Happy Bird-day Cake

My darling is turning 5 this month! Many moons ago, he already requested an angry bird cake for his birthday. After much googling, I found some really nice angry bird pictures. I downloaded the pictures onto my iPad.

Making this cake was nothing but time consuming! Can you believe, I took Friday off from work, just to work on the cake. After running some errands in the morning, I start working on mixing the colors. Getting the right color is actually harder than making the bird itself. After getting all the color I need for the birds, I call it a day.

I spend my Saturday baking and making birds. We are hosting a BIRD-day party for him on Sunday. This weekend I baked a total of 4 cakes and a kuih talam. Good thing we do catering, if not we'll have just cake party. If you know me well, you know I can't cook  :(( I like to bake, but I don't like to cook.

The cake was actually completed 30 minutes before our guest arrived. Not only I was pleased, all of our guest were impressed! After all the hard work, I deserve the compliments :))) **pat myself on the shoulder**



HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DARLING!



Things that you'll need:

Fondant

Gumpaste

Foodwritter (edible marker)

Color, lots of color

Pictures

iPad, optional.





Meet the casting crew

Happy BIRD-day!!!

Green Tea Snow Skin Mooncake

Mid Autumn Festival also known as Mooncake Festival is one of the biggest celebration the Chinese around the world celebrates on the 15th day of the eighth month in Chinese Lunar calendar. Tonight our neighbour invited us over to celebrate in their front yard. They decorated their yard with lanterns and served light snacks, of cos the main snack is mooncake.

Mooncake is a Chinese confession that is traditionally eaten on this day. Last year I made the traditional baked mooncake packed with salted egg yolk. This year I make this Green Tea Snow Skin (ping-pi) Mooncake. Unlike traditional mooncake, ping-pi mooncake is bake-free. And the most important, it's easy to make. To make things even easier, you can use the canned red bean paste or lotus paste. I actually made the red bean paste myself but I couldn't find the photos :`(  


Green Tea Snow Skin Mooncake

Skin:
240g icing sugar
40g shortening
200ml warm water
120g cooked rice flour (or fried glutinous rice flour)*

Filling:
Red bean paste/Lotus paste

Steps:

Mix icing sugar with shortening. Add in water and mix well. Then add the cooked rice flour and mix well. Set aside for 5-8 mins.

Divide snow skin into 50g each. (the skin weight may be vary depends on the size of the mould that you're using). Wrap in some fillings.

Press mooncake into the mould. Tap lightly to unmould. Refrigerate.



This is the first time he plays lantern. He was so worry that the candle inside will burn the lattern.



  

* If you couldn't find the Cooked (Glutinous) Rice Flour in the store. You can DIY. There are two ways of processing your own Cooked (Glutinous) Rice Flour:

i.   Oven: wrap (glutinous) rice flour with aluminium foil. Place it into preheated oven, bake in 300F for 20 mins.

ii.  Stove: fry the rice flour in a pan until it turns yellowish

Here's some pictures from last year...

Traditional mooncake - I made everything from scratch including the salted egg :))

Plain Snow Skin mooncake

uncooked traditional mooncake