Spiced Sticky Buns

YUM.

Seriously, I could end my post there. The pictures speak for themselves. These sticky buns are my new baking love. And not just because putting the word 'sticky' and 'bun' together makes me giggle a little bit.

Look at that caramel sauce dribbling down the sides. Total food porn. Can you tell how much I am loving my new cast iron skillet? I baked with it again this week. It was my inspiration for trying out this recipe, because I knew my new skillet would be perfect for something that involved baking with a layer of sauce bubbling at the bottom.

Rather than trying a traditional cinnamon bun or scroll, I decided to try these sticky buns. Similar in shape to the cinnamon bun, but baked with a sticky sauce on the bottom and then inverted after baking so the sauce oozes down into the bread. It makes me salivate just by writing about it. And instead of just limiting myself to cinnamon, I went crazy with all kinds of spices. I added vanilla bean to the caramel sauce, along with star anise. I added cardamom, ginger, nutmeg and cloves to the filling. If you're like me and you like your spices then this is the recipe for you. If not, you can tailor the spices mix to your liking or stick to just plain cinnamon. I won't judge.

Awwwww yeah.

This recipe is quite long-winded, I would definitely recommend saving it for a day when you have plenty of time to wander in and out of the kitchen throughout the day. I picked a rainy Saturday with the cricket on the tele when I was supposed to be cleaning the house for a rental inspection. I'm pretty sure that I ended up making more mess than I cleaned. It was so worth it. They actually tasted even better a day later because it gave it time for the sauce to really seep into the bun and reheating them in the microwave allowed it to steam and soften the bread slightly. These buns are soft, gooey and moreish and you should definitely make them.

Spiced Sticky Buns

(Adapted from this Cinnamon Bun recipe)

For bread:

1 tsp white sugar

1 (7g/.25 oz) package active dry yeast

1/2 cup warm water (45°C/110°F)

1/2 cup milk

1/4 cup white sugar

55g (1/4 cup) butter

1 teaspoon salt

2 eggs, beaten

4 cups (about 520g) plain/all-purpose flour

For topping:

170g (3/4 cup) butter

1 vanilla bean pod, split and seeds scraped (or 1 tsp pure vanilla extract/vanilla bean paste)

1 star anise

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup maple syrup

For filling:  

55g (1/4 cup) melted butter

3/4 cup brown sugar

1 tbsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground ginger

1/4 tsp ground cardamom

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

1/4 tsp ground cloves

Optional: 1 cup chopped pecans, divided between topping and filling

In a small bowl, dissolve 1 tsp sugar and yeast in  warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes. Warm the milk in a small saucepan until it bubbles, then remove from heat. Mix in 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup butter and salt; stir until melted. Let cool until lukewarm.

In a large bowl, combine the yeast mixture, milk mixture, eggs and 1 1/2 cups of flour; stir well to combine. Stir in the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, beating well after each addition (I used my dough hook attachment on my electric mixer for this). When the dough has pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 8 minutes (or continue to use your dough hook attachment on an electric mixer for about the same amount of time)

Lightly oil a large bowl, place the dough in the bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 hour. While dough is rising, melt 170g (3/4 cup) butter, with vanilla bean pod and seeds and star anise in a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir in 3/4 cup brown sugar and maple syrup, whisking until smooth. Remove vanilla pod and star anise and pour into greased 9x13 inch baking pan (I used a 10 inch skillet with high sides). 

Melt remaining 55g (1/4 cup) butter; set aside. Combine remaining 3/4 cup brown sugar, cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, cloves and nutmeg (I also added a bit of black pepper too) in a small bowl. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface, roll into an 45x35cm (18x14 inch) rectangle (about 0.5cm thick). While leaving a 1.5cm (about half an inch) border uncovered, brush evenly with half the melted butter and sprinkle with brown sugar spice mixture. Starting at long side, tightly roll up, pinching seam to seal. Brush outside with remaining butter. With serrated knife, cut into 15 pieces (since I used a smaller pan I cut it into about 12 taller pieces); place cut side down, in prepared pan. Cover and let rise for 1 hour or until doubled in volume. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). (You can place on top of another baking tray in case the topping bubbles up the sides.)

Bake in preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes, until golden brown. Take care not to overbake or they will be dry.  Let cool in pan for 3 minutes, then invert onto serving platter. Scrape remaining filling from the pan onto the rolls. Best served warm, can be stored in an airtight container for several days and reheated before serving.

