Sponge Cake with Glazed Cherries

Ideal : Get up in the morning, looking fresh and beautiful, like they do in the movies.

• Real : The first thing you hear at dawn, is your terrorized kiddo screaming – cause he got scared just by looking at your morning face.

Ideal : Happy family getting inside the AC car, going for long drives, smiling at each other all the times- like they show in the ads.

• Real : Car broken down in the middle of the road at 12 noon. All of us in a pool of sweat, bickering at each other and cursing the sun for the burning heat.

Ideal : New apartment at a relative’s place. The lift door opens and you see the aesthetically designed swimming pool. The view is design to have a calm, soothing effect as you enter the apartment.

• Real : The lift door opens, you see a fat, hairy man with a belly in swimming trunks, trying to float in the water. It does make me laugh out aloud when I think of the way its meant to be, and the way things work out.

Ideal : Bake a beautiful sponge cake, with cherries in it. Have a piece of it with your loved ones, making small talk and enjoying the time spent together.

• Real : Bake the cake, give it as a gift. And worry endlessly whether it turned out to be good or not. Blame the host for not cutting a piece and giving it to you, never mind that they had a hundred other things to do.

The ‘real’ picture is not so glossy at times. But you got to agree that it keeps life interesting :).

Recipe Source : The Book of Baking, by Thangam Philip

Ingredients:

• Flour                                                      :      230 gm
• Baking Powder                                  :      1 tsp
• Salt                                                         :      a pinch
• Butter                                                    :       170 gm
• Sugar                                                      :       170 gm
• Eggs                                                        :       4
• Glazed Cherries                                  :       100 gm
• Milk                                                         :       1-2 tbsp
• Vanilla Essence                                   :      1/2 tsp

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 175 C/350 F. Grease a 9″ round cake pan.
2. Wash the cherries clean and pat them dry in a kitchen towel. Quarter them.
3. Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs,one by one, and beat well after each addition.
4. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt in a separate pan.
5. Fold the dry ingredients into the wet to get a batter of dropping consistency.  Add a tablespoon or two of milk if the batter is too thick.
6. Bake for 25 – 30 minutes or until a skewer inserted comes free of crumbs.

Linked to:

• Blogging Marathon #15, Cook by Alphabets – Under ‘S’
• I Love Baking @ Tickling Palates
• Bake Fest, hosted by Sumee’s Culinary

MW Chocolate Mug Cake

I believe that sometimes ignorance is a bliss. Life is really uncomplicated and things just happen without you being affected by it.

Like yesterday.

I was sitting on the floor and reading something, when the wall I was leaning on, gave a small shake. All I thought was, honestly, that it was my tummy growling! It was, after all, past lunch time and I hadn’t had my fill then.

The simple me came out, was about to have my lunch when the phone call from hubby came.

‘I am fine. Are you fine? Is the kiddo fine? Where are you now?’ Non stop questions from the other end.

And my answer was,’My tummy made such a big noise that my whole body shook for a second!’.

That’s the precise moment, when I realized that ignorance, though a bliss, can sound pretty stupid too at times. That is also the precise moment in which ignorance and stupidity, which were protecting me until then, gave way to pure terror.

Thank god, everything was fine. Thank god no one is shedding tears over their life, family or property because of the earthquake.

And thank god, the tremor in my tummy stopped!

For this month’s Blog Hop Wednesday, I am paired with Charul Ajmera of Tadka Masala. I made this addictive MW Chocolate Mug Cake from her space, and by addictive, I mean I have made it four times by now! The cake is moist and tastes divine. I added a spoon more of sugar to suit my taste.

Ingredients:

• All purpose Flour           :      3 tbsp
• Powdered Sugar             :      3 tbsp (+1-2 tsp extra, if you like it really sweet)
• Oil/Melted Butter          :      3 tbsp
• Grated chocolate            :      3 tbsp (optional)
• Milk                                      :      3 tbsp
• Cocoa Powder                  :      1 tbsp
• Hide n Seek Biscuits      :      1 – 2
• Baking powder                 :      1/4 tsp

Method:

1. In a microwave proof cup or bowl, mix the flour, sugar, baking powder and cocoa powder. Mix thoroughly to ensure that there are no dry lumps.
2. Crush one or two Oreo/Hide n Seek or any chocolate biscuit by hand and add to the flour mix.
3. Add the milk, oil and 1/2 tsp Vanilla essence (optional). Mix well to get a smooth cake batter.
4. Add a tbsp of grated chocolate on top. Microwave in full power for one minute. Do a skewer test (I used a knife) and if the center is dry, then take off the MW. Else cook for another 30 sec, or until done. Mine was done in the first minute itself.
5. Let the cake stand in the MW for a minute and serve with some grated chocolate on top.

