Sugar-Rocks now has an order form! Thanks to my aunt.

In my last post, I mentioned that I made some Nutella swirled butter cakes for my aunts. However I only managed to get hold of one of them and I do love people to eat my cakes within two hours of baking! Optimal cake eating timing turned out to be terrible timing because I found my aunt in her living room staring at two computer screens and her TV screen. Yup she was multi-tasking, writing her thesis and watching some sappy serial at the same time. The conversation went roughly like that

Oli: Hey Ee Ee remember how we used to eat Nutella together? I made a Nutella cake!!!

Auntie J: Did you make a cake for my neighbour? I owe her a gift.

Oli: Why don’t you buy a cake from me for her?

Auntie J: No, you make the cake for her for free.(very fierce voice and starts eating the cake eyes still glued on the screens)

Oli:  I can’t make things for free for you to give away to your friends anymore! My friend and manager  L----s said NO MORE FREE CAKES. Hey I wanted to show you my website, remember how you told me I should market my cakes online? (grabs a computer that looks seemingly idle)

Auntie J: (For the first time her head turns towards me) : DON”T TOUCH THAT!!!

Oli: Just wanted to show you my website. (quickly types the sugar-rocks website before screaming unfolds)

Auntie J: Where are these pictures from? You took them off the internet?

Ryan : Muahhahahahahaa

 Oli: (stunned) Sheesh, these are my cakes, I took those photos! Look carefully can’t you even recognise our friggin house and plates!!!!

Auntie J: Hmm, actually you should start selling these cakes.They are really nice!

Ryan is just rubbing his head in his hands at this moment

Oli: EeEee I am selling these cakes. Just like you told me to a month ago!!! You are staring at the website where I am selling my cakes. That’s why no more free cakes for your random friends!

Auntie J:You sure you didn’t take them off the internet.

At this point I started to get slightly paranoid, not just because of my Aunt’s little faith in me, but also because perhaps people are unaware that I am selling these cakes. So I got Ryan to make an order form for me (thank you thank you thank you). You can access it from here so just click here. It is also on the top bar of the blog, under the header order. At the moment here are the following cakes available

1)      Some Like it Hot—Chilli Chocolate cake with chocolate ganache and a candied chilli padi (hot!)

2)      Like a girl—White cake filled with raspberry jam topped with cream cheese and a strawberry  (12 for $35)

3)      Roomantique—Lemon and Lavender cake with chocolate ganache filling and topped with a toasted meringue (8 for $25)

4)      Cruella De Vil—Natural Red Velvet Cake with Cream cheese frosting and chocolate chips sprinkles

5)      My Fav Bunny—Classic carrot cake with walnuts and raisins, cream cheese frosting and a little fondant carrot as a topper

6)      Guilt in a mini cake—Dark dark chocolate cake with a surprise centre, topped with a glossy chocolate ganache ( we can pipe words on the cakes)

7)      Where hasn’t Vanilla bean?—Vanilla bean cake with vanilla bean buttercream frosting

8)      A Chocolatey Affair—Dark Chocolate cake (brownie consistency) with a chocolate buttercream frosting

9)      Cococonut—Chocolate cake topped with a Marshmallow frosting and chocolate coconut ganache, grated coconut is sprinkled on the top (something like Rocky Road)

10)  Nutellen’ ya—The cake I brought my aunt.. Nutella swirled rich butter cake with Mocha and baileys frosting (baileys optional)

Sugar- Rocks does vegan cakes too, so please indicate if you have such a request. All cakes can be customised and made into whole cakes.

Oh to end that story with Auntie J, she sent Ryan running out of the house with the following words, “I think I want to do my last semester for my Masters in Melbourne but I will wait till you re-locate there then I CAN LIVE WITH YOU!

Here is an example of packaging I do for my cake orders. Enjoy! (BTW it is a “I Love Malaysians” cake complete with the twin towers)

card for the cake

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!)

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!