Tag: spices

Spicy Chocolate Garam Masala Fruit Cake … a winter warmer this holiday season

Spicy Chocolate Garam Masala Fruit Cake … my first winter fruit cake with chocolate and not the last by far! I make a fruit cake every year during the holiday season. Each year I have a special spice to flavour my cake, the garam masala.

This year there are two things different. One, I’ve added the charm of chocolate to my fruit cake, and second that the fruit were soaked exclusively in rum. More specifically soaked in Captain Morgan Rum, resulting in a drop dead addictive fruit cake! Oh, and another twist, coconut sugar. YUM!

I did a dry run with the recipe to figure if I was on track. It was amazing but maybe needed a few changes. The second time around it turned out perfect. It’s a simple recipe that has a fruit mix, and wet mix, then a dry mix. Line up the ingredients, get organised and you’ll have this baby baking in under 30 minutes.

My holiday baking through winter has increasingly been flavoured by garam masala, a spice my mother used to lace her fruit cake with year after year. It comes as a surprise to many since they associate this quintessential Indian spice with curries, kebabs and savoury food.

However, if you take a leaf out of my book, or many if you desire, you will see a splattering of recipes using this flavourful and common Indian spice blend. If the West is famous for its pumpkin pie spice, the East is known for garam masala, quite literally ‘hot spice mix‘!

Hot it is not and that is pretty much a regional thing. While it is much ‘spicier’ down south, the North Indian garam masala is gentle, flavourful and extremely pleasing. Just a sprinkle completely changes the mood of any dish, so you can imagine what it did to my cake.

One bite of the cake and you get transported to winter wonderlands where warm spices, chocolate and rum embrace you with their warmth. The flavours come together really well, and each crumb screams HOLIDAY SEASON! 

To finish the cake, poke holes through it as soon as it steps out of the oven, and drizzle over the warm cake with a little more Captain Morgan Rum. Then let this beautiful, fragrant bake sit back and mature a little bit. Slice and serve once cold…

Or add another level of indulgence by drizzling over with a rum spiked chocolate ganache, top with candied orange slices and frozen berries! Dust with cocoa…

… and you have a show stopper!

ENJOY!

Print

Spicy Chocolate Garam Masala Fruit Cake ... the right winter warmer this holiday season

Spicy Chocolate Garam Masala Fruit Cake ...One bite of the cake and you get transported to winter wonderlands where warm spices, chocolate and rum embrace you with their warmth. The flavours come together really well, and each crumb screams HOLIDAY SEASON!
Keyword baking, chocolate, dessert, fruit, homemade, sweet
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 1 hour
Total Time 2 hours 15 minutes
Servings 6 people

Ingredients

Fruit mix

  • 150 g fruit mix {raisins berries, apricots, figs, orange, ginger etc}
  • 150 ml Captain Morgan Rum
  • 2 tbsp garam masala powder
  • 2 tbsp coconut sugar

Dry Mix

  • 1/2 cup all purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup almond meal
  • 1/4 cup cocoa powder
  • Pinch salt
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1 cup chopped walnuts
  • 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

Wet mix

  • 75 g clarified butter {ghee}
  • 1 cup coconut sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tbsp Greek yogurt
  • vanilla extract

To top

  • 30 ml Captain Morgan Rum

Instructions

Fruit mix

  • Soak the fruit in the rum, 2 tbsp coconut sugar & garam masala for 2-3 days {or more if possible}. Check daily and top with more rum if required.
  • Preheat oven to 160C. Line the bottoms and side of a 6" round tin with baking parchment.

Wet Mix

  • In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the clarified butter/ghee and coconut sugar until light and moussey.
  • Beat in eggs plus vanilla extract. Beat in the Greek yogurt.

Dry Mix

  • In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, almond meal, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
  • Stir together dry mix with walnuts and chocolate chips.
  • Toss the fruit into the dry mix, then fold it all into the butter mix.
  • Transfer to prepared tin, even out and bake for 50-60 minutes until done.

To finish

  • Poke holes into the cake as soon as it comes out, and drizzle about 30ml of rum over it.
  • Cool completely and rest for a day.

