Marble Cake (or Marmer Cake in Bahasa Indonesia)

This recipe will show you how to make a marble cake that I used to make in Indonesia with my sis and bro. This is how I make and how I preferred it to be, so if you think you prefer it some other way, feel free to change whatever ingredients that suits your taste. Enjoy!!

Ingredients:
• 225 gr or 250 gr icing sugar (depending on the maker preference of sweetness)
• 250 gr soft flour
• A pinch salt
• 3 tablespoon Cocoa powder
• 6 egg yolks, 5 egg whites (if using baking powder)
9 egg yolks, 7 egg whites (if NOT using baking powder)
• 250 gr butter (preferably a mixture of 150 gr Wisman butter, 100gr normal butter to have a better taste)
• 1 tea spoon vanilla essence

How to make:

The White Marble

1. Please ensure that ALL your kitchen equipment is completely CLEAN and DRY, because no cake can be done if the equipment are not dry
2. Put butter and icing sugar with a pinch salt together in 1 container and mix it with a kitchen mixer (or if you don’t have any mixer you can mix them manually by whisker). Do this until all the mixture is nicely mixed with a yellowish color (because of the butter)
3. After everything is nicely mixed, put the egg yolks in one by one with the mixer running. Now this must be done slowly, if not, the yolk will not mixed properly with the butter & sugar mixture and you definitely don’t want that to happen now do you? Do this until the color starts to turn into a bit white
4. While waiting for the mixture to turn white, beat the egg whites using another mixer (or by whisker) until it becomes foamy and fluffy
5. Back to the butter sugar thingy, after it turns white, slow down the mixer by a bit and start to pour the flour SLOWLY (do not pour all the flour directly, because it will only make the dough not perfectly mixed and you have to throw this failure product). If you use baking powder, pour it now after the flour
6. By this time both egg whites and egg yolks should be finished. Now, pour the fluffy egg whites into the flour yolk butter sugar mixture, and start to fold them by PLASTIC SPATULA together. Again, this should be done slowly or else the mixture will not merge. You can only fold one way, so if you fold left than keep folding left and vice versa (or else the mixture will not rise when baked)
7. Give 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence to give a nice aroma to the cake
8. Start to preheat your oven at around 150 or 175 degrees Celsius

The Chocolate Marble

1. After folding, take 1/3 of the batter mixture and incorporate it with the cocoa powder.
2. Mix it slowly until all the white batter becomes brown (or black)

Finishing touch

1. Pour ½ of the white mixture first to a cake mold (preferably round shape 20x20cm). Cover all the inside part with a bit of cooking oil and soft flour all around it, just a thin layer should be enough. (This is done in order for the cake to be easy to taken out once the cake is done).
2. After that pour the all the chocolate mixture evenly throughout the mold. (Because you don’t want the cake to have only chocolate on left side and only vanilla on right side, you know what I mean?)
3. Pour the rest of the white mixture on top of the chocolate until finished
4. Use whatever thing you have (in my case 1 piece of chopstick) to mix the white and the chocolate mixture evenly so that the chocolate would not be only in the middle part of the cake
5. Bake the cake in the preheat oven for 30-45 minutes with 150 to 175 degree Celsius of temperature
6. Now until it’s done, turn the cake mold upside down and you will have a nice white and chocolate marble cake

Photo from Google

France Trip Restaurant Review

Bistrot Victoires

Bistrot Victoires
6 rue de la Vrilliere 1st, Paris
Area: Louvre
Phone: 01.42.6143.78
Open Hours: Open noon-3pm, 7-11pm daily.
Cuisine type: Local, Seafood, French, European
Price: Moderately Priced

Bistros with vintage decor serving no-nonsense food at generous prices are growing thin on the ground in Paris, so it’s no surprise that Bistrot Victoires is packed to the gills with bargain-loving office workers and locals every day. Even we travellers found it interesting. Located not far from The Louvre, it brought me and my friends to the heart of Parisian dining experience. This classic bistro seems to have it all, the cozy feeling, the ambience, the reasonable price, good food, and not-so-hard-to-be-found location. The first time we entered the restaurant, nobody was around as it was still 11.30am in the afternoon. Not long after that while we were eating our lunch, more and more people showed up for lunch. Lucky for us to came earlier so we did not have to wait for a seat. People queued just for lunch, there were mostly French, American, and even a Japanese woman was there. This shows how well-known the bistro is.

What I felt the first time I entered the restaurant was a not too big, cozy, and homey place for people to gather and have a chat with each other while enjoying the food. This may be caused by brown colors surrounding the restaurant from the wall, the bar, the table and the chair. Believe it or not, the atmosphere made me feel relax and it feels like home to me.

The menu was presented in a simple and clean way using white carton covered by plastic with only names of foods, drinks, and prices written on it. Luckily we understand basic French so we had no hard time picking what we wanted to eat and drink. It comprised of series of appetizers, main courses (or we can call it Plat du Jour in French), desserts, and choices of alcoholic beverages as well as non-alcoholic beverages such as coffee and tea. They also had some English menu so that tourists like us can read from it because not all tourists that come to France can speak French.

