another sweet - Chocolate Swirl pastry

I had been ignorant of the pleasures of the process of baking a cake, pastry or cookies and have recently started enjoying using my convection microwave to bake delicacies. Hence, once would see more of such recipes.

We were expecting guests at our place for Sunday and there was an elaborate lunch planned. My mum made vegetarian biryani with raita and valachi bhaji* (another words are dalimbi or birda) and wifey cooked fusili primavera (veg), paneer chilly and garlic bread. So, I decided to bake some sweet.

Now, the guests included 2 of my cousins – cousin sister’s family is strictly vegetarian and cousin brother’s wife (who is pregnant) has turned strictly vegetarian for her pregnancy. Hence, I had to bake a dish without eggs.

At Saturday 2:30 pm, after lunch, decided to bake it. The dish was called ‘Chocolate Swirl Cake’. The outcome was nothing compared to the visuals I had in mind before I started making it. This was inspired by Donna Hay’s recipe.

Although, by renaming the cake, it can go very well as a pastry. The outer-covering was hard and crusty, with lots of chocolate flavor in the middle. The picture can elaborate more on the description..

Ingredients              

Self-raising (rising) flour	1 ½ cup
Caster Sugar	¼ cup	Super-fine
Butter	40 gms	In cubes
Milk	½ cup	A little warm
Dark chocolate	50 to 75 gms	Finely chopped

Method

1.    Preheat oven to 180°C

2.    Place the flour and sugar in a bowl and mix to combine

3.    Add the butter and use your fingertips to rub it into the flour mixture until it resembles fine breadcrumbs

4.    Make a well in the centre and pour in the milk. Use a butter knife to gradually mix the milk into the flour mixture until just combined (it should resemble a flour dough)

5.    Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and gently bring the dough together. Roll out to a 18cm x 24cm rectangle (should look like a paratha, after rolling dough with a rolling-pin)

6.    Sprinkle with the chocolate and roll up to enclose (after sprinkling chocolates, roll like you would do in case of a chapatti roll – it will look like a frankie)

7.    Place in a baking tin lined with baking paper. Brush with extra milk and bake for 25–30 minutes or until cooked when tested with a skewer

8.    Cool in the tin for 5 minutes and ready to be gorged

Like I said, it turned more like a hard-crusted pastry instead of a cake.. All in all, it was great to eat and was comparatively easy to make

Another family dish called BHANAVALA (bha-nav-la)

Another classic dish from my grandma, executed to perfection by my mum. Have been relishing this from a very long time. A beautiful snack item. The dish has a marathi name and has been renamed to 'grandma's traditional vegetable pie'. This dish also can become non-vegetarian dish by adding some prawns (and gosh! it tastes mind-blowing). Want to try by adding bits of chicken pieces to the recipe next time around. As of now, it's a whole-some vegetarian snack!!!




  The dish was always prepared in round utensil with a hollow centre. This mould with open centre is used because it quickly cooks (as the steam can penetrate from the center as well as the sides).

Since, it is difficult to find such an utensil in most households, have decided to bake it in a oven. The taste did not change and also the cooking time drastically reduced from 90 - 120 minutes to about 45 to 50 minutes.

Grandma’s traditional vegetable pie

Before we start, do not get overwhelmed or anxious looking at the number of ingredients. It’s a very simple dish and does not need much preparations..

    

Sr.	Ingredients	Qty
1	Cabbage	100 gm
2	Onion	1
3	Tomato	1 (small)
4	Carrots	1 (small)
5	Green peas	½ cup
6	Ginger-garlic paste	1 tbpsn
7	Cumin powder	1 tbpsn
8	coriander powder	1 tbpsn
9	Red chili powder	1 tbpsn
10	Turmeric powder	1 tbpsn
11	Sugar	1 tbpsn
12	Salt	To taste
13	Coconut milk	½ cup
14	Besan (gram flour)	2 tbpsn
15	Chana dal	1 cup
16	Water	½ cup
17	Oil	½ cup
18	Salt	To taste

Method

1.    Soak the chana dal in water for 3 to 4 hours. Blend the dal in the mixer (consistency should be coarse; don’t blend it to give it a very smooth consistency). Keep aside

2.    Add ½ cup water to the coconut milk and keep aside

Assemble all ingredients together (you dont see coconut
milk, chana dal and besan in the picture; its somewhere
in the background)



