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This is a recipe sketch, implying that either we haven’t found the right proportion of ingredients, or that we’re too lazy to measure, or that it’s easy (and almost nothing can go wrong!). You’ve been warned! Now enjoy…
 Black forest cake
We just made this black forest cake. Well, actually, we’re not sure whether it can pass as a black forest cake. Hopefully. We used chocolate rum cake as a base, a dense cake with rich chocolate flavour and intense rum and vanilla aroma (we’ll post a recipe for this soon). We also used a chocolate ganache glazing, roughly 1 to 1 scalding heavy cream to chopped milk/dark chocolate ratio. The filling was whipping cream and canned cherries, lined with the ganache. We glazed the side and top of the cake with the ganache, and topped it with whipped cream and cherries. Finally, we sprinkled it with shredded chocolate. Yummy!
This amazing cream cheese frosting is a perfect compliment for a carrot cake. Slather over the entire cake or spread on individual slices—tastes heavenly. Of course, you can also choose to eat it with anything you want. Bread? Sure! Pretzels? Go ahead! Bacon? Okay, I haven’t tried this one, but you certainly can. d:
WARNING: This recipe is just for the frosting. If you want to eat it with carrot cake, we have a healthy recipe for that here. We are also posting another, less healthy one that we just tried recently very soon. Wait for it.
Makes enough to make 3 layers of 10″ round
- 12 oz. (336 g) cream cheese, at room temperature
- ⅔ cup granulated/superfine sugar
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 tbsp grated lime zest
- 1 tbsp lime juice
- 1⅔ cup sour cream, at room temperature
- Put cream cheese, sugar, and salt in a mixer bowl. Beat at medium-high speed with a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment until light and fluffy, approximately 7 minutes.
- Fold in the lime zest, lime juice, and sour cream until incorporated.
- Cover and refrigerate until stiff enough to spread, about 30 minutes.
With a carrot cake, this frosting also tastes heavenly with rum-soaked raisins. Get 1 cup raisins and soak in rum for at least 30 minutes (or overnight). Slice the carrot cake horizontally into 3 layers. Divide the frosting into 3 parts. Frost the first two layers and divide the raisins between the two layers. Stack all three layers and frost the top of the cake.
If you don’t own a paddle attachment, you can use the normal beater as well, though you should beat the mixture for shorter time.
To improve the appearance, you can replace up to half tbsp of grated lime zest with longer (half to 1 cm) zest.
Acknowledgment: The recipe is adapted from carrot cake recipe in The Sweet Spot by Pichet Ong. 
This is a recipe passed on from a Danish mother to his Danish son, to my Singaporean friend and then to me! There has been some contention whether this is a pie, strudel or crumble. But who cares? It’s amazingly easy and good! It requires almost no measuring, just lots of instincts and calories.
Makes approx. 5 servings
- 1 cup plain flour
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 3/4 cup butter
- 2 peeled thinly sliced apples
- Preheat the oven to 180 °C.
- Lay the apples at the bottom of the baking dish and cover with sufficient water such that all the apples are just covered.
- Mix the flour, sugar and butter and lay the mixture on the apples. The mixture should be dry and slightly crumbly. If not, add more flour.
- Bake for about 1 hour, stop just before the mixture cease bubbling. The apple flavour should have infused into the crumble.
- It is almost impossible to serve this crumble onto individual plates so just dig in and bond! hygge.
A pinch of cinnamon and nutmeg can be added to the pastry for more flavours
This is also excellent when served with ice cream.
Acknowledgment: Jakob for the recipe and Toh Wen Qiang for the demo!
This is a simple to make moist cake which like our carrot cake, turns out to be more like a kueh, but we still love it! A perfect recipe to use up those forgotten apples at the bottom of your fruit chiller.
Make 1 10″ tube or Bundt cake (12 servings)
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp freshly-grated nutmeg
- ½ tsp salt
- 3 large eggs
- 1 cup light brown sugar, firmly packed
- ½ cup vegetable oil (corn or canola)
- 3 cups peeled, cored and coarsely peeled apples
- 1 10″ tube or Bundt pan, sprayed with vegetable cooking spray or thinly coated with oil/butter
- Set a rack in the middle level of the oven and preheat to 350°F (180°C).
- Mix flour, baking soda, spices, and salt together thoroughly. Sift once.
- In a large mixing bowl, whisk eggs to break them up. Whisk in the brown sugar, followed by the oil.
- Fold in the half of the grated apples using large rubber or wooden spatula.
- Fold in the flour mixture, followed by the rest of the apples.
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top.
- Bake the cake for 45 to 55 minutes, or until it is well risen and firm, and a toothpick inserted halfway at the centre of the pan comes out clean.
- Cool the cake in the pan on a rack for 5 minutes, then unmold it to a rack to cool completely.
