Author: Ting-a-ling

Gluten free mandarin almond cake

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Mandarins are in season now and my uncle gave me a big bag of mandarins freshly picked from his tree. There were so many mandarins that there is no way I could finish them in time so I decided to make a mandarin almond cake. The amazing thing about this cake is that it is gluten and dairy free (without the cream cheese frosting). All it needs is eggs as its binding agent and it is so easy to make that it is almost fool-proof. I loved this cake so much that I made it three times (partly because I have loads of mandarin to get through) and it was such a hit amongst my friends. The cake together with the cream cheese frosting is a match-make in heaven. Ingredients for the cake  3 large mandarins (or 4 small ones) 5 large eggs 120g caster sugar 250g almond meal 1 tsp vanilla essence Ingredients for the cream cheese frosting 250g cream cheese 30g butter 40g icing sugar 1 tsp vanilla essence Directions Preparation time: 80min Baking …

Hummingbird cake

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A little history about Hummingbird cake. The cake is thought to originate from Jamaica. It’s called the hummingbird cake because it’s sweet enough to attract the hummingbird. This cake is one of the classic cakes in the States. I made this cake a couple of weeks ago but didn’t have the time to post. Making the hummingbird cake is very similar to making carrot cakes. It requires oil not butter and it uses the mixing method. I didn’t add any nuts to the cake this time but it goes perfectly well with pecan nuts. The key ingredients for the cake are bananas and pineapples. I used crushed pineapples from the can. I was having some issues with my cream cheese frosting – it was too melted and obviously I lacked the patience to wait for it to set before spreading it across the cake. But hey, the cake still turned out delicious! Ingredients for the cake 370g plain flour 1 tsp bicarbonate soda 1.5 tsp cinnamon powder 0.5 tsp nutmeg powder 0.5 tsp salt 4 …

Gluten-free cinnamon cookies

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I made these cookies for the first time a couple of months ago as a thank you gift to my supervisor. She’s on a wheat-free diet so I had to adapt to that. Gluten plays an important role in baking – it is a binding agent that helps give a nice chewy texture. Without gluten in cookies, the dough tends to get very hard and dry. The cookie would be very different (likely to be harder in texture) if I were to substitute the flour in my usual cookie dough recipe with gluten-free flour. So I decided to adapt my melting moment cookies recipe to make these gluten free cinnamon cookies. Making these gluten-free cookies were quite challenging. Simply because the dough was dry and crumbly which makes it difficult to roll out. When baking, the cookies remained pale in colour so to determine if they are done, just use your fingers and press down the middle. If the cookie is hard that means it is over-baked; it should be slightly soft in the middle. …

Classic chocolate mud cake

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Who knew that mud cakes were actually that easy to make? I adapted this recipe from Donna Hay and as usual, made some changes to it. When I first saw the recipe, I was shocked that it was that simple – mixing of the wet and dry ingredients together. I’ve added coffee granules into my mud cake because it gives a little punch and helps to enhance the taste of the chocolate. Warning: this mud cake is very rich, moist and absolutely delicious. If you are a huge chocolate fan and trying to be on a diet, then this cake is your kryptonite. I’ve always like to use Lindt 90% dark chocolate in my baking but Cadbury 86% dark coco works perfectly fine too. The trick to making the perfect chocolate cake lies in the quality of the chocolate used so don’t scrimp on it! I made this cake twice, the first time without Kahlua and the second time with Kahlua. Honestly, I could not taste the alcohol because the chocolate was overpowering. One thing about …