Bombay Foodie

Ruby Road

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 04:34:00 +0000

Up until 2017, there used to be only three kinds of chocolate: dark, milk and white. Then callebaut invented Ruby. Made with purple and pink cocoa beans, this sweet and slightly sour chocolate has been my favourite ever since. Ruby tastes even better as a ganache, and is best paired with like minded berries and tart fruits.

Since strawberries are now in season, I took it as a sign to make Ruby Trifle. It brings together three elements you have seen on bombay foodie already:

- Dorie Greenspan's Loaf Cake

- Balsamic Strawberries

- Ganache, but made with ruby chocolate this time around

In a glass or a bowl, add a layer of sliced cake. Add ganache, then balsamic strawberries and end with a final layer of ganache. I sprinkled a layer of glittery fairy dust on top and finished with a slice of strawberry and some ruby chocolate buttons. Then chill the whole thing for an hour to set and you have on hand a pretty, pretty dessert.

Best of 2024

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Wed, 01 Jan 2025 10:48:00 +0000

Of the many meals in Mumbai and from my travels around the world, these were my favourite new discoveries last year. There were of course many others that we revisited from past years but I always like to sum up what the new aha moments of the year were. So here goes, the top new flavours of 2024:

1. The Swiss Rosti: As a vegetarian, food during my Switzerland summer trip largely comprised cheese and potatoes. The best thing that the Swiss folks do with a potato is a crisp potato cake called the rosti. I had several variations of these during my 10-day trip, topped with variations of cheese, tomato and vegetables. But none were better than this plain rosti at Cafe August in Zurich. The open air seating in the Swiss sunshine and their homemade gelato is an added bonus.

2. Apple Pie Latte: Zermatt was my favourite city in Switzerland. I instantly fell in love with the car free town with its boutique spa resorts and michelin star bistros. My absolute favourite though was Cafe Petit Royal on the main street, pretty close to the train station. I love making a meal of sandwiches and coffee confections; this particular coffee was the best I had this year with notes of caramel and nuts. They make a mean white chocolate too!

3. Poke Bowl: 2024 was the year I fell in love with poke bowls. A good poke bowl has so many different flavours intermingling, it's like a party in your mouth. This particular one was in the tiny Austrian town of Feldkirch. It might have been specially delicious, coming as I was from a week of Switzerland's cheesy food. We landed at Magma Cafe for a late lunch and ended up with this delightful tofu poke bowl, full of rice and vegetables and a lovely tangy dressing.

4. Guacamole Hummus: The secret to the creamiest hummus might be an avocado. This one was at Somewhere, a modern middle eastern cafe in the sprawling Dubai Mall. Nothing's easy to find in the largest mall in the world but Somewhere's variety of hummus with thin, crisp dipping bread is worth the hunt.

5. Ice cream night at Masque: For one night in September, Bombay's top rated restaurant Masque replaced its tables with dessert carts. They were celebrating Masque's birthday in style with my favourite pastry chef, Vinesh Johny flying in from Bangalore to create 8 special desserts. They were some crazy concoctions with cheese and truffle and even beef in the mix. My favourite was this soft serve cocktail: craft gin turned into ice cream in a special softie machine made for the night.

6. Benne Dosa: Benne was the biggest opening of the year. It's a standing room only dosa place, with literally 2 tables and it gets queues around the block even today, months after it opened. The secret is fresh made benne dosas, the thick Bangalore style dosas laced with butter. I also love their freshly fried medu vadas.

7. Tofu Katsu Curry: Bandra has many tiny nooks serving great food. Benne's standing-room only is extreme, but most others make do with 2-4 tables or bar stools. It's competitive, which means that only the best survive. One Japanese place that's standing strong is Tamari where you can get a great ramen. Or an awesome katsu curry. I won't recommend their okonomiyaki though.

8. Jam and Custard Donuts: I've technically had donuts at Toast Donut Shop before. But those were big brioche donuts at their now shut Worli cafe. The new Toast on Bandra's 16th Road (yes, the same road as Benne and Tamari and many others) is where I first tried the mini eggless donuts, a vast improvement in my view. The original - jam and custard - is my favourite though many folks prefer their chocolate and honeycomb.

9. Palak Paneer Quiche: This is a bit of a cheat entry since (i) it's not new and (ii) it's no longer available. But given that it was pretty much the best thing I ate all year, I had to put it on the list. When subko first opened, I quickly became of fan of this puff pastry quiche filled with creamy spinach and paneer. But they would always run out of it so you had to be very lucky to get one. Subko's now expanded and their menu items are pretty much always available, unlike those early days. Except they took this particular quiche off the menu. It came back, just for one day, when Subko did a birthday celebration putting all past favourites on the menu. This particular quiche was likely the best version I ever had, coming hot straight out of the oven.

That's a wrap for 2024 then! Here's wishing you encounter many many delicious new flavours in 2025.

Blue Blood Thandai

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Thu, 17 Mar 2022 10:50:00 +0000

Tomorrow is Holi which means it's also the time for the original Indian milkshake - the thandai. The drink marks our transition from spring to summer. With poppy seeds and melon seeds and a whole lot of nuts and spices, the end result is meant to have a cooling effect. There are many fans of the original thandai but I've never been a fan - mostly, the colour and flavour of saffron never sits right with me.

So this year for holi, I'm shaking things up a bit. This version has most of the traditional thandai ingredients except I got rid of saffron. And I added two blue ingredients: blue poppy seeds instead of the white ones, and butterfly pea flower instead of the traditional rose petals.

The end result is smoother than your regular thandai and while it didn't turn out to be blue, it's a very pretty shade of white. The recipe is easy enough for you to make in time for Holi tomorrow. Enjoy the festival of colours, and the drink. Here's the recipe.

Ingredients
1 tbsp blue poppy seeds

2 tbsp melon seeds

1/2 tbsp fennel seeds

10-15 peppercorns

1/4 cup almonds

1/2 cup cashews

1/2 cup sugar

4-5 butterfly pea flowers

Soak all ingredients except the sugar in 1 cup warm water for about an hour. Remove the flowers, add sugar and blend everything to a smooth paste. Pop this into a glass jar and keep it aside until you are ready to drink thandai. This paste would keep in the fridge for a week.

When you are ready to serve thandai, add 2 tbsp of the thandai paste to the blender with a cup of milk and 2-3 ice cubes. If you are feeling particularly festive, add a splash of rum. Blend for a minute and serve topped with a sprinkle of crushed dried butterfly pea flowers.

The Reset

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 18:59:00 +0000

It's been a couple of years since I added a new post here. Covid wasn't the only culprit. Blogging's just not as much fun as it used to be. Today's bloggers are serious professionals, not the fumbling hobbyists of my time just making friends and bonding over food. But the two years I wasn't blogging, I found myself coming back to visit, to look up my own recipes. The blog has, over last so many years, become the equivalent of my personal recipe diary.

