“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”
Michael Pollan
Tropical Fresh Turmeric Chia Energiser… when a ray of sunshine hits you in the morning, you know you are energised. How much better can a morning be to wake up to? These glasses have all the colour, loads of flavour and summer literally within. You do know how good fresh turmeric is for you, right? Combine it with milk, chia seeds and a 100% pure maple syrup from Canada and the goodness comes together!So when you combine powerful ingredients that compliment each other, all the benefits come under one roof, or in one glass as the case might be.Here we have a superfood like turmeric well known for it’s antioxidant and anti inflammatory properties. It is also good for the control of diabetes and arthritis among other things. The turmeric latte has caught the world by storm over the past year. Just a peep at the vibrant sunshine colour will convince you of it’s goodness.To this, add liquid gold of a 100% pure maple syrup from Canada and you’ve got magic. Just a few tablespoons of maple syrup are enough to add a soothing natural sweetness. Maple syrup is a healthier alternative to regular sweeteners and sugar. It shares similar properties with turmeric. Is known to be an antioxidant, has anti inflammatory properties, and is a rich source of nutrients.Do try making things as simple and good as this. They are fun to create. Use seasonal fruit, use fresh herbs from the garden, maybe edible flowers too. See how pretty a whole bouquet looks! And of course if you are short on time, you can always just do a very very simple and basic Fresh Turmeric Iced Latte for summer. Combine milk with fresh or dry turmeric powder {haldi} if you please, add a glug of earthy robust 100% pure maple syrup, chill and get energised for summer!
Tropical Fresh Turmeric Chia Energiser... when a ray of sunshine hits you in the morning, you know you are energised. Wake up to a good morning. These glasses have all the colour, loads of flavour and summer literally within. You do know how good fresh turmeric is for you, right? Combine it with milk, chia seeds and a 100% pure maple syrup from Canada and all the goodness comes together!
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time 5 minutesminutes
Total Time 10 minutesminutes
Servings 2people
Ingredients
Tropical Fresh Turmeric Chia Energiser
200mlmilk
1inch piecefresh turmeric, grated fine
2-3tbsp100% pure maple syrup
3tbspchia seeds
To top
Cape gooseberries/physallis
Pomegranate
Fresh mint
Organic fresh rose petals
Instructions
Bring the milk to a boil, take off heat and add the fresh grated turmeric to it. Let it steep for 30 minutes, then strain and sweeten with 100% pure maple syrup.
Stir in the chia seeds, allow to cool, stirring a few times to distribute the chia seeds.
Add halved cape gooseberries to serving glasses and pour over the fresh turmeric chia milk once it cools.
Allow to stand in glasses in the fridge overnight.
Top with more cape gooseberries, pomegranate pearls, fresh mint and organic rose petals.
Serve chilled
Note: This can be served as only Fresh Turmeric Chia Latte too. Increase the milk for this version, and or decrease the amount of chia seeds. Alternatively, skip the chia seeds, and pour the steeped strained fresh turmeric milk with maple syrup over ice cubes. This will offer a very refreshing delicious iced latte!
Wholegrain Buckwheat Orange Chocolate Chippers … the cookies get better and better with each experiment, and these were really really good {if I may say so myself}. I know because they were over before I knew it, and I could see ‘those eyes’ searching for more. And yes of course, I got photobombed yet again.
Impossible to keep this little pup away. Impossible to keep her away. She wants to be part of just about everything, no matter how mundane it might be. Bambi is the cutest little one at 5 months, just slightly less cute than our Coco. Coco is our first love of course.Anyway, back to the food talk. Most of my baking finds roots in the ingredients I have on hand, much like this bread I made not so long ago. It’s a ‘Swirled Everything But the Kitchen Sink Bread’, an interesting concept that encourages you to use anything and everything left over in the fridge. I have yet to share this recipe, but it’s an easy swirled bread, the making of which I shared on Instastories on the PAB Insta handle a short while ago. Most of my recipes are really simple and on the go. Leaves me time to play around with the camera! I took a few different shots of the cookies on different backgrounds, different settings, angles, light etc.
I went on too do a dark moody shot series too. Call me addicted to the camera!!
