Jacob's Birthday Weekend

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Ever since I started my cake decorating classes I have been making cupcakes left and right It is my mission to drown my near and dear ones in sweet treats. My classes are mostly to blame as each week I'm required to bake a cake for the class. But a standard cake mix makes either two 8" cakes or 24 cupcakes. And since I need only one 8" cake, the rest of the batter is turned into cupcakes :).

Eight such left over cupcakes got turned into little forest animals for my nephew, Jacob, for his 4th birthday. He loves animals  and I figured this would be great for him. Almost every gift I have got Jacob has had something to do with animals, that's how much he loves them. I made these cupcakes once before for my other nephew Isaac. Back then, I had arranged the cupcakes on a plate on which i drew trees and grass.

A Panda, a Tiger, a Monkey & a Lion, just hanging out.

From Isaac's second B'day last July

 

 We were also planning to visit one of my childhood friends who had moved to Seattle and had recently given birth to a little baby girl. Diya and I decided to take some home made cupcakes for them. But earlier in the day, we had been browsing through Sur la Table and found the cutest little disposable mini cake molds, that you can bake in and give away. They were so cute that we decided to make mini cakes instead of cupcakes. We made two flavors, a marbled Nutella cake and a strawberry cake with real cooked strawberries and preserves. They were both yummy, but we both loved the Nutella cake the most! Here are a few pics.

Nutella Cake with Chocolate Frosting

Strawberry Cake with Pink Vanilla Rosettes

Little Cupcakes for Baby Scarlett

One of our friends had a sweet little baby last week and we went to see her this weekend. They named her Scarlett. Little baby Scarlett is the first Scarlett I know of in person. Welcome to our world Baby Scarlett! Anyway I thought of making some cupcakes for her parents to enjoy and this is what I came up with.

I decided to make lemon flavored cupcakes with a lemon glaze. For the piped flowers and leaves I used a standard buttercream icing. The results were cute, but I need to work on the lemon glaze so I get it more even next time, not too thick.

Cramalized Plantains - A Pazham Puri Fix

I'm from the southern most state in India, called Kerala and the one fruit it is famous for, is plantains! I always disliked bananas growing up, but plantains i liked. I think it was mainly because of my grandfather, who would slice a plantain after every meal and share it with his grandkids - all 18 of them. And there was always a fight at the end, but not for the plantain slices, but the skin! He sliced the plantain with the skin, but not all the way through. Once the plantain slices were taken out, the skin looked like a giant caterpillar!

One of the other pleasures I remember from vacations in Kerala, is Pazham Puri or Batter Fried Plantains! It is crispy on the outside and dark orange and mushy inside. really tasty. I had been craving these for a while, but haven't made them for 2 reasons, it is not easy to find ripe plantains in the US and i hate frying. But I found a way around both these problems!

All you need are ripe plantains and some brown sugar. For the ripe plantains, i bought the raw ones from the store, left it in a transparent plastic bag on the window sill. In about a week to ten days it had ripened. And instead of frying, I decided to crunch it up using caramel instead.

Caramalized Plantains

Ingredients:
2 - Ripe Plantains
1/2 cup - Brown sugar
Cooking Spray (Butter Flavored)

Method:
Line a baking sheet with aluminium foil, shiny side up. Spray it with some butter flavored cooking spray. If you don't have butter flavored, regular will do. Peel and slice the plantains diagonally into half centimeter thick slices. Place them uniformly in the greased baking sheet. Spread 1/8 tsp of brown sugar on each slice ad broil on high for 5-7 mins. Once it crosses 4 minutes, you should see the sugar melt and caramelize, so watch the plantains carefully. they can go from golden delicious to charred in just a minute. Once done, take it out and let cool for 5 minutes and enjoy!

It is best eaten within an hour of making. If you refrigerate it, the caramel will dissolve, but they'll still taste heavenly. I even creamed them with some evaporated milk and whipped cream and made an ice cream out of it. But I prefer it in its caramelized form.

The caramelized plantains are fat free (except for the little bit of cooking spray), but they do pack a lot of carbs, especially from the plantain itself, so enjoy them in moderation.

Tilapia Fish Cakes with Tomato Jam and Spicy Mayo

Last weekend we had some of Paul's friends over. Unlike my dinner parties in the past, this one was different in 2 ways - it was a pot luck and I decided to keep the menu as simple as possible. I know, that is so not me. Sigh... I think it is the wisdom gleaned from so many complicated menus, unnecessary prepping and the tension of last minute cooking.

