Lemon goodness

Everyone knows lemons in nature, it's good sense of odor makes us deserve it for more. Although it has a high amount of acids, it has a good benefits too. Peoples used it in their cooking, drinks, and washing agents for a long time ago. Ancient world is believed to have the lemons for their healing works. And now we all knows the very great nature behavior of lemon. What could it do in our daily life? Instead of being used in the kitchen, we can also used it as a main ingredients in a perfumes, detergents and soaps. This means, we almost uses it everyday!
Except for it pure existence form, we could have buy it from the markets, choosing from a bunch of yellow goods which has the size from smallest to largest. I'm quite concern that in my own country in Asian, it seems that we're less likely to be having this fruit, otherwise we uses another form of 'family' of this fruit, which is called a 'kasturi' in Malay. It has a small size, just like the lime, and yet the taste is slightly different from the original lemon. It has a splash of sweet, tangy, and preserve some of the smell of the lemon. This fruit is always used in the Malaysian famous drink, which is called 'Teh 'O' Ais Limau', which is Iced Lemon Tea for instance. Although we are not using lemon, it tastes just as it is what it is. There are some shops that keep selling the original Iced Lemon Tea as well, but many of us deserves the local version. To them, the taste of the original Iced Lemon Tea doesn't suites their tongue due to it's level of acidity that produces the high sour sensation. I believe that in our humidity and climate in Asian, it is best to suit our taste with a more sweety dishes rather than the soury dishes. Look for all type of desserts as well, there are a lot of sugary forms all over the fillings and toppings, like, for example, the 'putu mayam' or 'putu piring', it is compulsary to be served with a brown sugar or it won't be what it is supposed to be. According to our life science, the body of Asians needs more sugar and water during daytime due to it's heavy works on their farmers and planters, as told by the folks. My yesterday watch of the Astro program that shows one program that having the similarities with the other popular shows entitled 'Jalan-jalan Cari Makan' or Find the foods as you travel or simply JJCM, shows that Abon(the popular actor in Malaysia that have the Javanese descendants) is having his Nasi Pecal or Rice served with Vegetable dish, and when he finished it, he told the viewer that he need to go for 'bercangkul'(Farming). This is what our ascendants does for many years behind us. We used to have the high contents of sugar and water in our foods, but we used it back to perform our works in our tradition way. And this traditions has sustained for a long period of time until now, so that, even most of our people tend to work in the office under the air-conditioning environment like now, they still deserving the original kind of foods. This eating habits could becomes a disaster for those who has fully adopt the new lifestyle without preserving the previous one, as they could no longer uses the sugar and starch they consumed, but, if they still performs the culture as what their grandparents does, it will at least balancing their diets.
And, for this so named diet-balancing purposes, I've found one of my favourite tea-time treats which has a western twist, taken from the net, to suit one of our daily office workers who sets their machine just like the modern ways so far.. (This recipe was taken from the http://www.marthastewart.com/website, and this recipe could have a copyright. I just paste it here to let you know what I have been baked so far and what it should look like.)

Fluffy Lemon Buttermilk Cake

Ingredients

Serves 16

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened plus more for baking dish
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 4 large eggs
• Finely grated zest of 1 lemon, (about 1 tablespoon)
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup low-fat buttermilk
• 10 ounces seedless raspberry jam, (1 cup)
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 3 tablespoons confectioners' sugar

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter and flour a 9-by-13-inch glass baking dish, and set aside. Whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl; set aside.
2. Using an electric mixer, beat butter and granulated sugar in a mixing bowl until pale, about 2 minutes. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Mix in zest and vanilla.
3. Mix in flour mixture in three batches, alternating with two batches of buttermilk. Mix until just combined, scraping down bowl as needed. Spread batter evenly in prepared baking dish.
4. Bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into center of cake comes out clean, about 1 hour. Let cake cool completely in dish on a wire rack. Invert cake onto a baking sheet to remove from baking dish; then re-invert so cake is top side up.
5. With a long serrated knife, halve cake horizontally. Spread jam on bottom half; replace top half. Whip cream and confectioners' sugar in a medium bowl until slightly stiff peaks form. Spread frosting over cake, swirling decoratively. Refrigerate cake 30 minutes. Trim edges with serrated knife; cut into individual pieces and serve in eclair cups.

