Double layered cake

I picked up this idea from my aunt. She used to make amazing triple layered cake of vanilla, chocolate and strawberry. I could not get strawberry flavor, so I just made a double layer of chocolate and vanilla.

This is a fairly simple cake, and hardly takes any preparation time.

Ingredients:

• Eggs - 3
• 250 gms all purpose flour
• 225 gms powdered sugar
• 50 gms margarine
• 1/4th cup milk
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 1/2 tsp potato powder/flour
• 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts and raisins
• 2 tsps choco powder
• 1/4 tsp vanilla flavor

Effort: 30 mins

Serves: 20 pieces


- Beat the eggs till the mixture is fluffy, care should be taken that the eggs are not beaten till they are stiff. You can use a blender, but I prefer beating with a fork.

- Sieve powdered sugar and mix the margarine with the sieved powdered sugar. There should not be any lumps in the mixture. Add the beaten eggs to this mixture.

- Sieve together potato powder, baking powder and flour. Potato powder makes the cake very soft and fluffy. I learnt this from the Finns, they extensively use potato powder/flour which is called peruna jauhe in Finnish. I am not sure if this is even available in India/elsewhere.

- Fold in the sieved mixture in the beaten eggs/sugar mixture, and keep stirring the mixture with a spatula or with your hand. Add warm milk to the mixture, and stir properly to make sure there are no lumps. You can add more milk if the mixture is very thick. Add the dry fruits.

- Divide the mixture into half. To one half, add vanilla flavor, and to the other half add choco powder.

- Grease the baking tray. Fold the vanilla mixture into the baking tray and spread the mixture evenly. On top of the vanilla mixture, add the cake mixture and spread it.

- Bake at 175-200C in a pre-heated oven (pre-heating should be done at 50C for about 10 mins), it generally takes about 25 minutes to bake this cake. Keep checking every 10 mins. After around 25 minutes, remove the cake from the oven, and insert a toothpick in the middle of the cake to check whether the cake is well baked. If the toothpick comes out clean, then the cake is done.

- Remove the tray from the oven and let the cake cool. Once the cake is cool enough, you can cut it. The layers are unevenly formed and that looks superb ;)

Enjoy the cake with a cup of coffee!

NOTE: The temperatures are in celcius, many thanks to my cousin for pointing out my mistake. I had gotten confused between celcius and fahrenheit :)

Momos - Tibetan delicacy

This is one of my favorite starters! It is a Tibetan dish but it is also very popular in Nepal and some North-East India. I have tasted the best momos in Manali, a small hill station in North India. And mind you, you should go to a local roadside eating joint if you really want to taste authentic momos.

For those who have never tasted momos or even heard about them, momos are basically steamed dumplings dipped in soup.

I tried out this recipe sometime back and it turned out really good.

Ingredients:

For the dough:

• All purpose flour 1 cup (you could also use wheat flour)
• pinch of salt
• pinch of dried yeast
• 1 cup warm milk
  
• 2 tablespoons of olive oil
• You could also add some finely chopped herbs for variation in the dough
  

For stuffing:

• One small onion
• 2 tsps of finely chopped garlic
• 1 cup of finely chopped spinach, cabbage, carrots
• 5-6 leaves of basil
• 5-6 plum tomatoes
  

For the soup:

• Vegetable stock
• Olive oil
• Finely chopped spring onions
• 1/2 tsp garlic paste
• Sauces
• 1/4 tsp pepper

Effort: 45 mins

Serves: 4 persons

- Knead the dough into a soft mixture, using warm milk. Place the dough in a covered container and keep it aside for approx half an hour. Keep the container in a warm place.

- In the meantime, saute the above stuffing ingredients in olive oil, add balsamic vinegar, pepper, some finely chopped green chillies. Ensure that the vegetables are not over cooked, they should retain some crispness.

- Roll out small circular pieces from the dough, these wraps should be rolled out such that they are thinner along the edges and thicker in the middle. Place a small portion of the filling in the middle of the rolled dough and close all sides and taper the sides at the centre. It should look like a circular cone. Spread small quantity of butter or olive oil over the momos, preferably use a brush to do so.

- Steam the momos in a pressure cooker, or if you have the steaming microwave container, you can steam the momos in the microwave. I had used the microwave idli container to steam the momos. To get the authentic taste, you should steam the momos using a proper pressure cooker.

- After the momos are steamed properly, keep them in a greased plate, so that they do not stick. To make the soup, heat 1 spoon olive oil in a container, add spring onions, garlic. Saute for 1 min. Add the vegetable stock, vinegar, soya sauce and one tsp of tomato sauce. Bring it to a boil. You can also add some freshly grounded black pepper.

You can relish the momos by dipping them in the soup, or by consuming them separately with soup

The first one!

Well, I have been planning to start my own blog since a long time now, just could not get myself to do it.

Why a food blog? I not only love cooking but I love eating and trying out all possible recipes. My love for food is endless, any new place we visit, I have to try out the local cuisine, and if time permits I also try out the recipe at home. Most of the time, the husband is the guinea pig but there have been a lot of occasions when some of my friends had to be guinea pigs :)

I love all kinds of food and that's genetic. My brother and some of my cousins are true gourmands! I remember this one time when we had gone to Sukhsagar (an amazing thali place in Blore) and my cousin hogged on so many rotis that the frustrated waiter finally asked whether he should serve rice ;) This was years back, I hope that Sukhsagar has maintained its standard, would love to visit the restaurant again. Anyway, there are many such incidents to quote, but I will keep those for later posts.

Since I come from a family of hoggers and great cooks, my plan is to blog all the recipes I have learnt from my mom, grannies, aunts, my MIL and also to blog all the experiments that I try out on the husband and friends :) So watch out!