So I'm back! Maybe there will be more posts and maybe there won't. But I made these awesome waffles and I needed a place to stash the recipe for next time. I also felt I need to mark the day - it's been a whole 14 years today since the first cookie recipe was uploaded to Bombay Foodie.

So these colourful, celebratory waffles feel just right. Here's for the recipe.

Ingredients

1/3 cup plain flour

1 tbsp brown sugar or jaggery

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/3 cup buttermilk

1 tbsp melted butter

Berries and honey, to top

In a bowl, mix together the flour, sugar and baking powder. Add the buttermilk and butter and stir until just combined. Heat up your waffle maker, pour the batter in and wait until the waffles are done. I have a tiny waffle maker that makes exactly one waffle at a time, and uses about 2 tbsp of batter. This batch makes three waffles in mine.

You should read up on what works for your waffler - most waffle makers make upto 4 at a time so you might want to double the batter.

Once the waffles are ready, top with a drizzle of honey or maple syrup. I also added some sliced fresh strawberries and some frozen berries rolled in sugar for that pop.

Cereal Milk

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sun, 31 May 2020 16:28:00 +0000

I first heard of Momofuku not in the context of their legendary ramen or fried chicken but because I was intrigued by cereal milk. One of the outposts of the group is Milk Bar where, with Christina Tosi at helm, they dish out desserts that are straight out of a kindergartener's dream. There are many, many good things about Milk Bar but none as good or as intriguing as cereal milk. Think of that little bit of milk that's left at the end of your breakfast, infused with the flavour of cornflakes and sugar that you just ate. That's what cereal milk is, and at Milk Bar they sell whole cartons of it.

Having never had the real thing, I got hold of the Milk Bar cookbook instead and set about making, first, the cereal milk and then a cereal milk panacotta. But because I never do things by halves, I then also made a dark, dark caramel to go with it and some candied sesame seeds I've been thinking about even since I first saw them on food52.

You can make all components a day or two in advance so there isn't much for you to do except eat when the panacotta is set. Also, a word of warning: this is almost too delicate to unmould so if you would like to invert your dessert on a plate and dress it up, use a tad more gelatin.

The recipe follows but before that, here's what a spoonful of goodness looks like.

Ingredients
For Cereal Milk
50 grams cornflakes
2 cups milk
1 tbsp dark brown sugar
pinch of salt

For panacotta
All of cereal milk you made
1 1/2 sheets of gelatin
1/2 tbsp brown sugar
pinch of salt

For caramel
1/2 cup castor sugar
1/2 tsp vinegar
1/3 cup cream
1/4 tsp salt

For candied sesame seeds
1/2 cup sesame seeds
1/4 cup castor sugar
1/4 cup water

Let's start with cereal milk. Heat the oven to 160C. Spread the cornflakes on a baking sheet and bake for 15 minutes, until lightly toasted. Alternatively, you can pour the cornflakes in a large pan and toast on a low heat, stirring all the time.

Let cool completely, then put in a bowl and pour in 2 cups of cold milk. Stir and leave to steep for 20 minutes. Strain through a fine mesh sieve, pressing to get all the milk out. Whisk the sugar and salt in the milk until fully dissolved. Put it in the fridge to chill. Then drink it, add it to coffee or just make this panacotta.

For the panacotta, bloom the gelatin sheets in a bit of water. Squeeze out the gelatin and add to a bowl. Heat 1/2 cup of cereal milk and whisk it with the gelatin until it all dissolves. Whisk in the rest of the milk, sugar and salt. Pour into shot glasses and let chill for 3-4 hours.

In the meantime, we make the two caramel toppings.

For caramel sauce, mix sugar with vinegar and just enough water in a large pan so it looks like wet sand. Turn on the heat, stir until sugar dissolves and then let it boil until the whole thing is an amber colour. Watch it like a hawk because caramel can go from light to burnt in about a second. Take the pan off the heat and add cream. Stir, then put the pan back on low heat and stir until everything comes together a sauce. This should take less than a minute. Pour into a glass or another heat proof bowl and let cool.

You will notice that my caramel is a lot darker than what you will get. That's because I used brown sugar instead of white but unless you have a way with thermometers or a death wish, I don't recommend it.

For candied sesame seeds, line a baking sheet or a plate with parchment paper. Mix sugar and water in preferably a nonstick pan and bring to boil. Let the syrup cook for a minute until you see bubbles all over the surface, then add the sesame seeds. Keep stirring until the mixture, which starts as a liquid, magically turns to dry crystallised seeds. Pour onto the parchment, spreading into an even layer and let cool. Break up any large clumps when cold and store in an airtight jar. This makes a lot more than you need for this dessert but I've found many other uses for these sesame seeds.

To serve, pour caramel over the panacotta and top with candied sesame.

Crackerty Crackers

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Thu, 21 May 2020 08:35:00 +0000

There are many things I don't buy; cakes are softer and cookies more buttery when you bake them yourself. But I had a fear - possibly because of a failed batch years ago - that homemade crackers won't be as crisp and as nice as store bought ones. Fear no more. These rye crackers beat anything I have ever eaten or bought. Plus there is the added advantage of eating them warm, right out of the oven.

I only made these because snack shops are closed and I had run out of things to dip in my hummus but these are good enough to make every time you have a hankering for something crisp. Super easy too! Here's the recipe.

Ingredients
1/4 cup rye flour
1/3 cup plain flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp cold water
sesame and poppy seeds for topping

Mix together the two flours and the salt in a bowl. Make a well in centre and add olive oil and water. Bring everything together and knead into a soft dough - it should be moist but not sticky, add more water if you need to.

Line a baking sheet with parchment and heat the oven to 160C. Shape the dough into a rough square and roll out as thin as possible. This dough handles beautifully because of the high oil content so I didn't need to dust it with any extra flour. When you have the dough rolled out as thin as it will go, sprinkle it with any combination of seeds that you like. Roll over the seeds to make them stick to the dough.

Cut into squares with a pizza cutter and arrange on the baking tray. They don't really expand so you don't need to keep space between squares. Bake for 15 minutes or until the crackers are brown and crisp. Let cool on the baking try and check for crispness - put them back in the oven for 5 minutes if they are not crisp enough for your liking.

The batch is small enough to eat the same day but if you must, store in an airtight container and they stay good for 3-4 days.

Cooking in the Time of Coronavirus

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Mon, 16 Mar 2020 13:38:00 +0000

In the last month, the world seems to have gone crazy around us. Not only has coronavirus created an unprecedented health emergency, it is causing us to relook at our lifestyle and life choices like never before. Most people I know are working from home and because I live in Mumbai and work out of a startup hub, I am getting increasingly aware of another kind of panic gripping my friends and colleagues.

