Clove Tea and Coconut Date Cake

I love tea, and have managed to transfer my affection for this unassuming brew over to my  husband. I am fussy about the temperature and variety and in winter I love to add spices in my tea. Clove is one such variation. The tea I used for this particular recipe was whole leaf Assam tea.
For texture purposes this a full bodies black tea, usually the kind found in the English breakfast blends. This also holds it own with a bold flavor like cloves. To make clove tea my way is pretty simple.
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A fall kind of dish

Most people who know me, know my love for fall, I love the colors, the nip in the air, the apples, the pears and the soft rustle of fall leaves under my feet. It is the only time of the year, I am not quite so excited about the rain, not that I do not like to see the vivid colors against the sombre skies on a rainy day, or like to simmer my favorite stew on a cool dark day, the rain takes the crunch of the leaves away.

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A blush of summer -Blueberry chocolate chip muffins

This week I have been really enjoying the complete onset of the farmers market season, possibly in my mind a complete herald of summer. I have been enjoying berries and of course all the bounty from our yard.A couple of weeks back I was really excited to see a lone blueberry on the tree - the first one at least on the few small bushes that we have. Well, I took a picture that came out blurry, by the time I realized it the blueberry had been eaten. The next few weeks I tried looking for the same effect and took a few more pictures and was please. Well, until I stepped out today, every little cluster had a single lone blueberry, for me a sight for sore eyes. It was just the effect that I had been looking for and I took some pictures that I think were just what I was looking for. Silently as I drank in their beauty I realized in quite pleasure, nature cannot be rushed. We cannot capture it on our terms but rather need to wait patiently and learn to enjoy and cherish its beauty on its own terms.

This morning, I made a brunch for father's day. A quite affair just the four of us. The kids were excited and I know, that is really how the father in this house likes it. On such a day, I always miss my own father. It is more than just the distance that separates up. Bapi is too sick these days to be very interactive. I cannot often speak to him spontaneously. It has to be a planned event.

Well, I made these little chocolate chip blueberry mini-muffins. I would actually call then mini-cupcakes, but I was adviced by the two cupcake experts in my house that cupcakes have to have frosting and anything without are just muffins. They tasted great, so what's in a name.

For the base, I actually used this recipe for an eggless cake. I made a couple of variations to it, used whole wheat pastry flour and melted butter instead of the oil and all purpose flour. Of course I added the blueberries and chocolate chips and most of these are already gone.

Blueberry Chocolate Chip Muffins

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Cook Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients

1 cup of yogurt (preferable 1-2 days old)

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

11/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 cup melted salted butter

11/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour

1/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

1/3 cup blueberries

Ground nutmeg

Cooking spray for greasing the muffin pan

Method of Preparation

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees F.

2. Place the yogurt in a bowl and add the sugar and beat well till the sugar is dissolved.

3. Stir in the baking soda and baking powder and let this rest for 3-4 minutes, the mixture should appear nice and frothy.

4. Gently stir in the butter.

5. Mix in the sifted flour in small amounts until well mixed.

6. Stir in the blueberries and chocolate chips.

7. Dust very lightly with ground nutmeg.

8. Grease the muffin pans and add 2-3 teaspoons of the batter and bake for 20 minutes.

9. Turn off the heat and let these muffins rest in the oven for 10 minutes.

10. Remove from the oven and serve when completely cool.

Gulab Jamuns - Cheese and evaporated milk balls in syrup

These golden globes of joy are a common presentation in almost any Indian restaurant menu. In fact, even my son knows this dessert by name. I made these for Diwali and tried them again using this recipe.

I pretty much stuck to the recipe without any modifications, I did elimate the cardamoms from the syrup. I patiently made the khoya cooking down 1/2 gallon of milk. The results were really luscious.

Now, I also make a variation which is my mothers in laws recipe where she makes the balls with a proportion of 1/3 paneer to 2/3 khoya and adds just a little flour to bind.

