Eggless Moist Chocolate Cake with chocolate ganache

It was a very dear friend/neighbour's wedding anniversary and I got to know about it that very morning when we went to drop our children at the bus stop. Though I had very little time in my hand still thought what is better than baking a cake for such a beautiful couple to share our love and affection. Only challenge was they are vegetarian so obviously I cant use eggs. Normally when I decide to bake an eggless cake I use curd/banana as egg replacer but that day nothing was available in the pantry. So I searched in net and found that in few cake recipes people uses milk as well, so I went the milk way  this time :) .. Trust me it came out well with the sponginess, soft, and risen perfectly as well. Next challenge was the icing/frosting part as I did not want to give them a plain chocolate cake. So decided the easy and fool-proof way of using chocolate ganache as icing and sprinkling some grated/finely chopped white chocolate. Arranged the stuff quickly through home delivery option that we have available in every locality in Mumbai. And finally I finished preparing the cake just on time. I am so happy that they liked it very much. What else I could have asked for being a beginner at icing / frosting cakes. Their appreciation was so encouraging for me that now I really want to excel in this.
As I was left with a small portion of the batter so I made two cupcakes  with that. I & my kid quite liked the taste.

So here is the recipe of the cake for you all. Do try and send your feedback too.

Ingredients:

For the cake
Flour/Maida: 1 & 1/2 cup
Sugar: 1 cup
Cocoa powder: 1/2 cup
Baking soda: 1 tsp
Vinegar/Lemon: 1/2 tsp/1-2 drops
A pinch of salt
Cold milk: 1 cup
Vegetable oil: 1/4 cup
vanilla essence: 1 tsp
Oil & some flour to grease and dust the cake tin

For the chocolate ganache
Dark Chocolate: 1 cup chopped
Heavy cream: 1/2 cup
Sugar: 2-3 tbsp.
Butter: 2 tbsp.

For decorating the cake:
Grated or chopped white chocolate: 1/2 cup
Black grapes: 5 numbers I used

Method:

Preheat the oven at 180 degree Celsius.

In a mixing bowl, beat well the oil, sugar, milk, vanilla essence. Now add the vinegar and beat again. Remember the milk used should be really cold so that it wont get curdle as soon as you add the vinegar.

In another bowl, sift flour, baking soda, salt and cocoa powder and fold this mixture into  the wet mixture above. Always follow the cut and fold method to mix the mixture while preparing for cake. Over mixing or over beating would release the air pockets that forms and cake wont rise up and wont get fluffy.

Grease and dust the baking tin with oil & flour. Pour in the mixture and tap the tin a little. Bake this in the preheated oven for about 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick or fork inserted comes out clean. Baking time depends on the  types of ovens we use. So do keep an eye while its under baking process.

Once done, take it out of the oven and let it cool on a cooling rack.

In the mean time, prepare the chocolate ganache. Take the cream in a sauce pan and put it to boil. In a mixing bowl take the chopped chocolate. Now pour the hot cream onto the chocolate and let it remain like this for about 4-5 minutes. Then beat this so that everything mixes well, add the sugar and butter and beat again so that no lumps remain. Once ready keep it in the refrigerator for about 15-20 minutes before using for frosting.

Assembling the cake:

Take the cake on a cake stand. If you don't have a stand, invert any bigger sized bowl and keep a dish on it & place the cake on the dish for icing/frosting. What I do is I cover the dish with aluminium foil from all sides, then keep four pieces of paper to make a square structure above which I place the cake and remove them by pulling out once the icing/frosting is done. This is to get a clean end product after frosting the cake :). I saw this in a video in youtube. With a flat spatula spread evenly the icing on the top & cover the cake from all its sides. Apply a generous coat of icing. Once it is done keep it in the refrigerator for about 15-20 minutes.


I put 5 numbers of black grapes on the centre of the cake and spread the chopped/grated white chocolate on the border of the cake making a circle as you can see in the picture. Then dust some icing sugar on the whole cake with the help of a strainer. Keep it once again in the refrigerator for about half an hour.

