Saturday, February 6, 2010

Nanaimo Bars - Daring Bakers

I know I've not been doing a lot of Daring Bakers.. I apologize deeply.. Life has been hard on me the past few months.. Hence, I shy-ed away from a lot of things.. But I'm coming back.. So.. it's gonna be cool.. Hopefully..

Well.. The January 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Lauren of Celiac Teen. Lauren chose Gluten-Free Graham Wafers and Nanaimo Bars as the challenge for the month. The sources she based her recipe on are 101 Cookbooks and http://www.nanaimo.ca/.
The challenge this month required us to make graham biscuits from scratch.. Actually it was to make gluten free graham biscuits.. But since, Im kinda short on money and I don't want to waste the gluten free ingredients if I have them, I decided to make a normal graham biscuits.. It was really challenging to make the biscuits pretty and perfect because of the hot weather here.. When I tried taking the dough out.. it would turn sticky after a few minutes.. I had to go back and forth the refrigerator to make nice biscuits.. It still turn out uneven but taste great though.. I finally know what graham biscuits tasted like.. cause it's not really available here in Singapore.. And I suddenly remember that I ate it before.. It's those teddy bear biscuits that supermarkets used to sell!! hahaha..  

The bars were easy to make.. and you don't have to bake it.. I didn't add coconuts and nuts to that base because I don't like coconuts and I don't realy like nuts in the things I bake.. Hence, I just used more graham biscuits.. It was really sweet though.. and rich..  brought it to work and the boys like it.. They kept asking is the middle layer white chocolate?? I couldn't eat more than 1 bar.. But it was really nice.. I wouldn't mind making them again.. If only it's for kids to eat.. or those people who really like sweet stuffs..  
Gluten Free Graham Wafers (adapted from http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/000126.html)
Ingredients:
1 cup (138 g) (4.9 ounces) Sweet rice flour (also known as glutinous rice flour)
3/4 cup (100 g) (3.5 ounces) Tapioca Starch/Flour
1/2 cup (65 g) (2.3 ounces) Sorghum Flour
1 cup (200 g) (7.1 ounces) Dark Brown Sugar, Lightly packed
1 teaspoon (5 mL) Baking soda
3/4 teaspoon (4 mL ) Kosher Salt
7 tablespoons (100 g) (3 ½ ounces) Unsalted Butter (Cut into 1-inch cubes and frozen)
1/3 cup (80 mL) Honey, Mild-flavoured such as clover.
5 tablespoons (75 mL) Whole Milk
2 tablespoons (30 mL) Pure Vanilla Extract

Directions:
1. In the bowl of a food processor fitted with a steel blade, combine the flours, brown sugar, baking soda, and salt. Pulse on low to incorporate. Add the butter and pulse on and off, until the mixture is the consistency of a coarse meal. If making by hand, combine aforementioned dry ingredients with a whisk, then cut in butter until you have a coarse meal. No chunks of butter should be visible.

2. In a small bowl or liquid measuring cup, whisk together the honey, milk and vanilla. Add to the flour mixture until the dough barely comes together. It will be very soft and sticky.

3. Turn the dough onto a surface well-floured with sweet rice flour and pat the dough into a rectangle about 1 inch thick. Wrap in plastic and chill until firm, about 2 hours, or overnight.

4. Divide the dough in half and return one half to the refrigerator. Sift an even layer of sweet rice flour onto the work surface and roll the dough into a long rectangle, about 1/8 inch thick. The dough will be quite sticky, so flour as necessary. Cut into 4 by 4 inch squares. Gather the scraps together and set aside. Place wafers on one or two parchment-lined baking sheets. Chill until firm, about 30 to 45 minutes. Repeat with the second batch of dough.

5. Adjust the rack to the upper and lower positions and preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit (180 degrees Celsius).

6. Gather the scraps together into a ball, chill until firm, and reroll. Dust the surface with more sweet rice flour and roll out the dough to get a couple more wafers.

7. Prick the wafers with toothpick or fork, not all the way through, in two or more rows.

8. Bake for 25 minutes, until browned and slightly firm to the touch, rotating sheets halfway through to ensure even baking. Might take less, and the starting location of each sheet may determine its required time. The ones that started on the bottom browned faster.

9. When cooled completely, place enough wafers in food processor to make 1 ¼ cups (300 mL) of crumbs. Another way to do this is to place in a large ziplock bag, force all air out and smash with a rolling pin until wafers are crumbs.

Nanaimo Bars
Ingredients:

For Nanaimo Bars — Bottom Layer

1/2 cup (115 g) (4 ounces) Unsalted Butter
1/4 cup (50 g) (1.8 ounces) Granulated Sugar
5 tablespoons (75 mL) Unsweetened Cocoa
1 Large Egg, Beaten
1 1/4 cups (300 mL) (160 g) (5.6 ounces) Gluten Free Graham Wafer Crumbs (See previous recipe)
1/2 cup (55 g) (1.9 ounces) Almonds (Any type, Finely chopped)
1 cup (130 g) (4.5 ounces) Coconut (Shredded, sweetened or unsweetened)

For Nanaimo Bars — Middle Layer

1/2 cup (115 g) (4 ounces) Unsalted Butter
2 tablespoons and 2 teaspoons (40 mL) Heavy Cream
2 tablespoons (30 mL) Vanilla Custard Powder (Such as Bird’s. Vanilla pudding mix may be substituted.)
2 cups (254 g) (8.9 ounces) Icing Sugar

For Nanaimo Bars — Top Layer

4 ounces (115 g) Semi-sweet chocolate
2 tablespoons (28 g) (1 ounce) Unsalted Butter

Directions:

1. For bottom Layer: Melt unsalted butter, sugar and cocoa in top of a double boiler. Add egg and stir to cook and thicken. Remove from heat. Stir in crumbs, nuts and coconut. Press firmly into an ungreased 8 by 8 inch pan.

