Pokemon Cake

My daughter wanted to have a Pokemon birthday party. The center piece of the party got to be a Pokemon cake.

Steps:
1. T-7 days: Make rolled marshmallow fondant
2. T-6 to T-4 days: Make fondant figures Eevee, Pikachu, Charmander, and Squirtle. There are YouTube videos for other characters too. My clay skill was really rudimentary :-)

3. T-3 to T-2 days: Make cakes and crumb coating.
The bottom layer is 10" Vanilla Chiffon Cake with Swiss Meringue Buttercream crumb coating.
The top layer is 6" Vegan Chocolate Cake and Vegan Chocolate Buttercream crumb coating.
Store cake in refrigerator.

4. T-1 day: Assemble. After the cake is covered with fondant, it should not be refrigerated.

Sweet 16 Flower Cake

This is cake for my niece's sweet 16 party. The cake is Vegan Chocolate Cake and Vegan Chocolate Buttercream crumb coating. The outer layer frosting and decoration is actually Swiss Meringue Buttercream since I have not quite mastered vegan frosting.

Vegan Chocolate Cake and Chocolate Buttercream

My niece is a vegan now, and I thought she had to gave up sweets. But after some research, it was amazing how many vegan baking information is out there. I tried this vegan chocolate cake for my niece's birthday. It turned out very rich and moist.

Ingredient

This is for one 8-9" layer. Double or triple the amount for multiple layers.

1 ¼ cup all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
⅓ cup cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup warm/hot water (you may substitute this for coffee)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
⅓ cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon white or apple cider vinegar

Steps

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.

2. Grease a 8x8 square, or 8"/9" round cake pan.

3. In a mixing bowl, mix the dry ingredients.

4. Add the wet ingredients. Mix the ingredients together. 

5. Bake for 30 minutes. Cool on a cooling rack. 

6. Decorate with Vegan chocolate buttercream frosting, or other vegan frosting, or just use cocoa powder and fresh fruits.

Vegan Chocolate Buttercream

The vegan recipe I saw did not make sense to me. So I used the Regular Chocolate Buttercream recipe, except
- Replace shortening and butter with 1 cup of vegan butter
- Replace milk with Soy milk
- Add more soy milk, about 6-8 TBSP total. The consistency was okay for me since I used it for the crumb coating under fondant. If you want to use it to piping decorations, you may need more soy milk.

Pokemon Ball Cookie

These were the egg free sugar cookie with the egg free royal icing. The middle button is made with rolled marshmallow fondant.

Chocolate Cake Pops

For this Valentine's day, I followed this Chocolate Cake Pops recipe to make cake pops for my daughter's class. 

yield: 24-40 cake pops depends on pop size

Ingredients

【Cake】
All-purpose flour - 1 cup
Granulated sugar - 1 cup
Unsweetened cocoa powder - 6 Tablespoons (1/3 cup + 1 Tbsp)
Baking soda - 1/2 tsp
Salt - 1/4 tsp
Oil - 1/2 cup (canola, vegetable, or melted coconut oil)
Large eggs - 2, at room temperature (For eggless version, use 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce (4oz)  + 1tsp baking powder)
Pure vanilla extract -1 tsp
Hot water - 1/2 cup

【Frosting】

Unsalted butter - 6 TBSP, softened to room temperature
Confectioners' sugar - 3/4 cup
Unsweetened cocoa powder - 1/2 cup
Heavy cream or milk - 2-3 tsp
Pure vanilla extract - 1/2 tsp
【Coating】
32 ounces candy melts or coating (or pure chocolate)

sprinkles

Steps

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease a 9-inch pan.
2. Whisk all dry ingredients for cake together in a large bowl. Set aside. Whisk the wet ingredients for cake together in a medium bowl. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, add the hot water, and whisk everything together until combined. 

3. Pour the batter evenly into the prepared pan. Bake for 25-27 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Allow the cake to cool completely in the pan set on a wire rack.

4. To make the frosting, with a handheld or stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium speed until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add confectioners' sugar, cocoa powder, heavy cream/milk, and vanilla extract with the mixer running on low. Increase to high speed and beat for 3 minutes until it really comes together. Add another teaspoon of milk/cream if it looks a little too thick.
5. Crumble the cooled cake into the bowl on top of the frosting. Make sure there are no large lumps. Turn the mixer on low and beat the frosting and cake crumbles together until combined.

6. Measure 1-1.5 Tablespoon of moist cake mixture and roll into a ball. Place balls on a lined baking sheet. Refrigerate for 2 hours or freeze for 1 hour.

7. Melt the coating in a 2-cup liquid measuring cup, using microwave, double boiler, or candy melt pot.
8. Coat the cake balls: Remove only 2-3 cake balls from the refrigerator at a time. (Keep the rest cold!) Dip a lollipop stick about 1/2 inch into the coating, then insert into the center or the cake ball. Only push it about halfway - 3/4 through the cake ball. Dip the cake ball into the coating until it is completely covered. Make sure the coating covers the base of the cake ball where it meets the lollipop stick. Very gently tap the stick against the edge of the measuring cup to allow excess coating to drop off. Decorate the top with sprinkles and place upright into a lollipop stand, or styrofoam block or box. Repeat with remaining cake balls, only working with some out of the refrigerator at a time. The cake balls must be very cold when dipping!

