Apple Crumble and Home-made Custard

                          Wishing you all a happy and prosperous New Year

S and me are poles apart when it comes to desserts, he doesn’t have a sweet tooth at all , but me and our boy on other hand can eat sweets any time. One day out of nowhere, he told me that he feel like eating apple crumble or apple pie. I have  made Apple pie before and that’s the only dessert I have seen him eating greedily J But after one episode of apple pie I decided not to make it again, not because it wasn’t tasty, it was super yumm, but super rich too.  The amount of butter that goes in kind of shocks you so I decided to check apple crumble recipes online and they were much much lighter compared to Apple pie, So I decided to make this for him. Its almost ages since this demand came and he even forgot all about it but how can  I forget about a dessert that he demanded first time in 8 ½ yrs  !!

Apple crumble is so easy to put together and tastes great with home made custard. I think cinnamon and apple is a combination made in heaven, I just love it. This is a perfect dessert for cold wintery days, of course it cant be compared with the delicious apple pie, but any day I would prefer this over Apple pie as it’s a great dessert  with less calories.

Ingredients ( serves 4-5 )
Recipe adapted from here

Apple (preferably cooking apples like granny smith ) – 4 nos ( peeled, cored and sliced)

Butter – 2 tbs

Cinnamon powder – 1/2 tsp

Light Brown sugar – 2 tbs

For crumble mix

Plain flour – ¾ cup

Baking powder – ½ tsp

Salt - pinch

Demarara Sugar – ½ cup

Butter – 40 gm ( 1/5 th of a cup)

Cinnamon powder – 1 tsp

Method

1. In a frying pan add butter when butter melts, add apples, light brown sugar, ½ tsp cinnamon powder and sauté until soft and tender.
2. Transfer the apples into a small baking tray( right sized ).
3. In another bowl take plain flour, baking powder, salt and butter and run the flour with butter until it resemble crumbs/ mositened puttu podi
4. Add the sugar, cinnamon powder and mix well.Sprinkle the crumble mix on top of the apples placed in baking tray till the edge . Press them tighly.
5. Bake it a preheated oven at 200 degree C for 35 – 40 minutes until the top is crispy.
6. Let it cool for a little while.

For Home- made Custard

Egg yolks – 3 nos

Milk – ¾ cup

Double cream – ¾ cup

Corn flour – 1 tbs

Vanilla extract – 1 tsp

Sugar – ½ cup

 Method

1. In a bowl take 3 egg yolks and add corn flour and sugar. Whisk until sugar is dissolved. Add vanilla extract too.
2. In a saucepan bring milk, double cream to boil and turn off the flame.
3. Add the warm milk to the egg yolk mixture very slowly with one hand and whisking vigorously with other hand taking care not to scramble the eggs.
4. Transfer everything back to the saucepan and cook on a very slow flame (takes about 10 minute ) whisking continuously until custard starts to thicken a little bit.
5. Transfer into a bowl and cover it with a cling film with the cling film touching the surface of custard ( to avoid skin formation ) and then chill it.

Serve the warm Apple crumble with custard and enjoy !!

Kerala Mutton curry

Ingredients

Mutton – ½ kg (diced)

Shallots/ Cheriya ulli – 300 gm / ( 2 cup sliced)

Tomato – 1

Ginger garlic paste – 1 tsp

Curry leaves

Water – 1 cup

To marinate

Ginger garlic paste( Inji veluthulli paste) – 1tsp

Corainder powder – 1 tbs

Redchilly powder – 1 tsp

Turmeric powder – ¼ tsp

Pepper powder – 1 tsp

Salt – to taste

Curry leaves

To powder

Poppy seeds / Cuscous – 1 tbs

Cinnamon stick – ¼ inch stick

Cloves -2

Cardamom – 2

Fennel/ Perum jeerakam – ½ tsp

Pepper / Kurumulaku – ½ tsp

Star anise/ Thakolam – 1

Method

1. Marinate the mutton with ingredients listed under ‘ To marinate’ and keep it aside.
2. In a wok/ Cheena chatty add coconut oil and sauté the sliced shallots until soft and light brown.
3. Add ginger garlic paste and sauté for a minute.
4. Add chopped tomatoes and cook until tomatoes are soft.
5. Transfer this masala into a pressure cooker, add the marinated mutton, curry leaves and add water. Pressure cook for 4-5 whistles or until done.
6. Open the lid of the cooker when pressure goes off .
7. Meanwhile powder the indredients listed under ‘ to powder’ and add this to the mutton curry.
8. Turn on the flame again and bring the curry to boil for 3-4 minutes and turn off the flame.

Before I sign off let me wish you all a Fabulous Newyear !!

Katharine Hepburn Brownies and Happy holidays !

