Dark Chocolate Buckwheat Dessert Cakes. Happy World Chocolate Day!! For this special day, I’m sharing something indulgent, something simple, quite delightful, immensely satisfying, pretty, petite … so many adjectives to describe these little cakes. Then again, that’s the beauty of baking with chocolate as an ingredient, and also why it has its own special day!Volumes has been written on the benefits of chocolate, how good it is for you if used well. The more I work with chocolate, the more I fall in love with the promise it holds. It’s an empty canvas to play with, it seldom disappoints, there’s always takers for the end product, and you got to admit, it makes for pretty pictures.There was a time I used to find shooting chocolate very challenging indeed. To be able to bring out the beauty of chocolate desserts or bakes is now quite fun. I sometimes get it right, sometimes not, but it’s a fabulous learning experience. I have had such a satisfying time styling and shooting chocolate, that any opportunity is grabbed, no questions asked!So obviously, for World Chocolate Day, I HAD to share something chocolate, something I baked two days ago, something that I got a whole lot of requests for on Instagram where I shared an image. These petite indulgent Dark Chocolate Buckwheat Dessert Cakes.These little beauties are gluten free, use buckwheat flour – a pseudo cereal, are refined sugar free and use clarified butter. The Dark Chocolate Buckwheat Dessert Cakes are rich and indulgent too, just apt to celebrate this special ingredient on its special day! Do remember to serve them at room temperature or not straight out of the fridge at least. The high ratio of chocolate and clarified butter needs to soften up to allow for the taste to come through! Serve them with a drizzle of unsweetened cream, a cream chantilly, a fruit compote, a coulis, fresh berries, salted caramel sauce, whatever catches your fancy.
Oh, and HAPPY WORLD CHOCOLATE DAY! Treat yourself to a ton of this good stuff!
Deep, dark, CHOCOLATY, indulgent and gluten free, these Dark Chocolate Buckwheat Dessert Cakes do really please the die hard chocolate lover. Use a semi sweet chocolate if you like instead, top these with unsweetened cream, a cream chantilly, a fruit compote, a coulis, fresh berries, salted caramel sauce, whatever catches your fancy.
Keyword chocolate, dessert, glutenfree, sweet
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time 15 minutesminutes
Total Time 2 hourshours20 minutesminutes
Servings 6servings
Ingredients
150gdark couverture chocolate
35ghoney
85gclarified butter {ghee}
1egg
30gbrown sugar
20gbuckwheat flour {kuttu ka aata}
1/2tspvanilla bean powder
Instructions
Preheat oven to 170C. Line 6 3″ dessert rings with foil. Place on baking tray.
Place the chocolate, butter and honey in a large bowl. Microwave for 2 minutes, one minute at a time until melted and smooth. Cool slightly.
Beat the egg with the 30g brown sugar and vanilla bean powder until fluffy and mousse like.
Fold 1 tbsp chocolate mix into beaten egg to lighten it. Fold remaining egg mix into chocolate mix. Gently fold the buckwheat flour in.
Divide into desert rings and bake for approximately 15 minutes, until slightly firm to touch.
Cool completely in rings and chill for 30 minutes.
Top the cooled cakes with dark chocolate shards and berries.
Serve at room temperature. { Can be made a day ahead and chilled. Allow to come slightly to room temperature before serving}
Dark Chocolate Walnut Gateau … baking up for when the world’s lightest full frame DSLR comes over for a review. Well it’s a Canon, more specifically a Canon 6D Mark II, and you just know it’s time to add to the wishlist. Light, at a mere 685 grams, wifi enabled, a touch screen technology, good in low light, not sure what more you can ask for?Did they say adequate weather sealing too? YES!!Yes indeed, it’s a model that won me over even though I already use the Canon 5D Mark III. It seems a matter of luxury to have touch screen auto focus and even a shooting option with the touch screen. For a fleeting moment you might feel redundant since it’s a camera that appears to frame, focus and even shoot on auto! Yet once you get past that initial awe and excitement, this is a good feel, full frame snappy camera with a powerful processor.I speak from quite the non tech point of view but because I have always used Canon as a brand, I am a huge fan of the brand and quality products. I set off with a Canon PS40 when I began shooting, graduated to a G9, then an EOS 50D, and now use a 5D Mark III. Ever since I cut over to the DSLR beginning with a 50D, I used a Canon f/2.8 100mm lens for food photography. I’ve now graduated to an L series lens of the same specs and for me that’s the best lens to shoot food.The Canon 6D Mark II on review came with a kit lens, the 24-105mm f/4 which is pretty decent for a kit lens and the full frame camera. It has the image stabilisation feature that I find so useful, especially in low light conditions. Since I am used to shooting with the 100mm f/2.8 lens and used to the results that gets, it was only a matter of time before I snapped that onto the 6D body.
