Chia Seeds Pudding

Hello Friends,

After a long time, today I am doing a food post. I have recently come across this amazing “super food” (as people are calling it) called Chia Seeds. The seeds are really tiny, even smaller than Sesame Seeds. Click the link to get more details about the seeds.

1 ounce (28 g) or 2 tablespoons of these seeds give your approximately 137 Calories in energy and most of it upto 72 calories are fat calories. But, don’t be alarmed, it is one of the best known sources of Omega-3 Fatty Acids for a vegetarian/vegan and even meat lovers. Because you get 4915 mg meaning approximately 5 g (grams) of Omega-3 Fatty Acids from one serving of Chia Seeds, which is basically 1 ounce (28 g) or 2 tablespoons, whereas the recommendation is only 3 g. So, you get all your daily intake of this nutrient with just 2 tbsp of Chia Seeds. In addition, you get about 4.5 g of Protein along with 10 g of fiber and a bit of Calcium, Phosphorus, Magnesium, Sodium, Zinc, Copper and Manganese. Wow, no doubt, they call it “super food”.

Now, let’s see how to take it. It is in seeds form in its raw state. Once it is added to water or any liquid, it swells up and soaks all the water & liquid (up to 10 times its size) and forms a gel like consistency. It has very slight nutty flavor, but very subtle, I could never tell really.

In my house, we have started adding it to our juices and they become nice and jello like (of course depends on how much juice and how much chia seeds) and enjoy it.

In the course of time, I will bring many recipes of this ingredient as I experiment with it. For now, here is a recipe we tried and had it last week. Real simple to make and can be used as a great breakfast or snack or dessert. We used it for dessert :)

Chia Seeds Pudding

Ingredients

Chia Seeds – 4 tbsp

Nut Milk – 1 ¼ cups (I used Almond Milk, you can use any, due to Chia Seeds’ nutty flavor, they say it works well with nut milk, but you can surely use regular milk too with same results)

Honey – 1-2 tbsp honey (adjust it to your taste)

Cinnamon – ½ tsp

Preparation

• Mix everything together and shake it well (with just a spoon) so that everything is well blended.
• Let it soak for at least 30 min to an hour before consuming. I had left it overnight.
• Chill it as it tastes better cold.

Serving

Serve it chilled. It is just that simple. The quantity that will be made is 2-3 servings (depending on your serving size) and approximately 125 calories per serving (for 3 servings). 

Isn't that a great healthy dessert that gives you so much nutrition?

This is my contribution to Healthy Me & Healthy US event that I am hosting this month.

Take Care till next post,

Priya

Coconut and Cardamom Fudge - Narkol and Khirer Borfi AND A GIVEAWAY !!!

Hello Friends,

After a long time, an attempt to re-initiate the flow of my posts on my blog. I cannot believe it has been such a long time. But, I really appreciate all my readers' continuous encouragements and wishes to see me back int he blog world.

Recently, I had the fortune to connect with Rinku Bhattacharya one of our bloggers and an author of the book , The Bengali Five Spice Chronicles.

I had a wonderful opportunity to receive the book as part of a giveaway and review it. I am sure all of you already must be familiar with my Bengali connections (I was born in West Bengal) and my love for Bengali food. Here was an opportunity to review a Bengali Cook book which I simply could not turn away from. 

I have to tell you that the book was more than what I expected. To tell you the truth, when you normally think of a cook book, you think of all those complicated, not usually made at home recipes, but this is just so different. I have to tell you sincerely that most of the recipes are so close to my heart and my cooking style. They are the ones that I can just make any day without thinking twice. You need some basic spices and you are ready to cook off recipes from it.

The best part of the book is that it is divided based on the spices that are used in the Bengali cuisine, which makes it unique. So, you can actually choose a spice and explore it to your heart's content. And, last but not the least, it has those yummy Bengali sweets (the ones made with milk or milk products), so having such a sweet tooth, I had to pick a dessert.

Here is my try of making a famous Bengali Mithai (sweet) from this book.