These cookies also used anything I had on hand. Jaggery, oats, buckwheat flour etc. I shared these Wholegrain Buckwheat Orange Chocolate Chippers there too. Do follow Passionate About Baking on Instagram as I share quick and easy recipes there on and off. Instagram’s a great place to be, so much inspiration and so much creativity.The cookies of course are the simplest two bowl cookies. Mix the dry ingredients in one bowl. The wet go into the bowl of the stand mixer. Whisk both, mix both, and we’re good to go. Actually that’s just the good thing about comfort food like this. Minimum fuss, minimum clean up, maximum satisfaction.Do bake a batch when you have a little time to unwind. These Wholegrain Buckwheat Orange Chocolate Chippers will be baking before you know it. It probably takes more time just to line out the ingredients. That is one thing I always always do. Makes life simple, and you don’t miss an ingredient. I’ve learnt the hard way of course so I might as well share that tip!
Wholegrain Buckwheat Orange Chocolate Chippers come together in a matter of minutes, fuss free and absolutely delicious. That they are 100% wholegrain makes them a winner. Swap the chocolate chips for raisins, maybe add some walnuts, or make them coffee chocolate chip cookies. Either way, these will disappear before you know it! This is pure comfort food.
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time 20 minutesminutes
Total Time 25 minutesminutes
Servings 24cookies
Ingredients
Dry Mix
75gwholewheat flour {aata}
75gquick cooking oats
50gbuckwheat flour {kuttu ka aata}
3/4tspbaking soda
1/4tspsalt
75gdark chocolate chips
50gwalnutschopped
Wet Mix
100gunsalted butterroom temperature
115gjaggery granules
1egg
1tbspyogurt
1/2tspvanilla extract
Zest of 1 orange
Instructions
Place all the dry mix ingredients in a large bowl and stir to mix.
Place all the wet mix ingredients in bowl of stand mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment, and process for 2 minutes on speed 3.
Add the dry mix and stir with paddle attachment on slowest speed for 30 seconds.
Let the mixture stand/rest while you preheat the oven to 180C {15-20 minutes}
Line 2 baking sheets with parchment.
Place scoops of cookie dough on the parchment, 2 inches apart, 12 on each sheet. Flatten gently with the tines of a fork. {Sprinkle over a few more chocolate chips if you are feeling particularly indulgent}
Bake for 15-20 minutes, until the edges are done, light golden brown, and the centre is still a little soft. {Bake further 5 minutes if you like crisp cookies}.
Remove tray from oven, allow to stand for 5 minutes, then cool the cookies completely on the rack.
“The oat is the Horatio Alger of cereals, which progressed, if not from rags to riches, at least from weed to health food.”
Waverley Root
Date Walnut Orange Flapjacks … squares of goodness that come together in minutes. Not sure why, but ever since I began making granola again {read every Sunday}, I’ve had flapjacks on my mind. It’s a very strange thought as it crept in without prior notice, and yesterday for some reason that’s all I wanted to bake. Every time I got up to bake cookies, I pulled out the bag of oats. Guess these were meant to be. And so was this naughtiness that crept into my frames…Little Bambi, our newest little family member who we adopted recently, had an absolute field day. She loves photobombing whenever I try and shoot. You might see here here on PAB now and then!What are flapjacks you might ask.Well ‘a flapjack, muesli bar, cereal bar, or granola bar is a sweet tray-baked oat bar made from rolled oats, butter, brown sugar and golden syrup‘ and looks like this fits in quite well with my whole grain breakfast granola sort of a theme. I guess I could have just added some granola I made this morning into a bowl, tossed it in with some other stuff, pushed it together, let it set and made granola bars.But my granola is very precious these days. It’s much in demand in parfaits so I figured it would be a shame to use it so easily cheaply. Then again the net is overflowing with recipes of flapjack and this recipe fromFood52 won me over. The ease of the recipe, the beauty of ingredients, the pantry staples all made it seem so simple.Too simple I might add. You might have caught how easy these were to make on my instastories on my Instagram handle. In any case, this is the easiest ‘stir the wet mix into dry’ procedure. And it tasted drop dead delicious with ‘toffee’ good flavours, a sweetness which soothes the soul, and a load of oats, walnuts, sunflower seeds! Oh and a burst of orange flavour!Too much of a good thing and a new way to use quick cooking oats.Ever since I began using jumbo oats in my granola, the regular bag of quick cooking oats just sits and stares at me. No longer I guess. This is another fantastic way to use quick cooking oats . I adapted the recipe to use things that I had on hand so my flapjacks had walnuts and dates. Also the zest of an orange as it was just sitting on the counter and added freshness to the otherwise monochrome palette.
