Creating, collecting, and sharing thoughts and ideas. And learning along the way.
So, this is another how-to post: how-to make a traditional Christmas fruitcake.
I had the pleasure of making one with my mother this past Christmas. Enclosed below is a step-by-step slideshow of the ingredients and the process of bringing them together that results in a most incredible cake that lasts for several weeks after it is made. The pictures are all captioned to tell a story. Enjoy!
I would be remiss to not have a blogpost devoted solely to all the sweet and savory snacks that my mother made during her brief visit with me over the holidays.
And so, the objective of this post is to highlight via pictures all the many goodies that were made– many of them typically made during the Christmas holidays in India: karjakais, kalkals, ladoos, chudva, murukus, fruitcakes, the list goes on. Back in the old country, you made them in large quantities so as to have them ready on hand to serve when guests came calling for a friendly holiday visit, or to serve to the carolers after they caroled outside your house, or to serve with tea and coffee during the holiday season. And then for a few weeks after Christmas and New Years’, you’d still have boxes and tins of these goodies neatly stored in your pantry that would tide you over at least the month of January.
Well, my mother came to visit for Christmas, and she did exactly this: she made all these yummy sweet and savory eats that we’re now nibbling on even two weeks later!
Here are some of the pictures in the slideshow below. If you’re familiar with these eats, you wouldn’t care to read the captions that go with each photo, but you’re not, you might find it interesting.
So, if you know one interesting fact about me, I hope it might have something to do with Hyderabadi Biryani, or in particular, the fact that I can make it. From scratch. The kind that willl leave you stunned at the fact that you didn’t know how impossibly amazing that dish could be. And leave you talking about it forever. 🙂
Well, that’s the kind I make. For all special occasions like birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, etc. I obvioulsy made it this past Christmas.
So, this is a step-by-step slideshow of the very many steps of this many-layered dish. You’ll have to get your own recipe, or guesstimate the measures from the pictures here, but the sequence is critical to success. This is a huge degchi (pot) that holds about 20 lbs. The pictures are all captioned so you can see what’s what.
The best part, however, is serving it up with love for the ones you love! Oh, and the papads/appalams, pudina chutney and the boondi raita are the consummate accompaniments to the dish.
Bon Appetit! Or, like we say around here: Yeh Hui Na Baat!
So this past summer, I wrote a piece on my private blog about cakes and such. The post is duly reproduced below for your reading pleasure just as much as it is to add the image of yet another cake as an illustration that serves to support all the points previously made. And to recognize yet again this tradition of eating cake, especially when a birthday rolls around– this one being my husbands’!
Let them eat it everyday (if they can and wish!), but let them eat it for sure on their birthdays! Well, the title of this post is a phrase oft-attributed to Marie Antoinette, the last Queen of France known for her lavish ways for whom brioche or cake was as ordinary as bread. But cake is not ordinary. It is extravagant in every way: butter, sugar, flour and flavorings come together to create a decadent sensation for the palate and the eyes. It is the signature food for special occasions: weddings and birthdays, in particular.
And so, last week we had cake. To celebrate Samira’s 14th birthday. Not one or two, but three altogether! And here’s why: there’s the main one– a very fancy guava-and-lime tiered cake on the day of her birthday (which happened to be a Wednesday); another small one which was a double-chocolate fudge brownie cake (which is a tradition in our house to have a smallish one on the side, just for fun!); and a standard yellow sheet-cake on the day of her party (Friday of that week) with her friends that has a lovely blue-and-yellow frosting of flowers that also look like butterflies! Needless to say, all three were delicious!
And speaking of cake, I read this article the other day on an interesting concept in designing a dinner menu for a wedding reception– a novelty idea to have each dish catered by a different source, including the cake which looks oh-so-gorgeous in all that chocolate glory and those pink flowers (orchids?) as a shocking and delightful contrast against the rich brown chocolate exterior. Mmmm… I think that cake might have even stolen the show at that reception!
Oh, and by the way, that phrase Let Them Eat Cake, well, there is controversy on whether or not the line was truly uttered by Marie Antoinette. Here’s some more info on that.
So, enjoy these pictures of birthday cakes. They were certainly good enough to eat! Now, if only we could have eaten our cake and had it too… 🙂
