Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

 

Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

 

This is one the traditional moon cake for Mid-Autumn Festival. Moon cake is not really my favorite, but you have to have it for the festival. So every year, I try to bake some to share with friends.

Ingredients:Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg YolkMoon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

Dough: 100 gram all-purpose flour, 5 gram dry milk, 75 gram homemade syrup, 25 gram cooking oil, 1 gram potassium carbonate solution.

Filling: red bean paste, salted egg yolk

Topping: 1 raw egg yolk, 1 tsp egg white, 1 tsp water, mix well.Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg YolkMoon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

Tool: moon cake mold

Method:

Dough:

1. Mix syrup, cooking oil and potassium carbonate solution, beat until mix well.Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg YolkMoon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

I used homemade syrup which was made just for moon cake, recipe will follow. If you don’t have it, you can use store-bought, but recommend darker color and thick ones.

2. Sift flour, add with dry milk into syrup mixture, mix well until form a smooth dough.

3. Set aside for about 1 hour.

Filling:Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg YolkMoon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

1. Heat up skillet, no oil need, pour red bean paste in.

2. Stir fry red bean paste on medium low heat until you think it’s thick enough to shape.

3. Transfer to a container, let it cool.

Wrapping:Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

1. Decide the size and weight for each portion. My mold is small, so divided the dough into 12 equal pieces, about 15 gram each, red bean paste was 30 gram.

2. Separate dough and red bean paste.

3. Flat red bean paste (or break it), roll it over the egg yolk, form a ball with egg yolk inside.

4. Flat dough, use your fingers and hand to push/squeeze to make the dough cover filling completely.

Dough is really soft and tender, easy to operate.

Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk         Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk        Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk         Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk        Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

5. Put the moon cake ball with a thin flour coating in mold to shape it.

6. Pre-heat oven to 350ºF.Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

7. Sprinkle moon cake with water, bake for 5 minutes, then take out, thinly coated with topping, bake for another 15 minutes.

8. After moon cakes are cool, put in a sealed container, set for at least one day then serve.

Fresh baked moon cake has hard shell. Shell with turn tender after settling. Normally takes at least a day, sometime 2-3 days.

 

Moon Cake with Red Bean Paste and Egg Yolk

 

 

Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese

 

Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese

 

Many of my co-workers love the Kolaches from Shipley’s Donut. one day, I was in the mode of trying to bake them at home. Since I don’t really like the their recipe, I decided to use one of my favorite dough recipes instead. It turns out good, really good.

Ingredients:

Dough: 2 tsb dry yeast, 2 tsb sugar, 80g warm milk, 1.5 cups bread flour, 10g lemon juice, 1 egg, 2 tbsp butter (room temperature), a pinch salt.

Filling: 6 beef frank, proper amount grated cheese.

Topping: honey:water = 1:1, proper amount.

Method:Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese

1. Mix dry yeast and sugar, melted by warm milk, set aside for several minutes, or until you see lots of bubbles on the surface.

2. Add all the dough ingredients except butter into yeast mixture, form a ball.

3. Add butter to dough, punch for several minutes until dough is smooth and elastic.

4. Set dough aside until dough get double sized.Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese

If you’re in rush, you can let dough rest for about 10-15 minutes.

5. Punch dough down, then seperate into 6 equal pieces.

6. Roll each pieces into rectangle shape, a little bit wider than length of the beef frank, and cut one end as shown in picture.

7. Sprinkle grated cheese at the end with cuts, roll beef frank as shown in picture, make sure seam is at bottom. Then set aside until double-sized.Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese

8. Preheat oven to 350 degree.

9. Mix honey and water, brush on top of bread, bake about 20 minutes or until golden brown.

10. Brush honey mixture on top of bread right after taking bread out of oven, transfer to wired rack to cool.

I was in a playing mode, and tried to do the beef frank in a different way, below is what I did:

Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese          Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese          Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese          Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese

 

Caterpillar Shaped Bread with Beef Frank and Cheese

 

 

Yellow Squash Casserole with Onion

 

Yellow Squash Casserole with Onion   I found this recipe online, it looks simple and easy, so I decided to give it a try.

Ingredients:Yellow Squash Casserole with Onion

1lb yellow squash, 1/2 onion, 1 cup cracker crumb, 1/2 cup grated cheese, 1 egg, 1/3 cup milk, 4 tsb butter, salt and pepper to taste.

Method:

1. Slice yellow squash, chop onion, then steam for 5 minutes.

2. Drain vegetable after steaming, set aside.Yellow Squash Casserole with Onion

3. Mix cheese and cracker crumb, fold in half of the mixture with vegetable.

4. Whisk egg and milk, add to vegetable mixture.

5. Melt butter, add half to the vegetable mixture.

6. Preheat oven to 400°F.

7. Mix remaining butter with remaining cracker crumb.Yellow Squash Casserole with Onion

8. Pour vegetable mixture into a baking dish.

The one I used is 6×9.

