Car Cake

Yesterday was Clement's birthday & he wanted a car cake for his party.

We had to build the car from scratch, no specialty pan. I went through all my baking pans for the appropriate one for the car. After baking the cake, D got to work to cut out the shape for me to finish with the frosting part.

Gosh, it took me 2 hours piping the entire car ! By the time I finished, my right arm was aching & numb. When Clement's mum collected the cake, she was so surprised & pleased with it.

That made me a happy baker :)

Happy Father's Day !

To all the Dads out there, A Happy Father's Day !

Someone asked me if I baked hubby a cake today. Gosh, I've totally forgotten about it ! I mean I know it's Father's Day today, but as usual I've been so busy baking this 2 days that I've forgotten about hubby. But I'm sure he has a good one, helping me with the cakes. I did my part by buying him dinner.


Now, a cool cake for a cool Dad, from his cool wife, enjoy.........

Flower Themed Cakes

Girls cake are always so pretty. One can never go wrong with a pinkish cake for a girl's birthday !
This cake was baked for Gaby's 10th birthday. She wanted the cake to be in the shape of a flower. I don't have the Wilton flower pan, so D got to work again, cutting the shape of the petals individually.
Feedback from mummy : She loved the cake !

This one's for CJ's classmate, whose birthday was on Wednesday.

KA Food Processor

I was looking for a real big food processor lately but as usual couldn't find any here in KK.

Then, an advertisement in an Australia magazine caught my eye few weeks ago. The look of a Magimix food processor attracted me. I called both KL & Singapore to find out the details, was told that I could get it ordered in KK through Pelangi, but no way I'm going to buy my machine from that shop ! After some research on the net, I discovered that Magimix's body is made of plastic, not metal, so I gave up the idea of getting one even though the look is so cool.

Hubby suggested that I check out Kitchenaid website to see of they have any. Oh, how could I have forgotten about it ? Under the artisan range, they also have food processor. But only red & brushed metal is available in Singapore. Red would be the perfect accompaniment for my mixer. However the brushed metal version is so attractive I couldn't take my eyes off it (even though it's a S$100 more than the red one).

I was so lucky, because I got my sister to buy me the machine ! She went to buy it for me, my brother sent it to the hotel where hubby's friend was staying (he was in Singapore for a few days). Then hubby's friend was so kind to lug it back to KK for me. I was having sleepless nights before my machine came home to me because it weighs a whopping 14+kg !! I was worrying about dents, about excess baggage.........

So finally, on Wednesday night, I got it, in perfect condition. I would say, the box is really huge for a food processor, a 2.8L one. I mean the machine is big too & so gorgeous !

A big thank you to everyone who made the effort to help me acquire my perfect food processor !

Bob The Builder for Seng Seng !

This cake was baked especially for Chicky's cute little cousin, Seng Seng.

This cake has 2 different type of fillings, half mango & half blueberry, a special request from Chicky.

Kalbi, Marinated Beef Short Ribs

I'm so so into Korean food these days.

Frankly, I've never like Korean food. The only Korean food I knew while growing up was Seoul Garden in Singapore. It's a Korean BBQ buffet restaurant with so many varieties of heavily marinated meats (with tenderizer I think !!).

In the past year, we started trying out Korean restaurants around KK & I start to fall in love with Korean food. Guess what ? I'm beginning to enjoy Kimchi ! So far, I think Kimchi at Hi-Seoul, Likas Square, is the best, so fresh, so crunchy. I'm looking forward to my Korean friend's new restaurant opening at City Mall.

I even started cooking Korean at home. In fact, Korean cooking is not difficult, just the right ingredients you'll get the dish right.

I was shopping at Merderka Supermarket 2 weeks ago & spotted some beef short ribs in their freezer section. Immediately, Kalbi came to my mind. I know hubby likes ribs so I grabbed a kilo of it. This is quite a big portion for 4 of us as the ribs were cut into thin slices.

