Japanese Curry Bread

Last weekend I made these very Japanesey bread buns, Curry bread (we call it カレーパン, Karē Pan.) As it's quite obvious from the name, it's bread with curry sauce inside. It's normally deep fried like a doughnut but I baked mine to make it healthier.

Not only did I put the curry in the middle but also I infused the bread with the sauce in order to get the curry flavour with every mouthful. I used Medium Hot curry sauce and covered the buns with homemade breadcrumbs (by the way, the word 'Panko Breadcrumbs' always makes me chuckle because it's basically saying breadcrumbs breadcrumbs...).

They filled the Japanese hole in my stomach very well. I baked some with mild kids curry for Lana's lunch;) She seemed to like it. :D

Matcha danish pastry with Rum raisin

I love adding a bit of Japan into my breads and pastries. As I was making the pastry dough, I thought why not add a bit of green tea in it... so here we have Matcha Danish pastry!

It worked nicely. The flavour of green tea was there but not overpowering, and it went well with rum raisins.

I tried to reduce as much butter as I could to make it healthier, which worked pretty ok as a Danish pastry. I've made some croissants with the same dough that haven't been baked yet. We'll see how they will come out! I'll share the recipe soon. ;)

Strawberry yeast bread

For me there is no doubt that home baked bread is the best, and specially, the one baked with your own starter is better than best...

As some of you might already know, I'm very passionate about sourdough starters and naturally occurred yeast. I've so far tried making starters with raisins, bananas, lemons, coconuts, pineapples, apples, whatever is available at the time...

Currently I'm currently looking after (yes, I care them like pets...;D) strawberry yeast. And it's probably one of the most successful starters ever! To start the yeast, I cut the top bits of the strawberries (eat the actual fruits, of course!) and do the same way as the raisin yeast.

Although I don't put the fruits in the bread dough, there is still a hint of strawberry flavour and sweetness in the bread. And also unlike many sourdough breads, this bread doesn't taste sour and is nice and soft, which is great for my daughter. ;)

A strawberry on top to make it look like a cake.

Waffle maker sandwich with banana bread

 This morning I made banana bread again. This time I just baked it in a loaf tin. Since it didn't make it to breakfast, I decided that we were having sandwiches with the banana loaf for lunch. :)

I made tuna and cheese sandwiches and I used the waffle maker to press them. (I couldn't find the hot sandwich maker...) Look, it worked pretty cool!

The extra thick slices were real treats after a swim! Yum yum yum..., and being tired from the swim and belly full, Lana went to a deep deep nap while I was pushing the pram back home...;D

Frog (?) Loaf

So..., it was supposed to be a frog face... does that look so? I think it's looking more like an alien cat...

Anyway, I've seen this kind of loaf before on Japanese website (I don't know what it's called. Maybe a 'Loaf art'...) and I've been wanting to try it out for ages. So..., here we are, my first attempt for a loaf art... Mr Frog.. ;D

First I pictured what 'face' I want in my loaf, then thought about the pieces and ratios of dough I was going to need. I used green tea for the green dough and raisins for the eyes.As I started to assemble, I realised that the piece for the outer shell was a bit thin, but I stretched it out and managed to wrap the whole thing up... Now, all I could do was to wait for Mr Frog to prove.

It was so exciting when I cut into the loaf because you just don't know how it will come out until you actually see the inside! Ok..., to be honest, the face inside wasn't what I expected... but, humm, it still looked like a face of some sort... So, I say my first attempt wasn't too bad, and more importantly it tasted good and was a great fun. :)

I might get addicted to this...

Mango & Coconut macaron

A sequel to Matcha macaton...

Another macaron, mango and coconut this time. I added mango flavouring to the biscuit and put coconut icing in the middle. It was like a tropical taste explosion in my mouth. I liked it. ;)

Because I added a liquid flavouring in the meringue the biscuit batter was slightly wetter than normal which made the biscuit a tiny bit softer than I would have liked... But all in all it was another successful bake!

The coconut icing was nice too. After resting the macarons in the fridge, the filling sort of soaked in the biscuit a little, which was well tasty!

Matcha Macaron

Macarons are one of my favourite sweets. When I visit a bakery or cafe and they have macarons, I cannot walk out without trying their macarons...

Although I love macarons, I find them pretty hard to bake. I've been practicing and modifying the recipe for 'feels-like-forever' time. However, I think (touch wood!) I've finally got it right this time!

I made matcha macarons. And they came out.... simply perfect! They had nice feet on the bottom and crisp outer shells. The inside was soft and chewy. I put matcha jam in the middle. The flavour of matcha was just heavenly...

These perfect looking sweet treats certainly put a big smile on my face... :D

Spinach bread

It seems that leafy vegetables are quite hard for a little person to eat, so I, as a baker, blend them into bread for my daughter.

This time I added spinach into my basic milk loaf dough. I'm not a vegetable specialist, but spinach looks like it has a lot of good stuff since Popeye eats it and gets stronger. And it certainly gave a beautiful bright colour to the bread!

To my surprise, it didn't taste of spinach that much but it was more like pandan... strange, but rather nice...




