Prep your own candied dry fruits and nuts for a yummy fruit cake

How about making your own Christmas or New Year fruit cake this year? You think it is complicated? Not at all. You think it's too late to start ? No, again. Read on for an easy way to prepare your own dry fruit n nut mixture that tastes great even with a minimum 12 hour soaking period. What's more? Make a little extra and stow it away in the refridgerator for next year's baking.


Assorted chopped dry fruits and nuts - 3 cups (I used dates, apricots, golden raisins, jumbo raisins, walnuts, cashewnuts, prunes)
Orange peel - 1 medium sized orange's rind with the white pith scraped out (cut into small pieces)
Rum (use any spirit you have at hand) - 2 cups

Put everything together in a skillet and toss on low flame till warm, and an aroma emanates. Close lid and let stand overnight. In the morning, place this in the fridge and let stand for another 10 hrs or so. Bring to room temperature before using in the cake.

For an equally easy Fruit cake recipe with your candied fruits and nuts,
click here.

Whole wheat banana, raisins, and Chocolate muffins

This quick, wholesome muffin gets full points for nutrition and taste with minimal effort and time. Eat it for breakfast or pack it in your kiddos lunch box.


The recipe can be found here.

Baby carrots flavoured with garlic

A completely easy and nutritious dish that your family will love, especially your toddler, if you have one.



The recipe can be found here.

Rainbow Salad Meal and Fresh Figs in Yoghurt dressing- Reposts

The delicious Rainbow salad which is a wholesome meal in itself.



The recipe can be found here.

A totally addictive salad made with fresh figs and yoghurt dressing.



The recipe can be found here.

These two salads make their way to the Only Salads event on at The Chef and Her Kitchen. The 'Only' series of food events was started by Foodelicious.

Peanut and chocolate cookies

My college mate, Annu, lives a few kilometers away from us at Muscat. We had a small family get together at her place last weekend. I made a little batch of these yummy cookies for her. I made up the recipe with ingredients I had in hand.

Plain roasted peanuts - 1 cup
All purpose flour - 1 cup
Unsweetened cocoa powder - 2 dessertspoons
Egg - 1 large
Sugar - 3/4 cup
Butter - 1/2 cup (at room temperature)
Vanilla extract - 1/2 teaspoon (I use powder)
Cooking (baking) soda - 1/2 teaspoon

Powder the peanuts into meal using the chutney jar of your mixie or a coffee grinder. Pour the egg and butter into a blender jar and whisk till frothy. Add the sugar and cocoa. Blend again. Add the baking soda and whisk once more. Add in the vanilla. Pour out into a vessal and add in the peanut meal and flour. Incorporate well. If the batter is too thick add a little warm water.

Preheat an oven to 200°. Line a baking tray with aluminium foil or parchment. Pour out the batter by the spoonful with enough spacing (this one expands quite a bit). Bake at 150° for 18 minutes.

PS: The cookie is quite soft when hot and hardenes to crumbly perfection when cool. Hence, watch out for the colour and the lovely aroma as baking indicators and not texture.

The crumbly peanut and chocolate cookie recipe goes to theKid's Delight - Chocolate Feast event on at Srivalli's Spicing Your Life.

Simple Oats upma with roasted peanuts

This is our favourite oats upma recipe mainly because of the liberal douse of peanuts in it. This is also one of the most easiest of breakfast options; of course, apart from opening a readymade pack of cereal!

Rolled oats or Jumbo oats - 1 cup
Quick cooking oats - 1/2 cup
Plain roasted and deskinned peanuts - 1 cup
Ginger - 1" piece (chopped fine)
Green chillies - 2-3 Nos
Grated coconut - 1/4 cup
Onion - 1 medium sized (chopped fine)
Curry leaves - a few sprigs
Oil - 1 teaspoon

Heat a skillet and then pour in the oil and add onions, ginger, chillies, and curry leaves. Saute well. Add the jumbo oats, sprinkle some water and simmer covered for a minute. Open lid and keep stirring sprinkling water in between till the oats is cooked ( a few minutes are adequate). Add the grated coconut, salt, and the quick cooking oats. Sprinkle some more water and cook covered for a couple of minutes, stirring once in a while. Finally add the roasted peanuts and serve hot.

Chocolate, beets, and carrot muffins and a very happy 2011 to you!

Happy New Year 2011 to all my readers and friends! My New year fruit cake is still half done, so, for now ,here is a quick and healthy muffin I baked over X'mas for my little girl. My husband, who initially winced at the sight of veggies going into a chocolate muffin, later commented , " It's just not possible to figure out this one has beets and carrots in it. Really nice!". Little Abhi, as usual, enjoyed her mother's rare baking attempt.

All purpose flour (Maida) - 1 cup
Whole wheat flour - 1 cup
Baking powder - 1 teaspoon (5gms)
Egg - 1 large
Olive oil - 1/2 cup
Jaggery syrup - 1/2 cup
Pure Date syrup - 1/2 cup
(If you do not have jaggery or date syrup at hand then use packed brown sugar or even plain white sugar instead)
Beetroot - 1 small (grated very fine)
Carrot - 1 small (grated very fine)
Dates - a few (deseeded and chopped)
Dark unsweetened or semi sweetened chocolate chips - a liberal handful
Vanilla essence or powder - a few drops or pinches ( I used powder because I could not find propylene free essence)

Whisk the egg till it froths ( I use a braun electric handheld blender with whisking attachement). Add the olive oil and syrups, blend well. Sieve the flours and baking powder to ensure even blending. Add all ingredients, except chocolate chips, together and mix well. If you find the batter dry add a little buttermilk or milk at room temperature. Finally mix in teh choco chips.

Preheat oven at 200. Line the muffin tray with cases and pour in to fill 3/4th. Baking time might vary with the oven. I have a very basic OTG and baked my muffins at 150 for 25 minutes. Insert a toothpick and if it comes out clean your muffins are done.

Here's a picture of how this looks inside.