Chef Patron Inez Vargas Javellana from the famous Vargas Kitchen dropped by The Maya Kitchen recently and shared delightful recipes for the Holidays. Aside from fruit cake, one can choose other alternatives like Rum Cake. A rum cake is a type of dessert cake which contains well, rum. Wikipedia says rum cakes are a traditional Christmas dessert, descended from the...

Next to Christmas , Halloween has got to be the most awaited holiday for my growing kids. During those internet-less days, I scrounged around for ideas from magazines just to make Halloween day wickedly fun. I served food with orange color themes, and even decorated my home with pumpkins and ghouls. After the trick or treat fun, my kids and their friends...

One of mom’s specialties in her Sally’s Bake Shop was Special Mamon or what Americans commonly call as Yellow Sponge Cake. Customers raved about the creamy and soft texture of mom’s Special Mamon. My sister shared this Mamon recipe which is reminescent of Goldilock’s special mamon recipe. According to my sister, this is Minna Picache...

In the past week, I have shown you select recipes to be shared to you by the Maya Kitchen just to make Father’s day extra special. The Smoked salmon brings Eggs Benedict up another notch while the Traditional Beef Pot Pie is an unmistakable comfort food. Now for the dessert, we have Banana Cream Pie with Caramel Fudge which rounds up this simple but...

I don’t know if you drink that Milo Chocolate drink as a kid. Milo is added to hot or cold milk to give it a malted chocolate flavour and extra texture. I love also eating the Milo on a teaspoon. One day, I experimented with the Milo Brownies recipe just so I can get my dose of that Milo flavor again. It does not have the chocolate goodness apparent in most...

One all-time favorite breakfast menu I love is eating fruits along with Banana bread and cottage cheese. One thing great about Banana bread is that it contains fiber and that’s what we all need to start a day. Why not have banana bread for breakfast. Baking Banana Bread is so easy even your teen-aged kids can do it. This was the first recipe my daughter...

Anyway, here is a guest post from my sister who is based in San Francisco. Filipinas Magazine, (http://FilipinasMag.com), the magazine I represent, has featured —throughout the past 16 years — many aspiring and seasoned chefs. In 2002, before the book, Kape: A Philippine Coffee Cookbook by Vicky Veloso Barrera and Chit U. Juan (Anvil Publishing), was...

I have featured Torta Cebuana, a recipe from Mrs. Gertrudes Ybanez-Noval, the baking teacher of my mom. This is another Torta version of Mrs. Noval called Torta Banawa. Banawa is the place where Mrs. Noval lived and where she held her baking classes. 2 cups cake flour, sifted 1 cup all-purpose flour, sifted 3 tsps. baking powder 1/2 tsp. salt 4 eggs 2 egg...

Sorry for the minimal posting these days. My house got flooded by Ondoy last week and it’s only this week that we are back to normal operations at home. (see Ondoy damage to our house.) We are all safe. Damage was minimal in the first floor. Our oven got busted but the refrigerator is in working condition. In the meantime, let me share recipes tested in our...

Cheese cupcakes is now sold commercially in supermarkets for kids to bring as “baon” to school. It is not quite the same Cheese cupcake mom used to bake in our bakeshop. Cheese cupcakes are supposed to have that distinct “cheese” taste. Here is a recipe that’ll surely give you that tasty cheesy cupcake. Ingredients 1 bar margarine (225...