Tag Archives: Oven

Food

Mouthwatering Monday – Milk Peda

Image August 11, 2014 jcisnowjs 5 Comments

I love Pedas…. actually I love all the sweets (except those made with besan) 😐 Yumm….

Yesterday was Rakhi (Rakshabandhan), a festival where a sister ties a Rakhi, bond of love, to her brother’s wrist. I don’t like the notion that Rakhis are for protection, but I rather think, that they are a gesture of love between siblings. So, in my household, not only Tisha ties Rakhi to her Brothers, Otu & Renne’s hand, but boys too tie a Rakhi to Tisha’s wrist. More power to Love. ❤

I cherish these moments.

I cherish Milk Peda too…. so coming back to the recipe. 😉

Ingredients –

400 gm Condensed Milk
1 ½ cup Milk Powder
1 tbsp Ghee/Butter
½ tbsp Cardamon Powder
1 tbsp milk
5-6 Pistachios for garnishing, cut length wise

Method –

Heat ghee in a pan.
Add condensed milk to it and mix slowly.
When ghee is properly mixed with condensed milk, add Milk powder gently.
Mix well, so that no lumps are formed.
Check for consistency and add some milk if required.
Cook until mixture start leaving the sides (you can use microwave too).
Mix cardamon powder, and let it cool for few minutes.
Grease your hands with ghee or butter and roll the mixture into small balls.
Press in the middle gently and garnish with Pistachios or any other nut of your choice.
All done. 😀

Milk Pedas are done and I am ready for celebrating Rakshabandhan.

Do tell me what is your favorite recipe for festivals? 🙂

P.S. My cooking is experimental. You will find many similar and different recipes, but the idea is to explore your food and do experiments with it. Enjoy Cooking Experiments and Experiences 🙂

Books, Kids and Me

So, What Do You Read? Recipe Books?

Image March 20, 2014 jcisnowjs Leave a comment

Firstly, I am really sorry for this drought of post from my side. Remember my Curious George problem, yeah, my cute sweet two year old Renne, Yes, he is the real culprit. I can never understand how those cute little small hands can have the power to destroy hard disk of a laptop. Well, Devil has never looked better.

Now when I have just explained why I didn’t write for a week, let me now come back to basic point of writing a post. So this happens at a friends place, where I was admiring their new kindle edition. I blurted out that I want one too. Next thing I heard them say was “Oh, So, What do you read? Recipe books? Cooking?”

Next two minutes I was blurting out all the books name that I have read and saying NO in every two seconds, no I do not read recipe books. I never read them. I read real books. LOL, Real books. What are real books?

On the way home, I was wondering why did I react in this way? Was it because I thought of it as a gender specific comment, like you are a woman, so all that you must be doing is cooking? Or was it because a male asked me this question, that’s why I reacted in shockingly surprise mode? Then I realized, he asked me genuinely and he wouldn’t have had any other hidden agenda than to ask me about my interest in books.

So, why did I panic? was it that bad to read about cooking? No. As long as you are reading something, It’s not that bad. As long as I am doing something interesting with my life, it’s never bad. Maybe, it hit me to be considered as normal, a Normal girl.

To be like a normal housewife who has only one agenda – cooking. I am not normal. I don’t want to be normal. some abnormality is required. Not like few extra legs or hands or maybe a tail or horns. That would be weird, really weird. But something extra, as in, a new skill, new confidence of going out, making new friends out of totally strange people, exploring the world, and cooking too. I want it all and something extra too.

God, don’t ever let me be normal. Normal is boring. Normal is like being a couch potato. I will rather be a carved out pumpkin. A scary devious looking pumpkin. Not Normal. Smile

Food, Kids and Me, Photographs

Experimental Cookies

Image January 21, 2014 jcisnowjs 5 Comments

One Cookie….. Two Cookies…. Three Cookies

That’s how Otu (My 2 yr Old son) was counting cookies by watching a “counting for kids video” running on TV. Suddenly, I started hearing “Cookies, Cookies…. Mamma….I want cookies”.