All were happy and let me send this over just a little late to the ICC.

Diwali and Holidays

This holiday in India, is a big one in Northern India - the festival of lights, the start of a new year! So it is a very big deal for Anshul and his family. In Eastern India, it is celebrate similarly and called Kali Puja. In India, this marks the end of a month of various holidays, I like to think of it as the continuation of the holidays. Commencing with Durga Puja, the holiday season ends with the New Year for us.
Aadi's preschool tries to observe all the holidays - Chinese New Year, Easter, Rosh Hashanah, Diwali, Thankgiving... I think you get the drift. This purple diya was made by him. On Diwali morning, I tried making a simple quick dessert. Really nice and comforting especially given the



frigid temperatures we have been having here.

A phirni is traditionally a dessert made of ground rice and milk. I have made this with oatmeal and ground almonds.
Try this some morning for something special or for a nice simple and reasonably healthy dessert at night.

Oatmeal Phirni

Cook Time: 25 minutes

Ingredients

1 quart whole milk

1/2 cup evaporated milk

4-5 cardamoms

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup rolled oats

1/2 cup powdered almonds

1 teaspoon saffron strands

Method of Preparation

1. Bring the whole milk and the evaporated milk to a boil and cook for 5 minutes.

2. Add in the cardamoms, sugar and oats and cook on medium heat for 15 minutes. The mixture should have a thin porridge like consistency.

3. Stir in the almonds and saffron. Serve warm.

If you want to get some spices on the cheap stop by at the local Bhavik Grocery, he has a whole bunch of items on sale, I picked up a large package of cinamon sticks for $1.99.

Stay tuned, have cooked up some interesting recipes, trying really hard to finish green tomatoes and have visited a bunch of interesting eating joints!

Durga Puja

This year, I shall actually try to do a festival series on the blog. This series is really for my little daughter. She went to the Durga Puja in Stamford, CT this weekend and now wants the entire lowdown!

The next two months are really festive season all across Indian - with a multitude of festivals, Durga Puja, Navratri, Eid, Diwali. I wish I knew all about each one of these in detail, but I think I know enough to cover most of them. Actually one of the benefits of growing up in a secular country like India, there really is no dirth of festivals.

Simply speaking the story of Durga is the eternal commemoration of the victory of good over evil.

The demon Mahishashura was rewarded by Shiva with a boon that he would not be killed by any man. He took advantage of this and continued to terrorize people. The gods fed up of this, created the goddess Durga, who epitomizes the power of the woman. She is a 10-armed mother goddess who rides a lion. She is show with her 4-children who come to earth with their mother and also in turn merit their own festivals. Durga is shown as slaying Mahishasura thus symbolizing the triumph of good over evil.

While this is technically a ten-day festival commencing with Mahalaya, most of the religious festivities take place during the last five days of the festivals. There are different religious offers, most notably prayers including pushanjali (floral
There are food offerings most popularly the myriad number of sweets.

However possibly what I miss is the incredible transformation that takes place in the city of Kolkatta during these days - the city gets caught up in a week long carnival where Mardi Gras meets Christmas with a very Indian flavor. There are makeshift pavelions created in every nook and corned with different variations of Durga, there are food stalls, balloon stands and the city forgets to sleep!

To bring back just a little memory of this period, I made Sondesh probably the closest to Indian Cheesecake make with fresh paneer. Here is how I made it

Sondesh - Indian Cheesecake

Prep/Cook Time 2 hours (1.5 hours for the cheese to drain)

Make 12 lime sized sondesh balls

Ingredients

1/2 gallon 2% milk

4 cardamoms

1 cup yogurt

1/2 cup sugar

1 tablespoon rose-water

To garnish

Crasins

Powdered pistachios

Method of Preparation

1. Bring the milk slowly to a boil and gently stir in the yogurt. In less than a minute the milk separates into paneer and whey.

