I am not giving up baking with dark chocolate, but certainly you’ll see them reducing a bit in this space. You know well that all this while I have been using Morde Dark Chocolate in my bakes. While I have nothing against them and do love the fact that they are cheap (say 200 bucks for 500 gms), I’m increasingly aware that it comes at a cost that’s detrimental to our health. Stripped of all the cocoa butter and replaced with hydrogenated vegetable fats, including trans fats, it took me some determination for my daughter’s sake to give up on Morde or Selbourne and move to a better brand.

A while ago I asked my Bangalore buddies on FB if there was an alternative to it, since Cadbury’s Bournville was way too expensive for baking, but I got no satisfactory answers. What if there was a baking disaster? I would care not to lose night’s sleep over wasting couple of bars of bournville in my failed baking attempts! Does anyone have an answer please???

I love dark chocolates and biting into them makes me sensational. It evokes my happy moods.

I gambled into some cookie cravings this week while the weather wasn't so nice and chill as I would have loved it to be. For the first time I experimented with a bar of Cadbury’s Bournville dark chocolate and used them in baking like this Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies, least they fail, the less guiltier I feel about my failing attempt or the expensive bars. They are still too expensive for baking, but till I look for an alternative I may go with these. I baked these cookies for our evening tea and they turned out delicious our evening bites.

Chocolate Chunk Cookies

Adapted from the Big Book of Baking

INGREDIENTS

88 gm plain flour
62 gm soft salted butter
42 gm brown sugar
28 gm white sugar
1/2 egg
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. baking powder
62 gm chocolate chunks

DIRECTIONS

Pre-heat the oven to 180 deg C. Lightly grease the baking trays.

Place all the ingredients in a large mixing bowl and beat them till well combined. Please a teaspoonful of the dough on the prepared tray, giving sufficient space between them to allow spreading while cooking.

Bake in a pre-heated oven for 10-12 minutes, or till the cookies are golden brown. Once done, transfer the cookies carefully to a cooling rack and cool them completely.

Notes:

* To adapt to a vegan version, replace egg with equal amount of flax meal paste. Use vegan dark chocolate and replace salted butter with a vegan butter substitute.

Four years up with blogging on Veg Bowl and it almost feels unreal. Why? Because I admit I never thought I would take up blogging seriously. I began blogging more than five years ago. Before writing on Veg bowl, I blogged privately on a personal space which was limited to few of my family and friends. The huge inspiration came when I accidently stepped on a couple of family blogs and took hours to read through them. I was awestruck, and almost felt one with them. I thought it was a great idea to maintain a diary of memories that could be cherished later in life. I jotted down reminiscences of our travel, our family gatherings, weekly happenings, musings, and a bit more. But my blogging on it was quite temperamental. I spent a year on that, though not so passionately and unfolded Veg Bowl in parallel to jot down recipes I created eagerly in my little kitchen, penning down the recipes that were appreciated by my family and friends and posting pictures of dishes that came out of my kitchen.

Much before I got into mainstream blogging on Veg Bowl, I hadn’t explored my skills in food photography. I realized where my passions lay as I gained more readers and many friends through VB, and that was even before I existed on Facebook. My blogging on Veg bowl got more consistent than my personal blog and I lost interest in the other space with time. Somehow I wondered if VB would see the same fate soon, but it didn’t. There was a joy to learn, to connect with like-minded bloggers, to explore and do a lot in cooking and photography. Somewhere I believe that my interest in this blog was linked to this urge to learn photography.

Down the lane 4 years now, I still feel there’s a scope to learn and explore. I still enjoy the art of blogging that’s so creative and therapeutic. I have grown older and matured to better from where I started. On the flip side, I am not a social networking bee yet, and that explains why I am never so active on Facebook. But I love your emails and genuinely go through your comments. I am not on twitter yet, neither on instagram or googleplus or any other networking sites and pardon me on that. After a lot of persuasion, I finally have a VB like page on FB, but I’m not serious about it. Clichéd I know, but I don’t fit well into the whole concept of social networking well. Somehow it leads me to believe that social networking has become a wide spread web syndrome, with most of us hooking our precious time into the web mesh. We are so busy socializing and connecting on FB that we will miss out on living those beautiful moments of our life that can be cherished later. There are times I feel guilty while I’m busy blogging, because I should probably use that time to cater to my daughter and not miss watching her grow.

