Jelly Hearts

 

 

 

Jelly Hearts - A pretty and delicious cheesecake desserts.

 

Recipe adapted from here

 

Ingredients

 

For the base:

• 9 Digestive biscuits, crushed (I used 11 pieces, to ensure the base is thick enough)
• 70g butter, melted

 

For the cheesecake layer:

• 250g cream cheese, room temperature (I used low fat)
• 295g condensed milk (I reduced to 200g)
• Juice of 1 lemon
• 2 tsp gelatin powder (I added 1/2 tsp extra for a firmer cheesecake)
• 50ml hot water
• 6 strawberries

 

For the jelly layer:

• 90g jelly powder (I used 120g for thicker jelly layer, peach flavoured)
• Water, amount as stated in the jelly packaging

 

Methods:

 

1. Crush the biscuits into crumb and mix with the melted butter.
2. Pour the biscuit mixture into a square baking tin lined with aluminum foil for easy lifting up. Press the biscuit mixture evenly and firmly into the base.
3. Chill in the fridge for at least 1 hour.
4. Beat the cream cheese until smooth using a fork. Add condensed milk and lemon juice. Continue to mix till well-combined.
5. Dissolve the gelatin in the hot water. Strain it if there are insoluble granules. Add to cream cheese mixture and mix well.
6. Pour cream cheese mixture over the biscuit base and spread evenly.
7. Cut the strawberries into halves and trim each halve into heart shape.
8. Before the cream cheese is set, gently press the heart-shaped strawberries on top of the cream cheeses in a symmetrical pattern.
9. Cover with cling film and leave it to set in the fridge overnight.
10. The next day, make the jelly solution according to the instructions on the package. Let it cool to room temperature.
11. Gently pour jelly solution over the cheesecake and the strawberries. Place the baking tin back to the fridge for a few hours until the jelly set.

To serve, remove the tin from the fridge, carefully lift the cheesecake up using the aluminum foil and place it on a tray. Cut into 12 square pieces, with each piece has a strawberry heart at the centre.

 

Fruity White Wine Jellies

These pretty looking and delicious Fruity White Wine Jellies were dessert I made for our 2013 Countdown Party earlier.
 

 

 

 

 

I have a "Strawberry Red Wine Jellies"  recipe from a Christmas Baking Recipe booklet that came with the New Zealand Woman's Weekly Magazine I bought while holidaying in New Zealand years ago. I have made this same dessert for several times since and they never fail to impress my guests. This time I used fruity white wine instead of red wine and they turned out equally well to compliment the festive mood.

 

Fruity White Wine Jellies

 

Ingredients:

• 1 cup cold water (250ml)
• 1/2 cup boiling water (125ml)
• 6 tsp gelatin powder
• 3 cups fruity white wine (750ml)
• 1/2 cup sugar
• A variety of fresh mixed berries for the topping (I used strawberries, blueberries and kiwi)

 

Methods:

1. Sprinkle the gelatin powder over the surface of 1 cup of cold water in a shallow bowl. Let stand for 10 minutes .
2. Meanwhile, place white wine and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil, stirring until the sugar dissolve. Add in 1/2 cup of boiling water. Stir to combine.
3. Remove from heat. Continue to stir over an ice bath while slowly pour in the gelatin mixture. Stir to incorporate.
4. Pour into small serving cups, top with fruits.
5. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours until firm and set. Serve cold.

Ribena Jellies

On the last day of school, my younger girl has a "School's Out" class party in school. I made these simple, tasty and refreshing dessert for her party. She told me that all her classmates and teacher like the jellies very much.

Ribena Jellies

Adapted from Blessed Homemaker

 

Ingredients

 

• 1 packet Konnyaku Jelly Powder (10g)
• 80g Caster Sugar (Reduced from 150g)
• 750ml Water
• 200ml Ribena blackcurrant juice cordial (Increased from 100ml)

 

 

Method

1. Combine and mix konnyaku powder and caster sugar together in a small bowl.
2. Boil the water  and pour the konnyaku mixture into water gradually. Stir as you pour,  till sugar dissolved.
3. Turn off flame and keep stirring for about 5 mins, till jelly the mixture no longer cloudy and becomes clear.
4. Pour in the Ribena. Stir to mix well.
5. Pour the Ribena jelly mixture into jelly moulds.
6. Leave  them to cool down to room temperature before chilling them in the fridge.

Birthday Cake #3 - Double Chocolate Mousse Cake

This Double Chocolate Mousse Cake was the third birthday cake that I made in September. It was the second birthday cake that I made to celebrate my elder girl's 13th birthday. She loves chocolate and green tea. So, the best birthday cake for her would naturally be a chocolate-matcha cake.

