I Got Featured!

I was thrilled that the girls of the most popular cupcake blog "Cupcakes Take the Cake" featured My Blueberry Cupcakes on their blog. I was so excited that they took notice of the blueberry cupcake photo and they posted a link of my blog in their blog together with a full entry. Cupcakes Take the Cake is a blog created by 3 cupcake loving friends from NY. It features cupcakes from all over the world. I read from their blog that they will be in the Martha Stewart Show tomorrow. :) Please check out the link above for their entry on my cupcakes.

Blueberry Mud Cupcakes

I found a blueberry pie filling in the grocery and I bought it with a cheesecake in mind. If you noticed in my previous entries, I had been thinking of making cheesecakes for weeks but I never get to doing it because it is hard to make in small quantities and if I make it in full cake size, nobody will finish it. When I saw the pie filling sitting in my counter, I decided to open it and try to taste it and I was amazed at how good it tasted. The pie filling will be able to hold a flavor on its own because I was initially thinking of kicking up the flavor by heating it with some sugar and fresh lemon juice. Since the blueberry itself was very tasty already, I thought of making topping it on a plain butter cupcake.
So I then made the vanilla butter cupcakes which were out of the oven after 20 minutes of baking. As for the frosting, I made made some white chocolate mud icing and folded with it half cup of the blueberry filling. The resulting emulsion turned into a slightly violet/bluish mixture and the texture was like a mud. I then topped the cooled cupcakes with the frosting and decorated it with white sugar sprinkles for some color contrast.
The photo does not do justice to how the cupcakes tasted like! It was bursting with flavors from the blueberry and the slight whisper of the white chocolate. It's now one of my favorite flavors and definitely a keeper!

My Pandesal

If I were in the Philippines, it would be very impractical to bake my own Pandesal because it is sold in every corner. Pandesal sa Pugon was just very near our house and regardless of what we had for breakfast back home, there would always be Pandesal. Even Creamy (my dog) has his share of Pandesal every morning (but he's on a diet now, so no Pandesal for him in the meantime).
I had been craving for Pandesal for ages and I had been looking for a recipe so that I could make it on my own. I found several recipes, but since all of these recipes uses evaporated milk, I would always just ditch it because I cannot find any evaporated milk sold here in Israel. I decided to try replacing the evaporated milk with regular whole milk and see what will happen. There's no harm in trying. So last night, I made sure that I had all the ingredients at hand so that I would make Pandesal first thing in the morning for breakfast. But lo and behold, I woke up at 1pm! Technically, it would still be my breakfast since it's my first meal so I still decided to bake the bread. After much ado, I went to my kitchen and started preparing the dough. It's just a combination of very small amounts of milk, sugar, butter, yeast and flour plus other leaveners. After combining the ingredients, I left it on the stand mixer on kneading mode for 15mins. After kneading, I left it for another 15mins again so that the dough would double up in size. Once the dough was double its size, I used an ice cream scoop to make the individual Pandesal. My small recipe yielded 15 pieces. After baking it for 10mins, I have my freshly baked, golden brown Pandesal! I opened a Spam, made some fluffy scrambled eggs and opened a can of Reno to go with the bread. I know it's too much but I just had to taste all of it all at once! :) Manny and I never got to finish everything though, it was very heavy and filling. The Pandesal tasted like a real one (but it's real anyway! :D), and it was crunchy on the outside but soft inside.

Cuatro Leches Cake

Every time I bake a whole cake, I would always plan on taking a picture of the cake after it gets sliced for serving and I would either get lazy or forget about it. This time, I made it a point to take a nice photo after the first slice.
After a day of wondering what to bake, Manny thought that he wanted a Cuatro Leches cake. I have baked it before but it was rather improvised because I did not have all the ingredients back then. As I have learned from baking911, this cake is called as such because of the four types of milk used. It's basically a Vanilla Sponge Cake soaked in a four milk sauce, covered with Swiss Meringue and drizzed with some Caramel sauce.
After assembling the cake, I left it to settle for a while and we went to grill some barbecue for dinner. We were so excited with the barbecue so we set the table and then I immediately cut the cake without realizing that I have not taken a photo of the whole cake!
Anyway, Manny cut a clean and picturesque slice of the cake and I plated it, wedding style. I have always loved how sliced cakes looked neat and elegant at Martha Stewart's website. Here's a photo of my imitation. My cakes will never get nowhere close, but what the heck :)

