Chocolate Velvet, Peppermint Ganache Cake & Last Weeks in Manila

Been awhile! :) my last few months in Manila is occupied by local travels, local cafe hopping, eats, concerts, spending time at home and with friends.... Or some migration errands.

As much as I wanted to update my blog often and feature recipes that are out of the box, competition par  like those in Chefs-Talk and the flocks in Instagram, I just can't find the time. And so, I'm trying to make recipes that are easy to make and to replicate at home, let's be basic for now, after all, I will soon have the opportunity to create beautiful pastries again and share to all of you.

Soon,  I will be off to a better adventure. I will be a different nomad than I already am. My goals in jumping off to this excursion are simple; to become a better pastry chef. To outgrow thy loser self, haha. To meet more experienced chefs. To gain experience as I wanted to become a food historian. To study again, and to earn more so I have the means to invest in future endeavors such as traveling, studying and much more.

Sydney could be a good start. Yes, you read it, a good 'start'...I have so many places to see, so many food to try, so much more to learn. Im excited yet scared. I guess this is the first time I'm officially sharing this, I will be working in Sydney for a year (to start) and then another one if opportunity strikes.Then I will figure where exactly to head next (Stockholm, Seoul or San Francisco are my tight choices, I love places that starts with 'S', yes!)

Nomad life isn't easy for me, if you have some advice how to un-clutter my mess, please be kind to email me. Haha. I  started packing already and packed four boxes of my stuff, I'm re-sorting, throwing away trinkets, til I get just one final, can't live without, box.

I suddenly don't know how to pack light my shit 

While sorting my things, I wanted to also make a recipe that I can run easily in a busy day, I realized how inevitable Chocolate cake is.  I think all pastry chefs, home bakers,  and house wives should have a decent Chocolate cake recipe that we can flex, tweak, and pair with frostings of our hype. And so I created this recipe, I will be honest with all of you, I use chocolate cake premix a lot of time, something I mastered at work for its convenience and low cost. But what if there's no premix ever, this will be one of my Chocolate cake base. One of, yes, many more in the future! (I will share soon my Melt In The Mouth Childhood Chocolate Cake) but for now, let me share this Chocolate Velvet Cake with Peppermint Ganache .

Peppermint Ganache

All Purpose Cream 180ml

Dark Chocolate 500g

Drops of Peppermint Essence (to taste)

Chocolate Velvet Cake

All Purpose Flour 3 c

Cocoa 6 Tbsp (90 ml)

Baking soda 3t

Fresh Milk 1 1/2c

Sugar 21/4c

Vegetable oil 2 1/4c

Eggs 3 pcs

The ingredients are grouped into 3; dry ingredients, oil & sugar, and the liquid ingredients of egg and fresh milk.

Whisk together vegetable oil and sugar until the granules are 

smaller. Add the eggs one at a time and continue whisking til mixture is uniformed.  

Add in the sifted dry ingredients in about two-three batches, mixing the batter until just combined but uniformed.

The mixture has to be a smooth, lump-free and fully combined batter.

Pour into a 10" diameter x 2" height pan, covering til 3/4's full.

Pop in a preheated oven of 375 F and bake for about 40 minutes or until the cake is done.

Rest and cool down the cake before unmolding from the pan... while cooling down, you can prepare the Peppermint Ganache.

Once fully cooled down, slice the Chocolate Velvet sponge into three layers, filling each layer with Peppermint Ganache

To make the Peppermint Ganache, scald cream over low heat, add in chopped dark chocolate off the heat and mix until all the chocolate has completely melted. Add the drops of Peppermint essence, and transfer into another bowl to cool down faster, chill and mix occasionally until thick but spreadable. 

Mask the cake with more Peppermint Ganache and decorate with piped rosettes

Sprinkle with red, white and green dragees for the complete Peppermint feel

Chill before serving, best with strong black brewed coffee on ice!

I gave this cake to my dear friend Vincent, Polar Beer for his past birth day, and decided to use the occasion to share this recipe.

The versatility of this recipe is endless, this Mothers' Day sunday, why don't you spice up the Ganache with chili? Or spiked it with Bailey's?  You can also mask the basic Ganache and Chocolate Velvet Cake in toasted desiccated coconut or chopped Iranian pistachio nuts.  It will be a sweet mom and daughter/son bonding. Or why don't you bake and dedicate it to your mom, I just did.

It's not really her presence that made me who I am now, but her absence. And though she isn't there for more than half of my life already..I'm always trying to be right so that she won't get upset, eh sakit kaya mangurot.

I got this mommmey, keep chillin', kisses to the heavens! <3

Always,

English Banoffee Pie for NYE 2015

Whaddup Bakerlings! I just came back from my sweet holiday, and few hours from now I will be off to another round of feeling touristy. Pardon me from not accomplishing recipes that I promised…the few months that passed I was just really into work. I’m happy that I finished my deadlines and delivered my workloads. I had to give up blogging and reading books to focus my energy towards a big project, what I learned is we can’t really multitask as much as we want to, because the day is composed of just 24 hours, and our body is made of bones and flesh, I therefore conclude that I’m not infinite. I can’t really do as much as I want in a day…and I had to slow down a bit.

