Macavity Macavity! There is no one like Macavity!

Packaging for Roomantique Cupcakes for CWS

About a fortnight ago, my ex room mate Chi Anh and I decided to give back by organising a virtual bake sale (the cupcakes are not virtual of course, you WILL get your orders). Prior to a month ago I hardly went on Facebook! Yes I was missing all the parties, all the flea markets, all the sprees and I have 66 unread messages in my inbox. In fact up till a day or two ago, I was not entirely sure what the difference between a “status” and a “post” was. However I am just amazed at how Facebook has managed to spread this message of love and giving to people I have never met before. I know at this point of revelation, everyone is screaming, “You are such a country bumpkin!” but really for me, at this very moment, the harps and angels are playing furiously.

I am proud to say that we have two orders for Roomantique has already been placed. I am so glad that there is so much interest but really please do not hesitate to order them. I am planning to donate $8 for every box ordered to the Cat Welfare Society. The pick up point is at Kallang Leisure Park (Stadium MRT). I would prefer self-collect but if you do place a generous (in every sense of the word) we can arrange a delivery.

Some might not understand why cats and not maybe humans. I guess there is charity for every season and I just love cats. My friend Cal told me last week that I was probably the only cat lover who does not have a cat. I have only had two cats in my entire life. Rondo a black one and Ping An another black one. They both came into my life in a very similar situation. I found Rondo when I was walking home from school. I heard a “mee mee mee” noise and found this like scraggly , greyish  thing perhaps three quarter the size of my palm just outside our house. Honestly I was like “What is that!” This nice construction worker said, “It is a cat. You want? “and gave me a box to place it in.” My mum was witnessing the entire scene from our upstairs window and she screamed, “What are you doing!!! Oli!!!! DO NOT TAKE THAT I N!” Like all tweens I did not listen to my mother. I just smiled and brought it in. I knew she would love it, she loved the adopted turtle, the hamster and the baby mynah we found in the end.

To cut a long story short, my mum called the cat Mimi because of its ferocious cry. It was called Mimi for a day, until we brought it to a vet and were told that it was a boycat! It was named Rondo because he was such a bundle of joy bouncing around like Mozart’s Turkish Rondo. He turned out to be the most amazing cat on earth. Anyone who says that a cat is not loyal, impossible to train! Please talk to me!!

See I knew I should not talk about Rondo, I will just go on and on. So why cats and not anything else? I do not have a real answer. I just know that cats are not any less important, than any other beings on this earth. They bring many people joy, (Read about Cleo the cat) they are sweet and loving and honestly cats keep me grounded because of their unique personalities (Read T.S. Elliot’s Old Possum’s Book Of Practical Cats) Whether crafty, manja, sleepy, cautious, gregarious, they all keep their personalities and are never afraid to be what they are, a cat. Now non-cat lovers out there, I think it is time to eat cupcakes and place some change in that kitty!

Save the kitties with a Roomantique gesture

Last Sunday I spent a wonderful time with my ex room mate Chi Anh. We started our day at Hediard (Best French Café in Singapore HANDS DOWN!) just reminiscing about the past, celebrating the present and sharing our hopes for the future. Ok that sentence sounded like a National Day message but it was such a cheery day that it feels so apt to use such “sunny descriptions”. This was followed by a great cake supplies shopoholic experience. Yup, what nerds we be.

The one topic on our mind was the brand new cupcake flavour we were going to create. Truthfully, we both have real different characters yet our love for music and insanity (we are both mad in different ways) has cemented a sisterhood and friendship.

Should stop waxing lyrical about us at this point and explain the concept of the cupcake flavour. We wanted to do a white cake base but infused with the scents we love, lemon for Chi Anh and lavender for me (still learning to pronounce it but I love it). We also decided to do a surprise centre in our cupcake which would complement the lemon and lavender—dark chocolate ganache. This pretty cake is finally topped with a toasted meringue which is crispy on the outside but oh so soft and marshmellowy on the inside. Chi Anh and I just love natural colours. The toasted meringue brought with it a very antiquated brown, very dreamy and vintage, while the cake was golden speckled with sunny lemon zest and purple from the crushed lavender flowers. The latter coupled with the dark chocolate ganache was just beautiful.

We watched the oven together!

Lovingly filled with chocolate ganache

The liners were fairly large so we managed to fit 6 into my regular box. Chi Anh brought it to a party for a tasting. The result—everyone declared that it was a simply sophisticated cake! Yayy, it turns out that two girl pals who wanted to create a simple cake representing their friendship actually managed to pull off sophistication.

