Chocolate Avocado Almond Cake

by Deerga // May 21, 2017 // No Comments

Hi everybody! I know, it has been a very long time since my last post. And what is better to post than a recipe from my favorite form of cooking, baking!!! I have a greater affinity to baking and this must be the umpteenth time that I had mentioned here in my site. Baking generally involves sugar, that too lots of sugar. With that being said, wouldn’t it be awesome to bake something that is sweet but does not have processed sugar and healthy as well? I recently found one such recipe and that too of a cake! It is called the Chocolate Avocado Almond cake.
I came across the Chocolate Avocado Almond cake one afternoon when me and my HB were craving for something sweet but that doesn’t make us feel guilty after eating it 🙂 (thats one tough cookie!). Voila, I found this savior and was thoroughly satisfied afterwards. Chocolate Avocado Almond cake, as the name suggests, is made of avocado, coconut oil, coconut cream, almond flour, honey, chocolate chips and cocoa powder. It is very easy to make and is not time consuming at all.
Chocolate Avocado Almond cake is one of those rare, too good to be true, kind of recipe. It is healthy, has no added sugar (honey and chocolate chips take care of the sweetness) and is an excellent breakfast item. It can also be had as a snack (which we did when baked the first time :). For those of you wondering about the lengthy name, I came up with it, just put together the ingredients and here is your tasty, yummy Chocolate Avocado Almond cake. Try it out, you won’t be disappointed.

Chocolate Avocado Almond Cake

Recipe type: Breakfast

Cuisine: American

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 45 mins

Total time: 1 hour

Serves: 6

Ingredients

Almond flour – 2 cups
Raw cocoa powder – ¼ cup
Baking soda – 1 tsp
Salt – ½ tsp
Cashew nuts, roughly chopped - ½ cup (or any nuts of your choice)
Avocado, medium – 1½ Cups
Melted coconut oil – 3 tbsp
Coconut cream, room temperature – 2 ½ tbsp
Vanilla extract – 1 tsp
Eggs, room temperature - 2
Raw honey – 3 tbsp
Chocolate chips – ⅓ cup + 2 tbsp
Sugar – 1 tbsp (optional)

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and line the bottom and sides of the 8 inch loaf pan with parchment paper.
Sieve the flour, baking soda, salt and cocoa powder in a large bowl. Add the nuts to the dry ingredients and mix well without any lumps.
Remove the pit and pulse avocadoes in a blender. Add coconut oil, coconut cream, vanilla extract, eggs, and honey and blend together to a smooth paste.
Add the ground paste to the dry ingredients and gently mix using rubber spatula. Do not over mix.
Add the chocolate chips and fold the mixture.
Spoon batter into the loaf pan and spread it evenly using rubber spatula. (The batter will be really thick)
Bake for 40 to 45 minutes until the tooth pick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean.
Cool the bread over a wire rack for 15 minutes before serving. Enjoy!

Vanilla Cake with Swiss Meringue Blueberry Lavender Frosting

by Deerga // August 9, 2016 // No Comments

Hello everyone! After a few weeks, here I am with a new recipe. I might have mentioned this already but I love baking. It is a passion of mine. Trying out different varieties of cakes and whatnot is something I do when I get free time. Today I have posted below one of the recent recipes that I tried out in honor of friends all over the world. Happy Friendship Day!!! It is the recipe for Vanilla cake with Swiss Meringue blueberry lavender buttercream frosting. I know, the name itself sounds exotic and trust me, the taste do justify the name 🙂

One of the joys of baking is, for almost all recipes that you try out, there is a definite recipe with set measurements for ingredients. That in itself will give you the confidence to try out new items. Coming back to our Vanilla Cake with Swiss Meringue blueberry lavender buttercream frosting, the recipe is that of a wedding cake i.e., the vanilla cake baked here is most commonly baked for weddings! Meringue in itself is a type of dessert made from egg whites and sugar. And Swiss Meringue is a type of meringue. There are three types of meringues, they are French, Swiss and Italian. The swiss variety is smoother and silkier than the other two and is the popular choice for making buttercream frosting. I have used a concoction of blueberry and lavender to flavor the buttercream in this recipe.

