The Cake Unadorned

September 20, 2008 at 3:38 pm · Filed under breakfast, recipes

chocolate cake

These days my cooking has strayed towards a utilitarian bent. I still enjoy the primal acts of peeling and chopping and roasting and frying. I remain transfixed watching heat and chemistry work their magic onto raw ingredients. Often I find myself squatting and staring upon the oven door, watching the herb-rubbed skin of a roast chicken blister in the searing dry heat. But unlike the carefree time of two years ago when I started this blog, cooking is no longer a hobby to while the time away, but a necessity to keep oneself sufficiently fed. Luckily, it remains a pleasurable necessity, not a chore I have to tolerate.

As such, proper meals, the kind that involves meat and veggies, take precedence over ancillary dishes that would be categorized as appetizers or desserts. The stubborn sugar-fueled souls among us might persist and make their own puddings, but I’m not that rebellious. So I take the easy way out and buy a box of biscuits from the grocery store.

But we all need a break from mass produced cookies and supermarket brownie mix, so I thought I’d sacrifice an hour or so making my favourite chocolate cake. This cake I inherit from a friend during my time in Geelong. It has been five years since my first taste, and it has held me captive ever since. Like the forbidden apple that brought Adam down to earth, this cake promotes self-destruction in my inability to restrain myself from finishing it. I learnt my lesson the hard way, and after many days of repentance and atonement at the gym and the swimming pool where I often reflect on my errors, I swear to only make this cake once a year.

This cake and its many versions are better known as flourless chocolate cake. But I baulk at that name and its unfortunate suggestion that this cake is somewhat lacking in constitution. I understand the need to inform and cater to coeliacs, but I prefer not to have to mention the flour content of my cake in its name. Perhaps some people might even be fascinated by the irony in ‘flourless chocolate cake’, like it is with vegetarian chicken or dairy free cheesecake (both made with derivatives of tofu), but I like to keep things simple and just call a chocolate cake a chocolate cake.

I enjoy it unadorned, with no frostings or tappings of icing sugar that might make it pretty and more presentable. I love watching the surface crack as I slice it with my blunt knife, the fragile crust offering the faintest protection to the rich dark body of the cake.

The Unadorned Chocolate Cake

300 g dark chocolate
125 g butter
200 g ground almonds
2/3 cups brown sugar (lightly filled, not tightly packed)
5 eggs, separated

Pre heat the oven to 180 ºC.

Break the chocolate into pieces and melt with the butter. If using a microwave, as I do, melt the chocolate in 30 second sprints. Chocolate somewhat retains its form when melted, so stir them after each interval to check that they’re melting. Burnt chocolate is both a waste and a source of depression, so this bit of extra effort goes a long way.

In a bowl, beat the egg whites with a little bit of the brown sugar until soft peaks form. I use an electric mixer because it gives better results and I’m lazy anyway.

In another bowl, mix the egg yolks, chocolate mixture, ground almonds and remaining sugar. Fold the egg whites into the mixture as gently as your patience allows you. I find folding the egg whites in 1/3 batches is easier than adding it all in at once.

To save yourself from trouble later on, I recommend lining the base of a 20 cm round cake tin with baking paper. Mine is supposedly non-stick, but the cake sticks to the base nonetheless. Grease the edges of the tin with butter for easy separation.

Pour the cake mix into the tin and bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes. Cool in the tin for 10 or so minutes, and then transfer to a wire rack to let cool completely

Comments

Fasting Feast

September 16, 2006 at 12:23 am · Filed under misc


Last Sunday marked the start of Ramadan, when Muslims begin their month-long fasting ritual. Although many people understate the challenge of abstaining from food and drink for the better part of the day, I personally find it to be quite a daunting task. Every evening as I break fast, I am humbly amazed at my own, albeit small, personal achievement in this annual test of faith.

Of course, just as it is with school tests where most merely pass and only a few succeed with flying colours, my fast is completed with many imperfections and faults. But I am extremely grateful to belong to a religion that seeks the best of its followers, yet at the same time immensely tolerant and understanding of human frailties. And so I begin each day with the hope that each fast will be better than the last, and pray that I gain more from this test of faith than simply hunger and thirst.

