Category: Food

Anne of Green Gables Party Cake Ideas

~ The Author

I have yet to design and create an Anne of Green Gables themed cake! So just watch this space for now.

Anyway, for inspiration, here are some of the delightful Anne-inspired cakes from various corners of the web:

Sources:

  1. twitter.com/anneofgreengabl/status/838917116233277440
  2. jamarattigan.com/2018/02/13/of-love-longing-and-liniment-cake-a-sweet-treat-from-the-anne-of-green-gables-cookbook-a-giveaway/
  3. delectable–cakes.blogspot.com/2013/06/anne-of-green-gables-inspired-vintage.html
  4. cakesdecor.com/cakes/329682-anne-of-green-gables
  5. pinterest.com.au/pin/29554941294303580/
  6. aislesociety.com/post/anne-green-gables-inspired-shoot
  7. fiction-food.com/2015/09/raspberry-layer-cake-for-anne-of-green.html
  8. tidewaterandtulle.com/2015/08/anne-of-green-gables-wedding-inspiration.html?m=1
  9. flourandfancies.com/?p=436
  10. pinterest.com.au/pin/141159769559920436/
  11. itsallfrosting.wordpress.com/2015/08/25/readers-digestibles-annes-liniment-layer-cake/
  12. sweetonyoucakes.blogspot.com/2012/06/anne-of-green-gables.html
  13. pinterest.com.au/pin/768637861399087482/
  14. pinterest.com.au/pin/542683823854636476/
  15. worldturndupsidedown.blogspot.com/2014/06/historical-food-fortnightly-literary.html
  16. instagram.com/p/CEkgeFUAJCL/
  17. instagram.com/p/B2bTg6GhOmc/
  18. instagram.com/p/CAFgJMEFDBk/
  19. instagram.com/p/CE-OF9TnPFM/
  20. instagram.com/p/CFXVXTCsQ1K/

Harry Potter Themed Cake Ideas

~ The Author

Well now, of course, you’ve probably seen this very simple cake we made for Bee’s Harry Potter themed birthday party (click for details):

This very simple cake is great for time-poor amateur party organizers (such as moms, wives, dads, husbands, older kids, or whichever family member you are who’s trying to throw another family member a super awesome Harry Potter themed party without going into bankruptcy), or same party organizers who are being lazy or just a bit lacking in the cake decorating department. It’s made of our favorite carrot cake (click for recipe), on which we just quickly slapped some cream cheese icing, then topped with one golden snitch (click for recipe) and a tiny handmade paper bunting with the Hogwarts house colors on it.

But of course, if you’d rather try a different cake design or, perhaps, delegate this arduous task to a professional cake maker, here are some photos of amazing Harry Potter themed cakes we have collected to help with inspiration:

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  • 005
  • 006
  • 007
  • 008
  • 009
  • 010
  • 011
  • 012
  • 013
  • 014
  • 015

Sources:

  1. craftcompany.co.uk
  2. cake.puntopelotaforo.com/lego-cakes-for-birthday-at-walmart/harry-potter-lego-cake/
  3. tumblr.com/search/quidditch%20cake
  4. patacake-cakes.co.uk/portfolio-items/jennifers-21st-harry-potter-cake/
  5. everythingharrypotter.tumblr.com/post/10510151830/my-grandma-made-me-this-cake-for-my-18th-birthday
  6. sweetdiscoveries.com/2013/01/31/harry-potter-cake/
  7. thatsnerdalicious.com/nerd-cakes/an-adorable-harry-potter-cake/
  8. cakecentral.com/g/i/3040983/harry-potter-cake/
  9. crustncakes.com/some-cool-harry-potter-cakes-harry-potter-themed-cakes/
  10. betweenthepagesblog.typepad.com/between-the-pages-blog/2013/10/marvelous-harry-potter-cake-1.html
  11. flickr.com/photos/asweetdeisgn/8295253951/in/photostream/
  12. patacake-cakes.co.uk/portfolio-items/jennifers-21st-harry-potter-cake/
  13. tumblr.com/search/quidditch%20cake
  14. cake.puntopelotaforo.com/lego-cakes-for-birthday-at-walmart/harry-potter-lego-cake/
  15. craftcompany.co.uk

Nasi Goreng Recipe

~ The Author

Rice is something that we always have at home, whether uncooked and stored in the pantry, or cooked and on the kitchen counter top or dining table. There’s usually a pot of steamed rice in the kitchen, waiting to be devoured at the next meal. But steamed rice can become a bit boring sometimes, so occasionally, we’d have something different, like Nasi Goreng.

