Mascarpone Mousse Cake with Roasted Strawberries

I was thinking to make a cake for my sisters birthday. I thought of a chocolate layer cake, then a strawberry short cake. While searching for the perfect recipe, I came accross an absolutely perfect baking blog. Hers are the most beautiful cakes I have ever seen. 

The real recipe calls for quark cheese & Balsamic strawberries. I went for simple roasted strawberries & Mascarpone cheese mousse - reason: both of them were in the refrigerator :D.

I made roasted strawberries & the Sponge cake a day before. Both were easy & quick.

Roasted Strawberries in Vinegar

450-500gms strawberries, quartered
1/2 cup vanilla sugar
1/8 cup aged vinegar
Method:
Place the strawberries in a glass baking dish.
Sprinkle over the vanilla sugar, followed by the aged vinegar. Mix gently.
Bake in a preheated oven for 30 minutes. Allow to cool.
Drain strawberries. Put the liquid into a sauce pan, and reduce to a thick concentrate. It will thicken a bit as it cools. Chill before use.

             

Idea: Draw the design on a butter paper and put it arund the cake.

                                    
                                    
                                    
                                    

Mascarpone Mousse Cake with Roasted Strawberries
Sponge Cake {Make 2 sponges. Recipe is for 1 7.5″ cake}
3 eggs
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 a vanilla bean scraped {or 1 tsp vanilla extract}
1/2 cup plain flour
Method:
Line 2 X 7.5″ round tins with baking parchment.
Preheat the oven to 180C.
Beat the eggs with the sugar and vanilla bean until thick and mousse like {about 7-10 minutes}
Gently fold the flour in, making sure you don’t lose volume. {I just dump the whole flour in in one go since I have made this cake so often. You can add it gradually, 2 tbsp at a time, to make sure it mixes through}
Turn the batter gently into the prepared tin, and bake until done for about 20-25 minutes, or till the tester comes out clean.
Cool on racks for 5 minutes, turn out from tins gently, and allow to cool completely.

Mascarpone Mousse Filling
Inspired by BBC Good Food
200gms Mascarpone cheese
200ml low fat cream
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 vanilla bean, scraped
1 cup roasted strawberries  {Reserve 1/4 cup for topping}
Method:
Beat the Mascarpone cheese with powdered sugar and scraped vanilla bean until smooth. Taste and adjust sugar if required.
Whip the cream to soft peaks, and fold into the whipped Mascarpone cheese.
Add the balsamic strawberries {reserving 1/4 cup for topping}, and gently fold in to mix through.

Topping
100ml low fat cream
2-3 tbsps powdered sugar
Method:
Whip cream with sugar to medium peaks.
Add 1/8 tsp gelatin to reserved 1/4 cup strawberries, and gently simmer, stirring all the while till thick and jam like. Leave to cool completely.
1/4 cup strawberries and 1/8 tsp gelatin. Mix through, and then simmer on low heat till it becomes thick and jam like.
Lime-Sugar Syrup
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
Juice of 1 lime
Method:
Boil for 5 minutes till sugar melts. Add the lime juice. Allow to cool.

Assemble Cake:
Slice the sponges horizontally into two. Brush each layer with lime-sugar syrup as you work. Sandwich the layers with the Mascarpone mousse, and cover the sides with it too.
Add a lace border if you like. Cover the top with whipped cream, and top with some jellied roasted strawberries.
Finish the top and edges off with chocolate shavings etc.

Chill well before serving so that the flavours mature.

 
                         

Strawberry Mousse with Home-made Yougurt

“So many ideas, so much I want to do, so little time…

But I love the feeling of being inspired…”

Canelle Vanille on Twitter

When Foodilicious Cooks announced the *farangi meetha* dessert contest, the first thing came up on my mind was mousse & strawberries. The contest calls for a sweet with milk and 1 fruit. So, I went on making a home-made yogurt and strawberry puree a day before.

This a very refereshing, low-calorie dessert with no preservatives used(other than gelatine;))

First, I made a biscuit base.Pressed it down firmly to make a base. Next step was the dark strawberry layer following the light strawberry layer. Covering it with home-made strawberry puree. I kept the moulds in the refrigerator for 3 hours. 3 hours were too long to spend:P Was fun making it as i was getting very impatient to see the layers:D. and how it would come out. 


Perfect for summers - Light and ever-so-satisfying dessert!

