Green Apple Pineapple Tea 青苹果凤梨茶

I had 1/2 a green apple and some cut honey pineapple slices lying in the fridge for almost a week. They were too old to be consumed raw. In order to save them from the bin, I tried to boil them into sweet tea. Yes, I loved this fruity tea which left a fresh and sweet aroma in my throat after sipping it 😍 It would be a nice and refreshing tea to be served on a hot weather ⛅🌈🚿

Yield: 4 x 250ml drink

Ingredients

1/2 green apple, diced
1 blade pandan leaf, tie into knot
1000ml water

1/3 honey pineapple, diced

2 tbsp rock sugar

All the ingredient quantities can be adjusted according to your preference

Directions

1. Add diced green apple, pandan leaf and water into a glass or non-metal pot. Bring to a boil and add in the diced pineapple.
As the fruits used are acidic, it is best to avoid using metal pot.

2. When the content boils again, add rock sugar to your taste. Stir the content with a porcelain spoon. Lower the heat, and simmer for about 30 minutes.

3. Let the content cools down to room temperature in the pot.

4. Serve warm or cold 😋

Mango Yogurt Butter Cake 芒果优格牛油蛋糕

A soft and moist butter cake with faint mango flavour coming from the mango yogurt. As there was tiny mango fruit in the yogurt, I saved the time having to cut a whole mango just for the small quantity of mango needed 😆

Yield: one loaf of cake
Pan size: 26 x 10 x 7.5 cm

Ingredients

All ingredients in room temperature

110g salted butter, softened
100g caster sugar

3 eggs, about 55g each

115g top/cake flour
15g milk powder
3g baking powder

35g mango yogurt, 1.5% fat
15g golden syrup

Directions

1. Coat the cake pan with butter, and dust some flour over. Set aside.

2. Mix  mango yogurt and golden syrup in a small cup. Set aside.

3. Mix top flour, milk powder and baking powder in a bowl. Set aside.

4. Beat 3 eggs in a small mixing bowl till frothy. Set aside.

5. Cream softened butter with castor sugar till pale and light.

6. Gradually mix in the beaten egg from (4). Wait for the beaten egg to incorporate with the butter before adding the next batch.

7. Sieve in the flour mixture from (3) and mix manually using the whisks. Add the flour mixture in a few additions.

8. Pour in the mango yogurt mixture from (2) and mix well.

9. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan from (1).

Bang the cake pan to level the batter and get rid of trapped air bubbles.

10. Bake in a preheated oven at 150℃, at middle rack, for about 40 minutes or till the cake is cooked. If you want a neat groove running through the centre line, you can use a sharp pointed knife to slit the cake at the 30th minute.

Increase the oven temperature to 170℃ for 5 to 10 minutes to give the cake a nice golden crust and aroma.

11. Transfer the cake out of the oven and let it stays in the pan for about 10 to 15 minutes.

Invert out the cake and let it cool down over the cooling rack.

Cut and enjoy it warm 😋

Update: 11 May 2018
I slit a shallow long cut through the middle line at the 30th minute into baking to give the cake a cleaner and more uniform groove :)

Taiwanese Macaron 台湾牛粒

Yield: 8 x 6cm round macarons

I was craving for BreadTalk's Kawa Ichigo, which is a small cake with two macaron-like sponge cakes sandwiching a layer of mascarpone cheese and strawberry jam centre. To replicate, I borrowed the recipe from a Taiwanese macaron and substituted the expensive mascarpone cheese by cheaper whipped cream. Not a bad try. My family all love it 😍

Ingredients

1 egg white

Pinch of salt
25g fine sugar
1 egg yolk

5g milk
2g condensed milk

30g top/cake flour

About 2 tbsp icing sugar for dusting

Filling
40g whipped cream
2 tbsp strawberry jam

Directions

1. Mix 5g of milk and 2g of condensed milk in a small dish. Set aside.

2. In a dry, clean and oil-free small mixing bowl, whisk egg white to frothy. Add in a pinch of salt and gradually add in the 25g of fine sugar in course of whisking.

Whisk till reaches firm peak stage.

3. Whisk in the egg yolk.

Continue to whisk till reaching ribbon stage.

4. Sieve and fold in 1/2 of the flour.

Mix in the milk mixture from Step 1, followed by the remaining flour.

Use a spatula to give a thorough mix.

5. Pour the batter into a piping bag fitted with a 1-cm round nozzle.

6. Pipe the batter onto a silicone baking sheet, leaving about 2cm gaps in between.

7.  Dust a good amount of icing sugar over the piped batter.

8. Bake at lower rack of the oven, set at 170°C for about 15 to 20 minutes, or till the edge starts to brown.

Let the macaron shells cool down before removing them from the baking sheet.

9. Match the macaron shells to its comparable size shell to pair up.

10. Drop a small amount of strawberry jam onto the centre of a macaron shell.

Pipe a ring of whipped cream round the strawberry jam.

Place the other matched macaron shell over.

11. Store in the refrigerator and serve it cold 😋💖

Whipped Cream

1. Keep a tall mixing cup and a balloon whisk in the freezer for about 20 to 30 minutes before use.

2. Pour 40g whipping cream into the cold mixing cup and let the cup stands on an ice pad.

3. Whisk the cream till reaching almost soft peak stage, using the "Turbo" speed of an handheld blender. The process took about 2 to 3 minutes.

Add in 4g icing sugar.

Continue to whsk at "Turbo" speed till the cream starts to thicken. Reduce the speed to "4 to 5" on the speed dial, and continue to whip till reaching firm peak stage.

Do not over-whip the cream! Or, it will turn into butter and whey.

4. Transfer the whipped cream to a piping bag fitted with a 1M nozzle and keep in the refrigerator till needed.

Recipe modified from Taiwanese Macaron with Raspberry Buttercream