Nasi Goreng is a very popular Indonesian dish. It is fried rice mixed with a bit of meat or veggies, so it can be a complete meal by itself, especially when seasoned perfectly.  If you have cold cooked (not freshly cooked) rice in the house, that would be perfect for this dish, and if you have some bits of veggies in the fridge, you can prepare this dish for tonight’s dinner.

(Note: I’ve added a few substitution ideas, in case you do not have the fresh ingredients on hand, but have the preserved versions in your pantry.)

NASI GORENG

INGREDIENTS:
Olive oil
4 eggs, beaten lightly
1 brown onion, coarsely chopped
6 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
25g ginger, finely chopped (or a generous dash of ground ginger)
2 long red chillies, chopped (or a dash of ground cayenne pepper, to taste)
200g chicken fillet, sliced 1 inch squares or short strips
1 chicken cube
A handful of oyster mushrooms (or 184g can of champignon pieces and stems)
1/2 green capsicum, chopped coarsely
1/2 red capsicum, chopped coarsely
200g fresh baby corns, chopped coarsely
4 cups (cold) steamed jasmine rice
2 cups bean sprouts
3 green onions, sliced thinly
3 tablespoons soy sauce (or adjust to taste)
2 tablespoons kecap manis (or adjust to taste)

PROCEDURE:
In a wok, heat oil. Add egg to make a thin omelette. When cooked, remove omelette and let cool.

Saute brown onion, garlic, ginger and chilli. Add chicken and chicken cube, and stir fry until chicken is cooked. Add mushrooms, capsicums and corn and cook until tender.

Add rice, bean sprouts, green onion, soy sauce and kecap manis. Stir fry.

Cut omelette into strips. Add omelette strips to the mixture in the wok. Mix well. Remove from heat and serve hot.

Chocolate Mud Cupcakes Recipe

~ The Author

When somebody in the house is having a birthday, but work schedule is not letting you have a party, what do you do? In our case, we’ll just have cupcakes!

I found this simple chocolate mud cupcake recipe in one of my books, but as usual, I had to adjust parts of it to suit my preferences. Whatever works for you, right? So, here is how I made the chocolate mud cupcakes:

CHOCOLATE MUD CUPCAKES

Ingredients:
300g plain chocolate chips or cooking chocolate
300g butter
5 eggs
1/2 cup caster sugar
1 cup self raising flour

Melt chocolate and butter in a pan on the stove, or in a bowl in the microwave oven. Stir well and set aside to cool a bit.

Beat eggs and sugar in a bowl until thick and pale. Sift 1/2 cup flour into the egg mixture, then fold. Sift the remaining flour into the same mixture and fold again. Stir in the melted chocolate and butter until well blended.

Preheat oven to 160 degrees Celsius. (I prefer turning the oven on when I have already finished mixing the batter and just before I transfer the batter into the cake tin, as I find that if I start preheating the oven before mixing anything, it reaches the desired temperature waaaaaayy before I’m finished making the cake batter, so it’s just wasting energy for quite a while afterwards, until I put the cake in.) 

Spoon the mixture into paper baking cases in a muffin tin. This recipe should yield around a dozen cupcakes. Bake for approximately 20 minutes. The cupcakes are expected to be soft and gooey. Remove muffin tin from the oven and let cool for about 5 minutes before removing the cupcakes from the tin.

You can dust the cupcakes with cocoa powder or icing sugar, or decorate them with your favourite icing.

