carrotsandcherries

I welcome all you readers to a world of eggless bakes that tries to compete neck to neck with the "real deal", yes I try and bake without any eggs trying to achieve the same kind if texture, moistness and the quality of the baked goodies with added eggs. I have got a taste of both the versions. Of late I have been baking lot of bread, almost once a week and now I have the bread formula in my head !! Lot can be done to create a recipe from a base recipe - tweaking it here and there but mostly trying to keep it as it was - trying to understand the purpose of each element in the recipe and trying to substitute some in some cases like nut allergy, gluten intolerance, egg allergy etc..., - trying to add some more elements into the recipe to make it more suitable to your tastes Whatever you try to do to an original recipe, the basic thing will be to understand the purpose of each and every element of the recipe. Not only what the recipe contains but understanding the method is ...

Back into the blogosphere after a really long break !!! I have been continually trying and experimenting with new recipes or improvising on the old ones during these months of absence. Many new recipes were born out of sheer need for palate pleasing food without many gadgets and many ingredients. I was out of the baking zone for a long long time.......happy to be back and enjoying the joy of baking bread at home, with amazing results :) Several recipes, trials, not so-so and so-so results later I finally got " THE"  recipe for really soft home made milk buns. The trick to getting these soft is the amount of liquid and kneading of the dough. I got this  video when I was searching for bread on youtube, it was this recipe that worked for me. I tweaked the recipe a bit, most of it is exactly as in the video. So here goes the recipe, for 6 small buns you will need, Whole wheat flour - 250 gms Whole Milk - 200 gms Sugar - 30 gms Active dried yeast - 4 gms ...

Breakfast is one of the most important meal to kick start a day packed with energy. Here, we both prefer a nutrient rich and light breakfast. I used to buy this breakfast cereal to eat in the morning with milk, we used to always find it very sticky and too soft once you pour milk over it. Then I saw many recipes for something called granola , I did know what museli was and I loved it for breakfast with some cut apples in it. It was just a "perfect" way to start a day for me ! I just felt that most of the granola recipes had too much sugar and oil (may be butter also) in it. I got this really good recipe for a granola here , from Meeta at What's for lunch, honey? . Oh yea, I did tweak the recipe here and there to suit our tastes. I am giving here the final version of the recipe that I usually make when we want a good museli at home. These are what you need to make a hearty granola, 5 cereal mix, rolled - 400 gms Cranberries, raisins, apricots and dates - 145 g...

There are times in your life where you feel so elated at such simple things life throws at you. You have so much fun doing somethings so silly !!!! little you realise that if someone sees what you were upto, you would look quite stupid. Well.... as long as there you have fun and find joy in somethings, nothing really bothers you ! (right ?). It is kind of related and unrelated to me having a good time teasing a neighbour's cat.....  :) It is one of the most good looking cats I have seen here ! It is a very naught cat too. The other day when it was raining I noticed something sitting on my bathroom window, it was this naughty cat sitting there. Our neighbour has two cats, and both of them are really naughty and very very good looking ones ! Every evening, she whistles for the cats calling their names and they slowly reluctantly come back home, exactly like how we used to be when we were kids (but mom never used to whistle for us obviously ! ..... :P). Ok now back to the recip...

The windows os has crashed. I am using Linux now. Just waiting impatiently for Hubby dear to fix it, for me to post on my blog.... I will be soon posting some of my recipes.... Thanks for visiting my blog :)

This month the daring cooks challenge was hosted by Kathlyn of  bakelikeaninja . She had challenged us to prepare some peruvian food. I chose to make the papas rellenas tweaking the recipe a bit to suit our taste. This is how they looked (I pan fried them :P ). Thanks for visiting my blog :)

I am being quite a lazy girl now a days. I love reading and writing, and of late I am doing neither of it. In these "no posting on the blog" days, I have learnt quite some things, like I can now independently do a water colour painting (I will be showing off, some of my paintings soon......**giggles**) trying hard to learn Beethoven's very popular piano piece Moonlight sonata (movement 1) . I am making more of traditional home cooking than before, but I still try out new recipes to learn different techniques, combinations. Lots of experimenting in kitchen to go on. I do not know how much my husband realises but, he does play a major role. Yes, he is the guinea pig and he has a set a very sensitive taste buds which sense even the minutest ingredient (sometimes, I think they are on a break or strike rather so they refuse to detect the obvious flavours....quite a paradox huh ! The most puzzling mystery !!), also I very much appreciate the patience with which he asks me t...

