Loved it

Off for a while

I will not be blogging recipes in this blog for a while as I want to do something for my daughter.
New recipes can be found under
http://yayamma.blogspot.com
Sarah

Orappam

What is Orappam?
I don't know how to describe it. Once when we had lots of extra coconuts at home, Ammachi made orappam for me and the process was long. She had to manually squueze the coconuts to get the milk, manually pound the rice to get the flour and as she didn't have an oven and she had to burn coconut shells and place them on top of the pan to bake the Orappam. I have only eaten it once as a child.
I have modified Ammachi's version of Orappam. I don't have the patience to manually squeeze coconuts or make molasses syrup. Instead I use canned coconut milk and brown sugar.
Ingredients
2 cups of rice flour
2 cups of brown sugar
2 eggs
I can of coconut milk(400ml)
2 tbls spn ghee
2 tbl spn coconut oil
1/2 t spn cake Jeera/caraway seeds
1/2 t spn cardomom powder
1/4 tspn nutmeg powder
10 cashews broken in to pieces

Take 6oz of of coconut milk and add 2 oz of water to it and boil it along with the broken cashews for 10 minutes.

Beat the egg and add the rest of the coconut milk, brown sugar, rice flour, spices and the ghee. Mix well. Add the boiled coconut milk along with the cashews.

In a thick bottom pan, heat the above mix on medium heat, stirring often. It will get lumpy as you cook and that is ok. Once the mix forms a thick lump( ie, there is no more liquid) put in to a 7 inch buttered cake pan. Level the top with a spoon.

Pour the coconut oil on top.

Pre heat oven to 350 degrees F( 170 C). bake it for about 20 minutes till the top is golden brown
Take it out of the oven and cool for 10 mints. Cut it in to slices and serve

Boiled fruit cake

Didn't get time to soak the fruits in rum? Still want to bake a Christmas cake?
Well this is my favourite, easy fruitcake.. where you get to boil the mixed fruits!!

Ingredients
150gm butter or margarine
175 gm sugar
1/3 cup water
175 ml milk
250gm raisins
125 gm sultanas
125gm dates(chopped)
50 gm mixed peel( optional)
250gm plain flour
1/2 tspn cardomom powder
1/2 tspn cinnamon powder
1/4 tspn cloves powder
1/4 t spn nutmeg powder
2 eggs
1/2 tspn sodium bicarbonate

In a sauce pan, boil the sugar with the water. When the sugar has melted, add the butter/margarine, milk and the fruit, heat slowly till the butter has melted, continue heating on med heat for abt 10 mints.( the fruits now look plump and cute!!). remove from fire and cool

Sift the soda, spices and the flour together.( honestly, I never sift the soda and the spices with the flour, I just add that in to the cooled fruit mix and mix it well..I don't have a sieve!.)

Once the fruit mix is cooled, add the flour, and the eggs and mix well.

Pour in to a lined( outside and inside) 7 inch pan

Preheat oven to 150 degrees C(300F)
Bake for about 1 hr, till a tooth pick inserted in to the center of the cake comes out clean.( cooking time varies, according to the type of the oven).

Hint; If you are using the convection part of the microwave to bake a cake, keep a plate (oven proof) full of water under the turn table. This ensures that, the cake will remain moist, during baking

Christmas cake icing

I have been wanting to update my recipe blog, but I never get the chance to do so.. I wish a day had more than 24 hours!

I just finished icing my christmas cake today. I haven't made the rose flowers yet.!!( will upload the photo later)

The process of Icing a cake sounds a lot complicated. In reality it is one of the easiest thing to do.

I usually use marzipan as a base coat and Royal icing as a top coat.

Marzipan( Almond icing)
100gm almonds ground
1 cup icing sugar
3/4 cup castor sugar(fine)
1 egg yolk
2 tbsp lemon juice

In a bowl, mix the lemon juice and the egg yolk, add the rest of the ingredients and knead well till it feels smooth and nice. Sprinkle icing sugar on a kitchen board and roll the almond icing to 1/4 inch thickness( I find it easier to roll the icing, when I sprinkle some icing sugar on top of the almond mix and then roll).
I do cover the whole cake with the almond icing, so it is easier for me to do the royal icing. But you don't have to do it. You can cover just the top of the cake and not the side
Some people apply 2 to 3 spoons of apricot jam over the cake, before placing the almond icing, so the almond icing would stick to the cake. I hate apricots!


Next layer is the Royal icing. It is one of the easiest icing.. this is how you do it
1 egg white
1 tsp lemon juice
2 to 2 1/2 cup icing sugar

First thing to do is sift the icing sugar.. so that there are no lumps

In a fairly big bowl, mix the egg white and the lemon juice using a fork. ( you don't have to beat it so much.. just simple mixing will do)
Now add the icing sugar one spoon at a time (do not add too much of sugar at one time, you will get a lousy icing..I am telling you that from experience!!), in to the egg lemon juice mix and keep stirring, keep adding the icing sugar till you get the fairly stiff icing..
(I dip a spatula in to the icing and lift a bit of icing up and check if the icing forms a peak).
Apply the icing on top of the marzipan layer and smoothen the surface.

See, I told you, it is simple!!

The cake above was the one I baked for my daughter's birthday.The top coat is royal icing and the dancing girl was made with Plastic icing..

Christmas Recipes: Christmas Cake

At home, My mother always baked the 123 cake. We, the kids always had to pray and hope that one of the cousins would come for a visit and bring a fruitcake along...and when someone did bring a fruitcake, ah! it felt like winning a lottery. It was a well known rule that I get to eat the icing( especially the iced flowers).. Luckily my sisters never really fancied the icing..

