Hungarian Fairy Cake { Tündérsüti }

Hungarian Fairy Cake { Tündérsüti }
recipe via Tundi Konyha

Ingredients

For the dough
200gm Plain flour
80gm Powdered or Confectioner's sugar
100gm Butter, room temperature
2 Egg yolks
1 tsp Baking powder
1 pkt vanilla sugar
pinch of salt

For the filling
1 packet "puncs" / strawberry pudding powder
200ml Cold Milk
4 Tbsp sugar
180gm Sour cream, room temperature (normally 20% fat, but I only had 12%)
2 Egg whits
Rum extract, to taste
small drop of red food colouring

Powdered sugar for dusting

Method
1) Pre-heat oven to 180°. Prep cake tin (17.5x23.5cm) by greasing and flouring it. Set aside.

2) Make the dough by mixing  mixing flour, powdered sugar, baking powder and pinch of salt. Then add in butter by gently pinch butter into flour mixture until crumbly. Create a well in the centre of the bowl, pour in the egg yolks and gently knead into becoming a soft dough.

3) Divide dough into 6:4 portions. Roll out the bigger dough to the size of the bottom of baking dish. Place in the baking dish. Place the baking dish in the fridge to let the dough rest. The smaller portion of dough, wrap in cling film and let it rest in the fridge too.

4) While the dough is resting, prepare the filling. In a sauce pan , pour in cold milk, then slowly mix in the pudding powder and powdered sugar. Cook the pudding on stove top until thickens.

5) When pudding has thickens, carefully mix in the sour cream. This process will easily split the mixture. What I did was, take a little of the hot pudding, and add into the sour cream and then pour the whole sour cream mixture into the  hot pudding and quickly whisk it to avoid splitting. Then put in the rum and red food colouring, mix well. Set aside

6) In a bowl, beat egg whites until stiff. The slowly fold into pudding mixture.

7) Take out the baking dish from the fridge, pour the filling over the dough base. Finally roll out the smaller portion dough, cut into strips and lay a criss cross pattern on top (see pic from recipe link above).

8) Bake in the oven for 30-35 mins. until pudding is firm nad pastry is golden brown.

Grapefruit Cake

photo via Andrew Zimmern

Unfortunately I didn't managed to take a photo of the actual cake, before it was demolish and became "unphotogenic". I'm posting still the recipe because it was surprising good!

Grapefruit cake
recipe via BlissfullyScrumptious

Ingredients
40gm Sugar
1 Egg
50gm Butter, melted
50gm Plain Flour
1/2 tsp Baking powder
1/2 tsp Baking soda
a pinch of salt
50ml Grapefruit juice

Method
1) Pre-heat oven to 180˙c
2) In a bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, baking soda and a pinch of salt. Set aside
3) In another bowl whisk sugar, egg and melted butter until combine. Pour in the grape juice and flour mixture (1). Whisk until just combine, do not over mix!
4) Pour cake batter into greased loaf tin and bake for 20-25 mins.

Chinese New Year Cake / Nian Gao / 年糕

When it come to taste of Chinese foods, we work on the basis of sweet, sour, bitter, and spiciness. Another element which is also very important is the textures. Some of the favoured texture is stickiness, crispiness and bounciness of foods; which can be found when you're enjoying dim sums. To achieve stickiness, glutinous rice is used.

This Chinese New Year cake symbolises "raising oneself higher in each coming year" or 年年高升. You can read more on wiki.

My cake turned out very pale despite after almost 8 hours (!) of steaming. The cake is suppose to be dark caramelised colour. I know what I did wrong, and will improve on it the next Chinese New Year.

I made this based on recipe from Nasi Lemak Lover.

Chinese New Year dishes : Yusheng / Yee Sang / 鱼生

I love this "salad" dish with raw or smoked fish during Chinese New Year. The crispy crunch of the fried wonton, contrast with the fresh fish and vegetable toss in plum sauce is my idea of heaven!

For recipe, please refer to my recipe from last year.