Linked to:

• Blog Hop Wednesdays
• Microwave Easy Cooking, hosted this month by Nalini’s Kitchen

Fruit Cake

Breakfast, back at my home, has always been idli and dosa. Varieties and new recipes do come in every now and then, but nothing has come even close to challenging the position of dosa and idli.

The only time there was a serious competition was when my mother bought the oven. What followed was a cake festival.  The three of us would hang around the oven sniffing and compelling the cake to complete baking just by looking at it.

I still remember my mother munching on a piece of fruit cake and commenting, ‘Mmm..very nice. We can have this for breakfast instead of the same old idli and dosa’.

The oven may have won the battle, but the war was won by idli ultimately. After a fervent baking session, the oven was shoved aside to a corner and the idli cooker resumed its usual place.

When I saw this boiled fruit cake in Joy of Baking, it reminded me of the cake amma used to make. So I too started the nostalgic process of adding the raisins and tutti fruities to the batter, while Shreyas hang around saying, ‘Mmm.. smells nice’.

Ingredients:

• Sugar                                        :              1 cup (Brown, if possible)
• Hot water                                :             1 cup
• Butter                                       :              1/4 cup (50 gms)
• Mixed Spice                           :              1 tsp (or ground cinnamon + ground cloves)
• Ground Ginger                      :              1 tsp
• Eggs                                           :              2
• All purpose flour                 :              1 1/2 cups
• Baking soda                            :              1 tsp
• Vanilla Extract                     :              1 tsp
• Raisins                                      :             1 cup (about 100 gms)
• Candied Fruit                         :             3/4 cup (about 120 gms)

Method:

1. Pre heat the oven to 180 C. Grease a 9″ long loaf pan.
2. In a large pan, add the hot water, butter, raisins, ground ginger and mixed spice powder. You can include half a teaspoon of salt too, if you want to. Bring this to a boil, and let it cook for 5 minutes. Take off the heat, let it cool.
3. Beat the eggs and add it to the boiled fruit. Make sure that its cool, else the eggs might get cooked! Mix.
4. Add the flour, baking soda, vanilla extract and candied fruit. Mix. Pour the batter into the greased pan.
5. Bake for 45 – 50 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the center comes free of crumbs.

Linked to:

• Bake Fest, hosted this month by The Pumpkin Farm
• Kid’s Delight, for this month’s theme ‘Something Sweet’
• Hearth and Soul Hop

Exchange Mela – Chocolate cake

My cousin did the mistake of asking me to bake a cake for her. I agreed to bake one, making a casual remark that I had to cook dinner too. She immediately volunteered to help with the dinner and yeah – there I was, sifting the flour, while she was sweating in front of the stove. May be I should have mentioned about sweeping and moping too.

So here is an easy cake adapted from ‘Family Baking Book’ by America’s Test Kitchen, made under an hour, in exchange for an excellent dinner.

Ingredients:

All Purpose Flour : 1 1/2 cups
Cocoa Powder        : 1/2 cup
Boiling Water          : 3/4 cup
Sugar                          : 1 cup
Baking Powder       : 1 tsp
Instant Coffee         : 1/2-1 tsp
Veg Oil                       : 1 cup
Egg                              :1

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 350F/180C. Line an 8″ square baking pan with parchment paper.
2. Whisk the cocoa powder and boiling water. Once its cool, add the oil and egg to it and whisk thoroughly.
3. Mix flour, sugar, baking powder and coffee powder in a big bowl. Add the cocoa -oil mixture to this and mix until smooth and lump-free.
4. Transfer to the baking pan, bake for about 30-35 min, till a skewer comes free when inserted into the center of the cake. Cool the cake and decorate with chocolate glaze.