A Bit Of Nutritous Facts

Well, hi for everyone, there is a thought for a moment. Although I don't have what I baked for now, I'm having this good little info that I obtained from another sites. Most of these sites I've visited thought me the merely same thing, which is, the nature proves of the one and only healthy supplement, which is the WATER! Be it on its own, without any added disadvantages like the flavors, chemicals, or any pollutants, it's ready to be consumed by all of the lives on this planet!

I'm not talking about the recipes on water, but, indeed, I'm exposing you about the distinctions of water and any nutritous products of your health. As we know, the nature provides water for our daily lives for everyday as long as we are still alive on this planet. It is continuously cycled through the process routine that happens all the times. And for the fact that I believe most of you know out there, human can last without foods for 2-3 days, but still can last with just the supply of water for about a month. This is the truly amazing power of a water! Everyone can drink this just pure nature substance on its own, unless it has been polluted, contaminated, and premixed with any man-made materials. This can be caused by the over exposed to the non-friendly environments, blended with the greedy behavior of humans in nature in the name of a material lives.

I saw some site stated that there is a dangerous effects on using the plastic bottles as a container of drinking water, where this shouldn't happen if we are seriously encouraging the matter of life instead of the behaviour of it. If only humans can take the plain water as their daily beverage consumptions, then the biggest food factories doesn't have to invest a billion dolars to achieve a highly specified tanks to fill up the gases, the massive alumminium cans productions and so on. It will only produce the plain water tanks, as to be consumed by the dearest customers. Yet we could have all these sort of drinks and favorites, but in a controlled conditions. People can by the products with a limit number each day, or he/she have to have the pain water instead for the rest of the day. This surely can save the humankind and nature itself for an extra decade of ages, for sure.

What I'm hoping is not a direct decision for all, but let's think for it for a while. Couldn't we have a world that don't hurt us while we're alive after all?

CAKE MANIA!?

Welcome back, folks! Today I'll serve another twist of my collectible recipes, in a handy manner. There are 2 'secret' recipes revealed out of my collections, and there it came at the right time and place. It was a perfect pieces of home-baked goods. Here it comes: Hot Apple Cake with Pecan Sauce Topping, Coffee-cinnamon Walnut Cake And a cheesecake: Chocolate Orange Cheesecake.
When it comes to the standard that most of our local bakery claims to be, which is a 'home-baked' business, it should be like what it should be. Therefore, no added chemicals, flavorings, colorings and any synthetic items mixed to it. Unfortunately, I've seen a lot of bakers in Malaysia who prefer to use all these kind of things instead of the real ones. The very nearest points to this reasons is, not to be blamed, but it's the truth that almost all of the bakery supplies provide these kind of things. There are a bunch of colorful items here and there, stacked upon each other, in a sorted manner. This experienced me when I first visited one of the famous bakery items supplier at the heart of KL city 10 years ago. It is situated in a wet alleys, surrounded by the short shophouses, and there could be some human 'flees' too. What a silly place they have, but they were managed to get their business to run even smoothly without any circumstances!
This time, when I first discover how well the recipes are prepared in my only best book of all, I'm a bit surprised of how natural the ingredients it used in most of its recipes. I'm sure the author of this books has experienced the true environment of baking experts from around the world, especially the original places of breads. When it comes to breads, no other natural ingredients from the freshly harvested wheat that are being processed at the same time, the hands of the traditional bakers, and a minimal set of machinery items. And it uses the natural yeast, too. This scene has been showed at the food channel on Astro TV last time, where the scene happens at some part of Europe, like Scotland, if I'm not mistaken. Now this is what I mean by truly natural in baking, just like what the 'home-baked' items should be. With the geographical factors taken into account, I'm not hoping that the real wheat as the main ingredients of the baked items as well. We can used the nearest quality of the things that available in each country in this world. I believed that to produce the basic home-baked items such as breads and cakes, there could be enough of using the basics flours and fats while adding some additional liquids such as eggs and rising agents, plus the state-of-the-art actions of the two hands of the bakers, with the help of the basic tools like a wooden spoon, bowls, and the oven. If we handled them carefully and neatly, of course, the end result is what the home-baker expected to come.
And when I was first watched the game of Cake Mania, I'm shocked of how the standard bakery bake the cake such like that to a line of customers waiting for their orders in front of it? This looks like a Pizza house rather than the cake house as the items could be expressly finished within the period of orders. And I believed, if the way of baking is similar to the traditional taste, we could cut our cost in term of time and budget, just to make the cakes of the basic-like variants! Apart from that, we could just take some extra times just to decorate the finished product, like the wedding cakes, which could take for up to a week to accomplished it. By limiting the amount of unwanted ingredients, we can just have it for some days. The customers will loved the cake even it's just covered with a simple icing, where it still could become nice with the help of the arts to manipulating it.

