Croissant Bread Pudding

I never had bread and butter pudding before (until now). The idea never really appealed to me. Bread soaked in milky custard. It sounded soggy and rather unpleasant. How wrong was I? Though it wasn’t love at first bite, it was rather nice! It’s rich, moist and perfect for winter.

Bread and butter pudding is a great way to use up stale bread. Breads are soaked in custard and baked until they are set. It can be served with fruits, chocolate sauce, etc. It is a popular Australian dessert, especially for kids.  S said that it was something he loved and reminded him of his childhood (his mom made this often when he was a kid). I think it makes a great snack for kids. It got bread, milk and eggs (and of course, sugar). Doesn’t it resemble a breakfast recipe? Sure is, I made this in the morning and had them for breakfast dessert (after let the bread soak up the custard overnight).

This one was baked in square tin andserved with sesame ice cream

I used recipe from Tartine cookbook. Instead of white bread, I made this with stale me-made croissants. Isn’t it great to turn stale croissant to something absolutely delicious. S loved it so much and he was like, “now, we don’t have to give away croissants anymore ‘coz we can turn them into this”. Umm, don’t think so, I still like to share the buttery croissants with others. Though, we are both active persons, I don’t think we can keep up with eating 12 – 15 croissants every weekend. I say, let’s continue with the spirit of sharing croissants as usual.

Sour Lemon Cake - Dangerously Delicious

It’s time to revisit our all-time favourite cake; sour lemon cake. This cake is so dangerously delicious. So much so that I rarely make it as we would finish the cake in no time, way too quickly. Now, I only make this cake once a year (my disgruntled partner is not liking th idea).

It is a simple cake made with loads of lemon and its zest, and sour cream (and very quick to make). The cake is moist, rich, tart and zesty. The recipe came from Donna Hay magazine when they did feature on Bundt cakes few years ago. The feature was so beautiful and mouth watering that I rushed out to buy Bundt tins (yes, more than one tin, I’m really hopeless like that).

Bundt tin is decorative tin with tube in the middle. The tin works well with denser cake as the tube helps baking the cake evenly. I love cake baked in Bundt tin as it is pretty with little effort. It is also easy to portion the cake for serving following the ridges on the pattern.  

Rosewater Meringue

I started to think I had some sort of love affair with meringue. I love its sweetness and delicate crisp texture that melts in the mouth.

Apart from my biggest love affair with Macaron (the almond meringue cookie), I also love Pavlova; Australian (or New Zealander?, the argument  is an ongoing one on who actually can claim the title) famous Summer dessert.

I have made macarons way too many times and Pavlova quite a number of times but strangely enough, I have never made meringue. I mean pure meringue, little kisses kind of meringue just on its own. I was thinking about it and looking for the recipe few times but never feel motivated enough to make it. I think some recipes also make it too complicated as well and it was kind of put me off. For example, one of the recipes I came across suggested baking the meringue at really low temperature (around 100C – 120C) for hours and leaving them to dry for hours after that for the perfect crisp smooth texture.

Krantz (yeast) Cake with peanut praline and chocolate filling

I found this recipe in Dan Lepard’s Exceptional Cake cookbook. Given that it was book about cake, I didn’t expect to see baked goods with yeast in there, especially not for the dish called Krantz Cake.

Apparently (quoting Dan Lepard) yeast cake is a feature of German baking. I was curious to find out how yeast leavened cake would be different from baking powder or soda.

I expected the cake to have texture of soft bread, like brioche, something soft but still feel like bread. It actually turned out to be quite cakey soft, which I think resulted from the mixture of butter, egg yolks, cream cheese and sour cream in the dough (lots of fat and sugar going in there, which, come to think about it, was typical for cake). However, it wasn’t as crumbly and fluffy as the usual cake. It still got some chewy texture in it, which was rather nice. 

Lemon Cheesecake Macarons

Winter is the time where we have more lemons than opportunities to use them. Our house is full with lemons collected from S’mom. She grew the juiciest lemon ever. We don’t know what kind of lemon it is. It has thin skin and full of juice, which makes them perfect for making lemon curd and baking.

