Chunky Banana Walnut Cake

Chunky Banana Walnut Cake

I have been yearning to bake for a while now, often stopping myself because I always thought baking without eggs would be complex or rather a task nearly impossible to achieve! I decided to take the challenge head on and try and I was quite pleased with the results! Yes, one can bake yummy, fluffy, moist cakes without eggs and two of the recipes I've tried, have become instant hits!

If you are a fruit lover and love your cakes with a chunk of your favourite apple or banana, coupled with a dash of health, here's what you need to do!

CHUNKY BANANA WALNUT CAKE

Prep Time: 10 mins | Baking Time: 30-32 mins | Servings: 1 Bread loaf size or 8-9 inch round cake pan

Dry Ingredients:

1. Wheat Flour - 1 cup 
2. Maida - ½ cup
3. Sugar - 1 cup + 1 tablespoon (I used golden brown sugar) - grind it slightly 
4. Baking Soda - 1 teaspoon
5. Cinnamon Powder - 1 teaspoon
6. Salt - a quarter teaspoon
7. Medium sized bananas - 3 chopped (in case of apples, use 1 large apple,  peeled and cored)
8. Walnuts - a handful, chopped (raisins while making apple cake)

Wet Ingredients:

1. Vinegar - 1½ tablespoons (I use apple cider vinegar)
2. Cooking Oil - 5 tablespoons (you can use olive oil or vegetable oil)
3. Vanilla Essence - 1 teaspoon
4. Water - 1 cup (room temperature/cold - not refrigerated)

Preparation:

1. Preheat oven to 180° C (350F)
2. Take a cake pan (I used nonstick cake pan) and sieve all the dry ingredients together
3. In case of a nonstick pan, make three holes in the sieved mixture - add oil, vinegar and essence in each of them. Add a cup of water and whisk evenly.
4. Fold the chopped banana and walnut and shake the pan to level the batter
5. Bake for about 30-32 mins or till done
6. Serve warm

Notes (For baking Cinnamon Apple Cake):

• While making apple cake, I used 2 medium sized apples peeled and cored and replaced walnuts with

  

  Spiced Apple Cake

  half a cup of raisins
• I also added a quarter of a teaspoon of nutmeg powder along with cinnamon powder) 
• The baking time was higher compared to the banana cake - it took about 45 mins  
• You can sprinkle some powdered sugar once the cake is ready

Mambazha Pulissery (Ripe Mango Curry)

A few months ago, I introduced my non-South Indian friends to the magical world of vegetarian cuisine from

Mambazha Pulissery

Kerala with a popular curry known as Pulissery - yogurt and coconut based curry. The signature recipe for most festivals, especially the Onam Sadhya is the Mambazha Pulissery (Ripe Mangoes cooked in a tangy yogurt and coconut curry). This curry is also known by other names such as 'Pazhamanga Pulissery' or 'Pazhamanga Curry' in Kerala. It is traditionally made using the 'Nattu Manga' - a special variety of mango that is small in size and has a unique, sweet taste. It is made in different variations across different parts of the state and the recipe I am about to share was one of the simplest and tasty, especially if you enjoy the taste and flavour of ripe mangoes.

MAMBAZHA PULISSERY ('zh' is pronounced as 'ळा') in Malayalam
Prep Time: 10 mins | Cook TIme: 10 mins | Servings: 4

Ingredients:

1. Ripe Mangoes - 2 medium sized (I used Badami variety)
2. Water - 2 cups
3. Sour Curd - 2 cups (if you don't have sour curd, add a little tamarind pulp)
4. Grated Coconut - ½ - 1 cup
5. Rice - 1 teaspoon
6. Turmeric - ½ teaspoon
7. Green Chillies - 1-2 (depending on how spicy you like your curry)
8. Curry leaves - 1 sprig
9. Mustard and fenugreek seeds and 2 dry red chillies - for tempering
10. Salt - to taste

Preparation:

1. Boil water in a cooking vessel with salt and turmeric. Peel and chop the mangoes and cook them in the water and simmer for about 5 minutes.
2. Grind the mixture of coconut, green chillies, rice with a little curd into a smooth paste.
3. Add this paste to the cooked mangoes and stir. 
4. Add a cup of water to the remaining curd (whisked well) and add it to the mix while stirring well. 
5. Simmer till the curry starts frothing along the sides and remove it from the heat. Add curry leaves and mix well.
6. Temper with mustard, fenugreek seeds and red chillies.

