Sweet Tooth Journals

New Year's Eve is all about welcoming the new year with plenty of partying, eating, drinking and dancing with friends. So if you are the one playing the host this year, a lot of food and beverage arrangement is expected of you for sure. And even in all the whirlwind of chaotic party planning we simply CANNOT forget the dessert!! This recipe for a Dark Chocolate and Orange Zest Mousse is both simple to make and does not require your attention as it sets in the refrigerator leaving you with ample time on your hands for the appetisers and entree. The are also cute (being served in orange cups and all!!) and a pragmatic solution for having less dishes to wash the next day. (not to mention how orange cups are unbreakable unlike glass, even if your drunk guests drop them!) So here you go. A yummy dessert with mature flavours, perfect for welcoming 2015. ^_^ DARK CHOCOLATE AND ORANGE ZEST MOUSSE INGREDIENTS:  Dark Chocolate                 500 g Fresh Cream                     4

Merry Christmas everybody!!! Hope you have been enjoying yesterday and today to the fullest. I know I have been!! First up this is how my Christmas Tree is looking. Last night there was a Christmas Eve Party at my house and I cooked up a storm!! Even though I usually do not post about any non-dessert food in this blog, I must make an exception for this holiday season.  Vegetables for Casserole Honey Glazed Pork Ribs Roast Chicken with Cranberry & Rosemary Sauce Irish Beef Stew Aside from this there was Mashed Potatoes, Herbed Rice and Beetroot, Fresh Cheese & Dill Salad with Orange Reduction. For Dessert there was flambeed Rich Fruit Cake and a Mulled Port Wine to go with it. :) Flambeed Rich Fruit Cake Mulled Port Wine It was an extremely enjoyable evening complete with all things Christmas-y: family, friends, good food, cake, wine, music and laughter. This we followed up with midnight mass and a post-midnight stroll in Park St

With Christmas just around the corner and my inbox being flooded with requests for my Rich Fruit Cake recipe, this post was inevitable. My college life is basically over and I am back home in Kolkata for my final semester industrial training. Winter is here and I am missing everyone back at Manipal immensely!! :'( But Christmas time is solely reserved for merriment, happiness, joy and all things pumped up with the 'Christmas Spirit', therefore I shall bake lots of cakes and puddings and try my best not to despair.  In case you were wondering how the Fruit Mix from the fruit mixing ceremony is looking now, wonder no more. Have a look.  Looks delicious doesn't it? :) Now for the ingredients for my Rich Fruit Cake. And this is how you go about making the magic: Enjoy this beautiful recipe and have yourselves a very Merry Christmas!!! ^_^

I cannot believe I just quoted 'The Duck Song' in my post title!! :P Anyway, I swear by that song and it just seemed so appropriate because of my obsession with grapes. <3 <3 <3 In fact I love grapes so much, it has become quite a joke in my class how grapes and I are a match made in loony-about-a-fruit-land.  Don't get me wrong, I like green grapes too, but black and red grapes are what make my heart skip a beat! Grapes are my greatest dessert fruit muse no doubt. In a tropical country like India they are the closest you can get to berry heaven, both in terms of the tangy sweetness and the beautiful purple colour. My favourite thing to do with red and black grapes are to make compotes, jams and coulis out of them. You can then store this in glass jars for at least one month refrigerated and can use it for plated dessert presentations, as a dessert sauce, as a fruit salad dressing, as a breakfast spread or just to eat straight out of the jar. The f

Even though I was absent, the Fruit Mixing Ceremony for making Christmas cakes and puddings later this month, was in full swing back home. My mother set the entire session in motion back in Kolkata while I had to be contented with just a few pictures. The college fruit mixing ceremony (which is a grand affair!!) is scheduled for tomorrow evening, but our very own small ceremony back home is so much closer to the heart. :) Raisins, Prunes, Blackcurrants, Candied Orange Peel, Candied Ginger, Candied White Pumpkin, Glazed Cherries, Nutmeg, Cinnamon, Black Tea and Rum. I can only imagine how beautiful the house must be smelling right now!! Thank you Ma!!! MUAH!!!! <3

Do colourful, icy popsicles take you back to sticky, hot, summer afternoons of your childhood? If it does, this post is bound to take you down memory lane to the good ol' days of happiness, innocence and ignorant bliss! Even if popsicles don't ring a nostalgic bell in your mind, this post is bound to pull at all the right cords in your sugar-addicted soul. Before we fall into a nostalgic coma, lets talk about what popsicles actually are.   A  popsicle , ice candy ,   ice lolly ,   ice cream stick ,  freeze pop ,   ice block ,   icy pole ,  chihiro  or  ice pop  is a water-based frozen dessert. It is made by freezing flavored liquid, such as fruit juice  around a stick. Artificial food colouring and flavouring substances are very commonly used to give the brightness and sweetness so reminiscent of popsicles. Growing up in an all-girls' school in Kolkata, popsicles were known as ice cream sticks (EVEN when they were non-dairy ice lollies) and the absolute trademark

