Eggless Whole Wheat Blueberry Muffins

After my successful attempt of baking with whole wheat flour with Plum Baskets I wanted to try my hands on muffins and with berries in the season I immediately set my mind on blueberries. So my search started for a perfect recipe, there are thousands of eggless and vegan muffin recipes, majority of them call for egg substitutes like tofu, yogurt, flax seeds or applesauce. To my horror I didnt have any of these at home, as i have mentioned before I am trying to empty my pantry and not buying new things as i will be shifting to a new place. While going through my reader I saw the Classic Blueberry Muffins by Happy HomeBaker and thought my prayers were answered. I have been following HappyHomeBaking blog from quite sometime now and I have tried few of her recipes, they always turn out perfect! I twisted and tweaked the recipe to make it eggless and they came out perfect. These were sooooo good, I didnt miss the eggs in the muffins at all. They were light and fluffy, well risen and baked beautifully! A glass of cold milk with warm muffins is perfect way to start your day! Oh these are so easy you dont even require a hand mixer, just a spatula is enough :) Sending these to Madhuram's Whole Grain Eggless Baking event.

Ingredients: 2 cups white whole wheat flour (whole wheat pastry flour is also fine) 1/2 tsp salt 1/2 tsp baking soda 2 tsp baking powder 3/4 cup sugar (170 gms) 1/2 cup milk (125 ml) 75 ml vegetable oil (i used sunflower oil) 2 tsp vanilla essence 1 cup fresh blueberries (125 gms) Procedure:

• Preheat the oven to 200 degress C, line 12 muffin molds with wax paper.
• Wash blueberries and pat them dry with a kitchen towl. Add 1tbsp of flour and coat them well. Set aside.
• Sieve together whole wheat flour, baking soda and baking powder.
• In a seperate bowl whisk together oil, sugar, milk and vanilla essence.
• Make a well in between the flour mixture and slowly add in the liquid mixture, fold lightly using spatula. DONOT over mix .
• Now add in the flour coated blueberries and fold in lightly.
• Spoon the batter into the muffin pans, filling upto 3/4 full. Bake them fo 20 to 30 mins, until tooth pick inserted comes out clean.
• Remove and serve them warm with a cold glass of milk or ice cream!

Note: The batter should not be runny but thick consistency, if its too dry add a tsp of milk.

Parisian Apple Tarts for Taste and Create and an Award

Dear Foodies,

This is the first time I have participated in Taste & Create, a lovely event started by Nicole of For the Love of Food. Every month you are paired with a fellow food blogger and you need to create a dish from their blog. Its a great way to meet new bloggers in the blogosphere and to share your creations! I was paired with very talented Marthe of CulinairyDelights. Like me she too loves to bake and has wonderful collection of recipes, do check out her blog here. I wanted to make something fruity especially with apples, its been a long time since i used apples in my baking. Also I had lots of apples stuffed in my fridge which i needed to finish off before next week as i'll be shifting to a new home :) Initially I had chosen Apple Cranberry Phyllo Turnovers but I couldnt find phyllo sheets here and I wanted to stick to the recipe as much as possible. So i chose these simple and delicious Parisian Apple Tarts! These tarts are simply irresistible, just 4 main ingredients and they are ready in no time. I made a very small batch of tarts, the below recipe will give 3 medium tarts.

Anshika of Cooking Pleasures and Anita of Leave No Room for Dessert have nominated me for "Kreativ Blogger Award". Thank you so much both of you, I love to read your blogs and I am glad you like mine too :)

The Kreativ Blogger award comes with some rules:- 1. You must thank the person who has given you the award.

2. Copy the logo and place it on your blog.

3. Link to the person who has nominated you for the award.

4. Name 7 things about yourself that people might find interesting.

5. Nominate 7 other Kreativ Bloggers.

6. Post links to the 7 blogs you nominate.

7. Leave a comment on which of the blogs to let them know they have been nominated

So onto the seven things you may (or may not) find interesting about me:-

1. I am allergic to garlic, I dont know if you have not noticed this yet but in none of my recipes you'll find usage of garlic.

2. I love baking , especially cakes, it has been my passion ever since i started few yrs back. Would love to learn advanced cake decorating techniques some day.