The images above are all with the kit lens and the ones that follow with the 100mm f/2.8. Such an absolute pleasure to shoot with the 6D. It’s snappy, it’s quick and has a great new processor and a large sensor. These relate to less noise in your images. The live view focus is also really fast and enviable, and the colours are great. The wifi function also means that you can instantly share images to different devices without the hassle of downloading to another device tethered, or via a card reader etc.For the modern day digital lifestyle, this is an amazing feature. It takes the ease of what the cellphone camera can do, and places it in a camera. You might argue that carrying a camera is cumbersome, and these days cellphones produce amazing images too. Then again, If you are like me and are used to a DSLR to take pictures, then there’s nothing else that can offer you the same satisfaction.For you then, the 6D is a good choice if it’s in your budget range. It begins at INR 1,32,000 and if you are a serious photography enthusiast, then it’s a great investment. Though it is always the eye that frames the shot, the person that visualises the frame, you need great equipment to deliver the result. With a full HD capability and an LCD that shoots upto 4 frames a second with less shake in a video, this just might be the camera to consider.I have this Canon 6D in my view even though I love my 5D Mark III to bits. I love the innovative approach Canon has. The latest features are a sign of responding to the ever changing dynamic times, making life simpler while improving on quality, and largely responding to user feedback. How else would you find built in smart device pairings, remote control functions via a smart phone and instant transfers to devices?
If you have questions do let me know. I’ll try and answer them. Canon is my brand of choice as I’ve used no other, and find it meets my requirements and more.
And for the record, I barely do any post processing as most folk who know me are aware. So with minimal fixes {if any}, these are basically just images straight from the camera. I’d love to play around with it more, figure out white balance better etc, but for now I’ll say adieu!
… oh, and before I forget, the Dark Chocolate Walnut Gateau is a delicious healthy alternative for dessert. It’s flourless, it’s wholesome, and chocolate of course! You could actually serve it without the topping, yet who wouldn’t mind added indulgence?
Chocolate and walnuts are a marriage made in heaven. Giving a favourite an even healthier twist, this cake comes with a serving of oats too. It’s flourless, gluten free, moist and delicious. Make it ahead as a tea cake or dessert.
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time 30 minutesminutes
Total Time 4 hourshours35 minutesminutes
Servings 8people
Ingredients
Walnut Oat Base
30gclarified butter {ghee}
150gwalnuts
40gquick cooking oats
15gbrown sugar
Dark Chocolate Filling
4egg yolks
50gbrown sugar
1tspvanilla beanscraped {or 1vanilla extract}
15gcoffee powder
100gdark chocolatemelted
2tbspWater
4egg whites
1pinchcream of tartar
50gbrown sugar
30goatmeal
1/2tspbaking powder
10gpowdered sugar for sifting
Mascarpone Caramel Cream
200gmascarponechilled
2-3tbspsalted caramel sauce
Salted caramel sauce to drizzle
Instructions
Flourless Gateau
Preheat oven to 180 C. Butter an 8" springform tin. Line the base with parchment paper
Walnut Oat Base
Run walnuts, oats and 1 tablespoon brown sugar in food processor till ground. Add the clarified butter/ghee and pulse till it all comes together.
Gently press this into the bottom and up the sides of the baking tin to form a base.
Dark Chocolate Filling
Place the egg whites in the bowl of the stand mixer. Add 50g brown sugar, pinch of cream of tartar and beat on high speed to stiff peaks. Reserve in a separate bowl.
Place the egg yolks in the same bowl of the stand mixer. Beat on high speed for 5-7 minutes until thick and mousse like. Add the remaining 50g brown sugar, coffee powder and scraped vanilla bean, and continue to beat for another 3 minutes. Gently stir in the oats flour and baking powder.
Fold in the melted chocolate and water.
Gently fold in the beaten egg whites, beginning with a quarter at a time.
Turn the filling over the walnut base and spread uniformly. Sprinkle over with 1 tbsp brown sugar
Bake for approximately 30 minutes, cool in the pan for another 15-20 minutes
Loosen sides, and leave to cool completely for about 2 hours. The centre will drop/sink
Chill, then top with the mascarpone cream.
Topping
Whisk the mascarpone until smooth.
