A doll cake dressed like her

sunflower cake

First Birthday Garden themed cake

Doll Cakes and Butterfly Fairy Cakes

A cake marathon

 

My daughter just celebrated her 3^rd Birthday and she’s so thrilled to have doll cakes on her special day.  Since I love making doll cakes,  I intend to make her 3 on her third birthday.  I searched high and low for new designs to make.  I have seen how to make a butterfly cake from  HOWDINI. (video here) and gave it a go. 

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The first inspiration was Leila’s birthday dress, which I tried to imitate the design but couldn’t really get the right color.  Somehow, its similar to that dress.

Second inspiration was butterfly cakes, like that of Barbie Mariposa as it’s her chosen theme.  So butterfly fairies tickled me.  They turned out good and its something new for me to do as well.  The pleasure of making them was such an adventure.

In total, her birthday cakes were 2 doll cakes, 2 butterfly fairy cakes, 60 cupcakes. 1 Doll cake and 30 cupcakes for school. For home party there were 2 butterfly fairy cakes, 1 doll cake and 30 cupcakes. 

1 dollcake for the school and 30 cupcakes

All were made in two days despite the normal day-to-day activities. I can tell that I have improved my speed!  Sigh!

It was fun to do especially the cupcakes with different flowery designs.  The most detailed one is the embroidery on the doll cake for school.

Cupcakes for take-away.  Guest choose any of the designs
and packed in a plastic box at the lower left photo

The chocolate cake is just perfect for a doll cake as it is stable and firm. I’d like to thank my friends, Gwen & JC and Fritzielou for their generosity in sharing my new favorite chocolate cake.  I just love the moisture at the center and soft texture.

Here is the original recipe, but I prefer to reduce the sugar because I like it slightly bitter than sweet. Instead of 4 cups, I put 3 and it was fine for me.

Cookie Monster

3 1/2 c. flour

4 c. sugar

1 1/2 c. cocoa

3 tsp. baking soda

3 tsp. baking powder

2 tsp. salt

4 eggs

2 c. milk

1 c. oil

4 tsp. vanilla

2 c. boiled water

1. Pre-heat oven 350 F
2. Combine all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl
3. add remaining ingredients except boiling water, beat at med speed for 2 min.
4. remove from mixer and stir in boiling water
5. pour in baking pan
6. bake at 350 F for 30-35 min.  For cupcakes, 15 minutes per tray, at the middle shelf.

Birthday Girl Doll Cake - A cake the resembles the celebrant's birthday dress.

I used the same recipe for the cupcakes as well. I personally love its texture. I love it with coffee.

For Buttercream, It is based on the recipe of SERIOUSCAKES but I don't like the taste of the shortening that I could find it here in KL. It has a weird odor and aftertaste, so i used buttercup luxury spread and butter.  It turned out good and the crusting as well works great in this proportion. I'm more concerned on the taste and texture.  I use usually use salted butter to cut the sweetness.

Buttercream: 

1 Cup Buttercup Luxury spread

1/2 Cup Salted Butter

4 cups icing sugar

4 Tablespoons corn syrup 


Beat the buttercup luxury spread, add butter and beat 1 minute more, slowly add the icing sugar whilst continue beating. Add the corn syrup. Note that Butter and Luxury spread should be at room temperature before starting. Should be soft but not melted.

Butterfly Fairy Cake

Butterfly Fairy Cake

Cupcakes with Butter Cream Flowers

 This is a new adventure for buttercream icing.  I never realized that butter cream is so much fun until I saw pictures and videos of cakes made by the lady in "Seriouscakes".  She is such a talent.  If you  like this post, you may like check the link to all videos of seriouscakes and the stuffs she is doing. 

Now for the cupcakes, I chose to make vanilla flavor and I copied the proportion of the ingredients from "cupcake collection" but i rephrase the method because this method works well for me rather than putting all the ingredients in the bowl altogether and mix. 

 Persian Vanilla Cupcakes

Prep: 12 minutes cooking 20 mins

3 eggs

1 Cup butter, softened

1 Cup superfine sugar

These cupcakes I've made for Janet

½ Cup milk

1 ½ Cups Plain Flour

1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 320 degrees F or 160 degrees C.  Line a 12 cupcake tray with cupcake papers.

In a bowl, cream butter and sugar, add eggs one at a time, beat until light and fluffy.

