Plum cake

Here is a recipe for summer plum cake. A good twist to simple cake with  juicy plums.  The post has been sitting in the draft for a year but its never late to post it right !

Chocolate Chip Cookies

At one point, I was the following the "how to cook perfect..........." series on the guardian and found how to cook perfect chocolate chip cookies. It took me a while but finally got a chance to make them.  Here is the link in the guardian that describes different aspects in great detail. Cookies are stress free baking for me both in terms of time and preparation.

The perfect chocolate chip cookie was easy recipe to follow and thanks to the weighting scale it is easy to measure as well.

Ingredients:
120 gm unsalted butter (original recipes calls for salted butter but i didn't have salted butter )
75 gm light brown sugar
75 gm granulated sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 egg
240 gm all purpose flour
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
170 gm dark chocolate, chopped
sea salt flakes

1. Using a stand mixer, beat butter and sugar until well combined on a medium speed. Add egg and vanilla extract and beat well.
2. Sift together flour and bicarbonate of soda and slowly fold in to the above mixture until everything comes together.  Use a lower speed on the stand mixer. Fold in the chocolate pieces with spatula and bring everything together.
3. Wrap the dough in a plastic sheet and keep it inside the freezer for 1/2 hour or keep it refrigerated overnight.
4. Preheat oven to 350 C.
5. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Make about 14 golf size balls using the dough and keep them at a distance on the baking sheet. Bake for 15 minutes until golden. Make sure they are not brown.
6. Sprinkle one tray with salt and allow them to cool for couple of minutes on the sheet and then move them to cooking racks.

Enjoy the cookies.

Persian Mulberry Tut

These are such a treat! Easy, tasty and pretty. We used to have two mulberry (sahtoot) trees in my house when I was a kid. I enjoyed making these while remembering the uncounted mulberries we used to eat.

I saw these mulberry sweets in the book "Food of Life: Ancient Persian and Modern Iranian Cooking and Ceremonies" by Najmieh Batmanglij.  Also, a recipe of these appeared in Los Angeles Magazine from the blog My Persian Kitchen. The detailed step-by-step instructions can be found on the blog. I made couple of changes in the recipe. I decided to use almond meal instead of the almonds in the recipe to decrease one step :)

Ingredients:

1 cup + 2 tablespoon almond flour/meal (Use the meal that is prepared after peeling off the almonds, you can also use dry almonds and prepare the almond meal in a food processor.  I like the JK Gourmet Almond Flour which I buy through Amazon)
1 cup confectioners sugar (Use 3/4 cup if you don't have very sweet tooth)
1/2 tsp cardamom powder
2 tablespoon rose water (If you are using 3/4 cup of confectioners sugar, only add 1.5 tablespoon of rose water to begin with and add more if desired)
1/4 cup granular sugar
Slivered pistachios ~ 30 pieces

- Mix almond meal, confections sugar and cardamom powder.  Add rose water and pulse couple of times in a blender until mixture comes together. The mixture shouldn't be too dry or too sticky. If you find it sticky, you can add an extra tablespoon of almond meal.

- Take a small portion from the mixture and roll the mixture in to conical shape with hand and taper at the end as shown in the picture to give mulberry shape. You can make almost 30 pieces from this mixture. Approximate length of the mulberry tut is about 1.5 inch.

- Now, roll each piece in the granular sugar and put a single slivered pistachio at the fat end of the mulberry tut.

- Wait couple of hours before eating them. They also taste great after a day.

Baked Apple Chips

Vendor's at the farmers market in Santa Barbara often sell baked apple chips and persimmon chips. However, those are not a very common in Ventura's Farmer market. After seeing a post about apple chips on The Italian Dish blog, I decided to bake them. I absolutely adore The Italian Dish blog and have tried many recipes from the blog. In fact it is my "go-to" blog for italian recipes.

