The Life and Times of Choconutmeg

Delicious Chocolate Chunk Cookies, Fresh and Warm, Whenever You Want!

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date December 31, 2012
2 Comments on Delicious Chocolate Chunk Cookies, Fresh and Warm, Whenever You Want!

Warm cookies, fresh out of the oven, crisp on the outside, gooey on the inside, full of chocolate chunks- doesn’t that sound simply heavenly? So often, I think about baking cookies, and then decide that it’s not worth the trouble, considering how short-lived the joy is of eating them warm out of the oven. I’ve only ever liked fresh, warm cookies, you see. Once they’ve cooled, I lose interest in them. In fact, the only way I really enjoy cold cookies is by breaking them into chunks and dropping them into chocolate ice cream 🙂

But now, I have found a way to eat warm, fresh cookies everyday, whenever I want, and you can too! Just follow this recipe for cookie dough, then shape the dough into little balls, and freeze them raw. When you’re ready to eat a cookie, simply pop a dough-ball into the oven and 10 minutes later, enjoy!

If you’re having a party, and want to serve warm cookies at it, but can’t be bothered with baking them on the day of the party, then this freezing method works perfectly for that too. I did this for my birthday party, and everything went smoothly! I just popped the frozen dough-balls into the oven and then chatted with friends until 10 minutes later, they were ready 🙂

If you’d like to try the recipe I use, here it is! It’s from ‘Baking Illustrated’ published by the famous ‘Cook’s Illustrated’ magazine editors.

Here’s what you will need:

1¾ cups unbleached all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

12 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided

¾ cup (5¼ ounces) dark brown sugar

½ cup (3½ ounces) granulated sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 egg

1 egg yolk

2 handfuls of dark chocolate chunks

In a medium bowl, whisk the dry ingredients together. Next, in a microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter and let it cool until it is luke-warm. Add the two types of sugar to the butter and beat until smooth. Then, add the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla extract and continue beating at medium to low-speed until the mixture is smooth. Next, at a low-speed, beat in the dry ingredients. Once they’re mixed in, add the chocolate chunks, and try to mix them in with a spatula or your hand, until they are somewhat evenly distributed. Your dough is now ready!

The final step involves shaping the dough into balls. It’s best to move to the dining table for this last step as it takes about 5-10 minutes, and you don’t really need access to things in the kitchen or the sink for this. Place a sheet of parchment-paper or wax-paper on a baking sheet. Using an ice cream scoop, scoop out a little portion of the cookie dough on your palm and roll it into a ball. The size of this portion can very, depending on how large you want your cookies to be; I scooped out about a ping-pong ball sized amount. Roll the dough up into a ball, then tear it apart at the centre. Rotate the two halves so that the uneven, torn surface faces upwards, and re-attach the two bits together into a make-shift, but clearly imperfect sphere. (Apparently, this uneven surface makes the cookie look better once baked. (I am not entirely certain of this, to tell you the truth. One day, I shall be brave enough not to follow this instruction, and then I will let you know what happened.))

You’re almost done! Place the baking sheet in the freezer for about 2 hours, until the dough is frozen. Then take the sheet out, place the balls in a freezer bag and pop them back into the freezer. Whenever you’re ready to eat a cookie (or three), pre-heat the oven to 325 degrees farenheit, place a dough-ball on a baking sheet covered with baking-paper and bake for 10-12 minutes, until golden brown on top.

It’s best to let the cookie cool a bit on the tray and then on a cooling rack. But if you’re impatient, like I am, these cookies taste good minutes after they’re out the oven too, as you can see from the picture below, I could hardly wait to bite into my cookie 😛

Mmmm…deliciousness!

You could also enjoy it, all warm and gooey, with a glass of cold milk!

Tags chocolate chunk cookies, cookies in minutes, easy snacks, party food, quick, recipe

Chocolate Chocolate Truffles Cooking Food General Recipes

Dark Chocolate Truffles with Mint-Buttercream Centers

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date December 17, 2012
9 Comments on Dark Chocolate Truffles with Mint-Buttercream Centers

Last week I decided to invite some friends over to mine for drinks, desserts, cheese, and some cheese related hors d’ oeuvres. It was my birthday you see, and what better way is there to celebrate one’s birthday than by feeding one’s friends and drinking with them? 🙂

I tried several new recipes out for this party, including three new types of chocolate truffles! Here’s one of my favourite ones: truffles with mint centers!

