Whole wheat Swedish almond cake recipe

Was in a mood to bake a cake and browsing through my fav recipe books. Couldn’t wait to bake this cake and indulge :)... One of such days when you really want to dig in some yummy stuff. And thankfully the kitchen had all the required stuffs and a jar of slivered almonds was sitting in my refrigerator... Woo... Didn’t wait, just baked !

 

The recipe follows

Ingredients

Eggs – 3 (I use country eggs)

Sugar – 2/3 cup

Whole wheat flour (I use organic hand pound) – 1 1/3 cup

Baking powder – 1 tsp

Vanilla extract – 2 tsp

Milk – 4 tsp

Butter – 75 gm, melted

For the topping

Butter – 50 gm

Flaked almonds - 100 gm

Sugar – 50 gm

Flour – 2 tsp

Milk – 2 tsp.

Vanilla extract – 1 tsp

Method

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius and grease the base and sides of an 8 inch cake tin with butter and dust with flour.

Whisk together the eggs and sugar until it looks pale and thick.

Sift in the flour and baking powder and pour in the vanilla extract, milk and melted butter, then fold everything in until combined.

Tip the mixture into the tin and bake for 30-35 mins or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.

While this gets baked we’ll make the topping, take another bowl melt the butter and add the remaining ingredients and mix well.

After the cake has been cooking remove it from the oven and spoon the almond mixture evenly over on top. Place it back in the oven and bake for about 10-15 mins or until the topping is golden.

Leave the cake to cool for 10 mins and slowly remove it from the tin.

Please let the cake cool to cut it since when I tried cutting it as soon as it was baked, the d topping crumbled but when I cut the cake after waiting for an hour it was cut beautifully J

 The recipe is adapted from cakes by Rachel Allen with minor alterations.

Bake and enjoy

Thanks

Chaithanya

Whole wheat Dulce de leche cake

I am a big fan of caramel and since when I saw the method of making dulce de luche by pressure cooking condensed milk tin I have been making it occasionally though since it is very addictive. Also have been reading lots of recipes which uses DDL. This time I thought of trying a cake of Rachel Allen, one of my favourite baker :) 

So this cake is all about including DDL in the batter, I used whole wheat flour instead of white flour and the cake had a very distinct flavour of the DDL. Cake is equally loved by both kids and adults :)

Its as easy as any other cake recipe 

 

Ingredients

Butter - 175 gms

Light brown sugar  ( powdered) - 100 gms 

Vanilla extract - 1 tspn

Dulce de luche - 200 gms

Eggs - 2 no.s

Whole wheat flour - 1 1/3 cup

Baking powder - 1.5 tspn

Ground almonds - 100 gms

Method

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees.

Cream the butter until soft in a large bowl

Add the powdered sugar, vanilla extract and dulce de luche and beat the mixture for a good few minutes until the mixture is smooth and light.

Whisk the eggs in a small bowl for a few seconds and add to the creamed butter mixture beating all the time. Tip in the ground almonds, then sift the flour, and baking powder gently and fold until combined.

Pour the batter in a baking tin and bake for about 30 - 40 mins or until the skewer inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean.

Remove from the oven and allow the cake to cool in the tins for about 10 minutes , loosen the edges and carefully remove the cake on a wire rack to cool down completely.

Making dulce de luche ( dulce de luche is boiled condensed milk) 

Boil unopened tins of condensed milk for 2 hours  and let the tins cool completely.

Alternatively you can pressure cook the tin in low flame for about 20 - 25 mins with pressure. Open the tin only when its cooled completely.

Bake and enjoy!!

Cocoa devil's food cake

Have mentioned in the previous post of mine about my new buy 'Joy of cooking' , I am browsing through the book every day to try out something new :). Have tried a devils cake before but thought of trying this one too. Looked simple with handy ingredients. So here it is

Ingredients and method

Whisk together 
2 cups sifted flour ( I used atta)
1 tspn baking soda
1/2 tspn salt

Whisk in a separate bowl
1 cup powdered sugar
1 cup butter milk or yogurt
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 tspn vanilla