Recipe:

Ingredients:
1 large apple
2 tablespoon brown sugar
3/4 tablespoon cinnamon (I used less cinnamon than suggested by The Italian Dish)


- Preheat oven to 225 F
- Slice apple into thin slices (as thin as possible 15-20 slices per apple)
- Lightly coat the apple slices on both the sides with the sugar and cinnamon mixture
- Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper and place the apple slices on the baking sheet
- Bake for an hour
- After an hour, flip the slices and bake for another hour
- Remove from oven and cool them for some time and store in airtight container.

Variations:
- Make these chips with any fruit e.g. pear, persimmon etc.
- Eliminate brown sugar and cinnamon for a plain apple chips taste

Almond tart with caramel filling and shortbread crust

This is yet another egg less yummy tart particularly good in fall or spring as the base is like a rich shortbread. This won the Food52 contest for "your best late winter tart". Other than caramel making (which I am kind of getting comfortable with after many many failures in the past), I would say it is quite easy to put together.  If it is not already clear from my last three posts, I love baking tarts and trying out different flavors.

Serving: 20 small pieces

Ingredients:

Shortbread Crust:
1 3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup confectioners sugar (preferably buy confectioner's sugar which are sold in plastic bags)
1 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoon (3/4 cup) unsalted butter (cold, chopped in small cubes)
zest of one orange (or two tangerines)
~ 3 tablespoon fresh orange juice

Filling:
1/2 cup superfine sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 orange blossom honey/blue agave
1 cup extra heavy whipping cream
3 cups sliced almonds (toasted, I used 8oz pack of sliced almonds from Trader Joe's)
 2 teaspoon fresh orange juice
1 teaspoon fresh orange juice + 1 tea spoon warm water for brushing the tart base

Procedure:

1) Line a 9.5 inch tart pan with a parchment paper
2) In a stand mixer, pulse flour, confectioner sugar, salt, butter, orange zest. Slowly add one tablespoon of orange juice at a time and pulse again. You will need about 3 tablespoon of juice to bring everything together in form of a ball. Pulse slightly and carefully until the mixture starts to form a ball.
3) With your hands, spread the dough in the tart pan and on the side of the pan working with you palm and fingers
4) Chill the pan for  1 to 4 hours ( 1 hour minimum)
5) Heat the oven to 375 degree F
6) In a heavy bottomed sauce pan, add superfine sugar, brown sugar, honey, two teaspoon orange juice and mix everything gently.  Turn the heat to medium low and allow the mixture to melt while stirring gently.  Cook for 5-7 minutes until the mixture darkens and caramelizes. Make sure you don't over cook (burnt taste) or under cook (not a liquid form and you can still see crystals)
7) Add heavy cream and increase heat to medium. Cook the mixture for another 8-10 minutes until it thickens. Most of the time mixture will be boiling so decrease the heat setting little bit if the mixture wants to come out of the pan :)
8) Mix one teaspoon orange juice and one teaspoon warm water, apply this mixture to the chilled tart base with a brush
9) Stir in sliced almonds into the caramel mixture and spread the mixture into the chilled tart pan.
10) Bake for 30 minutes and lower the temperature to 350 F and continue baking for another 15 minutes
11) Remove from oven and let is cool completely and serve with whipped cream or as is. Make sure to cut a very small slice as a small slice goes a long way for this tart.
12) If you end up storing some in refrigerator, warm the slice for 10 seconds in microwave or for 1-2 minutes in oven at 350 F.

Easy and Tasty Egg less Peach Tart

Tarts are one of my favorite desserts comprising of layers of deliciousness with crusty base, smooth filling and a distinctive topping. Endless combinations exist which closely change seasons in terms of filling and toppings.

Peaches are in full swing at farmer's market now. I wanted to try this recipe that I had bookmarked for a while waiting for peaches to show up in the farmer's market. Tasty peaches make all the difference in this tart.  It is an eggless tart  and is quite easy to put together because of the minimal ingredients it contains.