 

 

 

  

I have not tried my hand on making mousse cake. When I chanced upon this triple chocolate mousse cake, I bookmarked it immediately as the steps sounded manageable for me and it will be a perfect birthday cake for my girl if I replace the bottom chocolate cake with a matcha cake!
 

 

 

I am very pleased with the end result. In fact, quite proud of it. This is the beauty of baking, when you created something that you are satisfy with and  your family/friends also enjoyed eating it, you will be at cloud nine!

 

 

 

For the Matcha Cake Base

(Adapted from this green tea swiss roll recipe. I halved the portion as below for a 8-inch round cake)

 

Ingredients:

• 13g unsalted butter, melted
• 42g egg yolk (about 3 small-medium egg yolks)
• 12g caster sugar
• 4g green tea powder
• 60g egg white (about 2 small-medium egg whites)
• 40g caster sugar
• 24g cake flour, sifted

 

Steps: 

1. Whisk egg yolks and sugar over a pot of hot water till thicken and pale in color.
2. Add in the matcha powder and stir well to combine. Set aside.
3. In another clean bowl, beat egg whites on high speed until foamy, gradually add in sugar and beat till glossy and soft peaks form.
4. Spoon 1/3 portion of egg whites mixture and mix with the egg yolk mixture using a hand whisk. Then gently fold in the remaining egg white using a spatula until well combined.
5. Gently fold the sifted flour into the batter. Add the melted butter into the batter and mix well.
6. Pour the batter into 8-inch round baking pan lined with baking paper. Spread evenly with a scraper. Gently knock the tray on tabletop to remove air bubbles trapped in the batter.
7. Bake in preheated oven at 175 degree C for around 10 minutes.
8. When cake is done, remove from pan and place on a wire rack to cool.

 

For the Chocolate Mousse

(Adapted from this Triple Chocolate Mousse Cake recipe, also halved the portion, as listed below)
 

Dark Chocolate Mousse:

• 3/4 tsp powdered gelatin
• 1 tbsp water
• 1/4 cup whole milk
• 3 oz good quality dark chocolate, finely chopped
• 150ml whipping cream

White chocolate mousse:

• 3/4 tsp gelatin powder
• 1 tbsp water
• 1/4 cup whole milk
• 3 oz good quality white chocolate
• 100 ml whipping cream

Steps:

1. Place 1 tbsp water in a small bowl. Sprinkle gelatin power evenly over the water to let it bloom.
2. Heat the milk to a simmer in a small sauce pan.
3. Pour the hot milk gently oven the gelatin. Stir gently until it’s completely dissolved.
4. Pour this milk mixture over the finely chopped chocolate. Let it sit for 2 minutes. Then whisk to dissolve the chocolate. Let the chocolate sit over a pot of simmering water and stir if necessary to melt the chocolate completely.
5. Whip the cream to soft peak stage. Keep chill until ready to use.
6. Scoop 1/3 of the whipped cream into the melted chocolate and stir to combine so as to lighten up the chocolate. Gently fold in the other 2/3 of the cream.

Repeat the same steps to make the white chocolate mousse.

 

The above yielded 1 cup (about 250ml) of dark chocolate mousse and the same quantity of white chocolate mousse.

 

To assemble:

1. Place the matcha cake into a mold. I used a heart-shape cake ring to cut the cake. Leave the cake in the cake ring.
2. Pour the first layer of dark chocolate mousse slowly over the top of the cake base. 
3. Leave it in the freezer for 10-30 minutes to set.
4. Remove from freezer and gently cover the dark chocolate mousse with the white chocolate mousse. I used a spoon to do this so as not to "disturb" the nicely set dark chocolate layer.
5. Freeze the mousse cake in the freezer for a few hours before serving. (I left it in the freezer over night)
6. 2 hours before serving, remove the cake from the freezer and gently remove the cake ring (I used a hot towel to wrap around the ring to loosen the cake and carefully lift up the ring). Once ring is removed, leave it in the fridge to thaw.

Decorate as desire before serving.

Crepes with Cameralised Bananas, Ice-cream and Granola

I made some crepes on Saturday for our afternoon tea time treat. the warm crepe filled with sweet caramelised bananas, topped with a ball of cold yummy vanilla-chocolate ice-cream and sprinkled with home-made granola, this is the best dessert to us in a hot afternoon.

The crepes recipe below yield about 12 pieces of thin crepes. We finished up half of them on Saturday. I store the remaining half in the fridge (wrapped with cling film) and had another round of crepes dessert on Sunday afternoon, this time with fresh strawberries added too :).  







