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19May 2013

Few recipes revisited

While experimenting with new recipes, I am also going through my old recipes, updating them, if necessary, including a print recipe option and updating photographs as well along the way.

Though I share the updated recipes on facebook and sometimes on twitter (I am still getting used to tweeting, so am not that regular with twitter updates), I realised people who have subscribed to the blog via email, do not get notified of the updates.

So this post if for you guys. Also, a big thanks to all of you for still sticking it out with me!

For the recipe, either click on the picture or on the link given in the description under the picture.

If you are fan of black forest cake, then this is the recipe for you.

Moist chocolate genoise cake, with whipped cream and brandied cherries in between the chocolate layers!

Delish!!

This is an adaption of Heidi Swanson’s whole wheat bread recipe, and it is great.

I made it for the first time right after I got messages from people who saw my pictures on Facebook and congratulated me on getting pregnant (when I clearly was NOT!).

This bread is packed with whole wheat, wheat germ, flax seeds and thus great for you if you are on a diet.

Find the recipe here.

The last revisited recipe I am sharing today is a favorite of many: Pav Bhaji.

It is a popular Indian street side food with a thick potato based curry served with buttered, toasted bread.

17Apr 2013

Mocha Swirl Bread

Shumaila ⋅ 9 Comments

Seriously this cake is jinxed.

This is the second time I am trying it and the second time I am getting it wrong.

Last time I dropped the whole cake halfway through the baking process, while I was trying to check on doneness. You can refresh your memory here. This time even before starting, I managed to drop the box of cornmeal on the floor. On the plus side, the box did not empty completely and some of the cornmeal did not spill onto the floor, leaving me with sufficient cornmeal to use in the cake. On the negative side, the cornmeal did make quite a mess on the floor.

If that was not enough, like last time I forgot that I was supposed to put the espresso water and cocoa after I divided the batter. I would like to blame the whole cleaning up of the corn meal from the floor process for my temporary absent mindedness, but I dont think it was just that. The cake is just jinxed.

Since it was too late to do anything I thought I will make a mocha chocolate swirl bread. So I added 4tsp of cocoa, 3 tsp of sugar and 2 tsp of yogurt to one of the parts and baked it. It might not be like the original, but it did not turn that bad either. Anyway I will try again. Maybe third time’s the charm?

09Apr 2013

Chocolate and Vanilla Five Layer Cake

Shumaila ⋅ 4 Comments

Today is Tuesday. But today, I am not posting on GMT.

Instead I am posting this.

A vanilla and chocolate layer cake with chocolate malt buttercream filling and an amazing vanilla frosting on top.

Seriously!

And oh my gawd, it was so so so good. So good that I had no cake left to take pictures of how the inside of the cake looked.

Its sad because the layers did cut up real well.

It’s a shame I can’t show it though. Can you just take my word for it?

27Mar 2013

March Daring Bakers’ Challenge

Shumaila ⋅ 6 Comments

After a very long break I am posting a Daring Bakers’ Challenge. And even though I am posting for it, I actually took an easy way out and did not dare myself too much with this month’s challenge.

Ruth from Makey-Cakey was our March 2013 Daring Bakers’ challenge host. She encouraged us all to get experimental in the kitchen and sneak some hidden veggies into our baking, with surprising and delicious results!

Initially when I had seen the challenge I had plans to make a beets red velvet cake and try out a black bean brownie recipe I had been eying for a long time. But as you can see those plans did not pan out.

Instead I tried this recipe my mom uses to make whole wheat cupcakes. My sister-in-law loves these cupcakes and always requests my mom to make them. So since she is over I thought would make them for her and that ways I would be able to post for DB as well. Killing two birds with one stone! Pretty smart, aren’t I!

And with Easter this weekend, the recipe did seem apt.

20Mar 2013

Celebrating the Two Vikrams in my life with Cake!

Shumaila ⋅ 11 Comments

19th March was our anniversary. For my grandparents it falls on 20th. Confused? You can read more about that here.

20th March (today in the US) is my brother’s birthday.

The V in my blog posts stands for my husband’s name Vikram.

My brother’s name is also Vikram. (No, there isn’t a lack of names in India. It just happens to be that the two most important people in my life are named Vikram.)

The similarities don’t just stop in their names. Their heights are comparable. One is 6ft 3 (the husband), the other 6 ft 4. Personality wise they are alike as well. So are their looks. People have actually congratulated me and my brother for a happy married life during my wedding. Its not something every girl wants.

There is a difference though. While the Vikram I am married to will go for a spinach-celery-lettuce smoothie, the brother Vikram would go for a large oreo double chocolate shake with whipped cream on top and shaved chocolate added for good measure. Of course I go after my brother. After all he and I have the same genes- some call it the fat genes, I call it the only-way-to-live-life genes.

Since we are celebrating our anniversary and my brother’s birthday, I thought to write today’s post on the Vikrams in my life.

Actually, I have written before about the brother Vikram, you can check the post here if you want to know just how awesome he is. I might not talk about you today, but I know you know that I love you a lot.

Today, let’s just concentrate on the husband Vikram, or V as he is known on the blog, since I feel that V never gets too much of my attention.