Ingredients:
(Adapted from the winning recipe for "your best peach pie or tart" in Food52 contest)

Crust:
3/4 cup spelt flour
3/4 cup all purpose flour (or u can use 1 and 1/2 cup all purpose flour and omit spelt flour)
1 tsp brown sugar
1/2 tea spoon salt
1/4 cup canola oil
1/4 cup olive oil (extravirgin or light olive oil)
1/2 tea spoon almond extract
2 table spoon milk

Filling:
3 peaches
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 table spoon cold unsalted butter (pea size pieces)
1/4 tea spoon salt
2 table spoon all purpose flour

- Mix all the dry ingredients for crust  (flour, sugar, and salt) and all the liquid ingredients (oil, almond extract, milk) separately. Combine them together while mixing slightly and not overworking the dough
- Grease a 9.5 inch tart pan or 10 inch tart pan (line with a parchment paper if you don't want to sctrach the bottom of the pan)
- Transfer the crust mixture to tart pan and spread it evenly and firmly with your plam and fingers throughout the pan and along the sides (no rolling required for this crust)
-Preheat oven to 425 F
- Now cut 1/2 inch pieces of peach and arrange them in circle from outside to inside and in the middle while covering maximum area on the crust
- For the filling, mix sugar, butter, salt, all purpose flour with your fingers until crumbly and sprinkle over the peaches evenly
- Bake for 35 minutes to 40 minutes based on your oven settings
- Carefully remove from oven and at this point you will see a lot of bubbles in the pan and let it rest for half an hour.
- Slice and eat :) . This tastes great when slightly warm so in case you endup referigerating the tart (if you are fortunate enough to have any left) warm a slice in microwave for 15 seconds before eating it (you can serve it with whipped cream or eat without it)
- Enjoy this fresh and light treat.

Multilayer date tart (Ranginak)

This is a popular dish from southern part of the Iran where date trees are in exuberance and is usually eaten with a hot cup of tea. What got me interested in the recipe was the familiarity with the ingredients and yet novelty in the way they are combined. Each ingredient in the every layer of this dessert is my all time favorite including dates, walnuts, wheat flour roasted in ghee, pistachio and cardamom powder. Naturally,  I couldn't resist this super high calorie dessert.  Very little use of sugar and natural sweetening with dates gives it a character especially in comparison to my favorite aata ke ladoo where we add a lot of sugar to ghee and aata mixture. It is a no bake tart/dessert however a baked version do exits for this dessert. Also, it reminds me of date crumble or aata/date shortbread and even classic aata ke  laddo.

I am paying some attention to dates these days at the local farmer's market. One of the farmers only brings dates of 5-6 different varieties and is among one of the most popular vendors. My favorite are majool dates (soft and chewy), then there are Bahri (eaten during Ramadan as told by the farmer, also soft and smaller than majool, people in middle east eat them with tea as a sugar substitute)  Farmers also have 2-3 other varieties which are relatively dry and perhaps could be used for chutney/baking.  Soft and fresh dates are recommended for making this dessert. Many variations exist for this dessert, some of which I will discuss at the end of the recipe.

This recipe was adapted from  Food of life ancient Persian and modern Irani cooking and ceremonies by Najmeih Batmangij.   In addition to small changes in the quantities of ingredients, I substituted ghee for butter and wheat flour for all purpose flour as I knew I would like this taste better and I remember reading it somewhere else that it used to be made with wheat flour also. This is the first recipe that I am trying from this book. It is one of my favorite cookbooks these days and I eagerly wait for trying new recipes from this book. Since Persian cuisine had so much influence on Indian cuisine, many recipes sound familiar yet they are so different in the preparation. 

Ingredients:

Layer1:

3 cups of pitted dates (preferably soft and fresh, Bahri or majool)

1 cup roasted walnuts (chopped into small pieces)

Layer 2:

1 cup ghee (clarified butter)

1 and 1/2  cup wheat flour (shifted)

Layer 3:

1/2 cup confectioners sugar (shifted)

1/2 tsp ground cardamom

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Layer 4:

Garnishing

3/4 cup pistachio (ground)

Procedure:

