Baking with Merry

For a change, this time I haven't referred any blogs or books; rather this is my own recipe....*smile*....A recipe, which I am soo used to since my chidhood....my mom and even my aunty used the same method for preparing it. I wonder if there is any other method for preparing a fruit salad!!! Ingredients: Recipe Source: My Own Milk - 500ml Sugar - 2 tbsps Custard Powder - 1tbsp Fruits - your choice (I used apple, banana, pomegranate, pineapple and grapes) Method: Prepare custard as per the instructions on the box of the custard powder. Peel and cut all the fruits (except banana and apple) into small pieces and chill for an hour. Once the custard is cool, line a bowl with the chilled fruits and pour the custard over it. Chill before serving the salad. Enjoi!!! If you guys know any other method for preparing a fruit salad, kindly share..... Now, who wouldn't love a fruit salad for dessert after lunch/dinner???  

I was browsing through my bookmarked cooking blogs, when I saw this particular dessert known as Banoffee Pie in Swapna's Cuisine. Frankly, I haven't heard about it earlier, but it looked quite interesting....Moreover, it required very little ingredients and there was no baking involved!!! I googled to know more about the dessert. According to Wikipedia, "Banoffee Pie is an English pastry-based dessert made from bananas, cream, toffee from boiled condensed milk (or dulce de leche), either on a pastry base or one made from crumbled biscuits and butter." The images of this dessert on many blogs/sites were quite tempting and a treat to the eyes, which is why I decided to make it. The below method is what I followed when making the Banoffee Pie. Ingredients: Recipe Adapted from: Swapna's Cuisine Condensed Milk - 1 can (400 gms) Bananas - 3, large Whipped cream - 200ml Digestive/Marie biscuits - 200gms Butter - 100 gms Cocoa powder - to decorate Icing Sugar - 1 tbsp

I always wanted to bake cookies, but never had the cookie cutters for cutting out the cookies in shape. Finally, last week when shopping at Niligiris, I came across a small box of 6 cookie cutters......no second thoughts; in goes the box into my trolley...*smiles*...... Now comes the next problem - a simple recipe!!!I browsed through many books, blogs and magazines and found a lot of recipes but I needed a simple one as this was an experiment!!!*winks*.....Lastly, when I browsed through my recipe book, I found this extremely simple and easy recipe, which I had jotted down long ago and forgotten!!! Ingredients: Recipe Source: Good Housekeeping (I think so) Butter - 1 cup Sugar - 1/2 cup Vanilla essence - 1 tsp (or 1 vanilla bean) Maida - 2 3/4 cups Method: Cream the butter and sugar together till fluffy and light. Scrape and put in the vanilla bean pods or essence into the butter and sugar. Add the maida to the mixture and knead it till it forms a soft dough. Cover the dough with

Happy New Year 2012 Hi dears....I know it's late, but "Better late then never" *smiles*....So how was your Christmas and New Year???Hope you guys had fun!!!What are your new resolutions for this year??As for me, I had spent my X'mas n New Year back at home with my parents silently....no resolutions (since I don't stick to any!); just prayers that this year is gonna be a good one too....*smiles* I was wondering what I would bake first in the New Year.....went through many recipes and finally spotted this particular recipe of a simple and delicious dessert by Ria Jobin.....I got this recipe of hers from Vanitha.... You could also find this in her blog . But unfortunately, the pictures didn't come out quite well...it was a total disaster!!Will surely re-post with better pictures asap.... Ingredients: Recipe source: Ria's collection 1. Mascarpone cheese - 100gm 2. Amul cream - 150gm 3. Instant coffee (strong) - 1/4 cup     Sugar - 2-3 t