Sweet Decadenze

Sugar Asterope, my elder golden retriever, will be celebrating her 3rd birthday tomorrow. Months before, I was already searching for the perfect birthday cake recipe, but to no avail.  Those I came across (which were far and few, by the way) were either boring or called for some exotic ingredient I’d never heard of.

Help came in the most unusual and unexpected manner, I should say.  During my recent visit to Taipei, I came across this book titled ‘Doggy Treat’s Recipes’ at one of the baking equipment stores where I bought all the lovely disney cookie cutters.  I was bracing myself for disappoinment as I took the book from the shelf and started flipping through, expecting only simple recipes of cookies and brownies.  To my pleasant surprise, the book actually covered quite a number of cake recipes!

I was over the hill.  Never mind that some of the instructions in chinese were somewhat lost in translation in English.  In times like this, I thank my family upbringing for insisting that, as a Singaporean Chinese, I should at least be effectively billingual, not monolingual.

Enough said.  Here’s the recipe I translated…

Mango Yoghurt Mousse Cake
50g disgestive biscuits, crushed
20g margarine, melted
13g gelatine powder
65g hot water
150g whipping cream
250g plain yoghurt
120g mango pureé

1. Prepare a 6-inch round mould and a cake board below.
2. Mix the melted butter and digestive biscuits in a mixing bowl till bonded.
3. Lay the mixture onto the cake board until it covers the entire mould, using the back of a spoon to press the mixture down, till about 1 cm thick.  Chill in the refrigerator while preparing the filling.
4. Sprinkle gelatin over the hot water in a bowl and set aside, stirring occasionally until it turns clear.
5. In another medium mixing bowl, whip the cream until stiff peaks form.  Set aside in a cool place.
6. In another large mixing bowl, whip the yoghurt until it is smooth.
7. Add in mango pureé and mix until well-incorporated.
8. Gently fold in the whipped cream till well-mixed.
9. Add in the cooled gelatine mixture.
10. Pour the batter onto the prepared crust and chill overnight until firm before serving.

Yield : 1 6-inch cake

Instead of a 6-inch cake mould, I used the 5-inch Pooh Bear mould I bought in Taipei.  I also used the some of the remaining unsweetened mango pureé I bought from Phoon Huat to make the facial features of Pooh on the cake surface.

Cute, isn’t it?  Well, as if my two golden retrievers could tell the difference if I’d used a simple mould instead.

I will admit it’s all for vanity and fun’s sake that I decided to try using the Pooh mousse mould.  And I quite like the way it turned out!