Strawberry Cheesecake Trifle Squares

Lofty plans! I think I have achieved mastery in this category. I have these ideas, seemingly brilliant at first. Then I do some research to see if others have had similar ideas and whether these ideas ever became reality. People talk about their stories. What went right, what went wrong. And then someone posts this oh so simple solution to the problem. But they also add a rider, "I am not sure if this will work in reality". And then I decide that I must be the one to check. Simply because the thread stopped right there.

The plan was to make a layer cake. Pound cake, cheesecake and jelly on top. It turned out to be a mosaic cake as I simply couldn't wait for the jelly to set before adding the cheesecake mixture, could I? The next time I attempt something like this, I will bake the cake, then set the cheesecake over it and then pour the jelly topping on top. But here's how I made it this time.

The cake recipe makes two 8" cakes. I used just one for this recipe.

Ingredients

For the pound cake:

1 1/2 cups Cake Flour/Plain Flour

2 1/2 tsp Baking Powder

1 tsp Salt

3/4 cup Butter, room temperature

1 1/2 cups Ricotta Cheese

1 1/4 cups Sugar

3 Eggs

1 teaspoon Strawberry Essence

6 Strawberries, pureed

A few drops Red Colour (optional)

Butter and Flour/Spray for preparing the cake tin

For the Cheesecake:

1/2 tin Condensed Milk (400g tin)

250g Cream Cheese

1/2 tbsp Gelatin

2 tbsp boiling hot Water

Juice of 1/2 a Lemon

6 Strawberries, pureed

For the Jelly Topping:

1 Packet Strawberry Jelly, prepared as per instructions on the pack

To make the cake:

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F. Prepare two 8" round tins.

Sift the flour with the baking powder and salt.

Cream the butter with the sugar and ricotta until the mixture is fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the strawberry essence and strawberry puree and beat well. Add the food colour, if using. Incorporate the dry ingredients into the batter, adding a little at a time.

Pour the mixture into the cake tin and bake for 40-45 minutes or until a knife inserted into the cake comes out clean. Allow the cake to cool.

To proceed:

Line a Springform 8" pan base with cling film and then fit the sides portion. Pour the jelly liquid over the base and allow it to set in the refrigerator.

For the cheesecake:

Beat the cream cheese and the condensed milk until the mixture is smooth and creamy. Add the lime juice and the strawberry puree and beat well again.

Dissolve the gelatin in the hot water. Add this to the mixture and pour it over the the jelly. (At this point, my jelly hadn't entirely set and so began to break. I quickly mixed the two layers to get the mosaic effect.)

Place the cooled cake over the the cheesecake jelly mixture and allow the cheesecake and jelly to set completely.

When set, place a plate on top of the cake, turn it over and remove the springform tin. Slowly remove the base of the tin and peel off the cling film. Cut into squares.

That is what I call a bite sized piece of happiness. And as I have done every year in the years before today, I come back here to share this little piece of happiness with all of you. After all, Sachin's birthday comes just once every year.

Happy Birthday Sachin! Happiness Always.

Very Berry Vegan Cake

The cake monsoon is on at The Singing Chef. I would like to believe that the season will change shortly or else I may need a new wardrobe very soon. I am on a baking spree and there is no proverbial light at the end of this tunnel.

I have had a lot of people ask me for eggless versions of my cakes. I have to admit, I never really baked too many eggless cakes. And whenever I absolutely needed to, I used the egg replacer powder that one gets in supermarkets. But for about a month, I was asked by Baby A's paediatrician to stay off certain foods to test if he was allergic to something. When something is denied to you, you tend to miss it the most. No eggs, no nuts, no dairy. Technically, no cake. But I simply wanted it. And I was adamant to find a way out.

Recipes for eggless cakes are easily available. I didn't find too many vegan cake recipes that jumped out at me and said "Bake me!" I decided that I'd find no-egg and no-dairy alternatives and use them in a regular cake. That is what I did. The resulting cake was a tad dense, but otherwise divine. It was just perfect to satisfy that craving for something sweet when I was being denied everything else.