Now slice a real big piece and take it on a dish, grab a fork and prepare to experience this chocolaty heaven & enjoy !!




 

Lamington - The Aussie classic: An Australian dessert

 

Baking was taking a back seat for last few months in my kitchen. Yesterday only I  thought of baking a cake for some guests but something different from the regular cakes. So it was lamington at home. Lamington which is a popular Australian dessert is basically sponge cake cut into squares, coat with chocolate sauce and roll onto coconut flakes. Heavenly delicious dessert I must say.. As I was having  some new oranges at home , so I baked an orange flavoured cake instead of the basic sponge cake. As all of us know that orange & chocolate is like match made in heaven, lamingtons tasted just awesome.

Ingredients:

For the orange cake:
Plain flour/maida: 2 cups
Butter: 1/2 cup melted at room temperature
Sugar: 1/2 cup (you can increase the sweetness as per your liking)
Egg: 2
Baking powder: 4 tsp
A pinch of salt
Vanilla Essence: 1 tsp
Orange juice: 1/4 cup
Orange zest: 1 tsp

For the chocolate sauce:

Butter: 2-3 tbsp. melted at room temperature
sugar: 1/2 cup powdered
Cocoa powder: 1/3 cup
Warm milk: 1/2 cup

&

Dry Coconut flakes: As required for rolling the cake pieces

Preparation:

Preheat the oven at 270 degree Celsius. Grease a cake tin with butter/oil and dust some plain flour and keep aside.

In a mixing bowl, sift the flour, salt, baking powder and mix the orange zests.  Mix the butter & sugar in another bowl nicely. You can use a hand blender or beater as well. I use a balloon beater. Now into this, beat the eggs one by one till fluffy. Into this add the orange juice, and vanilla essence and again beat all nicely. Now add in the flour mixture into this in batches and combine well with the cut & fold method.

Pour the batter into the greased tin and bake at 180 degree Celsius for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Mine took almost 35 minutes.

Once the cake is ready, allow it to cool down.

In the mean while , prepare the sauce. In a mixing bowl , beat the sugar & butter till fluffy. Add the cocoa powder & mix. Finally add the milk and combine all nicely. The sauce should not be of running consistency. So if you feel your sauce becomes runny, you can put it on low-medium flame in a saucepan so that it thickens a little and is perfect for using. I had to do this to thicken my sauce.

In a bowl, take the coconut flakes.
Cut the cake into square sized shapes. Now dip one piece of cake into the chocolate sauce so that chocolate coats over the cake properly from all sides. Roll the cake piece on the coconut flakes and keep aside in a dish. Follow the same procedure for rest of the cake pieces.

So here s your lamingtons ready. Keep in refrigerator in air-tight container and enjoy with your cup of tea/coffee.

My guest  loved eating them for sure and that made me happy ..that I am sure of ..

Try this super delicious lamingtons and do share your feedback .

Oats & Coconut Cookies

So it was a very dear friend's birthday yesterday. And I was excited  to bake a cake for her with lot of icing /frosting . Did not happen so as the husband is away on some work for a week , then the little one was not keeping well and finally I had to drop that idea. But my mind was not agreed to it, so i checked the pantry and found all the ingredients that required to make some cookies for her on her special day. I did taste one piece of it and found it quite ok barred the coconut flavour, which did not come out that well. Nevertheless i am happy as the friend liked them. So sharing this sweet story along with the recipe with you friends.

Ingredients:

Flour/Maida: 1/2 cup
Oats: 4-5 tbsp. roasted
Sugar: 3 tbsp.
Butter: 4 tbsp. softened
Baking powder: 1 tsp
Baking soda: A pinch
Dry grated coconut (mine was store bought): 3 tbsp. and 1 tsp to sprinkle on the top of the cookies
Raisins: A handful
Egg:1
Vanilla Essence: 1 tsp


Method:

Preheat the oven at 180 degree Celsius.

In a mixing bowl add the butter , sugar and mix well till it combines . Now add the egg and beat . Add the vanilla essence and whisk them very nicely.