I’m not complaining for having lots of lemons. You can never have too many, really. They are versatile in baking and cooking and we are fond of them. They are good with roasted chicken, pasta, custard flavouring, tarts, drinks and the list can go on and on. And if all else fails, we can always turn them into lemonade. 

Among our many favourite lemon dishes, lemon curd is on the very top. I love them as is, as tart filling, and of course, with macarons. It was one of the first macaron flavours I made and love. Not only its tartness and zing complement the sweet delicate macaron shell well, it is also a perfect way to use the leftover egg yolks.

Lemon Madeleines - a yummy snack in a flash!

Madeleine is mini sponge cake baked in shell-shaped pan. It is one of the classic French cakes. It is very easy and quick to make yet so nice and attractive, almost effortless to make.

Lemon Tart - simple, classic, delicious

Getting into winter, there are abundant of lemons around. This is the time of the year when I have more lemons than I can chew. S mom has a very productive lemon tree and she gave them to us whenever we saw her.

There are a number of lemon recipes we love. Our most favourite lemon recipe is lemon tart. Lemon tart can be made in few different ways, bake or no-bake, butter or cream to emulsify and set the tart. All produce good results. Well, hardly anything can go wrong with lemon tart.

I made the tart using the recipe from Michel Roux’s fabulous Eggs cookbook. I never thought that a cookbook with egg theme could contain such wide variety of recipes, from pastry, ice cream, dessert, to pasta. It is a humble and simple ingredient with endless possibilities. 

Sourdough Pancake with Poached Pear

I’ve been wanted to try making sourdough pancake for quite sometimes. It was regularly suggested by sourdough bakers as a good way to use the starter discard from the feedings.

I make pancake rather often. And I was curious to find out how well sourdough starter would leaven the pancake batter and the taste it would give.

I used the recipe from King Arthur website. The recipe is for sourdough waffle and also good for pancake. Looking at the photo on the site, I was tempted to get the waffle iron. Well, pancake will have to do for now. Unfortunately, I don’t have space in the kitchen for more gadgets.

Daring Baker's Challenge - Maple Mousse Tart

The April 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Evelyne of the blog Cheap Ethnic Eatz. Evelyne chose to challenge everyone to make a maple mousse in an edible container. Prizes are being awarded to the most creative edible container and filling, so vote on your favorite from April 27th to May 27th at http://thedaringkitchen.com!

As you might have guessed, Evelyne came from Canada, the land of maple syrup and my favourite breakfast dish, pancake with maple syrup and crispy bacon (what a great way to start the day, sweet and savoury at the same time). Her proposed dish was maple mousse served in crispy bacon, very interesting. Though, I would love to know how the mouse would taste like with the crispy bacon. I didn't follow the idea.

Inspired by my new book, “Chocolat: The Chocolate Bible by Le Cordon Bleu”, I intended to make chocolate cup from tempered chocolate to fill the mousse in. It was my first time making the chocolate container and tempering chocolate. Umm, it wasn’t easy. Tempering chocolate wasn’t too bad. But I had trouble taking the chocolate cup out of the mould in one piece. They were broken into pieces.

Portuguese Custard Tart - pasteis de nata - Accidental Dessert Hero

Throwing away food is something I find difficult to do, and as such, the very first time I made Portuguese custard tarts, it was because I had a heap of egg yolks left over from making a pavlova, the queen of Australian meringue desserts.

By browsing through cookbooks and online, I came across a tart that is the perfect candidate for the yolks, Portuguese custard tart. And now, the tart is a great way to use up the egg yolks from making all those macarons.

This Portuguese custard tart, Pasteis de Nata in Portuguese, is a favorite of many of my friends and family. My niece loves it, my workmates love it, my friends love it, they asked that I posted the recipe. Comes to think about it, I still haven't come across anyone who doesn't like custard tart. S' mum who isn’t a dessert fan, loves them. She occasionally requests them, and this makes me happy because she gets a treat and I find a good home for the orphan yolks.

The tart is also popular in Hong Kong, and even more so in Macau which used to be Portuguese colony (it explains why the tarts in Macau are so good). So, Asians love them, Australians love them, custard tarts are so universally appealing, in Bangkok last year, KFC (the fried chicken franchise) launched them which made them even more popular.

