Desserts Archives - Page 3 of 3 - THE BAKING SKILLET

Hot Milk Sponge Cake with Orange Italian Meringue Buttercream

June 29, 2016 2 Comments

This is a classic hot milk sponge cake that yields a light, deliciously tender crumb is complemented by a fragrant orange Italian meringue buttercream made with fresh orange juice and Grand Marnier. Last few days have been stressful and busy and lost in paperwork. There have been visa issues, lawyer meetings, laptop troubles, digital marketing class assignments and ongoing summer travel plans. We have been all over the place. I have missed blog deadlines, had awful baking disasters, yucky kitchen mess to clean up and missed a few posts. Basically, when my head is not in the game, best to avoid baking because I screw up and then I sulk for hours over whatever rubbish came out of the oven. Bad vibes everywhere! Not good at all. But then this hot milk sponge cake which was on my calendar for this week, came out of the oven smelling scrumptious, looking golden and moist and the crumbs tasted so good! I found myself, nibbling at the crumbs mindlessly while the cakes were cooling. It is a rich, buttery tasting hot milk sponge. I adapted the recipe from Baking Bites I don’t know how my brain came up with the Orange Italian […]

Desserts, Indian Inspired

A Canadian Whisky Caramel Sauce and an Indian Carrot Pudding

June 22, 2016 No Comments

carrot pudding with whiskey caramel sauce

We are sweating over summer plans. Did I mention that ever since we moved to Canada in January this year, we have been living a vagabond life between BnBs and service apartments? With most of our belongings from our previous life in Dubai tucked away in a self-storage somewhere in Toronto, we are lugging around a few suitcases and cartons around the city till we buy and move into our own home. I will save the rant about finding a house in Toronto for another day, another post. For the past two months, we have been growing roots at a service apartment downtown, but they are kicking us out next month to accommodate the influx of international summer tourists! I have kind of gotten attached to this place. It is where I started my blog, I have become comfortable with this kitchen and the oven. It is not amazing, but it is functional, clean and spacious. I am dreading moving into another BnB that looks great in pictures and then you find that basic pots and pans are missing or there is way too much clutter from the owner or the bed creaks precariously everytime you move! Since we are […]

Cakes, Desserts

Strawberry Swirl Pound Cake (Pound Cakes – Part 3)

May 31, 2016 No Comments

I am a recent strawberry convert. I remember I used to hate them. In the mid-western part of India around Bombay, the region where I am originally from, they are so precious and yet so disappointing. They sell it for an exorbitant price and if you are lucky you may find one sweet little strawberry in your pint. Like a lottery ticket. But you are obliged to say they were so good. You paid a high enough price for them to be good. It was the same in Dubai. They looked prettier but that’s it. I don’t remember ever buying strawberries. Ever! Until I met Steve who told me stories about how he worked on a farm as a child picking strawberries and eating most of them. I am not the biggest fan of fruit but picking strawberries at a farm and stuffing mouthfuls sounds like fun. And now I am here and it is berry season. Toronto markets are flooded. Strawberries everywhere! Plump, pretty, red, ready to eat and oh so delicious! While I was thinking of combining Pound cake series with strawberries I came across this gorgeous concoction by Joy the Baker. I tried the roasted strawberries and […]

Desserts

Matcha Cream Puffs

May 25, 2016 No Comments

2016 will go down for me as ‘the year of firsts’! First time in Canada. First encounter with snow (lots of snow!). My first painful attempt at skiing. My very first, rather ugly, snow-man! And now, my very first Matcha tea! Is that unbelievable to the western world? No, I have not been living under a rock. I have however been living in a beautiful bubble called Dubai. And unlike here, Matcha tea sort of got officially unveiled in the country that boasts of the tallest tower in the world, only in 2015. No, it did not come to Starbucks Middle-east. I believe it was available in select Japanese restaurants. But one thing I must note. Once a trend hits Dubai, it catches like wildfire. My first encounter at an unassuming tea shop was mildly embarrassing. Caught like a deer in headlights, I gave the nice girl blank stares when she asked if I wanted milk in my Matcha tea, or sugar or honey. She was the second person to know my shameful secret. She could not hide her shock very well. It all ended in nervous laughter on my end. I’m sure she rolled her eyes and shook her […]

Cakes, Desserts

Cardamom Pound Cake with Mango Cream (Pound Cakes – Part 2)

May 23, 2016 1 Comment

We are eating mangoes and berries for breakfast almost everyday! That’s supposed to be healthy right? So I should not feel guilty about eating a piece of cake with the bowl of fruits. Good. I wanted to use one of the pound cakes from the previous post and create a flavor that makes me nostalgic. Now this was experimentation territory and things could go wrong. And they did. But hey, this is all about challenging myself! I felt like baking a cardamom cake with mangoes. Why? Because in India summers meant long hot holidays, playing scruffy games on the streets, some boring and lots of fun visits to relatives and eating lots of mangoes. Ripe Alphonso mangoes are pulped by hand, chilled and served with some cardamom sprinkled on top. This was a real treat that one got only a couple of times during the short summer months. We really did look forward to it. Ahhh nostalgia… I wanted to recreate those flavours. The cake is lightly spiced with fragrant cardamom. This is potent stuff that can overpower everything, so I used only a touch for that beautiful aroma. And served it with mango cream reminiscent of the mango pulp […]