2. Turn the heat off, drain the solids into a cheesecloth, tie and hand the cheesecloth for about 1.5 hours to let the water drain out.

3. Remove from the cheese cloth and place into your food-processor with the sugar and process for about 2 minutes. The cheese actually begins to gather into a ball at this point.

4. Place in a heavy bottomed (preferably non-stick) pan and cook on low heat for about 6-7 minutes. The mixture begin separating form the pan at this point. Let this cool.

5. Shape into balls, top with a craisin and dust with pistachios and serve.

Modak - Rice dumplings stuffed with coconut

I want to play too, I kept thinking everytime I saw the Indian Cooking Challenge I wanted to join however I was concerned about whether I would be able to do the posts on time. However at the end of the day, the temptation and inspiration to cook authentic traditional dishes got the better of me. I joined in a couple of weeks back, and decided to start with Modak.

I have often looked at the descriptions of these lovely rice flour dumplings stuffed with rich and gooey coconut but never been brave enough to try them. I made them following the recipe from mints on the website completely. This itself is a challenge for me not to try and improvise. I made this is with quite a bit of trepidation, but honestly this turned out very well. The first few modaks had slightly more covering that needed, but after shaping a couple I got the hang of this. As I see the other pictures, I shall get a better idea of how to shape them. The recipe is as follows.

Modak from Mints

Ingredients Needed

For the Stuffing -2 cups freshly grated coconut (she says you can use frozen unsweetened coconut - that is what I used)

1 cup jaggery (grated)

1 tbsp poppy seeds

1 tsp cardamom powder

one pinch nutmeg (optional)

2 tbsp water (her mom uses milk, I did that too)

For the outer layer or Cover -

1 cup rice flour

1.25 cup water

pinch of salt

1 tbsp oil

Method for preparing the Stuffing

Roast the poppy seeds in a small skillet and let it cool down. Grind it coarsely and keep it aside. In a heavy bottom pan, take add the grated jaggary, and the milk and melt. Add in the grated coconut. Keep stirring so that it does get burnt in the bottom.In about 5 -7 mins you will see the mixture getting solid, at this stage add the cardamom powder (I did not use nutmeg).

When you see the mixture turning yellowish, more like golden and sticking to the sides, you can turn off the flame add the poppy seeds powder, mix well and set it aside to cool down.

Method for preparing the outer cover

I used a pressure cooker container for this. Start boiling water and add the salt and oil.When water starts boiling, lower the heat and slowly add rice flour. The flour needs to be added gradually however the overall process is quite speedy. The end result here is a snowy smooth mixture.

Now close the lid and take the pot off the heat. Let the covered pot cool down for 15 minutes or so. At this point the dough needs to be further kneaded, I used my hands for this, but it is soft enough to use a mixing spoon. 1-2 tablespoons of flour can be added to make this more manageable, but actually the rice flour worked fine.

Making the Modak

For making the Modak divide the dough into 20 balls and the stuffing into equal size of 20 balls. These modaks need to be shaped closer to a garlic, my look like fat macaroons. You actually get moulds for these. Shape the rice flour mixture like a kachori, and place the coconut filling inside it. Cover and seal.

They get placed in a steamer and steamed for about 15 minutes. After that they are left to settle as is for 5-10 minutes. These are traditionally eaten with ghee. I was so curious to try them, I had them immediately.

Red Therapy

A plate full I can deal with, a food processorful is daily fare, but there has been much more than usual going on. I am reaching the end of something I have worked on for a while but am really loosing steam on the project.

Also, my son is getting to a new phase, we are trying to get him more independent for next year. It might seem long, but is not that much in the real scheme of things. Aadi and I don't deal with change well. I am really struggling with little things like not helping him with the t-shirt that both of us know he can handle by himself. I have a harder time being firm with him. In general, there is just too much going on, as with other things when I am stressed out I cook. Lately I have been blogging a little more than usual, oh well there are worse things that I could be doing.The beetroots and the beetgreens are quite normal this time of the year, but yesterday I stared at the latest batch like I had never seen them before. Well, if you really focus on the vivid color it is truly quite stunning - hence beetroot red. Well, I have to confess now that I put this in perspective I dont think anyone other than the beet can mimic this stunning color. So it really is not an apt expression but then again, neither is turning tomato red.

