oats chocolate cup cake

Serves- 6
cooking time- 20-25 minutes at 180-degree celsius
Preparation time- 10 minutes.

well, this is similar type as my oats coffee mug cake, infant I made it on the same day to last me for a week. the only change I did was to replace coffee with cocoa powder and increased the quantity of ingredient used obviously. with these, I think I am sorted for this week at least :p

Ingredient:                                                                                                                                  

Oats (preferably powdered) –  1 ½ cups

Baking powder- 1/2 teaspoon
Baking soda- 1/4 teaspoon

Sugar (preferably powdered) - 1 cup

Melted Butter (I have used nutralite) – 3/4 cup

Milk (as required)

Cocoa powder (optional)– 1/2 cup

Egg- 2

Vanilla essence – 5-6 drops.

Method:

1. Mix sugar and butter together. Add whole egg to it one at a time. Whisk the mixture till it forms a dripping consistency. Add vanilla essence to it.
   
2. In a separate bowl, mix oats, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa powder together. Slowly pour the wet ingredients mixture into this bowl, stirring simultaneously so that no lumps are formed.
   
3. Bake it at 180-degree celsius for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean. Your oats chocolate cupcake is ready to enjoy!!    

note- you can replace oats with refined flour for a regular cake and cocoa powder with coffee powder for coffee cake.

try other variants:
oats-and-coffee-mug-cake.html
eggless-mango-cake-with-chocolate
chocolate-mickey-mouse-cake
choco-lava-cake
eggless-choco-coffee-cake

chikoo milk shake

Okay so today I have decided I’ll try my best to complete trying all my pending posts and this was also on the list, so just had to finish with it as well. This is the season all the humble, tasty fruits like oranges, chikoo and not to forget mangoes and lichi have just arrived. Chikoo is also known as safeda or sapoota in many regions. Milkshakes are easy, tasty and somewhat healthy too. the perfect evening drink for me and all the kids around.

Well it’s really simple as well. Take out the pulp of 2 chikoo’s and blend it with 1 teaspoon of sugar and cup of milk, and you are done. Add some crushed ice if you want. Yes, it’s that simple. But being simple doesn’t make it less tasty. I love having it with some chikoo and vanilla flavoured icecream . You can try that as well. Bon appetite!! 

ICE-CREAM (natural flavours)

Summers are here and so is the time for grabbing some ice cream. This season I thought of making my own different flavoured ice creams (inspired by naturals though). Now that you don’t get Naturals ice cream in Kolkata I thought of being my own chef once more and I must say it wasn’t a difficult job.

All you need is an ice cream base and you can simply add any natural flavour to it. well, I tried few with chikoo,  Nutella, peanut butter, mint and my favourite mango. It all turned great!! Be cautious while buying the whipping cream, it should contain a minimum of 35% fat (45% being the best).  Using Amul fresh cream won’t work as the fat content is less than that. I have used local cream and it turned out well.

To make the ice cream base:

Whip 2 cups of cream at a high speed for about 2-3 mins or until it start to form soft peaks. Pour a can condensed milk (milkmaid) to it. whip again for 2 more minutes and its ready.

To add any fruit flavour like chikoo or mango:

Mix 2 cups of ice cream base with 1 cup of the fruit pulp.

For Nutella, mix fruit jam, or peanut butter: Mix 5 teaspoon of any of these ingredients with 2 cups of ice cream base.

For the mint flavour, you’ll need to 2 teaspoons of concentrated mint extract with 2 cups of ice cream base.

Refrigerating- Once you are done mixing your favourite flavours with the ice cream base, refrigerate in an airtight container for about 4-6 hours. When it is half set, take out the container, whip it again and keep it back in the fridge to set for a minimum of 8 hours. Repeating this procedure twice would make your ice cream more creamy. Enjoy!!

Note- you can also try traditional chocolate and vanilla flavours. For chocolate, you can add 1 cup melted chocolate chips and 1 teaspoon of cocoa powder to the base and 1 vanilla pod would be sufficient for the vanilla flavouring. Follow the procedure for refrigerating thereafter.

oats and coffee Mug cake

How many times throughout the day have we craved for a simple, easy, tasty and yet a healthy snack? Well, the baker in me gave it a thought and came out with this oats mug cake. It requires just 40 seconds at a temperature of 800-degree celsius and preparation would not take more than 2 minutes. So basically here you go with a healthy and tasty recipe in less than 3 minutes. It’s perfect for an anytime snack or even as your version of breakfast oats. This was my perfect solution to everyday breakfast during the morning rush. Although, I would just try to cut down on my calorie intake by reducing the amount of sugar and butter but 1 teaspoon of butter is not going to harm anyone. I used to have it with seasonal fruits like a guava or an apple, making my breakfast a perfect one to start my day. Try it out tomorrow morning and you’ll love it for sure.

Ingredient:                                                                                                                                  

Oats (preferably powdered) – 2 teaspoon

Baking powder- ¼ teaspoon

Sugar (preferably powdered) - 1 ½  teaspoon

Melted Butter (I have used nutralite) – 1 teaspoon

Milk – 7-8 teaspoon

Coffee powder (optional)– ½ teaspoon

Egg- 1

Vanilla essence – 2-3 drops.

