Contemplations and Ruminations

Due to popular demand (no, don't laugh... folks are really asking for it) I'm putting up this wonderful cake recipe too right on the heels of my last recipe. This cake is seriously good, it gets wolfed down in seconds, and the divine smell of cinnamon wafting through the house is in a way invigorating.  Ingredients: 1 cup maida (or all purpose flour) 1 teaspoon baking powder 3/4 cup castor sugar 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 5 1/2 Tablespoon butter (roughly 40 gms) 1 Egg 1/2 cup milk 2 medium sized apples (peeled, cored and sliced) First combine half the powdered sugar with the cinnamon powder in a bowl. Also combine the maida with the baking powder in another container. The rest of the sugar and the 40 gms of butter go into another bowl. Drop in one egg and beat up the mixture. Now alternatively add the flour... and the milk stirring after each addition to form a nice creamy batter of pouring consistency.  Grease and flour the cake tray, pour in half the batter... Arrange...

Here's an easy briyani recipe that I learnt from my mom in law, I like this kind of briyani where the rice gets cooked along with the chicken. There are the other varieties where the chicken is cooked separately and boiled rice is then mixed with it in alternating layers. Since I don't really like plain white rice, I find that briyani bland... this one here is exciting, spicy and dangerously good. Briyani is preferably made with Basmati rice (long grained rice), you can use ordinary rice too... it will taste just as good. The only difference lies in the amount of water you add for both the rice varieties. The pictures posted here were taken when I made briyani with both basmati and ordinary rice, so don't get surprised if the pressure cooker changes colour from picture to picture. I picked out the best pictures... let's get started right away... First wash and soak the rice in water for an hour or so and please measure the quantity of rice you take. (Make sure you do n...

First off, how exciting and thoroughly wondrous was the whole Chilean miners rescue mission... it is indeed an event that will go down in history as one of the most meticulous and miraculous rescue operations ever carried out. To finally see each of them emerging victoriously from the unimaginable ordeal they must have endured over the last two months was awe inspiring. All the hugging, laughing, crying and kissing the ground are some of profound images we'll remember forever. I especially loved the second man (Mario Sepulveda) who emerged from the mines, he was like a rockstar pumping up the crowd and chanting a slogan (apparently some football based slogan). I think he is the one who said that he held the hand of both God and the Devil and finally God won... God held on till the end.  This precisely sums up their predicament right from day one when the world finally came to know bout these trapped 33 miners. They kept their wits bout them and rationed out the food they had ...

Hey everybody, how you doin? Ever since I put up a picture of this whole roasted chicken on Facebook, folks have been asking for the recipe... so here it is. Sorry for the delay people... Take bout 3 tablespoons of butter in a bowl, add the juice of one lime. Then drop in some Italian seasoning (optional), salt, pepper, and a few crushed cloves of garlic. Mix it up well and apply it over the chicken as seen below. First make sure to poke the chicken all over with a fork, this allows the juices to reach the fleshy interior parts. Using your hands rub the butter mixture all over the chicken and into its cavity too. Stuff the lemon skins into the chicken... along with some freshly chopped coriander and mint leaves.  So here is the little fellow stuffed with lemon skins, coriander and mint leaves.... Place the tray in the oven and bake for 45 minutes. Wash and cut vegetables into bite sized pieces, here I used potatoes and carrots and onions. Sprinkle a little oil, salt and pe...

So my parents were here for a week and it was great.... we spent everyday roaming the city, attending various fairs and exhibitions, visiting relatives and hanging out at all the opulent malls. One of the fairs (a rajasthani one) had a mehendi stall and that's where we got those beautiful patterns on our hands.  My birthday was fun too, I did not want a boring cake with Happy Birthday and my name on it, so told Tonio  to write something exciting & here's what he did... cracked me up. That's an Irish Coffee Cream cake by the way...  One night while returning home with the parents we saw this car in front of us... (the picture is blurry, there is never a signal in sight when you need one) do you see the words on it, Govt of Heaven... and they have a symbol too, that was so cool. Must be some minister... Minister of Mankind or something.  PS: The title is a beautiful song by Kenny Rogers...