chocolate muffins !

Few days back in my  daughter's kindergarten there was an annual meeting followed by a plate to share the food with everyone.I and my friends were discussing about what shall we make and also the food should be kids friendly ,i was thinking about cookies ,just then my friend rasheeda told me that her son is fond of muffins and kids surely luv muffins anytime,so without thinking anymore i went ahead and made these muffins.My princess also meantime insisted me to make muffins only that also she wanted chocochips in them,but i had hardly dark chocochips left so i used some white chocochips as well and the flavour of both the chips turned out amazingly yum !The muffins were exactly as i wanted them,simple,soft and super moist with chips in between !Everyone in kinder ,including my frend's son and my daughter liked these muffins very much and all the liners were empty in no time.

approx 14-15 muffins
dry ingredients :
11/2 cup plain flour
1/3 cup coco pwd
1 cup sugar ( adjust more or less acc to your taste )
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking pwd
1/2 cup white & dark choco chips ( optional,u can use one or both or none or can use some nuts instead)
wet ingredients :
1/2 cup olive oil
3/4 cup water
1 tsp vanilla extract
method :
Preheat the oven at 350f  or 180c .Sieve all the dry ingredients together except chocochips for 2-3 times.Mix wet ingredients together.Add the wet ingredients into dry ingredients and gently mix well.Fold in the choco chips / nuts and mix well.Line the muffin tray with liners,fill about 3/4 cup of the batter and bake for 15-20 mins or insert  the skewer and check if it is clean.Rest for 5 mins and remove from the muffin pan and njoy the muffins !

kesar nankhatai /saffaron cookies

Last week was not a good week for me as my daughter was suffering from viral fever,cold & cough,all together...kids getting sick is just too tiring for us ..they are so very cranky and need pampering every now and then that we start feeling sick :(.Anyways i really dont know what's store in this year, 2011 for me,nothing is working out too well.."hope for the best and prepare for the worst" is my father in law's fav quote and i too believe in it ,i am surely hoping some good things in coming days.Therefore, these days im not able to concentrate much on my cooking and blogging as well ,not trying out too many new dishes but yes this nankhatai recipe which i posted today was made for our last to last long weekend trip where we had been to buchan caves and lake enterance in east gippsland,outskirts of melbourne with some friends and had nice outing with overnight stay for a change!This is yet another tried & tasted dish from my blogger friend aipi's kitchen.Hope u all njoy the recipe as much as we all did !Sending this to priya for her bookmarked recipes-every tuesday ,co-hosted by aipi and also for hosting this month's  t & t event  started zlamushka & now owned by lakshmi.

original recipe is here.
ingredients :
11/4 cup plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
a pinch of salt
7-8 tbsp melted ghee
3/4 cup powdered sugar
3 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp kesar/saffaron ( powdered in a pestle or mashed by the back of the spoon )
1/2 tsp cardomon pwd
1/4 cup finely chopped nuts (pistachios /almonds/cashew nuts)
method :
Mix flour,baking soda,baking powder and salt together and sieve it for 1-2 times.Add sugar,saffaron,milk and mix well.Add ghee little at a time and make a smooth soft dough without any cracks.Cover the dough with cling sheet or plastic wrap and keep in fridge for 15-20 mins.Preheat the oven to 350F ,divide the dough into 22 equal portions,shape them round,flatten them little by your palm and garnish it with the nuts.Place them on the baking sheets and bake them for 15-20 mins or till golden brown in colour.Let it cool down for 10-12 mins and then remove from the sheet as they might be soft whislt hot.You can store it in airtight containers for few days and njoy eating !

banana-choclate muffins

I am not fond of bananas but i definately love the flavour of this high calorie fruit in muffins,breads & cakes,it really gives a beautiful aroma and  is a fantastic replacement for eggs.Though have not used much of banana puree for my baking goodies but my earlier banana bread post was surely a hit.I actually had a fully ripened huge banana left and wanted to use it as soon as possible or else i had to throw it ,which i am strongly against and so to avoid all this i jumped on my (new..yes ,finally i got one..yay! im sooo happy) laptop to hunt an eggless banana muffin recipe,there i landed upon jayashree's space and my eyes caught on this recipe,which i found was very clear,easy , few ingredients to use,also the best part was she had used chocolate powder which is my all time favourite ingredient and i blindly can use anywhere :P and so without spending a minute i went into my kitchen and tried this  recipe immediately.Now the best part of this muffins is that being eggless also it was super moist and soft as she said in her post and was just perfect,i never ever imagined that an eggless muffin would ever turn out this good ! thank u jayashree for sharing such a wonderful eggless banana choclate muffin.

