I was always obsessed with food, but recently I got also obsessed with cooking. I only hope that when I qualify from a cooking rookie into a chef I'll still be wearing the same size ;-P.
Ingredients:
- 1/2 cup unsalted margarine at room temperature
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 large eggs
- 1 1/2 cups coconut milk
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 cup shredded coconut
- 1 cup frozen blackberries
Total: 1 7x11 inch cake, about 16 servings
Directions:
1. Beat the margarine and the sugar until uniform and light (3-5 minutes in a stand mixer on medium speed).
2. Continue beating and add the eggs, one at a time, then the coconut milk and the vanilla.
3. Mix the flour with the baking powder and the salt. Add the coconut and mix.
4. Add the flour mix to the egg mix and gently stir in manually. Add the berries.
5. Grease a 7x11 inch cake pan and bake in an oven preheated to 350F for about 45-50 minutes until the loaf is lightly golden brown and an inserted toothpick comes out clean. The ovens may vary. In my oven I bake at 375F for 50 minutes.
6. Let the cake cool for 15 minutes before eating. If you want to store the cake, slice it, lay out individual slices on a baking sheet and freeze (if you freeze them together, they will stick to each other and will be hard to separate). Take out the slices as needed and defrost at room temperature for 15-30 minutes or in the refrigerator for about 1 hour or overnight. Freezing only adds moisture to the cake.
Afterthoughts:
- Recently I had several really nice and moist berry coconut cakes (at parties and coffee shops) and am trying to recreate that experience. This is pretty good, but not there yet. If you have better recipes, I'd appreciate them!
Custard muffin would be more accurate Source:Bruno Albouze
Taste: 4 (out of 5) Difficulty: 3 (out of 5)
Ingredients:
- 1 cup milk
- 23 g butter
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 egg yolks
- 112 g white sugar
- 60 g all-purpose flour
- 15 g corn starch
- 10 ml rum
- 10 ml Grand Marnier
Total: 6 caneles / canele muffins
Directions:
1. In a small pot combine milk, vanilla and butter and bring to 180F.
2. In the meantime, in a stand mixer, beat together the egg yolks with the sugar.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour and the corn starch.
4. Pour the warm milk into the egg yolks while beating to temper the egg yolks.
5. Add the flour and continue whisking / beating, until combined.
6. Add the rum / Grand Marnier.
7. You will get about 1 1/2 cups of batter. In my case it was pretty liquid. Not sure if that was the intention. Let it rest in the fridge for at least 12 hours.
8. I used a silicon mould for 6 muffins (about 1/2 cup each). Preheat the oven to 425F (or 450F in my hypo-energetic oven).
9. Pour about 1/4 cup of batter into each mould (no need to grease when suing silicon.)
10. Bake at 425F for 25 minutes and then at 380F (400F for me) for another 30 minutes.
11. Remove from the oven and let the muffins cool in the moulds. When cool, they will come out very easily.
Afterthoughts:
- I made these twice last week. They taste good, but come out custardy. Caneles should be drier and have a more cake-like texture. I am not sure if this is the fault of the recipe, my oven or the lack of an appropriate mould.
- This blog is called trial and error. I would put this in the error category, unless you want a custard muffin.
Simple Malaysian vegetable stew in a creamy coconut sauce. Source: Inspired by LinsFood
Difficulty: 1 (out of 5) Taste: 5 (out of 5)
Ingredients:
For the paste:
- 1 onion
- 30 g ginger
- 20 g lemon grass
- 10 g galangal
- 3 Tbsp shrimp paste
- 1 tsp sambal oelek
- 1 tsp ground turmeric
The rest of the ingredients:
- 2 Tbsp coconut or vegetable oil
- 250 g cabbage
- 250 g Normandy mix
- 250 g okra
- 100 g carrots
- 150 g French beans
- 150 g eggplants
- 400 ml coconut drink or water
- 200 ml coconut cream
- 1 Tbsp soy sauce
- 1 tsp fish sauce
- 8 kafir lime leaves
Total: 6 servings, about 1600 g, 1090 cal, 182 cal / serving
Directions:
1. Blend all paste ingredients until uniform (Vitamix comes very handy here.)
2. Chop the vegetables, the finer the faster they will cook, but in this recipe the size does not really matter.
3. Preheat the oil in a large, preferably non-stick, pot on a medium high heat and saute the paste until fragrant, for 2-3 minutes.
4. Add the chopped vegetables, stir well, add the rest of the ingredients, stir again and bring to boil on high heat steering from time to time.Once boiling, reduce the heat to medium low and let simmer for another 15 minutes, stirring from time to time.
5. Serve with rice.
Afterthoughts:
- I tried several sayur kemak recipes and was not quite satisfied with any of them, but this one is clearly the winner. I think it's even tastier than my beloved sayur lemak from Banana Leaf, a great Malaysian restaurant in Vancouver.
- I usually eat very mild food, so if you want something spicy, you might want to add more sambal oelek. For me this turned out just right.
- You can use a variety of vegetables, and can also add tofu and shrimps to this recipe. It will be all good as long as you stick to the main paste ingredients, and add enough coconut cream ;-).
- It's almost vegetarian, except for the shrimp paste. I don't really know what would be the substitute.
Simple base recipe. Makes a perfect loaf cake every time. Add more flavours and ingredients as you like. Source: a friend
Difficulty: 1 (out of 5) Taste: 5 (out of 5)
Ingredients:
- 200 g salted margarine
- 1.5 cups sugar
- 4 large eggs
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda mixed with 1 tbsp lemon concentrate
- 1 cup milk
- 2 tbsp rum
Total: 2 loaf cakes, 560 g each, 5300 calories, 20 servings, 265 calorie / serving of 55g
Directions:
1. Beat the margarine and the sugar until uniform and light (3-5 minutes in a stand mixer on medium speed).
2. Continue beating and add remaining ingredients in the order listed.
3. Divide the batter equally among 2 loaf pans (greased or lined with parchment paper). In my case each pan with batter weights about 940g.
4. Bake in an oven preheated to 350F for about 40-50 minutes until the loafs are golden brown and an inserted toothpick comes out clean. The ovens may vary. In my oven I bake at 375F for 45 minutes.
5. Let the cake cool to room temperature before eating. If you want to store the cake, slice it, lay out individual slices on a baking sheet and freeze (if you freeze them together, they will stick to each other and will be hard to separate). Take out the slices as needed and defrost at room temperature for 15-30 minutes or in the refrigerator for about 1 hour or overnight. Freezing only adds moisture to the cake.
Afterthoughts:
- I've been making this cake for years, it's a really fail-proof recipe, and requires very simple ingredients that are pretty much always on hand.
- If you have self rising flour, skip the baking powder and the baking soda.
- You can add cranberries or raisins, walnuts, chocolate chips or apples (about 100g of each.) Of coarse, not all at once, or the cake will not rise. If you are adding these, you might need to increase the baking times.
- You can also add vanilla essence or mango / lychee, orange, etc., about 1/2 tbsp.
Posts