Vanilla cake with Swiss Meringue blueberry lavender buttercream frosting is the perfect recipe for joyous occasions like birthdays and parties but you can also have it on days when you just feel like eating cake :). One thing to remember is you need a little bit of patience to try out this recipe since making the meringue takes some time. However, you will not be disappointed when you taste the soft and smooth cake once baked and frosted 🙂

Vanilla Cake with Swiss Meringue Blueberry Lavender Frosting

Recipe type: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Prep time: 35 mins

Cook time: 40 mins

Total time: 1 hour 15 mins

Serves: 2 layer 6"round cake

Ingredients

For the cake:

1 ½ cup flour
1 ½ tsp baking powder
A generous pinch of salt
3 eggs
1 ½ sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
½ cup whole milk
1 tbsp vanilla extract

For the frosting:

1 ½ cup blueberry
1 tbsp dried lavender flowers
6 egg whites
1 cup + 3tbsp granulated sugar
1 tbsp vanilla extract
A pinch of salt
1 cup + 4 tbsp (2 ½ sticks) butter, room temperature

Instructions

For the cake:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease the two 6” round cake pans with butter (on the sides and bottom), dust the bottoms with flour and line them with parchment paper.
Sieve the flour, baking powder and salt together in a medium mixing bowl.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the egg and sugar in medium speed.
Whisk in the butter until the mixture is creamy and smooth.
Add in the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix in medium speed until well combined- Do not mix too much.
Finally add in the milk and vanilla extract and mix again.
Divide the batter between cake pans
Bake for 35 to 40 minutes or until the tooth pick when inserted comes out clean.
Remove from oven and let cool completely.
Wrap them tightly in polythene sheet and freeze them for couple of hours before frosting.

For the frosting:

Place blueberry, lavender and half cup of water in a small pan and cook on medium for 5 minutes until juices have released. Let it cool.
Grind them in a blender. Strain out the pulp and extract the juice. Keep it aside.
On a double boiler (or a medium sized bowl suspended over the pan of simmering water) combine the egg whites, sugar, vanilla extract and salt. Heat, stirring gently until the sugar is completely dissolved- check by rubbing a bit of mixture into your fingers. It should feel smooth.
Take the bowl off the heat and whip the egg whites using hand mixer until stiff peaks form. It takes around 15 to 20 minutes.
Now add the butter 2 tbsp. at a time, until each tbsp. butter is well incorporated into the mixture. Once all the butter have been added, the resulting buttercream should be smooth and thick. This is called swiss meringue butter cream. If you think the frosting is runny you could add icing sugar to make it smooth and thick.
Finally add in 1 ½ tbsp. of blueberry lavender concoction and gently mix together until well incorporated.
Level the cake by cutting the top crust and frost them according to your taste.

Notes

1.To pasteurize the egg you could also clip on the liquid thermometer to the mixture to reach a temperature of 160 degree Fahrenheit, gently stirring continuously.
2.Butter that are added to the frosting should not be soft. It should be stable.
3.If the frosting is runny, refrigerate for 20 minutes and take out and mix in medium high speed until it becomes thick.
4. If the frosting have curdled, microwave for 10 seconds and then beat again until the frosting becomes thick.

Vanilla Cake with blueberry lavender frosting

Mocha Ice-Cream Cake

by Deerga // February 13, 2016 // No Comments

Happy Valentine’s Day everyone! I can hear the wheels turning in your head as to what to make for this special day so that your loved one will be blown away. I too had the same apprehension and I finally took a plunge in to a relatively unknown territory, Ice-cream cake. Yes, I finally made an ice-cream cake for my HB! It is the Mocha Ice-cream cake, entirely homemade 🙂 To be honest, I had had ice-cream cake only once before today, that too in my childhood. In fact I did not even know that it was an ice-cream cake then.

The Mocha Ice-cream cake is a pretty simple cake but extremely delicious and will particularly be enjoyed by coffee lovers, I believe, because my HB is one. The main thing to note while making the cake is the consistency of the mocha whipped cream. It should be beaten until you get a stiff peak. I have used homemade chocolate chunk cookies (for which I will post the recipe soon) as the base but you can also use store bought cookies. But make sure that you get good quality ones. Also, I personally prefer dark chocolate chunk cookies instead of the regular ones because they enhance the mocha flavor and the latter will make the cake too sweet. And I used a springform pan to shape the cake but you can also use a dessert bowl or any other small bowl to hold the ice-cream cake.

