Vegan brownies

I made these brownies for my colleagues at work. They liked them very much and one of them who is a chocoholic just loved it....I adapted this recipe from allrecipes and made some changes to the original recipe based on one of the review comments.
Everince I started baking vegan foods, I stopped buying/using dairy products like butter, ghee and cheese. But there are still some non vegan items like dark chocolate, choco chips etc in my pantry which I bought before going vegan. I don't feel like throwing them away, so I use them whenever I get a chance. So in this recipe, I used some choco chips.
Here is the recipe as adapted from allrecipes and one of the review comments

Ingredients to make around 20 pieces
All Purpose flour: 1 cup
Granulated white sugar: 3/4 cup
Cocoa Powder: 6 tbsp
Baking powder: ½ tsp
Salt: 1/4 tsp
Water: ½ cup
Vegetable oil: 2 tbsp(I used sunflower refined oil) 
Unsweetened applesauce: ½ cup 
Vanilla essence: 1 tsp
chocolate chips: a handful(Optional)

Procedure
1. Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C. 
2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, salt and cocoa powder in a large bowl.
3. Mix in sugar.
4. Pour in water, oil, applesauce and vanilla and mix until well blended.(I did the mixing with hand)
5. If using choco chip, pour half the batter in the greased or parchment lined pan, put in a layer of chocolate chips, and then pour in the rest of the batter, spreading to cover the chips. If not using choco chips, then pour in the batter to the pan.
6. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted comes out clean.
7. Allow it to cool for sometime before cutting into squares.

Dairy free Sakkarai/Sweet Pongal

      

Sakkarai or sweet pongal is my all time favourite sweet dish. I have always believed that the milk and loads of ghee that goes into the pongal makes it such a divine dish, until I made a dairy free version of it for Pongal/Sankranthi festival. It was tastier and healthier than the ghee loaded version. I have been using a traditional pongal recipe from my grandmother which I made vegan. I was not sure about substituting ghee. (I used to add almost 1/4 cup of ghee for pongal.) Checked out Vaishali's blog and was suprised to see that she overall used just a tsp of oil, that too to fry the dry fruits. I used a tsp of vanaspati for the same.

Talking about Pongal festival, it is basically a harvest festival when we(especially the farmers) thank the sun god for giving a good harvest and to give many more prosperous years. It is a grand affair in villages. For city dwellers, it is basically making pongal and vada, buying sugar cane and turmeric and doing some puja at home.
The pongal recipe here does not use pressure cooker to cook the rice. Instead, rice and moong dal are cooked in a vessel(directly kept under the stove) by adding water and milk. Once it is cooked thoroughly, jaggery is added. Finally it is garnished with cashew and raisins and flavoured with cardomom powder.
Here is the recipe..

Ingredients for pongal to serve 8 adults for dessert
Raw rice: 1 cup(not basmati or atleast I have not tried with Basmati)
Yellow moong dal: 1/4 cup
Water: 2 cups or more
Almond milk: 2 cups(I used homemade, recipe below)
Jaggery: 2 1/2 cups
Vanaspathi/Vegetable Oil: 1 tsp(I used sunflower brand vanaspathi)
Cashew and raisins: 1 or 2 tsps of each
Cardomom powder: 1/ tsp

Procedure
1. Dry roast moong dal for 1 or 2 minutes and keep aside.
2. Wash rice and drain water(it is OK if some water remains)
3. Add rice and dal in a thick bottomed vessel(it is preferred to use thick bottomed narrow mouthed vessel. I used "vengala paanai", which translates to bronze pot)
4. Add 2 cups of water to the rice and keep the vessel in the stove and set the flame to medium.
5. While rice is getting cooked, stir occasionally so that it does not get stuck at the bottom.
6. Once the water is evaporated and the rice comes to semi solid consistency, add 2 cups of almond milk and allow to boil. 
7. Check if rice is cooked after around 15 to 20 minutes. If it is still not cooked and water content is less, add some more water, not more than 1/4 cup at a time.
8. Once rice is completely cooked(it would take around 30 minutes), add jaggery and stir well. 
9. When jaggery is melted, it again comes to a watery consistency.
10. Set the flame to low and allow it to boil for sometime.
11. After around 5 to 10 minutes, pongal would come to a semi solid consistency.
12. Put off the stove at this point.
13. For garnishing, heat vanaspati/oil in a pan. Add raisins. Once it becomes fluffy, add it to pongal. In the remaining vanaspati, add cashew. Once it turns golden brown, transfer it and the left over vanaspati to pongal.
14. Add cardomom powder to pongal and mix well.
15. Serve it warm.

Note
Jaggery should be added only after the rice is cooked completely. When a small quantity of rice is put in a bowl and pressed with the fingers, it should get mashed easily.
When the rice is completely cooked, it should be of semi solid consistency and not watery. Adding jaggery would make the rice a bit watery again. So before adding the jaggery if the rice is watery, heating for more time might not bring it to the right consistency. So, care should be taken not to add excess water when the rice is getting cooked. 