In another bowl, sift the flour, baking powder, baking soda. Add the roasted oats, coconut and combine them all. Now in the above egg mixture , add the flour mixture slowly portion by portion. Mix them nicely. Add the raisins into it and combine all well into a dough like texture. If you find the dough a little dry or hard, you can add a little milk into it.

Grease the baking tray with oil or butter . Take spoonful of the mixture like small sized balls/small portions and keep them on the greased tray and flatten them gently with the back of the spoon keeping some gap in between them to allow  room for baking. Sprinkle remaining dry coconut and some raisins on top of each portion. Bake these cookies for 25-30 minutes at 180 degree Celsius  or till the cookies get that golden brown crust. Once baked , keep them on a cooling rack and keep in air-tight container and enjoy with your hot cup of tea/coffee and serve these crunchy cookies to your kids with their hot glass of milk.

Cheesy baked capsicum rice

Sometimes the days of the weeks are hard to make my little girl eat her regular meals. Obviously as mothers we always try and want them to eat healthy and properly. So today I thought to surprise her by cooking something with rice only for her in lunch, but in a healthier way.

This was just a random thought of mine to bake rice other than cooking pulao or fried rice. And honestly I was not even aware of any baked rice dish(until I saw someone commented on my post that she had it in Singapore). Thought if everything can be baked , why not rice, that too if loaded with veggies. So I tried & tested this for the first time ever in my kitchen and it was a hit for sure. Minimum ingredients and easy to prepare recipe this one. Do give it a try and share your feedback .

 

Ingredients:

Rice: 1 cup washed and strained
Salted Butter: 1 tsp
Pepper powder: 1 tsp
Salt to taste
red/yellow/green capsicum: 1 cup cut into julienne
Onion: 1 small sized finely chopped
Garlic: 1 tbsp. crushed
2 cups water
Cheese: 1/2 cup grated. I have used processed cheese. (You can avoid if you want)
Oil: few drops to grease the baking tray/tin (You can bake this in any oven proofed borosil/ramekin bowl)
One strand of Rosemary roughly tore & Finely chopped Lemon grass for that extra flavour

Method:

Heat butter in a pan. Add the onion & garlic & saute for sometime.  Add the capsicum, pepper & salt & stir. Saute for about 2 minutes and then add the rice, rosemary and lemon grass. Mix them well . Saute for another 2-3 minutes. Now put off the flame. In the mean time , preheat the oven at 220 degree Celsius. Grease the dish/bowl/tin/tray with oil and keep aside. Once the rice and vegetables are cooled, transfer it to the bowl ,add water and bake it at 220 degree Celsius  for 20-25minutes covering properly with an aluminium foil. After 20-25 minutes take out the dish/bowl and remove the aluminium foil and sprinkle the grated cheese on the top and bake again for another 10-15 minutes so that cheese melts on the top. Remove from the oven carefully as dish/bowl will be very hot. Serve this cheesy baked capsicum rice hot and enjoy.

I served this rice to my little girl with some home-made French fries and I had with my home-made chilli pickle. You can add variation to this dish by including some other veggies like mushrooms/potato/carrots etc. or can make it non-veg with boneless chicken .

 

The classic tea time lemon & almond pound cake

The blog that I have been following since last one year is "Archana's Kitchen" for all her easy to make recipes and the very colloquial ways of explaining them. This time when I saw her video of lemon pound cake, I did not wait much to experiment it in my kitchen. The one she made was eggless whereas I used eggs and a little change in the measurement of ingredients as per my family size.

Ingredients:

All Purpose Flour: 2 cups
Sugar: 1 1/2 cups
Butter: 1/2 cup softened (room temp). You can use unsalted butter as per the original recipe.
Baking Powder: 1 1/2 tsp
Eggs: 3 (original recipe was eggless. Egg replacer was flax meal)
Pinch of 4salt
Milk: 1/2 cup
Vanilla Essence: 1tsp
Lemon Juice: 1/4 cup
Almond powder: 1/2 cup (non roasted almond ground into powder)


Method:

Preheat the oven at 180 degree Celsius.

