Cupcake Weekend (Again with Cupcakes)

For now, I'd let the photos tell you what we did yesterday...

It was a lot of fun! I am going to add the person who'd assisted me with this project as an admin for this blog.

WE LOVE DESSERTS!

xx, 

Nadia

Cupcake Fever!

I've been having fever for a few days already.. and the first day I caught the disease I was homebound :/ and that was not cool at aaaaaaall!

While punching some numbers into my laptop, I felt the need to walk to the kitchen to get something to snack on..  I had oatmeal with milk. Sick people food! But while preparing my meal, my mixing bowl appeared out of nowhere (boo! This ain't a thriller!)~

Too doo~ too doo~ I was already looking for my baking materials.. TIME FOR AN EXPERIMENT!

After measuring the dried ingredients and sifting the flour, I realised I did not have BUTTER! WHOA! So then I had to go out to the nearest.... BAKING SHOP! -.-" Such an excuse....

I ended up getting more flour, 1 kgs of butter, colorful sugar decos and a 5-tiered cupcake stand that could seat 30 cupcakes.. I'm ridiculous.

I started baking as I got back. Heating the oven to the right temperature, mixing the ingredients, preparing the fancy cups I just bought.. Separated the batter into two different bowls.. One I'd poured vanilla extract in, the other I'd mixed in cocoa powder.. and voila~ the cups were in the oven~

While the cupcakes were baking in the oven, I had started to gather ingredients to make the buttercream topping for me to decorate the cakes with. Well I never liked buttercream topping, no siree! But I just had to try making an awesome one to satisfy my eager soul. *SOTT!*

To make chocolate butter cream frosting, you'd need:

226g of butter
2 tbspn of cocoa powder
200g of icing sugar
and 1 1/2 tbspn of hot water

With all these ingredients ready, you can then start of by creaming the soft butter until it fluffs and turns pale. While that is in order, you can mix in hot water with the cocoa powder and beat the two ingredients until you've reached that pastey texture. You can gradually add in the cocoa paste into the creaming butter, and when you're done, the icing sugar should be added in as well.

As the frostings' done, you can have it kept chilled in the fridge, while waiting for your cupcakes to cool off soon after it's been baked.

And this is how my cupcakes looked like that day.. :D

Yeh. Very humble. Not fancy at all!
I will debut my a bit more fancier cupcake holder soon 

This was mine.... YUMMERS.
Vanilla Cupcake with Choc Buttercream Frosting

Choc-on-Choc <3

The chocolate buttercream frosting turned out okay. I loved it like crayzay. hahah!

'Til next time.. I hope the next time I'm posting, I'd have colorful frostings or something.. that are yummy as it is purrrdy!

xx,

nuTt*

Make Yourself Simple Cupcakes!

To make simple cupcakes of your own, you'd need to have these ready:

• 125g butter
• 125g castor sugar
• 125g all-purpose flour
• 2 medium eggs
• 1/2 a teaspoon of vanilla essence
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• About 12 pcs of normal-sized cupcake cups

To make a simple buttercream frosting, you'd need to prepare:

• 460 g icing sugar
• 226 g soft butter
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence
• 4 tablespoon of low-fat milk
• assorted food colorings (don't put in too much, PLEASE!)
• YOUR CHOICE OF SPRINKLES!

Methods:

**Cake Baking.

1. Heat  your oven to 190 deg Celsius.
2. Beat your butter and castor sugar until the mixture pales and fluffs.
3. Add in the eggs gradually while mixing them in a slower pace. And then, in goes the vanilla essence!
4. Sift the flour and baking powder together. Gradually scoop the dry ingredients into the wet mixture.
5. When the batter's done, you can scoop in the prepared batter to fill 3/4 of cupcake cups. You have to leave some space for the cake to rise while it bakes, yea~
6. When all that is done, get your baking tray and voila~ carefully place your cupcake-to-be into the hot oven, and bake 'em baby cakes for about 20 minutes :)

**Topping Preparation.

1. Place the soft butter in your mixing bowl. Beat it with your electronic mixer until soft and smooth.
2. Beat in the vanilla essence and then add in the icing sugar gradually.
3. Scrape the sides of the bowls insides as you needed.
4. Add in the milk, and well all these items are well-blended, you should put the mixer on high-speed for 5 minutes.
5. While waiting for your cakes to cool down, it is best for you to right away cover the batter with a cling wrap and chill in the refrigerator.

Once you have the cakes and buttercream frosting in place, you can start decorating your cake as you please! 

YAY!

Good luck with cupcake-making and have an awesome time baking~

It is best for you to have your mom, dad, siblings or friends around to bake with you - It'd be FUN! Really :)

xoxo,

Bored Nadia :D

White and Dark Chocolate Cheesecake - My Newest Obsession

Yum Yum YUM!!!