Chocolate Glaze (From Hershey’s)

Butter                      : 2 tbsp
Cocoa                      : 2 tbsp
Water                      : 2 tbsp
Powdered Sugar : 1 cup
Vanilla Extract    : 1/2 tsp

Method:

1. Melt butter in a pan over low heat. Add cocoa and water and cook till smooth and slightly thick. Don’t let it come to a boil.
2. Take off the heat and add the sugar, vanilla extract and mix until smooth and shiny.
3. Spoon over the cooled cake and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Note:

Linked to Aipi’s and Priya’s Bookmarked Recipes – Tuesdays, Hearth and Soul Hop.

Pound Cake

One pound of flour, one pound of butter, one pound of eggs and one pound of sugar. That’s what goes into a traditional pound cake. Well, people in the good old times can eat this cake without guilt.  The effort of creaming the butter and sugar together alone would earn them the right to enjoy this cake. But the current generation, with our hand & stand mixers, really can’t afford to make a cake with 450 gms of butter! So naturally, the recipe got modified to suit the modern times. Now most of the pound cakes just keep an approximate 1:1 ratio of the main ingredients.

I have never made a pound cake before, and I was very excited about it. This recipe is adapted from Rose Levy Beranbaum’s Cake Bible and was the Sweet Punch challenge for the month of July. I followed the given recipe as such – no modification, no deviation.

Ingredients: 

3 tablespoons Milk

3 large Eggs

1 ½ teaspoons vanilla

1 ½ cups sifted cake flour

¾ cup sugar

¾ teaspoon baking powder

¼ teaspoon salt

13 Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened (184 gms)

Method: 

1. Preheat your oven to 350 F. Butter an 8″X 4″loaf pan, or any six cup loaf or fluted tube pan.
2. Lightly whisk together milk, eggs and vanilla in a medium bowl.
3. Place dry ingredients in a large bowl and mix on low speed for 30 seconds, until blended.
4. Add the butter and half the egg mixture, and mix until dry ingredients are moistened. On medium speed, beat for one minute. This will aerate and develop the cake’s structure. Scrape down sides.Add the remaining egg mixture in two batches, beating for 20 seconds between each addition. Scrape down sides.
5. Pour batter into prepared pan. Smooth surface with a spatula. Bake for 55-65 minutes (35-45 minutes if baking in a fluted tube pan), until a wooden toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
6. Let cake cool on a rack in the pan for 10 minuets before inverting onto a greased wire rack. If using a loaf pan, flip the cake over so the top is up.

This is my entry for Sweet Punch for the month of July and Celebrate Sweets - Cakes.

Cake Marathon

In the past one week I had made around 5-6 layer cakes. I didn’t eat them all, I really didn’t.

The last one I made, the Thank you cake, was for Bebo’s school. Yesterday was his last day there . He is starting in a new school from the next academic year. He is really going to miss his current school!

And I am going to miss sleeping late in the mornings :( – the new school’s timings are too early for me.

The toughest thing about summer is not the heat, but the summer vacation. Managing an active four-year old at home is not an easy feat. It will be too hot to take him out and anyway, there are no parks or play areas near our place, where it is safe to let him play.

In my childhood days (god! I am old!), summer vacation meant pure joy. You come home from school, throw your bags aside and play as much as you want. Vacation was truly a break from studies.

Now a days, vacation translates into vacation classes. Violin class,  dance class, keyboard class, painting class, karate class, swimming class, drawing class etc etc. For the academically inclined, they can send their kids to hindi class, sloka class, french class or similar. But this one takes the cake – Cursive writing class for KG students!

And coming back to cakes, the one I made for Bebo’s nursery was an easy one. It uses oil, so you can do it without taking out your hand/stand mixer if you want to. Even the icing called for melted butter, though I went for the softened version.

