Molten Chocolate Lava Cake - Happy Women's Day

She is every ounce of
"strength, courage and wisdom"
in trace amounts of man
and -isms

She is the effervescence of life:
dignity, destiny, faith in our fathers,
love, light,
hope for tomorrows

She is the seed of prosperity
bringing forth virtuous fruit
faith, charity, resilience
and truth.

She is the dawn
of every tomorrow
she speaks peace
to every sorrow

She is woman
for God's man
She is the chosen
by His hand

Happy Women's Day !!

To All Women In The World

Hey Guys!! I am back after a long hiatus just in time not to miss the special day for all the women. Lately the ending of the financial year has really kept me busy at work with all the deadlines to meet. At home front too, things are changing. Probably in a month or two, I will be shifting my base to a new place. So, please bear with me for a few months more. If you really wanna help me then I will be more than glad. Guest posts are invited. You can send me posts on any of the recipes of your choice, I will publish them with due credits.

Chocolate lava cake is one of my favorites and I can bet no one can resist it after just one bite. The warm molten chocolate inside makes a great combination with chilled fresh cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Also its very easy to make and is ready in minutes. For celebrating the Women' Day its just the perfect way, forgetting all the calorie dilemmas for a day and celebrating womanhood. So here goes my Chocolate Lava cake to all the wonderful women in the world, including me :)

 

Ingredients

2 egg yolks

2 eggs

4 pieces of semi sweet baking chocolate

1 cup butter

1 cup podered sugar
1 cup flour

Method

* In a pan heat butter and chocolate pieces together.
* Remove from heat and whisk till the chocolate completely melts in butter
* Add sugar and mix well.
* Add the egg yolks as well as eggs and stir the mixture.
* Fold in the flour.
* Take 4-5 small cups, greased well. Pour in the mixture.
* In a baking tray line them and bake them for about 15 minutes or till the edges are set but the inner crust is still moist.
* Turn the cup upside down and remove the cake.
* Serve the cakes with fresh whipped cream or scoops of vanilla ice cream.

Recipe: Pioneer Woman Cooks

Chocolate, Bread & Butter Pudding

Starting the blog post with an apology is making me feel so guilty. But I can't help it too. I am really sorry to my blog as well as my readers. Lately I have not able to update much, even my cooking is affected. As the financial year is going to end in another month, I have been piled up so much of work that I am unable to breathe. That is leaving me all occupied that I am not able to cook or bake much.

The delicious chocolate bread and butter pudding is off to Meeta's Monthly Mingle hosted by Life's A Feast.

Although the recipe was perfect. I baked it well too. The only mistake I did was that somehow I added more milk. Because of which it became more moist than required. So I have reduced the quantity of milk. Still it tasted heavenly. The lovely moist gooey taste of chocolate along with butter was delicious.

Ingredients

10-15 slices of bread or a loaf of brioche
4 yolks
1/2 cup caster sugar
1 cup cream
2 cup milk
1 vanilla bean, scraped
1/2 cup salted butter – melted
1 piece of dark chocolate, chopped finely

Method

* Remove the crust of the bread slices.
* Whisk the egg yolks and sugar together in a bowl until the mix turns pale. Keep it aside.
* In a pan add milk, cream and vanilla essence. Let it be warm on low heat.
* Add one fourth of this mixture to egg one. Again whisk.
* Then pour in the remaining mixture, whisking continuously.
* Strain the mixture and let it cool.
* Apply butter on the slices and place them on a baking dish.
* Sprinkle the chocolate pieces on them.
* Then add another layer of slices, followed by chocolate pieces.
* Pour the mixture on top of the slices.
* Let the slices soak the milk mixture for about half an hour.
* Bake it in a preheated oven at 130(C) for about 40-45 minutes.
* Remove from oven and cool the pudding.
* Serve warm, sprinkled with little powdered sugar.

Rice Flour Pudding (Phirni) - Creamy Indian Delight

Party season has started to welcome the new year and bidding adieu to the passing year. And parties mean entertaining guests, decorating the house, making wonderful food and indulging oneself. Finally the perfect time to stop thinking 'healthy' and start thinking 'desserts'. Given that I have done so much throughout the year to cut down on calorie intake, the holiday season means all sweet for me with divine cakes, tasty pastries, yummy chocolate to delicious puddings.

