VERY JAPANESE CAKE - Matcha –Black Sesame Mousse Cake

Ever since I started baking home-made cakes for friends' birthday, matching the right cake with the right person is getting more challenging these days as I have started to running out of ideas. For my friend Eliz's birthday last month, we decided to throw her a surprise party with a Japanese sashimi theme. Going along that theme, I wanted to bake a Japanese flavor cake with Japanese ingredients. And usually the first cake came to mind is my favorite matcha red bean mousse cake! In the past years, I made this cake so many times that I kind of bored myself from making. So this time I wanted to make something new. I surfed the web a bit and found this VERY Japanese cake - Matcha Black Sesame Mousse Cake combining 2 of my favorite flavors together. I knew right away this is the cake I wanted to bake and perfect.

This cake reminds me of my trips to Japan and my love for Japanese pastries. I can't wait to share!

Black sesame cake
Ingredients
• 1 ¼ cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 ¼ teaspoons baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
• 2 tablespoons black sesame seeds
• 2 table spoons back sesame paste
• 1 large egg, room temperature
• ½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 6 tablespoon unsalted butter, softened
• ¾ cup sugar
• ½ cup, plus 2 tablespoons canned unsweetened coconut milk
Procedures
1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350F.
2. Grease one 8-inch round cake pan, line bottom with parchment paper, duct cake pan with flour, and tap out excess.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk flour, baking powder and salt together, set aside.
4. Toast the sesame seeds in a dry pan over medium heat, stirring constantly, until they are fragrant, about two minutes. Grind (or pound) the toasted black sesame seeds in a spice grinder until they are the texture of damp sand. Combine grounded sesame seeds, sesame paste, eggs and vanilla in a 1 cup measuring cup, stir to combine, set aside.
5. In a bowl of standing mixture (or use a hand-mixer), beat butter and sugar on medium-low speed until sugar is moistened, about 30 sec. Increase speed to medium-high and beat until mixture is light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to medium, add sesame mixture (from step 4) in two additions, beat until combined.
6. Reduce speed to low, add dry ingredients in 3 additions, alternating with coconut milk (in 2 additions), beginning and ending with dry ingredients. Remove bowl from mixture, stir batter by hand with a rubber spatula to ensure there are no streak of flour left on the bottom of the bowl. Pour batter and spread evenly in the prepared cake pan.
7. Bake cake until toothpick inserted into center of the cake comes out clean, about 25-35 minutes. Cool cake and slice cake horizontally in half into 2 even layers.

Matcha Mousse
Ingredients
• 4 large egg yolks
• 1/3 cup (2 oz) granulated sugar
• 1/8 teaspoon fine sea salt
• ½ cup coconut milk, plus 2 tablespoon
• 2 tablespoon water, 1 tablespoon powdered gelatin
• 1 tablespoon water
• 1 teaspoon matcha powder
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 ¾ cup (14 oz) heavy cream, divided
• 1 tablespoon superfine sugar
Procedures
1. In a medium bowl, whisk egg yolks, sugar, and salt until smooth and fully combined, set aside.
2. Combine 2 tablespoons coconut milk and water in a small bowl, sprinkle gelatin over top and let bloom for 5 minutes, then steam it over boiling water (about 2 minutes). Combine water with matcha powder in a separate small bowl, stir to combine, set aside.
3. Add ½ cup of coconut milk and ¾ cup heavy cream to a medium saucepan and bring to simmer. Remove from heat, in a steady stream, pour into yolk mixture; whisk constantly to prevent curdling. Pour mixture back into saucepan, and cook over medium heat until mixture has thicken and coasts the back of a spoon, stirring constantly.
4. Remove pan from heat and stir in gelatin mixture until dissolved. Stir in matcha mixture and vanilla until incorporated. Pour matcha cream through fine-mesh strainer into nonreactive bowl. Cover surface directly with plastic wrap and let cool (refrigerate if making ahead).
5. With a hand-mixture, whish remaining 1 cup heavy cream and superfine sugar to soft peak. Gently fold whipped cream into matcha cream until incorporated with no white streaks.

