Nankathai

I am just done with preparing Nankathai. Referred to DivyasCookbook and followed her steps. Now am waiting for it to cool for it to be tried. I prepared mine in Microwave Convection.

Ingredients:
Maida/ All purpose Flour- 1 Cup
Sugar- Powdered- 1/2 Cup
Ghee- 1/2 Cup
Cardamom/ Elaichi- 1/2 tsp
Baking Powder- 1/2 tsp

Method:
Melt the ghee and mix the powdered sugar and cardamom into it. Sieve the maida & baking powder into the ghee mixture and mix well into a dough. 
Keep the dough aside for an hour.
Preheat the Microwave oven at 160C. 
Make small balls of the dough and flatten it with your hand on the microwave tray.
Now, set the Convection mode to 160C and bake for 23-25mins. 
Check the nankathai at 20mins to see if its cooking well. I took out mine at 24 mins.
The cracks on the nankathai tell you that its done.

I just gave a piece of nankathai to my son and he says its like cotton biscuit :-). Husband's saying its yummeeeee

Sweet n Spicy Pan roasted Pumpkin

I had a small piece of pumpkin left with me after I was done with the cake. Decided to quickly cook up something with it. 

Ingredients:
1. Pumpkin - 8-10 thin cut slices
2. Garlic paste 1/2 tsp or 1 tsp depending on your taste
3. Olive oil/ any cooking oil- 2 tsp
4. Chilli Powder
5. Sugar- 1/2 tsp
6. Salt- as per taste

Procedure:
I cut the pumpkin into small thin slices, added a tea spoon of cooking oil..olive oil would work better I think. Put the garlic paste & Salt into it and mixed it till all the pumpkin pieces were coated with garlic flavored oil.
Heat the pan and spread the pumpkin slices on the pan. Turn over when one side is done. The slices will tend to get soft and turn into golden brown when they are fully cooked. Now add the chilli powder and Sugar on your pumkin slices and roast both sides once more and remove from fire. 
The dish is ready to serve..It could serve as a good side snack with your meal. You could also add a dash of lemon juice incase you like your food to be tangy.

Husband loved the taste of this...daughter said she wanted the same done with potatoes and my son came back asking for a few more pieces.

Eggless Pumpkin Cake

I had a small pumpkin lying at home and didnt find my mum-in-law too interested in touching it :-P, so decided I pick some recipe from the net and try it at home. So this is what I did...I picked up this cake recipe from Gayathri's cook spot and went exactly as per her measures except that I did not add Pumpkin seeds to decorate the cake and...I baked my cake in Microwave instead of an OTG.

 

I missed clicking a pic before I ran the knife through my cake

Ingredients:
Grated Pumpkin-1 1/2cup  
Maida-2cups  
Butter-1/2cup
Curd-1/2cup  
Milk-1 1/4cup  
Baking Powder-2tsp
Baking Soda-1tsp  
Sugar-3/4cup  
Vanilla Essence-2tsp
 
Procedure:  
1. Beat butter until soft and creamy.  
2. Add the granulated sugar and beat again
3. Add curd, vanilla essence and milk and mix well.
4. Mix flour with baking powder and baking soda.  
5. Add this to the butter mixture and mix it slowly until fully mixed
6. Add the grated pumpkin and mix it.
7. Pour it in a greased and dusted tray.
8. Preheated oven (180C) and use Microwave+Convention mode, set it at 180C and bake for about 12 mins. Check the cake at 10mins to ensure everything is right. Pass a knife and check to see if it comes out clean. You could keep for another minute or two incase the cake is still moist.  
9. Slice it and serve.

When I started with the preparation my daughter had a face that said she didnt like the idea of having pumpkin in a cake, but once she had tasted it, she came back asking for more. The Cake did not have the usual Golden crust on top, but was a nice spongy one.

Sandwich-Thousand Island Dressing

My brother thought we had bought this from outside. He said it tasted like a professional had prepared. :-)

 

Ingredients:
Sandwich Bread-  1 Packet
Carrot- Grated- 2 Large red color
Cucumber- 1 deskinned and Thinly sliced
Thousand Island dressing Mayonnaise
Butter
Salt & Pepper to taste

Method:
Take the grated carrot, put about 3 spoons of mayonnaise. You could add more depending on your taste. I added just enough for it to be spread on the bread easily.
Apply butter on all bread slices on one side and keep it ready for making the sandwich. 
Put the above carrot mixture on the buttered side of bread. Arrange 4-5 thin slices of cucumber on top of this mix. sprinkle salt & pepper and put the next slice of bread with buttered side facing down. Press it a little so that your sandwich sticks together. Now cut out the edges and slice up your sandwich to whichever shape/ size you wish to serve and you are done.

Monaco Biscuit with Topping

The original recipe on Khana Khazana website, submitted by Divya had a lot of ingredients to be added. Am sure it would have tasted good, but I went with what I had in my kitchen and I must say I got appreciated for what I created...