If you think that eating out puts you at risk and you have never cooked before, chances are you are scratching your head on what to eat for dinner. I know of some fine folks stocking up on copious amounts of gin and 50 packets of maggi right now. But in case you are looking for a bit more variety and nutrition, here are some ideas for things you can cook even if you are an absolute novice cook. Also, read to the end for a nifty list on what to shop for when you have a pantry devoid of any supplies. It's a short list and I'm going to show you how to cook a whole week of meals with just that in hand. Let's get started.

Breakfast
Day 1: The easiest of all: toast with some butter.
Day 2: Make grilled cheese - slap a cheese slice between two slices of bread, lightly butter both sides and cook in a pan until browned
Day 3: Let's make eggs today. Boil 2 eggs, peel, slice and stuff between two slices of bread, just like you did with the cheese yesterday to make an egg sandwich. If you are the sorts to have mayonnaise or mustard lying around, this is the time to bring out those condiments.
Day 4: getting bored of bread? switch to granola with milk.
Day 5: You are getting to be a seasoned cook now so make an omelet. It's easy really: break two eggs into a bowl, beat with a fork alongwith salt and pepper. Heat oil in a pan, add the eggs and let cook until set. Then flip and cook the other side. If it all breaks while flipping, scramble it up and call it an egg bhurji. Eat either of the things with toast.
Day 6: Try this super simple poha
Day 7: End the week with another healthy dose of granola, with fruit and yogurt this time.

Lunch and Dinner
I'm going to assume you aren't up for cooking 3 times a day so let's just make sure you make enough to have leftovers for another meal. In that spirit, 7 easy ideas for lunch and dinner.
Idea 1: Dal with plain rice. A very simple recipe follows.
Idea 2: Lemon Rice
Idea 3: Pulao
Idea 4: Khichdi
Idea 5: Pantry Staples Pasta
Idea 6: Curd Rice
Idea 7: Pasta with store bought sauce: boil pasta as written on package, heat store bought sauce, mix. Bonus points for adding any vegetables; to do that, steam/boil the vegetables until cooked, then add to the sauce and let heat up before adding pasta.

How to Make the Simplest Dal and Rice
For dal: Measure 1/2 cup dal and 3 cups of water. Put dal in a bowl and wash. In a pressure cooker, add both the dal and water alongwith 1/2 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp turmeric and 1/4 tsp chilli powder. Cook for 5 whistles, then let the pressure drop. Check to see if the dal is cooked to your liking; if not, cook for another 2 whistles. In a small pan, heat 1 tbsp oil or ghee. Add 1 tsp each of cumin and mustard seeds, let splutter, then add to the dal.

While your dal is cooking, measure 1/2 cup of rice, put in a bowl and wash. Add the rice to a pan with 1 cup water. Start off cooking on a high heat. Once the water comes to a boil, reduce to a simmer, cover and let the rice cook for 15-odd minutes. Check to see if there is any water left; the rice should be fully cooked by the time the water is absorbed. Add a tsp of ghee to amp up the flavour if you like.

What to Buy
Bread
Cheese Slices
Eggs
Salt
Butter
Pepper
Chilli
Turmeric
Cumin Seeds
Mustard Seeds
Tomato Puree
Rice
Arhar or Masoor Dal
Ghee or Olive Oil
Pasta
Arrabbiata Sauce
Granola
Poha
Curd

Onions, Potatoes, Lemons plus any fruits you love

The Bread Whisperer

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Fri, 13 Mar 2020 12:30:00 +0000

What do an electrical engineer, a monk and an IT trainer have in common? These are all the things Abhilash was before he turned his attention to bread baking. Not the one to pick an easy path, Abhilash started with the most temperamental of breads - the sourdough - as his baking adventure. At first, he was baking these loaves for himself. Accolades from friends and family quickly followed and much to the delight of this writer, he turned his passion into a full time career six months back.

For the uninitiated, a sourdough bread is made by fermenting the dough with naturally occurring yeast, making it harder to perfect than the bread made with commercial yeast. The bread's signature tang and the open crumb, with lots of holes, is only made better with a high hydration dough that is super tricky to master. While extremely popular around the world, good sourdough is an elusive commodity in Mumbai and there are only a handful of bakers I would trust when I am looking for bread.

Thoroughbread, Abhilash's delivery-only bread brand, easily makes it to the top of my list of favourite breads. My first loaf, full of cranberries and walnuts, had both a delightfully open crumb and the chewy texture that is the hallmark of a good sourdough. The crust was less toothy than other sourdoughs I've bought in the city. Abhilash said this was a deliberate choice, based on his customer's feedback, and the loaf tastes better for it.

Similar care seems to go into every aspect of bread baking. The flours are locally sourced and turned into a secretly fine tuned blend for each variety that Abhilash bakes. My favourite San Francisco loaf is a blend of three different flours. And for the more tricky breads, like the whole wheat sourdough, Abhilash mills and grinds his wheat in house. The equipment and special ovens came from Europe. And for delivery, Abhilash works with a team of differently abled people. The very sweet gentleman who's now been to my home a few times is a big fan of Abhilash as well as his breads.

Thoroughbread primarily focuses on sourdough loaves for now though the menu also has its fair share of baguettes, ciabattas and bagels. Abhilash says cheddar and jalapeno is his most popular flavour, and there are plenty of others like olive and pesto to catch your eye. Plans are also afoot to cater to folks who don't like sourdough (who are you people!) so there will soon be sandwich loaves made with regular yeast on the menu.

I know the world seems to be going a bit crazy around us right now so if you are looking for a little pick me up this weekend, go order yourself a sourdough!

Practical Information
Thoroughbread delivers all over Mumbai. Call or message Abhilash at 96196 03524 a day in advance to order.

The Perfect Polenta

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Mon, 03 Feb 2020 16:33:00 +0000

This polenta is like a hug in a bowl. Coarse cornmeal cooked until creamy and then topped with cheese, honey and mint, this dish is as perfect for breakfast as it is for a lunch or a lazy dinner. What I like best though is that the porridge present a perfectly blank canvas for other flavours. On other days, I've topped polenta with a creamy mushroom sauce. Once, I felt fancy and set the polenta in a tray and cut it into dainty squares that were topped with whipped feta and caramelised onions.

What's most important though is that base. Polenta can very easily go wrong so here's my tips for that perfectly cooked, creamy flavour:
1. Use a lot of liquid. This recipe used 6 times the volume to cook polenta in. And while there's nothing wrong with using plain water, mixing in something richer (milk in this case) gives you better results.
2. You want to add polenta slowly, almost like it's a rain shower, and you want to keep whisking it while you are adding the grains so there are no clumps and lumps in your polenta.
3. Finally, watch it like a hawk. Stir constantly. Do not walk away. It only sounds like a lot of work; it's actually only about 5-7 minutes of stirring.

Also, while the garlic powder and pepper are completely optional, I did think they made a huge difference to the final flavour.

Here's the full recipe.