First it was just Otu, and within seconds two more monsters Tisha and Renne joined him. Ratio of Power just got shifted to 3:1, in fact 3:0, because, I don’t have any say, when all three kids unite against me 😛

Only reasonable thing to do next was to convince them that they will shortly receive some cookies. On that note, I was wondering why do kids always want that particular food item, which just got out of stock. :O

So, I went ahead and made some plain chocolate chip cookies. But, nothing is plain when it comes to cooking. Problem being, I try something new every time I make something. So what new now? Well, you have to read more to know that.

Here is the simplest Recipe for chocolate chip cookies.

Ingredients –

2 ¼ Cup All Purpose Flour

1 tbsp Baking Soda

1 tbsp Salt

1 Cup Butter

¾ Cup Sugar

¾ Cup Brown Sugar

1 tbsp Vanilla Extract

2 Large Eggs

2 Cup Chocolate Morsels (was out of them, so used butterscotch morsels)

1 Cup chopped Nuts

Method –

Preheat the Oven to 375 degree F.

Mix Flour, Baking Soda and salt.

Beat butter, sugar, brown sugar and vanilla extract in another bowl. Add eggs to it, one at a time, mixing thoroughly.

Mix the flour mixture with egg mixture.

Add morsels and nuts, stir well.

Now make small rolls and place them in baking sheet.

Oven time.

Bake for 9 to 11 Minutes.

Let them rest for 2 minutes, and Ready to go.

But, what was new that I talked about? Well, it got more to do with presentation.

So, instead of chocolate, I used butterscotch morsels, for the one thing.

Next to do was use shredded coconut. For this, roll your small cookie dough into shredded coconut, and then bake.

Third, I used my pineapple jam, as filling. Just placed a half spoon of it in the middle. Baked and done.

Fourth, I used chocolate syrup to do some fancy work on some of the plain cookies.

Fifth, did some mix n match.

After 10 minutes, Otu and Tisha were jumping and clapping seeing their cookies in different flavors. Renne as usual has by now forgotten about the cookies, and was busy destroying one of my book. Next mission, save the Books.

P.S. half of the cookies were finished in an hour 🙂

Food, Kids and Me

A Three Minute Cake for My Sweetie

Image January 6, 2014 jcisnowjs 4 Comments

My baby Tisha turned three, and all that she was bothered about, was her birthday Cake. So, we booked a Tinkerbell Cake for her Birthday party, which was on Saturday. Big Problem : Her birthday was on Friday, 27^th December.

We wished her, pampered her in every possible way on Friday, but she was still not in the Birthday mood. We took her to an animated movie, got new clothes for her, gave all the attention that she deserved on her special day. Still, she was like “No, It’s no Birthday”.

What’s a birthday, without a cake? She was right. So, I decided to bake a small cake for her. Small because in my family no one seems to have a sweet tooth. We don’t like eating cakes. Even my kids don’t like eating sweets much. All that Tisha wanted on her birthday was to cut the cake, not to eat it. 😦

I have baked cakes before, but this time I wanted to try something which is quick and easy to make, taste doesn’t matter. (I am not gonna eat it, so why does it should matter 🙂 ). I was going through all the cake recipes, when I stumbled on this easy to make 3 minute chocolate mug cake. Voila!!!!

Recipe is down below.

Ingredients:

All Purpose Flour (Maida) – 4 tbsp

Sugar – 2 tbsp

Cocoa Powder – 2 tbsp

Egg – 1

Milk – 3 tbsp

Butter/Oil – 3 tbsp

Vanilla Extract – ¼ tbsp

Choco Chips – 1tbsp (I was out of them, so didn’t use)

Method:

Add and mix all the dry ingredients.

To this add Egg and mix really well.

Pour in milk and oil as well to make it smooth.

Make sure there are no lumps.

Add Choco chips and vanilla extract. Mix well.

Put this mixture in a Microwave safe Mug. (I have used a bowl, to have a small cake shape)

Microwave it for three minutes on high.

And done. 🙂

I used some M&Ms and chocolate for decoration. All it took to make this cake was 5 minutes.

Some friends also joined in the small celebration and Tisha cut the cake happily. Icing on the cake, it was not bad in taste. Although, it was not as good as a cake baked in Oven for half an hour, but still it was a quick fix. Tasted okay, looked more than okay. Happy Ending. 🙂