For advance preparation, double-wrap the cake in plastic and freeze for up to a month. Bring to room temperature before serving.
It is much easier to grate a whole apple than a sliced up one.
Acknowledgment: This is a slightly simplified recipe from Perfect Light Desserts (Nick Malgieri & David Joachim).
This is a favourite cake of ours. Carrot cake simply tastes amazing! And it is also very healthy with no butter or margarine. So go ahead try making one! If you follow this recipe exactly, the cake is likely to be very dense, with a kueh-like consistency.
Make 1 10″ tube or Bundt cake (16 servings)
- 2¾ cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp freshly-grated nutmeg
- ½ tsp salt
- 3 large eggs
- 2 large egg whites
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup dark brown sugar, firmly packed
- 1 cup unsweetened applesauce
- ½ vegetable oil (corn or canola)
- 1 tbsp finely-grated orange zest (optional)
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 3 cups peeled, grated carrots
- 1 10″ tube or Bundt pan, sprayed with vegetable cooking spray or thinly coated with oil/butter
- Reduced-fat cream cheese (optional)
- Set a rack in the middle level of the oven and preheat to 350°F (175°C).
- Stir flour, baking powder, baking soda, spices, and salt together thoroughly. Sift once.
- In a large mixing bowl, whisk eggs and egg whites to break them up. Whisk in the granulated and brown sugar. Then whisk in the applesauce and oil, followed by orange zest and vanilla. Make sure that the applesauce is sufficiently cooled before adding to the eggs to avoid heat denaturation at this stage.
- Fold in the carrots using large rubber or wooden spatula.
- Fold in the flour mixture. Don’t overmix!
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top.
- Bake the cake for about an hour, or until it is well risen and firm, and a toothpick inserted halfway at the centre of the pan comes out clean.
- Cool the cake in the pan on a rack for 5 minutes, then unmold it to a rack to cool completely.
- Optionally, spread a slice with cream cheese. For less healthy choice, slather the entire cake with cream cheese.
For advance preparation, double-wrap the cake in plastic and freeze for up to a month. Bring to room temperature before serving.
We have no idea what is a Bundt pan too. We used a disposable aluminium tray and it works too!
To make the apple sauce, cut two large apples into small pieces and place in a saucepan with just enough water to cover. Bring to boil, then simmer for 20 minutes. If the apples get very dry before that, add some water. Use a potato masher or fork to break any large pieces.
Baking powder is DIFFERENT from baking soda. Baking soda is sodium bicarbonate, baking powder is sodium bicarbonate with a leavening acid and a filler (usually starch). An interesting experiment would be to try different proportions of the baking soda and baking powder. Do drop us a message if you get any interesting results!
Acknowledgment: This is a slightly simplified recipe from Perfect Light Desserts (Nick Malgieri & David Joachim).
This is one of my favourite nyonya/peranakan dessert. While it can be found in most dessert stall in Singapore and surrounding region, most of the time, the texture is too watery, with too little glutinous rice. This recipe produces sweet and thick bubur, with creaminess and a hint of saltiness from the coconut milk topping. Don’t omit the topping.
Makes approx. 10 servings
- 250 g black glutinous rice
- 7 cups water
- 3 pandan leaves, knotted
- sugar (to taste)
For coconut milk topping
- 1 cup fresh coconut milk
- ½ tsp salt
- Rinse the black glutinous rice thoroughly until the water is clear. Note that the water will still be deep purple in colour, but it should be clear.
- Measure the water into a large pot and bring it to boil with the knotted pandan leaves thrown in.
- Once boiling, add the black glutinous rice. Simmer in medium to low heat for at least an hour. Stir the mixture every 15 minutes for the first 45 minutes. Then stir and check the water level every 5 minutes to ensure that there is still enough water and to prevent the rice from burning. Add a cup of water when the mixture becomes too thick.
- The bubur is cooked when the rice grain breaks and the texture is soft. When it is cooked, add sugar to taste (I typically add about 15 tbsp of sugar). Then, simmer for a few more minutes while constantly stirring (to prevent the rice from burning) until the mixture becomes thick.
- To prepare the topping, mix the coconut milk and salt thoroughly.
- To serve, pour a heap of the bubur into a bowl and add a tablespoon of the topping. You may an extra amount of topping if you prefer creamier ones.
To reduce the amount of time spent cooking the bubur, you can soak the glutinous rice with water overnight after rinsing it. If you choose this option, use less water when cooking (start with 4-5 cups) and start checking often after 30 minutes.
You can experiment with the thickness of the dessert easily by adding more water or cooking longer to reduce the water towards the end of the cooking process. You can also experiment with the amount of sugar and the creaminess from the coconut milk to suit your own palate.
You may want to shred the pandan leaves to thinner strips before knotting to release the aroma.
Acknowledgment: This is a recipe adapted from several cookbooks and websites with my own personal experience and palate.
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