White sesame mousse
Ingredients
• 4 large egg yolks
• 1/3 cup (2oz) granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons sesame paste or tahini (I used tahini)
• 1/8 teaspoon fine sea salt
• ¾ cup whole milk (I used 2% milk)
• 1 tablespoon powdered gelatin
• 1 tablespoon water
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 ¾ (14 oz) heavy cream, divided
• 1 tablespoon superfine sugar
Procedures
1. In a medium bowl, whisk egg yolks, sugar, sesame paste (or tahini) and salt until smooth and fully combined.
2. Combine 2 tablespoons coconut milk and water in a small bowl, sprinkle with gelatin over top and let bloom for 5 minutes, then steam it over boiling water (about 2 minutes).
3. Add ¾ cup of milk and ¾ heavy cream to a medium saucepan and bring to simmer. Remove from heat, in a steady stream, pour into egg yolk mixture in step 2; whisk constantly to prevent curdling. Pour mixture back into a saucepan, and cook over medium heat until mixture has thickened and coats the back of a spoon, stirring constantly.
4. Remove pan from heat and stir in gelatin mixture until dissolved. Stir in vanilla until incorporated. Pour sesame cream through fine-mesh strainer into a bowl. Cover surface directly with plastic wrap and let cool (refrigerate if making ahead).
5. With a hand-mixture, whish remaining 1 cup heavy cream and superfine sugar to soft peak. Gently fold whipped cream into matcha cream until incorporated with no white streaks.

Assembly
This cake has 4 layers and should be assembled in the following order:
Bottom layer – Black sesame cake
2nd layer – matcha mousse
3rd layer – black sesame cake
4th layer – white sesame mousse
Top – garnish with matcha powder (~2 tablespoons)
Procedures:
1. Using the 9 inch pan, place one black sesame cake layer on the bottom-center, spread matcha mousse evenly on top and side of cake layer. Smooth top with small spatula, cove and refrigerate for 30 min.
2. Remove cake from fridge, center remaining cake layer on top of firm matcha mousse and spread sesame mousse evenly on top and side of cake. Smooth top and refrigerate for 30 min.
3. Remove cake from fridge, decorate cake with matcha powder, black sesame seed (optional) as desired.

Panna Cotta with fresh strawberry mousse

This is another very simple dessert recipe everyone can easily made at home with less than 30 minute of prep work. It tastes almost too good to be believe that it's that easy to make! The fresh strawberry mousse adds a perfect kick to the creamy panna cotta which makes it a perfect summer treat. I made 20 of these to Galeen's baby shower this past weekend and everyone loved it. Happy to share this freshly written recipe with all of you! :)

Panna Cotta
Ingredients: (serves amount 20 panna cotta using the clear container I had in the picture)
• 4 cups heavy cream
• ½ cup (100 gram) sugar (or a little bit less than that)
• 2 teaspoon of vanilla paste or 1 vanilla bean
• 2 packets powder gelatin
• 6 tablespoons cold water

Procedures:
1. Heat the heavy cream and sugar in a saucepan. Once the sugar is dissolved, remove from heat and stir in the vanilla paste.
2. Sprinkle the gelatin over the cold water in a medium-size bowl and let it stand for 5-10 min.
3. Pour the very warm panna cotta mixture from step 1 over the gelatin and stir until the gelatin is completely dissolved.
4. Divide the panna cotta mixture from step 3 into the prepared cups, then chill them until firm, which will take at least 2 hour but then I usually make it the night before.

Strawberry Mousse
Ingredient:
• 200 grams strawberry puree **
• 20 grams sugar
• 4 grams sheet gelatin
• 150 grams heavy cream, soft peak

Procedures:
1. Warm half of the strawberry puree with the sugar. In the meantime, soak the sheet gelatin in ice water. Add the softened gelatin to the warm strawberry puree.
2. Add the rest of the puree and let it cool.
3. Fold in the whipped cream into the puree base. Pour this mousse on top of the panna cotta (after having it chilled in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours) and let it set in the refrigerator.