 

Ingredients:
Monaco Salt Biscuit- 1 Packet
Hung Curd- 1 Cup (Hang the curd overnight in a thin cloth so that the water drains out)
Cheese- 2-3 large tbsp (I used the Amul cheese  with chilli flakes)
Mayonnaise- 2  large tbsp (I used 1000 Island dressing)
Italian Seasoning- Approx 2 tsp
Salt to taste

For Garnishing:
Few leaves of Coriander
Finely chopped Tomato

Method:
Put all ingredients(keep the ingredients of garnishing aside) in a bowl and beat it till a smooth mixture is formed. Since this was meant for the kids, I did not add extra spice or additional veggies, else you could add more chilli flakes/ Pepper powder, finely chopped capsicum or any other veggie according to your taste. 

Arrange the biscuit in a plate, put a small spoon of the above mixture on the biscuit. Decorate it with a sprig of coriander leaf & a piece of tomato just before your guests arrive. And the biscuit is ready to be eaten.     

Chocolate Biscuit Pudding

I am going crazy over desserts...and trying out the easy recipes at home.

I picked up another borrowed recipe Divyascookbook. Simple n delicious recipe. I tried it day before yesterday since I had half a pack of marie biscuit lying at home. It came out exactly as Divya has shown in her recipe. But since my husband tries and avoids too much sweet, I added in a little more coffee and lesser sugar as mentioned in her recipe. 

I served small portions to all and left some for next day. But when I came back from office yesterday and rampaged the fridge I found that my mum-in-law had already given the whole thing to my kids :-( And my craving for this dessert grew even more...so much so that I decided that I had to prepare it today and eat it post dinner. In 15 mins I was done...and now its resting in my fridge waiting to be devoured at night.

I am not putting up the ingredients and method here again as I went exactly as per Divyascookbook recipe, just that I used only Instant coffee powder and no filter coffee decoction in my recipe and I should tell you its worth trying...absolutely delicious.

December 17, 2013-- Having my son's Birthday party at home today and have kept 25 cups of Chocolate biscuit pudding and 5 cups of custard pudding(for those who dont like chocolate) ready in the fridge.

Eggless Lemon Curd

Lemon tart has always been my favorite. About 18-20yrs back is when I first tasted the Lemon tart and fell in love with tangy sweet taste. There was a guy from a bakery next to our campus who would come on a cycle and sell his bakery products twice a week and everytime I would insist that my mum buys the lemon tarts from him. They were delicious. After we shifted out of the campus into an independent house the lemon tart was forgotten...then one fine day when I was out with my husband(then my boy friend ;-) ) at Sweet Chariot M G Road I saw the lemon tart in their counter....and all the old memories just came back. The craving for a Lemon tart was so much that I ended up eating two at a time whenever we would be spending time outside together. And continuing on that....now everytime we pass via any sweet chariot I pick up lemon tarts for myself n my family.

About two months back we checked out cakewala in Jayanagar...and it was superb..On our second visit I found mini eggless lemon tarts in their counter and picked up 6-7 of them. They were heavenly and as good as a regular lemon tart with eggs in it. Now this brought me a thought that I could also look up for some eggless lemon tart recipes online and try it out. And I did that today :-)

Since I was eager to eat one..I didnt bother to prepare the tart. Instead, used some leftover marie biscuits that I had at home as the base and tried the simplest recipe on Eggless Lemon curd. And it turns out that my son who's going to turn 5 next week is demanding this to be as a part of his Bday party menu.

Am glad that I finally tried this out...my craving for picking this up outside for Rs.25/-(Rs.8/- when it got launched) dies down now..my very own home made EGGLESS Lemon cream will get prepared whenever I feel like having a quick dessert at home.

Ingredients:
1/4 c. cold water1/2 c. Sugar3 Tbs. Corn flour1/4 c. fresh Lemon Juice2 tsp. finely grated Lemon ZestPinch of Salt
I put the ingredients based on my gut feel as I had just 1/2 of Big lemon with me..
By the way, I added a pinch of turmeric too, to give it yellow tinge..the original recipe does not have the turmeric in it. I prefer not to use artificial coloring as far as possible..
I also added a cube of butter to give some shine to my lemon curd

Method:
Mix water, sugar, cornstarch, and salt until cornstarch is dissolved.
Bring mixture to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring constantly. When mixture thickens pour mixture into a non-metallic bowl and add lemon juice, Lemon zest, Turmeric powder/ artificial color, Butter & mix well.
Allow to cool and thicken at room temperature.
I served my lemon curd spread over a few marie biscuits. Next time its going to be Krackjack.

The lemon curd can be refrigerated, covered, for several days.

Am sure that Mr.Husband is happy that he gets to save on something ;-)

Pictures will be put up when I serve the dish at my sons party. For now, the little quantity I made is resting in our happy tummy :-)