Hot Cross Buns | Whole-wheat Hot Cross Buns | Easter Recipe | Tangzhong Method

Hot Cross Buns are a seasonal yeast bread traditionally served on Good Friday. These are sweet buns spiced with ground cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, and cloves, filled with currants (raisins).What makes them instantly recognizable is that the tops of the bun are marked with a 'cross' which symbolically represents the Cross of Christ and the Crucifixion.

I love doing seasonal bakes and I do try my hand, especially with baking recipes since I love to bake. The past year has been a whirl wind with me since I have tried tons of baking recipes and mind you I do get questions if I have kitchen flops, yes I do. Its been only a year since I have self-learnt to bake, I do read a lot, explore, do trial and errors, but mostly enjoy this new found love to baking bread.

Palak Dal | Spinach Moong Dal | Keera Parrupu

Moong dal is my favorite lentil, it is so versatile and can be made into many varieties using multiple number of vegetable or plain with greens like how I have made it today. Lentils are high in fiber and protein, and low in fat. Eating lentils and other foods that are rich in soluble dietary fiber can help decrease high cholesterol.

I had used spinach leaves in this dal and it is really a great combination. Quick to make and easy to seve along with rice and any of your favorite veg or non-veg side. This is one staple side that appears on our lunch table almost every other week, I even alternate it using fenugreek/ methi leaves. You can also make it plain without any  greens/veg. One other thing I love about this dal is the yellow and green color :-).

Choco Chip Muffins (Eggless, Butterless) ~ My guest post for Nithyas Nalabagam

Nearly a month ago Nithya Naveen of Nithyas Nalabagam sent me a mail to do a guest post and I said yes to her. And right from then I wanted to know more about her & her blog. We did have some conversations and I am so happy to share a recipe for her blog and readers today. Nithya is from Coimbatore, her blog mainly focus on Vegetarian & egg recipes mostly Indian.The past month I have been visiting her blog and she sure has high spirits when it comes to posting. Do check her lovely new blog and follow her. She had just one request she said anything vegetarian or eggless bakes. I had come up with a muffin recipe and she said it would be great if it was eggless, confident me said yes and my mind was all worked up. I had done eggless blueberry muffin recipe and I wanted to come up with a variation so you know what I did came up with my own :-)

Chinese style Chicken Spaghetti | Easy chicken noodles | Chinese chicken noodles

I love all things Chinese, and when its home made I get all excited. Although Chinese food/ buffet is loaded with deep-fried and calories. Simple Chinese cooking can be done at home with few ingredients like this Spaghetti noodles which I tried it the Chinese way. There has been a big fude as to who introduced Spaghetti was it the Chinese or the Italians, I am not joking google it to find your own answer. But what ever be it I love Spaghetti and I love Chinese :-) so here is my own twist.

This Spicy Chicken Spaghetti is quite hot with chili sauce and red chili flakes you can alter it according to your spice tolerance. Nevertheless it tastes absolutely yum !

Chocolate Mousse | Eggless Chocolate Mousse ~ Guest post by Sangeetha

I am so happy to share with all my blog followers a lovely sweet post from my dear friend and sister Sangeetha. She blogs and owns a space called Spicy Treats. She is one of my close friends from the blogging circle, whom I got to talk, chat and laugh with for the past few months. One gem of a person, sweet hearted, down to earth and very caring. Sometimes in life its hard to come across a lovely person and you wonder why didn't we be friends for a long time??? or where, why did we take so long to connect??? I sure got this feeling once we got to talk with each other. Sangee is a big inspiration to me in her blogging skills, versatile recipes, bakes and her beautiful clicks. There have been days that I have admired her bakes and sat and stared at the clicks, that I almost forgot to read the entire post :P. Her skills to capture, play with colors and use props, have really stunned me many a times. I am sure everyone will agree with me by seeing her pics in this post today. There is so many to talk about this lovely friend but I want you all to get to know more about her through this post. She was so sweet to come up with a lovely recipe that too with chocolate :-) now she does know how to win my heart. Sangee, I really am surprised with this post, thank you for talking time to do this recipe and chit-chat. Few of my food loves from her blog are the ~ Pink Roulade, Hidden heart cupcake, Chicken fry, Pinwheel pizza

Bounty inspired pancakes | Chocolate Coconut Pancake | Eggless Butterless Pancake Recipe

Are you a fan of Bounty Chocolate???? I am :-)... I love the flavor of sweet coconut and luscious chocolate, hmmm yummm!!! I always wanted to try something similar in my bakes but I have not found the need time to do one, although I think I need to. This morning my husband had his hunger pranks for breakfast and I have no idea why I thought of this combination, but it worked well. I made chocolate pancake batter, added some dessicated coconut and a little flavoring... volahhh Bounty pancakes, ohh yea with some Nutella too. These softest pancakes made me dream about Bounty in every bite.

