putting it on the crust.

Last is the decoration/dressing part. I don't know if it is considered as fun or painful. Cutting the strawberries one by one, Ugh. But yea, you can see how organised(not) I am from how I put the strawberries on.

I don't want to discourage you but this tart took my whole Sunday afternoon. It isn't that long, it's my fault, I was procrastinating between the steps and took pauses. + I made 2 other pie bases too.

Anyways, I should thank Laura Vitale who got me motivated again to make pies(I tried her apple pie too lately) and tart.

Here's the link to the video on how she made the pie crust. (The second part of the video is how she makes the pumpkin filling, you can skip that if you want)

http://www.laurainthekitchen.com/all/episode.php?episodenumber=63

How here's the link on the filling for the strawberry tart c:

http://www.laurainthekitchen.com/all/episode.php?episodenumber=33

I can really recommend anyone to check out her videos, which are absolutely easy to follow + she's a nice host(pretty too in my opinion ;p )

Hope you enjoyed reading this post, have a nice day,

Kim

Vanilla Cupcakes with strawberry butter cream

Felt like being a bit fancy today. But HEY the first recipe on my blog WITHOUT chocolate! Been so addicted with making cupcakes lately, they're so easy and quick to make. 

I know I posted a cupcake recipe before and it's almost the same thing. Meh, I prefer making this one than the chocolate ones.

Been sharing the cakes too with some of my friends and my past SC maths tuition teacher(Hi Chris!). Chris told me that I should open a coffee/cupcake shop. I did think of it before though.

The only hard thing about cooking is washing up.

To be honest, it's my second time trying this. I didn't want to post it the first time I tried it because I got the ingredients for the butter cream wrong and it didn't look pretty.

Been very tempted by Laura Vitale's Vanilla cupcake with Rasberry buttercream: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngN4TWgL3sY  I didn't find rasberry preserves so instead I used Strawberry jam.

Let's start Baking!

Preheat your oven.

Quick and easy vanilla cupcakes.

First step as usual, creaming 1 Cup of granulated sugar

113g or so of softened butter (Butter at room temperature)

In a separate bowl, mix 2 eggs and 2 tsp of vanilla essence together. Little by little add to the butter & sugar mixture.

Add sifted 1 1/3 cup of self raising flour. 

Incorporate in the mixture by making '8' form with your spatula/spoon. Laura Vitale used the electric mixer for this, but I preferred using the wooden spoon so that I can 'feel' exactly when the flour is incorporated in the mixture. +I'm sure not to overmix. You should mix until you don't see the flour anymore.

Then add 1/3 cup of milk

For the milk, I quickly mixed it with the electric mixer. Just enough so that the milk gets into the mixture.

See how creamy that looks! Hmmm!

Fill your cupcake tins and let it bake for about 15-20 mins or so.

Looking at this makes me super excited

Should look like this when it's readddyy!

It was so smooth and so light and so fluffy! (It's so fluffy I'm gonna dieee!)

You can stop here and start enjoying your cupcakes from now on. It's yummy like this, but if you feel fancy and want more flavor, you can make the buttercream. :D

Making butter cream is really easy...but again it's so messy :cry:

Mix for about a minute:

 113g unsalted butter at room temperature, 

1/2 tsp of vanilla essence  

and 450g of icing sugar

Add 2 big spoons of strawberry jam. 

That's how the butter cream should look like~ Bee-you-ty-ful

*cough* beautiful.

Fill in your piping bag, and start topping your cupcakes.

Make sure your cupcakes are cooled to top them with your butter cream.

And here's the final result!!

For the extra, I decorated the cupcakes with little 'sugar decorations' I found at the supermarket yesterday.

It's so cute!!

I hope you enjoyed this post and hopefully you will try it out. It's really easy, don't hesitate messing around!

(By the way, excuse my poor grammar and my lack of vocabulary in all of my posts.)

Kim.

Chocolate lava cake recipe

I'm serious, I am NOT a chocolate lover. (I know it's hard to believe me because there are only chocolate based recipes on this blog but what can I do? My little sister LOVES chocolate and I like spoiling her.)

So, Chocolate Fondant or Moelleux au Chocolat. Doesn't that sound evil for you all chocolate fans?

For the recipe I had to decide between onepotchef and Laura vitale's. But Onepotchef's looked easier, so yea, lazy people always choose the easiest option right? You can get the ingredients and watch how he did it, easier to follow with video maybe. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4nCR_MV-gY

For this recipe you will need : Dark Chocolate, Softened Butter, Castor Sugar, Plain Flour, Vanilla essence, Eggs.

Ingredients that you probably already have at home. So there's no excuse not to try this!!

Enough of talking now, let's start

As usual, preheat your oven. 

Place a baking tray inside too. We'll put our small cups on it later.

Okay first step. Melting the 350g of Chocolate.

I think you can also melt it in the microwave, but I tried that once in school and forgot to check it and it burnt. 

(Doesn't that look sexy?)

Anyway, I melted it by steaming. Boiling water in a saucepan then letting it simmer and putting the glass bowl with the chocolate on top of it till all the chocolate melts. Make sure the bowl doesn't touch the water else you are going to get burnt choco, and it's a no-no.

