Simple Yummy Chocolate Cake - Eggless and low fat

This cake I made for my daughter's friend. It was his birthday and she wanted to give him a surprise. But as usual she tells me late at night that she wanted me to bake a cake. She was leaving the house next day in the morning at 10am. So I baked this cake early in the morning, but forgot to take pics. A little batter I put in a rectangle tin for us to taste. So you can see only the slices. This cake is very easy to make. If you keep all the ingredients ready and preheat the oven the cake is ready in total 45 minutes. The result is light, somewhat like a cake brownie.

My daughter said that they all loved this cake and finished it in a jiffy. She too did not get a chance to click a photograph.

Ingredients

3/4 Cup Cocoa powder
1. 3/4 Cup All-purpose flour
1 Cup Sugar
1 Teaspoon Baking soda
1/4 Teaspoon Salt
1 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
1/2 Cup  Butter -melted and cooled

1 Cup Buttermilk - low fat
2 Teaspoons Vanilla essence

Method

Preheat the oven to 170 degrees. Oil a 9-inch, round cake pan and line it with parchment paper. Flour the pan, tap out the excess flour.

Stir together the cocoa, flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and sift it. Keep aside.
Whisk together the buttermilk, butter, and vanilla. Stir into the dry ingredients until all is moistened and mixed well.

Pour into the prepared cake pan, spreading the thick batter out to the edge. Tap the pan on your counter to even it out.


Bake for about 30 minutes, until the cake has risen and a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Cool for 5 to 10 minutes before unmolding.

Labels : Eggless, Cakes, Healthy, Bake a thon

For more cake recipes: See the recipe index.

Bake-a-thon 2014

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Kadve Vaal Chilly Fry

This a very tasty chilli fry, you will not find the bitterness of the vaal at all. In this dish I used bottle masala which is readily available in supermarkets or cold storage outlets. H is not very fond of Vaal.  When I served him this dish he loved the taste of it.

Ingredients
1 Cup Kadve Vaal -sprouted and cleaned
1 Medium Potato - sliced in quaters
3 Medium Onions - sliced
2 Green chillies - sliced
1 Small Tomato - sliced
1/2 + 1/2 Teaspoon Bottle Masala
1 Tablespoon Coriander - finely chopped
2 Tablespoons Oil
Salt to taste.

Method

To sprout the vaal soak the beans for 4 hours. Then put the beans in a cotton cloth and keep it in a dark place to sprout. After a day the bean will sprout. Place these beans in warm water for an hour and the skin will loosen . Peel the skins and keep the vaal aside (see pic).

Boil the vaal and potatoes with a pinch of salt, 1/2 cup water and 1/2 teaspoon bottle masala till the vaal is cooked. Dry all the water.

In a pan heat oil add the onions and fry till translucent add the green chillies and tomato, and fry or a minute add the boiled vaal and potato, 1/2 bottle masala and salt to taste fry well for 5 minutes on slow fire. stirring lightly. When done add chopped coriander and serve hot with rotis, bhakris or as a side dish with rice and dal.
Give this a try and you will definitely love it.

Sending this to the MLL event, to Lisa's MLL page and Susan's blog.


Labels: Vegetables, MLLA event

Tawa Pulao - Mumbai Street Food

This is the day 2 recipe that I have choosen from  here  for the Blogging Marathon.

Tawa pulao is a famous street food of Mumbai. A city which is always bustling with activity. People here have no time to look at eachother. Each one is running the rat race and moving with ticking of the clock. The fast life that they lead, people have less time to prepare meals, and you will find the street stalls busy with activity preparing meals for them.

This delicious rice is served in all street stalls in Mumbai. Tawa pulao as the name suggests is made on a tawa or large iron griddle. Pav bhaji masala is used for making this pulao and also uses veggies similar to that of pav bhaji. Tawa pulao tastes delicious when eaten fresh and hot. This can be served with raita or plain curd. ‘Tawa’ means griddle and ‘Pulao’ means "rice’. So basically tawa pulao is a rice preparation particularly made on a flat griddle on high heat (since I do not have a large tawa , made it in a large kadai). I like tawa pulao because it is a meal in itself as there are veggies too in it. In Mumbai you will get Tawa Pulao any time of the day. This Pulao is prepared in the same tawa in which pav bhaji is made and hence pav bhaji masala is main in ingredient, it contains a variety of spices. This pulao is usually served with raita on the streets of Amchi Mumbai.

Ingredients
2 Cups  Basmati rice – cooked
1 Onion –  chopped finely
1 Tomatoe –  chopped
1  Large Carrot –  diced into small pieces
1/4 Cup Green peas
1  Capsicum –  diced
2 Teaspoon Ginger - Garlic paste
A pinch Garam masala powder
2 Teaspoons Pav Bhaji masala powder
1 Teaspoon Red Chili powder
1 Tablespoon Coriander leaves - chopped

1 Green chilly - chopped
Salt - to taste

1 Tablespoon Butter
1/4 Cup Oil 

1 Teaspoon Cumin seeds

1 Tablespoon Lemon juice

Method:

Cook the rice and keep aside to cool.

Parboil all the vegetables except the capsicum and keep aside.

Heat butter+oil in a kadai, add cumin seeds allow it to crackle. Then add ginger-garlic paste and onion. Fry till slightly browned, then add tomato and saute till mushy, oil starts leaving the sides.Then add capsicum and saute for a minute  only. Add red chilli powder , garam masala powder and pav bhaji masala powder, salt to taste and saute till well blended. Then add the boiled veggies. Add  sprinkle little water (just for the spices to combine).  Add cooked rice and mix well. Cook in high heat for 2mins then switch it off. 

