万寿无疆

Sis ordered a box of birthday cupcake for her sis in law. Last week she ordered for her bro in law - the cute box of cupcake for Eric - and this week sis said she needs something more "serious" and not too cute.


Sis said she quite like this flower, it's called the chic pea flower if I'm not mistaken, or as the birthday gal had named this in her album, the tulip. I think they are supposed to be in yellow.



The word" 寿"which means longevity is specially requested by sis.

And instead of the usual piped flowers, which I supposed are called wild flowers, I've prepared some roses. These had to be piped and shaped first then lifted onto the cupcakes. Finished off with some leaves. If there are more space on the cupcakes, I think the roses will look nicer if they are in pairs.

The box of assembled cupcake. Happy birthday Jennee!!!

Cupcake with a 21st Birthday Message

There's always a kid in us. Though legally an "adult" the birthday boy still finds himself adoring these mini cupcakes a lot.

Chocolate Almond Biscotti

I've tried baking a chocolate base biscotti the last time, with pecan and chocolate chips (I can't seem to be able to forgo chocolate chips), but it was not good, leave alone a very troublesome baking method.

For curiosity sake, I want to try baking a chocolate base biscotti one last time (at least until I find a recipe that is so convincing.

Anyways, I thought this is quite a believable recipe and don't seem to be that complicated. Actually, compared with my confirmed recipe, this seems less troublesome since no electric mixer is required. And so I thought wrong... this recipe required kneading the dough and it was a very though dough! Didn't expect that type of consistency.

There was also one tricky instruction - the ingredient list says 2 eggs and 1 egg yolk. The method says "... add almond, and the eggs....". EGGS? The 2 eggs, or the 2 eggs AND the yolk? At the end of the recipe, it says "brush the dough with egg yolk".

So I guess just the 2 eggs without the yolk. But after kneading for a while, I realize that some of the flour couldn't be mixed together, so I added the egg yolk as well, and brush the dough with another egg yolk before baking.

Whatever do we want to brush egg yolk? I actually don't like the outcome of the egg wash. It's rather erm... yellow. See...


I didn't think the biscotti looked "pretty" with the egg yolk wash even after slicing them. One thing about slicing biscotti - if you slice them when they are just baked, it's easy since the dough is still soft, but since it's soft, the biscotti will crumble. Leaving the biscotti for about 5 minutes makes slicing a bit more difficult but you will find that the biscuit slices are more intact.

Sliced biscotti ready for second bake. If you want really crispy slices, cut them as think as possible and bake for a longer time (the dryer the crispier), but I also discovered (and according to feedback) that it will be a bit hard. Something like crispy equals hard. MFG said he likes it crispy, but the parents finds it a bit hard. A baking time of 10 to 15 minutes maximum would be just nice for the second baking.

Mini Cupcake "Sampler"

I've got an order from a "new customer". Fz said she wants to do her best to support TeaRoom and me. Thanks! As I told her, I felt so blessed with supporters and friends like you guys around.

The theme and colour were not specified. Neither does this box of cupcakes come with a cupcake message. So I did a box which looks like a "sampler" with most of the currently available designs for the mini cupcakes.

From top: Piped flowers, gummy beans, marshmallow flowers, gummy bears, marshmallows with chocolate rice, piped flowers.

Chocolate Cupcakes

I baked these last last week. Posted them on Facebook but forgot to post them to the blog. The toppers on these chocolate cupcakes, from left (back) marshmallows, (front) chocolate chips and chocolate mint sticks. Right (back & front) chocolate coated coffee beans.



Also decorated these, supposedly wanted to give to Lady Nina. But didn't seem to get the right timing for both of us. So I had to "force" SSB to take them. :p

Chocolate Clusters

If you have left over of chocolates (unlikely is it?) or you have bit and pieces of chocolates which you don't think is "interesting" enough for you, melt them all and customize into something you like. For me, I had a few pieces of dark chocolates of different brands which I used for baking different things previously. And I was also in a mood of combining a few things to make them into my idea of chocolate, I decided to make this.

If you really want to make some chocolate clusters, here's how simple it is to make...

First melt some chocolate of course. Dark chocolates are easier to set then milk chocolate by the way. So, melt the chocolate in a heat proof bowl over a bowl/ pan of hot water - no need to be simmering, just hot will do.

Then prepare whatever you would like to have in your chocolate, I chose raisins (which have been soaked overnight in Brandy), roasted almonds and some digestive biscuit to make the chocolate clusters crunchier. Basically, you can add whatever you like to eat into your chocolate. This is the beauty of making your own chocolate.

How much to put into the chocolate? Depends if you want to eat a lot of the extra stuff you put in, or a lot of chocolate. I would go for really thick mixture. So, just mix everything into the melted chocolate.

After mixing everything evenly, spoon the chocolate mixture either into little paper cups, like these...

Or just spoon them onto baking paper like so. Then put them into the fridge to set.

Make them as after dinner treat or all time snacks. They are real good indulgences.

Otherwise, use them as cake decorative items or cupcake toppers.