A Touch of Frost Cakes

First ever attempt at making Pineapple Tarts

2012-01-29T15:00:00.001+08:00

In order to make it seem more "Chinese New Year"-sy, I decided to make pineapple tarts.

Too bad I didn't have the pineapple tart mould (the one that makes each tart shaped like a flower)- I remember helping grandma making these ones for CNY; helping her make CNY bikkies was one of my strongest CNY memories from childhood.

Anyway the ones I made were pretty ugly- hardly any consistency. Taste-wise, pretty good for a first attempt though!

Made the filling from scratch- fresh pineapple (hurray for food processor), sugar, cinnamon and cloves. Took forever to reduce and caramelise (forever meaning 2.5hrs)

I combined two recipes; I wanted to make one recipe's filling but not the pastry as it had too many ingredients I'd have to go out and buy (eg. Cream cheese, shortening, ghee etc etc etc). The pastry I ended up making had a filling recipe using tinned pineapples, which I wasn't keen on.

Overall turned out okay, but I'd love to get the pineapple flower mould next time!

GONG XI FA CAI!!!!!

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Christmas cupcakes

2011-12-29T14:34:00.000+08:00

Not feeling particularly inspired to try anything new this Christmas, I decided on the simplest Christmas-themed cupcakes - red velvet cupcakes baked in Christmas cupcake cases, topped with cream cheese frosting sprinkled with green sugar. To me, Christmas colours ARE undisputedly green and red-

Simple Christmas cupcakes

I had the Husband take a dozen to work to share with his work colleagues. The rest, I packed 2 cupcakes each into cupcake boxes and tied it with a Christmas ribbon and gave them to a neighbour and my work colleagues. Looked lovely in a box, but I didn't take a picture!

Hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-25T20:53:00.001+08:00

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T-bone Steak Cake!

2011-12-14T11:28:00.002+08:00

It has been a long while since anyone's blogged about their baking ventures!

Well, the Husband turned the big 3-0 recently and to celebrate, we hosted a "T"-themed party (for Husband "Tim") - guests were requested to dress as something starting with the letter "T". The prizes for best-dressed also started with the letter "t"- Toblerone, Twix, Tim Tams, tissue paper, toilet paper, towels. I had planned on making the birthday cake - a few months ago a colleague and I had seen in a women's magazine a recipe for a burger cake and we thought it was cute. She ended making a steak cake for her partner's birthday, and when the time came for the "T" party, she suggested I make a "T-bone steak cake" which I thought was brilliant on so many levels!

The Husband loves nothing more than a rare piece of steak, and the cake would adhere to the "T"-theme. My work colleague got her inspiration from other blogs, and emailed me a link to I'm Hungry Too 's steak cake. My decision to make the cake red-velvet with cream cheese frosting 'mashed potato' was solely from this blog, so thanks to her brilliance! Many thanks to other random pictures and blogs on the internet (Hurray for the internet!) that featured various T-Bone steak cakes.

So I started by making a round red-velvet cake using the recipe from the Hummingbird Bakery. Then after it cooled a little on the rack, I started to cut the cake into shape. If you asked me, it looks like South America, with the southernmost point cut off.

South America Red Velvet cake - who ate Patagonia??

I then used store-bought icing and added brown and black to it. This took the LONGEST time. I never knew just HOW MUCH colouring is needed to get the desired brown! Each time I got the desired shade of brown for the 'bone', then the 'fat', I'd peel off a portion and set aside. Then added MORE brown and black and kept on kneading. When I FINALLY got the colour of the 'meat' that I wanted, I wrapped the cake with the rolled icing, and started to make the indentation for the t-bone...

Bone: I spent a lot of time trying to get the bone to look real - made sure the top part of the 'bone' had the hollow bit where the marrow goes, then finally, dotted brown-black gel colouring on the bone and smudged it in.

Fat: I wasn't TOO pleased with how this looked, but it did the job. I rolled some icing flat, then used a chopstick to 'straighten' the strap of 'fat' then wrapped it around.

Grill marks: This wasn't too difficult - I used a chopstick to make indentations into the 'steak' and then simply coloured it in by using a big metal pin covered with black gel colouring (I've just discovered it's called a flower nail, which came with my Wilton's cake decorating set).

The three accompanying veggies were no-brainers - peas and carrots are probably the easiest veggies made with coloured icing; and the mashed potato as mentioned before was the cream cheese frosting (some brown gel colouring added, although I don't know if it made much difference) that usually went atop red-velvet cakes. A friend who is Buttercup Bakeshoppe helped out by stamping 'Happy Birthday' with edible ink on a 'slab of butter' .

Ta Dahhh!!!!!

When I finally finished at 3:30am I couldn't help but wake the birthday boy to admire the finished product! It was to be another 18 hours before the steak was finally cut and the rare-ness revealed.

Steak best-served rare

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle (aka the Husband) was thrilled! Happy Birthday, darling!

Too easy!

2011-07-20T21:12:00.003+08:00

Here's an Aussie phrase I've learnt - "Too easy"!

"Can you pass me the salt?" "Too easy!"
"Can you get me the documents by 5pm?" "Too easy!"

Well - here's something that is really "too easy", so easy I don't know why I've never thought of making it for a dessert - instead I'd buy the frozen ones!

Apple Crumble!

All you need is flour, sugar and butter for the crumble, and Granny Smith apples, demerara sugar, cinnamon stick and ginger powder for the apples, and voila! Apple crumble!

Too easy!

Eggless Cupcakes

2011-07-18T20:58:00.002+08:00

I have been on the roll, since I bought my new mixer (more on that in another post). Made some eggless cupcakes with pink lemon frosting for a little 3yo girl who has an egg-allergy. I used buttermilk instead of almond milk + apple cider vinegar. I personally didn't fancy them a whole lot (except for the lemon frosting - yumm!), but people have commented that they were very moist and the cupcakes disappeared like hot cakes (when I brought the rest in to work the next day).

Eggless buttermilk cupcakes with pink lemon frosting

The little birthday girl's mum and aunt spent hours making her a Hello Kitty cake (with whom she is current obsessed); however she was not able to eat any of it. The picture below is of the amazing effort mum and aunt put in, surrounded by my eggless cupcakes:

Happy 3rd birthday, little Amelia!

Red Velvet cupcakes

2011-07-11T23:38:00.006+08:00

And so, I finally had the opportunity to try and make my first ever batch of red velvet cupcakes. A tiniest bit undercooked, but overall all was well. I was very keen to try these ones from the Hummingbird Bakery book, despite the wee fact that I actually never favour them. It was really a case of doing it for the sake of doing it!

A work colleague is leaving the organisation and so I thought I'd make cupcakes for the pot-luck farewell lunch tomorrow. I doubled the recipe so Husband could take some to work as well (I always say it is so that his colleagues will remind him what an awesome wife I am while he is at work! :P) Even though it was easily 1am by then (it's 1.42am now), I had so much fun writing stuff on his cupcakes for his workmates I couldn't stop. Thought it'd be amusing to have whimsical words on the cupcakes, seeing that everyone at work must be ridiculously stressed now (Husband had come home from work at 11pm)

birthday cupcakes

2011-06-26T21:30:00.002+08:00

It's been a while since anyone last posted! Today was one of my oldest dearest friend's daughter Emily's first birthday, and so I decided to try out rolled icing for the first time! To keep it really simple and easy, I ended up making vanilla cupcakes with vanilla frosting, but I managed to top 8 of the cupcakes with a lemon frosting. I think they turned out awfully pretty, considering it's my first try with rolled icing!

