My mad hatter!

This is the only reason why I tolerate Balu singing
"Dont you wish your husband were a cook like me?"
(sigh, like the Pussy cat dolls themselves!!!!!!)

Yes, all the potrayed dishes are his experiments in the kitchen & freakishly delectable!!

Baked my cake & ate it too !!

Well, this was a special cake and so had it all getting started real early (2 weeks)! like I soaked raisins, nuts of all types and orange peel in 2 cups of RUM. Should have mentioned, its not for the light hearted....

2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups butter
2 cups brown sugar
A pinch of salt
1 Tsp baking soda
2-4 eggs (upto you)
4 Tbsp fresh orange juice
4 Tbsp strong coffee
Few drops of vanilla essence
All the soaked goodness
A 9" cake tin lined with baking paper

* Get the butter to room temprature
* Beat the eggs until fluffy
* Add butter and sugar to the eggs and beat
* Sift the flour and add baking soda & salt
* Beat all of the above together with the coffee & juice
* Fold the nuts into the batter and empty onto the tin

Bake for an hour at 375F ( Pre-heated oven ) or until a skewer comes out clean.
The colour will probable say it all, all dark brown on top, the crust well baked all around.

I dont recommend frosting for a fruit cake, but this was spl...how often do married couples share their B'day?

Twisted pasta

One yummy, healthy dinner, with a ton of inspiration from "Food channel".

2 cups of Rotini
Fire roasted pepper
Bread crumbs
Roasted almonds
Cilantro
Olive oil

Cook the rotini until pretty tender and have it drained. Chop the roasted peppers, grind the crumbs with the almonds and have them coarse. In a large mixing bowl, toss the pasta, crumbs, peppers& olive oil. Add salt & pepper to your specification and garnish with cilantro and grated parmesan.

The colours seen in your platter are so amazing, the crumbs and nuts stick to the curves in the pasta and make them all the more intresting! Giada did say so and she was so true.....

Cooking up wonders!

Onion Pakodas

Want to make some amazing pakodas?Im here to help...
A very easy recipie created by my sister got my guests licking their fingers and asking for more!a very simple way of making yummy onion pakodas with no twists!and to be honest I didnt have all of the ingredients and yet managed to get so many accolades...

2c Besan(Gram flour)
1.5 c Rice flour
Few green chillies,finely chopped
Lots of curry leaves
A pinch of red chilli powder
Salt to taste
1 med Onion cut to thin flakes
Oil to fry

In a large mouth container,mix the flours,salt and chilli powder.Add the chopped chillies and onions and absolutely no water(a very imp hint)
When the oil is hot( try dropping a very smll piece of the mixture and if the oil cooks it asap, its ready for more) just grab a handful of the mixture with wet hands and make a profile thats remotely round /ellepical and doesnt fall apart .Slowly drop it into the oil and wait till its done.Toss it around and get both the sides a nice golden brown;To get the proportion of salt try the first one and correct the deficiency if any!Now you are ready to fry them all!!!
Serve them with Pudina(mint) chutney or some tomato ketchup.

*Wet your hands often to get them sit together but see to it the mixture is dry.
*Adding grated carrot and cabbage is a great alternative.

I started off with no besan and no curry leaves the first attempt.Atleast I had some channa dal which I put into the blender and managed to get decent besan!