July 24, 2008

Happy Birthday Kexian!

Me, and my girlfriends celebrated our Kexian's birthday last weekend. Without fail, I now would try to bake them a cake when anyone's birthday comes along. :)

Ok, this is definitely not made by me. :P I'm just sharing the dessert we had in the restaurant where we had our dinner at Robertson Quay. It's a cosy small Japanese Cafe that serves reasonably priced and great food as well. What is unique about this cafe is that they stock up lots of Japanese related reading materials such as comics, novels and magazines for you to browse. You can even buy home these books although they are not new ones at reasonably price!
The above is their homemade matcha ice-cream with azuki beans and jelly. Below is coffee jelly with vanilla ice-cream. I must say coffee flavoured (kopi-o, meaning dark coffee without sugar) jelly pairs really well with vanilla ice-cream!

The third dessert would have to be this strawberry swissroll I've made. :)

Somehow this idea of making a swissroll just came to me while I was browsing around cakeshops, trying to look for ideas for her birthday cake.

After my 80% success in my previous swissroll attempt, I decided to go for it again. This time round, I used this recipe from Aunty Yochana's pear swissroll with some of my own modifications. I was so happy as this was the first time my swissroll didn't crack at all! From my experience, I'd found that it is much easier to roll it with the greaseproof paper/a towel into the swissroll. After sometime when it has cooled and you are ready to spread the icing, then you unroll it, spread the icing and roll it again. As it had retained its shape during the first rolling, somehow it would be easier to roll it back without having any paper/towel as your guide the second time. Unless you are very experienced or have a very good technique, then probably you would not have to roll it first. Well, this is from my observations. Feel free to share your method or experience if you think yours is better. :)

Do remember never to chill the buttercream. This is different from whipping cream. I made this mistake of chilling it, when I was about to spread the icing, it had became too hard. Luckily, it was still salvageable by waiting for it to soften and beating back again. Hmm well, a lesson learnt cos' I'd never have thought about it. Hehe..
Ok, let me share this recipe with you people first. :)

Ingredients for Swissroll:
3 eggs
60g castor sugar
70g cake flour
40g canola oil
1 tsp strawberry emulco
2 drops of pink colouring

Ingredients for buttercream:

375g icing sugar, sieved
225g unsalted butter
Pinch of Salt
Some fresh strawberries, cut into slices
1 tsp strawberry emulco
2 drops of pink colouring
1 tsp vanilla essence

Toasted almond flakes
Strawberries for decoration

Method:


  1. Whisk eggs and sugar till light and fluffy.
  2. Gently fold in flour, pink colouring and oil and mix thoroughly, taking care not to deflate the eggs
  3. Pour batter onto tray and level it (I used 11-inch by 14-inch pan)
  4. Bake at preheated oven for 180°C for about 8 - 10 mins.
  5. Remove from oven and cool on wire rack.
  6. For buttercream: Cream icing sugar with salt. Divide into two portions. For one portion, add colouring, emulco and strawberries and mix well. For the other portion, add vanilla essence, leave out the colouring.
  7. When the sponge is cooled or slightly warm, lay onto a piece of greaseproof paper.
  8. With the help of the greaseproof paper, roll the sponge into a swiss roll (the paper would be rolled in as well).
  9. After about half hour, open up the swiss roll and spread strawberry buttercream onto the swissroll and roll it up again.
  10. Spread vanilla buttercream on the surface of swissroll. Decorate the sides with almond flakes. Decorate with strawberries or any fruits/toppings that you like!

Note: As I had used buttercream instead of whipping cream, the cream would harden if you chill in the fridge, tasting like sugar icing, which to me, is nice as well. You may also use whipping cream.


Recipe Source: Aunty Yochana's Pear Swissroll (Cake)
Buttercream: 500 Cupcakes and Muffins by Fergal Connolly


I really like this pink swissroll that I can't resist taking lots of photos ofits many angles. :) Glad that Kexian likes it except the chocolate biscuit. :P






9 comments:

Anonymous said...

The cake looks so good! It must be really yummy. I love swiss rolls. I have 1 year to perfect a birthday cake for my daughter. She will be turning 3 and I have bee commissioned by my wife to make a cake for her class at that time. So, I better start do some trial runs.

Anyway, I think swiss rolls makes a great birthday cake. And I must try.

Thanks.

Tom

Aimei said...

Hi Tom,

Yeah practice makes perfect. You still have time to try, I'm sure you'll be making the most beautiful cake for your daughter. Alot of effort and patience must be involved. So far I must say I still have lots to improve, and my decorating skills not good yet. Hehe...But I will keep trying too!

Jia you!!

daphne said...

And it looks so sweet too.

youfei said...

Hi Aimei,

Ive been coming to your blog now and then and I really like your swiss rolls!

I have tried a couple of times but only didn't crack 2 times. I realised i only baked mine for about 6-7 min in a 180C oven..i tried another time 10 min in 180C oven it actually cracked!

I wonder how you bake it for 7-10 min in a 200C oven and still roll it up so nicely..plus, i love how yours browns so evenly on the outside =D

keep up the good work!=D

youfei said...

hi Aimei,

I should thank you for visitng my blog too!

I believe you could tell i just started out blogging although i have been baking for sometime.

Thanks for the welcome msg! =D

Look forward to your future creations as well =)

Huiqi said...

Hi Aimei,

you mentioned that whipping cream could be used too. Any advice on how to do it with whipping cream instead? (eg. the amount of whipping cream, sugar, colouring etc) I tried searching in google but couldn't get any clue.

Thanks!

Huiqi said...

Dear Aimei,

further to my question. You said we can't chill buttercream. Does it mean that we can't put the swissroll into the fridge when it's done?

Thanks!

Aimei said...

Hi Huiqi,

If you use whipping cream, you can either use 1) dairy whipping cream. They can be found in most supermarkets with brand like emborg and you can add some sugar and beat it with a mixer. 2) non-dairy whipping cream. Also called non-dairy whip topping. They are vegetable fat and already sweetened so no need to add sugar. Also must use mixer and beat. However, if you use these cream for the filling, it should not be left in room temperature for too long otherwise the cream will melt.

If u use buttercream, it will hardened when u chilled in the fridge. Doen't mean u cant chill in the fridge but the cream will be hard. Thats also because I use a simple kind of buttercream using only butter and sugar. There are other methods of making buttercream (which I have not tried) and they may not hardened in the fridge.

Hope this helps. U can email me if you not sure. I'm not too good at swissrolls but will try my best to help. :)

Huiqi said...

Hi Aimei,

Thank you very much for the detailed reply. I'll try out the fresh cream method :)

Hope you enjoyed ur BKK trip ;)

Merry Christmas in advance ;)