It was decided that others would arrange for drinks, an appetizer, dessert and something starchy. I was in charge of 3 things - stuffed beef tenderloin, tilapia fish cakes and a green leafy salad. I know this sounds like a lot to most people, but compared to my complicated menus in the past this was a breeze. An example of one such menu from the past::

A Sardinian Dinner:

Appetizers: Music bread, Rosemary bread, marinara with poached eggs, balsamic and olive oil vinaigrette, Pesto with basil from my back yard, hummus, lamb kabobs. And yes, everything from the parchment like music bread to the hummus & lamb kabobs, were made from scratch

Main Course: Beef tenderloin stuffed with basil, prosciutto and Gruyere cheese - Au Jus, Greek chicken salad, Israeli couscous with goat cheese, and a green leafy salad.

Dessert:  Semolina saffron cake with a lemon glaze and saffron icing.

The menu had been very well researched and true to Sardinia, but it was way too ambitious a menu to be attempted by a single cook trapped in one of the smallest and most poorly ventilated kitchens ever, that too on a Friday evening after coming back from work! The food tasted reasonably good, i think my good intentions definitely shone through, but at what cost? I had triggered off the smoke alarm while grilling the kabobs, luckily before the guests arrived, but i set off the smoke alarm again, twice, while searing and baking the beef - while the guests were present. And because temperature in the room was so high, the whipping cream didn't whip up properly.

That experience taught me to keep my menu simple and to remain calm, how ever loud the smoke alarm. But stubborn that I am, I decided to make the stuffed beef tenderloin again for this lunch with friends. I wanted to prove to myself that I could make it again without setting off smoke alarms. And i did pull it off, the outside was perfectly seared, the inside was juicy with few spots of medium rare, medium well and well done! there were a few breastfeeding and pregnant ladies, and well done was necessary. In other words, I had tamed the albeit dead beast's tenderloin! Hurray!

It is very rare for me to host a party where everything tastes great - from the drinks, to the empanadas to the chocolate chip cookies. And everyone had fun as well! So this was a welcome change :).

But the focus of this blog is the second item on the main course - Tilapia fish cakes - a recipe that I came up with after reading a lot of fish cake recipes and disliking all of them :). It is a fairly healthy recipe and tasty too, so here it is:

Tilapia Fish cakes with Tomato Jam and Spicy Mayo

Tilapia Fish Cakes

2 lbs - Tilapia Fillets (boneless & skinless)
3 tbsp - Fresh Dill OR 3 tsp Dry Dill
1/4 cup - Fresh Lemon Juice
1 tbsp - Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper to taste (go a little heavier on the salt and pepper since it is going to be mashed in with other ingredients)

1 tsp - Olive Oil

1/2 cup - red Onion - chopped fine

3/4 cup - Celery Stalk - chopped fine

1 clove - Garlic - grated

1 cup - Scallions - finely sliced

1/4 cup - fresh Parsley - chopped fine

1-1.5 lbs - Red Potatoes
2 tsp - Fennel Seeds - roasted and crushed with a pestle
1 tbsp - Cayenne Pepper (adjust according to taste)
1/4 cup - Whipping Cream
Salt to taste

3/4 cup - Grated Parmesan Cheese
1.5 cups - Panko Bread Crumbs
1 egg
1+1 tsp - Cayenne Pepper
Salt to taste

Oil for frying (Canola and Olive Oil)

Whisk together the dill, lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper and marinate the Tilapia fillets for at least an hour. Grill the Tilapia till cooked - 3 mins on each side, and let cool a little. Crumble the fish lightly (leave as big chunks, as it will crumble further during mixing).

In a non stick pan, heat a tsp oil and fry the grated garlic till fragrant, add the onion and celery, salt and pepper and saute lightly - about 2-3 minutes. Add this to the crumbled fish. Add the scallions & parsley to the fish as well and mix lightly.

Peel the potatoes, quarter, and boil the potatoes in a little salted water till fully cooked. I do this in a microwave, you can use any method you are familiar with. Mash the potatoes while still hot, add the cream and mash till creamy. Now season with fennel, Cayenne Pepper and more salt as needed. Add the mashed potatoes to the fish mixture and combine with a light hand. Try not mix to a smooth pulp. Let there be chunks of fish in the mixture.

