Easy Rave paayasa/ Easy Semolina Kheer

 Stuck on what to do for DeepavaLi? Try this easy peasy payasa(kheer) recipe. My mom always made this along with puLiyogare or Lemon rice, and my brother and I just loved this combination. 

The only catch in this recipe is the amount of rave(semolina) to be used, as rave tends to thicken no matter how much water you put. The trick is to use as little rave and as much as liquid as possible. 

Another beauty of this recipe is that you can adjust the recipe as you go along without too much of a hassle. For the same reason, I don’t have exact measurements of ingredients as I tend to adjust along the way. So I’ll just give here a rough estimation and you can build upon it according to your taste. 

Do try! 

Happy DeepavaLi!! 

Drakshi Godambi is getting sucked in like in quick sand :)

Kaayi SukrunDe

Kaayi Sukrunde is one of my all time favorite sweets. It is basically made for thithi/shraaddha in our community. It is coincidental that I am putting this in pitru paksha. VaDe, Paayasa and Sukrunde is standard in every shraadha. Hence my mom never made it at home as regular sweet. Recently got to know that people make it as devi prasada too. I have to check if this is the case in our community too. 

Anyways, this particular recipe I found online(link given below) was spot on. My mom also gave me certain tips, which I will update later, or probably make a different post. Sukrundes stayed crunchy even after few hours. 

Mango Pudding

 The one thing I miss about Indian summers is the king of all fruits, the one and only, Mangoes. I preferred eating them directly, biting into the skin and sucking its juice and all. Cut mango doesn’t give the same experience.  

But now as I am aging and probably getting more and more used to the easy lifestyle, I no longer want to deal with the mess of eating them like that. Even for desserts I prefer using canned pulp more than the fresh ones, just for convenience sake… Or sometimes buy cut fruits over whole fruits. I think in the process of building a comfortable life, I am becoming more and more lazy *sigh*..  

Anyways, found this extremely easy Vegan Mango dessert recipe in one of the FB groups I follow. If you use all readymade ingredients like me, then this recipe is as simple as putting all ingredients together and serving. But the consistency will be more "payasa" like than pudding :) 

You can prepare this well in advance, making this perfect for potlucks and parties. Enjoy!!

Banana bread

 Here’s a fool proof recipe for banana bread, the one I have tried many many times. This recipe is from one of my favorite blogs for baking(link given below).

Bread comes out super moist and you can hardly tell any difference between this and the store bought ones. I have used milk and butter in this recipe, however the original recipe is for vegan banana bread[with suggestions for substitutions]. 

Do try! Happy baking!!

Antina Unde/ Gond Laddoo

 I always complain I never get things right the first time. But let me tell you how my mind works. Take for example this particular unDe. I see in the recipe that I should roughly chop dry fruits. Being the lazy/smart a** I am, I try to do this in the mixie. I pulse and see that it is very unevenly chopped, so I run couple more rounds and unintentionally powder them. For some reason, I do this with all the nuts, even after seeing that it didn’t work the first time. So instead of having coarsely chopped nuts, I now have their respective powders. 

To fix this I take couple extra and chop them by hand. Then I beat myself up for not doing this in the first place. Now I have double quantity of these, and I am not sure how much jaggery syrup to make to accommodate these extra things, that too in powder form!! So I add little extra jaggery, you know just in case, and turns out I added lot more than needed. So now to fix this I add almond flour to adjust the consistency. At this point my head is hurting, and I know that the littlest of the littlest thing can trigger me any minute…tick, tick, tick :))

Seriously, if I get a penny for every time I use almond flour to fix my dessert…… 

God bless that person who thought of selling almond flour ready made. Almond flour ki jai !! 

  

Coming to the recipe - this is a very poushtidaayaka unde, especially given to women during postpartum care, or when girls hit puberty. I would say women any age should consume these to keep ourselves strong.

Happy Mother’s Day ladies!! Stay strong!!

KadlebeLe Sabbakki Payasa/ Chanadal Sabudana Payasa

 I just love the feel of Sabbakki(saabudana) in payasa. Visually they are so appealing. This is one of my favorite payasas. Do try!