Strawberry Puree
Ingredients:
• 20 oz fresh strawberry
• 50 gram sugar
• Freshly squeeze lemon juice, optional

Procedures:
1. Put the strawberry and lemon juice into a food processor or blender and process the berries until they are pureed.
2. Pour the puree into a 2 cup measuring cup. You should have about 1 ¼ cups of puree.
3. Add 50 grams of the sugar to start and stir until the sugar dissolved
4. Taste and add more sugar if needed.

Bacon and corn pasta salad with mustard dressing

This is a quick pasta salad perfect for the summer.  It's very easy to put together.  I made this to a friend's party and most people liked it a lot.  

Ingredients

·         1 pound pasta

·         1 table spoon olive oil

·         9 oz mushroom, sliced

·         9 oz bacon, chopped coarsely

·         9 oz baby corn

·         1 medium red onion, chopped coarsely

·         1 large avocado, chopped coarsely

Mustard dressing

·         1 cup bottled Caesar salad dressing

·         1 tablespoon wholegrain mustard

Procedures:

1.      Cook pasta in large saucepan of boiling water until tender, drain.

2.      Meanwhile, heat oil in large frying pan, add mushrooms and bacon; cook, stirring, until beginning to brown. Remove mixture from pan. Add corn to same pan; cook, stirring, until browned lightly all over.

3.      Make mustard dressing

4.      Place pasta, mushroom mixture and corn in large bowl with onion, avocado, parsley and dressing; toss gently.

Chocolate-Almond Genoise Layer Cake with coffee butter cream

This is the birthday cake I made for my dearly god sister's birthday this year. My god sister has been deeply spoiled by me in the past few years being my dessert tasting guinness pig. Now she's more picky on cake than ever - she specifically requested from me not to bake her any green tea red bean favor cake for her birthday as she is tired of it! To make the remaining choices even more limited, she doesn't like any fruity favor cake. So cakes like strawberry shortcake, Chinese style fruit cake, or any type of cake with berries are all out! In researching for a cake she would like, I knew I had to go along the line of chocolates or coffee. This chocolate almond genoise and coffee butter cream layer cake has the best of both favors. It's a hybrid recipe I combined together from two recipes, neither of which I had tried before. But I think after making them and having to receiving good comments, I am confidence that they taste pretty good and more importantly they are not difficult to make.



The cake layer is created based off a simple Italian genoise sponge cake recipe using almond flour and the chiffron cake technique (beating the egg white separately).

Chocolate genoise
• 4 eggs, room temperature
• 1 cup confectioners sugar
• 1 cup almond flour
• 6 tablespoon chocolate powder
• ¼ cup all purpose flour
• 4 egg whites, room temperature
• 4 tablespoon white granulated sugar

Directions
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Grease an 11×17(or 12×16) sheet pan with shortening. Line with parchment and grease parchment paper. Set aside.
Combine the 2 whole eggs, confectioners’ sugar and almond flour in a bowl. Combine with a hand-held mixer until batter has lightened considerably in color.(Should be a pale yellow.) Add the 1½ tsp. matcha powder and mix on low speed until combined. Set aside.
Whip the egg whites in a clean bowl on low speed until they start to froth. Add the cream of tartar and increase mixer speed, whipping until stiff peaks form. Add the 2 tbsp. granulated sugar and whip for a few seconds longer to incorporate.
Sift the flour over the pale yellow egg mixture, then scoop about ⅓ of the egg whites into the egg mixture and fold together gently with a rubber spatula. Add the remaining egg whites and fold in until uniformly mixed.
Pour the batter into the sheet pan and distribute it evenly with an offset spatula, making the layer as level and smooth as possible. Your batter will be spread very THIN.
Bake for about 8-12 minutes until the cake is just firm. Keep an eye on the cake as it bakes! It will burn easily!
Remove from the oven and turn out cake onto a cooling rack. Remove parchment. Allow to cool slightly. Cut cake into four even pieces.