This was a modification of a basic truffle recipe that I came up with while fooling around with new flavours and textures; If you’d like to try it, read on!

Ingredients:

100 g dark chocolate (at least 70% cocoa solids) (the better this chocolate is, the better your truffles will taste)

1/2 cup heavy whipping cream

2 pinches of salt

5-6 tablespoons of icing sugar

5 tablespoons butter

1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon mint essence

3-4 drops green artificial food colouring

5-6 squares of dark chocolate for coating the truffles

Equipment:

4 Bowls and several spoons

1 large plate

A hand-held or stand-alone egg-beater/mixer

1 sheet of foil or butter paper

Method:

I began by heating the cream in a little pan to a gentle simmer. In the meantime, I chopped the chocolate into bits (you can also use a food processor), and placed the chocolate bits in a bowl.

Once the cream began to simmer, I poured it over the chocolate and let it sit until the chocolate melted.

Once the chocolate was melted, I took a whisk and gently mixed the chocolate and cream into a smooth mixture adding a pinch of salt as I did this. This delicious ganache needed to cool and firm up, so I covered it up and placed it on the dining table. Once it reached room temperature, I transferred the bowl to the fridge.

While the ganache cooled, I placed the butter in a bowl and began whipping it up with a hand-held mixer (egg-beater). When it was creamy and softened, I added a pinch of salt, 2 tablespoons of icing sugar, 1/4 tsp of mint essence, and a few drops of green food colouring. I whipped all this up into a creamy smooth mix and then tasted it. I thought the mixture needed a little more sugar, so I added another 2 tablespoons. (You should also taste the mixture intermittently and see if it needs more sugar or mint essence; add as much as you think is appropriate.) Once it tasted just right, I covered up the bowl and placed it in the fridge.

Once both the ganache and mint-filling were firmed up in the fridge, I took them out and began working with them. I covered two baking trays with wax paper (you can also use baking paper or aluminum foil) and then began scooping large blobs of chocolate on one of the trays.

Once all the chocolate was divided into ‘large blobs’ on the first tray, I began scooping smaller portions of the mint-buttercream into my hand, shaping them into rough spheres and then placing them on the other tray.

As soon as all the mint mixture was used up, I placed both trays in the freezer for about 15 minutes. Once the scoops and mint-spheres had hardened from the cold, I was ready to start shaping the truffles!

(When you’re trying this, make sure you have enough works-space on your kitchen counter. I like sitting down while I do this, because it takes some time, so I usually move over to the floor because I feel more comfortable sitting cross-legged. You could move over to the dining table if you prefer.)

Now I was ready for the fun part! I picked up one of the chocolate scoops and shaped it into a sphere in my hand. Then I flattened it out on my hand like a mini chapathi or tortilla.

Then, I took one of the mint flavoured balls and placed it at the centre of the ‘chocolate chapathi’:

and carefully rolled the chocolate layer over the mint centre, shaping the truffle into as perfect a sphere as possible. (I don’t have a photograph of the sphere-shaping bit because I needed both hands and by this time my other hand was covered in chocolate.)

I repeated this until all the chocolate was used up:

Next, I melted 5-6 dark chocolate squares in the microwave. (When you do this, be sure to do this on a low setting as you don’t want to burn the chocolate. Ideally, you should melt the chocolate in a double boiler to avoid this, but I find that if I am careful, I can do it in the microwave. After, I let the chocolate cool a bit (it’s important not to let it harden), I picked up one of the truffles, and dipped it into the chocolate, coating it completely, as shown in the photograph below:

Then, I placed the truffle back on the wax paper to cool. I repeated this until all the truffles were coated. Finally, I let them all cool and then placed them in little green-coloured paper cups.

And Ta DA! They were ready to be devoured! Rich dark chocolate truffles with soft mint-flavoured butter-cream centers.

And then, all that was left was one lonely half-truffle. If it looks half-eaten, that’s because it is 😛 I did it for you all, so you can see what the centers look like 😉

Tags chocolate, cooking, DIY, food, Mint truffles, recipe, truffle

Cooking Food General Recipes

A Deliciously Sweet Dinner

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date December 8, 2012
No Comments on A Deliciously Sweet Dinner

Normally, when I have a dinner party, I cook Indian food. The main reason for this is that most of my friends love Indian food, and they tell me it’s nice for them to get a chance to eat home-made Indian food. Second, I think I cook it better than I do any other kind of cuisine. After Indian food, Italian food is probably my favourite type of food, and most of my Italian recipes are heavy on the cheese :), like risotto, or gnocchi in a gorgonzola and walnut sauce.