I decided to capitalize on the natural sweetness of the vegetable and made beetroot halwa. This is my first attempt at making this, I have for some reason just not done much with beets except roasting them. I loved the results. I used lowfat milk some sugar and clarified butter.

We ate this greedily for breakfast before we set off on a one-day trip to explore the valley. You shall hear about that later.

Beetroot Halwa

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Cook Time: 45 minutes

Serves 6-8 people

Ingredients

6 small to medium sized beets

2 cups lowfat (2% milk)

3 cardamoms

1/2 cup sugar (adjust this to your taste)

2 tablespoons ghee

Toasted coconut to garnish

Method of Preparation

1. Peel the beets and grate them in a food processor.

2. Place these in a heavy bottomed pan and pour the milk over the beets. The effect of the milk turning pink is quite dramatic.

3. Add in the cardamoms and cook the liquid on medium low heat stirring occasionally until the milk is almost evaporated, you can seed the beets again in clumbs with the thick liquid boiling away around the sides.

4. Add the sugar and continue cooking until all the liquid is evaporated.

5. Add the ghee and mix well the the mixture is a soft, dry glistening mass. I cook this to leave some texture in the dish, you can grate the beets finer for a completely mashed variation.

The theme for this month's Sugar High Friday is vegetables, so I am sending this red creation over to the expatriate kitchen, that is hosting the event for August. The event was started by the Domestic goddess.

Monsoon Cake

This was yet again one of those chance forays with baking, that surprised me. A few weeks back we were visiting these dear friends of ours - the Brushes and I was all set to make a chocolate cake since that was high on the popularity rating, my resolve began to change one I realized how much tropical fruit I had (bits and pieces) sitting around. I had a rather juicy clementine, some pineapple and of course the bananas that had reached that level of fragrant ripeness, where you were reminded of their presence every time you stepped into the kitchen.

The ingredients were whizzed together in my food processor and cooked on low heat and cooled overnight. The cake does bring a lot of complexity of flavors, so you want to let it settle down nicely before serving. I think the overnight did it for me.

Monsoon Cake

Wet Ingredients

Juice of one Clementine (about 1/4 cup)

3 very ripe bananas (peeled and mashed)

4 eggs

3/4 cup ricotta cheese (1 used part skim)

1/2 cup low fat sour cream

3/4 cup vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla

Dry Ingredients

1 cup white all purpose flour

3/4 cup whole wheat flour (atta)

1/2 cup powdered unsweetened coconut

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon freshly ground cinnamon

1/2 cup dried cranberries

For the topping

1/2 cup molasses

1/4 cup water

1/3 cup butter

1 cup thinly sliced pineapple

1/2 cup almonds

Method of Preparation

1. Prepare a cake pan, I used a 10 inch spring form pan, by greasing it lightly.

2. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

3. Place the wet ingredients in a mixing bowl (I used the food processor) and mix until well mixed.

4. Place all the dry ingredients except the cranberries and stir well. Mix in batches into the wet mixture until very well mixed. Stir in the cranberries.

5. Line the base of the cake pan with the pineapples and almonds.

6. Cook the molasses, butter and water until just mixed through and pour over the pineapples.

7. Pour the cake batter over the pineapple topping. Bake in the oven for 45-50 minutes.

8. Cool overnight and then remove.

9. Enjoy with your favorite cup of tea.

A little flexibility

I have been having this odd shoulder pain, that is undefined by the doctors. This is most frustrating to me, not to mention my dear precise husband, who quizzes me on how I am comunicating the issue to the doctors.