Coffee butter cream (recipe adopted from Chef Defontaine's popular Paris pastisserie- Le Royale au Cafe)
• ¾ cup (or a bit less) cup sugar
• ½ cup water
• 6 large egg yolks
• 2 ½ sticks unsalted butter (cut into pieces, softened)
• 1 (starbucks) expresso shot (about 2-2.5 tablespoon)

Bring the sugar and water to a boil in a small heavy saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar, about 4 minutes. Let the mixture boil for 3 or 4 minutes, until it forms a soft ball (234-240 degree).
Meanwhile, beat the egg yolks with an electric mixer until fluffy.
As soon as the syrup is ready, with the machine running, pour the syrup onto the beaters in a very thin, steady stream until all the syrup is incorporated. Continue to beat until the mixture is fluffy and cooled to room temperature.
Add the butter, 1 or 2 pieces at a time, beating until the mixture is well blended and fluffy. Add the expresso to the butter cream and beat until well blended.

Assemble the cake:
Cut the cake into 4 even pieces
Place the bottom layer on a platter or a piece of card board cut slightly larger than the cake. With a spatula, spread about butter cream (thin layer or a bit thicker depending on one’s taste) on the layer. Gently place the second layer on top, spread another layer of butter cream, repeat to have 4 layers of cake and 4 layer of cream fillings (total of 8 layers).

Butternut Squash Soup

Hi everyone! It’s been a long 4 months since I updated this blog. It’s been a very difficult and busy 4 months at work. My life was literally put to a pause during this period. Hence, this blog as well. Nevertheless, my passion for cooking and baking never died. I still managed to find myself slipping some simple recipes to cook out. It’s true that you will always find time for things you are passionate about.
This soup recipe that I am sharing here it’s a very simple 15 minute recipe that yields a very comforting soup, especially during the winter season. I made it several times during the winter but only have time to post now. Apologies for the delay.
Serving size: 4

Ingredients:
· small butternut squash, about 1.5 pounds, diced (1/2-inch)
· sweet potatoes, peeled and diced (1/2-inch)
· ½ to 1 medium onion, diced
· 3-inch sprig of fresh rosemary
· 2 tbsp butter
· 6 cups vegetable broth
· salt + pepper to taste
· cream (optional)

Procedures:
Melt butter in large pot over medium-high heat. Add vegetables and rosemary and stir to coat. Cover pot and allow veggies to sweat for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
After 10 minutes, add broth. Bring to a boil then drop heat to moderate simmer. Let soup simmer for an additional 20 minutes, until potatoes and squash are quite tender. Remove rosemary sprig. Using an immersion blender or a regular blender, puree' soup until smooth and creamy. Salt and pepper to taste.
Optional: heavy cream for garnish or add to soup for a more creamy taste.

Skillet Roasted Chicken

Long over-due for cooking new dishes! The last 2 months had been crazy busy for me. I went on a 3.5 week vacation, 1 week for work training, and then took another short trip. Finally I have returned back home for the holidays and had have the luxury to cook again.

This is one of the dishes I cooked for our Christmas dinner this year. This skillet roasted chicken was featured in the front cover of the Bon Appetit magazine which was lent to be from one of my favorite colleagues who was dying to share this with me when he first saw it. This skillet roasted chicken is from the #1 restaurant in the States. With this hype, I gotta try it out right?

I have never really roasted a whole chicken at home before. It always seems like roasting a whole chicken is a very troublesome process which involving preparing the whole chicken all the way to cleaning up the oven after all the splattering of the chicken oil. This recipe is a bit different than others I have looked at before. The key to this dish is prepoaching the chicken in an immersion circulator: cooking the chicken sous vide (French for “under vacuum”). This restaurant technique locks in moisture and keeps the food in contact with flavor-boosting seasonings. The vacuum-sealed item (usually protein) is poached in a bag at a low, controlled temperature that ensures optimum doneness. So the trick to this recipe is the “hot-water baths” used before the chicken is placed into the oven. Since most home cook at home don’t have a immersion circulator, this recipe teaches us a home-cook friendly method to get an almost-perfect vacuum inside an everyday resealable plastic bag (please look at the step 4 below to show you how).

