Orange Rhum Cake by SWEET HIBISCUS

In the Bakers' Dozen Fair in Powerplant Mall, Makati, a rockstar pastry chef emerged two years ago -- Ange of Sweet Life. During our visit to the fair to sample this year's harvest of goodies, we chanced upon an old friend of my husband who was enthusiastically selling the now-famous Frozen Brazo de Mercedes of Sweet Life. The guy turns out to be the father of Ange! 

We were also quite surprised that Ange is two years younger than our daughter who is also into baking and who plans to go to the Culinary Institute of America in a couple of years to earn her associate degree in pastry arts. We were even more surprised that Ange, after being a celebrity of sorts in the pastry world, is bent on a degree not in culinary or pastry arts but in fashion and that the enterprising young lady is determined to make it in New York's world of high fashion and couture -- the reason behind Sweet LIfe's line of specialty Couture Cupcakes. 

If Ange became popular for the Frozen Brazo de Mercedes which we got addicted to two years ago, my daughter Nicole's signature dessert is her Orange Rhum Cake. We gave the rhum cakes as presents to our neighors and friends in the malls where we had our stores and it was a runaway hit last year - with rave reviews who were asking where we bought the cake! 

In the same manner that Ange's dad said that the frozen brazo's magic recipe was derived after downing several portions on a hundred different tries of the frozen brazo, Nicole's orange rhum cake also came about through trial-and-error short of giving our household members a case of diabetes before Christmas. 

But here it is, the Orange Rhum Cake that's good for sharing as Christmas is never complete without a traditional rhum cake to go with coffee or tea as an after-dinner treat or when you have friends and family over. SWEET HIBISCUS' Orange Butter Rhum Cake makes a Yuletide comeback! 

Spongy butter cake laced with hints of lite rhum, honey and orange and then topped with swirls of sweet vanilla frosting. Not too sweet though and best eaten with an appetite for all good things in life! MERRY CHRISTMAS to all!

SWEET HIBISCUS Sweet Christmas Treats

Today, I do a mother's job and write about how great my daughter is at baking. Yes, my daughter, Nicole, has opened her own line of sweet treats, inspired by the many ladies who have gone the dessert path before her -- Sonja Ocampo and her tribe of noveau pastry chefs and most recently, Anje of Sweet Life (famous for her frozen brazo de mercedes) who turns out to be younger than Nicole by a couple of years! 

It has actually been two years since she has been churning out dessert treats for special occasions like Christmas, bridal showers, baby showers, baptisms and every memorable family get-together we have had over the last couple of years.

Last year, my husband and I gave away her Sweet Hibiscus desserts for Christmas instead of buying from the local pastry shops. Nicole has been encouraged by the recipients especially with the rave reviews of last year's Orange Rhum Cake. This year, she came out with her line of Christmas pastries including Revel Bars, Snickerdoodles and her favorite kind of cookie: White Chocolate Chip Cookies. 

The tradition of giving a box of cookies or sweets to neighbors and friends is the Filipino way of spreading cheer during the holidays. And Sweet Hibuscus' simple line of treats this year is our family's way of making Christmas joyous and filled with sweet memories for families and friends who have made our year truly wonderful. 

Happy Christmas to everyone and may our coming year be full of the sweetest surprises!

ROYCE Chocolates is in Manila!

You read the headline right! Japan's most famous chocolates are now here in Manila and specifically, on the top floor of Rockwell's Power Plant Mall, right beside the chapel -- it's heaven beside chocolate heaven!

Now, everyone in Manila can get their boxes of the delectable chocolate treats - NAMA, Potato Choco Chip (yep) and the truffles with orange liqueur, kirsch and pralines. The Konbini Store used to carry only the Nama chocolates and some of the bars, no truffles. But this time around, everyone gets the full Royce' menu. No more calling for orders like before and no more waiting! You can get your orders right off the counter. Get your boxful of Royce' goodies now and have a merry Christmas before you run out of the best chocolates in town!