I was like - I am in pain, this I can tell them. The reality is though I do not like fuss and details, this is very much reflected in my cooking. Probably why I am not much of a baker.

This recipe made me try, though! The term anything was a good sell, I pretty much followed the recipe, used whole wheat flour, raw brown sugar and lots of blueberries! No sugar lemon drizzle either. Verdict from the kids! Oh like blueberry muffin, I suppose they had a point.

Lime Coconut Blueberry loaf

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 40 minutes

Makes 1 loaf

Ingredients

1/2 cup vegetable oil (1 used canolla and 3 tablespoons cocconut)

1 cup plain yogurt (1used homemade 2%)

3 eggs

3/4 cup raw turbinado sugar

Zest of two limes

Juice of two limes

3/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon wholewheat pastry flour.

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 cups + 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

Method of Preparation

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease and prepare a loaf pan.

2. In the bowl of a large food processor, place the oil, yougurt, eggs, sugar, lime zest and lime and pulse till blended.

3. Sift together the dry ingredients (except 1 tablespoon flour) and add in two batches to the wet ingredients.

4. Pour the mixture into a mixing bowl.

5. Toss the blueberries with 1 tablespoon of flour, and stir into the batter.

6. Pour the batter into the loaf tin and bake in the oven for about 40 minutes, the cake is well browned and an inserted toothpick comes out dry from the center.

7. Cook throughly and slice and serve.

As Easy as Pie

My personal contribution to these troubled times is to try to minimize the amount of food that I through out. Well, I hate to admit it, I do tend to buy food things very spontaeneously and as I have bemoaned earlier that the general tendency our stores have in that they sell us more that we really need, this tends to be bad in several ways,

1. Bad for the planet, yes once in a while I think about that.2. It can be bad for business, in that it turns off people who do not want quite so much.

Anyhow, I am so not a baker, baking for me is just too precise a culinary form for me. However, I think I have finally figures out the baking form that might cut it for me, with a little bit of help - making a pie. The little bit of help is the readymade piecrust. Well, the pie I am blogging about is my third exceedingly successful creation just this year and guess why the pies work for an experimental indian cook like me - they do not need to be exact. Now, I am sure the pie too have their challenges but not these once that I have tried. So here is a pretty good effort. I will confess however, what I used here will be most of the creadit for this dessert belongs to a lovely jam that I had found in the farmer's and is made by a company called Harvest Song.

So this is how I did this,

Pear and Apricot Pie

Serves Six

Ingredients

1 premade pie crust
2 bartlet pears
1 cup apricot jam
1/3 cup apricot nectar
2 tbsp butter

Method of preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
2. Cook the crust for about 10 minutes.
3. Thinly slice and core the pear (do not peel).
4. Arrange the pears around the pie shell in an overlapping circle.
5. Mix the jam, nectar and butter in a bowl and heat in the microwave or stove top till mixed.
6. Pour over the pears and bake for 30 minutes.
7. Serve warm.

Orange Cranberry Pudding

No matter how I slice it, I really am not a baker. Baking is too precise a science for me. This time of the year however most people think if you cook, you should bake. I cobbled these together for a daycare event. Actually, I love the moist and very flavorful results.

I used a lot of fresh clementine juice and a packaged pancake mix for the batter to keep it really simple. The fresh cranberries and powdered cloves helped, finally drizzled it with mapple syrup. The little ones loved it!

Orange Cranberry Pudding Cakes

Makes 18 servings

Ingredients

4 fresh clementines

1 lemon

6 eggs

1 tsp powdered cloves

1 cup ricotta cheese

1/2 cup half and half

3/4 cup fresh organic cranberries

1.5 cups pancake mix

To garnish

1 cup mapple syrup

2 tbsp tripple sec

Additional orange juice if desired

Sliced almonds

Method of Preparation

1. Squeeze the clemetines and the lemon juice. Mix them together and set aside.

2. Grate the zest of the fruit and mix with the juice.

3. Separate the eggs and whip the whites till softly peaked.

4. Beat the yolks separately and then beat with the clementine juice till pale colored and frothy.

5. Mix in the ricotta cheese and cranberries.

6. Gradually add the pancake mix and finally fold in the egg white.

7. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees farenheight.

