Chocolate Cake with Choco Glaze

I made this chocolate cake for New Year's Eve. It is a two-layer chocolate cake with caramel in the middle of the layers. Then I pour fudge chocolate glaze on the cakes. And lastly, decorated it on top with chocolate-dipped strawberries. Yummy! The family liked this fudge glaze better than the usual buttercream frosting.  

Ube Cupcakes!

 

Hello, guys! I have not written anything on my blog for months now. I am back! lol. Just checked my blog again today and felt like blogging again. Hopefully I will have time for it again from time to time.

Anyway, my blog post for today is about my homemade Ube Cupcakes! I have been wanting to bake some ube cupcakes or cake these past few months. But I was not so lucky to find an ube flavoring. It is very hard to find an ube flavoring here where I live. The Asian stores here do not have it always. Maybe if they do, it goes away pretty fast because it is not available all the time. I tried to find it online, found one in Amazon but it was too expensive for such a little amount. It is almost $10 for a 20 ml bottle. And I need to use at least two bottles in each recipe. It is not worth it, lol, I am on a budget.

Finally I found some ube flavoring two weeks ago at the Asian store. I got lucky! I bought two bottles ( did not read the recipe yet prior to buying). I thought the two bottles was more than enough. I regretted it. I should have bought all the four bottles. Because I later found out that the recipe calls for the two bottles to be used. Oh well! Lesson learned. I have to wait again for it to be available at the Asian store, lol. I should have been smarter. By the way, the price for each bottle at the store was just $3 each, big difference from the online price. 

So finally, I was able to bake some cupcakes. Primarily, I wanted to bake a cake, but I thought, if we do not finish the whole cake fast it will be wasted. So I decided to just bake the cupcakes. That way, I will just frost enough number of it that we can eat easily. And then I froze the rest for next time.

By the way, for those who do not know what "UBE" is, it is a root crop. Sometimes it is called purple yam, maybe because it is purplish in color. It is a tuberous root vegetable. It is different from the purple sweet potatoes though which is more common here in the US. In the Philippines, it is very common. You can find ube jams, ube ice cream, and of course ube cake/cupcakes.

Back to my baking. The recipe I followed was pretty good. But not what I was expecting. I was looking for the spongy type cupcake. The one I made was more dense. But it was still good, it was pretty moist. Though a little oily for my liking. But overall, the cupcakes were good and the ube taste did come out pretty well.

I will try to find another recipe next time and experiment. Hopefully I will find the recipe I am looking for. Until next post!:)

Chocolate Cake with Mocha Frosting

I was supposed to just buy our favorite cake from Whole Foods for my son's birthday. But the night before his birthday celebration, he told me he wants a mocha cake.

It was already past 7 in the evening when he asked. I didn't take out some butter and eggs. I thought, "Oh my! This is gonna be a long night." Butter and eggs should be in room temperature when baking a cake. I was going back and forth, if I'll bake it or I'll just buy one. My husband told me to just buy one. But I don't want my son to tell me later on when he will be a teenager that he felt disappointed when he asked me to bake a cake and I didn't. So I decided to bake a Chocolate Cake with Mocha Frosting. Luckily, I have all the ingredients needed. Well, I'm wrong, I actually didn't have the espresso for the mocha frosting. Good thing I found out a substitute for it.

Anyway, how did I let the butter and eggs be in room temperature? The eggs, I put them in lukewarm water for a few minutes. But the butter, I had a hard time. Because I just had one stick left from the refrigerator. I had to get a frozen one from the freezer. Now that took a long time to thaw. So I tried a trick I saw online. Get a bowl and put some water in it. Microwave the water for at least 3 minutes or until hot. Then pour the water, and cover the butter until it becomes soft. But it wasn't easy. I had frozen butters. I tried it maybe 3 times, putting the water in the microwave, heating it up and cover the butter. But it was getting late. So...I cheated, lol! I just put the butter in the microwave and heat it in 5 second intervals, lol. Oh well, it still worked. Though part of it melted. What can I do? Lol!

So fast forward, thank God, I was able to make the cake my son wanted. I was happy that the kids and my friends liked the cake. And super glad that my son was happy on his birthday!

Puto Cheese for New Year!:)