...my new favourite show

The List that escaped Santa.....and saved him from keeling over with a sugar overload!!

I came across this kitschy l'il picture while having a browse....and thought that it would be perfect to top off my list of Christmas bakes...........

~Traditional Christmas Cake (loaded with rum & all things hic!!)

~Fudge Brownies

~Coconut Ice-Fudge (disaster of gigantic proportions!!)

~Two-Tone Coconut Brownies

~Rum Balls

~Butterscotch Bars (which fast disintegrated into butterscotch brittle!?!)

~Mini-Coconut and Rum Pies (fancy name for rum balls that refused to stay round!!)

Thank.God.It's.CHRISTMAS!!

Away in a Manger

Away in a manger,

No crib for a bed,

The Little Lord Jesus

Laid down his sweet head;

The stars in the sky

Looked down where he lay,

The little Lord Jesus,

Asleep on the hay

Nibbling away at my penultimate piece of Christmas Cake and listening to the smoky vocals of Bing Crosby as he "Dreams of a White Christmas"....I feel replete and even blessed.

It was a beautiful Christmas day, picture perfect and straight out of a snow globe!! Meeting up with friends and neighbours.....forcing my baked goodies down their throats and gulping down equal quantities in return.....driving around Bandra, taking in the sparkly lights and the beautifully decked churches followed by a pop-your-trouser-buttons heavy dinner with family .....and finally, finally I am done for the day!!

Here’s are the pictures of my Christmas Pudding and the goodies that I baked.....

CULINARY CHRONICLES (Part 1) : No Rain on my Thanksgiving Parade!!

Come November, and I get bitten by the cooking bug! Suddenly I feel this insane need to slice and dice, sauté and simmer, grill and bake and (if things go horribly wrong) singe my eyebrows and turn the kitchen into a disaster-struck area!!

Thanksgiving.....the perfect time to get the ball rolling. I know it isn’t a part of the great Indian festive parade, but I like the concept of loud, noisy families coming together over a table creaking under the weight of a magnificent turkey, meltingly smooth mashed potatoes, ruby-red cranberry sauce and the wonderful assortment of pumpkin pies, cakes and other such finger-lickin’ goodies!!

Since I didn’t feel upto the task of tracking down the elusive turkey…I settled for the ubiquitous, ever faithful chicken.

My menu for the day:

~ Ham 'n' Cheese Stromboli

~ Apricot-Glazed Roast Chicken

~ Savory Bread Pudding with Mushrooms and Parmesan cheese

~ Green Leaf Lettuce, Pomegranate and Almond Salad

~ Warm Pumpkin Cake

After making an absolute nuisance of myself and speeding up my mum's aging process, I managed to whip up a pretty decent fare. I wish I could say the same for my photography skills!!

Browsing through the eye-catching and aesthically stunning visuals on Epicurious and Yahoo! Food left me with the grave misconception that I could achieve their lofty standards.

Needless to say.....I should be relegated to the big, black hole where all misguided wannabe photographers go after their pitiful attempts to "capture the moment"!!!

The entire clan is left twiddling their thumbs while I click a dozen odd snaps. The crisp lettuce is fast turning limp and the chicken looks up at me dolefully.....as if to say "Why god! Why me!?!!". My ex-photographer of an uncle shakes his head in supressed mirth and asks me whether I want the chicken to get into a hot-pink bikini and pout seductively for the camera. H-UH!!

That's family for you!!!

Photo-Session over, it’s time to dig in…no holds barred! And everyone does so……with gusto and scant regard for etiquette and patience. But as long as everyone is enjoying themselves……I feel GO-OD!!

This was the first session of the Culinary Chronicles. More...many more to come. Heralding in the New Year will be the new, improved....butter-ball version of yours truly!!!

Epicurious.com - Thanksgiving EYE-CANDY

O-BENTO!

Totally unrelated to the context of my blog, but couldn't resist posting it. This picture of a Bento-Box, with it's aesthetically arranged ingrediants was a visual treat! To know more about the bento-culture, visit : Cooking Cute.

Nigella Feasts!! (....or the other way 'round?!?)

