Honey Lemon Poppyseed Cake

We've come to the point in the wedding planning stages where we are now counting down the DAYS! It's 7 days to go to the ceremony, and then we'll be home free to just be a married couple - no more wedding planning, no more invitation lists, seating charts, fabric samples, and endless other things. I can't wait.

In the madness of it all, I wanted - nay, needed, to get some solid baking time in. It's been almost 2 or 3 months since I actually full on made something in the kitchen that's worth sharing. 

I feel the need to point out that despite what everyone may think of me, including myself, I haven't been a Bridezilla at all throughout this whole process! I honestly thought I would be, what with all my Pinterest boards, my Disney, fairy tale wonderland personality, etc. I suppose, at the end of the day, all I really care about is being married to the man I love, and being able to spend the rest of our lives together doing completely mundane things. The thing I look forward to the most is spending Saturday mornings and afternoons with him in our own home, having a lazy brunch and cleaning the house after ignoring it all week cos we're both too busy at work. And foot massages. Yes, I look forward to being on the receiving end of those, whenever I want them. For free. 

Hehe, anyway, last weekend while we were trying to pull our invitation list into some semblance of sense to then be able to convert it into a seating chart... I was struck by the overwhelming desire to make something. I was also lucky that the recipe I chose to test is one that uses a lot of readily available ingredients. I'm really happy with how this turned out, and I think this frosting might possibly my new favourite thing. 

Honey Lemon Poppyseed Cake
Recipe from the Hungry Rabbit

For the Cake

• 4 large eggs
• 1/2 cup coconut milk
• 2 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 1 3/4 cup cake flour
• 1 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp freshly grated lemon zest
• Smidge of fine sea salt
• 240g unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
• 3 tbsp blue poppy seeds

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C, and line 3 8" round cake tins with parchment paper
2. In your mixing bowl bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, lemon zest and salt until evenly spread
3. Whisk the eggs, coconut milk and vanilla extract in a small bowl before adding the mixture to the flour with the mixing paddle set on low speed
4. When all the egg mix has gone in, add the butter and increase the speed to low-medium while you mix to ensure everything combines and the butter is even
5. Stir in the poppy seeds by hand, then divide the batter into three tins, spread it out and bake for 15-20 minutes or until your kitchen smells like cake and a tester inserted into the cake at an angle comes out clean
6. Cool the cakes in their tin for 10 minutes before turning them out onto a wire rack to cool completely

For the (amazing) honey lemon curd filling

• 1/3 cup lemon juice
• 2 large eggs
• 1 large egg yolk
• 1/4 cup honey
• 30g unsalted butter, chilled and cut into tiny cubes
• 1 tbsp heavy cream
• A few drops vanilla essence
• Pinch of fine sea salt

1. While the cakes are baking, make the curd (haha I've been watching too much GBBO and am tempted to stop here)
2. Seriously though, over a low heat and in a heavy bottomed heat resistant saucepan, heat the lemon juice until just hot but not boiling
3. Whisk the eggs and yolk in a medium heat resistant bowl, and gradually add the honey as you're doing so
4. Gently trickle in the hot lemon juice, whisking as you do, then return the mixture to the saucepan to cook over a low-medium heat. Stir constantly until the mixture begins to thicken. Be careful of scrambling the eggs. 
5. Remove from heat and whisk in the butter until incorporated, then stir in cream, vanilla and salt. Strain the mix through a fine mesh strainer into a glass bowl, cover with cling wrap - directly onto the curd to prevent a skin from forming - and pop it into the fridge until ready to use

For the (ridiculously delicious) honey cream cheese frosting

• 114g unsalted butter, softened (but not melty and slouchy)
• 2 cups icing sugar
• 240g cream cheese, chilled but softened (trust me, warm cream cheese makes for gross looking frosting)
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup honey

1. In the bowl of your stand mixer, whisk the sugar, cream cheese and butter with the paddle attachment until fully combined (the original recipe says to do sugar and butter first, then adding the cream cheese after, but I'm lazy) 
2. Add the cream, honey and vanilla and beat again on medium to high speed until just combined (take care not to over beat as this will result in a too runny frosting). 
3. Cover the bowl with a clean, damp tea towel and refrigerate until needed