17Jan 2013

Glorious Sponge Cake with Champagne Roasted Strawberry Whipped Cream

Shumaila ⋅ 3 Comments

Ugh. I was so pissed off with myself yesterday. I was all set on making this loaf, and had all the necessary ingredients for it. I made the batter, and that’s where the first slip up happened. Instead of keeping the batter plain vanilla and then adding espresso and cocoa to the other half of the batter to get the marbled look, I added cocoa to the plain vanilla batter, and as a result spoiling the marble effect that the end loaf would have. Realizing my mistake, I let the batter be a little cocoa-ish and still divided the batter and added the espresso water to the other half. I managed to get a slight marble effect even if it wasn’t as distinct. The second slip up happened when, while baking I decided to check on the loaf. Since I was working with a new oven and my mom thought that the cake looked done, I took it out much before its baking time, and somehow managed to let the pan slip and fall on the ground batter side down (Murphy’s law at its best). I did scoop up the batter that was not touching the ground and baked it again. Of course the results are not spectacular. Or even close. I did add the glaze and somehow it is still edible. But the disaster has left me extremely irritated with my clumsy self.

Anyway. Coming to the recipe I am sharing today.

January 12th was my mom’s birthday. A woman who without a doubt is one of the nicest persons I know. And I do not say that because she is my mom. I know a lot of people who can vouch for her goodness. Committed to a fault to her work, even though she doesn’t get paid for it- it’s all volunteer work. Always there with a smile on her face. Amazing cook. Impeccable taste in interior decorating. Extremely creative and hard working. She is definitely the best in all that she does. And I love her a lot.

So of course for this special lady I had to make a cake on her birthday. On being asked, my mom requested for a fruit based cake and I decided that is what she will get.

I narrowed on a sponge layered cake with a strawberry filling. For the sponge cake I used a recipe from allrecipes.com, which had a high rating. Taking the advice of reviewers, I used almond extract and lemon juice in the recipe.

For the filling, I made homemade mascarpone cheese (since you don’t get commercially made here in Allahabad) and used it to make a cream filling based on the recipe here. In it I mixed some roasted strawberries, the recipe for which I adapted from here. Instead of using balsamic vinegar, I used wine and champagne oil that I had got from $250 chocoley Daring Bakers’ win.

24Sep 2012

Vegan Chocolate Cake

Shumaila ⋅ 11 Comments

275 meters swimming, 16km bike riding over our hilly town and a 5K run.

Finally, completed my first triathlon!

Now, the embarrassing part- I was one of the lasts to finish.(*sheepish look*)

While my swimming and run timings were pretty decent, everyone dusted me off in the cycling round. Before you make fun do understand, for me, the cycling part was the toughest. I only started cycling a month and half back, after more than a decade of not getting on a cycle. And it was a real task for me to do uphill cycling, which was almost 50% of the entire route. One of the roads we biked on is actually called Mountain road (not even Hill road- its called mountain!). So it wasn’t easy for me. And that’s why it took me a lot of time. And the wind didn’t help either when climbing uphill on the cycle.

Anyway, the idea this time for my first triathlon was to complete it. Next time I’ll probably think of actually competing!

23Aug 2012

Layer Cake Love: Four layer chocolate cake with oreo cream filling!

Shumaila ⋅ 18 Comments

I started 2012 with a resolve to make more layer cakes.

So, I made the sky high carrot cake for two (which turned out great). Then, I made the momofuku birthday cake (which had a few mishaps but tasted great nonetheless). In between the two, I made the lavender chiffon cake again for my for my friend’s birthday in March. And then there was the mascarpone meringue layer cake thrown in as well.

But, three layers had been the furthest I had gone with my layer cake resolution.

And then came this cake.

The original cake is a two layer cake with oodles of oreo cream cheese frosting in between. But I decided to go big and made a four layer, very chocolatey cake with an oreo cream cheese frosting. Did I hear someone say yum? You betcha, it was!

30Jul 2012

Momofuku Funfetti Birthday Cake

Shumaila ⋅ 20 Comments

Two years back, July 28th I hit the publish button on my free wordpress account for the first time. Something that started off as a way to keep me busy, has turned out to be so much more today- a way to keep me creatively inspired, a recognition of sorts, and the opportunity to be part of a community of so many talented folks that awe me everyday with their creations.

A little more than two years back was also when I started cooking for the first time in my life. The blog was a way to document those experiments. Now with 220 posts (most of them recipes, with a little art and random ranting thrown in occasionally), my experiments have become more daring. I am yet to add a full fondant cake to the list- but hopefully one day I will get there too.

I started off the blog to keep a track of my cooking and baking but now I have to confess its mostly the other way around. I bake and cook to feed my blog . Learn a little more about my journey as a blogger here.

Read More →

18Jul 2012

Cooking with the Books: KAF’s Scandinavian Gold Cake

Shumaila ⋅ 8 Comments

(This is Post 2 in the series Cooking with the Books.)

So I wasn’t going to bake.

I had already decided I am not sending anything with V for tomorrow’s Office Thursdays. I have a cake to bake tomorrow (it’s my friend’s daughter’s birthday), so I thought I will get my baking fix with the birthday cake. So I really don’t need another cake lurking around.

Plus, it was my rest day. I had cooked plenty yesterday, making sure I had no cooking to do today. The refrigerator was well stocked with ready to serve food. The kitchen was clean, more importantly the sink was clean. I really did not want to do any dishes today. I had just finished doing laundry and I couldn’t be bothered with doing any other housework. So I decided V will go empty handed for Office Thursdays. Everyone will understand. Its not like its set in stone or something. =/

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