Here's my earlier post on the famous heavenly treats which I discovered last August, thanks to a friend who was then still importing her "loot" from Japan, HK and Singapore. Now, it's just a stone's throw away from where she lives :) ....  

As posted on www.amyuy.multiply.com last August 3, 2008: 

I was introduced recently by a Chinese lady friend to the Japanese wonder chocolates that go by the name of Royce. After having a tasty lunch at Seryna in Little Tokyo in Makati, we went straight to her place in Rockwell to have tea and yes, generous servings of Royce Chocolates! She had Royce's Nama chocolates - the kind that melts so smoothly and sinfully in your mouth plus the truffles with brandy liqueur and one of the varieties coated with sesame seeds or nuts. My friend has to fly in her Royce chocolates from either Hong Kong or Singapore since they're not available in Manila or so she said. But lo and behold, a copy of Yummy magazine this month pointed me right to where Royce Chocolates can be had for P620/box of 20 pcs for the Nama and the nutty bars at P500 or so a piece! 

Yes, all Royce chocoholics can get their fix of these rich and delicate Japanese delights in Konbini Tokyo Market, a Japanese grocery just beside Angel's Kitchen in Connecticut St., Greenhills. I got a box of the Nama chocolates that had no liqueur and so pure and heavenly that you can finish all 20 pieces without guilt. Unfortunately, you can't just buy the chocolates off the Konbini shelves. You have to place an order with the store in advance so they can get your chocolates for you. I promised myself to sample more of the Royce Nama chocolates, the au lait flavor w/ cherry liqueur and maybe the champagne one. Plus, the well-loved Potato Chocolate Chip variety!

The chocolates have a short shelf life and must be savored before the due date stamped on the box to get the full benefit of their goodness. This is one of the reasons why Konbini can't store a lot of the chocolates and you have to call in to order first. You also have to keep them cold lest you end up with your confections turning into one gooey glob of chocolate. The chocolates are kept in a foil with a small pack of ice to make sure you bring them home fresh and intact.

But yes, apart from Truffettes de France that used to come from Canada and that are now sold in Costco Stores in the U.S. and which you can now get from a stall on the second floor of the Shangri-la Plaza Mall, as well as those Leonidas truffles that go for P80 or more per piece, you can now sample Royce Chocolates right here in Manila. Give Konbini a ring first before going over to the store to make sure you get the kind you want. The staff is very helpful and friendly and they will help you sort the varieties. Royce is just one of life's simple pleasures -- and rated highly on Lonely Planet's Blue List of must-eats. :-)

Moistest, Chewiest CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES

Some like it crunchy, others like it chewy. Cookies, that is, and I, like so many others, fall into the second category. Chewy cookies especially the chocolate chip variety are an absolute favorite in my book ever since Chips Ahoy! came out with theirs and then Keebler also had their own soft batch. And of course, who can forget Mrs. Fields who even paid the Philippines a visit a few years back? That was years ago when we Pinoys believed that Chips Ahoy! was God's gift to cookiedom.

With the surge of popularity of desserts, cookies, cupcakes and other sweet treats nowadays, it seems that there has also been a sudden interest in home-baked cookies. Credit that to our recent discovery of the magic of Kitchen Aid here in Manila which makes baking easier and more convenient. So these days, baking your own cookies at home and finding a recipe that yields the cookie type you want - crispy, with nuts, moist and chewy, with chocolate chips, white chocolate, etc. - is the ultimate fun trip. 

My search for the best chewy cookie recipe meant going through several videos online, trying out a few recipes and asking friends for their favorite ones. I got one from a friend who turned into baking as therapy and she gave me the recipe of the moistest and chewiest kind I've baked. If you follow it to the letter, it gives you the perfect consistency and texture which doesn't crumble. Make sure to let the freshly-baked cookies rest for two minutes or so on the pan and then move them to a wire rack so you retain the chewiness PLUS a little crispiness at the sides. 

Yum!

