Cooking with Fatty Episode 7: Acai Bowl

One of our favorite eats from Oahu: Acai Bowl 

Acai Base

1 pack Sambazon acai smoothie pack

1 frozen banana

1 tube extra soft tofu

1 cup frozen berries medley

1 tbsp chia seeds

1/4 cup almond milk

Topping

blueberries

kiwi

nuts (walnuts, pecans)

maple pecan clusters cereal

goji berries

flax seed meal

chia seeds

honey

His & Her

Acai bowl is so fun to make and very customize-able. Feel free to omit some and add some fun tasty stuff in or on top. The tofu added extra nutrients but also a somewhat distinct soy taste to our acai. Next time, we will probably omit it to highlight the lovely acai taste. 

Happy acai!

Earl Grey Chiffon Cake

Set out to bake an Earl Grey Chiffon Cake only to find out that we have no sugar at home.. What do I do? I scavenged all source of sweetness- honey, raw sugar, and powdered sugar. Read on to find out how it turned out.

Earl Grey Chiffon Cake
recipe adapted from My Kitchen
makes one 8" round

A
4 egg yolks
20g sugar (10g honey, roughly 1 pack)
50g vegetable cooking oil
40ml strong earl grey tea (used 1 tea bag of earl grey)
30ml milk
¼ tsp salt

B
100g cake flour (or 85g all purpose flour + 15g cornflour)
½ tsp baking powder

C
4 egg whites
100g sugar (5g powdered sugar + 15g raw sugar + 20g honey)
⅛ tsp cream of tartar

D
2 tsp earl grey tea leaves (cut up tea leaves from A)


1. Preheat oven to 338F (170C).
2. In large mixing bowl, whisk together ingredients A until combined.
3. Sift together ingredients B, then add into (2) and mix well. Set aside for later use.
4. In another large mixing bowl, beat egg whites until soft peaks. Add in sugar and cream of tartar and continue to beat until stiff.
5. Take ¼ of the meringue and mix with (3) until well mixed. Gradually add in remaining meringue, and lastly stir in tea leaves. Stir until just combined.
6. Transfer batter into chiffon pan and bake in the preheated oven for 40 minutes.
7. Invert the cake immediately after taking out from oven, and cool on rack completely before turning out from mold.

reminds me of a wrinkly pug!

The cake was done at 33 minutes and smelled delicious. The top was more firm and bouncy than my other chiffon cakes. The texture was soft and fluffy with a very even crumb!

&How about the sweetness you may ask with all the substitutions and reduction.. It was very very very not-sweet. I was only able to detect the sweetness after the first couple of bites when the cake started to concentrate? It worked out fine when I drizzled more honey on the slices.

Taste: 2.5 stars out of 5

lacked sugar and prominent tea flavor

Texture 3 stars out of 5

deducted 2 stars for drying and firming up overnight
(possibly due to absence of moisture from the white sugar)

Matcha Custard Pudding

100% Silky smooth! Steamed, not baked. I present to you my Matcha Custard Pudding in the cutest egg shells containers! Yay, I finally have enough of the egg shells to make them all in one batch. Now, I just need a bigger wok/pan to steam these babies all at once.

But anyways, this post is actually over 11 weeks due.
I was swamped with travelling during this period, and let me try to keep this recap short.

- New York was totally awesome, and I can't wait to be back. We definitely maxed out on our daily stomach capacity for 6 days straight. One sweet highlight which I recommend to anyone who's visiting is Doughnut Plant. I am completely blown away by how delicious the creme brulee donut was. It wasn't cloyingly sweet and just everything you would expect from the given name. 

- Immediately following NYC was my cousins arrival. We celebrated Dad's big 60 and had our first cake from Paris Baguette. The blueberry chiffon was well received by everyone since it was light and less sweet compared to Porto's. I feel a bit guilty not making my dad's cake this year but I promise to make it up with something crazy next year  (or anytime really)! 

- Family road trip to Arizona, Utah, and Vegas was next. We stopped by Horseshoe Bend, Antelope Canyon, Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam, and etc. These natural beauties were breathtaking, and lots of beautiful photos were taken. Then onto a very hectic SF tour for three days. 

Non stop traveling and eating out for 4 weeks straight. I was completely drained, exhausted, and home sick (and out of shape!) 

To make these matcha custard pudding, I just added 1tsp of matcha powder to my custard pudding recipe. There was a subtle matcha flavor and a nice hue of pastel green from the matcha powder. I definitely plan on making these again with some changes; adding 1tbsp of matcha and cooking the matcha with milk longer to get rid of the granules..

I steamed the pudding in two batches since the bottom of my pan was curve and had a limited area to place the pudding at a level. I steamed the custard for 10 minutes on a low rolling boil, and they came out perfect and not at all over cooked.

I also see that with experience, my caramel is turning out much better- nice toasty flavor and deep brown color.

Interested to try an Earl Grey flavor next!

Taste: 4.5 stars out of 5
could use a bit more matcha
Texture 5 stars out of 5!!