Squeeze lemon juice and add chopped coriander leaves. Serve hot, onion raita and with fried Appalam.

For the Boondi Raita:

1 Cup Thick Fresh Curds
1/2 Cup Masala Boondi
A pinch of Salt
A pinch of Chilly powder
A pinch Roasted Cumin powder

Method

Beat the curds well mix the boondi in the curds, add salt to taste and Serve with a sprinkle of chilli and cumin powder.

This was delicious.  

My Notes:
You can also prepare this with the previous day rice.

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM#47.

Labels: Blogging Marathon, Rice, Street food, Vegetarian, Raita, Boondi, Carrot, Green Peas, Capsicum, Mumbai

Samosa

Whenever you enter a restaurant the first thing that comes to your table is the menu card, you forget your hunger. You start browsing through the card and debating in the your mind whether to order this or that. This is exactly what happened to me when I was asked to pick a menu card and prepare three items from the card for the Blogging Marathon BM#47. I kept reading the cards and debating in mind what to prepare. After a lot of thinking I choose this one here. This is for the Day 1 of the Marathon, Samosa. 

Samosa is basically a fried pastry with savoury filling of spiced potatoes, peas or carrots.

Do you know that Samosa , is a popular brother the famous vada pav! The crisp outer crust of the samosa entices the person to have one more, and even one more!

As I was making these samosas it brought found memories, when my daughter was studying in school in the primary section, she would regularly make a demand for this and I use to make mini ones so that she could eat it without spilling and staining her school uniform. It also brought a another memory, when I recently visited my daughter in Brussels, I had made around fifty of these samosa's for a community lunch. The community people simply loved them, the children couldn't stop eating them. In the end, the incharge told me that I should stop making more of these or else this would continue till dinner time. The response was amazing. These were a novelty for them,  gave me great joy preparing it for them and making Mumbai Samosa famous ..... giving it an international status.

Ingredients
For The Dough

1 Cup All purpose flour
1 Tablespoon Ghee - melted
1/2 Teaspoon Carom seeds (ajwain)
Salt to taste

For The Stuffing
1 Tablespoon oil
1 Small Onion - finely chopped
1/2 Teaspoon Mustard seeds

A pinch of Asafoetida
1 Teaspoon ginger-green chilli paste

A pinch of Turmeric powder
3 Medium sized Potatoes - boiled , peeled and cut into cubes
2 Tablespoon Green peas - boiled
1/4 tsp Dried Mango powder (amchur)
1/2 Teaspoon  Garam masala

1/2 Teaspoon Coriander - cumin powder
1 Tablespoon Coriander leaves - chopped
Salt to taste
Oil for deep-frying

Method
For the dough
Combine all the ingredients in a bowl and knead into a semi stiff dough using enough water. Cover the dough with a wet muslin cloth and keep aside for 15 minutes.

Knead again till smooth and elastic and divide the dough into 2 equal portions. Cover with a wet muslin cloth and keep aside.

For the stuffing

Heat the oil in a  kadhai and add the mustard seeds.When the seeds crackle, add the asafoetida and ginger-green chilli paste and sauté on a medium flame for a few seconds. Add the potatoes, green peas, coriander-cumin powder, dry mango powder, garam masala and salt, mix well and cook on a medium flame for a minute, while stirring continuously.
Remove from the flame, mash lightly using the back of a spoon and add chopped coriander, cool, divide the stuffing into equal portions. Keep aside.

How to proceed

 Roll out a portion of the dough into oval (see pic). 

 Cut the oval horizontally into 2 equal portions using a knife.

Take a portion and join the edges to make a cone (see pic)

Hold the cone and stuff it with a portion of the potato mixture.

Take a pleat in the center see pic.

 apply little water on the edges and fold to seal it.

Repeat with the remaining dough and stuffing to make more samosas.

Heat the oil in a kadhai, and deep-fry the samosas on a slow flame till they turn golden brown in colour. Drain on absorbent paper. Keep aside.

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doingBM#47.
Labels : Snack, Street food, Blogging Marathon 

Zebra Cake

The pattern of this cake makes it look spectacular. This is an easy to make cake. On Sunday just felt the need to bake a cake. Since all ingredients are always there in the pantry, it is easy to bake a cake just any time I feel like. I made 2 small cakes sent one to my friends house and this one we enjoyed. 

Ingredients
1 Cup Sugar
4 Eggs
1 Cup Milk
1 Cup Vegetable Oil
1 Teaspoon Vanilla essence
2 Cups All purpose flour
2 Teaspoons Baking powder
2 Tablespoons Cocoa Powder
A tablespoon Milk

Method
Sieve the all purpose flour and baking powder thrice, keep it aside.

Sieve cocoa powder separately to remove any lumps.

Grease a cake tin and then line it with butter paper then flour it. Remove any excess flour by tapping it.

Beat the eggs well with an electric hand mixer or wire whisk. Add sugar and beat until the mixture is creamy. Then add milk , oil , essence and beat well. Fold in flour gently. 

Divide the batter into two equal parts. Mix cocoa powder with a tablespoon milk and add it to one part,  mix well. 

How to bring Zebra stripe effect

Now pour a small ladle of plain batter in the center of the baking pan.

Then pour a ladle of cocoa batter on top of the vanilla batter in the center. Do not shake the tin or disturb it with a spoon. Just keep pouring the batter alternately with cocoa and plain in the center. It will spread automatically.

Bake in a pre heated oven at 180 degrees for about 25 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Try not to brown the cake too much on the top or else this pattern will not be visible.

The stripes look awesome isn't it.  We enjoyed to too try.

Labels : Cakes, Bake a thon.

Bake-a-thon 2014

An InLinkz Link-up