Custard and puff pastry, is everything you would want in a sweet snack, creamy custard with buttery crisp and flaky pastry.

I used the recipe from Australian Woman’s Weekly Cook Book: How to cook absolutely everything, but adapted the method from the food channel in UK, by baking blind the puff pastry before baking the custard.

Note: Apologies to UK food channel, I haven’t been able to locate the site I visited, hence I was unable to provide the link or gave credit where it’s due.  

The typical characteristic of this tart is the browning on the custards, which is, apparently, not easy to achieve. It’s a balancing act to get browning without the custard curdling. I have made this tart a number of times in the past two years. For reasons yet known, blind-baking the tart case leads to the custard browning and retaining a silky smooth texture.

This batch was baked without using blind-baking.
The tart was sligthly curdled and the brown spots were hardly there.

Not blind-baking the tart means having to bake the tart much longer to achieve the brown spot. Even so, there were only a tiny amount of browning and the custard slightly curdled. Therefore, blind-baking (filling the tart case with pie weights and bake for 10-15 minutes before putting the tart filling) is highly recommended if you want the true characteristics of Pasteis de Nata.

For the pastry, I used my home-made rough puff pastry. Rough puff pastry won't rise as much and gives as many layers as the classic puff pastry but tastes equally good. It’s so much simpler (and quicker) to make. You can also use store-bought ready-rolled puff pastry. However, I encourage you to give rough puff pastry a go, it's very easy and you'll love it. If you make your own puff pastry, you’ll need to prepare it about 4 hours in advance or even the day before. Puff pastry can be frozen for up to 4 weeks. Making a big batch and freezing it as portions will save you heaps of time later on if you want to make things like sausage rolls, pies, tart tartin, pissaladiere, etc. etc.

Here is the recipe...

Portuguese Custard Tart (Pasteis de Nata) recipe
adapted from Australian Woman Weekly's Cook: How to cook absolutely everything 

makes 12 tarts

Ingredients
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup (110 g) caster sugar
2 tablespoons (30 g) cornflour
1 cup (250ml) cream
1/2 cup (125ml) water
strip of lemon rind
2 teaspoons vanilla extrac
1 sheet ready-rolled buttered puff pastry or half of rough puff pastry recipe below 

Preheat oven to 220 c / 200 c fan-forced. Grease 12-hole (80ml) muffin pan. Whisk egg yolks, sugar, cornflour, cream and water in medium saucepan.

Add rind; stir over medium heat until mixture just comes to a boil (keep stirring to prevent custard become curdling). Remove from heat immediately. Remove rind; stir in vanilla extract.

Cut puff pastry sheet in half; stack halves on top of each other. Stand about 5 minutes or until thawed (you don't need to thaw your home-made puff pastry as long as it is not frozen). Roll pastry up tightly, from the short side; cut log into 12 x 1 cm rounds.

Lay pastry, cut-side up, on lightly floured work bench; roll each round out to about 10 cm. Push round into muffin pans.

Blind bake the tart case at 220C for 10 minutes. To blind-bake the tart, line each tart case with non-stick baking paper, fill the tart cases with pie weight (ceramic or steel weights) or dried rice or bean.

Remove pie weights or beans, and fill the tart with custard to about 0.5 cm from top.

Bake tarts about 20 minutes or until well browned. Transfer to wire rack to cool.

Crisp, flaky pastry. Slight swirl at the bottom of pastry.

Rough Puff Pastry recipe
from Michel Roux's Pastry: Savory and Sweet

make 600 g

250 g plain flour (all-purpose flour)
250 g cold butter, cut into small cubes
1/2 tsp salt
125 ml very cold water

Note: you need very cold water so that the butter won't melt when water is incorporated into the dough.

Heap the flour and salt together on the counter and make a well in the centre (you can also work this in a big mixing bowl).

Gently rub butter into the flour until the dough becomes grainy (rough breadcrumbs texture) and butter is roughly incorporate.  

