☆Froggie & Penguin Cookies☆

Another cookie day for the girls.

This time, let's try the Froggie & the Penguin Cookies.

To think of it, I had purposely bought the charcoal powder for these cookies. I must say, these charcoal powder was very pricey..and the expiry date was pretty soon in September 2013. So I had to quickly find some recipes using charcoal powder???

Ain't these froggie cookies adorable??

I love the pretty matcha green and the charcoal combination, made the cookies so outstanding.

Mimi couldn't wait for the cookies to be baked and told me that she was very hungry and that she needed to eat the unbaked cookies now.

Nat had also chosen this penguin cookies as she thought that they were very cute.

They were indeed.

Would you bear to eat these cutie cookies??

I had some balance dough left and I let the girls played with them. They were trying to make their own cookie shapes with the rolling and shaping and the decorating. And Mimi was having lotsa of fun, and she thought that these dough were like "playdoh". kekekeke...

"Gingi" in my Pound Cake

I have a "Gingi" in my pound cake.. How about that???

Well, when I asked hubby to take a look at my cake.., I asked him, "Isn't this cute???"

So he replied me and asked me what was that? A star??? I told him, it's Gingerbread Man.. But he insisted that it looked more like a star instead of Gingerbread Man. So I decided to give "Gingi" a little makeover for photography purposes.. LOL...!!!! I gathered, I probably should have started with a heart shaped first before I became that adventurous...:-p

So this was what we need...

A chocolate pound cake. But you could do up with any flavour or colors that you preferred.

Cut them into your desired shapes using a cookie cutter.

You may wished to keep the leftover pound cake for making a cake pop???

I had spread some batter on the bottom of my baking pan, so that "Gingi" will stay in place. Once you had lined up the cutted cakes, topped the baking pan with the rest of the batter.

Here, another new loaf of pound cake with a surprise awaiting for you...

Ta-da...!!!!

"Gingi" is here!!!
As mentioned in the earlier part, hubby said it did not look much like "Gingi", so there's the makeover for it.

Looking sooo much better, wasn't it??

It was pretty much fun doing these pound cake.

But Mimi here, on the other hand, preferred only the deco sugar bits and eating ONLY the "Gingi" part...

-_-"

You may wish to use any pound cake recipe. As for me, I had used OKASHI's pound cake recipe.

Recipe as adapted from OKASHI
(yields 2 x 2"x7" rectangular loaf)
Ingredients:
150g top flour
(I used raising flour and omitted baking powder)
1/8 tsp baking powder
150g icing sugar
150g unsalted butter
1/8 tsp salt
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1 lemon zest

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 170C. Sift flour and baking powder together twice.
2. Beat butter, icing sugar and salt together in an electric mixer until light , fluffy and pale. Takes about 10 minutes.
3. Add flour and baking powder mixture and fold through completely using a spatula. Surface of the batter should be smooth and glossy.
4. Pour the batter into the prepared loaf tin and bake for about 50 minutes.
5. When the cake is done, remove it from the loaf tin and place on a wire rack to cool. Wrap with cling film before storing.

"Oink Oink" Cookies

Another adorable cookie is here...

"Oink Oink" is here... Eat me!!!

I think my little Oinky has a squarish face instead of a round one...kekeke..
Nevertheless, they still looked good and tested GREAT!!!

Once you get the hang of "playing" with these doughs, you will not stop.

It is pretty fun actually:)

超可愛！小本廚房的手繪幸福餅乾(附贈30分

By 小本

Here is the cookie recipe:

(yeilds about 25 pieces)

(As the recipe is self-translated by me, do bear with me:-p)

70g unsalted butter

(very softened at room temperature)

50g icing sugar

1/2 beaten egg, room temperature

1/2 tsp vanilla essence

1/2 tsp baking powder

130g plain flour

10g milk powder

Method:

1. Cream the butter and icing sugar in a mixing bowl until pale yellow.

2. Add in the beaten egg in 2~3 addition, make sure it blends well.

3. Add in the vanilla essence and mix well.

4. Add in the sieved flour, baking powder and milk powder into the batter, using a spatula to mix to form a dough. Do not over mix the batter.

5. Freeze the dough for 1 hour before using.

I did not managed to snap shot the step by step tutorial of my own, as it was simply impossible as I am a one-man show. So I had attached the instructions and method as from the book.