Buttery & nutty with a burst of orange, sweetly comforting and quite indulgent, these Date Walnut Orange Flapjacks are going to be showing up quite often. A recipe minimally adapted from one @food52 , it comes together in a matter of minutes.
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time 25 minutesminutes
Total Time 30 minutesminutes
Servings 16squares
Ingredients
Wet mix
125gunsalted butter
100gbrown sugar
90ghoney
Dry Mix
200gquick cooking oats
50gdateschopped
50gwalnutschopped
35gsunflower seeds
Zest of 1 orange
Instructions
Line a 8 X 8" square tin with parchment. Preheat the oven to 180C.
Place the butter, brown sugar and honey in a heatproof bowl and microwave for a minute until the butter has melted. Whisk well until you get a toffee like mixture.
Meanwhile, in a large bowl, add all the remaining ingredients and stir to mix.
Pour over the toffee mixture and stir well to mix.Transfer to prepared tin, pat down into place with an offset spatula or butter knife.
Bake for about 25-30 minutes until light golden brown on the edges but still soft in the centre.
Comfort food … food that reassures is different things to different people.” David Tanis
Crudites with Creamy Garlic Dip and Seedy Buckwheat Crackers might well be one of my favourite ways to rustle up something simple and quite addictive for an everyday healthy nibble, a small get together, or even a lunch box snack. The dip is as simple as it is finger licking good, and is a great way to get your protein fix for the day. Crudites on the side, in every colour, make this complete!
Comfort food for the soul! The recipe is a no brainer, a simple very simple whisking together of staple cooking ingredients that will possibly already be in your kitchen. These are ingredients that were meant to be together. The recipe is adapted from a very old one that I got while in college in Delhi University. A friends grandmother made a basic version often, and I gleefully went back home to recreate the recipe then much to the amazement of the family. This was in the late 1980’s!!
Much changed since then, the recipe evolved gradually. This is its current form. When Mother Dairy asked if I’d like to take do a few recipes for #CreamOfAllFood and taking over their instagram handle for a week, I knew this had to be shared too. This is our favourite dip, and is worth every share! Mother Dairy products have been a part of my growing up years, bringing up the kids, my kitchen, my culinary life. I am quite sure they are in your life too!
While I absolutely love doing sweet desserts and dishes, my heart belongs to savoury. Add garlic, fresh herbs, a dash of lime juice to any savoury dish and I’m a happy camper. Add cream to it, and now we’re talking. This Creamy Garlic Dip is possibly the simplest example of taking something delicious to finger licking good addictive! The cream made that happen!!Use this as a basic recipe. I added garlic and garlic greens to it. Sriracha might be really nice in here too. Maybe tahini, maybe grated red radish, or even finely chopped walnuts, fresh coriander and chilies. Who knows what might hit the chord with you. I urge you to try.
Begin basic. Hung yogurt, cream, grated garlic and salt is a good beginning. Then build as you go. And so many more reasons to enjoy this. Dahi/yogurt, garlic, fresh herbs, lime juice … think good gut bacteria and protein, think minerals, think garlic and its health promoting phytonutrients, think Vitamin C. As always, above all, think S I M P L E!! As simple as the Fruits with Cream & Granola Parfaits which I did in the #InstaCookingClass #1.
So wait no further. I whisked together the recipe on Instastories the Mother Dairy Instagram handle that I’ve taking over this week. This was #InstaCookingClass #2. Catch me there, or on the Mother Dairy FaceBook page later this week. Love to hear if you liked it {or not}, what recipes you might like to see in future, and what you’d like to make with the #CreamOfAllFood!And oh, did I tell you that I love pairing dips with wholegrain crackers? So I turned the oven on, and began throwing in stuff of all sorts into the Thermomix. One seed followed another, one flour followed another, and luckily enough the ending was good. The experiment worked!
