Guest Post by Priya Suresh: Vegan Christmas Fruit Cake

I thought of sharing this Festive Season with all my fellow blogger friends and all my other friends who visit my blog, you must be thinking how I do it? Simple, I have requested a few of my fellow blogger friends who I admire their blog and recipes to do Guest Post for my blog from 23rd December 2012 until 1st of January 2013. Who said it is difficult to celebrate Christmas and New Year with all my friends all around the world?

Now coming to the first post, I have requested Priya Suresh of Priya's Versatile Recipes to share her wonderful recipe here. She never said NO and gladly sent this post to me, I visit her blog everyday just like the name of her blog all her recipes are versatile and makes one go drooling the moment you take a look at her clicks. The recipes in her blog is easy enough for any new cook to try in their kitchen. Now let us see what she has to say;

Cooking specially and doing a guest post for a co-blogger is definitely an interesting part of this virtual world, few days back I got a message from Arthy asking whether I can do a guest post for her. Her message made me happy and immediately I said ok for making a guest post for her. I visit her space almost everyday since few months and love her variety of drool worthy foods particularly her malay foods, I have bookmarked few to try especially her prawn sambal, as I love sea foods very much. 

Coming to the guest post,she said she want something perfect for this festive season, I know I'll be making a fruit cake for her and finally decided to make a vegan version.Thanks to Arthy for giving me a wonderful chance to make this guest post.

Ingredients:

2cups All purpose flour

1cup Whole wheat flour

1cup Avocado Puree

1cup Oil

1+1/2cups Packed brown sugar

1tbsp Flaxseed powder

1tsp Baking powder

1tsp Baking soda + 1/2tsp for cooking fruits

1/2tsp Cinnamon powder

1/4tsp Clove powder

1/4tsp Ginger powder

1/4tsp Nutmeg powder

3tbsp Honey

1tsp Vanilla essence

1/2cup Water

2cups Dry fruits (chopped finely,i used dates,black & golden raisins,apricots,pineapples,prunes and tutti frutti)

1/2cup Nuts (chopped finely)

2tbsp Orange zest

Grease a round cake pan with oil and line a baking sheet.

Sieve the flours with baking powder and baking soda and keep aside.

Mix the flaxseed powder in  three tablespoons of warm water and keep aside.

In a pan, heat the dry fruits,sugar,honey,water in low flame until the sugar gets dissolves, then put the flame in high and bring it to boil.

Put the flame again in low and cook for half an hour,so that the dry fruits will gets well cooked, put off the stove and add the 1/2tsp of baking soda,mix it and keep it aside.

Preheat the oven to 300F.

In a bowl, take together the avocado puree,oil,flaxseed mixture,vanilla essence and spice powders and mix, now add the cooked fruit mixture,orange zest and nuts,mix everything well.

Add the flours to this mixture and mix gently with a spatula.

Transfer this cake batter to the already prepared cake pan and bake cake for an hour or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.

Let the cake gets cool completely .

Dust with confectioner's sugar and enjoy.

Thank you so much Priya for sharing this recipe with us, God bless you. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and your family.

Christmas Cake

I love Christmas my whole life, for me the best festival in the world would be Christmas. Fun filled, joyous and full of love is how I would describe this festival. Even though I don't celebrate Christmas but the month December always bring lots of excitement and joy for me, be it the movies aired on television, the cakes and cookies, decorations and gifts.

This year I have planned to make a Christmas cake for celebration at home so my mixed dried fruits  have been soaking in brandy for the past 3 days, I know usually minimum 6 weeks is needed to get the best out of soaking this dried fruits. But since this is the first time I'm making this cake so I don't have that much of patience to wait for 6 weeks.

Okay now let's check how I made this cake;

Ingredients:

500g of dried fruit (assorted)

2 cups of plain flour

1 cup of fresh orange juice

1 cup of soft brown sugar

3 tbsp of treacle/ honey

1 tbsp of orange zest

1 tsp of nutmeg powder

1 tsp of cinnamon powder

1 tsp of mixed spice powder

1 tsp of baking soda

1/2 cup of brandy

150 g of butter

A pinch of salt

2 eggs

Boil dried fruits, butter, brown sugar, orange juice, treacle, salt on a low flame until it bubbles, 

then add baking soda at this moment more smaller bubbles will be formed, 

turn off the flame and let it completely cool

In another bowl, sift plain flour, nutmeg powder, mixed spice powder, cinnamon powder and keep aside.

Once the fruit mixture completely cool, add eggs and mix, finally add the dry ingredients to this mixture and fold in  orange zest well, no need to whisk or beat for very long. 

Grease a baking tray and pour in the cake mixture and bake at 150 degrees for 30-45 minutes depending on your own oven. Once baked let the cake completely cool, leave in refrigerator for at least 2 days before cutting and serving the cake.

But I couldn't wait for another 3 days to post this picture so had to cut a small piece out to show to you. For the best taste and moist you can apply brandy on the top layer of the cake for 3 days.

Now our Christmas Cake is ready to be served. Do try and let me know it was!

Orange Butter Cake

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup of all purpose flour

1/2 cup of freshly squeezed orange juice

1 cup of castor sugar

1/4 cup of chocolate chips

1 cup of good quality butter

2 tbsp of orange zest

1 tsp of vanilla extract

1/2 tsp of baking powder

1/2 tsp of baking soda

1 large egg

In a mixing bowl whisk sugar and butter until fluffy then add egg and vanilla essence. Now add orange juice, orange zest, baking soda, baking flour and finally flour then mix everything well. Grease a baking tray and pour the cake batter and  add chocolate chips on top of it. Bake cake at 150-170 degree for 30- 45 minutes depending on your oven's requirement. Mine calls for 150 degree baked for 30 minutes.

Once cake baked let it cool for at least one hour then unmould and cut and serve the cake. Your whole house will smell fabulous with the cake baking in the oven.

Do try and let me know how it turned out!

Orange Flavored Chocolate Moist Cake

I have been planning to bake a cake for my colleagues today as I couldn't bring any of Diwali cookies, not because I don't want t share with them but I had only empty containers. We had given out cookies for relatives and neighbors who came to visit us. So for my colleagues I have baked an Orange flavored Chocolate Moist Cake, this is a very moist cake and it just melts in your mouth.

I have got this recipe from sis Love2Cook's blog, actually I planned to bake moist chocolate cake but while mixing the batter I saw Oranges in my fridge I thought of adding it to my cake, Orange and chocolate is a very good combo to go together. Now let us take a look at how to bake this cake;

Ingredients:

100 g of all purpose flour

50 g of dark cocoa powder

200 ml evaporated milk

50 ml of freshly squeezed orange juice

180 g of granulated sugar (I have used brown sugar)

1 tbsp of orange zest

1 tsp of vanilla extract

1/2 tsp of baking powder

1/2 tsp of baking soda

180 g of butter

2 eggs

In a bowl sift all purpose flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and baking powder and set aside.

In another bowl, whisk butter and sugar until fluffy then add egg one by one and mix everything well. Then add vanilla extract, orange juice, evaporated milk and orange zest, mix everything thoroughly.

Finally add the dry ingredients that have been sifted little by little and mix well without any lumps. Grease a baking pan and pour the cake mixture into the pan and bake at 170 degrees for 45 minutes  (My oven calls for 150 degrees 30 minutes only).

Once baked cool the cake completely before applying any toppings to the cake. 

For Chocolate Ganache topping:

100 g of cooking chocolate
5o ml condensed milk

2 tbsp of butter

Double boil the cooking chocolate once melted add the butter for a glossy shine.