Herman the German Friendship Cake

Hello my name is Herman.
I am a sourdough cake.
I am supposed to sit on your benchtop for 10 days without a lid on me.
You cannot put me in the fridge or I will die.
If I stop bubbling I am dead.

Day 1 : Put me in a large mixing bowl and cover loosely with a tea towel.
Day 2 : Stir well.
Day 3 : Stir well.
Day 4 : Herman is hungry. Add 1 cup of sifted plain flour, 1 cup of sugar and 1 cup of milk. Stir well.
Day 5 : Stir well.
Day 6 : Stir well.
Day 7 : Stir well.
Day 8 : Stir well.
Day 9 : Add 1 cup of sifted plain flour, 1 cup of sugar and 1 cup of milk. Stir well. Divide into 4 equal portions and give 2 portions to friends. Keep 1 portion for later and use 1 portion to cook me tomorrow
Day 10 : I am ready for the final stage.

Add the following to me: 1 cup of sugar, 2 cups of sifted plain flour, 2 heaped tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp salt, 2/3 cup of cooking oil, 2 eggs, 1 tsp of vanilla esssence, 2 heaped tsp of cinnamon. Mix well then mix in 2 chopped cooking apples and 1 to 2 cups of sultanas.  Pour into a prepared cake pan. Sprinkle 1/2 cup melted butter and 1/4 cup brown sugar on top of the cake, then bake for 45 minutes at 170 to 180 degrees Celsius.  Test the middle with a skewer.  You may need to cover with aluminium foil and bake for a further 20 minutes until set.  When baked I can be frozen.

Tropical Trifle

This is my spin on a traditional trifle with a tropical themed twist.  It made its first appearance last Boxing day at the family BBQ but I forgot to snap a picture of it in the chaos.  This trifle was commissioned by Mum for a BBQ.

The layers from bottom to top

• Sponge cake drizzled with rum
• Custard
• Pineapple Jelly
• Kiwi fruit
• Mango
• Coconut Agar Jelly
• Whipped cream
• Passionfruit Pulp

Mango and White Chocolate Cheesecake

I feel like a fraud when I tag "baking" on this post.  Most cheesecakes don't go near an oven!  Recipe from Women's Weekly Christmas edition.

The whipped cream in this cheesecake makes it light and fluffy.  The chocolate makes the mixture nicely sweet and not sour at all.

Crush 100g of sweet biscuits (I used Arnott's Nice) in a food processor and combine with 60g of melted butter.  Alternatively put the biscuits in a bag and bash it with a saucepan or rolling pin or frypan.  You get the idea. Press the crumbs into the base of a springform pan with the back of a tablespoon. Melt 200g of white chocolate buttons in the microwave by heating on high for 30 seconds at a time and stirring.  Whip 300ml of cream and set aside.  Beat 500g of cream cheese with 110g of caster sugar.  Fold in whipped cream and melted white chocolate.  Dissolve 1 sachet or 3 tsp of gelatine powder in hot water and add to the cream cheese mixture.  Pour into springform tin and refrigerate overnight.  Add 2 mangoes to the top of the cake before serving.

Happy Birthday my Love

Your favourite on your special day xo

Orange Almond Cake

This is a traditional Jewish Passover dessert from this episode of Food Safari.  I followed the recipe and found it was wonderfully moist with a slightly bitter taste from the inclusion of whole oranges.

If you don't like the bitter complexity of this cake, you can always substitute the boiled oranges with the rind of 2 oranges and 2.5 cups of orange juice.  You may need to increase the sugar to 300 grams to suit mainstream taste buds too.  Personally, I dislike too much sugar in my desserts.

I found I needed about 90 minutes at a lower temperature (160 degrees C fan forced) to stop the top burning.  In my opinion you can always decapitate the burnt top of a cake but it's harder to save a sunken cake so make sure your cake doesn't wobble when you move it and the skewer comes out clean-ish.

Damn you Food Safari!

Cooking shows are really dangerous for my waistline. I cant' stop eating these delicious madeleines by Guillaume Brahimi. The recipe is simple and they are so pretty and delicious!

Easy Banana Cake

This is a much loved recipe from my dear friend D. Not only is it a good simple recipe, it makes really good use of over-ripe bananas that are frankly too expensive to waste.