Beat in a large bowl
1/2 cup of unsalted butter

Gradually add and beat  
1 cup powdered sugar

Beat in one at a time 
2 eggs

On low speed add the flour mixture in 3 parts, alternating with butter milk mixture in 2 parts, beating until smooth. Scrape the batter into the pan and spread evenly. Bake at 180 degrees Celsius for about 30-35 min or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Remove from the oven, cool in the pan for sometime and then remove to the wire rack to cool
Easy , bake and enjoy! :)

Recipe courtesy : Joy of cooking

Tiramisu cake

This cake has been there in my mind for quite sometime, or probably months, but never been able to do it, I thought its a difficult one to do and then it was my dear husband's b'day the last week and since we were travelling I couldn't bake a cake. Only because I dint bake a cake for their father's b'day the kids thought their father's b'day is not over yet.. How sweet and innocent of them :) So I thought of venturing out baking this cake, thoroughly enjoyed baking it and of course my family and friends loved it. And I bet it is not that difficult, or probably I choose an easy path(recipe)for the cake. I did Google search for recipes for the same and there seem to loads of recipes too as usual. I zeroed of some factors of few recipes and derived this product :)
I made the mascarpone cheese at home, and I bet it very easy to make at home, all you need is fresh cream and a lemon.

For mascarpone cheese adapted from baking obsession
Ingredients:

• 500 ml fresh cream
• 1 tbsp fresh lemon juice

Preparation:

Bring 1 inch of water to a boil in a wide skillet. Reduce the heat to medium-low so the water is barely simmering. Pour the cream into a medium heat-resistant bowl, then place the bowl into the skillet. Heat the cream, stirring often, to 190 F. It will take about 15 minutes of delicate heating. Add the lemon juice and continue heating the mixture, stirring gently, until the cream curdles. It will cover the back of your wooden spoon thickly. You will see just a few clear whey streaks when you stir. Remove the bowl from the water and let cool for about 20 minutes. Meanwhile, line a sieve with four layers of dampened cheesecloth and set it over a bowl. Transfer the mixture into the lined sieve. Do not squeeze the cheese in the cheesecloth or press on its surface (be patient, it will firm up after refrigeration time). Once cooled completely, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate (in the sieve) overnight or up to 24 hours.

For the cake

4 eggs separated

2 tbspns cold water

1 cup sugar ( powdered)

1/2 cup boiling water

1 and half cups cake flour, sfifted 

1/2 tspn cream of tartar

1  tspn vanilla essence

1/2 tspn almond essence

Method

Prepare two 8 inch pans or one 9 inch pan ( I used the latter) If you want four layers and more height for the cake use two 8 inch pans. Prepare the pans and keep aside.

Sift the flour and measure. I used white flour for this cake, dint use wheat flour as usual. For one and half cup of cake flour you can take 1 and half cup of wheat flour, remove two tablespoons of flour and measure you cake flour and keep aside.

Put the egg yolks in a large mixing bowl and add 2 tbpsns of cold water into it. Start beating and sowly add the powdered sugar into the egg yolks while you continue beating it and beat until the egg yolks are pale yellow and then now add boiling water while you still beat the mixture. Add salt to the sifted flour and then sift the flour to the egg mixture. Gently fold in the flour with the batter, make sure you don't loose the aeration in the batter. 

Next you put the egg whites in a bowl and then add the cream f tartar abd beat the egg whites to stiff peaks. Again gently fold in the egg whites into the egg yolk mixture. at this point add the vanilla essence and the almond essence and and the remaining egg whites and fold in the mixture with a rubber spatula. Divide the batter into pans and bake at 180 degrees preheated oven. Bake the cake for 30 mins or till a tooth pick inserted comes out clean. Let it cool.

Now you have the cake ready and also the mascaropone cream ready. Now lets move on the filling and frosting.

For the espresso extract
2 tablespoons instant espresso powder ( I used Nescafe Select)
2 tablespoons boiling water
> Stir the coffee powder in hot water and keep aside
For the espresso syrup: 
1 cup water 
3 tablespoons sugar 
1 teaspoon vanilla extract 
1 tbspn espresso extract
>Boil the water with the rest of the ingredients and keep aside.

For the filling and frosting:
232 grams of mascarpone
1/3 cup confectioners’ sugar, 
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 tablespoon espresso extract
1 cup cold sweetened whipping cream 
1/2 cup grated chocolate

>Whisk the mascarpone cream, sugar, vanilla extract, espresso extract and keep  aside
>Whip the whipping cream will stiff, slowly fold in the whisked mascarpone mixture carefully and keep aside.