Earlier this week however, I found myself in a bit of a quandary. One of my friends was coming over for dinner, and she’s not a fan of either spicy food or heavy, creamy, fatty food. The thing is, every Indian recipe I know, is one or the other, often both. And every Italian dish I’ve ever made was either smothered with cheese or drowning in butter, sometimes it was both. So I decided to make her something different, something, non-Indian.

“What could I cook?” I wondered frantically on my way home from school. It was a tough question; after all, what is delicious and neither spicy or fatty/buttery/cheesy? It seemed like a truly insurmountable, unsolvable problem.

And then it hit me, I should cook something sweet! So I settled on a sweet themed dinner: grilled salmon marinated in a brown-sugar and lemon sauce served with roz bi zaffaran (saffron rice). (I made the saffron rice based on a recipe from ‘The Book of Jewish Food’ by Claudia Roden.)

The meal turned out rather well; the rice and fish complimented each other well. Another surprising upside was: the whole meal was really easy and quick to make, and the kitchen-clean-up involved was minimal.

If you’d like to try it, here’s what you will need:

For the Grilled Salmon:

1 pound salmon fillets

1.5 tbsp soy sauce

1 tbsp lemon juice

1/4th cup of brown sugar

1 tbsp dry white wine or water

1/8 th cup olive oil

Saffron Rice:

1 cup basmati rice

2 cups water

1 tbsp butter

Salt to taste

2-3 pinches saffron threads

A handful of toasted flaked almonds

3 handfuls of golden raisins soaked in a cup of hot water

Method:

Mix all the ingredients for the salmon (except the salmon itself), stirring until the sugar is dissolved. Place the salmon fillets in a small baking dish and then pour the marinade over the fish. Cover with the dish with a lid or foil and let the fish marinate for a bit. Turn the oven on and pre-heat it to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

In the meantime, grind the saffron threads with a mortar and pestle into a fine powder. Next, boil the water, oil and salt in a deep pot. When the water begins to boil, add the rice and saffron powder. Stir, lower the heat, cover the pot with a lid and let the rice cook. Check on it periodically, stirring.

While the rice is cooking, place the fish in the preheated oven and set the timer for 20 minutes. Every 5 minutes, bast the fish with the extra marinade in the baking dish.

The fish ought to be ready around the same time that the rice is cooked. Take the fish out of the oven when it’s slightly browned on top and flakey. Once the rice is cooked, fluff it, and mix in the raisins and almonds.

Serve the fish and rice up on a plate, with a few springs of fresh oregano and maybe a slice or two of bread. If you’re feeling like eating a healthier, more balanced meal, toss some spinach with some chopped strawberries and blackberries, and a lemon-honey vinaigrette (3 tbsp lemon juice, 1 tbsp honey, 1/4 cup olive oil, 1 tbsp poppy seeds and salt and pepper to taste). Throw in some toasted almonds and walnuts for some extra deliciousness. The salad goes perfectly with the sweet-theme of this meal. You won’t even want dessert 🙂

Tags food, grilled salmon, grilled salmon with soy sauce and brown sugar, recipe, saffron rice, saffron rice with raisins and almonds

Chocolate Food General Recipes

A Cure for Dark Winter Afternoon Blues

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date December 6, 2012
4 Comments on A Cure for Dark Winter Afternoon Blues

I’ve been remiss again, and for this I apologize. The life of a grad student is often erratic, and various deadlines have kept me from writing about my food-related adventures. Happily, they haven’t entirely prevented me from having said adventures. So, now that I have some time again, I shall return to chronicling my chocolate and spice related capers.

Despite my happiness at having a bit more free time though, there is a cloud in my otherwise blue sky. A literal cloud, in fact, because winter has arrived, bringing with it cold, dark afternoons :(. Finally, I understand why people who live in Canada, the northern U.S and northern Europe are so obsessed with the weather. It’s actually depressing to not see or feel fuzzy, yellow sunshine for months on end. (I mentioned these places in particular, because these are the cold parts of the world that I’ve lived in. I realize of course that there are other cold places, I’ve just never lived there and so, have no idea if people there are obsessed with ‘The Weather’.)