Assembly

• When the cake has cooled completely, swipe a small teaspoon of cream cheese frosting onto the bottom of the cake plate and place one piece of cake on top (I do this to prevent the cake from sliding around while I'm frosting). Spread half of the honey lemon curd on top, until about 1/2" off the sides of the cake, then top with another layer and the remaining curd. Place the top layer bottom side up and gently press down to level
• Apply a crumb coat of frosting on the top and sides of the cake and refrigerate for half an hour to set. Spread frosting on the top and sides of the cake, drizzle with honey or any remaining curd, and refrigerate to set for at least 30 minutes before serving 

Passionfruit Macarons

I've said it before, that I'm not a fan of macarons. They're too sweet, and I don't really like the texture of the shells... but they are so much fun to make! Baking to me is a sacred art, one that removes me from this realm and takes me onto another plane of peace and calm and sugar and happiness. So on a particularly bad day, I tackle the most complicated recipes. 

A lot of my baker friends ask how I have the patience to work on macarons, but really... it's so calming. The fact that you need to be 100% focused on the task, and then to have all the conditions around you at just the right state... and after all that concentration, when you peek into the oven after 10 minutes and see the little "feet" forming... it's like pulling off magic. 

I made these little pink macaron shells to fill with passionfruit curd and leftover passionfruit cream cheese frosting. They followed a particularly difficult work week, and I realised how completely stress free I had become while snapping pics of these little delights. I might have to make more macarons tonight. 

Macarons

Makes around 20 macarons (about 40 shells)

• 100g aged egg whites (I simply left them uncovered on the counter for 48 hours, though I've read that this is unnecessary) 
• 1 tsp meringue powder (optional)
• 110g ground almonds
• 200g icing sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 50g caster sugar

1. Line two baking trays with parchment paper
2. Run the ground almonds, icing sugar, and salt in the food processor for roughly 30 seconds, then set aside
3. Whisk the egg whites and meringue powder in your large stand mixer bowl until soft peaks have formed
4. Gradually add the caster sugar to the egg whites, and continue to whisk until stiff peaks form
5. Here's the tricky bit (but easily overcome by watching a few youtube how to vids): dump the dry mixture into the meringue, then with a spatula, just fold it in. I really cannot give you definite instructions for when to stop, but I stopped when the batter was softly oozing (like the lava in that film, Dante's Peak), and when a dollop over it blended into the rest within 30 seconds (just watch this video, maybe?)
6. Once you've possibly achieved the correct consistency, transfer the batter into a piping bag, snip off the edge and then pipe out 1" circles onto the baking trays, roughly 1" apart
7. When you've piped everything out, bang the trays on the counter 3-5 times
8. Leave the trays out for 30 minutes to an hour, and then bake in a preheated oven at 150C for 18 minutes
9. Let the mac shells cool completely before removing them from the paper or they will peel and break off from the bottoms
10. Pair the shells up with similar sized ones, then pipe in your filling and sandwich them together

Vanilla & Passionfruit Cake

One of my closest and dearest friends celebrated his 25th birthday last week, and I was asked to bake a seaside themed cake for him. He's a diver and loves the beach, so why not? The thing is, this turned out looking like a baby shower cake! Considering he's one of my babies, I don't see anything wrong with that. 

Dearest Leslie, hope you had a great birthday week surrounded by family and best friends. It's been a while since our last holiday together, so lets go diving in May! Or rather, you go diving with E and I'll go sit on the beach with a cheesy historical romance novel with the rest of the FFs. 

This blog post & recipe is dedicated to one of the sweetest, kindest, and most protective friends I have. I'm so glad to have you in my life. 

Vanilla Bean cake with Passionfruit filling, covered in Passionfruit Cream Cheese frosting

• 440g all purpose flour
• 3 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 240g butter, softened to room temperature
• 400g caster sugar
• 4 large eggs
• Seeds from 2 vanilla bean pods
• 1 cup milk

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C, line 2 8" round baking tins with butter and parchment paper
2. Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl and set aside
3. In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar until combined, then add the eggs one at a time, beating after each addition. Dump in the seeds from the vanilla bean pods and stir to get it mixed
4. Add half the flour mixture and beat until combined, then pour in all the milk and stir until it's incorporated in the batter, then add in the rest of the flour. Don't overmix, just ensure all the ingredients are evenly coated, be sure to scrape the sides of the bowl
5. Divide the batter between the two baking tins and bake for 35-40 minutes, or until a skewer inserted at an angle comes out clean
6. Cool the cakes in the tin for 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely (do this top side down to get flat, even layers)

