Dry Fruits Laddoo for Bhogi

First, let me wish all of you a happy and prosperous new year 2018. Days are quickly passing by and we are almost closing the first month of this year.
We celebrated Thai Pongal after missing celebrations for three years in a row. In these recent years, our celebrations are quite low key; to make ado for just two of us seems pointless. Nonetheless, to not celebrate, will never be my option. I love all the festivals and connected rituals and would not wish to skip.
Nostalgia sets in when between our sisters and cousins we reminisce the elaborate festive arrangements that used to take place in our childhood.
The other day, we were talking about the long hours we spent drawing the kolams for three nights in a row; the back breaking competition like effort we put in to show off our skills. One thing lead to another and we remembered helping arrange the flowers for the kaappu kattu on the Bhogi day and so on. Naturally we were asking each other about their choice of sweets and such.
I decided to move away from my comfort and go to Tirunrlveli halwa that I repeatedly made over years. I wanted to try doing something more healthy and less-on-effort sweet. I zeroed in on this easy and very quick, almost no cooking involved, laddoo with dry fruits. Last year for Ugadi, my friend had made it for us and we spoke about the recipe which goes by eyeball measures. However, I decided to measure in volume so I can keep a staple basic recipe and play around if I fancied. I have been keeping stock of nuts, seeds and dry fruits to snack on. So, it was quick to pull out a few and combine them in a delicious mix. I have used a small list of these. One can always put any nut, seed and dry fruit in any number of combinations. You can make it vegan by using coconut oil in the place of ghee.

Dry Fruits Laddoo

Ingredients:
Makes 20 laddoos , small in size - about 1'' in diameter
2 cups roughly chopped fleshy dates ( packed somewhat tight )
1/3 cup almonds in skin
1/3 cups cashews broken in big pieces
1/3 cups unsalted pistachios
1 tablespoon white sesame seeds
1 tablespoon pumpkin seeds
1/4 teaspoon cardamom powder
A pinch of nutmeg powder
4-5 strands of saffron
1 tablespoon ghee / clarified butter (divided)
1/4 cup desiccated coconut

Method:
Put a heavy and wide pan on heat. Dry roast the almonds until they are nicely warm, not browning quickly.
Add the pistachios and pumpkin seeds to the same pan and toss them around on low heat.
Add half of the ghee into this and drop the cashew nuts. Roast them until the cashews are golden in colour.
Add the saffron and the sesame seeds. Allow the sesame seeds to pop and remove the pan from the heat.
Allow the roasted nuts and seeds to cool down. Transfer them to a blending jar and pulse to a coarse powder that still has bits of the cashews and almonds that are not processed fully.
Transfer this nut mix to a wide bowl.
In the same blender jar pulp the dates roughly. Add to it the rest of the ghee and pulse further until it comes together in a mass. Few chucks of dates also left out in the process add a bite to the sweet.
Transfer the pulp to the nuts mixture, add the cardamom and the nutmeg powders.
Grease your palms, very lightly with ghee or coconut oil and gather the mixture in a slightly stiff dough like mass.
Pinch out small portions and roll them in laddoos/ balls.
Place the desiccated coconut in a flat dish and roll the laddoos in it to coat evenly on them.

Store in containers until need to use.
These have long shelf life. We have only just finished consuming all of them, ten days later.

Battenberg Cake - No Eggs In the Cake

 I seem to have fallen into a pattern of neglecting this space and giving excuses for that. However, my husband and daughter do not agree and push me hard enough to post here once in a few months or so. They try hard to coax me to make an attempt to keep this going.
 My daughter, especially, goes that extra step to persuade me by sharing her cooking and baking. This is one such post that was 100% hers. She baked this cake a few days ago for their weekend snack and shared her photographs. They were so eye catching that I asked her to make a blog to be put up here.
 She said that when they moved to the new city and she was still getting her home in some order, she wanted to do something enough to break the boredom. While she was looking through recipes to bake, the Battenberg cake caught her fancy. Since they both like chocolate and the flavour of coffee, she alternated for the traditional bright colour layer with the brown checkers.
 Known by many names, like church or chapel window cake, chequerboard cake and domino cake, the Battenberg cake is said to have been named in honour of the marriage of Princess Victoria, grand daughter of Queen Victoria to prince Louis of Battenberg in 1884. However, there are some early examples of this that go by a variety of names. The Neapolitan roll, a similar cake contains more squares than four.
 The American version of the battenberg cake is the checkerboard cake that gets the name because while sliced it resembles the board of the game. a typical one alternates vanilla sponge and a chocolate cake and is covered with rich chocolate buttercream icing.
 My daughter made the cake as well as the marzipan without eggs. For the cake, she followed this recipe posted here sometime ago. she used the recipe for one cake but divided it in two half cakes to make the layers. She had used parchment to separate the cake batters and baked them in one cake tin. She said she was not able to take pictures of the process.
I found Traditional Battenberg in Mandi Mortimer's Blog very descriptive, with pictures of how to bake, layer and roll in the marzipan, the post is very helpful.