1.  Lightly toast raw walnuts for about 5 minutes on a skillet on medium heat.
2. Chop them or grind them into big pieces for stuffing in dates after cooling them for little bit.
3. In a thick bottom pan, mix the ghee and wheat flour on low-medium heat and cook the mixture. It took about 40 minutes for me to cook it. (Since there is enough ghee in the mixture, it was sufficient to mix it every couple of minutes to avoid sticking at the bottom. Original recipe called for cooking it on medium heat for 15-20 minutes. I usually like things on slightly more cooked side especially halwa and ladoo so decided to toast it for 40 minutes. Make sure that you don't burn this. When you start smelling beautiful aroma of ghee flour mixture you will know that its ready and also it will change color similar to caramel sauce or little darker than that)
4. Slit one side of date (remove the pit) and stuff with chopped walnuts
5. Grease a 9.5 inch tart pan or a 9 inch pie pan and arrange stuffed walnuts from inside to outside covering maximum space on the pan
6. Once your ghee flour mixture is ready, evenly pour it over the dates and cover them completely. Level it to make a even surface
7. Now mix confectioners sugar with cardamom powder and cinnamon powder and evenly sprinkle over the flour mixture and tap it little bit from the back of a spoon. Soon this will be submerged into the flour mixture and you won't see sugar as prominently
8. Now ground some pistachio and distribute those evenly over the sugar mixture 
9. Let it cool for an hour (put it in the refrigerator for 1-2 hours) and then cut a small triangular piece and warm it slightly for 30 seconds in microwave. Enjoy with hot tea (Note that it will be little soft and crumbly before putting it in the refrigerator so be careful in taking out the pieces if you do not want to put it in the refrigerator . If you do put it in the refrigerator, make sure to microwave it to heat up the flour ghee mixture a bit)

 Variations:

*  You could also just put the flour ghee sugar mixture in the pan and arrange the date (stuffed or without stuffed) on the mixture

** You could put half of the flour mixture at the bottom, sprinkle sugar mixture, arrange the dates and put remaining half of the mixture on the top and use your own artistic idea for garnishing

*** You could just serve the stuffed dates with little sprinkle of pistachios or even add feta cheese or a savory/sweet combination for stuffing to make your own date delights

Persian Almond Baklava

Out of millions of recipes that are floating on the Internet, its always tough to select the ones which I want to try in my kitchen. Since it is a significant time investment to try a new recipe (and a depressing state if it doesn't come out well), I have created a safe zone for myself i.e. try recipes, which have won some sort of award. One website that I frequently visit is FOOD52 as it announces contest winners and wild card winners in different categories each week. I have a good number of recipes on "to be tried list" from their contests. One of them was almond baklava, which I made this weekend. I am proud to say that this is one of the prettiest desserts I have ever baked (not that I have baked a lot) and it also tastes pretty good. This blog entry is inspired by the “almond baklava wild card entry winner” in food52 contest.

Ingredients:

Crust:

1+1/8 cup all purpose flour

8 tablespoon (1 stick) unsalted butter

1/8 cup very cold water

Filling:

3 cups almond meal/flour (blanched)

1 cup powdered confectioners sugar (shifted)

1 teaspoon cardamom powder

2 tablespoon water

1/2 tablespoon rose water

Glazing:

2 tablespoon water

1/2 teaspoon flour

Syrup topping:

1/2 cup sugar

3/8 cup water

1 tablespoon rose water

Final decoration:

1.5 tablespoon pistachios (chopped)

2 teaspoon dried rose petals (available at Persian grocery stores)

Procedure:

1. Cut butter into eight equal pieces. Add that to the flour and mix them together (either with hand or stand mixer) until the combination is crumbly and pea size pieces are formed. Now drizzle water to this and knead the dough to bring everything together and wrap this in a plastic and refrigerate for 30 minutes

2. Now in a bowl (or in stand mixer), add almond meal, confectioner sugar (shifted), cardamom powder and mix slightly. Mix rose water and water separately. Then drizzle water/rose water mixture to the almond mixture so that the mixture is moist (don't over mix otherwise almonds may leave butter)

3. Now take a 9x9 size pan and apply little oil on the inside.

4. Divide the dough into two equal parts and roll the first part into a 9x9 inch size (I flipped my pan and then used the plastic to cover it and then rolled the dough on the back of the pan to basically get the 9x9 shape without having to cut any thing. You can also roll it on kitchen slab and then fit it into the pan. Also, I find it helpful to roll with the large rolling pins for even rolling without any mess)