The crackers were a ‘cracker of an idea’! The dough was so good and loaded with SEEDS! It behaved beautifully so I made some savoury shells in the my favourite mini pie pan from Kitchen Aid too. Seedy wholewheat & buckwheat canapes filled with a creamy garlic dip, and pickled radishes are as delicious as they sound! Do make these as well if you are a passionate baker like me. Else crudites in seasonal colours like bell peppers, cucumbers, radishes are great too!
Crudites with Creamy Garlic Dip and Seedy Buckwheat Crackers might well be one of my favourite ways to rustle up something simple and quite addictive for an everyday healthy nibble, a small get together, or even a lunch box snack. The dip is as simple as it is finger licking good, and is a great way to get your protein fix for the day. Crudites on the side, in every colour, make the platter balanced!
Prep Time 5 minutesminutes
Total Time 2 hourshours5 minutesminutes
Servings 6people
Ingredients
Creamy Garlic Dip
200mlMother Dairy Cream
400gMother Dairy Ultimate Dahi
2tbspextra virgin olive oil
Juice of 1 lime
1tspHimalayan rock salt {to taste}
1small bunch fresh coriander leaves
1-2green/red chili
2-3garlic cloves
3-4garlic greens
Seedy wholegrain buckwheat crackers
100gsunflower seeds/kernels {Divided 65+35}
35galmond meal
20gflax seeds
15gwhite sesame
15gblack sesame
1tspsmoked sea salt
40gbuckwheat flour
200gwholewheat flour {aata}
40gclarified butter/ghee
10mlhoney
125Water
Instructions
Creamy Garlic Dip
Whisk the cream + yogurt + olive oil + salt + lime juice until smooth.
Finely chop remaining ingredients including the stalks of the coriander and greens of the green garlic.
Stir in.
Taste & adjust seasoning.
Tip: Use as a dip, on crackers, on canapes, in a roll, as a marinadeSeedy wholegrain buckwheat crackers
Seedy wholegrain buckwheat crackers
In the bowl of a food processor, grind together 65g sunflower seeds, almond meal, flax seeds, white & black sesame seeds.
Add the smoked sea salt, buckwheat flour and wholewheat flour. Stir to mix, followed by the clarified butter. Mix again on high speed to distribute the fat evenly.
Add the additional 35g sunflower seeds and stir to mix {low speed}.
Stir the honey into the water, and slowly drizzle in enough to make a stiff yet pliable dough. Add more if required. {All flours have a different absorption capacity.If the dough is soft, add a tbsp or two of buckwheat flour}.
Allow the dough to rest covered for a bit while you preheat the oven.
Divide the dough into 4. Roll out one portion as thin as possible between 2 sheets of parchment paper.
You can either cut into shapes using a pastry wheel/pizza cutter/knife, or leave it as one whole and roughly break it up. Alternatively, you could stamp out into fluted round shapes with a cookie cutter, and bake into tiny bite sized canape shells. I used the KitchenAid mini pie tray for some.
Bake until they feel firm and begin to colour. Keep an eye on them after 20 minutes as they can colour and burn petty quick.