3 oz sugar

3 oz unsalted butter

1 egg

2 tbsp milk

1 tsp vanilla essence

2-3 mashed bananas

4 oz self-raising flour

Cream together butter and sugar. Beat in egg, milk and essence. Add 2-3 mashed bananas then sift and fold in flour. Bake at 170 degrees C for 30-35 minutes in a small bread tin. Serves 4.

Oldfashioned Cheesecake

This is my attempt at Nigella Lawson's "Old Fashioned Cheesecake" recipe. It's a tad fiddly if you ask me as you have to pre-bake a biscuit base then whip cream and egg whites to mix into the cream cheese. I guess that is what you'd do in days before powdered gelatine. I also found the quantities for the biscuit base were insufficient to properly cover the baking pan she specified. I might stick to Mum's cheesecake recipe which calls for crushed Scotch finger biscuits and powdered jelly mix.

The finished cake is quite nice, but not quite sweet nor lemony enough for my taste. The cheesecake has a lovely soft marshmallowy texture and the biscuit base is soft and chewy which is quite nice.

Pandan Cake

Aka... that green sponge cake you see at Asian grocers.

In her cleaning frenzy, my Mum gifted me her baba cake tin which got me really excited. I've been sitting on a Pandan Cake recipe for a while because I didn't have the special donut shaped, loose-bottomed baking tin you need to make the traditional cake. According to Poh from Masterchef you need to cool the cake with the tin inverted so it doesn't deflate so you should definitely use the proper tin.

Best Recipe Ever. I had the cake up and ready in under 2 hours which is fricking awesome if you ask me. Only 25 minutes to bake and you dont' even have to grease the tin. In fact if doesn't work as well if you do. Score.

Pandan Cake
Preaheat oven to 160 degrees C and seperate 5 eggs. Whisk egg whites with 1/2 tsp cream of tartar and add 75g white sugar gradually until stiff peaks formed. In another bowl, whisk egg yolks, 75g white sugar, 1/4 cup coconut milk, 5 tbs vegetable oil and enough pandan extract to turn it all bright green (I think I used about 1/2 tsp). Sift in 150g SR flour and fold in. Also fold in egg white mixture. Bake in a 23cm baba tin for 25 minutes or until golden brown and skewer comes out clean. Invert over a cooling rack and let it cool. Run a knife around the tin when ready to invert.

Chocolate Mud Cake with Ganache

This is a very easy cake, made to to serve 8-12. You don't need a beater or mixer if you cut your softened butter into 1 inch cubes or zap it in the microwave first.

Put 3 eggs, 3 cups of SR, 2 cups of sugar, 1.5 tsp vanilla extract, ¾ cup of cocoa powder, 2 tsp of baking soda, 200g softened butter and 1 cup milk in a bowl and pour 1 cup of boiling hot coffee over it. Stir for 2-3 minutes until smooth and the butter has melted. Pour into prepared tin and bake at 160 degrees for 1 hour. Cool the cake completely and refrigerate for a few hours if possible. Ice with chocolate ganache (hot cream poured over equal part grated/chopped dark chocolate, stir until smooth).

Recipe by Annabel Langbein

Chocolate Cake

I was reminded of this cake recipe when thinking of my London cousins. They mentioned this cake when I visited in 2008. Must have been a good cake because I made it for them over 10 years ago! I hadn't baked it in quite a while so I thought it was the ideal recipe to test out my new flour sieve toy (thanks ebay).

Before I forget, congrats to J2 who aced his piano exams and shout outs to J1 for the entertaining photos on FB on college life in Cambridge. This one is for you.

200g dark cooking chocolate
1 tbsp instant coffee mixed in 1 tbsp hot water
200g butter
200g sugar
5 eggs
150g SR flour

Preheat oven to 170° C and grease and line a cake tin. Melt chocolate. The microwave always works well. Let the chocolate cool slightly. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy and beat in eggs. Add the coffee then chocolate. Sieve flour and fold into mixture. Pour into prepared tin and bake for 50-55 min.

Vanilla Cupcakes

Ok, in spite of votes for more chips, bacon, biscuits, bacon biscuits and Chocanna muffins; I've decided to cook the premeasured store-bought Vanilla Cupcake mix that's been sitting in my cupboard for the better part of 3 months. Gee I wonder why? :P

It's not yet frosted but W says they're delicious.
WHEEE ... What to cook next?!