Lamb Mince Capsicum / Keema Capsicum … winter favourite comfort food

Lamb Mince Capsicum / Keema Capsicum … a one wok / kadhai dish which is certain to tantalise the taste-buds, keep you warm this winter, basically comfort food at its best. The dish has origins in India & Pakistan, a recipe that’s changed hands several times over. It’s quite different from how I used to cook a similar recipe earlier, and this one tastes loads better. It’s quite fuss free, a recipe I from an old aunt.Very often, you’ll find curries and lamb dishes that originate from the Indian subcontinent to have loads of ghee / clarified butter, fried onions, lots of ‘bhunoing‘ or roasting over low flame etc. Often too, the list of spices and ingredients are not everyday pantry ingredients. This Lamb Mince Capsicum / Keema Capsicum is different by way of process and also by way of ingredients. It uses simple everyday spices, the only exception being dried mint. That in any case is a great addition to any kitchen pantry and adds great oomph to food!I love that this is flavoured simply by 3-4 spice powders, coriander {dhania}, turmeric {haldi}, roasted cumin {bhuna zeera}and Kashmiri red chili {degi mirch}. Also, just two herbs here, the more fascinating of them being dried mint. Dried mint adds a certain earthiness and depth to the recipe, one that I haven’t experienced before. I usually use fresh mint since I have loads growing in my patch the year round. Dried mint was refreshing this time around!The rest of the ingredients are very common to Indian curries and stir fries … onion, tomato, ginger, garlic, green chilies, yogurt {Greek yogurt as that’s what I had in the fridge}, and an optional dash of lime juice. And the process is a no brainer too. Take a read!Just cook the mince over low heat for a while, add the spices and chopped ingredients, cover and cook, throw in vegetables if you like. I added capsicum since that’s all I  had. Alternatively, you could use flat beans {sem as we call them here}, peas, potatoes, green chilies or even bitter gourd if you like. Towards the end, Greek yogurt, more fresh coriander {I like to add LOADS}, a dash of lime if you like tangy.Then just give it a squeeze of lime {optional}, slit green chilies {very optional} and a nice drizzle of clarified butter/ghee {MUST}… and enjoy!

I served the Lamb Mince Capsicum / Keema Capsicum with parathas one time, some toasted sheermal {sweetish Indian flatbread} another time. You could even give this a fusion and scoop them up with nachos for a snack with tea or drinks! More ideas … filling for lamb mince samosas!

Print

Lamb Mince with Capsicum / Keema Capsicum

Lamb Mince with Capsicum / Keema Capsicum ... a one wok / kadhai dish which is certain to tantalise the taste-buds, keep you warm this winter, basically it's comfort food at it's best. The dish has origins in India & Pakistan, a recipe that's changed hands several times over. The recipe uses simple pantry ingredients, is fuss free and gluten free as well!
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 1 hour
Total Time 1 hour 15 minutes
Servings 4 people

Ingredients

  • 500 g lamb mince
  • 1 tbsp clarified butter {ghee}
  • 2 large onions finely chopped
  • 2 tomatoes finely chopped
  • 5-6 cloves garlic finely chopped
  • 1 piece ginger finely chopped
  • 2-3 green chilies finely chopped
  • 1 small bunch fresh coriander, finely chopped
  • 2 tsp dhania powder/ coriander powder
  • tsp ½Kashmiri red chili powder / degi mirch
  • tsp ½haldi powder/ turmeric
  • 2 tsp bhuna zeera powder/ roasted cumin powder
  • Salt to taste
  • 2 capsicums deseeded, chopped
  • cup ½Greek yogurt whisked
  • Juice of ½ lime
  • Fresh coriander to garnish
  • 1 tbsp ghee to finish off

Instructions

  • Heat the glee in a heavy bottom wok. Add the lamb mince, stir well to break up any clumps. Allow to cook uncovered over low heat for 30-45 minutes until it cooks through and begins to change colour.
  • Add the onions, tomatoes, ginger, garlic, green chilies, dhania powder, haldi, degi mirch and bhuna zeera powder. Mix well, season with salt, ten cover and leave to cook over low heat for about 30 minutes.
  • Stir in the chopped capsicum, then the whisked Greek yogurt. Cook again covered over low heat until the liquid has evaporated 15-20 minutes.
  • Taste and adjust seasoning, add the lime juice if desired, more fresh coriander if you like. Drizzle over a tbsp of ghee.
  • Serve hot with naan, parathas, sheermal or tandoori roti.