Ingredients

· 1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

· 3 Tbsp. chopped fresh chives

· 2 Tbsp. chopped fresh thyme

· 1 Tbsp. chopped fresh Chervil (I actually skipped this one as I couldn’t find it in the super market)

· 1 Tbsp. chopped flat-leaf parsley

· 1 Tbsp. chopped fresh tarragon

· 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

· 1 tsp. finely grated lemon zest

· ½ tsp. freshly ground black pepper

· 1 (2-3lbs) chicken, halved

· 2 ½ tsp. kosher salt

Procedures

1. Whisk 1/3 cup oil oil, 1 Tbsp. chives and next 7 ingredients in a medium bowl.

2. Divide marinade between 2 (gallon-size) resealable plastic freezer bags.

3. Season chicken with 2 ½ tsp. salt, place 1 chicken half in each bag. Seal bag, release excess air, chill overnight.

4. Place bags side by side in a large pot. Add cold water to cover by 2’’. Heat water over medium heat until an instant-read thermometer registers 150 degree.

5. Turn off heat, cover, and poach chicken for 50 minutes.

6. Transfer bags to a large bowl of ice water to cool, about 15 minutes. Remove the chicken from bags; pat dry.

7. Preheat oven to 450 degree.

8. Heat vegetable oil in a large cast-iron skillet over high heat. Add chicken halves, skin side down, so chicken sits against sides of pan. Cook, moving chicken occasionally for even cooking, until skin is browned all over. Flip chicken and transfer skillet to oven. (note that I skipped this instead as I didn’t want to get the kitchen all smoky. As a result, I had to leave my chicken in the over longer (about 28 minute in the oven instead of 15 minutes)

9. Roast until an instant-read thermometer inserted into thickest part of thight registers 165 degree, about 15 minutes. Let rest for 10 minutes.

Again, since I skip the skillet procedure, I had to leave my chicken in the oven to cook longer. I first tried 20 minute and the chicken was still a bit red in the inside and not too brown on the outside so I let it cooked for another 8 minute then it turn out almost perfect – got a nice brown coding outside and still very juicy inside the meat. I think the poaching procedures works very well on the chicken in order to give it moisture and tenderness. So the extra pre-poaching step here it’s actually worth a try!

Oxtail stew in tomato red wine sauce 西班牙牛尾煲

Another one of my favorite dishes to cook. I usually make this dish when I am hosting dinner parties at home since it is well liked by most of my friends. It goes well with almost everything: pasta, rice, garlic bread....etc. It is also a good winter dish for thanksgiving dinner/X'mas dinner too. Who doesn't like oxtails right? This dish calls for a lot of ingredients. But don't let this overwhelm you! It's actually not hard to make. It just takes sometime because it's oxtail takes hours to cook to tender and fall off the bone.

Ingredient:

-2lbs Oxtail
-1 medium onion, diced
-2 medium carrorts, diced
-3 celery stalk, diced
-3 baking potato
-15oz of canned diced tomatoes (use fresh only at peak season)
-2 tbsps miced garlic
-2-3 medium bay leaves
-1 small bunch parsley, chopped (optional)
-2 cups red wine (dry red wine)
-1 can beef stock
-1 canned tomato paste
-1 tin water
-salt and pepper
-sugar to taste
-four for dusting
-oil for frying

Procedures - let the fun begins....

1. Season the oxtail with salt and pepper and then dust with flour


2. heat a large pan or casserole that will later hold all the meat, heat and fry the oxtail in batches until well browned. Remove and set aside


3. add a little more oil to the pan/casserole, add the onion, carrorts, celery and potato. Fry over medium heat for 2 minute, add in the garlic and bay leaves, fry for another 5 minute, stirring continuously so not to burn


4. Remove the potato from the pan and return the oxtail from step 2, add the wine, tomatoes, and broth, water, and season with salt, pepper and sugar to taste


5. Bring to boil, cover and place in the preheated over (350 degree). Cook for 2 1/2-3 hours or until the meat is very tender and starts to fall off the bone. If you do not want to use over, you can use stove instead.


6. add in the remaining potato during the last hour and let it cook for 1 hour.