1/4 cup Oil
1 2/3 cups Flour
2 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
2/3 cup Sugar
1/4 tsp Salt
1 Lemon, zested and juiced
1 cup of Soy milk (approx.)
1/4 cup Silken Tofu, pureed
1 cup Mixed Berries (Blueberries, Strawberries, Raspberries and Blackberries)
A few drops Pink Food Colour (optional)
Icing Sugar for dusting

Pour the lemon juice into a large measuring cup. Add enough soy milk to make 1 cup.

Preheat the oven to 375F. Grease and line an 8" cake tin.

Sift the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt) together.

In a mixing bowl, add the pureed silken tofu and sugar and beat well. Add the oil, curdled soy milk and the lemon zest and beat together. Add the dry ingredients a little at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the colour, if using. Add the berries and mix gently.

Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the cake comes out clean. Dust with icing sugar. Cut into wedges and serve.

Mixed Fruit Crumble

How does one even begin to summarize a year which seems to have packed in so much? The year which began for in the absolutely cold snow mountains and will end in the sunny and warm tropics. On January 1, 2010, if someone had told me that the year would bring a whole host of changes, I'd have laughed and said that that is what every year does. But as I look back today on the year gone by, I realize that this year was special.

There were so many ups and downs that this year brought with it. The highs outshone the lows and I am glad that the year will be remembered for the highs and it will only be a matter of time before the lows are forgotten.

On the blogging front, both my blogs suffered as a result of the highs and the lows. There simply wasn't any time. The project 365 suffered because as the monsoons began, my travel time to and from work increased from 3.5 hours a day to around 5.5 hours one way. While I did take loads of pictures, the last thing on my mind when I reached home just a little shy of midnight was to upload the pictures to the laptop or the blog. Slowly, I was so far behind that it didn't make sense to try to catch up.

The food blog suffered because there was no time. There was also no "new" cooking that happened. It is a miracle that cooking even happened on some days. I think August and September must have seen the maximum consumption of Maggi, Subway sandwiches and McDonald's burgers. We also ate out so often because that meant no washing up afterwards (a lifesaver when your maids have been thrown out of the city for 30 days).

In our initial days in Singapore, I barely cooked and definitely didn't cook new stuff. But I realized that I could churn out 3 meals a day with just 3 pans, a 2 hob induction cooker and a microwave. For someone whose kitchen articles make up 30-35% of the entire household stuff, that is a BIG revelation. The pressure cooker queen cooked for 30 days sans the sweet sound of the whistle of her precious cookers.

I have no plans for 2011. I hope to write about my experiences in a new place in my other blog. I hope to cook with the new variety of ingredients that I have access to. I hope to be able to try out the recipes that I could only fantasize about until I moved here. I don't want to make concrete plans. 2011 is going to be the "take it as it comes" year.

Keeping in with tradition, I leave you with a dessert recipe. A little warm, a little cold. A little tart, a little sweet. Just the way this year has been: a mixture of flavours that surprises you with each bite, but leaves you with a happy feeling when the last bit has been savoured.

Ingredients: 

1 Apple, peeled and chopped

1/4 cup Cherries, halved

1/4 cup Strawberries, chopped

1 Pear, peeled and chopped

1/4 cup Brown sugar

2 - 3 tbsp Butter

1/3 cup Flour

Arrange the fruit in a microwave safe dish and sprinkle the sugar. Build 2-3 layers alternating the fruit and the sugar. Leave about a spoonful of the sugar aside. Cook oh high in the microwave for 4-5 minutes.

In a separate bowl, mix the flour and the butter along with the remaining sugar until it resembles bread crumbs or small peas. Press this mixture over the cooked fruit and bake in the microwave on high for 8-10 minutes. Allow to stand for 10 minutes for the crust to harden. Cut into pieces and serve with vanilla ice cream.

I hope 2010 was a good year for each of you. Wishing all of you and yours a very happy 2011.

Strawberry Crumble

Once in a blue moon, I crave a sweet something after dinner. This doesn’t happen more than 3-4 times a year (thank goodness for that!). Even a lone bar of chocolate lasts for months. That is probably why I haven’t tried too many desserts.

