Boiled Fruitcake -The Easiest Fruitcake Ever 杂果蛋糕

Yes, it is true. This is by far the easiest fruitcake I have ever done. It turned out soft and moist, just as I wanted it. Have you heard of Boiled Fruitcake?

Traditional Fruitcake 酒香杂果蛋糕

Talk about acquired taste. Just a couple of years ago, I have to give away fruitcakes received as presents because I simply don't like it. This year, however, I have such intense cravings to eat one that I have to purposely make an effort to get the ingredients to make one amidst my busy schedule. I blame it on the booze for my utter addiction cum obsession. Yes, I like my fruitcake all boozy-filled plumped-up with alcohol.

Christmas Tree Croquembouche/ Croquembouche de Noel 圣诞泡芙塔

The Informal Chef would like to wish everybody a blessed and fruitful Christmas!

Yes! I have finally done this. Croquembouche de noel. I have always been fascinated with this profiterole cone ever since I saw it on Kim Sam Soon (Korean drama). Traditionally, this is a French wedding cake but the shape of the cone makes it perfect for a Christmas tree, hence, Croquembouche de Noel. Nowadays, with my on-going home business, I hardly have time to update this blog. Today is different. It is Christmas and I am dying to do something different. With whatever free time that I had, I summoned my courage to try out this intriguing dessert.

Chocolate Yule Log Cake 巧克力树桐蛋糕

I always wonder what is the fascination with a dressed-up Swiss roll. Well, today I have my answer. A Yule log cake symbolises the oldest tradition of burning a Yule log during Christmas. Mind you, this burning of Yule log is huge, spanning for days to weeks. And there would be a huge celebration during this time. That was as Christmassy as you could get at those times. Fast forward to today, this tradition of burning the Yule log is only represented by a meager chocolate cake - the Chocolate Yule Log Cake or Buche de Noel.

Baking Christmas Cake: Chocolate Swiss Roll 巧克力瑞士卷

Who doesn't love chocolates? Today, I am giving you a double dose - Chocolate Swiss Roll plus whipped chocolate ganache. Are you jumping with joy yet? Admittedly, I am not trained in ways of baking. I consider myself a rookie. There is good in this though, for I do not have to conform to learned rules and techniques. And this has worked wonderfully for me. Just look at this beautiful roll!

Christmas Surprise Cake 圣诞惊喜蛋糕

My first attempt at a Christmas surprise cake. Boy, what was I thinking? The number of steps needed was enough to make Santa proud of me. I felt like I was in a Masterchef competition! But all being said, the cake turned out fine and I do believe I would get better and faster with subsequent cakes. And it is also possible to make two of these at one go, thus saving work.

Christmas Shortbread Cookie Recipes: Nonpareils Shortbread Bites/Almond Snowballs

Now that we know the recipe for easy shortbread cookies, things are only going to get easier. Using the same recipe, I managed to dish out two different variations with a Christmas theme. This first one was easy. Just invest in some rainbow nonpareils and add it to your shortbread dough and make it into bite-size cookies. The nonpareils add colours and excitement to this cookie. It is colourful, it is festive, it is Christmassy. Surprisingly, it also add a beautiful seedy crunch to the otherwise soft cookies. These nonpareils shortbread bites are children magnet. The kids just adore the colours. Very suitable for parties or gatherings with children.

Christmas Shortbread Cookie Recipes: Nonpareils Shortbread Bites

Makes approx. 48 bites

Ingredients 

1 portion shortbread dough (recipe here)
3 tbsp rainbow nonpareils (or red, green and white only)


Mix dough with nonpareils. Pinch a bit of dough to be shaped into little balls. Alternatively, you could also bake like you would a shortbread and then cut it into cubes. Bake at a preheated oven at 160C for 15-20 minutes or until the sides are slightly browned. Remove and cool completely before storing.

Christmas Shortbread Cookie Recipes: Almond Snowballs

These almond snowballs taste like snowballs. It melts...so pleasantly in the mouth. The almond nibs add crunch and additional flavour to these melt-in-your-mouth cookies. I thought these cookies would be too sweet for my palate since they are rolled in so much icing sugar. It was however beautifully balanced off by the additional almond. A sweet cookie it is but in an acceptable way. Perfect for those who has a sweet tooth.

Makes approx. 50 balls

Ingredients 

1 portion shortbread dough (recipe here)
60 g almond flakes/nibs, toasted
3/4 cup of icing sugar

Mix almond flakes into shortbread dough. Pinch a little dough and form into a little ball. Repeat until all are done. Bake at a preheated oven at 160C for 15-20 minutes or until the sides are slightly browned. Remove to cool. Roll balls in icing sugar while still slightly warm. Roll again when serving or when completely cool.

Easy Shortbread Cookies 英式奶油酥

It is that time of the year again. Christmas and New Year is just approximately one and a half months away. Time flies and it flies pretty quickly, doesn't it? If you are making your own edible gifts, you ought to get busy already. Today we will kick off the festive season with an easy bake - Easy Shortbread Cookies. This traditional Scottish cookie is so simple to make yet the taste is utterly delish. I would strongly suggest shortbread cookies if you want an easy to make recipe but at the same time, adding a personal touch to your gift.

Traditionally, this cookie follows the 1 to 2 to 3 ratio, that is, one part of sugar to two parts of butter to three parts of flour. Because of its simplicity, you would get the original taste of its buttery salty sweetness. For a little bit of variation, you could replace 1/5 part of the flour with rice flour or cornstarch to give it a different texture. Besides that, you could also alternate between icing sugar or castor sugar. When you have such basic ingredients, it is essential that you get good quality ingredients so that the flavours come out authentic and strong. Yes, invest in a good (and expensive!) butter and try your best to get your hands on that pure vanilla extract if you could. You wouldn't regret the effort.