Your Mambazha Pulissery is ready to be served with steaming hot rice and pappadam (papads)!

Enjoy the season of mangoes with these interesting recipes!

Eggless Fresh Mango Cake with Nuts & Raisins

Eggless Fresh Mango Cake with Nuts & Raisins

The mango season is just about getting over and I still can't get over the king of fruits! The number of recipes that this fruit can be a part of is amazing - pickles, dals, curries, desserts, juices, the list is endless and the taste, rich, sweet and sour, delightful! 

One such recipe is a quick and easy cake using fresh mango pulp/ puree! Don't believe me? Try it and let me know if your taste buds enjoyed it!

EGGLESS MANGO CAKE WITH NUTS & RAISINS

Prep Time: 15 mins | Cooking Time: 6-7 mins | Servings: about 15 slices

Ingredients:

1. Mango Puree/ Pulp - 1-1½ cup (I used 2 medium sized 'Badami' mango)
2. All purpose flour/ Maida - 2 cups
3. Milk - ½ cup
4. Sugar - ¾ cup
5. Condensed Milk - ½ cup
6. Vinegar or Lemon Juice - 1 tablespoon
7. Refined Oil - 2 tablespoons
8. Baking Powder - 1½  teaspoon
9. Baking Soda - ½  teaspoon
10. Vanilla Essence - ½  teaspoon
11. Nuts & Raisins - 1 cup (I used about ¾ cup walnuts and filled the rest with raisins)

Preparation: 

• Add mango pulp, sugar, condensed milk, milk, oil, vinegar, vanilla essence in a bowl and mix till the sugar dissolves.

• Sieve the maida, baking powder and baking soda and slowly add it to the mango pulp mixture and keep whisking lightly to ensure there are no lumps. Add nuts and raisins and mix evenly.

• Grease a microwave bowl and add the mixture to it. Microwave on high for about 6-7 minutes. Rest the cake for 5 minutes. Serve once cool.

Serve the cake with Vanilla Ice cream, Mango ice cream or just as is.. Enjoy the flavour of the season!

Spaghetti with Sweet & Sour Vegetables

Spaghetti with Sweet & Sour Vegetables

It is the middle of the week and I often wonder what can I cook up quickly for dinner instead of the routine Rotis, Vegetables and the likes... It's been a while since I stepped into the kitchen to dish out some 'Indianised-Chinese Food'. So here goes a little experiment gone totally right! Throw in whatever vegetables you find in your vegetable basket at home... A little sweet here, a little tangy there and a tinge of spice...end your day on a tasteful note!

Here's a quick pic-by-pic low-down on the recipe:

SPAGHETTI WITH SWEET & SOUR VEGETABLES

Prep Time: 15 mins | Cook Time: 15 mins | Servings: 2

Ingredients:

1. Spaghetti Pasta
2. Bell Peppers - Red/ Yellow/ Green (either one or all three) - chopped into square pieces
3. Onion - 1 medium sized chopped in quarters with layers separated 
4. Carrot - 1 chopped into chunks/ cubes
5. Zucchini - 1 sliced (I opted for the yellow  zucchini)
6. Baby Corns - 5-6 nos (split at the centre and cut into halves)
7. French Beans - 8-10 nos
8. Broccoli or Cauliflower Florets - 1½ cups
9. Soy Sauce - 3 tablespoons
10. Garlic - 3 cloves finely chopped
11. Ginger - ½ inch finely chopped
12. Tomato Ketchup - 2 tablespoons
13. White Vinegar - 1 tablespoon
14. Cornflour - 2 tablespoons
15. Water -  ½ cup to mix cornflour and 2 cups for the vegetables (you could add vegetable stock instead of water as well)
16. Oil - 1½-2 tablespoons
17. Pepper - ½ teaspoon
18. Sugar - 1 tablespoon
19. Salt - to taste

Preparation:

• Boil and coat the pasta as per instructions and set aside. Blanch the zucchini, baby corns, cauliflower, french beans in water (add a teaspoon of salt) and keep aside

• Heat a wok/ kadhai and add oil. Saute ginger and garlic and add onions and bell peppers and stir fry (on high flame) for about 3 minutes

• Add rest of the vegetables and stir fry for about 4-5 minutes. Mix soy sauce and tomato ketchup in a bowl and add it to the vegetables. Season with salt, pepper and sugar and mix well. Add two cups of water (or vegetable stock) and simmer and cook for about 5 minutes.