4.    Mix all ingredients from sr. 1 to sr. 12 in a big flat vessel (till such time the spices are evenly distributed)



Grinded chanal dal added to the vegetable mixture



In goes the besan and coconut milk (with water)

5.    Add besan, the blended dal and coconut milk to the vegetable mixture and keep combing it till all the flavors are evenly distributed (do a taste check and feel free to add salt, sugar or more spices)

6.    Heat ½ cup oil and pour the hot oil in the vegetable mixture and give nice last mix

7.    Preheat the oven at 230 celsius and bake the dish at 230o for a good 45 minutes (it’s done when the top starts giving cracks and turns brown)

8. Ready to be served with some tangy ketchup

the served pie (oops!!where is the ketchup)

another pose (from a different
angle)

3.    Slice the cabbage, onion, tomato and carrots in small pieces (not very fine or thick)

Dimsums / dumplings / momos !!!

One of my favorite dishes from the oriental cuisine!! Actually, all the cuisines in the world have different kinds of dumplings or dimsums, but in different ways (like the Italians have the ravioli and tortellini). The oriental dimsums / momo’s are the most common and have been promoted well and hence we know them by these names. There is a sweet and a savory variety.

In Indian cuisines (and these could be relatable), we have the sweet gujia’s, karanji’s (kajjikayi in kananda and telegu) and ada (kerala) are the sweet varieties, whereas gujia’s (stuffed with peas), pitha (bihar, oriya) and our most popular samosa are the savory ones.

I have left one out from the list and that is our own maharastrian Modak (ganpati’s favorite) is a classic sweet delicacy and is mostly made during the month of ganpati’s arrival.

It was 6:30am on 25^th September and I was wide awake, especially surprising when this is a Sunday. I had decided that Sunday lunch will comprise of a dimsum and a dip. Since, I had got all the ingredients necessary from the market on Saturday evening, decided to prepare the stuffing that will go in the dimsum.

Chicken dimsums

dimsums in the steamer; layered on banana leaf

Ingredients             

Chicken mince	300 gm
Dumpling (wonton) sheets	10	Used spring roll sheets for the recipe
Coriander	2 tbspn	Finely chopped
Ginger	2 tbpsn	Finely chopped
Soya sauce	2 tbpsn
Pepper	To taste	Use coarse pepper
Salt	To taste

Method

1.    Finely slice the ginger and coriander

2.    Mix all the ingredients in a vessel and leave aside to rest (more the better)

3.    Take a little portion of the mixture and arrange on the sheets (I picked up spring roll sheets, which are readily available) and fold them nicely (the sheets were not soft and hence I just rolled them in a way it resembled a spring roll; the sheets were tearing off when I tried to give a shape)

4.    Steam the dimsums in a steamer for 3 to 4 minutes

1. I used bamboo steamer for this dish
2. Layered the bamboo steamer with banana leaves (so that the dimums don’t stick to the bottom and can easily be removed)
3. The steamer which went into a big vessel was covered with so much water, that it does not touch the base of the bamboo steamer ( I put star anise in the water (love the aroma of that spice), which gives a nice flavor to the food)
4. Arranged the dimsums on the leaves in the bamboo steamer and let it steam for 3 to 4 minutes with the lid on

5.    Ready to be served

I made a spring onion dip alongside to go with the dimsum. Used vinegar, sugar, spring onions, chillies and salt to create the syrupy dip.

Dimsum dip

spring onion dip, the vinaigrette

Ingredients             

White vinegar	½ cup
Sugar	½ cup
Spring onion	3 or 4 stems
Green chillies	3
Red chillies	3
Salt	To taste

Method

1.    Finely slice the ginger and coriander

2.    De-seed the chillies and cut in juliennes

3.    Finely chop the spring onions

4.    Put all the ingredients in a frying pan and let it simmer until it becomes syrupy

5.    Ready to be served alongside those steamed dimsums

Although, I was extremely happy with the taste of the dimsum, was way too disappointed on the shape. The shape was a disaster and could not fold or give a shape, as the sheets were tearing off. Am sure there should be some other sheets available in the market for making steamed dimsums – searching!!!

The vinaigrette was surprisingly tasty, went very well with the dimsum. The syrupy texture and the consistency was quite a delight.