Monday, April 30, 2012

Icing.

Usually I buy a pack of icing for most of my cakes. But from this moment I have decided to make my own. So for this Easter I made cream cheese frosting and butter cream icing. I wanted a low calorie cream cheese frosting for my cupcakes and an 'icing tool friendly' butter cream icing. While doing this only I realized how easy and healthy it is to make icings at home. The following recipes may not be for a professional but works out the best for me.
 Easter cake with basket-weave icing and fondant flowers.
Butter cream icing:
In mass production they would add vegetable shortening to buttercream icing, to get smooth flowing cream for cake professionals. But I didn't add shortening, as I wanted to share it with some adorable kids too. The finish was very good and it tasted extremely good, except for the fact that this buttercream icing will dry-out in few days. So it is better to finish the cake within 3 days after icing. Other than that I didn't face any challenges in doing the basket-weave icing. It was as flowy as the store-bought. Also we can keep the excess icing in air-tight container for a month in fridge. Before icing keep in room temperature till it is smooth ,add a tbsp milk if it is dry.
Primary crumb coating before real icing.
After this crumb coating allow it to dry for 1 hour. Then do a more polished outer cover icing. After that start with the favorite design. I made a basket weave pattern.
Click to see tutorial. Basketweave tip # 48 is used here.
For rope icing, Star tip 18 is used.  Click to see tutorial.
Cutting the cake on Easter eve, after attending the mass.
Ingredients:
Butter - 1/2 cup (1 stick)
confectioner's sugar - 4 cup
(for rose and decorations use 3 cups of powders sugar)
milk - 1 tbsp
vanilla extract - 1/2 tsp
salt - a pinch
food color - if needed

Bring butter to room temperature by leaving it in counter top. First beat the butter to fluffy. (I did manually using a fork, but a mixer is good for this). SIFT the sugar and add to butter. Again mix well with other ingredients to fluffy. Butter cream icing is ready!
Cream cheese frosting:
For the cupcakes I prepared cream cheese frosting. I wanted it to be on the tart side. so halved the prescribed sugar level and still it tasted yummy. 1:1 sugar with zero calorie sweetener is also possible, I hope. We can refrigerate this icing for nearly 2 weeks, keep out for 1 hour to get the texture and pipe-out before serving.
Prepared this icing few days earlier and kept refrigerated.
Carrot cupcake with cream cheese frosting.
Ingredients:
Cream cheese - 8 oz (1 pack)
unsalted butter - 8 tbsp (1 stick)
confectioner's sugar - 4 cup
vanilla extract - 1 tsp

Bring cheese and butter to room temperature by leaving them in counter top not any means (this is important). Mash together the cheese and butter. Sift the sugar and add it along with vanilla essence. Mix well. Enough to frost 2 to 3 dozen cupcakes (1 tbsp icing per cake). Makes one tub (US) frosting.
Fondant flowers:

I bought Wilton's readymade rolled fondant. Then got some videos in Youtube to learn fondant rose and calla lily.
The white daisy flowers are my own creation:)
Next time I should try some homemade fondant.
Click to see for video on rose flower making by icing / frosting.

Saturday, April 28, 2012

Carrot apple cake

Carrot cake is the most favorite for my hubby. This Easter also I wanted to bake some for all of us. I was a little intimidated to apply my recipe for making fluffy cupcakes. So I combined two recipes 1 and 2 to get the below one. This will yield one 6 inch round cake and 12 cupcakes or 24 cupcakes. Thanks to the authors, this is the most successful fluffy carrot cake I have ever baked.



First batch is ready!

Cupcakes and round cake I baked.

Fluffy carrot cupcake.

Ingredients:
Carrot - 2
Apple (small) - 1
All purpose flour - 2 cup
egg - 4
sugar - 2 cup
oil / butter - 1 1/4 cup
shredded coconut (dry) - 2 tbsp
vanilla extract - 2 tsp
orange peel - 1 tbsp
cinnamon powder - 1 tsp
baking soda - 2 tsp
baking powder - 2 tsp
salt - 1/2 tsp
walnut - 1/2 cup
raisin - 2 tbsp

Method:
Shred the carrot. Core, peel and shred the apple.
Preheat oven to 350 deg (175 deg C) for at least 30 minutes before we start baking.
Grease and flour the cake tin. Keep aside.
Beat the eggs in a mixer or using a fork till fluffy. Then add vanilla essence, sugar, oil and beat till its fluffy.
Sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt TWICE.
Put it in a mixing bowl and add the liquids from mixer.
Mix well
Add the shredded carrot, coconut, orange peel, cinnamon, coarsely chopped walnut and mix slightly.
Now the batter is ready!

Fill the cupcake cups to halfway and bake for 20 to 22 minutes.
6 inch round cake may need 40 - 50 minutes.
6 inch round carrot cake before icing.

Carrot cupcake with cream cheese frosting.

Note:
Take out and cool completely before frosting / icing.
Makes one 6 inch cake and 12 cupcakes.

Serving suggestion:
Tastes great with or without icing.
Approximate energy from 1 cupcake without frosting is 150 K cal.
1 tbsp cream cheese frosting will be 70 K cal.

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