Polly's Giant Sun Flower

 I thought I will give a try at growing a large sun flower.  Well, surprisingly, they are tall - 10 feet tall.  Some grew a regular size sun flowers and turns with the sun, but the large sun flower stays facing the east.

This one likes to dress itself with a tiny bonnet on its side.  Cute...

 

  

It's Time to Make UME-SHU - Japanese Plum Wine and UME Anything

 I was gifted with fresh UME - Japanese Plum.  They emit such a sweet aroma in the air that you would want to trace where it is coming from if you didn't know a boxful of beautiful plums are in the area.

The plum ripens real quick, too.  Whether they are placed in the refrigerator or not, the bag of green plums turned pink and orangish color while I was getting ingredients together to make plum wine.

 

It's challenging to find the 35% alcohol by volume - TAKARA SHOCHU.  I found 25%  alcohol by volume YOKAICHI MUGI (Barley) HONKAKU SHOCHU.  I don't think it will cut it, but I thought I will give it a try as my plums are ripening by the moment.  After buying 4 bottles of it, I found 1 bottle of SHOCHU with 35% alcohol.  Then, I had to look for the rock sugar.  Went here, went there, no luck.  Finally found it and bought bags.  Got the plums all cleaned - peck off the ends.

After thoroughly sterilizing mason jars and lids, embed the bottom of the jar with a layer of rock sugar, then, plum. Repeat until the entire jar is filled.

As you can see these are ripened.  Good to make UMEBOSHI - pickled plum.

Regardless, I picked all ed the rather green ones and made them into Plum wine.

 

Made two jars of plum wine.

The other ripened ones, I decided to add equal amount of rock sugar and Kosher Salt and or coarse Sea Salt and pickled them for a week.  Then air dried under the sun to make dried plum candy.

After a week, the sugar and salt dissolved naturally.   It's time to sun dry them.

Cover them with picnic food umbrella to protect them from bugs and dusts.

After a couple of days, place them in a jar.  Enjoy them during the hike or after an aerobic workout.
 

 

Polly's Wanna Be of 'The Best Taiwanese KASUTELA / Castella" Cake

 

There are so many different postings in the YouTube about baking CASTELLA / KASUTELA.  And sometimes, all it takes is a good pic to motivate you to bake or cook.

And, I tried one found under "The Best Taiwanese Castella Cake" (by Molala cook),.  One big mistake I made was that I missed the instruction section about mixing the flour with heated cooking oil.  I was in a hurry, and according to a couple of other YouTubers that steps are important part of this Bain Marie Castella resulting with no big bubbles in the cake.  

Recipe:

8 inch square mold  - my U.S. brownie mold is 9" - line it up with Parchment paper to make 10 cm wall

8 Large Eggs - Separated - 8 Egg Yolks for the flour mixture

Cake Flour 105g 

Corn Starch 15g 

Corn Oil 95g  - I used my Avocado Oil and this is supposed to be microwaved! which I missed.

Milk 90g 

Salt 2g 

Lemon Juice 4g <<< I added it to my flour batter rather into meringue  But I will try next time to add it to the egg white the next time.

 

For Meringue:

Egg White 8 

Sugar 95g 

 

1. Sift cake flour, corn flour. 

2. Microwave corn oil for 1 minute and 45 seconds or (194'F) approx 88 - 90'C pour it into the flour immediately, and mix   << This is what I missed.  I thought it is a easy Chiffon Cake baked in bain marie, but I was wrong.  The texture of the flour mixed with oil would look like this.

3. Add milk and stir, then add egg yolk and stir 

 

4. Add salt and lemon juice to the egg white, add sugar in three portions, beat until firm peak forms

 

Preheat up to 165 C Degree - 325'F

*Normally, everyone wants the oven preheated at the beginning of the prep work, but I don't like hot kitchen, so I time it to turn it on  10-15 minutes befor I use it.

 

5.  Add 1/3 of the meringue into the batter.  Use "Fold" in method to mix in meringue.  Add the 2nd 1/3, then, transfer the batter into meringue bowl, and complete the fold in.  

Transfer the batter into prepared cake mold line with parchment paper.

 

6.  Heat enough water to 70'C to cover the large cake pan half way for Bain Marie  Place the cake mold.  Fill more water to bring up the water half way of the cake mold.

 

7.   Bake for about 65 minutes at 155 C degrees and 165 C degrees - 325'F.

*Do not open the oven door until well into 55 minutes at least and top is browned.

 

8.   The cake should have a nice brown top and would not dent it when touched.   Tester comes out dry.

9.   Remove from the oven.  Lift up at the parchment mold onto a cutting board while still hot. 

10.  Remove the parchment paper all around while the cake is still hot..  

11.  Slice the cake while hot.  

 

 

 I think this Meringue is overbeaten.  I was busy mixing egg yolk and ignored my timer beep and let it beat 2 more minutes and resulted in dry meringue.  

Beat egg white into firm peak, but not dry clump like this.  It should be smooth, shiny firm peak. 

I didn't have a large single sheet parchment paper to form into a mold wall about 10cm high.  I used 4 sheets overlaying each other instead.

Bain Marie.

After 70 min.

Looks great!.  Take out right away and remove the parchment paper gently while the cake is still hot.

Trim away the sides (and gobble them up) to make into a beautiful sides.   You can see that I didn't.  It's only for me.  No need to waste.

Slice it in sawing motion.

Different lighting make the cake look whiter or yellowish, but actually, the bottom pic in yellow color is the right ones.

 A day in refrigerator is also a good idea in a closed lid container lined with parchment paper.  The cake is moist and soft.