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies

I had been contemplating on making some cookies but I don’t have a cookie sheet and when I finally got one, I let it sit for weeks in my cupboard. Having seen a good oatmeal cookie recipe in baking911, I decided to try making one. I wanted to try few flavors all at once, but again, no one will finish it! The recipe that I got was very easy and quite healthy because of the oats.
As always during weekends, I immediately turn on my oven when I wake up (this time at around 11am) to bake something, and normally, I get started at around 2pm. This time around, it was already 3pm but I have not decided to bake anything yet. I had thought of baking some cheesecakes for today but it will take us forever again to finish it! As much as I wanted to eat it, as I got older, I realized that I cannot just eat anything without gaining any weight! So anyway, while I was still thinking of what to bake, I decided to bake something quick in between and decided on popping some cookies in the oven.
After 5mins of making the batter, and 12 minutes of baking, I have freshly made oatmeal cookies. Ate Jen went by our house today to have her laptop installed with some softwares and she initially did not want to eat anything because it was Good Friday. But then I tempted her with some cookies (and some beef with oyster sauce and broccoli meal) and she gave in! :) The cookies were soft and chewy, and smelled really good! We had some after dinner (cookies for dessert, weird eh?) and I forgot to send her some when she went home. My bad!

Chocolate Revel Bars

Today is my first free day after 2 weeks. I had been very busy at work for the past 2 weeks, and then we went to Jordan for a quick 3-day vacation last weekend. We drove to the border, then took a taxi going to Amman where we stayed for the entire time. Then we went to Petra for a day trip. I was tired after going back here in Haifa! As they say when you take a vacation, "you need to take a vacation to relax after your vacation!".

I spent the entire day today fixing things around the house. I have a 3-week laundry load that I started to do today (and at 11pm, I have one load of beige/cream colored clothes left). Then there's the sheets that I needed to change, bed that I needed to do, dust the entire house, clean the bathroom and cook meals for my hungry tummy! I pretty much did everything today, and when I was standing at the middle of the living room, I saw one big something that I forgot to do...remove the Christmas tree! It's already March and I still have it in the middle of the room! :)

Anyway, in between all of those things, I managed to take a nap, and bake something just to satisfy the sweet tooth craving. While cooking tapsilog for brunch (which is more like a lunner, or dunch...because it's at 2pm already), I prepared the batter for the Chocolate Revel Bars. I remember talking with Lemon in YM a few months back and she said she loves Revel Bars. I thought I haven't tried one yet and I googled it and found that it was how it is called! I have tried it already after all! I started looking for a recipe back then. However, I can't find a decent one. I tried looking again today (with the laptop in the kitchen counter while cooking) and I failed to find that perfect recipe. What I just then did is to take 3 recipes from the web, and interlace it based on my very short baking career. LOL!

I did the mixing of the batter in parallel while I was frying the beef tapa that I made, and by the time that the beef was done, I was starting baking the Revel Bars. After finishing our lunch, the Revel Bars were also done. It baked for around 40 minutes. We had it for dessert and it was very good. Not too sweet, chocolatey, soft and crunchy because of the oatmeal. It was very good for a quick baking fix. Let me know if you'd like some! :)

Rolled Fondant Cake

There really is no occasion this week to make a whole cake and fancy at that. I normally make cupcakes only just to be able to bake and to try out new recipes in small quantities. This is the first weekend that I had a free weekend so I decided to try out making fondant. Or this could be my Tita Len's belated happy birthday cake! :)This is my first successful attempt at making rolled fondant from scratch. The recipe for the rolled fondant is Toba Garrett's which I got from baking911. It's made up of gelatin, corn syrup, vanilla extract and confectionary sugar mixed and kneaded together to form the dough like consistency. The final fondant was slightly on the dry side, so I had a lot of creases and folds on the cake which I cannot straighten out because of the dryness. Creases were more obvious on the bottom part of the cake.
The cake inside is also something that I made for the first time. The cake recipe is Rose Levy Berenbaum's All Downy Yellow Cake. It was very good (based on the crumbs that I got) and very... yellow (but of course! LOL!). I frosted and coated the cake with some Vanilla Buttercream.
After assembling the cake with the fondant, I topped it with some sugar flowers, sugar pearls and silver dragees on top. I would have wanted to make the flowers from gum paste (which would have made it thinner and more realistic) but since it's a no-occasion cake, I just settled with some fondant sugar flowers. After having the final cake done, I can't wait to make another one again! :)