3. Light or Sky Blue is my favorite color, infact there was a time when my wardrobe was full of light blue colored clothes, anything i see in light blue i tend to buy immediately until my mom threatened to throw my things away that i stopped :) Still it is my fav color and will always remain, plus makes me look good :)))

4. I dislike ripe Mangoes or rather i should say I am not fond of them...yeah i know sounds stupid and i think i am the only one who is not fond of mangoes :( the only mango dessert i really liked was my very own Mango Pannacotta with caramelized mangoes and hazelnuts and i do love raw mangoes especially sprinkled with salt and chilli powder :)

5. My all time favorite food is Masala Papads :)) There was a time when i didnt go to a restuarant because they didnt serve good masala papads , i can eat them for lunch, dinner or even breakfasts :) Here comes a real kicker, once i ordered for a masala papad right after having my dessert, the waiter serving us thought i m nuts and till now he gives me a weird look :)))

6. I am completely a chaat person, I am sure I have mentioned this before too. I love chaats to such an extent that once i celebrated my bday dinner on a roadside chaat stall..ah it was so much of fun with dahi puri and kalakhatta gola :))

7. I am toooooo much of a diet conscious person, hence i avoid oily, fried (though i love it) and cheesy stuff.

And the seven bloggers whom I am nominating for this award (in no particular order) are:-

1. A2ZVegetarianCuisine - Sadhna & Muskaan 2. HealthNut - Yasmeen 3. PlantainLeaf - Rekha 4. HomeCookReceipes - Lavi 5. 4th Sense Samayal - Nithya 6. Dishes from My Kitchen - Pavithra 7. My Experience with Cooking - Pooja

Pls accept the award and pass on the kreativity!

Ingredients: 1-2 pastry puff sheets 1 granny smith apple, peeled and chopped finely 1-2 tbsp brown sugar for sprinkling 2 tsp softened butter Cinnamon powder (optional)

Procedure:

• Preheat the oven at 200 degrees C.
• Roll out the pastry puff into 1/4 inch thick circles of your desired size.
• Leaving 1 inch space from the corners, spread the finely chopped apples.
• Fold in the sides over lapping each other.
• Generously drizzle brown sugar and butter on the apples.
• Bake them for 20 to 25 mins until lightly browned.
• Serve them warm with a dollop of vanilla ice cream.

I am back with Mini Plum Baskets.....My 50th Post

Hi Everyone, I am back with my 50th Post..yuhuuuuuuu..never thought I'll reach this far. Thank you everyone for your support and encouragement shown in past few months, love you all!!!

I wanted to post something sweet for my 50th post hence I made these cute looking tarts with plums. To be honest I wasnt fond of plums until few days back when i tasted the most sweetest and juicy plums ever. I made these mini baskets using whole wheat pastry flour and semolina, adding semolina makes them extra crispy and crunchy. You can choose any other filling of your choice, just make sure that the filling is not too watery or else it may take a lot of time to bake and also the tarts may become soft and not remain crispy. These are wonderful and absolutely guilt free tarts which are sure to make you drool!

I was shocked when I checked my reader this morning with 300+ posts from my dear blogger pals, frankly I have never missed anything so much as I have missed visiting and reading your posts, blogging now has become a part of my life and i owe this to all my friends who have showered their love on me! I would like to thank each and everyone of you with my whole heart! I promise to visit you all soon, it might take few days to go through all the post so pls forgive me if I am a bit late!

Sending these to BSI:Plum hosted by Lk of Healthy Delicious and also to Madhuram's Whole Wheat Eggless Baking event

Ingredients: (adapted from Kitchen UnPlugged by Gattina) For tarts: 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour 1/2 cup semilona 1/2 tsp sugar 1/2 tsp salt 3 tbsp cold butter cut into pieces 2-3 tbsp cold milk as required For Filling: 2 plum chopped finely 1 tbsp vanilla sugar 1 tbsp raisins 1 tbsp chocolate chips 1 tsp finely chopped pistachios 1 tbsp almond meal Procedure:

• Mix wheat flour, semilona, sugar and salt in a bowl. Cut in the cold butter and mix with pastry blender or fork until crumbly. Now add in milk little at a time to make dough. Chill the dough for minimum 2 hours.
• For the filling, mix ala the ingredients together and keep it aside.
• Roll out the dough to about 1/4 inch thickness and using a cookie cutter or a glass cut round pieces and place them in greased muffin pans making cups.
• Fill the baskets with a tbsp of the plum filling, sprinkle some chocolate chips on top.
• With the remaining dough cut small thin strips and arrange them as basket handles, use little milk or water to stick them to the sides.
• Bake these in preheated oven at 200 degrees C for 20 to 25 mins until golden brown.