Ma Niche : carrot

Showing posts with label carrot. Show all posts

11.5.15

Vegetable "Makhanwala" (made light)

It was almost after a decade that I cooked Vegetable "Makhanwala" the other day... and even before we started dinner I knew that this version was a keeper.....

20.5.14

Carrot Chili Pepper Quinoa Salad

I love exploring cuisines and I love to cook from books. So when the hosts of Food of the World decided to travel to Mexico, I picked up a couple of avocados, a pineapple and some jalapeño peppers from the grocery store, a copy of The "I Do Not Know How To Cook" Book Mexican from the library, then flipped through the pages of the book to find a match for the ingredients in hand.

1.5.14

Mexican Carrot Cake

I love a traditional carrot cake with cinnamon and nutmeg and bits of walnut. It is rich and flavorful and probably one of my all time favorite desserts. However from time to time I like to experiment with other recipes, specially when the list of ingredients lists an ingredient that I would have never imagined or considered otherwise.. Such was the case with this Mexican carrot cake.. The list of ingredients was short. It did not include any kind of flour. However "flour tortillas" were part of it and those were enough to arrest my curiosity.

11.4.14

Quiche Maraîchère # French Fridays with Dorie

Quiche Maraîchères (pronounced as maʀeʃe) was this week's assignment for the French Fridays with Dorie.

Finally ! I had been longingly staring at the photograph alongside the recipe for weeks... With all the red and green market fresh vegetables, the quiche looked so pretty, springlike and so very inviting. But when it came to making it I was such a mess....

No. The recipe, though a little unusual, wasn't complicated at all. All we had to do was to toss chopped celery stalks, leeks, carrots and red bell pepper in melted butter. Cook the veggies for about 10 minutes, then spoon the cooked vegetables into a 9 inch partially baked tart shell. Next whisk cream with an egg and an egg yolk, pour the custard over the veggies and bake the quiche for about 20 minutes at 400°F. Finally sprinkle grated Gruyère or cheddar over the semi-baked quiche and bake it for another 5 to 10 minutes, or until the cheese is golden and the filling is uniformly puffed, browned and set.

My quiche would probably have come out of the oven all pretty and dolled up had I not been over enthusiastic about letting the filling puff and brown uniformly. In trying to do so, I let the quiche bake for an extra 10-12 minutes which made it as brown as it looks below :( Anyway though thoroughly browned and somewhat over baked, the quiche tasted wonderful. I used grated smoked Gruyère cheese on top and both husband and I thought that that cheese made it even more flavorful. We simply could not stop admiring the quiche. We loved it warm, we loved it cold, we loved it every time we cut a wedge out. It was simply fantastic !

update 4/27/2014: Made the quiche for dinner tonight and enjoyed it in all its prettiness... I baked it for 30 minutes this time and was rewarded for following Dorie's instructions to the T :)

Visit French Fridays with Dorie to know what the other members thought about this quiche. You can find the quiche recipe here and the recipe for the tart shell here. For more such delicious recipes order your copies of Around my French Table and join the Doristas in this tasty adventure.

I shall be sharing this recipe at some of these parties.

22.3.13

Petite Treats for the Easter Bunny..

I am really excited to share today's recipe with you. The Petite Treats for your Easter Bunny inspired by Starbucks Petites. aren't those miniature treats absolutely adorable. i love them and think they are a smart way to enjoy sweets without over-indulging in them. so the other night when i had planned to cook some Gajar ka Halwa for us, to ration the servings and ease on the sweetness that is customary of all halwas i had decided to serve it in petite oat-cups. but cooked in unsalted butter without a hint of khoya and pistachios, my carrot halwa could not match the deliciousness of the traditional halwais halwa. so on my second attempt, working with the limited list of ingredients at hand, i decided to improvise my recipe as i went along. and the outcome was this light, slightly spiced and not overwhelmingly sweet carrot dessert that is sure to please your family and friends and specially the carrot-crazed cute Easter bunny.

now the recipe...

ingredients

for the oatcups

3/4 cup baby carrots

1/3 cup ground walnuts

2 tablespoons light brown sugar

3/4 cups oatmeal

1/4 cup all purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon oil

warm water

for the carrot filling

1 1/4 cup grated baby carrots

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1/4 cup light brown sugar

11/2 tablespoons evaporated milk

1/4 heavy whipping cream

1/4 cup walnuts

5 cloves of cardamom

2 teaspoons cinnamon powder

1 teaspoon ginger powder

for garnishing

cashews

1/4 cup white chocolate chips

what i did

for the oatcups,

first i preheated the oven to 350 degree F
then put the baby carrots, walnuts and brown sugar in the blender and grated them together.
next i combined the carrot mixture with the remaining ingredients adding a little water at a time and kneaded the mixture to form a dough soft enough to work with.
after letting the dough rest on the kitchen counter for about 10 minute, i rolled it out on a floured surface, about 1/2-3/4 cm thick. then pressed pieces of the rolled out dough against the walls of a 6 cups of a mini muffin pan and baked them for 18 minutes.
i made oatcakes out of the remaining dough in the same way as the apple-walnut oatcakes.

for the carrot filling,

in a saucepan i melted the butter, added the grated carrots in it and sauteed them till the color changed. then added in the sugar and evaporated milk and stirred for sometime.
next i ground the walnuts and cardamom together in the coffee grinder and added it to the carrots along with the cinnamon powder and ginger powder. i let the carrots cook in the spices for about 5-7 minutes.
at this point i felt that a little more fat was required. so i added in the whipping cream and let the spiced carrots cook in it, until the mixture carrot mixture began to leave the sides of the pan.

for the garnish,

i melted the white chocolate chips, then piped out the bunny face and feet on a parchment paper as shown in the picture below and let the dry on the kitchen counter overnight....

this picture was taken when i attempted a finer bunny with features. this did not work out too well. the outline was too delicate to be stable. so on my second attempt i filled out the faces and the feet outline and as you can see that worked out pretty well...

assembling the dessert

once the oatcups cooled down i filled them with the carrot filling and just before serving planted the chocolate bunny face and feet on top of the carrot heap.
For Mr MN, a piece of roasted cashew was enough. so on 2 of the cups i simply perched pieces of cashew on top of the carrot heap...

and tadaa... dessert is ready to serve..