recipe source : spice & curry
dry ingredients :
11/2 cup plain flour
1/2 cup chocolate/cocoa pwd ( i used drinking chocolate )
11/2 tsp baking soda
wet ingredients :
1/4 cup melted butter
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 cup yogurt at room tempereature
1 cup mashed riped banana / banana pulp
method :
Sieve all the dry ingredients together for 2-3 times and keep it aside.Mix butter and sugar together in a mixing bowl,add vanilla essence and yogurt.Mix well.Add mashed banana and mix thoroughly.Fold in dry ingredients and mix well till no lumps.Grease the muffin trays or line the muffin trays and fill 3/4 th cup of the mixture .Bake in a preheated oven at 175c for 20 mins .( keep checking time varies from oven to oven ,can check by inserting a toothpick/skewers in the muffins,if it comes out  clean tht means its done. ).Cool it down for few mins and remove from the muffin trays and njoy eating !

chocochip cookies

This choco chip cookies are usually favourites of all ,very less ingredients,easy and simple recipe ,i had taken this recipe from my friend sonali (bagad )a couple of months back and made long time ago,but somehow didnt post it,actually the pics were not uploaded and not too good so thats why  i didnt post this recipe ,but today when my daughter asked me to make some cookies i suddenly remembered and i immediately found out this recipe in my drafts and thought of posting it.Thanx sonali for this wonderful cookies recipe and im so sorry to post it late :P

ingredients :

11/2 cup selfraising flour 

180gm softened butter ( at room temp)

1/2 cup condensed milk

1/3 cup sugar ( pls adjust acc to your taste ,i used little less )

150gms  choco chips ( i used dark ones )

method :

Preheat the oven at 180c ,beat butter and sugar till light and creamy,add condensed milk and beat few more mins or until thoroughly combined.Fold in the flour and stir,add chocochips and mix gently into a dough.Roll out small walnut size balls and slightly flat them and place them approx 1 inch apart from each other ,on a greased baking sheet and bake for 15 mins or till evenly brown.Remove from the oven and let it cool down for 5-10 mins and then remove the cookies as they might be still soft when warm,you can store these cookies for a week in air tight containers.

Sending this to akila's DNSW : C event.

anzac biscuits

Anzac biscuits are tried and tasted by palate corner from aparna's blog,they are  traditional biscuits of australia and newzealand,you can find the history of these biscuits over here.I love the baking goodies made my aparna ,my diverse kitchen and as soon as i went through her recipe list i knew im going to make these biscuits as i had tasted them here in melbourne many a times but never baked them at home and this was wonderful oppurtunity to try on my own in my kitchen and i was very excited as my biscuits turned out crisp from outside and chewy from inside,which anyone could have asked for,just perfect,thanx aparna for sharing such wonderful recipe,it was simple and u made it quite easy with the basic ingredients which are usually in our pantry.

 

makes approx 28-30 biscuits/cookies
dry ingredients :
3/4th cup plain flour
3/4th cup brown sugar ( i used white sugar)
1 cup oats
1/4th tsp salt
3/4th cup dessicated coconut
wet ingredients :
1/4 cup butter
2 tbsp honey
1/2 tsp soda bi-carb
3 tbsp hot water
method :
Mix all the dry ingredients together.Melt the butter in pan ,switch off the flame and add honey,mix hot water and soda together ,add this to butter  and honey mixture and mix well.Add this wet ingredients in the dry ingredients and make a soft dough.If the dough is little hard then add little water and if soft then add little flour
( mine was perfect ,i didnt had to add anything ).Take a heaped tablespoon of dough and make balls and flatten them slightly,make the same with the remaining dough.Grease a baking tray,preheat oven to 160c and bake the biscuits for 12-15 mins or till brown in colour,let it cool down completely as they might be still soft ,after it cools down it will turn little harder and store in airtight containers.
sending this to the following events :
1. srivalli for hosting this mths T & T ,an event by lakshmi.
2.me and my kitchen for EFM cakes and bakes series !
3.versatile kitchen for her weekly bake-off event.
4.pari for "only" kids delight event.
5.akila for her event dish name starts with letter A .

