Foodie Favorites: Kitchen Appliance Edition

Hello to all our Foodie Followers!

Our semester is coming to an end this week but we would like to share one more kitchen tutorial video with you!

In this video check our favorite kitchen appliances that we use almost every day!

Check back all week for our last week of daily posting!

Friday Funday Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies

Who doesn’t love the combo of chocolate and banana? No one that’s who. So why not make bananas unhealthy by baking them into cookies. Or are we actually making cookies healthy by baking in bananas? While you figure that out I’m going to stuff my face with these delicious banana chocolate chip cookies.

Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies 

Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup butter
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• ½ cup mashed banana (one whole banana)
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
•  cup all-purpose flour
• ½ teaspoon baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 cup chocolate chips (a 6 oz bag)

 What to do:

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Using your electric mixer, beat butter and sugar until creamy (about a minute).
3. Beat in egg, vanilla and mashed banana.
4. Add sugar, flour, baking powder and soda, salt.
5. Once completely mixed (about two minutes) stir in chocolate chips.
6. Drop dough balls onto a greased pan (or parchment paper) and bake 11 minutes.

Tips

• Use a really ripe banana.
• Wait to mash the banana until right before you add it or else it will turn brown and get watery. That makes it lose flavor.

This is one of my easiest cookie recipes and I love that you can experiment with the ingredients. Why not try adding some nuts or some dried fruit?

Please share any variations on this recipe that you’d like to try! And be sure to check back next Friday Funday for an extra special brunch edition!

Wild Wednesday's -  Scrambled Eggs it is Today! 

Total time to cook -  10 minutes.

Indian-Style Scrambled Eggs (Egg Bhurji)

Serves 2

Ingredients - 

1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 teaspoon brown or yellow mustard seeds
1 medium onion, diced finely
1 1/2-inch piece ginger, peeled and finely chopped
1 small green bird's eye chili, finely sliced
1 large tomato, chopped
1/8 teaspoon ground turmeric (optional) 
4 large eggs, lightly beaten
Small handful fresh cilantro, to garnish
Salt and pepper, to taste

Directions to cook - 

1. Heat the oil in a skillet and add the mustard seeds. When the seeds start to splutter, about 30 seconds, add the onion. Sauté for 3 to 4 minutes, until just beginning to soften.

2.Add the ginger and green chili to the onion. Sauté for about 30 seconds, then add the chopped tomato and turmeric (if using). Cook together for two to three minutes, until the tomato is just beginning to break down. Turn down the heat to medium low.

3.Stir the eggs into this mixture. Cook, stirring occasionally, until creamy curds form, similar to scrambled eggs. Stir in the fresh cilantro.

4.Season to taste with salt and pepper and serve.

Tasty Tuesday : Summer Drink Jaljeera

With summer stepping in, doctors recommend that you stay well hydrated all day and drink good quantity of water daily. How about sipping some tangy Jaljeera drink to quench your thirst?

Jaljeera(Jal means water and Jeera means Cumin), the original Indian lemonade is a healthy ayurvedic drink which aids in digesting all the fiber that you eat day long, helps to cool the body and reduces the excess heat produced in the body.

7 Health benefits of Jaljeera drink-Aids in weight loss, Reduces acidity and gas filled in your stomach, Puts an end to constipation problems, Stops nausea feeling, Hydrates your body instantly and reduces the painful menstrual cramps.

So for this summer, please try this tangy and healthy Indian Lemonade to cool you off all day.

Prep time: 20 minCook time: 5 minServes 5      
Buying tip: All ingredients are available in any Indian stores.

Ingredients:

·        1 tbsp. seedless tamarind - for a pronounced more sourness, you can add ½ tbsp. of more tamarind.