The Masala Dabba #3. As we journey on, the colours pop for Spring and Holi

“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.

Don’t miss a post
Also find me on The Rabid Baker, The Times of India

The Masala Dabba #2. Spicing up desserts and journeying further into the spice box

“He who controls the spice controls the universe.”
Frank Herbert

The Masala Dabba #2. February 2016. It’s strange how often we connect spices to savoury foods, often in India spice is synonymous with a curry! Delightfully enough, as we blog on, reading more, breaking new ground and exploring our palettes, ingredients take on new meaning. For instance, there is always so much more you can do with spices, enough to make them leap out of the masala dabba or spice box!!

Yes I’m back with the second version of our collaborative spice journey with exploring or rather ‘shooting’ spices, a fun interaction called by the ever sweet Dolphia, seconded enthusiastically by my soul sister Simi and yours truly. We’ve collected a new spice girl along the way. Meeta joins us this month as we delve into the fascinating world of spices. It’s only about styling and shooting spices, yet for me, the inspiration often goes a step further. It’s impossible to just shoot spices without following my nose to the simmering pot, hence a recipe is born now and then!

It began with shooting spices, and eventually turned into a winter inspiration. I desserted with spice! The three found their way into this absolutely smooth and delicious Gur Panna Cotta With Candied Walnuts. Talk about flavours that compliment each other! If panna cotta is not divine enough on it’s own, this version turned out to be sublime, a recipe I contributed for my column on askme.wellness.com.I couldn’t just stop there so I then drank or sangriad with it! The Sangria Mocktail was great fun to shoot. You could go down the red wine way with this of course. I mean, after all a recipe is often a springboard for further creativity. With cinnamon it’s difficult not to think of warming, comforting wafts of sweetness in the air. I plan on making bite sized cinnabons some day soon. They really call my name. I think the mini dessert trend happening now, along with my recent spice overdrive, might well be the culprit!Our spices of choice for the first month to challenge us – Cinnamon + Cloves + Star Anise. Three spices, cinnamon I use often, cloves a little rarely, and star anise possibly never. While I love how star anise looks, one of the prettiest spices ever, the flavours are often overbearing. Yet, surprise, surprise. I used star anise in a the trio of spices to make a Spiced Strawberry Wine Jam for this Chocolate Berry Wine Fallen Gateau and I was rewarded with beautiful lilting flavours. As I begin to use star anise more often, or rather infuse it, keeping it at a minimum, the gentle undertones are rather endearing.

Cinnamon
The inner bark of a tropical evergreen tree, harvested during the rainy season when pliable and then dried into curls sold as sticks or ground into a powder.With its warm, sweet flavor, cinnamon is one of the biggest workhorses on the spice shelf. Cooks often use it to flavor baked goods and drinks, but cinnamon also works wonders in stews and sauces.
Matches: apples, berries, chicken, chocolate, coffee, custards, fruit, lamb, oranges, pears, rice

Cloves
Native to Indonesia, cloves are small nailed shaped flower buds that are dried and have a sweet, somewhat penetrating flavor. They can be bought whole or ground. Ground cloves are commonly used in baking.
Matches: apples, beets, game, ham, lamb, pumpkin, sausage, tea, tomatoes, walnuts, wine

Star Anise
A star-shaped, dark brown pod that contains a pea-size seed in each of its eight segments. Native to China, star anise comes from a small evergreen tree. It’s flavor is slightly more bitter than that of regular anise seed. Asian cooks use star anise to give a licorice flavor to savory dishes, particularly those with pork and poultry.
Matches: duck, eggs, fish, leeks, pastry, pears, pork, poultry, pumpkin, shrimp.

Do stop by our other spice girls as well as we share this charming journey from one month to the next! Hope you enjoy it as much as we are.

