Cornmeal-Cranberry Scones:

These are very soft, crumbly and melt- in- the -mouth kind of delicacies. It has rich corn meal flavour and it is neither a cookie nor a cake and is very mildly sweet. It does not need any side dishes like butter or jam and one can enjoy it as it is with a cup of tea or coffee.

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Ingredients:

All-purpose flour- 1 cup

Cornmeal- ¾ cup

Butter- 100 grams

Dried cranberries- ½ cup

Baking powder – ¾ teaspoon

Baking soda- ¾ teaspoon

Salt – ¼ teaspoon

Sugar – ½ cup

Butter milk – ½ cup (chilled)

Topping – Sugar crystals

Method:

  • Pre heat oven at 170 C
  • Take one mixer jar or food processor. Put all the dry ingredients like flour, corn meal, salt, baking powder, baking soda, salt and sugar. Dry grind all these for a couple of rounds.
  • Chop the butter into bite size pieces and add. Again dry grind until flour becomes crumbly and wet.
  • Add buttermilk and run the food processor. Dough will become a little sticky.
  • Line the cookie tray with butter paper.
  • Drop the dough into lined cookie tray either by using spoon or ice cream scoop.

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  • Sprinkle some sugar on top and bake this in a pre-heated oven for 12 to 15 minutes.

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  • It yielded 15 scones for me and I have used small ice cream scoop to scoop out the dough.

 

Christmas Fruit cake:

The day before yesterday, my daughter V asked, ‘Amma, everywhere I can feel the Christmassy atmosphere, why haven’t you made anything?  Please make a plum cake.”

Immediately, daughter A said, “No need to do that grrrrrrrrrrr, It has raisins; I don’t like raisins in any baked goodies. Make Red velvet instead of plum cake.”

Finally, mamma came up with this win-win cake for both –

This cake has no booze or fruit juice, or raisins.

Ingredients:

Dry fruits to soak – 1/2 to 1 cup (dried cranberries, tutti-frutti)

For the Caramel:

Light brown sugar – ½ cup

Water – ¾ cup

Butter – 1 tsp

For the Cake:

All-purpose flour – 1 ½ cups ( you can take whole wheat flour + all-purpose flour as well)

Baking powder – ¾ tsp

Baking soda – ¾ tsp

Dry ginger powder – ¼ tsp

Cinnamon powder – ¼ tsp

Cardamom powder – ¼ tsp

Pinch of salt

Eggs – 2

Melted Butter – ¾ cup

Fresh Orange rind – 1 to 2 tsp (grated)

Caramel – ½ cup

Dry Nuts – 1/4  cup (cashew and almonds)

Method:

-The next step is the preparation of the cake batter –

-First, we will mix all the dry ingredients, from flour, baking powder, baking soda, ginger powder, cinnamon powder, cardamom powder, and salt, in one bowl and dry mix using a wire whisk.

-Drop all the dry fruits like soaked and drained dry fruits, chopped cashews and almonds

-Once again, mix the flour nicely and keep it aside. This is the dry ingredient mixture.

-The next step is- to preheat the oven to 180 degrees centigrade.

-Line the cake tin in which you want to bake. I have used a bread tin over here.

-Next, we should make a wet ingredient mixture. Break the eggs, beat them properly, and mix in butter, caramel, sugar, and grated Orange rind. Beat all these together until the sugar dissolves.

-Take one wooden spatula, fold it in the dry mixture, and make a uniform batter of wet and dry ingredients with a very light hand. Don’t overmix this.

-Now pour this ready batter into the lined cake tin, sprinkle some cashew and almond chunks, and bake this for 40 to 45 minutes or until done at  180* C. Enjoy this fruit cake this festive season!!!