Assembling the cake
Now that your syrup and the cream mixture is ready get ready to assembling the cake and frosting it.
Slice the cake and place one layer on the assembling board, brush the syrup until the cake is coated and soaked in the syrup. Now give a coat of the cream and also sprinkle some grated chocolate over it. Repeat with the rest of the layers and finally frost the outside of the cake and decorate the cake as you wish . You can even decorate the cake in the simplest way by simply sifting some cocoa powder over the cake.

Simple right.. bake and enjoy it!!!

Banana butterscotch cake

 

It was such a day when I had loads of over riped bananas in my fruit bowl and scratched my head as to how to use it off. being a weekend thought of baking a quick banana muffins with it , but dint have the patience to even arrange the muffin moulds and whole of the experiment resulted with a cake in the shape of a foccacia bread :) . Anyway it tasted lovely and so all was fair!!

Here goes the recipe which is quite simple and I did the mixing in my food processor bowl , so it was all the more easy, nevertheless the texture of the cake was good

            

                         

                               

  

Ingredients

Eggs  - 2

Mashed bananas - 1 cup

Raisins - 1 cup

Sugar - 2 tbspns

Whole wheat flour - 1 cup

Refined oil - 1/4 cup

Baking powder - 1 tspn

Baking soda - a pinch

Butter scotch - a handful

Method 

Mix everything in a food processor or in a large bowl whisk it up and pour the batter in a pan . Top it with a handful of butterscotch and bake in a preheated oven at 180 degrees celsius for about 20 - 25 mins or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean

The butter scotch gives a very nice crunchy crust for the cake !

Lychee cake with butterscotch

Ok now I know you got a hint that I try to make cake out of anything, and tell you all the truth I have realised that the world and the nature is so versalite that it does listen to us if we respect them. Ok so here where have I given the respect to the lychees to turn it into cakes .. I will tell you how :)

Being a mother I wish my kids eats all the good things specially seasonal fruits and being a south Indian have never tasted lychees before, and being privileged  to live in a big city  u get variety of seasonal fruits available across the country. And since my kids take only selective fruits my crazy mind worked in a cakey way :) and the result is a lychee cake. Though the cake was sold at home I would frankly tell you that the cake dint have much flavour of lychee, since lychee itself has a very subtle taste. Anyway still if you want to know the recipe here it goes

Whole wheat flour- 1 cup
Sugar - 1/2 cup ( powdered)
Butter - 1/4 cup
Lychee puree - 2/3 cup
Eggs - 2 no.s
Baking powder - 1 tspn
Butter scotch - a handful (optional)

Method
Sift the flour with the baking powder and keep aside
Beat the eggs till fluffy and then add the sugar and beat again
Add the flour mixture to the egg sugar mixture little by little by adding lychee puree in between and make sure the wet and dry ingredients are well incorporated . Make sure you dont over mix the batter and finally throw in some butterscotch into the batter.
Pour the batter into mould and bake at a preheated oven at 180 degrees for 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted come out clean. Let the cake sit outside for about 5 minutes and then turm to a wire rack and slice when it cools down.
Done .. Bake and enjoy!

Avacado cake with blue berries

Have been venturing out with avocados for sometime now, and this time its cake since I also had some fresh blue berries with me and wanted to try it out too in cakes. 

Following is the recipe

Ingredients

Whole wheat flour - 1 cup

Eggs - 2 no.s

Sugar - 3/4 cup

Baking powder - 1 tspn

Butter - 2 tbspn

Milk - 1/2 cup

Avocado - 1 ( remove the pulp and mash and keep aside)

Blue berries - a handful

Chocochips - a handful

Method

Sift the flour with baking powder and keep aside

Melt the butter in milk and mix the avocados and keep aside

Take a big mixing bowl and break in two eggs and beat till fluffy and then add in the powdered sugar and beat again. Now slowly add in the flour mixture and avocado- butter- milk mixture alternatively and fold in the egg mixture, starting and ending with flour. Throw in the blue berries at this stage and also throw in the choco chips.

Bake in a loaf tin in a preheated oven at 180 degrees celsius for about 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Bake and enjoy :)!