• Mix 2 tablespoons of cornflour in ½ cup water and add to the vegetables. Stir quickly and ensure no lumps are formed. Simmer for a couple of minutes till it thickens and round it up with a tablespoon of vinegar. 

Your sweet & sour vegetables is ready to be served with the spaghetti... If you change your mind, you can serve it with steamed rice, plain noodles or fried rice too! Enjoy a different dinner on the weekday! 

A "Date" with a Cake!

Dates and Wheat Flour Cake

My love for quick cakes, thanks to the microwave, is on an upswing! And when instant blends with

healthy, it is literally like 'cherry on the cake'! I jumped at the option of a cake made using dates and wheat flour and the result was... poof... magical - both in terms of its fluffy, light texture and balanced sweetness thanks to the dates. Here's a quick scan on the recipe...

DATES CAKE

Prep Time: 4 hours | Cooking Time: 7 mins | Servings: 16-18 slices

Ingredients: 

1. Dates (seedless) - 20-25 nos
2. Wheat flour - 1½ cup (approx 175 gm)
3. Milk - 1½ cup
4. Sugar - 1 cup (approx 200 gm)
5. Vegetable Oil - 3 tablespoons
6. Baking Soda - 1 teaspoon
7. Liquid Soda - ¾ cup

Preparation:

1. Soak the de-seeded dates in 1 cup of warm milk for an hour
2. Grind the soaked dates and sugar. Add oil and baking soda to this mixture. Add wheat flour little by little and whisk to ensure there are no lumps in this mixture. Add half cup of milk and mix well. Let this batter stand for 3 hours
3. Just before you add the mixture to a greased, microwave safe cooking bowl, add the liquid soda and whisk well.
4. Pour this into the baking container and microwave (without lid) for 7:30 mins.
5. Insert a knife/ fork to check is the cake is baked through and through
6. Slice it once cooled

Notes & Tips:

• This cake can be made using Maida (all purpose flour) as well - for this you do not need to let the batter stand for 3 hours. Once the dates and soaked for an hour, just add the maida to the mixture (dates + sugar) along with oil and baking soda. Add liquid soda and microwave immediately
• Always mix the batter in one direction 
• Always add the liquid soda just before you pour the batter and microwave 

Makar Sankranti Special: Gulachi Poli (Indian Flatbread stuffed with Jaggery)

Makar Sankranti, the harvest festival of Maharashtra is celebrated in different forms (and with different names) across communities throughout the country. Besides marking the start of the harvest festival, it is also the beginning of the movement of the Sun into the northern hemisphere. The day is noted as the beginning of an auspicious phase in Indian culture and people usually dress up in new black clothes, exchange sweets and gifts and fly colourful kites. The significance of wearing black is that since the festival is celebrated in winter, black retains and absorbs heat, keeping everyone warm. 

Makar Sankranti special Gulachi Poli

Like any other Indian festival, the highlight of Sankranti is the special ingredients used to prepare sweets and delicacies - sesame, sugar, jaggery, ghee (keeping us warm) being the main components. We exchange coloured 'halwa' (sesame coated with sugar syrup) or 'til-gul' (sweets prepared using sesame and jaggery) and greet each other with 'Til-gul ghya goad bola'. And what's Sankranti in a Marathi household without the irresistible aroma and flavours of the gul poli (flatbread stuffed with jaggery mixture)! Here's a loud cheer to all the Maharashtrians out there and a step-by-step recipe for the perfect, yummylicious Gul Poli! 

GULACHI POLI (Indian Flatbread stuffed with a Jaggery Mixture)

Prep Time: 1 hour | Cooking Time: 2 hours (to make 25-30 rotis) | Servings: 25-30 rotis

Ingredients:

1. Jaggery - 500gm
2. Chickpea Flour (Besan) - 100 gm
3. Sesame Seeds - 50 gm
4. Cardamom Powder - 1 teaspoon
5. Nutmeg Powder - ½ teaspoon
6. Refined Oil - Approx 75 ml (besan should immerse well in oil while roasting it)
7. For making Rotis (Flatbreads)
• Wheat Flour - 200 gm
• Maida - 200 gm
• Besan - 1 tablespoon
• Oil - 2-3 tablespoons
• Water - to knead the dough (should be stiffer than roti dough)

Preparation:

• Grate or finely cut jaggery and set aside. Roast sesame seeds and finely powder them. 

