Been almost a month since I posted here. Not that I lacked anything to write about but I got distracted. This site came under a hacker attack once again… sigh. Just after I had spent a sunny afternoon cleaning up the posts and deleting what seemed like tons of horrible spam links, it happened again. I think I need to be realistic here. Website security isn’t my forte; maybe it is time to find a competent person to manage it, so I can get back to writing.
Well, we’ll see what happens. I was almost tempted to take the site back to Blogger but it seems like such a copout, especially after all the time spent getting this site up…
In other news, I got an Oyama Stainless Steel Rice Cooker. The older rice cooker had a nonstick bottom and the coating had been peeling off gradually. Oyama has a sturdy stainless steel vessel to cook the rice in – no question of any peeling off happening. However, we have been trying to figure out the cooking time, water-rice ratio, etc. Brown basmati requires more water than regular white rice plus cooking time is longer. However you need to monitor the cooking process. Else the rice turns out to be horribly dry. Anyway, it feels like I now have a handle on the cooking process but any illusion I had of letting the rice cook unsupervised is poof!
I have to share this GEM of a recipe for a chocolate cake that the lovely world of food blogs brought my way. So simple and sublime in both taste and preparation… Wow. I had to get a container of buttermilk to make this one, and because it is a big-sized container AND there was such a lot of buttermilk remaining… I made this cake another time. And possibly once again. It is such a keeper, the simplest chocolate cake you can ever make! I chanced on this recipe via Nupur’s One Hot Stove and she got it from Deb at Smitten Kitchen.
I have been cooking a bit from Heidi’s gorgeous book Super Natural Every Day too.
Super Natural Every Day
During the holidays, I baked the divine Apricot-Ginger-Chocolate Cookies… Lovely! A few days back, I made the Kale-Coconut Salad. Unfortunately, that one turned out a tad too dry for P and I. I think it may have to do with the fact that the kale was slightly wet after I washed it? I don’t know. I loved the taste of baked coconut flakes and toasted sesame oil but I doubt I’ll make this again. Or maybe I’ll go the route of chips instead of salad? I don’t know.
Kale Coconut Salad
In a last-ditch attempt to finish up the buttermilk (and to use the zest from a couple Meyer lemons I bought two weeks ago), I baked a Buttermilk Cake, again from the same book. I got impatient towards the end, threw in the chopped dates, skipped the toasted walnuts and large-grained sugar… I wasn’t expecting anything fancy. Fancy this cake is not, but it has a subtle saltiness that combines with a light and airy crust and a rich buttery flavor… Mmm, I love it. Have already been tucking in one slice after another this evening. And now I feel bad that I lost my patience while making it. I have to make it again, for sure. But this time, instead of using liquid buttermilk, I am going to see if I can get hold of a packet of powdered buttermilk.
Buttermilk Cake