After browsing through my recipe books, I found a great recipe :

1 Sweet Chinese pear, peeled
1 Tart green apple, peeled
1 Onion, peeled
1kg Beef short ribs, sliced

Marinade :

6 Tbsp Soya sauce
3 Tbsp rice wine
2 Tbsp sesame oil
3 Tbsp Sugar
2 Tbsp roasted sesame seeds, crushed
6 Cloves garlic, crushed

Finely grate the pear, apple & onion into a large bowl, add the beef short ribs & mix thoroughly. Set aside to allow the meat to tenderize.

Combine the marinade ingredients in a bowl, mix well & pour it over the beef, mixing thoroughly until the beef is well coated with the marinade. Cover & let marinade for at least 4 hours or overnight in the fridge.

Heat a frying pan or grill over medium heat until very hot. fry the beef ribs, in batches, for 2-3 mins on each side until golden brown. Remove from heat & transfer to serving platters. Garnish with roasted sesame seeds & serve with rice.

We had this over 2 meals in a day, lunch for hubby & I, and dinner for the 4 of us. Hubby thought it was good, very well marinated with natural ingredients.



Now, what is Korean food without any side dish ? No, I can't make Kimchi. So I could only come up with their most common salad, the sigumchi namul, which is seasoned spinach. But I don't have any spinach in my fridge that day, so I've substituted the spinach with choy sum.
How to :

300g Choy Sum, chopped & washed
3 Tbsp Soya sauce
2 Cloves garlic, minced
2 Tbsp Sesame oil
1 Tbsp Roasted sesame seeds, crushed
1 Tsp Sugar

Bring 3 cups of water to boil, blanch the choy sum for about 1min. Remove from heat & rinse in cold water. Drain & squuze out the excess water from the vege.

Mix all other ingredients in a large bowl. Add the blanched choy sum & toss the mixture thoroughly, making sure it's well coated with the seasoning.

Place in an airtight container & chill in the fridge for at least 1 hour before serving.

Daisy Wedding Cake

We had the opportunity to make a wedding cake for J's wedding tomorrow. I've been very nervous about it for the past week, this being our first 2-tier wedding cake !

Preparation began a week ago when the order was confirmed, from soaking the dried fruits with brandy, to making the sugar paste. Gosh, I made 3 kg of sugar paste this time & it was so so tough kneading it, especially when tinting it a pastel blue shade !!!

I'm still not confident in making 3D flowers yet, so I rely on my daisy plunger cutter set.
I hope the next time I have the chance to make a wedding cake again, I'll be able to come up with some really 'real' looking sugar flowers .......

My Daughter Turns 9 Today !

Exactly a week after hubby's birthday is our first born, CJ's birthday. Their birthday fall on the same day of the week, just a week apart, so mummy has to keep herself busy during this 2 weekends. This year , both their birthdays fall on a public holiday, how lucky !

I've been wanting to do a fondant cakes for my girls. This thought has been on my mind for such along time, just like the L'opera for hubby. Since I managed to whip up the L'opera, I thought I shouldn't give fondant cake a miss this year !

Preparation for CJ's cake started on Monday. I had to dye the sugar paste into different colours to cover the cake & to make sugar flowers. This time I didn't use store bought flowers, they were easily cut out with the help of plunger cutters ! The flavour of the cake was a heavy moist dark chocolate cake, which I baked on Wednesday. The decoration was done on Thursday night as I have to bring it to school on Friday morning.

The kids have enjoyed the cake. CJ said her classmates ate the cake, as well as the sugar paste !



CJ, with her sister.

Cake cutting time !

After the first cut !



I have to bake another batch of chocolate banana cupcakes for CJ's French class this morning. She wanted the frosting to be bright green in colour. (wonder why the girls are so into green these days, we've just painted their room almost the same shade of green as the frosting !)
The little flowers on the cupcakes were gum paste flowers, JF said they tasted horrible, so plasticky ! Still, the sugar paste flowers from the sugar paste that I made from scratch tasted better, she said.