Yet with all that said, I do not intend to give up blogging in the near future. Because this space has given me a lot more than I expected. Like it keeps me active and thinking all the time. What began with just a food and photography site has grown to share a lot on my personal front apart from just recipes. VB was not meant to be a commercial blog, that’s why I choose to keep it clutter free, clean and minimal as possible. I vent out here, I speak a lot of my mind, share fond memories close to my heart, unleash the joy of cooking and creativity, and I love to part away with my most loved recipes and photographs with you all. That means a lot to me since it keeps me going, and connects with you all.

For the joy of completing 4 successful years of blogging and for more to come, I am celebrating this day with this Whole Wheat Banana Bran Loaf. Coincidently, it’s my daughter’s birthday today. What can be a greater joy than this? As I see her geared up to celebrate her big day this evening, I baked this easy and delicious, yet an all healthy loaf last evening so that we could wake up to treat her with a quick bite of this loaf and wish her good luck, the best of health and bounty happiness in life she deserves. Time is fleeting by unbelievably fast. From a new born baby to infancy and now a swift intelligent toddler that she is, she turned two today. Happy Birthday to both my sweethearts! Life cannot be better without you!

Whole Wheat Banana Bran Loaf

INGREDIENTS

1 ½ cup whole wheat flour (150 gm.)
1 tbsp. wheat bran
1/3rd cup vegetable oil (35 gm.)
2 very ripe bananas (60 gm.)
½ cup milk (40 ml.) {replace with vegan milk of your choice for a vegan version}
2/3rd cup organic dark jaggery (60 gm.)
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. cardamom powder

DIRECTIONS

Prepare a 8 inch pan by greasing and lining it with baking paper. Pre-heat the oven at 180 degrees C.

Pulse the bananas along with milk and jaggery in a food processor. Next add in the vegetable oil and blitz again. In a separate clean bowl, sift the whole wheat flour twice. Add baking soda, wheat bran and cardamom powder to this. Make a well and pour in the wet ingredients. Stir well till combined. The batter will be thicker than regular cake batter, but not stiff. At this stage you may add in nuts if preferred. Finally pour the batter into a greased loaf pan and bake in a pre-heated oven at 180 degrees C.

Notes:

* Jaggery has a typical rustic and earthy sweet flavour that’s customary to South Indian cooking. Hence pairing it with bananas and cardamom powder brings out a traditional aroma to this cake.
* I’ve used high quality organic jaggery here. The local jaggery available generally contains high amounts of impurities. Hence to remove the sediments, soak the jaggery in milk, dissolve it and strain it through. Alternatively, use brown sugar if jaggery is not available.
* To make a vegan version, replace milk with any vegan milk of your choice.
* Wheat flour and wheat bran bring out a nutty flavor to this cake, although you may replace them with plain flour altogether.

Couple of years ago I got an Aloe sapling handed over to me by my mom so that I could plant them in a lone pot that sat empty for a while in my backyard. My Aloe grew beautifully even with unattended attention. She stood strong in the worst of weather, rains, dust, pollution and draught, grew stout by days and bred couple of more saplings till the pot could hold it no longer. Later when we moved into our own little nest, one of the first things I had on my mind was to do a bit of kitchen gardening. For a long while I attempted to do some kitchen gardening, but all in vain. I hardly attended the Aloe, yet even today she adorns that pot I planted years ago. My kitchen gardening went for a toss as my coriander and fenugreek seeds never sprouted, the mint saplings I planted never took off, the leaves withered, the brahmi, sambharballi, amruthaballi and insulin plants went fungal till they broke down to die. It pained me as I saw their end. Every time I went to a nursery, I asked for tips and they would hand over some fertilizers that promised to help my plants grow, but they didn’t. Something went terribly wrong. I blamed the pot, the soil, the seeds, the vaastu and gave up on home gardening.

