Morning Muffins (with Apples, Carrots,Raisins & Coconut)

.A healthy way to start any day.  Packed with nutritious goodies such as carrots,apples, raisins,coconut and cinnamon, this muffin offers a tasty, sweet and healthy start to the day.

 Ingredients:
 (Makes 16-18)

Flour 2 cups
Sugar 1 1/4 cups
Baking Soda 2 tsp
Cinnamon 2 tsp
Salt 1/2 tsp
Carrots,grated 2 cups
Raisins 1/2 cup
Apple, peeled & grated 1
Coconut 1/2 cup
Eggs 3
Oil 1 cup
Vanilla 2 tsp 


Method:

Preheat the oven to 170 C

2. In a bowl, mix the flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon and salt.

3. Stir in the carrots, raisins, apple and coconut.

4. In a small bowl, beat the eggs, oil and vanilla and stir into the flour mixture until just combined. Spoon the batter into well-greased or paper-lined muffin cups, filling to the top. Bake for 18-20 minutes.

Linking this to Fast Food Not Fat Food Event

Doll Cake to celebrate My First Blog Anniwersary & the Arrival of a New Member to our Family

Celebration Time Again!! It has been a year of wonderful food blogging, posting new recipes, taking part in events, making new friends.....  I've come up a long way. It wouldn't be possible without you readers who leave wonderful comments which keeps me going  Thanks a lot for that!!!

Time passes extremely fast and it feels like I just started blogging yesterday . I can't imagine that it has been a year posting my very first recipe and now done with my100th recipe on the first day of this month..

I was confused while choosing the recipe to be posted during such an occassion . There were 2 cake posts pending and then I chose this Doll Cake which I've baked  for my daughter's birthday as this cause for another celebration too... to welcome a new cutie pie to our family. She is ma baby who is just 6 days older. Yea & me back to blogging?#$ Actually this post was almost done before my delivery .

Happy Diwali too !!!

Now, about the cake. The sponge is so simple and yummy that you'll go on baking this again and again. I had to bake 3 times the measure to adjust to the length of the doll. Recipe of the sponge adapted from Shabs Cuisine; Buttercream frosting from Martha Stewart.



For the cake:


Ingredients:

Egg 3
Flour 1/2 cup
Sugar 6 Tbsp
Zest of 1/2 an Orange
Vanilla essence 1 tsp

Method:

1.Preheat the oven to 190 degrees Celcius. Grease and line a very deep 6 inch pan or a7 inch pan.

2. In a bowl whisk the eggs sugar and orange zest on high speed for about 10 minutes until thick and pale and leaves a thick trail when the beaters are lifted.

3. Fold in the flour with a metal spoon, being careful not to knock out any air. Pour into the prepared tin. Bake for about 35-40 minutes or when a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean. Turn the cake on the wire rack, peel the parchment paper and leave to cool completely. Once the cake is taken out o foven, place the almonds in the pan and bake for about 5-8 minutes until lightly toasted.

For the filling:

 

284 mls tub Double Cream

1/3 cup condensed milk

Grated zest of ½ orange

Few drops of vanilla essence

150g chopped strawberries

To make filling, whip cream along with zest until soft peaks form. Add vanilla essence and condensed milk and whip until stiff. Take out 5-6 tablespoons of this cream mixture and mix it with chopped strawberries, keeping aside the rest of the whipped cream to frost the cake.

Now for Assembling the cake,  take a doll and break the bottom part of it . Or you may wrap the doll with Cling Film if you want to keep the whole doll.  Take the cake, layer it, spread  frosting there between the layers. Once done with the layers, shape the cake if needed according to the doll to be placed. Now frost the cake all over and insert the doll into the cake after done with the frosting. I used buttercream frosting for decoration.

*** Kitchen temperature is a must while using frosting.. It should not be too high. My frosting was melted a bit which you might have noticed in the pictures.

Pasta spinach and meat sauce

'A cheesy and tangy pasta' - yes, that's the exact description  for this dish. Though cheese used depends entirely upon your choice, this is a healthy option. The taste of white sauce with spinach stand out in this. The minced meat sauce  gives it a tangy and spicy non-veg. touch . You can use non-minced meat (cubed in small pieces) for this dish too... or you may omit this one. The spinach and white sauce may itself give a complete taste.

