Preparing for a birthday!

Top of the DAN cake

Today is Dan’s 26th Birthday.  Which means that I spent most of my yesterday in the kitchen, and I have few recipes for you.  We’re not having a huge party or anything, I just wanted to make him some awesome birthday boy worthy food.  What did he want for his birthday this year?  ”A cake.  A lemon poppyseed pound cake with fondant.  You know, Ace of Cakes style.”  Where the crap am I going to get all that stuff?  Walmart… surprisingly enough.  I picked up everything there.  Sugar for buttercream icing… a cake decorating kit… rolled fondant… coloring for icing… just another reason that their craft section is awesome.  You can get some really great deals on fabric at Walmart.  On to the recipes!

The Cake! – The recipe I used was a Lemon and Poppyseed Pound Cake from Pegg_KS on the Taste of Home forums.  Her profile picture sold me.  A cute little old lady from Ottawa, KS couldn’t possibly have a bad recipe.

Lemon Poppyseed Pound Cake

• 3 c flour
• 2 c sugar
• 1/4 c poppyseed (optional)
• 1 c butter, softened
• 1 c buttermilk
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 5 tsp lemon zest

Heat oven to 325 degrees F.  In a large mixing bowl combine all cake ingredients.  Beat at low speed scraping bowl often; until all ingredients are moistened.  Beat at high speed for 2 minutes.  Pour into 2 – 9″ round pans (greased and floured).  Bake for 40-45 minutes.  Cool 10 minutes, then remove from pan and let cool completely on a wire rack.

Happy Cake!

I used round pans because I wanted to cover the cake with fondant.  And again I did one with poppyseed and one without.  Mostly because I didn’t have enough poppyseed for a whole other cake.  I bought plain white fondant and coloring for icing.  I rolled out the white and successfully covered the first cake.  I kneaded some blue dye into some of the fondant and cut out some blue stars and circle to decorate the cake.  Once I actually started working with the fondant it was pretty clear this wasn’t something I would be doing again any time soon.  So I figured go big or go home.  I added a second tier (it was by no way covered as gracefully as the first) and busted out the rest of the icing and a piping bag.  Piping was my favorite.  I may have gone a little overboard with the smiley face though.  Frankly I was probably just happy to be done rolling fondant!

The Soup! – Xiao Long Bao Part I

I’ve wanted to try and make Xiao Long Bao from the second they showed Nan Xiang Steamed Bun Restaurant on the Shanghai episode of ABNO.  I love soup.  I love dumplings.  Think about it.  It’s the prefect marriage of tastiness.  Steamy Kitchen lured me in with some amazing amazing food porn.  The pictures alone convinced me I had found my recipe.  I’m going to cover this puppy in steps.  We’ll start with the soup itself.

Xiao Long Bao – from Steamy Kitchen

• 2 quarts of water
• 2 lb turkey bones
• 2 oz ham
• 1/2 lb pork skin & fat
• 1 inch piece of ginger sliced into 4-5 “coins”
• 2 scallions, cut into 3″ pieces
• 2 garlic cloves, smashed with the side of your knife
• 2 tsp of chinese rice wine (or dry sherry)

Wash pork thoroughly.  Take the pork skin and with the backside of your knife, firmly scrape the surface of the skin to clean it further.  This will help you produce a cleaner soup.  Rinse again.  Place all ingredients in a large stock pot.  When all ingredients come to a boil, immediately turn to low heat and simmer for 2 hours.  Skim surface of impurities constantly to keep soup clean and clear.  When the soup is done.  Strain and discard solids.  We will only use 4 cups of broth.  Save the rest for soup!

Place 4 cups of broth back in the pot, turn on the heat.  When just about to boil again, turn heat off and add 1 tbsp of powdered Agar Agar or 1 tbsp of unflavored gelatin.  Whisk for 2 minutes until all powder is dissolved.  Pour broth into an 8×8 baking dish.  Refrigerate until set, about 3-4 hours.

The Shrimp!

Tom Rim

As I was waiting for the Xiao Long Bao stock to gel, it was pretty clear I needed another idea for dinner.  There was no way this stuff was going to be set in time.  I hit the wonderful interwebs and found a really great site for asian recipes Rasa Malaysia.  I’m brain was on overload!  So many different asian recipes at my fingertips.  I settled on a Tom Rim or Caramel Prawn recipe.  It was so easy and was just a great fast and easy recipe. I used peeled shrimp, and it turned out just fine.

Tom Rim from Rasa Malaysia

• 1 lb fresh water prawn or shrimp (shell-on and head-on)
• 1 shallot (finely chopped)
• 1 bunch of scallion
• 1 tablespoon fish sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Add all of the above ingredients in a mixing bowl and allow to marinade.

Caramel Sauce

• 2 soup spoons of canola oil
• 2 tablespoons sugar

In a wok or small pan, add 2 soup spoons of canola oil and allow the oil to get hot.  Add the sugar and with a spatula stir the sugar in the oil so that the caramel sauce is not congested into a clump.  One the sugar and oil take on a caramel color, set aside.

In a wok or skillet, heat 2 tablespoons of cooking oil and add the prawn and sute them for 2 minutes.  Add the caramel sauce and with your spatula saute everything together until the prawns turn pink all around and the juices seem to have been sucked up by the shrimp.  Serve immediately.

It was a good day.  I love my kitchen.