Cake Fixes: Forgot to add sugar

Almost on autopilot, she preheats the oven and then reaches for her measuring cups, mixing bowl and whisk. It’s a recipe she has made several times. She opens the cupboards, pulls out the dry ingredients and measures them into a bowl. She takes a few steps to the fridge for some eggs and mala. She…

Conversion

It seems to happen that just after I have greased a tin or started kneading, that will be the moment I need to reach for my phone to convert the weights in a recipe. The majority of the time though, the home button—actually my phone in general—tends to be covered with flour. It is no surprise that…

How to Make Flaky Pie Crust

Nothing beats the feeling you get when you make a pie completely from scratch. However, unless you are a professional baker, pastry can be intimidating. I shied away for years, but now absolutely love baking pies.  The Science of Flaky Pastry When the pie goes inside the hot oven, the solid bits of fat…

Of Flowers and Cake Flour …

I get my love of flowers from my mum. Every week, she always has a fresh bunch of flowers at home, not for any special occasion, but just because. I don’t have great pics of them, but for this post I have used beautiful photos of flowers taken by the husband. Cake flour This one…

How to Make Vanilla Essence/ Extract

Making vanilla extract is straightforward and requires two ingredients: vanilla beans and alcohol. However vanilla is the second most expensive spice in the world after saffron. Vanilla beans are indigenous to Mexico but are now cultivated in different parts of the world including Uganda and Tanzania (Bukoba). Madagascan vanilla is considered top tier like Mexican….

No-Fail Pizza Dough

Pizza – a food the whole world has fallen in love with. It’s hard to resist gooey melted cheese over a crispy crust, a slightly acidic sauce, umami from the toppings, and the freshness of herbs. For the crust, start by activating the yeast. The key to bringing dormant yeast “back to life” is the…

How to Make Homemade Lemon Extract

Food scraps can be used to stock the kitchen pantry with your own specialty ingredients. Take for instance, citrus peels from lemons, oranges, limes, tangerines, grapefruit etc. Most often than not once we have eaten the fruit or squeezed the juice, we discard the rind/peel. Lemon (but it applies to all citrus) peels however can…

Homemade Cream Cheese

Why Have you seen a gorgeous no-bake cheese cake recipe you would like to try?  Or maybe you simply want some cream cheese for carrot cake icing, a dip or sandwich spread but … you are broke?  Do I sound like a commercial? What to do We are surrounded by people who think outside the box…

How To Beat Egg Whites

Want to attempt a chiffon cake, sponge cake, lemon pancakes, or a meringue etc this weekend? What they all have in common, is that you have to beat the egg whites to stiff peaks. What? Why? (Confession: Actually I was doing a post on the orange chiffon cake but it was too long and so…

Baking Essentials

Hey!  Do your weekend plans involve baking?  However, do your cakes sometimes turn out not as moist as you hoped, or dense or do they sink?  Or do you simply want to improve the quality of your baked goods? One of my besties who makes amazing chocolate chilli cakes, sticky toffee puddings, and the list…