Ingredients
1/2 cup polenta
1 cup milk
2 cups water
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp dried garlic powder
1/2 tsp fresh ground white pepper

Feta Cheese
Dried Mint
Honey

Bring milk and water to a boil in a saucepan. Add the salt, garlic powder and white pepper. Stir to mix the spices. Slowly add the polenty, whisking the entire time. Turn down the heat to a simmer and cook, stirring all the time, until the polenta is thick and smooth. This should take 5-7 minutes.

Pour the polenta in bowls and add toppings of your choice. My favourites are salty cheese, mint and a drizzle of honey.

Alternatively, spread the polenta in a 1/2 inch thick layer on a baking sheet and let set for a couple of hours. Cut into 2 inch squares. Add 1 tsp olive oil to a nonstick pan and swirl to coat the base. Add the polenta squares and cook for 2-3 minutes, until slightly brown. Flip and cook the other side. Serve with toppings of your choice or alongside a stew.

Ruby Brownies

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sun, 24 Nov 2019 09:35:00 +0000

Have you heard of ruby chocolate? Up until 2017, chocolate used to be brown, dark brown or white. Then Callebaut came up with another colour: ruby chocolate is naturally pink. I first tasted Ruby last year at London's Fortnum and Mason and was instantly taken in by the unique flavour. It's sweet like white chocolate but there is a lingering sourness, a light tang that sets it apart.

Ruby chocolate has become easier to get hold of in Mumbai now so after I had my fill of the chocolate in its natural form for a few months, I turned to what else I could do with it. The first recipe to cross my mind was naturally brownies. This fudgy concoction is set to showcase the chocolate and for my first attempt, I used my trusted recipe from Dorie Greenspan.

Some adjustments had to be made though. Ruby chocolate is sweeter than the dark variant I normally use in this recipe so I reduced the sugar content. And I noticed the pink gets pale, almost brownish, in the batter so I added a little bit of beetroot powder to keep my brownies in the pink of health. Here's the recipe.

Ingredients
70 grams butter (I use salted Amul)
180 grams ruby chocolate, chopped if you have a bar. I use callets
1/2 cup caster sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essense
1/3 cup flour
optional: 1/2 tsp beetroot powder or 1 drop red food colouring gel

Heat the oven to 170C. Line an 8 inch square pan or a 7 inch springform pan with parchment paper and set aside.

In a double boiler (or a pan set over a pot of simmering water), melt butter and chocolate until smooth. Whisk in the sugar. The mixture will get grainy but don't worry, it will all even out in a minute. Beat in the eggs, one at a time. Add the vanilla essence. If your batter looks brownish by now and you want it to pinker, whisk in beetroot powder or red colour at this point.

Add the flour and switching your whisk for a spatula, mix just until the flour is all blended in. Pour into the prepared pan and bake for 30-35 minutes, until the top is dry and a thin knife inserted in the centre of the pan comes out clean.

Let cool for 10-15 mintues, then unmould and cool completely over a wire rack before cutting into squares or wedges.

Banana Cake. Peanut Streusel.

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Tue, 08 Oct 2019 14:53:00 +0000

I love baking Plain Jane cakes. The ones you can whip up quickly in a bowl and the ones where you do not need to fuss about frostings and such. I specially like the kinds you can bake on a weekend and leave in the fridge to snack on during the week.

The brown butter banana cake from food52 checks all the boxes. As an added bonus, there is no need to even bring out a whip; you only need a blender or a food processor. The original recipe is for a loaf cake but I adapted mine to fit a 6 inch springform pan. If you are comparing recipes, you will notice that my cake recipe is halved but I kept the full recipe for peanut streusel. That's because the peanuts and oats add a real crunch and more is really a lot better in this case.

Here's the easy breezy way to get your cake fix.

Ingredients
For Streusel
40 grams butter (I use salted Amul butter)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup oats
2/3 cup salted, roasted peanuts

For cake
50 grams butter (I use salted Amul butter)
1 cup minus 2 tbsp plain flour (measure a cup, then take out 2 tbsp)
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 ripe banana
1 egg
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup yogurt
1 tbsp cointreau (or orange juice)
1 tsp vanilla extract

Line the base of a 6 inch springform pan with parchment paper. Preheat the oven to 180 C.

First make the streusel. Chop the peanuts or pulse them in a spice grinder until coarsely chopped.

Mix the peanuts with oats and sugar. Melt the butter, pour on top of the other ingredients and mix until the whole thing resembles mortar. Set aside.

On to the cake now. In a small pan, melt the butter. Once it melts, reduce the heat but let the whole thing sizzle around for 4-5 minutes until the brown bits separate and fall to the bottom of the pan. Let cool while you get to the rest of your cake batter.

Mix together the flour, baking powder and baking soda in a large bowl. Slice the banana and put into your food processor or blender alongwith the egg, sugar, yogurt, cointreau and vanilla essence. The browned butter should be cool to touch by now; add that too and pulse until everything is well blended and you don't see any banana pieces.

Pour this blend over the dry ingredient and mix just until there are no streaks of flour. This is a fairly wet batter so you can just spoon or pour the whole thing into your prepared pan. Scatter the streusel all over the top of the batter. Bake for 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Let cool for 15-20 minutes before you unmould, then cool completely over a wire rack.

Kaffir Lime Rasam

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Wed, 04 Sep 2019 14:28:00 +0000

I've been on bit of a Thai food kick this past month. Which means that the fridge is also chockfull of Thai ingredients. So I started to think what else I could do with them. Which means there have been a few experiments. Here's the most successful of them thus far: a kaffir lime rasam.

As far as fusion foods go, this isn't too much of a stretch. Lime rasam is already a thing and kaffir lime adds a lovely new dimension to flavour and fragrance of this rasam. Here's the recipe.

Ingredients
2 tbsp arhar dal
4-5 kaffir lime leaves
1/2 tsp salt
pinch of turmeric powder
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp mustard seeds
pinch of hing (asafoetida)
1 tbsp rasam powder
1 tbsp lime juice

In a pressure cooker, add arhar dal, 2 kaffir lime leaves, salt and turmeric with 3 cups of water. Boil until the dal is fully cooked and you have a watery stock.

Heat the oil in a pan. Add hing, cumin seeds and rai. Wait a minute for all the seeds to start sputtering, then add the kaffir lime leaves and the rasam powder. Stir fry the spices until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the cooked dal with all the cooking water. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and let simmer for about 10 minutes for all the flavours to meld in.

Turn off the heat and add the lime juice. Taste and add more salt/lime juice if needed.

The Curries of Thailand

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Thu, 29 Aug 2019 17:40:00 +0000

For someone who grew up in India, I am really a chicken when it comes to eating spicy food. Hence, for a long time, I would also avoid Thai curries. But then I went to Thailand twice this year and fell in love with the food. I also realised that the curries come in a whole spectrum of spice levels, from the mild massaman Curry to the fiery green one.