Happy first birthday, Emily!'

Lion Birthday Cupcakes

2011-06-25T21:06:00.004+08:00

These were for my younger son's birthday celebration at school. The lions were edible and of course, store-bought!

Toy Story Birthday Cake & Cupcakes

2011-06-25T20:54:00.008+08:00

At last! It has been soooo long that I've actually forgotten my password for my sign-in! Yikes!

I actually made this for my younger son's birthday party in April. Yes, yes, I know that it is now the end of June! Sigh, laziness is in my bones - there is really nothing I can do about it :-P Anyway, I just used edible icing images for the cupcakes and put toy figurines on the cake, as per my usual lazy way!

Spring is almost here!

2011-03-09T17:11:00.002+08:00

Apple Tart

2011-02-20T20:48:00.002+08:00

I made this apple tart for dessert last night and it was oh-so-yummy! I got the recipe from The Pioneer Woman and it was very easy to make. Hence the name 'Quick and Easy Apple Tart'. It uses frozen puff pastry and it couldn't be simpler to make. The only thing is, it was a tad too sweet for me. The next time I make it, I will try to remember to reduce the sugar. But, still heavenly! :-)

Strawberry and Vanilla Cake

2011-02-20T20:34:00.005+08:00

I know I've been out-of-action for a while. Have been soooo lazy :-P I didn't even bake anything for CNY! Decided to make this as strawberries from Korea are in season. But it's just way too hot here! The whipped cream very quickly turned soft and my cake was a big mess. Nevertheless, it was still so, so yummy!!

This is dedicated to Sister No. 3 who celebrated her birthday, er....ahem.... two weeks ago. Still, better late than never right?

Happy Birthday, M! Hope you had a great day!

Gong Xi Fa Chai!

2011-02-08T15:47:00.004+08:00

May the year of the bunny bring you health, wealth and most importantly, happiness!

Peanut Butter Cupcakes

2011-01-28T22:10:00.003+08:00

This is, AGAIN, from the Primrose Bakery book. It's the opposite of what I always make - chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting. The cake is quite dense but overall yummy. My little one loved it as he loves peanut butter. The topping is Reese's peanut butter chips which Sister No.1 got for me when she went to the States. Yum!

Earl Grey Cupcakes

2011-01-25T18:11:00.003+08:00

I actually made these a couple of weeks ago, for my hubby's colleagues who gave him Christmas presents. They are Earl Grey cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting. This is, again, from the Primrose Bakery book. The cake was quite dense but had a nice hint of Earl Grey.

These are also dedicate to our baby sister who celebrated her birthday last Wednesday.

Happy Birthday, V! I hope you had a wonderful day!

Pineapple Tarts

2011-01-19T16:45:00.003+08:00

My hubby has been harping about me lying to him... Cause I kept promising him that I will make him some pineapple tarts...and I kept postponing and postponing. Hehehe. The last time I made these tarts must be more than 3 years ago. I kid you not!

Anyway, I got the recipe from the Kenwood Site. This time however, I used Crisco instead of butter. The result is a very melt-in-the-mouth, light and crumbly tart. On hindsight, I should have used half-butter and half-Crisco...then at least I would get the rich buttery taste as well. Nevetheless, they taste mighty good!

Oh..by the way, I told H to just buy it from the shops in future. These tarts are rather time-consuming and tedious to make! Don't know how people can make and sell these tarts for a living. I just made one batch today and I was soooooooo tired.

Christmas Cupcakes

2010-12-31T23:56:00.009+08:00

These were made weeks ago, but I was just too lazy to post them :-P They were made at different times, for different people - friends, neighbours, teachers and colleagues. They were mostly vanilla and chocolate cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting.

For Music Teachers

For Neighbours

For Hubby's Colleagues

For School Teachers

Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting For Friends

Wishing Everyone a Merry (Belated) Christmas

A Happy New Year!!

Time for joy, and time for cheer

2010-12-26T16:45:00.001+08:00

Christmas eve had never been so stressful. Had gone to work for half day, then did some mega last-minute shopping (had to buy ingredients for fried rice I had to cook for church for boxing day), then chopped up branches and dropped them at the tip; then baked 2 chocolate mudcakes and 30 chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting for Christmas eve and Christmas day dinners.

But I consider busy at Christmas time good- makes it more festive and less lonely.

Happy Christmas!

Christmas Chocolate Mudcake

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Christmas Baking....

2010-12-17T10:50:00.004+08:00

Here are some photos of previous week's baking. Didn't take everything I baked as they looked somewhat the same anyway....

A box of Christmas Cupcakes...

Christmas Gifts...

Pink & Purple Birthday Cupcakes

Ladies Luncheon Cupcakes
(colours a bit "jeng")

Cupcakes for Charity Bake Sale

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!

Raspberry Cupcakes with White Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

2010-12-10T22:17:00.002+08:00

This is, again, from my Primrose Bakery book. The frosting is made by mixing melted white chocolate pieces with vanilla buttercream frosting. I only made this when I had some buttercream leftover as the recipe only requires four tablespoons of it. My kids loved it! Maybe because they love raspberries :-)

Basic Butter Cake

2010-11-24T21:47:00.003+08:00

It is now the school holidays and the beginning of endless whines of "I'm bored! Can I play the computer, watch TV, play Wii, play with your phone, etc, etc?" We'll be staying put here for the holidays until Christmas week when we'll head back to my parents' for a few days. How do you entertain a seven-year-old for six weeks? .....I really don't know. Will probably find some holiday camp for him. SOON!

In the meantime, Mummy ie. moi, just has to get her butt off her chair and not be so lazy and find some activities for everyone to do together. We've been to the library a couple of times and borrowed tonnes of books. And yesterday, we baked a butter cake. My hubby loves this butter cake with chocolate chips. Unfortunately, I didn't have any chocolate chips when I thought I did, so we just made it plain. I measured out all the ingredients and my son put them in the mixer and mixed it. The cake turned out really well. Maybe next time, I'll let him do all the measuring. Or is that too ambitious?

Chocolate Hazelnut Cupcakes

2010-11-19T21:14:00.003+08:00

These are from Rachel Lane's Wild About Cupcakes. All her chocolate cakes are quite dense and crumbly and this one is no different. I really like the chopped hazelnuts in the cake and the frosting (just melted dark chocolate and Nutella) was nice, not too sweet.

Breads....

2010-11-11T21:51:00.003+08:00

Did not intend to bake so many types of breads...

Wanted to bake a brioche in my Bread Maker - which had not seen the light of day for FOUR years. But a technical problem resulted in my having to knead the dough by hand.

Not accepting the fact that my Bread Maker had decided to die on me, I attempted to use it a second time... a simple loaf this time round. Shucks! The mixing just won't happen. Again, I had to mix and knead by hand. So this is the result...

