Dancey Cake

I have been craving for these chewy, spongy doughnuts.  I like them coated in just plain sugar, icing sugar or cinnamon sugar!

yields approximately 2 dozen
Ingredients

1/4 cups lukewarm water
1 tablespoons yeast
1/4 cups sugar
2 tablespoons shortening
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup hot water
1/2 cups milk
1 eggs, beaten
3 1/4 cups flour


Dissolve yeast in lukewarm water.  Set aside.In a large bowl mix together sugar, shortening, hotwater, salt, and milk. When milk mixture cooled down mix in beaten eggs and yeast mixture.Gradually add flour, 1/2 cups at a time.  Add a bit more if dough feels sticky.Refrigerate for 30 minutes up to 1 hourShape donuts to desired size. Fill pan with olive oil. 2" deep.Heat up oil.Fry up donuts in medium low heat until golden brown.Sprinkle with sugar or any topping you like.

This yeast donut took the whole day to make.  Multi tasking my way around the day so I can create this delish awesome treat.  Everyone is at home self isolating.  Running around making 3 meals a day and snacks is a lot of work!  It turned our really well so proud of this!

I also made a video just make it easier for everyone to follow along.  Watch it with your kids and partner.  Bond while baking.  





For those of you who prefer the recipe format.  I screen shot some of the scenes. You can shape these in whatever shape you want.  You don't even need a cookie cutters.   Simply roll out your dough into desired thickness and shape and then cut them up into little rectangles.  It's so easy!

Yup! This is one of those, "what in the world" moment when you think your getting an awesome recipe but what you get is a baking disaster.  Let me tell you this recipe dates back to the time when internet is not so life defining and when I don't have kids yet.  
When I found this recipe in Reader's Digest I really wanted to make it.  It turned out awful and for the longest time I thought I did something wrong.  When I recently made it again I got the same result.  The dough was dry and will not form into a "smooth dough".  So I fixed the recipe up and what I got is this amazing crispy buttery shortbread!

I made some extreme changes to the recipe!! Since I got rid of  1 tablespoon of fresh lemon juice, I have to add 1 tablespoon of milk.  Anything I take away I have to compensate with another ingredient otherwise I will not get the same final product.  My texture and quality of my shortbread will be off.



Spanish Shortbread
265g all purpose flour 1/2 tsp cin…

Battle Cats is Japanese tower defence game launched in 2012 and rereleased in 2017.  The birthday boy is a big fan of battle cats he got a similar cake last year.  (This cake can be found here).. Originally I wanted the chainsaw attached to battle cat's vehicle.  Unfortunately the chainsaw was too heavy and the cake is not dense enough to hold it into place.  I had to put in on the cake board and use it as a background for the celebrants name. Perhaps it would have been better if I use wafer sheets to create the chainsaw or install a heavy, dense base that can hold the the heavy chainsaw.

THIS IS THE BASIC SHAPE OF THE CAKE
I used the ball cake mould for this cake.  I baked 3 pieces so one whole ball and a small bowl for the bottom base piece.
This is a full ball cake.  I cut off 1/3 of the top layer to create the shape for battle cat's vehicle.  To prevent the cake from tipping and rolling around I added at o thick piece of fondant at the bottom of the cake.  I am going to trim…