Year: 2012

Fluffy Sponge Cake and a Trifle Pudding

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Sponge cakes are so called because they are as fluffy as a sea sponge. The air incorporated into the batter lifts the cake to make it light and irresistible. Since it is used as a base for many other desserts it’s one of the first cake recipes that I wrote down in my little black book of Baking! (Yes, I have one – though the color is more navy blue than black). There are many variations to turn out a perfect sponge. I use the method which involves creaming the eggs and sugar and adding the melted fat in the end. Some people use oil instead of butter, but I always think butter makes everything better, so you know my leanings! You can eat the sponge cake like a Victorian Sandwich – jam and whipped double cream or use it for a rolled cake like a Swiss Roll. (The flexibility of a sponge cake allows us to roll it without breaking).  I have used it as a base for the popular English Trifle. Now the …

Green Goddess Frittata (Spinach, Broccoli and Mushroom)

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Frittata is a variation of an omelette and is derived from the Italian word fritto meaning to fry. The difference between an omelette and frittata are four fold. (A) Ingredients are combined with the beaten egg mixture before cooking, unlike an omelette where its tossed on top before the omelette is fully cooked. (B) The mixture is cooked over a very low heat, but for a longer period of time (10-15 mins) compared to an omelette (4-5 mins). (C) The frittata is not folded over like an omelette, but grilled briefly to set the top (D) and finally a frittata is for sharing, unlike an omelette which is a one person dish. So after getting all technical on you, I’d like to conclude by saying – it tastes just like a fat, fancy omelette or a baseless quiche. Both of which are fully acceptable and appreciated with gusto in my home. I would serve the frittata cold with some toasted baguettes for a fuss free lunch. It’s also a great option to lug around for …

Summer Pasta Salad – a la Infinitea

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I’m more of a summer person than a winter person. Or so I thought, till I got baked in the sun the past couple of days. The heat has been unbearable. I have the fan on full speed at home and there’s still no respite. Being Bangalorean, I always think I don’t need an AC in our pleasant city. Boy, am I wrong! The only time I’m happy these days, is when I’m in the car and I have the AC on full blast in my face or when am under a cold shower! Which leads me to change my earlier notion of what weather person I am – I am an opti-weather person. I don’t like it too hot or too cold, too dry or too rainy, too windy or too still! I’m not fussy, but that’s the weather I would like. If wishes were horses, right? But I still concede that when it comes to satisfying my weather requirement, no other city in the world gets it as close to perfect as Bangalore. …

Ice Cream Sandwiches for Milestones and Hot Days

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I’ve always been bewitched by Ice Cream Sandwiches. Not many companies made it and on the rare occasions that I would get to eat it; I was always in awe that ice cream could be held together by two cookies! They are very popular in Singapore (being one degree above the equator, that’s fair enough!) and that’s where I had one, every day of my trip. No exaggerating! There, they use wafers to make the sandwich but I much prefer the cookies…so much more yummy! A very popular flavor there is Durian ice cream sandwich. The fruit may stink like old socks but the ice cream tastes divine. Summer just kicked in last week and the Bangalore heat has gotten as bad as Singapore this year. No really, we were at 35 degrees yesterday! The heat made me crave for the ice cream sandwiches. After looking for them in most ice cream parlors and turning up negative, I made them myself. (Not the ice cream darlings, bought that one). And since this is the month …

Strawberry Griddle Cakes for a Fancy Breakfast

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Yes, I know it’s another recipe with strawberries back to back. But I have so many in my fridge that I need to use them and use them in innovative ways! (lest the co-resident realize my evil plan of ‘waste to wealth’). I have a supermarket weakness. If something looks fresh, is in season and the store has a buy one get one free offer – I’m hooked. Rest assured, I will be carting loads of it back home! Come on now, who doesn’t like a good bargain? Thankfully Strawberries are such accommodating fruit that you can pair them with almost anything and achieve success. Now coming to Griddle cakes. First of all, don’t let the name take you on a wild goose chase. Another name for a frying pan is a griddle and griddle cakes are nothing but pancakes that are just a little firmer. So you can call them Strawberry pancakes if you please… but I much prefer the fancier sounding name. (Fools the co-resident into thinking he’s getting something radical to chew …

Strawberry Milkshake and My 100th Post

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It’s my 100th post today. I can’t believe I had enough material to go this far (apparently I do!) Bloggers say that lasting the 2 years is the biggest challenge. You need to be interested in what you blog about and let’s face it, people need to be interested in what you write about. You might say that you give a rat’s ass about what people think…but that’s not true. You need an audience to appreciate art. (Ok, in my case … the art of blabbering!) If nothing else, I have at least 100 failsafe recipes that I can always fall back on! I’ve also come to realize that I care as much,  (if not more) about my pictures that accompany each blog post. So the journey for me has been about taking baby steps to produce pics that I am proud of. (Here’s the link to my first post and picture. (Click Here) No, am not ashamed, it’s a learning curve right?) 😛 Talking of learning curves, was I going to put up some …

Easy Vanilla Cupcakes with Nutella Frosting

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Once you get the basics right then everything else is a breeze. My first cupcake was a vanilla cupcake. Somehow adding the chocolate as an additional step made it feel like advanced baking! Now here’s the best part. I made my first cupcake (in my whole life) in March last year! After which I’ve been stuck with the cupcake bug and been driven to try all kinds of mini joys. So now you know that I wasn’t born with a ladle in my hand nor did I have supreme baking talent. The key to success is the 3P’s – Practice, Practice, Practice! (Like the joke – Rumor is that a pedestrian on Fifty-seventh Street, Manhattan, stopped Jascha Heifetz (the greatest violinist of our time) and inquired, “Could you tell me how to get to Carnegie Hall?” “Yes,” said Heifetz. “Practice, Practice, Practice!” So there you go … if I can bake, so can you. And starting you off is this Basic Vanilla Cupcake Recipe. And just to add some pizzazz, we have a nice and …

Ham, Bacon and Green Apple Quiche

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So today has been a frustrating day. I made a cheese cake which did not set and made a Mexican Chicken Mole which had too much cinnamon! And on a hot day tempers can flare everywhere! Clearly some days are not for culinary adventure or rather just any culinary venture. Every woman who rushes home from work and still wants to whip up a fancy meal a la Nigella, is living in a dream world if she doesn’t have failsafe recipes to fall back on! It’s times like these that I have even more reverence for a good recipe, a blogger who tests the recipe and finally a book that publishes only tried and tested recipes. That is why you can be rest assured I am not putting up dubious recipes on my blog. I don’t want to inflict the pain of failure on anyone. (No, seriously, that’s how it feels when a recipe screws up!) So it’s with supreme confidence that I am posting the Ham, Bacon and Green Apple recipe. It worked liked …