·        ¾ cup mint leaves/pudina patta

·        1 or 1.5 tsp cumin seeds/jeera

·        1 tsp. fennel seeds/saunf

·        ½ tsp. black pepper

·        ½ or 1 tsp amchur/dry mango powder

·        1 tbsp. boondi(fried chickpea flour)

·        black salt or rock salt as required

Preparation:

1.     Rinse the mint leaves.

2.     Also rinse the tamarind ball.

3.     First blend all the ingredients except boondi in ½ or ¾ cup water till smooth.

4.     Then strain through a strainer

5.     Add 3-4 cups of chilled water to the strained mixture or as required

6.     Keep in the fridge or serve chilled jaljeera.

7.     Add boondi to jaljeera while serving.

Recipe courtesy: http://www.vegrecipesofindia.com/dassanaamit

Tune in every Tuesday for interesting ingredients and recipes. 

Couscous Salad!

This weekend, I tried making Couscous for the very first time! Although I'd heard about it and even eaten it on rare occasions before, I had never made it for myself. And even though I was experimenting, the Couscous Salad turned out to be great! I ate it as a side dish, but I think it could work really well as a meal in and of itself as well.

Something you may not know (which I certainly didn't know before doing a bit of research) is that couscous could actually be considered a pasta. Its made of small granules of semolina flour which puff up into little balls when cooked. A traditional food in most North African cuisine, couscous is also very popular in France, and is a great substitute for rice and quinoa. Also, one cup of couscous has about 6 grams of protein, or about 12% of your daily recommended intake - so if you're a vegetarian like me, that's a pretty good source of protein to consider!

The recipe I used was from Paula Dean of the Food Network, however I changed the recipe just slightly. You can find the original here. 

Ingredients:

1 box couscous (flavored or plain - I used plain) cooked according to instructions on box 

1-15 oz. can chickpeas (also called garbanzo beans)

1 red bell pepper - chopped

1 bunch scallions (5-6 stalks)

1 cucumber chopped

1 large tomato - chopped

1/4 cup parsley leaves (I used dry parsley, but it will prob. taste even better with fresh parsley)

1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese

1/4 cup olive oil

2-3 limes juiced

salt and pepper

Directions:

After cooking the couscous according to the directions on the particular box that you buy, combine all the ingredients in a bowl. Pour in the olive oil and lime juice, mix, and then add salt and pepper to taste. It's that easy! Enjoy!

Foodie Favorites Recipe Edition

Hello to all our Foodie Followers!

Check out our first video in our series Foodie Favorites and feel free to message us for the recipes!

Enjoy!! 

Friday Funday Simple Cake

Boxed cake mixes are great. Why mess with perfection when Pillsbury and Betty Crocker already did it best? Well it’s still a great idea to know how to make your own homemade cake. If nothing else, you can impress your friends with your newfound skill.

This week’s recipe is in honor of my birthday week. Here’s the cake I made from scratch for my birthday this year.

Easy Vanilla Cake

Ingredients:

Cake

• 1-1/2 cup butter
• ½ cup vegetable oil
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Frosting from scratch

• 1 cup butter
• 2-1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

What to do:

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Using your electric mixer, cream butter and sugar about a minute.
3. Add eggs, oil, milk and vanilla extract.
4. Gradually add in flour, baking powder and salt.
5. Bake for 20 minutes or until a knife inserted comes out clean.

For frosting:

1. Beat butter until smooth.
2. Add sugar and vanilla and beat for two minutes.

 Tips

• Let cake cook completely before frosting—at least a half hour.
• If baking cake in a pan, spray pan with oil cooking spray first.
• If the frosting is too watery, let it sit in the fridge for a half hour or add more powdered sugar.
• You can also use store bought frosting—hey you made a cake from scratch you did good enough!

Once you have a basic cake recipe down you can start experimenting with different flavors. I’ve added a cup of cocoa powder to this recipe as well as a half-cup of melted chocolate and it comes out as a great chocolate cake!

Get creative with your decorating! I added some pink food coloring to my frosting and topped each cupcake with a sprinkle of colored sugar.

Check back next Friday Funday for some chocolate and banana goodies!