Cherry Almond Cake

The blog has been a bit dormant lately so thought I'd kick start it...last weekend I was in the mood to bake but not in the mood to go grocery shopping so I had to improvise with what I had and it turned out pretty good!

Ingredients:

2 cups plain flour

3 eggs

2 tbsp butter/margarine

1 cup milk

3/4 cup sugar (i used raw sugar)

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup fresh cherries

1-2 tbsp almond slivers

Cream the butter a little with a fork so it's smooth. Add and beat in the eggs. Add the milk. In a separate bowl mix the dry ingredients - flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Fold in the dry mixture in the wet mixture. Pour into a baking dish. Cut the cherries into halves and remove the stones. Top the cake batter with the cherries and the almond slivers. Bake at 375F for 40 mins.

It was so simple and quick but definitely was good - especially warm with a bit of vanilla icecream :)

(On the same day Saugar made this roast lamb - which was un-freakin-believable. Probably the most tender lamb i've ever had...that recipe coming up :)

Puran Poli/Bakshalu

Yesterday was Ugadi and every year on Ugadi my mum makes Bakshalu (Puran Poli) as do most telugu/kannada/marathi people I think. When I called to wish my parents and my mum was making them I got very sad cause I wanted some too. My mum told me that she would make me some when I'm home in december, and that she would also freeze a couple from Ugadi just so I don't miss out.

 

I thought about this for the rest of the day, and in the afternoon I decided that instead of pining for something I couldn't get (yes I was actually pining), why not just get off my ass and attempt to make some? Well with a little bit of luck, they turned out very well, considering it was the first time I made them. And to my surprise, it wasn't difficult at all. The whole thing only took an hour.

 

Thought I'd better keep a record of how I made it for next time, and where better to keep track of that than through the sisterhood? :)

So here goes:

 

Ingredients:

1 cup channa dal

1 cup brown sugar

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1/2 tsp cardamom powder

2 tsp of oil

 

Cook the channa dal with 2 cups water in a pressure cooker till it is very soft and mushy. While the dal is cooking make a dough with the maida, water and a little oil. The dough should be pretty soft. Let the dough rest for a little while. Once the dal is cooked, open the pressure cooker, add in the sugar and the cardamom and start to cook it down till it becomes a fairly dry paste-like consistency. Take it off the stove and let it cool a little. Take a ball of the dough and a slightly larger ball of the channa dal filling. Flatten out the dough to a slightly smaller than palm size, add the ball of the filling and stretch out the dough to cover the filling completely. Flatten out the filled ball (use plenty of dry flour because it was super sticky) with your palm first then roll it out with a rolling pin into small rotis. (don't make them too flat). Cook on the tawa with a little butter on both sides.

 

 

Banana Muffins

I had an over ripe banana so decided to do some baking yesterday. Again tried to cut down the amount of butter and sugar and I was very happy with how they turned out.

Recipe below makes between 6 and 8 muffins based on the size of the muffins in the tray

1 cup self raising flour

1 ripe banana

1 egg

1/4 cup milk

1 tbsp butter/margarine

About 6 tsps sugar (I used brown - the muffins weren't super sweet so increase the sugar if you like)

1/2 tsp salt

handful of chopped walnuts (optional - I added them cause I had them around but all they really added was a bit of texture)

1/2 tsp vanilla essence

Mash the banana. Beat together the egg, mashed banana and butter.

In another bowl mix/sift the flour, sugar and salt

Mix the dry and wet ingredients

Add the chopped walnuts and the vanilla

Pour into a lightly greased muffin tray (about 3/4 way up) and bake in a pre-heated oven at 400F for about 20 minutes.

The whole process took about half an hour so was definitely worth it! (and didnt feel super guilty either because I knew the ingredients that went in)

Bread ki Kheer

 I was inspired by Double Ka Meetha - which I so *love* but it has so much butter that I'm also scared of it

So decided to come up with something else yesterday. I made this for breakfast - so kept it a little lighter on the sugar - but you can up the sugar content to make it more dessert-y. I will say that it was a very comforting breakfast on a winter sunday morning.