Choco Coconut Pancakes/ Bounty Pancakes as I call it is super soft, airy and without eggs and butter, yes you read it right, it is totally egg-free and butter-free. Surely a guilt free indulgence for the morning / brunch munch.

Chickpeas & Sprouted Green Gram Sundal | Healthy Indian Snack Recipe | Protein rich snack recipe

Chickpeas / Channa / Kondakadalai is one of my favorite and I love it almost any form be it pulao, sundal, curry, kurma, biryani and so on. Chickpeas is high in fibre and protien so they make you full and keep you full for long. i have read that they also have the power to reduce cholesterol - Including 3/4 cup (175 mL) of chickpeas in your diet each day can help lower LDL (bad) cholesterol levels, which reduces the risk of heart disease. Chickpeas can be used in salads, soups, curries, chilis, hummus and stews. Or consider roasting them with your favorite savory spices. Chickpea flour is gluten-free and can be used to make pakoras, pappadams or pancakes, or can serve as a substitute for eggs in baked goods.

Being someone who loves this legume. I love to make it quite often and enjoy it. This time around I had picked up some sprouted green gram and was lying around so I had included some of it to make this sundal. It was so filling that I had to skip dinner. Try and enjoy this sundal along with a cup of coffee/ tea

Pinwheel Cookies ~ Guest post for Malabar Ruchi

One big blessing from the virtual world to me is good friends and I am so happy to share today's recipe for one of my good friend Vineetha Susheeb (Vinee) who blogs at Ruchi aka Malabar Ruchi. Her blog is a bakers heaven, she has lots of traditional recipes from Kerala and other Indian recipes too. We got acquainted few months ago through facebook and also we also got to meet at Bloggers Buzz, a food bloggers meet in London. Vinee is such a down to earth person and I can tell you she is very friendly, she has been blogging on and off for nearly 5 yrs now but when you talk to her she will be so humble and listen to you like a newbie blogger. I am so happy to meet and get to talk to her frequently. I was still am really stunned with her fondant cakes and if you have never baked, this is one creative baking skill that Vinee pulls off so well, for instance check out her Scooby cake, Princess cake, Coconut cupcakes, Tuna cutlets and many more. Vinee does bake cakes for friends and extending family, which she also blogs about.

Eggless Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Ganache for a 2 yr old angel

I love all things chocolate and do I really need a reason to love chocolate??? certainly not. Over the weekend we had a birthday party to attend and it was for a cute little princess Olivia who turned two. I wanted to bake her something so that she can have it later so planned to do some cookies and a cake. Like always I was confused as to what to bake and all the recipes I had picked somehow I felt she may not like it. So my safest bet was chocolate, tell me who does not lov will not love chocolate? well it was a pure guess. And to my surprise she actually loved the cake and she is a chocoholic just like me:-) 

The cake was eggless and hence you don't need a beater to cream butter. Its really simple to put together and in a matter of 1 hour you can finish the cake and the ganache (dark chocolate & cream). It is the most simplest of recipes that I found and it came really handy to do. I was in such a hurry to click pics and hence I could not take decent ones.

Mutton Soup | Amma's Recipe | South Indian Style Mutton Soup

I am not a big fan of soups, If you talk about soups the only two recipes that I would recognise is sweet corn chicken soup and the other is this mutton soup that Amma makes. Other than that I am zero when it comes to soups, not that I cannot make them, I just don't enjoy soups or you can say I am not a soup person. Like me, husband also is someone who is not fond of soups. If I ever mention the word soup, he would go soupppppp ahhhhhhh??? :P so I seriously have no motivation to stir soup. Today was one of those days that necessity called for some warm soup, husband was down with flu and after two rasam days I was so looking forward to having something good and I remembered Amma's Mutton soup which she used to give me when I was sick. Usually I love having it along with mashed rice, nice and warm. Its a very comforting food when you are down with a throat pain, cold or runny nose. Another way that I relish this soup is just the liquid served warm before lunch.  

Mutton Soup is very common in the southern part of India,this soup is made by cooking mutton bones with flesh along with spices which is very aromatic and fragrant.  The spice level is less and can be increased or decreased according to taste and preference. If you are a meat eater then you must give this a try and you will keep making it often. Today I served soup with mashed white rice and beans stir fry. Also saved some more of the soup to be relished later.