As for the cheesecakes, you can see that the recipe used a little and minimal ingredients as it can to produce a basic and home-touched cheesecake recipe. This is yet different from the traditional type cheesecake, as this only used the plain type of cheese, the cheddar cheese, blended with the fats such as cream.

Now I will let you feel the secrecy of the baking havens, where it could brings you to feel like at home whenever you deserve it.


1st recipe: Hot Apple Cake with Pecan Sauce Topping
(For your info, I've omitted the topping for this recipe)

Ingredients:
For the Cake:
226 g butter
1 cup caster sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups All-Purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 1/2 teaspoon ground cinammon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 medium apples, peeled, cored and diced
3/4 cup pecans, chopped
1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Method:

• Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
• Beat in the eggs one at the time
• Add the dry ingredients.
• Mix in the apples, pecans and vanilla
• Bake at 30 - 40 mins at 175 C / 350 F.

For the Sauce:

4 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup pecans
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup cream, simmered.

Melt the butter and add the pecans. Add sugar and cook for some minutes until the mixture starts to caramelize. Pour in the cream. Keep stirring. Bring to the boil until the sugar dissolves and the sauce is browned.

(Copyright: Juadah Manisan Istimewa Chef Wan, 1998 Times Edition Pte Ltd, 2000 Tme Media Private Limited)


2nd Recipe: Coffee-cinnamon Walnut Cake

For the cake:
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 cups All-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
150g unsalted butter
1 cup caster sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoon instant coffee powder, dissolved in a little bit of hot water
1 cup fresh milk
1 1/2 cups walnut, chopped.

Method:

• Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
• Beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
• Add the eggs, one at a time, with the coffee liquid at the last additions.
• Fold the sifted ingredients alternatively with the milk.
• Add in the walnut, stir and pour into the greased and lined 22cm tin.

For the topping:
1/2 cup all purpose flour
3 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup walnut, chopped coarsly
powdered sugar for dusting.

• Add flour, butter, cinnamon and walnut and mix well. Drops over the cake mixture.
• Bake in the preheated oven at 170 C/340 F for 40 minutes. Cool before cutting.
• Dust with the powdered sugar on top.