In a mixing bowl, take the butter and sugar and mix them either with a hand blender or with your hands using spatula till the mixture is smooth & fluffy. Now beat the eggs into it so that all the ingredients combine well.. Add baking powder, salt, almond powder and give it a nice stir. Now add the lemon juice and milk and mix nicely. Add the flour & vanilla essence into the mixture and mix it by cut and fold method.

Grease the cake tin/mould with some oil and dust some flour. Now pour the mixture into it and bake for 30-35 minutes at 180 degree Celsius or until a toothpick comes out clean when inserted. Mine took exactly 40 minutes.

Once baked , let it cool and enjoy with your cup of tea/coffee. My little girl carried this to school even in her lunch box today along with aloo parantha. I intentionally packed two medium sized portions so that she can share with her friend. As expected she did not, saying it was so yummy I ate it all by myself. Well this was an added story of my happiness related to this beautiful cake. Do try it in your kitchen , I  am sure you will be happy with the outcome.

My new experiment with coffee cake

I am normally quite good at making tea as my husband says , few friends too and most importantly my mother-in-law. But very bad at making coffee. That's why I always prefer to sip a cup of cappuccino in CCD/Starbucks whenever we go out. I have been noticing one full coffee bottle in my kitchen cupboard for last few days which I bought but never opened it. Yesterday I suddenly had a craving for coffee cake and I thought to bake it at home only without following any particular recipe. No eggs in the fridge as well coz I normally do not keep eggs from Wednesday onwards as we eat vegetarian food on Thursdays. So I replace the eggs with yogurt. The cake was very delicious , soft, gooey and that little bitterness of the coffee and its aroma /flavour. Wow!! heavenly.

Try this coffee cake once at your home and do send in your feedback too which will keep me going :)

Ingredients:

Flour: 1 cup
Sugar: 1/2 cup
Oil: 3-4 tbsp
Vanilla Essence: 1 tsp
Baking Powder: 1/2 tsp
Baking Soda: A pinch
Yogurt: 3/4 cup
Milk: 1/2 cup
Coffee Powder: 5 tsp
Cocoa powder: 1 tbsp.

Method:

Preheat the oven at 180 degree Celsius.

In a mixing bowl, sieve the flour, baking powder & baking soda. In another bowl , add sugar, oil , milk, yogurt, vanilla essence and beat them well. Now into the dry mix, add the cocoa powder & coffee powder and mix them. Fold in this dry mixture into the wet mix and keep aside.

Grease the cake tin/mould with oil with the help of a brush or with your hands. Pour the mixture into the mould/tin and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Once the cake is baked, keep it on a cooling rack. Cut into pieces and keep in refrigerator in a air-tight container and keep enjoying with your cuppa.

My Crunchy oatmeal cookies

Cookies remind of Ma making nan-khatai in her  square shaped cake oven when we were kids. The house use to smell so good when she makes them. The soft melt in mouth nan-khatais from Ma's hand will always be there in our heart & mind. Though she doesn't bake them any more. I learnt from her to make them after my marriage and I use to make them once in a while as in those days I was little reluctant about baking . So today like after almost 5-6 years of gap, I decided to make some simple cookies at home. And I did it. Its crunchy and softy at the same time. My little girl liked it very much. From next time there will be no limitation of my own innovation into cookie baking.

Ingredients:

Maida/Flour: 1 cup
Oats: 3/4 cup roatsed
Sugar: 1/2 cup powdered sugar (you can take less sugar as per your taste/requirement)
Egg: 1
Butter: 3/4 cups softened
Vanilla Essence: 1 tsp
Pinch of salt
Baking soda: a pinch
Baking powder: 1/2 tsp
Cornflakes : 1 cup crushed


Method:

Preheat the oven at 180 degree Celsius.