Coconut and Cardamom Fudge - Narkol and Khirer Borfi

  

Ingredients

Khoya (Milk Solids) - 1.5 cups (12 oz or 341 gms)

Fresh (or Frozen) Shredded Coconut - 1 cup (8 oz)

Sugar - 1 cup

Green Cardamom - 1/2 tsp (crushed)

Sliced Almonds - as you may like to sprinkle on top or even to mix with the fudge

Preparation

• If you are using frozen Khoya (khoa) instead of fresh one, just nuke (microwave) it for about 1 min. and then add it to a non-stick pan. You can use normal pan too, non-stick is just better as it won't get stuck to the bottom.
• Let it become softer in consistency (make sure your gas is in the lowest settings of heat)
• Once soft, add coconut (if frozen, soften it in microwave) and sugar.
• Mix well and cook on medium heat till it becomes soft and kind of starts leaving the sides and forms a ball shape (kind of sort of)
• Grease a pan with enough ghee (clarified butter) and pour the hot mixture in it to any size and height you may prefer your fudge to be in.
• Let it come to room tempertaure, before cutting it into shapes
• Wait even more for it to completely cool down, before digging into it :)
• I felt @ one point, that I could even make them into balls instead of cutting them like barfis
• Now, what do I tell of the taste. My husband called it a variety of Mawa Mishri / Milk Cake (for people who are familiar with these names).

Serving

Mine came out just melt in the mouth. I cut it way too soon (couldn't wait) and I will recommend waiting little more before cutting into it to get nice, firm pieces.

You can buy this book online almost from any big online store. But, here is the best part. Do you want to get a copy of this book and start enjoying Bengali Cuisine? If so, without further delay, go to my Blog's Facebook Group, join and MUST leave me a comment on this post. You only have till end of December 9th to participate. I will do a random choice and you never know, you may win the book :)

THE CONTEST IS ONLY OPEN TO US AND CANADA RESIDENTS.

Take care till next post !!!

3 Ingredient Nutella Brownie - from US Masala

Hello Friends,


I am sure all of you know by now how I am a big fan of Chocolate. And, Nutella has become a staple in my house these. Even my husband and my older one who are not a fan of chocolate love Nutella.


So, whenever I get a chance to bake with Nutella, it is amazing. Plus, this recipe, that I am sharing with you, which has been a replica of recipe from US Masala, is so simple to make that it is going around viral in my circle. I made and had 3 of my colleagues taste it and all of them have already retried and also passed it on. I don't think I need to tell you any more than that, do I?


I have to share this funny story though, before I jump on to the recipe. I baked these for my son's school's open house. It was sent to an activity called "Cake Walk" during the open house. My son happened to participate in it and won a round. The reward for winner was to pick a baked good that people had donated. And, guess what my son picks, my own brownies. I asked him to reconsider, and he flattered me by saying, "But, I love these mom". That is the best compliment I have gotten yet :)


3 Ingredient Nutella Brownie

Ingredients

Nutella - 1.5 cup
Egg - 3 large
All Purpose Flour - 1 cup
Preparation

• Heat oven to 350 degree
• Whisk Nutella and Egg till well blended
• Add flour and whisk till well blended (add 1 tbsp oil or butter if it seems too hard).
• Pour in a square pan or muffin liners (You could choose to use nuts in this stage, if you like them as a topping). Just for the easy of carrying I baked in muffin liners.
• Bake for 20 minutes.
• The ingredients mentioned here made me 16 brownies the size of these muffin liners.
• If you just want to make 5 or 6 use these ingredients (Nutella - 1/2 cup, All Purpose Flower - 1/4 cup and Egg - 1 large)

Serving
I served them warm as that is what brought the best taste. As you can see from my picture, I served few as it is and few with Nutella spread at the top.


This is my entry to Bookmarked Recipes - Every Tuesday (Volume 84)event.

That's all for now. Take care till next post.

Semiya Kesari - सेमिया केसरी (Vermicelli Pudding) - April Blog Hop

Hello Friends,


Here is my late entry for April Blog Hop. Another apology to Radhika and Gayatri.