(Copyright: Juadah Manisan Istimewa Chef Wan, 1998 Times Edition Pte Ltd, 2000 Tme Media Private Limited)

3rd Recipe: Chocolate Orange Cheesecake

serves 8-10
Preparation time: about 30 minutes, plus chilling
Cooking time: about 10 minutes

Ingredients:
40 g/1 1/2 oz. plain chocolate
40 g/1 1/2 oz. butter or margarine
175g / 6 oz. digestive biscuits, crushed

Filling:
225 g/8 oz. full fat soft cheese
75 g/3 oz. caster sugar
grated rind of 1 orange
4 tablespoons orange juice
15 g/1 1/2 oz powdered gelatine
1 tablespoon lemon juice
large can evaporated milk, chilled overnight

Decoration:
150 ml/ 1/4 pint double or whipping cream
1 1/2 - 2 packets plain chocolate biscuits
jellied orange slices


Method:

1. Melt the chocolate and butter or margarine in a saucepan over a gentle heat. Stir in the crushed biscuits until evenly coated, then press over the bottom of a well-greased 19-20 cm/7 1/2-8 inch loose-based round cake tin. Chill until set.
2. To make the filling, beat the cheese and sugar until soft and smooth. Gradually beat in the orange rind and juice.
3. Dissolve the gelatine i the lemon juice in a heatproof bowl over a pan of hot water. Cool, then mix evenly through the cheese mixture.
4. Whisk the evaporated milk until very thick and standing in soft peaks, then quickly fold through the cheese mixture. Pour into the tin over the biscuit base and chill until set - preferably overnight.
5. Remove the cheesecake from the tin and place it on a plate. Whip the cream until stiff and spread a thin layer all around the sids f the cheesecake. Stick the chocolate finger biscuits round the sides.
6. Decorate the top with whirls of whipped cream and complete with jellied orange slices.

(Mine was made without any decorations!)

(Copyright: Cakes & Cake Decorating, Rosemary Wadey, 1982 Hennerwood Publications Limited)

A greet festive months, a bunch of 'hot' recipe..

Happy festive days to all of you fellow readers, and I'm apologize for a long time inactive contents. It's a long story for my hibernation process, where I got a good but yet big responsibilities at my workplace where I got my eyes' weight increase during my home stay after the office hours. You can get my 'pictures' at my other blog, my developer tales at: http://frzdevtale.blogspot.com/. Here I describe my real activities during a day long, and sometimes I got back home at nearly 9.00 o'clock at night. Reaching home is a one-hour later, which is at 10 pm. And you can imagine what you'll feel during this time of reaching home from a daily work. What can I do is just browsing my cookbook, a page by page, but unable to cook it, even at a weekends. I just caught myself slept in my room for almost the whole day, so that when I'm connected again, I feel fresh. So, for this so-long gap, it doesn't mean I do not cook, but I did it in a what so called 'bunch', where I by the ingredients together, and finish it at a range of cooking sessions together. These cooking sessions is not being held very near to each other, but it is rather being held very near to my free times available - as long as I do not feel weak. Sometimes when we want to cook, there are more efforts than we taught, like preparing, measuring, washing, and sometimes cleaning before the cooking starts wherever possible. This could take some time, although in the recipe it said that the cooking just took some 30 minutes or so, but excluding this tiny routines, how can you judge on the precision given by the books? You may or may not found these routines if you are all experts, like a chefs so that everything needed would be in hands for just almost everyday.
By the way, I want to share with you my all baking activities in these past 3 months or so - starting from the Eid-ul Fitr, christmast, and for now - the Chinese new year - but this time the recipe was not quite match, but alias, I did not just mean for this occassion, and there will be other celebrations worth to it as well.
Here's the recipe: there could be around 5 recipes altogether, but let me introduce you with the Raya version first.

Now, the first bunch of recipe:
1) Kek Kukus Baldu - a soft steamed fruit cake

(recipes will be included soon)



2) Biskut Badam Strawberi Bercoklat


(recipes will be included soon)



Here comes the second bunch of recipe, this is my self-invented cake:
1)Kek Betik beryogurt(Papaya Yogurt Cake)



(recipes will be included soon)



And finally, the third bunch of recipe:
1) Sour Cream Cookies
Ingredients:
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup margarine or butter, softened
1/4 cup shortening
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 2/3 cups all-purpose flour *
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 cup dairy sour cream
Decorators' Frosting (below) - however, I omitted the frosting.

