EASY CRANBERRY CUP

I FEEL SATISFIED AFTER COOKING A DISH PROPERLY!

How I wished that feeling to be accompanied by money. Though I am happy with the budget I have set for my life, I wished to earn my own pizza or burger. I used the words happy and budget together as I cannot be a spendthrift. I could not spend much when I worked, I kept saving. My types hardly spread the wings wider, we are conditioned to live within budget since childhood. Cristine went to the Moss Burger chain. They are offering two chicken burgers for 8$, 5 small Hash Browns for 4$ only on Mondays. I wanted to avail the offer though not fond of burgers. 

I liked the hash browns. I told earlier I want bun maska and chicken or fish cutlet separately on my plate. Having "chai-biskut" thereafter proves I dislike burger, have it on rare occasions.

YESTERDAY WAS ANOTHER LONELY SUNDAY!

Starting at 1:45pm I was alone at home, yet could not watch a single piece. I was hooked to the social media, on print media and you-tube wanting to follow one single incident, such pathetic it is. I still search Google for Ms.Guha's case, a well educated, beautiful lady  who was poisoned to death. Heavyweight offenders get acquitted in our country. I was only 7-8 years old at that time, remember remotely how there was an uproar about the incident, a beautiful, meritorious girl's death made our parents, neighbourhoods, state cry literally. Since then, I have a dislike for that institution, even if I had the quality to work under those suspicious heads, I would not have applied. I didn't wish to send our son there, it has blood stains at it's doorstep. They are a powerful family who presently run another institution, roam freely. We tend to forget easily, this becomes advantageous for the wrong doers. I fail to understand what kind of a child did the mother give birth to who chose money, power instead of getting the dead mother justice. Also, we become fans of the celebrities, of their artistic qualities, they may not be good human beings, unworthy of our praises. The recent case may go unsolved I fear because fair judgements are rare in my country. Everyone knows everything but to prove it gets impossible, power stands supreme. If we are well off and keep our eyes closed and mouths shut, we get to live happily ever after, else we would be sent off. I feel good if I get to eat my choice of meals.

WHAT IS EASY CRANBERRY CUP?

For quite sometime I have been watching similar recipes around, in the western bloggers' spaces. I already have a similar recipe in the Blog. I see the westerners prepare this kind of cup cakes for their breakfasts. They use eggs in the batter that I did not wish to add. Moreover, I wanted this EASY CRANBERRY CUP to be vegan and gluten-free too. That leaves us in confusion you know. The pro- bakers approve or not, I got used to baking simple cakes without buying an almond flour worth 16$ per kilogram. I find out ways to bake a vegetarian cake, also try to keep it vegan, gluten-free specially on days like Rakhi Poornima / Rakshabandhan. We live in violent times, we cannot expect anyone to protect us. We just have to be cautious as much as we can, keep our cool. This is not an era "where the mind is without fear and the head is high" works if we want to live. I recently bought this square cup cake tin online from Shien Official.

INGREDIENTS :

OATS : 1 & 1/2 COFFEE MUG

CRANBERRY : 2-3 TBSP

BANANA : 2 STANDARD SIZED

CORN FLOUR : 1 TBSP

BAKING POWDER : 1/2 TSP

BAKING SODA : 1/4 TSP

SUGAR : 3-4 TBSP [I used Brown Sugar]

OIL : 2 TBSP

PROCEDURE :

Take the oats in a bowl. In a blender, take the rest of the ingredients except for the cranberries.

Blend them to a paste and add to the oats. Mix the ingredients roughly.

Add the cranberries and mix again.

Grease a cup cake tin with few drops of oil and half fill with the mixture. I bought it recently from Shein Official.

Mine is a convection mode microwave oven. I did place the low height wired stool inside the oven, closed the door and pre-heated the oven at 180*C.

Thereafter, I did place the cake tin inside, baked for 15 minutes at 160*C. They are done.

They were crisp on the top when fresh and hot. Enjoy with your choice of beverage. From the kids to the adults, everyone would be happy to have the baked vegetarian, gluten-free, vegan sweet cups.

VEGAN GLUTEN-FREE KOKI

 I WAS DOING NOTHING SINCE THE MORNING!

