Vols-au-Vent

When I am looking for something new to bake, I enthusiastically search on the Daring baker's site for the challenges that were rolled out before I joined this group. Usually these recipes are very reliable and most of the times fun to work on. The Vols-au-Vent challenge was rolled by Steph of a wish and a spoon in September 2009 which looked particularly interesting as they can be twisted towards savory or sweet mood/need.

Traditional English Pudding (Steamed Resin) - Daring Baker's April Challenge

The Daring Baker's Challenge for April was hosted by Esther from The Lilac Kitchen. The idea was to make a British pudding using suet. Before this challenge, I used to think that puddings are like custards but England seem to own a world of puddings which are very different from custards and are more in-line with cakes.

Naan

I often wondered about differences in the dough for pizza base, pita bread, naan, flat bread, bhature, bread loaf and thought that there should be a single recipe which can turn into any one of them based on the shape, thickness and mode of cooking. Recently, I found a recipe by Marion Cunnigham for pizza dough which I have used to make bhature and naan with great satisfaction by using some tips for baking naan in oven from the recipe here.

Stuffed French Toast

Quiz: What happens when a wife goes out of town to attend a conference and the husband wants to have a quick homemade bite using only the ingredients inside the fridge?

Chocolate Avocado Truffle

Chocolates/truffles are a girl's best friend - Aren't they ? Despite loving them and enjoying my monthly FREE truffles from the King of Chocolate 'Godiva', I never ever dreamt of making them.

Frozen banana

Summer is almost here and so are light colors and frozen desserts! How about a frozen Hawaiian banana adapted from a recipe by Clementine Paddleford (1898-1967) - the first journalist in American history who truly defined the American food. A jewel who brought freshness of food to the newspapers which were primarily sources of politics at that time.

Apple Cake

I own a dozen or so books on cooking/baking. Some are gifted, some I bought, and others have interesting stories behind them. One such book in the later category is Walter C. Black School cookbook. People used to donate books at our Princeton apartment common room to share with other people for various reasons. Once I found this cooking/baking (spiral binding form) book which had a collection of very simple recipes by a community. I just loved the simplicity of recipes in this book which has about three recipes on a A8 (1/2 of A4) size page with 12pt font. Isn't it amazing ?