Sugee Cake

This is a typical Eurasian cake.
We have it all the time, anytime. At birthdays and weddings and anniversaries and christmas and new years and every other day we can think of.

Anytime is sugee cake time.

And it's easy to come across a horrid sugee cake.
Too dense, too greasy, collasped, too sweet, too--

un sugee cake like.

Growing up, my grandfather made the best sugee cakes. I swear. In fact, my sister ever proclaimed 'No one can make better sugee cake than grandpa except Jesus."

i struggle to imagine Jesus baking sugee cake, but i am sure he would have loved it.

It uses an unhealthful amount of eggs and butter, but hey. It's sugee cake. You can spare a bit of indulgence.

Ricotta and Almond Cake

I love cheesecakes, but i am tired of having the same old classic new york cheesecake time after time.

Gingersnap crust with cream cheese filling? Sure it's delicious, but after a while, aren't your taste buds just crying of any other cake, any other cheesecake?

This is unusual cheesecake number 2. Previously, I tried a Japanese sponge cheesecake. This one is an Italian recipe, and calls for ricotta cheese.

Like mascarpone in northern-Italian cuisine, Ricotta is a favorite component of many Italian desserts, such as cheesecakes and cannoli. There are also kinds of cookies that include ricotta as an ingredient.

We had a tub of expiring ricotta in the fridge, so what could be a better excuse than this to experiment with unusual cheesecake no. 2?

A ricotta and almond cake. If you're out of almonds, walnuts work as well. Actually, the original recipe called for walnuts, i just used all of mine making my coconut maple granola.

Chocolate Cake Pops

I am a terrible mess in the kitchen.

And so you can imagine the chocolate on the walls, sprinkles on the floor, cake bits all over my coutertops while i was making these cake balls.

but despite being a huge setback on your new year's resolution to keep things tidy AT ALL TIMES, these cake pops are worth it.

Nest i am going to try a carrot cake pop. I have to.

The Ganache recipe is over here and One-Bowl chocolate cake recipe is over here.
Hop to it!

One-Bowl Chocolate Cake

This, essentially, is a diet chocolate cake.

What am I doing baking a diet cake when i am in no need of a diet?

Well, i think i have mentioned before that i am not a chocolate-cake lover. Or, in that case, a brownie lover. I love my chocolate but i love it plain. Straight out of the packet, a chunk of a bar. I will name my future cat Cadbury.

So what do i do when i FEEL like eating a chocolate cake but i know that about 99% of the recipe on the Internet will give me a dense, oogey gooey rich chocolate cake?

I google "Light Chocolate Cake Recipe'.

It took a fair amount of searching and skipping recipes because of horrible review, but i eventually found this one. I was skeptical at first. A cake made out of Olive oil? no BUTTER? But the review were phenomenal. SO i had to try it out.

It did not taste like a diet cake.
At all.

It sort of tasted like one of those box-cake mixes i love so much. Sans the preservatives and artificial flavouring. My sister, who isn't terribly fond of chocolate confectioneries as well, whacked about 1/3 of the cake by dinnertime.

You don't have to be on a diet to eat this. but if you ARE on a diet. Say hello to your new best friend!

Apricot upside down Cake

This cake has been an important part if my life for the past three years.

I still remember the first day my mother decided to try out a recipe from some odd magazine we sneaked out of a hotel.
Peach upside down cakes.

Of course, we did not have peach jam.
So we used the only jam we had in ridiculous quantities: Apricot.

Why we possess so much apricot preserves? Because my mother loves making fruit cakes. For Easter, Christmas, dinner parties. And whenever you ice a fruit cake with marzipan it is never half as good when you do it without a layer of apricot jam in between.

So, anyway. Apricot Jam it was!
And, my oh my. i must say, apricot jam would probably be the better choice. As much as i do love my peaches, apricot really brought out the buttery, warm, moist cake more than it's peach counterpart would have.

Now even if we have a jar of peach jam in the fridge, we still may these babies with apricot jam.
But i suppose this would go well with almost any kind of jam.
Imagine raspberry, or blueberry. How about Marmalade?

Oh!
My recent jam-obsession : Fig Jam.
I wonder if fig upside down cakes will taste just as good.

Because i was incredibly bored today, I doodled out the recipe too.
I am no picasso.
but, here it is anyway. have a laugh.

Japanese cotton cheesecake

I hate it when i have to walk past bread talk every time i go to the mall.
You know why?

Because every time--EVERY TIME--i catch a glimpse of their cotton cheesecakes and i just die.
right there.
In a public place. i die.

Well, not literally. But inside.
Why i never BUY one?

Because by that time i would have already spent about 99% of my savings on topshop stuff. More accurately--ONE topshop item. gosh things are getting pricey, aren't they?

Then i came up with the GENIUS idea that i would make my mom buy me all the ingredients so i can MAKE my own. That way i get to stuff my face all free of charge!

SO here is the ultimate sponge-cake-like, light, cheesy, Japanese-inspired cheesecake that i have been obsessing over for about nearly a year. It's about damn time.

This is what happens when a cheesecake meets a sponge cake. ever want all that cheesy goodness in a less dense, not-so-rich cake?

Of course you do.
Now you have the solution so don't dilly dally and get your parents to invest in some quality cream cheese.

And because i couldn't resist...

Coconut Layer Cake

This cake, is a commitment.
You have to make the cake, make the custard, make the cream. Split the cake. Manage not to break the cake, layer the cake, make sure the cake doesn't fall over as you ice the cake...

You get my drift.

And even the buttercream or custard isn't the easiest thing to make.

You may even have to drive down to your nearest supermarket to grab some coconut extract if you don't have any already (who would?)

But, nevertheless, this cake is worth it.

So make that cake, custard, cream, what have you. Don't have coconut extract? what are supermarkets FOR?

And then when you have run out of cake it is perfectly fine to go ahead and make another because practice makes perfect, and who can resist a perfect coconut layer cake?

(only people allergic to coconut)
(even then, maybe not.)