Things on gardening seemed brighter last month. The changes of water I use to wash the rice, the dal, the greens and other vegetables in are used efficiently to water my aloe and other pots. In quest to save water and not let go into drains, I drain them down to the aloe plants and the extra ones to the empty pots too so that they evaporate to the nature. A month ago though I was taken by surprise. A sapling that I thought to be weed sprout through my pot. I let it grow naturally till it shot up to 2 feet tall and flowered tiny white buds. I was elated but had less known it would fruit too. Last week, couple of the white flowers withered and beneath them shot tiny buds of green chillies. Somewhere in the process of draining the washed water into the pots, the green chilli seeds must have made their way and sprouted. Sometime ago, I had a tomato plant sprout the same way. It bore 3 cherry tomatoes that I used in my cooking, but later wilted away. This triggered my love for gardening all over again.

Last Sunday, we drove down to the nursery. I got a pot of basil and couple of seeds too. I almost went crazy and could have picked up the whole nursery, but I settled with basil, spinach, fenugreek, dill and parsley. I potted the fenugreek seeds again in a hope that they will sprout. I speak to them daily. I care for them just like my baby. I try to bond and hope they will reciprocate. I’m keeping my fingers crossed and hope they will shoot soon.

Meanwhile the budding green chilies have been making me happy. I watch them for hours. I tender them affectionately. Today morning, I couldn’t resist and plucked the longest one for this South Indian breakfast delicacy, Tomato Kharabath, which my husband loves for its tang and spices. The chilies rendered a fresh, bold and spicy taste to this dish. Beyond all, they were organically grown in my own garden. That’s the beauty.

Tomato Kharabath

INGREDIENTS

1 cup pre-roasted semolina / rava
1 onion, chopped
2 green chillies, finely chopped
2 large tomatoes, chopped
3 tbsp. ghee / clarified butter (use regular vegetable oil for a vegan version)
½ tsp. mustard seeds
½ tsp. cumin seeds
½ tsp. turmeric powder
1 tsp. sambhar powder
A sprig of curry leaves
Salt to taste
A dash of lime juice
Fresh coriander leaves to garnish

DIRECTIONS

Heat oil / ghee in a thick bottom pan. Add mustard seeds and allow them to splutter. As they splutter, add the curry leaves, chopped onions. Fry them till they golden brown. Next add the green chillies, the chopped tomatoes, turmeric powder, sambhar powder and salt and fry them for another 2-3 minutes. Now add the roasted semolina / rava and fry for few minutes. Pour 3 cups of hot water into the mixture and bring it to rolling boil on low heat for couple of minutes. The water should be absorbed by the semolina / rava and cooked. Turn off the heat and add a dash of lime juice. Garnish with coriander leaves. Serve hot.

Notes:

* Clarified butter / ghee makes this dish rich and delicious. However avoid it and replace with vegetable oil if you want a vegan option
* I've used only a tsp. of sambhar powder for a hint of added flavour. You may skip it altogether.

Do you have any specific flavour of ice cream you love and always prefer to go back to?

More than a decade ago, before several flavours in unusual range flooded Indian markets, I remember each of us in our family had ice cream flavor of choice. As a kid, I was addicted to classic vanilla or occasionally the vanilla-chocolate combo (a scoop of each) just the way my little sister was. Dad’s huge fetish for dry fruits and nuts in his scoop of ice cream always left us amused, while for mom it was undoubtedly the butterscotch that made it to her plate.

Dining out on Sunday nights wasn't a rule on the book, but whenever we did, which was often once a month, it was followed for sure by an ice cream for our dessert. As we tucked ourselves comfortably onto the rattling chairs waiting for the orders, dad would head over to the ice cream kiosk, crane his neck to take a peek over the glass counter displaying their varieties in vivid colours and flavors to order the scoops speckled with roasted nuts and dry fruits. I guess his choice was often pistachio or badam pista ice cream. Of sheer joy each of us would proclaim our choice of ice cream and happily dig into them as they were served. Choices in terms of flavourings were limited to vanilla, chocolate, butterscotch, pista badam that ruled the roost. For the more exotic ones, there was anjeer, shahi kulfi, casatta… but then that’s about it.

Back in 80s and early 90s, ice cream came served in small paper cups with a tiny wooden spoon to scoop them from. We would fish out scoops of ice cream much larger than the spoon, only to fill our mouthfuls, more often spilling out the melting ice cream. The candid moments of the ice cream dripping off the tiny spoon on to our pretty frilled frocks, followed by mom’s howl deliberating the pain she took to rub the stains off while washing still taunt my memories! We had personal choices of flavours. And we always stuck by those choices. By 90s, chocolate coated vanilla ice candies, aka the Choco-bars entered Indian market a huge way and made way into our preferences too. I still admire Choco-bars.