Gayatri has this amazing collection of recipes. But, I specially wanted to try this one as I had created pudding out of semiya, but never a kesari, so it intrigued me and I have to say it didn't disappoint :)

Semiya Kesari - सेमिया केसरी (Vermicelli Pudding)

Ingredients

Semiya (Vermicelli) - 1 cup

Milk (I used Skim) - 2 cups

Sugar - 3/4 cup

Ghee - 1/3 cup 

Saffron - a couple of strands

Saffron Food Color - 2 pinches (optional)

Cardamom Powder - 1/2 tsp

Broken Cashew Nuts - 1 tbsp

Golden Raisins - 1 tsbp

Preparation

• Lightly roast semiya in about 1 tbsp of ghee. Keep it aside.
• In 2 tsp ghee, fry raisins till they are plump and cashew nuts till they are nice and golden (separately).
• Soak saffron in a tbsp of warm milk.
• Boil milk and add vermicelli to it and mix well.
• Once milk is all absorbed, add sugar and cardamom powder to it.
• When sugar is all melt, add all the rest of the ingredients and mix well.
• Cook for another 2-3 minutes (mixing frequently).
• Serve it warm.

Serving

Served it as dessert. I always serve warm as that is how we prefer in our house.

Do check what other blog hoppers made for April Blog Hop.

That's all for now. Take care till next post.

Celebrating 2 years of my blog and Chhena Poda (Indian Cheese Cake) for ICC March 2012

Hello All,


Wow, what a long break I had from the blog. I am not sure how to start explaining my MIA status. Of course I was busy, which was one reason, but I guess the other reason was what I have heard some bloggers call "Bloggers' Block" or something like that. Basically, there was no enthu to post anything. It was as if life had something missing. I missed my blog big time. I hope and will do my best to be regular now. It also means that I have not really been cooking anything special or worth blogging about. 


See, the whole point of this blog was to share unseen and unknown or even famously known Rajasthani and some other recipes that people can learn from and enjoy. But, as that was the missing piece, there was nothing to blog about. We were literally eating usual same old dal/roti or roti sabzi all these days. Seriously, no kidding. My son would tell me every evening, again rice, again roti, why can't you do something different. And, I didn't have answer. Anyways, enough of my vent.


So, here I am with a very new and superb recipe called "Chhena Poda" or Indian Cheese Cake. This is a recipe from blog Anyone Can Cook. Very authentic Orissa Recipe. Orissa is south-eastern state of India. Please check her blog to find more mouth watering Oriya recipes. This was fortunately chosen as ICC recipe for this month. I am super duper late in posting it, and I have already apologized to Valli about it.


Now, that it is really late, but you know how they say "better late than never". My this small blog has also completed 2 years as of Feb 17th 2012. So, I would also like to thank my blog readers and fellow bloggers for all the encouragement and feedback that my blog and I have received in these 2 years. Thank you everyone, without you I couldn't be where I am today and you give me the strength to keep going :)


Without further boring you, here is the recipe which I loved and is our own variety of cheese cake that I am sure if you haven't already made and enjoyed, you will surely do so.


Chhena Poda (Indian Cheese Cake)

Ingredients

Full Fat or Low Fat Milk - 6 cups (this produced 1.5 cups Chenna/Khoya - Milk freshly curdled)
Lemon Juice - 2-3 tbsps
Suji ( Fine Semolina) – 1/4 cup
Fine Sugar - 3/4 cup (increase per your preference, I found this enough)
Cardamom powder - 1 teaspoon
Raisins - 1/4 cup
Cashew nuts - 2 tbsp Broken pieces (optional)
Ghee (Clarified Butter) - 1 tbsp

Preparation

• Boil milk in a heavy bottomed pan and let it come to boil.
• As soon as it starts boiling, add the lemon juice and simmer the milk for 5 min.
• You will immediately see that milk starts curdling. Mix it once and switch off the gas.
• After it cools down for about 3-4 min, strain it in a muslin cloth or fine mesh, to remove all whey. (This whey can be used to make soups or mix dough etc, so, don't just let it drain, but instead save it).
• Meanwhile, pre-heat your oven to 360 degree F.
• Nicely wring the muslin cloth to get rid of all the moisture from Chhena.
• Mix all the other ingredients well into this chhena and mash it well with your hands.
• To get nice caramelized effect, take the pan you will be using to make this cake, spread some ghee (clarified butter) in the bottom and on the sides.
• Sprinkle some sugar at the bottom and hold it right above the gas for a min. or so, to slightly melt it.
• Add the mashed chhena mixture, level it and bake it for about 1.5 hours or till a tooth pick comes out nice and clean.
• After it cools down a bit, turn it upside down and serve right away or chill and serve.
• The ingredients given above makes a big enough cake for 4 slices, so great for a family of 4.

Serving
We enjoyed it as dessert after our meal. It tasted great both warm and cold.