Recipe for almond milk
I first made almond milk at home for this Bread pudding recipe.
1. Soak half cup of almonds in 2 cups of water and keep in the fridge overnight.
2. The next day grind the almond in a mixer by adding 1/2 cup water(which was used for soaking) until it is smooth.
3. Add the rest of the water and grind just for few seconds.
4. Strain the blended almond and almond milk is ready.
For pongal, I soaked almonds for just 3 hours. I also did not strain the blended milk.

Do have a look at Vaishali's blog for pressure cooker version of dairy free pongal which is much easier to make than this tradional method.

Bread pudding with almond milk topped with strawberry compote

I had a secret mission to make as many strawberry based desserts as possible in December when we get the fruit here. Strawberry cupcakes, muffins, cake, fruit fool, ice creams and what not was there in my mind. I was totally fascinated(read jealous) by the strawberry recipes posted by Western world bloggers during summer. It was not very surprsing that I could not find the fruit even in super markets. I somehow mangaged to get a small box of strawberries paying a fortune. I just got 15 berries for the huge amount I paid of which 5 were stale. I realised that I can't even use it as a topping for dessert.

Disappointed, I was searching for strawberry recipes in Vaishali's blog and came across this bread pudding topped with strawberry compote. That suited me the best. I prepared the almond milk at home for the pudding. The pudding was awesome with the tart, sugary strawberry compote topping and pista seasoning. We liked it cold than warm. This makes for a perfect, cozy dessert.

Here is the recipe as adapted from Vaishali's..

Ingredients for the bread pudding to server 6 adults for dessert
Bread: 8-10 slices.( I used homemade sandwich bread . I cut each slice into 6 medium sized cubes and I did not trim off the edges.)Raisins: 1/2 cup 
Almond milk or soy milk: 2 1/4 cups(The original recipe calls for 3 cups. I used homemade almond milk)
Cinnamon powder: 1 tsp
Vanilla extract: 1 tsp
Sugar: 3/4 cup 
EnerG egg replacer: 6 tsp (I used corn starch)Water: 8 tbsp
Pista: broken into pieces for seasoning(optional)

Procedure
1. Pre heat the oven to 170 degree C.
2. In a smal bowl, mix together corn starch and water until smooth.
3. Whisk together the cinnamon, vanilla, sugar and corn starch. 
4. Then whisk in the almond milk until everything's incorporated.
5. In a greased square baking dish, spread out the bread evenly. Scatter the raisins on top. Now pour the almond milk mixture on top. Soak for about 30 minutes, pressing on the bread with a ladle periodically to ensure the bread gets evenly soaked.(Next time I will soak for only 15 minutes. The bread pieces at the bottom somehow got mashed completely, but that does not change the wonderful taste.)
6. Place the pudding in a water bath (a larger dish filled with about 1 inch of water).I used the tray that came with the oven as water bath.
7. Bake for 50-60 minutes or until puffy and golden on top.
8. Serve warm or cold with strawberry compote.

Ingredients for strawberry compote(I am giving the exact recipe posted by Vaishali. As I had very few berries, I just did eye measurement.)
Strawberries: 1 pound (hulled and then cut into slices)
Sugar: 1/4 -1/2 cup(use more or less depending on the tartness of your strawberries)
Cinnamon: 1 stick

Procedure
1. Place the strawberries, sugar and cinnamon in a saucepan and cook on medium heat until the strawberries break down and express their juices. 
2. Continue cooking on low heat about 10 minutes.

Putting it together
1. Place small portions of bread pudding in single serving bowls.
2. Spread the strawberry compote over the pudding and season with pista.(chocolate sauce could be a nice variation for the topping.)

Enjoy the delicious pudding warm or cold.

Suyan for Saraswathi puja

Suyan is one of my favourite sweets though this is the first time I made them at home. I got the recipe from my mother. There are a couple of things to be taken care of while preparing the batter to get good suyans. The batter should be very smooth and the consistency should be such that one should be able to immerse the stuffing(purnam) in the batter and put them immediately in oil for frying. It should be neither too thin nor too thick. Here is the recipe to make around 15 medium sized suyans.

Ingredients for the batter
Urad Dal(full): 1/4 cup
Raw rice: 1/3 cup
Salt to taste

Ingredients for the stuffing
Shredded Coconut: 1/2 cup + 2 tbsp
Jaggery: 1/2 cup(broken into small pieces)

Refined oil for deep frying

Procedure to make the batter
1. Wash both rice and dal and soak them together for atleast 1/2 an hour.
2. Grind the soaked rice and dal into a very smooth batter by adding very little water. (Check while grinding if water is not sufficient. Only then add water.)
3. Transfer the batter to a bowl, add salt and mix well. Kepp aside.

Procedure to make the stuffing
1. While the dal and rice are soaking, the stuffing can be prepared.
2. Mix coconut and jaggery in a kadai/pan.
3. keep the stove in medium flame and stir until the mixture comes together and the most of the water evaporates. Keep aside.