Gradually add cold water and mix until it is all incorporated and comes together as a dough ball. Do not overwork the dough as we don't want any gluten development and a tough pastry as a result.

Roll the dough into a ball and wrap in a cling wrap. Chill for 30 minutes.

Dust the work bench with flour and roll the dough into 30 x 15 cm rectangle, approximately. Fold it into three, like a letter fold. Give the dough a quarter-turn (you will now roll the dough in a different direction from previously). Roll the dough into 30 x 15 cm rectangle and do the letter fold again (fold into three). These are the first two turns. Wrap the dough in cling wrap and chill for another 30 minutes.

Give the cold dough 2 more turns (these are the final two turns), rolling and folding as before. This makes a total of four turns, and the pastry is now ready to be used. Wrap it in a plastic wrap and chill for at least 30 minutes before using.

The left-over dough will last in the freezer up to 4 weeks. Freeze them in portions in a zip-lock bag or cling wrap.

Daring Baker Challenge - Orange Blossom, Chocolate and Raspberry Panna Cotta

panna cotta served on florentine cookie and with a macaron!

It’s my second month doing The Daring Baker’s challenge. It was fun participating in the Challenge and I learned a lot along the way. It was fascinating to see how one recipe can create so many variations and that The Daring Bakers members are so creative.

The Challenge is revealed on the first day of each month.  Each month, I can’t wait to see what would be the challenge for the month. It has been so much fun.

The February 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Mallory from A Sofa in the Kitchen. She chose to challenge everyone to make Panna Cotta from a Giada De Laurentiis recipe and Nestle Florentine Cookies.

Panna cotta is an Italian dessert with a soft jelly texture. That would be served as is or with fruits, biscuits, sauces, and the like.

I love panna cotta and make them quite often. It is a delicious dessert that is so easy to make, truly simple yet so special.  Usually, I would make a simple vanilla panna cotta and serve them with fresh fruits, e.g. fresh strawberries soaked in orange juice and a bit of sugar.

My improvised panna cotta mould

 However, being a part of the Challenge, it feels like I have to do more. So, instead of a simple one-flavor panna cotta, I opted for three-favour, three-layer panna cotta, with orange flower, chocolate and raspberry layers, served with Florentine cookies and raspberry coulis.

The Florentine cookie was also part of the challenge. I have never made this cookie before or had one, for that matter. The cookie was really nice. It resembled Oat Crisp cookie a little, only sweeter, much sweeter. I never thought of serving biscuit with panna cotta before. So, I was pleasantly surprised that it worked so well.

Making three-layer panna cotta was quite involved as I needed to make two different types of milk jelly and raspberry jelly. Additionally, I would have to wait for each layer to set before I can pour another layer on top of it, to make sure that layers will totally separated. The panna cotta mixture also needed to be completely cool before being poured into the other layers.

Three-layer panna cotta tasted really good.  The flavors worked well together. It made the eating experience more enjoyable and never boring. It was worth the effort. Oh, and the presentation was great with the multi-color layers too.

Delicious!

I love The Daring Baker Challenge! Can't wait for next month's!

Note: you can check out the recipe and have a look what other DB members have whipped up for the challenge at The Daring Kitchen website.

Blueberry Mousse Joconde Entremet with a little heart

I totally love my first Daring Baker Challenge last month, where I made strawberry chocolate mousse joconde entrement dessert. It was so enjoyable that I did it again but this time with the blueberry mousse filling.

This time, I made them into smaller cakes for individual serve. The recipes for joconde (almond sponge cake) and decorating paste are the same and you can found them here as well as the how-to-assemble-the-cake.

I changed the colour of the décor paste to purple (mix the red and blue colours together) to match the blueberry filling. I filled the dessert with blueberry mousse using Michel Roux’s recipe from Pastry: Savory and Sweet. The mousse tasted heavenly. It is so light and refreshing. It is an elegant dessert that is perfect for special occasion, like Valentine's Day:)

I also use heart-shaped cookie cutter to cut small heart pieces to decorate the dessert. It is to add some Valentine’s spirit into the cake:)

Blueberry Mousse Joconde Entremet recipe

Adapted from Michel Roux’s Pastry: Savory and Sweet

Make 4 small cakes

For recipe of joconde cake, décor paste and how to assemble the dessert, you can visit my Strawberry Dark Chocolate Mousse Joconde Entremet post.