Clockwise from Top:
Bacon & Onion Rolls from the Brioche Dough, Simple White Loaf & Mini-Brioche

Also baked a yummilicious (but costly) chocolate cake....

Happy Diwali.....

2010-11-08T20:56:00.003+08:00

Okay. Okay. A little belated. But I only received the order on Friday....so by the time I pop out to the shops to get the ingredients, and bake...it was Sunday already.

HAPPY DIWALI

As usual, I baked some extra for my boys' snack at school.... Look at the cool Cupcake Holders that I had bought from my recent trip to Melbourne. Great, huh?

Cool Cupcake Holders

Back in action!

2010-11-03T21:43:00.002+08:00

My oven is finally working, after more than 3 months living at my new place.

If anyone remembered my baking resolution, it was to try a new recipe in honor of my sisters' birthdays.

I DID attempt a new cupcake recipe for Sister #4, but it was so disastrous it was too shameful to post photos of it.

But I (and my cupcakes) have been redeemed!

Green Tea cupcakes

They turned out really well. They have a chocolate base with a hint of green tea, and the green tea in the icing was conspicuous.

Happy Belated (x10) Birthday, Sister #4, M!!

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-31T23:34:00.004+08:00

I know this is quite badly done. I didn't have the mood to do the decorations like I did last year. But just to make something to commemorate this day, I just cut out some orange fondant I had left over and used edible black markers to draw on them. And that's one sad-looking Jack O'Lantern! Hehe, anyways.....

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Orange Cupcakes with Orange Blossom Buttercream Frosting

2010-10-31T23:26:00.002+08:00

These are from the Primrose Bakery book. The cakes were nice, with only a subtle hint of orange. The frosting was nice too but waaaaayy too sweet! The recipe uses 115g of butter and FIVE HUNDRED grams of icing sugar. And no, I did not follow the recipe. I only used 230g of icing sugar and you can tell because the frosting was so so soft and 'runny'. But even then, it was so SO sweet. I really can't imagine how it would taste like if I had followed the recipe!

Buttermilk Raspberry Muffins

2010-10-28T10:20:00.003+08:00

I had quite a lot of buttermilk left from the scones, so I used them to make these. They are from my new book, 1001 Cupcakes, Cookies & Other Tempting Treats by Susanna Tee, which was given to me by lovely Sister No.3.

They were quite nice and the texture was good too. I gave some to a friend who absolutely loved them! :-)

Buttermilk Scones

2010-10-24T23:33:00.003+08:00

These scones are Nigella's recipe. You can find it in 'How to be a Domestic Goddess' and 'Kitchen'. They were really yummy. I went out and bought clotted cream, which cost a bomb (slight exaggeration there!) but oh, so worth it! I love scones with clotted cream! But if not available, I'll make do with whipped cream :-P

Purple and Orange BIRTHDAY Cupcakes

2010-10-17T21:54:00.002+08:00

My girlfriend ordered 50 cupcakes for a party yesterday. When she first told me that she wanted PURPLE and ORANGE cupcakes, I asked "is it for Halloween??"
Nope.
It's for her daughter's 13th Birthday.

I was a little apprehensive with the PURPLE and ORANGE colour combo... but I think the colour combination turned out quite alright. What do you think??

As 49 cupcakes fit NICELY in a square box (the 50th would be the ODD one out!), I refunded her the money for 1 cupcake. HeeHee :-)

By the way, these are MINIs... half chocolate and the other half vanilla cupcakes - all frosted with vanilla buttercream and then decorated with fondant butterflies and flowers.

Ben10 Alien Force Birthday Cake

2010-10-16T13:55:00.003+08:00

It was my older son's birthday last week. Since he is a Ben10 fan, of course his cake has to be that theme. We had a party for him and there were twenty kids altogether. So I made cupcakes with the edible icing images which my sister bought. I also made a chocolate cake. The green bit, supposedly the 'Omnitrix' is made of fondant but the figurines were all toy ones.

Lazy, Lazy, Lazy!

2010-10-04T20:41:00.003+08:00

Well, as the title of this post suggests, I have been really lazy! Lazy in baking and when I do bake, lazy in taking pictures. And when I do take pictures, lazy in posting them (eg. the previous post). Sigh, how can I chastise my older son for being lazy (in doing his homework or practising his musical instruments or whatever) when his Mummy is the biggest lazybones there is?!? Sigh...sigh...sigh....

I have just received my new cookbook in the post. Well, not 'just received' as it has been more than two weeks. I think. Anyway, that's not important. The cookbook is Nigella's new book, Kitchen. I think she's very funny. And very 'real', if you know what I mean. So far, I have tried a few recipes from the book and all of them 'sweets'.

I tried making the chocolate banana muffins and the brownies. Sorry, no pictures. I can't quite remember whether I forgot or I just couldn't be bothered. The muffins were only so-so. The brownies were better, though I've never been a brownie fan. But I really liked the chocolate pieces in them.

I think I will try chocolate brownie bowls next. They look so delicious. And cute!

Coffee Cupcakes with Coffee Buttercream Frosting

2010-10-04T20:33:00.002+08:00

I actually made these more than a week ago. But I've just been too lazy in posting them. They are from my 'Primrose Bakery' book and they are good! I have to say, I really do like the recipes in this book. The ones I've tried anyway, of course.

These are dedicated to Sister No.1 who celebrated her birthday a week ago Saturday.

Happy Belated Birthday, Sis! I'm sure you had a blast celebrating in Melbourne!

Cupcakes for Teachers' Day

2010-09-13T19:45:00.002+08:00

Teachers' Day was almost two weeks ago, on 1st Sept. A few days after that, I went away on holiday. Hence, the delay in posting this. I made chocolate cupcakes with chocolate buttercream frosting for my older son's teachers. I packed them individually. There were only five of them and I already found it such a hassle to put them in the small cupcake box and to tie the ribbons round them. I don't know how Sister No.1 did FIFTY of them by herself.

For my younger son's teachers, I made carrot cupcakes with orange cream cheese frosting. I kept them simple this time, without fondant or wordings. I included a picture of the cake box here, stuck with stickers that I got from the local supermarket :-)

Lebaran Cupakes 2

2010-09-06T21:49:00.002+08:00

As mentioned in my previous post, the same friend ordered another 2 boxes of Lebaran Cupcakes plus 25 minis for last Friday. These are chocolate and vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting. I kept the design for these Lebaran Cupcakes the same as the previous batch (Lazy to do something different. Lazy is the keyword here. My son chided me for not checking my Cupcake email for potential orders. He said I could have had tonnes of orders but but but..... Hee Hee...)

Anyway, here's the two boxes..taken with my little Point-n-Shoot. Close-up of one box

25 minis

Lebaran Cupcakes...

2010-09-02T10:19:00.002+08:00

As you know, Idul Fitri is literally round-the-corner and many folks are frantically searching for last minute Lebaran gifts and packages...and my dear 'ole friend W is no different. She wasn't sure if she should get me to bake as my spine was still acting-up the last time I met up with her. I assured her I was better... She had ordered 3 boxes of a dozen each..... the flavours were a mix of lemon cupcakes with lemon buttercream, vanilla and chocolate cupcakes with vanilla buttercream - all picked up yesterday.

