YUMMY Chocolate Cake for Chocolate Loverss!

Yayy! I get to post the first recipe of this year...This past year was great. Especially during Christmas, I was able to share some good time with my family and close friends. I am grateful for all the blessings in my life.. Now I am eagerly looking forward to face all the opportunities and challenges this New year has to offer..Wish you all a Happy and Blessed New Year!!

I was searching for a good brownie recipe for a while. I have tried so many brownie recipes over the past and they were all a flop. So this past week, I stumbled across a chocolate cake recipe on all recipes.com; I decided to give it a try because all the reviewers raved about it plus I had lots of free time on hand. I didn't have any unsweetened cocoa on hand so I used some hot cocoa that my mom got as a holiday gift.To my surprise..the end result was awesome!!

First, a word of WARNiNG! - All CHOCOLATE Haters and CHOCOLATE Allergicss, PLS stop reading this and go Back to your Business. Just kidding;) This is a chocolate cake meets Brownie recipe.

Recipe Link:
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/black-magic-cake/detail.aspx

This time I made it in a bundt cake pan. I am planning to make some cupcakes for my coworkers soon. Also, dont forget to put your favorite Frosting on it.

Meat Ball Pasta

Its almost the end of year 2011. This year went by really fast. I am so glad that I have this last week off..... I can relax,have some 'me' time and just sit home and do nothing:) Hence, I decided to update our blog..

" Meat Ball Pasta" aka "Pasta with meat balls and Cheese (of your choice)". I know the name of this recipe sounds very generic. I did not follow any recipe for this. This is my own creation, so I took the liberty to call it with a name of my choice. This is something I make occasionally, and every one at home seems to like it a lot.

Ingredients for this recipe are the following:
1. Pasta (tubular shaped) -See the picture below
2. Mozzarella Cheese(or any cheese of your liking that we normally use for lasagna)
3. Meat balls(store bought or home made)
4. Spaghetti Sauce - 1 and half jar (I used meat flavored)
5. Garlic Cloves-2
6. Butter-1 table spoon
7. White Onion - half of 1

Preparation:
1. Cook the pasta according to the instructions on the package (al dente) and drain it. Be careful not to over cook your pasta.
2. While your pasta is cooking, take a large non-stick pan. Melt 1 table spoon of butter and sautee chopped garlic cloves and onion.
3. Add 1 big jar of spaghetti sauce to the sauteed onion and let it simmer on medium heat.
4. Cook the frozen meatballs in microwave(according to package instructions). Add them to the spaghetti sauce and let it cook for 2 minutes.
5. Add drained pasta to the meatball sauce and mix them well. Then add about 3/4 th cup of cheese and let it melt.
6. Preheat the oven to 350 F.
7. Add pasta and meatball mixture to oven baking dish. Then pour about half a jar of spaghetti sauce on top of it and spread evenly.
8. Then add rest of the cheese on top of the sauce. I added a little Parmesan cheese as well on top.
9. Cover the dish with Aluminum foil, and bake it for 20 to 25 minutes.

I hope you all enjoy this. This is a quick and easy recipe.

March Madness!!!

March was Great!!!

A Tea to Remember!

So this weekend, my mother and i went to the mall for some light shopping and as we start walking down the corridors, we smell a familiar nostalgic fruity smell, Ripe jack fruit. Jack fruit is a common fruit known for its distinct smell and taste found in southern India where we grew up. So obviously we were compelled to stop and check out where this pleasant smell was originating from. To our surprise it was from a tea shop called Teavana. They had brewed tea out for sampling, so of course we couldn't pass up a free sample especially if it smelled like jack fruit. So on our way back, we stopped at the Tea Shop and sampled all 4 teas. Two of them fruity but we weren't a big fan, the one that smelled like jack fruit had a mixture of fruits including acai and blueberry that gave it its distinct smell. But the white ayurvedic tea with samurai chai matte and the jasmine green tea was awesome. So i had to get it. I didn't even know how they sold the tea, which looking back if i had known i would not have been writing this blog as i sure as hell would not have gotten the tea. I went to the cashier and said i want these 2 teas and he said a pound or two and then started talking really fast about the teas, i mean i don't know even how much a pound of tea looks like. a weeks supply? a years supply? God knows! He then said most people buy the half pound, well if most people do that then that HAS to be the right way right? so i got the most people order. As far as prices he talked really fast and just spewed off number that really didn't add up in my head. there was 10% off, per pound, 32, 48- too many damn numbers. And the guy was like would you like it in a tin and i said YEA ( oohh a free tin) and then he said its only 7 dollars and put my tea in the tin - DAMN ITT!! So all in all this was most i ever spent on Tea. $88.47.



Did i feel like a sucker when i walked out the store. YES. But as i sip my white ayurvedic tea while writing this blog I'm quite content in the purchase. One because it is damn good tea and two because it gave me material to resurrect this blog. Miss you girls!!!