Home-made Crepes Recipe

Ingredients:

• 3 eggs
• 1/2 cup milk (I used soya milk)
• 1/2 cup water
• 45g unsalted butter, melted
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour, sifted
• 1/2 tsp salt

Methods:

1. Place all ingredients into a mixing bowl, whisk until smooth (if there are small little flour lumps in the batter, use a sieve to filter them away)
2. Heat a lightly buttered non-stick pan over medium heat.
3. Pour about 1/4 cup of the batter into the centre of the pan. Lightly move the pan in circular movement to let the batter spread evenly over the pan to form a thin layer of crepe.
4. Cook for a few minutes until the crepe is set and can be flip over without breaking. Flip over and cook until both sides are lightly browned.
5. Stack cooked crepes over each other on a plate .

Caramelised Bananas

Ingredients:

• 3 ripe bananas, peel off the skin and cut into slices
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• 1 tablespoon of caster sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon of ground cinnamon

Methods:

1. In a small pot, melt the butter over low heat.
2. Add in the bananas and sprinkle the sugar and cinnamon over the bananas
3. Stir lightly to allow the bananas to be coated evenly with the caramel.

To assemble:

Place a piece of the crepe on a serving plate, fill about one tablespoon of caramelised bananas over the crepe, fold up 2 sides of the crepes. Top with one scoop of ice-cream and sprinkle crispy granola over it. Enjoy!

To heat up the crepes:

1. Heat up a non-stick pan on low heat.
2. Please one piece of cold crepe into the pan to warm it up. Flip to the other side once the first side is warmed up. Be careful not to burn the crepes.  

Apple Crumble

Apple Crumble with Strawberry Sorbet for a hot Sunday afternoon.

This delicious and easy to whip up desert is adapted from Noobcook. I adjusted the quantity of ingredients as a afternoon tea-time dessert for my family of four.

Apple Crumble

Ingredients
(Serves 4)
- 75g plain flour
- 3/4 tsp cinnamon powder
- 35g cold butter, cut into small cubes
- 21/2 tbsp caster sugar
- 3 big apples or 5 small apples
- ice cream to serve (optional, I used strawberry sorbet as I did not have ice cream in my fridge)

Directions
1. Mix flour and cinnamon powder in a large mixing bowl.
2. Add cubed butter to sifted flour. Using fingertips, gently rub the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Add sugar and mix well with a spoon.
3. Peel and core the apples. Cut into small thin slices. Arrange apple slices in a shallow baking dish.
4. Spread the crumb mixture to cover up the apples and press lightly with the back of a spoon.
5. Bake at pre-heated oven of 200°C for about 30 minutes, or until the topping is lightly golden brown.
6. Carefully scoop the hot apple crumble in individual serving plate, top with a scoop of ice cream. Serve.



Easy Cold Desserts

After the cooling winter-like breezy days, the weather here has slowly gone back to the usual hot and stuffy summer-like times… L

The best way to chase away the heat is eating sweet cold desserts! Matcha Jelly, Mango Sago and Avocado Smoothie are the desserts that my family enjoys a lot. They are yummy, healthy and easy to make.

  

This Matcha Jelly is very refreshing, chewy and full of green tea goodness. The recipe is adapted from The Modern Vegetarian but I made slight adjustments and also added Nata De Coco as my daughters love them.

Matcha Jelly with Nata De Coco

Ingredients:

• 1 packet (10g) konnyaku jelly powder
• 100g fruit sugar
•  900ml water
• Matcha mixture (4 teaspoons green tea powder, mixed with 100ml warm water)
• Some Nata De Coco

Method:

1. Mix the konnyaku jelly powder with sugar and set aside
2. Bring water to a boil in a pot. Stir in the jelly powder mixture; continue stirring to dissolve the mixture
3. Remove pot from heat and continue to stir until bubbles disappear and mixture becomes clear
4. Sift the liquid mixture into a bowl, and then sift in the green tea mixture too. Stir to combine the two
5. Pour the matcha jelly mixture into the jelly mould and add in 2-3 small cubes of Nata De Coco
6. Leave the jelly to cool before refrigerating until chilled.
7. Enjoy the chilled jellies

Many people stay away from avocado because of its un-appetizing appearance, relatively bland taste and high fat content. However, the fruit actually has tones of benefit for our health. (I’ve extracted some nutritional goodness of avocado and posted then at the end of this post).