Funfetti Skillet Cookie with White Chocolate Chips

Last week was a little bit cray-cray. I'm still recovering from it. I'm not usually someone who makes a big deal about my birthday but somehow I ended up with multiple birthday celebrations and multiple birthday cakes. I have the best friends and I'm incredibly lucky. And then on top of that I also happened to attend the awards ceremony for Cosmopolitan Australia's Fun Fearless Female Awards and somehow came away with the award for Blogger of the Year. What?!

In true Steph style, I had completely convinced myself that I had zero chance of winning. I never win anything. Not exaggerating. Okay, I might have won a speech night award at school once but that doesn't count. I had managed to pick up a cold the day before so I was on the cold and flu meds, and then started enjoying the Moscato a little too much (don't try this at home, kids) so was totally shocked when I had to go up and accept my award. Cosmo put on a great event and it was hugely humbling to be surrounded by all these amazing women, like sportswoman of the year Jacqui Freney and overall winner Turia Pitt. And then there's me, who plays around with butter and sugar on the weekends. Surreal. I was there because I have amazing readers who voted for me! So this post is for you guys, thank you for voting for me!

Now on to this skillet cookie. Last week I received some amazing cast iron skillets from the awesome Karen and I knew I needed to make a skillet cookie. For those unfamiliar with it, it's one giant biscuit/cookie baked in a pan, so it's crunchy on the edges and chewy in the middle. Heaven. And then Lisa made me this incredible funfetti fairy bread birthday cake and reminded me how much better life is when it's full of rainbow sprinkles. So I decided to combine these two awesome things and make myself a Funfetti Skillet Cookie.

It kind of looks like unicorn vomit. I don't mean to be gross but that's what my first thought was when I cut into this. The innards are probably not the prettiest, since the cookie dough is quite dark brown and so the sprinkles inside don't show up as much. But it looks pretty damn cute from the top, especially with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. And it tastes SO much better than it looks. Still warm from the oven, it has a crunchy, golden, buttery edge, with a soft and chewy middle. I don't know why it's taken me this long to make a skillet cookie, but this will definitely be the first of many.

There's also white chocolate chips inside the cookie, you'll find small pockets of melted white chocolate throughout it if you eat it warm. I know the sprinkles don't really add any flavour but I just love how fun and happy the cookie looks with all the bright colours. It was really tempted to lift the whole thing out of the skillet and take a bite out of it like it was one gigantic biscuit. I might still do it.

Funfetti Skillet-Baked Cookie with White Chocolate Chips

(adapted from Martha Stewart)

2 cups (about 260g) plain (all-purpose) flour

1 tsp baking (bi-carb) soda

1/2 tsp salt

170g (3/4 cup) butter, softened

3/4 cup packed light-brown sugar

1 large egg

2 tsp pure vanilla extract

1 cup rainbow sprinkles (I used half 100s and 1000s and half of the long skinny soft sprinkles)

1 cup (about 170g/6oz) white chocolate chips or chopped white chocolate 

To serve: Vanilla ice cream and extra rainbow sprinkles

Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F) and grease a 10-inch (25 cm) ovenproof skillet. (If you have a smaller skillet, you may end up with excess dough, which you can just bake on a sheet as regular sized cookies) Whisk flour, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl and set aside. Place butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl and beat on high with an electric mixer until mixture is light and fluffy, about 2 mins. Add egg and vanilla and beat until combined. With the mixer on low, add the flour and rainbow sprinkles and mix until just incorporated. Stir in white chocolate chips.

Transfer mixture to the skillet and press to flatten, so that the surface is even and covers the bottom of the pan. Bake until edges are brown and top is golden, about 40 to 45 minutes. If you find it is browning too quickly (mine started to due to the cast iron pan and the fan-forced oven) you can reduce the oven temperature slightly. Don't overbake; it will continue to cook a few minutes out of the oven. Transfer to a wire rack to cool, 15 to 20 minutes. Cut into wedges and serve warm with vanilla ice cream and extra sprinkles.

Chocolate Mousse Layer Cake

It's my birthday on Friday. I know it seems a little bit sad to bake your own birthday cake, but I had to make this cake. I couldn't get it out of my head all week. It's 6 layers of fluffy chocolate sponge cake sandwiched between thick layers of icing that tastes like chocolate mousse. When I was around 11-14 years old, every week my parents and I and would visit my favourite shopping centre in KL at the time (1 Utama) and my Mum would always buy me a slice of this layered chocolate cake from this bakery (which I can't remember the name of for the life of me). It was glorious. Thin layers of moist, light cake with a milk chocolate mousse icing. Equal ratios of cake to icing.