9. Sprinkle remaining cracker crumb on top, bake for about 25 minutes or until the top turn golden brown.

 

Yellow Squash Casserole with Onion

 

Chiffon Cake

 

Chiffon Cake

 

I’m not a big Chiffon Cake fun. It is so complicated, and so many steps to make and you can make mistakes. It’s really not my type of cake.

But I accidentally got myself a chiffon cake pan, so I decided to try it at least one time, so the cake pan won’t go completely waste.

Ingredients:

5 egg yolk, 7 egg white, 80 gram flour, 20 + 10 gram corn starch, 40 + 60 gram sugar, 65ml cooking oil, 65ml milk, several drops lemon juice, a pinch salt.Chiffon Cake

Methods:

1. Set everything to room temperature.

2. Mix flour and 20g corn starch, sift twice.

If you have cake flour, you can use 100g cake flour instead.Chiffon Cake

3. In a large mixing bowl, beat egg white, salt and lemon juice at low speed until you see big bubbles, then add 20g sugar, keep beating until smaller bubbles, add 40g sugar and 10g corn starch.

4. Speed up the beater, keep beating egg mixture until stiff.Chiffon Cake

5. In another mixing bowl, mix milk and 40g sugar until sugar melt completely.

6. Add cooking oil into milk mix, beat until they mix completely.

7. Add sifted flour into mix, beat until it mix until smooth.Chiffon Cake

8. Add egg yolk into flour mix, mix until smooth.

9. Preheat oven to 340ºF.

10. Pour 1/3 of the egg white mixture over egg yolk batter, folding in with rubber spatula.

Do not stir, but fold.Chiffon Cake

11. Pour the mixture over the rest egg white, folding in with rubber spatula until smooth.

Do not stir, but fold.

12. Pour batter into baking pan.Chiffon Cake

13. Bake for about 50 minutes or until done. Turn baking pan upside down immediately after
taking out of oven.

14. Take cake out of pan when it’s completely cool.

Chiffon Cake

Flower Shaped Bread

 

Flower Shaped Bread

 

I love the shape of the bread, it looks really like a flower. I just couldn’t stop thinking of baking it myself. Now here it is.

Ingredients:

300 gram flour, 60 gram milk, 1 little bag dry yeast, 2 & 1 egg yolk, 1 egg, 20 gram condensed milk, 40 gram sugar, 40 gram  cream, 45 gram butter, a pinch salt

Method:

1. Set all the ingredients to room temperature.Flower Shaped Bread

2. Heat milk, make sure it’s warm.

3. Mix yeast with same amount sugar, dissolve in warm milk, set aside until it’s full of bubble.Flower Shaped Bread

4. Set 1 egg yolk aside, mix everything together until the dough is smooth. Then set aside (you can coat the dough with some oil, so it won’t be sticky.) until dough double in size.Flower Shaped Bread

5. Deflate the dough and turn it out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide the dough into 8 equal pieces. Roll each piece flat as showing in picture.

Flower Shaped Bread6. Roll each flat piece into a long stick.

7. Form the stick as showing in pictures, hide the ends at the bottom. Then place on greased baking sheet until double in size.

8. Preheat oven to 350°F.Flower Shaped Bread

9. Brush the surface with the egg yolk, then bake until it’s light brown on surface.

10. Brush with butter after taking out of oven so it looks shining (optional). Serve when it’s warm.

 

Strawberry Pizza with Heavy Cream

 

Strawberry Pizza

I’m not a dessert person, but I fell in love with this strawberry pizza when I first met her. I think I’d never say no to her for rest of my life.

 Ingredients:

Base: 2 cups all-purpose flour, 1 tsp baking powder, 2 sticks room temperature butter, 1 cup chopped roasted nuts.

Cream Filling: 8oz cream cheese, 16oz heavy cream, 1/2 cup sugar powder.

Strawberry Topping: 1lb fresh strawberry, 13oz strawberry glaze.

Method:Strawberry Pizza

1. Mix baking powder with flour.

2. Add butter into flour mixture, mix together to form a ball.

3. Add nuts into mixture, form into a bigger ball.

4. Preheat oven to 350 degree.

5. Spray baking pan with Pam, then put dough into pan, press to cover the pan.

The original recipe used a pizza pan, I used small pans.

6. Bake pizza base for about 20 minutes, then take out of oven, set aside to cool.

7. Pour sugar powder into heavy cream, beat to firm. Strawberry Pizza

8. Lightly beat cream cheese, then fold into cream.

 9. Spread cream mixture on pizza base.

10. Slice all strawberry, then mix with strawberry glaze.

11. Top strawberry mixture on cream.

12. Serve immediately.