Runny Rabbit Cookie is here!

Are you as excited as my girls to have these cookies???

These new cookies were a new treat to them. They were so excited about these cute little cookies, and having a fantastic taste, crunchy as well. It was really a hit for them when I attempted these cookies for them last weekend.

I had gotten this recipe from this book I had bought a couple of months ago.

I was really impressed with these cute little cookies but thought they were a hassle as there seemed too many steps to be done...

Finally plucked up my courage and started to attempt this challenging tasks.. Well, come to think of it, it wasn't that difficult. It was just like playing with "plasticine"or "clay". Probably needs alittle more patient than usual as well too.

So adorable ain't them...???
We all loved these cookies very much and the girls were also busy packing up some for the best friends and teachers in school. These cookies I baked over the past 3 days were easily gone in a nip nap.

Try baking some for your kids, and I am sure they will love them as much as we do... :-D

Do you too???

This is the book I had gotten my recipe from:

超可愛！小本廚房的手繪幸福餅乾(附贈30分

By 小本

Here is the cookie recipe:

(yeilds about 25 pieces)

(As the recipe is self-translated by me, do bear with me:-p)

70g unsalted butter

(very softened at room temperature)

50g icing sugar

1/2 beaten egg, room temperature

1/2 tsp vanilla essence

1/2 tsp baking powder

130g plain flour

10g milk powder

Method:

1. Cream the butter and icing sugar in a mixing bowl until pale yellow.

2. Add in the beaten egg in 2~3 addition, make sure it blends well.

3. Add in the vanilla essence and mix well.

4. Add in the sieved flour, baking powder and milk powder into the batter, using a spatula to mix to form a dough. Do not over mix the batter.

5. Freeze the dough for 1 hour before using.

I did not managed to snap shot the step by step tutorial of my own, as it was simply impossible as I am a one-man show. So I had attached the instructions and method as from the book.

So have fun with these cookies...:-D

For other cookies:

Bear, Dog and Watermelon Cookies

曹可爱的饼干。♡Bear Cookie, Doggie Cookie & Watermelon Cookie♡

It is a Cookie Weekend for us this week.

I was looking through some of my cookies book I bought a couple of months.

Finally pluck up the courage to do "such" cookies as I thought, these cookies were very challenging and tedious. Plus the last time I had tried another cookie recipe from another book but it didn't turned out what they supposed to be:-p

Took up this challenge and had a very fruitful result!!!

Ain't these cookies awfully adorable too???

My girls loved these cookies too. They were all waiting by the side to grab a cookie once I'm done with the photo takings...

The Bear Cookie

The Dog Cookie

And the Watermelon Cookie

(Does it looked like one anyway???)

As much as the girls were thrilled over the cookies, so was I.

After all, it wasn't that much of a challenge. All I ever need was time and patience.

Here are the cookies before baking.

 So, how would you like these pretty cookies too??

Not only they looked fabulous, they tasted delicious too!!!

So in ♡♡ with these cookies.

I will post up the step by step pictures in my next attempt.

As the recipe was in Mandarin and some of the the steps were stated wrongly and it took me quite a while to follow up.

Meantime, enjoy!

For other cookies:

Rabbit Cookies

Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cupcakes with Hershey's Chocolate Frosting

Happy Happy Sweet 2nd Birthday to Bake-Along.

Time flies and it had been 2 years unknowingly. Getting to know the wonderful hosts, Lena, Joyce and Zoe and the other bakers whom had baked along with us. I must say from this, I had learnt many more cakes that everyone had shared. 

Thank you to all and our Bake Along hosts for all these wonderful recipes, attempts and most of all, company:))

So here we have along with the Bake-Along 2nd Year Anniversary, a "Perfectly Hershey's Chocolate Chocolate Cupcakes with Hershey's Chocolate Frosting.
I realised I had some cocoa powder in my office desk and "it" caught my attention with its this recipe from Hershey's Cocoa box.

Basically this is just a mix in everything recipe. I made a messed as I had poured 1 cup of oil instead of half cup.. So no choice, I had to prepare another portion to balance it. BUT, I messed up by putting half flour.. Anyway, somehow or rather I did made it right.. But getting a very watery consistence batter was what I had gotten and I was quite skeptical about it.

So these were how my "cupcakes' looked like and though they looked abit "ugly", they tasted fantastic!!!