Carrot Cake Recipe

~ The Author

Many many years ago, when I was a child, I learned to bake cakes while helping my aunt. We made chiffon cakes, chocolate cakes, fruit cakes, and many other baked goodies. But when my aunt decided to retire her side business of making cakes, I stopped baking as well.

It was only a few years ago that I decided to bake cakes again. After nearly two decades of not baking cakes, I was a bit lost, without a single trusted cake recipe, neither a single baking tin, nor a single decorating tip.

The funny thing is, I cannot remember how I met this carrot cake recipe. But this is the cake recipe that got me baking again, and I have made this carrot cake so many times. We love how it’s moist and not too sweet (in contrast to a bakeshop-bought one we’ve tasted once, which was the complete opposite – too sweet and dry!). But then, the best way of creating a moist cake is not over-baking it – when it’s done, take it out of the oven right away!

So anyway, here’s the delicious carrot cake recipe, tweaked to suit the taste of me and the crowd I feed. Enjoy!

Ingredients:                                       Icing:
Olive oil (for greasing)                        250 g    spreadable cream cheese
2 (300g) carrots, finely grated           1/3 c     icing sugar
1   c   self raising flour                          1/2 t      vanilla essence
1/2 c  plain flour
1   t    bicarbonate soda
1/2 t   ground cinnamon
2/3 c   brown sugar
3/4 c   organic olive oil
1/2 c   maple syrup
3        eggs
1   t    vanilla essence

Procedure:

Preheat oven to 170 degrees Celsius, or 150C if using a fan-force oven.  Lightly grease a cake pan with oil and line with baking paper.

Sift flours, bicarb soda and cinnamon in a bowl.

In another bowl, whisk brown sugar, oil, maple syrup, eggs and vanilla. Pour this mixture into the bowl with the dry ingredients. Mix well with a wooden spoon. Stir in the grated carrots.

Place the mixture into the pan and bake for approximately 55 minutes. Then, let cool in the pan for a few minutes, before turning it out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

For the icing, combine the cream cheese, icing sugar and vanilla essence in a bowl, using a wooden spoon, until well mixed. Spread the icing over the cake.

Topped with fruits for the ward conference luncheon.

Golden Snitches Dessert Recipe

~ The Author

To produce golden snitches in food form when I threw a Harry Potter theme birthday party for hubby (why not?), I didn’t want to do what others have done, which was to create round cakes (cake pops) and cover the snitches with artificially coloured icing to make them look like snitches. Besides, I had too much on my plate then to bother intricately decorating each cake pop. I just wanted something that was relatively easy to make.

Then I recalled a homemade sweet called Yema. I knew a few people whose mums used to make these sweets and get them to sell these to other kids at school. The brightness or dullness of this dish’s natural yellow colour depends on the ingredients you use and their proportions. Some can be quite pale, while others darker and almost brownish. In addition, you can also coat the yema balls with raw sugar or glaze them with caramelized sugar (which is a bit more tricky).

For the duration of hubby’s Harry Potter party, I called them not yema, but Golden Snitches. Here’s the recipe I used:

Ingredients:

10 egg yolks
1 can of sweetened condensed milk
1/2 teaspoon lemon juice, or zest
Raw sugar for coating

Procedure:

In a non-stick pan, combine egg yolks, condensed milk and lemon until well blended. Place pan on stove, over low heat, and stir constantly until thick enough to be formed into small balls. It is important to keep on stirring and scraping the sides and bottom of the pan while cooking to avoid burning parts of it.

Remove from heat and let the mixture cool. When cool enough to handle, shape them into small balls, about an inch in diameter, which seems to be just a good size for a snitch. Roll each ball in raw sugar.

Arrange in a serving tray with enough spaces in between the snitches so they don’t look too crowded when you add the wings.

I made the wings days in advance so they’re ready to add to the golden snitches on the day of the party. I used toothpicks, aluminum foil and double-sided tape to make them, while seated on the couch, also watching an action movie with the hubby. 🙂