Think it’s chocolate? Think again. Look harder. It’s actually a dark shade of purple.

What’s that? Yea I know. Don’t you raise your eyebrows at me! I haven’t gotten over that purple phase yet. Seriously, I’m gaga-fied by it. Utterly completely totally besotted with the shade and the vegetable that can produce such a hue by very natural and earthy means – the purple sweet spud aka purple yams aka beni imo 紫芋 aka okinawan purple sweet potatoes. Cheshire cat grin.

A dear friend of mine from Chiba felt some of my pain about a month or so ago when I struggled to find a cheap variety of these spuds here. I ranted so much I reckon I might have burnt her ears right off or if I exaggerate a little less, probably melted them down. She, being the nice girl that she always is (bless her heart), sent me 400g of beni imo fumatsu 紅芋粉末 (and via express EMS mail at that!). If you understand the matcha concept, you’ll get this. It’s simply purple sweet potatoes roasted and then ground into a fine powder or funmatsu. I believe there are grades to this just as matcha does and that will determine the vividness of colour of the powder and its cooked outcome. Mine was one of a dark mauve shade in its raw state and so the colour wasn’t as vivid as I hoped it would be. Neither did it look as stunning as Junko Fukuda’s in her cookbook but hey, I’m not complaining because it was still visibly purple!

This pound cake I thought was pretty snaz, not just in terms of colour, but in terms of flavour. The use of goma dare, commonly used over tofu salad as a dressing, was interesting. I quite worried that this cake would be way too savoury and it smelt like it would be as I was mixing everything up. I have a penchant for using exotic ingredients whenever I can because it just feels a little more risky and exciting. I know Mama Diva will dislike this right away because it probably tastes way too weird and non-traditional for her. It definitely needs some getting used to but the deep and rich roasted flavours (of white sesame seeds more so than sweet potatoes) really come through in this pound cake. A dark yet earthy and vegetal fragrance from the beni imo is also quite evident. The scent of beni imo powder strangely reminds me of dark cocoa (the texture and fluffy ‘jumpy’ nature of the powder itself resembles cocoa powder too!) and the altogether nutty creamy taste and textures from the white sesame sauce with roasted nuts make it quite an appetite-reviving bit of cake.

Yet again I’ve gone purple and although this is one simple loaf cake, it contains just an edge of the weird and wonderful. An interesting flavour combination and a bit of an eye-opener but rather delicious. And GARH it sure did take away from the frustration I was experiencing due to a college fudge up this morning. I’ve never looked upon my electric mixer and pantry cupboard more affectionately than I did today. What stress-relievers they are. Bake, and let’s hope for a better day.

Note: This cake DOES NOT MARBLE ON ITS OWN like other marble cake recipes. The two separate batters must be added together, given one quick circular stir then transferred to your greased loaf tin. The batter isn’t as agile or active as we’d expect it to be. Between soymilk and firm tofu, this would be the latter.

Beni Imo & Sesame Marble Pound Cake 紫芋芝麻大理石磅蛋糕
(Recipe from 我♥和風洋菓子 – Japanese Title: 和スイーツの本 by 福田淳子 Junko Fukuda )
Ingredients

60g unsalted butter, softened
40g white sesame sauce (goma dare)
50g caster sugar
2 eggs yolks
1 tbs vanilla extract
1 tbs milk

2 egg whites
50g caster sugar

10g cake flour, sifted
50g beni imo powder

50g cake flour, sifted
black & white sesame seeds, for garnishing

Preheat oven to 170d Celsius. Grease and flour a loaf tin.

In a large bowl, beat softened butter for about a minute. Add white sesame sauce (goma dare) and 50g caster sugar. Beat until it is creamy and lightens in colour.

Add an egg yolk one at a time, beating in between. Add vanilla and mix. Split the batter into 2 parts and add 1 tbs milk to one part of it. Mix to combine.

In a small bowl, combine 10g sifted cake flour with beni imo powder. Set aside.

Prepare egg whites: Using an electric mixer, beat egg whites until it starts to froth. Add half the amount of sugar (25g) and beat for a bit more. Add the rest of the sugar when it starts to whiten and continue to beat until egg whites begin to form soft glossy peaks.

Add 1/4 of beaten egg whites to the batter with milk. Whisk to combine. Add half of the beni imo flour mix and beat. Then add another 1/4 of egg whites to the mix and whisk. Finally, add the rest of the beni imo mix and whisk to combine.

In the bowl containing the batter without milk, do the same. Add 1/4 of egg whites to it and whisk. Then add 25g cake flour and whisk. Add the final 1/4 of egg whites, whisk followed by the remaining 25g cake flour.

Add this onto the beni imo batter. Using a spatula, very gently give it ONE circular stir to mix (and create that marbling). Pour into your prepared tin, smoothen the surface and place in preheated oven to bake for 35mins. Remove from oven thereafter when cooked, or when a skewer inserted comes out clean, and leave it to cool in the tin completely.