Channa Dal Halwa | Chickpeas Halwa

As the world celebrates Women's Day today I would also love to share my wishes to all the lovely women in my life ~ my mom, my sisters, my friends, my cousins and every lovely reader. This is my wish for all of you today

Be bold. Be true. Be kind. Be you.

Happy Women's Day !!!

Chana Dal Halwa/ Burfi is a traditional Mugal sweet. It is an aromatic sweet that is loaded with ghee(clarified butter), milk, channa dal, sugar and nuts. Its very popular in the Northern part of India and is adored during festival seasons. For me this was a new sweet recipe, as I have never tried to do halwa with dal. But nevertheless I loved it so much.

Verdict ~ Channa Dal Halwa was super flavorful and melt in your mouth and we kept having more and more. Taste wise I felt it was similar to poli stuffing and close to sweet pongal taste. 

Rose Meringue Cookies ~ My post for Rendez vous with Foodie, Priya's Versatile Recipes

Today is a special day for me, the reason being I am the first one to do the guest post series hosted by my dear friend and fellow blogger Priya Suresh Aks called 'Rendez vous with a Foodie'. Last week Priya aks had approached a group of newbie food bloggers to do guest posts for her famous blog Priya's Versatile Recipes aka Priya's Easy N Tasty Recipes and I jumped to it almost instantly. This series is only for new food bloggers to get to know more about them and the blogs they write and Priya aks plans to do this twice a month.I found this as an immense honor and a superb opportunity to showcase talents from the upcoming bloggers like me. As always I wanted to share a special and favorite recipe for this series and keeping in mind the short time frame, I had planned for this Rose Meringue. Priya aks is a very lovely friend and dear sister to me, and I am so happy to get to know her through this virtual platform, she is an inspiration to me and my cooking. We talk a lot and I got to know more about her and one other reason for doing this guest post is her love for meringue cookies and the color pink. And my own surprise for her is in this post itself. Thank you aks for giving me this lovely opportunity to cook for you, your blog and readers. I hope you like my recipe...

Since 10'th March 2013 is Mothers' Day I planned to dedicate this post to a lovely mother of 3 Priya aks and to every mother in this world also remembering my sweet Amma at this time. Mind you Mother's Day in Europe falls in March, in India and US its in May. So since I live in London I am sending out my wishes to all the Mothers' and mum's to be. Hop to Priya's Versatile recipe, Click to view the full recipe

Blueberry Muffins ~ My Guest post for Sarani's Kitchen

I am so happy when it comes to cooking for friends and today is no exception as this post is solely dedicated to my dear friend Saranya Balaji of Saranis Kitchen. We have been friends in a non-blog way, does that sound right? we got acquainted not though our blogs and we live in the same city and we do meet quite often. We ramble about our husband's, food and any random thing. A few bloggers got to meet her during the Blogger Buzz event that took place over the weekend. I am sure most people have this first impression of her being calm, down to earth and caring. That is exactly how Saranya is to me from day one, a very humble person who has great cooking skills up her sleeve and she is a great foodie too. I really wonder how she maintains her slim frame :P but tell you what she is beautiful and if you had not seen her in a saree, you sure are missing something... that gorgeous :-) ok ok enough of my ramblings I am so excited to cook for my dear friend Saranya Balaji these cute little muffins. During the BB event I seemed to know that she loved the muffins served in the event hence sending this post to her... Do check out her blog for some lovely day to day cooking and easy baking recipes. To view the recipe please hop into Saranya's blog HERE

My experience @ Bloggers' Buzz

One of the best things that happened in 2013 is a Food Blogger's Meet, a get together of like-minded foodies called "Bloggers' Buzz". This was my first ever bloggers meet I had so much fun, made some great friends and we also got to share about things other than food. I was really surprised and happy to see how well organized the event was, right from the start to the end, everything was well co-ordinated and hats off to the BB Team- Preeti Deo, Nupur Mehra, Nisha Thomas & Suchismita Mazumdar for doing this

♥ ROSES CAKE ♥ for 2 gorgeous years

This day 2 years back we said 'I do' and life from then has been a memorable journey. We can't imagine its been 2 years already and sometimes we do feel its been a long time since we've been together. But no matter how we feel we still look back happy, hold hands tightly and look forward to all that is ahead of us. We want to take a moment to thank God for our life and our union, for all the blessings, family and friends that He has blessed us with. Thank You Lord for everything !!!