Mid valley megamall at the moment is quite an exasperating place to do grocery shopping, coz both Carrefour and Jusco are undergoing renovation, and half the stuff is not available, which includes, PASTRY. So I am combing the mall on Thursday night is a futile quest for ready made shortcrust.
Conclusion : The supermarket that sells the most variety of ready pastry, is Village Grocer, Bangsar Village. You can get Pampas Puff Pastry, Shortcrust, Borg Puff Pastry, Canola Pastry, Filo, etc etc...Not even cold storage has that variety.
I decided to experiment on my cell group first, on Friday night. Beef in guinness stout is not everyone's cup of tea, or stout, or beer. Anyway, I decided on an assortment of puff and shortcrust pastry. Now, since I couldnt find ready rolled shortcrust, I had to contend with the block of shortcrust, which you have to roll yourself. And as I forgot to defrost it early enough, it was still too hard. After zapping in microwave, it was too soft. Looked like a disaster from +the word go
Muffin Sized (not mini muffin) Beef Pies in Guinness
For my main event on Saturday, I got lazy, and made just one big pieAlso made cream puffs,
with very badly made custard, that turned out looking like scrambled eggs.
I must try to make a creme patisserie from scratch.
Friend ordered a durian cake, which I had to make by Sunday night. As it is chock full of fresh cream, I hope that along the way, the cream doesn't melt, in transit. Unlike some commercial cakes, that use non dairy cream, which hold its form, fresh cream melts darn fast. Again, this is a guinea pig case.... It's my first attempt at this type of durian cake, inspired of course by my recent less than pleasant experience at the cafe mentioned in previous post.
On Saturday night, I got an emergency order from friend, for birthday cake with purple icing. Decorative cakes are not my forte, but since she wasn't in a position to be choosy, I relented. (which was a bad idea coz was up till 4am on Saturday partying, and was sleep deprived on Sunday). Forgot to take a picture of the purple cake.
As I was getting the cake ready, I get YET another SOS from friend, who said her restaurant had run out of dessert. It was 2.30pm, and she was picking up purple cake at 4.30pm, so the only dessert I could quickly whip up for her was the peach and banana crumble.
26 comments:
Ya, tell me about it! Everywhere got no Pampas Puff, so I settled on local Kawan puff pastry that I found in Tesco. RM3.99 for a pack of 20 small square sheets. Not bad lah.
Only much later did we discover the super variety at Bangsar Village.
hey, snowdrop, u dun have a blog right? why ah? i'm so curious to see the lotus cake.
i oso cheated with the custard, used instant...not bird's, but the one from bake shop. i think bird's is better. last time i added whipped cream into it, which was much better.
spot, yarrrrr, i oso had to buy the kawan puff pastry, which is not bad, but a bit thick. 3.99 not for twenty la, only 12 i think. coz i only managed to get six pies out of one pack, 6 for base, 6 for top.
there was a period where EVEN village grocer no pampas puff....national shortage or what!!!
snowdrop, japanese cheesecake is the chiffony light type issit? aiyo, i have to brush up on my cheesecakes, the restaurant lady oridi enquiring about cheese cake.
I guess you could charge an SOS ("Surcharge fOr Service")for emergency desserts...waitaminit...that ain't good for me as a potential customer! Forget i wrote that....how to delete this comment...is it by pressing this..
i used to love cheesecakes, but these days, not into it at all. i have the japanese cheescake recipe, i think either in alex goh's book or catherine lau's cheesecake seduction.
nice looking beef pies. do u hv the recipe for it? been looking for a good one and thought i might like to try yours. thx!
evan, basically the beef is 500gm of good quality beef, (skirt, i think its called), 250ml beef stock, 1 can guinness stout, 2 tablespoons flour, 1 large onion. Fry the onions, until nice and brown and fragrant, then add the beef, until browned, add the flour, pour in the stock and simmer, add the guinness, continue simmering for an hour or so. i added mushrooms as well, which wasnt in the recipe.
snowdrop/spot: spot got blog meh? i click on link, nothing pun.
The experimental durian cake was a runaway success with my mom. Then again, she loves all things durian. It's her birthday hence the order for one. My son (aged 5)was worried about the thorns since i said the cake was made of durians. My youngest kid (15 mths)threw up after a little bite...typical banana kid. As for me...i found the cake quite light and the aroma wasn't overpowering. More durian than cake...hardly the case for commercial ventures. Cream wasn't too thick. But i'm hoping to have a second slice to be sure....if there is any left.
thx for the recipe...but beef skirt? where to get leh? can substitute using minced beef not?
DURIAN CAKE!!!! How's the taste like?
evan: I bought the beef in carrefour that said "SHIRT" which I guess was a typo for SKIRT. I actually thought of using mince meat as well, but the thing with mince, here in msia, you never know what the heck goes into it.
jackson: i myself have not tasted the cake. only the individual components. you have to rely on the review given by toekneetoe.
I've tried that Beef guinness pie before. Sedap kan. One thing good about living in Australia, I can buy my pastry almost in all the supermarket here. Pampas even make springroll skin.
hey fatboy, thx for yr comment in my blog but unfortunately i'm from singapore leh. otherwise, can get alot of "tips" from u hehe. so, is sausage mince a kind of raw mince meat or is it merely chopped sausages?
are the mince meat in malaysia really that bad that u dont know what goes into it? its terrible! i don't think such thing happens in singapore. stuffs are pretty safe to eat here, so i guess i can go ahead to substitute skirt beef for minced beef then =)
Fatboy
The sausages ingredients here in perth also do not what they put inside. Dare not ask incase it might turn me off.
evan, i'm pretty sure sausage mince is processed meat....the texture etc is completely different from normal mince.
i guess it's fairly safe to buy mincemeat here la, (as in normal mince meat), but yes, singapore would certainly be a more sterilised guarantee, when it comes to strange things in food.
flower, rumour has it that aussie meat pies are filled with horse and kangaroo meat even right!!!
wow! they way you r running around making cakes, pies whatever... in no time you'll have to call your blog thinboybakes :D ... secretly wish i belong to you cell group!
haha thinboybakes!! audrey, u really do hv a sense of humor, tho' i feel that slimboybakes would sound nicer :p hehe
Oohh.. i am slow! didn't know your venture has grown so much, congrats! So can i order my mom's birthday cake from you? (her birthday end of Oct) She likes cheese cake/walnut cake (i think she hasn't tried that many other types!)
audreycooks and evan, thanks, but yar, somehow thinboybakes or slimboybakes....is like that program, never trust a thin cook hor!!!
but it can get pretty tiring....half my stress if from trying to look for things... measuring cups la, pans la, they seem to have a life of their own and go into hiding.
I see you buy pastry.
I've stopped doing that because I really need to cut down the amount of fats I eat. Trouble is how to do shortcrust without using a solid fat?
I'm just trying to make one with olive oil instead of butter. Will see how it goes.
hi clive, do let us know how the shortcrust with olive oil goes. well, i dont always eat the stuff, (as in pastry), so when i do, i dont mind it loaded with butter.
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