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New year

 

With Holiday season just around the corner I wanted to do this post  before it was  too late ! Whole food blogging world is full of Christmas bakes and I was feeling a bit left out and wanted to whip up something quick for you all and this Katherine Hepburn Brownies fitted the bill perfectly. It is literally a one bowl brownie, just stir everything together in a bowl and pop it an oven and a delicious brownie will be ready is less than 1 hour. They are perfect to gift for friends or to munch on with a cup of milk. I have to say, for a chocoholic like me, this brownies were kind of addictive. I made this cookies for giving it to a friend and good that I packed half of it to her or else I would have ended up eating whole lot of it in a single sitting.

Those who are wondering about the name of this recipe, its named after Katherine Hepburn (actress) who contributed this awesome recipe to us. I gave a little twist to the recipe by adding cashewnuts instead of walnuts and I think that lifted up the taste to a new level, I absolutely loved the cashewnuts in brownies and even my hubby who is not chocolate lover ate quite a lot !

Recipe source – Joy of baking

Ingredients

Dark Chocolate ( 70 % cocoa ) – 60 gm

Unsatled butter – 113 gm / ½ cup   

Granulated White Sugar – 200 gm /  1cup

Eggs – 2 large

Vanilla extract – ½ tsp

Plain flour/ Maida – 30 gm / ¼ cup

Salt – ¼ tsp

Chopped cashewnuts / walnuts – 100 gm

Method

1. Take butter and dark chocolate in a heat proof bowl and place them over a simmering pan of hot water until its melted.
2. Add sugar and stir in.
3. Break 2 eggs,add vanilla extract and stir in.
4. Add the flour, chopped nuts and stir in.
5. Pour the batter into a greased 8 inch square cake tin and bake in a preheated oven at 165 degree Celcius for 30-35 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted comes out clean.  

Chuggington cake

I have been asked by many of my friends to consider cake decoration more seriously from a business perspective but since my cakes were far from perfect / professional standard I was never confident and was not ready for such a commitment and moreover deep inside I felt that  if I do it on a daily basis I wouldn’t have enjoyed it like I do now and the truth is as much as I enjoy it,  it is  time consuming and very tiring. Now that I have moved onto to a new  role in my sons school and has different set of goals, my hubby asks me why am I still  clinging on to this passion for which I don’t have  an answer ! I can’t really blame him for asking that as its he who suffers when I am busy with a cake, I don’t get time for my usual cooking so end up cooking something very simple for us or sometimes go for  takeaways or even frozen back up options in freezer or  sometimes he is forced to take up cooking :)

Coming to todays cake, I made this for my friend's son who is a chugginton fan. It was a vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream for 30 servings. The  birthday boy was so  happy to see the cake and afterall  that’s what  make all the effort really worth while ..that innocent smile on their face is priceless !!

Coffee Walnut Sponge with Chocolate Buttercream icing

Wishing Happy Thanks Giving and Wonderful Holidays to all friends in US !

Grey sky, rain, wind, Chill ... that’s pretty much the weather here these days and moreover the sunset at 4 o clock makes matter worse, for all these reason and other reasons I find it hard to get  into kitchen for cooking. My kitchen is really cold and there is no heating in kitchen. So I even dread the thought of cooking but on the other hand I am in full mojo for baking, after all its Christmas and holiday season soon. Shops and streets are already decorated and people are busy buying Christmas gifts for loved ones, so it’s lovely atmosphere expect the weather part. When the weather really gets to me I always tend to bake and it really helps, baking and winter goes hand in hand for some reason and that’s why I guess I have more tendency to bake during the winter!

Coming to today’s post, I would have never made this cake if I haven’t tasted it, so when a friend made this cake and gave it to me I couldn’t stop eating it, it was just so yumm. I did some googling and also got hold of her recipe book and all the recipes were pretty much the same so I made this cake adapting all those recipes. Coffee and walnut combination is a combination made in heaven, if you still haven’t tried it you are missing out a great flavour. I have baked this cake and taken it to India for my cousins and family this summer and they all loved it and they have asked me take the same cake next time as well, in fact when my parents visited us they asked to send one through them when they were going back !

