rise and shine all you gold-digging mothers

It's been more than a year since our last update. Things picked up for lovanilla and her delicious goodness of Bite.Me and the rest of us consigned to drooling on our laptops looking at photos of those delectable desserts.

Anyway, purpose of this blog's resurrection (ha!) is to document our kuih raya adventures for this year. Will also try to share some recipes and should we attempt to do them, we'll let you know how it pans out.

My first challenge this weekend would be making Afghans (not the dog, the country or the rug) cookie. Recipe is as follows:

Preparation time: 20 minutes
Total cooking time: 20 minutes
Makes: 25

150g unsalted butter, softened
60g lightly acked soft brown sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp vanilla essence
125g plain flour
2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
30g desiccated coconut
45g cornflakes, lightly crushed
90g dark chocolate chips


1. Preheat ovem to 180* C, line two baking trays with baking paper (or use silicone mat for you lucky brownies)
2. Cream butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla and beat well
3. Add sifted flour and cocoa powder to bowl with the coconut and cornflakes. Stir with a metal spoon until the ingredients are combined. Put level tablespoons of mixture on the prepared trays, allowing room for spreading. Bake for 20 mins, or until lightly browned, then leave on the tray to cool completely.
4. Place chocolate chips in a small heatproof bowl, bring a saucepan of water to boil, then remove pan from heat. Sit the bowl over the pan, making sure the base of the bowl does not sit in the water. Stir until the chocolate has melted and mixture is smooth. Spread the top of each biscuit thickly with the melted chocolate and allow to set.


Google afghan cookie for an idea of how it looks like. I'll try to post a photo once I attempted them. You don't have to wait for me to try it, you know :)

black forest cake

After so long procrastinating, I finally made black forest cake because it reminds me of the good old 90s (remember when black forest cake was THE cake?) Didn't follow any specific recipe, just used the trusted rich chocolate cake recipe and added some cream and cherries to it. I didn't use kirsch for consumption reasons so I substituted it with the heavy syrup from canned cherries mixed with a bit of mixed berry jam (the only jam we had in the house).

It wasn't as moist as I had hoped it would be but it was because my oven's timer's busted so it couldn't 'kriiiingg' to let me know of the time and I was busy watching Quarantine on telly (REC is so so much better, btw). Still, licin in a day. The benefit of boys outnumbering us ladies in this house, semua pun disapunya.

another one bites the dust

Oh yes, we made another cake for another dear friend! :D

101 cupcakes...

What exactly are black bottom cupcakes?

I'm a bit confused. I've read a few recipes on how to make black bottom cupcakes and I find two differing methods and idea of what makes it... black bottomed. One uses chocolate biscuit (Oreo-like) as a base (think graham crackers-like cheesecake base) and the other uses a dense chocolate cake batter as the black bottom. I like both in different ways (spoken like a true pro who doesn't know what she wants). The recipe with 'biscuit base' often would have a chocolate glaze after the cream cheese filling (the first picture is just before I poured chocolate glaze to fill the cup liners). The one with dense chocolate batter is like the third picture above.

I've heard a few people who dislike these cupcake liners, calling them as just a fad or by saying that it's difficult to eat (because you need to know the how to's of peeling the liners off. My reason for using this is simple, I don't have enough cupcake pans or muffin pans to hold 'normal' cupcake liners (muffin liners) and with these they hold their form because it is designed in such a way that you can say goodbye to cupcake trays! You can spend the money saved from buying cupcake trays on silicone sheets or fondant rollers :D

I've been baking carrot cake, butterscotch cake, marble cake, blondies and cream cheese marble cake but no pictures because I am frogetful like that. Oooh, I made chicken pie for my younger brother's birthday (he's been craving pies because we've been watching Pushing Daisies). Sedap!! (angkat bakul sehh).

Living around cupcakes

Hi all, i'm back after what seem like ages.
For the past month, being unemployed has allowed me to dive into the baking business for abit. Thankfully there are people out there who actually trusts me to fulfill their cupcake orders. :)
I had a couple orders for red velvet cake, chocolate brownie and tarts as well but cupcakes being the most.

So here are some of the photos I would like to share.



















Voila!

Most of the cupcakes that I did were either vanilla or chocolate flavored cake with buttercream frosting. Although there were a few orders of red velvet cupcake with cream cheese frosting and also a coffee cupcake with coffee flavored buttercream frosting.

I really enjoyed the short amount of time that I had to experience the life of having a cake business, even tho it was a very small one I would say. Sadly, I have to stop for now because I'm starting a new job tomorrow.

However, I strongly believe I'll be back in business in no time.

Till then keep in touch and stay tuned! :P

Much Love,
Lovanilla

dotty dot dotness

I'd like to take this opportunity to wish a massive ultra congratulations to our resident virginredvelvette who tied the knot with the love of her life last Friday. On behalf of the ringless virginredvelvettes (lol), I wish you and your husband all the happiness in the world and please please make cute babies so we can bake cute cakes for them and they'll love us more because we'll be their cool aunts. haha

I also would like to dedicate the following sonnet penned by the sexy work of words by Pablo Neruda:

Sonnet LXIX

Maybe nothingness is to be without your presence,
without you moving, slicing the noon
like a blue flower, without you walking
later through the fog and the cobbles,

without the light you carry in your hand,
golden, which maybe others will not see,
which maybe no one knew was growing
like the red beginnings of a rose.

In short, without your presence: without your coming
suddenly, incitingly, to know my life,
gust of a rosebush, wheat of wind:

since then I am because you are,
since then you are, I am, we are,
and through love I will be, you will be, we'll be.

Lovanilla and I had the privilege of baking the wedding cake. It was hard work and we went through one hellova rollercoaster (emotionally, mentally, and physically) but we made it through and we're very proud of it. Especially because it was made with love (chewah!).

I think we'll probably provide a more in depth post on the cake-making procedure soon. Personally for me, it was one of the most exciting things I've done in a while. I love the adrenaline rush, the tension, the sense of accomplishment and the pressure against time... fuhhhhh just thinking about it makes me want to relive it.

For now, I'll just leave you with a teeny image of the cake :)

Yummies... :)

I guess it's only fair to put up some food pics from Simply Spice Restaurant since i had 'promote promote' in the previous post. :P


Nasi Tumpang with Ayam Bersenggek (signature dish)


Crispy Chicken Fried Rice (my personal favorite)


Penang Assam Laksa


Savoury Pie (choice of chicken, fish or beef)


Chicken Tuna Capers


Oriental Chicken Chop


Chicken Love Boat (deep fried breadcrumbs chicken stuffed with sausage served with chef's special sauce)

to be continued...