Long Over-due Hari Raya Celebration!
Okie, my apologies! Once again, my mind had slipped off the date of Brunei's most important celebration for the year: Hari Raya Aidilfitri, the day of celebration. This is celebrated by Muslims all around the globe at the end of fasting month known as Ramadhan. It usually lasts for a month so I guess I am still not too late?
happy belated hari raya!
selamat hari raya aidilfiltri!
em..I wonder if this greeting is appropriate? It does seem a bit weird.
Anyway, I was reminded by Renee on her hari raya post that Hari Raya Aidilfiltri fell on 14th of November this year. To save me typing (yes, I am lazy) , please visit her post to get some culture background to Hari Raya celebration in Brunei!
That extremely-rich and wicked looking chocolate fudge-like thingie in the photo above is kek batik (batik cake), a very rich chocolate-milo cake that is relished during Hari Raya celebration in Brunei. This cake is a to-die-for for both of us. It's one of the gourmet yummies from Brunei that still have us lusting after even years after we have left Brunei.
We had been musing about how this rich and luscious milo cake is made and Renee has come up with her own version of kek batik. Very very well done, lady! *smooch*
The ingredients of the cake are easy to get. I am sure most of us would have most of the ingredients at home. I actually have all of them sitting in my pantry! So chop chop I went and got myself busy in the kitchen to make this yummilicious nolstagic cake!
♥ chocolatey batter
This is how the batter looks like after all ingredients are combined. It's quite liquidy that has a consistency similar to thick cream. Now now, warning to all chocoholics out there: you need to have very strong self-control to not start pigging out on this chocolicious cream! It's hard. Very hard.
I actually think this recipe is great for children because it is simple and easy enough to follow: measure, add then mix and fold. Simple as that! What's more the kids would love to lick off all the left-over chocolate batter.
♥ thick chocolate fudge after about 30min cooking
After about 30minutes of stirring in the non-stick pan, the liquidy chocolate cream becomes darker and very thick. I actually stopped cooking my batter here but later found that this consistency is still a tad too liquidy. I would guess another 5 to 10 minutes would be better so as to give a dryer dough and I would have a more brownie-like chocolate slices.
ps. the stirring gives very good exercise to tone up your arm muscles! and I had so much fun scrapping off excess cooked dough from my pan. *big wide grin*
♥ folding in biscuits
I used Weston's Marie Biscuits which I found is a tad too soft and crumbly.
♥ Pressing the chocolate dough into my 6-inch cake tin
I was supposed to used a rectangular or square pans but I had none of those. I only have a 6-inch cake tin and a muffin pans. I was contemplating whether to use the muffin pans to yield cute little kek batik or not used a cake tin at all and used a rectangular plastic container instead.
And then I found out I didnt even have grease-proof paper in my kitchen! (*shucks* there are just so many stuff I still need to stock up on) To make for easier removal, I opted for my 6-inch cake tin with a removable base. As you can see, I used plastic wrap instead. It looked quite ridiculous, dont you think?
♥ 6-inch kek batik!
Here's my 6-inch kek batik! The recipe is just right to make a 6-inch cake. It was just too hard to resist the temptation. I mean here you are sitting about 10 metres away from the fridge that holds a lusciously rich chocolate cake inside, is it not hard to surrender your self-control and give in to temptation?
We couldnt wait and grabbed the cake out of the fridge after about 7 hours.
Wrong move.
The cake was still a bit too soft. Anyhow we cut the cake and licked off the chocolate bits that stuck to the knife. *Warning*: this action shall not to be done without adult's supervision. Oops. What the heck am I saying here. I mean do NOT try this at all.
♥ a rich and luscious slice of kek batik
This kek batik slice pic was taken 2 days after I made the cake. The cake has become denser and firmer and is easier to slice up, though a warmed knife is still needed.
The cake is very chocolatey-rich. Surprisingly, it's not powerfully sweet probably because half the sweet milo powder had been replaced with unsweetened cocoa powder. The after-taste headache probably stems from the super rich chocolate fudge.
♥ kek batik from the side
My kek batik is soft and fudgy, not the cake-like or brownie-like texture that I was seeking after. It still took a bit of hard work to slice up the cake. If the dough had been cooked a tad longer, it should be easier to slice without bits of chocolate fudge clinging onto your knife.
I will just have to make sure I would stir my chocolate batter longer the next time I make this. Speaking of which, the stirring process actually reminds me of making custards! It's very similar, really! Except that we are stirring chocolate custards! *yummo* ^-^
♥ a piece or rather 2 pieces of nolstagic gourmet: kek batik
We are just gluttons. We pigged out on one large slice of kek batik each. In Brunei, kek batik is cut into bite-size slices and usually 2 pieces of the rich chocolicious slice are enough to give you a massive haedache. We probably had triple of that quantity at one go. No wonder my waistline is expanding so fast this week!
But no complains! I am over-the-cloud that I now know how to make kek batik. Ha. No more self-pity during Hari Raya anymore because I can enjoy this whenever I want now. *yay*
Right. Maybe not whenever I want afterall I have to watch my waistline. :-p
One last thing, kek batik has a fair bit of resemblance to Manna's from Heaven's Chocolate Crunch!
♥ pinkcocoa tabete @ Wednesday, November 24, 2004
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