Dolphia @ Story of Cooks
Simi @ Turmeric & Spice who has a spicy giveaway this month
Meeta @ Whats For Lunch Honey

Don’t miss a post

The Masala Dabba #1… exploring the Indian spice box

“Once you get a spice in your home, you have it forever. Women never throw out spices. The Egyptians were buried with their spices. I know which one I’m taking with me when I go.”
Erma Bombeck

The Masala Dabba. A name that paints a spicy picture. A fun food styling experiment born out of a conversation one day in December last year. Spices are something that intrigue us, and are sometimes challenging to shoot. So Dolphia floated the idea, and it was instantly lapped up by Simi and lazy me. It’s always great to have something that gives us inspiration, or maybe focus to shoot. The idea was to shoot the spices, in sets of three, month after month.

Doing something creative as a group is always fun. Makes you want to reach out for the elements time and again. Makes you also impatient to see how different minds style and shoot. It’s another new creative start, one that should see a few months of spicy good fun! This month we each picked a spice…

Nigella {not Lawson 😉}  sativa or kalonji
Fenugreek or methi daana
Caraway or ajwain

A step back into the history of the world, and in many ways spices were central to exploration of uncharted territories, to discovering exotic lands. Spices led to wars and empires being built, and then eventually being lost! Nowhere in history would you find the same ingredient common to being celebrated as an aphrodisiac, holding proven medicinal qualities, yet being an inherent part of the ‘recipe’ for embalming! Such great properties can only be SPICEY!!

Spices are an integral part of the Indian kitchen and each one adds punch and flavour to the pantry. Even though I’ve never used the three of these together, individually they pop up every now and then when I cook. Ajwain shows up a great deal in radish or mooli ke paratha, in root vegetable stir fries and in curries. I use it often as a substitute for oregano in my pasta sauces, giving the seeds a good rub between the palms before throwing them in. They have huge digestive properties.

Fenugreek finds itself more often than never in pickles and curry powders. My mother’s aam ka achaar or mango pickle always had fenugreek, and I still remember the slightly bitter aftertaste after biting into the soft firm seed once pickled. I use fenugreek the most in the tempering or baghaar for kadhi, a yogurt curry with dumplings, which is a huge favourite at home. Fenugreek too offers great digestive properties, is used to treat diabetes, reduces blood pressure, congestion and a host of other illnesses.

Nigella of course lands up most often on the naan, sometimes in a ‘paani ke station wale aloo‘ ki recipe {a water based no oil potato curry served with puri at railway stations in India}, and an inherent part of paanch phoron. Paanch phoron is a five spice blend quintessential to Bengali cuisine. Nigella satvia is one of the five, the others being fenugreek, mustard, fennel and cumin, all seeds.

Shooting spices is always challenging but quite addictive. Already looking forward to what we can do next month with the spice girls!!

Do stop by and explore the dabbas/spice boxes of my other two partners in crime spice
Simi @ Turmeric n Spice
Dolphia @ Story of Cooks

…and if you’d like to learn a bit of food styling, do check out my next workshop with Darter below

Don’t miss a post
Also find me on The Rabid Baker, The Times of India

Baking | Lebkuchen Cream & Genoise Verrines with Apple Craisin Compote

“Life is a great big canvas,
and you should throw all the paint on it you can.”
Danny Kaye

When we were very young, we received  a Danny Kaye for Children LP as a gift. We spent HOURS listening to “I Taut I Taw a Puddy Tat”, “Tubby the Tuba Song”, “Popo the Puppet”, “Laugh it Off Upsey Daisy” … and so many more.  Can’t not mention “I’m Late” from Alice in Wonderland. Did you listen to Danny Kaye when you were little {alright, I’m like talking the 70’s!}? Life was carefree, full of hide & seek moments, climbing trees – a laugh-riot all the time with simple and fun comfort zones everywhere!

I often miss those ‘no TV, no computer, no i-this, that and the other‘ days. Days when you could count the minutes pass, catch butterflies and grasshoppers, and languish mindlessly in the mid day sun. Can still feel my shaky little hands gently lifting the needle of the record player to place it on the LP … blissful! I often feel bad that my kids will never know simple joys of playing and listening to an LP … their comfort zone existing in plug-ins and downloads!