Ingredients:

Penne pasta, cooked 400 gms
Spinach 250gms
Onion 45gms
Garlic 30gms
Cheddar cheese 35gms
Butter 25 gms



For white sauce:

Milk 300gms
Plain flour 30gms
Butter 30gms
Nutmeg 2 gms
Salt & Pepper to taste


For Meat Sauce:


Beef Mince 200gms
Chopped Onion 35gms
Chopped Garlic 15gms
Chopped celery 15 gms
Chopped tomato 65 gms
Tomato paste 25gms
Bay Leaf 1
Salt & Pepper to taste
Beef stock or water as required

Method:


White Sauce:

1.Heat a thick-bottomed pan and add butter.

2.When the butter melts, add flour. Keep stirring till the raw smell of the flour is gone. Ensure that the flour does not brown.

3.Now add milk gradually whisking continously so that lumps do not form. Cook on a simmer till the sauce begins to thicken. Season with salt, pepper and nutmeg and keep aside.

4.In a thick bottomed frying pan add butter and saute onions and garlic till translucent. Now add spinach and cook for few minutes. Add white sauce and stir well. Correct seasoning, if required.

Meat Sauce:

1.In a thick bottomed pan, heat oil and saute onion, garlic, celery and bay leaf, until the onions are translucent.
2.Add minced beef and saute till the juices released dry up.

3.Now add tomatoes and tomato paste. Cook for a few minutes.

4.Add enough stock or water to allow the mince to cook. Check for seasoning and cook till it is almost dry.

5.To serve, in a deep serving dish, spoon pasta, meat sauce and stir fried spinach side by side. Top with cheese and gratinate in an oven for 10-15 mts. Serve hot

Free Download -Ebook (100 Yummy Diwali Recipes- Sweets & Desserts)

Diwali is near and it'll be easy to access if a list of all recipes is compiled in a book. Desserts and Sweets are an added and unavoidable attraction to the much awaited festival of Diwali. So here goes the link to download E-Book named 100 yummy Diwali Recipes compiled by Indus Ladies :

Download Here Go to this link and click there ' Attached Files - Diwali eBook.pdf'

You can see my recipe of Pineapple Pudding there in Page No. 137 

Trifle Pudding

 Trifle is a classic dessert layered with sponge cake, custard, fruits and whipped cream. Its bright colored layers  gives it a variant look cos of which this dish is used  for decoration as well as taste. Those who had never tasted it before is missing something. You really have to try this. I'm sure you'll enjoy every bit of it.

This variant has the sponge soaked in jelly  when the trifle is made, which sets when refrigerated. The egg and jelly bind together and produce a pleasant texture if made in the correct proportions. Its then layered with custard, fruits and whipped cream to top it..

Ingredients:
(Recipe Courtesy: Hanan Shefeek)


Sponge Cake / Muttapola/Kums
Jelly of your choice ( I luv strawberry banana flavor)
Custard** recipe follows
Dreamwhip/ Whipping cream/ Fresh cream 1 packet or 250 ml
Fruits (either canned or your choice of fruits)

 For custard :-

Milk 500 ml
Custard powder 4 tbsp
Condensed Milk 1/2 tin

Method:

1.Take a pudding dish and place cake pieces at the bottom. I baked a muttapola/kums (sponge cake) with 3 eggs for that; Cut the cake through the midlle and then layered it as we don't need the cake layer to be so thick.

2.Now prepare jelly according to package instructions and soak the cake with that. It took about half of the jelly for me to soak the cake as I don't like strong flavor of jelly in my trifle that the cake flavor disappears completely. Let it set in a refrigerator for atleast half- an- hour.

3.By the time, prepare custard :-  Take  milk in a pan and mix  custard powder and condensed milk in it. Here I used more custard than prescribed in the pack as we need a thick custard for layering. Boil it till it thickens. Switch off the flame and let it cool.

4.Take the cake soaked in jelly and layer custard over it. Allow it to set again in the refrigerator.

5.Now whip the dreamwhip or whipping cream until soft peaks are formed. If you are using whipping cream/fresh cream, then add sugar & vanilla essence to taste. Dreamwhip don't need that.

6.Pipe in the cream on top and garnish with fruits of your choice.  You can layer fruits anywhere between the layers. Depends completely on your choice.

7.You can garnish them with caramelised nuts too which gives a different flavor to the whole dish.

*** The quantity of the  ingredients depend on size of the dish. Like the sponge cake used, the jelly to be soaked with and so on.. You can adjust according to the taste. I used 10*4 inch rectangular glass dish for this dessert and the measurements are according to that.