CoFFee !!

I am writing this blog on my way home, sitting on the last seat of my bus (office ka).I can’t do anything other than work / sleep in the bus with my best friend "MY IPOD" always on me. My sweet chit chat partner got married and her bus route has changed :). Struggled to take that pic.


Times have changed and so have things around. 2 months ago, I used to have the best of my friends (in office) around me. One by one each person departed, as they moved on to pursue what was good for them.

In office were- 4 of us, we got acquainted in Nov 07.
I will name our gang as "coffee talkies". (I made up this name, just to spice up the blog.We never had a "gang" and stuff)
As the name goes, we always used to meet up for coffee 2 times a day (at least 1ce).

Ahhh, those coffee breaks. I miss every bit of it. Everyday we had a topic to engage us in chit chatting the whole while, many a times bitch about people :D
It was quite a good stress buster. I enjoyed (so did all others) every sip of coffee we had.

Not to forget my PJs

Instance: This one - I am very famous for this-

Question: Whats up Sam?
Reply: Roof!!!
Again me: Sorry, bad joke!! :D
I am almost used to answering this way. Some times deliberately, but not always.
Such PJs just comes out of my mouth even if I don’t wanna make em.

Coming back to "coffee talkies". Once it boiled down to 2 from 4 people, I stopped having coffee.I won’t say I quit on coffee. I have had 5 cups of coffee from 25 Nov 08. When my mind stops working, a caffeine kick does the magic of gearing it up.

MISS U ALL ...

HappY NeW YeaR

Bye Bye 08, Welcome 09.

The welcoming of 09 seemed pretty quiet and calm around me. I decided that I am not going to come back from work and just sleep on a 31 Dec Night. I wanted to do something exciting. So I baked a Cake.

I know, U might be laughing, thinking...
What is exciting in this?


Here it is: I prepared an "EGG LESS", "Comparatively LOW CAL -> as in, with out butter, healthier", "YUMMY", "CHOCOLATE", CAKE.
I know this sounds good for all those cake lovers, who are watching their calories and want to eat a cake with full heart :-)
(If you are still laughing/giggling reading this. Then don’t read further, it is not required.)

I wanted to share the recipe of the same in this blog.

Ingredients:

1. Dates (Seed Less, Finely chopped) - 1 Cup
2. Milk - 1 and half Cup
3. Maida - 1 and half Cup (I am not sure if there can be a replacement for this)
4. Honey - quarter Cup
5. Sugar - 3/4 Cup (Depends, if you want to reduce this quantity. I was a little generous here. Or use sugar Free as a replacement. )
6. Cocoa Powder - 25 Gms
7. Baking (cooking) Soda - Half t-spoon
8. Baking Powder - 1 and half t-spoon
9. Bru Coffee Powder (optional) - 1 t-spoon (For flavor)
10. Caramel (optional) - 2 t-spoons (For flavor)
11. Cherry (Finely chopped) - 50 gms (your choice for the quantity, More or less)
12. Nuts (Finely chopped) - I Put cashew 10 pieces. (This is also your choice for quantity. As an option you can use Badam also.)
13. Vegetable Oil - 3/4 Cup
14. Pinch of Salt


Preparation time: 40 mins.

Procedure:

1. Put the following in to a Blender:
Dates (Seed Less, Finely chopped) +
Milk +
Honey +
Sugar

And Blend the above until all the ingredients are fine mixture and no longer grainy.
Keep this aside.


2. Put the following into a bowl: (Let the bowl be big enough to home all the ingredients)
Maida +
Cocoa Powder +
Bru Coffee Powder (optional) +
Baking (cooking) Soda +
Baking Powder +
Pinch of Salt

The above mixture must be sewed twice. Throw away the waste.

3. Keeping the remaining in the same bowl. Add the point 1, blended mix into the bowl.
Add the:
Cherry (Finely chopped) +
Nuts (Finely chopped) +
Vegetable Oil +
Caramel (optional)

4. At this point all the ingredients are into the bowl. Now this must be mixed by the cut and fold method. (Yes, we will not beat the mixture as for the normal cakes).i.e. Take a big spoon and fold the mixture until the whole thing looks like a brown paste. (this will be a little loose paste, but the viscosity will be low. I hope you dint mistake the word paste.) This process will take 2 mins.

5. Take your Cake baking tin.
(My brother calls it the - "Bake a cake in Me bowl")

Grease it with Vegetable oil (just a few drops). Sprinkle some Maida on the greased Tin evenly all over.
This makes your baking tin Ready for the cake mixture to be poured in.

6. Pour the mixture into baking tin and spread it evenly.
(Keep your Oven preheated at 160)
Put it into the oven. Bake it for 20 - 25 mins.

7. Remove the cake carefully from the oven.
To check if your cake is done, poke a needle into the cake to see if the needle comes out clean. If it does, then your cake is done!!! (Else keep it in the oven for 5 more mins)

Yuppie!!!!

This cake Ideally serves 10. That is, if you are not a lavish eater...