Christmas kind of came and went real quick this year. The big ol’ traditional feast cook-up this time round was a little more stressful. For what reason I was so frazzled I know not, but in my book, the means justifies the end. And if the end is the pudding, then whatever comes before that is allowed to go by in a blur. I’d like to think I save my best card for last and I play that card best in sweet treats rather than the savoury. Just for the record, I can whip up a mean Christmas roast and yorkshire puddings. I just take more joy in beating up eggs, butter and flour.

Cherries mean big Christmas business for me. Of course, there’s the whole medley of dried fruit soaked in rum or brandy overnight and made into the usual fruit cake shebang schmang but sometimes that all gets a bit boring. Christmas pudding is a tad bit too stodgy for my liking and my all-time favourite bread and butter pudding probably would not have gone down well either with a weight-conscious family. The current monsoon season we’re experiencing has also resulted in extreme levels of humidity. The air is so thick its almost chewable! We’re pretty much live bread and butter puddings ourselves: thick, pneumatic, sticky piles of flesh which don’t sit too well in a steamy bubble of heat. Ew (in relation to ourselves and our general appearance). Delicious (this time, I refer to bread and butter pudding), but really just too hot to handle in this heat.

Something (deceivingly) light, something flavoursome and still a sweet round-off worth your calories was what I wanted. That of course is when Nigella comes in handy (not so much her love for big knobs, oh I meant slabs, of butter). Flipping through a cookbook of hers I received from girlfriends on my 21st, the page which had a recipe sporting dark natural-coloured juicy fat sweet cherries got me at first sight. Hello, goosebumps. And so my Christmas sweet was sorted. Just like that. You’d say this was more of an afternoon teacake and yes it is, but that works since the leftovers get gobbled up for breakfast and lunch on Boxing Day.

I have swapped a few ingredients (natural-coloured glacé cherries and almond essence – they’re not well-liked by the family) and added a granola crust just to pretty up the surface of the cake. Plus, I’ve always loved that gorgeous golden brown hue, the texture and rustic feel granola can give to a loaf cake. Can’t resist a bit of granola any day! And it seems neither can the hungry fools around the Christmas dinner table.

Hope everyone had a joyous holiday season. We’re stuffed Tellytubbies at the moment with barely enough time to recover before the Lunar New Year hits us right smack between the eyes. Oh geez. Time to brace ourselves.

Cherry Almond Loaf Cake
Recipe adapted from Nigella’s How to be a Domestic Goddess
Ingredients

200g dark pitted cherries
250g self-raising flour, sifted
225g unsalted butter, softened
175g caster sugar
3 large free-range eggs
2 drops of pure vanilla extract
100g ground almonds
6 tbs milk
about 1/4 cup mixed granola, for crust (optional)

Preheat oven to 170d Celsius. Grease and flour a long loaf tin.

Drain the juice of the pitted cherries in a sieve, halve them and pat dry a little with a kitchen paper towl. Toss them in some flour and shake well to get rid of the excess.

In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating in between each addition. Add the vanilla, beat.

Gently fold in the flour and ground almonds. Fold in the cherries and milk. You will get a thick and heavy batter. Spoon this into the prepared loaf tin and using a rubber spatula, even out the surface. Sprinkle the granola (use your favourite brand of granola, mine’s Dorsets Cereals, or homemade granola) over the surface and gently pat down into an even layer to secure the bits of oats, nuts, etc. to bake in the cake.

Bake loaf for 45mins-1 hr or until a skewer inserted comes out clean. Mine took 1hr 5mins to cook perfectly.

When it is cooked, remove from the oven and let cook in its tin on a wire rack until completely cooled.

The first ever homebaked cake I received (birthday cakes not counted) was a butter pound cake when I was in primary school. Right, I ain’t being totally honest with you because I so didn’t receive it. Out of greed, I paid a classmate just under ten bucks for the ingredients and her time in the kitchen to prepare one just for me. (Would you believe it if I told you I was a bit of a school bully in kindergarten? I bullied boys, never girls mind you) At that time, we didn’t own an oven, only a hand-me-down Japanese microwave. I was young and didn’t know how to bake then. Cakes weren’t a common thing for us in my house either. In fact, they were equivalent to rare yeti sightings. Far, few, and almost…well, impossible to spot! We were only allowed them on birthdays when our parents would splurge a little on a ridiculously over-decorated and over-iced cake. It didn’t matter that the cake was often more cream than sponge, mightily topped with cloyingly sweet jelly pops – a dentist’s nightmare. Nonetheless, that to us was the most special, most beautiful most wonderful cake in the world. Of course, in my childish understanding, it almost felt like a round structure of cream, sugar dusting and sponge was the utmost expression of my parents’ love for me. I know better now that’s for sure but it isn’t strange to think that a cake could stand for so much. It’s symbolic power is immense, especially to a child with a wonderfully innocent and simplistic mind.