Form the mixture into cakes using a food ring or free form them using your hand. Mix the egg, some salt and 1 tsp cayenne pepper in a wide flat bowl. Mix the bread crumbs, Parmesan, 1 tsp Cayenne and salt in another wide bowl. Brush each fish cake with the egg mixture, drop it in the bread crumbs and lightly press and reform the shape. the crab cakes are going to be soft and so you wont be able to just pick them up and drop them in the egg, you'll have to use a brush. Shallow fry the crab cakes in 1-2 mm oil (combination of Canola & Olive) or spray oil and bake at 450 F for 8-10 minutes. But the baking method can dry them out a little. If you plan to bake, up the whipping cream to keep it softer. Serve with Spicy Mayo and Tomato Jam.

Note: This recipe makes about 20 2.5" round fish cakes.

Spicy Mayo

1 Cup - Low fat Mayo
1/4 cup - Whipping Cream
2 tbsp - Dijon Mustard
1-1.5 tbsp - Srichara Spicy Sauce
1-2 tsp - Sugar

Whisk all the ingredients together and keep chilled.

Tomato Jam

1 14 Oz can - Petite Diced Tomato in juice
1 14 Oz can - Tomato Sauce
1 tsp - Pepper
1.5 tsp - Cayenne Pepper
1/2 cup - Red Onion - chopped fine
3 tbsp - Balsamic Vinegar
3 tbsp - Red Wine Vinegar
2 tbsp - Sugar (or to taste)
2 tbsp - Honey
1 tbsp - Corn Syrup
Salt to taste

Combine all ingredient and cook on medium high flame till reduced to a third of the volume or till it reaches a jam like consistency. there will be some spluttering, so use a slightly bigger vessel than needed for the quantity of sauce. The corn syrup will help reduce the bubbling and spluttering. stir the sauce every few minutes, more often as it gets thicker. If you wish to use fresh tomatoes, skin the tomatoes and remove the seeds.
Note: this recipe is adapted from Emeril Lagasse's recipe for Cajun Tomato Jam.

The Birthday Surprise

My Birthday started off like any other day, I woke up rather grumpy after only 5 hours of sleep ( I was up late writing the previous blog :). Paul wished me Happy Birthday, we got ready for work and reached work - late - like most days. The rest of the day was spent working and answering phone calls from friends and family calling to wish me on my Birthday. At lunch time, Paul picked me up and took me to a sushi restaurant we used to frequent and where they make you a special little Birthday Sushi Plate. Like always, we ate too much and headed back to work. As Paul dropped me off, he said he was going to run a few 'errands'. I knew that meant he was going to clean up the house some more and buy me something, most likely some flowers and/or a cake. I also had a strong hunch that someone would be coming home since he spent some time on Thursday tidying up the house.

So B-Day afternoon was spent in doing some work and at the same time doing a little research for my first food blog project - a cake for Mom & Dad's (Paul's Parents) Anniversary. Dad likes coconut desserts and so I decide to make it a Coconut White Chocolate Cake. As I was looking around for icing ideas, I came across this Cake Decorating class at Michaels. I instantly decided to join. I pinged (Nerd slang for chatted over Instant Messaging) my friend Ankita and reeled her in as well. By the time Paul picked me up in the evening (40 minutes too late - so I guessed he had stopped by Costco to buy me a gold bracelet that I had been eyeing last week), I was all excited about the cake decorating class. So he took me to Michaels (after giving me a beautiful bouquet of flowers) to register for the class and buy the class supplies. I bought the biggest Wilton Cake Decorating kit I could find. If you are wondering, why don't I start small, then I shall quote someone I know, "If it is worth doing, it is worth overdoing". We then headed home to get ready for the second half of the B-Day celebration - Dinner for 2 at Cheese Cake Factory.

As we were walking to the restaurant from the parking lot, I hugged Paul and told him how happy I was that it was just the 2 of us, I was really looking forward to the quite weekend of baking! On the way to the restaurant entrance, Paul paused a couple of times, was very listless and as we neared the restaurant he insisted he wanted to go to the AT&T store. The AT&T store part irritated me because we were 30 minutes late for our dinner reservation! As we turned into the restaurant entrance, Paul held back and I walked ahead. And sitting there, were Anand and Ankita! I was a little surprised and was telling them it was such a nice surprise to see them, when I noticed Anand looking at the person next to him. I couldn't understand why he was constantly looking there so I turned - only to find Diya, my sister sitting there! I was surprised all right! When I spoke to her a few weeks back, she said she couldn't come to Portland on my birthday weekend because my niece Rachel had Sunday school. And I completely fell for that. Apparently Paul had called her a couple days before I did and she agreed go along with the surprise. It was a great surprise!