And then suddenly, a few weeks ago, I stumbled upon a cure, a magical, instantaneous cure for winter blues, namely: hot chocolate. All you need is a few minutes in the kitchen to stir up a nice cup of hot, chocaltey richness, and you’re all set. You can curl up on your couch with a blanket and a good book, and a soft pair of socks on your feet (ideally a cat is also included in this scenario) and winter will actually seem bearable.

Don’t believe me? Just look at this:

I’ve taken to making myself a cup every once in a while 🙂 I use homemade chocolate fudge ice-cream topping to make the hot chocolate, rather than cocoa or chocolate flakes. If you’d like to recreate this deliciousness, it’s fairly simply. Just warm up 2/3rds of a cup of milk. Then dissolve 2-3 tablespoons of homemade dark chocolate fudge into it. Here is a recipe for a velvety, homemade dark chocolate fudge that I strongly recommend; it’s super yummy and super-easy to make. (It is also delicious on ice-cream, which is what I originally made it for.)

Once you’ve dissolved the fudge, top off the hot chocolate with some whipped cream and stick a cinnamon stick into the cup:

Finally, sprinkle some cocoa powder on the cream, and sip away! If you’ve got a cookie to go with it, more power to you. I think my next post will be about the dark-chocolate-chunk cookies that I am now about to go and bake 😛 Mmmm.

Tags chocolate, food, hot chocolate, snack, winter drinks

Chocolate General

The Perfect Pick-Me-Upper on a Cold, Wet, Awful Fall Evening

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date October 23, 2012
No Comments on The Perfect Pick-Me-Upper on a Cold, Wet, Awful Fall Evening

I am not much of a coffee drinker. I barely ever drink coffee actually, although I do like a tisane or a flavoured green tea every once in a while. However, because I find myself having to spend long hours at my desk in front of this computer, painstakingly writing, footnoting and editing my thesis, over the past week, I’ve resorted to coffee. The problem though, is that it tastes awful. Coffee smells absolutely heavenly, which is why I use it in baking (my espresso buttercream icing is a case in point) and chocolate-making, I even just sniff coffee-bean jars sometimes, but I am not a fan of its taste. I know, I know, all you coffee lovers out there might object on the ground that I might not be buying the right beans, or grinding them fresh etc., But, dear readers, I’ve never, absolutely never, liked the taste of coffee. No matter how it was made and no matter what beans were used, the taste of coffee never appealed to me.

Therefore, today, I decided to try complimenting my cup of coffee with flavours that I do like. I brewed myself a cup (I used a milk frother and steamed milk by the how, so my coffee would turn out more foamy) and then added 3 dollops of my velvety hot chocolate fudge (go here for the recipe) and one and half teaspoons of Frangelico liqueur.

I have to say, it turned out pretty darned good, for a homemade cup of coffee made by a complete amateur! It was a perfect hazelnutty, chocolatey accompaniment to copyright law on this cold, wet, depressing evening.

I did of course top the coffee off with a generous helping of whipped cream and a sprinkling of cocoa powder.

Now I am all perked up and energetic. Also, I feel strangely warm and fuzzy, it must be the booze 😛

Tags cappuccino, chocolate, coffee, hazelnut liqueur

Cooking Food General Indian Cooking Recipes

Miriyala Pappu-Charu/Rasam (Low-Fat Peppery Lentil Soup)

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date October 17, 2012
11 Comments on Miriyala Pappu-Charu/Rasam (Low-Fat Peppery Lentil Soup)

Summer is clearly over, and as climate-change enthusiast Ed Stark has been known to say, ‘winter is coming’ (if you don’t get this reference, google ‘Game of Thrones’). In fact, I prefer the cold winter to these months of pre-winter anticipation otherwise known as fall; at least in the winter there is the hope of snow. And so, I woke up this morning feeling a bit peevish. It was a little chilly and I really didn’t want to leave the warm-coziness of my wonderful duvet.