Our final product! Buy one! Save kitties!

Chi Anh and I share another aesthetic—we believe that food is beautiful and can bring joy to our world. That is why we share our recipes freely. What is the point of creation if it is intangible to another? Hence we have decided to share this recipe with everyone. This particular recipe can be found on Chi Anh’s blog entry. She has done a wonderful job with the pictures! In addition we would be donating 50% of the profits of this cake to save kitties at Cat Welfare Society. We chose this charity because we love cats! It is also in honour of our little kitty Ping An who passed away 8 years ago.

Here are the details

A Box of 8 would cost you $25. This comes with a little handmade gift card.
I would be taking orders until the 21st of September 2010 (Tuesday)
You are able to arrange for collection from the 24th of September 2010 (Friday) to30th of September 2010. (Friday
0
Requests for an alternative collection date will depend on Sugar Rocks baking schedule.
A $10 deposit per box is required. This can be transferred to a bank account which will be given upon receiving your order. Orders are confirmed once this deposit is received and a confirmation email and text message will be sent.
To place an order, kindly email me at oli.greenwood@gmail.com with the following information:

Name:
No of boxes:
Preferred Collection Date and Time:
Contact No:

Spot the Cupcake !

Cruella De Vil—Natural Red Velvet Cupcake

    

I love a red velvet cake frosted with cream cheese. However I am just appalled at the amount of red colouring iused. Was watching the Cupcake Wars and I also noted that everyone just dumped red colouring in their batter. Gosh even Magnolia Bakery’s recipe requires tonnes of that stuff. 

                                                   Soft peaks of cream cheese with chocolate chips.. yummy

I have thus been spending the last few days trying to find a way to make a red velvet cake without colouring. I suck at chemistry but basically red velvet cake is a devil’s food cake dyed red. However because of the acidity of lemons, the cocoa in the cake also takes on a red sheen, hence the bright red colour. I decided to incorporate beetroot in this cake, so as to give it a natural red. Why beetroot? Erm basically the stuff never comes off your clothes, could be a great dyeing agent. The truth is I LOATHE beetroot. I hate the taste! I used to cry so bad when I find them in my food. So for the first time in my life I actually purchased beetroot from the grocers. I thought it could not be so bad, sugar does come from beetroot and it would possibly keep the cake moist. Plus beetroot supposedly lowers your cholesterol! A healthy red velvet, who would have thought?

After a few trials, I finally came up with a good batter for this cake. A certain Miss M tried the cake (I did not tell her it was beetroot). Miss M was a good choice because she has zero affinity with beetroot too. She was quite surprised when I told her it was beetroot and was quite delighted with the taste. The truth is, the cake isn’t as red as I envisioned it to be (more magenta with red sparkles under yellow light) however the taste was so moist and it was velvety smooth alright. I like beetroot now…only in my cakes though.

                                                      Cruella De Vil baby cake

Why is this called Cruella De Vil? I am preparing for the Halloween season (quite wussy, cruella is scary enough for me). Red velvet cake is essentially devil’s food cake  with red colouring, I have paired the red velvet cake with its traditional cream cheese frosting. I have also added drops of chocolate chips onto the pipped cream cheese stars—Now doesn’t that look like a cake Madame De Vil would approve of!

Please contact me if you would like to order these cakes. The baby cakes go for $1.80  a piece with a minimum order of 24. All orders come with a gift box and a card. Pricing for standard size cupcakes depends on customisation , so please email me for a consultation

P.S. I can use red dye if you really really want that RED look heh 

                                         how cute are my IKEA liners (email me for a quote!)

When fusion food is a thing of neccesity-- Black Pepper Crayfish with Spaghetti

A foodie friend of mine from Australia sent me a message on Facebook today declaring that he wanted to eat Chicken Rice after watching a Singapore special on “No Reservations”. Oh and he wanted Laksa too!  Isn’t it just so wonderful when someone else in the world acknowledges the beautiful food your country has (or am I the only one who feels like this). Well most of us who have guests from overseas would take them to our favourite eating places in Singapore, not necessarily famous but it must be one of a kind. Have you ever thought about whether these raving guests would want to eat our delicacies everyday if they were to live in Singapore?