Heat oven to 425^oF. Mix 1 cup of sugar, the margarine, shortening, egg and vanilla. Stir in remaining ingredients except frosting. Divide dough into 3 equal parts. Roll each part 1/4 inch thick on lightly floured cloth-covered board. Cut into desired shapes with 2-inch cookie cutter, pipe with Decorators' Frosting. Place about 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake until no indentation remains when touched, 6 to 8 minutes. 4 to 5 dozen.

*if using self-raising flour, omit baking powder, baking soda and salt.

SOURCE: Betty Crocker's Cookie Book - Golden Press, New York (Western Publishing Company, Inc., Racine, Wisconsin - 1980)

2) Chocolate Granola Slices.

Ingredients:

1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup shortening
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 1/2 cups granola, crushed
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 ounces melted unsweetened chocolate (cool)
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped nuts

Method:

Mix brown sugar, shortening, egg, vanilla and almond extract. Stir in remaining ingredients. Shape into roll, about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Wrap and refrigerate at least 4 hours.

Heat oven to 350^o. Cut roll into 1/4-inch slices. (If dough crumbles while cutting, let warm slightly). Place about 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake until set, 10 to 12 minutes. Immediately remove from cookie sheet. About 4 Dozen.

NOTE: To make a chocolate granola drops, you may not refrigerate the dough, but you can drop the dough by rounded teaspoonfuls on the pan, remember to leave some gap.


That's it, all 4 marvelous recipes from my own selections according to this year end and the starting of a new year - all of a sudden, peoples must think something to kick up a new life.
So as to this opinions, may I wish the good warmth of new year celebration to all of you(even we're already end of January, but I thinks it's not too late to start a new kick so that your new year's resolution will spice up), enjoy my recipe suggestions without any fuss.

As far as you can see, the pattern of my activities done reflects my mood at the current time. The history of recipes tracked above is just as how you feel about me. When I'm excited, I'll choose the most simplest and easiest recipe to make, like the first steamed cake. To have the most complicated recipe of all the times required the full stability of mind and body, just see how the chef in the latest advertisement of Ferrerro Roche chocolate, where the chef is making the dessert very carefully, steadily and politely by using the high quality ever ingredients and materials. What I do have at the time(including my mind) could not yet being match with the guy in this advertisement so far. Anyway, I'm approaching through it, and hope you'll see my progress soon!

















At the left you'll see my quick desert made by the fascinating bananas harvested from my second's home garden. There are a lot more fruits and vegetables coming on, but this time this is just enough, a bunch of big bananas coming into my house, waiting to be consumed immediately. And to make it consumable, I've come out with this two fast serving deserts, where it was a banana split and peanut butter toast with a banana and honey topping (top pic). These are the most easiest recipes to prepare, just split the banana into halves, and add any filling that you like in the centre, garnish with whatever sauce and go! For the peanut butter toast with a banana and honey topping, I used two slices of toast and spread with a peanut butter on top, add the banana slices and drizzles with a honey on top. That's how it'll look like when you know how to indulge your garden's goodness yourself!

Cherry Madeira - Oops! We're in a Papaya Season!

Dear folks!

Finally, I would like to thank for those who could contiually reading my 'not-so-catchy' entries, whereas I was unable to spend even a minute or two in front of my lovely laptop, even in the free times, as the main gadget box in my house refuse to open the 'pod bay door'.

It was a long haul, shortly after the projects deadlines, activities with a similar threats, and all of the goodies work handed to me short after where the box get mad and got the blink eyed in front of it - shows it's unability to connect via the world. It is the what so-called streamyx ADSL modem, shared by 4 to 5 computers at my home. Whenever the middle light shows this blink, it means no WORLD! And it last till a couple of weeks, to about a month later.

And miracleously, by the end of this week(where I'm writing now), it comes back, almost AMAZING!.