When strawberries were in season earlier this year, we had our fill with milkshakes. I even made kulfi and these two cakes. When a friend got me another tub of lovely strawberries (the best of the season), we ate a lot of them right then. I had a little less than half left when I had my craving for a sweet something. After a light dinner of pasta and baked vegetables, I decided to make this dessert quickly. It isn’t much of a recipe, but I have to admit, it was very tasty. S and I literally scraped off every bit of the jam like strawberry mixture from our ramekins.


1/2 cup Strawberries, sliced

1/4 cup Brown sugar
1 tbsp Butter
1/4 cup Maida

Butter for greasing

Preheat the oven to 400F. Grease 2 ramekin cups.

Arrange the strawberry slices in a single layer in each of the 2 ramekin cups and sprinkle some sugar on top. Build 2-3 layers alternating the strawberries and the sugar. Leave about a spoonful of the sugar aside. Cook for 4-5 minutes.

In a separate bowl, mix the maida and the butter along with the remaining sugar mixture until it resembles bread crumbs or small peas.

Press this mixture over the strawberry mixture and bake for another 10 minutes.

I'm certain this would taste divine with some vanilla ice cream. It was great on its own too.

Strawberry Almond Cake

Although it was Arundati who sort of pushed me to use fresh fruit in my cakes, Pritika is the one who has eaten the fresh fruit cakes that I've baked. She is most definitely my best PR person. She places orders for cakes with amazing regularity and gives them away to others. It's her way of "getting them hooked", she says. We moved from being just colleagues to being good friends and it has been a wonderful journey. She celebrated her birthday in March and a week later, we invited her along with her husband for dinner. Since she loves fruit in her cake, S brought a box of strawberries. I made this cake by giving a little twist to the strawberry cake I made earlier.

1 cup Flour

1/4 cup Almonds, coarsely powdered
1/2 cup Sugar
2 tsp Baking Powder

1/4 tsp Baking Soda
a Pinch of Salt
1/2 cup Milk

1 cup Strawberries, chopped
1/4 cup Oil
1 tsp Almond Essence
1 Egg, beaten

Slivered almonds for garnish

Preheat the oven to 350F (180 C).

Grease and flour/line an 8-inch cake tin.

Sift the flour with the baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add the powdered almonds and mix well.

In a mixing bowl, add the egg, milk, sugar, oil, and almond essence. Beat well together. Add the flour mixture to this and blend well. Add the chopped strawberries and mix well.

Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin. Decorate with slivered almonds and bake for 30 minutes or until a knife/skewer, inserted into the centre of the cake, comes out clean.

We cut the cake after dinner and relished a slice each. I packed the rest of the cake for Pritika to take back with her. (She told me later that she wouldn't have had it any other way.) Have a lovely year ahead P!

I'm sending this to Go Nuts-Almonds hosted at Tasty Treats.

Strawberry Kulfi

Strawberries. I had only tasted the artificial srawberry flavour when I was little. I must admit, I liked it very much. When I was about 8, I was introduced to the flavour of real strawberries. I think it must have been ice cream that I ate in the US. I had a lot of trouble accepting the new flavour as "strawberry" even though I liked it. Today, I enjoy both flavours equally. I can still relish a glass of Strawberry Nesquik as much as I enjoy fresh strawberry milkshake.

I made this kulfi when fresh strawberries were in season. I think I made it during the Valentine's Day weekend. I didn't use any artificial colour and as a result, the kulfi looks a bit pale. But it was delicious.

1 litre Milk

1 tbsp Flour

1 cup Strawberry Pulp

1 tin Sweetened Condensed Milk (I used Amul Mithai Mate)

Heat the milk, condensed milk and flour together and bring to a boil. Do this over a low flame and stir continuously as the condensed milk has a tendency to stick to the bottom of the vessel and get burnt. Cool completely. Mix the strawberry pulp into the milk mixture. Fill the kulfi moulds with this mixture and freeze until set. When set, dip the moulds in warm water, unscrew and hold over a plate. The kulfi slides out effortlessly.