Battenberg Cake - No Eggs Recipe

The following is my daughter's mail that I have copied verbatim

This recipe is a twist on the traditional Battenberg cake, which is usually made with an almond white cake, and the pairing sponge is a pink one made with a couple of drops of red food color in the white cake batter. I didn't want to be using artificial food coloring, hence the dark chocolate cake. 

You can use any cake recipe you'd like - as long as you can get the size of the cakes right.

Ingredients: 

For the cakes:

All purpose flour - 200 grams.

Cocoa powder - 2 tablespoons. heaped

Sweetened condensed milk - 1 tin (13.6 oz)

Butter - 100 grams

Baking powder - 1 teaspoon

Baking soda - 1 teaspoon

Aerated soda - 150 ml (reserve an extra splash to slacken the chocolate batter if needed)

Almond extract - 1/2 teaspoon

For the marzipan:

Almond flour/meal - 2 cups

Granulated sugar - 1 cup

Icing sugar - 1 cup 

Splash of milk (approx. 1/8 cup) to bind

To assemble:

A jam of your preferred flavor 

Method: 

- To start, make the marzipan. Sift into a big bowl, the almond flour and icing sugar, to get rid of lumps. 

- Add the granulated sugar and mix well 

- Add the milk and knead till the dough comes together

(The marzipan may be quite sticky - if so, add a little more almond flour as you knead) 

- Store in an airtight container in the fridge until you are ready to use

Making the cakes: 

- Preheat the oven to 350F and grease an 8in square tin. Fold a long piece of parchment paper in half along its width, and form a pleat the same height as your tin, to partition your square tin into two equal rectangles. You will be able to bake both cakes side by side.

- In a big mixing bowl, beat together the condensed milk and the butter. 

- Add the almond extract 

- Sift together the flour, baking powder and the baking soda 

- Add the flour mixture and soda alternatively to the beaten butter and condensed milk, beating well after each addition 

- Separate the mixture into two equal parts - use a weighing scale to do this accurately, so that your cakes are even when baked 

- Fill one half of your prepared tin with the white cake mix 

- To the remaining half, fold in the cocoa powder. If your mixture feels a bit stiff, add a little splash of the remaining soda to slacken (you could also add a tbsp. or two of espresso instead, if you'd like - dissolve instant coffee in hot water and add it once it is cool)

- Fill the second half of your tin with the chocolate mixture 

- Bake the cakes for 45-50 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean 

- Cool the cake slightly in the tin, and transfer on to a wire rack to cool completely 

To assemble the Battenberg:

- Trim the cakes, and stack them one on top of the other. 

- Using a serrated knife, slice the cakes along their lengths into batons. Depending on the size of your tin, each cake can be sliced into 2 or 3 pieces 

- Line up the batons, alternating the colors to form a checkerboard, and stick them together with a slathering of the jam 

- To roll out the marzipan, sprinkle your work surface generously with icing sugar, and roll into an approximate rectangle. It needs to be wide enough to cover the length of the cake, and long enough to wrap completely around. 

- To ensure the outside of the marzipan is clean and free of icing sugar, once rolled, I flipped it over so the sugar dusted side is on the inside of the cake 

- Place the cake in the center, and slather on more jam, to help the marzipan to stick 

- Bring the marzipan up from both ends, to meet at the top of the cake, and join the ends. 

- Trim off any overhangs, and flip the cake so that the seam is at the bottom. 

- And you have a beautiful checkered cake with a mildly sweet marzipan icing.

- The cake is best stored in the fridge, and will keep well for about a week in an airtight container.

Enjoy the cake with your favourite cup of tea.