A Princess turns 9 with a Pear and Nut Crumble Cake

Sunday, 17th February 2013 marked the 9th Birthday of my (not so) little princess. I cant believe how the time has flown and how quickly she has grown up. As per tradition, we woke her up early in the morning and she looked under the bed for her presents.

This year she got a nice stash that included a set of headphones, a Faber Castell paint set, a clay art and craft set and a Litte Miss key-chain. She also got DrawSomething - a game that all of us can play together since she loves boardgames so much.



It being a Sunday, we went for the early Church service and while the kids had Sunday School, we rushed back home so The Lovely Wife could cook lunch. It was going to be a vegetarian lunch since the kids have given up meat for Lent.

The Lovely Wife, with some help from her Mother, cooked up a whole bunch of vegetarian dishes that were really tasty. The menu this year consisted of Vegetable Briyani, Stir Fried Ladies Fingers (Okra) Tomato Chutney, Yoghurt Curry, Tarka Dhall, Baji and Stuffed Taufoo (tauhu sumbat). Very Yummy indeed!



The kids had a lot of fun stuffing the Fried Bean curd with cucumber and turnip and topping it with chilli sauce.



Lunch was really delicious....

Pear and Chocolate Mousse Cake

Not too long ago, actually it could be sometime in May, so that makes it quite some time ago, I made this dessert for a couple of friends that came over for tea and good conversation. Lynn brought along a lovely salad while the delectable Ms Kong Piang brought along a team smoked trout that was rather delicious. She also mentioned that she hadn't had a nice dessert in a while and that all the stuff she had been 'forced' to eat was really not worth her time. Ms Kong Piang often repeats that same story to me just to get me to make her desserts. *Yawn*

So anyway, not wanting to disappoint neither Ms Kong Piang nor Lynn, I decided I was going to make something different. Something chocolatey yet fruity. The Lovely Wife kept bugging me as to what I was going to make but I hushed her up. Very politely too!

In my mind, I wanted a chocolate cake with a pear mousse on top. I surfed the web for a Pear Mousse recipe and found this recipe from cdkitchen.com reproduced below.

For the cake, I decided on using my Baked Chocolate Mousse as I wanted a nicer soft texture.

While I was baking the mousse, I decided to make a cinnamon sauce to complement the pear mousse.

Ingredients
PEAR MOUSSE
3 large pears
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup brandy
1 cup Whipping cream


Method
Peel and core pears and chop coarsely. Place pears in pot with sugar and butter and lemon juice and cook and stir over low heat 15 to 20 minutes.

Let cool slightly and place in blender and puree smooth. Add the brandy and mix well. Cool completely.

Whip heavy cream and blend into cooled pear mixture. Chill well for several hours.


BAKED CHOC MOUSSE CAKE
200g Good Quality Dark Chocolate
4 eggs
200g Caster Sugar
300 ml Thickenend Cream
3 Tbsps Corn Flour

Method
Melt the chocolate over a double boiler and let cool. Meanwhile, beat eggs with sugar till nice and foamy. Add in the melted chocolate and continue beating till nicely incorporated. In a separate bowl, whip cream to soft peaks. Fold into the chocolate mixture and then add in sifted corn flour. Mix well to incorporate. Pour into a 9" round pan and place in a water bath. Bake in 180C oven for about 30 minutes.

Caramel Cinnamon Sauce
5 Tbsp Sugar
2 Tbs Water
1 Tbsp Butter
about 1/2 cup cream or milk
2 - 3 tsps Cinnamon powder (to your taste)

Method
Melting the sugar and water and allow to cook without stirring till the sugar turns amber. Turn add in the butter and stir quickly. Mixture may sputter. Reduce heat and allow to cool slightly before adding in the milk/cream. Return to heat and whisk until everything combines and mixture is nice and thick. Add in the cinnamon powder to taste.

Before serving, I dusted the top of the pear mousse with some cinnamon powder for those that didnt want to eat it with the caramel cinnamon sauce. The cinnamon really did make a difference and seemed to bring out the flavour of the pears.




The pear mousse turned out really nicely although if I make this again, I would let the pears mixture thicken some more as the mousse took a long, long time to set. In fact, even after being in the freezer overnight, the mousse melted very quickly. However the next day, the mousse had set up very, very nicely as you can see above.



The mousse was great as a dessert on its own too - especially with the caramel cinnamon sauce! Ms Kong Piang remarked that it would make a very good ice cream.




The combination of the pear mousse and the baked choc mousse was rather sublime and very interesting. The fruitiness of the pears combined really well with the chocolate and one slice was definitely not enough. This is the kind of dessert that you can just eat and eat... and that's exactly what we did!