8. Pour the mixture into buttered ramekins or muffin pans and bake in the oven for 30 minutes.

9. Cool slightly and unmould.

10. Mix the maple syrup with the tripple sec and additional orange juice (if using).

11. Pour about 3-4 tbsp of the mixture on the puddings. Garnish with the sliced almonds and serve.

Note: This does not result in a very sweet pudding, but I think it tastes fine with the mapple syrup. If additional sweetness is desired, some powdered sugar can be added in step 8.

Deflated Aha moment

Ever took the effort to look up something healthy, felt really thrilled with your self, as in a "aha moment"Well, that kind off was my first thinking when I found this recipe on Ashwini's blog.I was like, look here is a nice healthy dessert for the kids, well I first tried this on Anshul and we both finished one-third of this until it went to the kids, well guess what, they rejected it completely...Ok so much for the "aha moment"..

This is an incredibly satisfying simple and lovely dessert nonetheless. I modified the recipe a little

Raji Halwa -Finger Millet flour Pudding

Serve 12

Ingredients

1 cup finger flour

1.5 cups light coconut milk

1 cup water

3/4 cup powdered jaggery

2 tbsp ghee

1/2 tsp saffron

1 cup blanched almonds

Method of Preparation

1. Mix the ragi with the coconut milk and water.

2. Place in a pan and simmer stirring constantly till the mixture thickens.

3. Add in the jaggery and contine stirring till the mixture reaches a fudgelike consistency.

4. Stir in the ghee and mix throughly.

5. Stir in almonds and spread uniformly on a plate and enjoy!

Pomegranate Yogurt Mousse

This dessert was a refreshing way to end the weekend. It was a nice balance of flavors with a touch of sweetness tempered with just a hint of richness. It was in fact a lot like what my mood had been over this thanksgiving weekend, my general thankfulness over the general peace and quite in my house, the fact that I have happy and healthy children is tempered with the general economic problems surrounding us and of course my sheer shock with all the events in Mumbai, India.

Pomegranate Yogurt Mousse

Serves 6

Ingredients

1 carton organic non-fat vanilla yogurt
5 cups pom wonderful pomegranate juice
3 cloves
1 tsp grated ginger
1/2 cup raw cane sugar
1 envelope unflavored gelatin
1/2 cup chilled whipping cream
1 cup pomegranate seeds (about 1.5 pom wonderful pomegranates)

Method of Preparation

1. Place the yogurt in a colander lined with a cheese cloth and place in a bowl and let this drain for 4-5 hours.
2. Heat the pomegranate juice with the cloves and ginger for 1 hour till about 1/3 in volume. Strain the spices and stir in the sugar and gelatin and let this cool.
3. Whip the cream till stiff.
4. Beat the strained yogurt with the reduced juice till smooth and mix in the cream.
5. Prepare six individual bowls or one large bowl, spoon some of the yogurt mixture to fill about half the mixture, layer with pomegranate seeds and cover with the rest of the mixture.
6. Chill for at least six hours, serve decorated with additional pomegranate seeds if desired.

Pinenut Saffron Popsicles - Chilgoza Kesar Kulfi

We had traveled to Antartica in 1999 (what seems like a lifetime ago), on a ship. Outside of the other interesting aspects of the trip, it was nice to be able to spend so much time with other travelers. I did have a camcorder back then, but did not use a digital camera.
There were other on the ship who did and as one person told me, you have got to love digital - no bad pictures. I think of this one because, this particular recipe turned out lovely but was a bear to photograph. Thankfully, with some editing I have a somewhat respectable picture.

