In Your Kitchen: Baking with Taruna

In Your Kitchen: Baking with Taruna

I’d like to introduce you to Taruna Deepak, a fabulous food blogger with beautiful photography skills and scrumptious dishes. She makes mouth-watering Indian delicacies, healthy snacks and writes incredibly well.

Previously a manager at Reliance, homemaker Taruna started writing her blog to turn her love for cooking into something productive, as well as to create a curated platform for her and her family recipes for her daughter. An added dusting of sugar is she’s now one of the most prominent Indian food bloggers with both electronic and print media recognition!

Each post of hers will have an interesting write up which gives us a slight peek into who is Taruna. You’ll fall in love with her, as I have, which goes to prove that people who love to cook are in fact, the best kinds of people!

Here is a little more on this fabulous lady and the recipe for her gorgeous cake:

 

10 Questions with Taruna

Day Job: Home maker

Lives in: Mumbai

In the kitchen, I couldn’t live without: Spices and kitchen gadgets

Current food obsession: None

If I could cook for anyone: My blogger friends!

A traditional family dinner is: Chicken curry, dal, chawal, alu ka bhujiya

Go-to comfort food: Chhenar Payesh

Next travel destination / Would love to travel to: China / Malta

On my nightstand: Feroze the forgotten Gandhi by Bertil Falk

My motto: Whatever happens, happens for a reason. Trust the process.

 

Taruna’s Recipe for Chocolate & Orange Cake

 

I have yet to meet someone who doesn’t like these classic flavours. The cake I am sharing is a family favourite; one, that my daughter never seems to get enough of! Perfect as an after meal treat or simply to snack on. Do try it in your kitchen and I promise you, it will surely delight you. The only advice I would give here is, use good quality chocolate and good quality vanilla extract for this cake.

 

Serves: 12 – 14 | 9 inch Bundt cake | Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 40 minutes

 

Ingredients:

1½ cups all purpose flour (maida) plus extra for dusting the pan

3 tbsp cornflour

1¼ tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

1 cup caster sugar

¾ cup unsalted butter (room temperature) plus extra for greasing the pan

3 eggs (mine were 60 grams each)

1/3 cup yogurt

¼ cup orange zest, packed

1 tsp vanilla extract

100 grams dark chocolate

 

For Orange Glaze:

1½ tbsp orange juice

¾ cup confectioners sugar (Icing Sugar)

 

For Chocolate Glaze:

100 g dark chocolate

1½ tbsp milk

1 tbsp unsalted butter

 

Method

Grate the chocolate and set aside (I grate the chocolate the night or at least a few hours before I intend to make the cake and keep it refrigerated till ready to use; a trick I learnt from a local baker).

Preheat the oven at 170 degrees C.

Rub in the orange zest to the caster sugar, using your hands, and set aside.

Prepare a 9 inch bundt pan by greasing it with butter or oil and dusting it with flour. Remove excess flour and set the pan aside.

Sift together the all purpose flour, cornflour, baking powder and baking soda at least five times. Set aside.

In a mixing bowl, whisk butter for a minute or till it is smooth and creamy. (I had used handheld mixer)

Add sugar and whisk for another two to three minutes, scrapping the sides occasionally.

Add the eggs, one at a time and beat on medium speed until smooth. Scrap the sides of the bowl with each addition.

Add the vanilla essence and yogurt along with half the flour and fold it in till it just gets incorporated.

Add the rest of the flour and mix it in. Do not over whisk or over mix the batter. You just need to incorporate it.

Gently fold in the grated chocolate and transfer the contents to the prepared bundt pan. Smoothen the top of the batter using a spatula or back of a spoon and then gently tap the pan on the counter top to remove any air pockets. Transfer the pan to the pre-heated oven.

Bake for approximately forty minutes or till a skewer inserted comes out clean.

Remove the pan from the oven and allow the cake to sit in the pan for 10 minutes.

Run a knife gently around the edges of the pan and turn over the cake on to a wire rack. Cool completely before adding glaze.

 

For Orange Glaze:

Whisk together the juice and the sugar (adjust consistency to your liking) and drizzle over the cooled cake.

 

For Chocolate Glaze:

Scrap the chocolate with a knife and heat it over a double boiler along with milk and butter. Do not stir. Once the chocolate has melted, remove it from heat and whisk it well. Allow it to cool before pouring it over the cake.

Slice and serve the cake. Enjoy!

Notes:

Do not open the oven door for the first 10 – 15 minutes.

Do check after 25 minutes and if the cake browning fast, cover it loosely with foil.

Every oven has its own setting of the thermostat. I advice you adjust the temperature according to the thermostat of your oven.

Feel free to add nuts of your choice to the batter if you wish to.

 

Follow Taruna for her kitchen adventures at:

Website: http://www.easyfoodsmith.com | Facebook: Easy Food Smith  | Instagram: @easyfoodsmith  | Pinterest: Easy Food Smith 

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The recipes are tried and tested, some are adapted from various places, and a few are passed down; but every one of them comes straight from the heart.