Useful Kitchen Utensils: Toothpicks

How are toothpicks useful? Aside from picking your teeth that is. Well, I use them to prick my cakes and cupcakes to test whether they're cooked through! I of course am a fan of many gadgets in the kitchen and actually invested in a cake tester:

But, for those who don't really bake often and don't want to have to spend that money, then toothpicks are your best bet. They do come in different lengths so longer ones can be used to test the centre of a very tall cake while shorter ones are for shorter cakes! Go figure...hahahaha!!! In any case, it is your cheaper alternative and you do not need to spend a load of money to bake a cake. 

Toothpicks are also good to pin your choice of meat together after filling it up with your choice of filling before roasting / baking / frying. Or if you are making vegetables parcels, use them to hold one side before steaming them. Or perhaps you are baking paper wrapped chicken or banana wrapped fish, then a toothpick is fantastic as a fastener to ensure the juices from the chicken or fish do not escape and the flavours are locked in!

Know more useful tips on how to use your toothpicks in the cooking process? Then leave a comment! 

A recipe is always being brewed,

The Innovative Baker

Valentine's Day - your perfect meal :)

Valentine's Day is always tricky when it comes to pleasing the other half. And while I may have suggested a number of cupcakes and snacks for the special day, I figured why not devise a menu from the many recipes I've written to help those who have no clue what to serve up! So here's a couple of suggestions that perhaps would serve the day well...and mind you, they are easy and too fussy as well!

Starters:

Flash-Fried Chilli Prawns and Mushrooms served with a Garden and Peach Salad

Warm Cold Salad with Grapes and Grilled Chicken

Chicken Feta Cheese and Coriander Wantons

Mains:

Risotto with Cherry Tomatoes, Pea Shoots, Brown Cap Mushrooms and Chicken Breast

Rump Steak with Sundried Tomatoes and Olives in a Red Wine Reduction

Spinach Feta and Olive Quiche

Pan Fried Cod Fillet on a bed of stir-fried Chinese Spinach

Desert:

Chocolate Chip Cheesecake

Chocolate Fudge Cake

Happy cooking you love birds :)

The Innovative Baker

Spicy Sausage Rolls

I am a big fan of sausage rolls and whilst it isn't the healthiest of snacking options, I do enjoy the occasional sausage roll from Greg's. Then I figured why not make my own. So I did! This recipe was easy! And since I haven't had much time in the kitchen to really roll out self-made puff pastry, I bought ready-rolled puff pastry from the supermarket and proceeded to making them:

Ingredients:

500gms sausages

1 yellow onion - diced finely

1 tbsp chilli flakes

freshly ground black pepper

2 carrots - finely grated or diced finely

100gms stilton cheese - finely grated

1 packet of ready-rolled puff pastry

1 egg - to hold pastry together and to brown the pastry

Method:

1. Take out your ready-rolled puff pastry out of the fridge to defrost for a bit so that when you unroll it, it won't crack. Then crank up your oven to 180 Degree Celcius. Line a baking pan with greaseproof paper and set aside.
2. Next in a food processor, add in your sausages. Here I used german sausages that were coarsely chopped into smaller pieces. Pulse the sausages first to make them coarsely ground. Then add in the diced yellow onion, chilli flakes, black pepper, cheese and carrots and pulse them again. You could opt for a coarse filling or a denser one, it is entirely up to you. There is no need for salt and the sausages are normally salted already. Beat the egg and set aside.
3. Next...unroll your pastry on to a chopping board. Then using your hands, line a row of the filling along the pastry about 5cm away from the pastry border as you will fold the pastry over the filling. 
4. Once you have finished lining the filling, use a brush or your finger tips and dip into the beaten egg and brush along the edges of the pastry and the filling. Fold the pastry over the filling and pack it firmly leaving no pockets of air. 
5. Press the pastry along the areas where the beaten egg was brushed on. Then cut along the edges of the filled pastry. You will have a very long pastry that looks like a sausage naturally. Then cut the filled pastry into smaller pieces and slice the top of the pastry to give it more character. 
6. Brush the pastry tops with the egg wash and line it on the baking pan. Repeat the process until there is no more pastry or no more filling. Save whatever that is leftover and you can reuse it for a different occassion.
7. Pop the rolls into the oven for about 20 minutes or until golden brown. Let it rest on the baking pan before serving it up warm!

You can opt to not make them into rolls by using a pastry mould and the effect will be the same just bigger or smaller portions.

Safe to say this can be something you can make for Valentine's Day as well and it is quick to make without much hassle. So who says you can't make sausage rolls eh?

The Innovative Baker looking to make currypuffs next!