Avocado Smoothie

Ingredients:

• 1 ripe avocado
• 125ml low fat milk (or more for a more watery version)
• About 6 ice cubes
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 1-2 teaspoons gula malacca syrup (or more)

Method:

1. Cut Avocado into halve, peel away the skin and the seed
2. Blend the avocado in a blender, together with milk, ice cubes and honey
3. Pour out the smoothie to a bowl/glass
4. Drizzle with gula Malacca syrup on top of the smoothie
5. Stir and enjoy the goodness

Mango is many people’s favourite fruit. I did not add any sugar and it still tastes so sweet. Thanks to the fruit’s natural sweetness.

Mango Sago

Ingredients:

• 2 big and ripe mangoes (I used Australia mangoes)
• 250ml Fresh Milk
• 50g Sago
• Some ice cubes

Method:

1. In a pot with water, boil the sago in low heat. Stir constantly to prevent them from sticking
2. Once all the sago turns opaque, strain and rinse them with cold tap water. Set aside
3. Remove the mango skin, cut them into cubes. Set aside about 4 tablespoons and blend the rest in a blender into puree
4. Add in the milk, ice cubes and sugar syrup (if using) and blend to combine
5. Stir in the sago to combine
6. Pour into 4 bowls and top each bowl with one tablespoon of mango cubes
7. Serve chilled

Note: Can omit the ice cubes and place the mango sago dessert in the fridge to chill before serving.

Some good to know nutritional facts about Avocado:

1. Avocado is rich in magnesium that reduces risk of excess belly fat, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and high blood sugar.
2. Avocado is a good source of dietary fiber. One Avocado delivers a whooping 11 grams of fiber. It is also rich in vitamin A, vitamin K, Vitamin C, Foliate, Iron and calcium.
3. It is a good source of antioxidant too. The antioxidants in avocados are believed to help in the prevention of cancer, arthritis, heart disease, and eye cataracts; the fruit may also delay the aging process.
4. The fat content in avocado is believed to make you feel full quicker and thus help you to eat less saturated fats and sugar. Hence, it offers a good option for those on diet to shed some weight.
5. One avocado of 201 grams has 322 calories, 29 grams of fat, 17 grams of carbohydrates, 14 milligrams of sodium and 4 grams of protein.

Matcha & Sago Jelly Cake

I made this in late January after reading a dessert book that I borrowed from the Library.

It started with my intention of making a simple Matcha & Sago pudding which was featured in the book. After I placed the pudding in the fridge for it to be firmed up, I have the sudden thought of turning it into a jelly cake by adding a crystal jelly on top of the pudding, And, the picture posted below is the end-product. It was quite a eye-pleasing piece of dessert, isn’t it?

It is also light and refreshing to the taste bud. My elder girl ate most of it and has been pestering me to make another one since then. I promised her that I will make another one, this time, with fresh mango puree instead of green tea as I could imagine the fresh bright yellow mango below the crystal-like jelly will be equally eye-pleasing. Moreover, all of us at home like mango. Instead of using peach slices to create the rosette, I will probably use fresh kiwi slices to make another rosette as the center-piece under the jelly. Hmm…. I can clearly visualize this Mango & Sago Jelly Cake in my head now :)





  

OK, back to the Matcha & Sago Jelly Cake. below is the tranlated recipe, which I’ve adapted from “美味糕点“ / Pudding:

Ingredients:

For the bottom layer

• 5g matcha powder
• 100g milk
• 40g sugar
• 100g whipping cream
• 4 tbsp sago
• 8g gelatine powder
• 40g water

For the top layer:

• 5g konnyaku jelly powder (ie half a packet)
• 100g sugar
• 450ml water
• 1 piece of canned peach halve
• strawberry to decorate

Methods:

For the bottom layer

• Sprinkle gelatine powder over the water in a bowl, melt it above a saucepan of simmering water, until the liquid become clear.
• Soap sago in water for 30 minutes then boil with water until they become clear in color. Rinse them with cold water and set aside.
• Whisk whipping cream until soft peak.
• Place milk, sugar and matcha powder in a saucepan and cook for 5-8 minutes. Strain and mix with gelatine solution.
• Leave matcha mixture to cool down until thicken. Add in whipped cream and sago, mix well.
• Pour the mixture into a mould and leave in the fridge overnight to set.

For the top layer:

• mix konnayaku powder with sugar.Pour the mixture into 450ml water and bring to boil in a saucepan.
• stir constantly to dissolve the mixture
• leave to cool down
• slice peach halve into thin slices, and arrange them into a rosette in the center of the matcha pudding.
• carefully pour the slightly cooled clear jelly mixture over the matcha pudding layer.
• Leave in fridge overnight to set. Place the strawberry on top as decoration.