Juniper
Unfortunately, I don’t receive many invitations for cooking workshops so when Tefal invited me for their 1st ever media cooking workshop “All About Desserts” by Ili Sulaiman, founder of Dish by Ili and Food Hero Asia 2015 at the Tefal Experience Centre, I was really looking forward to it.
The workshop focused on one Tefal product – the Titanium coated non-stick frypan which is super stylish and so useful as nothing sticks even when oil is not added. The red circle in the middle of the frypan has black spots which disappear when the desired temperature is reached. It’s known as the Thermo-Spot which turns full red when the temperature set is attained. This lets you know when to put in the ingredients.
We were given two of Ili’s recipes, both desserts. Ili demonstrated the 1st one – Churros With Kaya Dipping Sauce. She made it looked so simple. Water, butter, sugar and salt were mixed together in a pot until the butter melted. Then flour was added until the mixture became doughy. The dough was left to cool for 5 minutes.
In another bowl, eggs were beaten with vanilla extract, then added to the bowl with the dough and blended until thick and smooth. Frying oil was poured into the Tefal frypan and heated till 350 F (170°C – 175°C).
While heating, Ili filled a pastry bag with the dough and in another bow, coarse sugar was poured as coating for the churros. The dough can be prepared the day before and left in the fridge. Ili’s churros recipe served between 4-6 people.
When the oil has been properly heated, snip the desired lengths of dough into the oil and fry between 3-4 minutes. The lengths can be short or long depending on preference but it’s nice to have them short as you can consume them at one go.
As for the Kaya Sauce, Ili combined a tablespoon of kaya with 4 tablespoons of hot water and a pinch of salt to make it into a runny consistency.
Then it was time for the media to make our own Red Velvet Pancakes With Cream Cheese Glaze and all the ingredients were on a communal table for us to gather. Our individual tables were organised with all the kitchen implements and tools we’d need such as whisk, spatula, bowls and of course our own Tefal frypan so that we could see for ourselves how awesome it is.
To begin, we gathered flour, sugar, cocoa powder, salt, vanilla extract, white vinegar and red liquid food coloring in a bowl (“pancake mixture”). In another bowl, we separated 2 egg whites and yolks (yolks went into the pancake mixture bowl). Then we got to work whisking the egg whites and that took a few minutes as we had to make them white and fluffy.
When the egg whites turned white and fluffy (looked like clouds), they were slowly added to the pancake mixture. Time to heat up the Tefal frypan. It heats up in seconds. Wasn’t long before the black dots on the red circle in the middle disappeared.
One scoop of pancake mixture was poured into the middle of the frypan and in a matter of seconds, the pancake was ready to be flipped over. I burnt the 1st two as the pan was too hot and I finally got edible pancakes once the temperature was decreased. Once bubbles form in the batter, you know it’s time to flip the pancake over. When the edges are dry, they are ready to be taken out of the frypan. The frypan is remarkable as there was no sticking at all! Most other frypans would required a bit of butter or oil on the surface to prevent sticking but not so with the Tefal frypan, its non-stick qualities are par excellence.
Just like in cooking competitions, Ili brought over a box and asked us to choose a mystery ingredient which we had to incorporate into our dish. I picked a box of whipping cream which meant I had to use my wrists again and whip it up. I intended to put the whipped cream in between the pancakes and make stacked pancakes.
Time to make the cream cheese glaze. In a blender, we blended cream cheese, powdered sugar and vanilla extract. Milk can be added to make a glaze that has a thin enough consistency to drizzle.
With Ili’s help, my pancakes had whipped cream and cream cheese glaze in between and whipped cream on top. I named my creation “Cascading Cream Red Velvet Pancakes”. I had a lot of fun during this dessert workshop and I like Ili’s guidance. She is patient and very friendly.
I’d like to thank Tefal and Ili Sulaiman for a very informative workshop. Creating nice desserts from scratch doesn’t take a lot of time and is almost effortless as long as you have Tefal cookware! After using the Tefal frypan yesterday, it makes me want to throw away my current frypan and rush out to get the Tefal frypan. Makes cooking so much easier and less of a dread.