• Heat a pan and add oil. Roast besan till it turns golden brown. 

• Once the besan is lukewarm, add jaggery, sesame seeds, cardamom and nutmeg powders and mix. Churn this mixture using a food processor or grinder till it is evenly mixed and roll small balls (the size of a pedha) for stuffing into the roti dough. For the dough, mix wheat flour, maida, oil and water and knead to form a stiff dough and roll small balls (slightly bigger than the jaggery mixture)

• Press the dough ball lightly between your palms and slightly flatten the edges using your thumb and index finger. Stuff the jaggery mixture into it and close it. It is now ready to be rolled into a roti.

• Roll the roti lightly, without using too much pressure (else the jaggery mixture will spill out). Heat a skillet or frying pan and roast the roti using ghee. Serve with a dollop of homemade ghee! 

It's a tad bit late, but hoping you all have had a splendid Sankranti and there's no harm trying this yummylicious roti on a cold afternoon - sit back and let the combination of jaggery, sesame and ghee warm you up!! 

Chocolate Cake in 6 Minutes

I always thought microwave cooking is a complex, still worse, a perplexing task - you measure ingredients accurately (something we rarely do in Indian homes, it is mostly our gut feeling or experience passed on from generations), calculate measurements vis-à-vis temperatures (mathematics was never my favourite subject), using eggs to make desserts, people scaring me all the time saying a few seconds here and there could ruin the dish and so on... Over the last few months I was observing a friend dishing out delicious desserts and other recipes and having absolute fun at it... My New Year gift this year was a Microwave - leaving me pleasantly surprised and I was automatically seen making a resolution with myself that I will learn the basics of microwave cooking, and more importantly, enjoy the experience! As long as you love to cook, the method or mode of cooking should be the least of your worries - what is essential is cooking from your heart and dishing out wonders from the kitchen for your loved ones!

Cook up a spongy Chocolate Cake in 6 Minutes! 

My giant leap in microwave cooking, or 'I-can-control-the-machine-and-cook-something-tasty' Moment sprang last evening when my aunt shared a wonderfully easy cake recipe ("Baking and Easy?!?!" is what I always thought., but this was literally a cakewalk - you don't need a convection/ grill for this one either!) that made my New Year's Eve and surprised all my loved ones at home too!!! My spongy, delicious chocolate cake was ready in literally 6 minutes... Here's a low down on the recipe  

QUICK CHOCOLATE CAKE

Prep Time: 12-15 mins | Cooking Time: 6 mins | Servings: 8-10 big pieces

Ingredients:

1. Maida - 1½ cup (150 gm)
2. Sugar - 1 cup heaped (approx 175 gm)
3. Cocoa Powder - 4 tablespoons (heaped)
4. Baking Soda - 1 teaspoon
5. Water - 1 cup (150 ml)
6. Oil - ⅓  cup (50 ml)
7. Vanilla Essence - 1-2 teaspoons
8. Vinegar - 2 tablespoons
9. Walnuts - ½cup (chopped)
10. Sugar syrup - 3-4 tablespoons (runny, not very thick - mix ½-1 tablespoon of powdered sugar with 3-4 tablespoons of water)

Preparation:

• Sieve the maida, cocoa powder and soda in a bowl and keep aside

Mixture of Maida, Cocoa Powder and Baking Soda to be sieved 

• In a separate bowl, mix water, sugar, oil, vinegar and vanilla essence and mix till the sugar melts completely into the mixture.

Sugar, Oil, Water, Vinegar and Vanilla Essence mixed till sugar melts 

• Add this mix to the dry powder and keep whisking till all lumps are cleared

• Grease a microwave-safe cooking container with oil and flour and add the batter to it.

• You can sprinkle some walnuts on the batter. Now microwave (regular settings) this for 6 minutes (open) and once done, allow it to rest for a couple of minutes. Insert a knife or toothpick to see if any batter sticks - if the knife is clear, your cake is ready

• Once the cake has cooled completely, drop it on a plate and brush/pour sugar syrup on it to leave it moist

Surprise yourself and your loved ones - it is never too late to experiment and cook up easy yet tasty dishes from your heart!