Jibe Goja - Fried Pastry in sugar syrup

Food events make the food blogging world a little more interesting. I love events, I do not have time to participate in most of them, but ever so often one of them catches my eye and I have stop by later to see what a variety of dishes are offered in the round-up even if I cannot participate. One event that I have been following since last year is RCI-Regional Cuisine of India. I think this event is such an amazing idea, just brilliant of Lakshmi to think of this.

This month RCI-Bengali is being hosted by Sandeepa at Bongmom's cookbook.



There are just so many interesting recipes, I finally settled for trying this sweet simple recipe. Jibe Goja is thinly rolled pastry dipped in a thick sugar syrup. Works wonderfully with tea and actually keeps fairly well for a few days in an air-tight container. The name is derived from the toungue shaped appearance, jib in bengali refers to tongue.

Jibe-Goja- Fried pastry in sugar syrup
Makes about 15 gojas

Ingredients
For the syrup

1 cup water
2 cups sugar

For the goja

2 cups flour
2 tbsp ghee
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
water to knead
Oil for frying

Method of Preparation

1. Make the syrup by boiling the water and sugar for 10 minutes. It should make a thick (1.5 strand consistency)
2. In the meantime, mix the ghee into the flour with the salt and sugar. This should be evenly mixed in with your hands.
3. Add the water to make a firm and smooth dough.
4. Let this sit for 30 minutes.
5. Break into small pieces and roll into long (toungue shaped) pieces.
6. Score well, to prevent this from puffing up while frying.
7. Fry till golden brown, drain the oil and dip into warm syrup for 1 minute.
9. Remove and set aside on a piece of parchment paper.
10. When this cools the Goja hardens just enough to make it flaky rather than soft.

Chocolate Cardamom Strawberries

Last weekend I went to visit my cousin in DC. Actually, I had to attend a conference and Anshul and the kids tagged along. While we did not do a lot, spring had certainly arrived in the capital, and, it was beautiful to get glimpses of the cherry blossoms and daffodils. Here in New York, the weather has improved, we are begining to see little things peeking out of the soil but they are not quite there yet.

On Friday evening, I wandered to Whole Foods Market to see what I could get by way of a gift. What caught my eye were these stunning stem strawberries. They were large and just the kind of stuff that make a still life artists day, they were pricey at $7.99 a pound, but, I had never seen such beautiful strawberries before. So, I got myself a pound. Then, I was left with figuring out what to do with them to make them even more special, so, I scrounged around my pantry. We had some white chocolate (that is what I like) and some good dark chocolate (everyone else likes that). And then I found a few pods of cardamom that I removed the seeds from and crushed very finely. I melted the white chocolate and added the cardamom into it. I dipped the strawberried into this, spread them on a sheet of parchment paper and kept them in the refrigerator for 20 minutes, in the meantime, I melted the dark chocolate. I then dipped the white chocolate strawberries into this again, simple, elegant and amazingly good results.

Strawberries are such a harbringer of spring, colorful and full of flavor. It certainly mixes with the pretty spring landscape. This is my entry for this weeks weekend herb blogging. It is hosted this week by Ahn at Food Lovers Journey.

Date-Pine Nut Cake with Fennel

As always, I find Mahanandi
a beautiful blog to visit. I was recently struck by this recipe, for a Date-Walnut cake. Firstly, when I went to make it I realized that I did not have any walnuts, then I played around with the flavorings but overall the results were really good and frankly this was quite wholesome for a cake.

Date-PineNut Cake with Fennel

Makes one loaf

Ingredients

1 cup wholewheat flour

1 cup all-purpose flour

3/4 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp fennel seeds

1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice

1 cup pinenuts

1 cup chopped dates

1/2 cup honey

1/2 cup dark brown sugar

1/4 cup soft butter

1 egg

1 cup buttermilk

Method of Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a loaf pan and set aside.