That's all for now. Keep visiting and encouraging me like this.

Banoffee Pie for Sweet Punch of January

Hello Friends,


I am here after another long gap. But, I am here with a wonderful Banoffee Pie recipe that was picked as this month's Sweet Punch recipe. It is a wonderful English Dessert.


I got to tell you how daunting it looked first and then how really easy it was to make. It was like just assembling everything, if you use pre-made Dulce De Leche. Of course, I chose to make my own Dulce De Leche, but a short-cut way explained very nicely by Aquadaze. She has listed a couple of ways of making it and me being me, I picked the easiest one. Actually, I made it at the last minute and did not have time to do the original authentic way of cooking condensed milk for 3 hours, which I will surely try the next time.


Without further ado, here is the recipe and enjoy the pics that go with it. Sorry, I didn't get a pic where it looks overall or a slice pic, but hope you like these. 


Banoffee Pie
Recipe Resource: Swapna's Cuisine

Ingredients
Dulce De Leche - 1 can (14 oz.) - I made it using Aquadaze's Microwave method.
Digestive Biscuits - 2 cups, Marie or Parle G (like I used), powdered
Butter - 2 tbsps, melted
Banana - 3 medium ones, sliced
Whipped Cream - 2 cups (whip 2 cups of heavy whipping cream with desired amount of sugar, and that should be good enough)
Chocolate sauce or chips or cocoa powder - to drizzle at top for garnishing
Preparation

• Arrange all items before hand and it will be easy to assemble
• Mix powdered biscuits with butter and make a nice crusty dough and spread it as a first layer on the pie dish (I chose to bake this @ 350 F for 10 min.)
• Once the crust is @ room temperature, spread the layer of Dulce De Leche
• Now, arrange banana slices in any way you want. I added 2 layers of banana
• Cover the whole thing with desired amount of (or all of) whipped cream.
• Now, decorate it the way you want. In my house, none of the boys like chocolate, so I just went white with little grated chocolate.

Serving
Cut it into slices and serve it chilled.


That's all for now. Take care till next post.

Chakkarai/Sweet Pongal for Blog Hop

Hello Friends,


I don't know where to start. These last couple of weeks or shall I say months have been crazy busy. So, many things happening (nothing bad). Like I was telling this friend of mine, it is an action-packed days, full-to-busy from morning 4:30 am till 10 pm (before I crash in bed).


I guess I am also going through that blogger block or whatever it is called where I don't know what to do or what to post. And, again, I am also not cooking very new and uncooked dishes, so that is also one of the reasons.


Anyways, I want to apologize here to all my readers and my blogger friends whom I follow religiously as I did not get to post or visit anyone in last month or so.


I love Blog Hop event, but unfortunately, could not post my dish on time as I should have. Sorry Saras about it. I was paired with wonderful Saras. While I was going through her blog, this dish caught my eye right away and I knew what to make. I always wanted to try Chakkarai/Sweet Pongal as I love it as a prasadam. For my non South Indian friends who have not heard of this before, let me explain it. It is cooked rice/moong dal mix in milk and then sweetened with Jaggery and loaded with ghee. Have I tempted you enough? :)


Here is the delicious recipe.


Chakkarai/Sweet Pongal

Ingredients
Rice - 1 cup
Moong Dal - 1/3 cup
Milk - 1.5 cups
Water - 2.5 cups
Powdered Jaggery - 2 cups or to taste
Green Cardamom Powder - 1 tsp
Cashews - pieces, 2 tbsp
Ghee (Clarified Butter) - 3 tbsps
Preparation

• Pressure Cook Rice & Dal till almost mushy with Milk and Water mix (as mentioned above).'
• Meanwhile, heat jaggery with about 1/4 cup water till it melts nicely.
• Pour Jaggery water and 2 tbsp ghee in cooked rice/dal mix (add about 1/4 cup water, if needed).
• Add cardamom powder and mix well.
• In a small non-stick pan, fry cashew pieces to golden brown in 1 tbsp ghee.
• Mix cashews well with the sweet pongal and take it off the heat.

Serving
This is usually made as an offering to God, but we enjoyed it as a delicious dessert. If I were you, I will serve it warm :)


That's all for now. Hope to be back on track. Take care till next post.