On the thirteenth anniversary of the release of first Harry potter movie, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, I must pay homage to the book and movie series that made my childhood oh so special. My Sunday has come to an end and there is an exhausting week up ahead. It is close to my bedtime and I have classes early tomorrow morning, so I am going to keep this real short. The Harry Potter series has influenced my life in a lot of wonderful ways and I have remained a Potterhead till date. The books never get old (Even after the sixth reading!) and the movies always bring about a fresh wave of nostalgia. I love HP to death. <3  Since mine is a blog about desserts, I must bring the tiny village of Hogsmeade into the equation, if only to talk about 'Honeydukes'. " There were shelves upon shelves of the most succulent-looking sweets imaginable. Creamy chunks of nougat, shimmering pink squares of coconut ice, fat, honey-coloured toffees; hundreds of different kin

This one is a Children's Day special. Growing up in India, 14th November was always a day all of us looked forward to. It was our day to be pampered, spoilt and celebrated!! Children's Day is celebrated on the birth anniversary of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of independent India due to his love for children.  Children's Day was always celebrated in my Alma Mater - 'Modern High School for Girl' with a mini fete. Game stalls, food stalls, music, balloons, ice cream vans and teachers being the nicest they possibly could be!! Now, at 20, no longer a child, I sorely miss these glorious days. :') The eye-moistening nostalgia aside, when I think of childhood, a dominant guilty pleasure was jellies and jujubes. I do not know what exactly made these confections so tempting. Was the unnaturally bright colour? The artificial fruity scent? The cloying sweetness? Or was it the soft, gluggy, chewy, slurpy texture? Even though I am suppose to be a

Yesterday we made Gingerbread Houses in Bakery practical class. It was a two day affair. We made the gingerbread dough, cut it out and baked it day before. And yesterday we made pastillage ornaments, assembled the house and decorated it. There were more than our usual share of hiccups along the way, with an entire wall of the house crumbling, but we sure did a great job. :) Yet another recipe to keep handy for Christmas (if you really have the patience that is!!). So here you go. GINGERBREAD Ingredients: Flour                                       4 kg Black Jag                                 2 kg Oil                                           750 ml Ginger Powder                        250 g Clove Powder                         50 g Cinnamon Powder                  50 g Icing Sugar                              1 kg Baking Powder                        20 g Roll the dough out to about 1-1.5 cm thickness. Cut out desired shapes. Bake at 180*C for 20

A break-up? A falling out? Constant bickering? Heartbreak? Feeling lonely? Nightmares? Memories coming back to haunt you? Friends behaving nonchalant? No idea why things are so messed up? The most exasperating week ever?  If you have answered most of the above mentioned questions with a resigned nod of the head, this post is definitely for you. Disclaimer: I neither support abusing alcohol, nor do I think it is better to drown in sorrow and self-pity rather than to speak to someone about your problems. I also do not wish to stereotype rom-com watching or video game playing. And most importantly, in case you didn't get the joke, I do not know a anyone named Rex. :P This remedy is for when you are really down and nobody is willing to pull you back up on your feet. A temporary solace: Chocolate and Rum. Yup. You guessed it right. The following recipe makes the most chocolatey and boozy rum balls you have EVER tasted! You may want to keep this recipe handy with Christmas just a t

A crisis in my life, an unbelievable conversation with a dear friend and an evening of unnecessary research, got me thinking about this topic. Patriarchy and chauvinism, and how accepted and normal it is in my country, and even around the world. Though the most apparent form of patriarchy, domestic violence has decreased, other vile forms still exist. Take double standards for example. A man socialises with a few too many women, it is masculine and desirable. A woman does the same and she is labelled a loose woman. The brother going out for a drink with his friends is the norm. The sister even contemplating the same is disrespectful to her family. A young boy is taught to be proud of his body and use it as a weapon of intimidation. A young girl is taught to hide her body and protect it from harm. Though the occasional sprinkling of liberal families exist, most would have their daughters "innocent", "untouched" and "pure", as if they were objects th

It has been over a month since I have blogged. My campus interviews were going on and I was travelling a lot. These are my only excuses. I am sorry. :( Now that I am back I am intrigued by the date as usual. 28th October. On this day, 60 years ago Mr Ernest Miller Hemmingway was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. For those who are not well acquainted with Mr Hemmingway, he was an American author whose works have gained classic status. For majority of his life Hemmingway was a journalist. It is due to his news coverage of wars that he sustained several injuries that made him suffer till the end of his days.  His life was quite a painful one, filled with injury, pain, disease and depression. It was quite a colourful one too however, with four marriages and frequent alcoholic sprees. Needless to say, he had an unsuccessful personal life and never gained happiness even in his work. His works such as "The Old Man and The Sea", "A Farewell To Arms", "The Sun