Rainbow Inside My Pink Roses

A customer was having a wedding ceremony last 31st August and she needed a cake for one of her Dowry to exchange with her husband. She said she likes my rainbow cake and she wanted me to make a smaller Rainbow Cake for her wedding. So I made a 1.8 KG Rainbow Cake and follow her pink theme color for the cake decoration. And she absolutely loved it and wished she didn't have to gave away that cake.

Below is the cake I made for her on the 31st August.

Pretty Cupcakes

I always believe that people eat through their eyes first and the taste comes second as an added bonus. Imagine if the food is ugly, nobody wants to eat it unless somebody said that it taste really delicious then only we would try right?

But not in the case of cupcakes, not only they are so pretty dainty little cakes but they taste really delicious too. Thanks so much to the sweet frosting that we piped on each cupcakes and then sprinkled with sweet colorful sugar tiny beads, balls, rice, heart shaped or stars.

I have always love to eat cupcakes. Even when I am already tired of eating every single ones that I stumble upon in every cafe and bakeries in every malls in Kuala Lumpur, I go home and bake more for myself.

Whenever you suddenly strike with a mood to bake and you got all the ingredients in your kitchen, go on and bake some for yourself. Home baking is suppose to be a joy and not a chore. So enjoy yourself and create a pretty one. Below are some of my own cupcakes.

What Is Red Velvet Cake?

Lately I got so much orders for my Red Velvet Cakes and Cupcakes. It is funny how people are so fascinated with Red Velvet. Is it because of the name? Or its color? Or the vague taste of Red Velvet itself which is neither chocolate nor butter? Or simply because of its popularity?

Generally my customers love the texture, the moist factor and the interesting taste of my Red Velvet. The deep red velvety color does play such an important role as when the eyes see it so appertising, the vague sweet taste of the cake with the slight sour taste from the cream cheese frosting really make up for the whole combination. The whole cake really came out like a winner.

The funny thing is whenever my customers, friends or family asked me what is the taste of Red Velvet, I often have to explain what I put in the cake instead. Well I suppose I could say that Red Velvet is a taste combination of chocolate, sweet and a little bit of sour from the cream cheese and also the white vinegar.

Below are some of my Red Velvet Cakes from recent orders.

 These were a special order for a wedding with a theme of peach color. So I decided to decorate the red velvet cupcakes with simple peach fondant daisies.

The Classic Carrot Cake I Love

So finally I bake a carrot cake a few days ago. I can't even remember when was the last time I bake one though. So this time I had to figure out a new recipe for my carrot cake. The original recipe required me to use Pecan nuts but of course this is just an option and since pecan is so darn expensive....like RM 82.90 per KG. I might as well use the nuts that I like better and cheaper like Walnuts which is only RM 48.00 per KG.

And I have been meaning to make some fondant decorative thing for my cake and Carrot Cake is the best opportunity. So I made these miniature carrots from Fondant and it makes the cake looks cute. And this carrot cake recipe is quite good and moist too, although I had to change a few things in the recipe as I find it a bit wrong, such as the flour content was a bit less so I add another 1/2 cup to the recipe and reduce 1/4 cup of sugar. And the cake came out like a winner. I loved it!

Bread Pudding

Bread Pudding is one of the easiest dessert that anyone could make or at least this is what I thought before. Until I have to bake one for someone who is willing to pay for it. And therefore no room for trial and error. It has got to be perfect! But this simple dessert really put me to a test yesterday.

So I looked back into my recipe book and look at my little notes of what I have done before. Frankly, most of my recipes are taken from American cook books. But every time I made anything from my American recipe books, somehow they are always too sweet. Most of the times either cake, frosting or any dessert recipes, I will have to cut down at least half a cup of sugar. It is weird that I have to cut down this much of sugar to get the taste to a normal sweetness. I couldn't help but wonder, is this really the sweetness level of general American people? Diabetes much?

So going back to my Bread Pudding, I decided to make the one that I have done several months ago and this one required me to use whipping cream and not milk. My rule of thumb of eliminating problems and complaints is to always use a really good quality ingredients. And therefore the result and taste will be the best and there'll be less dispute of quality after that. It will be the worst complaint if my customer spit out my frosting because I used Margarine or that stupid butter-wannabe Buttercup brand. It happened before and I learned my lesson the humiliating way. Never again. Nowadays I will either only use pure imported butter such as Anchor butter and whipping cream from New Zealand or Tartura butter and cream cheese from Australia.

So for the whipping cream I used a quite expensive Anchor Whippping Cream. The cost really affected the price that I was going to charge my customer. In my opinion, simple dessert like this shouldn't cost so much because its quite simple to make. But I explained briefly to my customer that I used expensive and good quality product and luckily she didn't say anything. At least for now! And I truly hope she liked it and that the ingredients speak for itself.

This 8"x8"x2" aluminium container is just perfect for my one portion recipe and this container comes with a clear plastic cover. Makes it look so neat and clean.

My Bread Pudding comes with a really yummilicious Vanilla Sauce but I didn't take the photo of it. That Vanilla Sauce also I have to reduce the sugar and add more whipping cream inside to balance the thickness. Somehow the original recipe was pretty screw up. 

My bread pudding up close and personal. It looks pretty good to me.

The Story of My RED VELVET

It is unquestionable at this point that Red Velvet is my most popular cake. There is something about Red Velvet that is so appealing to a lot of cake lovers out there. If you ask me, the ingredients for Red Velvet is just a bunch of common things that we normally eat such as eggs, flour, oil, cocoa powder, baking soda, vanilla, white vinegar, and food coloring. But somehow the proportionate combination of the ingredients makes Red Velvet such a wonderful tasty cake. I can pretty much eat this cake everyday and not getting tired of it.

When I first made this cake, I knew that this cake is popular but I have no idea that this cake is that popular. So I started to play around in creating the look of my very own Red Velvet. So below are some of the Red Velvet cake from the first time I made them to the most recent one.

My First Red Velvet. Too white and too plain.

 My second Red Velvet, I put some color on top but seem kind of not enough and too ordinary looking.

 My third design of Red Velvet, still kind of plain although I sprinkle it with some Red-colored sugar to add some creative effect. Somehow still too plain looking for me.

 A customer requested me to create something a bit more colorful for her and this is what I did. Hmmmm! Sigh! But she loved it though. Thank god!

Finally, I managed to create the look that I really like for my Red Velvet. Yeahhhhh!

My Rainbow Cake To Cheer My Day

Rainbow cake is such a fascinating looking cake. Somehow the colors really makes the average Butter Cake taste a lot better and become the talk of the town. I have been making so many Rainbow Cakes before this but just a few weeks ago I realized I have been putting double the amount of butter in the cake than I was supposed to.

So when I made the cake this time, somehow it become less moist and less soft. I got the recipe from a renowned Chef from the USA. I won't reveal what recipe I use for my Rainbow Cake but anyone can just Google Rainbow Cake recipes on the internet and you'll get one. There are just so many versions of the recipes. However, in my quest to become a perfect baker I must first satisfied with my own Rainbow Cake. Or maybe I should start experimenting with several different recipes. Too lazy though and too much effort. Sigh!!

In KL, lots of my customers prefer to order the half size of the actual cake. Meaning I cut the recipe in half and make it into a smaller cake. It's cheaper and for a small group of people, this half size is convenient and just enough. However the small little problem that I got from baking this small cake is that the challenge to make it as moist and as soft as the original full size.

At this point I prefer to just make this cake in full size only. This way I can be sure of the "Satisfaction Guaranteed" motto. Moist and Soft cake will make anyone happy. Dry and hard is a complaint guaranteed. No No No!!!