A box of Lebaran Cupcakes

3 boxes all packed and tied with Ribbons...

She wants another 2 dozen + 1 batch of minis for Friday.... will post that later.

Carrot Cupcakes with Orange Cream Cheese Frosting

2010-08-23T15:48:00.002+08:00

This recipe is from The Primrose Bakery book. There's orange rind in the carrot cupcakes and in the cream cheese frosting. The cupcake is light and soft and not too sweet. In the book, it says one batch of frosting is enough to frost 15-20 regular cupcakes. I ended up baking three times, over three days, just to finish off the frosting. I think I used it to frost about 30 cupcakes. I'm sure if I piled on the frosting, instead of flat-frosting, I wouldn't have so much left. But I think too much frosting would be......well, too much. Don't get me wrong, it was very very yummy. I think the orange goes very well with the carrot. But too much frosting would just overkill the taste.

Anyway, I will definitely make this again as it was so yummy. My older one loves carrot cake. One time we went to a popular cafe here in Singapore and I ordered a carrot cake. I asked my son if this cake was nicer or Mummy's was nicer. He said Mummy's. I said to him, "Are you saying it because it's true, or you just want to make me happy?" He said, "It's true. Your carrot cake is sooo much nicer. I think you should open a cake shop. And call it 'The Famous Sisters' Cake Shop'. " Awww, bless him!

Yellow Buttermilk Cupcakes

2010-08-14T23:27:00.002+08:00

These buttermilk cupcakes are from Martha Stewart's Cupcakes book. I made them when my older son had a playdate and I think the kids really enjoyed them. But to be honest, I don't think I will make them again. Personally, I still prefer the fluffier vanilla cupcake recipe that we have. I know that some people prefer their cakes to be denser but not me. But to each his own :-)

Froggy Cupcakes

2010-07-29T22:40:00.002+08:00

I made these for a friend's birthday last week. No, it wasn't for a child. A quite old man, in fact. Our nickname for him is Frog (for reasons that I shall not divulge here) and hence the froggy cupcakes :P

Star Wars Birthday Cake

2010-07-24T15:13:00.002+08:00

It was my hubby's birthday last week and of course, I baked him a chocolate cake. 'Of course' because he loves chocolate cakes. He's a fan of Star Wars, so instead of the usual simple cake that he always has, I put two Star Wars figurines on it. And voila, we have a Star Wars birthday cake! :-P

We all know that I'm as lazy as can be, so there definitely was not gonna be any fiddling with fondant and moulding and all that. Just get two toy figurines and there you have it! I was actually gonna write 'May the force be with you' but that would be a bit too much, don't you think? :-D

Birthday cake

2010-07-23T12:15:00.002+08:00

A colleague had wanted to bake for her daughter's birthday but had no time in the end so she ordered a chocolate cake from me. This is not the usual chocolate cake that I make as she specially requested it to be the cupcake recipe that I usually used. As she was gonna feed 30 people, I had to buy a new cake tin to make this and estimation was not very good as it turned out to be a little "shorter" than I anticipated. Nevertheless, they all loved it!

Cookies and Cream Cheesecake Cupcakes

2010-07-15T22:52:00.003+08:00

I have finally tried these cookies and cream cheesecakes from Martha Stewart's Cupcakes book. I mentioned a while ago that I've been wanting to try this recipe but somehow just didn't get to it. Well, I finally did! They were very very easy to make. But I wonder if Martha Stewart expect the people who try her recipes to feed an army. Okay, exaggeration. Not an army but maybe two football teams. Most recipes make two dozen to over thirty cupcakes! For this recipe, it makes 30, so I halved it.

They were yummy and the people who tried them all liked it very much. But personally, I prefer the other Oreo cheesecake, the one that I always make :P

Chocolate and Banana Cupcakes

2010-07-10T22:57:00.004+08:00

Yes, I know it has been a looooooooooooooong time since my last post. The month of June was the school holidays here in Singapore and we've been away. So haven't had the chance to bake anything. And after we returned from our holidays, I was just so lazy. And I missed three birthdays in June - my mum, sister no.4 and our sweetie-pie niece, S.

Finally baked something a few days ago. They were chocolate and banana cupcakes with chocolate buttercream frosting. They were actually banana cupcakes with chocolate pieces in them. I got the recipe from 'Cupcakes from the Primrose Bakery' but I didn't use their recipe for the frosting as it requires melting the chocolate. And I didn't have time for that as I made them in the morning. But the cakes were soft and light and very yummy!

It just so happened that my parents were here in Singapore and they brought a couple back to KL. And sister no. 4 had one. So these are dedicated to them for their birthdays ;P

Happy Belated Birthday, Mum, Sister No.4 and Sweetie-Pie S!

Buttermilk Chocolate Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

2010-07-08T11:16:00.002+08:00

Donno why my picture quality is so bad. Anyway, had made dinner last night so this was dessert. Saw the recipe on the Donna Hay's 50th Anniversary Issue and got really excited about it coz it looked so beautiful! In the picture, it was actually four layers of cakes but I didn't have two small round tins so I just made do with one big one. Heh....somehow the taste reminded me of the chinese "kai tan goh"(literal translation is still cake but somehow you have to say it in cantonese to understand what I am referring to). = P

Cupcake Treats

2010-07-01T13:19:00.005+08:00

Tomorrow will be the LAST DAY of school for both my boys....and then it's 7 weeks of looooooooooooooooong lazy Summer holidays.... So what does a good mommy do?
Whip up some mini cupcakes for both the boys to share with their classmates....

One of the Boxes of Cupcakes.....

(Other box is exactly the same)

Yes. yes. I know that I should have arranged them properly and not crookedly. Been a bit disorganised and clumsy today. Got frosting on the sides of the box and on myself too!

And whilst I was at it, I made extra for tomorrow's luncheon at my friend's house. She has invited over a few friends for a get-together before the long break.

Cupcakes for Ladies Luncheon

HAVE A GOOD SUMMER HOLIDAYS, EVERYONE!

Banana Loaf

2010-07-01T13:05:00.002+08:00

Don't know if you all know.....my H does not eat cupcakes. Somehow, he thinks cupcakes are for ladies...and eating a cupcake is UNCOOL for a man...making one unmanly!

Anyway, he has been bugging me to make him a banana cake since I don't know when. I supposed it is high time I baked him something...especially I didn't do so for his birthday. *gulp*
Bad WIFE!

Here is the Banana Loaf that I made last weekend. H absolutely loved it...and kept repeating YUMMYYYYYYYY to my younger son, S2 till he was shouting "Dad! STOP IT!"...

Summer 2010

2010-06-04T17:24:00.002+08:00

Yup. I know. I know. I haven't had a post for ages.... That's because I haven't baked for ages. Have not been feeling well, and then was out-of-town etc...

Anyway, had an order for 26 cupcakes from a friend's friend. Odd number, I know... She wanted 2 boxes of 6's, a box of 4's and then 10 cupcakes with the words SUMMER 2010, with a letter per cupcake. Thought that it wouldn't look too good if they were scattered about. So decided to do this instead....