Coffee and Chocolate Pudding - Sweet Punch for November 2011

Hello Friends,


Another month and another wonderful Sweet Punch Entry. This time it was mouth watering and super yummy Coffee & Chocolate Pudding. 


It was super easy to put together, about 5 minutes and then 20 min. to bake and this is a dessert that you can enjoy right out of the oven, so no need to wait for it to cool down completely :)


Enjoy !!!

  Print this recipe

Coffee and Chocolate Pudding

Recipe Source: Fair Lady
Ingredients (makes 4 servings)

All Purpose Flour - 1 cup
Baking Powder - 2 tsp
Cocoa Powder - 2 tsp
Salt - one pinch
Brown Sugar - ½ cup
Butter - 2 tbsp, melted
Milk - ½ cup
Egg - 1, beaten
For the topping
Brown Sugar - ½ cup
Cocoa - 3 tbsp
Strong Black Coffee - 1 cup (I used Nescafe Decaf)
Preparation

• Preheat oven to 180°C. 
• Sift together dry ingredients.
• Stir through butter, milk and egg until well combined.
• Spoon batter into 4 ramekins.
• Sprinkle over brown sugar and cocoa then pour over coffee but do not stir.
• Bake for 20 minutes.
• Dust with cocoa powder or cinnamon and sugar; serve with vanilla ice cream.

Serving
I could not take pics of this, but I served it with a big dollop of Nutella at the top and warming it again to let that Nutella melt and have more gooey chocolate :)


That's all for now. Take care till next post.

Buttery Jam and Nutella Tarts for Sweet Punch

Hello Friends,


Another month and another wonderful Sweet Punch time. This time, we had to re-create Ria's Buttery Jam Tart.


It was so much fun making them. Took me hardly 5 minutes to put them together, another 20 min. for baking them and then the last difficult 30 min. of waiting for it to cool down for us to eat them. Results, we loved them. They were very buttery and the tart themselves were crumbly.


Buttery Jam and Nutella Tarts

Ingredients
All Purpose Flour - 1 cup (this will make about 5 muffin sized tarts)
Butter - 1/2 cup (chilled)
Baking Powder - 1/2 tsp
Jam - 5 tbsps
Nutella - 2 tbsp
Preparation

• Pre-heat your oven to 360 degree Fahrenheit
• Sift the flour and mix butter to it slowly. You will have a smooth dough in less than a min.
• Divide them in equal sized 5 balls.
• Prepare your mini tart pan or muffin pan with liner (as I did not have a tart pan).
• Flatten each ball you made earlier a little and put then in muffin/tart pan to take the shape of the pan.
• Fill some tarts with jam till they are about 3/4 full.
• The tarts that you want to fill Nutella with, bake them without any filling.
• Put your tarts/muffins in the oven and bake for about 20 min.
• Let them cool completely before you take them out.
• Now, fill the tarts that are empty with Nutella. You can let it set and then fill it again with some chocolate ganache per your liking.

Serving
I am guessing you will grab them right out of oven, I mean after they cool down. We would have loved them with ice-cream or whipping cream, but we finished them even before we could get to that stage... lol


Looking forward to baking the next Sweet Punch !!!


That's all for now. Take care till next post.

Quinoa Cake Stix for Blog Hop

Hello Friends,


Another week of Blog Hop, love it, get to try different blogs and different recipes. Please check out what all this is about.


So, this week, I am paired with Jabeen of Jabeen's Corner, who has this amazing blog and I wanted to try something different, out of my comfort zone. So, I chose these Quinoa Cake Stix recipe, which she had made during MAITRI event.

As I was browsing, it immediately caught my eye and I wanted to try it out. I used her recipe all the way to Ts and Dots. So, please hop on her blog to check out the recipe. I have to tell you, I wasn't disappointed. I had these yummy, delicious, full of banana flavor, soft bread. No one would ever imagine that it had quinoa in it. Great texture, simply superb. Give it a try !!!

Please do check what other blog hoppers are cooking.

That's all for now. Take care till next post.

Jalebi for Indian Cooking Challenge - August

Hello Friends,


Nothing says "Celebration" like Jalebi, how many of you dream about eating it. OK, may be none of you. But, I do. When we plan India trip, I dream of this one place where we get really good Doodh Jalebi (meaning Jalebi with milk and cream). They serve it real warm and in those earthen pots. Now, to get that in US is difficult. We do get some decent jalebis, but nothing like homemade, right?


