Palak/Spinach soup

Palak soup is one of the commonly prepared soups at home. Even though, palak features mostly in gravies in our lunch menu, the soup is relished by everyone at home. In microwave, it takes less than 10 minutes to be made.

Palak - 1 bunch

Onion - 1

Butter - 1 tspn

Water- 2 cups

Pepper - 1 tspn

Milk - 1/2 cup

Salt to taste

Chop the palak and onions roughly. Take a microwave safe bowl. Add a teaspoon of butter and MW for 30 secs. Add chopped onions and MW for 2 minutes, till the onions brown. Add chopped palak and 2 cups of water. MW for 4 minutes. Make a puree of the whole mixture. Add milk, salt and pepper to the puree. Adjust the quanitity of milk according to the desired thickness. Adding milk is optional , instead can add water to adjust the consistency. MW for 1 minute.

Garnish with cream or grated cheese and serve hot. I like without any garnish.

I am sending this to Srivalli's MEC - Soups and Stews.

P.S Srivalli is compiling a food blog list featuring on its cuisine/specialty. If your blog is not already listed there and would love to be part of that list, leave her a comment here.

Lemon Curd Cheesecake

This was one of the best selling product in Huntingdon especially during the summer as it's so refreshing. The cheesecake contains cooked lemon curd which could easily get from the supermarket or made our own homemade lemon curd. I did it myself as I like to add more lemon juice to have a strong lemon flavor and used some the left over to decorate the cheesecake.


Recipe for 9 inch baking tin

Bottom base:
155g Digestive biscuits crumbs
75g butter (melted)

Fillings:
375g cream cheese
50g sugar
300g cooked lemon curd
7 tablespoon lemon juice
15g gelatin (dissolve in water)
250ml whipped cream

Cooked lemon curd:
135g butter
330g sugar
3 egg beaten, strain
3 teaspoon lemon zest
6 tablespoon lemon juice
*Add 2 tablespoons lemon juice for stronger flavor

Method:

1. Mix crumbs and melted butter in a bowl. Press crumb mixture onto bottom pan and keep in the fridge.
2. To make lemon curd: In the top of a double boiler, combine all the ingredients over gently simmering water. Cook until thickened and coats back of spoon. Remove from heat and completely cool.
3. To make the filling, in large bowl with electric mixer on medium-high, beat cream cheese until fluffy, gradually beat in sugar then beat in zest and juice follow by lemon curd.
4. Add the dissolved gelatin into the mixture and add in the whipped cream until everything combine. Pour into crust and chill in the fridge until it set.
5. Decorate the cheesecake with some whipped cream at the side of cheesecake and pour over some left over lemon curd on top of the cheesecake.

Honey Muffins

The title Healthy honey cake caught my attention when I was glancing through TOI. When I saw Roma's Honey cake recipe, the first thing I noticed the absence of eggs in the list. That got me interested. Added to that, the ingredients were all healthy. So went straight to the kitchen tried it.

I followed her recipe with few variations

• I used jaggery instead of brown sugar. In spite of increasing by another tablespoon, I found the muffins to be very less sweet.


• Added 1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg powder. That gave a unique flavor to the muffins.

Every one loved the muffins. For those who found the sweet to be too less, I served honey. Next time, I will increase both jaggery and honey quantities.

This healthy muffins goes to Aparna, who is the host of the month for the Think Spice, originally started by Sunitha.