Procedure to make the suyan
1. Divide the stuffing into 15 parts/balls..
2. Heat oil in a kadai/pan
2. Dip each ball in the batter so that it gets coated on all sides with the batter.
4. Put it immediately in the oil. Do the same for some more balls.(as much as the pan can hold)
5. Fry till the suyan turns golden brown on both the sides.
6. Remove from the pan, drain excess oil and place it in dry bowl.
7. Repeat the same for the rest of the stuffing and batter.

Choco rava kesari and a dedication

My mother is celebrating her 60th B'day today. I thought of dedicating this post to her. My mother has inspired us(me and my sis) in more than one way. She(read as she and father) gave us the best education that we could get by putting us in the best school in my city.(Madurai) For a middle class family it was definitely an expensive affair then. She always gave the highest priority to studies. She used to work in the state government and managed both work and family very elegantly. She was well respected at the office and at home front too she managed to do everything a "stay at home" mom would do for her kids. In a nutshell she is the BEST and a guiding factor in whatever we do..

Here is something I wrote for a competition held at my company last year end during parent's day. I was selected for a memento for this effort :-), but unfortunately it was never given as almost during the sametime the company faced a crisis due to some shocking revelation by the then chairman regarding the financial condition of the company..

Just giving the last two lines of the original writeup to make the post short. :-)

Trinkets you bought, they are no more. Love you showered, they are memories. But the lessons you taught. That's us! Thank you mom and dad.

Here is also a choco kesari recipe that I made especially for my mom. My parents are off to a pilgrimage trip for a couple of days as my mother wished to visit few famous temples during her b'day. She feels, her faith in "amman" is what keeps her going. And I don't have any reason to not believe it. :-)

Once again Happy B'day to dear amma and wishing many many more happy returns of this day.

Coming to the recipe, I shall not take credit for the idea of using cocoa powder in kesari for I saw it in almostturkish blog, long time ago..It tasted really good with a nice chocolaty flavour.

Here is the recipe

Ingredients

Ordinary Suji/Rava/Semolina: 1/4 cup
Water: 3/4 cup
Sugar: 1/2 cup
Cocoa powder: 1 1/2 tbsp
Ghee: 4 tbsp
Cashew: a few for garnishing

Procedure

1. In a small bowl, add the cocoa powder and little water(2 to 3 tbsp) and mix well to form a liquid mixture. Keep aside.
1. Add a tbsp of ghee in a pan/kadai and add suji and cashew.
2. Roast on a low flame till suji turns golden brown. The cashew also would have got roasted nicely by this time.(My grandmom suggested me this method of adding cashew and suji together. This way even if we are not able to make out if suji is roasted or not, looking at the color of roasted cashew we can remove suji from heat.)
3. Tranfer the suji to a bowl.
4. In the same pan, add water and allow it to boil.
5. Once hot, add the roasted suji and mix. Keep on low to medium flame.
6. It would absorb the water immediately and would become semi solid. Do not add more water eventhough one might get tempted to do so..
7. Add the cocoa powder mixture and sugar and mix well.
8. Now the mixture would again become watery. Add ghee and mix on low to medium flame.
9. Put off the flame once the mixture again reaches semi solid state.
10. Allow it to cool a bit so that it thickens.

Note: Feel free to increase or reduce the quantity of sugar as per preferences. The cocoa powder can be omitted to make an authentic south indian kesari. The amount of water mentioned is for ordinary suji. It might vary for other types of suji though I have not tried.

Cream and brownie in a glass

This dish was made as part of “No Fuss American” menu. Please see here for the other dishes as part of this menu.

This is one of the easiest yet tastiest brownie recipes. Too good.

Ingredients for the brownie

Maida/All purpose flour: 1 cup
Cocoa powder: 1/4 cup(I used Cadbury's brand)
Powdered sugar: 3/4 cup
Baking Soda: 1/2 tsp
Baking Powder: 1/2 tsp
Fresh thick yogurt/curd: 6 tbsp
Milk: 5 tbsp
Melted butter: 5 tbsp
Walnut: 1/4 cup(chopped)
Vanilla Essence: 1/2 tsp

Ingredients for the cream

Fresh Cream: 2 cups(chilled. I used Amul Fresh Cream)
Powdered Sugar: 4 tbsp
Vanilla Essence: 1/4 tsp
Canned Peach halves: 8(I did not use this)
Cherry for garnish

Procedure to make the brownie

1.Preheat the oven to 180 degree C
2.Mix all the dry ingredients in a bowl and keep aside
3.Mix all the wet ingredients.
4.Fold in the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients without over mixing.
5. Pour the batter in a greased baking tray and bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted comes out almost clean.
6.Cut small pieces once cooled and keep aside.

Procedure for the cream

1.Whip the cream until it forms soft peaks and doubles in volume.(Mine was thick enough and that shows in the photo too.)
2.Fold in the sugar and vanilla essence.
3.Fill the cream in a piping bag and keep aside.

Putting it together

1.Pipe out some cream in a tall glass(I did not use a piping bag. I used a spoon to put the cream in the glass)
2.Place a few brownie square and top with a peach half.
3.Repeat step 1 an 2 again and garnish with a cherry.
Serve chilled or as it is.