It had a steamed cake texture, soft and moist, very unusual from the cupcakes that we would usually baked.

And after some "makeover", they looked much prettier. These chocolate frosting were also made with Hershey's Cocoa...And I must say... they were great!!!! They were simply heavenly chocolate!!!!

These moist chocolate cupcakes had all thumbs up from everyone!

So... lets not wait no more!!!!

Try them and you will know what I mean...hehehehe...

Recipe as adapted from the Hershey's Cocoa Box :-p

Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cupcakes

(measurements in brackets are in my own modifications)

Ingredients:

2 cups sugar (256g)

1 3/4 cup all purpose flour (224g)

3/4 cup Hershey's cocoa (96g)

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

2 eggs

1 cup milk (236ml)

1/2 cup vegetable oil (114ml canola oil)

2 tsp vanilla essence

1 cup boiling water (236ml)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350F (175C).

2. Combine all dry ingredients in a lagre bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla essence and beat on medium speed for about 2 mins. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin). Pour into cupcake cases about 2/3 full.

3. Bake for about 22-25 mins or until a wooden pick inserted in the centre comes out clean. Cool for 10 mins before frosting.

Perfectly Chocolate Chocolate Frosting

(for about 30 cupcakes frosting)

Ingredients:

1 stick butter (113g)

2/3 cup Hershey's cocoa (I use abt 50g for half frosting portion)

3 cups powder sugar (384g)

1/3 cup milk (79ml)

1 tsp vanilla essence

Method:

Melt butter. Stir in cocoa. Add in powdered sugar and milk, beating at medium speed to spreading consistency. Add more milk if needed. Stir in vanilla essence.

So come along and join us with our Bake Along Hosts: Lena, Joyce and Zoe and the other bakers in this cupcake theme. :-D

Cutlery Cookies - The Fork & The Spoon Cookies

I was packing up the cupboard in my office and I found these cookie cutter. My colleague had visited China last year and she had bought this cutter for me as a souvenir. This is cute isn't it??? It came just nice for the new cookie that I had wanted to try out.

I realised that recently my girls had been pretty keen on the cookies that I had been trying out.. It had been quite a while since their last thrill on my baked cookies.. Probably this time round, all these new cookies attempts were very cute & interesting??? I would think so too.:-D

The girls were all very excited as these forks & spoons were very cute. And plus the fact that they can dip them into the chocolate sauce. Only one problem was that I couldn't find anything to let my cookies stand while waiting for the chocolate to set in... No choice, I tried using my cooling rack, with its little holes to hold them.

This cookie dough was much more easier to roll on as it did not have any egg contents. I had also cut down on the sugar level as I do not want the cookies to be too sweet.

After cutting out the shapes, I had used the letters to endorsed the girls' name on the cookies...

All of them can't wait to lay their little hands on the cookies and kept asking me if the cookies were ready..

Here's Mimi, she is one of the persistent one... as the elder sisters had to go to bed early for school tomorrow, Mimi had been hanging around the kitchen, waiting for the cookies to be ready..

These little cookies were all nicely packed up for school tomorrow.

While the 3 of them were enjoying the cookies in school, their classmates were also very envying them as the cookies had their names on it... A little time consuming to bake these cookies...but the thought of it, when the cookies were very popular with the girls and that they were gone the very next day, made all the effort worthwhile..:)

Recipe as adapted from 每天都是餅乾日 by 安星美 

Ingredients:

(yeilds about 20 pieces)

120g plain flour

30g almond powder

65g icing sugar (I used 50g)

pinch of salt

20g whipping cream (I used milk)

60g butter, softened

1 tsp vanilla essence

120g chocolate for dips

How to bake:

1. Add the butter, icing sugar & salt in a mixing bowl. Mix well.

2. Add in the milk until well corporated.  Add in the vanilla essence, stir well.

3. Add in the sieved flour and almond powder into the mixture, mix well until you get a dough.

4. Roll out the dough until 0.3cm thick and cut them using the cookie cutter.

5. Bake the cookies in a preheated oven of 170~175C for about 10 mins. Remove the cookies from the tray and let it cool on the rack.

6. Dip the cookies into the chocolate and let it set. Ready to be eaten & packed:)

HAVE FUN!!!