Sadly for Ryan, the answer was “no”. Ryan and I had such a wonderful time eating our way when he first came to Singapore. However this enthusiasm and spark for Char Kway Teow, Chilli Crab and Murtabak has now dropped to, “Honey can we have steamed veggies with pepper for dinner tomorrow, rice is optional.” I know plenty of Singaporeans who eat out everyday, but I think eating out gets slightly too jalat for Ryan after a while. At the same time, I get so sick of eating roasts, soups, salads and pastas all the time (I LOVE RICE). Our different cultures and diets have resulted in the birth of fusion food in our kitchen.

Before I started cooking for Ryan, my foray into fusion food was limited to Doc Cheng’s, one of my dad’s favourite restaurants. I always thought that place mystical with its chic décor and the strange concoctions they served! It always seemed elusive, excessive perhaps a little unnecessary. It is hence quite disconcerting for me that I have ventured into preparing fusion food because of necessity and practical reasons. One of these dishes we have “invented” is Black Pepper Crayfish served with Spaghetti! If you don’t feel squeamish about killing crabs you can try this with crabs. Family can’t decide if you want Western or Asian? Simply prepare this and you can have your cake and eat it!

This recipe yields 2 servings

Ingredients;
1) 3 Crayfish (scrubbed clean and chopped in half)
2) 3 tablespoons of butter
3) 1 red chilli seeded and finely chopped (you can use more if you want it spicier)
4) 2 sprigs of curry leaves
5) 1tablespoon minced garlic
6) 1 tablespoon of minced onion
7) 1 tablespoon of oyster sauce
8) 2 tablespoons of Hu Tiao Jiu (Chinese cooking wine)
9) 1 tablespoon of light soy sauce
10) 5 tablespoon water
11) 2 teaspoon of sugar
12) 1 tablespoon of blackpepper
13) 1 teaspoon cornflour
14) Cornflour for dusting Crayfish
15) Oil for frying Crayfish (maybe 2 tablespoons)
16) Instant Spaghetti

Method

1) Cook Spaghetti following instructions on packet till al dente. Pour into a colander after it has been cooked and rinse under cold water. Set aside
2) Heat oil up in a wok
3) Dust cleaned and scrubbed Crayfish with cornflour and fry in wok
4) Fry till Crayfish has turned orangey and set aside (you can blot the oil with a paper towel)
5) Add 2 tablespoons of butter into the wok (the same one you previously fried your crayfish in), fry chilli and curry leaves until fragrant.
6) Add garlic and onion to the wok and fry till fragrant
7) Mix ingredients 7—13 together and add combined mixture into the wok.
8) Cook until the sauce has reduced
9) Return fried crayfish into the wok and cover the wok while you turn up the fire (about 3 minutes)
10) Take Crayfish out and arrange on your serving plate.
11) Heat up wok and add another tablespoon of butter to the rest of the sauce. Add spaghetti into the wok and stir with sauce.
12) Dish out spaghetti and serve it with your Crayfish
13) Enjoy!

This is basically a one-pot meal which is really satisfying and can be very impressive!

Recipe for French Chocolate Tart

This recipe has been a running joke between Ryan and I. You see Ryan has this enormous crush on this contestant called Fiona on Masterchef Australia (my favourite show!!!). This crush is soo huge that there was once when he was slightly annoyed with me he actually hit the pause on Fiona’s segment of the Masterchef intro and declared, “I’m so angry I am going to stare at Fiona for five minutes!” ……Yes Ryan can be pretty amusing at times. Anyway Fiona’s signature dish is a chocolate tart topped with lavender cream and raspberries. It so happened that after that declaration I decided to work on my chocolate tart recipe. Now pause, I need to backtrack slightly. In case you (like Ryan) think that I have a jealousy issue and was trying to compete with Fiona’s tart, my obsession with French chocolate tart has preceded Ryan’s obsession with Fiona by far! Here is photographic evidence!


Just after I quit my job (wheeeeee), we took a short trip to Vietnam. Right next to our hotel was this lovely little French bakery called Une journées a Paris. This bakery is really authentic and has French proprietors. The food presented here was simply delightful

Ryan eating a beautiful quiche


The fresh sandwiches, the flaky pastries and the beautiful beautiful gateaux were to die for. However the one item on their menu which took my breath away and me scream “Vive le Chocolat” (uh I don’t speak French I just used Babel fish) was the beautiful Tart au Chocolat!

I realised I needed to show you how thick the tart was, pardon my tooth marks.