Fasting always brings back the best memories of growing up in Malaysia. The Ramadan Bazaar is a Malaysian institution equal in stature to the venerable pasar malam (night market), where we would browse through stall after stall selling the most cherished dishes in the country, from nasi biryani gam to nasi dagang, the common kuih talam to kuih pelita, those fragile puddings delicately flavoured with pandan and coconut milk, filled in rectangular cubes of banana leaves. And then there will be at least one stall selling ayam percik, grilled chicken basted with a spicy gravy, that will provide the unmistakable smoky aroma and air pollution that accompanies every Ramadan bazaar.

For tonight, I find myself with a rapidly ripening avocado. Avocadoes, like bananas, bruise quickly, and so I decided to make an avocado smoothie, if only to get rid of the avocado before it goes to waste. It was in fact, a really good way to get rid of avocado, as the resulting smoothie was thick and rich. Every heavy gulp was a luxurious thirst-quencher, the neutral but unmistakable creaminess of avocado counterbalanced by the faintly-sweet addition of a drizzle of honey and sugar (actually, it was more than a drizzle).

For the main meal, it was a simple, traditional Malay arrangement; rice with an accompanying dish of vegetable and meat. The vegetable dish was a stir-fried assortment of deep-fried eggplants, capsicum and Chinese broccoli, liberally drizzled with a dressing of soy sauce, vinegar and sesame oil. The meat was opor ayam, chicken slowly cooked in coconut milk and kurma powder until most of the liquid has evaporated.

To finish off the meal, I baked chocolate macarons. To be honest I’ve never had macarons before so I’m unsure if my macarons turned out into what they’re meant to be, but all the same I’m quite happy with the result; a chewy shell that gives way to a very moist chocolate ganache filling.

To all Muslims, have a blessed Ramadan ahead.

Comments

Fast Food

September 11, 2006 at 12:21 am · Filed under misc

In the world we live in, one of the most precious commodities, besides oil of course, is perhaps time itself. Despite the advent of new technology such as laptops and PDAs that promises to increase efficiency and cut down on the amount of time spent working, we seem to be even busier than before. Time seems to obey the same principles that govern the Rules of Roads: the more roads you build, the more traffic jams you get caught in. The more time we set “free”, the less time we have for ourselves.

However, there are in fact many ways of filling our stomach without resorting to Macca’s or KFC. For a quick food that is both easy to prepare and exotic, I almost always turn to noodles. They are more versatile than rice, in that they take less time to cook, and you don’t have to worry about making accompanying dishes (unless you’re happy eating rice with fried eggs, in which case I salute you for your lack of fussiness).

I keep a packet of Japanese noodles (ramen, soba or udon) in the pantry together with a packet of instant noodle soup powder. Purists might read this in disgust and abandon me altogether but I really can’t be bothered making my own broth. In any case, I plunge my noodles into the hot soup and simply add any salad or leafy vegetable that’s soft enough to cook in its own steam. Slurping my piping hot noodles, I am a happy man.

Desserts, the highlight of the meal, are normally not quick to prepare. A speedy dessert would simply be ice cream, or if I’m feeling a bit industrious, I’d make a hot chocolate sauce to be poured on top of the ice cream.

Brownies are really easy to make; simply combine flour, nuts, sugar and chocolate pieces (I’m being very general here, obviously there’s more things to add and measurements to consider). Sticky date pudding is a popular Australian pudding that’s not as revered as the Pavlova or even Peach Melba, but I personally find that it’s the best of the lot. Like the brownies, it takes only about half an hour to bake in the oven. I normally let them bake while I enjoy my main meal and have them straight out of the oven for a rich and sweet finish to another long day…

Comments

Cooking for Company

August 13, 2006 at 12:12 am · Filed under house events


There was a time when cooking at home was seen as cumbersome and old-fashioned and was the unfortunate preserve of those who can’t afford to dine out. Those with extra cash to spend would splurge on a good meal at a trendy restaurant or at the very least, a decent café, while those with a little less cash would still prefer to grab takeaway at a fast-food joint. This was when Maccas’s was the in thing and all the cool kids ate burgers.