Passionfruit cream cheese frosting

• 2 tbsp strained juice of a passionfruit
• 42g butter, softened
• 114g cream cheese, cold
• 2 1/4 cups sifted icing sugar

1. Beat the butter and cream cheese in the bowl of your stand mixer until thoroughly combined. Pour in the passionfruit juice and continue to beat for another minute or so
2. Add the icing sugar in one go and just beat until light and fluffy (you may need to stop and scrape the sides of the bowl), for about 5 minutes. Do not beat for too long as that will make it too runny

Assembling the cake
Place one layer top side down on a cake plate, and pipe a circle of cream cheese frosting around the edges of the cake. Fill the middle with passionfruit curd (I used about 1 cup of curd as I piped a thick layer) and place the second layer of cake on the top, bottom side down.
Apply a thin crumb coat and allow it to crust for about 15 minutes before frosting the rest of the cake. I chose to go with a simple frosting design this time around, placing the cake on a revolving cake stand and just running my offset spatula along the side, tilted at an angle while I spun the stand. I should try to make a tutorial video to show how I blended the colours... 

The beautiful seaside themed cake toppers you see in these pictures was made by Zurisha over at Tinytype: Propfolio, a local designer who takes orders for themed cake toppers and the like. If you're in the KL area, you can contact her at tinytype.propfolio@gmail.com to order some or check out her instagram page @TinyType to see her work. I'm definitely looking forward to getting more of these to go with some of my upcoming dessert spreads.

Passionfruit Curd

I seem to have a newfound obsession with passionfruit this year. Last year I couldn't get enough of raspberries, but it looks like 2014 will be a year of this gorgeous, tangy and tart fruit! My current favourite thing is this gorgeous passionfruit curd I whipped up in 15 minutes on a weeknight last week to act as a filling for a friend's birthday cake. I overdid it though (as I am wont to do) and made too large a batch, so I've been spreading this beautiful curd on toast, rolling it in my pancakes, and dolloping it on fresh vanilla cupcakes. Certainly doesn't do a body good to have jars of this stuff lying about...

Anyway, here's sharing what is likely to be the base of many recipes to come.

Passionfruit Curd (or butter)

• 200g passionfruit pulp
• 1 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 3 large eggs
• 140g butter, diced
• 200g caster sugar
• 2 tbsp cornflour

1. Strain the passionfruit pulp to get the juice from the seeds, set the strained seeds aside in a bowl for later
2. In a heavy saucepan and over a low heat, combine all the ingredients and gently stir until the butter has melted, then continue to whisk over low heat until it thickens. Shouldn't take more than 5 minutes to thicken. 
3. Remove from the heat, pop into a bowl, swirl in about 2 or 3 tbsp of the reserved seeds (this is optional, you can do without the seeds) and cool before storing in airtight jars and containers in the fridge

Easy homemade lemon curd

Sundays tend to tread the very thin line of sadness and happiness, leaving most of us wistful for the short break we just wasted. Not to say that every weekend is wasted, simply that by 5pm on a Sunday afternoon you try to think of what you did all weekend only to come up with a list of things you didn't have enough time to do.

Okay, enough with the sob story. I had a really good weekend; lots of time to read, write, bake, and even got to spend quality time with some friends over some really good meals. What really captured the beauty of my time off was this wonderful lemon curd I made to just have on hand when I feel a little blue. There's nothing quite like fresh, home made lemon curd to spread on a hot pancakes, a piece of toast, or in between two fresh sponge cakes.

Lemon curd is easily accessible in supermarkets, but for those of you who like to tinker in the kitchen to cheer yourselves up, then lets take some time out of our busy schedules to whip up this simple but rewarding recipe.

Lemon Curd

• 3 lemons
• 1 1/2 cup caster sugar
• 120g unsalted butter, room temperature
• 5 egg yolks
• Salt

1. Zest the lemons and whizz the zest and sugar in a food processor until the mixed thoroughly
2. Transfer the sugar and lemon to your mixing bowl and beat in the butter until light and fluffy
3. Beat in the egg yolks until combined
4. Now transfer the mixture into a saucepan and heat over a small flame, stirring frequently for 20 minutes. The mixture should thicken gradually, but don't turn the heat up to hurry the process as this will scramble the egg yolks and you'll end up with a rough curd
5. Remove the curd from the flame, and cool to room temperature before transferring the curd into a jar to refrigerate