Recipe:
Biscuit base Ingredients:
100gms digestive biscuits; ground
4 tbsp melted butter
Method:
Mix the crumbs in with the melted butter to form the crumb mixture for the base.
 
Strawberry Mousse
Ingredients:
100gms Yogurt 
50 gms Cream Cheese
100gms Whipped Cream
1tbsps gelatin
200gms Strawberries; pureed 
4-5 tbsps powdered sugar
Method:
Blend the yogurt, strawberries & powdered sugar together until smooth. Add the clear gelatin & whisk. This makes the dark strawberry mousse. Once you use a portion of this in the first mousse layer, add the whipped cream to the rest to make the light strawberry layer. Pour the remaining strawberry puree on the top. And put it in the refrigerator for 3 hours.

Serve it with strawberries.

Fettuccine alfredo

Todays lunch - Fettuccine Alfredo. 

When you are running out of time. Or you arnt in mood. This is it!! Just 10 min. Haha!!

Fettuccine alfredo is a pasta dish made from fettuccine pasta tossed with Parmesan cheese and butter. Its simple, its rich & very classic!!

Here is the most reliable recipe: 

               Ingredients

• 1 pound  Fettuccine Noodles

• 1 stick  Butter

• 1 cup  Heavy Cream

• Salt and Pepper, to taste

• 2 cups  Freshly Grated Parmesan Cheese

                     Preparation Instructions

• Cook pasta according to package directions.
• In a saucepan or skillet, warm butter and cream. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper.
• Grate Parmesan cheese and place half of it into a large serving bowl. Pour warm butter/cream mixture over the top.
• Drain pasta and immediately pour it into the bowl.
• Toss a couple of times, then sprinkle in the other half of the Parmesan.
• Toss to combine, thinning with pasta water if necessary.
• Serve immediately.

Paneer Cigar Rolls

This is the second time I have tried Paneer. The first time was when I made paneer makhani, which turned out absolutely awesome(recipe yet to post :P). This recipe is taken from here. This is one of my favourite place for perfect desi recipes. I wish I could try each and every recipe of hers =:)

Back to Paneer cigar rolls, I used store bought patties. mixed the ingredients, rolled out & fried. Easy & Quick - that`s the point!!

Recipe (yield approx 15-20 rolls depending on the size of your rolls)

20 wonton wrappers/ samosa patties.

For the Stuffing
1 cup crumbled paneer
1/4 cup approx of v finely chopped onions
1-2 green chillies, chopped finely (or as per taste)
1-2 cloves of garlic, finely minced (or as per taste)
1/4 cup fresh mozzarella, crumbled (or use grated mozzarella)
1/4 cup tomatoes, finely chopped
1 inch ginger, peeled and grated
1-2 drops of rice vinegar (or use regular – optional)
salt to taste (little since wrapper also has salt)

Method

On a stove top in 1 tsp oil, add all the ingredients together except the cheese. Saute until soft. You can do a taste test and change the seasoning according to your taste.

Remove from heat and add fresh mozzarella. Toss until well mixed.

roll it.
Now fry these up in hot oil.

Serve hot with ketchup and wait for compliments :P.

Jalebis - My love!

I love desserts!

And I love Jalebis!!

I have tried Jalebis with a lot different recipes before. The yeast, the yogurt, the gram flour and sometimes semolina too. I never got the crispy-ness. So this time around I thought I'd use a different recipe. This is the most simplest and the easiest one ever. I would say, this recipe had a

better outcome. Or maybe I have become a better cook now ;)

Recipe

1 cup flour

1tsp level baking powder

2 pinch yellow food colour

3 cups sugar

1 ½ glass water

cold water to mix

Make the sugar syrup, let it cool completely, it should be thick, only then the jalaibi will get it’s taste.

Mix the flour, with the food colour and mix it with COLD water, it will start turning very sticky like a glue, keep mixing strongly with a whisker till the batter is very creamy but not runny.

I use the icing set which is used for cakes and fix the tinniest nozzle on it as when you drop the batter in the oil it will raise in size so better use the smallest one, now heat the oil, fill in the icing device, and go round round with it dropping it in the oil and make the form of jalaibi .

Don’t fry too long you will feel as the colour changes to a light brownish orange, take it out and put it directly in the syrup BUT take it immediately out after 4-5 seconds!! If it stays long it will become very soggy, to have it crunchy you have to hurry, place them on a grill so that the extra syrup runs out, don’t cover them they will stay crunchy 100% !!!

Now enjoy and eat my share too