Nowadays fast-food outlets are facing a huge image crisis, brought about by the onslaught of obesity and the unflattering comments by chefs and chef-y foodies, eager to rid the world of preservative-laden and over-salted burgers. Fast-food is fast becoming the new tobacco. The rise of television cooking shows and books by renowned chefs and food experts have brought about a renewed interest in transforming conspicuous consumers into competent cooks. This democratization of good food has helped make home-cooking not only acceptable, but de rigueur.

Over the weekend I had the pleasure of having some of my closest friends over for a relaxing Saturday lunch. I normally make lunch or dinner with friends a (relatively) simple affair. However, this time around I decided to make lunch a slightly more theatrical occasion. Going over-the-top can be fun sometimes, in that stressful, tiring but it’s-all-worth-it-in-the-end sort of way.

Sushi with avocado, cucumber and imitation crabstick filling laced with mayonnaise was relatively easy to prepare, although to my regret the avocado was unripe and did not provide the creamy, mushy comfort that I normally associate with it. However, the rice was judiciously seasoned with sugar and vinegar which adequately countered the bitterness of the unripe avocado, and so a potential disaster was averted.

Another appetizer dish was my very own version of Sigara Boregi. Mine deviated slightly from the original Turkish creation in that the filling was bursting with spinach and feta, whereas in the traditional version, the spinach filling is quite sparse. The abundant filling resulted in the pasty shell unable to retain its ideally thin, cylindrical cigar-like figure, instead transforming into a flat, rectangular rod, like a morbidly overweight spring roll bursting into the seams with spinach and feta.

For the mains, I modified a recipe obtained from Jamie Oliver’s The Return of the Naked Chef for baked fish which he cooked for Tony Blair and the Italian prime minister. The fish fillets are baked on a bed of roasted sliced potatoes and fried mushrooms, so that when it is scooped from the baking tray onto the plate, the fish rests on a beautiful pile of mushrooms and potatoes that is an appealing visual effect on its own. Of course, a ring of paprika sprinkles for added colour and spicy accompaniment wouldn’t hurt, nor would the sprig of fresh rosemary for a rustic feel.

The pre-dessert was inspired by Chocolate Fire, a newcomer to the Melbourne chocolateria scene. They dip Pringles into melted Belgian chocolate for a salty-sweet combination, much like peanut butter and Nutella.

We finished off with the cake, which consists of choc cinnamon mousse sandwiched between thin layers of hazelnut meringue. The chewy meringue provided good contrast to the creamy smooth mousse; however it was quite a messy affair to eat because the meringue was quite hard to be penetrated by a fork and we ended up eating with our hands, treating it like an oversized wafer biscuit.

Comments

Chocolate Trickery

August 6, 2006 at 12:11 am · Filed under sweet treats

This website, The Cocoanut, is a play of words, where the meaning of ‘cocoa nut’ can either be taken as its literal meaning, the nut of the cocoa plant from which we derive chocolate, or a person who is mad about cocoa. The phrase ‘Cocoanut’ also alludes to coconut, whose milk forms the basis for many of Malaysia’s well-loved dishes.

The motive for choosing a name that conjures images of smooth, velvety chocolate is pretty obvious. Chocolate is universally loved and anyone who is not mad about chocolate is himself quite mad (there’s never been a case of a woman who dislikes chocolate). A less obvious reason is that the first thing I ever made in the kitchen was a batch of truffles.

It never fails to amaze me how easy they are to prepare in relation to the decadent, luxurious taste they impart. Truffles are essentially a mixture of melted chocolate and cream, cooled and shaped into mounds and rounds and dusted with cocoa to resemble their namesake, those highly sought-after and extremely expensive fungi from Italy and France.