strawberry jam drops

A couple of months back on my bday,one of my friend gifted me a book which she thought was apt as now that i have started a food blog ,since then i wanted to desperately make something from it,the book is just wonderful and all about baking goodies,but somehow one or the other ingredients were not in hand and so was lazying around to make but now that,that friend of mine is moving back to india i was feeling very bad and wanted to make something from that book ,so i tried the very first recipe raspberry jam drops,yes i did mentioned the name strawberry jam drops as my title because i didnt have raspberry jam i tried making with strawberry jam,actually i dont think so it will make any difference ,any of your favourite flavoured jam will do,after all at the end it depends on your family tastes and my daughter likes starwberry jam so she was kinda happy and excited as usual when i baked these stuff.Thank you so much rashmi for this beautiful gift,it was definately the best and perfect gift for this year and i was really very touched :-)

makes approx 32-34 pieces ( i made with half the qty as given below because i was trying these for the first time )
ingredients :
125gm (1 cup) self raising flour
80 gm (1/3rd cup ) softened unsalted butter
40gm (1/3rd cup ) instant vanilla pudding mix /custard pwd ( i used vanilla custard pwd )
100 gm raspberry jam ( i used starwberry jam )
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsps milk
caster sugar
method :
Preheat the oven at 180c ,line the baking trays with baking paper or grease the tray with butter and dust it with little plain flour.Cream the butter and sugar with the electric beater until light and fluffy .Add the milk and vanilla and beat till all r mixed completely.Sift the flour and custard pwd and fold in the butter mixture and make a soft dough.Divide the dough into equal marble size balls,make an indentation with finger or end of a wooden spoon in each ball.Fill the holes with your favourite jam and bake for 15 mins or till golden brown in colour.Allow it to cool for few mins and then remove them from the baking tray.These jam cookies can be stored for a week in an airtight container.

chocochip-walnut and banana bread

This is my second attempt for banana bread, first time i made ,it was a couple of months back but it was a disaster though the taste was fine but the appearance and texture was not good and so i was little upset but few days back when i saw malika of veg bowl's post on chocochip banana bread i was quite happy and excited as now i had an easy and a perfect eggless banana bread  recipe on hand and i thought of giving it a try,i sticked to the recipe as this time i didnt  want any disaster and was super excited with the results,it was perfect ! thanx MD for sharing this wonderful recipe ,it was a big hit  and soon im gonna make it again :).I had very few choco chips on hand and so i added little walnuts in it,also i love the combo of walnuts and banana,though my clicks are not so good and cannot be compared to MD's but the taste was just great :P

ingredients :
3 small riped bananas
1 cup plain flour
1/4 cup oil ( i used olive oil )
1/2 cup sugar ( i used raw sugar )
1 tsp baking pwd
1/4 tsp soda bicarb
1/4 cup milk
1/4 cup chocochips ( i used 2 tbsp chocochips + 2 tbsp chopped walnuts )
1/2 tsp cinnamon pwd ( optional )
method :
Mash the bananas,add milk and oil and mix together.Preheat the oven at 180 c.Grease the loaf tin.Add flour,sugar,cinnanamon,baking pwd and soda,mix all togther.Fold in the choco chips and walnuts and gently mix it.Pour the batter into the loaf tin and bake for 40-45 mins ( pls keep an eye on time and the baked goodie as all ovens differ ) or till brown in colour,keep checking in between,insert a fork or a skewer to check if its done.Cool down for a while,remove the loaf from the tin and cut into slices or any desired shape and njoy.I like my banana bread toasted with butter ;).

rocky crunchy cookies

My husband loves to try different variety of cereals ,specially cornflakes and this time he brought crunchy cornflakes which was little sweet as they were honey flavoured but he didnt like the sweet taste so he brought another huge box of plain regular ( original )cornflakes and he mixed the two together so that the sweetness was balanced and now daily he was having it and few days back when i saw the boxes very little quantity as left so the other day i emptied the dabba and transfered the little portion in a smaller container & was about to throw the two big boxes suddenly i saw the recipes given on them and liked one of them which was eggless and quite healthy & easy ,i  replaced sultanas as i really dont like them and making these cookies more healthy and crunchy because of oats,it really turned out well and my first batch was over in couple of days so i had to make some more again for the party.So guys please have a look on your cornflake boxes before throwing or else you may miss yum yum recipes ;) Sending this over to chaitra's bread mania event.

ingredients :
11/2 cup cornflakes ( i used 2 varieties 1 cup crunchy honey cornflakes and 1/2 cup plain cornflakes )
13/4 cup plain flour/maida
110 gms soft butter
1/2 cups sultanas ( though i susbsituted them by 1/2 cup rolled oats )
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup milk
2 tsps baking powder

method :
Preheat oven to 180c.Beat butter and sugar together till light and fluffy.Add sifted flour,baking pwd and mix,add cornflakes and oats gently and make a stiff dough using the milk.Place heaped teaspoons of mixture on greased baking tray and bake for 10-15 mins .( please keep checking it may take more or less time depending on the oven ).Let it stand for few mins and then remove from the tray as it may be soft when hot but gradually turns hard when cooled.These cookies can be stored in airtight containers for couple of weeks.