Method:

1. Dissolve ½ tsp of coffee powder in 7-8 tsp of milk. Keep aside.
2. Mix sugar and butter together. Add whole egg to it. Whisk the mixture till it forms a dripping consistency. Add vanilla essence and dissolved coffee into it.
3. In a separate cup, mix oats and baking powder together. Slowly pour the wet ingredients mixture to this cup, stirring simultaneously so that no lumps are formed.
4. Bake it at 800-degree celsius for 30 seconds or until the cake just rises up. Your oats cake is ready to enjoy!!    

note- you can replace oats with refined flour for a regular cake and coffee powder with cocoa powder for chocolate cake.

Lauki ki kheer

An easy and healthier substitute for the traditional rice kheer.

This food is low in Saturated Fat and very low in Cholesterol and Sodium. It is also a good source of Vitamin E (Alpha Tocopherol), Thiamin, Niacin, Vitamin B6, Folate, Iron, Magnesium and Phosphorus, and a very good source of Dietary Fiber, Vitamin A, Vitamin C, Riboflavin, Potassium, Copper and Manganese. Now, that we have enough reasons let's start with the cooking.

Ingredients:
bottle gourd (lauki) - 250 grams
Milk - 1 litre
Sugar- 4 big tablespoon
Roasted Nuts, raisins (kishmish), cardamom (elaichi) powder to garnish

Method:
Fine Grate lauki.
Boil milk and add finely grated lauki to it. Cook on a medium flame. Let it reduce to half. Keep stirring it ocassionally.

When the milk turns slightly brownish, add 4 big tablespoon sugar to it. Give it a nice stir so that the sugar dissolves. 

Add chopped nuts, raisins, and elaichi powder to garnish.

Serve chilled. Bon appetite!!

try our instant vanilla coffee mousse for a quicker recipe.

GRAPE MOCKTAIL

Summers, the only time when I get to try all my favourite mocktails. This drink is purely natural, no added preservatives or artificial flavours whatsoever, however, you can add soda for the fizz. 
Grapes are a rich source of vitamins and antioxidants and curd contains high amounts of proteins and calcium thus making this mocktail a very healthy substitute for market bought soft drinks. 

INGREDIENTS:
Freshly prepared grape juice- 1 cup 
Plain Curd- 1/2 cup 
Lemon juice - 1 tsp 
Sugar - 2 tsp (according to sweetness of your grapes) 
Black Salt- 1/2 tsp 
Chatmasala- 1/2 tsp 
Few mint leaves for garnish 

METHOD:
Add all the ingredients (except mint leaves) into a mixer jar and blend well. Dilute it with chilled water or soda if you wish. 
Dip the serving glass in water and then in salt to coat the rim of it with salt. This gives a salty punch to the drink while sipping. 
Pour the mocktail into the glass, add crushed ice, mint leaves and serve immediately.

try our other sweet delights;)
Masala mango buttermilk
orangy lassi 
mango-tulsi-icecream.html

choco lava cake

This holiday season I probably found the easiest way to bake a cake. From the time I had seen that advertisement on choco lava cake my heart was pounding to make one perfectly.  So after few trials, this one turned out pretty well, also my addition of choco cookies turned out good. (Pat on my back :p) 

I was in short of heavy cream so tried using vanilla flavoured custard cream to top it up. It wasn't a bad idea though, and it served the same purpose as a heavy cream. I had even added 2 tsp of custard powder in the cake mix but you can omit this if you want. I feel it would have been better had I just used custard cream to top it up and not add it to the cake mix. (Wait, am I permitted to write my mistakes here? Maybe yes so that others don't commit the same :P). But it was overall fun to bake.
I took a total of 10 minutes to mix all the ingredients together and then just poured it into a greased container and cupcake moulds. The next 40 minutes, it was only my microwave at work and me busy making the custard cream and cleaning the kitchen. Sometimes I really think these activities are much more time consuming than the actual cooking. 
ahh, done with it. Time to treat myself!!

Ingredients required:

1 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
a pinch of baking soda
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter/refined oil
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract

Optional:
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 cup semi-sweetened choco chips
Few choco cookies

Method:

• Since I started with the normal granulated sugar, my first task was to grind the sugar to make it powdery. It's easy to mix powdered sugar with other ingredients. Alternatively, you can even use icing sugar.

• Once the sugar is done, add butter/refined oil to it and blend until they form a paste and you cannot differentiate between the two.

• Next, add eggs to it. One at a time and mix the contents well. it's important to beat the contents properly at this point so that enough air gets into it and your cake rises up while baking.

• Next, sieve 1 cup flour, 1/2 tsp baking powder and a pinch of baking soda in a large bowl. If you want to make a chocolate cake, add 1/2 cup of cocoa powder also to it. 

• Mix the wet ingredients with the dry ones in the bowl by cut and fold method. Once done add vanilla essence and choco chips to it. mix again.
  

• Grease a baking tin/cupcake mould with butter and pour the mixture into it. 

• Half fill the cupcake mould, put a piece of chocolate in the centre and cover it with another spoonful of cake mixture on top.

• I had used a  baking tin as well and had put small pieces of choco cookies on top covering it lightly with the cake mix. This made the top crust very crunchy and chewy.

• Preheat oven at 180-degree centigrade and bake the mixture for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.

• Once done, top it up with cream and choco chips and you're done. Time to treat yourself with this mouthwatering dessert.

Sweet tooth forever,
Ritu:)