When the pandemic hits and you want preserves with your home-made ricotta , you go to the freezer. This is very quick and bubbles happily while you make brunch. In a pan, add a 10oz pack of frozen blackberries, about a tsp of fresh grated ginger (I always have frozen ginger) and 1 tbsp of so of mulling spices, pumpkin spice or any variation of clove/cinnamon/all spice/cardomom you wish. Cook for 20 minutes- stirring every few minutes.
Ricotta is a soup-ier creamier paneer. Delicious savory with eggs or on pizza or sweetened with sugar or honey with fruit and pancakes or crepes or toast or crumpets. Problems of rubbery ricotta can be solved by just giving the acid time- leave it be to do it’s magic. Draining early causes rubbery curd- still delicious just not as creamy.
I use vinegar with Melissa Clark’s milk-yogurt-cream proportions. The yogurt really works and makes the ricotta curds creamy. Bring to a low simmer: 4 cups of whole milk, 1/2 cup of heavy whipping cream and 1/4 cup of yogurt. Add 1/2 tsp of salt and 2 tbsp of white vinegar. Stir till the curds seperate. Remove off heat and leave curd-whey mixture alone for 10-15 minutes. Strain with cheesecloth/coffee filters over a colander for 5-20 minutes (depending on how firm you want your ricotta). I drain for about 6-7 minutes generally. The ricotta should keep for a few days – I wouldn’t know- this is such a delicious treat with sugar that we finish ours the same day everytime.
When you order all purpose flour in a pandemic and the store has run out, the teenager bagging and delivering your groceries substitutes the first flour he/she can see. So I have a considerable amount of semolina flour, rye flour, almond flour and spelt flour to experiment with. This cake is the result of a search for a semolina cake and it is a winner. Based off this Tejal Rao recipe in the NYT– it is a dense very sweet cake. But the sweetness is not cloying, it is a sweetness of a good gulab jamun or a baklava, a pleasant delicious moreish sweetness.
The recipe is extremely simple. Preheat oven to 400F and grease a 9×13 inch baking pan
Step 1- to one cup of yogurt, add 2.5 tsp of baking soda, mix well and allow it to froth and rise. It rose up to nearly 3 cups by volume in 10 minutes.
Step 2: Mix 3 cups of semolina flour with 1.5 sticks (3/4 cup, 12 tbsp) of melted butter and 3/4 cup of sugar till there are no lumps.
Step 3: Add yogurt to flour and mix well (yes till no lumps remain). Spread in prepared pan.
Step 4: Score in diamond shapes and add a nut to each diamond- I used walnuts. Bake for 30 minutes or so. The scoring is unnecessary in my opinion. Just sprinkle the nuts on top.
Step 5: Make syrup with 2 cups of sugar and 1 cup of water and add 1tbsp of lemon juice and 1 tbsp of flavor (the recipe suggests lavender or rose water , I used vanilla)
Step 6: When cake is done (it pulls away from the sides)- pour the syrup(yes, all of it) on the cake evenly. Let cool and then cut along the pre-scored shapes.
Eat with coffee or wine
My friend Anshu is from Himachal Pradesh, the beautiful hill state of India. She tells me pahari (hill) food means no onions and no garlic. Sounds good to me- less prep is always good. This is her recipe. My only modification is to use ghee (or butter). In Maharashtrian food- the tempering for yogurt based dishes is always in ghee. This was so good with dosa. It’s also delicious with rice and roti.
Boil and cube 3-4 medium potatoes (about 1-2 cups)
To a cup of yogurt- add 1/2 tsp each of turmeric, red chili powder, cumin powder, coriander powder and salt.
Tempering (phodni/tadka): heat 2-3 tbsp of butter till it lightly browns or ghee- add 1 tsp of cumin seeds till they sputter, add a pinch of asafetida.
Add potatoes and cook till they are heated up: Add the yogurt mixture and about 1/2 cup of water. Cook over gentle heat till bubbling (about 5 -10 minutes). Add 1/2 tsp of garam masala and cilantro to garnish.
When you need a quick jam with your pancake or Dutch Baby– this works. Also works for all frozen fruit.
Heat a 10 oz bag of frozen pineapple or berries or mango. Add a quarter cup of sugar and 1 tbsp of mulling spices (or pumpkin spice or any blend of cloves, cardamom, nutmeg, all spice, ginger you wish). Cook for 20 minutes on low-medium while your pancakes are cooking. This jam won’t keep and may or may not set. If you wish to be precise- heat the jam to 220 F (setting temperature), I don’t particularly care because this version has never survived more than a day in my house- my kids licks up the bowl once the jam is gone.
A Dutch Baby pancake is a yorkshire pudding by another name. An enormous puffed up layer of deliciousness with chewy bits under the crust. My modification to the recipe is to brown the butter before the batter gets added it and adding bread flour. The butter has to be hot, the pan has to be hot and remember never to open the oven to check on your Dutch Baby till 20 minutes are done. The recipe is modified from this Florence Fabricant NYT recipe.
Heat oven to 450F with a 10 inch cast iron skillet.
Blend 3 eggs, 1/2 cup of bread flour (or all purpose flour), 1/2 cup of milk, 1 tbsp of sugar and 1tsp of flavor (for eg vanilla, orange zest, orange essence, lemon zest, cardamom). Blend for about a minute till all the flour gets incorporated into the batter.