I had my first White & Dark Chocolate last February, on our Engagement Anniversary/Valentines' dinner at Tom's restaurant in town. Oh how it haunted me that day... I kept on thinking about it ever since, that the next day during my trip to KL the next 2 days I just had to buy the first W&D chocolate cake I saw at one of the deli in KL Sentral.

Pannetone's W&D Choc Cheesecake
MmmMmmm~!

The Sweet and Bitter combo sweeps me away, every time~ This dessert look so simple yet sophisticated and  tastes so beautiful that I thought I could actually fly when I sank my teeth on it.. HAHA! I did not sink my teeth in it. While enjoying this delicious confection on a simple white platter, I was imagining myself in a white room with beautiful black-brown abstract on the clear white walls and floors. Oh me on my dessert-high!

My Dainty Dessert next to Mommy's Valentine's Day bouquet  :)

I can't wait to have Naby make me my own White and Dark Chocolate Cake!!

xx,
HUNGRY NADIA

I fell in love with Cupcakes in 2011

I have to admit, I was never a fan of cupcakes before. Instead, I hated cupcakes. I despise the texture of the cake base, the butter cream toppings and the fact that it was always too fancy yet it had to always, always taste gruesome.

The 90s Cupcake: "What did I do, nutt?" :/

I know that I am being overly-dramatic over these kind of things, but cakes are for eating, and I do not agree that just because the cake is so pretty it couldn't taste nice. That'd be like a pretty face without a heart or a character! That'd be something like a bimbo cake! -.- (Really, I hated cupcakes with buttercream toppings... everytime someone wants to put buttercream on a cupcake I'd have the urge to say to the person doing that to not do that.. but I never really prevented them from doing so, and I'd ended up eating only the cherry on top... I don't know why.. o.0).

nuTt: ERRR... cupcakes? I'll pass...

I blame the uncreative 90s for this (lol) simply because the cupcakes I had then were always so dry and almost tasteless, and the colorful toppings were always too buttery and mehhh.. (yes, mehhh!). And then there'd be chocolate rice sprinkles that I never liked. Oh how I hated cupcakes, then... until...

Urban Roots 2011, at Green Heights Mall
We promoted em for TEC! :D

Just a few months before my wedding in 2011, I have consulted the daughter of one of my mom's close friends, Lyanna, who had been making and experimenting on cupcakes. I was in desperate need to find a baker to bake for my wedding (though in the end I did not have any fanciful cake for my wedding receptions, yes I had two receptions and no fancy cakes!), so she prepared some samples for me and then, just when I took a bite of her famous "Nano Rocher" I felt like I just bit a piece of haven food! Right after, I tried her red velvet cake, which was equally as marvelous as the Nano Rocher... I sat in the living room that night, obsessing with her cupcakes and went all crazy about it, telling my husband-to-be then how awesome her cakes were.. Too bad we didn't have em for the wedding. I truly regretted! :/

Cookies 'n Creams~

She's truly an artiste! 

Anyways, Lyanna's cupcake business had been so popular in Kuching these days~ Under the label of "The Enchantress's Cauldron" (I don't get how some people could never pronounce it the right way -.- *annoyed*, but we'll call it TEC from now onwards), her cupcake flavours varies from the red velvet and nano rocher to carrot, bananas, milo, cookies 'n cream cupcakes, etc.. o my goodness.. now she even makes macarons that I have yet to try, but I know would taste just as great as the rest~ Furthermore, she takes cupcakes and cake orders for birthdays, weddings, anniversaries and just about anything really, and best of all she's always so flexible with the orders' designs that I am constantly obsessed with her creations. REALLY!

The old RM1-badged Nano Rocher! ~

Just last week I ordered her Nano Rochers, which are my hubby's favourite, topped with the usual yummy chocolate topping and edible badge of the old RM1 coin print. I can talk more and more about my obsession with her cakes. But if you want to find out more on TEC's cupcakes, please do visit their Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/theenchantresscauldron. Maybe you'd fancy to try any of TEC's delectable selections :D

So then thanks to Lyanna's/TEC's cupcakes, the windows of my heart was open for all the other cupcakes I had tried by the Appetit, Bijou, Cupcake Chic, even hotel cupcakes which are all delicious as well. If it was not for her cupcakes, I do not think I'd know the joy of eating cupcakes. HEHE.

xx,
Nadia Suib

I am a Dessert Lover

I INDULGE

I PROMOTE

I ADORE <3

I SAMPLE

I LEARN

I CHILL

I ORGANIZE

I PREPARE.