The boom in Western market and their brands in early 2000 have brought out huge assortment and today, and as I walk into a Baskin Robin’s or Swensen's outlet, I am astounded by the variety they have to offer. I am elated by the choices, but at times I step back thinking there is too much to choose from, fearing the ones across the counter may be more delicious than the one on my plate, that I am unable to make a convincing choice. The guys over the counter are often generous enough to help me with a few scoops of flavors to try from, but by the end of test tasting session I run in to flurry of complete confusion. Somehow the test tasting session seems more stimulating exercise than the choice of ice cream itself. My taste buds can’t relate to a winning choice. Mint, Oreo, Chocolate chip, Berry, Cookie dough, Peanut butter, Belgium chocolate and so much more… I am spoilt for choice and that confusion happens way too often!

Honey and Roasted Almond Ice cream stands out of all. My love for Honey and Roasted Almond Ice cream dates back a few years ago when I tasted its first scoop from a BR outlet at namma Bengaluru airport. While waiting at the lounge, my husband made a random pick on my behalf and got me a waffle cone loaded with a big dollop of this BR’s Honey and Roasted Almond Ice cream. It was an instant love since that first bite. It’s brilliant taste still lingers strong.

Remember I made some Honey ice cream a while ago with flavours so similar to the BR one? That was a small batch good enough for two servings, so I promised I would make them again, not to disappoint anyone who requested a second or third helping. In a bid to experiment a little more, this time around, I played a slight variation using Coconut cream instead of milk or cream and the resulting ice cream was extremely creamy and delicious with a hint of coconut flavour. This is one of those ice creams that is simple to make and uses barely few ingredients and for sure needs no ice cream maker because the fat in coconut cream will help in whipping it to soft peaks, making the ice cream light and creamy. Honey will further curb freezing the ice cream into a rock solid stage.

Coconut cream, Vanilla Bean and Roasted Almond Ice cream

INGREDIENTS

200 ml coconut cream* (I used 1 pack of first pressed Dabur Homemade coconut milk)
1 pod vanilla, split and seeds scraped
½ cup roasted chopped almonds
80 gm / ¾ cup honey* (replace with maple syrup or agave syrup or vanilla sugar for a vegan version of this ice cream)

DIRECTIONS

Roast ½ cup almonds on a medium low heat till they begin to change their color and turn aromatic. Switch off the flame and keep aside. Once they cool down, chop them roughly.

Chill the coconut cream along with the bowl and beaters overnight or at least for 6-8 hours. To prepare the ice cream, take the chilled coconut cream in a chilled bowl. Connect the beaters and whip the cream till it fluffs up and holds soft peaks. Add in vanilla honey and whip further till it's all well combined. Split a vanilla bean and scrape the seeds off them into the prepared ice cream. You can skip this, however I used it for an intense vanilla flavor. It’s optional.

Whip the cold cream till it begins to form soft peaks. Taste your ice-cream at this stage. Commercially available honey tends to be sweeter and thicker as compared to the organic fetch. Hence I suggest you taste the ice cream batter and add more honey if preferred. Transfer to a freezer proof bowl/loaf and freeze it for an hour till it just begins to set. Once it's almost set on the edges, remove and churn it briefly. Repeat a couple of times. This helps ice-cream to be creamy. After the final churn, add in the roasted almonds (or almond pralines) and freeze till it's completely set. Remove from the freezer and place the ice cream in the refrigerator compartment for 15-20 minutes before serving. This way the ice cream should have softened a tad bit and will make it easier to scoop out.

Notes:

*For a vegan version replace the honey with maple syrup or agave syrup or vanilla sugar.
*Similarly, you can replace vanilla beans with vanilla extract. I used slit beans for an intense vanilla flavor and for that million-dollar speckled look. Again, it’s optional.
*If coconut cream is not your flavor of choice, replace it with regular milk cream, however it will no longer be vegan. It works fabulous!

That's my little toddler's tiny fingers sneaking in to grab some more scoops of ice cream!