Ok. The fruit season is here. Last night I've caught for about 7 pieces of our King of Fruit(Ask Malaysian, if you want to know) until I got almost sick, but it's still mild for someone else. There is a plenty of days until we step into a holy month again, and this time the fruit is still on the way to go. I'm glad to have it again and again and again, but the source never tried to stop. And this is the very good of the Malaysian's goodness, where one could repay their own sweat by just using their tasty buds as well, and the value comes next.

All of these stuffs gives me my very basic ideas, by what I may called the prototype of my forthcoming recipes. All fruits has been put over, be it the puddings, the main dishes, the cookies, the sweet threats, tid bits for occasions, and so on. Say it what you want it to be. By using my creativity, I've invented(still saved somewhere in my brain's RAM) about nearly a hundredth kind of recipes, just waiting to be write to another known to be disk, as long as I don't 'switched off' my memory.

However, I need to test it first. Then only I got to publish it. You just wait for it, and you might know it. Besides, there's also a gifts, it's so many we can afford to have it - even at my office. There should be some tea threats, or even some leftovers, brought by some of my colleagues, and we have it for some times together. One of the famous threat is Bubur Kacang Hijau served with Durians, and this may welcomed some person by make them saying "Just to see, not to have!". You sure know what kind of person who falls into this category, where the amount of calories counted for them.

For this time, the recipe I would share with you is yet a British cake, but has been altered a bit by me, by adding some bits of papayas, dried fruit mix and orange juice instead of lemon juice.


Recipe:

Cherry Madeira

6-8 oz. glace cherries (use a mix of other fruits, eg: papaya, raisins, etc.)
6 oz. butter or margarine
6 oz. caster sugar
3 large eggs, size 2
1/4 level teaspoon almond essence
8 oz. plain flour
1 1/2 level teaspoons baking powder
2-3 tablespoons milk or lemon juice (or orange juice, or most preferably local fruit juice, like pineapple juice, for example)
A few flaked almonds (I've omitted this)

Method:

• Set oven to moderate, Gas Mark 4, or 350^oF / 180^oC.
• If the cherries are very sticky wash them under warm water then dry thoroughly on kitchen paper. Cut 2 oz. in half for the top and quarter the rest.
• Cream the butter or margarine until soft, add sugar and cream until light and fluffy.
• Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the almond essence. Sift together the flour and baking powder then, with a metal spoon, fold into the creamed mixture with milk or lemon juice to give a dropping consistency. Fold in the cherries.
• Spoon the mixture into the tin and level the top. (If a cake tin is used, hollow out the centre to a depth of about 1 inch.)
• Place reserved cherries over top of cake and scatter over the almonds.
• Bake in the centre of the oven for about 1 hour or until firm and springy to the touch. An inserted skewer should come out clean.
• Note: If you have a curved-based ring tin, scatter cherries and almonds over base before topping with cake mixture.

Now, that's all for the cherry Madeira cake, I'll look up like this some more soon. Right now I'm wondering for a right match for a local buds, as we have too many combination nowadays in Malaysia - western, Arabic, Indians, Chinese, Japanese, Indonesians and the list is still counting...

What makes the perfect taste is never ends. If you like chocolate, for instance, there may be a blend of chocolate and any other things. And the things goes on, you'll probably switch to another flavour, but the things keep changing. While all of the ingredients keep interacting within each others, I'll like to try to look up in my brain, (if any) where can I pops up a perfect match of most of my ideas, like what it would be the next perfect threats this season! The time is rolling, yet, however, I would like to think out of the box. There could be the ready-made recipes in my collections, but, to make it meet the current season, I need to deal with the extra occasion-like theme held at my local place, whereas many of thousands of participants from the background of agricultural and the industries beyond it took part in it. Thanks for the MAHA exhibition, thanks to a lot of stuff which will be integrated to my popping ideas. Right now I have one of those pop-up menu in my brain, thinking to choose from what menu to what menu to be prepared soon. I have this in my mind: Asam Pedas Tempoyak, Biskut Durian Coklat, Chocolate Gratitude(which may be made of tapioca flour), Durian Talam pudding cake, and at last but least - Noodles in Sweet n sour souce.