For my latest batch of truffles, I decided to deviate from the usual path of cocoa-coated truffles to try my hand at chocolate-dipped ones. Colour would be a dominant theme, and I wanted a play of colour to both confuse and excite the eater.

Milk chocolate is almost universally cherished, but its other cousins, dark and white, lie at the extreme spectrum of chocolate appreciation and have often divided what would otherwise be a United Chocolate Lovers Front. Purists maintain that the only chocolate worth its weight is the darker variety, while its fairer cousin seems to have attained cult status among the small but growing number of white chocolate fanatics.

I often find that those who like dark despise the white, and vice versa. This is unfortunate because their arrogance stems from complete ignorance of what the other has to offer. Dark chocolate lovers complain incessantly of the sickly sweet taste of white, while exponents of White Power whinge endlessly of the strong bitter aftertaste of the Dark Side. I personally find that the sickly sweet taste only occurs in cheap white chocolate. The better ones assert a comforting aroma of vanilla with a rich velvety texture that is unmistakably chocolate (or, technically speaking, cocoa butter).

The bitter aftertaste of dark chocolate only lingers during the first few samplings. After a while, the bitter aftertaste actually becomes a delight rather than a bother. There is something about dark chocolate that really invokes the sensation of decadence and guilty pleasure.

If only lovers of dark and white took the time and effort to give each other a chance, we could all then concentrate on more pressing issues, such as the pros and cons of margarine, why chicken skin should only be fried and never steamed, or the merits of using free-range eggs.

To trick them into eating the chocolates, I coated my white chocolate truffles with a layer of dark chocolate and vice versa. Although this is a rather dishonest method, I feel that in this particular circumstance, the Machiavellian attitude could perhaps be justified.

Comments

Pass Me The Tapas

July 19, 2006 at 12:09 am · Filed under sweet treats

I am currently still quite fascinated by the idea of small servings, which previously was a concept so foreign to me. The concept of super-sizing portions, along with all-you-can-eat buffets and the buy-1-get-1-free deals, have created a dining culture that celebrates that feeling of being totally full to the point of not being able to eat anymore. For a very long time my idea of a satisfying meal is one where I have eaten until it hurts.

I, and people like me, then gasp with genuine horror when we read articles that tell us the ideal meat portion should be no bigger than the palm of your hands. “My palms must be unnaturally small”, I would reason, as I chomp down another chicken meatball that was created with no intention of being able to be fit into the palm of one’s hand.

The Spanish dining concept of tapas is quite contrary to the growing trend of super-sizing and overeating. Tapas is basically a meal consisting of various small, bite-sized dishes, like an array of entrees that Spaniards normally enjoy at a tapas bar on a night out. It allows diners to excite their senses by treating themselves to dishes of different textures and tastes. The small sizes of the dishes totally eliminate the prospect of big portions and the nature of being in a social group prevents overeating (or does it?)

Bakerzin, of Singapore, which specialises in cakes and French pastries, created a nifty menu of tapas desserts where we choose from quite a wide choice of desserts that come in threes, fives or sevens (or nines, I’m not too sure). We ordered the fives: banana pizza, vanilla creme brulee, raspberry panna cotta, chocolate fondue with strawberries and hazelnut ice cream with rice crispies.

The hazelnut ice cream and chocolate fondue came in two beautiful glasses that has a protruding conical bottom that allows it to tilt and rotate. Food is not just about taste; presentation elevates a meal from just being something to be eaten to something to be enjoyed, and the glasses provided that lift.

The banana pizza was for me, the most interesting dish; the crisp wafer-like base provided a contrast to the comforting velvet texture of the banana, while the sweet banana itself complements the slightly salty cheese topping. The dish was a classic example of a marriage between two opposing characters (salt vs sweet, crisp vs velvety) that complement each other when done the right way.

