Making your own popcorn

Popcorn is a must when I go to the movies. Not like I can finish the whole box myself, even when I buy the smallest size. Usually I go for the mixture of sweet and salty. When I saw this at the supermarket, I couldn’t resist. Why buy expensive popcorn when I can do it at home? I drizzled my popcorn with the honey I bought in Sydney earlier and they tasted wonderful.

Honey popcorn
90g corn
100ml vegetable oil
4 tbsp honey
 
1. Heat up the oil over low flame in a medium sized pot with a lid.

2. Add the corn and cover the pot. The corn will start popping after about 4 minutes.

3. Hold up the pot, with the lid on, shake it over the flame. Rotate every now and then to ensure that the heat gets distributed evenly. It takes about 15 minutes to pop all the corn.

4. Pour all the popcorn into a bowl. Drizzle with honey and mix thoroughly before serving. Makes one big bowl.

Secret

Pssst. If I tell you a secret, would you keep it to yourself? For I may ruin my very cool reputation if this secret leaks out. Promise? Okay, here it goes. *deep breath* I suck at cracking eggs. Big time. Everytime I crack eggs, the yolks would either break or there will be bits of egg shells will suspended in the egg mixture. Crap. Recipes that require me to separate egg yolks and egg whites are the worst. I usually waste a couple of eggs before I get it right. Which was what happened for the Japanese light cheesecake which I did for my aunt. I wasted 3 eggs, ending up with 3 extra yolks. I looked at the 3 yolks and hesistated. Can’t possibly eat them by myself. That’s alot of calories to down at once. Flipping through my recipe book, I spied Pichet Ong’s Honey Castella Cake which I have bookmarked forever. It required 7 eggs and 3 yolks. Perfect. The honey castella (also known as Kasutera) cake is a japanese sponge cake and is a specialty of Nagasaki in Japan. I tried it once and fell in love with the light but flavourful sponge cake.

Just after putting the cake into the oven, I realised that the ingredients in this recipe is largely similar to the honey cupcakes I did earlier, except I used all purpose flour this time round and omitted the baking powder. Pichet Ong’s instructions were a little vague. His instruction was to beat the batter until thick. That leaves alot to imagination as not may not exactly know how thick should thick be. I beat the batter until it was a very pale cream color, and the batter did not sink immediately when you dribble it back into the bowl. Perhaps it was because I had really high expectations on the cake, I was a little disappointed with the results. Sadly, it was nothing like the castella cake I tried before   It was also very sweet. At least, too sweet for my liking. It was a little on the tough side too, possibly due to the usage of all purpose flour instead of cake flour. Another thing, the batter volume is very large.  My 4.3 litre mixer bowl was filled to the brim after the egg mixture more than tripled in volume after beating. Thus, you may want to scale down the recipe.

Honey Castella Cake
(Adapted from The Sweet Spot by Pichet Ong)

¼ cup (52g) vegetable oil
1 ½ cups (210g) all-purpose flour
1 ½ cups (300g) sugar
¼ cup (100g) honey
½ tsp salt
7 large eggs
3 yolks

1. Preheat oven to 175C (350F) and set the rack in the center. Grease (very generously) a 9 x 13 inch pan and set aside.

2. Sift flour and salt together.

3. Put eggs, yolks, sugar and honey in the bowl of an electric mixer and set over a saucepan of simmering water. Whisk constantly until sugar is completely dissolved and the mixture is warm to touch, about 10 minutes.

4. Fit the bowl into the mixer and whisk at medium high speed until the mixture is pale yellow, thick and completely cool. Lift the whisk attachment and let the batter drip back into the bowl. The batter should not sink immediately. Gently fold in the flour.

5. Lastly, mix in the oil quickly but firmly. Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Let the batter sit for 10 minutes before putting it into the oven.

6. Bake for 15 minutes, then lower the heat to 150C (300F) and bake until a tester inserted in the center comes out clean, about 55 minutes more. Cool completely on the rack.

Are you Twitter-ing?

Have you been compulsively updating your moves (in 140 words) on Twitter 24-7? Seems like Twitter is the next big thing after Facebook. For those of you who aren’t quite familiar with it, Twitter is basically an online tool that allows your friends and family to communicate and find out what you are doing. As long as you are logged on, you can update your status and post pictures. Simply put, you can call it an online tracking tool. You can also follow other Twitter-ers and track their movements. I have been following Ashton Kutcher on Twitter and that guy is really entertaining. He is an avid Twitter-er and we followers get a behind the scene in to his life and movie set of his latest flick he is filming. Pretty cool, but other than that, unless you are always online, you may not be too into Twitter. Perhaps its more for movie stars and models who can delight their fans with their latest movements.

I am finally on leave after being busy for the past 3 months. Will be busy studying for the upcoming CPA exam in May, and hopefully catch up with some sleep as well. I bought this cook book from Kinokuniya ages ago and have yet to try any recipes in it. Even though I bookmarked quite a few. *hangs head in shame* These mini honey cakes are really easy to make and you can whip up a batch in half an hour. I use this brand of honey because it reminds me of my granny. She used to make me hot honey using this  Do use a good honey for the flavour will shine through in the cake.

Simple Honey Cupcakes

(Adapted from 100 cake recipes by Teacher Meng)

 

30g oil (any flavorless oil)

45g honey

3 large eggs

40g sugar

75g cake flour

½ tsp baking powder

 

1.     Preheat oven to 165C (325F). Line a 10 cup muffin tray or grease with cooking spray. Pour honey and oil into a cup (or bowl) and warm it over a pot of simmering water for about 10 minutes until honey melts. Stir mixture and leave it aside.  

 

2.     Whisk flour and baking powder together before sifting.

 

3.     With your stand mixer fit with whisk attachment, beat eggs and sugar, gradually increasing speed from medium to high. The batter will gradually change to a pale yellow, 8 – 10 minutes. To test whether the batter is ready, lift the whisk attachment and allow the batter to trickle back into the bowl. The batter will not sink immediately. Continue to beat at low speed for 1 minute.

 

4.     Add in the dry ingredients and warmed honey and oil mixture into the batter. Stir quickly but gently until just combined.

 

5.     Divide the batter evenly, filling them up to ¾ full. Bake for about 16 – 22 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cupcakes comes out clean. Makes about 10 – 11 cupcakes. Store in an air tight container for up to 3 days.

 

Note: Pour 3 tablespoons of water into unfilled cupcake moulds before baking. This will help to prevent the moulds from distorting in the hot oven.