Friday, January 11, 2019

Fruit/Plum cake

Fruit Cake

1/4 cup each red and green candied cherries (you can use tutti-frutti also)
1/4 cup black raisins
1/4 cup yellow raisins
1/4 cup apricot
Rum or brandy to soak. *** IF you don't like adding alcohol you could soak dry fruits in orange juice as well.

In a glass bottle put all the above ingredients, pour rum/brandy to cover dry fruits. Let this sit for atleast 2 days.

Also - take 1/4 cup each of cashew nuts, pista,walnuts - chop these and dust it with flour to prevent sinking to the bottom while baking.





Dry ingredients

All- purpose flour - 1 3/4 cup, baking powder - 1 tsp, salt- 1/2 tsp. Mix all these well.

Wet ingredients

Whole eggs -3, brown sugar - 1 cup, butter - 1 stick/cup, v.essence- 1 tsp, 1/4 cup-orange juice

Powder brown sugar, add butter and beat using a hand mixer until it is fluffy. Add eggs one at a time and continue beating until you get a soft and creamy mixture. Add vanilla essence and orange juice, combine well.

Once the wet ingredients are combined very well, slowly add flour and mix. Do not use hand mixer. Folding it gently, mix all the ingredients well.

Now the last part- empty the dry fruits bottle into the batter (need not strain, as the rum/orange juice gives all the flavours a fruit cake is expected to have) Again mix it very well.
Lastly add in the chopped nuts and stir once more. That's it.

Preheat the oven at 300 f(USA)/ 180 C and bake this for atleast 45 minutes. Always keep an eye on it as the oven temperature may vary . You can google for temperature conversions.

If sugar is high, always good to bake in lower temperature as it may turn brown faster and you get a burning smell.

Thursday, January 10, 2019

Vattayappam (Steamed Rice Cake) - Kerala's traditional tea time snack !

You need

1 1/2 cups of soaked raw rice/idli rice
1 1/2 cups grated coconut
A handful cooked rice
1 tsp instant yeast
1/2 tsp salt
2-3 tbsp sugar
4 to 5 cardamom seeds
Roasted nuts and raisins
water as required
coconut oil/ghee to grease



Soak raw rice for atleast 3 hours. Into a blender or mixie put  rice, coconut, cooked rice, sugar,salt,cardamom seeds and instant yeast. Add water, just to cover the ingredients. Take care not to add more water, we need thick batter like that of idli batter. Grind this well. Now pour this to a bowl and let it sit for 2-3 hours to ferment/rise.
Grease a round/flattened pan with coconut oil/ghee.

Pour batter into the greased pan, almost 3/4th full.Sprinkle the roasted nuts and raisins on top. Now place this pan into steamer/pressure/idli cooker and steam for 15- 20 mins.I used Idli steamer .

After 20 mins insert a tooth pick or fork to see if it is cooked. If it comes out clean switch off the flame and allow it to cool. Once cooled, run a knife around the edges and invert the pan. Your delicious Vattayappam or Steamed rice cake is ready. 

You can prepare this without adding sugar, nuts and raisins too. Sometimes i preapre this for breakfast without adding sugar and serve it along with Chicken curry or vegetable stew. Enjoy!!!