Happy Shivaratri!!

 

Easy Sabudana-Chia seeds Dessert

 I’m a little late in wishing, still, 

Happy 2022! Or, as they joke Happy 2020 too!

[bidtu, bidtu, bidtu, thoon, thoon, thoon] 😬😬😬

Happy Sankranti! 

Want to start this year with a sweet note, try this easy peasy Sabbakki dessert. It’s basically fruit custard, made slightly differently. You can prepare this well in advance, making it a perfect potluck dessert. Addition of Sabbakki and chia seeds gives a nice contrasting texture to the dessert. Enjoy! 

Tutti Frutti Cookies/ Karachi biscuits

 Enjoy these wonderful tutti frutti cookies(Karachi biscuits) this holiday season! 

 

This recipe is from this popular blog(link given below) which is my goto blog for baking. She has so many foolproof and wonderful recipes and I love how she explains things so thoroughly. Do try! 

Happy holidays!!  

Fig Halwa

 Craving for sweets - try this healthy halwa. 

This is a sugar free healthy dessert. Add sugar if you want to cater to kids as they are not at an age to appreciate sugar free desserts yet. 

As the blogger suggests, this recipe is very forgiving. It can hardly go wrong. I added too much ghee and to compensate I added couple of teaspoons of almond flour, and it complimented the halwa very nicely. 

It is tasty as it is! But the blogger served this with ice cream. I love that combination! Do try this holiday season and enjoy some guilt free dessert! 

Easy Milk Barfi in InstaPot

After the first-try-success(which rarely happens in my case) of badam Katli in InstaPot, I braved to try another similar recipe from the same blog - Milk barfi.

Since this is the first time I am eating this barfi, I have no clue how it should taste. I was expecting it to taste more like doodh peda, but it tasted more raw, in the sense one can easily tell there is milk powder in it. But it was tasty nevertheless. A generous pinch of cardamom powder will definitely enhance the flavor. One cool thing about this barfi is that the texture changes drastically as the barfi cools down. So this is not exactly make-and-eat-directly kind of sweet, you need to give this a good resting time.

I have seen a similar recipe on YouTube which was made on stovetop, which looks very easy, but one cannot beat the convenience of IP in making sugar syrup. 

Overall a very easy and tasty recipe. Do try this for Deepavali and enjoy!   

Ragi(Finger Millet) Mug Cake

 If you are craving for some cake and want it instantly, and don’t want to get into the hassle of baking a whole cake + wait for an hour or so for it to bake +  then clean up after it’s done, then you should try mug cakes. These are so easy and they get done in 3-5 min max, then all you have to clean up is just 1 coffee mug!!! 

 

Mug cakes recipes have been circulating around in the net for many years now. For those who don’t know what it is - it is basically a single portion cake that you cook(bake) in the microwave in a coffee mug! 

But what’s special about this particular mug cake recipe is that it uses ragi.. RAGI! 

My kid who doesn’t like anything made out of ragi, loved this. 

This cake doesn’t taste like regular cake, you CAN taste ragi in it. This tastes like some exotic version of dark chocolate cake. If you are a dark chocolate lover like my kid, you will definitely love this. 

Do try this for Mother’s day this weekend and enjoy it guilt free! 

Happy Mother’s day! 

GasaGase Payasa/ Poppy seeds payasam

 Happy Ugadi! May all of you have a blessed year! 

We celebrate Souramana Ugadi and not Chandramana Ugadi. But in our house there is only one way of celebrating, so it doesn’t matter which one we celebrate..  because the only way we celebrate any Hindu festival is prepare special food and then eat. I keep it in front of God, light the lamp, prostrate, that much I do.. 🙏

Coming to the recipe, gasagase payasa is our family favorite. Grinding gasagase is little bit tricky, water should not be added all at once, but little by little for it to grind properly. This is my mother’s recipe, with tips and tricks as she taught me. Enjoy! 

Badam Katli in InstaPot

 Making Indian sweets/ barfis is always a daunting task for me. Bringing sakkare paaka(sugar syrup) to one string consistency is where I get stuck mostly. 