Add milk, flour and baking powder. Add vanilla and stir to combine.  Beat with an electric mixer for 2 minutes until light and creamy.

Pour mixture into prepared cupcake papers until 2/3 full.  Bake 18-20 minutes until risen and firm to touch.  Allow to cool for a few minutes and then transfer to a wire rack.  Allow to cool fully before Icing.

Buttercream topping:

½ cup butter

½ cup shortening

1 tsp. vanilla extract

4 cups icing sugar

3 Tablespoons milk

Beat butter and shortening together until light and fluffy.

Slowly add milk in a steady stream

Add vanilla

Stir in icing sugar, beat until well combined

Beat with an electric mixer for 2 minutes.

To get the consistency you like, you may add more milk (for thinner) and icing sugar (for thicker).

Tint butter cream with food coloring you like.

Birthday Cake : Ben10 and Princess Doll cake

Schenker's and Samantha's Birthday


I haven’t made cakes lately until last week, I got a message from a friend Janet in Kuala Lumpur asking if I’m around to make the birthday cake for her son and daughter to be held in one occasion and she would like to have cupcakes as well. It was a huge celebration as they are celebrating with it their wedding anniversary as well as their parent’s. So there were 2 wedding anniversaries, 2 birthdays and other guests’ birthday. Her son likes Ben10 and her daughter likes Princess. Instead of making 2 cakes she planned to have combined motifs in one cake. This is how it turned out:

The base cake is Madeira Cake, which recipe I got from one of my books. I chose Madeira cake so that it has a solid base for the princess which would be towering above it. The princess cake itself is a plain madeira cake while the base is chocolate marbled madeira cake.


Madeira cake

Good for 12 inch round or 11inch square

Ingredients:

6 cups flour
4tsp. b.powder
2 1/4 Cups Margarine or butter
2 1/2 Cups sugar
10 eggs
4 T. lemon juice



Sift together the flour and baking powder.

Cream margarine/butter and sugar, add eggs one at a time.

Add flour mixture.

add lemon juice.

Beat until mixture is smooth and glossy.

Baking time, approx 2hours 15mins.




This cake is iced in fondant. I will have to make a separate post for fondant recipe that I used and how to dress up the doll. By the way, the doll is not edible. The cake part starts from the waist down.

Doll Cakes

Here are samples of doll cakes I've made, inspired by my friend Joan who makes gorgeous cakes. I really enjoyed decorating this cake. In fact I have dressed the doll twice! It's a detailed work, it can not be rushed but when you order this ahead of time, I can make it for you too!

Chocolate Cappuccino Cake

This post is long way overdue. I made this for hubby’s birthday last week, along with the PORK TERRINE. But, I count on the saying "better late than never". I just don’t have the time to compose this post until now.

Well, this cake may seem complicated when you look at the recipe but if you had been making cakes before, things become simpler. I love the flavor, its mild and creamy with the bitterness of coffee and chocolate that melts the mouth with a sip of coffee, ohh so heavenly.

If you are a coffee lover, there is no reason why you wont like this with your favorite cup of coffee. I’ve bookmarked this in the recipe book waiting to be done for quite a long time. Just waiting for an occasion. Birthday calls for a cake; what is birthday without a birthday cake after all? Source of the recipe is my book which I had for quite a long time and I just flip the pages when I’m looking for some inspiration when there is an upcoming occasion. The book “Cakes and Cake Decorating” by Angela Nilsen, Sarah Maxwell and Janice Murfitt. Below is the recipe that I have copied from the book for this post, but I didn’t follow everything as I have to consider the portion for just the 2 of us. I used a circular pan and cut in half and layered it. If you are wondering why the cake is just half the circle, its because I’m limiting the portion. I don’t want to have big extra cake sitting in the fridge after because I’m sure I will keep on coming back and have a slice and this cake is rich and creamy with lots of goodness… too good for my belly, that is. (winks)

Another alteration for this recipe, I don’t have coffee liqueur, so I just used coffee powder instead. Any coffee powder will do, not necessarily espresso powder.

