Eggless Pumpkin Apricot Cake

Initially I had planned  to use the apricot received as part of the Arusuvai Friendship Chain in a baking recipe. And I bookmarked few recipes too. I tried a cake using the recipe from Allrecipes. The original recipe was for two cakes. Since I wanted to bake a single cake, I halved the ingredients. I replaced eggs with flaxseed meal and used whole wheat flour (atta) in place of all purpose flour(maida). Except for these two changes, I have followed the original recipe. 

I chose this recipe since I have never baked with pumpkin puree.  Its just mixing the wet and dry ingredients and no creaming/whisking required here. Actually you can do all the mixing in one bowl as mentioned in the original recipe. Since I am used to doing it separately and also wanted to be sure that the wet ingredients are combined well for even distribution.

Ingredients

• Dried apricots  -8 nos  1/4 cup puree
• Pumpkin puree - 1 cup
• Whole wheat flour - 2cups
• Baking powder - 1 tspn
• Baking soda - 1/2 tspn
• Ground cinnamon - 1 tspn
• Salt -1/4 tspn
• Caster sugar  - 1 cup (I powdered granulated sugar not very fine)
• Flax seed meal - 1 tblspn mixed in 4 tblspn of water
• Vegetable oil - 1/4 cup

Method

Prepare the apricot puree

Soak the apricots in boiling water for half an hour. Water should be enough to cover the apricots. Puree the apricots in a mixer grinder. Add some water while grinding. The puree should measure 1/4 cup. You can use the soaked water to make it to 1/4 cup.

Prepare the pumpkin puree

Take 250 gm of pumpkin. Peel and deseed the pumpkin and then chop it into cubes. Steam cook in the pressure cooker or microwave until it is tender. Puree the pumpkin to get 1 cup of puree.

To bake

Mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, salt and sugar in a bowl.  In another bowl, add flax seeds mixed in water, apricot and pumpkin purees. Make a well in the centre of the fry ingredients. Add the wet ingredients and mix until they are just combined. 

The batter consistency is similar to that of muffins. At first, I had mixed flax seed meal in 3 tablespoon of water. But I found the batter to be very thick and added. another tablespoon of water to get muffin batter consistency.

Bake in a greased and dusted tin at 180 C for 45 minutes or until the skewer inserted comes out clean

The cake was moist and airy. The cake is just sweet enough for my palate. If you prefer it be very sweet, then increase the sugar by 1/4 cup more. After tasting, I felt addition of a handful of nuts/tutti fruity/chocolate chips will be better to make it more than just a plain cake. Else a butter cream frosting would have complemented the cake well but decided not to go for it since I did not want to add more calories.

I will be sending mystery ingredients, as part of the Arusuvai Frienship Chain, to Rajani of Healthy Slurps and Rituparna of ChocolatesAndDreams

Instant Rava Poha Idli

You can see that now a days I am experiment on making instant idli's lately. Yes it is, because usually during the weekdays I do not have the idli batter and when I think of making idli's I need to think of something which is instant and healthy alternative. So came up with these recipes and they turned out good, so thought of sharing this recipe for you guys to try too.

Ingredients:

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1/2 Rava

1 1/2 cup Thick Poha

1 green Chili chopped

1 small Onion chopped

1/2 Cucumber chopped

2 Carrot grated

1/4 cup Peas fresh/frozen

1/4 Cilantro

1 1/4 tbsp Fruit Salt

Salt to taste

1/2 cup Yogurt

1 1/2 cup Water

1/2 tsp Mustard seeds

1/4 tsp Asafoetida

1 tsp Oil

Method:

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1. Wash poha in a strainer so and keep it aside after the water is drained.

2. In a pan add oil, when it's hot add mustard seeds and when they sputter add asafoetida, green chilies, onions and peas, once the onions are translucent add carrots and saute it for a min, add cucumber and mix it well and off the flame and add salt and cilantro and mix well.

3. In a bowl add rava, poha, yogurt, water and fruit salt and mix well.

4. When the batter starts rising add the vegetable mixture and mix well and let it sit for about 15 mins.

5. Meanwhile In a idli cooker brush the idli plates with oil and now spoon out the batter and steam it for about 15 mins on medium high heat.

6. Off the flame and let it rest for about 5 mins and then remove idli with a spoon dipped in cold water, so that the idli does not stick.

7. Serve this hot with your choice of chutney and sambar.

Menthi Pappu (Methi Dal/ Fenugreek Lentil)

This recipe is again my mom's and my mom's sisters recipe and this is a very traditional to Andhra cuisine. I can say that mom and my mom's sister prepares this recipe when we run out of vegetables in our house (he he!). I like this recipe very much to eat with steamed rice and ghee, which is optional. I love this recipe for two things, the first being that it's healthy and the second is that it's spicy and simple to make.

Ingredients:

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3/4 Toor Dal

1 tbsp Fenugreek seeds

2-3 cloves of Garlic with or without skin crushed

5-6 dry Red Chilies

1 tsp Oil

Salt to taste

Method:

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1. Wash the dal/lentil and strain the water and keep it aside.

2. In a pan add oil, when it's medium hot add the dry red chilies and saute them until it's turns brown. 

3. Add the fenugreek seeds and reduce the flame to minimum. The heat from the pan will be enough to turn the fenugreek seeds to brown.

4. Add the dal/lentil and saute it until it turns very slight brown. Off the flame.

5. In a pressure cooker add enough water (about 2 cups) and bring it to boil, add the dal and fenugreek and  pressure cook it for 2-3 whistles.

6. Off the flame and let it cool or come to room temperature. Remove lid, mash the dal so that the red chilies are mashed completely. Serve this hot with steamed rice, ghee and papad.