I tried to order 24 to bring back to Singapore but the baker said that it was impossible as the ganache had to set.


Anyway I wanted to recreate this chocolate tart, but as I was researching other recipes (yes even Fiona’s) I realised that a touch of cream and raspberries would add texture and might suit the summery nature of our weather.

The best thing about this recipe is that you can use a toaster oven. You just need to make sure that you buy a smaller tart pan. The ones I have here are 4 inches in diameter It should look like this.

This recipe should yield enough for 3 tarts or if you have a normal oven, it will be enough for a 9 inch tart (I think smaller tarts are cuter though). So if you have the following equipment;

1) toaster oven,

2) tart pan

3) oven proof bowl,

4) grease paper

5) handful of rice/ uncooked beans

6) whisk


Please proceed to make this for your loved ones!


Short Crust Recipe


Gosh this is the best pastry recipe ever. In Singapore it takes forever to make pastry. Most of the time, you would need to refrigerate it for a day, then roll it out on your pastry mat, and fight with the humidity to get it into your tart pan. This recipe requires you almost zilch equipment and really you can get that pastry ready in less than an hour. I can’t take credit for this recipe though, I adapted it from David Lebovitz who adapted it from Paule Caillat.

What you need

One 9 inch tart shell or three 4 inch tart shell

90 g (3 ounces) unsalted butter, cut into pieces

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

3 tablespoons water

1 tablespoon sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

150 g (5oz, or 1 slightly-rounded cup) all purpose flour

Preheat the oven to 410º F (210º C).

1) In a medium-sized ovenproof bowl, such as a Pyrex bowl (I use a claypot), combine the butter, oil, water, sugar, and salt. You can also place it in the microwave, just remember to watch it!

2). Place the bowl in the oven for 15 minutes, until the butter is bubbling and starts to brown just around the edges.

3.) When done, remove the bowl from oven (and be careful, since the bowl will be hot and the mixture might sputter a bit), dump in the flour and stir it in quickly, until it comes together and forms a ball which pulls away from the sides of the bowl.

4). Transfer the dough to a tart pan with a removable bottom and spread it a bit with a spatula.

5). Once the dough is cool enough to handle, pat it into the shell with the heel of your and, and use your fingers to press it up the sides of the tart pan. Reserve a small piece of dough, about the size of a raspberry, for patching any cracks. The dough should be about a centimeter thick inside the mould

6) Cut a piece of greaseproof paper the diameter of the pan and weigh it down with your beans or rice (they act like pie weights)

6) Prick the dough all over with the tines of a fork about ten times, then bake the tart shell in the oven for 15 minutes, or until the dough is golden brown.

7) Let the shell cool before filling. This would take about an hour to cool


Chocolate Ganache Filling


What you need

Whisk

200grams of good quality chocolate (I recommend Valrhona chocolate, it’s the best!)

100 ml of Cream


1) Place Cream in a heat-proof bowl and place in microwave, alternatively you can heat cream up on stove but make sure that it does not boil.

2) Place chopped dark chocolate into cream and whisk till it reaches a smooth consistency

3) Wait till it has cooled (about 15 minutes) and fill tart shells with the ganache.

4)Place chocolate ganache filled tart shell in the fridge and wait for about 3 hours!

Top your delish chocolate tart with a plop of whipped cream and fresh raspberries or strawberries. If you want to be even more decadent, sift some icing sugar on top of the berries.

Try this recipe! It sounds like plenty of steps but it really requires very little baking equipment and expertise. Besides nothing beats the satisfaction of making your very own Chocolat Tarte!

27

I am 27! Ryan keeps reminding me that we are no longer in our mid twenties sob sob. I am just really grateful to receive so many well-wishes from the people I love.. Sure it could be just a short post on my facebook wall but I am just so touched that so many people remembered me. Even happier because I managed to reconnect with a few of my friends I have not met for eons. My sweet sweet in laws also organised a “Greenwood plus one choir” to sing “Happy Birthday: to me (on the phone). Yes all I am swooning but I just feel so overwhelmed with a spirit of thankfulness and contentment and I hate to admit this but because I have been so bitter for so long, I am grateful for this feeling. For this I can only thank everyone for breathing positivity into me! I can just feel it in my bones, 27 is going to be GREAT.

A Great Gift from Ryan

Ryan thinks it is old-fashioned and even chauvinistic to give a household appliance to your wife… but I LOVE IT!