This is the basic recipe for shortbread cookies. Not my best work, but I have to concur it tastes bloody good. This easy shortbread cookies that could be transformed into multiple variations. It is akin to a white canvas waiting to be painted with colours and textures. Therefore, I suggest you make a big batch of this cookie to be divided into a few different recipes, saving you tons of work. The best thing is, you could pre-make these various cookie doughs and keep it frozen until the very last minute when you are about to give this away. Bake it then and you would get fresh mouth-watering buttery shortbreads immediately. Very handy if you have guests over. And if you are all too lazy to even warm the oven, just wrap it nicely to be given away as cookie dough present!

Shortbread Cookies 奶英式奶油酥

Adapted from Joy of Baking

Ingredients

260 g flour
225 g salted butter, room temperature
60 g castor sugar (original recipe uses icing sugar)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp salt


Cooking Instruction

1. Combine flour and salt and mix. Preheat oven to 150C.

2. In a mixing bowl, cream butter and add in sugar. Whisk until butter turns pale and creamy in about two minutes, occasionally scraping down the sides of the bowl.

3. Beat in vanilla extract.

4. Using a spatula, stir in flour until well combined.

5. Pour mixture into a lined baking pan. Level with spatula, score lines for the rectangles and make indents using a fork. Bake at 150C for 20 to 25 minutes or until cookies are slightly browned at the edges.

6. Remove from oven and cut along the lines into rectangles while it is still warm. Serve plain or dipped in chocolate.





Also check out my previous year's Christmas Butter Cookies here:

Or my Fudgy Chocolate Crinkles here:

Asian-Inspired Canape

Hey, it is the festive season. Why not serve up something different to your party guests? In this second instalment, I am introducing something different. Who would have imagined canape could be Asian? Well, make it the talk of your guests with these Asian inspired recipes! The fact is I got inspiration from the nearby kuih (malay dessert) stall! Isn't it charming?

Easy Party Canapes

I love everything small and dainty. It is no wonder that I adore canapes. Remember what they said about good things coming in small packages? This is exactly that. These bite-sized goodies are absolutely pleasing to the eyes and simply delicious.

My basic requirements for easy party canape are simple. Use ingredients that are easily available with minimal cooking. It also has to be time-saving with minimal wastage (very important to me). I am not a fan of skewering multiple components. Imagine you are organising a party and have million and one things to take care of. You do not want to spend hours poking at your food. I am also not a fan of cutting odd shapes that leaves two third of the ingredients to the trash.

Fudgy Chocolate Crinkle Cookie

Christmas without chocolate crinkle cookies is not complete. There is something about this wrinkly cookie that reminds you of Christmas. Maybe it is the whitish coat that looks similar to snow. The colour is surprisingly festive in its signature black and white.

Not-the-best-ever but Delectable Crunchy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Who owns the best ever chocolate chips cookies recipe?

It seems that almost every chocolate chip cookies recipe that I searched has this "best-ever" tag on in. I am flabbergasted. Which one is actually THE best ever then? Most of the time I'm not convinced. I guess it does jazz up their blog a little. Before I get myself into hot soup, I have to reiterate that those recipes are not bad at all, just not best ever.

Asian Style Roast Chicken for Christmas?

I have never roasted a whole chicken before. Since, it is almost Christmas, I thought it would be good to practice roasting a chicken. I know, I know, traditionally a turkey is used. But turkey is just too huge for our small family of non-turkey eating members. Besides, Turkey Inn  does not come cheap in this part of the world. So, practicality outbeats tradition. Chicken is god given. It is so much easier to prepare, especially in its small size.


Now, let's just talk about my roast chicken. It is not your usual western roast chicken with simple ingredients like salt, pepper and thyme. Somehow, living in this part of the world, everything gets more complicated, even the marinade. If you look at the marinade, its primarily ingredients are easily obtainable here. Yes, quite a few things are added I'd admit, but the result is awesome! You can actually smell the roasting chicken half a mile away (metaphorically saying of course!). But it does smell strongly good, that I guarantee. Aesthetically, I feel it is still lacking but I'll let you be the judge.

Crunchy and Light Butter Cookies

Christmas is around the corner. I was thinking of baking some cookies as gifts for my son's playmates in church. So I randomly googled for an original Danish butter cookies recipe. I stumbled upon this site with lengthy explanation on how to make this simple five-ingredient cookie, together with the dos and don'ts meticulously listed. And I told myself, this is it. How else would a normal person knows so much about just butter cookies?

Creative Christmas

Can't believe it is already December! I know this is cliche but I have to say this again...How time flies! I am already starting to feel festive. A tad early, but I reckon good feelings are more than welcome anytime of the year.

Before I know Christ, Christmas was just another holiday where you go out to party and binge. But everything is different now. Christmas means celebrating the birth of Christ, be it in church or other places. Somehow, Christmas carols makes perfect sense now. And I am looking forward to it every year.

In the spirit of Christmas, there are going to be a lot of giving involved this year. I have already bought a huge bag of presents to be given away. In addition to that, this Christmas I have gone creative. I am also going to bake and cook for this Christmas. So, don't be peeved if this month's recipes are all Christmassy. I am sure you will like to know one or two of these just in case you might want to DIY your own dinner or party. I would love to hear some reviews from you. After all, Christmas is about sharing, opinions included!

I know it is a wee bit early but I am wishing everyone happy preparation for Christmas. Meanwhile, I will be getting back to my figgy pudding...♩ ♫ ♪...