Microwave Chocolate cake

On popular demand, I’m blogging my chocolate cake recipe. Its a straightforward and basic recipe – no icing, nothing fancy – very useful for occasions when u want to bake a yummy cake even on a weekday.

 

Ingredients:

1 and 1/2 cup refined flour (maida)

3 eggs

3/4 cup melted butter

3/4 cup sugar

1 tsp baking powder

2 tbsp cocoa powder

small quantity of milk (for getting the right batter consistency)

almonds, raisins, chocolate chips (optional)

Procedure:

Preheat the microwave oven on convection mode at 180 degree Celsius.

Mix the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder in a bowl. Beat the melted butter, eggs and sugar in another bowl till it gets fluffy and the sugar dissolves. Of late, I’ve been using an electric hand mixer for beating which makes it much simpler and quicker to prepare the batter.

Now, slowly mix this egg mixture to the flour mixture and beat till you get a smooth batter. The batter could be a little thick – smoothen it by adding milk till the batter is of a thin ribbon consistency. Once the batter is ready, add almonds, raisins, chocolate chips or other dry fruits of your choice to get that extra flavor. Mix the batter well.

Grease the cake tin/bowl with oil and pour the batter uniformly in the bowl.

I’ve noticed that the cake comes out better if you wait for the oven to cool a little after the preheating is over (probably for 3-4 minutes). If possible, keep the bowl on a low rack and bake in convection mode at 180 degree Celsius for 40 to 50 minutes. In between (after 20 mins or so), you can remove the low rack and continue with the baking. After 40 mins, check if the cake is done – insert a thin knife and see if it comes out clean. If it does, your cake is done. If not, continue for some more time till you feel that the cake is baked properly. I still use this trial and error method after 45 minutes to check if the cake is fully done.

Once done, allow the cake to cool before serving.

Kashmiri Dum Aloo

For Mahashivratri this year, I decided to make dum aloo – a must-have of any vegetarian Kashmiri feast. For the benefit of non-kashmiris, let me first clarify a misconception. The brown, sometimes sweet so-called “Kashmiri Dum Aloo” served at hotels is nowhere close to the original. The original dum aloo is deep fried, fiery red and painstakingly cooked. Reason enough for me to blog the recipe. Here’s what the final product looked like:

At the outset, I was a little apprehensive. I’ve cooked dum aloo a few times before and its been appreciated by non-kashmiris, but connoisseurs of the kashmiri cuisine would’ve passed it off as a lame attempt. This time, though, the results were excellent. Enough talk, lets get to the recipe now.

The Recipe:

10-12 small potatoes

Oil (lots for deep frying, around 3-4 tbsp for cooking)

Kashmiri Chilli Powder (the quantity varies depending on how much you can handle, make sure though its enough to get a nice red color)

Saunf (aniseed) powder, called baidyan in Kashmiri (around 1 and 1/2 teaspoon)

Soonth (Dry ginger powder), called shonth in Kashmiri (around 3/4 tsp)

Curd or Dahi (2-3 tablespoon – if its the hung curd variety, mix it first into a liquid form)

Cloves (3-4 pieces)

Cardamoms – black and green both (2-3 pieces)

Salt to taste

Try to choose the right sized potatoes – don’t go for mini potatoes, just select the smaller sized ones. Boil the potatoes, peel them and prick each of them on all sides with a toothpick or a knife. Heat a generous measure of oil in a kadhai (wok). After the oil has heated up, put the boiled potatoes in the oil and reduce the flame to the minimum. Now, let the potatoes deep fry. I’ve seen enough recipes of the dum aloo that hardly talk about the process of deep frying the potatoes. I would say that how you fry the potatoes will finally determine how well the potatoes are cooked. The trick is to let the potatoes slowly deep fry at low flame till they turn brown. Make sure you don’t over-do it. The potatoes should be light to medium brown in color when you switch off the flame. It might take close to an hour for the potatoes to be ready if fried at low flame. Be patient, give it that hour and stir around the potatoes at regular intervals of time to fry them evenly.

In a kadhai or pressure cooker, heat 3-4 tbsp of oil and add the cloves and cardamoms to it. Add salt, saunf powder, soonth powder and chilli powder to the hot oil. Now, these spices may burn in hot oil, so quickly add the curd, keep stirring. Add a cup of water, stir and bring to a boil. Now, add the potatoes and let it simmer on low flame. Stir around the potatoes at regular intervals of time. Most of the water should dry and you should see the oil come to the top before you switch off the flame. This might take another 45 minutes to an hour depending on the quantity you are making.

The dum aloo is best served with white rice, and mind you – seldom alone, there have to be at least 2-3 more side dishes with it( Kashmiri cuisine, of course). Watch out this space for more such recipes.

Drumstick sambar

Of late, I’ve been trying my hand at quite some recipes, and surprisingly, the results have been pleasant. I’ll be posting these tried and tested recipes on this blog, as a reference for myself as well as for sharing it on the internet.

I’ve always loved the south-indian sambar. I’d cooked sambar a couple of times before with good results, but I was still looking for an easy way to get the perfect flavor. I chanced upon a sambar recipe on the internet – it sounded good and simple. I did make a few personal modifications to the recipe and this is what the result looked like:

The Recipe:

1 and 1/2 cups toor dal
2 drumsticks (vegetable)
1 medium onion
1 capsicum
1 medium tomato
1 teaspoon turmeric
4 teaspoons sambhar masala
wet tamarind pulp
salt (to taste)
1 tablespoon oil
1/2 teaspoon asafetida powder
1 tablespoon cumin seeds
curry leaves
4 dried red chilies (whole)

1. Chop all the vegetables into medium-sized pieces. Drumsticks should be kept 2 inches long. Put veggies in a pressure cooker with the Toor dal and turmeric powder. Add enough water to cover the vegetables. Cook for about 20 minutes.

2. Soak the Tamarind in warm water for about 30 minutes. Remove the pods and filter out the tamarind water.

3. Open the pressure cooker and make sure the dal is cooked well. Add about 4 heaping teaspoons of Sambhar masala. Also add the tamarind water and salt to taste and stir the mixture.

4. Heat oil in a kadhai and add asafetida powder, cumin seeds, curry leaves and red chillies. Add this ‘tadka’ to mixture.

5. Boil the mixture for 2-3 minutes and serve hot.