Chocolate cupcakes with Whisky Chocolate Cream, Pink Elderflower Frosting and chocolate decorations

Ah yes... Valentine's Day is coming and for all you love birds out there, I'm sure you're wondering what you can do on a budget to surprise your loved one.

Now I'm not usually someone who does much for Valentine's Day but I have had many people asking what they can do to impress their significant other. The cupcakes I made was a combination of three recipes put together using the best elements for each part. The chocolate decorations you see especially the hearts can be bought of shelves from supermarkets to make your life easier. 

So here's the recipe:

Cake ingredients:

225g caster sugar

100g butter - very soft

300g self-raising flour

15g (1 1/2 tsp) cocoa powder

1 tsp baking soda

2 eggs

100g melted dark chocolate

250ml whole milk

1 tbsp red wine vinegar

Whisky Chocolate Cream ingredients:

300g cream cheese

294ml double cream

100g icing sugar

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 tbsp or more whisky

200g melted dark chocolate

Pink Elderflower frosting:

100g cream cheese

100g double cream

1 tbsp elderflower syrup / cordial

2 tbsp honey

2 squirts of red food colouring. 

Method:

1. Crank up your oven to 180 Celsius and line your cupcake trays with cupcake cups. Put aside.
2. Sift the dry cake ingredients together and then beat the sugar and butter together until light and creamy. In the meantime mix the red wine vinegar with the whole milk and set aside. It will curdle a little bit but don't worry. 
3. Add in eggs to the butter sugar mixture one at a time before adding half the flour and half the milk portions. Continue beating until well mixed before adding in the remaining flour and milk.
4. Finally, add in the melted chocolate and mix well.
5. Using an ice cream scoop, scoop equal portions into the cupcake cups and pop them into the over for no longer than 15 minutes or when pricked with a toothpick, it comes out clean. Repeat the process until batter finishes.
6. Whilst waiting for the cupcakes to bake, make your chocolate cream. Mix together all the ingredients until firm peaks start forming. Set aside. The same goes with the pink elderflower frosting. 
7. Once your cupcakes have fully rested and are cooled down, prepare your piping bag with what ever nozzles you feel like using. A bigger one for the whisky and chocolate cream while a smaller one for the pink elderflower frosting. Pipe the whisky chocolate cream first before the pink elderflower frosting. Then finally decorate it with chocolate hearts or chocolate fingers whichever you fancy. If you fancy more booze, then buy chocolate hearts with alcohol centres. Add a finishing touch with a raspberry, blueberry or half a strawberry. 
8. Additionally you can prick your cupcakes before piping the cream with toothpicks and spoon over more whisky to soak the cupcakes.

And there you have it! For the non-bakers, you can do this by simply buying pre-baked plain chocolate cupcakes, whip up the cream yourself, and decorate away! No nozzles or piping bag? Don't worry, use a zip log bag, cut a bit of the edge away to allow air to escape as well as allow the cream to go through. 

Other suggestions for Valentine's Day are:

Red Velvet Cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and hand piped chocolate decorations

Red Wine Cupcakes with Brandy and Chocolate Liquour Frosting with Raspberries and Chocolate Finger Decorations

I bet you your date will be impressed and all loved up!

A savoury attempt coming soon!

The Innovative Baker

Kam Heong Chicken (Stir-fried chicken in dried prawn and curry leaf sauce)

As promised for the last two weeks, Kam Heong Chicken for the home chef! I do not know how to translate it per se but the description would be Stir-fried chicken in a dried prawn and curry leaf sauce. Anyway, I was enchanted by the taste of it all from home and from the once famous Special Zone 1997 restaurant in London that now has phased out the ever famous dish that us Malaysians order when we head there. So researching for the perfect recipe was quite daunting as not many do know what goes into it. But I found one and loosely based on the recipe, I came up with my own version:

Ingredients:

The sauce:

200gms dried prawns - soaked in warm water

8 small shallots or 3 medium sized ones - skin removed

8 cloves of garlic - skin removed

1/2 bowl of curry leaves

6 bird's eye chillies - stems removed

3 tbsp oil

2 heaping tbsp curry powder

The chicken marinade:

2 tbsp oyster sauce

2 tbsp soy sauce

1 tbsp sesame oil

1 tbsp cornflour

Method:

1. Firstly marinade the chicken and set aside for 30 minutes. The longer the better.
2. In a blender or a mini chopper, place the pre-soaked dried prawns with some water, shallots, garlic and chillies and blend into a rough a paste. That means not to a pulp but you can still see rough pieces of prawn, shallots, garlic and chillies.
3. Next heat up a small frying pan with the oil before adding the paste for frying. Add in the curry leaves and curry powder and continue stir-frying until oil comes out from the mixture and becomes fragrant. Switch off the fire and set aside.
4. Prepare some oil to deep fry the chicken. There won't be any crust of course when deep frying. Just enough to make sure the chicken is covered and can be cooked through.
5. Place on a kitchen towel to absorb excess oil and then slice into bite size pieces.
6. On a separate pan, heat up some of the sauce with oil and toss in the chicken. Stir until finely coated and combined.
7. Serve with piping hot rice and vegetables on the side.