Thanks to my friend Anusha, I got this recipe which uses InstaPot to make sugar syrup. She shared it along with some yummy katlis, which gave me more confidence to try them myself. 

I remember my other friend’s words here that more the gadgets you use in the kitchen, less is the skill required :) 

Earlier cooking needed skill/ experience, now everything seems to happen at a touch of a button - electric rice cooker, InstaPot, Bread machine, Rotimatic.…  

I’m not complaining. This recipe is so easy and fool proof and it turned out extremely good. Make syrup in InstaPot, mix almond flour from Costco, let it cool and done!  

You can make this for any festival/potluck without breaking a sweat. 

Do try! 

Happy Holi! 

Eggless Marble Cake

 Whew! What a year it has been! What a contrast between beginning of the year to end of the year! Who knew at this time and age a small virus can still have a potential to disrupt the whole world. One can only pray. Stay safe everybody! 

Coming to the recipe, presenting a delicious and cool looking cake - Marble cake. Something to cheer up holiday season. I loved the simplicity of this recipe.  

Do try! 

Happy New Year!! 

Eggless Tutti Frutti Cake

 Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas!! 

Enjoy this holiday season with freshly baked Tutti frutti cake. 

The cake turned out super moist and tasty despite no egg. Very easy to make.  Enjoy! 

Gulkand Barfi

 Happy Deepavali!!

Presenting an easy peasy barfi recipe which can be done in no time and tastes like store bought ones. I clearly need to work more on how they look :)

It doesn’t need any major prep work other than buying ingredients and it must’ve taken me like 15 min from start to finish. 

I saw this recipe on Oggarane dabbi cooking show long time back. It needs 3 main ingredients - Khoa, Sugar and Gulkand. The original recipe uses sweetened khoa, but since it was not available here, I added powdered sugar. 

Do try! Happy Deepavali once again! 

Godi nucchina payasa/ broken wheat payasa(kheer)

Godhi nucchina payasa - a sweet dish made with broken wheat and jaggery.  My family is a big fan of these kind of payasas. This can be made with other pulses and grains in a similar fashion. Ideal for functions and festivals. Enjoy!

Inside Out kayi kadubu

This year Ganesha Chathurthi is falling on Labor day. Everybody can take it easy with the preparations.  

Anyways, when you make kayi kadubu, there is a very good chance that some extra dough is remaining; if it’s stuffing you can eat just like that. Or it can be just that you find making kayi kadubus extremely tiresome and tedious and you don’t even want to venture into it. Or you just don’t have the time or patience to make kayi kadubus.

Yet, you want to eat it or want to make something for habba - then this recipe is for you. 

I don’t know what it’s called or if it is even made anywhere else. I call it inside out kayi kadubu. My mom gave me this procedure for finishing up remaining dough. I found this extremely easy and tasty. It isn’t exactly quick, but chances are of it going wrong are very small. Do try! 

Happy Ganesha Chathurthi everyone! Happy birthday dear blog!  

Easy eggless brownies

Enjoy this Christmas with some homemade eggless brownies…  

I have used flax meal as an egg substitute. Flax meal(ground flax seed) is such a wonderful egg substitute, it has no odd taste, it is good for health, and texture of the brownie comes out soft and fluffy. 

This recipe is extremely easy. Mix everything and bake, as simple as that. Do try! 

Happy holidays!! Merry Christmas!! Happy New Year!!

Kayi Kadubu - Sweet dumplings for Ganesha Chaturthi

With Ganesha habba only few days away, I want to share how to make kayi kadubu recipe. 

Kayi kadubu is traditional sweet made for Ganesha specially during Ganesha habba. Rice flour dumplings filled with coconut-jaggery filling. My favorite sweet! 

It requires certain skill to pat thin shells with your hand and make sure they don’t break while steaming. The ones I made used to break. As usual my mom came to my rescue and gave few tips which saved my kadubus. I’ve shared the details below. Either shape them like kadubu or modak, recipe is the same. You can also make sweet undlakka - more like inside out kayi kadubu… maybe I’ll save the recipe(method) for next year :D

Happy Ganesha Chaturthi everyone!