Blueberry Mousse Recipe
60g caster sugar
300g fresh or frozen blueberry puree (made in a food processor and strain it through fine sieve)
8g leaf gelatin
2tbsp (30ml) creme de myrtilles liqueur (optional)
120g italian meringue (recipe is below)
150ml (2/3 cup) heavy cream, softly whipped
20-30 fresh blueberries, for garnish

Soak the gelatin in cold water to cover. Heat 50g of blueberry puree in a pan. As it begins to bubble, take the pan off the heat, squeeze the gelatin to remove the excess water, then stir it into the hot puree until dissolved. Stir in the remaining 250g blueberrie puree with a whisk. Add the liqueur if using, then delicately fold in the meringue with the whisk. Finally fold in the whipped cream using a flexible spatula.

Italian meringue
make 120 g
70g caster sugar
6g liquid glucose (optional)
1 large egg whites

Put 16 ml (one heap tablespoon) water into a heavy base saucepan, then add the sugar, and glucose if using. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring and skimming occasionally. Use a pastry brush moistened with water to brush down any crystals that form on the inside of the pan. Increase the heat and put a sugar thermometer into the boiling syrup. When it registers 110°c, lower the heat to minimum.

Keeping an eye on the syrup beat the egg whites to stiff peak, either by hand or in an electric mixer. The moment the syrup reaches 121°c, take the pan off the heat and let the bubbling subside for 30 seconds. Pour the syrup in a thin, steady stream onto the beaten egg whites, whisking at low speed.

When all the syrup has been absorbed, continued to beat at low speed for 15 minutes until the meringue is almost cold (30-35°c). It is now ready to use.

Coconut Sago Pudding with Fresh Corn (สาคูน้ำกระทิข้าวโพด) - a good reminder of my home

Sago pudding (สาคูน้ำกระทิ) is a typical dessert in Asia. Tapioca, black beans, mung bean, sweet pumpkin, corn (to name a few) are cooked in coconut milk flavoured with pandan. Pandan is the Asian cooking equivilant of vanilla.

I usually don't make much Asian desserts. I suppose I am more excited with something new to me, like western style dessert, something that I didn't grow up with.  It's the curiosity nature in me.

Until S and I went to Thai restaurant and we had the sago pudding and that he raved about how much he loved it (he actaully raved about it even before we went to this place, how beautiful the sago pudding was at this restaurant). Well, I told S that it was so easy and cheap to make and that I had no idea he loved this kind of dessert. It's something seriously easy and can be done at home.

We just started our communual vegie patch this year and the corn is now ready to be picked. So, it was perfect opportunity to make sago pudding with fresh corn. At first, the idea of growing your own vegies was very intriguing for me as well. Coming from Asian background, we don't grow anything because it is so cheap to buy and fresh produces are always available at a shop just around the corner. So, now that I started growing my own herbs and vegies, I just realized how easy it was and how good it was to have fresh produces whenever you want to.

Our vegie patch gaurd

Freshly picked corn cobs are so sweet and it works perfectly well with the sago pudding. It adds texture, sweet taste, more glutinous effect and colour to the pudding.

Fresh corns from our vegie patch

You can buy sago (small tapioca pearls) from Asian grocery store. The same go with pandan leaves, you can buy it fresh or frozen from the Asian store.
Sago pudding is a delicious dessert that is quick and easy to make. All you have to do is dump everything in the pot, let it boil, stir it occasionally and that's it. Here you go, the easiest yummy dessert you can do it at home.

I'm submitting this post to Weekend Herb Blogging hosted by Astrid at Paulchens FoodBlog.

Coconut Sago Pudding with Fresh Corn Recipe

สาคูน้ำกระทิข้าวโพด (sa-koo-nam-kra-ti-kao-pode)

INGREDIENTS
3 pandan leaves, tied into knot
1 cup (200 g) Tapioca (small pearl)
3 cups water
1/3 cup sugar
1 cup coconut cream
2 fresh corn cobs, remove the corn kernels, or 1 cup frozen corn kernels
pinch of salt

METHOD
1. Soak tapioca in a large pot filled with water (in the recipe) few hours before making the pudding. However, if you run out of time, you can skip this process and add more boiling time for tapioca.

