Wanderberry Tales

Roast chicken has always found its way into our Christmas eve dinner menu. What better an accompaniment than beautifully roasted potatoes. Some things are hard to do away with and I am sure this year's menu is no different. Rather, we would want it to remain the same - a reminder of our first Christmas together when we attempted baking a chicken that was marinated and frozen with potatoes layered and spent hours trying to get it to cook at varied temperatures messing up the oven and kitchen in the process. Finally we had our dinner at 12:30 am after giving up on our oven attempt and frying the chicken and potato on the stove top. If everything were to be be perfect then we would have hardly remembered our first Christmas together. The imperfections set our traditions! Here is a look into the roast potatoes recipe. I chose the Indian potatoes and it worked well for me. Ingredients  Potato - 500 gms Rosemary - 1 tbsp Garlic - 6 cloves Garlic Powder Olive ...

Festive season along with the breezy winter has made its presence felt. Although good food needs no season or reason, it is simply an excuse to make some deep fried sugary  tea time snacks. It's strange how memories that have long been pushed to some remote corner of the brain comes popping back on occasions with no particular trigger. That is how diamond cuts made its way into my list.A long time ago (as all stories begin) my mamma lovingly rolled out these dough and the sheer desire to use the spoon that had a wheel on its end to make the diamond shapes got me onto the kitchen slab beside her! I did enquire after the well being of the spoon last time I was home:) I have used wheat flour, you could easily replace it with Whole Purpose Flour and also use some powdered sugar in the dough itself. Off we go to the recipe. Ingredients For the dough- Wheat Flour - 2 cups Ghee - 5 tbsp + 1 tbsp Water - 1 cup warm Salt to taste For coating -  Sugar - 50 gm...

This blog was born out of sheer boredom of relocating to a new country combined with an interest to cook.  We have come a long way since then and we just turned 3 this week! This time, we have a simple no bake chocolate tart recipe for you. Desserts are a rarity in my house but this one has made its way into our menu various times because its not complicated, uses easily available ingredients and takes very little time to make. Here you go to the recipe - Ingredients  For the tart base Marie biscuits - 40 no.s Butter - 150 gms For the chocolate filling  Semi sweet chocolate chips - 300 gms Whipping cream - 250 ml Corn starch - 1 tsp For Raspberry topping Raspberry- 1 pack  Mint Leaf - a few Method Grease a tart pan and keep aside. Powder the marie biscuits coarsely in a food processor Add butter and let it combine such that the butter soaks the biscuit crumbs and holds it together lightly. Tip this into the ...

Love is all around. You just need to open your eyes and your minds to figure it. Universities and political parties boycotting Valentines Day has become the norm of this month year after year in India - just because how misunderstood the whole concept has become. Your perfect Valentine is just about anyone you Love and want to share your time with. Then again - you could have so many valentines too. Love is not limited to this time of the year. It is just a reminder that Love exists in this day of hatred and unrest. And if life turmoils have made you fail in expressing love, this is the day to re-kindle it. Call up your loved ones - express your gratitude and love because you are blessed as can be. To love and to be loved is the greatest gift mankind ever has. 'Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.   It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does...

This Christmas season has been a busy one. Lots of baking , mall hopping to see the Christmas decor, karaoke singing of Christmas carols to watching Christmas movies - we have done it all. With my sister in town to celebrate Christmas with us we have had quite a spike in our December activities.So while I sit down to relax before beginning the Christmas eve preparations, thought of sharing a quick recipe for your Christmas breakfast table. Apple french toast is simply the addition of Green apples to your normal french toast and getting it baked. Scroll below to the recipe!! Meanwhile, Have a holly jolly Christmas this year!! A Joyous Christmas to all! Ingredients Green Apple – 1 big finely sliced Butter – 2 to 3 tbsp White bread – 10 pieces Milk – 400 ml Egg – 2 large Sugar – 2 to 3 tbsp Salt – ¼ tsp Cinnamon  powder – ¼ tsp Method Pre-heat the oven at 180 degree centigrade for 15 minutes Heat butter in a pan. Layer apples in the pan and...

Christmas waves a magic wand over this world,  and behold,  everything is softer and more beautiful.                                                                -Norman Vincent Peale Dump it all together - there you have a dessert on your table! Cranberry sauce, topped with cake mix and butter drizzled on top - that is the name of the dish deconstructed for you! This is my first guest post and I am happy I got to do it with thebigsweettooth  . Rafeeda of The Big Sweet Tooth is one of first bloggers I got introduced to through blogging. Her blog is a repository of recipes - a go to website for all your recipe needs. I am so glad I could add to her repository. Head over to her blog to check out my recipe for Cranberry Cobbler Dump Cake .