Yet I started to write late. I am not in the mood to write a new blogpost today but I have to share this. I am pretty happy with the outcome, not that happy with the photo feature though. To concentrate on something at a stretch you require a calm state of mind. When something bothers me, I cannot stay cool. I do not get vocal at every issue does not mean I lack the concern. Many of us do have grudges against the system, we do want to voice our displeasure but we cannot do that out of fear, for  our safety. I did not teach our son to be fearless, his life is precious to me / us parents. It is pathetic how we are made to live in fear, only the powerful few exercise control on us. If there is danger waiting outside our doors, we have to be cautious about the dangers, there is no point questioning why we do not have the freedom to live our own ways. We just want a decent society to roam free, the women's plight are worser. When I feel pathetic, I usually go out to somewhere or cook something but I decided to write a new blogpost. Although, we live a secured life in this island, we cannot be that selfish not to think about our fellow countrymen, family and friends.

NOT IN THE NORMAL RYTHYM, I FORGOT CLICKING MY SUNDAY MEALS!

I updated the Potato Biryani blogpost yesterday which took me half of the day, Cristine is not around on a Sunday. The man perhaps enjoyed it but for reasons unknown he would never admit I cook good biryani if not with an expertise. I kept a bowlful for Cristine, she had for lunch today, praised it. I had to cook the rice slightly more, I use minimal oil and ghee in a biryani, put it in dum on the gas top, I should not expect the half-cooked rice to fluff and double in amount. The fun is that even some of Kolkata's renowned joint's biryani rice remain slightly under-cooked. Biryani made with over-cooked rice does not work for the Indian Bengalis. Yesterday night, I made cooked semolina parathas, the dough got softer, the parathas were smooth but I did not wish to click them. My food has to taste good and look good too, unfortunately that does not happen always. For my first meal I had air-fried Bengali French Toast and it tasted lame. I would have it rare but I would have it fried in oil.

Watermelon soothes my system. But overeating watermelon and litchi causes severe stomach congestion!

WHAT IS VEGAN GLUTEN-FREE KOKI?

Koki is Sindhi Community's breakfast bread. I learnt that pretty late in life. My food blogging journey has taught me about different cuisines, yet not done. Sindhi Koki can be sweet or savoury. The dough uses a mix of whole-wheat flour and gram flour. I wished to do it but a vegan & gluten-free version, so that I can blog about it and make others try my recipe. I do not buy pricier gluten-free flours. Also millet flours are not for me, I have hypothyroidism. The man and Cristine wants bread made of wheat flour and refined flour only. When the son stayed with us, he liked having sticky brown rice along with me, do not know if he would have liked gluten-free flours or not. At this time, I am using only sattu and besan for my gluten-free breads. I felt the VEGAN GLUTEN-FREE KOKI bread making would not be that difficult as it demands a tight dough for it's making and that it's a thick bread. 

That I did, I used roasted gram flour / sattu and the raw gram flour / besan for the making of the vegetarian Sindhi flat-bread, the rest used remains the same as original.

INGREDIENTS :

ROASTED GRAM FLOUR / SATTU : 1 COFFEE MUG

GRAM FLOUR / BESAN : 1 SMALL TEA CUP

CHOPPED ONION : 3 TBSP

CHOPPED CORIANDER : 2 TBSP

CHOPPED GREEN CHILLI : 2 TSP

CAROM SEED / AJWAIN : 1/2 TSP

CUMIN SEED JEERA : 1/4 TSP

CRUSHED BLACK PEPPER : 1/4 TSP

SALT : A LITTLE

OIL : 2 TBSP + A LITTLE TO BRUSH EACH SIDE OF A BREAD

PROCEDURE :

I had taken the two flours, salt, carom and cumin seeds, crushed black pepper in a wide-mouthed bowl and mixed well.

Thereafter, I added to it the chopped and washed fresh coriander, green chillies, onions and 2 tbsp of oil. I mixed together everything.

We are required to prepare a tight dough, not knead it. I did wet my right palm 2-3 times and brought together everything.

I kept the dough covered for 10-12 minutes, kneaded for a minute,  tore off portions, pressed flat each between my palms.

I used the sattu flour / roasted gram flour to dust each ball and rolled thick flatbread. Then I made shallow slits with a knife as a Sindhi Koki bread demands.

I heated a griddle, roasted both sides of each paratha until brown, brushed oil on both the sides, roasted again, done.

I enjoyed them with thick, plain yogurt and sweet boondi.