This week I suddenly remembered this weekly ritual of my past and I couldn't stop thinking about eating a slice of that cake. So I made it. And I ate it. IT WAS GLORIOUS. I might have gone a little overboard by making it 6 layers high, but I like my cakes sky high. I used a chocolate mousse icing recipe from the food dept. (if you aren't already following them, you should be) which looked pretty close to the icing I remembered from the magical cake of my childhood.

As per usual, there were a few mishaps in my kitchen. The first batch of icing totally effed up. The chocolate seized and the cream split. I had to make a mad dash to the supermarket to get more cream and butter (also gobsmacked that I managed to run out of butter, that hardly ever happens). The second batch I made nearly split again. I figured out it was probably because my cream was super cold and mixing it with the slightly warm chocolate/melted butter mixture was not the best idea. But it was still salvageable. At this point everything was covered in chocolate and I was extremely frazzled. So unfortunately this cake is a little messier than my usual layered-cake efforts. While I was taking the above photo, I pulled out that lovely tall slice of cake and then promptly dropped it. SPLAT. All I could do was sigh, take a photo of it and move on:

To be honest I was too impatient to eat the thing to spend a long time making the icing smooth or getting a great shot of the cake. It was for meeee. I topped it with a giant sized pack of Maltesers, to give it some crunch on top and because I love me some Maltesers. That first slice tasted so good. The sponge cake was the perfect cake to use with this icing, so light and soft and the whole combination wasn't heavy. It was exactly what I was looking for.

I did learn that eating this cake straight out of the fridge is not a good idea. All the butter in the recipe hardens and makes it quite dry when it's cold. You definitely need to let it come right back to room temperature before eating it, as recommended by the original recipe. I even reduced the amount of butter in the icing to make it a bit softer but feel free to use the amounts in the original recipe. I still think I could tweak this recipe to improve it, maybe brush some liquor on the sponge before layering it to make sure it stays moist, or play around with a different chocolate mousse icing recipe. But I'm pretty happy with it as is.

Chocolate Mousse Layer Cake

(chocolate sponge cake recipe adapted from my Tim Tam cake, icing recipe from the food dept.)

For the cake:
Note: Feel free to substitute with your own chocolate cake recipe, as this recipe is very delicate to handle. This cake is not recommended for those inexperienced with layered cakes.

8 large eggs

220g (1 cup) caster (fine granulated) sugar

130g (about 4.5 oz) cornflour (cornstarch)

70g (1/2 cup) Good quality cocoa powder

2 tbsp plain flour

2 tsp cream of tartar

1 tsp baking (bi-carb) soda

100g (7 tbsp) butter, melted and cooled

Grease well and line two 18cm (7inch) round cake tins with baking paper (if you use a larger tin (like a 20cm/8inch) you will end up with thinner cakes so you can probably only get about 4 layers). Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F). Whisk eggs and sugar in an electric mixer until thick and pale (at least 5-6 minutes, go nuts and don't underwhip). Sift over cornflour, cocoa, flour, cream of tartar and bicarb soda, fold in with spatula and make sure to get rid of any pockets of dry ingredients. Fold in butter, split equally between prepared tins. Bake in centre of oven until the centre of the cake springs back when lightly pressed (20-30 minutes). Turn onto baking paper covered wire rack and cool completely. (Can be baked the day before assembly and stored in an airtight container.) Use a long sharp knife to carefully cut each cake into 3 even layers, take care as the cake is delicate.

For the chocolate mousse icing:

400g (about 3.5 sticks) butter, softened

400g (about 14 oz) good quality chocolate (dark or milk, your choice. I used half dark half milk), melted and allowed to cool

600ml (about 2 1/2 cups) thickened cream

4 tbsp caster (fine granulated) sugar

Optional: Maltesers to decorate

Remove cream from fridge about 30 mins before starting. Place butter in a large mixing bowl and beat on high with an electric mixer until smooth and fluffy. Add cooled chocolate and beat until smooth. In a separate bowl, whisk cream and sugar until it just reaches soft peaks. Take cake not to overmix. Carefully fold cream mixture into chocolate mixture until combined. 

To assemble, place first layer of cake on your cake plate or stand, cover with icing and smooth with an offset spatula. Repeat with remaining cake layers and more icing. Crumb coat and cover entire cake with icing. Top with maltesers or another of your favourite chocolates. Can be served immediately (if in hot weather and the icing is very soft you can refrigerate it quickly to firm up the icing a bit but don't let it harden). Can be stored in the fridge overnight in an airtight container, make sure you return to room temp before serving or icing will be too hard (this may take a while, I had to warm my cake slightly in the microwave).