Wait it till I announce it, where I should put this into the 'untested recipe' list first - and I'll looking up on how can I improve this blog in order to have this kind of menu at the right side. Also, should I modify this site, and I'd like to put on whatever I feel is beautiful, like java drop-down menus or the like.

Bye for now, hi for next!

Dreamy Midsummer Cheesecake

Welcome to the dreamer's magic. This cheesecake is full and rich of flavors, yet it contains reduced fat whipped cream and use 1 package of cream cheese. Many versions of cheesecakes, that claimed to be richy and 'dreamy' uses a lot quantity of dairy products, mainly the cream cheese and / or the sour cream, whipping cream and sometimes includes the yoghurt. Now this recipe I've obtained from my favorite cooking book, what a great cookers might like to have. The book has a good quality of illustrations, making it the first in choice for the cookers in doubt. If I have to make a quick choice when looked at the book at first place, I'll choose it. No matter the recipes inside are easy to follow, with a full description of recipes.
Ok, I don't have enough time to mention about the book alot, but I might introduce it to you the title of the book. Its called "TESCO COOKERY COLLECTION - Cheesecakes". It has a smaller size, handy to use in the kitchen with a hardcover skin.

Here I'll try to include the recipe I've just followed, and there may have be a copyright against it, but this is just the way I want to show you what I've cooked in the past, and how did I cooked it!


Dreamy midsummer's cheesecake



Serves 8

For the base:
50g (2 oz) margarine or butter, melted
50g (2 oz) caster sugar
100g (4 oz) ratafias or macaroons, crushed

For the Filling:
15 g (1 1/2 oz) sachet powdered gelatine
3 tbls water
225g (8 0z) full fat soft cheese
2 eggs, seperated
100g (4 oz) caster sugar
grated rind of 1 orange
a few drops of almond essence
142 ml (5 fl oz) carton double or whipping cream (I'm using the Emborg brand, which contains around 35% of cream)

To decorate:

225-350g (8-12 oz) mixed strawberries, cherries or raspberries and redcurrents(I've used dragon fruits, strawberries and some mangoes)
3 tbls redcurrent jelly
1 tbls strained orange juice


Grease a loose-bottomed or spring-form 18-20 cm(7-8 inch) cake tin.
Mix the melted margarine with the sugar and ratafia crumbs. (However, I've omitted the sugar for this part, and used the marie biscuits instead). Spoon into the greased tin and press evenly over the base. Chill the biscuit base in the refrigerator while making the almond-flavoured filling.
Sprinkle the gelatine over the water in a heatproof bowl and leave for 2-3 minutes until spongy. Stand the bowl in a pan of hot water and stir until the gelatine has dissolved. Set the liquid gelatine aside to cool slightly.
Beat the cheese in a bowl until softened. Beat in the egg yolks, half the sugar, the orange rind, almond essence and cream. Stir in the liquid gelatine. Leave the mixture until it is on the point of setting.
Whisk the egg whites until stiff, then whisk in the remaining caster sugar. Using a large metal spoon, fold lightly, but thoroughly, into the cheese mixture.
Turn the mixture into the prepared tin and gently tilt and tip it to level the surface. Chill in the refrigerator for 3-4 hours, or until set.
Run a round-bladed knife around the sides of the cheesecake. Melt the jelly with the orange juice in a small saucepan over low heat; cool slightly, then brush or spoon over the fruit. Transfer the cheesecake to a serving plate. Allow the glaze to set before serving the cheesecake well chilled.