Simple vanilla sponge cake with fresh cream frosting

Have baked loads of cakes and among that loads of vanilla sponge cake, but was never as happy as I have done this cake. Some how the cake was soft and spongy than many other recipes I tried. I used whole wheat too. I got this recipe from here and I just replaced the flour with whole wheat flour and no other changes.May be you can reduce sugar to your taste.
The recipient of this cake a 3 yrs old little angel who wanted a 'blue butterfly' and when I had all the ingredients I agreed on giving it a shot.. and by God's grace it was not bad either, according to the reviews :)
I did think about how to bring about the shape of the butterfly, thought of many sized and shaped pans and finally decided to do in a rectangular pan and carve the shape out. Hmm.. may be I could do it a lot better next time :) Anyway here is the recipe for the same

Ingredients
4 eggs
2 cups sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup whole milk
1/4 cup butter (lightly salted)
2 cups  flour  (I used whole wheat flour )
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt


1. Beat eggs in large mixing bowl with paddle attachment for 4 minutes or  use an electric egg beater.
2. Add sugar, and continue beating for another 4-5 minutes until light and fluffy.  Add vanilla and stir on low until just combined.
 3. In a separate bowl, sift together dry ingredients.  Add to eggs and sugar on low speed until just combined.
4. In a saucepan, heat milk and butter on low heat just until butter is melted and wait for it to be cool. Add to batter, beat just until combined.
5. Pour into two greased and floured 8" round cake pans.
6. Bake at 325 until the middle springs back when touched, or a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove from oven and let stand in pans for 10 minutes. Then turn out onto wire cooling racks and cool completely.

I traced the pan in a paper and tried a shape of the butter fly onto it and then cut out the shape and cut the cake accordingly. Be careful while carving the cake and I would advice you to refrigerate the cake for a while so that it becomes easier for carving

For the decoration I used 'Tropolite' cream and whipped it up adding colour until light, fluffy and stiff. Use an icing nozzle to pipe in the cream over the cake. You can use all you creative juices to have the best decorated butterfly :)

Bake and enjoy!!!

Simplest cake with no butter

Have a major cake in agenda, reason being my son's b'day and on my shopping to procure some stuffs , I found this beautiful butterfly silicon mould. I cudnt stop myselves from buying it , I know many would agree with me in that aspect of 'shopping' :)

Ok anyway that same afternoon my daughter was quite restless missing her brother who started with full day school and hence we both decided to bake a cake which is really really simple. I have heard this recipe before and just last week my friend also told about it and so thought of giving it a try and also to try out my new mould :)

Following is the recipe

Eggs - 3 no.s ( I took country eggs)

Flour- 1/2 cup ( whole wheat )

Sugar - 1/4 cup

Vanilla essence - 1/4 tspn

Milk - 2 tbpsn

Choco chips

Method

Beat eggs with an egg beater till fluffy and double or even the triple its quantity. Slowly add in the powdered sugar and whisk again and also add the vanilla essence. Fold in the flour and and also add the milk. Finally throw in the choco chips ( this is only for the sake of being fancy :) ) and pour in the mould and bake at 170 degrees celsius in a preheated oven for about 15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean.

 

Remove from oven and let it cool.. Serve !

Pretty easy na.. and no butter or oil too...

Bake and enjoy!!!

Choco chip peanut butter cupcakes

Now this recipe is totally inspired seeing my peanut butter jar lying at my cabinet which will get expired soon ! . Neither my kids nor us like the taste of peanut butter so it was just lying like that. I did try peanut butter cookies a while back , so I thought of trying cupcakes this time and it was good! So tells my kidoos who happily munched it off!

Now shall I proceed to the recipe

Whole wheat flour- 1 cup

Powdered sugar - 1/2 cup

Vanilla essence  1/2 tspn

Egg - 1

Peanut butter - 1/2 cup ( in which 2 tbspns is butter)

Choco chips- a handful

Baking soda- 1/2 tspn

Baking powder - 1/2  tspn

Milk- 1 cup

Method

Sift together the flour, sugar, baking soda and baking powder and keep aside. 

Beat together the egg , peanut butter and the butter till soft and fluffy.

Add in the vanilla essence

Fold in the flour and milk alternately till the batter comes to a smooth consistency.

Throw in the choco chips and fold in again

Scoop out the batter with an icecream scoop to the cupcake moulds place with the liner.

Bake in a preheated oven for about 13-15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean  at 180 degrees Celsius
 

Remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack and get ready to munch on it!  

