Pumpkin Cake

Obviously, I had to make something special and write about it here. It has been so long. I am sorry for being away for so long.

I have been cooking a lot but somehow I never got a chance to click pictures and write about it. I feel that I am missing out on something but I can not get back to it. I have been shifting cities and have taken up a job which keeps me engaged.

Enough of excuses though! Let me first take you straight away to the food.

I made pumpkin cake. Actually, the plan was to make pumpkin muffins but my muffin plans have never succeeded. I have baked muffins twice and they have kind of over flown and flattened out on me. I know, I know, it is hard to imagine a person having a blog and trying to preach cooking having difficulty baking muffins. So, I made 6 muffins out of the batter and when I saw their beautiful faces, I decided I would bake cake with the rest of the batter. The cake came out really well. I am a bit proud as I made changes to a Dorie Greenspan recipe successfully. We all know that she is amazing and so are her books and her recipes. I bought her book "From my home to yours" just 2-3 months back and now, whenever I have to bake something, it is the first place I peep into.

I changed the recipe to make it healthier. My boy friend is on a strict and healthy diet these days and I did adjustments so that I could provoke him to eat it. I succeeded. I know I am putting all the blame on him but I myself keep searching ways to replace all purpose flour and butter in all these recipes. So far, I have been quite successful. I replace all purpose flour with whole wheat flour and butter with olive oil. It is not that simple as it sounds though. First of all, do not use these replacements when you are baking breads. Breads work with very specific ratios. Secondly, go step by step. Do not replace the complete two cups of flour with whole wheat flour, as both have different densities and different characteristic aroma and you might need to adjust the other ingredients accordingly. I replace half of the flour with whole wheat flour and same goes for butter.

Here is the recipe.

Pumpkin Muffin
Recipe Adapted from : Dorie Greenspan
Ingredients:
1. 3/4 cup (170 g) unsweetened pumpkin puree
2. 110 g (1 cup) all purpose flour
3. 120 g (1 cup) whole wheat flour (Original recipe adds two cups of all purpose flour)
4. 1 stick (110 g) unsalted butter (I used 55 g of butter and added olive oil to compensate for it)
5. 3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
6. 1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
7. 1/2 tsp ground ginger
8. 2 tsp baking powder
9. 1/4 tsp baking soda
10. 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
11. 3/4 cup (170 g) sugar (original recipe adds 1/2 cup sugar and 1/4 cup brown sugar)
12. 1/4 cup (60 ml) buttermilk
13. 2 eggs
14. 130 ml milk
15. 1/2 cup (50 g) soaked raisins
16. 1/2 cup (50 g) cashew

Steps:
1. Beat the butter and sugar together. The original recipe mentions doing this using an electric beater. I have always been using a hand beater though. I heat the sugar and butter a bit before hand to get a head start.
2. Add the eggs one by one and beat well. Add olive oil, vanilla extract and pumpkin puree.
3. Sift the flour, spices, baking powder and baking soda together.
4. Slowly add the flour to the butter and sugar mixture. Add some amount and mix well. While mixing the flour, add buttermilk and milk to keep a good consistency of the batter. The batter should neither be too thick nor too runny. You can adjust the amount of milk accordingly.
5. Add the raisins and cashews and mix well.
6. Preheat the oven to 205 degree C or 400 degree F.
7. Grease a regular size muffin pan or fit the molds with paper muffins cup. Bake for about 25 minutes or till a toothpick inserted into the muffin comes clean.
8. Cool the muffin pan for 5-10 minutes before taking out the muffins.

It is a delicious cake. The pumpkin, cinnamon, nutmeg and the whole wheat flour worked out so well together.

Go bake :)

Wholewheat Pumpkin Walnut Almond Streusel Cake

Omg! It has been a long time since I have penned down here.

First of all a very happy new year to everyone. May this post and many more to come
find you all in good health and peace. Have a glorious year ahead filled with full of fun :)

As the name already speak out, I made a wholewheat pumpkin walnut almond streusel cake. I wanted to make something sweet and special.

I had my eyes upon this cake for sometime now. I had to start travelling the next day and I thought this would be a good treat for me on the train. Oh I just love the train journeys. They are so much fun. You are on the go, no one disturbs you, you witness marvelous views along the journey, meet new people and see different things happening around. I just love the whole experience. And you know what! This post has been written during the train journey.