Nigella Lawson, the domestic goddess ….who’s heating up the kitchen with more than just her hot stove and steaming oven!! Renowned for her smouldering sensuality and glorious curves, this smart chef manages to keep the audiences hooked (a sizeable portion of which comprises the slavering wolves who follow her every word and pout with ardent devotion!!!).

I had only heard about the lovely lady, catching her recipes occasionally on the net. But then I heard two of my cousins having a heated debate over the merits of hand-kneaded dough and mashed peas and other such epicurean fundas. To say that I was puzzled was an understatement. Two reasons…..

One, because they are predominantly “manly” men, who still believe that their mother was put on this earth for the sole purpose of feeding their bottomless pits and two, because they hadn’t yet advanced to the state of being termed as truly-uplifted metro- sexual males who knew their way around the kitchen effortlessly.

With clock-work regularity, popped up the statement…."but Nigella says". And whenever the name was mentioned they smiled dreamily and exchanged knowing looks.

To top it off, I read a normally acerbic scribe waxing lyrical about her show in his hard-hitting column. With almost loving detail, he had dedicated a sizeable portion of his space to the merits and wonders of luscious Lawson!.......and this was just the tip of the fast-melting iceberg!!

Who was this enchantress who had turned a majority of the male population into blithering babies?? I was intrigued and had to see the woman in action.

Luckily(?) for me, the show aired some days later. With almost indecent haste, my cousins had grabbed their seats in front of the tube. I managed to squeeze in between Twerp#1 and #2.

.......And there she was, in full “peaches and cream” grandeur…..all curves and no hollows! She smiled coyly, licked her lips suggestively and managed to convert the innocent art of rolling out cookie-dough into something definitely X-Rated!!

She sauntered around the kitchen, flirted with the camera and cast steamy looks at all her devoted viewers. I understood the appeal……a talented career woman-who can cook -and - who looks like all male-fantasies rolled into one delectable package!!!

I was with her through the entire chocolate fiesta; she made it sound quite sinfully tempting and mouth-watering. But then came the episode where she got to the part of the kidney beans (our humble l’il rajma) and rolled her RRRsss over how it was a lovely ric-hhhhh terracotta shade!! Chocolate, I get……but Rajma!! Even raw sensuality has it’s limits!! I’ll never be able to look at a kidney bean again without blushing furiously!!


I had had enough of cooking for the hormonally-supercharged.

Quietly (not that they would even notice an over-weight bull elephant rampaging through the room!!), I left my besotted cousins to their guilty pleasure and retired to my room.

Hell, one good thing out of the whole episode could be that the family could look forward to fledgling chefs who’ll whip up some tasty morsels, every now and then. I have no complaints, so long as they don’t start oozing a lot of unwanted sensuality all over the kitchen floor!!!!

"HEALTHY DESSERT" .......one of the most depressing oxymorons!!

I belong to the ol'school of thought whose strong belief is that a dessert should be rich, scrumptious, decadent, oozing with creamy goodness and loaded with calories. The concept of a healthy dessert is alien to me….shocking almost!

But going against the grain and not to mention, being bamboozled by my health-conscious dad……I decided to forego my staunch principles(!?!?!) and attempt a healthy “Banana Bread Pudding”. Swiped from an old edition of Femina…here’s the recipe:

BANANA BREAD PUDDING

Serves: Four
Time Required: 30 minutes

Ingrediants:

~2 ripe bananas
~300 ml skimmed milk
~4 slices whole wheat bread
~2 tbsp honey (or to taste)
~a few drops vanilla essence
~2 egg whites
~a few nuts and raisins

Procedure:
1. Blend or mash the bananas to a smooth consistency. Set aside.

2. Cut the bread slices into small pieces and then add the milk to them.
Cook on low heat till thick.

3.Add the honey and vanilla essence to the banana puree and mix well.

4.Beat egg whites and fold it into the banana mixture.

5.Add the bread-milk mix to the above and mix well.

6.Apply a little butter to a flat cake tin or a pie dish. (I went a bit further and used Amul Lite!!)
Pour the entire mixture into the dish.

7.Bake for a few minutes till the crust is slightly crisp.

8.Sprinkle a few nuts and raisins on top of the dish as an option.

9.Serve warm.


