CAKE CHEMISTRY!!!!!

Estelle Chey has developed a chemistry with baking - through NUMBERS and MEASUREMENTS.She MIXES and MATCHES INGREDIENTS to come up with her own takes on RECIPES from websites such as FOOD GAWKER. The 23-year-old auditor says : " I enjoy experimenting with cake recipes and I like baking cakes because the process is more complicated than muffins or cookies. You can't get a single measurement wrong." In the process of perfecting her recipes, the Food Network fan has had her fair share of kitchen mishaps.

The red velvet cake recipe, which she shares here, had to go through a few trial rounds before the taste and colour were perfected. On the first try, she says ; "The cake was too sweet and its colour was a bit too red and looked quite scary." Another baking boo-boo happened when she made a mango mousse cake. She explains : "The cake didn't have enough gelatin inside. It fell apart and had to be thrown away." Other unsuccessful attempts include trying to "bake healthily" by using wholegrain products and less sugar. Says the Accountancy graduate from Nanyang Technological University :" I try to eat healthy, so I thought that cutting down on some sugar and cream in cakes would work out. It didn't turn out well and I gave up. I guess I will save my unhealthy eating for cakes."

She has learnt from her unsuccessful attempts and now rattles off tips on baking alternatives. To get the vibrant red in the red velvet cake recipe, she suggests using beetroot instead of red food colouring. As she potters around her kitchen making the cake, she also offers the tidbit that a buttermilk substitute can be made by mixing one tablespoon of white vinegar with a cup of whole milk. She started baking when she was young with her elder sister, Elaine, 42, and her mother, Evelyn, 68. But she went full-stream into baking after she returned from a six-month exchange programme to the Netherlands in 1993.

"I felt quite deprived of baking since I'm so used to baking cookies with my mother and sister,"she says. Now she bakes cakes such as cheesecake, chocolate cake and opera cake, a type of French cake with almond sponge cake layers, for her family and church friends. Says Mrs Chey, who is a fan of her daughter's red velvet cake and strawberry shortcake: " Estelle is always baking every other week,even at midnight sometimes. She's more adventurous than myself and her elder sister. She'll always try to bake something different for each of her friends."

The creative young baker even made a four-layer purple cake with different shades of purple icing for a church friend whose name is, aptly enough, Purple. Mrs Chey had to outfit the kitchen in their semi-detached house in Jalan Pemimpin with a Blomberg oven a few months ago because Estelle was making 128 red velvet cupcakes for her cousin's wedding. Currently looking to create a hazelnut cake recipe, Estelle says:" Now, when I eat cakes, I try to figure out the ingredients that go inside. Sometimes I spend too much time looking at recipes and thinking what else I can do with it."