Take 2-3 tbsp and whisk in the salted caramel sauce to loosen, the gently fold this through the remaining mascarpone. Taste and add more sauce if desired.
Top the chilled cake with this, add some salted caramel popcorn if you like.
Slightly warm a little more salted caramel sauce and drizzle over to finish.
Mousse-a-cotta with salted caramel is another twist on a previously failed chocolate panna cotta recipe. That Cocoa Mousse-a-cotta turned out to be one of my most popular recipes and images, especially on Instagram. It was a while back that I set out to make a dark chocolate panna cotta. Turned out the panna cotta didn’t set well at all yet it tasted absolutely delicious.When I turned it out of the mold to plate it, it formed this beautiful half circle and I just hadto take a picture of it. I gently dusted it with some chocolate shavings, went with a dark moody palate, and it’s been one of my best minimalistic simplest images ever. I often play around with that recipe, and as you might already know, I play around a LOT with chocolate.I got several requests for this mousse-a-cotta recipe when I shared the image on Instagram, so here you are. If you want to skip the salted caramel sauce, you can always add a spoon or two of Kahlua or Baileys to the mousse. Alternatively, a topping of cream, sweetened or otherwise, whipped or not, never hurts. To get a set panna cotta, you might need to experiment with increasing either the gelatin or the dark chocolate.However, for us, for now, this works perfectly well in single serving Weck jars. Don’t you love these pretty jars? My sweet friend Bina from A Bit Wholesomely sent them across to me as a gift a while ago, and I can’t stop using them! There’s so much you can do with them, but for now it’s the Mousse-a-cotta with salted caramel!
Mousse-a-cotta with salted caramel. Some desserts are classic no matter how you serve them. This one is where a silky dark chocolate mousse meets the panna cotta, resulting in a sublime, deep, chocolaty dessert. A topping of salted caramel sauce is just the right thing for it.
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time 20 minutesminutes
Total Time 5 hourshours25 minutesminutes
Servings 6people
Ingredients
500mlsingle cream
1/4cupcocoa powder
1/4cup+ 1 tbsp brown sugar
100gcouverture chocolate {72%}
50mlmilk
1tspgelatin powder
Instructions
Warm milk to tepid and sprinkle over the gelatin. Leave to stand until soft.
Place cream, sugar and cocoa powder in heavy bottom pan and whisk well to mix.
Simmer over low heat until bubbles begin to appear around the edges, stirring constantly else the cocoa will get lumpy.
Take off heat and stir in the gelatin mix and dark chocolate.
Whisk well to mix, cool for about 30 minutes, then pour into glasses or jars to set.
Chill 5-6 hours / overnight.
Top with salted butter caramel and chocolate shards before serving.
“As while other passions in your life may, at some point, begin to bank their fires, the shared happiness of good homemade food can last as long as we do.”
Jenni Ferrari-Adler
Persian Roasted Eggplant Walnut Dip is perhaps the yummiest dip I have made in a while. From an out and out eggplant hater, to one who got sold over a smokey roasted eggplant {or brinjal or ‘baingan’ as referred to here locally} one fine day, the journey was uneventful. There are some things I just will not touch with a barge-pole. Eggplant was one of those. For a long time. Until 3 years ago.
Then one day I tasted a Baingan ka Bharta made by a lady who used to cook at my mothers. The flavours had me captivated, and her style of cooking this quintessential Indian vegetarian dish had me smitten. Garlicky, smokey, earthy, firey was what she presented on the table that memorable day. One bite down, and I chased her for the recipe. Simple as ever, it was a game changer for me. Then came a dip I tasted at Ruchira’s place more recently. Sold again!This Persian Roasted Eggplant Walnut Dip is inspired by both the recipes. The twice used garlic from the bharta, and the creaminess from the dip. Can there ever be too much garlic? For me, no. I love it with a vengeance, and here the roasted garlic pods with eggplant bit gives the dip subtle undertones. The caramelised sweet onions and garlic add more depth to the flavour. I love adding walnuts to dip so in they went, while the Greek yogurt adds the right creaminess that the dip demands. All in all it has a lot to offer. Go ahead and add some roasted paprika to it if you like, maybe some pomegranate pearls to give it a juicy pop of flavour and colour. In the blender and smooth, this barely takes time and is a great make ahead party option. It also doubles up as a useful ‘sauce‘ for wraps, or a sandwich spread if you like. I served the Persian Roasted Eggplant Walnut Dip with these equally earthy Rosemary Garlic Sesame Millet Crackers I made recently. The more garlicky, the better! And of course, since the dip was ready and sitting there, I decided to experiment with it for a few pictures.Just different backgrounds, angles, light, what have you! Some work, some don’t, but the important thing is to keep experimenting. Darter & yours truly have announced our next Food Styling & Photography Workshop in Delhi this September, our 5th one here, so it’s always fun to experiment and share ideas. I tell the participants to try and shoot everyday, to constantly experiment with different backgrounds, angles, light and moods. I do just the same.