Christmas is a time that brings back so many memories. Some are funny as can be! Good food comes with any celebration and Good food comes after so many failed attempts too! Christmas is no less. Our first Christmas together was within a month of moving to Dubai. The cooking range oven and the griller were totally new to me. All that Shibin wanted for Christmas was 'Karangunna Chicken' - loosely translated rotating chicken. Don't whack your brains! He only meant to have those rotisserie grilled chicken :) I had my chicken marinated and for reason best known to no one I decided to place the marinated chicken in the freezer! We went out shopping got back a little late - just in time for dinner which was till in the freezer. I had no time to defrost. I placed it in the oven to melt the stubborn ice. After a while onto the rotisserie. The chicken was big and the marinade was all dripping down which is when I realised that I needed a dripping pan too. After all the trials...

Does the word Lovlolikka ring a bell? I am sure atleast a few malayalees have heard of those red cherries that grow abundantly in their backyard and that grand moms fondly fed you in pickles. Lovlolikka is mildly sour, tangy with a tinge of sweetness and may not be as popular for eating as is when compared to the pickles and jams that are dished out from these cherries. I did a hunt for the English name of this cherry and google threw up names like Indian sour cherry and Indian coffee plum. To keep things simple let's call it cherry:) My mom in law has a lot of these cherries peeping into her backyard from the neighbor's garden. The neighbors have graciously offered her all the cherries that grow on the branches hovering in her yard and trust me they are a basketful. So that is how Lovlolikka wine came into being for us. She did not use yeast for fermentation but the wine came just as good with a lovely color. Hardly a month for Christmas and if you start now, I bet y...

There are days when my mind wanders to my home country and my desire to go back there gets stronger. I am sure these thoughts resonate with atleast a few of the expats. Sometimes I busy myself with some work to shut away these thoughts and other days I whine and whine. After some whining, I turn to my laptop to cheer me up. The one show that makes all the worry lines cease to exist is FRIENDS. I just can't have enough of it. I have watched season by season and now go on to youtube to catch some scenes from it. All the characters have become so etched in me that I feel they live around me. Like any other Friends fan, I would love to see that Reunion happening till then I can continue to watch it in a loop.  Cooking does cheer me up but imagine cooking and watching Friends at the same time :P I do it often these days.( I hate it when I have to turn on the blender, the noise is such a distraction:P) From Monica's jam to Ross' Fajita , Rachel's English Truffle to Joey...

Happy Easter !! I did want this post to be done a couple of days early but Easter seems a good enough reason for this cake recipe to go through. I completed two years of blogging this month and if someone told me two years back that this would happen, I would never believe it! Now that I am here, I would just love to say THANK YOU to everyone.  While I try out my mamma's recipes, she tries some of mine too! My Pappa  religiously clicks away pictures of recipes from newspapers and magazines for me and my sister believes that my blog will make it big some day! My cousins - Vinitha and Neenu - one who diligently gives me ideas and other who meticulously reads them and  questions. My mother in law is the first one to share my recipes on facebook and my bro - in- law and co sister who always read my write ups and provide their comments. My love to all my friends, fellow bloggers and friends who are the reason why I am still in this blogging space and enjoy being here...

The long weekend has heralded a hopefully long winter in Dubai. The winds are chilly and my hands are invariably reaching out to the woolens. The sky is clear and occasional clouds pass by as I look up and pray that at least one would sprinkle showers as they go by. I have not been that lucky yet! It is that time of the year when we reach out to those soothing hot drinks and soups. Yet the crazy part in each of us would want to grab hold of an ice cream or something chilled. ( although the angel in your head would speak of possibilities of falling sick - the devil in you doesn't care) The call for making a cheesecake has been there since the last mango season. The season passed by and no cheesecake was made. While discussing the menu for Christmas, Shibin was quick to suggest a cheesecake and since mango is not in season now, I was left pondering on the flavor. I was quickly taken back to one of the episodes of Dhe Chef - a Malayalam channel cooking reality show where one of ...

It has been long since I played the game of Secret Santa - I am sure most of you are familiar with this game. It is not the gifts you wrap or unwrap that gives the happiness. It is more about the suspense, the secret letters and the guessing games as to who could be your Santa. I was introduced to this game when I was in hostel where every year we religiously play  - we did have our semester exam during this time of the year but that never dampened our spirits. Nothing could possibly be a hindrance to this game when you have a whole hostel - 100 odd girls playing this game. We had a letter box where we could drop in letters addressed to our secret friend. The thrill of finding a letter addressed to you or small gifts that would mysteriously appear on your bed or a messenger getting it for you. Aah!  Shopping for the gifts weren't easy either. It was always last minute purchases and all the 100 girls end up at the same store every time. We had to dodge our secret frie...