Chocolate Cappuccino Cake

Ingredients:

175g plain chocolate, chopped
2 tsp instant espresso powder; dissolved in 3 Tbsp boiling water
3 eggs, separated
2/3 cup sugar
Pinch of cream of tartar

Cocoa powder

For the coffee cream filling:

¾ cup whipping cream
2 Tbsp sugar
1 cup mascarpone or cream cheese; softened
2 Tbsp. coffee flavor liqueur
25 g. plain chocolate, grated

For the Coffee Buttercream:

3 egg yolks; at room temperature
5 Tbsp. Light golden syrup
¼ cup sugar
1 cup butter, cut into small pieces and softened
1 Tbsp. instant espresso powder dissolved in 2 Tbsp boiling water
2 Tbsp. coffee flavor liqueur

Procedure:

Make the Cake:

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C / 350 degrees F/ gas 4.

Grease a 40 x 27 cm baking tray. Line with baking parchment. Grease the parchment.

In the top of a double boiler, over a low heat, heat the chocolate and dissolved coffee powder until melted and smooth, stirring frequently. Set aside.

In a bowl with an electric mixer, beat the egg yolks and sugar for 3-5 minutes, until thick and light colored. Reduce speed to low and beat the chocolate mixture until blended.

In a large bowl with an electric mixer with cleaned beaters, beat the egg whites and cream of tartar until stiff peaks begin to form. Do not overbeat. Stir a spoonful of whites into the chocolate mixture to lighten it, and then fold in the remaining whites.

Pour the batter into the prepared tin, spreading into the corners and smoothing the top evenly. Bake for 12-15 minutes until the cake springs back when touched lightly with a fingertip. Sprinkle a clean dish towel with cocoa powder to cover and turn the cake out on to the towel. Peel off the paper and cool.

Prepare the filling:

In a medium bowl with an electric mixer, whip the cream and sugar until soft peaks form. In another bowl, beat the mascarpone or cream cheese and liqueur until light and smooth. Stir in the grated chocolate and fold in the whipped cream. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.

Prepare the Buttercream:

In a bowl with an electric mixer on high speed, beat the yolks for 5-6 minutes until thick and pale in color. In a saucepan over medium heat, cook the syrup and sugar until the mixture boils, stirring constantly.

With the mixer on medium-low speed, slowly pour the hot syrup over the beaten yolks in a slow stream. Continue beating until the mixture feels cool, 5-6 minutes. Beat in the dissolved coffee and liqueur. Refrigerate until ready to use, but bring to room temperature before spreading.

Assemble the Cake:

With a serrated knife, trim off any crisp edges of the cake. Cut the cake crosswise into three equal parts. Place one cake on a cake plate and spread with half of the coffee cream filling. Cover with a second cake and the remaining filling. Top with the last cake.

Spoon about one third of coffee butter cream into a small piping bag fitted with a small star nozzle. Spread the remaining buttercream on top and sides of the cake. Pipe this around the cake with the design. Refrigerate cake until ready to serve. Allow to stand at room temperature for 30 minutes before serving.

Pork Terrine

Pork Terrine

This pork terrine goes well with salad. It can be made ahead of time, at least a day before you are planning to serve it. It can be served as an appetizer or as a main course, depends on what you serve with it. I think potatoes would go well with this as well.

It is my first time trying to make terrine and without any recipe to follow. I just imagined how things would go and with what consistency I was looking for and it worked just right and I'm so pleased with it, especially when you slice and it reveals the black olives and tiny green leaves of thyme. In fact I’m going to explore some more flavors with terrine. Some interesting ideas came up during dinner; hubby suggested fish terrine but use smoked salmon instead of bacon. Hmmm… quite a challenge to figure out how it would work out.

Ingredients:

500 g. minced pork

1 large onion (finely chopped)

4 cloves garlic

Salt and pepper

100 g. black pitted olives

1 Tbsp. Corn starch

1 Tbsp. flour

fresh thyme

300 g. bacon

Procedure:

Preheat oven at 250 degrees C. or gas mark 6.

In a mixing bowl, mix pork, onion and garlic, season with salt and pepper. Using a food processor or blender, blend the mixture until fine. Remove from the blender and add flour and cornstarch. Lastly, add fresh thyme Mix thoroughly by hand. You may want to use gloves as it will be messy.

Line a loaf pan with foil with 3 inch extra on the sides to overlay. Arrange the bacon on top of the foil leaving the ends overhanging the tray.

Put the meat mixture in the lined tray using a spoon. Randomly put the pitted black olives with the sides lying down. Push the mixture with the back of the spoon to make it compact.