Everyday. With whatever I have on hand. If I haven’t baked or cooked something ‘image worthy’, then I just grab raw produce, knick-knacks or props from an earlier shoot, things lying on my desk, stuff I like, then shoot them in frame. It’s a huge learning process, and therapeutic too. The important thing is to experiment, to keep your mind open. I can never say that enough!
And that’s how I got to this delicious Persian Roasted Eggplant Walnut Dip too, with an open mind!
Persian Roasted Eggplant Walnut Dip ... earthy, smokey, moorish, delicious!
This Persian Roasted Eggplant Walnut Dip has a lot to offer. The twice used garlic, the walnuts, then the creaminess from Greek yogurt make it endearing. The caramelised sweet onions and garlic add more depth to the flavour. Play around with ingredients to suit your palette. That's the beauty of dips.
Course Appetiser
Cuisine Mediterranean
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time 20 minutesminutes
Total Time 25 minutesminutes
Servings 2people
Ingredients
Roasted eggplant walnut dip
1mediumeggplant, whole
4cloves garlic, unpeeled
1/4cupwalnuts halves
2tbspGreek yogurt
1/2tspsalt {to taste}
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1smallsmall onion, chopped
2clovesgarlic, chopped
1tspghee to caramelise garlic and onions
Juice of 1/2 limeas per taste
2tbspchopped chives {or garlic greens}
Topping
Walnuts, chives & extra virgin olive oil to drizzle over
Instructions
Cut 1/2" slits into sides of eggplant and push in 4 cloves of unpeeled garlic. Roast over low flame {or under broiler} until charred {like for baingan ka bharta.} Leave covered in a bowl to cool.
Remove garlic and press out roasted pods. Discard skin. peel off charred skin of eggplant. Chop roughly. {Can be done a day or so in advance}
While the eggplant is cooling, heat ghee in heavy bottom pan and caramelise onions and garlic.
Place in cooled eggplant with with caramelised onions & garlic and remaining ingredients in a blender. Blend until smooth. Stir in chopped chives. Taste and adjust seasoning. Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil and keep for a couple of hours/overnight for flavours to mature. Top with chopped walnuts and chives.
“The only way cheese is dessert is when it’s followed by the word cake.” Michele Gorman
Eggless Cheesecake with Mango Lime Sauce must be the easiest dessert to make. Minimum fuss, barely four ingredients, one bowl dump and quick hand whisk, can’t ask for much more in a dessert for summer. I make this often, and am constantly amazed at how versatile I can get with it. Even if summer has slipped by, please make the basic cheesecake and dress it up with anything you like – a salted butter caramel sauce, a berry reduction, a dark chocolate ganache, a homemade preserve, maybe grated chocolate and toasted nuts.
I made a series of mango based desserts this summer. Have been busy with work, some travel, loads of house work etc. Did I mention the guinea pig? Now there are TWO just because they are social animals so a pair seemed right. Then there is Coco who now eats ALL vegetables with renewed interest trying to beat the guinea pigs at their game!
In any case, that I procrastinate is quite obvious else this would have been on the blog a while ago. I made this a short while ago, and recently shared the image on Facebook and Instagram. With so many requests for the recipe, I thought I had better share it before summer sneaks by us, while a few of you can still make it.
So here you are. A quick, eggless delicious cheesecake that is a western take on an old Indian classic, ‘bhapa doi’. Make the Eggless Cheesecake with Mango Lime Sauce a day ahead, chill well, and then enjoy the compliments that come your way. Looks like a lot of work, but all this actually needs is half an hour in total. The mango sauce compliments it beautifully, and makes it look pretty too if you ‘dress it up’ a little. I had fun cutting out shapes with a sharp cookie cutter! I’ve baked this several times before. With summer stone fruit, a Mishti Doi Cheesecake for a festive feel, a Salted Butter Caramel Cheesecake, and a Dark Chocolate Orange Cheesecake too.
Quick, eggless delicious, the Eggless Cheesecake with Mango Lime Sauce is the Western take on an old Indian classic, ‘bhapa doi’. Make it a day ahead, chill well, and then enjoy the compliments that come your way. Looks like a lot of work, but all this actually needs is half an hour in total. The Mango sauce compliments it beautifully, and makes it look pretty too.