Recipe for chocolate cake

Ingredients:

All purpose flour(Maida) : 1 3/4 cups

Sugar : 2 cups

Cocoa Powder : 3/4 cup

Baking Powder : 1 1/2 tsp

Baking Soda : 1 1/2 tsp

Salt : 1 tsp

Milk : 1 cup

Vegetable Oil : 1/2 cup

Vanilla Extract : 2 tsp

Eggs : 2

Boiling Water : 1 cup

Method:

1. Pre heat the oven to 350 Degree F/ 180 degree C.
2. Grease and flour two 9″ round baking pans.
3. Mix together the dry ingredients (sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt) in a large bowl.
4. Add the liquid ingredients (eggs, milk, oil and vanilla) to it.
5. Beat on medium speed in a mixer for 2 minutes or beat well with a whisk for 5-8 minutes.
6. Stir in the boiling water. The batter will be very thin. Pour it evenly into the prepared pans.
7. Bake for 30 – 35 minutes.
8. Test with a wooden skewer. If the skewer comes out clean, the cake is done.

Chocolate Frosting

Ingredients:

Butter : 1/2 cup (113 gms or 1 stick)

Cocoa Powder : 2/3 cup

Powdered Sugar : 3 cups

Milk : 1/3 cup

Vanilla : 1 tsp

Method:

1. Melt butter, stir in the cocoa.
2. Add powdered sugar and milk alternatively, beating to a spreading consistency.
3. Stir in vanilla. Add more milk ,in teaspoonfuls, if needed.

Note:

I didn’t melt the butter. I chose to soften it and beat it with sugar, using a hand mixer.

I had some left over Icing from last time. So I mixed a bit of the chocolate icing with it to get a lighter shade and used it for the borders, flowers and writing.

*Found out that this is the Hershey’s “Perfectly Chocolate” Chocolate Cake.

By the way, if you are wondering which vacation class I am sending Bebo to, let me tell you that my parents are here to happily share the ‘vacation burden’ (they don’t look at it as burden). And once my parents leave, Harry’s parents will be coming to spend some quality time with their grandson. So thanks to both set of grand parents, my vacation time is going to be nice and smooth and Bebo’s vacation is going to be vacation class free :).

Linking this to the Chocolate Recipes hosted by My Culinary Creations.

C for Cake

Birthdays are always special. You feel excited for your close friends’ birthdays too- especially if you get to bake a cake for them.

Two of my close friends are celebrating their birthdays today! I baked a cake for my friend in Chennai and am sending my wishes to the one overseas. One of them worked with me for a long time, the other one was my room mate for a long time. They are both as close to me as one can get. So they will eat anything I cook or bake ;-)

So here is to Friendship- to birthdays – to cakes!

Recipe for a simple yellow cake.

Ingredients:

Flour – 1 1/2 cups, sifted

Sugar – 1 cup

Butter – 1/2 cup (about 115 gms or 1 stick)

Eggs – 2, medium

Baking powder – 1 1/2 tsp

Milk – 1/2 cup

Vanilla Essence – 1/2 tsp

Salt – a pinch

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 180C (350F). Grease an 8″ round pan.
2. Sift flour, baking powder and salt.
3. In a big mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar till light and fluffy(I use my hand mixer for this).
4. Beat eggs separately. Add it to the butter-sugar mix and continue beating for a minute or two.
5. Add the flour and milk alternatively and keep beating in low speed. Add vanilla essence.
6. Pour into the greased pan, level it and bake for 25- 30 minutes.
7. Check for doneness by inserting a wooden skewer into the center of the cake. If it comes out dry or with a few crumbs, the cake is done. Else bake for 5 more minutes.

Ingredients for Butter cream Icing:

Butter – 3/4 cup (175 gms or 1 1/2 sticks)

Icing sugar – 2 1/4 cups

Milk  - 2 tbsp (optional)

Food coloring

Method:

1. Beat the butter in a big mixing bowl(I used my hand mixer).
2. Slowly incorporate icing sugar until well blended.
3. Add milk, if necessary and continue beating until pale and fluffy.
4. Add a drop or two of the required food coloring and beat until well mixed.

How I did it:

1. I made the cake the previous day and wrapped it in two layers of grease-proof  paper(butter paper).
2. Then I put it in a zip-lock cover and kept it in the freezer overnight.
3. I made the butter cream icing the next day and decorated the frozen cake.
4. I left the decorated cake to thaw itself out for about two hours.
5. Sometimes the cake ‘sweats’ out. Its fine. This time, how ever, it didn’t.
6. Icing over a frozen cake is easier and the cake turns out to be very moist.