Comments

The Housewarming Birthday Event

April 12, 2006 at 11:59 pm · Filed under house events

Last weekend I said goodbye to adolescence and a carefree childhood and ushered in, rather reluctantly, the prospect of adulthood. I am now 21. This defining coming-of-age coincides very neatly with the new-found responsibility of living on my own, and carrying the responsibility of taking care of the house, paying the bills on time and most importantly, making food for myself. It seems a very obvious fact to state at first, that if you don’t make food then there won’t be anything to eat, but somehow there lingered this infantile, childish hope in me that a plate of hot piping dinner will miraculously appear out of nowhere, as long as I believe in myself, like they do in the movies.

I decided to hold a housewarming to coincide with the eve of my birthday. It was going to be a housewarming party first, and birthday acknowledgement second. Not a birthday ‘celebration’, simply an ‘acknowledgement’. I am not looking forward to turning 21.

Most 21st celebrations Down Under are defined by flowing rivers of alcohol, with equal amounts of vomit thereafter. I may be in Australia, but I celebrate like a true Malaysian, with lots and lots of food.

The highlight of any birthday is the cake. I made two cakes that day, Nigella Lawson’s Nutella Cake (or more fancily, Torta Alla Giandula) and New York Cheesecake. Nothing can quite compete with bread fresh out of the toaster and spread with a judicious amount of Nutella. Actually the bread doesn’t even have to be hot and toasted. Cold bread taken out chilled from the fridge will still taste good with the hazelnut spread. A cake version, therefore, was an obvious choice for the housewarming. There are literally hundreds of cheesecake versions out there, ricotta, oreo, white chocolate, lemon, coffee, blueberry cheesecake, but my all-time favourite is the New Yorker, lured by the soft and light texture of the cake. It was amazing! I had to make it, not so much for my friends to try but more for me to indulge on my birthday.

But man, did they take forever to make. The Torta Nutella was quite straight-forward, although still time-consuming, but the cheesecake was something else. Nigella specifically asks of the eager baker to bake the cake with the door unopened (quite impossible, from my experience) for a good hour and a bit, and then leave it with the door still unopened for another 2 hours, after which the cake should be left for another hour with the door opened. Of course, then you have to chill the cake for a few more hours, all while battling the temptation to cut a piece, if only to exact revenge on the attention-demanding cheesecake.

Thankfully, my friends need no coaching when it comes to exacting revenge on cheesecakes.

Comments

Product May Contain Traces Of Nuts

April 12, 2006 at 10:57 pm · Filed under sweet treats

A close friend recently celebrated her birthday, and I, being the DIY kinda guy that I pretend to be, decided to surprise her with a gift that I made myself. When it comes to birthday presents, I have this obsession with trying to be different, which means either making one myself or buying something completely off the radar in gifts catalogue. Unfortunately, this daring-to-be-different experiment often turns out with a gift that is either less than perfect or poorly constructed.

To make things more complicated, this particular friend happens to be a passionate foodie herself, and has enjoyed some of the most delicious fare around town. So good is she in recommending restaurants and picking the best dish in the menu that whenever I go out with her, I give up choosing my meal altogether and simply replicate her order, so that we end up having two identical dishes on the table. This is a win-win situation not only for the chef, but also for a very contented me at the end of a meal.

Determined not to screw up, I decided to make her the one thing I’m best at, truffles. These chocolate candies are so easy to make, and although there are many variations, which includes adding syrup, butter, rum or brandy, the classic recipe of dark chocolate and cream almost never fails.

Normally, I would coat the truffles with cocoa powder, but for a change I substituted cocoa for nuts. Originally I had wanted the coating to consist of hazelnuts, so that the truffles would bear a subtle similarity to Ferrero Rocher, but the local supermarket ran out of hazelnuts when I went there and I ended up using peanuts instead.

The truffles, far from tasting like Rocher, were closer to a bite-sized Snickers bar, which is actually not such a bad thing. In this world of information overload, where brand power is king and everything is labeled, my truffle gifts would be incomplete without the proper ‘packaging solution’. However, due to my complete lack of design skills, I had to solely rely on bright fluorescent colours and bold, oversized text to grab attention to my truffle label. Most companies resort to the same trick, anyway, so I figure I can get off with it.

Comments