My brother's office wall clock, Boss Of The Year!

I would like to share a roundup of my favourite photos and of course my holiday dessert! 

The True Filipino Bounty; Came home to this hot, crisp, just cooked Lechon! Fireworks to my palate!

My recipe for the past NYE was the English Banoffee Pie. So easy isn’t? It was a season of gift giving, for a brief moment I had this idea to make my gifts very personal to the point I will painstakingly find gifts or prepare desserts, make handwritten post-it's and personally hand it over

My English Banoffee Pie Mise En Place

English Banoffee Pie

This recipe yields 2 whole pies

Graham Crumb Crust

440g Butter, melted

440g Graham crackers, crashed

Melt butter and combine with crashed graham crackers. Press tightly against 8 inch round pie pan or rectangular 7 inch x 8 inch x 1 inch pie pan. Set aside in the chiller.

Sticky Toffee

220g Heavy Cream

240g Sugar

2 cups Water

4 Tbsp Cornstarch

2 tsp Butter

Caramelize sugar until amber brown in color, mount with butter and gradually add in heavy cream. Simmer the pan of caramel before adding in water. In a separate bowl, dissolve cornstarch with some of the simmered liquid and pour in back to the pan, stir until a good boil. Cool down and set aside.

Ganache

125g Heavy cream

75g Dark Chocolate callets

To make the ganache, simmer cream and add in the chopped chocolates and warm over bain marie just until all the chocolate is melted. Cool down and set aside.

Vanilla Chantilly

2 Liters Heavy Cream

220g All Purpose Cream

1 ½ Tbsp Vanilla

1 Tbsp Gelatin

1 Tbsp Water

1/8c Powdered sugar

To make the Vanilla Chantilly, Bloom gelatine in water, in a pot infuse all purpose cream with vanilla and melt in gelatine, cool down. Once the mixture has cooled down, whip heavy cream until soft peaks, gradually add in powdered sugar and fold in the Vanilla infused cream and continue whipping til stiff peaks.

To assemble the English Banoffee Pie...

4 pcs Bananas

1 cup Pecan, toasted and chopped

1 cup Cashew nuts, toasted and chopped

Spoon generous amount of good love, I mean the Sticky Toffee!

You may add more nuts, a good alternative to Pecan nuts is Walnuts or Almonds... I put a bit because I read nuts are not very good for toddlers, which attendance-wise is 2 tiny monsters in my family.

The more banana, the crazier. Go ahead!

What if you Bomb Bath in a tub of Vanilla Chantilly, with  Sticky Toffee underneath... the World is such a sweet, sweet place!

Simply layer the Sticky Toffee on the prepared Graham crumb crust, sprinkle chopped cashew nuts and chopped pecan nuts. Then arrange freshly sliced bananas, cover with Vanilla Chantilly. 

Drizzle with remaining Sticky Toffee and Ganache, then sprinkle again with more nuts. Pipe borders of Vanilla Chantilly rosettes. You may freeze it until the pie is set, serve chilled and best with black coffee!

English Banoffee Pie

Happy New Year everyone! T'was a wonderful year, onwards to a more wonderful 2015, let's claim it! 

English Banoffee Pie

Closely..

It’s a Mommy Bruni thing (Frank Bruni's Mum) to showcase your thoughtfulness through cooking, it resonated in me that if I get old and  remember something sweet I did when I was 23, was when I made desserts , chose presents and gave them to my favourite people, forget that I spent some money and time, It’s an investment of generosity.

My current read, Born Round (The Secret History Of A Full-time Eater) by Frank Bruni

What’s your New Year’s Resolution? Hmmmm… maybe I will stop shaving my eyebrows because my brother is not liking my very trimmed brows lately, or maybe I will eat healthier goat food. But more importantly I would invest more generosity and stop counting how much money I have. I will continue working towards the goals that I haven’t accomplish (because a year is composed of just 12 months…errr)

This year, I will turn 24. I feel so old by now (I have  6 months more) … and so I will watch concerts, get a tattoo, see how beautiful my home country is  by back packing, read my stack of new books, spend more time doing church work, spend more time with my family… and this year, I will go to Sydney.

I will work towards my innermost passion, to live in a new city, learn more desserts, meet new people, study another language, study in a university… go to Europe. Ahhhh! And continue if 12 months is too short.

My favorite Holidays photos...

I got the most awesome-st BFFs in the world! Thank you Nanibear!

Thank you my Inday for these!!!

New Year's Eve are never the same again without my Mom who is a total feast boss, my Pap who cooks the best holiday food ever and my Aunt who is noisier than a Good Bye Earth (a Filipino firecracker). At least the kids got to visit :)

Like a boss... This is how a 2 year old play Temple Run e?

Michael: You are the original big baby

Bagac, Bataan, Philippines with my back pack buddies and extended siblings!

Grateful for the year that had been, Thank you sweet peas for the time and visits! Let’s bake more this 2015!

“ Onwards! “ –Elizabeth Gilbert

Faith, Hope, Love...