2. Mix the flours, baking soda, baking powder, fennel seeds, pumpkin pie spice in a large bowl.

3. Stir in the pinenuts.

4. Mix the dates in the honey.

5. Beat the sugar, butter and egg till smooth.

6. Add in the dates with the honey.

7. Add to the dry ingredients in batches with the buttermilk. Blend till smooth.

8. Pour into a pan and cook for 45 minutes till well browned. Serve hot with tea.

Interestingly enough, I made this rather late at night and was not sure about having tea at that time. Someone had sent me a gift of something called white tea that I had never had before. This happens to be a rather mild tea that needs to be steeped in hot but not boiling water. It is also much lower in caffiene than regular black tea so it makes a good late evening drink when you are craving tea at night.

Gajar Halwa - Simple but takes so .......Long!

Relationships like everything else in life are full of surprises. My husband takes this day pretty seriously, well I do not necessarily get 101 roses, but I do feel appreciated and special and he does do something nice ( last year he gave me a collection of movies by my favorite director, which took some time to find, things like that). The reason I find this surprising is not because he is generally not appreciative, but he generally is not especially a fan of what we call Hallmark pressure.

Anyhow, I am the dessert person in this house and unfortunately it shows. My husband does have a couple of favorites - good gulab jamuns and gajar halwa. He likes the former the way my MIL makes it but the later my way. I do this with a few basic ingredients and other than the time, it is fairly simple.

Gajar Halwa - Carrot Fudge

Makes 35 servings

Ingredients

4 lbs carrots
3/4 gallon whole milk
4 green cardamoms
3/4 cup sugar
3 tbsp ghee
1/2 cup raisins
1/3 cup chopped nuts

Method of Preparation

1. Peel the carrots and process them in a food processor or grate them.
2. In a heavy bottom pot, bring the milk to a boil and add the carrots cardamoms.
3. Turn the heat to very low and keep cooking stirring occasionally till fairly dry, this process takes 3-4 hours.
4. Add in the sugar and let the mixture turn fairly dry and shiny orange.
5. This takes about 40 minutes and it needs to be stirred frequently at this point.
6. Add in the ghee and raisins and nuts and cook stirring well for 10 minutes.
7. Cool slightly and serve warm. I like this with ice-cream.

Meeta is keeping us dishing out suggary treats with the sweet love theme.

Almond - Pine Nut Cookies

Some people are just clumsier than other at certain things, one of the things that I do not do well is pretty neat baked goods. I also stay away from the sugar because of the little ones, but this time of the year is an exception. In terms of making cookies, I find bar cookies to be maneagable since, you can control the shapes somewhat. This is what I thought I would send Habeas Brulee who is doing the Sugar High Friday event.

One of my favorite bar cookie books are A to Z Bar Cookies by Marie Simmons.

I tried these pine nut, almond cookies the other day, they are eggless and the results were satifying especially with my favorite cup of hot orange pekoe tea.

Almond Pine Nut Cookies

Ingredients

1 stick salted butter

3/4 cup grated jaggery

3/4 cup unbleached white flour

3/4 cup semolina

3/4 cup blanched almonds

1/2 cup half and half

3/4 cups pine nuts

For the topping

1/4 cup pine nuts

1/2 cup stawberry or apricot jam

1/2 cup powdered sugar

Method of Preparation

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. With a hand mixer, mix in the jaggery and butter till well mixed.

3. Sift the flour and semolina onto this mixture and mix well.

4. Make a paste with the almonds and half and half and mix into the batter.

5. Fold in the pine-nuts.

6. Grease a rectangular baking pan and pour the batter onto the pan and even out.

7. Bake for 30 minutes.

8. Let this cool for 10 minutes and invert onto a flat surface.

9. Gently toast the remaining nuts till lightly browned.

10. Heat the jam for 5 minutes, cool and strain.

11. With a brush brush this evenly onto the cookie bar.

12. Sift the powdered sugar onto the jammed suface.

13. Scatter the toasted pine nuts, cut into bars and serve.