The Mocha Ice-cream Cake is pretty light and is not too sweet (because of the dark chocolate and brown sugar) and can be had for dessert or simply as is. My HB thoroughly enjoyed it 🙂 and hope your loved ones will too once you make this extremely delicious cake. So do try it out and let me know your experience 🙂

Mocha Ice-Cream Cake

Recipe type: Dessert

Cuisine: Italian

Prep time: 5 mins

Cook time: 5 mins

Total time: 10 mins

Serves: 4

Ingredients

½ cup cold heavy cream
3 oz of Italian mascarpone cheese
1 ¼ tbsp granulated white sugar
1 tbsp filter coffee decoction
½ tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder (I used Dutch processed)
¼ tsp instant espresso
¼ tsp pure vanilla extract
5 Good quality thin crust chocolate chip cookies

for decorating:

10 Lindt toffee bites (optional)
1 Godiva dark chocolate truffle

Instructions

I made homemade thin crust brown butter dark chocolate chunk cookies for this recipe. You could use any good quality thin crust chocolate chip cookies for this recipe.
First add all the above given ingredients except cookies in a medium mixing bowl.
Mix them in very low speed until combined.
Then move to medium speed until stiff peak forms. It takes around couple of minutes.
Then in a 4” spring form pan, line the cookies on the bottom.
Layer the cookies with mocha whipped cream on top.
And repeat by layering another cookie and mocha whipped cream layers.
Repeat and finish it off with mocha whipped cream layer. Cover it with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.
Carefully scrape the sides using plastic knife before removing from the pan. Drizzle a tsp of cocoa powder on top using strainer and decorate with lindt toffee bites or anything of your choice. Enjoy! 

Red Velvet Cupcake

by Deerga // December 24, 2015 // No Comments

I love cakes and pastries, period. Cake is one food that I can eat even when I am not in the mood to eat anything!:) So obviously, trying out different varieties of cakes is a favorite pastime of mine. Recently, we celebrated my HB’s birthday and this time I decided to make something that was in long time pending list and a favorite of mine (as for as cakes are concerned my HB’s choice comes in second :)), the red velvet cupcake!

Cupcakes are classic American delicacies that have been around as early as the late 18th century. There are numerous varieties of cupcakes. After the advent of boutique pastry shops, more and more interesting flavors are being baked. The earliest mention of Red velvet cupcakes was in the late I950s (courtesy Wikipedia). Also the distinct red color has its own titbit. Apparently, one businessman in Texas started baking red velvet cakes as a marketing ploy to sell more red dyes! It is quite hard to nail down the flavor of this cake. It is a mixture of mild chocolate, with a hint of buttermilk, enough vanilla and lots of butter taste. The major attribute of Red velvet cupcakes is the dense but soft, moist crumb. The best part about Red velvet cupcakes are their cream cheese frosting. The slight tanginess of the cream cheese goes hand in hand with the soft moist crumb of the cake. There are certain things to be noted while baking Red velvet cupcakes. One is the use of cake flour. All purpose flour is a strong no-no. Cake flour gives the distinct softness associated with this cake. Another is the use of unsweetened cocoa powder. This gives you a mild chocolate flavor just enough to tease your tastebuds 🙂 For Red velvet cupcakes, there are two special ingredients that we use. One is buttermilk and the other is vinegar. Buttermilk gives you a slight tanginess and moistness to the cake. It also enables the baking soda to leaven the cake. Vinegar is used to enhance the red color. Trust me, you will not taste even a hint of vinegar once the cake is baked.