No wonder then that the massaman curry is my favourite and the one I cook the most once I got back from Thailand with a bag full of ingredients. It's a strange one too, with flavour influences from India and Malaysia. Originally made with beef and potatoes, I make my vegetarian version here with a mix of onions, peppers and potatoes. Here's the recipe.

Ingredients
1 medium onion, peeled and chopped into bite sized squares
1 yellow bell pepper, chopped into bite sized squares
1 medium potato, boiled, peeled and cut into squares
2 tbsp massaman curry paste (look for the vegetarian version)
1 tbsp peanut oil
200 ml coconut milk
1 tbsp palm sugar
1 tbsp tamarind paste
2 tbsp roasted peanuts
salt to taste
thai basil, to garnish

In a pan, heat the oil and fry the curry paste until fragrant. Add the coconut milk, mix and let it come to a boil. Then add all the vegetables, palm sugar, tamarind paste and salt.

Let the curry come to a boil, then reduce the heat. Add some water if the curry looks too thick, give it a stir and let it simmer for 5 minutes until the flavours meld and the curry is a nice orange colour. Pour into a serving bowl and top with peanuts and thai basil.

The curry goes well with steamed rice but is equally great with malabar paranthas.

Green Soup

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sun, 31 Mar 2019 07:55:00 +0000

Last month, I discovered a hydroponics grower in Mumbai called the Herbivore Farms. They grow salad leafs and chards and herbs and once a week, send a box over to your home. The lettuces are so fresh, it just automatically makes for healthy salad eating. Then there's chard: I added it to stir fries and Asian style miso fried rice the first week. This week, I made green soup.

Anna Thomas' soup is less recipe, more a canvas to do with as you please. The first time I'd made this soup a few months back, it was with spinach and coriander and spring onions. This time, I used the swiss chard and carrot top leaves. It turned out pretty amazing both ways so make use of whatever green leafy vegetable and herbs your fridge is overrun with at the moment.

Anna's original recipe uses arborio rice to thicken the soup. I used a potato which works equally well. Don't be stingy with either the slow fried onions or the lime juice; both contribute to most of the flavour in this one. Here's your recipe:

Ingredients
2 bunches of whatever leafy vegetables or herbs or combination you like
1 small potato
1 small onion
1/2 inch piece of ginger
1 tsp salt
juice of 1 lime
olive oil
black pepper

Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a small pan. Add finely chopped onions, stir to coat with oil, then reduce the heat and let onions cook slowly until browned.

In the meantime, start your soup. Peel and dice the potato. Wash the greens, remove any tough stalks and tear/chop roughly. Peel and grate the ginger. Add the potato to a largish pan with 1 litre water and 1 tsp salt. As the water starts to boil, add the greens and the ginger. Reduce the heat and cook until the potato is tender and cooked through. Add a bit of the simmering liquid to the onions, stir and add them to the soup. Turn off the heat and let cool.

Puree the soup in a blender until smooth. Return to the pan to heat. Stir in lime juice, add some freshly ground pepper and if needed, more salt. Pour into bowls and finish with a drizzle of olive oil.

Blini Bling

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sun, 25 Nov 2018 10:17:00 +0000

Buckwheat is the grain of choice when it comes to fasting in India. Every navaratri, my mom makes paranthas with what's locally called 'kuttu ka atta'. The dough is made with a combination of buckwheat and mashed potatoes, then rolled out and shallow fried in ghee. It's delicious enough to make atheists like me pretend we're fasting. But because this is fasting day food, you don't do much to the paranthas beyond eating them with yogurt.

The Russians on the other hand make a fine art of topping their version of buckwheat pancakes, the blinis, with salmon and caviar and sour cream. The pancakes themselves are a bit bland though, a pale match to the dark beauties that Indian kuttu paranthas are. So why not combine the two, I thought. Make a base of mini buckwheat paranthas Indian style, then load them up like a blini. The resulting dish packs quite a punch.

So ditch the idea of buckwheat as a fasting day food and go make these indo-blinis. I topped mine with a red pepper and walnut pesto and a dollop of whipped feta, ending with a sprinkle of pink pepper and dried mint. But truly, any creamy topping of your choice will do. The parantha recipe follows.

Ingredients
1/2 cup buckwheat flour
1 large potato, boiled and mashed
1 tsp ghee, plus more to cook the paranthas
salt
warm water

In a bowl, mix together buckwheat flour, mashed potato and salt. Add ghee and rub together until the potatoes are mixed through the flour and the mixture looks crumbly. Add enough warm water to form a dough. Knead lightly until the whole thing comes together.

The dough is quite a tricky one to work with so your standard rolling techniques won't work. Instead, take two sheets of parchment paper. Take a golf ball size piece of dough and put it in the middle of one parchment sheet. Top with the second parchment sheet and press the dough until it is rolled into a thin layer. Remove the top parchment sheet and use a cookie cutter to cut out small paranthas.

Heat a non stick pan. Brush the top of the rolled parantha with ghee and plonk it, ghee side down, on the pan. Cook on a low heat so it's fully cooked through. Then brush the other side with ghee, turn and cook until both sides are brown and crisp.

Once you have enough mini-paranthas, arrange them on a plate and add toppings of your choice. Make sure you have something creamy (cheese, labneh, sour cream) to cut through the dry nuttiness of the paranthas.

Chris' Pumpkin Soup

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sat, 29 Sep 2018 16:22:00 +0000

Some dishes take you by surprise. In the middle of a quiet dinner, they grab you and force you to sit up and take notice. It's even more surprising when that dish happens to be soup. It happened so at a dinner with my friend Chris. We started off with his lovely homemade bread and salad and then he brought this soup in. A soup with punchy flavours that also freezes well. I eventually got the recipe off Chris and I now make this often, leaving bowlfuls in the freezer for a rainy day. You should too!

Ingredients
250 grams yellow pumpkin, cut into chunky cubes
250 grams potatoes, peeled and cut into cubes
1 small onion, peeled and roughly chopped
1 inch piece of ginger, peeled and thinly sliced
1 small carrot, peeled and sliced
1 leek stem, washed, cleaned and roughly chopped
1-2 celery stalks, washed, cleaned and roughly chopped
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
10-12 peppercorns
Roasted pumpkin seeds and dill to garnish

Find the largest saucepan you own and heat the olive oil in it. Add peppercorns, roast for 10-15 seconds in the oil and add all the vegetables to the pot. Give everything a good stir, then add enough cold water to cover the vegetables.

Cover and bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook until the potatoes and the pumpkin are soft. Blitz everything with a blender into a thick, creamy soup. Add a tsp of salt (or enough to suit your taste) and check if it's thick enough for your liking. If not, put the soup back on the simmer for the water to evaporate and for it to thicken.