Fold inside the remaining bacon that is exposed to cover the meat. Make sure the meat mixture is fully covered with bacon; add extra bacon if necessary

Fold the foil inside to cover the bacon.

Place the pan in a large roasting pan and add boiling water until it reaches half of the loaf pan.

Bake for 1 hour and 30 minutes at 250 degrees C.

Remove the pan and drain extra fat from the bacon by tilting the loaf pan to the sink, but do not remove the terrine just yet.

Put some weight onto the terrine so to keep it pressed and compact and leave overnight in the fridge until ready to serve.

To reveal the terrine, carefully remove the foil on top and turn upside down and completely remove the foil. Serve in slices with salad. If served as a main course, potatoes would go well with it.

Pavlova with Strawberries and cherry

Pavlova – Strawbery and cherry

I’ve been wondering what to do for dessert for a birthday dinner and I’d wanted to try something that I haven’t done before. My inspiration is from a fellow food blogger Margaret of KITCHEN DELIGHTS. Her Kiwi and Passion Fruit mini pavlovas inspired me to do this. My version is a little bit bigger than Margaret’s, as I made 1 pavlova per person.

Although I had pavlova before, made by hubby but I wasn’t so curious by then until now. I can’t find kiwi and passion fruit in the market but I got cherries and strawberries instead. It turned out great but first, it took me a little research on the dessert.

I think its worth to have a little bit of history of this dessert.

Pavlova is a popular merigue dessert in Australia and New Zealand to which both countries believed to have claimed the origin of the dish. The dish is named after Anna Pavlova, a Russian ballet dancer, who had a tour in 1926 and 1929. She was a famous ballerina of her time and her dances best described as light and airy, just like the dessert. Hence, the famous dessert “Pavlova” was named after her.

Well, after knowing such, its time to get to work! Do it!

The good thing with this dessert is you can make the base which is the meringue in advance and just add the whipped cream and the fruits just before serving.

If you have been working with meringue before, you must have been familiar with the stages of the egg white when beaten. Say “soft peak” and “Stiff” stages are very important as to when to start adding sugar and when to stop beating.

Make the meringue:
Ingredients:
4 egg whites
1 pinch cream of tartar, (alternatively salt can be used)
2 tsp. vinegar
1 ½ cup sugar
2 tsp. corn starch
1 tsp. Vanilla essence


Procedure:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C. (Gas 4)
2. Cut baking paper into 5 inch squares (make 6 squares)
3. Draw a circle at bottom side of the baking paper. Use this as a guide when you put meringue in each portion. Set aside.
4. In a dry clean bowl, place the egg whites and cream of tartar.
5. Beat the egg white using electric beater until soft peak
6. gradually add sugar whilst continue beating until
7. Add vinegar and cornstarch
8. Add vanilla essence
9. continue beating until stiff. The meringue must look smooth, silky and holds a stiff peak when you lift the beater.
10. In the prepared baking paper, spoon in the meringue making a circular pattern as per the guide, working from the center, create a small well and spread the meringue to the edge of the pattern.
11. Pipe around the meringue to create a little well, where you will put the whipped cream later on.
12. Bake for 1 hour and half. Turn the oven off and leave the meringue to cool completely inside the oven. It is best to do this at night and leave the meringue in the oven overnight. The meringue should be firm and crisp.
13. Store the meringue in an airtight container until you will use them.




Assemble the Pavlova

1. Whip the cream until soft peak. Sprinkle 2 Tbsp. of icing sugar, beat for few seconds more.
2. Spoon in the whipped cream on top of each of the prepared meringue
3. Place the desired fruit on top of the cream
4. Serve immediately.

Tomato Roses

Here's a garnish that amazed everyone, they thought these were candles! Actually they are tomato roses which I put in each plate with the main course. This garnish makes the plate looks so stunning. Ohh, sorry I haven't took a picture with main course as I was so busy for the preparation. I just got this picture because I prepared it ahead of time and just garnished it when everything was ready. It was a birthday dinner for 6 persons, seated with 3 courses, you can imagine how tight to prepare things on time, no time for picture taking (for foods) we just ate and drank.

The main course was grilled skinless chicken breast served in a bed of asparagus, with mashed potato with parsley.

To make tomato rose, click here to see my old post.