Red velvet cupcake is a decadent dessert that is sure to make any party a memorable one, given its distinct taste and delightful appearance. So try it in your home and have your own party, tasting the awesome Red velvet cupcake!:)

Red Velvet Cupcake

Prep time: 30 mins

Cook time: 18 mins

Total time: 48 mins

Serves: 12 cupcakes

Ingredients

1 ½ cups cake flour
½ tsp baking soda
1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
¼ tsp salt
¼ cup unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
½ cup vegetable oil
2 large eggs, room temperature, separated,
¾ tbsp vanilla extract
½ tsp distilled white vinegar
1 ¾ tbsp Gel or liquid or powder red food coloring
½ cup buttermilk, room temperature
¼ cup white chocolate chip

for the cream cheese frosting

5 oz. cream cheese, brick type
3 ¼ tbsp unsalted butter, room temperature
1 ¾ cups confectioners’ sugar sifted
½ vanilla bean paste +1 tsp vanilla extract or 2 tsp clear vanilla extract

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350 degree Fahrenheit or 180 degree Celsius. Line cupcake pans with paper liners.
Sift the flour, baking soda, cocoa powder and salt together into a medium mixing bowl and keep it aside.
Separate the egg yolk and egg whites and set aside.
In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter using hand mixer on high speed until smooth for about one minute.
Add sugar and beat on high speed for another couple of minutes until creamy.
Scrape the sides using spatula and add the oil and beat on high for another 2 minutes.
Now add in the egg yolks and vanilla. Beat on medium high speed until well combined.
Now beat in the vinegar and enough food coloring until you reach the desired color.
Set the mixer on low speed and add the dry ingredients in three additions alternating with the buttermilk, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients, and mixing each addition just until incorporated – do not over mix.
Vigorously whisk the egg whites until thick and foamy for 3 minutes as shown in the picture.
Fold the beaten egg whites into cake batter with a spatula. The batter will be silky and lightly thick.
Add in white chocolate chip and gently mix the batter. Again, do not over mix the batter.
Pour the batter into cupcake pans filling ⅔ of the way full and bake for 18 minutes or until the tooth pick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Remove the pan from the oven and let it cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack and cool them completely.
Now for the frosting, combine the cream cheese and butter in a medium mixing bowl and beat on medium to high speed for 3 minutes until light and fluffy.
Add in the confectioners’ sugar and mix on low speed until well incorporated. Increase the speed to medium to high and beat for another 2 minutes.
Blend in the vanilla.
Add the frosting into a pipe bag. And refrigerate for one hour. Later cut the edge of the pipe bag and frost the cupcakes according to your own taste. Enjoy 🙂

Notes

1.Using cake flour is a must for making red velvet cake or red velvet cupcakes. Cake flour is much lighter than all-purpose flour and gives right texture.
2.Separate the egg white and egg yolk and then add to the cake batter to achieve the fluffiest texture possible.
3.Buttermilk is a must for this recipe to give tangy flavor and moisture to the cake and vinegar as well. Read that vinegar helps brighten the color.
4.You can make 6” red velvet cake using the same measurement or double the measurement for 2 layer red velvet cake.

Zucchini Bread

by Deerga // July 28, 2015 // No Comments

Today, I have posted a kind of healthy dessert variety that you don’t find normally in restaurants or bakeries. It is called as the Zucchini bread. As the name suggests it is made from zucchini, a relative to pumpkins 🙂 Zucchini is also called as summer squash and is of European origin, mainly from Italy. You can make a number of dishes from zucchini like fritters, fries, as a topping in pizzas (it tastes yummy 🙂 ) etc.

Zucchini bread is a very easy to make bread variety and can be had as snack and for breakfast as well. Zucchini, as with all vegetables, is rich in nutrients especially vitamin A and very low in calories. I first had zucchini bread in a vegan restaurant and liked the taste so much. Believe me, you cannot identify that it is zucchini bread unless someone tells you that 🙂

Zucchini bread, as said above, is a very good breakfast dish, especially for children who normally do not like to eat vegetables (which covers 95% of them :)). Try this tasty bread variety and let me know your comments.