Course Dessert
Cuisine American
Prep Time 10 minutesminutes
Cook Time 20 minutesminutes
Total Time 2 hourshours30 minutesminutes
Servings 6people
Ingredients
Eggless Lime Cheesecake
1tin sweet condensed milk {approx 400g}
400gyogurt
2tspmilk powder
Zest of 1 lime
Mango Lime Sauce
150mlmango juicefresh/tinned
Zest of 1 lime
Juice of 1 lime
1tspcornflour dissolved in 1tbsp of cold juice
1/2tspsugar
Instructions
Eggless Lime Cheesecake
Preheat oven to 180C. Line a 6″ dessert ring with a double layer of foil to come up around the edges so the mixture doesn’t leak. You can also use a loose bottomed tin but make sure you wrap it with foil too.
In a large bowl whisk together all ingredients for cheesecake until smooth.
Turn into prepared tin and bake for 15 minutes. Leave to cool in tin, then cover and place to chill in fridge overnight.
Meanwhile, prepare the sauce for topping.
Mango Lime Sauce
Place the mango juice a in a heavy bottom pan with lime zest and sugar, and cook over medium high heat until halved in quantity. {If you like a slight hint of chili, you can add half a slit deseeded green chili for 2-3 minutes, and then discard it}
Once the juice has reduced, add the lime juice and corn flour stirring until it thickens to desired consistency. The sauce will thicken a bit more on cooling.
Cool sauce, and then chill overnight with the cheesecake. {The sauce can be made in advance}
Top with cutouts from mango slices, fresh basil leaves, flowers if in bloom. Chill until ready to serve!
“Each spice has a special day to it. For turmeric it is Sunday, when light drips fat and butter-colored into the bins to be soaked up glowing, when you pray to the nine planets for love and luck.” The Mistress of Spices
The Masala Dabba #3. We enter month #3 of our collaborative spice journey exploring or rather ‘shooting’ spices, a fun interaction with Dolphia, Simi,Meeta and me. The spices we cover for The Masala Dabba #3 are cardamom, whole pepper and turmeric. I think I love the spice journey best. March is synonymous with Spring, new beginnings and a whole lot of colour. This March also had holi, the festival of colour, which inspired me to shoot several times through the month. I did a fun version of Thandai for KitchenAid, one you can play around with endlessly. The recipe included a bit of pepper and cardamom.I’m just a little badly organised, procrastinate a lot, so I didn’t get down to editing the images for The Masala Dabba #3. Now I’m rushing to post on the last day of the month!Winter in North India means a lot of fresh turmeric root, and the colour it yields when it hits the grinding stone is amazing. Ground fresh turmeric makes for a fabulous turmeric milk. You can find the recipe for warm soothing turmeric milk on Dolphia’s blog.Our recent trip to Banaras actually brought alive and to the forefront the Indian love for spices and everything colourful.The play of spices ruled the roost. And if there are spices, can colour be far behind? Do read about Banaras and it’s beautiful culture if you find a moment. We had the most fun time ever!
March was a busy month. I haven’t been blogging too much, but I made a mean Gajar ka halwa, Rich Indian Carrot Pudding adapted from Delectable Platter. The Indian dessert, delicately laced with green cardamom, was absolutely delicious. Green cardamom is an interesting spice and works equally well in savoury and sweet recipes. I use it a lot in kormas, a delicate Awadhi lamb/chicken curry.
Not so much black cardamom. It’s a larger, more robust almost rustic spice, and you would often find it in a lamb curry or as part of garam masala, a baghar/tadka/tempering maybe, also in rice pulao. I haven’t ever heard of it in a sweet preparation ever. Have you?
Kormas, curries, pulaos and garam masalas also use a lot of whole back pepper. The Thandai interestingly had some too. There are several colours in whole pepper, though the black is most widely available, and perhaps the cheapest. There is a controversial pink pepper, actually they are dried berries I hear, and it is said to be toxic. However, it is used often in the West. I use it sometimes to sprinkle over wholegrain bread, very sparingly, just for visual appeal.And that pretty much covers the spices for March. Spices are addictive to shoot. I can’t barely wait for time to shoot in April. All I know is that it’s going to be another colourful and fun month!
The other Spice Girls have been amazing with their spices this month.
Do stop by Story of Cooks and Turmeric n Spice. Meeta has yet to blog spices this month.
