Twisted Chocolate Banana Cake

The very first layered cake that I've ever baked was this Chocolate Banana Cake. It tastes exactly or relatively close to Secret Recipe's Chocolate Banana Cake. It's one of my personal favourties that I can hardly get sick of. However, the cake's relatively rich and decadent chocolate cake. So this time round for Ben's family's birthday celebration, I suggested a plain sponge cake to go with the cake in place of a chocolate sponge. This way, the cake is less sweet and less rich. I name this Twisted Chocolate Banana Cake.

This cake will take about 3 hours to bake and assemble and ranks 4/5 in terms of difficulty.

Fluffy Pandan Chiffon Cake

So, as I woke up this morning with great joy that the blog was finally open to public again with the block lifted, I was in great spirits! I baked 7 tubs of Pineapple Roses and baked 2 of these Fluffy Pandan Chiffon Cakes! It's also a great day as our church wedding venue has been confirmed! Charis Methodist Church it shall be! So, with this great joy.. I decided to bake 2 cakes on top of the 7 tubs of pineapple tarts I baked..

Pandan Chiffon Cakes are widely sold all around Singapore with Bengawan Solo's being one of the more popular ones. Giant/Shop & Save even sells them at a cheap cheap 2 bucks! Pandan chiffon cakes has always been my mum's favourite and it has also been my favourite when I was growing up. I can still remember stuffing myself silly with these fragrant slices. 

Some time ago, I tried a pandan chiffon cake using ieatishootipost's recipe but it didn't work out well for me as some parts of the cake were still relatively spongey. I believe this was due to the uneven folding of the batter back then.. well, that was till I decided to try out this recipe given to me by Vanessa using the hand folding method that I'm so deeply in love with!

Most people I know of would squirm at the thought of using their bare hands to fold the batter but to me, so as long as our hands are cleaned thoroughly before we fold the batter, it actually works better than a whisk or spatula!

So, here's the recipe that I love so very much as there's no food colouring involved.. all the flavour of the cake's from the pandan juice made from pandan leaves. This cake takes about 15 minutes to prep and an hour to bake. I'm using a 20cm base chiffon tin and it yielded a 2" tall cake. If you'd like, you can use a smaller tin to achieve a taller cake. 

30 April 2013: I made a taller version of the cake to full up more of my 20cm baking tin. 7 eggs would be perfect for this recipe provided that the eggs are the the 55 - 60g variety. I have provided the 7 egg version of the recipe in the ingredient list. 

Back!

So, as some of you may know of have realised, this blog was closed/restricted/blocked by Blogger for about 9 days. This was due to some malware detection made by their autobot but being the careful person I am, I've always played my part to ensure that there's no malware in this blog so that it's easily accessible for all my readers without 'infecting' you with viruses.

It has been real tough for me as I fret every day for the blog.. thinking of the next steps I should take. So this morning, I'm definitely glad that Blogger has removed the block and now, the blog is back to normal. I maybe making some changes/adjustments.. Just not too sure where to go from now though.. 

Till then, enjoy the CNY snack recipes, especially the Pineapple Roses recipe! I'll be back to blog the recipe for the Fluffy Pandan Chiffon Cake I baked earlier today! Till then, please do hang around! (: 

Pineapple Roses

So Chinese New Year is approaching and what is Chinese New Year without Pineapple Tarts? The last time I made Pineapple Tarts successfully was 2 years ago when I was adventurous enough to cook my pineapple paste from scratch. It was sure a lot of fun and a lot of satisfaction but as time isn't on my side this season, I decided to try out the Sarawak Pineapple Paste from Ailin that's so highly raved. Well, true enough, I love the pineapple paste that's not too sweet yet it's not too sour. For me, it's just right, even though it's not as fibrous as I'd like it to be. Then again, with store bought paste, this is really good enough at $6.80 for 1kg. So this time round, I love these Pineapple Roses.

This recipe was taken from food4tot. Even though the paste is meant for Nastar tarts, it worked perfectly fine for the close tarts I did. They melt perfectly in the mouth and that's just about the only complain I have of these tarts: they are way too crumbly and fragile! Then again, even though it's a mess to manage it after it's baked, it's all worth it as the tarts are so 'melt-in-the-mouth-and-oh-too-good-to-be-true' good.

So, give this recipe a try! (:

Pink Ombre Strawberry Shortcake (Birthday Cake for mama-to-be)

So today, 16 January is my mama-to-be's birthday. The woman who loves me so dearly despite not having any blood ties with me. I'm blessed to be blessed with a great hubby-to-be and a 'new' family. 

So to celebrate her birthday, we're gonna have dinner tomorrow night. As such, I baked her this Pink Ombre Strawberry Shortcake. Am glad that she loves it! (: 

Joy is when your bakes for loved ones baked with lots of love is being appreciated. 

Almond Cookies

Almond Cookies.. where do I begin? Tiny yet packed with flavour.. Even though the cookie is tiny, it's sweet but yet packed with the fragrance of ground almond! It's kinda irresistable.. so much so that I keep popping one after another into my mouth! Just this inability to control the popping of CNY snacks.. uurgh! Just when I need to shed some weight for the big day!

In any case, even though I don't really fancy the Chinese-ness of Chinese New Year cos' it's usually associated with loud festive Chinese music for my family, some family visits and maybe some good food! The only thing I love about Chinese New Year is the abundance of good food! Love Letters, Pineapple Tarts (Oh I so wanna bake these again!), Kueh Bangkit, Barbecued Pork and the list goes on and on.. and oh yes, the ultimate favourite of mine? MANDARIN ORANGES! 