Unfortunately, get up I had to, because a thesis does not write itself. I motivated myself with the prospect of a cup of rich Italian hot chocolate (the kind that is so viscous it takes about 10 minutes to empty a cup of it even when you are holding the cup completely upside down). But as I made my way downstairs to the kitchen, a new craving hit me: I wanted some spicy, garlicy steaming hot charu! Charu or Rasam, a famous South Indian creation, is best described in English as a spicy soup. One can make it with or without lentils, and various types of souring agents can be used in it, including tamarind and lemon juice. What I was craving was a particular type of charu that is a quite common in Andhra Pradesh: ‘Miriyala (pepper) Charu’. So I set about grinding some fresh spices and cooking up some hot (in every sense of the word) charu for lunch.

It turned out pretty well, and now I feel cheery, warm and ready to get to editing word-documents (otherwise known as thesis-writing) 🙂

If you’d like to try making some, here’s what you will need:

Ingredients:

1/2 cup toor/tuvar dal (split pigeon peas) (for more on these lentils see this wikipedia entry)

1/4 tsp turmeric

1 large tomato, cubed

1 lime sized piece of dried tamarind soaked in a cup of water or 1.5 tsp tamarind paste

1 tsp brown sugar

10 curry leaves

Salt to taste

For Charu powder:

1 tsp toor dal

2 tsp pepper

2 tsp coriander seeds

1/4 tsp mustard seeds

3/4 tsp cumin seeds

1-2 dried red chillies

5-6 menthulu (fenugreek seeds)

For Popu/tadka/baghar:

1- 2 tbsp ghee (for more on ghee and my recipe, go here) or oil

4-6 cloves of garlic

2 twigs/sticks of curry leaves

2 pinches of asafoetida

1 tsp mustard seeds

4 dried red chillies

For garnish:

A handful of fresh cilantro or coriander leaves

Method:

The first step involves cooking the lentils (toor dal). If you have a pressure cooker cook the lentils in it; it’ll only take about 10 minutes. Otherwise, cook the lentils in a pot with 2 cups of water and a pinch of turmeric, until the lentils are completed cooked and soft.

Next, in a large pot bring 2 cups of water and the tomato, turmeric, tamarind (use only the water if you’re using dried tamarind), salt, curry leaves and sugar to boil.

While waiting for these ingredients to begin boiling, prepare the charu powder. Place all the ingredients for the powder in a dry grinder or blender and grind them to a coarse powder. You can also use a mortar and pestle, but this will require a little patience.

Once the ingredients in the pot are boiling, add the cooked lentils and charu powder, stir, cook for a few minutes, and then turn off the heat.

Now for the last step! In a small pot heat the ghee or oil and add the mustard seeds. As the seeds begin to splutter add the remaining popu/tadka/baghar ingredients. Fry until the chillies darken and the spices are fragrant. As soon as you think the spices are ready, pour the ghee and spices into the bigger pot (with the other ingredients) and immediately cover the pot with a lid. Your charu is ready! I must warn you though, this is a very spicy concoction.

You can eat it like soup:

Drink it like a warm fall/winter drink:

Or eat it with hot rice and a peppery papad!

Tags lentil soup, low-fat, miryala charu, rasam, recipe, simple recipe, soup, south indian, spicy

Baking Cooking Food General Recipes

Refried Beans Remixed Part II

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date October 14, 2012
9 Comments on Refried Beans Remixed Part II

Sometime ago, I wrote about how relatively easy it is to make refried beans. Now that I’ve figured out a recipe for beans that works for me (and by that I mean that it is a wholly vegetarian recipe and it’s super-spicy) I’ve been making refried beans a lot lately. My favourite ways to eat beans include: beans on top of rice, beans inside burritos and quesadillas, and even just beans on more beans with lots of cheese on top 🙂 And then of course, there is the refried bean pizza 🙂

My latest bean-related experiment involves mixing two iconic foods from Mexican and French cuisine respectively: refried beans and crepes. Here’s how it turned out:

If you want to try it out, here’s what you will need:

For the Filling:

One serving of re-fried beans, go here for my recipe.

Freshly grated aged cheddar, to taste

Chunks of mozzarella, to taste

1 tsp cayenne pepper

1 tsp freshly ground cumin seeds

For the crepes:

1 cup all-purpose flour (leveled)

1/4 teaspoon coarse salt

1 1/2 cups whole milk

4 large eggs

3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Method:

I started by making the crepes. I just threw all the ingredients for the crepes (in no particular order) into a food processor (you call also use a blender/mixie) and whizzed them all together until I got a smooth mixture. The batter will be pretty thin, quite unlike pancake batter.