The service given was pretty well. Ordered were taken fast, without delay and with a smile. Not every restaurant has a waitress to receive an order with a friendly smile on her face. No sir! Also, I might add, for French people I would say that they had very warm attitude towards the guest. I said this because most French people in Paris were not that warm and welcoming to tourists.

The price was moderately priced around 8 to 15 Euros and for a restaurant that served this type of food with this level or service, I would say this amount of money was worth it. I also would definitely come back for more of their ducks. I may have not try lots of restaurant in my life, but still as far as it is, this duck salad was the best one that I have ever tasted.

Overall, I must say that I am quite satisfied with the food and service given by Bistrot Victoires. If you ever go to Paris and wandering what to eat in the Louvre area, try to drop by and stay for a while in this warm and welcoming bistro.

France Trip Food Review

In this blog today I am going to talk about three different foods (appetizer, main course, and dessert) that I had in a certain bistro called Bistrot Victoires in France during my French trip with Taylor’s University in May-June 2013. They have their own unique taste, hope you all enjoy.

1. Salade Landaise (Landes Salad) 9 Euros


This salad was made of green salad, foie gras, duck wings, confit duck gizzards, and cured ham. So basically, it was a salad with duck meat that has been confit, with several slices of ham covering the salad. It was a right choice to order this salad and the main course while sharing with my friend because as you all can see in the photo; it was a full plate of salad with duck meat (and ham) all over it until you cannot see the salad anymore. What’s more was the foie gras that they served was quite big for a salad. In my opinion, it was as big as a mini patty burger here in Malaysia. The presentation was good, the taste was better. Heck, who am I kidding… it was really delicious it rolled my eyes back it was so good.







2. Entrecôte grillee au thym brule de la garrigue frites au couteau (Grilled steak with burnt thyme and scrubland knife chips) 11 Euros

After the duck salad, I and my friend ordered a grilled steak for the main course. Now what I realized from the plate presentation in Bistrot Victoires was they used a normal white plate with names of their foods and beverages on the tip of the plate circling the center part of the plate. Back to the food, we ordered the steak to be medium-well as many people say that they cannot find the joy of eating steak in a well-done steak. So, medium-well it was. It was more or less the same as many steaks we had eaten before (and it came with fries), but there was this hint of thyme when it came. We quickly realized that there were several burnt thymes on top of it. That was what makes the difference. The taste was delicious as the combination of grilled steaks and thyme worked really well. Personally, I liked the taste and overall presentation, but it would be better for the steak to come with something green like broccoli or lettuce because it really is better for a plate presentation and also health value.



3. Gateau tiede au chocolate coulant, glace vanille (Luke warm flowing chocolate cake with vanilla ice cream) 5 Euros

As for the dessert, I had this Luke warm flowing chocolate cake or we could call it ‘Chocolate Lava’ with vanilla ice cream. It really blew my mind. It was presented in a round white plate with the chocolate in the center, sprinkled with lots of cocoa powder and icing sugar. The finishing touch was the magnificent vanilla ice cream. The combination of warm chocolate and cold ice cream could really melt someone’s heart. It had the nice not too sweet sensation when you put it to your mouth. Overall it was pretty good and I would definitely comeback for more of its chocolate lava.

Biscuits

A biscuit is a baked, commonly flour-based food product. Commonly is divided into two types: American biscuit and British biscuit. The term biscuit is applied to two distinct products in North America and Commonwealth of Nations and also Europe. In the United States and sometimes Canada, it is a small, soft, leavened bread, somewhat similar to a scone, though generally softer and fluffier. In Commonwealth English, it is a small baked product that would be called either a ‘cookie’ or a ‘cracker’ in the United States. Biscuits in the United Kingdom and Ireland may be savory (often referred to as ‘crackers’) or sweet such as chocolate biscuits, ginger nuts, custard creams, and many products that we can see inside almost every convenient store these days. Although in Commonwealth Nations, the term ‘cookie’ may be synonymous with ‘biscuit’, a cookie is generally a softer baked product like what they sell in Subway.

In Malaysia, American biscuits can often be seen in the fast food chain restaurant, for example Popeye, as for English biscuits, we can find them in many convenient stores like 7 Eleven. American biscuits are dry, which results in they usually eaten with jam like Strawberry or Blueberry jam. English biscuits, on the other hand, are usually eaten with milk. People often eat it in a way of dipping some part of the biscuits to a glass of milk to infuse milk flavor and soften the biscuit by a bit before they eat them.

A good American biscuits should have uniform golden brown at the top and bottom part, the inside should be creamy white and free from yellow or brown spots. It has to have straight sides and a smooth level top. The volume is at least twice the size of the unbaked product. The crust should be tender and moderately smooth; it also should be free from excess flour. A biscuit texture is preferred to be slightly moist, tender and flaky crumb, with a medium fine grain while the flavor is pleasing, well-blended with no bitterness at all.

Good condiments for high-tea like British biscuits have a variety of color from yellow to dark brown; the inside should have same consistency as the outside. The volume should be at least twice the size of the unbaked product, same as American biscuits. The crust and texture should be crunchy, not soft as it will be broken when snapped. Flavor should not have any bitterness as well, and may have savory or sweet taste, depending on people’s preference.

The two of them are delicious and are worth eating as a snack. Like the languages themselves, they have their own unique characteristics.