All posts by Annie

Our Favorite Layer Cake Recipe

Daniel’s 7th Birthday Cake

Daniel's 7th Birthday Cake

When I first had children and started celebrating their birthdays, I’d bake my own birthday cakes for their parties. The very first one I did I used a recipe from Rose Levy Beranbaum’s Cake Bible book and it turned out really well. However, the frosting called for buttercream. While it was a really delicious and not-too-sweet buttercream frosting, it was still a LOT of butter! And I’ve always preferred fresh whipped cream whenever possible.

This recipe from Fine Cooking magazine has been my go-to cake recipe for all special occasions now. I’ve used it to bake birthday cakes and baby shower cakes. Just about any occasion that calls for a cake, I’ve made it. I’ll tell you why.

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3 Cups Chicken Recipe

3 Cups Chicken

This dish is another classic Chinese dish that originally calls for 1 cup each of 3 main ingredients: soy sauce, sesame oil, and rice wine, hence the name 3 Cups chicken (Sam Pui Kai)! However,1 cup of each ingredient is quite a bit too much for me. Imagine having a whole cup of sesame oil in there! You’d have a circle of oil lubing your mouth if you did that. Not too pleasant!

So, I looked up some recipes and decided to adapt all the different recipes into my own (heavily borrowing from Amy Beh’s original recipe on kuali.com). After a bit of experimenting I find that instead of 3 cups of everything, it’s actually better to have one part sesame oil to two parts soy sauce to three parts rice wine (1:2:3 chicken might be a more appropriate name ^_^). Continue reading 3 Cups Chicken Recipe

Easy Green Tea Tiramisu Recipe

Updated 29 January, 2009
Originally published 14 January, 2007

This is the dessert that capped our Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24 meal.

Green Tea Tiramisu

I got this recipe from my good friend, Elizabeth, with whom I’ve been swapping recipes for a long time. She told me about a green tea tiramisu recipe that she was trying. I was so intrigued by the idea of “Asianifying” tiramisu that I had to try it myself.

I’ve since made green tea tiramisu a few times, and Nate has even taken a video of me making it. Nate has been requesting this dessert as his birthday cake ever since the first time I made it. Yes, that’s how much he loves it.

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