To slice your own over-embellished birthday cake with Mama’s hand to guide you was such a precious feeling. I can feel a sigh of nostalgia just bubbling up at the back of my throat. I can’t quite forget the taste of those cakes of my childhood. And I can’t forget the taste of that beautifully buttery, dense and vanilla-ry pound cake I received back in primary school. You know how all things rustic and homemade get to me.

The memory of this cake, the demand-and-supply nature of our friendship (between that girl baker and I), the simplicity of a butter cake are all things engraved deep in my mind, heart and tastebuds. A cake of simply and few ingredients; it reminded me of other equally simple and basic cakes such as yellow cake, a butter cake, a pound cake, a British madeira, a plain chiffon, a Chinese steamed cake. They are different types of cake but essentially still cake! And cakes very accessible to everyone because of their basic and non-exotic components. Think of them as essential as a cream cardigan. A wardrobe necessity, even more so than the LBD and ever so hard to fault. And then it occurred to me how I loved them all, whatever the rendition of cake, as much as I love different types of photographs such as the beautifully styled ones, the soft-focused ones channelling the aesthetics of vintage photos and of course, the well-lighted macro shots of food (as you can see I’ve cheesily tried to achieve the above ‘types’ in this post’s photographs).

I love the fanciful cakes available in patisseries, the delicately decorated and styled birthday cakes, and sure enough, things like macarons and whoopie pies, etc. BUT. My point is, there’s something mysteriously heartwarming and humble about a slice of cake produced from just a mere few ingredients. And to pay homage to how the combination of few ingredients can produce something quite so delightful and life-changing is this post on Kasutera, a cake that oh-my-dear doesn’t even use butter!

Kasutera, a Japanese honey cake otherwise known as Castella in English, is a cake derived from the Portuguese pao de Castela. I know not much about the history of this cake except that it is now a Nagasaki specialty and often found in wagashi stores or in the sweets section of Japanese grocery stores. It’s light but its flavour is unique, fragrant and very likeable, thanks to the honey syrup it incorporates.

I’ve been terribly eager to give this recipe a go. It was well-received and according to my parents who sat about tasting them forever, kasutera tastes like a non-butter cake of their childhood! I felt very flattered and quite pleased to have brought a slice of their good ol’ days on a plate to savour. But also rather envious of the variety of sweet treats they might have experienced back in them days.

This cake is simply delicious despite being uncomplex. It is light as cotton fluff and with zero butter in the mixture, feels slightly less decadent and a little more ‘healthy’ to eat. Unfortunately, when removed from the oven with a plate left to flatten the top for 5 minutes, one shouldn’t leave it to cool too long in the cake tin. Once the cake is no longer oven-hot but warm enough to handle, remove from cake tin and let it stand on a wire rack to cool. The consequences of doing otherwise (as mine is proof of that) is a cake that is soggy, a little sunken and difficult to slice. Shame on me for trying to do more than two things at once!

I will be making this again and again until I get it right. Minimal ingredients, batter tastes amazing no matter what and quick to whip up. There’s no excuse to say no to round II. Practice makes perfect anyway!

Kasutera カステラ
(Recipe from 我♥和菓子：57 wagashi recipes – Japanese Title: かんたん！和菓子レシピ by 山崎彩 Aya Yamazaki )
Ingredients

2 eggs, at room temperature
80g caster sugar
15g raw honey
10ml water
60g cake flour
15g coarse brown sugar

Line the bottom and sides of a small loaf tin with baking parchment. Sprinkle coarse brown sugar in an even layer on the bottom of the tin on top of the parchment paper.

Preheat oven to 160d Celsius.

Lightly mix the honey and water together in a small bowl to form a thick syrup. Set aside.

In a bowl, beat eggs with an electric mixer until fluffy. Add the sugar and beat on high until the mixture pales and thickens. The mixture should be ready when the electric whisk leaves a slow dripping, thick trail when lifted, taking a while to disappear into the rest of the batter. (after reading more recipes for kasutera, the general feedback was to whisk for a long time until soft peaks are formed, around 15mins; I think I whisked mine for about 5-7 mins. Will give this method a try next time round for a fluffier cake.)

Mix in the honey syrup. Then sift in the cake flour (you may want to double sift this cake flour before adding to the batter) and lightly beat this in. Set aside the electric mixer, using a rubber spatula, use the folding method to gently mix until incorporated. Ensure no pockets of flour are left.

Pour the batter from a high point into the prepared loaf tin. Use the rubber spatula to slice the batter in the middle from top of the tin to the bottom in a straight line. Then, using both hands, pick up the tin and lightly tap the bottom on the table to release excess air bubbles.

Place loaf tin on a flat cookie tray and bake in the oven for 30mins, or until cake tester when inserted comes out clean.

Once baked, remove from oven and place loaf tin on a wire rack. Top the cake surface with a piece of baking parchment and place a long flat dish over it to keep the cake surface flat for 5 mins. Thereafter, remove the dish and parchment paper and let cool in the tin for a little while (another 5mins thereabouts) until cool enough to handle with your hands but still warm. Tip the cake out from the tin, baking parchment and all. Place the cake into a plastic ziplock or using clingfilm, wrap it up. This is apparently to seal the moisture within the cake. Letting it cool completely standing on its own will dry out the cake a little.

To serve, use a sharp knife and make 1inch slices from the cake. Carefully slice away the sides to reveal the inner crumb. Be very neat when slicing, because obviously I ain’t at all.

I’ve been feeling the need to rejuvenate myself lately in every way possible. Even as I type this post, I’m listening to my favourite electro remix playlist on iTunes and am literally replaying each taste of cake in my head. It’s kind of a funky experience. Maybe future tastings of cake for me should be in a soundproof room, ALONE for maximum satisfaction, with professional headphones stuck on blaring house music as I clink clank away on plates and chomp down on petite gâteaux. No? Ok, I’ll hide that thought somewhere else along with my deepest darkest desires.

Royal Copenhagen. A proper noun that sends pleasurable shivers down my spine. And of course, makes me think of terribly feminine and beautiful vintage china. I miss the utter decadence and quirky pop eccentricism at Sketch with their vintage china unembarrassingly showing signs of use. Royal Copenhagen is a little more slick but the cakes were delicious! The service was level-headed and friendly. The room, an oblong-shaped space tucked away awkwardly into a corner of the ladies’ department nonetheless was a nice respite from manic Christmas shoppers. With a backdrop of glass-clinking and delighted chatter soft and bubbling like a glass of Möet, a room awash in crisp sunlight inducing you into a state of airy-fairy frou-frou lightness much like the kiss of a butterfly, afternoon tea begins on a carefree note (plus, you start to realize that size doesn’t matter at all – this is in reference to this oddly shaped tea lounge/cave)…

“There was an Old Person of Rheims,
Who was troubled with horrible dreams;
So, to keep him awake,
they fed him with cake,
Which amused that Old Person of Rheims.” ~ Edward Lear

The past week, my sleep was a tad bit troubled. I was (and actually am still) having a few odd dreams, those that leave you waking up puzzled and constantly mulling about what it meant. My latenights were also giving me unsightly dark eye circles, pale skin and a general lethargy about me. Someone mentioned, who cares about latenights when you’ve got cosmetics?! That’s true. I’m none too bothered about the amount of concealer I go through in a week but oh, something was just missing in my day to day goings-around. So when a friend suggested a cake day-out, I jumped at the chance. I was so glad to go to tea! It felt like ages since I had a good tête-à-tête with those things magically made from flour, fat, eggs, sugar and cream. Ahhh…What better to make one feel a little more alive than the sugar high petite little cakes provide?!

If I could, I would’ve eaten my weight in everything sat behind the cake counter. That’s me talking some crazy I know. Although it sure is hard to be sensible when one has a severe case of sweet teeth (plural or singular?). Imagine if one fine day all cake maniacs were to let themselves go and you saw me right at the frontline of this lets-eat-all-the-cake-in-the-world campaign, I’d make the tabloids in the most disgusting way known to humankind.

We managed four cake slices on our visit to Royal Copenhagen. I thought that was pretty impressive. Each mouthful was slowly savoured but not without wishing that each taste could go on forever. I’m blushing now as I’ve just realised my own greediness – 2 out of 4 cakes were chosen because I insisted I must have matcha cakes or something that’s green. I’m glad my cakemates humoured me. Bless ‘em. Here’s what we had:

Key Lime Pie ~ creamy and melt-in-your-mouth

Chocolate Earl Grey Mousse with Caramel Ganache ~ rich. dirty rich.

Matcha & Morello Cherry Cake ~ this was simply beautiful; gorgeous flavours with a moist denseness from possibly ground almonds & polenta

a personal favourite whatever the rendition ~ Matcha Tiramisu

The last two were of course my favourite. I’m drawn to anything green, purple and black sesame flavoured. I’m fairly simplistic that way I suppose. The key lime tart was also something real jazzy, resulting in a party in my tummy. Delicious, smooth with a good mix of sweet and tart.

Once the final crumb was licked up, I felt like an old car with a fresh engine, purring away and all revved up for the next roadtrip. All I had to do really was give my heels a quick polish, pop on some pearls and off I go. If you hear me complain about tiredness this week, remind me that it’s time for cake! It sure is the best fuel to keep me going for a while.

Royal Copenhagen Tea Lounge
Takashimaya Level 2
391 Orchard Road
S 238872
Singapore
Open Mon-Sun 10:00-21:00

I’m not gonna lie, I honestly thought this was going to be a failure. I was ready to sink into depression like a cake deflated and ruined. Thankfully, things worked out for the better. And so life carries on as usual.

After a blender disaster and an overly buttered crust that baked to a crisp (I followed a recipe quite blindly without doing the proper math therefore resulting in a crust with double the butter), I was sure this was doomed. Fortunately, following the advice of Marc of NoRecipes to let the cheesecake sit for possibly a day longer, this worked out fine. The parched crust absorbed enough moisture from the cheesecake filling. The layers gelled and the crust became more manageable. It tasted good too with a lovely smooth and fluffy mousse-like texture. The tofu flavour needed some getting used to and the matcha wasn’t strong enough to be really that noticeable but it’s definitely something I’d try again and tweak it as I go along to perfect it (until Mama Critic deems it worthy of her taking another spoonful). Also, I’d definitely use soy milk fresh from the markets in the future rather than the cartoned stuff from the supermarket because it lacked a little bit of that soy umami and the thick, creaminess of the former.

So here it is. Simple, naked for all to judge. I didn’t think it needed any more fussing or additional garnishing etc. The flavours worked. Besides, I thought it’d gone through enough – from being bashed up in an inferior blender, exploded in a slightly better blender, to being dripped all over the kitchen and completely let down by a messed up crust. That’s it.

Anyway, you can imagine my relief. A cheesecake saved from the bin. And somehow, still tasting pretty damn swanky.

Shame about the hole in the wall where I bashed my head into though. Expect repair works some time around end of 2011 until the state of my finances picks itself up again and the bits of my sanity return back to its mothership.

Tiny kitchen drama, Twitter to the rescue, overreaction controlled, etc. – story of my life. End of.

This recipe makes one round tin cheesecake. I’ve altered the measurements for the gingernut crust thankfully.

Matcha Tofu Cheesecake
Original recipe of filling from Manggy, inspired by Okashi Treats
Ingredients

For the crust:
250g tube packet of gingernut biscuits
4 tbs caster sugar
1/2 tsp salt
5 tbs butter, melted and cooled

For the matcha tofu cream:
225g Philly cream cheese
1 tbs light brown sugar
70g caster sugar
225g silken tofu
50g heavy cream
50g sour cream
2 tsp powdered gelatin
100g soy milk
2-3 tbs matcha (or to preference)

Line bottom of cheesecake tin (preferably springform) with baking parchment or light grease it.

Crumb gingernut biscuits. Add sugar and salt and lightly whisk together with a small egg whisk or fork. Add melted butter and mix until combined. Transfer to cheesecake tin and press down into a nice even layer of bottom of tin. You can bake this in the oven 190d Celsius for 5-10mins or simply place it in the freezer for 15mins to bind (I prefer the latter).

Combine all ingredients for the matcha tofu cream, except soy milk and gelatin, in a blender and mix until smooth.

Sprinkle gelatin over soy milk and let sit for a few minutes. Then melt it in a baine marie (or in a bowl over a saucepan of simmering water on the hob). Stir to dissolve completely, then process it into the rest of the tofu cream.

Pour complete tofu cream into the cheesecake tin and refrigerate overnight until set.

To unmold, warm the sides with a warm towel and use a thin palette knife to separate the cheesecake from the tin around the edges before unlocking the springform pan.

Serve chilled on its own or with a little bit of whipped cream. The flavours don’t need much else and will delight you quite pleasantly with a mild bitterness of matcha, creaminess of soy, honeyed sweetness from both white and brown sugar and a distinctive savoury and gingery flavour from the crust.

There are some things in life that must be enjoyed as a pair (like cookies and cream, bangers and mash, bread and butter, salt and vinegar, etc.). Madeleines fall into that category.

Not to be eaten without a cuppa coffee or tea, it would be almost criminal in my book to eat a madeleine just like that. Moreover, the best and freshest madeleines, according to French food expert Patricia Wells, are dry and have an almost dusty taste when eaten on its own. Its flavours, however, come to life when soaked in tea. I am not sure about how ‘dry’ madeleines are supposed to be but I have always enjoyed madeleines from a local boulangerie which were fairly moist. If they were at all mistaken to be dry (because I don’t think they ever quite were), they were just a tad difficult to swallow from being quite so dense.

Of course, some things are just best savoured in their place of origin. I had some lovely madeleines in Paris and I doubt my own come close but these were wonderfully buttery, fragrant and light. A real treat to the senses, especially with a fresh pot of tea livened up with a dash of milk. Indeed, the taste of a madeleine becomes vivid only when dipped in a cuppa tea, seducing you with its almost caramel/toffee-ish flavour. And is it wrong that I especially love squishing madeleine crumbs soaked in tea between the roof of my mouth and tongue?

These babies make such an awesome and cute tea treat. I’m looking forward to making a few more batches in the weeks to come as gifts for friends. And with the many variations of madeleines, in terms of flavour, out there, I’m truly eager to get going in the kitchen again.

I ain’t a perfectionist and wasn’t looking to recreate the perfect French Madeleine. Hence, I’ve chosen a recipe that includes baking powder. About the buerre noisette, otherwise known as nut or browned butter, I couldn’t be bothered. Don’t judge me, please. But hey, I got ‘em sexy humps didn’t I (see picture above)? My sis C, who wandered into the kitchen at time of baking, commented that it was like cultivating nipples in the oven. Yes it was cute to see them grow and peak, but also slightly weird to observe in the space of 10 minutes 10 portions of eggy batter become miniscule golden brown mountains.

I’ve used a recipe from the very talented Evan via her patisserie blog Bossacafez. I’ve added some tips in my directions below as well.

French Madeleines
(Recipe from Bossacafez, matcha powder omitted)
Ingredients

160g butter, melted and cooled to room temperature
120g cake flour
130g caster sugar
4.5g (about 1 heaped tbs) double acting baking powder
3 eggs, at room temperature
1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste
icing sugar, for dusting (optional)

Preheat oven to 200d Celsius.

Grease madeleine mold with butter, dust with flour and tap out the excess. Freeze the madeleine mold before baking.

Sift together cake flour and baking powder. In a separate bowl, whisk together sugar and eggs until pale and fluffy. Add vanilla. Mix well.

Fold flour mixture into egg mixture followed by melted butter. Scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl with a rubber spatula to make sure that the butter is mixed in, leaving no oily residue on the sides.

Cover bowl with cling film and refrigerate it for at least 3 hours or overnight.

When ready, pour batter into mold using a pouring cup/jug. You may also use a spoon to fill the mold although a jug is a little less fussy. Fill the mold to fill 2/3 or 3/4 of the shell-shaped fill. Do not spread the batter out in the molds once poured in.

(I kept overfilling mine and this prevents your madeleines from growing a nice proud hump. Some bakers have recommended measuring the exact amount required to fill each shell-shaped mold perfectly but David Lebovitz on his blog here says it’s fine to eyeball it. Practice makes perfect I suppose!)

Bake in preheated oven for 10-13 mins, until puffed and golden around the edges.

After each batch, clean the pan with a kitchen towel then bake the rest. The pan should be fairly greased from the butter in the batter, requiring no second greasing of the pan.

Remove baked madeleines immediately onto a cooling rack. You can tilt them out onto it. I used a pair of chopsticks and gently picked them out of the mold. They slide out and off quite easily if you’ve greased and floured your pans well. They are quite soft and delicate when just out of the oven so I recommend using a cold plate or cooling rack with fine grids as they can leave marks on the shell shapes of your madeleines.

Once cool to handle, dust with icing sugar then eat to your hearts desire but don’t forget to dip (very ladylike, please no dunking they’re not bloody OREOs!) in a cup of tea. Whether you have milk in your tea or not, that shall be left to your own discretion.

Japanese sweets and pastries (traditional, modern, Chinese and/or French-influenced) have a very soft spot in my heart and a welcome place in my belly because they are so known for being light, delicate, subtle, understated and adorable in every sense of the word. It’s like a fluffy teddy bear or a frou frou lace skirt or a pastel-coloured cone of cotton candy. And where do I normally go to for such indulgences? Sun Moulin Japanese bakery. I love this place and my whole family’s a big fan and loyal frequenter.

But after returning home and finally being able to suss out the good, new, and sometimes modern eats available on our sunny island, I’ve discovered more Japanese pâtisseries and am so pleased to see them around and about! Ladyironchef, a local blogger with a notorious sweet-tooth, introduced me to Pâtisserie Glacé. There’s no turning back now. The melting of soft, cloud-light choux cream, the fluffiness and airiness of chiffon and the use of simple lush ingredients like strawberries, mangoes and paper-thin crepes (yes I’ve researched their menu). I’ll be going back to Glacé for a lot more.

Things we tasted? A Mont Blanc モンブラン comprising a gorgeous chestnut cream or paste if you rather with lovely thin noodle-like strands sat atop a cotton-soft chiffon platform. Could not resemble the Swiss Alps in any way (this baby was about the size of my palm!) but very beautiful and memorable. I won’t forget the pillowy softness of the chiffon and that velvety smooth chestnut cream which was garnished with tiny bits of roasted chestnuts!

…and the Chiffon Cup was another interesting thing we licked up. A tofu chiffon served in a paper cup with fresh cream and puff pastry. I am digging the fact that this chiffon’s main ingredient is TOFU which I adore completely and tend to eat raw and cold during the summer. This was delicious and has only piqued my appetite for Glacé’s organic green tea tofu chiffon cake. A return trip is much needed.

AH, a post that’s meant to be short and sweet, just like Glacé is. A humble hole-in-the-wall type of pâtisserie in the Icon Village but with much to offer in terms of little gâteux; no seats or standing bars in sight save an amiable agreement with a kopi (coffee) shop around the corner for hungry diners to tuck into their cakes seated. Simple, short and sweet. That’s all there is to it. Oh, and so heavenly light and more-ish.

Pâtisserie Glacé, ダイスキ!

Pâtisserie Glacé by Chef Yamashita
12 Gopeng Street
#01-33/34 Icon Village
Singapore 078877

http://cakeglace.com

In London, living in the East was something rather coveted by the people in my social circle (partly because we all wanted to be each others’ neighbour). And true enough, I loved being an Eastie bummer. Having a choice of local Vietnamese on Old Street/Kingsland Road, The Breakfast Club and The Diner literally a stone’s throw from my apartment, some cool haunts we never failed to end up in Hoxton/Dalston plus quirky vintage shops of Brick Lane pretty much stretching out its arms beckoning me in…the East was it for me. So vibrant and alive, so weird and wondrous, so intensely insane and buzzing, grimey, damp and unkempt. The East, like an ever-repeating collage of faded signs, cracked paint jobs, crumbling walls and random dotting of dog poop, like a crazed soothsayer who can’t shut up has much to tell. A place with that much character is not easily forgotten but forever burned into the back of your eyelids, reminding you that at every turn there is a story to uncover. Whatever it was, it was home, for a while at least.

In my hometown, I’m also an Eastie. And here, to live in the East leaves very little in terms of cuisine to be desired! At least, that was what I was told before we moved into this area five years ago. East Singapore has much to offer in terms of dining areas, brimming with little eateries, restaurants, traditional Chinese bakeries and hawker centres offering the famous selection of local dishes like Katong laksa, fried Hokkien prawn mee and Hainanese chicken rice. You can never go hungry if you live in the East. And that rings ever more true if you work in the East. The past few weeks I’ve been hired as my sister’s PA. No, don’t even dare think it is glamorous. I’ve also started helping out one of her friends as a researcher to source the market for environmentally green products, etc. When the brain’s working and the pen’s tapping away, one gets hungry very easily. Moreish and so dastardly peckish. Our office is situated on East Coast Road, quite the food hub I must say. This stretch of road offers the traditional to the modern, ranging from un-air-conditioned outdated coffee shops to the glass-doored modern restaurants & bars decorated with queer names to the pretentious cafés with an eye for minimalism. It’s got it all.

A famous little Hainanese coffee/cake shop here is Chin Mee Chin Confectionary introduced to me by A my sister of course who is up to her arms deep in the knowledge of good local haunts. It’s the only coffee shop she visits in the area and although my iced kopi C (iced coffee sweetened with Carnation milk…I’m still getting the hang of all the codes for ordering local coffee) wasn’t the best, CMC (as it’s commonly known in this area) is beloved by the locals who patronize it for a traditional Southeast Asian slash Chinese breakfast old-school style. And what would that be, you’re asking? Coffee + kaya toast + half-boiled eggs seasoned to your own taste with ground white pepper and Chinese soy sauce. Kaya is coconut jam, a thick and lusciously rich jam of a custard-like texture made from coconut, egg yolks and sugar and flavoured with pandan leaves. I may not have tried CMC’s kaya toast (we were too stuffed after a big fat lunch), but the locals (and even some foreigners) swear that CMC’s locally made kaya, all made from scratch within the shop, is simply the nation’s best. I peered at a neighbouring table’s kaya toast and it looked mouthwateringly good for sure, slabbed with loads of butter onto a toasted bun sliced in two, this is Singapore’s version of butter & jam on hot cross buns I suppose!

Because I had become a hippopotamus post-lunch, I did not eat much in this little un-air-conditioned hole-in-the-wall (only a coffee & a small cupcake). But that didn’t stop me from getting swept off my feet by the understated 1950s old world charm it exuded. It is certainly a nostalgic jewel of a find with ceiling fans, tables with marble tops and dark wooden legs, floral-patterned mosaic tiles across the walls and tiny green tiles on the floor which reminded me so much of the music room of an old piano teacher of mine. It’s even got the ol’ shophouse metal shutters for doors! People sit around comfortably, elbows on the tables because they don’t give a damn and slurp coffee out of porcelain mugs just like in the old days. From the yuppies who stop by during their lunchbreak, to the locals who are well chum with the aunties who run the shop, to little kids with faces glued to the glass cake display box to tourists seeking out authentic local flavours to curious weirdos like me, CMC welcomes everyone without discrimination (except maybe one of the coffee aunties who was cranky as an old cow!).

CMC is a place of so much character and personality, aged but riveting like a fine wine, hardworking, honest and fondly remembered like a good woman. It captivates me, and I’m certain it’s the same for many others! A true local favourite.

Wander in into this shop serving up just the bare essentials from interior to menu, walk down memory lane and feel like a child yet again. I could find nothing in there that disappointed me or upset me in any way. Simplicity at its best and a human character the Chinese value most.

Chin Mee Chin Confectionery
204 East Coast Road
Singapore
Open Tues-Sun 730am – 430pm

•••

And just another photo of something local snapped on the same day when A took her old box-type Mercedes to the car workshop…How old school, eh.

*photo taken on a Diana F+

The last couple of days in London I spent café hopping. Absolutely love the cosy ambience of cafés, the smell of brewing coffee, the tins of imported tea leaves, the displays of fresh cakes and breads; and strangely, even folded paper napkins, sugar cubes and little milk jugs are a comforting sight to behold. But that’s just the outer layer of the lure of cafés. It’s the fact that time stands still. That everything beyond its walls (if it’s got any) ceases to encroach upon your space and your mind for a while. When you step into the dim interiors of one, with that soft lounge or jazz music playing, you shed the dusty coats of worry at the door. You enter a time capsule where you can be perfectly still or perfectly alone. With a book, with a hot cuppa, with something to eat, you are at ease and calm. I like that. Or maybe I’m just lazy and overly indulgent.

Bea’s of Bloomsbury
It was early morning. I had egg cravings. This was beaute. Buttery & creamy. Also, there’s a shelf of books, magazines, newspapers and flyers by the stairs. A cookbook on rustic fruit puddings kept me busy during my wait for food.

a smooth cappuccino and a curried egg & celery toasted muffin

Stopping by to admire Ladurée
The Burlington Arcade is quite a magical place. Placing Ladurée at its entrance is like icing on a cake. Stunning to look at and so enchanting, like a unicorn, you can almost not believe that it’s there. If everything were so pretty and gold-embossed!

Tapped & Packed
Dropped in to meet (finally) the groovy Supercharz. She was funny and so friendly, I almost forgot how good my coffee tasted.

love having all my stuff go ‘plonk’ on café tables

a final refresher – mint tea

Just before I left, a bespectacled dude joined me at my table. He flipped out a shiny macbook and ordered a cappuccino. Eyes trained on his laptop screen the whole time, he proceeded to dunk 5 heaping teaspoons of brown sugar into his little cuppa coffee. Stirring done, lick foamed milk off spoon, sip. Eyes still on laptop screen. I wasn’t sure if that was an artful and coordinated demonstration of a coffee-trained hand vs. attention distracted by laptop or a scene which made me feel a little too sickly sweet in my mouth.

I’m big on café culture. Aside from serving good coffee (and food), cafés need to be spaces for relaxation and quiet thinking, a shelter from noise and city annoyances, a temporary rest stop to catch one’s breath and replenish body and mind. Hurwundeki ticks all these prerequisites.

Its counter that greets you is straightforward and honest. Neatly set and labelled with nothing out of place and not a stray crumb in sight. The smell of roasting coffee goes choo choo and away.

I love that what greets you first is the neat display of the café’s selection of savoury foods and pastries, although this makes choosing what to have just so much harder. Everything looks so good.

Here’s the entrance to more seating – into an area where everything, from your table to your chair to the wall of knick knacks and vintage finds are all for sale.

the food

I love this bit of wall here. Something about the weathering of the bricks was very enchanting. I took quite a few photos of it.

Parma ham, mozzarella and lettuce in ciabatta

Carrot cake slice

the rawness, the crudeness, the random equations of this space for creative discovery

Something about café spaces, with the customers that come and go, with the endless permutations of customer orders and for Hurwundeki, the ever-changing make up of their café space (since every bit of furniture and decoration is for sale), can make the observer feel quite so small and humble. A tiny flaneur in a big bad world. A big world with much to look at where every minute and mundane detail is worth one’s study and contemplation.

I rewind, reset, recharge my tired brain. With the empty cappuccino cup I’ve set back down, my insides come alive. The sound of the trains directly above (the café’s roof is the railway arch) at regular intervals reminds me of time passing whilst the old beaten furniture around me tells of time passed.

A quirky cafe with a haunted house/a-paedo-lives-here exterior (and that’s not a bad thing at all!) gives me flashbacks of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining the same time it makes me fall in love with it completely. I give you…Hurwundeki, the master of a boutique, hair salon and café.

[For more pictures of this wicked cafe, check out their website. It does it far more justice than I can ever try to capture.]

Hurwundeki cafe
299 Railway Arches
Cambridge Heath Road
London
E2 9HA