Ingredients (serves 8-10)

( Cup measurement given is in a 200 ml cup)

Plain flour – 150 gm ( 1 1/3 cup)

Baking powder – 1 ½ tsp

Salt - pinch

Butter – 175 gm ( ¾ cup)

Sugar – 175 gm (  roughly ¾ cup) + 2 tbs

Coffee powder – 1 ½ tbs

Boiling water – 50 ml ( ¼ cup)

Walnut – 75 gm ( 50 +25 )

Eggs – 3 large

Method

1. Sift flour, baking powder, salt and keep it aside.
2. Dissolve 1 tbs of coffee powder in 50 ml of boiling water and keep it aside.
3. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy for about 5 minutes.
4. In a bowl break three eggs and lightly beat them with a spoon or whisk.
5. With hand mixer or electric mixer running add the beaten eggs gradually to the creamed mixture adding a tbs of sifted flour in between(to avoid curdling) .
6. Beat until eggs have been mixed well into mixture.
7. Blitz 50 gm of Walnut with 2  tbs of sugar into a nutty powder ( if you  do not add sugar you will end up with a  paste !) and add this to the creamed mixture and beat in.
8. Add the sifted flour, fold in.
9. Add the coffee and  25 gm of chopped walnut pieces to the batter and fold in.
10. Pour the  batter into a two 8 inch prepared/ greased cake tin and bake in a preheated oven at 180 C for 20-25 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted comes out clean.

 Chocolate buttercream Icing

Ingredients

Butter - 100 gm - (approximately 1/2 cup )
Icing sugar - 200 gm ( 1 1/2 cup )
Double cream - 50 ml
Meringue powder - 1tsp
Coffee liqueur / Vanilla extract  - 1tsp
salt - pinch
 Dark  chocolate - 40 gm (melted )

Method

1.In a mixing bowl add 1/3 of the sugar, salt and meringue powder and mix.
2.Add cream to it and beat it for 5 minutes in an electric mixer with paddle attachment 
3.Add remaining sugar and beat for 3 minutes.
4.Add butter little by little and beat for 5-7 minutes.
5.Add coffee liqueur, melted chocolate and beat for 1 minute.

Assembling the cake

Once the cake is cool, place one cake on the cake stand/ board and spread the buttercream to top. Place the second layer on top and spread the remaining buttercream on top and decorate it with some walnut pieces or as you wish ! 

Sending this to Cakes Mela @ Cooking 4 all Seasons
also to Bake fest # 25 @ CooksJoy

Corn Flake Cookies, A guest post for Rekha of " Foodolicious pictured "

It was during one of my lazy afternoon browsing session that I stumbled upon Rekha’s blog Foodolicious pictured accidentally. I was totally impressed by her blog, her beautiful pictures and superb collection of recipes. I immediately became her FB fan and  left few comments and  it led to  the beginning of a new friendship ! The one  good quality that  I really like about Rekha is the way she support and encourage other bloggers. I have seen Rekha sharing fellow bloggers recipes on  her Social media platform. It is indeed really sweet of her to do that and support other blogs.

I have to say Rekha  is a versatile blogger as she contributes a variety of recipes, some of them are very unique and innovative. Picking few favourites from her blog would be a tough job but few pictures which left me drooling are Gongura Mutton, Bread Gulab Jamun, and Mediterranian Meat balls .

Thanks you  Rekha for inviting me for a guest post, its indeed a pleasure to do a guest post for friends.

Coming to todays post, it’s a melt in mouth kind of cookies with crunchy cornflakes coating. I tried this recipe from MyKitchenatics and it was a hit expect that it was a  bit less sweet to our liking, so the second time I made this I added a bit  more sugar to adjust to our liking and it was perfect. If you would like to check out the recipe head over to Foodolicious pictured and while you are there don’t forget to check her blog for more J

Mango Shrikhand/ Amrakhand

I maybe get some odd looks for posting this recipe now as its almost winter and mangoes are wayyyy out of season, but since mango pulp  are easily available in tins here, I make and enjoy mango based desserts throughout the year. Its a light dessert which you can enjoy after a heavy meal and the best bit is it is so easy to put together  (less than 10 minutes)  if you hang the yogurt in muslin cloth overnight. Even though I love this dessert and have enjoyed it several times, I got the inspiration to try this at home after tasting this at a friend’s place, it was so delicious and creamy and one of the best shrikhand I tasted. Her's was a pineapple shrikhand made from tinned pineapple with bits of pineapple but since I was more of mango fan  I decided to try mango shrikhand, but I got to say I liked pineapple shrikhand better than my mango one, so next time when I try shrikhand I am going to make  pineapple one .

Ingredients (serves 4 )

Thick yogurt / Curd – 3 cup

Mango Pulp – 1 ½  cup

Cardamom powder – ½ tsp

Saffron  Milk – 2 tbs ( Add  ¼ tsp of Saffron strands to 2 tbs of warm milk for 15-30 mins )

Crushed Nuts / Pistachios/ Almonds -   2 tbs

Sugar – 1/4 cup or as required 

Method

•  Strain yogurt in a muslin cloth overnight.                                                            
  
• Beat the thick yogurt for 1-2 minutes until creamy.
• Add mango pulp, Saffron milk,sugar, cardamom powder and mix well and chill for 2 -3 hours
• Serve them in individual bowls or cups with crushed nuts on top.