5. Now cut a parchment paper and transfer the rolled part on it and cut it to fit the size of the dough (9x9 inch)

6. Now roll the second part of the dough in a similar fashion and remove it from the pan along with the plastic

7. Flip the pan and transfer parchment paper with the dough into it (if some sides of the dough are smaller than the pan, work with you hands to stretch the dough to fit the whole pan)

8. Transfer the filling on the dough and press it to make an even surface

9. Now transfer the second part of rolled dough on top of the filling (of course without the plastic:)

10. Now transfer the pan into freezer for 20 minutes (this helps in not crumpling the top part while baking)

11. Preheat oven to 350 F

 12. Take out the pain from freezer and cut the dough into 8 equal parallel parts horizontally and then cut at 45 degree angles in eight equal parts to get the diagonal shape. Make sure to cut it all the way to the bottom

13. Mix 2 tablespoon water and 1/2 teaspoon of flour. Heat it in microwave for 20 seconds. Mix again and heat for 20 seconds.

14. Now using a brush, glaze/coat the top part with the water/flour mixer. This will give the baklava a nice golden finish

15. Transfer the pan into oven and bake for 15 minutes

16. Take the pan out from the oven and run the knife through all the cuts because some of them may have diffused into each other

17. Transfer the pan back to oven and bake for 20 minutes

18. Increase the temperature to 375F and bake for another 10 minutes (until crust turns golden)

19. When you increase the temperature to 375 F, start preparing the syrup. 

20. Heat the sugar and water into a pan until the sugar is melted and bring to a low boil

21. Add rose water and let the mixture boil

22. Once its starts to boil, switch off the gas and let it cool down a bit (still warm)

23. Take out the pan from oven and let it cool to that its warm (~10 minutes)

24. Now pour the warm syrup evenly through the pan

25. Sprinkle chopped pistachio and rose leaves on the pan for decorations 

26.Cover it with plastic wrap once the pan has cooled completely and let it  rest for at least 2 hours. The taste will improve in day so you can even make it ahead of time.

Cardamom, Pistachio and Saffron Pound Cake

Preparing brunch is one of my favorite things as there are no set rules. I usually try pound cakes of different types. While browsing through recipes, I stumbled upon a pound cake by Suvir Saran. Originally this was a pistachio pound cake with Lebanese origin which he tweaked a little by adding cardamom.  While reading the recipe, I was convinced that adding saffron might also add to the taste. Soon, I tried this on a Saturday morning and it was delicious. You have to try this flavorful cake!

Recipe:
1 cup all purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cardamom powder (freshly ground for best results)
1/4 teaspoon salt

One and half sticks unsalted butter at room temperature (12 tablespoon butter)
1 cup brown sugar

3 large eggs (room temperature)
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 cup milk
1/4-1/2 teaspoon crushed saffron

1 cup roasted pistachios

- Preheat oven to 350 F
- Grind one cup of roasted (unsalted) pistachios ( I usually get mine from Trader Joe's). Make sure you do not over grind them.
- In a stand mixer or in a big bowl, cream butter and sugar together
- In a separate bowl, whisk eggs and vanilla extract
- Slowly mix butter mixture and the egg mixture
- Slightly warm 1/4 cup of milk and add crushed saffron and let it sit for 2-3 minutes and then add this to the remaining 1/4 cup milk.
- In a separate bowl mix all purpose flour, baking powder, ground cardamom and salt
- Add half of the flour mixture to the butter/egg mixture and then add half of the milk and mix together
- Add remaining flour mixture and milk and mix everything to make sure that the batter is free of  lumps
- Add pistachios into the mixture and mix very gently
- Now grease a 8x4 pan and transfer the batter to the pan
- Bake for 45 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean
- Let is cool in the pan for ten minutes and then on a cooking rack for another 20 minutes
- Enjoy this flavorful Lebanese pound cake with an Indian and Persian touch!