Cool completely on cookie racks, and store in an airtight container
“Fussing over food was important. It gave a shape to the day: breakfast, lunch, dinner; beginning, middle, end.” Robert Hellenga
Fruits with Cream & Granola Parfaits … couldn’t be a better way to begin the morning. All this while I thought granola was just one of the best ways to start the day, so I made that a lot. It was simple. Granola + Milk + fruit = done! Then along came cream, an idea crossed my mind and breakfast got a makeover, a fun and colourful one at that. The parfait is showing up as dessert at home too now, made with just cream, no dahi! Folk who know me, know of my love for dairy. Everything and anything dairy hits a home run for me, and that speaks pretty much for everyone at home.The neat little tetrapacks of Mother Dairy cream have changed the way I work in the kitchen, cooked and baked. The ease, the taste, the quality stepped up what I do in the kitchen in exciting ways. I am sure if you are like me, and love to cook and bake, your pantry’ll never be without this handy staple. It literally finds its way into everything I make, especially sweet!So when Mother Dairy Creams asked if I’d like to take do a few recipes for #CreamOfAllFood and taking over their Instagram handle for a week, I could hardly say no. There was nothing I’d have liked to do better! Mother Dairy products have been a part of my growing up years, bringing up the kids, my kitchen, my culinary life. This was just going to be an extension of what I enjoy doing most – experimenting in the kitchen.A ton of ideas tumbled out of my head. I settled for this one first – Fruits with Cream & Granola Parfaits because I love the idea of layered desserts, cakes etc. Because the family had just returned from NYC and one of them described a delicious parfait they had for breakfast there. Because I had a sackful of granola at home that someone had sent as a gift. Because I love fruit in food, and lastly, I love playing with my food recipes…
One thing led to another. Some twitter conversations later, before I knew it, I was baking granola for the parfaits. I have always been charmed by doing things from scratch, granola being one of them. I find it difficult to understand why you wouldn’t bake something so simple at home? Please try baking some once, and you’ll do it over and over again. It makes life simple, you feel great, the kids get addicted to it, you can use it for energy bars, for breakfast…and for dessert too. Throw some into smoothies, scatter it over fruit salad or ice cream, or just munch on some as a snack. It is so customisable too. That done, a nice big batch smiled at me as I thought of putting the parfait together. It’s the simplest thing to do. As things go, I love the edge of subtle indulgence these Fruits with Cream & Granola Parfaits offer. There is little guilt for two reasons. No, make that three! Maybe more!!Cream is good fat. The granola is 100% wholegrain, glutenfree and home made. Last but not the least,the parfait has a generous portion of seasonal fresh fruit in there. And so many more reasons to enjoy this. Dahi/yogurt, honey, chia seeds … thing good gut bacteria and protein, think natural sweetener, think superfoods that are also called seeds of life. Above all, think S I M P L E !!So wait no further. I played out the recipe on Instastories the Mother Dairy Instagram handle that I’m taking over this week. This was #InstaCookingClass #1. Catch me there, or on the Mother Dairy FaceBook page later this week . Love to hear if you liked it {or not}, what recipes you might like to see in future, and what you’d like to make with the #CreamOfAllFood!
Tip: Use a piping bag or ziploc to pipe in the cream mix to make it neat.
Tip: Use any seasonal fruit you enjoy eg Banana Strawberry Parfait, Black Forest Parfait, Banoffee Parfait.
Tip: Great idea to make a parfait bar and get kids to 'build their own' colourful parfaits
Tip: Use more cream, less yogurt and turn this into a dessert with the cream.mix, fruit & nuts!!
Easiest Homemade Granola
Preheat the oven to 160C. Line a large baking dish with parchment.
Stir together all the dry ingredients EXCEPT the dried cranberries and chocolate chips in a large bowl. {Tip: Use the mixer bowl from The Kitchen Aid Stand Mixer as it is convenient to use and very big}.
Whisk the honey into the olive oil.
Pour the wet mix over the dry mix, and give it all a good stir.
Turn it into the prepared pan, press down lightly, and bake for approximately 45 minutes until light golden brown. Stir 2-3 times while baking.
Once baked, stir in the dried cranberries while still hot, and chocolate chips once cool.
“It didn’t matter how big our house was; it mattered that there was love in it.”
Peter Buffett
Gingerbread Garam Masala House – some things in life take long, some miss the date, yet any project made with love is better late than never. I had plans to make a Gingerbread House over Christmas. It was something I have longed to make again for along time. With travel and other commitments it never happened. Until now….In Bangalore in November I chanced upon a billboard from Casa Grande, and it talked about a dream house. An acquaintance had booked one of those and was quite thrilled. Talking to her about her dream home, for some reasonthis bakers mind connected to a gingerbread house, a dream I had nurtured for long, something I longed to bake again. That set me thinking about how my dream home might be.The elements danced in my head, plans to bake moving forward. First the foundation, or oops main flavours! A recent trip into Old Delhi meant a shifting of gears from ginger to garam masala in flavouring. Such is the power of inspiration. My dream home would have garam masala aromas wafting through it. I often bake my Christmas cake with garam masala, and I can tell you that it is wonderful sweet & warm!Hence I set to work at my first free moment. Can I tell you that building a gingerbread house is a lofty project, needs a couple of hands to help, is an arduous task, yet you fall in love with it once it’s made? Yes, all that and more.