Zucchini Bread

Recipe type: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 65 mins

Total time: 1 hour 20 mins

Serves: 1 9x5x3 inch loaf

Ingredients

1 ½ cups bread flour or all purpose flour
½ tsp salt
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp baking powder
¼ tsp ground cinnamon
½ cup vegetable oil
1 cup white sugar
¼ cup brown sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
1 cup grated zucchini
½ cup chopped walnuts (or any nuts of your choice)

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit or 180 degrees Celsius.
Grease a loaf pan (9 x 5 x 3 inches) with butter or oil on the bottom and all four sides and line the bottom with parchment paper.
Sieve all the dry ingredients together into a small bowl.
Combine oil and sugars to the large bowl. Mix well until well combined.
Add in the eggs and beat well until creamy consistency.
Add and beat the vanilla extract.
Now combine the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Mix well without any lumps.
Finally add in the grated zucchini and chopped walnuts into the mixture and mix well.
Pour batter into prepared loaf pan. Shake the pan and even the batter on top using spatula.
Bake in oven (preferably in the middle rack) for 55 minutes, until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean – I covered the pan with aluminum foil after 35 minutes when it starts to brown on top.
Turn out onto a wire rack and allow them to cool. Serve the yummy zucchini bread as hot or cold for a breakfast or brunch or as evening snack. Enjoy! 

Mango Bread

by Deerga // June 2, 2015 // No Comments

Today, I was in the mood for something sweet, something that describes the summer season and something healthy. Yep, it has got something to do with Mango. It is the Mango bread! The recipe for Mango bread that I have given below is truly healthy and is a light fare. It has no eggs, is made of wheat flour and has very little added sugar!
I came across this Mango bread recipe online recently and it immediately picked my curiosity. I have heard about banana bread, zucchini bread, raisin bread etc but Mango bread? It was the first time I have heard about it. But trust me, the bread tastes awesome. Mango bread can be had for breakfast or served as a snack. If you are left with more mangoes than you could possibly eat, I would say Mango bread is the way to go.

Mango bread is very easy to make and as said earlier, is healthy as well. Kids would love it. Try baking this unique bread variety in your kitchen and let me know how well you liked it 🙂

Mango Bread

Recipe type: Breakfast

Cuisine: Indian

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 55 mins

Total time: 1 hour 10 mins

Serves: 1 (9 x 5 x 3 inches) loaf

Ingredients

1½ cups wheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
8 tbsp unsalted butter (1/2 cup or 1 stick), room temperature
¾ cup sweetened condensed milk
2 large mangoes or 1 cup mango puree
3 to 4 tsp sugar or add as required
1 tsp pure vanilla extract

Instructions

Grease a loaf pan (9 x 5 x 3 inches) with butter or oil on the bottom and on all four sides and set aside.
Sieve flour, baking powder and baking soda together in a medium bowl.
Peel and cut the mangoes (measuring 1 cup tightly packed) and add it to the blender. Add sugar according to your taste and depending on mangoes' sweetness. Blend together in to a puree.
Preheat the oven to 350 degree Fahrenheit or 180 degree Celsius.
In a large oven safe mixing bowl, heat and melt the butter for 35 seconds. Allow it to cool.
Add in condensed milk to the butter and whisk together in to a smooth mixture.
Add in the mango puree and vanilla or mango essence and whisk together until well combined. – I would highly recommend using mango essence to get the complete flavor in the bread.
Add in the flour and gently fold them together using a spatula. – The important thing is not to over mix the batter. You do not want it to be smooth. Over mixing the batter will yield tough, rubbery bread. The batter might look thinner if you are using store bought mango puree.
Pour batter into prepared loaf pan. Shake the pan and even the batter on top using spatula.
Bake in oven (preferably in the middle rack) for 55 minutes, until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean – I covered the pan with aluminum foil after 35 minutes when it started to turn brown on top.
Turn out the bread onto a wire rack and allow it to cool. Serve the yummy mango bread as hot or cold for a breakfast or brunch or as an evening snack. Enjoy! 

Notes

1.Recipe also suggests to use cardamom powder or cinnamon powder or mango essence in place of vanilla extract.
2.Use a fiber less mangoes.
3.Wheat flour could also be substituted with all purpose flour.

White Chocolate Cupcake with truffle filling

by Deerga // May 26, 2015 // No Comments

Thank you, guys for your love and support. I have received 1000+ likes for MyEdibleCravings Facebook page. It has been an amazing journey so far and I hope it continues to be so in the future as well. To celebrate this special milestone I decided to prepare something special; something that is sweet (obviously :)) and something exotic in taste. And that special recipe turned out to be that of a White Chocolate Cupcake with Truffle filling. It is a soft, fluffy cupcake with a creamy frosting and a silky smooth truffle filling which is the kicker. Don’t you agree that the name itself has its own taste?