Kulfi-Sharing a recipe and an award passed by Sadhana & muskaan

we get one of the best kulfis in a small shop off MG road. When we go to that part of the city(which is very rare), we make it a point to relish those kulfis that come in different flavours..kesar-badam, kesar-pista, pista-badam and so on..I guess kulfi is a north indian dessert though it is avialbe in south too. Some years back, I remember people in my native place referring to it as "gulfi". However one calls it, it tastes divine....just divine..So, when I saw the recipe for kulfi at Sadhana and muskaan's, I had to bookmark it.

Along with sharing the award that they passed on, I thought it would be apt to make something from their blog and post it too as a way of thanking them for both sharing the award as well as such wonderful, healthy vegetarian recipes..

I remembered that the recipe uses evaporated milk which the duo had suggested can be prepared at home by reducing the milk to half the quantity. Plus it uses some nuts and cardomom all of which I had. So, I was mentally prepared to make them this weekend. Switched on the PC to go through the recipe and alas..the first 2 ingredients are cream and condensed milk both of which I did not have..It was raining and there was no way I could go and buy them..Then I realised that the kulfis taste much like the paal payasam(reduced milk kheer) sans the rice. So I went ahead and prepared the kulfi with just the reduced milk. I was very confident that it would taste good, for that matter anything with milk and sugar tastes good..

The kulfis came out well as expected. I made two different flavours..kesar-badam and cashew, adding cardomom in both..It was liked by everybody at home. The only problem was, it was melting away too very fast which is very unusual of the kulfis..May be the culprit was the errant electricity because of which the kulfis did not freeze properly..

For the original recipe please have a look at kulfi at a2zvegetariancuisine

Ingredients

Milk: 1 1/2 litres
Sugar: 1/2 cup + 1/3 cup
Nuts: 1/4 cup(I used cashew and badam/almond)
Saffron/Kesar: 4 to 5 strands
Cardomom/Elaichi: 5 to 6 powdered

Procedure

1. Soak saffron in 2 tbsp of warm milk and keep aside.
2. Bring milk to boil and then simmer.
3. Add sugar to the milk and allow it to boil. Keep a vigil on the milk if increasing the flame as it might overflow. Keeping a ladle in the milk pan avoids overflowing in medium flame. But its better to keep checking.
4. Let the milk reduce to 500 ml. (it took almost 1 1/2 hours)
5. Remove from heat and allow it to cool.
6. Once the milk is cooled down, divide the milk into half.
7. Add the soaked saffron, badam and half the cardomom powder in one half and mix to combine.
8. Add the cashew and rest of the cardomom powder in the other half and mix.
9. Pour the mixture in kulfi moulds if availble or in small cups with lid.
10. Freeze over night.
11. Remove the mould from the refrigerator before serving, immerse in slighlty hot water for 10 seconds for the mould to loosen.(Immerse for more time if the mould is too hard..If over immersed, it might melt.)
12. Release the kulfis from the mould by inverting them into serving plates and garnish with nuts.

Note: As I had mentioned earlier,the kulfis melted very fast and that shows in the picture. :-) Melted or frozen, it tasted awesome. As I did not have pistachios, I did not use it. Otherwise, I guess, its one of the integral parts of the kulfi along with cardomom.

Thank You Sadhana and muskaan for both the award and the recipe. Both are a treasure. :-)

I would like to pass on the award to

Supriya, Lubna, Raks: Their food photographs are among the best.
Hari Chandana: She is a very young talented blogger and an artist too
Aparna: I have the most number of bookmarked recipes from her blog.

I know all these wonderful people would have recieved many awards in the past, but I too would like to share my maiden award with them..

Mango frozen yogurt

Who would not want to try the blueberry frozen yogurt after seeing it in RC's blog? There are only 3 ingredients and its so easy to put everything together and the result is such a good looking dessert..As I don't get blueberries here, I used ripe mangoes. I had to make slight modification to the recipe, which involved some extra work. We don't get greek yogurt here and I thought using homemade yogurt as it is would not yield good result.(There is lot of water content in it) So I hung the yogurt overnight and the next day I got a nice creamy yogurt devoid of water content perfect to use in the recipe. Here is the recipe as adapted from Supriya's.

Ingredients to serve 5

Homemade Yogurt/curd: 4 cups(to get one cup creamy yogurt after hanging overnight)
Pureed Ripe Mango: 1 cup(I used neelam variety, got 1 cup puree from 3 small sized mangoes)
Sugar: 1/2 cup(can be adjusted according to the tartness of both the mango and the curd)
Chopped cashew and badam for garnish(optional)

Procedure

1. Pour the curd in a muslin cloth placed on top of a wide bowl. (I used a cotton cloth)
2. Bring together the cloth and tie with a rope.
3. Hang the cloth and place a bowl below it to collect the water dripping.(Water is collected just to keep the place clean. It has to be thrown away. :-))
4. I hung it overnight on a steel knob connected to the water purifier. I did not find any better place. I would have preferred to hang the cloth in the refrigerator, but could not do it.)
5. The next day, add the cut mangoes and sugar in a mixer and puree it. Taste it. Add more sugar if needed.
6. In a bowl, mix the puree and the hung curd. (I did this using a hand blender.)
7. Place in a wide bowl and freeze it for 2 to 3 hours or till it hardens.(Mine took almost 3 hours)
8.Take it out, mix with a flat ladle to break the hardened mixture. Again place it in the freezer. I filled small jelly moulds with the mixture and froze it.
9. Remove from the freezer, 5 minutes before serving so that it loosens a bit. Scoop out and garnish with chopped almonds and cashew.