9. Coating will set within an hour. Store cake pops in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.

Make ahead tip:
- You can make the cake 1 day ahead of time. Cover and keep at room temperature.
- You can store the undipped cake balls in the refrigerator for up to 2 days or freeze them for up to 6 weeks. Allow to thaw in the refrigerator then continue with step 7.
- You can also freeze the finished cake pops for up to 6 weeks once the coating has fully set. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator.

Homemade Mochi (糍粑)

Traditional way to make Mochi is to place steamed glutinous rice in a mortar, then pound it into sticky rice dough. See this video. The Mochi made from the Glutinous rice powder just do not have the same chewy texture. To save my arms, I used the Kitchen Aid to do the heavy lifting. This did limit how much rice I could make in one setting since the rice became very sticky and required the mixer to work hard.

Ingredients

Glutinous rice - 1 lb
Hot water - approx 1/2 cup

Steps

1. Soak rice overnight.

2. Steam rice over high heat for 20 minutes or until fully cooked.

3. Transfer cooked rice to stand mixer right away. Use the dough hook to mix at low speed for about 10 minutes or until you get a sticky dough. Add the hot water in batches, if needed.

4. Put the sticky rice dough onto an greased surface, and use a greased pestle (I used a steak hammer) to pound the dough. The more you pound it, the smooth the dough. Do it until you are satisfied with the texture, or too tired to continue.

5. Fresh Mochi can be served right away by.

- Boil brown sugar and water, with 2:1 ratio, in small pot until sugar is melt.

- Roll small balls of mochi in cooked soy bean power.

- Then put the coated rice balls into sugar water. Serve warm

6. To store the mochi, let it air dry for about 1 day. Then wrap with shrink wrap to store in container.

When you are ready to eat, slice it and pan-fry it. Can serve with sugar or other dipping.

Strawberry Cheesecake French Macaron

The procedure to make the shells was the same as the Chocolate French Macaron. The ingredients is as following,
- Powdered sugar - 150 g
- Almond flour - 150 g
- Egg white - 3 eggs, about 105 g, at room temperature
- Superfine sugar - 92-100 g
- Food color - 3 drops of red gel food color
- Optional - flavor with vanilla extract

The filling is made by mixing 4 ounces softened cream cheese and 3 tablespoons strawberry jam.

If the filling is too soupy, put it in refrigerator for 30 minutes before piping.

Matcha French Macaron with Red Bean Buttercream Filling

The procedure to make the shells was the same as the Chocolate French Macaron, except using green tea power instead of cocoa. Red bean seems to be a natural partner with green tea.

Ingredients:

Powdered sugar - 130 g
Almond flour - 120 g
Matcha (green tea) powder - 26 g
Egg white - 3 eggs, about 105 g, at room temperature
Superfine sugar - 92-100 g (used spice grinder to grind the granulated sugar)
Red bean buttercream (mix Swiss Meringue Butterceam with Red Bean Pastry Filling) - 1 cup

Steps:

1. Sift the powdered sugar, Matcha powder and almond flour through a fine-mesh sieve into a large bowl, pressing with a rubber spatula to pass through as much as possible. It will take a while, and up to 2 tablespoons of coarse almond flour may be left; just toss it.

2. Beat the egg whites with a stand mixer on medium speed until frothy. Increase the speed to medium high; gradually add the superfine sugar and beat until it holds a firm peak, about 5 more minutes.

3. Transfer the beaten egg whites to the bowl with the almond flour mixture. Draw a rubber spatula halfway through the mixture and fold until incorporated, giving the bowl a quarter turn with each fold. Continue folding and turning, scraping down the bowl, until the batter is smooth and falls off the spatula in a flat ribbon, 2 to 3 minutes. It takes about 35-40 folds.

4. Transfer the batter to a pastry bag fitted with a 1/4-inch round tip. Holding the bag vertically and close to the silicon baking mat or baking sheet lined with Parchment paper, pipe 1 1/4-inch circles.

5. It is important to firmly tap the baking sheets twice against the counter to release any air bubbles.
6. Let the cookies sit at room temperature until the tops are no longer sticky to the touch, 15 minutes to 1 hour, depending on the humidity.

7. Preheat convention oven 310°F.
8. Bake for 5 minutes.
9. Reduce oven to 275°F, and bake 8 minutes.
10. Cover the cookies with a big sheet of aluminum foil and bake for the last 5-8 minutes.

11. Transfer to a rack to cool completely.

12. Peel the cookies off the sheets and let it cool completely.  Sandwich the cookies with filling.

13. When cookies are cool, put in a sealed container in refrigerator. The cookies taste better after 1-2 days.