Viki 's Kitchen

Monday, September 10, 2012

Mother Mary's Birthday (small carrot cake 6 inch)

On September 8 we celebrated Mother Mary's birthday in our house. I made a 6 inch round apple carrot cake and decorated it with butter cream frosting. I started celebrating Mother Mary's birthday since 2008, by preparing a cake and cooking something special. Many Catholic churches hold a feast celebration on that day all over the world. After coming to USA, I came to know that many children celebrating this day at home by baking a cake with blue frosting and wearing blue dresses, as blue is Mother Mary's favorite color. On seeing those kids enthusiasm, I too got encouraged and we celebrate that feast day with great fervor. Here are some pictures from our celebration of Mother Mary's feast day.

Basic coat and finishing required 4 tbsp butter cream frosting. 1 tbsp of pink frosting for writing, 2 tbsp of yellow icing for roses, 4 tbsp of blue icing for scallop border in top and bottom. See, how small the cake looks....it can sit on that little saucer:)

Happy Birthday Mother Mary!

I have already published this recipe while I made cup cakes for Easter. But I thought it would be good if I have the measurements for my small cake pan.

Ingredients for a 6 inch round cake:
wet ingredient 1:

egg - 2 (small)

sugar - 2/3 cup
oil / butter - 1/3 cup + 1 tsp for greasing the pan

Wet ingredient 2:

Carrot - 1 (small)
Apple (small) - 1/2
shredded coconut (dry) - 2 tsp
vanilla extract - 1/2 tsp
orange peel - 1 tsp
walnut - 2 tbsp (chopped)
raisin - 15

Dry ingredient:

All purpose flour - 2/3 cup

baking soda - 2/3 tsp
baking powder - 2/3 tsp
salt - pinch

cinnamon powder - 1/4 tsp

ginger powder - 1/4 tsp

Method:

Shred the carrot. Core, peel and shred the apple.
Preheat oven to 350 deg (175 deg C) for at least 30 minutes before we start baking.
Grease and flour the cake tin. Keep aside.
Beat the eggs in a mixer or using a fork till fluffy. Then add vanilla essence, sugar, oil and beat till its fluffy.
Sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt TWICE.
Put it in a mixing bowl and add the liquids from mixer.
Mix well
Add the shredded carrot, coconut, orange peel, cinnamon, coarsely chopped walnut and mix slightly.
Now the batter is ready!
Pour into the prepared baking pan and bake for 40 - 50 minutes.

Carrot apple cake is ready!

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Ginger chutney

Last week we went to Niagara and corning glass museum. Though we have already gone there some years back, Niagara is one of the places we wish to go often. Upstate New york is very different than the busy NY city. The state is full of green meadows, beautiful scenery, large farm houses, barn, agriculture, cows, dairy farms, nice people and great food. The weather was beautiful and the total vacation was very good. We went through a tour package as I wanted hubby dear to sit next to me and enjoy that relaxing journey. Any tour gets its full charm only if we eat the local foods. So I didn't pack any food for the trip and enjoyed the locally made pizza, onion rings, French fries, burgers, chicken fry in the upstate New york. The country side restaurants serve very unique tasting meals though they come under the same name. I had prepared some snacks like oats bars, banana walnut cupcake and took some apples, grapes too.

Here I should say how much I rely on ginger to overcome my travel(motion) sickness. So for the first day breakfast I made some idly and Inji (ginger) chutney and kept some honey soaked ginger in my handbag:) Yes, ginger is the best home-remedy to get rid of motion sickness and to stay awake. Moreover my sister inlaw who is a physician has also told me to stay hydrated (from previous day itself), sleep well and to munch something to keep the digestive system healthy:) Those tips are golden for me and helped me a lot to enjoy the journey.

Here is the ginger chutney I prepared along with idly for the tour(photo taken before packing them).

Ingredients:

Fresh Ginger (chopped) - 1/2 cup
urad dhal (black gram) - 1 tbsp
channa dhal (bengal gram) - 2 tbsp
dry red chilli - 4
curry leaf - a sprig
coconut (shredded) - 2 tbsp (optional)
tamarind - 2 inch
crushed jaggery - 1 tbsp
salt - to taste
oil - 1 tbsp

tempering:

mustard - 1/2 tsp
hing - a pinch
curry leaf - 1 sprig
oil - 2 drops

Method:
Choose tender ginger without much fiber (we should be able to snap the ginger and there shouldn't be much visible fiber. The skin will be more wet and little pink). Scrub and remove the ginger skin. Wash well and chop coarsely.

Soak the tamarind in few drops of water, salt.

Heat oil in a pan. Fry the urad dhal and channa dhal till they turn mild red. Take them out. In the same pan fry the red chillies till they turn shiny and flavorful. Take out. Add the chopped ginger, curry leaves and fry for few minutes (no browning).Take out. Then add the shredded coconut and fry till it turns mild red. (Avoid coconut for travel food to ensure freshness).

Grind together everything along with soaked tamarind, jaggery. It should be a fine paste.

Heat few drops of oil in the pan and crackle the mustard seeds. Add hing, curry leaves and switch off. Mix the chutney with this tempering.

Ginger chutney is ready!

Serving suggestion:
Serve as side dish with idly, dosa, adai.
Makes a nice side dish with curd rice, sothi kulambu rice, briyani.
Finish this chutney within 8 hours in room temperature.
If kept refrigerated, this stays good for 3 days.

Some photos from our tour.