The Paper Tree

The Paper Tree
of little home baked treats

Date :	2007-06-05 19:34
Subject :	Chocolate Eclairs / Mousse
Entry Type :	Public

Chocolate Eclairs

I never knew that baking 3 dozen mini eclairs would take me lesser time than stirring up a quick chinese dinner. This was the simplest of the lot (Lot being the many delicate recipes from my current most favourite cook book, Chocolate Desserts by P. Herme).

A couple of eggs, some flour, butter, milk, several moments under 200 deg. conditions and you get yourself these petite little french goodies. That was all there is to it. Sadly, I didn't have any heavy / whipping cream for the filling so I had to deal with just dipping them in dark chocolate. For a first timer, I rate myself 4/5 for the effort and 3/5 for the turn out. Albeit slightly too eggy for my taste, they were good enough for it being my first time. Next round, I'll consider taking out several yolks and adding a lil' more milk.

Also, recipe stated to use Valrhona chocolate but I didn't have any. So I substituted it with 75% dark baking chocolate and they still turned out passable.
(To purchase : several blocks of valrhona + vanilla bean paste on next stock up.)

Edit // I piped the leftover chocolate mousse into the eclairs.
In my opinion, a good substitute for whipped cream.
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Simple Chocolate Mousse.

I woke up the next morning with a sudden strong craving for something creamy and yes, chocolatey. Could be the fact that the last thing I saw before I dozed off last night was the recipe for a simple chocolate mousse. I won't deny it, P. Herme has been my bed lamp companion for quite sometime now.

So I began melting chocolate, stirring and pouring. Caught up on my reading for an hour for it to set just cause' I wanted a sinful 200 calorie chocolate curd for breakfast. I didn't regret it one single bit.

It was surprisingly rich (considering I only used avout 60grams of dark chocolate) with a dense chocolate flavour. It also had a really light, fluffy texture that when spooned, swirls gently around your tastebuds and gradually melts in your mouth. For chocoholics out there, those afraid of the calories, less fond of cakes / ice creams... this is your type of dessert.

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Date :	2007-06-01 23:14
Subject :	Neapolitan's Cupcakes
Entry Type :	Public

White, brown or pink?

Before you comment let me just say that I'm not that insane to be baking every single day. These were just some other cupcakes that I made from yesterday's batter. Which brings me to my point of how much I adore the fact that cupcakes (be it for flavour or decorating) are such cute little things to play around with.

So the batter was split into three, chocolate, obviously, reigned first. Followed by almond vanilla and lastly an inspiration from some left-over strawberry jam that I spotted in the fridge.

Vanilla Almond Crunch.
Slightly more buttery than the rest, with strong hints of almond and crunchy roasted almond bits.
Topped off with almond flavoured cream and sprinkled with leftover almond.

Dark "Mud" Chocolate
Exactly alike the one in the previous post, just layered with cream instead of icing sugar.

Strawberry Jam
A slightly less-sweeter variation. Strawberry flavoured with a dollop of jam in the middle
and strawberry cream icing to end.

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In the event that another cupcake batter should come up (I hope not cause' cleaning up for this batch was hell), I'm gonna try incorporating floral and leaves. I'm thinking along the lines of roses, lavender and chai tea. Till then!

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Date :	2007-06-01 00:05
Subject :	Little Devil's Mudcake
Entry Type :	Public

It's evident that Chocolate and I have this really intense love-hate relationship (ambivalence as you may call it) with each other. I love it cause it's orgasmically good (understatement) and then again I hate it cause' it's awfully sinful.
Thank you Max Brenners, I've been hooked ever since I had your first cup of noir java chocolat.

Call me crazy, but lately I've spent many of my "dazing off" lecture moments thinking of chocolate, what to make with chocolate and chocolate related desserts. Ask my school mates. It's quite scary.. this recent unhealthy obsession of mine. Nonethless, baking is proven to be therapeutic and chocolate apparently releases endorphines in one's body (I need all the happy I can get) so I guess it's kind of a win-win situation. Chuck the thought of "I think I am gonna put on so much weight!" , I'll just have to save my calories (from scary carbs) and add a 2km extra to the usual jog routine, something I'd gladly endure just for chocolate.

Enough about my current infatuation, or almost true love.
Here's a little something I baked this morning..

