Author: Ting-a-ling

My favourite carrot cake recipe

Carrot cakes are one of my favourite cakes – especially with cream cheese frosting. The important thing about carrot cake is that it needs to be moist and jam packed with flavours. I like my carrot cakes without any sultanas and with lots of walnuts. This time, I’ve decided to experiment on cream cheese frosting and I had to cut down the sugar like crazy because most recipes call for more than 400g of icing sugar, which is insane! I’ve tried to cut down the sugar as much as I can without compromising the texture of the cake, hope that you’ll enjoy it as much as I did! Tips for making the perfect carrot cake Make it a day in advance – it takes time for the flavours to come out so let the cake rest in the refrigerator for a day before serving. For the cream cheese frosting, make sure that the butter and cream cheese are at room temperature To make the cream cheese frosting, add the sugar in by batches then beat …

The classic cakey brownie

There are many different kinds of brownies – fudgy brownies, the dense rich brownies (check out my rich chocolate brownie cake for the recipe), the chewy brownie and the cakey brownie. Regardless of which you prefer, a good brownie recipe is a must-have for every single baker. Today I’ll be sharing with you my classic cakey brownie. It requires the use of sour cream which makes the cake light and fluffy. One of my favourite things to do is to warm up my brownies and serve it with vanilla ice cream! Yum! I made this cake twice – one with chocolate chips on top and one without it. There is a difference in the texture of the cake after leaving it in the fridge overnight (as shown in the picture below). The cake becomes denser and the taste more flavourful. Hence it is always better to make brownies a day ahead. A few tips about brownies: They get better with age – so always make them a day ahead Let them cool completely in the …

Soft & chewy chocolate chip cookies

I was surprised by the number of attempts it took for me to finalise this recipe. Most of my recipes takes about three attempts before I am happy with the results, but this recipe took five different attempts. I was reading up on different recipes to find out what is the trick to getting a soft and chewy cookie and here are the tips that I’ve gathered. Use melted butter – yes, in liquid form, this gives the cookies a nice soft texture. The kind of sugar used – in this recipe I used raw cane sugar but some recipes call for brown sugar. I guess they both work the same – but definitely not with caster sugar (tried it in one of my attempts, the cookies turned out hard). Slightly beaten egg – don’t over beat the eggs because it changes the protein structure and makes the cookies harder. Dough resting time – For better tasting cookies, let the dough rest overnight. Baking time – cookies should be slightly under baked because they tend to …

Little key lime cheese tarts

Limes are in season now and one of my favourite desserts is key lime tarts. I saw this recipe on Sally’s baking addiction and decided to give it a go. I’ve made key lime tarts before (click here for the recipe) but this new recipe calls for cream cheese… yum! As usual, I tried to cut down the sugar and butter as much as possible and the result is a delicious, tangy and very sour tart – which I absolutely love! So if you are not a fan of sour stuff, reduce the amount of lime juice used. Other than that, this recipe is perfect for dinner parties and it’s really easy to make! Nutrition per tart (12 serves) Ingredients for the crust 15 pieces of digestive biscuits 50g melted unsalted butter Ingredients for the filling 140ml of freshly squeezed lime juice (about 5 limes) Zest 5 limes 250g condense milk (I used Nestle skimmed condense milk) 120g cream cheese 5 egg yolks Directions Preparation time: 20 min Baking time: 10 min for the crust, 15 …