This dessert was a result of one of my recent carefree adventures,  one of those things that happened. I seldom follow a plan for desserts I serve at home as this is my playing ground; my experimental comfort zone. I know that if my culinary escapades turn out good or even just OK, my sweet guinea pigs will lap them up. They’ll let me know whether it’s a ‘HIGH FIVE’ or just ‘Hmmmm OK‘, but they won’t let it go waste! I count my blessings…

These verrines were lapped up joyfully. I had a vanilla bean genoise sponge ready, one that I wanted to make into a strawberry kiwi cake for someone, but that day strawberries played truant in the market. {Yes, the strawberry season in North India has just begun again}. I came back rather disappointed, and baked a coffee genoise instead, but had this basic sponge on hand. The daughter declared that she wanted to frost it on Sunday…but as I knew would happen. With her exams on, and rather lost as always, she forgot about it! It still played on my mind …All of a sudden, another frosted cake seemed a boring proposition. I looked around and saw a sachet of lebkuchen spice that spicy Meeta had got for me a while ago. YES… that was definitely part of my dessert,  maybe in cream. The mind began wandering. What next? I saw these coffee mugs, and thought ‘layered dessert’. One thing led to another, and soon I was whizzing chunks of the cake in the food processor to get a breadcrumb like mix. What followed was layers of vanilla genoise crumbs, lebkuchen cream, and more crumbs. Scrabbled through the larder. What would go with warm, spicy Christmas flavours that the lebkuchen spice threw up so enticingly? It’s a seductive spice blend, one which calls your name! Apple compote sounded like an idea, maybe with craisins or raisins. Some orange zest too? I was on the track.Make sure you leave the cream whipped to soft peaks so it mingles gently with the cake crumbs, moistening it as you allow it to stand in the fridge for a couple of hours. It permeates the layers and infuses the lebkuchen spice aroma right through. This is a light dessert, yet quite satisfying. I do love verrines for their appealing looks. Play around with layers if you like. The space within is your canvas. I think verrines are a wonderful playground of colours and textures.Make the holiday season fun. Grab any transparent glasses, coffee mugs, goblets, shot glasses, ice cream bowls you have, doesn’t matter if they are mismatched. Begin the layering. Add a red cranberry compote layer to tie the colours in nicely, and top the glasses with a sprig of mint. Red and green ribbons swathed around tie it all together nicely. I love dressing up my food, and I’m having fun as you can see. {Thank you Mia for the vanilla beans that I spiced my genoise up with, and the ribbons! Love them!!}

Lebkuchen Cream & Genoise Verrines with Apple Craisin Compote
6-8 servings { depending on size of glass}
Prep: 30 mins | Cooking: 25 mins | Assembling: 10 minutes
2/3 of a 3 egg vanilla genoise sponge
300ml low fat cream {25% Amul, chilled}
3-4 tbsp powdered sugar
1 tsp lebkuchen spice
Method:
Whip all ingredients till the cream holds soft peaks.
Apple Craisin Compote
3 medium apples, peeled, cored, chopped
1/2 tsp lebkuchen spice
2 tbsp brown sugar
1/8 cup water
juice of 1 lime
1/4 cup craisins/raisins
Zest of 1 orange
Method:
Place all ingredients in heavy bottom pan. Simmer, covered till apples are soft and liquid almost evaporated. Stir from time time. Taste and adjust lime and sugar {and lebkuchen} if required.
Genoise cake cubes for topping:
18-24 tiny cake cubes, like croutons
1 tbsp unsalted butter
1 tbsp sugar
Place sugar and butter in a frying pan on simmer. Once the butter and sugar melt, before the sugar turns brown, add the cake cubes, and toss them around to coat all sides.
Keep an eye on them, and take off once the sides begin to get caramelised. Cool and store in an airtight container until use
Assembling the verrines:
Run genoise slices in food processor for a minute or two till you get a fine breadcrumb like mixture. Spoon 2-3 tbsp per glass.
Add 2 tbsp of lebkuchen spice cream over the crumb layer, and add some more cake crumbs. Divide any remaining cream over the second layers. Poke a thin cake tester through the centre to gently ease some cream through to the bottom layer.
Spoon the warm apple-craisin compote over the second layer of cream, and chill until time to serve.
Top with crisp sautéed genoise cake cubes!
♥ Thank you for stopping by ♥

Don’t miss a post
Also find me on The Rabid Baker, The Times of India

Please wait...

Subscribe to my newsletter

Want to be notified when the article is published? Do enter your email address and name below to be the first to know.
SIGN UP FOR NEWSLETTER NOW
Exit mobile version