Received Special Gifts

This evening I had received this set of special gifts from Wei Wei of 'The Sweetylicious'. She is a kind girl and it very nice to meet her. Thank you so much for the gifts. :)

Tube Pan

Some of you has asked me, why is my chiffon cake is so nicely brown and is it due to the tube pan I used? So today I posted the image of the tube pans which I used all this while. The one on the left is 21cm (chiffon cake uses 4 to 5 eggs) and the right is 20cm (chiffon cake uses 3 to 4 eggs).

I think the answer lie on the oven or maybe my oven (above 12years old) heating element is old, so it heat up very fast and caused the cake to brown easily. As I had ever tried baking chiffon cakes and cakes using lower temperature for longer time (an extra 5-10mins more than the usual baking time) and the result still the same.

Message Press Set

I bought this Message Press Set from Phoon Huat. Hoping this could help my piping skill. It easy to assemble and use but I felt that the wordings are too big for cake which has picture on it.

Ice-cream Maker

I wanted to invest in an Ice-cream Marker for quite some time and finally I found the right one. I bought this Ice-cream Maker (Venetto) from SUN LIK. It cost $95, it easy to use and the size is not too bulky for storage.

Firstly, freeze the mixing bowl in the freezer for 1 to 2 days. Mix up all the ice-cream mixture and chill in the fridge for 1hr. Then bring the mixing bowl out from the freezer and fix on the mixer. On the switch, pour in the ice-cream mixture and let it do it magic for 15 to 20mins. Lastly, chill the soft ice-cream in the freezer for 4 to 5hrs until it set. And next thing you know is a cup of homemade ice-cream. :)

Whipped Cream Decorating Knife

I bought this from Daiso, a S$2 store. It made of stainless steel and has 5 different patterns which you can choose to decorate your cake.

Instant Read Thermometer

Some call it Candy Thermometer. I used this to monitor on the temperature when cooking Water Roux for bread or sugar syrup for French/Italian Meringue or melting sugar in egg white for Swiss Meringue. For example; when boiling sugar syrup, if the temperature is too high the syrup will crystallize. If too low when syrup is pour into the meringue it will turn watery as a result I will waste all my time, effort and ingredients used. I am not a professional baker, with this it really help.

Double Boiler Pan

I bought this Double Boiler pan from IKEA which come in very useful for me. I used it to melt chocolate, cream cheese and other ingredients. The pan base is rounded so ingredient/s can be melted evenly and you don't have to worry that some is left stick to the corner of the pan or bowl. It has a hook which hook onto the pan of simmering water. This will be more stable when stirring. :)

Cake Leveler

Bought this few weeks ago. The wire is thin and is not sharp at all, so it can't really slice a cake. You need to press hard into the cake and it don't give a smooth cut. So I used it to make an impression around the cake, then I used a sharp knife to slice it.