Poached Pears with Coke Reduction

I love pears. My son loves them too and one of his favourite desserts is my Caramel Pears. Both the kids and I also love our Coke - the drinking kind and not the snorting kind. I'd always wondered what a Coke reduction would taste like. I imagined it to be sweetish and with a hint of Coke flavour. That's when I decided I would make Poached Pears with a Coke reduction sauce.

The whole family are great fans of MasterChef(USA) and Junior MasterChef (Australia) as well. There is so much we all learn from watching it and it is great fun. In one episode, the junior Masterchefs had to make poached pears and this is where I was introduced to the cartouche. The term cartouche, in cooking, refers to a circle of parchment or grease-proof paper that covers the surface of a liquid reduce evaporation. It is often used in poaching to keep the liquid over the surface of the items being poached.
Cartouche is also the term used to describe a set of Egyptian hieroglyphs enclosed in a rectangle with a horizontal line at one end, indicating that the text enclosed is a royal name. You can often find a lot of rectangular shaped jewellery with hieroglyphics in them. This is a cartouche. Anyway, I digress.





To poach the pears, I used a combination of spices to add some flavour to the pears. While the pears poached, I boiled the coke to reduce it. My son asked me expectantly whether the sauce would have a 'gassy' taste to it so I took that as a good opportunity to teach him about carbonated drinks and how boiling would get rid of all the CO2 in the drink.

Ingredients
2 pears - pealed and quartered
2 cups water
2 Tbsp sugar
4 cloves
1 stick cinammon
2 cups coke
Method
Place the pears in a deep saucepan and add in the water. Add in the sugar, cinnamon and cloves and cover with a cartouche. Bring to the boil and then allow to simmer until the pears are tender.

Meanwhile, boil the coke until it reduces to a thick syrup

The coke took an inordinate amount of time to reduce but it finally did. There wasn't any milk or cream on hand and I was a tad disappointed as I wanted to add a little milk to the reduced coke to lighten it and make it a little more creamy.



The coke reduction was very interesting but a tad too sweet. It would certainly have been nicer mixed with cream or at the very least served with some whipped cream. I dont think I will make a coke reduction again as it is far cheaper and nicer to make a caramel. My son and princess both enjoyed the coke reduction but they too agreed that it needed some cream and they also both agreed that the usual Caramel sauce was tastier.

It was a good experience trying it out though and I think a coke reduction might go well as a marinade for chicken or pork. Now thats a thought!

Festmahl Kuchen - a cake fit for a feast

In my previous post, I mentioned how Lynn's request made me decide to make Quinoa Stuffed Peppers for the dinner we had with friends prior to watching the World Cup Quarterfinals. The ever discerning Ms Kong Piang yawned in her royal manner and declared that she was tired of purchasing substandard desserts and wanted something that would "hit the right spots." She waxed lyrical about something fruity then pondered upon something chocolatey before she dismissed everything and just 'demanded' something that would satisfy her. Kind of like Jean-Luc Picard saying "Make it so". (For those of you not from the same generation or wavelength, Picard is the Captain of the Starship Enterprise from Star Trek, The Next Generation)

Anyway, I'm quite frightened of Ms Kong Piang . She has such discerning taste and is a fabulous cook in her own right that I would have to think of something that would match her expectations. Same goes for TLW as well as Lynn!

Having 3 gorgoeus women expecting satisfaction from one man may not be such a dream after all... Women with discerning palates are not to be trifled with. Be afraid. Be very afraid.





TLW kept asking me what I was going to make but I knew it would be better if I surprised her. I decided on a dessert with pears, chocolate mousse and a nutty base. My usual mousse uses egg whites to make it light and fluffy but I needed the egg whites for the meringue and didn't want to have leftover egg yolks. I decided to modify my Baked Chocolate Mousse. This is what I came up with, another original recipe:

Ingredients
3 Egg Whites
150g Caster Sugar
160g Ground Hazelnuts

3 egg yolks
1 Egg
2 Tbsp Sugar
200g good quality Dark Chocolate
400ml Cream
1 large can pears
Method
Start off by straining the pears. Discard the juices. Cut the pears into quarters and set aside.

Whip egg whites till at soft peak stage. Add in the sugar and continue beating till thick, stiff and glossy. Quickly fold in the nuts till well incorporated. Spread into a 10" Springform lined with parchment paper. Bake at 180C for 30-40 mins till meringue is nicely cooked. Remove from oven and let cool. Once cool, remove the parchment paper from the meringue and place the meringue back into the springorm pan, being careful not to break the meringue.

Meanwhile, Melt the chocolate over a double boiler. While chocolate is melting, whisk together the egg yolks, 1 egg and sugar together till light and creamy. Add the egg mixture into the melted chocolate, stirring quickly. Should the chocolate seize or get lumpy, dont worry. Beat with an electric mixer for a short while and chocolate will become thick and silky. Set aside.

Whip the cream till it forms stiff peaks. Carefully fold into the chocolate mixture incorporating well to get a lovely chocolate mousse.