Cupcakes for an Aunt

2010-05-17T21:08:00.003+08:00

I went to visit an aunt the other day and I made her some cupcakes. They were chocolate with vanilla buttercream frosting - sweet and simple. But I think I was colour-blind that day. I don't know why I thought the roses were pink. Ah, well!

Happy Mother's Day!

2010-05-09T22:59:00.003+08:00

Happy Mother's Day to all mummies!!

Lemon-Raspberry Muffins

2010-05-03T16:51:00.004+08:00

We went on a picnic on Saturday (our first in Singapore!) and I made these lemon-raspberry muffins from Nigella's Domestic Goddess. My older son asked me why I always bake the same thing, so I had to try to make something else. I chose this because I wanted something tangy yet sweet enough for my boys and this looked like an easy recipe. And it was. It was really really easy to make. It was soft and moist and I loved the lemony raspberry taste. Funnily, my younger son would only eat the cake part without the raspberries even though he loves fresh raspberries!

Cupcakes for Husband

2010-05-02T15:59:00.003+08:00

Hahaha.....obviously not my husband. A friend ordered some chocolate cupcakes for her husband and this is the end result. Think I need to get more "guy cutters", all I have are like flowers and butterflies; just too girlie for a guy, right?

Blueberry Swirl Cheesecake

2010-04-29T12:15:00.003+08:00

I made this as a farewell gift to the administrator in my younger son's school. We get along quite well and I will surely miss her.

My Little Munchkin turns 3!

2010-04-29T11:55:00.002+08:00

Well, he turned 3 last week actually. For a few months before his birthday, he kept saying that he wanted a Barney cake to share with his friends. So that was what he got. I bought those edible icing images and they were ready-cut! Unlike the Thomas ones which I got for my older son's birthday. I sure had a tough time cutting them out! And these Barney ones had different images. I was very pleased with them. So I made chocolate cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting, stuck the images on top and piped stars all round. I think they were very well-received by all.

I didn't have any cake left as I brought them all to his school. So when I got home, I baked another cake (for the birthday song with the family at home) - this time a vanilla sponge baked in two sandwich tins. I spread Nutella in-between and just used the leftover buttercream I had from the cupcakes. For his name, I just used one of those ready-to-use gel icing. Hmmm..... now looking at the picture again, maybe I should've sprinkled some hundreds and thousands all around.

Chocolate Cheesecake Muffins

2010-04-26T12:30:00.002+08:00

Heh....donno why but I have been wanting to try this recipe for the longest time ever! Very strange that I just kept trying other new recipes instead of this one since I have been thinking about it. Anyway, finally made it over the weekend. Was a little disappointing because I could not taste much of the cream cheese so it's just like a chocolate cake. On the other hand, I used reduced fat cream cheese so maybe that's why the taste of the cream cheese is not very strong. Hmmm........shall try this recipe again in the future but no this "reduced fat" bullsh*t! ; P

Farewell Party

2010-04-20T21:13:00.002+08:00

A friend of a colleague has tasted the chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting that I made and liked it. So for her farewell party at her company, she has decided to order 50 of them. On top of that, she has also ordered 25 vanilla cupcakes with buttercream frosting and 25 vanilla cupcakes with chocolate frosting. Heh.....this is the first time that I'm using our colour ribbon and sticker, presentation is quite nice right? = )

Cookies and Cream

2010-04-20T21:00:00.002+08:00

Hmmm.....picture a bit blur but it's the only picture that I took.

21st Birthday Cupcakes

2010-04-18T23:28:00.003+08:00

I am really sleepy and tired and my brain is not really functioning. So I have nothing to say except a lady ordered this for her daughter's 21st. :-p

Blueberry Swirl Cupcakes

2010-04-14T22:56:00.002+08:00

This recipe is from my Rachel Lane Wild About Cupcakes book. It uses honey and thus, is sugar-free. The recipe only calls for mashed fresh or frozen blueberries. But since I have some blueberry puree left, I used that as well and mixed it into the batter. That's why the cake is a purplish colour (sort of like a bruise actually :P).

Chocolate Overdose?

2010-04-12T20:08:00.005+08:00

Was a little ambitious the other day when I made a batch of cupcakes and a batch of muffins one after another. I can't really remember why though. Anyway, made Peppermint Slice Cupcakes and Triple Chocolate Muffins. Both cupcakes and muffins have melted chocolate mixed into the batter. The cupcakes are covered with melted chocolate and the muffins have both milk and white chocolate chips in it......heh.......talk about chocolate overdose!!

I love the Peppermint Slice Cupcakes!

PSC is filled with peppermint buttercream(left) Triple Chocolate Muffin(right)

Oreo Cheesecake

2010-04-09T11:21:00.002+08:00

A friend ordered this oreo cheesecake for his ex-boss. He tried it before and really loved it. I have to admit, I don't know how to take the cheesecake out of the tin nicely. The sides are not smooth at all, really rough and jagged-looking. How do people make them so smooth? But, as my friend said, it's a 'damn good oreo cheesecake' :)

This ex-boss that he ordered the cake for must have been a very very good employer. Separately, a colleague of my friend's ordered some chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting for her too as it was her birthday. If I'm not mistaken, I think this lady has retired for a while. And to have your ex-staff still remember your birthday and send you gifts, she must've been one special employer!

Easter Cupcakes

2010-04-06T10:31:00.002+08:00

Yes, this is a bit overdue since Easter's a few days gone. I actually had plans to get some chocolate eggs and pipe 'grass' onto the cupcakes as well as make some bunnies. Er, ahem, of course it didn't work out. I was feeling sooooo lazy that I thought of not making anything at all. Then on Thursday morning, I decided to make carrot cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and just put a carrot on top and voila, cupcakes for Easter! Haha, yep, that is the lazy man's (or rather, woman) way of doing things! I gave these to my younger son's school teachers and my older son's music teacher.

Mocha Cupcakes

2010-04-05T16:43:00.001+08:00

This is my super expensive mocha cupcakes. If I charge according to what I normally charge for a cupcake, I would "sit pun" (lose money) BIG BIG time. =P

Mango Cheesecake

2010-04-05T16:32:00.005+08:00

I have been wanting to make this mango cheesecake since I had it in Singapore when my sister made it. The base is made with Gingernut biscuits instead of the usual digestive ones. I love the taste of the ginger with the mango, the taste just complements each other so magnificently! Anyway, when my sister made this according to the original recipe, the whole cake was rather soft, like "lam pat pat" like that. This time, due to lack of ingredient, I kinda "tweaked" it a bit and the cake turned out to be more solid. Heh.....but as my sister said, it is more fattening!! =P

Birthday Cupcakes

2010-03-27T23:45:00.003+08:00

This was an order from my hubby's colleague. He had the chocolate cupcake with peanut butter frosting and really liked it. And so he ordered some for his little girl's third birthday. I wasn't sure what colour would go with the light peanut butter brown but I was quite sure girly pink wouldn't. I finally decided on orange. I hope the little girl enjoyed her birthday cupcakes.