Making White Chocolate Cupcake with truffle filling is a time consuming process and patience is the key. It is a sweet treat and is an excellent dessert to serve. To mix the batter and to whisk the eggs and chocolate, having an electric mixer will be handy (I used KitchenAid hand mixer). Also, as the name suggests, white chocolate is the star ingredient here and I went with Lindt-Lindor white chocolate varieties, both for the cupcakes and the truffle filling.

White Chocolate Cupcake with truffle filling is something I came across recently. I have been waiting for the right occasion to make it because as mentioned above, it is a little bit time consuming and I wanted a worthwhile cause to justify my effort ;). And 1000+ likes is indeed a worthwhile event for me to celebrate. I wish that after seeing the recipe down below, you too would give it a try for one of your memorable occasions in life 🙂

White Chocolate Cupcake with truffle filling

Prep time: 1 hour

Cook time: 25 mins

Total time: 1 hour 25 mins

Serves: 12 cupcakes

Ingredients

1¾ cups cake flour
2 tsps baking powder
⅔ cup milk, whole milk is best
½ a vanilla bean
4 egg whites, room temperature
6 tbsps butter
½ cup granulated sugar
¼ cup sour cream
12 Lindt-Lindor white chocolate truffles

For the frosting

6 Oz white chocolate for baking, chopped
1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese, softened
¼ cup butter (1/2 stick), softened
½ a vanilla bean
2 cups powdered sugar
White chocolate shavings (optional)

Instructions

Bring the eggs, butter and cream cheese to room temperature. Preheat the oven to 325°F. Place paper liners inside the wells of a muffin pan.
Sieve flour and baking powder in a small mixing bowl. Slit the whole vanilla bean in the center and scrape just half a vanilla bean paste. Combine milk and vanilla bean paste in a measuring cup (1-cup).
In a medium mixing bowl (2 qt.), beat egg whites on high speed of electric mixer until stiff peaks form. It took me 40 minutes to reach that stage using my hand mixer. Refer notes below.
In a large mixing bowl, beat butter and granulated sugar on medium-high speed until fluffy (it would take around 3 minutes); beat in sour cream until smooth.
On medium speed, add flour mixture in three additions, alternating with milk mixture in two additions, mixing until smooth.
Whisk in one-third of the egg whites with whisk. Fold in remaining egg whites using whisk. Divide batter evenly among liners.
Bake in the middle rack for 17-20 minutes or until wooden toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Remove pan from oven on to a cooling rack.
Immediately snip a ½-inch-deep “x” on top of each cupcake using scissors. Press one truffle into each cupcake until flush with top of cupcake.
Remove the cupcakes from pan. Allow it to cool for 30 minutes or to room temperature. (Truffles will melt into cupcakes.)
Meanwhile, for frosting, place white chocolate in a microwave safe bowl. Microwave, uncovered, on high for 1 to 1 ½ minutes or until chocolate is mostly melted, stirring every 30 seconds if needed. Let stand 3 minutes or until slightly cooled.
In the same mixing bowl, combine cream cheese, butter and vanilla; using clean beaters, beat on medium speed until well blended. Slowly add powdered sugar; beat well.
Frost cupcakes and sprinkle with white chocolate shavings.

Notes

1.If you are using a electric hand mixer like me, I would advise you to follow these steps.
• Beat sugar and butter until fluffy in a large bowl.
• In a medium mixing bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.
• Add sour cream to the sugar and butter mixture and beat until smooth. And then proceed with step 6 above.
2.You could also use double strength vanilla essence in place of vanilla bean. Add half tsp each for the batter and frosting.
3.I would recommend cooling the frosting in the refrigerator for about 10 to 15 minutes before decorating the cake with it. That way it will get perfect frosting. I used Wilton’s jumbo 2M pipe for frosting the cupcakes.