Ingredients:

3-4 bread slices (remove the edges and tear into bite sized pieces)

2 tsps butter (i used the butter substitute thing)

1.5 cups milk

pinch of cardamom

2 tsps cashew nuts/almonds

3 tbsps sugar (honestly i'm not sure of the exact amount of sugar i used - just added and tasted)

Put the milk to boil in a pot with the cardamom. At the same time, melt the butter in a separate pan and fry the pieces of bread in it till they turn golden. In the same pan fry the nuts/dried fruit (whatever you wish to add)

Once the milk has started to boil, turn the heat down and add the fried bread pieces. Stir till the milk starts to get absorbed. Add in the sugar and keep stirring till the sugar melts in. Keep it on the stove on low heat for a while, till you get the consistency you like - could be more milky (which is how we had it) or wait for it to get more 'halwa like'

That's it...very easy. And we finished the whole lot in one sitting. Would definitely make it again!

Microwave self-saucing chocolate pudding

Hey girls.. I just re-discovered this awesome recipe that I used a few times when I was in NZ... it takes like 7 mins in the microwave and produces a yummy as chocolate cake with chocolate sauce on it!!! Very easy and quick dessert :) I've modified the recipe a bit from what I found online:

Microwave Self-saucing Chocolate Pudding

Ingredients (this makes around 4 servings)

Pudding:

• 1 cup self-raising flour (check if this has salt, if it does, omit salt from the recipe)
• 3/4 cup sugar (i like brown sugar better)
• pinch of salt
• 3 tablespoons cocoa powder
• 2 teaspoons melted butter (i used unsalted but doesn really matter i guess)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence (i used to add a bit of orange essence when i had it and it gives the yummmmy jaffa taste)
• 1/2 cup milk (if the batter is too hard, u can add a bit more)

Sauce

• 1/2 cup sugar (brown is better again)
• 1 tablespoon cocoa
• 1 1/2 cups boiling water

Need baking paper (wax paper)
I usually just mix/make this in a large glass bowl/measuring jug.

Directions

1. Mix/sift (actual recipe said sift, i just mixed) flour, cocoa, salt and sugar into a bowl
2. Stir in milk, melted butter and vanilla till mixture is just combined.
3. Combine brown sugar and cocoa and sprinkle it over the batter.
4. Now, very carefully, pour hot water over the batter (best is to run it along the side of the container so it forms a pool on top of the batter) and cover with a sheet of waxed paper. Press the wax paper down onto the water so that it 'sticks' to the water. Its fine to have some paper sticking on the sides of the container too.
   
5. Cook on high for 6 - 7 minutes.

Voila! We had it straight but it tastes amazing with some ice cream :)

Almond Cookies

I really wanted to bake something on saturday but didn't have any butter in the house and the weather was really bad so couldnt go grocery shopping.

 

So I hunted around for cookie recipes that didn't use butter. I found one, which I modified slightly based on the comments on the recipe that it was too sweet. I also simplified it a little with fewer ingredients. The whole thing took less than half an hour to make so i was pretty excited

 

Ingredients:

1 cup toasted almonds

1 cup plain flour

1/2 cup sugar (you can increase this if you like it slightly sweeter)

2 large egg whites

A pinch of salt

 

Grind the almonds with the sugar into a coarse powder. Mix the almonds and sugar into the egg whites along with the flour and salt. The whole thing will be fairly dense. Spoon out individual cookies on to a cookie sheet. I made fairly small ones - so 1 tsp of dough per cookie. I didn't really shape it but you can if you want i guess. Make sure you don't flatten them out. Because there is no baking powder, they won't really rise or spread out.

 

Pre-heat the oven at 325F. Bake the cookies for 15 mins (the bottom of them will be brown and the top will be just golden. Let it cool

 

Have a lovely week!

:)

Atte ka Halwa

Atte ka Halwa - a new addition to favourite Indian sweets list!

 

Hello Girls..

 

Sorry havent been emailing recipes for a while. Havent really been doing much cooking lately. Going to start my new job next week - 1st Feb! Busy looking for apartments and preparing to move houses 3rd time in less than 8 months. Also just found out my PhD viva will be held on the 18th Feb via video conferencing. So its all go at the moment.