In Memory of our Beloved Brother

2010-03-21T22:07:00.002+08:00

Today would've been our brother's 30th birthday.

We love you and we think of you always!

Sprinkle, Sprinkle, Little Stars

2010-03-21T21:54:00.003+08:00

Haha, I'm just being lame (re. the title). I made these for my six-year-old's music school today. There was some sort of exhibition for kids (basically enrichment classes!) and he was one of five violinists selected to perform. So I made these for the other musicians. I admit that it was a really shoddy job! I don't know why the buttercream turned out really really soft. And I didn't have enough! So I just flat-frosted them and dumped a lot of sprinkles on top! :P

More chocolate and peanut butter!

2010-03-21T14:30:00.002+08:00

Nuff said.

End-of-Season Party

2010-03-13T20:20:00.002+08:00

Today was the last soccer game of the season for S2's team. And one of the coach had graciously offered to host a party for the team and families. I couldn't exactly show up empty-handed. So this was what I brought... Chocolate Cupcakes with Chocolate Buttercream.

Initially, I wanted to craft individual soccer jerseys from fondant with each team member's jersey number and maybe write down their names on the individual cupcakes. Then I got too lazy, and thought of printing the jerseys from my computer and stick them onto the cupcake with toothpicks. Even that, I was too lazy to do. And decided to have wordings. When the time came to make the cupcakes, I was a real lazy bum. Lazy to even do fondant cut-outs of the letters.

:-P

Green Tea Cupcakes

2010-03-10T19:41:00.002+08:00

Yes, it looked like I had gone AWOL again. Well, I have been baking but they were the same stuff that I always do, so no point in posting them. But the other day, I decided to make green tea cupcakes. I had wanted to make them for a while but just never got round to it.

I looked through ALL my cupcake books but I couldn't find a recipe for green tea cupcakes. So of course I googled it. Oh, sorry, I did a Google search on it (is that right?). There were a few and I chose one from here. I halved the recipe and made 12 cupcakes. The cake was soft and fluffy but I couldn't really taste the green tea. Same with the frosting, and it was waaaaaay too sweet for my liking. You can't see it in the picture but the frosting was a very very pale green. The pictures on the website where I got the recipe from all had very nice green colour. Not sure if it was all natural?

If I make this again, I think I will increase the matcha powder in both the cake and frosting and reduce the icing sugar. Hmmm.....maybe it could be the brand of my matcha powder too. I'm sure that would affect the taste and colour of the cupcakes. Anyway, I WILL try this again. Someday.

CNY orders

2010-03-05T12:09:00.005+08:00

Had a total of three orders over two weeks during the CNY period and I am swearing off cupcakes!! Haha.......just kidding. =P My first order was for a hundred mini chocolate cupcakes. 50 with chocolate frosting and the other 50 with peanut butter frosting. Didn't take a photo of that coz I was crazy busy with rushing them off.

Second order was also a hundred mini chocolate cupcakes but this time, it's all with peanut butter frosting. Friend wanted to give to relatives and requested it to be packed in 20s so had 5 boxes in total.

Then another friend ordered ten vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream and I gave her two free to make a dozen. Thank goodness my eldest sister was in town that day and she helped me with the frosting; if not, I probably would have gone mad rushing it! Thanks Cheh!

Gong Xi Fa Chai - Take 3

2010-02-23T22:43:00.001+08:00

The same friend that ordered the 2 dozen CNY cupcakes earlier ordered another dozen for one of her group meetings. So here they are....chocolate cupcakes with buttercream frosting.

I was feeling a bit off today, and didn't see the block of butter that I used for the frosting. I was like auto-pilot and proceeded to whip the butter with the icing sugar....and as usual, I took a taste. And thought that it was kinda salty. I thought my tastebuds have gone awol with my not-too-feeling-well. Then I walked to my bin to pick up the butter wrapper. Yup. You guessed right. It was SALTED BUTTER. No wonder. Unfortunately, I had run out of butter, and could't make another batch of buttercream frosting. And didn't have the car as well.
I asked my No.1 fan for Chocolate Cupcakes, i.e. S2 to come and have a taste test. He said "It taste like normal. I love it!". Hopefully, my friend would agree as well. I told her that I would give her money back if she is not satisfied with the product....

Soccer Mad??

2010-02-21T20:11:00.002+08:00

My younger son, S2 is turning 10 tomorrow. And to celebrate his turning 10 in the year 2010, we had a party at home yesterday. I had bought a Pinata in the shape of a soccer ball earlier in the week ....sorta by chance. And since he had soccer game both yesterday and today (YUP! Games on both Saturday and Sunday!) , I thought I would just stick to SOCCER for his birthday cakes as well. As my S2 prefers chocolate flavour, naturally all the cupcakes here are chocolate ones...

Mini Cupcakes for yesterday's Birthday Party
(Can you see that it is in the figure 10? And S2's Jersey number is indeed 15....which is also used as "is" here. You can't see it here, but his football boots actually have the WHITE swish Nike sign)

His actual birthday is tomorrow,......and I had to bake more cupcakes for his classmates.

Mini Cupcakes for S2's Class

(It's in a plastic container for easy transport)

A Standard-sized Cupcake with Flowers for S2's Teacher

Extra Cupcakes...which I gave to S2's Friend's Family

Gong Xi Fa Chai - Take 2!

2010-02-21T19:47:00.003+08:00

If you don't already know..., Chinese New Year is celebrated for a total of 15 days. Today is actually Day 8. For many Hokkiens, tonight at midnight is the BIG prayers to "Thi Kong".

These 24 chocolate cupcakes were ordered by my friend, CL for her Vietnamese friend. Vietnamese celebrate their new year in accordance to the lunar calendar too. And they call it "Tet" for short.

Cupcakes all-lined up....

16 cupcakes ready to go into the box....

And two more boxes of 4s....

40th Birthday Cupcakes

2010-02-19T22:56:00.002+08:00

It's a friend's fortieth birthday tomorrow and she had a small gathering today. I offered to make her birthday cake as I didn't know what else to give her. At first, I was planning to make the Valrhona chocolate cake as I know she loves that. But last night, her hubby texted me and said that there would be 30 people altogether. No way was the 9-inch cake gonna be enough. So I decided to make cupcakes. It was quite rushed as I decided to do the letterings, flowers and butterflies using fondant. I made banana cupcakes AND chocolate cupcakes. On top of that, my chocolate buttercream was NOT enough and I had to make another batch. Sigh. Needless to say, we were late, late, late for the party. But I'm happy to say that they were very well-received and the birthday girl loved them.

Gong Xi Fa Cai!

2010-02-17T10:49:00.004+08:00

I know I'm a few days late in posting this but it was the holidays and I was lazy, etc, etc. I was also comtemplating whether to post it or not. I had an order last Friday for 80 chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting and I was to pack them in boxes of 2. I planned to take a picture of the packed boxes but of course, after packing the 40 boxes, I forgot. I just can't help it, I'm old and have the memory of a goldfish. And to prove that, I actually forgot to put in my business cards! Talk about duh!

I made some extra and tried to colour the frosting orange. This is my very sad and pathetic attempt of a tiger. Well, tigers ARE cats! :P

Wishing everyone a happy, healthy and prosperous Year of the Tiger!