Banana bread

by Deerga // May 12, 2015 // No Comments

Hi guys, Today I finally decided to make something with the ripe bananas that has been on the counter for the past two days. So zeroed in on Banana bread, a favorite of us. Banana Bread is a type of bread that is often served as an after meal snack. According to Wikipedia, Banana bread became popular in US in the 1930s after the advent of baking soda 🙂 and February 23rd is National Banana Bread Day. Generally, I am a fan of banana and like food items that has banana as one of the ingredients.
Banana bread is very easy to make and is very flavorful. In fact while I am writing this, Banana bread is getting baked in the oven and I could smell the divine smell of bananas and butter mixed together. Can’t wait to have a bite! If you have the ingredients sorted out, then baking the bread takes no time at all. There are different varieties to banana bread as well, like, chocolate chip banana bread, banana nut bread, banana raisin bread etc. Here I have given you the recipe for plain banana bread with cashews.
Here comes the beep from the oven! Alright, enough of the stories. I guess its nom nom time and I am off to the kitchen. Hope you are too, to start making this wonderful, simple and flavorful dish, i.e. the Banana Bread 🙂

Banana bread

Recipe type: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 60 mins

Total time: 1 hour 15 mins

Serves: 1 9x5x3 inch loaf

Ingredients

1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt
½ cup (8 tbsp) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
½ cup brown sugar
½ cup granulated sugar
2 eggs, beaten
3 overripe large bananas, mashed
⅓ cup any nuts, chopped, divided (I used cashews)

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C).
Lightly grease a 9 X 5 inch loaf pan with butter on the sides and line the bottom with parchment sheet. Set aside.
Mash the bananas, chop the nuts and beat the eggs.
In a large bowl, sieve flour, baking soda and salt together.
In a separate bowl, cream together butter and sugar.
First add the sugar mixture into the flour mixture and mix well without any lumps. Then add in eggs and bananas and mix them with a wooden spoon or rubber spatula until the batter is thick and chunky (The important thing is not to over mix the batter. You do not want it smooth. Over mixing the batter will yield tough, rubbery bread).
Mix half of the chopped nuts to the batter. Lightly fold the batter. Pour batter into the prepared loaf pan. Top it off with the remaining nuts.
Bake in oven (preferably in the middle rack) for 60 to 65 minutes, until golden brown and a toothpick when inserted in the center comes out clean. Turn out onto a wire rack and allow them to cool.
Serve warm or at room temperature. This bread can be frozen.

Chocolate cake

by Deerga // April 30, 2015 // No Comments

Now, why did I bake a chocolate cake, that too with a diet conscious HB by my side? It is the ONE year anniversary of my website, guys!!! What started as a personal log of my favorite recipes is now well on its way to become a repository of recipes catering to all types of palate. Thank you all for your continuing support and well wishes! When we decided to commemorate the milestone, there was a lengthy debate on what to make. I was oscillating between a white chocolate truffle cup cake and a perfect chocolate cake and finally settled on a chocolate cake, much to my HB’s delight!

Chocolate cake is one of the most recognized cakes in the world. I am pretty sure that there is not even one bakery/pastry shop around the world that does not sell a chocolate cake! Though the name is generalized, there is multitude varieties of chocolate cake. Today, I am giving here a very simple but decadent recipe of chocolate cake which is my favorite as well. It is a three layered chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. I have been wanting to bake a cake from scratch for a long time and now that I have done it, it turned out to be a job well done :). Baking a cake, in general gets a bit messy and doing it from scratch makes it even more messier, but trust me, it is all worth it.

I am a very big fan of cakes in general (it would be the only thing that won’t get me angry when I am woken up from my sleep and offered ;)) And after trying this chocolate cake, I have a profound respect for cakes 🙂 Do try this decadent recipe and post your comments.

Chocolate cake

Prep time: 20 mins

Cook time: 45 mins

Total time: 1 hour 5 mins

Serves: 3 layer 8"cake

Ingredients

For frosting:

1 ¾ cups (350 gr) sugar
1 ½ cups heavy cream
7.5 oz (213 gr) unsweetened chocolate, roughly chopped
12 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1 ½ tsp pure vanilla extract

For cake:

Scant 3 cups (425 gr) All purpose flour
3 cups (600 gr) sugar
1 cup + 2 tbsp Dutch-processed cocoa powder
1 ½ tsp salt
2 ¼ tspn baking powder
2 ¼ tspn baking soda
3 eggs, room temperature, beaten
¾ cup vegetable oil
1 ½ cup whole milk
1 ½ cup hot coffee decoction, filtered

Instructions

For frosting:

Combine sugar and heavy cream into a sauce pan. Heat the pan and bring them to boil in a medium heat. Once they starts to boil, simmer it for another 5 to 6 minutes.
Remove from heat and stir in the chopped chocolates until completely melted.
Now add in the butter pieces and stir them again until completely melted.
Finally stir in the vanilla extract.
Let the frosting cool completely, whisking every now and then during cooling. (You can do this step in the refrigerator to speed up the process) Once completely cool at room temperature, the frosting will be spreadable.

