Castella Cake 蜂蜜长崎蛋糕

Castella Cake is here again! :) Thanks to my friend who lend her wooden cake mold to me. I tried out a new recipe using the wooden cake mold ...three attempts totally with one unsuccessful attempt, one dry cake and one consider a good texture cake. All these attempts were using same recipe with whole egg, not the egg separation method that I tried on my previous bakes on Jul 2013, and Mar 2012. 

Verdict is I prefer the cake texture using egg separation method, as it produces dense, soft chewy and fine texture compared to whole egg method. 

Out of my three attempts on whole egg method, two of the attempt I used water steam bath underneath the cake, the cake turned out moist and chewy and not dry as the one baked without water steam bath. So, I have to record down this point to keep myself remember. 

This Castella Cake is with only four ingredients, egg, sugar, honey and bread flour. But I think I prefer the one with maltose sugar and milk in it, as it produces smoother and finer cake texture. 

Recipe adapted from JustOneCookBook
Ingredients:
6 eggs, at room temperature
218g sugar
200g bread flour, 
5 tbsp Black Forest Honey
2.5 tbsp warm water
1 tbsp Black Forest Honey
1/2 tbsp warm water

Method:
1. Preheat the oven at 160C with a tray of water underneath the rack.
2. Place all six eggs in the mixing bowl, whisk for a min then add sugar and whisk the eggs for 5 mins using KitchenAid speed 10 until the egg volume becomes four times its original size.
3. The egg mixture should have achieve its ribbon stage.
4. Mix the 5 tbsp honey with 2.5 tbsp warm water in a small bowl, stir well the mixture. 
5. Pour the honey mixture into the (1) and whisk with speed 2 for 30 seconds.

6. Add the sifted flour to the egg mixture in three batches. Add the first batch, whisk the egg mixture using speed 1 for 15 seconds, then add second batch of flour, whisk for another 15 seconds then final batch of flour, whisk for 30 seconds. 

7. Pour the cake batter slowly into the lined cake mold, knock the cake mold on the kitchen worktop a few times to release the trap bubbles and use a skewer to draw the zig-zag on the cake batter.

8. Bake the cake for 35~40 mins.

9. Mix 1 tbsp honey with 1/2 tbsp warm water in a small bowl, brush the mixture on top of the cake surface after the cake is out from the oven, remove the cake from the wooden mold when it cool down a bit and wrap it with parchment paper and plastic cling and store overnight in the fridge before consume. 

Yakitori Chicken

Today a tiring day, finally able to sit down and enjoy my own time. Going through the photos backlog and decided to post Yakitori.

One of my family favourite on-the-go snack is Yakitori the Japanese grilled chicken. We ate a lot of it when we were in Singapore. Never cross my mine to make one myself until I saw Nami of Just One Cookbook Yakitori video. It looks easy and simple and I just went on to try it out. 

All these photos here were from my first attempt, the second attempt was for a friend birthday. I would say that the taste of my second attempt was better because I marinated the chicken, also I added a bit of sake, dark soy sauce and oyster sauce into the sauce to enhance its taste, yes, I prefer stronger taste. Trust me, a little golden brown on the meat will make it more appetizing. 

10 mins of broiling time will give you a perfect tender Yakitori, however it also depends on the size of your chicken chunk. 

Recipe adapted from Just one Cookbook with changes in the method.

(Yield 20 skewers)
Ingredients:
20 bamboo skewers soak in water for 30 mins.
20 pieces of chicken drumsticks, debone and cut the meat into two for each of them. (if using chicken tights will be better)
9 scallions
some vegetable oil

Source:
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup mirin
1/4 cup water
2 tsp brown sugar
1/4 cup sake
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tbsp dark soy sauce

Method:

1. Prepare sauce: Add all the sauce ingredients in a saucepan and add green part of the scallion, bring to boil. Lower the heat to low and allow it to simmer until the liquid reduced by half. Leave to cool in room temperature.

2. Use 1/3 of the sauce to marinate the chicken pieces for at least two hours. (I placed it in fridge overnight) Reserve 1/3 of the sauce for coating while broil, and another 1/3 of the sauce for final coating.

3. Place two chicken pieces into one skewer, in between can add desire vegetables like green or red capsicum, repeat until all skewers used.

4. Preheat the oven to 230C with grill function, arrange the chicken skewers on the wire rack with a tray below to catch the dripping sauce. Broil the chicken for 6 mins, bring out the chicken skewer and brush with some sauce. Bring the Yakitori back to oven and continue broil it for 4 mins. Transfer to serving plate and brush the remaining 1/3 sauce with a clean brush. Serve warm. 

Bacon Parmesan Gougeres

五月，好多朋友将离开卡达尔的月份，说不伤感是假的。 夏炎的空气有时闷热得让人抓慌，菜埔里的菜啊，水果啊，都死轿轿了！日子回到原来的厨房，关在有空调的屋里，心是平静的。我爱我的厨房！那天看到 Fine Cooking 的 Bacon Parmesan Gougeres 就动工了，好一道不用酵母的面包。成品是偏咸带奶酪香有咬劲的软面包，实合加入孩子的午餐合里，当然也是很好的早餐。除了好吃之外，这面包加分在。。。速战速决！

This May a few of my friends are leaving Qatar for good. The sun physically burn the leaves of my Australia Avocado, the plant which took me eight weeks to care from seed, root and sprout! Now, I only hope it can survive the summer. My days back to the kitchen with air-conditioning 24 hours blasting, temperature in the house is cool and my heart is calm.  

Saw the Fine Cooking introduces this Bacon Parmesan Gougeres, I swing into action to make this yeast-less bread. The end result is a soft savoury bread with cheesy aroma. Is a good choice for kid's lunch box, of course is a healthy breakfast too. Besides the taste, I like this bread because of its short making time. 

Recipe from Fine Cooking
Yield: 13 pieces

Ingredients:
4 slices of Bacon or you may used sliced ham 
1/2 cup whole milk
4 tbsp unsalted butter
1 tsp salt (to taste, can reduce to 1/2 tsp)
1 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp sugar
1/8 tsp cayenne (omitted)
1 1/4 cups bread flour, sifted
3 large eggs
1 1/4 cups grated Parmesan cheese

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 210C. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.

2. Cook the bacon in a frying pan over medium low heat until crisp. Transfer to a kitchen paper, chop or cut into small when it is cool down completely.

3. In a small saucepan, bring milk, 1/2 cup of water, the butter and the reserved bacon fat to a simmer over medium heat. Keep stirring with spatula to prevent burn at the bottom of pan.

4. Stir in the salt, onion powder, sugar. Add the flour, and using a wooden spoon, stir very quickly in one direction. The flour will absorb the liquid and form a dough. Continue stirring to cook the flour until the dough pulls away from the sides of the saucepan, continue to stir for another one or two mins.

5. Transfer the dough to the electric mixer bowl. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing on medium speed until each is incorporated into the dough, which will change from shiny to sticky as the eggs are worked in. On low speed, stir in one cup of Parmesan cheese and the bacon until just combined.

6. Using a small ice cream scoop, scoop the dough onto the baking sheets. Top the gougeres with the remaining 1/4 cup Parmesan. Bake for ~ 20 mins or until it is puffed and golden. Serve warm.