Any surprise that brings family to Portland (Especially when the family ahs 2 cute little kids), is a great surprise.

We had a great Birthday dinner with way too much good food. Rest of the weekend was a chaos of late night talks, big celebration dinners and a Super Bowl party. But amidst all this I was inclined on making some baking happen, so we decided to bake the cake for  Mom & Dad after all. So Anand and Ankita  came over on Saturday afternoon. After a lot of research I picked a hybrid buttercream recipe that I read in the Art of Dessert blog because the blog mentioned how the icing was soft and yet was very smooth like meringue. The icing was really tasty, not too sweet and really creamy. Though it was a good icing for covering the cake, it wasn't very good for piping flowers. But it was too late to make another icing, so we decided to go ahead with it anyway.

I came across a guest post on Ria's Collection that described how to make chocolate lattices. I liked the idea of a chocolate lattice very much. Initially I planned on piping an intricate design. But the chocolate was very hard to work with and it started hardening rather quickly and a fourth of the way into making scroll like designs, the tip had completely hardened. So we melted some more white chocolate chips and decided to go with a quick checkered design. This came out well. But we waited a few seconds too long before we wrapped the chocolate around the cake, so there was a little cracking. But it was still a good first attempt. Diya used the excess molten chocolate to write out 'Happy Anniversary Mom & Dad'. She also drew a few hearts and leaves. We colored the leaves with some powdered green color and gold dust. We also dusted the lettering with some gold dust to give it a little shimmer. Piping the drop flowers was easy, but because the icing was a little denser than we had expected, it broke off leaving crooked edges. Another problem I faced while making the roses was that the icing had a very tough time sticking to itself. But the end result surpassed our expectations. I had started out wanting to make coconut cake for my in-laws, but we ended up with a mini wedding themed cake.

The cute part was when it was time to cut the cake, Isaac, my 2-1/2 year old nephew started crying - 'don't break the fence'! He was really upset that Mom & Dad broke the chocolate lattice to get to  the cake.

Note to self: No chocolate lattices on Isaac's birthday cake.

The Story Behind the Name - 'Food from the Cloud'

I thought it was necessary to explain my choice of the blog title. The choice of the word 'Food' is kind of obvious - I love to cook and eat (maybe eat more than cook :) and I intend this to be a blog about food I like to eat as well recipes that I have tried out in my little kitchen. Now, what is the significance of the word 'Cloud' you might ask. Well, I chose it for 2 reasons.

Reason 1: Cloud Computing. Yes, I am a Nerd!

For those of you who don't  know me, I'm bit of a Nerd. I work in the field of Storage Networking or more commonly known as the 'Cloud'. In fact my entire work experience has been in this field and I feel a very strong sense of attachment to it. So when I thought of a way to link this to my passion - Food - I couldn't let it pass.

For those of you who don't know what the cloud means, it is basically the internet. When you upload photos to a website, it means, you are being 'loaned' some space on the site's Web Server, this is basically a service provided by the 'Cloud'. Same is the case when you write Blogs, share recipes, generate social content, etc.

Reason 2: I Live in Portland! Duh!

I live in Portland, Oregon (USA), and the city is almost perennially prey to overcast skies. So literally, I'll be food blogging from under cloudy skies.

Inspiration:

I have loved to cook for a long, long time and I have blogged in the past, so what inspired me now? Over the last 2 years I have been going over a few food and cooking blogs that I have fallen in love with. Some are simple recipes, some are artistic creations, some educate you on techniques, but they all have one thing in common, a deep appreciation for cooking and other cooks, be it amateurs or experts. So a Big Thanks to all you internet cooks out there! Here are a few food blogs I like:

Spicyana

The Art of Desserts

Ria's Collection

Another practical reason is that I wanted a single online repository for all my recipes. My sister, Diya has always been pestering me for recipes and I always forget to type it up and send it to her. So hopefully I'll be good about updating my recipes here and she'll be only a few clicks away from my recipes.

Coincidentally, today is my Birthday, so it is a pretty good day to start blogging again :). Happy Birthday to Me!