Now for making the crepes. I heated a skillet, melted a little butter on it and poured a ladle of batter on it. Then, I swirled the batter about to make a thin layer completely covering the entire skillet. I cooked the underside of the crêpe for about 3 minutes. Using a rubber spatula I loosened the edges of the crepes and then flipped the crêpe over and cooked the other side for about 2 minutes. Then I placed the crêpe on a plate, covered it with plastic wrap and repeated the crepe-making process until I’d used up all the batter. (You can also store the batter in the fridge for a day or two if you prefer.)

Now I was ready to stuff the crepes with their filling! (You can stuff and bake a couple at first and store the rest of the crepes in the fridge. Since they’re all wrapped up in plastic, they will stay fresh.)

But first, I had to pre-heat the oven, which I did to 350 F. While the oven heats up, start filling the crepes with refried beans and cheese and lining them up on a baking tray. To keep the crêpe nicely wrapped and beans snug inside, I used a toothpick.

Once the oven is warmed up, place the crepes in the oven and bake for 10 minutes or so. Monitor them and reduce the temperature, or take them out sooner if they look like they are browning too much. You just want them to be a nice golden colour with the edges starting to crisp up.

Once they are ready, take them out of the oven, sprinkle with cumin and cayenne pepper and enjoy!

If you don’t want to spend the time decorating the crêpe with cayenne pepper and cumin polka-dots like I did, you can just lightly dust the crêpe with the spices:

They made for a perfect snack while working on my dissertation.

Tags cooking, crepes, food, french food, fusion food, mexican food, Recipes, refried beans, snack

Cooking Food General Recipes

Deceptively Delicious Super Smoothie

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date August 26, 2012
2 Comments on Deceptively Delicious Super Smoothie

If you know me well, you should be sitting down for this post. In fact, I would advise strewing some cushions about the floor, just in case you should fall over in sheer shock. You see, this smoothie is not just pretty good, it’s actually ridiculously healthy, but most importantly, it contains a vegetable! Yes! A real vegetable! And I, enemy of vegetables, find it quite edible, enjoyable even!

I must warn you, it doesn’t look all that delicious.

But don’t be fooled by how unattractive it looks, it’s actually more than palatable. Remember my post about the strawberry-banana smoothie that I am now sweet on ;)? Well, this is a variation on that smoothie that I was brave enough to try out. And I am so glad I did! I get spinach into my diet now, and it’s easy and yummy! Much easier than having to find a way to stomach (literally and metaphorically) a salad!

Here’s what you need:

5-6 Organic Strawberries

A banana

A handful or so of raw, organic spinach

3-4 tablespoons of yogurt

A few splashes of milk, depending on the consistency you prefer

Two pinches of cinnamon powder

Method:

Hull the strawberries:

Wash a handful of spinach, this is about how much I used:

Now, throw the strawberries, peeled banana and spinach into a blender, along with the yogurt, milk and cinnamon powder.

And blend it all until even and smooth. You can add more or less yogurt and milk, depending on the thickness/consistency you prefer.

And there you have it, a perfect little drink between study breaks:

It doesn’t look all that appetizing, but I promise you, you can barely taste the spinach. All it tastes of is strawberries, banana and cinnamon.

I make sure to use organic fruits and vegetables for this smoothie because I figure there is a decent chance that they will have less pesticides than the non-organic ones. I am aware of course, of how little the use of the term ‘organic’ is regulated in the food industry.

I’ve also made a chocolate variation of this by adding a tablespoon of cocoa to the mix. I find it tastes fine without the chocolate however; I almost feel like there are too many flavours interacting with one another in the chocolate version.

Tags banana, food, health, recipe, smoothie, spinach, strawberry

Adventure General Reviews

An Island Paradise 5 Minutes from Downtown Toronto?

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date August 19, 2012
2 Comments on An Island Paradise 5 Minutes from Downtown Toronto?

The Toronto Islands are surprisingly beautiful, all things considered. I’ve been before, several years ago, but it was only on a recent trip there for the first time in years, that I realized how picturesque the islands are! Obviously, they’ve got nothing on any island in the Caribbean, but for a beach in a busy metropolitan centre, it’s pretty gorgeous. Far more peaceful than the beach in Chicago, and more beautiful than the beaches on Sentosa Island in Singapore for instance, by several orders of magnitude.

