Amarula Carrot Cake

No, I didn't lie. It is a carrot cake, see the orange bits? Yes, this is a carrot cake without cream cheese frosting. I have issues with frosting and I usually scrap them out when I eat. Half the people whom I share the calories with doesn't eat the frosting either. So I made a carrot cake with no frosting.

I first read about Amarula carrot cake from here. Of course the recipe said the Amarula can be substituted with Baileys but then it isn't Amarula carrot cake anymore, isn't it. I would then have to call it Baileys carrot cake. Long story short, I managed to get Little P to grab me a bottle when she travelled home to Malaysia from the free duty shop. Of course I need to have a few sips to see if I like the flavour before making the cake and I love it! So here's the cake, with some modifications as I made do with what's leftover in the house.

Let's pretend there are 3 carrots and 1 can of pineapple. The peanut butter bottle contains bicarbonate of soda

Again, please find original recipe here (the author is one of Masterchef contestant). I used the ml measurement.

Ingredients:

Cake
4 large eggs at room temperature
1¼ cups (300 g) castor sugar --> I cut down to 150g
1¼ cups (310 ml) grapeseed oil --> I used rice bran oil
2 cups (about 3) grated carrots
1 canned pineapple grated and drained well --> I used Golden Circle Pineapple Pieces in Natural Juice Canned 440g
1 cup chopped pecan nuts --> I used crushed peanuts
¼ cup Amarula Cream, plus extra ¼ cup for soaking later
½ cup (125 ml) apricot jam --> I used strawberry jam
2 cups (240 g) plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tbsp mixed spice --> I used 1 tsp cinnamon (I was afraid the cinnamon would be overpowering)
1 tsp salt --> after I put in the salt, I give it a taste and feel it is a bit salty, so I added another splash of Amarula cream
Extra chopped pecan nuts and pistachio, for garnish --> also crushed peanuts

Cream Cheese icing: ---> i omit the whole icing/frosting
125g cream cheese room temperature
¼ cup (100g) butter room temperature 
2 cups sifted icing sugar 
1 tbsp Amarula Cream

Method:

1. Beat the eggs in a food mixer (or handheld mixer) for 3 minutes until thick, add the sugar gradually and whisk for another 2 minutes until the mixture is pale and thick. 
2. Add the oil slowly and beat for another 2 minutes. 
3. Pour mixture into a mixing bowl.
4. Add carrots, pineapple, nuts, Amarula and apricot strawberry jam and stir well with a spatula. 
5. Sift the dry ingredients into the mixture and fold in with a spatula until well mixed. (I found the jam sticking together a little, maybe because I used strawberry jam...)
6. Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F). 
7. Line and grease a springform tin (used some rectangular pyrex bakeware) then pour the mixture into the prepared tin and for 1 hour and 10 minutes or until a skewer inserted into centre of the cake and came out clean. 
8. Once ready, remove from oven and allow to cool in the tin for 10 minutes before turning out onto wire rack, and leave to cool completely.
9. Use a skewer stick, poke tiny holes all over the top of the cake. Use a spoon and slowly pour amarula and let it soak into the cake. Make sure the liqueur is evenly spread through the cake and do not over soak it.
10. I sprinkled crushed nuts and very little icing sugar on the top to camouflage the holes. 
11. Add cream cheese and butter into a mixing bowl of a mixer, beat on high speed until creamy. Turn the speed to slow, gradually add the icing sugar a tablespoon at a time until all blended in. Pour amarula cream and give it another quick mix.
12. Ice the cake with the cream cheese frosting, from side first, then the top. Grab a handful of chopped pecans and in a clockwise rotation, stick the nuts onto the side of the cake. Finally decorate the top with whole pecans, and sprinkle pistachio on top.

For some reason I forgot to add in all the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, cinnamon and bicarbonate of soda) and I thinking to myself that the batter is quite watery..lol. Lucky for me that I had pre-measured the flour and while I was taste testing the batter, I saw the bowl that contained the flour. Ha!

I kid you not the batter for this cake is yummy, must be the Amarula!

Let's also pretend the ice-cream is in a perfect ball shaped ^^

To be honest, I don't actually remember how carrot cake taste like usually because I don't usually eat them...

Homemade Salted Eggs

I've always associated salted eggs with duck eggs but it appears that it could be done with chicken eggs. But - why use chicken eggs when Little P's colleague is selling organic eggs from home reared ducks! ^^

Recipe courtesy of Little P's aunt. I "harvested" this when my mum was here in Melbourne with me and she was hooked on this. This must be one of the few things that excite her.

The water is supposed to cover it all....

Ingredients:

6 cups of water

1 cup of salt

1 tbsp sichuan pepper

3 tbsp cooking wine (I used Shaoxing wine)

10 eggs (duck / chicken)

Method:

1. Boil everything and cool to lukewarm
2. Can use plastic container (I used glass container)
3. Put for 30 days

Hard boiled salted egg

Banana Bread

I've made a few banana breads and they are a bit on the heavy side. This one probably is a little on the heavy side for my liking but it also means I would be eating many at one good (that's a good thing on the waist and hips). However this is probably one of the better recipes I tried and doesn't use oil. I grabbed the recipe for here.

I used a more bruised and ripe bananas, almond pieces and vanilla extract not in picture and the bottle with yellow cap is soda bicarbonate

Ingredients:

160 g (1 1/3 cups) walnut or pecan pieces --> I used almond, that's the only nuts I have at home currently
85 g butter, melted and allowed to cool until lukewarm (if using unsalted butter, add 1/8 teaspoon fine table salt)
300 g (2 cups) plain flour
3/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
168 g (3/4 cup) caster sugar --> I used brown sugar, packed and reduced to 1/3 cup)
390 g (1 1/2 cups) mashed very ripe banana
2 large eggs (we use eggs with a minimum weight of 59g)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
90 g (1/3 cup) natural yoghurt.

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 160 degrees Celsius fan-forced. 
2. Place almond on a baking tray and bake for about 3 minutes or until fragrant. Set aside to cool to room temperature.
3. Line a loaf pan.
4. Stir flour, bicarbonate of soda and sugar together in a large bowl.
5. In a medium bowl, stir or whisk together mashed banana, eggs, vanilla, yoghurt and melted butter. 
6. Add almonds to the banana mixture and stir to combine.
7. Add banana mixture to the bowl with the flour mixture and gently fold ingredients together until just combined. Don't over mix as this can make the banana bread tough. Transfer mixture to prepared pan.
8. I put flaked almonds on the bread just because I have some leftovers and I love almonds ^^
9. Bake for about 1 hour and 5 minutes, until a wooden skewer or thin-bladed knife inserted into the centre of the bread comes out without any batter attached.
10. Allow banana bread to cool in the pan for about 10 minutes. 

All these sugar treats at home is not good for me! :|