What do you get when you mix a loving baking-extraordinaire/mother/wife with an aspiring/half-baked baker? You get a jolly good baking session! (That wasn't too hard right?) Well, in fact, I (the aspiring baker) got more than what I hoped for during a baking session kindly sponsored by Fathiscakes. Read on to find out what you can expect from a baking session at Bake With Fathis.
Meet Reh.
The owner of a Fathiscakes, a local homemade gourmet goodies where sweet dreams are made of red velvet cakes, s'mores pies, macrons, brownies, cupcakes and more. Fathiscakes was created in memory of Reh's mother, Fathis, with the sole intention of providing a better future for Nuri, their energetic and beautiful daughter who has a soft spot for cream cheese frostings. Awww...
Through Bake With Fathis, Reh wanted to share her years of baking experience with aspiring bakers and help them get started or continue in perfecting homemade baked goods. I expected an awesome lesson where I will learn to bake like a pro in my own kitchen. What I didn't expect was to befriend a very sincere and down-to-earth baking chef who patiently answered all of my baking questions and imparted a lot of baking knowledge to me in that few hours. It's not easy to find someone who's so willing to teach nowadays, especially when she herself owns a bakery business!
This is the humble corner where magical things take place. Reh bakes, have dinner and even answer emails at that very desk where we mix and fold the cake batter.
You may be assured of quality ingredients when you get cakes and baking lessons from Fathiscakes. All ingredients used in their baked goods are also certified halal.
Here's Reh explaining to me the different functions of the high quality mixers and when to use what before we get started. On a side note, I think kitchenaid succeeded in their branding campaign to make baking looks cool and funky!
But if you do not have kitchenaid at home, fret not! These independent stand mixers work as well too, and the best part is that they free our time to work on getting the other ingredients ready. So while this was being done...
I was busy melting high quality chocolate using a double boiler. I learnt during the class that the chocolatey flavour in red velvet cakes is also from this special ingredient that can be found in local baking stores like Phoon Huat. Find out more about this special ingredient when you attend the baking classes at Bake With Fathis!
I was in glee not because this is what I like to do, but because Reh made baking so simple and fuss-free!
I felt that it was good that I attended the classes with some questions at the back of my head that I wanted to ask Reh, it really helped in understanding the why(s) and how(s) in baking. If you are a beginner who has no clue how to mix all these together, fret not! Reh is more than happy to guide you along.
Being the lazy and slightly clueless baker, I usually just let everything gets incorporated in the mixer, not knowing that when you add the flour to the butter mixture, you should gently fold in the flour by hands instead. I got those bicep (and mouth) muscles working and began to fold, mix, fold, mix and it was almost ready!
Here comes the fun part, though I looked a tad serious listening to Reh explain! Scooping all the batter into little paper liners on the muffin tray with an ice cream scoop. It's really one of the best invention.
The boyfriend (cum photographer) had a go at scooping the batter into the paper liners too. He admitted that it wasn't as easy as it looked because it took practice to aim the ice cream scoop into the filler!
And we're ready to pop them into the oven!
What's red velvet cupcakes without cream cheese frosting right? In this baking class, I learnt how to make delicious, light, not too sweet and pipe-ble cream cheese frosting.
Check out the fluffiness of the cream cheese frosting! I have been trying to perfect my cream cheese frosting and if you like me, have had frostings that just go phlat or overly sweet, Reh passed on some good tips on how to perfect the cream cheese frosting!
I learnt how to make a rose swirl on the cupcake and Reh gave a detailed step-by-step on the technique to achieve the perfect rosettes.
Another nugget of red velvet cupcake - if the cupcakes are overly red, most of the times it lack cocoa powder. Which means, the taste of the RVC will be slightly less chocolatey than the usual ones. The better ones usually come with deep red or maroon colour. #factoftheday
They were really the most delicious cupcakes I have baked thus far, and the cream cheese frosting was just plain addictive! I was out the whole day under the sweltering heat and the frosting did not melt at all. Have a go for yourself and learn from an expert who have had her fair share of trial and errors and sincerely want to help aspiring bakers to achieve that perfection.
Fathiscakes also hold baking classes for macarons! Although I have never tried baking these shells before, Reh shared with us that it really took a few rounds to get it right because of the techniques that goes into baking these intricate shells. So best advice for macaron-bakers out there, do sign up for Bake With Fathis' upcoming macaron classes. More details of baking classes at Bake With Fathis can be found here.
If I can bake, so can you!
I was truly humbled by their down-to-earth and sincere hearts in hopes of reaching out to more aspiring bakers to aid in their baking experiments. Just when I thought my days of grasping Science was done and dusted with, I got to understand that it was very closely related to baking. Of course, skills and techniques play an important part as well, including a very important element when it comes to baking - the reason why you want delicious baked goods coming out of that oven every single time. For Reh and her husband, Idris, the reason is very simple, everything they are doing is for Nuri, their heart and soul.
I would also like to thank my big love for being my photographer for this session, my support in everything I do, and just being the wonderful man he is. ;)
Fathiscakes
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Bake With Fathis
Email: hello@fathiscakes.com
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