I think Toronto residents often don’t get to enjoy the beaches on the Islands as much as they could and should.

Don’t believe me? See for yourself.

We even managed to stay long enough to enjoy a beautiful sunset:

Tags adventure, beach, photos, sightseeing, toronto, travel

Baking Chocolate Food General Recipes

In Praise of Spontaneity and Vanilla and Espresso Buttercream Frosting

Post author By Megha Jandhyala
Post date August 19, 2012
5 Comments on In Praise of Spontaneity and Vanilla and Espresso Buttercream Frosting

One of the things that often irks me about living in North America is how much people seem to plan and organize their social lives. Speaking broadly of course, based on anecdotal evidence from my life, I find that people in India are far more spontaneous. I think there is something nice about being able to phone a friend and make an impromptu plan for the same day once in a while. But, here, more often than not, people plan dinner parties and drinks weeks in advance.

Unfortunately, having to pencil appointments with my friends into my calendar really doesn’t work for my personality. I often find myself feeling tired, or un-social, and want nothing more than to sit on the couch with a book, but end up having to go out because I accepted an invitation weeks ago. People may have gone to considerable trouble to cook for me, or a the very least they’ve set aside time to see me, so I feel compelled to go. At other times, I have a spontaneous urge to go out and see people, but end up staying in, because I haven’t made any plans with anyone.

I realize that part of life is having to do things one doesn’t feel like doing, but when it comes to how we interact with one another, I don’t think it has to be this way, and it isn’t this way in India. Of course, the ‘impromptu system’ I am advocating has its own drawbacks. In spite of its flaws however, I prefer this system to what I see as an overly organized North American model.

Luckily, that’s all it is, a model; which means not everyone follows it and I’ve managed to find a few people here who like spontaneity once in a while too 🙂 All of this has meant that last evening, I was able to indulge in one of the small, simple joys of life, namely throwing an impromptu soiree. The plan was made frantically, over multiple text messages, sometime last afternoon. After which, I could be seen running about trying to throw some snacks together. Since spontaneity was the theme, I even decided to bake a cake! It turned out pretty well, but what I really liked about it was the icing, so I thought I would share the recipe here with you 🙂

Ingredients:

1 Chocolate Cake

4 Eggs

1 Cup Sugar

2 Pinches of Salt

3 Sticks of Butter

1 tsp Vanilla Essence

1 tbsp Instant Espresso

Method:

Place the sugar, salt and eggs in a double boiler (just place them in a heat proof bowl and then place the bowl over another bowl of simmer water, make sure not to let the bottom of the first bowl touch the water). Gently and continuously, whisk the mixture while it heats up. Using a thermometer check the temperature of the mixture periodically. When the temperature reaches 160 F, take the mixture of the heat. Now beat the mixture at high-speed until it becomes fluffy and airy and reaches room temperature. Then add the butter in, half a stick at a time, beating continuously at medium speed. Once the butter is whipped in, separate the mixture into two equal parts in two bowls.

In the first bowl beat in the espresso at high-speed until you have a really light fluffy frosting.

Next, cut the cake in half. (Ideally, when you bake the cake, bake it in two separate bowls so that you have two layers without having to slice the cake in half later). Using a spatula spread a thick layer of espresso frosting over the top of the bottom layer. You don’t have to worry about doing this neatly. Make sure to leave aside about 3-4 tablespoons of frosting to decorate the top of the cake with. Then place the top layer of the cake on top of the frosting.

In the second bowl, beat in the vanilla essence, until you have a smooth, fluffy texture.

Using a separate spatula, spread this over the top and sides of the cake. Once you have a somewhat smooth (it does not have to be flawless) surface, use a basting brush to draw fine decorative lines along the sides and top of the cake. Finally, fill some of the left over frosting into a frosting bag and squeeze little bits of it on the top the cake in whatever pattern you like.

And there you have it, a white vanilla butter-cream frosted cake with a creamy espresso layer in the middle. Mmmm.

Mine turned out a little lopsided 😦 clearly I have to work some more on my decorative skills. However, it tasted pretty darned good and got rave reviews at my party 🙂

Tags baking, buttercream frosting, coffee, food, frosting, Icing, recipe, vanilla

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