Happy Birthday Mom!

Mom's b'day was yesterday so I tried my hands on baking, for the very first time on my own! Recipe courtesy of Lih Yi ^^

Black Magic Cake

• 110 g all-purpose flour
• 100 g white sugar (initially 200g. I couldn't accept the fact that it was twice the amount of flour!)
• 30 g unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 tsp baking soda (I didn't know it was sodium bicarbonate until.. yesterday T.T)
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt (but my friends complained it was slightly salty though. So I might put 1/2 tsp next time)
• 1 egg
• 120ml strong brewed coffee (I used 3 in 1 coffee for this one.. LY recommends Nescafe Arabica)
• 120 ml buttermilk (I used full cream milk)
• 60 ml vegetable oil
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 175 C/350F. Grease and flour two 9 inch round cake pans or one 9 x 13 inch pan (actually it expanded to only half the height of my 8 inch square pan)
   
2. In large bowl combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Make a well in the center. (You might want to sieve the flour, baking soda and baking powder first for a more even batter I suppose)
3. Add eggs, coffee, buttermilk, oil and vanilla. Beat for 2 minutes on medium speed. Batter will be thin. Pour into prepared pans.
4. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 30 to 40 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into center of cake comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes, then remove from pans and finish cooling on a wire rack. Fill and frost as desired.

The end result:

I was slightly upset that there was a big ugly crack in the middle.. It was also dome-shaped instead of square and flat..According to google results and LY, it was probably due to:

• my cake was closer to the upper heating element in the oven so the top part was baked faster than the bottom, causing the cake to crack when the bottom part of the cake started to rise
  
• the baking temperature (180 C) was too high
• the batter was uneven

But all in all it was pretty much a success and luckily mom enjoyed it (she HAD to, I suppose XD)

Check out here for June's recipe for the black magic cake (plus chocolate ganache as topping!)

Oh ya.

How we "dealt" with the leftovers from the steamboat. Using rice cooker ah! "Geng" or not?