Orange Frosted Sponge Cake - THB #15

For some of you whom are new to this THB - The Home Bakers, it is a group that Joyce had set up. By owning the same recipe book of Coffee Cakes by Lou Seibert Pappas, you can simply join us in the wonderful bakes with the rest of the other bloggers. The rule of this bake is that only the host of the chosen bake can post up the recipe.

Should you like to have more details, please feel free to contact Joyce from The Home Bakers ^-^

This is another excellent recipe from Coffee Cakes by Lou Seibert Pappas. I had chosen this recipe as I personally preferred sponge/chiffon type cake, enjoying its ever soft & fluffy texture.
As I was preparing all the ingredients, I suddenly got worried as I thought I might had missed out the "oil" ingredient as usually, sponge cake will required oil. I read the ingredients once more, to make sure I hadn't missed out the "oil"... And I really didn't. I was rather surprised and wondered how the sponge cake will turned out.

As you can see from my picture below, I had used an 8-inch chiffon tin for my bake. My sponge cake did rise VERY well. I was really amazed with it... I thought this in fact was one of my few cakes baked in a chiffon tin that had gotten a nicely browned skin on the outer and sides of the cake... I was happy...:))

But after taking a bite of the sponge cake, I thought that my sponge cake tasted abit like the鸡蛋 糕. My colleagues and hubby who had tasted my sponge cake, had agreed that it did really have the 鸡蛋糕 texture and had a very mild orange taste, which I failed to detect it myself..  Strangely....

I have referred to THB post for the tips and read that everyone's gotten a excellent soft, fluffy texture of this cake... Something went wrong somewhere... I had then, realised that probably it was the plain flour and too little orange juice, and my accidentally overdosed the cake with additional 1/2 tsp of baking power... So just before posting up this recipe, I had to bake another one!!! This time round I had used top flour and increased my orange juice, and added 1 orange zest.
And YES!!!!
The sponge cake did turned out excellent, soft as everyone had mentioned. 

Instead of coating my whole sponge cake with the orange frosting, I had prepared 1/3 of the frosting and coated ONLY 1 slice of the sponge cake for photgraphy purposes.
By sprinkling some orange zest on the frosting made it even more tastier... I really enjoyed this great combination...Yum Yum...♡♡♡

Let us all share a slice of our Orange Frosted Sponge Cake by starting to bake yours now^^

Recipe as adapted from Coffee Cakes by Lou Seibert Pappas

Ingredients:
(Makes one 10-inch cake: serves 16)
(With slight modifications to my own measurements)

1 1/4 cup cake flour (150g)

1 1/2 cup sugar (I used 150g, 100g & 50g)

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

6 eggs, yolks & whites separated

1 tsp cream of tar tar

1/4 tsp cup orange juice (70ml)

1 tsp vanilla extract

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 325F (165C).

2. In a large bowl, combine the flour, 1 cup of sugar, salt & baking powder and stir to blend. In another large bowl, combine the egg whites and cream of tar tar and beat with an electric mixer on high speed until soft peaks form. Gradually beat in the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar until stiff, glossy peaks form.

3. Add in the egg yolks, orange juice and vanilla  to the flour mixture and beat on medium speed for about 1 minute, scarping down the sides of the bowl once or twice. Stir about 1/4 of the egg whites into the yolk mixture, and then fold in the remaining whites until well blended. Pour the batter into an unbuttered 10-inch tube pan and smooth the top.

4. bake for about 50 minutes, or until the cake is golden, springs back when lightly touched, and a cake tester inserted int he centre comes out clean. Invert on a wire rack and let cool completely. Unmould and transfer to a serving plate.

Orange Frosting

3 tbsps unsalted butter at room temperature

2 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted

1 tbsp thawed orange juice concentrate mixed with 2 tbsps of water

(As I do not want to coat the whole cake with the frosting for fear that my girls will not eat them...and I was absolutely right about it...!!! I had used 1 tbsp of butter+100g icing sugar+1 tbsp of fresh orange juice instead. I had also coated the orange frosting with the orange zest which actually enhanced the light tasted sponge cake.)

Method:

In a medium bowl, combine all the ingredients and mix until blended. Spread over the top and sides of the cake and let it set for about 1 hour. Cut into wedges to serve.

Do join us along in the wonderful bake with our co-founder, Joyce from The Home Bakers and also Kitchen Flavours, and do make sure to check out othe bloggers who had participated in this Home Bakers theme as well.
Have fun everyone...!!!!