Dulce De Leche Cupcakes

These are White Cupcakes filled with Dulce De Leche and topped with Vanilla Meringue. This is the first time that I used my blow torch and at first it was scary using it but it gets fun afterwards. LOL. Meringue really tastes better torched. I made these cupcakes after 2 weeks of hectic schedule at work, and after finally releasing my test program. It was also my record breaking baking time, everything was done from the baking to the frosting after an hour!

Here are some more photos of the cupcakes. Pictures are not so good because I took it. Hehe. I keep saying must be because of the different camera, but I guess it's me. :) And of course Manny and I cannot (or should not!) finish 16 cupcakes before they perish so I brought the rest to our morning meeting at the office. Together with a hot coffee, the cuppies were a hit!

Birthday Cuppies

It's Ate Jen's birthday today and as a gift for her, I made her some cupcakes. She wanted a chocolate mousse cake, but I did not have the time to make her one, so instead, I whipped up a chocolate cupcake recipe that I could make fast. Manny's parents were already going back to San Jose today and we brought them to the airport in Tel Aviv at 2:30am. We were back in Haifa at around 6am. Being tired and all, I slept until 2pm, stayed in bed until 3pm, got up only when my stomach was already grumbling from hunger :) Plus, I ate my very late lunch for more than an hour because of the Sharapova-Radwanska Qatar Open game on TV. Having slept almost the entire day, I was not able to make Ate Jen's chocolate mousse.
Anyway, I managed to make her some chocolate cupcakes with melted chocolate filling inside frosted with raspberry buttercream and topped with some sugar dragees.
Manny and I went to her place at around 9pm. She had a party and we had some Filipino food for dinner. She liked the cakes and cupcakes that I previously made and she did not want to share these new ones to anyone! :) LOL!

Coffee Crumb Cupcakes

These cupcakes are leftovers of the Coffee Crumb cake that I made below. It is made of a butter cake in the bottom, topped with a generous layer of coffee crumb on top. It was so good! Sorry about the photos, I just had to take a picture before they're all gone! And gone they were! :) This cake is not very sweet, and has a big crunch when eaten. Definitely good with coffee too!

Cuppies Boxed Up!

These cupcakes went all the way to Eilat (southernmost Israeli city which is on the border of Egypt and Jordan) as presents for Manny's relatives living there. His parents who are here in Israel for vacation brought with them the cuppies. It seems like my Chocolate Cupcakes which is a version of Sarah Philips' UCBC are becoming bestsellers. I again made the Chocolate Cupcakes with Fudge in the middle, this time topped with Vanilla Buttercream. They said the kids loved the chocolate!

Happy Valentine!

My valentine cupcakes are made of double chocolate fudge cupcakes topped with raspberry buttercream. I brought some to the office to spread some love to my Israeli officemates who celebrate valentine's in July. :) I also gave some to Thet and little Iya who probably won't be able to eat it because it's sweet and she has coughs. I hope Iya gets well soon so she could enjoy Europe!

My New Kitchen Aid!

I bought my new black Artisan about a week ago and after staring at it for a week, I finally found time to bake something. These are the first cupcakes that I made using it. It really is the coolest mixer ever! :) The cupcakes turned out very soft, fluffy and moist.

These double chocolate blast cupcakes were made with 75% Cocoa Belgian chocolate and all natural cocoa powder. Because of all the chocolates, each tasted like it's made with some expensive European chocolate. Some Vanilla Buttercream on top.

Google Me!

If you google "odette cupcake", this blog will be the first one in the searched results. If you google "cupcake odette", I'd be the second result. Ain't that cool? Hehe, but the question is, who would be crazy enough to search "odette cupcake" other than Manny? Haha. He's the one who told me about this google thingy. :)
You can click on the picture below for a larger image.

Hey Ly and Ice!