2. Place the pot filled with tapioca over medium-high heat. Put the knotted pandan leaves into the pot and bring the mixture to the boil.

3. Once the mixture is boiling, reduce the heat to medium-low and continue to cook tapioca for another 5 - 8 minutes until the tapioca become translucent.

4. Put coconut cream and corn kernels into the tapioca mixture. Continue cooking for a further 5 -8 minutes until the mixture is sticky and the corn is cooked through.

5. Mix in sugar and salt.

6. Serve the pudding at room temperature or slightly warm, with a dash of coconut milk on top (optional).

Every spoonful of the dessert makes me feel nostagic
Aroy mak (very delicious in Thai)

Strawberry Chocolate Mousse Joconde Entremet - The Daring Baker Challenge

This is my first Daring Baker challenge. Actually, December’s should have been my first challenge but I was away and had no clue about how the Challenge works.

Being a Daring Baker member feels like I am a member of the ‘Secret Society of Baking” as the Daring Baker’s rule indicates that thou shall NEVER discuss the Daring Baker Challenge with anyone before the reveal date, which is on/after 27^th of each month. If you do, your membership to the “Secret baking Society” will be revoked.

The January 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Astheroshe of the blog accro. She chose to challenge everyone to make a Biscuit Joconde Imprime to wrap around an Entremets dessert.

Joconde imprime is a decorative paste baked into an almond sponge cake (Joconde).  The sponge cake is then cut into various shapes to line and used to wrap dessert in a ring mould.

I felt a bit overwhelmed when I first saw the long list of recipes and processes I had to follow. It all looks quite foreign and too professional for me. I also can’t give this challenge a miss. It will be bad to miss two challenges in a row and my membership to the Secret Society could be cancelled. It felt that it was rather difficult for the first challenge.

In fact, this dessert/method is very doable and I really enjoyed the challenge. Thanks to Astheroshe at blog accro for introducing us to this. If it wasn’t for her challenge, I wouldn’t have thought about ever attempting this dessert myself.

It was also a perfect timing to make a beautiful dessert for my workmate’s pre-wedding celebration (yippee, killing two birds with one stone). I chose to make Joconde/Imprime filled with dark chocolate mousse and topped with fresh strawberries to be in line with her black-white-red wedding theme. Plus, I love cooking whatever are in season. Not only they cost less, they also taste better. And strawberry is totally in season at the moment.

The finished product was seriously impressive. I couldn’t believe I could pull off anything this pretty. Not only it is so beautiful, it also tasted heavenly. Dark chocolate mousse worked really well with sweet yet slightly tart strawberry. It was an elengant dessert and looked celebrative.

All of my workmates keep asking how I did the print/design on the cake. And I kept telling them “This is a secret, if I tell you, I’ll have to kill you” “I can only tell you after 27^th January”.

Please do not feel intimidated by the long recipes. I encourage you to give it a go and visit The Daring Kitchen for more information and varieties that the members whipped up for their challenges. They’re all spectacular to look at.  

These are a number of recipes for the composition of Strawberry Dark Chocolate Mousse Joconde Entremet:

1.       Joconde décor paste

2.      Joconde Sponge

3.      Dark Chocolate Mousse with fresh strawberry topping

4.      Making the pattern on Joconde Sponge

5.      How to put the entremet together

Two invaluable tools for this challenge, pastry comb and palette knife.

Strawberry Dark Chocolate Mousse Joconde Entremet Recipe:

Joconde Sponge Recipe

(from Astheroshe of the blog accro)

Make  two ½ size sheet pans or a 13” x 18” (33 x 46 cm) jelly roll pan

INGREDIENTS:

85g almond flour/meal

75g confectioners' (icing) sugar

25g cake flour or all purpose flour (plain flour) 

3 large eggs (about 150g)

3 large egg whites (about 90g)

10g white granulated sugar or superfine (caster) sugar

30g unsalted butter, melted

METHOD:

1. Whip the egg whites and caster sugar until it reaches firm and glossy peak. Put it aside. 2. Sift almond flour, icing sugar, cake flour (or plain flour) together.  (This can be done into your dirty egg white bowl).