Molten Lava Chocolate Cake

 S loves chocolate more than I do and he picks chocolate based desserts or pure chocolate over any other dessert! He enjoyed drinking a glass full of molten chocolate (so called hot chocolate) from Bent spoon in Princeton and finished a pack of twenty baking chocolate, Scharffen Berger, without me even getting a chance to bake something from it.

So I always had some motivation to make desserts out of chocolate which do not take too much effort like chocolate coated strawberries. To increase this simplistic list, I started sharpening my baking weapons (oven, pans, chocolates) specifically to make molten lava cake.

Serving size: 8 small ramekin cups

Ingredients:
13 tablespoon unsalted butter
6.4 oz chocolate Scharffen Berger (65% dark)
4 large eggs
6.5 tablespoon sugar
pinch of salt
3 teaspoon all purpose flour

Garnish
18-20 pieces of raspberry (or small pieces of tangerines/oranges)
1/4-1/2 cup confectioner sugar or cocoa powder

Sauce
1/2 cup raspberry jam (or orange jam if using oranges for garnish)

Procedure
- Preheat oven to 425 F
- Melt butter and chocolate pieces into a cup in microwave for 30 to 60 seconds
- Mix together to get a liquid mixture and let is cool slightly
- Beat eggs, sugar and salt until sugar dissolves in the egg mixture
- Combine egg mixture with chocolate mixture
- Add flour to the mixture and stir gently
- Grease small ramekins and divide the mixture equally into eight ramekins
- Bake for about 8-10 minutes until sides are firm and center is soft and when top part starts to crack
- Invert onto a plate.
- Combine sugar (or cocoa powder) and raspberry/orange and decorate the inverted cake with few pieces
- Melt raspberry/orange jam in a small pan and serve on side to be poured on the cake

Enjoy!

Aata ka Halwa

I remember waking up in late morning hours with an aroma in house. Often it was from aata (wheat flour) halwa in winters. Behind the aroma was a trick. A trick played by my mom to wake me up. As she new I would want to eat it as soon as it is removed from the gas. Sizzling hot halwa eaten with fingers is one of my favorite breakfast in the winters . This is one thing that I feel does not taste good if you eat it with spoon :) You can eat it plain or with papad for breakfast or after aloo puri as dessert.

This is one of the favorite sweet dish prepared in India for guests, during festivals and celebrations.  At times, this is the first dish prepared by a new bride at her in-laws place. If someone bought a new car or new house, first thing that was done was to make halwa at home and offer it to god. I have made very few attempts to make halwa at home. Even though it comprises of three simple and essential ingredients: Flour, Ghee (clarified butter) and Sugar. Some people may find it easy to make it but somehow I always thought its quite complicated precisely for the same reason: it only has three simple ingredients!

I am very picky with this dish  as I really like it when it is well cooked and looks dark brown in color in comparison to the less cooked (light brown) version. When I would ask my mom for the recipe, she always says andaje se daal lo, 20 logon ka khana banoge to measuring spoons mein hi aadha din lag jayega ( Just add ingredients with approximation, if you have to prepare food for twenty people every day, half the day will be spend in using measuring spoon).  I am amazed how she never tastes the food while she is making it and yet all the spices are perfectly balanced.

When she was visiting me last summer, I convinced her to use the measuring cups to take out each of the ingredients (although she was still making it with her "andaja" but I had my numbers right :)

Ingredients for ~ 1 1/2 -2 cup halwa

1/2 cup wheat flour
6-8 tbsp ghee (clarified butter)
1/2 cup sugar
about 3 1/2-4 cups hot water

- Put a karahi (a deep pan) on gas stove on medium heat. Immediately add wheat flour and ghee to the karahi and mix them.  Slowly cook them, stirring often so that flour and ghee mixture does not stick to the karahi

- After about 15 minutes, flour mixture will change color from light to dark (if you like your halwa really well done continue to cook for another couple of minutes)

- In parallel, boil 4 cups of water in a pan

- Add hot boiling water to the flour ghee mixture and stir everything really fast. Mix everything properly for about 3-4 minutes or until it becomes a thick mixture. It is very important to mix it properly to remove any clusters of aata in the water/flour mixture. A special type of flat ladle  is used to make halwa so that it is easier to mix and scrap while making the halwa.