Eggless dates cake

Date cake- Eggless

Ingredients:
18 dates
3/4 cup milk
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup oil
1 tea spn baking soda
1 tbl spn any nuts ( optional)


Method:
Soak the dates in warm milk overnight or just heat milk and dates for few minutes or microwave them so that dates becomes soft and help in grinding. Remove the seeds. Add sugar and grind them to a smooth paste along with the milk in which it is soaked in. Add oil and mix.
Sieve together flour and baking soda. Add the flour one table spoon at a time and mix slowly. Add the nuts and mix.
Preheat the oven at 350F. Bake the cake in a greased oven proof dish for 35-40min (or till a knife inserted in the cake comes out clean). 


Note : This cake was done in my convection microwave those days , will take a proper picture when I bake this yummy cake n my OTG next time .

Eggless butterless chocolate cake

Egg less chocolate cake


Ingredients 

1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
4 tbsp. cocoa
1 tsp. vanilla
1 tbsp. vinegar
6 tbsp. oil
1 cup cold water


Method

Preheat oven to 350°F.
Grease an 8 or 9-inch square baking pan or 9 x 12-inch pan.

Combine flour, sugar, salt, baking soda and cocoa. Sift all together in the pan in which you will be baking the cake. Using a spoon, dig 3 holes or wells in the dry ingredients.

In one, put 1 teaspoon vanilla, in another, 1 tablespoon vinegar and in the third, 6 tablespoons of oil. Pour over the top 1 cup cold water; stir with a fork.

Bake the cake in preheated oven for about 25 or 30 minutes. 




Note : Picture is ancient :)

Whole wheat jaggery cake

I know this picture looks bad , but nevertheless its quite close to my heart as its one the early pic I took when I had just started the journey of my culinary experiments :) . By now you would have seen that I stay away from using white flour for my bakes and experiment with other flours and this was the first among the few first experiments.

I have got positive feedback from quite a lot of people who tried this cake . So following is the recipe for the same . Try making it , I am sure you will fell less guilty of having a cake and eating it too!!!

Ingredients
1 cup cooking oil
2 cups jaggery ( powdered)
1 tsp. vanilla
4 eggs
2 c. whole wheat flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder

Method
In a large mixer bowl blend oil and jaggery in an electric mixer until smooth. Add vanilla; beat in eggs one at a time. In another bowl stir together flour, baking soda, baking powder (1 teaspoon of salt optional). Add to egg mixture until well blended.

Pour batter into a greased and lightly floured pan. Bake at 180 degrees Celsius for 50-60 minutes until the cake tests done. Cool in pan, then invert on serving plate. Optional to sprinkle powdered sugar on top.

Orange marmalade cake

Orange marmalade cake


Ingredients
1/4 cup orange juice
2 tspn grated orange rind
1/2 cup orange marmalade
2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour 
2 1/2 tspn baking powder
150 gms butter
3/4 cup sugar
3 eggs separated
1/2 cup tutti frutti
1/2 to 2/3  cup milk


Method


Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius. Grease and line a baking pan
Sift the flour and baking powder together. Cream the butter, orange rind, sugar and egg yolk in a bowl with an electric mixer on a med speed or with a whisk until light and fluffy. Stir in the marmalade and tutti -frutti. Fold in the sifted flour alternatively with milk and orange juice.
Beat the egg whites until they form peaks and fold gently into the cake mixture.Pour the batter into prepared tin and bake in the preheated oven for 25 - 35 minutes . Remove from the oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool.


Recipe source : Sanjeev kapoors cakes and bakes with minor changes in some ingredients and the temp.

Fatless sponge cake

Basic fatless sponge cake


Eggs -  4 no.s
Powdered jaggery - 3/4 cup OR 1/2 cup sugar
Vanilla essence - 1 tspn
Whole wheat  flour ( atta) - 1 cup
Almonds 1/2 cup ( powdered)
Baking powder - 1 tspn


Method


Preheat the oven to 180- degrees celsius
Beat together the eggs , powdered jaggery and the vanilla esssence till light and creamy. Gradually fold in the flour stirring with a light hand in one direction only.
Add in the powdered almonds and fold again.
Pour the batter in a prepared pan and bake for 20-30 minutes or until the toothpick inserted comes out clean.