I started baking the christmas cake when I was 17 yrs old. I soaked the fruits in rum and followed the 123 cake recipe. Well, I didn't know then that there was such a thing as fruitcake recipe.
My 123 fruitcake was much better than drinking the batter my oldest sister served as a cake!( she tried to bake a cake in a toaster oven..it did really look like a cake. with a nice brown crust on top. But we couldn't cut it)

Finally one day I found my mother's recipe book among the junk she was throwing out and was surprised to see that she did have a Christmas cake recipe and she never once baked a cake using that recipe.
Amma gave her recipe book to my oldest sister as she is the eldest and have the right to the family heirloom..My sister lost that recipe book, however I still have the recipe for the christmas cake from her recipe book.. I copied most of the recipes, because I knew, I would never get the book. I follow that recipe to this day..

Ingredients

1.5 kg mixed fruits(raisins, almonds,cashews)
1 cup rum
rind of 1 lemon
1 1/2 cup brown sugar
250gm butter( room temperature)
1 tbspn treacle/caramel
5 eggs(room temperature)
2 cups of flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon, cardamom, cloves each
1/4 tsp nutmeg


Soak the fruits in rum for atleast 24 hours( longer the better)

Before you bake the cake, take a 9 inch round pan. Line the inside and the outside with baking paper.

Cream the butter and sugar well

Add one egg at a time along with a tbl spn of flour from the 2 cups you have meassured for the cake

Mix the rest of the flour, fruit mix, spices, caramel together in another bowl

Add the creamed butter, sugar egg mix in to the fruit mix and stir using a wooden spoon

If the mix looks too dry add 1/4 cup rum to the batter

Preheat oven at 150 degrees

Pour the batter in to the lined cake tin and bake for about 2 hours, till you insert a wooden skewer in to the cake and no batter sticks on the skewer.

Note: I don't use any raising agents with this recipe and cooking time varies according to the oven you use.

Christmas recipes

Every year on the first day of Nov, I soak the fruits for the christmas cake. You may ask Why Nov 1st?
2 reasons.
The first one: Kerala celebrates Kerala day on that day and being a malayalee I celebrate Kerala day
The other reason is, it is the perunnal(festival) of Parumala Thirumeni, patron saint of Jacobite Christians.
I usually soak 1.5 kg of mixed fruit in 2 cups of rum.

I bake the cake on the 1st of december and from then on, every week I pour a tbl spn of rum on top of the cake till Christmas..( did I tell you, my kids are normally well behaved and extremely sleepy after eating the christmas cake??)

This year, I am taking my oldest daughter through a culinary journey of the Christmas of my childhood..
I remember having vattayappam, pal appam, stew, orappam, kuzhalappam, achappam and ofcourse Christmas cake every christmas as a child.
Join me as I make all the wonderful goodies and celebrate another year of peace and happiness

Chicken Kali Mirch

I still have a jar of pepper that I plucked and dried when I was 18 years old..
We had 2 pepper wines in the house we stayed and it was full of pepper. Amma didn't have time to pluck it or dry.. I was home after the 1st year MBBS exams and because I had nothing to do, I plucked all the peppers from both the wines, dried them and completely forgot about it.
When I got married and was leaving for Malaysia, Amma gave me a big jar of pepper.. She told me
"This is the ones you plucked and dried"
It felt very special especially because I harvested it all by myself and I carried that jar of pepper, where ever I went. It had come with me to the jungles of east Malaysia, to the beautiful Penang island, to English country side, to the land of windmills, to the busy Mumbai and finally to Canada.
It is still half full!
This recipe too was given to me by a Sufi friend

250gm boneless chicke
2 onions (med size)chopped fine
1 tsp ginger and garlic paste each
1 tomato chopped fine
50 gms cashew
1/4 cup milk
4 tbsp Mawa( optional)
1 tbsp pepper powder( yes 1 tbsp)
2 tbsp oil
2 tbsp cream to garnish

Soak the cashew in the milk for 10 mints and then grind
Heat oil, add the ginger garlic paste, fry till lightly browned
Add the onion and keep stirring till the onion is light brown
Add chopped tomato, fry till the oil separates around the side
Add the chicken pieces and fry till the chiken is light brown
Now add the ground cashew and mawa if using. add 1 1/2 cup water, cover and cook on low heat till the chicken is done and the gravy is thick
Just before serving sprinkle the pepper and gently stir to mix it.
Garnish with cream.
My kids take this chicken curry with Roti for School lunch

Baghdadi Kheema

This is my kids favourite Kheema.. it is easy and yummy
This recipe came from a prominent Sufi family in Mumbai. I was invited to their house for a party and was served this dish. They were kind enough to share the recipe.

1/2 kg mince( the original recipe calls for mutton and I can't stand the smell of mutton. We use Pork or Chicken)
1/2 tsp chilli powder
1/4 tsp turmeric powder
1/2 tspn garam masala
2 tspn Kashmiri Chilli powder/paprika
1 bay leaf
1/2 tbsp ginger and garlic paste each
1 onion chopped
1 large tomato chopped
5 almonds
5 cashew
1tbl spn dessicated coconut
2 tbl spn oil

1. Grind the almond, cashew and the dessicated coconut with 2 tbls spn water
2.Heat oil in a wok
3.Add the bay leaf, ginger and garlic paste, fry for a minute
4. now add onion and fry till the onion is light brown
5. now add the mince and finely chopped tomato and fry till the water is evaporated.
6.add the chilli, turmeric and garam masala, salt. and the ground almond cashew mix.Keep stirring over med fire
7.when the oil begins to seperate at the edges, break the eggs in to the meat, keep stirring to scramble it well.
8. serve garnish with coriander leaves