Chinese New Year is so much about food and more food! So.. if you have the luxury of time, why not try this relatively simple to prepare Almond Cookie? The only difficulty/set back in this is that the moulding of the cookie is tricky but I found a way to combat that.. Other wise, this is relatively manageable and is worth a try! This recipe was given to me by Sally who took it from Alan Ooi's book.

Cornflake Cookies,

I'm so glad I tried out this recipe that a really dear friend and mentor Molly shared with a bunch of us girls. This recipe is really simple and it tastes great! Crunchy yet not too heavy! This cookie is perfect for Chinese New Year.. or actually, just about any time of the year! 

This recipe is really simple and I believe that it's easy enough to even have your kids around to bake with you! This is one of those rare 1/5 level of difficulty recipes I have on the blog! So, quick buy some Kellogg's (I only like these!) and some good quality butter (if you're gonna bake such awesome cookies, why not use good butter? more fragrant too!) and start baking!

Overview: Links to all recipes and blogposts

As I've revamped the website, please click on the tabs above to look for your favourite recipes! (: 

I'd love to see the bakes or stuff you've cooked using the blog's recipe! Do share photos of stuff you've baked or cooked using the blog's recipe with me either via FB message to http://facebook.com/limcynthia OR http://facebook.com/thebakingbiatch OR via email at cynthia.lim.hl@gmail.com! I look forward to hearing from you! (: 

Billy & Cynthia: Overview

For easy access, here's a consolidation of all the blog posts related to our wedding preparation! 

Billy & Cynthia POST 1: The beginning

Billy & Cynthia POST 2: The Proposal

Billy & Cynthia POST 3: Our Bridal Package

Billy & Cynthia POST 4: Charis Methodist Church

Billy & Cynthia POST 3: Our bridal package

Here's a sneek peek at the evening gown for my Actual Day banquet! 

As we all know, what's a wedding without beautiful wedding gowns? It's said to be the only white dress that would make every girl the prettiest girl that very day of their wedding. So, of course for Our Big Day, I want to don a beautiful white wedding gown and walk down the aisle to the favourite boy who would be eager to marry me! (:

Image taken from this website.

So, we needed a bridal studio that could provide us with the rental of gowns, make-up as well as photography for our pre-weddding shoot as well as actual day. We visited close to 15 bridal studios both locally and in JB to hunt for the right one. Trust me, bridal visiting is a very tiring process. I'll be blogging more about what some of the local studios as well as JB studios offered us. 

As the entry is relatively long, please click on the link below to read more! (: 

Billy & Cynthia POST 2: The Proposal

So, it's been 2+ months since we've been engaged. 27 October 2012. The favourite boy sure knows how to catch me off guard. As our anniversary is on the 3rd of October, I didn't want him to 'recycle' date.. So, even though we purchased our rings in late September (Yes I picked my own ring!), I was waiting for THE PROPOSAL! One thing great bout' purchasing my ring with him, even though it wasn't much of a surprise was that I get to pick what I like. Many men that I know of, including Mr Chu would just walk into the shop, see the rings available, pick the first one and just make payment. I'm just glad that I picked out my ring from Lee Hwa with a great price. Totally digging my solitaire of 0.4 carat with a great colour and cut! We got it at half price as well. (: Talk about great bargains! 

Anyway, as this blog post is image intensive, please click on the link below to get to the whole story (: 

Billy & Cynthia POST 1: The beginning

So as some of you may already know, I'm tying the knot soon with the favourite boy! The man who has been supportive of me through my good and bad times. It's been on my mind for a bit to do up a wedding blog but frankly speaking, it is already tough as it is to manage this blog.. So I guess I'm gonna do a lumped up blog with my personal life injected here too! This is also cos' the favourite boy has hardly any time to blog unlike in his younger days due to his work commitments so if I'm gonna be the only one blogging, it might as well be here! (: Maybe I can get him to guest-write here!

Anyway, we got engaged on 27 October 2012 (more details to follow in another blog post!), just a day after my birthday. It was something I've been waiting for (: However, as I was still busy with my school assignments and exams, I wasn't allowed to do any wedding planning till' my school semester ended. By the time my school semester ended, I was out full force! I started getting bridal magazines and emailed many hotels for quotations for our banquet, photographers, bridal studios etc etc! We even visited bridal studios in Johor Bahru in hope that we could get better deals. We do not drive so imagine how 'gung ho' we were to travel in and intended to travel in for our bridal!

Anyway, with our planning came meetings after meetings, emails after emails, visits after visits! We were really ALL OVER THE PLACE in search of the perfect bridal studio, photographer, church, hotel/restaurant. Indeed, by God's grace, we've managed to secure some of these stuff! I'll share more about our search and bridal packages etc in time to come for interested brides/grooms to be as reference!

I'll be sharing more about our flat application for our first home in Tampines too! (: 

Anyway, after a long search, we finally settled down on Seletar Bridal. Here's a sneak peek at my actual day evening gown:

The colour for this gown is just totally me. Electric blue is one of my favourite colours. In fact, I love my OPI coloured electric blue nail polish that it's a shade I often have on my nails! I'm just totally in love with all 4 gowns that I've selected for my wedding. Even though my wedding is still technically a year away, I've already selected my photoshoot gowns for our photoshoot in March as well as my actual day gown. Indeed, God is awesome and He provides for our every need! (:

So, I'll stop just about here for now. I've got so much to share but let me do it in instalments so that you can follow our wedding preparation if you're keen. Till then, tata! (: