Mandarin Orange Cranberry Butter Cake

A moist butter cake using a seasonal ingredient - mandarin orange 🍊. Besides the sweet orange flavour, the cake carries an auspicious golden hue with specks of orange peels and cranberry bits scattered within the fine, moist crumb 😀

As there would be plenty of cookies to be eaten during Chinese New Year period, so I just baked a small cake to compliment 🌸


Yield: one 15x9x5cm cake
Pan size: 17x10x8cm
Baking temperature: 155°C for 30 minutes, 170°C for 5 to 8 minutes

Ingredients:

Using 55g Omega 3&6 eggs
All ingredients in room temperature

75g salted butter, softened but not glossy
60~65g caster sugar*

2 eggs

78g top flour
10g milk powder
2g baking powder, about 1/2 tsp

15g mandarin orange juice

10g rice malt syrup/golden syrup/honey

10g dried cranberry, cut into fine bits
8g mandarin orange peel

* Use 5g less sugar if you prefer a less sweet cake

Directions

1. Extract juice from a mandarin orange. I used a garlic crusher to help me extract the juice.
Remove the whitish layer of the orange peel and chop the orange peel into fine bits. Set aside.

2. Beat eggs in a bowl till frothy. Set aside.

3. Cream softened butter with caster sugar till light and fluffy.

4. Blend in the beaten egg from (2) gradually.

5. Mix top flour, milk powder and baking powder in a bowl before sieving into batter in 3 batches.

 6. Mix mandarin orange juice with rice malt before adding to the batter.

Blend well.

7. Add orange peel to the batter and mix well.

8. Pour about 1/3 of the batter into the cake pan coated with a layer of butter.
Mix the dried cranberry bits with the remaining batter.

Pour the batter into the cake pan.

9. Bake in a preheated oven, at middle rack, at 155°C for 30 minutes, or till an inserted cake tester draws out clean. Increase the oven temperature to 170°C for 5 to 8 minutes, just to give the cake a nice golden crust.

10. Remove the cake from the oven and let it cool down for about 5~10 minutes in the pan.

Invert out the cake and let it cool over a wire rack.

Cover it with cling wrap to seal in the moisture.

11. Let the cake cool down before cutting. Enjoy 

Wishing you a happy and prosperous Chinese New Year 2018

Five-Spice Roast Chicken Thighs 五香烤鸡

A simple and easy to prepare roast chicken thighs that tasted like braised duck because of the 5-spice powder.

Yield: 4 chicken thighs

Ingredients

4 chicken thigh with skin

Marinade
1 tbsp rice wine
1 tsp light soya sauce
1/4 tsp dark soya sauce

2 tsp raw sugar

1 tsp golden syrup/honey

3~4g fine salt, close to 1/2 tsp

1/4 tsp five-spice powder

1/2 tsp ground rainbow/black pepper


Glaze

1 tbsp rice bran oil
remaining marinade

Directions

1.Rinse chicken thighs and trim away excess fat.

2. Marinate the chicken thighs for 30 minutes to 2 hours, or overnight.

Seal the marinated thighs with cling wrap. For a longer marinating period, keep them in the fridge. Thaw the meat close to room temperature before roasting.

3. Arrange the meat, in a single layer, over a grilling plate or over a baking tray lined with parchment paper.

Collect the remaining marinade and mix with 1 tbsp of rice bran oil for glazing the meat later.

4. Roast the meat in a preheated oven toaster at 180°C for 20 minutes.

Remove from the oven toaster, and brush a coat of glaze over the skin. Return the meat to the oven toaster and continue to roast at 180°C for 10 minutes.

Reduce the temperature to 170°C and continue to glaze and roast at an interval of 10 minutes till you use up the glazing sauce. About 2 to 3 rounds of glazings.

At the final round, reduce the temperature to 150°C and roast for 10 minutes. Keep the meat in the oven toaster for another 20 to 30 minutes to melt the fat under the skin.

5. Enjoy :)

Golden Crust White Bread

I have been using this fabulous Japanese recipe to bake a few of these golden crust white breads recently. It has a golden crust that would not hurt the blade of your bread knife. To me, this bread tasted like baguette, good aroma and has a soft moist crumb. Most importantly, it can be prepared within 3 to 4 hours.

I baked this about a month ago with an extended proofing time and it gave the bread a nicer aroma and crumb texture 😀

♥

I named it golden crust white bread as I can't find the proper name for it 🤔😌
With this recipe in my collection, I'll save the trouble to source for baguette to go with my curry chicken meal in the future  \0/

Yield: one 15cm long bread

I halved the original recipe and bake a single loaf.

Ingredients

70g Prima bread flour
30g Prima top flour
3g raw sugar

2g fine salt

1g instant dry yeast

60g water
8g natural yeast, 100% hydration*

* can be replaced by 4g of bread flour and 4g of water

Directions

1. Mix natural yeast to 60g of warm water, about 35°C.

2. Mix all the remaining dry ingredients in a mixing bowl.

Dig a hole in the centre,

and pour in the natural yeast water.

Mix into a lump till it pulls away from the wall of the mixing bowl.

3. Hand knead the dough into a smooth dough. Place in a covered mixing bowl to undergo 1 hour of proofing, or till it double in size.

End of first proofing.

4. Transfer the dough to a well-floured work top. Deflate the dough into a flat dough.

Fold in the top two opposte ends,

followed by folding down the middle end.

Repeat the same procedure for the other half of the dough.

Fold in the left and right ends.

Fold the dough into half, and pinch to seal up the seam.

5. With the seam side facing down, place the dough over a baking tray lined with parchment paper.

Spray some water, cover with a tea towel, and let the dough proof for about 1 hour, or till double in size.

6. Pre-heated the oven to 250°C for about 15 minutes.

About 10 minutes later, dust some flour over the dough and make a straight scoring.

7. After transferring the dough into the middle rack of the oven, spray a good amount of water to create steam in the oven. Close the oven, and reduce the oven temperature to 220°C and bake for 20 minutes, or till golden.

8. Let the bread cool down before cutting :)