So, when Srivalli  announced Auagust's Indian Cooking Challenge, I was super excited and nervous both. Super excited as I love jalebi and nervous as I had never made them before in my life and I have heard horror stories about them going wrong.


I have to say that it wasn't as bad as I thought. Of course, I didn't get that professional shape and it doesn't look great, but believe me when I say that it tasted delicious and with warm milk, it reminded me of that old place :)


So, without further ado, here is the recipe. I have one more jalebi recipe bookmarked that I have to try, may be later !!!

Jalebi - जलेबी (Deep Fried Indian Dessert Soaked in Simple Sugar Syrup)

Ingredients

For the Jalebi batter

All purpose flour / Maida - 100 gm

Curds / Yoghurt - 1 cup 

Lime juice - 1 tsp 

Cornstarch - 30 gm 

Hot oil - 1 tbsp 

a large pinch of saffron color

pinch of salt
For the Sugar Syrup

Sugar - 1 cup 

Water - ½ cup 

Lime juice - 1 tsp
Oil for deep frying

Preparation

• Mix everything listed under batter till smooth.
• Keep it on the counter overnight for fermentation. Make sure that your jalebi batter is not too thin and can be pressed into spiral shape without disintegrating in water. It should be that of thick cake batter consistency or thinner than cookie dough consistency.
• Next day, heat oil for deep frying.
• While oil is heating, take sugar, lime juice and water in a separate pot and let it come to boil.
• Let it boil till it forms a one-thread consistency syrup (to check one-thread consistency, take a drop of syrup between your thumbs and index finger and slowly pull your fingers apart and it should form a thread).
• At this point, switch off the heat, but keep the syrup warm when dunking fried jalebis in it.
• Prepare jalebi batter for frying by pouring it into  a zip log bag and then making a very small hole at the end of the ziplock to dispense the batter. Take care in making a small hole, as we don't want really thick spirals.
• Once oil is hot (it has to be really hot to make them crispy), slowly dispense batter into the hot oil in spiral motion forming concentric circles of about 2-4 inches in diameter.
• Don't worry, if you don't get a perfect shape as after dunking them in syrup, everything will taste great, lol
• Once they are deep fried, gets a nice golden color (make sure they are not fried too much), dip them directly in the suryp. Keep them in syrup only for about 20-30 seconds and remove them.
• Continue making all jalebis till batter is done. Take care to make only as many jalebis in the hot oil as many the pot can hold as they expand or fluff a bit after frying and if they are crowded, they won't be cooked well. In a regular pot, you can fry upto 5 jalebis of my size at one time.
• From the measurements I gave, I made about 25 jalebis of 2.5 inch diameter.

Serving

Serve it just as it is, but warm is the best way to go. Or serve it the way we like, dipped in milk and topped with malai (cream).

That's all for now. Take care till next post.

Ultimate Brownie for Blog Hop

Hi Friends,


Today is the 3rd week of Blog Hop Wednesdays, an effort started by Radhika. It encourages us to blog hop and try our fellow blogger's recipes. Please check out what all this is about.


This week, I am paired with Anamika who has an amazing blog with great recipes and the best of all, some mouth watering pics and presentations. I have a couple from her blog bookmarked, but this is what I started with. She has this wonderful table in this post where she compiled some mouth watering brownie recipes from different sources and how they compare with each other. She picked this recipe Dorie Greenspan. Now, being a big Brownie fan, you can bet that I am going to try all those 6 recipes one by one, but this was the first one I wanted to try.


It came out perfect, not too crumbly, not too chewy, just perfect and melt in the mouth kind. How many of you have had those Brownie Petites @ COSCO (a store here in US). If you had those, you can compare these to the texture and taste of those. It took me just 10 minutes of preparation and 25 minutes of baking. It is that simple. So, what are you waiting for get started guys and make them. You will not regret. Thanks Anamika for that table and this delicious recipe.