It is winter, it is Christmas and baking just happens this season! Listening to the carols, there I went baking again.   My mind began wandering to 'Long time ago in Bethlehem', In the 'Silent Night' I envisioned 'Hark the herald, angels sing'. The bright stars guiding ' We three Kings of Orient are' Led them to the place where ' Mary's boy child Jesus Christ ' lay.   ' O Come All Ye Faithful' and spread the word. 'Go tell it on the mountain' and spread 'Joy to the world' . It is a 'Merry Merry Merry Christmas' And 'Santa Claus is coming to town ' 'Dashing through the snow' here he is With 'Rudolf the red nose reindeer' by his side and 'Frosty the snowman' to welcome him I 'Decked my halls with boughs of Holly' , and keep dreaming about a 'White Christmas'. Looks like an overdose of carols!! Oh Never mind, like Shibin sa...

It is never too early Christmas! The best is always saved for the end of the year - there cannot be anything better to end a wonderful year! I pray this season passes by slow so that I get to savor every moment of it. So while it lasts - let's get into some cooking , carols, decorating and lots of fun filled moments with family and friends. I did happen to mention last Christmas that our love for Christmas was one thing that brought Shibin and me close. We are leaving no stone un-turned this year as well. We have put up our tree, our Christmas wreath is in making, cbn radio that plays Christmas songs throughout the year is live on my system while I write this, Christmas movies are up and running in the evenings and I am preparing my December menu! If you are a person who enjoys this season as much as we do then hurry up - put your tree!! Listen to cbnradio - (http://www1.cbn.com/radio/christmas) if you love the carols and checkout the Hallmark Christmas movie coll...

It is Ramadan season. Festive display of dates and sweets made of dates fills the supermarkets in Dubai. So why not something made from dates for Iftar this season. This is my first attempt at making dates loaf and it was a colleague who suggested to add in the walnuts as well for the crunch.  Dates by itself is quite sweet and I wanted to make sure that the loaf does not become extra sweet by regulating the sugar content. Again, like my most recipes it is simple and quick. Here you are - Ingredients Dates - 3/4 cup de-seeded and chopped Milk - 3/4 cup All purpose flour - 1 and 1/2 cup Sugar - 4 tbsp Egg - 2 no.s Cinnamon powder - 1 tsp Baking powder - 1 tsp Salt - 1/2 tsp Vanilla essence - 1 tsp Walnuts - 1/2 cup Vegetable Oil - 1/2 cup  Honey - 2 tbsp Method Heat the milk with the chopped dates on medium flame for 5 minutes and let it rest. Sieve together the flour, baking powder,cinnamon powder, salt and keep aside. Break ope...

The English version of our very own Indian Dosa is what I would want to call it -Crepes. A good way to begin your day, an easy brunch for those lazy days, an evening snack or even a relishing dinner - the way you like with the filling of your choice.  We chose to have it as our Saturday Brunch! The first time I heard of crepes..hmm..Of course from my husband!! Heard, may the wrong word. He 'made' it for me on our second Valentines day together!! What fascinates me about crepes is the choice of filling you possibly can have. While we chose Jam, you may opt for anything from Honey to Nutella if you want it sweet. As a savory dish, you can choose any fillings of veggies or meat and roll it up. Also, this could turn into a perfect snack for your kids tiffin box:) Get innovative with crepes - roll it up and slice it or stack it and serve with fresh fruits and glimmer of honey. I am sure kids and adults will enjoy every bite of it. So here we go -  I...

Jam roll always reminds me of the summer vacations while we were still at school -a long two month hiatus in Kerala along with my cousins. There was a routine established for the four of us and the most important of it all being the 5 pm wait on our balcony for my aunt to get back from work - for pouncing on the goodies in her bag. She never failed us.  Jam Roll was my favorite, it always intrigued me. Sometimes I would just bite into it hungrily and sometimes I took the time to unroll it lick away the delicious mixed fruit jam and then dig on the cake. The 'little me' never would have imagined that she would actually be making jam roll one day. The idea of trying out something like this popped up when we brought orange marmalade. I was tasting it for the very first time and it did not fascinate me much. I had a bottle full of it and did not absolutely want it to rot away. That is when my hubby told me why not try a Swiss roll? I was clueless how this was done. Ye...

It all started for Christmas in 2012 when a colleague gave me a cake recipe. The very same day I purchased all the ingredients and made my very first cake. I did not have an oven and resorted to baking the cake in a cooker. ( you need to be careful, you don't use water and gasket and the cooker gets mighty hot). Since then, I have tried a lot of cakes in the cooker. It did turn out tasty but often a little too hard with the bottom and the edges burnt, I have also tried the traditional method of baking where the cake tray is inserted into a vessel with hot sand generally kept over the traditional chullah. The vessel is then covered with a lid with burning coal on top as well so that the cake gets evenly baked. I was too scared to handle that and it was my mother who was a master in that and me just a by stander. It was only post marriage in 2014 that I learnt to use an oven to bake cakes. I had no idea about the right temperature nor the timings .After a few burnt and also...