Cucumber avocado rolls and Baked parmesan zucchini

Considering I find cooking tedious , it's ironic that it is the most creative thing I do presently.... 😄  😄
Cucumber avocado rolls; Baked Parmesan zucchini; a salad of roasted shiitake and capsicums to go with pan fried Salmon... Happy weekend !!

These are not original recipes but have been improvised from recipes on Pinterest.

 1. Cucumber Avocado Rolls : Mash an avocado and add lemon juice, salt, pepper to taste. Cut a cucumber thinly lengthwise with a mandolin. Apply the avocado paste to the cucumber slice and  sprinkle a little red chilli powder for taste and more for decoration. Chill it in the refrigerator till it is time to serve.

2. Baked Parmesan Zucchini : I had never cooked zucchini or seen a zucchini till I came to Singapore. But now it is one of my favourite vegetables as it is so easy to chop, cook.. ;) :)

Quarter zucchini length wise. Drizzle olive oil on it.  Sprinkle a mixture of grated parmesan, Italian seasoning, ground black pepper on the zucchini. Bake in a preheated oven at 180 degrees centigrade for fifteen minutes or till cooked.  Serve warm.

3. Pan fried Salmon

Apply turmeric powder , salt and chilli powder to taste ( chilli powder is optional) to the washed salmon. Heat the oil till it is very hot. Fry the salmon on both sides till crisp. Serve warm.

Aalu Achaari , Aalu achaar

Aaloo achaar as learnt from my friend and cook par excellence Neeta Agrawal..... Chop two boiled potatoes and add turmeric powder - salt to them ( as I worry about burning the turmeric powder if I add to oil directly).  Heat mustard oil and give a chonk of methi seeds / temper with fengureek seeds . Add finely chopped green chillies and the potatoes. Saute them for some time. Add grounded roasted jeera ( say 1/2 measuring teaspoon) and coarsely grounded roasted sesame seeds ( say 1 measuring tablespoon) and saute for a minute. Sprinkle lemon juice and put off the fire... It tastes lovely, achaari and its different like the Maggi sauce ad goes..😊😊

Eggless ginger walnut banana cupcakes

Eggless ginger walnut banana cupcakes.. This recipe by Sunita Bhuyan uses atta / whole wheat flour  and so works out like a good snack too for those who would like to minimize use of maida / refined flour... The next time, I  will bake them longer and in smaller cups ... 1.25 cups of atta/ whole wheat flour  sieved with 2 teaspoons  of baking powder and 1/3rd tsp of baking soda + 1 over ripe banana+ 1/2 cup almond milk + 4 teaspoon ground ginger + chopped 12 pieces of candied ginger + chopped 8 pieces of walnut + 1/4th tspn nutmeg powder + 1/2 cup oil + 4 tbspn brown sugar.. Bake at 180 deg in a preheated oven for 20 mins or till an inserted toothpick comes out clean.. For the original recipe and some excellent recipes, do checkout Sunita's blog sunitabhuyan.com

Cointreau infused Nutella Hazelnut chocolates

I came across this lovely post in  Sunita's World  on Nutella and dark chocolates truffles. My son loves nutella and I had some baking chocolate and  Cointreau ( orange liqueur) sitting in my refrigerator -- seemed just the right moment to try out these. I made a basic chocolate .. To make truffles -- finish and all , please do check out Sunita Bhuyan's post the link of which is attached herewith ..

http://sunitabhuyan.com/?p=2909

Ingredients :

1 bottle Nutella ( The packaging we buy here has 375 gms per bottle)

100 gms of dark chocolate

4 tbspns of honey

1 tbspn of ghee (clarified butter)

Hazel nuts (Dry roast and cool)

1 tspn Orange essence

1 tspn of Cointreau

Take a glass bowl . Add the nutella, the dark chocolate broken into pieces, the honey and ghee. Microwave for a minute or less till the dark chocolate melts or softens. Remove from oven and  add the orange essence and liqueur.  Mix properly . The liquid will turn solid as you mix and it cools. You will find the mixture coming out slightly from the sides.  Cover the bowl and refrigerate for an hour. Take small portions. Put a hazel nut  or a filling of your choice while rolling into balls. Place in mini muffin cases. Makes around 42 chocolate balls.

This simple recipe is very versatile and can be tweaked for variety. You may roll it in melted chocolate or cocoa powder or desiccated coconut for different finishes. You may add different fillings inside. You may also divide the mixture into different bowls and add different essences in each making a different flavor . Bon appetit!

Cranberry Orange Lemon Tea Cake

Oh well, the original post calls it a bread -- but for me it is an awesome cake and yes I have it with my evening tea.. And so it is my orange lemon cranberry tea cake... :) :)

Ingredients

1.5 cups Flour

2 tsp  Baking powder

3/4th cup sugar

1 egg

1/3rd cup oil

1/3rd cup milk

a pinch of salt

1 tspn vanilla

Zest of one orange.

1/2 cup cranberries

1/2 cup candied lemon peel.

You may also use one cup of cranberries as in the original recipe. I wanted to increase the taste of orange and candied lemon peels was the nearest thing I had to recreating the taste of an orange.

Procedure

Sift the flour and the baking powder thrice. Do not ask me why , but I have this thing of having to sift thrice. ( Penny! Penny! Penny! ) 

 In a bowl, take the sugar and add the orange zest. Mix it properly for sometime till the sugar becomes orange and the oil of the zest pervades the entire house... Trust me, it smells wonderful. And it allows you to increase the flavor of orange zest in the cake. I picked this up from Dorie Greenspan's French Yogurt cake ( see post) .  If you are in a hurry, you may skip this step .

Add the oil, egg, milk, salt, vanilla. Mix them properly. Add in the cranberries and lemon peel. The recipe says bake it for 20-25 minutes. But she did not mention any oven temperature and so I preheated the oven at 180 degrees and baked it for all of 50 minutes!! And it still did not brown as beautifully as the original post. I guess I need to increase my oven temperature to 200 degrees centigrade and bake it.

Do check out the original post of the recipe at the villagecook.com

http://thevillagecook.com/cranberry-orange-bread/

Bon appetit !!