Serve topped with roasted pumpkin seeds and sprigs of dill. Makes a great wholesome meal with some toasted sourdough bread.

The Last Hurrah

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Tue, 26 Jun 2018 17:33:00 +0000

May and June are my favourite months of year food-wise. It's when all the best fruits are in season at the same time. For about a month, I go crazy eating my fill of fresh peaches, plums, cherries, litchis and apricots. Then monsoons kick in and all the fruits vanish at about the same time. This is the last dessert I made this year with my fruit bounty. A plate full of plums, peaches and cherries, the flavours bound together with the easiest pudding you can make. And a sprinkle of almonds to bring in a much needed crunch.

Posset is a pudding that sounds impossible. But it's far less fussy than your typical mousses et al that require scary combinations of hot liquids and egg yolks. There are no eggs in this funky British dessert. Instead, your purposefully curdle cream with lime juice. It all feels like it shouldn't work but it really does end with a creamy, delicious dessert.

This recipe from Food52 was made with heavy cream, but I made it with the light 25% cream found in India, our tiny limes and with much less sugar. It's brilliant nevertheless.

Ingredients
1 cup cream (I used Amul 25%)
1/4 cup caster sugar
1 tsp finely grated lime zest
2 tbsp fresh lime juice
pinch of salt

Combine cream, sugar and lime zest in a saucepan. Let it come to a boil over high heat, then reduce the heat a bit and let the cream boil for 5 minutes. Turn off the heat and whisk in lime juice and salt. Let cool for 15 minutes, then pour into pretty glass bowls. Or put in a bowl you can later spoon the pudding out of. Either ways, leave in the fridge until completely chilled and set.

Here, a scoop of lime posset is served over sliced peaches and plums.

Nori Granola

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Tue, 05 Jun 2018 10:21:00 +0000

The first time I heard of nori granola, I was instantly impressed by how brilliant the idea is. The recipe by Heidi Swanson, one of my favourite bloggers, combines the salty seaweed with a whole lot of complementing and contrasting flavours. There are oats, obviously. But there are also less obvious additions like cashews, fennel and sesame seeds. All bound together by a tiny amount of honey and olive oil.

This isn't breakfast cereal. This is a grown up granola that's perfect for snacking. I'm yet to try it with yogurt but I've already scattered it all over a bowl of pumpkin soup and it was delicious there too.

Heidi says to use up the granola in a week so what follows is half her recipe.

Ingredients
1 3/4 cup oats
3/4 cups coarsely chopped raw cashews
2 tbsp sesame seeds
1 tbsp fennel seeds
3 six-inch nori sheets, crumbled
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp sea salt

2 tbsp honey
2 tbsp brown sugar (I used coconut sugar)
1 tbsp water
2 tbsp olive oil

Preheat the oven to 150C and line a baking sheet with parchment. Combine all the dry ingredients (the first seven on the list) in a bowl. In a small saucepan, heat honey, sugar and water until the sugar dissolves. Stir it constantly, it should take about 3-4 minutes. Pour the syrup over the oats and other things and stir to coat well. Add the olive oil, mix well and spread in an even layer on the baking sheet.

Bake for about half an hour until the granola is golden brown. Give it a stir a couple of times, every 10 minutes or so, just so the granola bakes evenly. Let cool on the tray - it will crisp up as it cools - then store in an airtight jar.

A River Flows Through It

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sat, 26 May 2018 05:08:00 +0000

Chiplun isn’t your typical middle of nowhere. In fact, it is the exact midpoint on the drive from Mumbai to Goa, a fact that comes up within the first minute of you mentioning the tiny town to anyone living in these two cities.

I had a different reason to visit Chiplun though. I’d heard many years ago of a resort, tucked right at the edge of the town, with fabulous views of a river. My research showed that the Riverview Resort was originally built by the Taj Group but now had different owners. The views still looked glorious which is why I headed towards Chiplun one long weekend.

Getting There

Chiplun is a picturesque 6-7 hour drive from Mumbai. I’ve driven through the Konkan a few times before so to mix things up a bit, I booked myself a train ticket that gets you to Chiplun around 1 pm. There are several of these convenient trains that get you in and out of Chiplun. At the station, you can request the resort to send a car for pickup or get yourself an autorickshaw for the 20 minute journey. The autowallahs may not know the resort name but asking for ‘Parsuram’ – a temple near the property, or the old Taj hotel will get you there.

Where to Stay

The Riverview Resort has regular rooms facing the gardens or superior rooms looking onto the magnificent view of the Vashishti river. I could spend all day looking at the beautiful valley, but the sunsets are particularly glorious. The rooms themselves are huge with two double beds and a balcony to sit out at. It’s an old property, sure, but as far as old properties go, this is a well maintained one.

What to Do

Apart from walking around the garden and the tiny village nearby, you could go to the Parsuram temple if you are so inclined. We visited when the sun was much too hot but if you go to Chiplun during monsoons or the colder weather, you could go boating in the river. It’s about 10 kms away and you could drive to the river bank but the resort also offers hiking trips.

For the restless sorts who want to ‘do something’, the Guhagar beach is about an hour’s drive away. And if you have an extra day, you could even make the 2.5 hours drive to Ganapatiphule.

Do not forget to cool off at the resort’s pool, set at the edge of the valley. It’s shallow enough that you can just sit in there and sip on a cold, icy drink.

What to Eat

The resort only has one restaurant but has a menu spanning multiple cuisines. They do Konkani food surprisingly well, and I will particularly recommend the potato curry and the varan dal from the Konkan section of the menu. North Indian curries and breads are executed equally well. Then, when you are tired of curry on your third day there, ask for Chinese or chilli cheese toast with pasta. Breakfast has a rather limited choice but they cook everything reasonably well and the warm service and their eagerness to customise dishes to your requirements more than makes up for anything you miss.

What struck me most at the restaurant and at the resort everywhere was the friendliness of the staff. There are some old timers from the Taj times and most of the staff is local. Everyone I met there was super helpful and intent on making sure we had a good time. Special mention to the guy who got us the off-menu jalebi because it was being cooked at the wedding reception they were hosting that evening.

All in all, Chiplun is that perfect getaway for 3 days. In a year that’s full of long weekends, this just might be the holiday you are looking for.

A version of this story was also posted on Whats Hot Mumbai.

Olive Oil Cake

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sat, 12 May 2018 08:48:00 +0000

The other day, Food52 published a story on their most popular genius dessert ever. And it turned out not to be something faffy or chocolate-y or fruity. Instead, it was the plain and humble olive oil cake. I've never baked with olive oil though I have used the more neutral oils in cakes before. This one does let the olive oil shine with all its personality. This is also one of the simplest cakes you will ever bake, so maybe that accounts for the popularity.

The original recipe is for a full cake but I reduced it to a third and baked 6 cupcakes instead. Mine's also a pale vanilla colour whereas the one on food52 is a rich brown so there is a chance I underbaked it. It's quite soft and nice and tasty all the same.

