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!

:)

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.

Some interesting breakkie ideas

Anch...the pasta sauce sounds good...except i dont usually have wine in the house since neither of us drink....hehe

thanks for the tip on brown pasta...

and praneeti - will def try the savoury tarts...they sound lovely

i love puff pastry...there's so much you can do with it...even the simplest things

 

my simplest puff pastry "recipe" (it's not really one) but great for a quick saturday/sunday morning breakfast

 

cut puff pastry into fairly big squares (one sheet into 4 pieces).

take hard boiled eggs and cut them in half. sprinkle salt and pepper.

put half a boiled egg on each pastry square and fold the pastry over so it's a triangle

bake till golden brown

i know it sounds ridiculously simple but it's awesome

 

oh and another breakfast idea...this i sort of came up with myself after seeing something on tv...saugar liked it - more for the fun of it!

ingredients required per serving - 2 slices of fairly thick bread, 1 egg, 1.5 strips of turkey bacon (u can use regular bacon too - i dont like bacon so use turkey), a sprinkling of cheese (can be any kind - something that melts nicely - i usually use grated mozarella)

cook the bacon to a crisp on a seperate pan (or i recently saw a tip that cooking bacon in an oven/toaster oven works better - haven't tried yet)

take the first slice of bread - using a wine glass, cut a hole in the center of it.

heat a tiny bit of butter on a pan and place the slice of bread with the hole on it.

take an egg and break it right into that hole - try to keep the egg from running outside the hole - but a little won't matter.

let it cook till the underside of the egg is hard enough then flip it. add salt and pepper
cook the other side - a little will spread - but not a big deal.

how much you want to cook it depends on how you like your egg - both me an saugar like it a tiny bit runny when you bite into it

while the bread and egg is cooking on the other side toast the other slice of bread - either on the pan or lightly in a toaster

once the egg is almost done to how you like it - break the bacon strips into half and put three halves (hence 1.5 strips on the bread/egg). sprinkle a little cheese and place the second piece of bread on top.

cook for a little longer till the cheese melts a little

 

there's my little tit-bits for the day

 

and yes if all in favour let's start a blog

anch - rather than an email address - maybe just starting a blog on blogger with all of us having access to post to it?

if that works i can set one up and send you invites

 

signing out....

megha :)

 

Praneeti's Savoury Tarts

BTW.. thought I might as well share with you all my random, easy-to-make recipe that I sent to someone else :) These are yummy as!!


Savoury Tarts
You need muffin trays to make this
Ingredients:
- puff pastry sheets,
- veggies/any leftover curry (tastes best with leftover curries),
- tomato & chilli (ideally sriracha sauce),
- mozzarella cheese

Method:
- cut out squares of the pastry sheets and line each muffin well with one sheet
- put in some sauce mix and spread it around
- put in the veggies/leftover curry
- spread some mozzarella cheese on top
- bake at 180degC for about 20-30 mins (or till done)

 

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

:)