Drawing the same parallel, so is the home you choose to live in. Make it a good choice. It’s a lofty order to build it together like this Gingerbread Garam Masala House, so it’s best left to safe hands. A good company likeCasa Grande a Chennaibasedrealestateenterprisewhich isdriven by a strong belief in buildingaspirations and fulfillingthem. It designs and develops quality livings spaces and operates in niche residential segments like luxury villas and apartments in Chennai, Bangalore, Coimbatore and Cochin.Well they take care of all the hard work, quality work, delivering on time all part of the deal, leaving me to take care of my edible dreams. And baking this dream home wasn’t easy by any standard. You need a firm cookie dough to keep it all together, like a good foundation does a dream home. I adapted an earlier gingerbread recipe, made it a 100% wholegrain and smelling sweetly of garam masala. Wasn’t sure my house would stand but here we are. Looks like it came together.It has all the elements I’d like in my dream home. A rustic look, simple lines, sloping roofs, loads of windows that would let in light, and a ton of greenery. The roof is covered with flower cutouts. A few snowflakes too just because it was just Christmas, and just because I love how beautiful they look. And oh yes, how could I forget to mention the beautiful aromas of garam masala cookies wafting through my kitchen.I had real fun putting this together with the daughter. You do need more hands than one to bring together this sweet little home. What would your dream home be like?
The Garam Masala Gingerbread House is my wholegrain take on traditional Scandinavian Gingerbread House. Sweet, spicy and warm and fun to build, this little dream house is well worth the time and effort!
Prep Time 15 minutesminutes
Cook Time 20 minutesminutes
Total Time 35 minutesminutes
Servings 6people
Ingredients
Garam Masala Biscuit dough
115gunsalted butterchilled, cubed
150gjaggery powdered
1tbspcinnamon powder
1 1/2tbspgaram masala powder
1tspbaking soda
1/4-1/2cupboiling water
350gwhole wheat flour
Royal icing
1/2egg white
1cuppowdered sugar
Few drops almond extract
1/2tspwhite vinegar
Sugar glue
1cupwhite crystal sugar
Instructions
Garam Masala Biscuit dough
In the bowl of the food processor, process the chilled butter and jaggery for 1-2 minutes on high speed until you get a breadcrumb like mix
Add the cinnamon powder and garam masala. Stir the baking soda into a 1/4 cup of boiling water Mix the baking soda with the boiling water and add to the dough along with the flour. Mix to make a stiff dough. If necessary add more water, a tablespoon at a time. Chill 2 hours or overnight.
Preheat the oven to 375’F (190’C). Bake for 12 to 15 minutes until the cookie dough feels firm.
Cut patterns for the house, making patterns for the roof, front walls, gabled walls, chimney and door out of cardboard.
Roll the dough out on a large, ungreased baking sheet and place the patterns on the dough. Mark off the various pieces with a knife, but leave the pieces in place. {I rolled out the dough on a floured bench, roughly 1/8 inch thick, cut required shapes and transferred these to the baking sheet. Any scraps I saved and rerolled at the end.}
After baking, again place the pattern on top of the gingerbread and trim the shapes, cutting the edges with a straight-edged knife. Leave to cool on the baking sheet.
Royal icing
Beat all ingredients until smooth, adding the powdered sugar gradually to get the desired consistency. Pipe on pieces and allow to dry before assembling. If you aren’t using it all at once you can keep it in a small bowl, loosely covered with a damp towel for a few hours until ready to use. You may have to beat it slightly to get it an even consistency if the top sets up a bit. Piped on the house, this will set up hard over time.
Sugar glue
Place in a heavy bottom saucepan and simmer over low heat just until the sugar dissolves. Take off heat. Dredge or brush the edges of the pieces to glue them together. If the syrup crystallizes, remake it.
Note: Please be very careful while working with hot sugar syrup as it can burn the skin.