Ultimate Brownie (Recipe of Dorie Greenspan)

Ingredients
Butter - 5 tbsp (I used salted to give that extra salty taste in my brownie, which I like, but feel free to use unsalted one to suit your taste buds)
Chocolate - 6 oz (I used semi-sweet squares of baking chocolate)
All-Purpose Flour - 1/3 cup
Sugar - 1/3 cup
Eggs - 2 large (I used egg beaters equivalent of 2 large eggs)
Vanilla - 1 tsp
Salt - 1/4 tsp
Preparation

• Prepare your favorite pan with parchment paper and then some butter on the parchment paper as well.
• Pre-heat oven to 350 degree F.
• Take a small saucepan on heat and melt butter and chocolate till smooth.
• Take it off the heat and let it come to room temp (about 4 min.or so)
• Add sugar and whisk till smooth.
• Add eggs, vainlla and salt and mix well till incorporated.
• Add whisked APF now and mix till smooth.
• Pour in the pan and bake for 25 - 30 minute or till toothpick comes out clean.
• Let it rest for at least 10 minutes before trying to eat it.
• Patience will be paid off :)
• I got 16 squares of the size you see in the picture from the ingredients mentioned above.

Serving
Serve them as it is or with ice-cream if you prefer it. I just had a warm brownie all by itself. What a divine pleasure it gives to a chocoholic like me. You have to be a chocoholic to understand that :)

Please do check what other blog hoppers are cooking.

That's all for now. Take care till next post.

Kesari Bhaat - केसरी भात (Saffron Infused Sweet Rice Preparation) - A Rajasthani Delicacy for my 401st Post

Hello Friends,


Updated: I had mistakenly written as 301st post whereas it is 401st. Silly me !!! :)


Wow, time just flies by, especially when you busy like hell. I have no memory of how these last couple of months passed. One more day and it will be September, whoa !!! Where has all the time gone? When I wake up in the morning, I usually consider that day almost done as it will pass without me doing anything, busy, busy, busy. 


OK, enough babbling. Today I am so happy that I am actually writing my 301st post. Can you believe, 401st post? It has been about 1.5 years since I started this blog, which was just an effort to have some Rajasthani recipes in one place as I did not find a single blog which had a lot of those. Most of the places had only those well-known 5 or 6 recipes. I am so proud to say that my blog boasts of about 90+ traditional Rajasthani and slight fusion recipes.


Also wanted to mention that I have now 316 follows (thanks everyone) and 228,729 hits.


Thank you to all my blogger friends and readers for their continued support and encouragement to make this blog what it is. If you all were not there, this blog wouldn't be where it is today. Thanks !!!


To celebrate this occasion, I am sharing a traditional and very commonly made Rajasthani sweet rice preparation. If you guys ever had Zarda recipe (a traditional Muslim Rice preparation), this is very similar to that.  Very easy to make and a perfect way to end your meal. I apologize for not a great picture. I was in real rush when I took it. When I make it again, I will try to replace this pic with a better one.


Kesari Bhaat - केसरी भात (Saffron Infused Sweet Rice Preparation)

Ingredients
Long Grain White Rice - 1 cup
Boiling Water - 1.5 - 2 cups (keep an eye on the rice while cooking and add more, if needed)
Sugar - 3/4 cup (adjust the quantity to suit your needs)
Saffron - a few strands (soaked in few tbsp of warm water)
Mixed nuts - 1/4 cup of your choice
Green Cardamom Powder - 1/2 tsp
Ghee (Clarified Butter) -2 tbsp
Preparation

• Wash and Soak rice for 1-2 hours. Drain after the period.
• Meanwhile in a non-stick pan take 1/2 tbsp ghee and fry your choice of mixed nuts) and keep separate.
• Take a heavy bottomed pan (to make sure that rice doesn't stick to the bottom) and add the remaining ghee.
• Once ghee is hot, add drained rice and fry till rice becomes translucent.
• Add boiling water to it along with saffron infused water and let it cook covered till it is about 3/4 way  cooked. Keep stirring every few minutes to make sure it doesn't stick to the bottom.
• Now, add sugar and cardamom powder. Mix well and cook to perfection.
• Mix in fried nuts and serve warm.
• Because of all the ghee and frying rice, the rice grains will be very fluffed and separate and not become mushy, unless you add a lot of water or overcook this recipe.

Serving
This is traditionally made on occasions as a perfect ending of a feast. Enjoy !!!


At this point, I also want to apologize to my fellow bloggers as I haven't been as regular in checking everyone's blogs as I was before. I am trying my best, but something it gets difficult to check every post. But, that is not an excuse, I will give it my best, I promise :)


That's all for now. Take care till next post.