GONG XI FA CAI!

Happy Birthday, Sister Number 3!

2010-02-07T20:55:00.000+08:00

True to my word this time - I made these never-tried-before cupcakes in time to honour sister number 3's birthday. I chose this recipe because I think she would really enjoy these! Oh yeah, each time I will endeavour to choose a recipe that I think birthday-sister would enjoy!

Black-bottom cupcakes

i.e. dense chocolate cupcake with a dollop of cheesecake
topped with cream-cheese frosting - yummy yum yum!

Picture shown also includes unfrosted cupcakes - to show how they look underneath. To be honest, I really wasn't sure how it would turn out as I was baking them. The chocolate cake batter looked more like cookie dough prior to baking, and my cheesecake batter wouldn't become smooth and fluffy, like how the recipe said.

But turns out, husband loved, loved them!

Happy Birthday, Sister number 3! Hope you're having such a wonderful time, which explains why I haven't been able to get ahold of you all day!!!!

Busy Busy Day!

2010-02-07T20:46:00.004+08:00

I had two sets of order today. One was for 15 chocolate cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting and 15 carrot cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. And the other was for a dozen chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting and a dozen strawberry shortcake cupcakes. So I had three different kinds of cupcakes and four different frostings to do today. Phew!

The first order was for a little boy's birthday. So, naturally, it would be blue. His mother wanted them plain and simple, so that was what she got.

The other order was for a reunion dinner, so that one was simple too. Nevertheless, still a busy day!

Happy Birthday, Sister No. 3!

2010-02-07T20:33:00.002+08:00

It is Sister No.3's birthday today and so I dedicate these to her. I know the flowers are not very pretty but I tried my best. Somehow, I just can't do the drop flowers properly. Even the leaves look kinda cacat (erm, spastic?). Ah, well! Practice makes perfect! So I will just have to practise more!

Happy Birthday, Sister No. 3! I hope you are having a wonderful day!

Lavender Cupcakes

2010-02-04T10:17:00.004+08:00

They actually tasted really nice! Both icing and sponge were lavender-infused, though it's more obvious in the icing. You can't quite see it in the photo, but it actually had a lovely lavender/lilac colour (sister no. 2's favourite colour) to it!

Happy belated birthday, Sister no. 2!

Some Like It Hot....

2010-02-03T17:42:00.002+08:00

Some like it cold, some like it in the pot, nine days old! Hahaha.....I thought this makes a good analogy for 'different people, different tastes'. I had an order a couple of days ago for a dozen vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting and a dozen chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting. The feedback was that some people found it too sweet. Well, one thing I've learned is that I can't please everybody, so I shouldn't beat myself up about it. Correct?

Really a Long Time Indeed!

2010-02-02T14:55:00.003+08:00

Realised that I haven't baked for ages! My last post here was before my boys' Xmas Holidays...

Anyway, my friend ordered 40 cupcakes to be given to her friend's little girl. Have packed them separately - 24 for school plus 16 in another box.

Here are the photos... NOPE. They are not taken with my new DLSR. This is with my old point-and-shoot under BAD light conditions. Too lazy to move cupcakes to the windows for the natural lighting.

25 Cupcakes in a Plastic Container - For easy transport to school

The remaining 16 cupcakes

Happy Birthday to Me!

2010-01-24T23:43:00.002+08:00

Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to dear OLD me, Happy Birthday to meeeeeeee! :)

I just wanted to post on my birthday presents which I received early from Sisters No. 3 and 4. I had wanted to bake my own birthday cake from a recipe from one of the books but I didn't in the end. A few years ago, if somebody had suggested that I bake my own birthday cake, I probably would've balked at the idea. But now, and I'm sure this has got to do with aging *gasp*, I'm very comfortable with the thought of baking my own birthday cake.

Why didn't I then? Well, my hubby went out and bought me an ice-cream cake. At first, I thought "It's ice-cream. It's not the same. We can have cake AND ice-cream". Moreover, I had already bought all the ingredients. But then, my older son had a birthday party to go to in the afternoon and of course, he would have cake there. And I thought that's just too much cake for him in one day (not to mention the ice-cream, pancake and various other desserts he had during our buffet lunch!). So I decided not to make the cake. Maybe next year!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, Sister No.2!!!

2010-01-24T15:16:00.004+08:00

Made our usual chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting yesterday and it is Sister No.2's favourite so here's to you sis, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

Happy Birthday, Baby Sister!

2010-01-19T18:20:00.004+08:00

These are apple and cinnamon cupcakes from my Sue McMahon book. Yes, it seems that I have tried a lot of recipes from there now. My six-year-old chose this recipe and helped me made them. He creamed the butter and sugar. By that, I meant he switched on the Kitchenaid and stood next to it. He cracked the eggs and poured them in. He stirred in the grated apple and spooned the batter into the paper cases. Erm, okay, okay, I helped him and not the other way round :P

The cakes came out really moist and had a great cinnamon-y smell and taste to it.

These are dedicated to our youngest sister, who lives in Melbourne.

Happy Birthday, V! I hope you had a wonderful day!

Strawberry Shortcake Cupcakes

2010-01-13T22:04:00.003+08:00

These are white chocolate cupcakes with chopped strawberries in them and white chocolate buttercream frosting. This recipe is from a new cupcake book I received from Sister no. 3 - an early birthday present. In fact, I received THREE cake books and one cookbook from Sister no. 3 and Sister no. 4. I will post on them later :)

Anyway, this one is from Wild about Cupcakes by Rachel Lane. They were really yummy and the cake was very soft. But I have to say, it was a tad too sweet for my taste. Probably because of the white chocolate.

I filled the paper cases too full. And when they were done, it overflowed out and the top was very flat, like pita bread! hehe. But after I cut the top off and slapped on the frosting, it looked ok :P

Coffee Cupcakes with Baileys Buttercream Frosting

2010-01-07T15:44:00.005+08:00

This is a backdated post as my kids have not been feeling well. I made these coffee cupcakes with Baileys buttercream frosting for New Year's Day. They are from my Sue McMahon Cupcakes book, though it's called 'Irish Coffee' there.

The Baileys buttercream was really soft as I didn't put as much icing sugar. And there was only a hint of Baileys, which was good enough for me as I'm not much of a drinker (I actually find beer and wine quite .......erm, yucky). But overall, it was a nice combination.

Happy New Year and Wishing everyone a Wonderful Year 2010!

Happy Birthday, Dad! (updated)

2009-12-24T23:28:00.003+08:00

I am now in Malaysia over the holidays and staying at my parents'. Today is our dad's birthday and sister no.4 made a carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. Why am I doing this post if I didn't make it, you ask. Well, because I know sister no. 4 will probably not put up this post. FYI, sister no.4 is the one who had a baby girl six months ago. She HAS been baking quite frequently over the last few months actually. YOU ask her why she hasn't put up any posts :P

Anyway, Happy Birthday Dad!!

p/s: sorry, picture to follow soon.

Here's the pic, a week later :P

Christmas Cupcakes Part 2 (or Take 3?)

