Grandma in the Garden

My sweet neighbour will be flying to Sydney for her birthday this year. She is a sweet lady who loves gardening and loves yellow roses. So, this year, instead of a cream cake (that's what I made for her last year), I decided to make her a fondant cake with her favourite things and colours.  The cake is a buttery chocolate cake with coffee buttercream. I am so glad that she loved it.

Here's a photo of the cake which I made for my darling neighbour....

Wohoo....2 more cakes to go for the July boys....

Malaysian Banana Cake

Banana cake....yummy! I love banana cake, especially the Malaysian ones.  Its so soft and it melts in your mouth with the first bite. I love the smell of it baking in the oven too. My other half was never a banana cake fan as the banana cakes which he has eaten was always dense (so said he) till he tried my humble banana cake.....and ta-daa....he fell in love with it. I made it for a potluck function and was very happy with the reviews. Some of my friends told me that Banana Cake is also called Banana Bread....but, I don't really think so due to the texture.

When I was young, my Grandaunt will always bake this delicious local delight at least once a week as bananas are often bought as one of the fruits and when its over-ripe, it will be mashed to create banana cake.  The aroma of this baby baking in the oven brought neighbours to our house. According to my Grandaunt, banana cake was made in the olden days by women who wanted to make some extra income and most houses have banana trees. That's what she did when she was young.

Here's a photo of my humble banana cake for the potluck.

Yummy Yummy Banana Cake!!!

An update...

Thanks Jasmine for visiting my humble block.  Here's the simple recipe which I use for this banana cake.

2/3 cup sugar
2/3 cup butter / margarine

1 1/4 cup self raising flour

3 grade A eggs

1 - 1 1/2 cup of bananas (mashed with fork)

pinch of soda bicarbonate

a splash of vanilla essence

Method:

- cream butter and sugar together till its fluffy.

- add in 1 egg at a time.

- fold in the flour by hand.

- add in the soda bicarbonate and vanilla essence.

- fold in the bananas ( do not over mix)

- bake in the oven for 20- 25 mins at a temperature of 160 degrees C.

Hope this helps.  Happy Baking, Jasmine.

My Princess 4th Birhday

My little Princess is growing up so fast...she turns 4 today.  She wanted a Strawberry Shortcake cake and I was told that she wants the "new" Strawberry...not the old one.  I watched the DVD with her to understand more about this "new" Strawberry.  It looks like the Strawberry which I grew up with has gone for some major make-over or something as the "new" one doesn't look anything like the old Strawberry which I know so well.

I often have trouble with the eyes whenever I do the gumpaste figurines and this time there is no difference.  The first Strawberry which I made did not get the approval from my little Princess. Hence, I had to mould another head and tried my hands in making her look like what she suppose to look like.  I compared my figurine with the DVD cover and I must say it doesn't look like her much. However, thankfully, my little Princess loved the second one better.....wohoo!!!  To see the smile on her face and receive a hug and a "I Love You, Mummy" is the best gift ever.

Here's a photo of the approved Strawberry Shortcake Cake from my little Princess.

Till next time.....bye!!!

Quiche...

Quiche.....my kiddos think I am saying "Kiss".....haha!  So, what is quiche? Its a savoury open face pie with egg custard filling, cheese, veggies, meat, etc.  Some people told me that quiche comes from Germany and others state that its from France. What I can say is...who ever created this, quiche is AWESOME!!!!

I was thinking of making small individual pies but the lazybum in me shouted, just a big one will do...save time, save energy.... So, here's how my quiche turned out...

That's all for now....

Happy quiche.....ing!!!

Bread, Bread and more Bread...

Winter is here and not surprisingly, my kiddos love having bread...its better if its MV first.  They will have it with their warm milk or chocolate milk.  So, I decided to make 2 types of bread this round.  I will do some buns and a loaf.  I just wanted to see if my kiddos prefer the buns or slices of bread.  As usual, my kiddos wanted raisins inside the bread. Hence, here's several photos of my humble raisin breads.

Last stage of proving...going into the oven very soon....

Just out from the oven.....

On to the cooling rack....

My humble raisin loaf...

Gosh...I just love the smell of the bread baking in the oven....don't you?

Tom Yum Noodles

Tom yum....mmmmm....yum!yum! This soup comes from Thailand and its known as a clear spicy soup. Some people calls it the hot and spicy soup.  Winter is just around the corner and any hot soup will be a welcome in this household.  I love to add cauliflowers, baby corns and of course the other ingredients which I use for hotpot into the tom yum soup...yum!!! This time around, I added yellow noodles to it too.

I quickly took this photo as I saw the fork and spoon heading towards the bowl....haha!!!

Till next time....happy tom yumming!!!

Raisin Buns and Scrolls

My little darling Princess was asking for raisin buns when we walked passed Bread Top yesterday and I told her that we will try and make some today.  Since we have a good old breadmaker, we should put it into good use. My little Princess got all excited and we can out with 2 different types of raisin buns.  In between waiting for the dough to double in bulk, we also tried to make some Danish scrolls. As I do not have a laminator / dough-breaker, I had to do it by myself with a rolling pin.

Here's some photos of our little project today...

Raisin Buns 

Raisin Buns

Danish Scrolls

I am pretty happy with the end results as my 2 kids ate at least 1/3 of the buns and my DH ate 1/2 of the danish scrolls...wohoo!!!