- Add sugar and continue to stir for another 2 minutes. The mixture will become darker after adding sugar
- Enjoy this for breakfast or eat with papad and add some nuts for garnish

Mango in Estyle!

 

" What diamonds are for women, mangoes are for Indians! "

American: What do you miss most about India in summers ?

Indian: Mangoes man!

After putting things in perspective, let me share the legendary story of mango flower with you. 

Sahi Tukre/ Double ka meetha

I read about Sahi Tukre (Egg less bread pudding) through a recent post by Shayma of The spice spoon. Shamya writes beautiful stories with each post and I always look forward to reading them. Pictures of Sahi Tukre looked so delicious that I couldn't resist making them at an earliest opportunity.  Apparently, these are similar to a dessert called "Double ka meetha" in Hyderabad.  It was such a treat. I will surely be making this on a regular basis now.

Almond Brittle (Badam ki chikki)

This recipe is quick yet very complicated. It is extremely easy to mess up while caramelizing the sugar. After failing couple of times while caramelizing the sugar, I finally found a recipe to make it consistently (most of the times!) It surely brings back the memories of "chikki" (Peanut brittle).

Warm Chocolate Tart

French are leaders in pastry making among many other things! Often recipes from famous chefs are long and time demanding given the perfection desired. Not surprisingly, I have been looking for recipes by French chefs which are short and sweet for some time now!  One of my favorite places to go and work (or to pretend) on weekends is the public library where I happily take rather frequent breaks to search through the cookbook sections.

Surprise breakfast: Dukkah, honey glazed onion polenta and chocolate cake

Somehow weekends have been pretty hectic for the last couple of months and I didn't get much time to have a relaxing breakfast. Either we had to rush somewhere or high carb breakfast choice was on the plate!! To surprise Sid (or perhaps treat myself!), I woke up much earlier than my usual Sunday mornings to have the following on the table:

(1) Griddled polenta with caramalized onions, honey and goat cheese [winner of Food 52 contest for category " Polenta"]
(2) Dukkah (Egyptian mix of nuts and spices) with boiled eggs! Recently I learnt about it at the amazing blog Chocolate and Zucchini. I replaced chestnuts with walnuts in the recipe. Later on we also enjoyed dukkah in a more traditional way with olive oil and bread)
(3) Simple chocolate cake! [winner of Food 52 contest for the category "Best Chocolate Cake"]. I used instant coffee in this recipe.

All are easy to make and taste really good. Highly recommended!!!

Besan Ladoo

Wednesday mornings were special for a little girl as her mother would give her 11 Rupees  to get Besan Ladoo for lord Ganesha from a Mithaiwala (Sweet shop) next door.  On special occasions, she tried two varieties of besan ladoo after visiting  Ganesh temple on Wednesdays with her sister and brother. Time flies and now she enjoys Besan ladoo made by her mother-in-law (MIL) while remembering her childhood days. Then, one day thousands of miles apart from her memories, she attempts to make them with an andaaza (approximate) recipe -  remembering bits and pieces of how MIL moved the ladle effortlessly with a lot of patience and love and yet, thinking about the little girl running to the sweet shop.

Pecan Tart

Tarts are wonderful desserts and almost always I would pick a tart over a cake for dessert:) Joy of tart making is both in the pastry and the filling. Once you have your numbers right for the pastry, the whole new world of fillings open up to make fruit tart, chocolate tart, pecan tarts, cheese tart... the list is endless.

Daring Baker's August Challenge - Petit Fours with Brown Butter Pound Cake

The Daring Baker's Challenge for the month of August was hosted by Elissa of 17 and Baking. We were required to make a brown butter pound cake, an icecream and then use them to make either Ice Cream Petit Fours or Baked Alaska. Due to shortage of time, I decided to make brown butter pound cake and then Petit fours from only the cake while having store bought icecreams on the side:)

Walnut Ladoo

Tired of eating Aata Ladoo or Besan Ladoo [Most of you are thinking (including myself) - not possible !!), try these delicious and healthy walnut ladoo for a change!