Blend the sugar and butter properly and beat the egg into it. Add the vanilla essence and mix. In another bowl  mix flour, oats, salt, baking soda & baking powder. Now fold in the dry mix into the wet mixture of oil, egg & sugar and make dough.  Take the crushed cornflakes into a bowl/dish. Take spoonful of the mixture like small sized balls/small portions and roll on the corn flakes and flatten them gently with the palm of your hand. Grease the baking tray with oil or butter and keep them on the tray keeping some gap in between them to allow  room for baking. Bake these cookies for 25-30 minutes or till the cookies get that golden brown crust. Once baked , keep them on a cooling rack and keep in air-tight container and enjoy with your hot cup of tea/coffee and serve these crunchy cookies to your kids with their hot glass of milk.

 

Easy Breezy melt in mouth brownies

I have baked brownies before also but this super easy brownie recipe is a big hit. I found this recipe from a friend's blog and I found it so easy to bake with available ingredients at home all the time  that I baked last night after 11pm

And the taste was heavenly ..gooey inside , crunchiness of the sugar in every bite! DO give this recipe a try at your home and write your feedback.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup oil
1 cup sugar
2 Eggs (Replace each egg with 1/4 cup of thick yogurt/curd to get eggless brownies)
1 tsp Vanilla Essence
1/3 cup Cocoa Powder
1/2 Flour/Maida
1/4 tsp Salt
1/4 tsp Baking Powder

Grease a baking tin with oil/butter and keep aside. Preheat the oven (I use microwave oven) at 180 degree Celsius.
In mixing bowl, mix oil and sugar well. In another bowl beat eggs and mix vanilla essence to it and beat/mix with the oil & sugar mixture.
Mix and sift flour, cocoa, salt and baking powder in a bowl and add them to the above wet mixture and give them a nice mix.
Now transfer this mixture to the baking tin and bake for 30-35 minutes at 180 C or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Once baked, transfer to a cooling rack and cut into medium sized squares /cubes and enjoy with your cup of tea or coffee. I am sure your kids gonna love these brownies too. You can garnish with chocolate chips/cherries/cream frosting or at the time of baking put some nuts which will enhance the flavour and aroma of these gorgeous brownies.

Yours madly muffins -- my super healthy style muffins with carrot & oats

Lets indulge our kids today with some muffins ..adding some healthy twist without letting them know what they are eating exactly. This is one of my favourite recipe that I like to bake for my girl.. Super healthy Carrot & Oats muffins.

Ingredients:

White flour (Maida): 1 cup
Roasted Oats: 5 tbsp
pinch of salt
Baking powder: 2 tsp
Baking soda: 1/2 tsp
Brown Sugar: 1/2 cup (you can use white normal sugar also)
Veg oil: 1 tbsp.
Yogurt: 3 tbsp.
Milk: 3/4 cup
Vanilla Essence: 1 tsp
Grated Carrot: 1 pc
Cinnamon powder: 1 pinch


Method:

Sieve the maida, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon powder in a large mixing bowl. Add the cinnamon powder. In the meantime, preheat the oven at 180 degree Celsius. Dry roast the oats in a pan and keep aside to get cool.

In another bowl, add the yogurt, oil, milk, vanilla essence, sugar and mix them  very well. Add the grated carrots into this mixture and blend very nicely. Now pour this mixture into the dry ingredients. Now add the roasted oats into this and again give a nice mix. This batter need not be very smooth and running . You will be amazed by the aroma and flavour of the grated carrots and cinnamon powder while mixing all these ingredients. That's heavenly I bet !! And the cinnamon powder will balance the flavour/taste of carrots so nicely that the kids would hardly get to make any guess that you have made them eat vegetable in their muffin.


Now get the muffin moulds ready . I use silicon moulds for baking so no greasing etc. is required. If you are using aluminium moulds/tin, then grease and line them with oil/butter and some dry maida. Fill the moulds with the batter with the help of a big spoon and arrange them in a baking tray.

Now these will go into  the oven for 35 minutes at 180 degree Celsius in convection mode of microwave. Bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the muffin comes out clean.
Enjoy these delicious muffins with your cuppa and serve your kids with their glass of milk.

Happy baking!!





