Awfully Chocolate vs. Shira's Choice

You may be surprised if I tell you I'm not a chocolate person. I don't like those off the shelf milk chocolate bars like Cadbury... never like the gluey and super sweet taste that stick in my mouth. My perception towards chocolate changed when my cousin offered me a fine piece of chocolate which she bought from a store at Landmark - a very high end shopping mall in Central, HK. This very chocolate appeared in one of the top hit HK movies "God of Gamble 赌神". After he had lost his mind, 赌神 could only play cards like God again after he ate these dark chocolate.

To be honest, in my journey of baking cake, I hardly make chocolate cake, be it chocolate cream or chocolate mousse cake. I may have made some brownies once. Even for my cookies, I prefer making those without chocolate chips. But how could a baker not know how to make chocolate cake and do not enjoy eating these popular cakes, I asked myself one day. And the chance came when my neighbour asked if I could make one for her friend. I knew it's time to dig through my book shelf and venture into it. I had a few chocolate cakes orders, one after another in the same month. So there was no room for error. I just had to study hard to master the skill.

To stay objective when you comment on the quality of cakes brought from professional bakery shops is tough because food is all about personal preferences and taste. For instance, I liked Lana Cake located at Sixth Ave. The first time I tried it and I instantly fell in love with it. I heard that they use very good quality Belgium chocolate and they don't produce much every day.

Secret Recipe is my first choice of cake shop in general. If I have a crave, they'll be my choice. Their cheese cake and chocolate cake are generally good (esp. banana chocolate, chocolate indulgent, chocolate mud cakes etc)

Bakerzin's cake was good when they 1st came to the market. But I feel that the standard has recently dropped. I visited their shop @ Vivo a few weeks back. U could tell that the cakes had been on the shelf for a few days cox you could see hairline cracks on the cream. These cracks were so visible and the strawberry skin was so dry...

Recently, I read the report about Awfully Chocolate in ST. It was interesting to learn how they started and stuff like that. I expected quite a lot when my hubby bought home a "banana chocolate cake". Verdict: my kids couldn't finish a small slice and they said they didn't like the cream. Each one of us had one slice and the rest of the cake was stuck inside the fridge for days... my helper and I slowly finished it off ... don't think I will buy from them again.

Today, I could proudly say that my chocolate cream ganache cake is one of my best cake selections. I usually use at least 50% cocoa couverture to make the cream. I don't do much fancy decoration. I would put some icing monogram or fresh fruit.

When it comes to treating my friends, I always pick my best. So I made a chocolate cream ganache cake to Joan's house when she cooked her famous Hok Kian Mee for all of us. This I used Valrhona 60% chocolate. I leave the verdict to those who tried my cake. What's important is that we had a great time together and I liked the cake ;>

Cute Little Emma is 2

I know I've been slacking on my post. Perhaps trying to catch some breath after a hectic CNY busy fulfilling orders.

My 1st official "commencement" order was from Emma who turned 2 on 10th Mar. It was about a year ago when I’d met this cute little "sweet pea" again since she was born. She's so cheerful, sociable, cute and happy playing with my "active" girls all the time in that first encounter. So when her mummy asked me to make some cup cakes for her birthday celebrations, I took it on gladly without a 2nd thought.

Mummy knows Emma doesn't like food that's too sweet and I have to reduce the sugar content. So it would be cream cheese with little icing sugar flavored with orange zest for the topping.

The birthday cake was a banana cake sandwiched with fruit jam, topped with a little bit of cream. Instead of fresh cream, I made custard cream because it's not so sweet and it tastes like vanilla ice cream. It should blend well with the banana flavour. It would have been perfect if the cake is slightly softer. Maybe I should use banana chiffon cake next time

Happy Birthday Emma ;>

Banana Cake with Custard Cream

Happy Birthday to Grace S.C.C

My church committee members have enough faith in me by asking me to make a cake for the big 30th anniversary in March. Thanks to Godma and SH who always help promote my cake. I gladly took on this project as part of the service to my church that we've stay on for close to a decade. The end product is a small cake surrounded by many beautiful cup cakes. Happy 30th Birthday and many more to come.

Always wanted to make something "grand". One more item off my "must try" list.

Happy Birthday my princess Shanice

My princess no. 1 Shanice turned 7 on 27th Feb. She wanted a ice cream cake with lots of high rise buildings on it. Don't know where she got the idea from.

Due to the hectic CNY schedule, I had no time to think of what to meet her wish. Her birthday came on a weekend and our new helper newly arrived on the same day. I had no time to bake her a cake. Ice cream cake indeed is a very good choice because I could prepare it a few days in advance and I would need very little time to decorate it.

Her name, Shanice, means "the gracious gift of God". God indeed blessed us with Shanice as our first born . She's a very teachable kid and she can be reasoned with even at very young age. I did explain to her why mummy could not do a better cake to fullfil her wish (i.e. one with the city feel). She's able to let go without any struggle and she still showed a lot of appreciation. Anyway, she's still a 7 years old and would expect to have a little party with presents or at lease to have her god parents around to cut the cake with her, just like Shanae's birthday 10 days earlier.

I bought 4 punnets of fresh strawberries to make puree and diced them into the ice cream. Wanted to make a different filling by using vanilla ice cream with lots of chocolate flakes. A bit disappointed because the chocolate was not the best grade. The unpleasant chocolate after taste and powdery texture was easily detected by the food critics... Shanice & daddy... Most importantly Shanice is happy about it and liked the strawberry ice cream!!

Happy Birthday Donovan

This 3kg ice cream cake was made with Pistachio & Rocky road Ice Cream and coated with Chocolate Ganache of course many more Kit Kat Bar for Donovan's Birthday.

Gong Xi Gong Xi ! 恭喜恭喜, 新年快樂 !!!

Happy Birthday to Dominic :)

Ice Cream Maker

Bought a Ice Cream maker, getting ready to make a ice cream cake for Dominic and Hong this Sat ;>

Happy Birthday JUNBIN

Pineapple Sorbet

Pineapple juice is by product of pineapple tart paste if you plan to make your own...

What a waste to discard it but boring just to drink it... So added a tea spoon of ginger juice, sugar syrup then froze the juice in a tall jar. Use my "mixer Stick" and make this sorbet... A dash of vodka before serving to highlight this simple and refreshing dessert ;>

1 cake 2 design