Wholesome. That’s a Lentil and Spinach Shakshuka in a word. Meal planning is a daily challenge for most of us and we should all have a dish such as this to back us up when we’re all out of ideas. Everyone has some kind of lentil and a few ground spices in their kitchen cupboard, some leafy veg in the fridge and the usual, onions, garlic, tomatoes and of course,…
Chatpata, often used to describe chaat, is a Hindi word without an English equivalent. My Matar Tikki Chaat, celebrating the bounty of winter-fresh, sweet green peas turned out to be deliciously chatpata(a combination of tangy, salty and hot flavours). I had stuffed them with a paneer and raisin filling. If you’re a chaat lover, you must try this green version of the usual aloo tikki. I’ve included recipes for the…
Today I’m sharing the result of my happy experiment making Guava Cheesecake Bars. Fruit and cheesecakes are old friends; everything from blueberries, raspberries and strawberries to bananas, oranges, lemons, mangoes and kiwi have been incorporated into cheesecakes. In baking, guavas are usually incorporated in the form of jams, jellies or pastes. So I thought, “ Why not use fresh guava?”. Guava and chilli – naughty but nice Driving on holiday,…
This Thai Tofu Vegetable Soup is a regular on my weeknight menu. Simple and easy with pantry staple ingredients, it makes an excellent protein-packed meal. It takes 15-20 minutes to put together and can even be made in advance. A flexible, forgiving soup My Thai Tofu Vegetable Soup had pumpkin and carrots, this time. Each time, I use the vegetables I have in my fridge. I don’t shop separately for…
A chocolate strawberry cake is always welcome on any table, especially if it’s a flourless cake. Strawberries in India, arrive at the end of the year; a happy coincidence when the mood and food are both celebratory. At a time when menus are loaded with rich offerings, a skinny yet scrumptious cake is a smart way to cut out a few calories. A flourless, butterless batter There’s no grain flour…
Baking a simple lemon almond cake in the midst of a crippling pandemic gave me much needed joy and feeling of gratitude for the life that I have. Forced to be frugal, with shortages of ingredients, my choices had to be based on what was in my pantry and fridge. Craving a cake and having run out of all things chocolate, I had to make do with what I had.…
A gluten-free banana bread with the goodness of whole grain flours. This Gluten-Free Eggless Banana Bread is made with my very first, homemade gluten-free flour blend. I’m not gluten-free 100 per cent of the time but ever so often, I like to eat a cake, a flatbread, bread or pancake that is satisfying yet light on the tummy. Very often, I’ve found gluten-free flour blends to be merely a combination…
A flourless pear and almond cake is perfect if you’re loyal to your waistline but are loathe to give up on dessert. This one is a light, healthy and easy flourless cake recipe for your collection. Pears are in season and their blushing charms are hard to resist. For the cake, I make sure to choose ripe but slightly firm fruit that can be baked without getting mushy. …
Banana and coffee meld marvelously yet hold their own in this grain-free bread. It is built with ground almonds and oatmeal with cornflour acting as the cement. In this banana bread recipe, I’ve tried a riff on the classic and combined the vanilla sweetness of ripe bananas with the delicious and dark complexity of coffee. I even dropped the butter for fragrant, cold-pressed coconut oil. So obviously, I had…
Lately, all my online food haunts seem to be inundated with big, brown, fudgy squares, beckoning at every click. Overdosing on all the brownie porn induced a chronic craving within me. I needed an urgent brownie fix. I even dreamed of brownies – plain, marbled, glazed, layered, filled with nuts….. But waiting, shopping for ingredients, delaying was not an option. A new jar of peanut butter in my kitchen cupboard…