Lana loves it too. :D

Yudane Wholemeal Bagel (湯だねベーグル）

Yudane (湯だね) is one of the techniques I use when I want to make soft springy breads. I often make a loaf by using this method but this time I opted for bagels.

I love bagels. They are so versatile! Even though I made only one batch of dough, I finished with four different types of bagels (plain, sweet corn, cheese and maple) by varying the fillings and toppings. :D

Thanks to Yudane, they were nice and springy but not to chewy, and the added bonus was I could really enjoy the natural sweetness of flour. Umm, with cream cheese and smoke salmon... yum yum...

Since Yudane is one of my favourites bread making technique and a popular style in Japan, I thought I'd share on BON APPETIT.

Recipe for Yudane Wholemeal Bagel.

Golf birthday cake for Ony

This weekend we went to stay at Forest of Dean to celebrate our friend, Ony's birthday. I know he is quite into golf so I made a golf cake for him.

I covered the cake with green incing frosting, then sprinkled with coloured coconuts flakes to make 'edible grass'. I placed a bunker which was made with sugar and twice baked sponge cake, and also a pond with blue glitter sugar.

I wanted to put a real golf ball and tee on the cake but we forgot to bring them ;(... However, Nneka helped me to create an edible golf ball out of fondant, thank you Nneka!, and..., there we were, Ony's birthday cake was complete..

Not only was the golf birthday cake a surprise, but also I added another touch to the cake. The inside was a checkerboard cake. ;)

I absolutely loved making this cake. The cake looked just how I imaged, the checkerboard was perfect, and most importantly everyone liked it. :)

Thanks, Ony and Nneka for inviting us. It was an awesome weekend!

Mix vegetable bread

Recently my daughter has developed a new habit... When she decides she doesn't want certain foods, she drops them on the floor, and that happens quite often with green vegetables...

I don't want to force her to eat something she doesn't fancy, but as I want her to grow big and strong (not small and strong, that's me! ;D) I thought I should at least make an effort to interest her in eating veges.

So.., I put mix veges in my bread dough... hehe.., mischievous...
But look! She was loving it! I guess she did notice the veges in the bread but she didn't seem to mind! Not only that, when I toasted one for myself, she wanted that one too. ;)

I think this is going to be my technique to make her eat more vegetables!

Sweet corn pancake

My daughter has been a little poorly for a few days so I made what I call 'power charge pancakes' in order to get my daughter's appetite back. And..., it worked! In fact, she demanded for the second one!

The pancake batter has no butter, no oil, no sugar, and I mix soy flour to get a protein boost. Sweet corns and maple syrup give the pancake a nice subtle sweetness too.

For both kids and adults, these pancakes are perfect for an easy and healthy breakfast and snack. ;)

Recipe for Sweet Corn Pancake.

Hot cross buns

On Easter weekend, I made hot cross buns for the first time. Instead of a usual hot cross bun recipe that has quite a bit of sugar and butter, I used my sugar free banana bun recipe as a dough.

You don't really taste of the banana but it plays an excellent roll of bringing a natural sweetness to the bread. Not only is the banana a good alternative to sugar but also it makes the bread dough nice and soft.

For the hot cross buns, I soaked dried fruits in orange juice for a little while, and mixed them into the dough.

I really liked these buns. I think I will make them more often!

Here is the recipe for Banana Buns.

Two bunnies cake for two girls!

Our friends' daughter, Ayda's birthday is only 3 days later from Lana's birthday, so last Friday we went up to Leeds to see them and pre-celebrate their first birthday together.

I, of course, made a cake for them. Since they shouldn't be having much sugar, I baked sugar free cake and covered it with fondant so that they could have a bit of inside.

I put two funny looking (or slightly evil looking...) bunnies and golden eggs which Ayda picked one up and tried to eat it! That was hilarious! ;D

The girls seem to have had a good time together as well as the parents. Thanks, Cookie, Chi and Ayda for a lovely time there!

Easter Monday & Joint birthday party

As well as it was Lana's birthday yesterday, it was Easter Monday and we had an afternoon joint birthday party for Lana, Steve and me.

So..., there were three cakes on the table, what a treat! Of course, I started (oh, Lana did too!) with a slice of cake...

My birthday cake was made by my mum-in-law. It was a very pretty iced cake with lemon curd. Umm, yum yum, thank you, Chris!

I made sugar free non baked cheese cakes for Steve. Since it was Easter, I used Easter eggs as a cup and put bunnies and eggs on top.

Andy wanted to make vegetarian sausage rolls so I made a sheet of puff pastry too... I love making puff pastry. It's very therapeutic and much more rewarding when you see a nice rise and flaky pastry come out of the oven. ;D

Considering we had a bit of hectic days beforehand, I'm very pleased that we managed to have a lovely afternoon. :)

Happy 1st Birthday to Lana!

Happy Birthday to my No1 girl!
It's Lana's first birthday today. It sounds like a cliche but I cannot believe it's already been a year since that sunny day this little lady came to us!

This year has been a whole new experience as a mum with Lana and I've learnt a lot from her. I'm looking forward to much more fun things to come and do with her!

I love love love you, Lana.xxx