OATMEAL CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES

Recipe from Sheila Paras 

1 cup butter, room temperature

1 cup sugar

1 cup brown sugar

2 large eggs

2 tbsp milk

2 tsp vanilla extract

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

2 1/2 cups oats (rolled or "quick," but not "instant")

2 cups chocolate chips (about 12-oz.)

1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and the sugars until mixture is light in color. Beat in the eggs one at a time, followed by the milk and the vanilla extract.

3. In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Either by hand or with the mixer on low speed, gradually beat the flour in to the sugar mixture until just incorporated.

4. Stir in the oats and chocolate chips by hand.

5. Drop 1-inch balls of dough onto the cookie sheet, placing about 1 1/2 inches apart so they have room to spread.

6. Bake at 350F for 10-13 minutes, until golden brown at the edges and light golden at the center.

7. Cool on baking sheet for at least 1-2 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes 4 dozen.

Ang Tunay na INASAL

Last February, before we opened our own inasal store in Megamall, my husband who is from Bacolod, asked me to go to his hometown and "train" in the land of inasal -- MANOKAN COUNTRY. After trying several chicken inasal in the most popular places in Manila, he still wanted to go after the "real" and "orig" taste that he grew up with. 

So off I went to Bacolod, landed in the new spanking airport in Silay and went straight to Manokan Country which now sits right across SM Bacolod. Immediately, we scouted the best of the best chicken inasal restaurants in the area and spotted the biggest one in the middle of the inasal strip: NENA'S BETH Chicken Inasal. I looked around and up at the sign hanging on the resto and wondered why the name with two names?? 

But first order of the day was to "order" and we did! Chicken inasal is actually street food in Bacolod and in Manokan Country, you at least get to eat at a table and not standing on a street munching away on a piece of "pechopak" or "pa-a." Here in NENA'S BETH, we were seated fairly comfortably and our table was laden with the standard condiments that add to the flavor of the chicken inasal: sinamak, toyo, chicken oil, calamansi and siling labuyo for that added kick.

 

Sinamak is the Visayan vinaigrette of sorts - a mixture of native coco vinegar with garlic, ginger, onions and chili. That's the base of the dipping sauce for the inasal. With some sinamak, you add a tablespoon or so of soy sauce or toyo, squeeze a calamansi and put a piece of siling labuyo. 

Of course, in MANOKAN COUNTRY there is nothing but inasal on the menu. You order the part you like best: pa-a (thigh), pechopak (breast and wing), and a variety of the innards like the isol, baticolon and liver. All are marinated in the secret inasal mix that makes NENA'S BETH and the rest of the restos on the strip distinct from the inasalans in Manila. 

We had our fill of chicken inasal served with steaming hot rice. That's all you need in MANOKAN COUNTRY and everyone's encouraged to eat with their hands. You get a spoon and fork only if you ask  - and let's not even ask for knives here... Some of the restaurants also serve other Ilonggo food like oysters and really large mussels (tahong) but the people go to MANOKAN mainly for the chicken. 

A talk with the owner of NENA'S BETH, Beth Baker, revealed the origins of their restaurant and why the two names. While she's Beth, her mother's name is NENA and so go the names of the restaurants of her other siblings. They are originally from Iloilo and her mother is one of the very first Ilonggas who made the street food a popular dish when they moved to Bacolod and set up their chicken inasalan there. Today, several restaurants carry their mother's name, NENA and then append their names after - as in NENA'S BETH, and so on. 

The chicken inasal recipe of Beth remains true to their mother's secret recipe and while there have been a lot of enterprising people who have asked for the recipe, they share it only with those whom they believe will promote the originality of the dish. A popular actor managed to get the recipe but as Beth says, it does not yield the authentic inasal taste, perhaps because a recipe that is simply passed on by word of mouth is not enough. You have to immerse yourself in the art of inasal-making to master it and later on, to replicate the color, flavor, aroma and the whole experience of eating Bacolod chicken inasal. 