2. Gradually add eggs (one egg at a time) to almond flour mixture in a bowl of electric mixer fitted with flat beater. Beat on medium speed until the mixture is smooth and light.

3. Fold in one third reserved whipped egg whites to almond mixture to lighten the batter. Fold in remaining whipped egg whites. Be careful not to overmix.

4. Fold in melted butter.

5. Reserve batter to be used later.

Patterned Joconde-Décor Paste

(from Astheroshe of the blog accro)

Make two ½ size sheet pans or a 13” x 18” (33 x 46 cm) jelly roll pan

INGREDIENTS

100g unsalted butter, softened

100g confectioners' (icing) sugar

100g egg whites (about 3 extra-large egg)

110g cake flour or all purpose flour (plain flour)

Food coloring gel, powder or liquid

METHOD

1. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy in a bowl of electric mixer fitted with flat beater.

2. Gradually add egg whites while the mixer is still running.

3. Fold in sifted flour.

4. Mix in colouring liquid or powder until the desired colour is achieved.

Preparing the Joconde- How to make the pattern:

(from Astheroshe of the blog accro)

 

1. Spread a thin even layer of décor paste approximately 1/4 inch (5 millimeter) thick onto silicone baking mat or non-stick baking paper with a spatula, or flat knife. Place mat/baking paper on an upside down baking sheet (The upside down sheet makes spreading easier with no lip from the pan).

2. Pattern the décor paste – Here is where you can be creative. Make horizontal /vertical lines (you can use a knife, spatula, cake/pastry comb). Squiggles with your fingers, zig zags, wood grains. Be creative whatever you have at home to make a design can be used. OR use a piping bag. Pipe letters, or polka dots, or a piped design. If you do not have a piping bag. Fill a ziplock bag and snip off corner for a homemade version of one.

I used pastry comb to make teh stripe pattern

3. Slide the baking sheet with paste into the freezer. Freeze until the paste become hard. Approx 15 minutes.

My freezer is rather small so I used the cooling rack as an insert
so that I can stack two trays in the freezer.

4. Remove tray from freezer. Quickly pour the Joconde batter over the design. Spread evenly to completely cover the pattern of the Décor paste.

5. Bake at 180°c (160°c fan-forced oven) for approximately 15 minutes or until the joconde bounces back when slightly pressed (I reduced the baking temperature from what suggested in the recipe and decided to stick with common baking temperature for sponge cake).

6. Leave Joconde to cool down slightly. Flip cooled cake on to a powdered sugared parchment paper. Remove baking mat/paper. Cake should be right side up, and pattern showing! (The powdered sugar helps the cake from sticking when cutting.)

Strwawberry Dark Chocolate Mousse Recipe

from The Fundamental Techniques of Classic Pastry Arts

INGREDIENTS

455 g semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chopped into small pieces

375 mm (1 ½ cups) chilled heavy cream

1 gelatin leave or 1 teaspoon unflavoured granulated gelatin

25 mm or 1 tbsp + 2 tsp liqueur of choices (I used 1 tbsp coffee dissolved in 25 mm water instead)

75g sugar

1 large whole egg, at room temperature

1 large egg yolk, at room temperature

300 g fresh stawberry, hulled and cut in half

1-2 tablespoons strawberry jam, warmed

METHOD

1. Fill a large saucepan with about 7.5 cm of water and place it over high heat, bring to a boil, and immediately remove the pan from the heat.

2. Place the chocolate in the heat-proof bowl. Quickly set the bowl into the pan, and make sure that the bottom is not resting in the hot water, and immediately begin stirring with a wooden spoon. Heat just until the chocolate is partially melted.

3. Remove the bowl from the heat and continue to stir until the chocolate is melted completely. Thh chocolate should be liquid but not hot.

