Persimmon Fruit Cake & S'more Cookies

Heard a really sad news today. A University hostel friend of mine just passed away. I was so shock when I hear the news from another good friend. The decreased was staying next door to me in the hostel for a year. We are not that close, but we are still friends. Although we have not been in touch for a good few years now, but I still hear things about her now and then. She was a real popular girl and well liked by everyone around her. Somehow hearing the sound of her bubbly laughter seems to be so recent...so close, just next door. Knowing her departure at such a tender age was a little overwhelming to me. However, I pray hard, I pray with all my heart that she will find peace and joy in heaven and will always be remembered in fond memories. We'll all miss you KT.

I apologies to start off the post with such a sad news. But I feel much better letting out my feelings. Thanks for staying and listening to me my friend. :) Let's get back to food. As the title stated, I made Persimmon cake and S'more cookies this time. Actually these two bakes were made on separate occasions a couple days back, but only able to put up the post today. Persimmon cake, pretty unusual I must say, probably no one has done it before, hahaha. It so happened that my MIL had some persimmon fruits in the fridge which were almost a week old and I thought... why not?Generally speaking, persimmons are a delicious fruit on it's own. So putting it on the cake is really not that common. My MIL had generously spared me 3 persimmons to make this special cake. And the persimmons are on the medium to small side, so that is why I used 3. Interested how I make it? Read on:

Ingredients for Persimmon Fruit Cake (5cm X5cmX10cm loaf tin):
80g unsalted butter, room temperature
100g caster sugar
2 eggs, beaten
95g plain flour
3g baking powder
7 tbsp fresh milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp salt
2 to 3 persimmon fruits, peeled and cut into wedges (seeds removed)

Method:

• Preheat the oven to 180°C. Grease and line with parchment paper a loaf tin.
  
• In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and confectioner's sugar together till creamy and fluffy. Add vanilla , salt and continue to mix till well combined.
• Stir in the eggs, drizzling a little at a time. Making sure it is well mixed before adding a little more each time.
• Sift the flour, baking powder into the egg mixture and stir well.
• Pour the batter into the prepared tin. Then gently place the persimmon wedges on the top of the batter.
• Bake in preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes or when the tester comes out clean.
• Remove from oven, let cool in tin for 5 minutes. Remove from tin and let cool completely before slicing the cake.
  

Overall, the cake was moist and the right sweetness. In fact the persimmons were sweeter then the cake itself! Even though I like it, I probably will modified it to bake with other fruits...perhaps with apples. :) Somehow the cake is lacking a bit of "kick" to it, that slight acidity to make it a well balance taste. But I still find it a good try...

Next up is S'more cookies. Okay, you must be thinking that I am totally "obsessed" with S'mores! This is probably my 3rd kind of S'more's bake! First was the S'more cupcakes, then is this S'more brownies. And now S'more cookies, hahaha! Okay, if you are new to S'more, please Google it...it's this chocolaty, gooey with a crunch comfort food that you won't want to miss out! The S'more cookie recipe was obtained from Cookie Madness, which after reading her recipe, I find it way too irresistable not to bake them! Look at the photo below and tell me you how will you not agree to that?!
These cookies are really yummy! Crunch at the edges and chewy on the inside....my absolute favorite! :P Plus the chocolate chunks and gooey marshmallows are really added bonuses to the already delicious cookies. Furthermore, the graham cracker crumbs added extra texture and flavor, superb! But perhaps the next time I make these, I will reduce the sugar by 10g so as to suit my taste....
Hold up...you asking me where's the marshmallows? It's there...totally melted down into the cookie. :-P And since I am not too big a fan of marshmallows in the first place, I have reduced the amount to only 1/2 a cup instead of 1. Another change I made to the recipe was using 70% cocoa Lindt bar chocolate instead of Hershey's bar (which I think will be sweeter).
Interested to bake up a batch? Don't hesitate...it's really worth the trouble...in fact it's not too hard to make! Try them.

Final thought: Learning about the sad news today again reminded me on the fragility of human life. We are constantly reminded by medias and other influences to cherish our life and things/people around us. But are we really doing it? I believe so long as we live life with an open heart, give with a generous mind and striving for the best, I bet bliss and happiness is within reach. I truly wish everyone will cherish what you have and live life to the fullest with no regrets. :) Have a good day and a great week. Cheers!