LCTP

Lemon Cake Top Pudding- For as long as I can remember, we've called it LCTP. My Mum said its one of the easiest and most rewarding dessert recipes. She said years ago, just after she got married, she made trays upon trays of this for over 100 people. 

Small Joys

A few years ago, I uploaded some of my poems (I think it was my Dad who told me about such sites) onto a few sites for writers and poets. Just a few of them, that I thought stood out slightly out of all my poems. I posted three that I wrote when I was in 11th and 12th- they're here on the blog too.

Today I was trying to remember which sites I had posted them onto, having not opened them since I posted the poems. I opened up my profile on PoemHunter and had comments that I never saw. Aren't these kind of sites supposed to send me emails when I get comments? 

Then I opened up my profile on VoicesNet- more comments and rates and lots of views over the past few years. 3 people even shared it on Facebook. Where? When?

Then I found something even better. The month I uploaded 'Reason for Writing', it was given 2nd place in the July 2009 Monthly VoicesNet.com Writers Contest- Read here. Yay! I am so excited, even though it's been two years since I posted it and 5 years since I wrote it.

I can't remember if I've put poems on any other site. But this is enough excitement for now. 

:) I think I am inspired to write poems again.

It spoke to me.

I was doing my routine blog jumping. I came across this from HelloJenuine and it spoke to me.


I want this printed and framed for my kitchen (when I have my own house and my own kitchen)


I just had to share this.

And I found this on Gemma Correls site and laughed and laughed. Then I opened the image again and laughed again. 

Great blogs. Great artists. :) 

Baked Vegetable Crêpes

Finally something new instead of the usual Indian and Italian.


My Mum was spending time with her favourite hobby- reading recipe books. But today, hobby became something productive, and we actually made something.


Taken from a Parragon published, 'the best ever Vegetarian' and adapted based on what veggies we had in the fridge and what seasoning we felt like using. (I can't find the chef's/authors name anywhere on the book).


So, here goes-

"It's showtime!"

"Life is the most spectacular show on Earth"- Sarah Gruen

It's been a while since I read a book; quite shameful. But I picked 'Water for Elephants' off my Mum's bookshelf, because I wanted to read it before I watched the movie. It was a pretty easy read and managed to finish it in a day. I had a cold that day and felt quite miserable, so I stayed in bed with the book and a few cups of lemon and honey tea. 


It was quite an exciting book. The functioning of a circus troop in the 1930's was definitely a fresh read. She (Sarah Gruen) used a similar concept to the Nicholas Sparks movie, The Notebook, with a alternating past and present narrative. I liked this contrast- cold, white, nursing home to the colourful energy of the circus.

Italian Omelette

My Mum made the most fabulous omelette for me today. It was a three egg one. Was so stuffed. That was my protein quota for the week.


So I made one for my brother in the evening. Similar, but not the same. Still tasted good. 


Fry half a chopped onion and 2 cloves of chopped garlic in 2 tsps of butter and a little bit of oil because butter burns easily. Add 6 chopped mushrooms. Fry well. Add salt, pepper, finely chopped rosemary. Chop about 1 tbsp worth of sun dried tomatoes and add that along with 1 tsp of oil from the sun dried tomato bottle. Beat together 2 eggs and 1tbsp of cream. Evenly spread the mixture in the pan and pour over the eggs.

Add small chunks/grated cheese to the top. Lower fire and cover pan. When there isn't much runnyness left, carefully fold in half or flip. 
Note: I tried flipping today. Didn't work. It kind of fell apart, so I folded what was left of it. Hence not a perfect picture


Cook for another minute or 2. Careful not to burn it. Serve with buttered toast and a wee bit of ketchup. 

Photo Shoot! :P

Me and my bored narcissistic self. I like this camera. :)

Of Pins and Other Things.

Most people collect at least one thing, often subconsciously. I don't know anyone who lives minimalistically with zero clutter and empty cupboards. People collect what they enjoy like collections of music, postcards, shoes, etc.


Then there are those mad mad collectors. I visited one of my Mum's friends years ago who collected stuffed animals and her house was like a still life zoo. She was a bit extreme. My piano teacher's wife collected antique plates. They were all over the house. I wonder what happened when little hyper children visited their home. I've seen numerous sites of collectors who collect absolute anything from teapots, letters,  McDonald happy meal toys, and even- this is just gross- naval fluff! And I found this blog of someone who just collects everything.


There are no shortage of collectors in my family. My mum has a huge owl collection. If you've ever visited my house, you'll see them everywhere. My aunt collects spoons and miniature tea sets. My grandmother has a collection of airlines cutlery (before they started giving out plastic ones). We have a few of her extras in our kitchen. There are others with key chains, bookmarks, pens, pencils, coins, stamps, art, etc. My other grandmother is a huge collector. She has stones, shells, feathers, stamps, bizarre newspaper cutouts, and probably other collections that I don't know of. 