Suffice it to say that after eating a few whole chicken inasal(s), I am now an expert. And Ms. Baker was kind enough to let us observe and capture the essence of cooking real chicken inasal - from doing the authentic inasal marinade to the right way of cutting the chicken pieces, to skewering the chickens, to grilling them over live hot coals, and then to making the famous chicken oil or achuete oil for brushing the chicken and topping your steamed rice. There's also the making of the sinamak which is a secret concoction in itself. 

It was a heady experience being there and witnessing the true Filipino way of creating a chicken barbecue that has made its way from Bacolod into the heart of all Filipinos in Manila and beyond: CHICKEN INASAL. Our thanks to the Bakers from the City of Smiles for their warmth and hospitality!

Of Chocolate Dreams & Memories

It was only last year when I was in chocolate heaven - a small patch of heaven on the kitchen floor of ISCAHM across Ateneo. It was only last year when I was literally licking off gooey chocolate on my palms after rolling truffles in my hands in the Pralines Course. 

I had lofty dreams before I joined the class -- of becoming a chocolatier myself, whipping up chocolate truffle goodies and making a living out of it, just like in the movie, "Chocolat." But alas, a year later I still find myself dreaming chocolate dreams and still buying ready-made truffles instead of creating them with my bare hands. Part of the reason I haven't become a billionaire chocolatier as yet is the cost of producing these delectable gems is really prohibitive. It also requires great passion to be able to source the best ingredients and I guess, not everyone in Manila is ready to shell out hard-earned money for a ball of chocolate that melts in your mouth in as little as 20 seconds, longer if you let the chocolate linger till it slowly dissolves in your tongue, slithers around and envelopes your mouth in a sweet, smooth sensation that is simply next to heaven. 

At this point, I can only recall the sweet memories I had last year of being in ISCAHM's kitchen with renowned pastry king, Chef Ernie Babaran. Being there last November was priceless and I guess it's not too late to look back, savor the thoughts and feel the sweet rush all over again! 

Here's last year's story behind the closed doors of PRALINES COURSE of ISCAHM.... I'm thinking I can still follow my chocolate dreams....because as we Pinoys say, it's not too late, Chocolate!

I decided to finish the year with a short course in ISCAHM (Intl School for Culinary Arts and Hotel Management). After all, I began the year taking the fundamentals in culinary arts course and I finally managed to cook a Thanksgiving dinner for my family (except it wasn't turkey but coq au vin), so what better way to end 2007 than with a bang -- a sweet one.

Day One of ISCAHM's Pralines Course was all about making Truflle Chocolates. You know, like the ones sold in Leonidas for 80pesos a piece. I thought 80 bucks for a ball of chocolate with a quick shot of gooey, slurpy, liqueur inside is rather steep. But after Day One, the uninitated among us in the making of those truffle chocolate jewels discovered why the stuff costs more than a cup of coffee in Starbucks.

It takes a millionaire to invest in making really good chocolates that you would want to give your very best friends. It requires a tempering apparatus costing P31,000 (and that's the one made in China, which makes the Swiss version of the machine even more expensive), an infrared thermometer to monitor the correct temperature of the tempered chocolate (P3,500 for a really good one), specialty forks and ringed spoons, and for those who wish to make a living doing this, a good cutting machine that will set you back P80,000. AND, that's not even including the marble slab which you must have (to spread the chocolate mix on for the tempering method) that you should keep inside a CHOCOLATE ROOM where you have to spend on expensive chillers to maintain the right temperature for your chocolate. WHEW.

Those of us who enrolled thinking that we could make fancy chocolates for gifts this Christmas could only shake our heads after taking in all these bits of info. They should have included them in the pre-requisites for enrollment. BUT, since we already paid good money for the short course, we had no choice but to relax and just enjoy the experience. I could only wonder to myself how the poor family in the movie "Chocolat" was able to make those marvelous goodies without all these costly gadgets. Oh well, so much for watching too many movies and taking them for real.