Gorgeous frozen dessert is ready to be relished. It tasted more like frozen mango flavoured shrikand.. :-)

Note: If using thick store bought yogurt, hanging it is not needed. For homemade yogurt, it is better to hang it atleast for 4 hours if not overnight. As I hung the curd overnight at room temperature, it was a bit sour. After blending the puree and yogurt, it can be tasted to check for the sourness. If it is very sour, more powdered sugar can be added and mixed.

Peanut and Jaggery balls(Kadalai urundai)

Some 15 years back if someone had asked in my neighbourhood "Do you know Priya?", the immediate answer would have been "Oh!that girl who just lives on ghee and kadalai mittai(peanut squares)". They would have also added with a sigh "She just troubles her mother by falling sick frequently". How can one fall sick by eating ghee and kadalai mittai.? Well, I used to get giddiness atleast once in a fortnight due to overeating of the above mentioned items..

Nothing can match the taste of the peanut squares that I used to get for 25 paise a piece in the near by potti kadai(small shop)..It was hard, but not so hard to cause a tooth ache, it was sticky but not too sticky that you got to do all sorts of mouth exercise to remove it..

And the ghee....I used to sneak into the kitchen when ever possible and eat 2 spoonfuls when nobody is around..And my most preferred combination was bournvita powder, ghee and sugar...Just awesome....

When I was staying in the hostel during college days, my grandmother used to make kadali urundais and pack it for the hostel..Though it did not tatse like the store bought ones, it was equally tasty in its own right...After college days, I pretty much lost connection with kadali mittai/urundais..When I saw JFI-Peanuts, I had a chance to recollect those bygone days...Now, at 30, I really don't have a desire to eat the kadalai mittais.(though I am tempted to try the bournvita-ghee-sugar combination) But just to relive those memories, I got the recipe from my grandmother and made the kadali urundais at home for the first time with guidance from mother-in-law.

Ingredients

Shelled Peanuts: 1 1/4 cup
Jaggery/Gud: 1 cup(broken into small pieces)
Cardomom powder: 1/4 tsp
Water: 1/4 cup

Procedure

1. Roast the peanuts in a pan/kadai in low/medium flame for 10 to 15 minutes.
2. To check if it is done, remove 4 to 5 peanuts and rub with the fingers. If the skin comes out easily, its done. Also just eat one or two peanuts to see if it is roasted.
3. Once roasted, remove the skin from the peanuts. This is the most time consuming job. We did it by taking a handful and rubbing with the fingers. Then separated out the peanuts from the removed skin. (During this process the peanuts might split. But that is OK.)
4. In a kadai add jaggery, cardomom powder and water. Keep in medium flame and melt the jaggery. The consistency of the melted jaggery is the most important thing. If it is thin, we can't make balls, if it is to thick, the ball would be very hard. The correct consistency is when you drop a few drops of melted jaggey in a small bowl of water, it should immediately form a small ball. If you take out the ball and throw in the bowl, it should make a sound while hitting the bowl. (This process of melting the jaggery takes around 10 to 15 minutes)
5. Once the jaggery reaches the correct consistency, put off the flame and pour it over the peanuts. Mix with a flat ladle immediately. Make small lemon sized balls as soon as you are able to touch the mixture without feeling very hot.(within 2 minutes of mixing)
6. Allow the peanut balls to cool and store in an air tight container.

Note: The consistency of jaggery is very important and its better to get the help of elders at home if doing for the first time, like I did. You are blessed if you get readymade roasted peanuts with skin removed. Then 70% of the time is saved.

This is my entry to JFI-Peanuts hosted by Pavani, originally started by Indira of Mahanandi.

Plums Crumble

Food blogs introduced me to fruit crumbles. I wouldn't have known about thier existence, if it were not for those wonderful food blogs that I visit. When I bought plums yesterday, only crumble came to my mind. I agree, plums can be eaten as it is, but these days, anything I buy, the first thing that comes to my mind is, "can I make something different using this"..May be that is the side effect of blogging and blog hopping...

