An attempt to make chocolate puddle cookie from 101 Cookbooks. Actually made it twice. First time, i misread and beat the egg white till stiff peak stage, but actually the recipe specify mixing in the egg white as is.

First Attempt:-

Left: Cocoa powder + sea salt + walnut(toasted, cooled and roughly chopped).

Right: cocoa powder + sea salt + walnut all mixed up.

Left: Egg white beaten till almost stiff peak stage, anyway above is 2 egg white with about 150g of caster sugar. (i halved the recipe, also original recipe specify icing sugar which is not available at home, so caster will do, anyway, caster melted while beating the egg white…)

Right: fold in the egg white with a dash of vanilla

all fold in

oops, the recipe in 101 Cookbooks doesn’t look like this, why are mine so puffed up and big?

Left: second batch of “chocolate meringue”

Right: finished product, after 15 minutes baking time

Left: peel the chocolate meringue off baking sheet, it will be better to peel it off after being cooled for a while, else it easily break into pieces

Right: left on wire rack to be cooled completely.

Second attempt:-
Left: measuring all the ingredients, icing sugar this time on the scale
Right: cocoa powder + walnut + icing + sea salt all mixed up. Then put in 2 egg white into the mixture

Left: look more like what is in 101 Cookbook, don’t overbake these, else it will harden and stick to the baking sheet.
Right: finished product, peel it off the baking paper after cooled for a while, else it will break apart while peeling the baking sheet off.

Chocolate puddle cookie. Actually prefer my variation of beating the egg while to almost stiff peak. Chocolate meringue style is less cloying, more crispy/airy, and guilt-free tasting. Whereas chocolate puddle cookie is more gooey, sticky, looks extremely chocolatey(although i use the same amount of cocoa powder for both attempt) and actually taste sweeter to me, probably due to the more “compact” style, suitable for days when you just want to munch on something sweet, comfort cookie.

Left: a failed attempt in making my favourite munch – Almond crisp recipe taken from Lily’s Wai Sek Hong. ingredient: almond flakes, vanilla essense, sugar, 1 egg white

Right: mix them all up, while melting some butter in microwave

Left: mix in melted butter, and leave overnight in fridge

Right: the next day

Left: mix in 20g of cake flour

Right: all mixed

spread on baking sheet

cooked

failed because they stick to the baking sheet :\ think it has to be baked directly on baking tray

made this a while back, first time having success in baking bread, or bun for this matter. The bread has good soft texture, however it don’t keep well, get dry after about 2 days, maybe i didn’t put in bread improver/dough improver etc etc Recipe taken from Cheese Sticks@Oh bin, it is a chinese blog. Above is after the dough being knead for a good 15-20 minutes(approx)

have finally conquer the fear of baking bread, baking bread always seems so unattainable, i mean how does mere flour turn into soft pillowy bread with holes uniformly dotted in it… One of the secret is while mixing the flour with liquid ingredients(egg etc) to form into dough above, it will be very wet initially(almost seems like it is not going to hold together), but be patient, don’t add more flour frantically into it, but just continue to work it in a bowl, it will gradually become more workable(less wet), the later turning the dough onto a working surface, give it a good 15 minutes knead till it pass the window pane test(or almost passing the window pane test) which is stretching a little  bit of the dough on your hand, and you will actually be able to see light thru the dough, meaning gluten(bread structure) has developed nicely, and the dough is “elastic” enough to form a good soft bread. If it doesn’t pass the “window pane test”, you just have to knead it longer before letting it rise.

after the first rise(about 1 to 2 hours) under humid area. I put it near the front porch where the sun shines in

shaped into bun, give them another 1 hour or so rise(second rise), brush egg wash, quartered cheese on top, and leave some buns plain as it is.

finished products, nicely joined to each other

nice soft texture

Recipe source: Oh Bin

after kneading all the ingredients, recipe is from a recipe book at home.

after proofing it in warm area for 40 minutes, doubled in size.

second proofing for about 45 minutes.

after second proofing, double in size again

finished baking 30-35 mins

looks nice.

the strong bread protein structure is not there

super macro shot of the crumbly structure.

Post mortem:

- cause of this failed bread could be due to my incorrect mixing sequence, butter should be put in earlier, but i mixed it in when the bread is fully kneaded and springy(kneaded for about 5 minutes), and the butter unable to penetrate into it, thus i torn the bread into small pieces rubbing in the butter, that’s probably where the bread protein structure is disrupted and broken.

was bored, so played with food instead This is a new method of baking cake where boiling hot milk are added into flour-egg mixture instead of the usual cold or room temperature ingredient. Recipe from Homemade Heaven, the cake i baked failed but the cream patissiere is really nice, like those from beard papa’s and it is fat free! The cake turn out dense, and big holes in areas, maybe i add in the milk too fast, in fact i add them in one go, and stir the thick flour-egg mixture with the milk frantically, and it is a bit lumpy when i pour it into baking tin. Also experiment with Olympus mju 7000 taking food picture, i guess the preset scene-Cuisine is still the most suitable for taking food photo as i am not familiar with doing setting manually.

sifting flour with baking powder + salt

to be hot milk mixture for the cake, here is 1 pack of UHT milk + 100g butter + orange zest

4 egg + sugar, beat till pale white… for making the orange cake.

about 60ml of milk + 3 egg yolk + sugar + vanilla

bottom of pot after cream patisiere is fully cooked and thick… yummy stuff