 

Baking Brownie

It was a lazy Saturday afternoon and the husband busy with his laptop and working from home, my little girl busy watching her favourite cartoon shows.. And I was as usual doing some household work.. Suddenly I found one sheet of paper in one of the drawers at home. This sheet had nothing but a hand-written note of a recipe of brownie. Then I realised that was the recipe of Tarla Dalal. I quickly checked my facebook profile where I had uploaded the picture of the final product made by me following her recipe long time back. I immediately thought to pen it down for you all in my blog. So here it is...

Ingredients:

2 cups chopped dark chocolate
(250 gms)
1/2 cup softened butter
1/4 cup castor sugar
1cup plain flour
1/2 tsp soda bicarbonate
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup curd beaten
1 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 chopped walnuts


Method:

Grease and line a microwave safe bowl with butter and keep aside..
In a bowl, Sift together flour, baking powder, soda and keep aside. Now in a microwave safe bowl add the chocolate pieces and microwave on high for 1 min. Remove from microwave and Stir to get a smooth mixture. You can use double boiler method also for melting the chocolate. In another bowl add the butter and castor sugar and stir with a wooden spoon till the mixture is soft and creamy. Now add the melted chocolate to this butter mixture and mix lightly.Into this mixture now add curd, vanilla essence, walnuts, flour mixture and mix and fold lightly. Now the batter is ready to go into the oven. Transfer this mixture to the greased bowl and microwave on high for 3 minutes. next reduce the temperature from high to 70% power and microwave for another 1 min . 

Now preheat the oven using oven+grill option for 5 mins at 220deg c. Bake the brownie in the preheated oven for 3 mins at 220degC.  Once it is baked, remove and keep aside to let it cool.

Cut the brownie into square shaped pieces and serve with hot chocolate sauce and ice cream. My twist while serving the brownie was with sprinkling some icing sugar on it and whipped cream on the top of the brownie with a cherry which added a nice colour to it and made it look more gorgeous..

DO try this recipe and lemme know the feedback too :)



 

Rich Dark Chocolate cake

Thought I should start my blog by sharing one sweet dish with you all.. So its time for a simple regular chocolate cake which you can make very easily at home. I did put my own trick to this simple recipe. Follow the recipe step by step with the correct ingredients and the quantity.. So here we go!!!!





Super soft Rich Dark Chocolate cake with chocolate sauce

Ingredients:
200gms dark chocolate of good quality
200 gms butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
3 eggs
1 1/2 cup flour
2 tbsp cocoa powder
1/2 milk
1/4 soda bicarbonate


Method:
Preheat the microwave oven at 160c. Grease one cake tin (of any shape -round/square/oval shapes) with butter/vegetable oil with the help of a silicon brush or you can always use tip of your fingers to grease the tin. Or in case if u use silicon mould, you do not need to grease.

 Melt the chocolate through double boiler process (what is double-boiler process: take one big saucepan on gas with water and bring to boil. Cut/grate the chocolates in a glass bowl and keep that on the saucepan with hot water on the gas. Stir the chocolate continuously till it melts). Add the butter (room temperature) with the melted chocolate and beat them well with blender or mix with a spoon/spatula. In another bowl sieve flour, soda and cocoa powder . Add sugar with this dry mixture and mix them well.. Meanwhile beat the eggs in  a bowl and stir in 1/2 cup of milk. Now pour the chocolate n egg mixture into the flour mixture and beat them nicely until u get a smooth running consistency. Now the batter is ready to go into the oven. Pour the mixture into the greased tin and bake for 35-45 minutes in convection mode. Once it is baked let it cool. After getting cold, transfer the cake to a cake stand or u can use a dish also to place it.

Here is the twist I gave to my normal chocolate cake. After transferring the cake from the tin to a cake stand, slice it diagonally from between and keep aside the upper sliced portion of the cake. Now spread chocolate sauce evenly on the base of the lower portion of the sliced cake which is there on the cake stand or u can spread evenly whipped cream also. Now cover it with the upper layer  which we had kept aside and gently press a little with your hands. Now keep the cake in refrigerator to set for half an hour or 45 mins. Once it is set , cut into wedges and serve with hot chocolate sauce pouring on it. Also sprinkle some tutti frutti on the pieces as well while serving to add some colour to it. Happy baking !!!:)