This makes a perfect dessert after a nice Indian lunch on a hot afternoon. Try it! And off this goes to Priya as she hosts this month's edition of FIC-Rose/Pink.

Strawberry Cake for an important milestone

Although I celebrated Appa's birthday on The Singing Chef with a Date and Fruit Cake, in the non blog life, I celebrated it with this simple strawberry cake. My friend in Bombay had sent me 2 boxes of strawberries through Amma and they needed to be used up really quickly. So I decided to use them up in a nice manner. I even tried to decorate it with some strawberry halves, but they all sank in. The cake turned out to be very tasty and extremely moist. I loved every bite. Half of the cake was gone in no time at all. The other half was savoured slowly. I didn't get any pictures of the cake after it was cut.

1 cup Flour

1/2 cup Sugar

2 tsp Baking Powder
1/4 tsp Baking Soda

a Pinch of Salt

1/2 cup Milk
1 cup Strawberries, chopped

1/4 cup Oil

1 tsp Vanilla Essence

1 Egg, beaten

a few drops of Red Food Colouring (optional)

Preheat the oven to350F (180 C).

Grease and flour/line an 8-inch cake tin.

Sift the flour with the baking powder, baking soda and salt.

In a mixing bowl, add the egg, milk, sugar, oil, vanilla and food colour (if using). Beat well together. Add the flour mixture to this and blend well. Add the chopped strawberries and mix well.

Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin. Decorate with strawberry halves, if desired, and bake for 30 minutes or until a knife/skewer, inserted into the centre of the cake, comes out clean.

I'm sending this cake to Sig as she celebrates her birthday. Since it has as much fruit as it does flour, I hope she won't mind a small slice. This blog is now 21 months old and I am thrilled to celebrate my 400th post here with this cake.

Strawberry Muffins

Ever since I saw Sharmi's post on Strawberry Muffins, I wanted to make my own. I had to wait for the lovely berries to be in season before I could try them out. So, I tried variations. I found great success with almond raisin muffins and the black currant raisin muffins both of which were variations of Sharmi's Strawberry Muffins.

Now, strawberries are in season. And we have been buying them regularly. I made these with the first batch that we brought home this year. I found a recipe for raspberry muffins in one of the books that I acquired last month. This was a low fat recipe. I was quite thrilled. It also wasn't very sweet. It fit perfectly in with our plans and I substituted half of the flour with atta and was very happy with the result. I suppose these muffins would go very well with some butter and jam, but I didn't have time to experiment. We sampled only two of these and the rest went as a housewarming gift to a friend. I also used half the batter to bake a cake to take to the party.

This is a very simple recipe.

1 cup Strawberries, chopped

1 1/4 cup Flour

1 1/4 cup Atta or Whole Wheat Flour

1 tbsp Baking Powder

1/2 cup Sugar

1 egg

4 tbsp Oil

1 cup Buttermilk

Preheat the oven to 200 C (400 F). Prepare the muffin pan by greasing or placing muffin cases.

Sift the dry ingredients together. Mix the buttermilk and oil and add the egg. Add this mixture to the dry ingredients and mix until it all comes together. Add the strawberries and spoon the mixture into the muffin pan. Bake for 20-25 minutes.

One of my nieces turns 18 today and she is probably the only one I actually watched growing up. Kind of right in front of me. When she was about 3 or 4 years old, she saw me putting on some lipstick and asked me to put some on for her too. I told her she was too young. She, almost never seeing that there was an age difference between the two of us, asked me how I got to do it when she didn't. I told her, "When you turn 18, you can too." These muffins go out to her as she turns into a young woman. I also sent her some top of the line L'Oreal stuff and she is excited like no other kid I've seen. Happy Birthday Kalyani. My friend, Muly, also celebrates her birthday today and will be extremely happy to have a couple of these. Happy Birthday Amulya!

