Phirni

We did a lot of payasams during August. So for my son's birthday I wanted to do something different yet easy. Especially after the spiderman cake I did for A~'s school, I wanted something easy and quick. Added to that, V~ who is six months old has wheat allergy. So, I cannot have wheat based dishes until I stop nursing. The dish had to be non-wheat based, easy and quick. That is how I decided on Phirni.

Phirni is a specialty dish from the state of Jammu and Kashmir. I have done this a really long time back. But my son has never had it. So I did not know if he would like it or not. He generally does not like anything sticky or liquid. I knew he would like it if he tried but they he has to right? Anyway, I went ahead and made it. As expected he said he did not want it, the moment he saw a mushy dish. But after some cajoling and bribing, we got him to eat one spoon and he said it was good and finished of the phirni I had got for him. The rest of the folks at home like it as well.

Ingredients

Milk - 3 cups (I used whole milk)
Raw rice - 4-5 TBSP
Sugar - 3/4 cup
Saffron - 3-4 strands
Cardomon - 3-4 powdered
Almonds - ground coarsely for garnishing

Method

* Soak raw rice in water for 1 hour
* Grind it into a smooth paste
* Boil milk and once it starts to boil, add the rice paste and stir well. Keep stirring to avoid forming lumps.
* Cook until the rice is cooked completely.
* Add sugar, saffron, cardomom and cook for somemore time. The milk should reduce to half and the phirni should thicken.
* Transfer to the serving bowl and garnish with almonds.
* Let it sit in the refrigerator and serve it chilled. Or if you are like me and cannot wait, eat it immediately

Notes
This is a basic phirni. You can do your own variations by adding mango(mango phirni), gulkandh(gulabi phirni), almond paste (almond phirni)
Add the almonds, the portion of phirni I had along with the almonds tasted yum. Did you notice the nuts on the right side have vanished? How long can I keep taking pictures without eating??? It was hard to resist
Though I have not tried it myself, I think this dish would come out well in a microwave as well.

Sending this to Diwali sweets and savories hosted at Tickling Palettes

Super Moist Chocolate Cake | Spiderman Cake- My little one turns 4:)

Time flies so fast. Can't believe A~ is 4 years old. Happy Birthday Kaju Kutty. God Bless you.

When he was1 year it was elmo, when he was two, it was barney and thomas, when he was three it was toystory and more recently spiderman. So, for his fourth birthday I decided to bake a spiderman cake. I have baked cakes before, but I have never done any icing. It is just too much sugar and I do not do that normally.  This is also the first character cake I am baking. With my level of experience, I should have taken up something simple, but then my son adores spiderman and I wanted to try it out as well.

I bought the Wilton spiderman pan. It comes with complete instructions. I followed it...almost. I started the icing late in the night. I was tired, worried my second one would wake up and I would have to leave it half way through. So I skipped few things. The instructions are elaborate but this cake takes a lot of time. Take this up, if you have lot of time on hand.

I decided to do a chocolate cake. This chocolate cake recipe never fails. It is super moist and yummy.

Super Moist Chocolate Cake
Adapted from here
Ingredients

Dry Ingredients

All Purpose flour - 2 cups
Sugar - 2 cups
Baking soda - 2 tsp
Baking powder - 1 tsp
Salt - 1 tsp
Unsweetened cocoa powder - 3/4 cup

Wet Ingredients
Oil - 1/2 cup
Eggs - 2 large
Buttermilk - 1 cup
Boiling water - 1 cup
vanilla essence - 1 tsp

Method
* Preheat oven to 350 degree F.
* Prepare the pan by greasing the pan with shortening and dusting it with flour. The wilton instructions specifically asked not to grease using butter or oil.
* Sift the dry ingredients and mix well.
* Mix the wet ingredients together.
* Add the dry ingredient mixture slowly into the wet ingredients and mix thoroughly.
* Pour into the pan and bake for 35-40 mts or until the toothpick comes out clean.
* When cake is done let it cool for 10-15 mts in the pan.
* Invert the cake onto a cooling rack and let it cool completely about an hour.

Note:
The changes I did to the original recipe are I added baking powder and reduced the oil by half.

I used the buttercream frosting recipe that came along with the Wilton  spiderman pan instructions.

Ingredients
powdered sugar - 1 lb (4 cups)
solid vegetable shortening - 1/2 cup
butter - 1/2 cup
vanilla essence - 1 tsp

Method
* Beat shortening and butter with a hand mixer
* Add vanilla essence
* Add powdered sugar slowly and beat well until it is combined well.

For the icing - Follow Wilton spiderman cake instructions.

I took it to A~ 's school and everybody loved it. The chocolate cake is super yummy and the recipe is a keeper.

Notes:
It helps to prepare the icing before hand and refrigerate. It is very time consuming if you do everything on the same day. I completed the cake 3 AM in the morning. But the joy in the face of A~ as soon as he saw the cake in the morning - priceless:)

Roasted Baby Potatoes

Happy Vinayaka Chathurthi to everyone...the recipe I am posting today is not ganesha's favorite (or is it? we don't know.) It is my son's favorite. My son A~ turns 4 this september and I will be posting his favorites the whole of this month.Is there anyone out there who does not like potatoes? No one can go wrong with a potato dish. It tastes just awesome whatever you do with it. Some love it in the form of mashed potatoes, some in the form of hashbrowns, but the form we love the most is the roasted baby potatoes. I do this dish in  couple of ways and today I am presenting to you one of the ways to do this dish. This can be had as a side for rasam, sambhar or even curd rice. I have still not started asking my son for choices while cooking...especially for vegetables. But if I do ask, his standard answer is potatoes.