Quite a simple baking challenge but a tricky panna cotta challenge ! This month's daring baker's challenge was hosted by  Mallory of  asofainthekitchen . After much thinking, I tried to give it a go. Since I am trying to avoid baking (regularly) as all that is showing of on the waistline !!!!! I tried making a really low fat vegetarian version of panna cotta (a trial which did not work so well as in the texture) and I also reduced the amount of butter and sugar in the florentines. So here is a quick post on the ridiculously low fat panna cotta and perfectly sweet and lacy five cereal florentines. Vanilla Blanc battu panna cotta (vegetarian) Milk (2.5 % fat) - 250 gms Blanc battu (0.2 % fat) - 200 gms Agar agar powder - 8 gms Sugar - 50 gms Vanilla sugar - 20 gms 1. In a pan pour in the milk, the sugar both varieties and the agar agar powder. Stir well till there are no lumps. 2. On Low heat bring this mixture to a boil and let it boil for 2 mins. 3. Take of the heat...

WOW..........yumm !! We really liked the combinations. I found it very easy to make and I made a vegan version of tempura which came out well and tasted as good. I will definitely make this again ! I thank  Lisa for challenging us with this Noodle dish from Japan. I simply loved this challenge. The best and the most enjoyable part of the challenge was eating it :P I just followed the recipe given  here , scaled it down and made it vegan (egg free) and vegetarian for us. I also did not find any soba noodles, so I used the regular noodles that is easily available in the Asian food section here. Some pics (taken in a real hurry !!) of our Japanese lunch. Thanks for visiting my blog :)

It is quite sometime since I blogged :) Yesterday I got hands on some very fresh white button mushrooms here and I prepared a lightly spiced rice using them as the main ingredient. No one can beat mom in preparing mushroom biriyani. The taste is simply WOW !........Whenever she prepares this dish, the whole house retains the utterly mouth watering aromas of the spiced basmati rice. I have tried this dish several times, to my delight only today was it tasting a little like the one mom used to prepare. Do not get discouraged by me saying this, I had an ingredient missing !!!! It was Garam masala powder. This powdered spice mix enhances the flavour of a dish immensely and caution has to be taken to not add too much of this spice powder to a dish. I had recently bought a pack of couscous. I prepared it with some veggies, just like the Indian vegetable upma. I had cooked the couscous separately before adding it to the veggies. As soon as the couscous was cooked, I had a taste of it and a...

This is going to be a real tiny post, to say I did try making but did not give it enough time though. This time at Daring bakers we were challenged to make the Biscuit jaconde imprime entremet by  Astheroshe of accro. It was quite not a breeze. I had tried to make an eggless jaconde earlier and it was not quite to our taste. So I tried making the one with eggs at the last minute (Really not a good thing to do when you got to make a really good looking dessert like this !) Well I did try and I made a chocolate jaconde with a saffron rosewater coconut mousse (Sad because it had not set, I really need to learn how to use agar-agar in the place of gelatin). Well, I am being brave and putting up a snap of the dessert (no fancy designs, sorry Astheroshe. I will definitely try making this and let you know :)   ).   Thanks for visiting my blog.

Every time I post a recipe on my blog, I would like it to be unique, original in its own sense. That is why I am struggling right now to post truly original to my home recipes !! This time at  Mactweets , Jamie and  Deeba had challenged us to make a macaron inspired by a favourite dessert. I was planning to flavour the macarons depending on how they turn out. Well they were not so great. I followed all that I read, still no success. I had a different kind of problem this time. My macarons had BIG feet but they slid out very neatly like the nice ones. But still it did not have that kind of texture inside, I felt they were rather chewy. Since the macarons were not a great success I decided to make a simple strawberry quark filling to sandwich them. I gues no one can deny that strawberries and cream are unbeatably the simple yet very delicious dessert. I tried to mimick the same strawberry and cream, but instead of cream I used low fat bio quark :). All the more good for us...