2. For Middle Layer: Cream butter, cream, custard powder, and icing sugar together well. Beat until light in colour. Spread over bottom layer.

3. For Top Layer: Melt chocolate and unsalted butter over low heat. Cool. Once cool, pour over middle layer and chill.

I halved the recipe of the Nanaimo bars and made it in a 6" square pan. I would prefer if the middle and top layer were thinner beacuse it was really sweet.. But I don't mind having one again.. And it's really nice eaten cold..

~On a moonlit walk on the beach..
Watching the sunrise for the first time
I'm in a trance.. to the one slow dance.. ~

Friday, February 5, 2010

Wilton Course 3 - Finale Cake

Today I learned life has to move on.. The past may hurt us so bad.. leave us alone and hanging.. so many questions running around.. doubts dangling in your head.. and there will never be answers.. Filled with utter sadness, anger, vengeance.. :'( At some point of time, you know things will never be the same again.. So what are you to do? Well, just accept things as they are.. What can you do?? Where can you go?? Hence, just accept it and learn from it.. Hopefully.. :)

Well, I've completed my Wilton Course 3.. Wow.. What a challenging course! I dare say that.. Maybe cos I am troubled with other matters too which is why it was so challenging for me.. But the challenge was the one that made it all worthwhile to see the results.. Seriously, it is the most satisfying course out of all 3.. It took me a lot of planning and preparation too..

The flowers took like 1.5 days to dry.. I had to do 2.5 batches of recipe for the cake.. The covering of the cake with fondant was so intimidating.. and I failed cos there was not enough fondant to cover the whole cake.. Haha.. Colouring the fondant was so tiring.. I had to knead the fondant until I developed muscles.. hahaha.. But thinking of ideas on how I envisioned the cake to be was the most stressful.. I wanted a more modern, funky, contemporary looking cake.. But I had class requirements to make it kinda formal with the flowers and borders.. I was stressed for a few days thinking of how I want the cake to be and the colours to choose from.. Thank you to my 3rd sis and Wafi for giving opinions.. 

Finally, the dream came came to be.. haha.. I chose a stacked cake cos the pillars were kinda formal looking and didn't go with the cake that I envisioned to be.. I wanted to make it orange colour cake cos I just love my orange colour and people always ask me what colour did I buy.. I assume it's the most attractive colour of all.. I decided to do laces border around the cake cos i hated the frill borders that I learn in class cos I think it looks typical and boring.. and hated doin it cos it never looks as nice as the ones in the book.. haha.. At first, I wanted to colour the lace pink but my sis said purple would be nicer.. It was challenging to get the deep purple that I wanted.. I had to mix my violet, red and bue colours.. And still it wasn't what I really wanted but I was too tired to mix anymore.. The flowers took 1.5 days to dry and I was worried it won't be enough.. I've always like lilies and I think it was the easiest to make.. Hence, I chose lilies.. I wanted to use Petunia too but my sis told me it would be too much have 2 different flowers.. Ok.. Lesser work for me anyway.. As a result, you got what you see.. trust me.. It's a lot of work but it's really really worth it.. *Pats on tha back.. Alright.. here's the inside

The whole class did a good job.. All the ladies did a wonderful job.. really.. I think it was really stressful for all of us cos while we were decorating our cakes, the class was so quiet and you can see each one of use intently decorating the cakes.. Only stopping to take a short break and give our fingers and wrist a short time off.. haha.. Here's the  lovely ladies.. Germaine in black.. Im in green.. out instructor Chermaine with the blue apron.. Indul in pink t-shirt beside me.. Melody with the rainbow top.. Su in white apron and Veronica in pink in front.. Thank you all of you for making the class enjoyable..  

This is Germaine's sweet looking cake.. Just lovely..
Melody's masterpiece.. Her garden.. It was really beautiful.. Especially her roses.. It looked so real.. with the different tones and the lustre dust that she used with it on the edges.. The cake also had some imprints which she highlight with some lustre dust.. She has like a whole collection of lustre dust.. with all the interesting colours.. One passionate lady for decorating cakes I would say...
This is Indul's cake.. The wonderfully crafted and colourful roses.. I love her borders too.. I don't even dare to make borders.. But she did a very good job..
This is Veronica's cake.. She used chocolate fondant.. Which was really cool and unique.. It smelled really nice when she took the cake out.. I'm sure it taste nice too..
This is Su's cake.. She mentioned the word gothic.. She also said it wasn't really completed yet.. She wanted to put some feathers on it.. I'm sure it will be really prettier after that..
As you know already.. That's my work of art.. Finally.. Alright.. I'm ready to take orders!! Ahaaks.. :P

~I'm missing your laugh..How did it break
When did your eyes..
Begin to look fake
I hope you're as happy as you're pretending to be~