Then there's me. I don't want to be a collector. I don't want to end up with 100 owls in my house or too much of anything, so when I was about 8 and my parents said its a nice hobby to collect something, I chose to collect pins/badges. It was easy and affordable. Most of the souvenir shops in the places we visited sold pins. And they are small and easy to keep. I also like cats. At one point, I liked cats more than I do now, so people gave me a lot of cat things. But thankfully no one does anymore. So, I don't count that as a collection.

Tri-colour Salad

I'm opting to name my food according to their colours. Can't think of any fancy names right now. 


Tri-colour Salad- Red, green and white- also the colours of the Italian flag :)

(I am not going to mention any quantities. I don't think I have measured anything for a salad)


Wash and pat dry lettuce. I've used an assortment of lettuce- green, darker green and purplish (bought at Namdhari's Fresh). Half cherry tomatoes and quarter bocconcini mozzarella (tiny baby mozzarella). This is bought from Metro- Comes in a tub. It's very fresh and very good quality and I think the price is totally worth it. It doesn't last too long in the fridge, so have salad every other day till it gets over. Add chopped up pecans/walnuts.

Dressing- In a small bottle- olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper, grated garlic and mustard. Close bottle and shake away! Again, sorry about not being able to measure quantities. 


Add dressing and toss up the salad.

Green+White

This pasta has no particular name. Its spaghetti with green beans, potatoes in a pesto sauce. It's quite a well known combination, so I'm surprised that I couldn't find a name. But there must be some fancy Italian term for it. 

I was in charge of lunch today. It was very very last minute. Mum was busy in the hospital and we came back from church starving. So, I raided the fridge and made this. It was only after I finished cooking, that I found some pain tomato pasta sauce in the fridge, which would have shortened the cooking time if I had found it earlier. Oh well!


So. This, I think is one of my all time favourites. It was the first time I made it and turned out a bit different to my Mother's.


Boil/pressure cook 4 potatoes. If you can get new potatoes (the small ones with thin skin) even better, but they're a headache to peal if the skin is not thin enough to leave on! Chop 250g of green beans into roughly 3inch lengths. Harricot beans are best to use, but today we only had French beans- ok, but usually not as tender and tasty. Plus you have to string them. Boil for a few minutes till tender, or put into water and in the microwave for about 8 minutes. Make sure they are tender; nothing like chewy hard beans.

In a pan, add 3 tbsps of olive oil. Fry one chopped onion and 6 cloves of chopped garlic. Add 2 tsps of dried sage, 1/2 tsp of pepper and salt to taste (I keep saying 'to taste' because I am so bad at putting the right amount. Always too little or way too much!!)  Fry till nicely brown. Add 5 tbsps of pesto. I usually use homemade, but there wasn't any. Second option would be bought basil pesto, but there wasn't any. Found a bottle of rocket pesto- Good, but not as good as basil pesto. Also add half a tub (100g) of cream cheese. This is the first time we've ever bought it here- Brittania processed cream cheese. Its not cheap. I didn't expect it to be so thick. Was expecting it to be more like creme fraiche. Also add 200ml of milk, since it was a bit thick. Stir away till it's a nice creamy sauce.


Lastly add chopped up boiled potatoes and beans. Mix well and serve with spaghetti and some shavings of Parmesan.


Variation:
This is how my Mum makes it. I didn't know till after I finished.
-Add the boiled potatoes and beans and fry with the onions and garlic mixture. If at all, mine was the healthier option! 
-Use only pesto and a bit of water as the sauce. She doesn't use the cream and milk. I guess, maybe mine wasn't the healthier one.


Either way, both taste good. :)

September 2011
I went out to Toscanos a few weeks ago. (click for their menu) I was so excited when I saw that a pasta with green beans and potatoes in a pesto sauce had an Italian name. So what I made should be titled Pesto Rinforzato Spaghetti.

Stop Motion + Music

This is sort of a recent interest. It was also my brother's first college project and I loved how a couple of thousand pictures played super fast became a movie. I mean, I knew that this is how animated movies are made, but it was fun seeing it happen. 

Stop motion is probably the most primitive form of animation. No need for a video camera to make the video. It definitely seems a lot more painstaking, but it's the uniqueness of the outcome that keeps stop motion animation as in-style as some of the hi-fi graphics used presently in the media industry.


Right from the movies- Corpse Bride, Coraline, Wallace and Gromit, etc etc. to the numerous short films and now increasingly popular in the advertising industry, stop motion animation is all over the place.