Well enough rambling! I guess I am just posting to inform my readers (if I have any at all) that my “recipes” section is going to be up and running soon! Please check it out! The first recipe I would like to present to you is my French Chocolate Tart! I would also be sharing other simple savoury dishes that you can whip up on a weekday night. Now I don’t proclaim to be an expert or a chef, however I just thought it would be nice to share some simple recipes which has really enhanced my quality of life (think one pot, easy to prepare, no more oily hawker food, easy on the purse). Similarly I would love to hear from more experienced cooks out there so please feel free to give comments and share your opinions on these humble recipes from my kitchen.

On another note, I am so stoked about Sunday!!! My roommate (ok ex-roommate) Chi Anh, writer of the very popular blog, Door to My Kitchen will be baking together, creating a dessert which really encompasses our relationship. She is the only other person besides my sister Heidi and Ryan whom I have shared a tiny space with and we have just done so many crazy things together! I am really thankful to have her support my aspirations and my dreams. Chi Anh if you are reading this, please know that we will always be like Julia and Avis, Love you bun

Like A Girl-- A new flavour for Sugar Rocks

Like a Girl!

My younger brother, Frans is currently studying in Melbourne. Even though I have been complaining about him all my life, I do miss him terribly now. We just do real silly things together and I just love to tease him for his rather contradictory nature. So vain, yet so simple. So “himbotic” yet at times so wise. My mother’s favourite phrase for him was “like a girl”, which is really quite funny because Frans is a real “macho, I go to the gym, man vs wild” kind of guy.

Frans celebrated his 21st birthday last year and I recently dug up this photo of the three of us taken by my sister-in-law.

Every year, Frans gets the same cake for his birthday, a strawberry short-cake! It is Frans’s favourite or rather my mum has designated it as his favourite. She would say. “Get Frans a strawberry cake, it is his favourite, He’s like a girl!”. I guess this has inspired my new cupcake flavour—Like a girl!

This comprises of a moist white butter cake with tangy lemon zest, filled with raspberry jam in the centre, frosted with cream cheese and topped with a fresh strawberry. I bet Frans and all berry lovers would approve.

I am selling these in a gift box, $35 for a box of 12. This includes a handmade gift card. Isn't this a perfect way to tell that special someone how much they mean to you! You are able to customise the cupcake toppers and the frosting at a small fee. Please contact me for a quote!

The Wedding Cake-- How I started sugar crafting

As I am an obviously a late bloomer in the blogging world, I have to retrace my steps and perhaps explain how I went about designing my first iced cake. I have been baking since I was a teen. However I never got to the stage of icing and decorating a cake, partly because the cake never reaches that stage.It doesn’t even get to cool, it ends up straight in mine or dad’s stomach. I knew the cake I would like to serve up for our wedding --a traditional fruit cake steeped in kirsch and brandy. I also wanted this to be a tribute to my mum and our baking sessions hence I wanted to use a particular recipe which my mum and I found in the Marine Parade Library eons ago. It became her standard fruit cake recipe and the cake would be baked in November and soaked with kirsch and brandy till Christmas time. Now the deal was this, I was quite confident that I could replicate that same cake, but I certainly could not serve the fruit cake wrapped in foil and coloured cellophane paper as we always do, I needed to figure out what in the world was fondant !!!

Even after I did find out what was fondant, I was not entirely confident that I could roll it out nicely on my cake. Good thing in the midst of my research I found Gina! She decided to give Ryan and I a class on fondant sculpting. The result was this!

                                  our beach themed wedding cake, both tiers were fruitcake 

 

We were quite reluctant to cut our cake!

We chose to make it blue to go with our beach wedding, the frangipani flowers were made from gumpaste and the blue pearls were chocolate dragees. We told our wedding venue, 1 Twenty Six to cut off the fondant so as to not detract the taste of the wonderful fruitcake.Inside the cake was a beautiful moist traditional fruit cake, baked a month before our wedding and filled with the freshest nuts and dried fruit from Pat’s Oven (can be found in Parkway Parade or Vivocity, they are GREAT!). I recommend fruit cake for wedding cakes.The best thing about fruit cakes is how well-preserved they are that you can keep a slice or tier for your wedding anniversary. Ryan said that there was a couple who served their fruit cake on their child’s christening. Fruit cake is the way to go!! Better still, I make a fabulous fruitcake and can make one for you, complete with a beautiful fondant icing and decorations to suit your wedding theme. Email me for a wedding cake consultation.