So, Day One went really well. We first learned how to make the fancy fillings with the different liqueurs that you want inside the truffle shells. We had Baileys, Kirsch (cherry liqueur), Brandy, and of course, Grand Marnier, mixed with different varieties of tempered chocolate couverture. After doing the fillings and setting them for a day, they had to be piped into the truffle shells and depending on the kind of chocolate gem you're making, you can use three of these pre-made shells: milk chocolate, white and dark.

Piping the fillings into the shells is a skill in itself. You can't pipe in too much of the fillings as if you overfill the shells, they will be too moist and the truffle shells would break. Then there's the whole task of covering the shells with more chocolate couverture and letting them set first before either coating them in Bianca dusting powder or rolling them over wire (for those spiked effects on the truffles).

Looking at the chocolate baths, I was tempted to dip my fingers and licking the chocolate off. BUT YES! I got to do just that after Chef Ernie Babaran (yes, the great pastry chef of Dubai royalty), asked me and my groupmate to dip three fingers into the bath and spread the chocolate onto our palms for rolling the chocolates before coating them in dusting powder! After the rolling task, we had our fill of eating the "rejects" (haha!) and then licking the milk chocolate off of our hands. It was then that I realized why the course was that expensive! You could eat all the chocolate you want and you have a really good excuse to eat melted chocolate from your palms! The course offered sheer pleasure and the realization of every childhood fantasy, short of being locked up in Willy Wonka's chocolate factory and scooping chocolate from the river!

And the final moment, of course, was in eating the delectable treats that passed through our hands. Unlike in the fundamentals culinary arts course where students had to muscle each other out for food to bring home, we all had boxes of the pralines ready to bring with us to sample and brag about to our friends and family. I brought my box of goodies and proudly told my husband, our househelp, my kids and some of our staff that I made them! And they couldn't get enough of the chocolates.

So now, we all know why those truffles are more expensive than a cup of Starbucks. They are made with the most sophisticated ingredients, requires the most expensive tools, and not to mention, a whole lot of patience and love. But the sheer pleasure of each bite is way worth it for what kind of world would this be without chocolate

PAELLA Valenciana

Since it's Christmas time and in honor of the opening of our new La Paella branch in one of the malls in Manila, am posting my personal recipe of PAELLA VALENCIANA which I've road-tested several times, to much success.

As I learned in culinary school last year, paella is cooked differently in different regions of Spain such that what goes into the paella recipe in a given area depends on what kind of meat and seafood are abundant there. Hence, the many variations of cooking Paella. 

But what's constant in all is the slow cooking of the paella rice which owes its rich taste and color to the addition of a pinch of saffron threads, pounded to a powdery texture to extract a rich orange-red color that makes your paella true to its origins. Filipinos usually substitute kasuba or achuete for saffron because of the prohibitive cost of saffron threads. But for authenticity, you should go for real saffron threads - at P200 for as little as 10 grams or so in Santis, it will go a long way in giving your paella the stamp of approval of your discerning diners.

Paella must also be cooked slowly. Rice in a 10-inch paellera will cook for 1-2 hours and you can either let it cook on the stove or in an oven. Personally, I prefer to cook it on the stove so I can see how well the rice cooks and if I need to add a bit more broth to make the cooking even. Whichever way you cook the rice, make sure that you get much of the soccarat or browned rice bits at the bottom of the paellera which are the best portions of the dish!

Here's my version, a mix of several recipes, that has never failed me when our friends and family gather around the table for a meal to mark special occasions.

PAELLA VALENCIANA

¼ cup olive oil

5-6 cloves garlic, minced

1 cup onions, chopped

1 can Purefoods chorizo bilbao, sliced

250 g pork loin or liempo, cut into pieces (seasoned)

6 pcs. boneless chicken breasts (seasoned w/ calamansi, S&P)

red bell pepper / green bell pepper, sliced

150 g tomato paste

450 g long grain rice (soaked in water for 15 mins at least)

6-8 cups hot chicken broth

salt and pepper

pinch of saffron

frozen green peas

 

Toppings:

boiled mussels or clams (w/ salt and pepper)

squid sliced

8-15 pcs of shrimps (boiled in water w/ slices of calamansi, S&P)

2 pcs small crabs

sliced hard-boiled eggs

• Heat olive oil in paellera. Saute garlic and onions.
  