Ingredients
2/3 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup + 1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 tsp baking powder
100 ml extra virgin olive oil
100 ml whole milk
1 egg
1/2 tbsp orange zest
45 ml fresh orange juice

Line 6 muffin tins and set on a tray. Preheat the oven to 180C.

Mix flour, sugar, salt and baking powder in a bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together the olive oil, milk, egg, orange zest and orange juice. Add the dry ingredients and mix until just combined. It's a very wet batter so you can just pour into the muffin tins. Bake for 40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

That's it, folks. You can pop them out and enjoy while warm or cool on a rack and then top with cream or ganache or frosting. They are quite nice plain though.

Black Bean Soup

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sat, 17 Feb 2018 17:34:00 +0000

I first saw this black bean soup on David Lebovitz's blog about a month back. I made it almost immediately and loved it. Then I made it again and then I made it a third time. I have been tinkering with the recipe and while I think the soup is now perfect and one of the best I've ever made, it no longer bears any resemblance to what David made. Which is why it seems right to share this recipe here before I forget it.

The key difference is that I use canned ancho chillies and other pantry goodies whereas David uses a lot of fresh vegetables. They are both great so pick the recipe depending on what you have in the pantry or fridge. Here's my version.

Ingredients
1/2 cup dried black beans
1 small onion
2 cloves garlic
1 ancho chilli (I have a jar of ancho in oil)
2 tbsp pitted green olives
1 tbsp capers
1/2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp chipotle powder
To garnish
sour cream
dried mint
crushed nachos

Wash and soak the black beans overnight. Next day, put the beans in a pressure cooker with enough water to cover and cook until soft. Drain the beans (you should have about 1 1/2 - 2 cups of cooked beans), reserving one cup of cooking water.

Peel and quarter the onion. Peel the garlic cloves and pop into a grinder with onion, ancho chilli, olives, capers and cumin seeds. Add a couple of tbsp of water and grind to a smooth paste. Put the beans and the reserved cooking water in a large pan. Add the onion/ancho paste, oregano and chipotle powder. Mix and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer and add the vinegar and the olive oil. Let cook for a really long time. At some point, the soup will go from having bland beans to a harmonious blend of flavours. I let it simmer for between 45 minutes to an hour.

Pour into two bowls and top with garnishes of your choice. A dollop of sour cream adds a beautiful contrast and I like the crunch of crushed nacho chips. You could also add fresh herbs or even guacamole. But while all of this is optional, I've found that dried mint is an essential addition to the flavour.

Easy Peasy Chocolate Mousse

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Tue, 13 Feb 2018 08:04:00 +0000

Valentine's Day is just a day away which means that right now, you are in one of the two categories. You either planned ahead and have dinner reservations at a trendy restaurant and a box of chocolates tucked away to bring out at the right moment. Or you are looking for excuses on why celebrating love just once a year makes no sense, driven largely by the fact that everything is too cheesy and too crowded and too sold out at the moment.

I personally remain a fan of staying at home not just for Valentine's but also for other crowd attracting festivals and new year's eves etc. This usually translates to ordering in pizza. But one thing I never order in is dessert. This particular year, food52 came up with an idea so genius and so easy just in time, I haven't even had to research cake recipes. For what they have is a super simple, super easy and completely fuss free chocolate mousse.

Now yogurt and orange marmalade aren't the first things to come to mind when you think chocolate mousse. But that's what we are dealing with here. There are no eggs or cream to faff around with, just a super simple recipe that takes less than 5 minutes to put together. The original recipe calls for a liqueur and no sugar but I have made some adjustments here to use what I had. The resulting mousse is still super rich.

Ingredients
90 grams dark chocolate (I used callebaut 72%)
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 cup greek yogurt
2 tsp orange marmalade

Finely chop the chocolate. In a small saucepan, heat the milk with the sugar, stirring to dissolve the sugar completely. Add vanilla to the milk, stir to mix and pour over the chocolate. Let sit for a minute, then stir until the chocolate dissolves completely and you have a smooth ganache.

In another bowl, beat greek yogurt with a spoon until completely smooth. Add the yogurt to the chocolate ganache and fold in with a spatula until the two are fully combined. Scoop out the mousse into two bowls, cover and leave in the fridge to set for at least an hour. You can even make this a day in advance.

Just before serving, spoon a tsp of orange marmalade on top of each bowl.

Ten Years of Blogging

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sat, 03 Feb 2018 04:27:00 +0000

It was the evening of 3rd February, 2008. I had just baked my first cookie, and I was mighty proud of myself. This was the time before smartphones so I found my point and shoot camera and took a picture of the chocolate shortbread. Then, not knowing what to do with it and where to save the recipe, I went to blogger and set myself up a blog page. I thought it will be a good way to store recipes as I bake more. I couldn't have thunk that I will sit here, the morning of 3rd February, 2018, celebrating ten years of blogging.

400 recipes and countless friendships later, the blog is now an integral part of my life. As I have tried new foods, met fantastic people and gone on fabulous journeys, Bombay Foodie has witnessed and chronicled it all. My recipes may look more complex now than 2008, my food a bit more nuanced, and I am surely a better cook thanks to all the experiments and all the failures I shared with you.

Thank you, dear readers, all the thousands of you who stop by each month to read about my food journey and sometimes to share your own. Later today, I am celebrating with some foodie friends I have made in real life through this blog. And because what's a birthday without a cake, I have a celebratory cake recipe for you as well.

Bombay Foodie's birthday cake is still in the oven and I promise I will show you later today what it is. But this one - sticky toffee cake with caramel ganache and macadamia praline - is what I baked for my own birthday a few days back and has to be one of the nicest cakes I have baked. Here's the recipe.

Ingredients
100 grams date syrup
65 grams brown sugar
1/2 tbsp honey
1 egg
50 grams butter
90 grams plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
splash of vanilla extract

For the caramel ganache
1/2 cup white chocolate (chopped or you can buy chocolate buttons as I do)
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup caster sugar
splash of white vinegar

For macadamia praline
1 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup macadamia nuts
1/2 tsp white vinegar

Preheat the oven to 180C. Line a 6 inch round tin with parchment. Melt the butter and wait until it's cool.

Whisk the egg, sugar, date syrup and honey together until pale and fluffy. Slowly beat in the melted butter. Add the vanilla and stir to combine. Separately, mix the flour, baking powder and baking soda. Add the dry ingredients on top of the wet and carefully fold in with a metal spoon. Pour into the prepared tin and bake for 45-50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out clean. Let cool in the tin for about half an hour, then remove the parchment paper and cool over a wire rack.

In the meantime, make the toppings for the cake. For ganache, mix the chocolate and the cream. Microwave or put on a low heat until the chocolate melts. Take off the heat and whisk until you have a smooth mixture. Let cool.

