Thoughts for Food

Finally!! a no sugar, no white flour recipe that works really well!!
This recipe really gets your hands dirty... you have been warned :)

You will need:

4-5 medium sized ripe bananas
1 cup Maple Syrup (You could even experiment with honey and let me know the result)
1/2 cup butter (cold butter from the fridge is best, or room temperature is ok too, dont melt)
1 Tablespoon Vanilla Essence

2 cups whole wheat flour
1 tsp fine salt
2 tsps baking powder

1 cup pecans (chopped), you can replace with walnuts if you wish.
1/2 cup dried raisins

Clean your nails, preferably trim them :) and then wash and dry your hands,

Pre heat the oven to 250 deg
Sift the flour, salt and baking powder at least 3 times through a fine sieve. Keep Aside.

Mash up the bananas really well with your hands, so little pieces are still there. Add the butter and again mash it into the banana mixture, add maple syrup and vanilla essence, and with your hands blend the whole thing properly. It should smell gorgeous: bananaey and mapley with a hint of vanilla...



Now to this add the flour, baking powder and salt mixture and again with your hands mix it really well.. Do not use an electric blender or a spoon. Use your hands and squeeze and blend and make the flour and banana mixture into a nice homogeneous mass. It will be smelling delicious, and will be gooey and will have dropping consistency...

Add the chopped pecans or walnuts and raisins to this mixture, reserve a small handful to garnish. Mix the nuts and raisins in well.

Lightly grease with butter a baking tray and pour the mixture into it.



Put to bake for 40ish minutes. See below.



About half way through at approx 25 minutes, when the mixture has firmed up a bit, you can optionally give it a milk bath. Using some a liquid which is 1 part milk, 2 parts water, just brush the top of the cake lightly and quickly and replace into the oven. This just gives a very nice glaze effect to the cake. It shines when it is done :)

Remove from the oven. Let it cool just a bit before cutting it up and serving. We had it just like that, with chocolate sauce, with it drenched in maple syrup, with some honey, and with french vanilla ice cream!

Its a really simple cake to make and we had lots of fun to making it! This cake is enough for about 5-7 people...

I guess we should start off with something really really simple and easy to make:

Get together:

5-7 Potatoes small to medium size
Olive oil
Butter (a generous tablespoonful)
1/2 cup grated cheese (cheddar is best), you could use lesser if you wish
Mushrooms (1 packet)
1-2 Carrots medium size, cut (dice) into very small pieces
1 clove of garlic, peeled and squashed or diced finely
6-7 fresh basil leaves
Fresh Cream
Juice of 2 Lemons
Salt



Trim your nails, wash your hands :)

Pre heat to oven to 250 deg

Throughly wash the potatoes, do not peel the skin... If there is some mud stuck on them, looosen it and remove it. Poke the potatoes 7-8 times with a fork. Stick the fork right in, dont do it politely :)
This allows the steam to escape while baking... i have been told that they may explode otherwise!

In a Pan melt the butter and add some olive oil. Remove from gas.

Now just put each potato in the butter and oil mixture and with your fingers spread it on the entire potato, dont put too much. Put the potato on a baking tray. Do for all potatoes. Sprinkle some salt on them. Put to bake at 250 deg for about 30 to 40 minutes. When they turn a delicious golden brown they are done.

Meanwhile, put the pan with the olive oil and butter mixture on the gas and add 1 pod of garlic that has been peeled ad squashed or cut into fine pieces. wait until it browns a bit. Then add 6-7 fresh basil leaves. Add the diced carrots and just saute them. They should be crunchy. Add the Mushrooms and cook for about 3 more minutes, add grated cheese to this and stir well until the cheese has melted. Remove from gas.

Add the juice of the lemons to about a cup of cream and beat it well till it is nice and thick.

Once the potatoes are done, slit them along one side and open them up a bit. be careful they will be really hot. Spoon in some of the mushroom carrot cheese mixture. Add a dollop of the sour cream and decorate it with a basil leaf. Serve immediately. It should be eaten piping hot...


You can be creative with what sort of toppings you put on your baked potatoes: Just sour cream with finely chopped chives, grated cheddar cheese with a dash of red chilly powder, finesly shredded spinach with sour cream... the list is almost endless :)