I saw the definiton for crumble in wiki which says, its stewed fruits with a cripsy topping usually made of flour, sugar and butter. I made a fruit crumble using the plums.(though I did not stew the plums) The crumble tasted very nice though the tartness of the plums was prominent. The dark red color of the baked fruit was very striking.(though I have not captured well in the pictures. :-) )

Ingredients for the fruit mixture to serve 4 adults

Plums: 170 gms after removing the seed or around 10 to 12 numbers(de-seeded and cut into medium sized pieces)
Brown sugar: 2 tbsp(can be varied based on the tartness of the fruit)
Cinnamon: a pinch(optional)
Nut meg: a pinch(optional)

Ingredients for the topping

All purpose flour: 1 cup(130 gms)
Granulated white sugar: 2 tbsp
Butter: 100 gms which is little less than half a cup (cold and cut into small pieces)
Salt: less than 1/8th of a tsp

Procedure

1. Mix all the ingredients in the fruit mixture(plums, brown sugar, cinnamon and nut meg) in a bowl and keep aside for 15 minutes.
2. In another bowl, mix flour, salt and sugar
3. Add butter to the flour mixture and mix such that it is crumbly.(I ran a stand mixer for 3 to 4 seconds to get a crumbly dough)Do not make a soft dough, otherwise it will not be that cripsy after baking.
4. In a baking tray, first spread the fruit mixture evenly.(I used a pie tin)
5. Then spread the topping over the fruit mixture.
6. Bake in a pre-heated oven for 30 minutes at 160 degree C or until the topping turns light brown in color.

Note: As I used a pie tin to bake the crumble, I first spread some dough in the corners of the tin to avoid leakage of fruit mixture. The plums had very strong tartness due to which the crumble was very sour. So, I will not try a plum crumble again(unless the plums are sweet), but will try with other fruits like apple.Next time I might try topping the fruit with crushed biscuits and oats to make it low fat..

Mango fruit fool

I had the mangoes and Srivalli's mango mela event..I also had the heavy whipping which I bought in IBCA(Institute for baking and cake art,Bangalore) after searching in almost half a dozen supermarkets...In one of the super markets, when I asked for the heavy cream, the sales girl gave me a shaving cream!!!!!Its that difficult to get the heavy cream here...

I just used the cream once when I made eggless chocolate pudding. I was so happy to see the stiff peaks forming while whipping the cream...I wanted to use the cream again, this time with mangoes..I googled and was surprised to find that there are indeed recipes using pureed fruits and whipped cream and are called fruit fools. I saw many recipes for strawberry fruit fool. I came up with my own version of mango fruit fool.

The recipe goes like this..

Ingredients to make two pudding cups of fruit fool.

Ripe mango: 1(around 350 gms) to make around 200 gms of puree.
Granulated white sugar: 2 tbsp each for the puree and cream.(add more sugar depending on the sweetness of the fruit)
Heavy whipping cream: 150 gms
Few peeled and cut mango pieces for garnishing(optional)

Procedure to make the mango puree

1. Peel the mango, take the pulp from the seed and mash it in a mixer by adding 2 tbsp of sugar.
2. Once it is pureed nicely, place it in a bowl.

Procedure to make the cream

1. Whip the cream and 2 tbsp of sugar in low and medium speeds using a hand mixer until stiff peaks form.(it took around 3 to 4 minutes)

Procedure to make the fruit fool

1. Fold in the mango puree with the whipped cream gently leaving some white streaks of the cream.
2. Tranfer to pudding cups and garnish with cut mango pieces if needed.

Delicious mango fruit fool is ready..

Instead of making fruit fool with all the puree, I tried setting layers of mango puree and the fruit fool in a glass.

I did the following for that.

1. Took half the mango puree(100 gms) in a separate bowl.
2. Whipped only 80 gms of cream and made the fruit fool with the remaining 100 gms of puree by following the method provided above.
3. In a glass, first added some puree and cut mango pieces.
4. On top of it added some fruit fool, then added again the puree and mango pieces and then the fruit fool.
5. Garnished with some cut mango pieces and a cherry.

It tasted fantastic and makes for a great dessert after a feast.

I am sending this recipe to Srivalli's Mango mela event.

Eggless chocolate pudding

I had been thinking of making an eggless chocolate pudding for a long time. This weekend I fulfilled my cravings for this pudding. I got so many recipes for eggless chocolate pudding in the net. I took the best from each of the recipes and came up with my own. Few websites I browsed are recipezaar, informationsindia, tammys etc. The pudding tasted very nice. As Stephanie had mentioned we had it with softly whipped cream topping. It was just delicious.

Ingredients to serve 2 adults

Milk: 150 ml
Heavy cream: 30 gms
Granulated white sugar: 35 gms
Cocoa powder: 8 gms
Corn flour/Corn starch: 10 gms
Salted/Unsalted Butter: 1/2 tsp
Vanilla extract: 1/2 tsp
Salt: a pinch

Procedure

1. Mix sugar, cocoa powder and salt in a bowl.
2. Add little milk(around 5 tbsp) to the mixture and mix well to form a smooth paste.
3. In a sauce pan, pour the rest of the milk and cream and bring to a boil. Switch off the stove.
4. Pour the paste mixture into the sauce pan and mix well.
5. Keep the sauce pan in a stove under medium heat. Stir constantly(otherwise it might form lumps) till the mixture becomes thick(pudding consistency).
6. Remove from heat.
7. Add butter and vanilla extract and mix well.
8. Pour into bowls.
9. It can be had warm or refrigerated.