Add 4 tbsp of butter to the hot cast iron in the oven (or on the stove). Heat for 1-4 minutes till the milk solids start browning. This burns very fast- be careful (or skip this step and heat till the butter starts to bubble). Add batter and return to the oven for 20 minutes. Shut off the oven after 20 minutes and cook for another 5 minutes.
Serve with home-made pineapple jam and that maple syrup sampler from the Vermont trip that you never opened and found during pandemic pantry cleaning.
This is a childhood favorite for every Indian child. It’s a pudding I guess but with more structure. The mango is completely optional, add bananas or raisins or pineapple or almonds to the halwa if you wish. it’s traditionally made with cashews and raisins. The cardamom is essential, the saffron is delicious but not essential.
Roast one cup of rava (coarse semolina) in a quarter cup of butter or ghee. The rava will become pale brown and nutty and burns very fast. Roast the cashews with the rava towards the end. Maybe a quarter cup or so of cashews.
Add 2 cups of milk and 1 cup of water with 1 tbsp of ground cardamon and a pinch of saffron. Add about 10oz of mango (I had a bag of frozen mangos) and cover and steam for 10 minutes. Stir every few minutes to prevent sticking. Then add 3/4 cup of sugar. Stir, turn off heat and cover for 5 minutes. That’s it ! Serve with coffee or tea.
The quarantine has led me to a lot of bread recipes. I enjoy trying new things but I come back again and again to my favorite loaf .The recipe works as a boule and a loaf. It is delicious with butter, hearty enough for soup and fantastic as garlic bread. This is a recipe from my all time favorite bread book- Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. Everyone should buy this book . The premise is simple, make a no-knead dough and let it rise slowly. The yeast does the gluten development for you. Let it rest in your refrigerator. The bread picks up delicious sourdough flavors. When you want to bake, all you have to do is separate out enough dough for one loaf and shape and let it rise.
This recipe makes two loaves- about a pound each. This can be doubled easily if you are planning to bake 4 loaves over 14 days.
Dal Makhani is the king of all dals. This is a restaurant dal, a dal to be savored with butter naans fresh out of the tandoor. Unless you live in Omaha, where what passes for dal is a sad approximation of the real thing. Here is how I make the dal makhani of my dreams. Warning- this is a slow cook, but with minimal work other than stirring.
1) Soak 1 cup black whole urad dal and 1 cup rajma or red kidney beans seperately overnight
2) Rinse the water off. Pressure cook (I use my cuisinart pressure cooker) the dal with about 4 cups of water and a tsp of salt for 10 minutes.
3) Separately- heat 2 tbsp of oil, add 4-5 cloves of whole garlic and cook till pale golden. Add the rajma and 4 or so cups of vegetable stock (I use water and better than bouillon). Pressure cook for 15 minutes. This is my standard quick rajma-without-spice-for-rice recipe.
4) Melt one stick of butter. Add 1-2 tsp of cumin seeds and 1 large onion. Caramelize on low heat for 20-40 minutes till dark brown but not burnt.
5) Add 2 tbsp of ginger and 2 tbsp of garlic and 1 14oz can of San Marzano tomatoes (pureed) and 1 tsp of red chilli powder (I like using the Korean gochugaru) . Cook this on low heat till the butter seperates from the paste. This takes about 15 minutes
6) Add the dal and the water and 1/2 cup of kidney beans and 1/2 cup of the kidney bean water (from the pressure cooker). Cook stirring frequently for 15-20 minutes
7) Add 1tsp of garam masala and about half a cup of heavy whipping cream
This makes enough dal for 10 people or so. It freezes beautifully- I generally freeze half if there is a pandemic and no one to share it with
The quarantine has changed my baking. The creaming and the whisking and the finicky angel food and genoise sponges are in the past. Give me a good solid oil cake using the muffin method anyday. If the cake can use up the frozen berries that have been in the freezer since the smoothie phase years ago- even better! This is based off a NYT Dawn Perry recipe. Couple of things to remember- don’t defrost your berries, this is a slow cooking cake and the berries form their own jammy pockets. Also poking this cake with a skewer to see if it is done may or may not work- you may hit some fruit which will be wet. The sugar on top is essential- the crackly crust goes brilliantly with the jammy fruit. I’ve used a 10 oz bag of just rasperries and a 10 oz bag of mixed berries- works great with both. Cut the strawberries into rasperry size bites.
Heat oven to 350 F and prep a 9 inch square or round pan (butter and flour/PAM spray/parchment). Parchment works best for this cake- it is a soft cake.
Dry ingredients- whisk with a fork to combine: 1.5 cups all purpose flour, 1.5 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp baking soda, 1/2 tsp kosher salt
Wet ingredients: whisk well till sugar dissolved: 1cup sugar, 1/2 cup buttermilk (or milk with 1/2 tsp vinegar) , 1/2 cup neutral oil (canola, vegetable etc), 2 eggs and 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
Mix dry and wet ingredients till just mixed (there will be lumps- such is life) . Toss a 10 oz bag of frozen berries with 1 tbsp of flour -gently fold into batter.
Add batter to pan, sprinkle 2 tablespoons of sugar evenly on top and bake for 55 minutes or so till the top is golden. Eat with whipped cream if you are feeling particularly indulgent and the news has been really depressing.
Delhi Girl Meets Food 