Many music artists have used stop motion in their music videos. More specifically- pixilation- where humans are used as part of the animation as apposed to just drawings and clay figures. In India- the recent MTS MBlaze data card ad uses this type of stop motion. 

Spicy Fried Mushrooms

You cant go wrong with mushrooms! 

Wash and dice 400g of button mushrooms. Add 2 tbsp of oil and 1 tbsp of ghee (it makes everything better!) into a pan. Add half an onion finely chopped and 4 cloves of garlic, also finely chopped and half a tsp of ginger. Stir together and add 1/2 tsp black pepper, 1/4 tsp cinnamon(gives it some pizzazz), 1/2 tsp haldi powder, 1/2 tsp of curry powder and salt to taste. 

Fry well till onions and garlic is nicely cooked. Add one chopped up tomato and the mushrooms. Note: A lot of water comes out when you fry up mushrooms. Fry and fry and fry till most of the water has evaporated. Chop up a few sprigs of coriander and add that last. Mix well and eat with rice, chapatis, bread or plain. :)

(As you've probably noticed, I am totally loving my Dad's camera and food photography!)

Aubergines & Spaghetti

This is my throw-together recipe. Came out exceptionally well today.

Spaghetti with Aubergines(brinjal) in a tomato sauce:


People often screw up their noses when I mention that my mum added brinjal to the pizza or pasta. But when we visited Italy, we were quite pleased to notice brinjal in many of the dishes.


Fry (either deep or shallow) diced aubergines (1 large/4 small- basically enough for 4 people). Make sure the aubergines have been pre-soaked in salt water and then rinsed and patted-dry before frying. Fry till cooked. Over-fried will make it bitter.


Boil 8 chopped tomatoes with about 200ml of water till cooked. I didn't puree it. Wanted slightly chunky sauce. In a saucepan add 6 cloves of chopped garlic and half a chopped onion to 4 tbs of olive oil. Add salt, 1 tsp of Italian seasoning, a tsp of chili flakes and 3 tbs of pesto sauce (I used homemade. Bought is perfectly fine too) Stir well, until you can smell the garlic being browned.


Add pre-fried brinjal and the tomatoes. Cook for ten minutes. Add 6 chopped olives and 2 tbs of the olive brine. Cook another 3-5 minutes. Turn the heat off and add 50ml of cream and 100ml of milk. Makes it nice and creamy!! :) 


Note: Careful when you add the cream and milk. Sometimes the acidity of the tomatoes can split the milk. It still tastes the same. 


Boil a packet of spaghetti. (enough for 4 people)


Serve with olives and a generous grating of Parmesan. 

Brownie Points published again!

Over the past few days, we got a few orders from people who said they heard about is from the Mid-day. We were quite surprised because we didn't get interviewed or send in any pictures. Then we realized that someone who worked there ordered from us last week.


It took a while before I actually found the e-paper online. We were featured in the issue on June 29.

Classic Genoise

I learnt how to ice a cake using a piping bag last week. Today was my first test. As far as the icing goes, I think I did ok.


How could I not bake a cake for her, despite the fact that she didn't want one. This was the easiest recipe in the book and the picture looked so perfect!


I dont remember making this kind of sponge cake before. Whisk together 4 eggs and 2/3 cup of sugar over a double boiler. It said to whisk till 160F/70C. Whisk vigorously as the volume increases and the batter 'is thick enough to fall back on itself like a ribbon when the whisk is lifted' Should take about 5-10 minutes of whisking.


Add 3/4 cup of cake flour that is sifted at least twice. Gently fold it into the sugar and egg mixture so as to not lose the air. Do the same with 60g of melted butter and 1tsp of vanilla. Without wasting too much time (i.e prepare pan and preheat oven first) pour into a greased & papered/greased & floured pan and bake at 180C for half an hour until the top is spongy. Cool, ice and eat.

Note:
1. Be very careful with the eggs on the double boiler, especially if you don't have a thermometer. Excess heating will start to cook the eggs, and the cake will have a slight eggy-ness. Bleah! 
2. Little embarassing, but I didn't know what cake flour was. I added baking powder assuming it was self-raising. Oopps!
3. Icing- same as Peanut Butter Chocolate Cake but added cocoa powder and removed colouring.
4. There are lots of variations to this cake- add nuts, other flavourings, citrus, etc. I substituted the vanilla essence for almond essence. Added that to the icing as well.
4. I did warn everyone that it may not taste as good as it looks. My mum said it was a bit dry. I then read up about the Genoise cake. It is supposed to be dry-ish- read here.
5. Recipe from 'Essentials of Baking'- Williams & Sonoma.


I will try this cake again. Maybe go further and make Tiramisu with it :)