This is how the sauce would look like!

Easy as can be! Next on the chopping board, Sausage Rolls ala Innovative Baker!

The Innovative Baker

Useful kitchen utensils: The Ice Cream Scoop

When you're making cupcakes, you'd normally use two spoons - one to scoop out the batter from the mixing bowl, the other to slide the batter down from the first spoon into the cupcake cup right? Well, after watching one too many baking programs, one utensil stood out - the ice cream scoop. This was definitely THE tool to get when portioning your cupcakes to the perfect cupcake portion. Half a scoop for a smaller cupcake, full scoop for a big one! Do not worry when you're making mini cupcakes as there are smaller ice cream scoops too! Where can you buy them? Anywhere and everywhere actually. From Sainsbury's, Tesco's, your local sundry shop to even the specialist kitchen shops. They do not cost too much and would save you time and hassle when making your cupcakes. Naturally, it does not stop at cupcakes but perfect for portioning your muffins too!

The Innovative Baker looking for yet another tool!

Red Wine Chocolate Cupcakes with Brandy and Chocolate Liquour Frosting

When researching for a new taste, I always wondered whether wine would be a fitting choice of liquid in a cupcake. Then cupcake wars on the Food Network started and that sold me. Then I wondered whether red wine and chocolate in a cupcake go together and it sure did because the combination is no stranger in the US. While researching for a recipe I could loosely base my version on, I found a ton of blogs and recipe websites that have one version or the other. The closest was Rachel Ray's version. Then I figured why not amend my own recipe that I have and see where that takes me. And then voila, it gave birth to...Red Wine Chocolate Cupcakes with Brandy and Chocolate Liquour Frosting.

The Ingredients:

300g self-raising flour - sifted

15g cocoa powder - sifted

1 tsp baking soda - sifted

2 eggs

100g butter - slightly melted

225g golden caster sugar

1/2 cup whole milk

1/2 cup red wine (any kind)

100g dark chocolate - melted

Method:

1. Firstly crank up your oven to 180 Degrees Celcius. Then line your cupcake cups in a muffin tray.
2. Sift all three dry ingredients together into a bowl. Set aside. Melt the dark chocolate in a bain marie. 
3. Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy before adding the eggs one by one. 
4. Then pour in half the dry ingredients and the red wine, beat it until combined, before adding in the second half of the dry ingredients and the milk. Continue beating. Use a spatula to scrape the sides of the mixing bowl to make sure all the dry ingredients are mixed thoroughly. Finally add in the melted dark chocolate. Stir until combined.
5. The using an ice cream scoop, scoop a portion into each cupcake cup. Pop into the oven for about 25 minutes depending on the size of your cupcake. If it is smaller, it would only need 20 minutes or so. 
6. Take it out and leave it to cool while continuing the baking process for the rest of the cupcake batter.

Brandy and Chocolate Liquour Frosting Ingredients:

1x 300g cream cheese (philadelphia cream cheese was used)

1x 284ml double cream

1 tsp vanilla essence / syrup

100g icing sugar

1 tbsp brandy

1 tbsp chocolate liquour

100g butter melted with

200g dark chocolate

Method:

1. In the mixer, put everything in and whiz away!!! It will combine quite quickly.
2. Then add in the melted dark chocolate and butter and combine well. Put aside.

Once the cupcakes are cooled, poke a knife in the centre of each cupcake. Make sure it is deep enough. Then in a piping bag, add some of the frosting in and stick it into the cupcake to inject more frosting inside the cupcake. Then in a bigger piping bag and a nozzle of your choice, pipe the frosting on top of the cupcake. I used a normal circular nozzle. To add a more decorative touch, add a fresh raspberry (or as Rachael Ray would suggest half a grape) and a chocolate stick. Here I used chocolate fingers from cadbury.

The cake will have the taste of the red wine when eaten. But it isn't too overpowering that you can't taste the rest of the chocolate. But this was heavenly. Not too sweet either :)

Yes...I promised the Kam Heong Chicken recipe. And it will appear over the weekend. Figured something sweet would be nice!

The Innovative Baker on the go!