• Put in chorizo, pork and chicken. Saute till brown.
  
• Mix in tomato paste. Saute and stir well.
  
• Put in soaked rice and pour in some broth.
  
• Season w/ salt, pepper and saffron. Cover for 10 mins.
  
• Stir rice well every now and then. Pour more broth if needed.
  
• Cover and let rice absorb the liquid. Put in frozen green peas. Transfer to an oven and let the rice cook for 10 more mins.
  
• Top with seafood, garnish w/ eggs, bell pepper slices and lemon.
  

 

My first food writing article

Last year, out of curiosity I joined a food photography and food writing seminar organized by the Filipinas Heritage Library. The seminar included a trip to Bulacan and Pampanga and from that trip emerged several photos and an article that thankfully, was deemed worthy of print in Yummy Magazine last May. Sadly, it got edited down to a few paragraphs which did not capture the essence of the article. Here is that piece and I do hope you like it... it's a tribute to one of the Philippines' kakanins called the "Tibok-Tibok." Enjoy!

The Tibok-Tibok: An Ode to Love from the City of Angels

Pure, unblemished and yes, unpretending. It is true love laid out in a bilao. And to me, it was love at first bite. This is how I fell in love with the tibok-tibok, a soft and silky milk pudding that tenderly melts in your mouth with each bite.

Honestly, I haven’t been much of a “kakanin” person. I fancied cakes, cupcakes, and anything with valrhona chocolate in it, influenced by Manila’s newest thing for dessert buffets. But the tibok-tibok has changed my perception of the kakanin – it is a refreshing change from the designer cupcakes with candy sprinkles, peppermint, bubblegum and strawberry frosting, and yes, even the rich valrhona chocolate that we have been stuffing ourselves with for months now. The tibok-tibok, with its sheer pureness, with its meek tenderness and with its plain white beauty, has made me a convert.

It was in Everybody’s Café in Angeles, Pampanga during a culinary trip where I met my first tibok-tibok. The Kapampangan women in our group said that it was named as such because it was ‘soft as a heartbeat’  (in Filipino, heartbeat is “tibok ng puso”). True enough, there is nothing quite as soft and as creamy as the tibok-tibok. You never even feel it in your mouth until you are swept away by its overwhelming creaminess which, they say, comes from using fresh carabao’s milk – no substitutes. This is probably what makes the tibok-tibok so light on the taste that after downing all those icing-laden cupcakes, you would swear them off the face of the earth.

As unassuming as it looks, this queen of kakanins requires simple ingredients. The key is in using the freshest carabao’s milk one can find. And in keeping with our culinary tradition, one needs good old galapong or rice flour then blended with some coconut milk and bit of dayap zest to make the tibok tibok’s flavor come alive. 

Perhaps, the appeal of the tibok-tibok is in its innocence. It is stark white in color minus the latik on top. It’s also not too sweet and with a sprinking of latik, you are treated to a nutty flavor that goes well with its light milky taste. For those wanting a little twist, it can be paired with some ube haleya. But alone, the tibok-tibok is a true delight. It believes in its own beauty and goodness. It needs no frosting to get you to love it.

I do believe that the tibok-tibok is the women of Pampanga’s ode to love. I can only imagine how it is painstakingly and lovingly made for their lovers, husbands, friends and families. I can almost imagine it being cooked, or created, by the women in total silence, like in the wee hours of the morning, so as not to disturb its freshness, its purity. I can almost see the lovely Kapampangan women softly whispering a prayer as each bilao of tibok-tibok comes out of their kitchen. And I can feel the delight of the lovers, husbands, sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, to whom a tibok-tibok has been made and given as a gesture of kindness and of love.

My heart now beats for the tibok-tibok. I am happy to have had a taste of it and to have known how our women can create a love so pure and so real in a simple sweet pudding. It is a culinary masterpiece that comes from the heart.