2009-12-20T21:51:00.004+08:00

My sister from KL bought me some snowflake plunger cutters (is that what they are called?) and so I decided to try them out as I wanted to give some cupcakes to a friend. It's been raining a lot recently and the fondant was really soft and sticky. Nevertheless, I think they turned out all right and yes, I did make the snowman this time! (Because I only made one :P)

Happy Birthday, Sister No. 5!

2009-12-20T21:41:00.005+08:00

These are dedicated to sister no. 5 who is celebrating her birthday in oh-so-cold London. They are from my Cupcakes by Sue McMahon book. They are sort-of lemon cupcakes. Sort-of because there's only lemon rind in them, no lemon juice nor extract. While the cupcakes were still warm, granulated sugar was sprinkled on top and lemon juice was poured over it. The cakes have a really nice lemony crunch to it.

Happy Birthday, Sis! I hope you have a wonderful birthday!

Christmas Cookie Gifts

2009-12-19T20:42:00.003+08:00

I made cookies for my sons' teachers as Christmas gifts. The jar ones are for my six-year-old's teachers and the pack ones are for the other teachers. No, I'm not playing favourites. It's because it's my older son's final year in the kindergarten, so his teachers get the jars. They are all the same cookies, it's just that the other teachers only get one Christmas tree cookie. If I were to give jars to all the teachers, I'd be up to my neck in cookies and I think I'll just go crazy :P

Indian Inspired Eggless Cupcakes

2009-12-17T22:06:00.004+08:00

After frequent requests for eggless cupcakes, I have decided to give it a go. This is quite a tricky one because I wasn't quite sure whether egg substitutes will be able to bind the ingredients together. First try was a major disaster! The cakes sunk so low, they looked like bowls (Bowlcake? Start a trend, maybe? Maybe not).

Round 2 turned out much better, although, for some reason (and maybe it's my imagination), they're not as tasty (but were still moist). Anyway, doesn't really matter I suppose, considering a cupcake isn't just about the taste, but how it looks like as well!

Round 3 was the first order I got for eggless cupcakes. Since it was for a Hindu Temple, thought I attempt to give it an Indian touch. What do you think?

Christmas Cupcakes - Take Two?

2009-12-17T00:28:00.003+08:00

I have really been MISSING IN ACTION for ages...due to a myriad of reasons.
But I did don the apron and baked some cupcakes yesterday and today. Actually, I baked not because I really want to...but because both my boys had end-of-year Xmas parties at school, and I had a ladies luncheon today etc.. And since I was baking already, I decided to bake some for some good friends as Xmas gifts.

Cupcakes for my S1

Cupcakes for S2
Cupcakes for Ladies Luncheon

Cupcakes for my Friend, CL
(Had another similar box, for my friend WW)

Cupcakes for Friend, SH

This is going to be my last batch of baking for the year... I will be MISSING-IN-ACTION again for another 3 or so weeks. I will be flying back home to Kuala Lumpur on the 19th December...and then off to the States for 2 weeks, and only back here in Jakarta on the 8th of January 2010.

Wishing all a very MERRY CHRISTMAS and a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Happy Birthday, Hubby!

2009-12-14T14:50:00.004+08:00

It was hubby's birthday last Friday, and so I decided to bake cupcakes! 2.5 dozen of them...

The Yummiest Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting

They were bleedin' yummy! The chocolate cakes were moist, and the frosting was smooth as! See my other blog for other yummy looking non-cake foods!

Baked Mango Cheesecake

2009-12-11T21:43:00.003+08:00

Sister No. 4 is visiting with her family, so I made this mango cheesecake. Not because she likes mango cheesecake but because I've been meaning to try out this recipe which I got from the Food & Travel magazine.

The base is the usual digestive biscuits with melted butter. But this recipe required it to be baked for 10 minutes. I have to say this baked recipe is much better than the chilled one that I made a few months back. I will definitely make this one again.

Christmas Cookies

2009-12-10T16:53:00.006+08:00

Yesterday, we had a baking session at my six-year-old's school. It started off when he asked his teacher why they were not making anything for Christmas (they made mooncakes for the Mooncake Festival). So when the teacher told me and said something about making cookies, I volunteered to help out.

We decided that I should prepare the dough and just let the kids cut out the cookies using Christmas cutters. There was something wrong with the oven and it took a long time for the cookies to bake. After they were baked, we had to wait for them to cool down so that the kids could frost them. I made some glace icing and coloured them red, blue, yellow and green.

It was a looooong morning and at first we thought maybe we should've had let them just frost the cookies (without the cookie-cutting process). But we figured we made the right decision because the kids had a blast!

Christmas Cupcakes

2009-12-08T18:10:00.004+08:00

I made these vanilla and chocolate cupcakes for my hubby to bring to his office. I would like to say that I made the snowmen but sadly, I didn't. Of course I bought them, as usual. It just makes more sense (ahem, for a lazy cow like me :P) as the alternative is just way too time-consuming.

The Santa Claus is a non-edible figurine. It came in a pack of five and when I bought them, I didn't really pay attention. I just got the first pack of Santa Claus that I saw. If you look very closely, the SC looks like he's squatting and getting ready to ......er, erm......you figure it out......hahaha.

Blueberry and Cream Cheese

2009-12-02T20:26:00.001+08:00

This is, again, from my Cupcakes by Sue McMahon book. It's actually lemon cupcakes with lemon cream cheese frosting, topped with blueberries and brushed with a blueberry jam glaze. I guess I didn't put enough blueberries and glaze, so it looks a bit 'sparse'. But yummy nevertheless.

Almost fell asleep on my cakes

2009-11-27T00:38:00.006+08:00

Yesterday was a super-rubbish day. Woke up with joint pains due to the changing weather, missed BOTH trains to work and had zero attention the whole day. Trip home was no better as well, with a cancelled train and freezing weather (not quite, but it was REALLY cold).

When I finally got home, I had to make 3 dozen cupcakes. It would've been okay if they were all the same, but I had to make ONE dozen strawberry cc, ONE dozen chocolate and ONE dozen red velvet and ALL for different occasions. It would be quite terrible if I cancelled the orders at the last minute, so I forged on make them. Finally finished about 1am, but caught myself on time from falling into the frosting bowl.

On the bright side, I think they turned out quite well!

Birthday - Red Velvet with Vanilla Frosting

Strawberry Glory

Spring Chocolate

Under The Sea

2009-11-26T23:32:00.003+08:00

A couple of days ago, my ex-neighbour texted me to thank me and to ask if I sell my cupcakes (I had given them some of the snowman/snowflake cupcakes). Her son (who is the same age as my older one) was going to camp and she wanted to order some for him to share with his friends.

She was very flexible in that she didn't mind what flavours or colours they were. So I just did half vanilla and half chocolate. At first, I thought I'd do a Christmas theme then changed my mind as I wanted to use the sea creatures-shaped sprinkles that I have. I didn't want to do all blue again as I've been doing that, so decided to do half blue and half green. There's loads of green under the sea, right? ;)

The sprinkles are shaped sharks, dolphins, turtles, sea lions, fish and sea horses. Hmmm...I wonder if the kids noticed them!