4. Place the cream in the bowl of a electric mixer fitted with the whip attachment. Beat on low to aerate and then raise the speed and beat until soft peaks form. Using a rubber spatula, scrape the whipped cream from the mixer bowl into a clean container. Cover with plastic film and refrigerate until ready to use.

5. Wash and dry the mixer bowl and whip attachment and return them to the mixer.

6. Place the gelatin in a small bowl with cold water to cover and let soak for a minute or two to soften. Drain the soft gelatin and melt it with the alcohol (or coffee mixture). This dilute the gelatin and keeps it from sticking to the bowl when added to the mousse mixture. Set aside until ready to use. 

*Make sure that the gelatin is totally submerged in the coffee texture and completely soften. If not, the gelatin won’t melt and blend in with the mousse texture.*

7. Combine sugar with 25 mm (1 tbsp + 2 tsp) water in a small heavy-bottom saucepan, stirring with a wooden spoon until the mixture is the consistency of wet sand. Using a wet pastry brush, clean all the sugar crystals from the sides of the pan to prevent the sugar syrup from crystalising during cooking.

8. Place the saucepan over medium heat and cook without stirring for about 5 mins, or until the syrup reaches 116°C on a candy thermometer (if you don’t have thermometer, this will take approx 4-5 mins for the syrup to reach this stage). This small amount of sugar will cook quickly, so watch carefully. It is important that the syrup cook undisturbed, as stirring might cause it to crystallise.

9. Prepare the  mixture. Combine the egg and egg yolk in the bowl of the standing mixer fitted with the whip attachment. Beat on low to blend. Raise the speed and beat on medium until the eggs are thick and pale yellow. Be careful not to overbeat the egg mixture.

10. As soon as the sugar syrup reaches 116°C, carefully and slowly, and with the mixer is  running, pour the hot syrup down the sides of the bowl. Do not let the syrup hit the whip or it may spatter and burn your skin. Beat for a few minutes, or until just warm.

11. Add the reserved melted gelatin mixture and continue to beat until the chocolate mixture is very smooth and thick. It should be a bit above body temperature.

12. Remove the bowl from the mixer and fold the chocolate mixture into the egg mixture using rubber spatula.

13. When the chocolate has been incorporated, remove the whipped cream from the refrigerator and using the spatula, fold it into chocolate mixture. At this point, the mousse should be smooth, light and airy, with he consistency of soft-peak whipped cream.

14. Put the mousse aside until ready to use. The mousse can also be made a day before and kept in a covered container in the fridge. However, the mousse texture will be denser/not as light.

Assembling the Joconde Entremet

1. Place a springform pan ring on a large piece of parchment paper laid on a very flat baking sheet. Line the inside of the ring with a strip pieces of parchment paper.

2. Trim the sponge cake of any dark crispy edges. You should have a nice rectangle shape.

3. Decide how high you want your “Joconde wrapper”. Traditionally, it is ½ the height of your mold. This is done so more layers of the plated dessert can be shown. However, you can make it the full height.

4. Once your height is measured, then you can cut the cake into equal strips, of height and length. (Use a very sharp paring knife and ruler.)

5. Make sure your strips are cut cleanly and ends are cut perfectly straight. Press the cake strips inside of the mould, decorative side facing out. Once wrapped inside the mold, overlap your ends slightly. You want your Joconde to fit very tightly pressed up to the sides of the mould. Then gently push and press the ends to meet together to make a seamless cake. The cake is very flexible so you can push it into place. You can use more than one piece to “wrap “your mold, if one cut piece is not long enough.

6. Using the cake ring as a guide, cut one or two rounds of sponge, for lining inside of the dessert.

7. Fill half of the cake ring with dark chocolate mousse. Place the round sponge cake piece on top of the mousse. Fill the rest of chocolate mousse on top of that. If another pieces of round sponge is used, top the mousse with the other round cake piece. 

8. Arrange strawberry on top of the cake.

9. Slightly brush the strawberry with warm strawberry jam for a glossy finish.

10. Chill the finished cake for at least 4 hours so that the mousse will set.

11. Sprinkle shaved white chocolate on top of the cake (optional).

Very beautiful dessert that will sure to impress your friends and family