Newer things are happening in life and new decisions are being taken. Maybe this cake is celebrating those or who knows maybe this cake is celebrating  just good food and good life around me. Believe me, this cake needs no reason. I am not happy with myself as I have not done justice with the photo. The photo does not do justice to the absolutely delicious cake.

But I promise I will do better next time.

Does it happen with you guys that you can't eat right after you cook. I mean I can, but I can't eat as much as I normally do. Or I can't eat the normal portions me and my sister usually eat. I enjoy it a bit later. Like I did in the train. I also offered it to the gentleman nearby and he was about to take it. But I suddenly remembered that he ordered vegetarian for dinner and I was not sure if he would eat egg. I asked him to have and as he was about to take some, I asked him if he would eat egg. He said no and I apologetically pulled back my hand. Then while watching a movie I had the whole big piece.

Oh my my! It was a beauty. The taste of the streusel made my taste buds dance. I am telling you, the photos are not doing justice. But I could not resist myself from posting this recipe. I wanted  everyone to have access to this beautiful cake.

I have blabbered a lot. Go and make this cake. You won't regret. One specific note: As mentioned do use the spring form cake pan and not the normal one. Or else the cake may break. Its a soft cake. I didn't had my spring form pan and used the normal one. Which explains why this post does not have a full picture of the cake ;)

And also one learning from all the baking I have done. Brown sugar works wonders with desserts. I love it. It brings out a strong molassey flavor. I can never forget the feel of the streusel in my mouth and neither will you.

Now enough of talking. Let me go straight away to the cake recipe.

Absolute bliss!

Almond Walnut Streusel Cake
Bake in a 9 inch springform cake pan
Recipe Adapted from : The White Ramekins

Ingredients:

For the streusel:
1. 40 grams (1/3 cup) Whole wheat flour
2. 100 grams (1/2 cup) dark brown sugar
3. 1 tsp cinnamon powder
4. 20 g Walnuts (original recipe uses just walnuts. I put in almonds too. I had whole walnuts and breaking them was a long and painful process. )
5. 50 grams almonds
6. 50 grams cold butter, cut in chunks
7. pinch of salt

For the cake:
1. 130 grams (1 cup) whole wheat flour
2. 55 grams (1/2 cup) all purpose flour
3. 1 tsp ground ginger
4. 2 tsp cinnamon powder
5. 1/4 tsp nutmeg powder
6. 2 tsp baking powder
7. 1/2 tsp baking soda
8. 100 grams butter
9. 2 eggs
10. 200 grams (1 cup) brown sugar
11. 60 grams (1/2 cup) pumpkin puree
12. 80 grams (slightly less than 1/2 cup) yogurt
13. pinch of salt

For the dripping:
1. 55 grams (1/2 cup) confectioner's sugar
2. 1 tsp vanilla extract
3. 1 tbsp milk


Steps for the streusel:
1. Warm up a non stick pan and lightly toss the chopped walnuts and chopped almonds.
2. While the nuts are being toasted, sift the flour, salt, cinnamon and brown sugar together.
3. Put in the chunks of butter in this mixture.
4. You have to make a crumby mixture now of the butter and the flour mix. You can do it by hand or by giving it a go in the mixture for a minute or two.
5. Now add the toasted walnuts and almonds into it.

Steps for the cake batter:
1. Mix the dry ingredients (whole wheat flour, all purpose flour, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, salt, baking powder, baking soda) together.
2. Beat the butter and sugar together till it forms a nice mix (alternatively melt the butter and mix in the sugar in it well enough)
3. Now add the eggs one by one while whisking the mixture properly.
4. Now add in the yogurt and the pumpkin puree and mix well.
5. Add this mix to the dry mixture.

Steps to make the drizzle:
1. Whisk the vanilla extract, milk and sugar together. Add milk to adjust the consistency
so that it is easy to drizzle.

To assemble:
1. Pre heat an oven at 175 degree celsius
2. Prepare a spring form pan by buttering it with butter
3. Pour in half of the batter, then place half of the streusel on it. Now pour over the rest of the batter and then layer the rest of the streusel on it.
4. Bake for around 25 minutes or till a tooth pick comes out clean.

After the cake cools down take it out of the spring form pan.

Pour over the drizzle and serve.

It is an amazing cake. Uses such a variety of ingredients and the flavor comes out together so well.
It is definitely a treat. :)