Creamy, sweet and delicious, Phirni/Firni is a fabulous dessert for serving in party dinners. Very easy to make. The main ingredient Rice flour can be obtained ready made from food stores. If you want you can even prepare rice flour at home by soaking rice overnight. Then remove all the water and let the rice dry on old newspaper. When rice becomes completely dry, grind it in a grinder to powdered form and use whenever you want. You can experiment with the flavors to make mango phirni, almond phirni or pistachio phirni. I really love the creamy taste and aroma of phirni be it of any flavor or plain.

Ingredients


1 l milk
1 cup rice flour
nuts & raisins according to your choice
1 cup sugar
pinch of cardamom powder (roasted)
few saffron strands

Method

* Boil milk and sugar together in a pan, until a thick consistency is achieved.
* Add rice flour slowly in parts, dissolving each part properly so that no lumps are formed.
* On medium heat let the mixture boil.
* Add the cardomom powder & saffron strands.
* Remove from heat. Serve warm or chill it as you want.
* Garnish with raisins and nuts and pour in clay pots for serving.

Caramelized Bananas - A Quick & Simple Dessert

When you are back home after slogging for almost nine hours of work and you come to know that you have guests, then what do you do? Panic ? Atleast I do. Although I love to entertain but unexpected guests really spoil my mood. Yesterday night was also the same. But for a change, I pondered for a few moments, searched quickly through my refrigerator, checked the blogs of my foodie bloggers, took a deep breath and diverted my anger towards preparing the dinner.

Preparing the main course was easy, followed by a salad. Being equipped by the appliances of modern cooking, it took me over an hour. Yoo-ho !! Guests arrived just at that moment. Cooking had made my mood. I welcomed them with a smile. But still an important thing was left and that was the dessert. All of a sudden a glance on a bunch of bananas and something clicked. Any guesses?? Yes, Caramalized Bananas. Bingo !! When you want something quick and simple, caramelized bananas make just a perfect dessert in winters and even in summers, if served with scoops of ice cream. The recipe is just too simple and almost all the ingredients are there in the home.

Ingredients

6 bananas (peeled)
1/2 cup sugar
2 cup orange juice
1/4 cup butter
1 tbsp cinnamon powder (roasted)
1 tbsp cardamon powder
handful of raisins, peanuts & pistachios
1 tbsp orange zest
1 tbsp brown sugar

Method

* In a pan, heat sugar on low flame until it melts and turns brown in color.
* Add butter, orange juice, cinnamon and cardomom powder.
* Keep on stirring till the mixture comes to a boil.
* In a baking dish, place the bananas and pour the mixture over them.
* For topping add orange zest along with the nuts.
* Sprinkle the brown sugar and bake the bananas for about 20 minutes at 170 degrees(C).
* Remove and let it cool for sometime and serve warm with fresh cream or vanilla ice cream.

Rice Pudding With Orange Flavoring

There are many of us who have a strong urge to have something sweet from time to time. And when we are invited for dinner by any of our friends, colleagues or relative, what we look forward to is desserts. And I am just that kind of a person. No matter how good might be the food, I make sure that I have space reserved in my tummy for the dessert. Although any dessert means a lot of calories even if most of the steps have been carried out to reduce the calories. Still that has no relation with the craving.

To end this craving I made, rice pudding this weekend finally. And while I was making it, a wonderful thing happened, it started raining. Initially I wanted to have a chilled dessert but when I was through, I couldn't resist and ate it when it was warm. Rains had made the temperature dip and in that cool weather when I had this warm dessert, it was such a heavenly feeling. The orange flavoring gave such a wonderful aroma and a change from the traditional rice pudding.

Ingredients

For rice pudding
1 cup rice
3 cup milk
1 cup cream
1/2 cup coconut milk (optional)
1 teaspoon cardamom powder
3 tbsp caster sugar

For flavoring

1 cup orange juice
2 tbsp honey

Method

* Before making rice pudding, wash and soak rice in water for half an hour.
* First prepare the flavoring. For it in a saucepan add orange juice and honey and boil on medium heat till it thickens like syrup.
* Set it aside to cool.
* Take another saucepan and boil milk.
* Drain and add rice to the boiling milk, reduce heat to low and cook for some time, stirring continuously.
* Cook till the rice is soft and the milk is thickened.
* Add cardamom powder, cream and sugar. Stir and set it aside to cool.
* Refrigerate for an hour.
* Serve in chilled bowls with orange flavoring on top.
* If you want you can add chopped nuts.

Note: Coconut milk not only thickens the pudding but also make it tastier.