Coconut Croissant Pudding with Kaya

I have a small confession to make; I've never really gotten excited about bread and butter pudding. There's something slightly unappealing about the idea of baked soggy bread to me. I know, you'd expect me to be a fan of anything sweet, but this is one of the ones that I haven't gotten my head around until now. (I'm also still on the fence about rice pudding.)

But a few weeks ago my friend Re asked me why I had never tried making bread and butter pudding. She suggested that I try and make it with an ingredient that I loved to make it my own; kaya (Malaysian coconut jam). I was suddenly intrigued. And then I recalled a super old episode of Nigella where instead of using stale bread, she used stale croissants to make a very indulgent version of bread and butter pudding with caramel. At the time I scoffed at the idea of ever having croissant sitting around my house long enough to go stale. I put off doing this for so long because the two most important ingredients (croissants and kaya) were things that I tend to eat quickly so I don't have enough of it leftover to make anything with! But now the idea of trying this dish was good an idea to pass up. I bought a bunch of croissants and hid them away to stop myself from eating them. I hoarded a few jars of kaya from the Asian grocers.

To keep going along with the whole coconut theme of this dish, I made a coconut custard mixture to soak the croissants in, as well as dolloping a generous amount of kaya throughout the pudding. To add a bit of crunch, I sprinkled some roasted coconut chips after baking. The result was kind of incredible. A puffed, golden brown pudding with flakey buttery layers, mixed with a lovely coconut flavoured custard and warm pockets of coconut jam and that last final crunch of the coconut flakes on top. It smelt SO GOOD. It tasted even better, especially when it was straight out of the oven and the pastry was still all flaky and a little crunchy on top.

This is definitely not a light dessert. But I didn't find it over-the-top heavy since I decided not to add any extra sugar to the egg mixture as I knew I was adding so much coconut jam. The mixture has enough moisture that you don't need to add any sauce or cream to enjoy it, though serving it with a some extra kaya will surely go down well.

Yeah don't ask my why I'm making seasonal berry cheesecakes one week and then a pudding the next week (after a couple of boiling hot days too). There's no method to my madness, I just really wanted to try making this. And I'm so glad I did. I think I may be a convert to this whole bread and butter pudding thing, but it might just be due to the buttery croissants and abundance of kaya. I'm so glad my friend pushed me to try something new, it's so easy for me to stay in my comfort zone of baking.

I don't expect everyone who reads this recipe to know what kaya is (though regular readers should be fairly familiar with it, since I'm so obsessed with the stuff), or to have easy access to it (you can make it yourself but it's quite time consuming) so I've included alternate ingredients if you still want to make a coconut croissant pudding. However a lot of Asian supermarkets these days (at least in Aus) stock kaya now, you can usually find it near the coconut milk and cream. If you're in Sydney I'd recommend the Nona brand, I've seen it at Castle Towers, Eastwood and Chatswood Chase. It's definitely worth tracking down for this dessert, it just adds a little something.

Coconut Croissant Pudding with Kaya (Coconut Jam)

(serves about 6, adapted from this Martha Stewart recipe)

About 3 croissants, torn into large pieces (you may need to adjust the amounts of this recipe to suit the size of your baking dish)

2 large eggs

1/2 cup coconut milk

1/2 cup coconut cream
1/4 tsp salt

2/3 cup kaya (you can make your own, or if unavailable add 1/2 packed cup brown sugar and 1/4 tsp vanilla extract to your egg mixture)

Roasted coconut flakes (or shredded/desiccated coconut)

Optional: a few drops of vanilla or pandan extract to add extra fragrance

Preheat oven to 150°C (300°F) and butter a shallow, heavy baking/gratin dish or iron skillet (mine was approx 21cm x 15cm). In a large mixing bowl, whisk together eggs, salt, coconut milk and coconut cream (and sugar and vanilla if you are not using kaya). Add croissant pieces and allow to soak in mixture for about 10 minutes. Pour contents into prepared dish, layering with large dollops of kaya throughout the dish. If using untoasted coconut, sprinkle over the top and place in the oven.

Bake for 40-50 minutes or until puffed and golden brown on top and a skewer inserted into the centre (a non-kaya part) comes out clean. At this point I sprinkled roasted coconut chips over the top, but you can skip this if you baked it with coconut flakes on top. Serve immediately, can be served with extra kaya.