Now make caramel. Put two cups of caster sugar in a large pan. To this, I added a splash of vinegar (essential to keep sugar from crystallising) and 2 tbsp water. Mix everything so the sugar looks like wet mortar. At this point, put your spoon away because there will be no more stirring. Simply wait while the sugar melts and bubbles. Swirl it occasionally if you like but otherwise, just stand there and stare at the pan until the sugar turns amber. It will take several minutes so be patient. Once the sugar is the caramel colour, turn off the heat, add the cream at once and stir to mix it well. Let the caramel cool, then whisk it into the cold ganache and put the whole thing in the fridge to chill.

The praline starts the same way as the caramel - mix sugar, water, vinegar and let it become caramel as before. But before you do that, line a baking sheet with parchment paper and spread macadamia nuts over it. Once the caramel reaches a dark amber colour, pour it over the nuts. Let cool, then break up the crunchy caramel in pieces and grind to a coarse powder.

Once the cake is cold, spread ganache over the top and sprinkle macadamia praline to finish.

Farm to Fork in Chail

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sat, 30 Dec 2017 16:41:00 +0000

Back in 19th century, when Shimla was the summer capital of India, the Maharaja of Patiala got the British rulers riled over his dalliances and got banned from entering the city. Not the one to be put down so easily, he found a tiny little town about an hour from Shimla and made Chail his very own summer capital. Today, Chail still has the impressive Palace that the Maharaja built and the highest cricket ground in the world. There really isn't much more to the city apart from a small local market and a couple of hotels that get spillover crowd from Shimla in the summers. It's a pleasant little diversion but that's not why I went to Chail. I stopped nine kilometers short of the town to make Ekam my home for a weekend.

Sumeet Singal built this house on a cliff as his own weekend home. Today, even when Ekam is open as a luxury boutique resort, the cosy homely feeling remains intact. I asked Sumeet what there was to do during my three day holiday at Ekam. He told me that there was absolutely nothing to do. But as I found out, Ekam has much to engage the mind and the taste buds of a traveller looking for some quiet in the middle of mountains and the majestic deodar trees.

Be One with the Nature

From the winding road that leads up to the property to the views of the hills from the balconies outside the room, Ekam is built in harmony with its surroundings. In summer, you can sit in the garden as you sip your morning tea. We went in early winter when the fireplace is a fantastic spot to curl up with a book. Each of the four rooms at Ekam is tastefully decorated and has gorgeous views. You will see other guests but the folks at Ekam let you mingle or go your own way as you like.

Ekam has 400+ fruit trees that bear peaches, nectarines and a myriad of stone fruit. The kitchen garden grows most of the vegetables, salad leaves and herbs they cook with. There are cows to help with the organic farming and even the water is pumped from the reservoir onsite. This is true farm to fork if you want to experience one.

Breakfast Like a King

Fresh fruits and a view of the hills from the balcony make for some amazing mornings. We had sandwiches with homemade pesto one day and banana and nut filled pancakes the other. Both happened to be equally amazing.

The Wood Fired Italian

One of the first things you will notice at Ekam is the large wood fired oven in the backyard. That's where the chefs bake their homemade pizza dough into a lovely Italian dinner. We also had a delicious mushroom bruschetta one evening. It was accompanied by a simple stir fry but with broccoli and pokchoy grown in the garden itself, you won't believe how nice even simple flavours taste at Ekam.

The Slow Cooked Indian

The range of food at Ekam is pretty amazing for a resort of that size. While we were still marvelling at the pizza from previous evening, the chefs whipped up a fantastic lunch full of local flavours the next day. They have a traditional chulha on which they roasted eggplants to make baingan bhartha. The dal was slow cooked overnight and the himachali kadhi was so flavourful I kept eating long after I was full.

I shouldn't forget to mention the cheese balls. I'm not sure what the chefs put in these fried treats they make every evening but they are sure as addictive as crack.

You will notice all of these specials listed on a nifty blackboard in Ekam's kitchen, alongwith some amazing teas that they make from locally grown herbs like nettle and fennel. Go in the summer and there will be a peach cobbler to go with your tea and an enticing mountain trail to walk off all the calories after.

The holiday at Ekam for me was more than a weekend retreat. It was the warm, fuzzy feeling you get when you find a new home away from home.

Some Practical Tips

- Chail is about 3 hours drive from Chandigarh. There are direct flights into Chandigarh from Delhi, Mumbai and several other cities.

- We used makemytrip to make a taxi booking from Chandigarh to Chail.

- The rooms at Ekam start at 9000 for a couple and include all meals.

- The name of the village is Dunti and it is 9 kilometers before Chail. You can take a bus to Chail if you would like to visit the town.

- Ekam's kitchen is completely vegetarian but they are okay with you bringing in your own booze.

Fruits of the Forest

noreply@blogger.com (Bombay Foodie) — Sun, 26 Nov 2017 07:04:00 +0000

I know there hasn't been a new recipe on these pages for a while. But worry not, I'm back with a real zinger. Earthy, creamy, crunchy - this is an appetizer that ticks all the right boxes. And if you happen to be a mushroom lover like me, this is the best way to eat mushrooms I've found so far. I present to you, for all your year end parties and appetizer cravings - creamy mushroom pate on toast.

Its mushroom pate two way - just on its own and panko-crumbed and fried. Both go on a crisp garlic baguette with watercress and some kewpie mayonnaise. Here's the recipe.

Ingredients
Crunchy garlic butter toasts (I buy them as is, but you can also slice and toast baguettes)
200 grams button mushrooms
1 small onion
3 cloves garlic
2 tbsp cream cheese
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup panko breadcrumbs
kewpie mayonnaise (or regular mayonnaise)
watercress or micro herbs
salt and black pepper to taste
oil for deep frying

First, make mushroom pate. You can do this upto a week in advance. Wash mushrooms thoroughly, remove the stems and chop the caps into small pieces. Peel and finely chop the onion. Peel and crush the garlic cloves. Heat olive oil and butter on low heat in a pan. Add the garlic and onions and cook, stirring often, for 3-4 minutes until the onion softens. Add the mushrooms and the vinegar, turn the heat the high, and stir fry until any water that exudes from the mushrooms evaporates and they are cooked through.

Let cool for 10 minutes, then pop in a blender with cream cheese and blitz until you have a smooth puree. Taste and add salt and black pepper to season. Move the pate to an airtight jar; this can stay in the fridge for upto a week.

When you are ready to eat your mushroom on toast, scoop out tiny portions of the pate with a melon baller. If the pate is too soft, leave it in the freezer for half an hour before you do this. Heat oil in a small pan. Roll the pate balls in panko crumbs and deep fry until golden. Drain on a paper towel.

To assemble, heap a tsp of cold mushroom pate on toast. Add one fried mushroom pate ball and finish with a dot of mayonnaise and a sprinkle of herbs.