Blueberry and apple braids.

I am proud of this one. I love baking bread. The part I like the most is when the dough rises, doubled up the original amount. And punching it. And let it rise again. Lol. My place smells so good, I feel like am in a bakery wonderland.

The rise of the dough.

I got this recipe from The Fresh Loaf site – an awesome website for bread lovers. The original recipe is here http://www.thefreshloaf.com/recipes/blueberrycreamcheesebraid.

Blueberry Cream Cheese Braid
Makes 2 braids

Sponge
1 tablespoon instant yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
1 1/2 cup warm milk
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

Dough
2 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/3 cup sugar
2 1/2-3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter

Blueberry Filling
2 cups blueberries
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
2 tablespoons lemon juice

Egg Glaze
1 egg
1 tablespoon milk

Cream Cheese Filling
3/4 cup cream cheese
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon egg glaze

I couldn’t find unbleached all-purpose flour at the bakery ingredients store near my place, so I bought 2 packets of high gluten flour (each weigh a kilo). I thought I would be using it a lot, but seriously, unless you like a real tough bread, DO NOT incorporate too much of this flour in your recipe. When I first used this flour I substituted a cup (or more) of all purpose flour with this flour and the bread turned out too tough and dry. Not yummie at all .

For this blueberry cheese braid, I only used 2 – 3 tablespoon of high gluten flour, mixed with all purpose flour. The bread is soft and moist, just the way I like it aha aha! I like it! Aha aha!

Blueberry braid in the making.

For the first braid filling, I used something like a chunky pureed blueberry paste or whatever you wanna call it. Fresh blueberries will cost me a bomb, and I can only find them at supermarkets. This not so fresh pureed blueberries is cheaper, and it’s ready for spreading. I just added a couple of tablespoon of lemon juice to compensate its sweetness.

Blueberry braid.

As for the second braid, I stuffed it with green apple – original recipe is here http://www.thefreshloaf.com/recipes/blueberrycreamcheesebraid#comment-165

Apple braid in the making.

2 cups of freshly cubed Granny Smith apples
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup BROWN sugar
1 cup walnuts
1/3 cup corn starch
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. nutmeg
1 tbsp. butter

In a small pot, combine; butter, brown sugar, and chopped walnuts. Stir until combined. Add apples, cinnamon, nutmeg, lemon juice, and corn starch. Combine and heat until you get a gooey concoction . The goal is to get the nuts a touch roasted…the apples will finish baking in the oven.

Big fat ass apple flavoured caterpillar.

If I were to make these wonderful braids again (which I will, definitely), I would wanna try stuffing it with butter mixed with brown sugar, sprinkle with semisweet chocolate chips and cinnamon powder. Ah… the soft, moist, gooey cinnabons.

Cakes!

I’m happy and in a very good mood today .Haven’t felt this happy for quite sometime. Life is good

And so I was planning to post about my birthday last DC10 but I haven’t edited the pictures yet so am gonna post on something that I love doing besides dicking with my computer.

Baking!

Red Velvet cake.

I love baking cakes. Just before my birthday was my niece’s birthday. I baked for her the Red Velvet cake aka Waldorf Astoria cake, which I like the most for it looks. The contrast between the vibrant red colour with the cream cheese frosting is just awesome. But I personally feel that the cream cheese frosting is too sweet for my liking though (I used 2 cups of icing sugar). I followed the recipe from Pinch My Salt website. The only thing that I modified is that I used 2 1/4 cups of all-purpose flour instead of 2 1/2 cups cake flour. This cake uses quite a lot of colouring.. I don’t think I’d put so much if I were to bake it just for the family, non-occasion stuff. The taste is ok, but the next time am gonna bake it I think I’ll just add in a little bit more of cocoa powder or chunks of bittersweet chocolate.

I think I did quite a good job decorating this cake. Simple and cute lol.

Yummie!

Another cake that I baked is this rich chocolate cake. It’s a flourless cake. Very rich, suitable for chocolate fanatics. The chocolate cake is supposed to be sliced into half, with a thick layer of whipped cream in the middle, but since the texture is soooo soft I couldn’t even placed the cake to a proper cake board, I didn’t dare to try slicing it.

Just look at how chocolatey the cake is

So here’s the recipe, adapted from DianasDesserts:

Rich Chocolate cake

113gm butter, cut into pieces
300gm good quality bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
6 large eggs, separated
1 cup caster sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
butter and flour, for greasing and flouring cake pan

1 ) Melt chocolate in a double boiler until it almost melted.
2 ) Add butter and stir until mixture is completely smooth. Keep warm.
3 ) Beat egg yolks using a food mixer until its light and lemon coloured.
4 ) Gradually beat in 3/4 cup of sugar until mixture becomes thick.
5 ) Blend in the chocolate mixture and vanilla.
6 ) In a separate mixing bowl, beat egg whites until it form soft peaks.
7 ) Gradually beat in the remaining 1/4 cup of sugar.
8 ) With a rubber spatula fold 1/3 of egg whites into the chocolate mixture.
9 ) Fold in the remainnig egg whites and blend it well.

Oven settings:

First 15 minutes (pre-heated): 190 C
Next 15 minutes: 150 C
Last 30 minutes: 120 C

After an hour baking the cake I let the cake stand in the oven for about 30 minutes with the door left ajar. Then I took it out, cover the pan with a damp cloth and let it stand for about 10 minutes or so. Then because the cake is so soft like it’s going to melt, I just refrigerate it for several hours before glazing it with chocolate ganache.

For the chocolate ganache:

300gm good quality bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
200ml double cream
A pinch of salt

Prolly not the proper way of preparing a ganache though:
1) Melt chocolate in double boiler until it melts completely.
2) Remove from heat and add in double cream. Whisk until it thickens.

Rich Chocolate cake.

It has almost a similar texture like a chocolate mud cake, something that I’ve been looking for for ages. I was planning to cover it with a chocolate mousse, but I forgot that I need to wait the melted chocolate to be slightly cold before whipping it with double cream, so I ended up with a chocolate ganache instead. Not a bad thing.. not a bad thing at all. Eating this chocolate cake alone is nice, eating it with a whipped cream, is artery choking. Lol. But it is seriously delicious. This recipe is definitely for keep