For garnishing, a tbsp of heavy cream can be whipped until it forms soft peaks and put over the pudding.

Delicious eggless chocolate pudding is ready.

Note:Special care needs to be taken when the pudding is in the stove, otherwise it might form lumps. So it is better to keep stirring slowly till it reaches the pudding consistency.

Carrot Poli-A sweet dish

I came across the recipe for carrot poli when I was browsing the net for carrot recipes that I have not tried before. Yes, I was trying to find a nice carrot recipe to participate in Sanghi's FIL-Carrot event. I liked the recipe for carrot poli, firstly because it was a sweet dish and secondly I have never made this before.

The polis came out well. I did it in a very small quantity as I was trying this recipe for the first time.

I would like to dedicate this recipe to the event hostess Sanghi as I wouldn't have searched for a carrot recipe in the net and come across this delicious recipe for carrot polis, had it not been for her event. I guess the whole credit for this carrot recipe as well as the dedication goes to Sanghi. The website where I found the original recipe has a very good collection of vegetarian recipes.

Here is the recipe

Ingredients to make around 6 polis

Carrot: 70 gms(grated)
Sugar: 75 gms
Water: 100 ml
Maida/all purpose flour: 100 gms
Ghee: 2 tsp
Saffron: 2 to 3
Cardamom powder: powder of one cardomom
Salt a pinch

Procedure for the stuffing

1. Cook the carrot with water, till all the water dries up.
2. When cool, grind into a puree in a blender, without adding any water.
3. Add sugar and cook in a pan, till the mixture becomes dry.
4. Add one tsp of ghee, saffron and cardamom.
5. Cook till the mixture becomes thick.
6. Remove and keep aside to cool and harden.

For the dough

1. Mix maida, one tsp of ghee and salt into a firm dough.

To make the carrot poli

1. Take a small ball of dough and with a greased palm, spread it thinly on a greased plastic sheet. (I used milk cover)
2. Place 1/2 teaspoon of carrot filling in the centre.
3. Cover with the dough and pat again into a round circle.
4. Shallow fry till golden on both sides with a little ghee.
Offer hot.

This is my entry to Sanghi's FIL-Carrot event

Thai coconut pancake

I was browsing the net for vegetarian thai recipes (which I can turn Vegan) to participate in IAVW-Thai event. I found many . I could not try them as most of the tempting recipes called for some regional herbs and vegetables which we don't get here. I did not want to experiment with the ingredients that I have. I stuck to this coconut pancake recipe. As it was a sweet recipe, I knew however the pancake comes out, it would be liked by us sweet lovers..I replaced the eggs in the original recipe with flaxseed meal and added a bit more sugar. I also could not use glutinous rice flour and pandan essence as I did not have them. I also do not know what a glutinous rice flour is.

The pancake tasted great. According to thai.about.com from where I adapted this recipe, these pancakes are like those that they get in thailand night markets.

Ingredients

Coconut milk: 200 ml(I used store bought coconut milk)
Rice flour: 100 gms
Sugar: 6 tbsp(I used granulated sugar so that it can easily dissolve in coconut milk)
Salt: 1/8th tsp
Flax seed meal: 1 tbsp
Water: 3 tbsp
Baking powder: 1 tsp
Refined Oil for frying
Food color: optional(I used orange, yello and green and plain with vanilla flavour)

Procedure

1. Mix dry ingredients in a bowl.
2. Whisk flaxseed meal in water in another bowl.
3. Add coconut milk to the whisked flax seed meal and mix well.
4. Add dry ingredients to this mixture and mix well to combine.
5. Add food color if desired.
6. Heat pan/tava, add 1/2 tsp oil and spread it. Once the tava is hot, add a laddle of pancake batter.(Need not spread it)
7. Add some more oil over the edges of the pan cake.(1/2 tsp)
8. Once it is fried, turn the pancake so that the top portion is fried well.
9. Once the pan cake is fried well, remove from tava.
10. If desired, garnish with shredded, fried coconut.(I did not do this)

The pancakes were very soft and tasty. I got around 8 pancakes and they got over in 2 minutes.:-)

I am sending this recipe to IAVW-Thai event guest hosted by Priya of Akshayapatram originally started by Vaishali of Holycow.

Akkaravadisal- a delectable sweet with rice, sugar and milk

This is one of my favourite sweets and it is one of my grand mother's specialities. I noted down the recipe in my diary long back. I generally make this on special occasions. This is one of my grnadmother's recipes that I would never want to loose and hence blogging it.

This is how my grandmother makes akkaravadisal...