Well done, do let the cheesecake to completely set before serving, as this need the usage of refrigerater even after the cheesecake has been served, and being eaten! This is because of the humidity differences, the temperature changes and also the ingredients type that may differs across a countries or regions. For example, I am using the Emborg Whipped cream, which contains 35% cream only, unlike the others that available in Malaysia, like President or Anchor, which may contain more cream. This should also taken into account when baking, because you may/may not get surprised when you saw your final product get melted into the plate after leaved for too long outside the refrigerator, and this is what happened to my very last piece!

Almond Streusal Bundt Cake with Coffee Glaze

Alright, there you goes.. waiting for almost a decade for my next episode..

Actually, there is a big schedule for me to manage my daily life and activities, plus there is a one trial-and-error interview that I had to canceled at last minutes just because of my healthy problems. There is a less hour left for me to plan what to cook, even at the weekend, I have to accommodate my office too. Just because of this hourly packed humanity period of the election day, I have to become a back-up citizen for most of my officemates.

After a long 'vacation', I have came out with a mouth-watering dessert product that could fit almost all of your daily meals, be it breakfast, lunch or dinner. The cake is quite rich, packed and contains full of nuts, oats and cinnamon flavor. There is a layer of streusal at the center, where it combines most of the ingredients like what to be in a granola, the oats, nuts, brown sugar, and butter. This is added with a little of coffee powder, to make it produce well blended herb aromas, lead by the authentic tastes of the cinnamon.

First of all, I would like to note that I've got this recipe from the internet, which the site is www.RecipeLand.com. At the time I was looking for the recipe which has the combination of the nuts, preferably almonds, oats, and some other cereal. At last I found this - luckily it match my searching criteria, although I didn't use any ingredient filter or any other kind of advanced search. Just look at it, and it comes by. Pretty nice? Awesome!

Ok., here is the recipe:

Almond Streusel Bundt Cake and Coffee Glaze


Submitted by: anonymous

(Categories: Almonds, Baked Goods, Bundt Cakes, Cake, Desserts, Oats, Sweets and Desserts)


Prep. Time: 60 minutes
Cook Time: 60 minutes
Total Time: 120 minutes


Ingredients:

-------------------------------------streusel----------------------------------
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup almonds, chopped, toasted
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/3 cup oats, old fashioned
1 1/2 teaspoons instant coffee
1/4 cup butter, chilled, cut pieces

---------------------------------------cake------------------------------------
3 cups cake flour, sifted
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 cup almonds, whole, toasted
3/4 cup butter, unsalted, room temp
1/2 cup almond paste
1 2/3 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 cup milk
6 large egg whites, room temp

--------------------------------------glaze-----------------------------------
1 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon instant coffee
1/3 cup almonds, sliced, toasted


Directions:

FOR THE STREUSEL: Mix all but butter in a small bowl. Add butter and rub in with fingertips until well blended. Set aside. FOR THE CAKE: Preheat oven to 350~.

Butter and flour a 12-cup Bundt pan (I've used a normal pan instead, as I don't have any bundt family of pans in my house). Mix flour and baking powder in a small bowl. Finely grind almonds in processor.

Using electric mixer, beat butter and almond paste in a large bowl until blended.
Gradually beat in 1-1/3 cups sugar. Continue beating until fluffy. Beat in extract.Stir in dry ingredients alternately with milk.Mix in ground almonds.

Using electric mixer fitted with clean dry beaters, beat egg whites in another large bowl to medium peaks.Gradually add remaining 1/3 cup sugar and beat until stiff but not dry.Fold meringue into batter in 2 additions.

Transfer half the batter to prepared Bundt pan. Sprinkle streusel over. Spoon remaining batter over. Bake cake until tested done, about 1 hour.

Cool in cake pan on rack for 20 minutes. Turn cake out onto rack and cool completely.

(Cake can be made 1 day ahead; cover and let stand at room temperature.)

FOR THE GLAZE: Stir powdered sugar, whipping cream and instant coffee powder in a small bowl until well blended. Drizzle glaze over cake, allowing to run down sides.

Sprinkle cake with sliced almonds.

(Copyright: http://www.recipeland.com/)