chocochip and nuts muffins

My daughter loves chocloate cakes and muffins very much ,so this time i decided for her bday will try some muffins as her birthday cake we had already ordered outside so was not keen on making another cake and therefore started browsing eggless chocolate muffins and finally i bookmarked this recipe from DK's chefinyou blog.I was never good at baking as most of the times my eggless cakes were  never well risen  but  was highly  impressed by myself  this time when these muffins turned out superbly fantastic :P.My daughter also loved it and specially she liked the choco chips poking out and she was trying to pull all the chips and popping into her mouth.This is my entry for chaitra's bread mania event and priya for hosting this mth's T & T EVENT by lakshmi.
ingredients :
1/2 cup butter at room temp
1 cup sugar
11/2 cup yogurt
2 cups plain flour (maida )
1/2 tsp baking pwd
1/2 tsp salt
1tsp soda bi-carb
1tsp vanilla extract
3/4 th cup chocolate chips
for toppings :
2 tsp brown sugar ( i used white sugar though )
1 tsp cinnamon pwd
3-4 tbsp chopped walnuts ( i crushed it in mixer instead )
1/4th cup chocolate chips
method :
In a mixing bowl beat butter and sugar together till light and fluffy,add yogurt and mix well,add vanilla and mix well.In another dry bowl combine flour,salt,soda and baking powder together.Add the dry ingredients into the butter mixture and mix until moistened.Gently mix the chocolate chips into this mixture .Mix all the toppings ingredients together .Line a mufffin tray with a paper-lined cups and fill about 2/3rd of the mixture and sprinkle about a spoonful of topping on it and bake on a preheated oven on 350F for 15-20 mins or u can check by inserting a toothpick in the muffin and if it comes out clean that means they are done.

eggless moist chocolate cake

Chocolate cakes....yummy..this is the first word which comes straight from our mouth rather always from my mouth as usualy in cakes i prefer chocolate cake and i just cherish like anything...even my husband and my daughter are in favour of chocolate cakes than any other flavoured cakes.It was 1st aug and suddenly realised oh my god !! tomoro is 2nd aug and my husband's birthday and there i felt no time for ordering now,its too late ,but baking cake at home is never too late ,though i am never good at baking cakes at home as we dont use eggs at home,yes we r not eggitarian but completely vegeterain,without eggs its quite difficult to get a good sponge like we get in cake shops but still i wanted to give it a try as occassional on birthdays,anniversaries,valentines i prefer a home make cake rather then a ready made cake :) to impress my hubby dear :P,so had very less time and suddenly i started searching for some eggless chocolate cake and i really found 2-3 similar ones and were kinda easy and very less time consuming so i mmediately wrote on a piece of paper which i found lying down with whom my daughter was playing around and just started writing the ingredients by the time she came running and suddenly she tempered my laptop as usual and the window got closed...phew !! i wanted to yell at her but was in hurry so again looked for the recipe but in vain ,still could found similar ones with different method and so though now its high time and i shud give it a try...and bingo !! i finally made this beautiful cake in minutes and hid it before my hubby came as wanted to surprise him the next day.The day came and early in the morning before he left for his office i presented this cake in front of him and he was really surprised,also he was impressed by the outcome and we all had almost finished in no time.

ingredients :
1 1/2 cups plain flour

3 tbsp cocoa pwd
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup sugar
5 tablespoons  oil (i used olive oil)
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup cold water

method :

Put the flour into mixing bowl, add cocoa, baking soda,sift them 2-3 times ,add sugar and mix well 

Make three deep holes in the dry mixture. Into one, pour the oil, into the next, pour the vinegar into the next, pour the vanilla.Pour the water into the bowl, over all of this , making a great big mess.

Mix the wet and dry ingredients together until there aren't any more lumps and pour into a  baking pan, 

Bake at 350°F for about 25-30 mins or till done,pls keep checking every oven may vary its time.

Enjoy this delicious cake. You will be surprised at its moistness and richness!!!!! It can be cooled and iced with your choice of icing or can be enjoyed on its own. 

oat cookies

ingredients :

1 cup oats
1cup self raising flour
1cup sugar
1cup butter
1-2 tsp milk ( optional only if req )
cardomon pwd as per taste
dessicated coconut as per taste
pistas as per taste

method :
mix all the above ingredients together.preheat the oven on 200c .grease and dust the baking tray.take 1 tbsp approx mix and make pendas and keep on the baking tray .there should be a distance of atleast 1 inch between each pendas.bake for 20-25 mins and keep checking till it turns brown in colour.let it cool down and stand for 10-15 mins and after cooling completely you can store in air tight containers.