For cake:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F or 175 degrees C. Grease the three 8" round cake pans with butter or oil (on the sides and bottom), dust the bottoms with flour and line them with parchment paper. If desired, wrap the cake pans with bake-even strips.
Sieve sugar, flour, cocoa powder, salt, baking powder and baking soda into a large mixing bowl. This is done to avoid lumps and even the mixing. Meanwhile make hot coffee decoction and keep it ready.
In a separate bowl, combine the beaten eggs, vegetable oil and milk. Stir to mix. Then, with the mixer on low, pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. Mix on low flame until evenly distributed.
Pour the hot coffee into the batter and mix on medium to low flame until smooth and creamy. .
Divide the batter between the cake pans.
Bake for 40-45 minutes. When a toothpick inserted into the center of the cakes comes out cleanly, the cakes are done. Remove from the oven and let cool completely.
Refrigerate the cakes for at least 2 hours or place it n the freezer for one hour. Level the cakes by cutting the excess top bump.
Stack the cakes, spreading a layer of frosting in between each cake layer. Frost the outside of the cake for a smoother finish.

Notes

1.I would strongly recommend to line the parchment paper as this cake is so soft and gooey. You could also use cold wet cloth to tie around the pans instead of bake-even strips.
2.The recipe I have given here is for the big batch. You can reduce the ingredients by half for a smaller batch.
3.This recipe also works for a 3-layer 9" cake, with slightly shorter layers.

CHOCOLATE CHIP COFFEE MUFFIN

by Deerga // April 27, 2014 // No Comments

Chocolate chip coffee muffin is a variety of muffin with coffee as the base flavor. It is one of my most recent recipes that I had tried.
Coffee is my HB’s favorite drink and hence this chocolate chip coffee muffin has become one of his favorite dessert as well 🙂 Chocolate chip coffee muffin is very easy to make and involves minimal ingredients. I am pretty sure that all the coffee lovers out there will enjoy this muffin. Though the muffin does not have the exact coffee taste, it has a touch of coffee flavor in it making it far tastier.
Chocolate chip coffee muffin can be had as a breakfast muffin (serving the dual purpose of having coffee and a muffin :)) So all the coffee lovers and general food lovers, try this wonderful muffin at your home and let me know your thoughts.

CHOCOLATE CHIP COFFEE MUFFIN

Recipe type: Breakfast

Cuisine: American

Prep time: 15 mins

Cook time: 25 mins

Total time: 40 mins

Serves: 12

Chocolate chip coffee muffin is a variety of muffin with coffee as the base flavor. It is one of my most recent recipes that I had tried.

Ingredients

Butter, softened - ½ cup
Sugar - ¾ cup
Coffee extract (McCormicks) - 1 teaspoon
Eggs - 2
Flour - 2 cups
Baking powder - 1 Tablespoon
Salt - ½ teaspoon
Milk - ½ cup
Strong brewed coffee, cooled - ½ cup
Miniature chocolate chips, semisweet – ½ cup
For the Glaze
Powdered sugar - ¾ cup
Brewed coffee, cooled - 4 teaspoons

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 375 F. Beat together the butter and sugar until creamy. Add the extract and eggs and beat again.
Whisk together the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, and salt).
Stir together the milk and cooled coffee.
Add the flour mixture and milk mixture alternately to the creamed butter until it is all combined. Do not over mix. Stir in the chocolate chips.
Fill 12 muffin liners ¾ full. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes. Let cool.
Meanwhile stir together the powdered sugar and coffee until dissolved. Dip the tops of the muffins in the glaze and let set. Enjoy!