I have always stayed away from eggless cakes we cause we love very fluffy cakes which are usually made by lot of eggs. But recently, we have got few strict vegetarian friends who do not eat eggs. So I have been venturing into eggless baking. Slowly we have started liking them now. It is amazing that last few cakes that I have baked are all eggless. I baked the very popular date cake for a get together recently and it was gone within minutes. So when we were planning to go for a trip to animal safari over the weekend, I started thinking about cakes. I decided to bake this eggless banana cake with carrots and raisins. I have baked couple of times before and everyone loved it – ofcourse you should like the banana flavor to like this cake!.
This cake is based on a old recipe banana-carrot cake . I tried to change it a bit to taste different and make it little more healthy. Cardamom gives a great aroma to it. I was a bit lazy to make cardamom powder, so I just used 1/2 tea spn. I think 1 tea spn of it would have given a better aroma. The cake came out very moist and soft. The biggest fan was Ishaan, so I was very happy.
Ingredients: 1 cup all purpose flour 1/2 cup wheat flour 1 cup grated carrot 1 cup sugar 1 cup mashed banana (approx 2 bananas) 1 tea spn freshly ground cardamom powder 1/2 cup oil 2 tea spns baking powder 1 tbl spn raisins 1/4 tea spn salt
Method: Preheat the oven at 350F for 10mins. Mix sugar, bananas and oil till they are well mixed. Sieve together flours, baking powder and salt.
Add this mixture to the banana mixture, a little at a time, and mix well. Add carrots, raisins and cardamom powder. Mix with a spatula. Pour it in a well greased baking dish. Bake at 350F for about 30mins or till a knife inserted in the center comes out clean.
Makes about 10-12 pieces Preparation time : 1 hr
I know, I am posting too many nonveg dishes. Somehow I am in that mode these days. I prepared this super delicious Spicy chicken vegetable stew yesterday. I am down with too much cold and cough. Ishaan is also having cold, thankfully so far it is not as severe as mine. It really sucks to get sick during a week when the weather gods decide to give us decent temperatures after very heated days till last week. I had all plans of going to local farmer’s market here yesterday, but all I could think of was sleep!.
I am making a genuine attempt to increase our intake of fresh veggies during every meal. Although our staple is one gravy – one side dish – rice or chapati – one sidedish, I make one extra dish with veggies when I make some kind of nonveg. This is new to us because earlier whenever we had nonveg, we skipped on veggies, all of us have a small appetite and there was just that much space in tummy.
Before coming to US, I had rarely tasted any dish which had both chicken and veggies in it. During our initial years here, one of our friends introduced this to me. I was very skeptical before. Slowly, we got used to it. I have become a huge fan of it now. Yesterday, all I craved was a spicy dish with chicken and lots of vegetables. I initially thought of chicken stew that I had posted many years ago. That had much milder flavors  and I wanted something strong. A quick google search landed me on Food Network’s chicken stew recipe . I pretty much mixed both the recipes and added more spices to make this spicy chicken vegetable stew. The curry leaves gave it a very strong aroma and it was a very comforting dish. The ingredient list is a bit long but all are available in most of Indian kitchens.
Ingredients: 1 lb chicken 1 tbl spn ginger garlic paste 1/2 tea spn red chilli powder 1 tbl spn thick yogurt (curds) 1/2 cup onions 1/2 cup carrots 1/2 cup celery(optional) 1/4 cup fresh/frozen peas 1/2 cup potato 1/2 cup tomato 12-15 curry leaves 1/2 tea spn cumin powder 1/2 tea spn coriander powder A pinch turmeric 1 tbl spn fresh/frozen coconut 3 cloves 1″ cinnamon A small piece of nutmeg 1 mace 2-3 red chillies Oil Salt
Method:
Marinate the chicken in ginger-garlic paste, a little salt and yogurt for about 30 mins. Add chilli powder to it. Heat a big pan and add oil. Add the chicken pieces and cook till they are almost done. Take out the chicken on a plate and keep aside. In the same pan, heat little more oil, add half the curry leaves, onion, celery, carrot and fry for few minutes. Scrape out all the bits of chicken which is stuck to the pan. These bits give flavor. Now add potatoes, cumin and coriander powder, turmeric and fry for few minutes. Add tomatoes, peas, little salt, about 1 cup water. Cover and cook till vegetables are almost done.
Grind together coconut, red chillies, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg and mace. Add the ground paste to the vegetables and let it come to boil. Adjust salt. Add the chicken and remaining curry leaves. Cook for about 5 mins. Serve hot with chapatis or bread.
Serves : 4-5 Preparation time : 45mins