Place a thin layer of mousse over the meringue and then arrange pear quarters over the layer of mousse. Cover the pears with remaining mousse and smoothen the top of the mousse. Bake at 190C for 25 mins. Remove from oven and let cool before allowing to chill for at least 6 hours. Decorate with sliced pears.

I was in a bit of a rush when I made this cake that I didn't remove the parchment paper from the meringue before covering it with mousse. So when I wanted to unmould the cake, I caused a bit of cracking. I've written the recipe above to make sure I dont repeat that mistake!

When I brought the cake out to be served, everyone asked what it was and it was then that I realised that I didn't have a name for it. We decided to eat it first before deciding if it was worthy to be named.



The dessert was a huge hit! Everyone enjoyed it with Ms Kong Piang saying that it was the nicest dessert she had partaken of in a while. I was pleasantly surprised at how well the mousse complemented the pears while the hazelnut meringue was much nuttier and tastier than my usual almond meringue base. Michael enjoyed it so much that he had two pieces at one sitting while the rest of us definitely had more than one serve each!

Lynn and I reckoned that we had to give the cake a Geman name to commemorate Germany's destruction of Argentina in the 2010 World Cup Quarterfinals. Since its a Chocolate Mousse Cake with Pears, I thought of calling it Schokoladenmousse Birnenkuchen - a direct translation.


Maybe Festmal Kuchen is a better and simple name for this cake as I reckon it is the perfect finale to any Feast!

Caramel Pears

It's amazing that I haven't posted about this before, because for a long, long time, this was my son's Favourite Dessert. I can't even remember when I hit upon the idea of serving pears with caramel but suffice to say that I did and the very first time, I used canned pears. However, as time went on, I tried it with fresh pears and I must say it is far nicer with Fresh pears. The pears are not so sweet and you can also get a little crunch out of them as opposed to canned pears.

This dessert is not at all difficult yet turns out to be a real crown pleaser. This is what I do.

Ingredients
6 fresh pears, peeled, cored and halved
300 ml cream
1 cup sugar
½ cup water
2 tsp rum (optional)


Method
Preheat the oven to 200°C.
Make the caramel by melting sugar with water in a heavy saucepan.
Bring to the boil without stirring and continue boiling till sides of syrup start to turn golden.
Allow the caramel to cool slightly and then add in the cream. Be careful as the mixture will splutter. Continue to boil until it becomes thick.
Bake the pears for about 30 minutes or until tender.
Spread 1/3 of the caramel over the pears and bake for another 15 minutes. If using rum, add it into the remaining sauce and mix well.
Serve the pears with the remaining sauce.



I usually serve my Caramel Pears with whipped cream but this time I decided on serving it with Ice Cream. To be honest, I cant quite remember when this was served but that doesn't really matter, does it!





My son now says that this is ONE of his favourite desserts and that to me is a good thing as it simply means that he his tastes have matured a bit and it also means that both The Lovely Wife and I have increased choices to make our children happy with their favourite desserts!

Pear Pudding with Caramel Sauce

One thing about food blogging is that sometimes, you make something, take all the pictures but just keep delaying posting about it. This is one of those times and although this was made more than 6 months ago, I just failed to post it!

Good thing I had uploaded the photos though as my PC has been on the blink for the past week. I have a backup 'ol dinosaur' pc which I am using to update this post but would you know, the 'ol dino' is giving some problems as well... So that kind of explains my silence. I'm really struggling without my home PC but I guess I'm getting by with a little help form 'Ol Dino'!




This recipe comes from an old cookbook I own called Indulgence Food. The recipe is actually for a Steamed Pear Pudding with Caramel Sauce but I baked it instead. This is how the recipe goes with my modification of baking:

Ingredients
3 pears
125ml water
1.5 tbsp sugar
45g butter
3 tbsps caster sugar
2 eggs
90g self raising flour
4 tbsp milk

Caramel Sauce
185g sugar
3 tbsp water
45 g butter
155 ml whipping cream

Method
Peel, core and finely chop the pears. Place pears, water and sugar in a pan and cook over medium heat for about 10 minutes or till pears are just tender. Set aside.
Cream butter and caster sugar till pale and fluffy. Add eggs and beat well. Sift flour over mixtrue and fold in with milk.
Strain pears and fold into puidding mixture. Pour into a 9" srpingform pan. Bake in a preheated 180C oven for about an hour or till done.
Make the caramel sauce by placing sugar and water in a saucepan. Cook until sugar dissolves and then caramelsies into a deep amber culler. Remove from heat. Add in butter a little at a time. Return to heat, add in cream and contiunue cooking till smooth.



One of my son's favourite desserts is Caramelised Pears (not sure if I've posted about these...) so he absolutely loved this cake! I served it with Ice Cream and it was quite a lovely dessert!