This recipe is supposed to make 12 muffins, but I almost always get around 18 with most recipes. I think it has to do with the size of my muffin cups. So, I made 9 muffins and converted the remaining batter into a cake. I topped the cake with some left over fruits and nuts from my New Year Cake and when it was baked, I melted about 2 teaspoons of jam and poured it over the cake as a glaze. The cake continues to be low fat as the batter is the same. But it is loaded with dry fruits and nuts. And the jam glaze gave it additional flavour. It wasn't exactly a pretty, decorated cake. Everyone knows how brilliant I am when it comes to decorating cakes. So, we won't go down that path now. This cake goes to the wonderful woman who also celebrates her birthday today. The one who tells us what to eat, what not to eat and also tells us why. The one who never fails to impress upon us the importance of eating right. Starting from our first big meal of the day: breakfast. As I got to know her a few months back, it turned out we had loads in common. Eventually, I figured I knew her husband's family for almost as long as I've been alive and the two families go back 3 generations. We had a two hour chat session that freaked us out. We got on the phone soon after to continue our journey of discovery. A month before that day, I didn't know this girl. And suddenly, we were chatting like long lost friends. We have still not met each other, but I would count her as one of my very good friends. It is thanks to her that I started this blog. I am so glad to have found this friend. It is through her that I have met all of you. Nandita: Here's wishing you a very happy birthday!

Strawberry Fizz

Ice cream sodas! I'd read about them all the time while growing up. Archies and his gang are always at Pop Tate's having ice cream sodas. For some reason, I didn't ever have them when I was in the U.S. Or maybe I had them and didn't realize what I was having.

I fell in love with the concept and the drink at a place called "Shakes & Creams" in Madras. Ever since, I make them at every opportunity. (The opportunities come very rarely as we never have ice cream or sodas ready at home!!)

Some time ago, I had everything at home. (Soon after we had a houseful of guests for dinner.) So, I was able to enjoy this drink on a weekend. While this drink can be made with about 30 ml of vodka as well, I made it good old fashioned kiddies' way.

For one glass I used:

1 tbsp Strawberry Crush

200 ml Sprite/Plain soda

1 scoop Vanilla Ice cream

Pour the strawberry crush in a glass. Drop the ice cream over it. Pour the Sprite over this. Stir everything together and enjoy it on a hot day.

This is my entry to Meeta's Monthly Mingle. This month's theme is Liquid Dreams.

Strawberry Trifle Pudding

There are days when you set out to make something and you end up making something else. And then there are those days when you want to make something, but you're not quite sure what that is. S's birthday was one of those days for me. I knew I was going to make a nice cake. I knew I would have some portions of cake. But I had no idea what to do with them.

A long time ago, I had made chocolate rum balls with cake leftovers. But chocolate cake, chocolate balls. That would have been a little too much for us to take. I wanted to make a layered dessert. After seeing Meeta’s Strawberry Mirror Cake, I wanted whatever I was making to have a strawberry jelly layer on top.

But halfway through the exercise, I changed my mind and created my own trifle pudding. I mean if those guys at restaurant buffets can serve me anything in the name of Trifle, why can I not cheat myself?

Ingredients:

2/3 cup Cake slices

5 tbsp Strawberry Crush (I used Mapro)

2 tsp Gelatin

3 tbsp Strawberry Custard Powder

3/4 cup Milk

2 tsp Sugar

Arrange the cake slices in a baking dish. Pour 2 tbsp of Strawberry Crush over them and bake for 15 minutes at 350F.

In a small bowl, mix the custard powder with about 2 tbsp of milk. Bring the rest of the milk to boil with the sugar. Add the custard powder misture to the boiling milk while stirring continuously. Boil this for a minute and set aside. After 5 minutes, pour this mixture over the cake slices and allow to set in the fridge for an hour

Dissolve the gelatin in a little warm water and add this to 2/3 cup of boiling water. Add the remaining strawberry crush and mix well.

Pour this jelly over the custard cake mixture and allow to set for a couple of hours in the fridge.

Cut into slices and serve. I had some left over jelly which I froze. I enjoyed my trifle with the frozen jelly pieces.

Why did my pudding not turn out the way I'd expected? Because I didn't wait for the custard to set fully before pouring the hot jelly over it. But that did nothing to affect the taste. S isn't too fond of jellies so I've been treating myself to a little slice every 2 days.