Little Devil's Mudcake

If I may be so bold to say, this one's definitely my best chocolate piece yet. The sugar dust certainly represents some sort of a halo but don't you be so naive to believe that this little cupcake is harmless. Yes, once again I insist that anything that has chocolate IS sinful, otherwise it wouldn't be called chocolate.

Now imagine this ;
A 70% dark chocolate ganache enveloped in an extra chocolatey cupcake. Light, crunchy on the top, soft and moist through the cake and the middle, a warm, rich blob of chocolate goodness, all melting in your mouth. I hope that by this point, you're starting to salivate, cause' that means I'm another step closer to baking good chocolate desserts. :)

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Date :	2007-05-29 16:36
Subject :	Little Pebbles
Entry Type :	Public

Pebbles (Little "Macaron-Wannabes")

My first time baking macarons resulted in me getting a huge lack of sleep and a restless being caused by the myraid of emotions felt. Estatic, cause initially they were looking good, almost close to reaching success if I may add. Then sad cause when they were popped into the oven, only one or two developed "feet" (I prefer to call it a skirt). The rest turned out as brown pebble lookalikes.

Yes, thus the title, Little "Macaron-Wannabes".

On a lighter note, the little pebbles weren't half as bad! I filled them with a generous blob of chocolate ganache and they tasted quite good too. The pebbles were crunchy, light and slightly chewy. The 70% bitter dark chocolate paired up with them like p. butter & jelly.

( Two more photos here. )

Alright, back to my 6 hour ordeal...
I paid very close attention to the recipe. Being as precise as I could, I sifted everything thrice to ensure the mixture was light / dry enough and stirred very gently. Maybe it was the ratio. Hmm, I should really invest in a domestic kitchen weighing machine. Or maybe it was the stirring... or the fact that I didn't measure correctly. A ton of reasons why I failed and the rest of my life to perfect this recipe.

Wish me luck, I'm not giving up till I get it right! Well... hopefully soon.

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Date :	2007-05-27 22:24
Subject :	Gâteau de Banane
Entry Type :	Public

Banana (Almond) Cake

What do you do when theres two overly ripped bananas in the kitchen?

They aren't enough for a full cake and I just baked banana muffins about a week ago. So I decided to try something different. I don't know what to call it exactly, it's somewhere between a tart and a spongecake.

This recipe was inspired from my late grandma. She loved pastries / cakes but she suffered from diabetes and high colesterol so she seldom consumed stuff from the bakeries cause they were too sweet / oily. She loved baking (so you see how I got influenced) and often came up with recipes that she could include in her diet. One of her favourites was the simple vanilla spongecake. She substituted sugar with artificial sweetener and used only egg whites.

I tweaked the recipe a little using brown sugar instead. I also added some mashed bananas and flavoured the butter. The results were brilliant. My parents loved it (they too aren't fans of overly sweetened stuff). The cake turned out moist, light and spongy. The fusion of the bananas and vanilla butter added a really aromatic flavour to the cake without it being too sweet.

I love this recipe so so much. So here it is for all to share. I hope you enjoy baking / savouring it as much as I did. :)

( Click here for the recipe. )

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Date :	2007-05-27 12:53
Subject :	Matcha Cupcakes
Entry Type :	Public

Matcha (Green Tea) Cupcakes

I'm not ashamed to say that as much as I love french / western ingredients , I have this very terrible weakness for the best asian flavour yet (albeit sesame's not too bad as well) , green tea.

G.T flavoured candy, white chocolate, ice cream, starbucks (frappucino blended cream) and whatever there's left to make with green tea, I'd gladly consume.

In my opinion, baking good cupcakes isn't one of the easiest tasks, your batter has to be light and of the right consistency or it'll either turn out too heavy (muffin-like) or too fluffed (angel cake). Adding anything at the wrong time and results could be disastrous. That was what happened when I made my first batch of green tea cupcakes a year ago. The batter became too dense and my cupcakes had a very warped texture, chewy brownie like. Not good especially since it was green tea flavoured.

So yesterday I made a large batch of assorted cupcakes (vanilla and chocolate). I had some leftover batter from the vanilla ones and so I added grounded green tea powder to the mixture, carefully folding (not mixing) till it becomes even, ensuring that the batter was still light and fluffy. Thank gosh they turned out great.

Lastly, to give a really asian / japanese feel, I topped them off with green tea white chocolate icing and some black sesame seeds.

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