Around the 2nd week of January (I think), Lyra told me that she is expecting and she is due again I think, around end of August or early September. After 2 weeks, Ice told me that she is also expecting and due around of end of September! You guys are going to be preggy together! I'm so happy for you two girls and I am looking forward to seeing those big bumps. :) I'll be praying for both of you that you'll have safe pregnancies and healthy babies. :)

And now for the fun part, I made you sample cuppies. Well, these are exactly not samples, these are just flavors that I haven't tried (among other to-try recipes that I have) and just needing any reason to bake. :) So ly it's plus happy birthday for you, on top of your and Ice' groundbreaking(!) news. Hehe.

I'm currently planned to go home by mid-October unless I get extended here again. I hope I'd make it home to be able to make cupcake towers for you girls! :)

These cupcakes are the "Lemon Burst" - Lemon Cream Cheese Cupcakes topped with Lemon Buttercream.

After 10 Years!

I haven't been able to blog for ages because of my new laptop. For some reason, whenever I open internet explorer and start posting new blogs, the tool for uploading photos (and all of the enchalada...font, size, etc) is not available. For starter, here's for you mommy myleen. Some white chocolate raspberry ganache on top of an orange butter cupcake! :) Kelan uwi mo?

Cream Cheese Frosting

I had been wondering for the longest time how does the Cream Cheese frosting taste like. Wouldn't the mixture of confectionary sugar and cream cheese be weird? Well it turned out it's not. I made some chocolate cupcakes to use my first-time-tried cream cheese frosting. It tasted like ice cream (according to Ruben). The chocolate cupcake also turned out very moist. I am finally over the bridge of making good cupcakes. I can now bake chocolates with more confidence :) So here's how the final cupcakes looked like.

Happy Birthday Mike!

It's Mike's nth birthday today (secret raw) and I made him some cupcakes. I made him Chocolate Chip Blast Cupcakes with Ultimate Vanilla Buttercream frosting. In our office here in IDC, it is their tradition that if it's your birthday, you are supposed to bring your own cake to share with everyone. So there, I made him cupcakes to share with his PPV peers. We were all joking that I had "low yield" for my cupcakes. My overall yield is only 68.75%. For a normal recipe which yields me 16 cupcakes, I only got 11.
We all had dinner at Giraffe (Me, Manny, Ruben, Daniel and Mike) and had a whole load of dishes that turned my empty stomach upside down. We had fried rice, the "Philippine Dish" (which is not a tad bit Filipino), calamaris, chicken something and the Giraffe special which seemed to have had all their available ingredients in one big bowl. Afterwards, we went to Greg's for coffee where we stayed only for a few minutes because I had to go home (go figure why I had to go home!). It was a fun get together, with Mike sharing his and Thet's love story (hehehe). And as usual, Daniel would be in the hot seat because we keep nagging him if he has a secret girlfriend and we keep setting him up with our girl friends.
Anyway, today was a fun day. And they liked the cupcakes (or at least that's what Mike said). And since it was low yield, I was only able to pinch few crumbs to taste how my cupcakes went. :)

Irish Cream Liquer Cupcakes

Here are my cupcakes for the weekend. I had been very busy over the week so no time to bake some cupcakes. For this week, I made some Vanilla Cupcakes with Chocolate Chips inside (as requested by Manny) and frosted with Chocolate Ganache laced with Irish Cream Liquer. I can't seem to find Bailey's here but I found other Irish Cream Liquor brands. I bought Fenney's and I used it for this recipe. The frosting does not taste alcoholic at all, but it gives the chocolate a different tanginess, making it seem like I used an expensive Belgian chocolate for the frosting. Well I did use a chocolate with 75% Cocoa content, so it's a little on the high end side. Above is my attempt at making basket weaves. It needs a lot of practice. :)
Now here's my cupcake ala-Magnolia. It's topped with Sugar Sprinkles. The sprinkles add a little twist to the frosting. The frosting is a Ganache so it's not sweet at all. The Sugar Sprinkles makes it slightly on the sweeter side.
Here's my classic swirls topped with Sugar Flowers and Dragees. I'm still on my quest for that perfect swirl. The chocolate chips inside the cuppies look like raisins. The chocolates inside were very soft and chewy.

What's For Breakfast?

Well it's actually not breakfast because I never wake up early and I don't technically eat breakfast. It's my weekend lunch, high starch, high fat, high cholesterol. It's pancakes with ham in between, bacon on the sides and an egg to top it. What a way to start my day. Hehe.