VERDICT: Warm and pleasant…..went down well with the health-nuts. Personally, I prefer the good ol’creamy version of Bread Pudding. I got a lo-oong lecture on the merits of healthy eating and how I don’t need every dessert to be an artery-clogging mass of cream, butter and white flour!! I nodded obediently. You could practically see my halo gleaming in the late-afternoon sun.

P.S. Did I mention that I add four heaped tablespoons of castor sugar to get just the right hint of sweeteness????

Blistering Bowls of Pasta!!

My Pièce de résistance…if I say so myself.A rainy day coupled with a lovely warm bowl of pasta in tomato and mushroom sauce smothered with oodles of fragrant cheese!!.....Utter bliss!

I try to stay true to the original recipe, but when you belong to a true-blue South Indian family with a fiery palate….things kinda change beyond recognition. My family likes it hot…’n’ I mean dragon fire-breathing hotttt!”. If you’re eyes haven’t watered or you ain’t got a runny nose…then u might as well relegate the dish to the back of the fridge already!!

So like a mad-scientist on a pay-rise…..I cackled evilly over my tomato sauce….throwing in chilli flakes, red chilli sauce, freshly-ground pepper and more than a generous dash of chilli powder! (yep, I don’t believe in moderation). Needless to say…it was scary-a** Hot! But my crazy family tucked in merrily and managed to give me an approving nod beween the sniffles and leaky eyes.

I fear for their sanity….but since this blog session is interspersed with me stuffing my face with the said pasta…..it’s basically a situation of “Hello kettle, said the inky pot….Lordy Lord, ain’t u black!!!”

il bruschetta humble

Bruschetta is a delectable slice of heaven originating from Italy. Tradition has it that olive growers in good ol’Italy normally take along some wholesome country bread to the olive-pressing sessions. When the oil emerges from the press, they toast a bit of the bread at the fireplace to taste their oil in it. The toasted bread is rubbed with garlic, either before or after sprinkling on the olive oil. A smidgen of salt and Voilà…..a simple, honest-to-goodness slice of Bruschetta.

The humble bruschetta has ofcourse been revamped, remodeled and undergone enough revisions and modifications to leave the poor olive growers fuming in impotent despair! Variations include toppings of tomato, cured meat, beans, veggies, spicy peppers…you name it, practically everything short of the kitchen sink!!!

Being meddlesome as hell, I couldn’t very well leave the much-marauded dish alone! I had to go and add some of my own twists and turns, which thankfully turned out to be fairly appetizing. So here goes my version of Bruschetta:




Ingrediants:
~ 10 button mushrooms, sliced.
~ 8 slices of Garlic Bread/ French Bread.
~ I large onion, chopped finely.
~ I green chilly chopped.
~ 3 cloves of garlic crushed and sliced.
~ 4 tomatoes; boiled, skinned and deseeded.
~ Hot ‘n’ Sweet Sauce.
~ Dash of sugar.
~ Pinch of salt.
~ Pepper.
~ Basil leaves, roughly torn.
~ Butter, 50 Gms.
~ I teaspoon Garlic Paste.
~ Slivers/ Shavings of Parmesan cheese.
~ Extra-Virgin Olive oil.

Procedure:
1. Heat oil in a pan; sauté the garlic, chilly and onion.

2. When the onion turns a light, caramelly shade; add the mushrooms. Sprinkle some salt and freshly ground-pepper. Toss in the basil leaves. Mix well.

3. Cook on a high-flame until the water surrounding the mushrooms evaporates.Throw in some basil, mix and set aside.

4. Chop up the boiled tomatoes roughly.

5. In a pan heat the chopped puree, add some Hot ‘n’ Sweet Sauce and the sugar.

6. Mix well and fry on a high-flame for a minute or two. Remove and set aside.

7. Mix the garlic paste with the butter and smear the bread slices with this mixture.Lightly toast the bread.

8. Apply a layer of the tomato paste followed by spoonfuls of the mushroom mixture.

9. Top with thin slivers / shavings of Parmesan cheese.

10. Grill gently till the cheese melts and…..DIG IN!!!

On a drizzly Sunday evening, sink your teeth into this hot, steaming treat and if possible, accompany it with a lovely long flute of sparkling Prosecco. Finally....when you rise from the “cheese-infused” euphoria, mutter a heartfelt prayer that deep in the heart of Tuscany, some purist olive grower isn’t baying for my blood!!!