Ingredients that serves 2 spoonfulls for 5 adults

Rice: 70 gms
Sugar: 200 gms
Milk: 200 ml(boiled)
Water: 100 ml
Ghee: 4 1/2 tbsp
Cashew: few pieces(around 10)
Dried grapes: around 10
Orange color: a pinch

Procedure

1. Pressure cook rice by adding milk and water.Allow 4 whistles.
2. In the meantime, fry cashew and dried grapes in 1 tbsp ghee one after the other.
3. Once the rice is cooked, mash it with the back of a laddle.
4. In a pan/kadai, add sugar, cooked rice, color and 3 tbsp ghee and keep in medium flame.
5. Keep stirring slowly, until akkaravadisal starts leaving the sides of the pan.(around 6 to 7 minutes)
6. Add the remaining 1/2 tbsp ghee and mix well. Put off the stove.
7. Garnish with fried cashew and dried grapes.

Delicious akkaravadisal is ready.

Note: My grandmother gave the measurements in terms of ratio which I have converted into gms. In terms of ratio, for 1 measure of rice, we would need 2 1/2 measures of milk, 2 measures of water and 3 measures of sugar.

Stirring is done only to avoid burning/sticking at the bottom. So it need not be done very hard.

I am sending this recipe to Mithai Mela event hosted by Srivalli.

"Strawberry jelly and cream" sandwiched eggless vanilla cake

I decided to participate in FIC-Pink event guest hosted by Priya (announced by Harini of Tongue Ticklers) as soon as I saw it. Pink being my favourite color, I did not want to miss this event. As soon as I saw pink as the color for the FIC event, only rose milk came to my mind. It was my co-sister who suggested using strawberries for the recipe.. The idea of combining jelly, cake and cream was given by her and I am obviously awe struck at her culinary skills.

So here is the recipe for Strawberry jelly and cream sandwiched eggless vanilla cake. The SJACS eggless vanilla cake consists of three individual recipes.

1. Strawberry jelly
2. Eggless vanilla cake
3. Strawberry cream(icing)seet

Strawberry Jelly

Ingredients

Strawberry Jelly mix: 1 packet or 100 gms(I used Weikfield brand)Powdered Sugar: 3 tbsp(Optional)

Procedure

1. Follow the instructions in the package to set the jelly.
2. Refrigerate the set jelly.

Note:

1. I did not add powdered sugar this time. But I will definitely add the next time as the sweetness was not sufficient for us.
2. I added some jelly mix to set in the glass in which I was going to make the sandwich. (A little less than 1/4th the glass)

Eggless Vanilla Cake

I have made this cake number of times and every time I get the same great texture and taste. To make this cake, I just followed Bharti’s recipe. This is one of the cake recipes that's a treasure.

Ingredients

All purpose flour/maida: 2 cups(260 gms)
Usalted butter: 5 tbsp at room temperature(ariubd 65 gms)
Sweetened condensed milk: 1 tin(400 gms)
Butter milk: around 1/2 cup(around 120 gms)(Butter milk quantity can be varied a bit based on the consistency of the cake batter)
Baking powder:  1 tsp
Baking Soda: 1 tsp
Vanilla Essence: 2 tsp

Procedure

1. Pre heat oven to 150 degree C.
2. Mix all the dry ingredients thoroughly.
3. Cream the butter and condensed milk using an electric hand mixer until soft. (I generally mix/beat with an egg beater. I recently bought a electric hand mixer, hence used that.)
4. Add butter milk and vanilla essence and beat again for few seconds.
5. Add the dry ingredients 3 tbsp at a time to the wet mixture and mix well in one direction. (Need not beat. I generally do this with hand)
6. Pour the batter in a greased cake pan and bake for around 30 to 35 minutes or until the skewer inserted comes out clean.

Note:

I made some cup cakes too using muffin tin which was very useful for making the sandwich cake. See more on it in Putting Everything Together Section.

Strawberry Cream

Ingredients

Unsalted Butter: 3 tbsp(butter should be at room temperature)Icing sugar: 10 tbsp
Strawberry Essence: 2 tbsp
Milk: 1 tbsp(Optional)

Procedure

1. Beat butter, strawberry essence/puree/powder and icing sugar using a hand mixer or egg beater.
2. If the mixture is very thick, add a little milk to bring it to a spreadable consistency.

Note:

I did not have Strawberry Essence. So I saved some powder(2 tbsp) from Strawberry Jelly mix and used it in the cream instead of essence.
Since I wanted to pour the cream over the cake, I made it a bit thin by adding more milk.

Putting everything together

I used a juice glass to make the sandwich cake.

1. If the jelly is already set in the glass, proceed to the next step. Otherwise, cut a small piece of jelly using a cookie cutter and put in the glass.
2. Cut 2 pieces of cake using a cookie cutter and place one piece on top of the jelly in the glass. Instead of cutting the big cake, I cut the cup cake using the cookie cutter as that was easier. Also I did not want to disturb the big cake
3. Pour some cream on top of the cake and place the other piece too. Again pour some cream. Decorate with some cherries.

I did this sandwich especially for the event. So the last step(Putting everything together) can be modified according to one's one creativity. I thought the jelly would also be in light pink in color, but it was dark pink or rather red. But the cream is still pink in color and I am sending this recipe to Priya’s FIC-Pink event

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