When you are done melting the chocolate, put it aside and let it cool. < Very important.

I dare you not to lick the spoon !

Next, in another bowl, mix

50g Softened Butter 
1/2 Cup of Castor Sugar

one tsp of vanilla essence

Till it becomes soft and creamy.

Then add 4 eggs.  One by one. And continue mixing, till it all comes together.

I had to stress on that because...I forgot this when making the recipe and put the 4 eggs at one go...Don't do this. 

Then, add  1/4 cup of all purpose flour in the mixture and stir it in.

(For this recipe, I have added a lil bit of salt and expresso powder inside. According to Laura Vitale salt brings out the taste of the ingredients better and expresso powder gives it an additional yum flavour. )

Okay, make sure you sieve the flour before adding it in the mixture. I didn't sieve it and it became all so lumpy and I had a very hard time trying to break the lumps. :cry:

See how lumpy it is? :rage:

I think the next step will make chocolate lovers faint.

Yup, adding the chocolate into the mixture. Make sure the chocolate is cool before adding it though.

Some more mixing.

And here's the consistency.

Stay with me, your chocolate fantasy will soon be realised!

Grease your tins/cups in which you will be putting the mixture. Else it's going to stick inside and it's going to be hard to transfer it to a plate.

For my first trial, I put some of the mixture in a coffee cup.

Then rest in aluminium tins, covered them and stored them in the fridge.

Finally

Place your cups on the hot tray and bake for about 10-15 mins at 200C, depending on how consistent you want it to be. Really really fondant, 10 mins. 

Don't bake for too long, else it will start cooking inside and you will only get a chocolate cake, not a chocolate fondant. 

Tadaaaa! It's ready!

You can decide to serve it(or eat it) in the cup/pot itself if you wish to.

Or you can also, transfer it to a plate. Take a knife and run around the edges to make sure they don't stick

For this one I'll be honest, I baked it for a bit too long and it didn't came out as liquidy as I wanted it to be. But here's how it looks like inside. After my sister dig into it.

Lovely right?

You can serve that with ice cream and a red fruits for some MOAR yumminess.

Actually I was amazed at how easy and simple the recipe is. + It's delicious (according to the chocolate lovers who tasted it)

There you go~

I wish you enjoyed this post and that you will enjoy your fondant when you have tried it out. 

I will be more than pleased to see your trials too.

Don't be scared of trying it out! 

It was my first trial too!!

Chocolate cupcakes recipe

Nope, not a chocolate lover AT ALL. But my sister loves chocolate. Thought I might spoil her a bit huh?

About the recipe, I thought I would try Laura Vitale's
Check her out! http://www.laurainthekitchen.com/all/episode.php?episodenumber=222

For the cupcakes, we're going to use the 'creaming method'(or that's what I remember from my food and nutrition class)
Basically the creaming method consists of mixing the butter and sugar, and egg together, and lastly adding the  flour. Easy right?

Let's get started !

Preheat your oven and prepare your cupcake tins.

First you will need:

1/2 cup of unsalted butter at room temperature

¾ cup Granulated Sugar
¼ cup Brown Sugar

1 egg

Vanilla essence

And MIXXX !

Don't over mix though. Normally you should stop when the mixture becomes creamy and white-ish in colour.

Second you will need:

½ cup Cocoa Powder

1 cup self raising flour

¼ tsp Salt

*(I'm using self raising flour, because I don't like using baking powder/soda; I can never get the quantities right.

Else you can use

1 Cup of All purpose flour

1/2 tsp Baking Powder
½ tsp Baking Soda)

Add the flour and cocoa powder to the 'wet' ingredients

Mix!

Okay so, at first I was really skeptical about the consistency and texture of the mixture, because it looks really  'heavy'

But then I put 3/4 cup buttermilk in it

*To make butter milk, you will simply need one cup of whole milk and one teaspoon of lemon juice or white vinegar. And let it rest for 5 mins

 and mixed it quickly

Then I was more reassured after seeing the texture. Just DON'T over mix.

Fun part now! 

Filling the cupcakes tins. 

Don't be me and try having 'many' cupcakes, you'll end up having cupcakes which look bad.

Bake for 20 Mins or so at 180C.

And we're done!

I can NEVER get the quantities right. This time I put too small quantity in them and now they look like they didn't rise well. :c

Epic fail?

But hey hey! They were so good and so smooth and so yum! :D

For the decoration part now

In the recipe Laura uses buttercream(which I used too) but you could also use whipped cream. I find the consistency of the buttercream much better than that of whipping cream though!

Buttercream is really easy to make, the ingredients you need are:

4 Cups of icing sugar

1 1/3 cup of butter at room temp.

vanilla essence

some spoons of whole milk(depending on the consistency you want)

Then, mixing again. In my opinion, I should have mixed it a little bit more and put more milk.

Put the cream in a piping bag and let's start the FUN

OBVIOUSLY, I had to mess up

To be a lil' more fancy, you can grate chocolate or take cherries and decorate on top.

Voila!

Hope you enjoyed this post and that it prompts you to try this recipe.

Kim