happy birthday, baby!
the making of his surprise cake, black forest, which is one of his favourites. after browsing through several black forest cake recipes, i decide to go for this. i must say this was rather ambitious, considering i've never made layered chiffon cakes that requires cream frosting. anyway, i was just thinking that if all plans fail, i'll just hop over to any cake shop to get a decent birthday cake. :P
knowing this was going to be relatively tedious and more time-consuming, as compared to baking muffins and cookies, i decided to split the work over two days (thank goodess he's too caught up with his own badminton tournament the same two evenings to pose any form of hindrance to my great plans :P). the 1st session was spent baking the chocolate chiffon cake, then letting it cool overnight. this recipe makes use of the combination method, i.e. adding whipped egg whites to the creamed ingredients, to create the additional volume and light texture to the cake. i was really glad to see the cake rising in the oven, knowing that it definitely won't turn out flat and rocky hard. being the first formal time i've whipped cream to frost a cake, i was quite worried over the consistency of the cream, i wasn't even sure how long i needed to whip the cream, how soft/stiff the peaks should be, etc, and i've read how easy it was for the loose crumbs to get caught in the frosting to spoil the cake's appearance. the splitting of the cake into three was surprisingly easier than i've thought, and the layers turned out smooth. the frosting process was quite tough and messy though, and i had to bring the cake in and out of the fridge several times just to ensure the frosting doesn't melt.
anyway, here's the result - ta-dah - presenting my first ever black forest cake! (and probably more to come, considering this is my mum's favourite cake too.)
scribbled at 11:18 am
.::.
the making of his surprise cake, black forest, which is one of his favourites. after browsing through several black forest cake recipes, i decide to go for this. i must say this was rather ambitious, considering i've never made layered chiffon cakes that requires cream frosting. anyway, i was just thinking that if all plans fail, i'll just hop over to any cake shop to get a decent birthday cake. :P
knowing this was going to be relatively tedious and more time-consuming, as compared to baking muffins and cookies, i decided to split the work over two days (thank goodess he's too caught up with his own badminton tournament the same two evenings to pose any form of hindrance to my great plans :P). the 1st session was spent baking the chocolate chiffon cake, then letting it cool overnight. this recipe makes use of the combination method, i.e. adding whipped egg whites to the creamed ingredients, to create the additional volume and light texture to the cake. i was really glad to see the cake rising in the oven, knowing that it definitely won't turn out flat and rocky hard. being the first formal time i've whipped cream to frost a cake, i was quite worried over the consistency of the cream, i wasn't even sure how long i needed to whip the cream, how soft/stiff the peaks should be, etc, and i've read how easy it was for the loose crumbs to get caught in the frosting to spoil the cake's appearance. the splitting of the cake into three was surprisingly easier than i've thought, and the layers turned out smooth. the frosting process was quite tough and messy though, and i had to bring the cake in and out of the fridge several times just to ensure the frosting doesn't melt.
anyway, here's the result - ta-dah - presenting my first ever black forest cake! (and probably more to come, considering this is my mum's favourite cake too.)