 

But once things have calmed down a bit and I get into a normal routine (is that even possible?) I am going to start trying out some of those pasta and salad ideas.

 

As for atte ka halwa:

 

I didnt make it myself.. just saw it being made by our multi-talented cook (who we hired during the shaadi time in India). Apparently he was in the mehendi business before he got told by several customers that he was no good at it.. so he left and became a cook. :) He is a pretty good and resourceful cook, so I think change for the better for him.

 

So here is what he did - very simple:

 

• You will need equal parts of Wheat Flour, Ghee and Sugar (maybe 1 cup each)
• Heat the Ghee in a pan until it has melted completely.
• Add the wheat flour and stir in with the ghee, until brownish, not lumpy and the fat starts to separate.
• Add water (lots of it maybe 4-5 cups) and sugar.
• Keep stirring until it is halwa-like consistency (because it is atta the consistency will be much smoother than for example sooji (semolina) halwa)
• Take it off heat. Add dry fruits and nuts. Enjoy! YUM YUMM

Have fun!

 

Swati

 

 

Til Laddoo (or for the lazy ones among us, i.e. ME - Til ki Mithai)

My contribution based on my sankranti experiment

Til Laddoo (though mine was more Til Mithai - but hey it still tastes the same!)

Ingredients:

3/4 cup sesame seeds

1/4 cup cashew nuts

3/4 cup brown sugar

pinch of cardamom powder

Roast the sesame seeds and the cashew nuts in a pan till they are light brown.

In a pot add the brown sugar to 1/2 cup water and let it boil till it forms a syrup

Once it thickens a fair bit, add in the sesame seeds, cashew nuts and cardamom powder and let it boil further till the whole thing becomes a very thick mixture.

If you want to make laddoos let it cool down a bit and then shape them into laddoos

If you are lazy like me - grease a plate or tin and pour the mixture on it.

Once it cools down cut them into pieces

there you go :)

was very simple and fairly quick...worth a try i'd say

especially since it stores pretty well and you can put it away and have it a piece at a time.

10 minutes can make a desi sweet? Hard to believe but true :) - Coconut Laddoos

My discovery of the day...a 10 minute, 3 ingredient mithai...pretty excited about it :)

This morning I suddenly remember coconut laddoos...it was a sweet my mum made for every diwali when I was young but later stopped cuz coconut is so high cholestrol etc. Anyway I called mum and asked her how to make it...she said she would boil milk, sugar and coconut together till it started to thicken but suggested I use sweetened condensed milk instead and give the microwave a try to avoid the mess (cuz she said it tends to spill etc)

So I did...and success! hehe

3 ingredients as I said: (the quantities below made 13 average sized laddoos)

400gms grated coconut (I used a frozen pack from the indian store - make sure it's frozen fresh coconut - the dried one will have too much of a coconut oil smell)

300gms condensed milk

1/2 tsp cardamom powder

If using frozen coconut defrost it completely in the microwave first

Mix all three ingredients properly so there are no lumps

Put it in the microwave for 3 minutes

Take it out - stir thoroughly

Put it back in for 2 minutes

Take it out and stir once again

(Repeat last two steps 2 more times or till it becomes thick enough - just keep an eye on it cause it might spill depending on the power of your microwave)

Once the mixture feels fairly thick

Spread it on a greased plate and let it cool

Once it's cooled make them into laddoos - place in the refrigerator so they firm up a bit

(Mine are in the fridge right now but me and Saugar had one each just after I made 'em and they're definitely a hit - especially for something so simple!!)

Merry Christmas!

xoxo

Megha

Marshmallows - yum!

So the other day I was talking to Praneeti about how much I love our fireplace (though have only lit it 3 times so far) and one of the most fun things is toasting marshmallows

yesterday I had this craving for toasted marshmallows...i absolutely LOVE the burnt flavour outside and the melted marshmallow inside...but we didnt have the fireplace going

I got curious and thought about trying it in the oven and it came out really well!

I just put some of those big marshmallows on some aluminum foil in the toaster oven for 5 mins...probably need to turn it once so it gets black on both sides

but they tasted awesome!

and a relatively guilt free and easy dessert

:)