My Weekend Success

One fine Friday afternoon, My cousin and I went to my favorite sushi place, Wasabi for lunch. By that morning i already knew what i was going to get - Lunch special sushi rolls - salmon avocado, white spicy tuna and crab something(my cousins choice). I naturally thought she was going to choose sushi too, but instead she said she wanted real food. go figure! So she looked at the lunch boxes and finally ordered Beef Negimaki. She said she One friday afternoon, My cousin and I went to my favorite sushi place, Wasabi for lunch. By that morning i already knew what i was going to get - Lunch special sushi rolls - salmon avocado, white spicy tuna and crab something(my cousins choice). I naturally thought she was going to choose sushi too, but instead she said she wanted real food. go figure! So she looked at the lunch boxes and finally ordered Beef Negimaki. She said she doesn’t know what it is but wants to give it a try. So when it came i didnt even give it a second look, i was too concentrated on my sushi rolls. So finally she said, Jewls just try it and i did. It basically looked like a sushi roll except it was beef with scallions inside. I had one bite and was hooked, it was DEeeLISh!!! The first thing i thought was i need to learn how to make it, it would be perfect for my low carb diet. So last week during a slow day at work i printed off some recipes. Beef Negimaki - Sweet Potato Chicken curry and a Beef Marinade.

So this weekend i followed the recipes for both and then with the left over beef and scallions, i made a stir fry - i followed Pheeb's recipe of beef n chrysanthemum something that she had posted a while back.

BEEF NEGIMAKI

BEEF W/SCALLIONS

CHICKEN & SWEET POTATO CURRY

My Zumba Review

One of my favorite workouts at gym is the Zumba. Mainly because i get to shake it and you are doing lots of different moves unlike most cardio excercises. Plus you get to listen hot latin music that sometimes sounds like Indian too. Actually once they did play an Indian song - Jai ho.

So i figured when I am home for the weekend what better way to exercise than Zumba. So one Saturday morning i saw an infomercial for Zumba and...you know the rest -- #1 Marketing sucker right here! So anyways i was all excited, they claimed its high energy so much fun,shaking this and that and all that stuff. And Beto- the zumba guy is so motivating and hot and blah blah. So i was excited to get the DVD..there was like 4 DVD's in there - Basic step learning, abs, a toning one ( with a 1 pound shaking weight - some toning that is going to be) and a live work out video.

So within the last 3 weeks i tried all of them, Let me just tell you this was nothing like the workout at the gym. This was BORING!!!! That beto guy did nothing but bore me and he was not that hot either. The girl next to him was more entertaining. The biggest let down was that it felt like i was doing cardio and the same salsa steps over and over. The only one i kind of liked was the live workout which after the first 10 minutes was kind of fun. So boo thumbs down for at home Zumba. Nevertheless since i did spent the money on it, my goal is to do at least one zumba DVD a weekend which so far i have been doing!

This is what i got

Chicken Spaghetti Casserole, Tres Leches cake, and Stir-fry Green Beans

Hi Ladies, long time no post! Back in March, I have made couple things that I really like, and I would like to share with you. Of course, there is a pasta dish! Ha!

Pretty simple... I used Chicken, onion, green pepper, pimentos, cheddar cheese, cayenne pepper, can of cream of chicken soup, can of cream of mushroom soup, seasoned salt and of course spaghetti. I cooked the chicken and shredded the meat. I then cooked the spaghetti and drained. 

Then mixed everything except a little cheese which saved for later. Then poured into a baking pan, and top with the remained cheese. Put it in the oven and baked until bubbling, and it's ready to eat!!!

Tres Leches Cake has become one of my favorite dessert now... Very sweet, but I like it! Before I made it, i didn't know what Tres Leches means, then people who ate my cake told me that Tres Leches is spanish, and it means Three Milk... oh, it makes sense, because the cake has a sauce that is made of 3 different kinds of milk! So the cake is very simple, I bake the cake by following the recipe. And I took the cake out(upside down) onto a bigger pan and let it cool down.

Then I stabbed (my favorite verb) the cake with a fork a lot to make many tiny holes, and I slowly poured the cream "sauce" which was made of condense milk, evaporated milk, and heavy cream on top of the cake. Then wait... for at least 1/2 hour for the cake to absorb all the juice!!!

Lastly, I spread a layer of icing, which is heavy cream and sugar. And then EAT!

Ok, I think the following recipe is the easiest but, it's still pretty tasty! I stir-fried some green beans with garlic. 

And while the green beans being cooked, I combined soy sauce, brown sugar, and peanut butter, yup, you read it right, peanut butter in a big bowl! The recipe asked for sesame seed too, but I didn't have any...

After the green beans were cooked, I put them into the sauce, and mixed them, and again, it's ready to EAT!

 

And here are the recipes:

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2007/06/chicken_spaghet/

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2009/09/tres-leches-cake/

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Green-Bean-Stir-Fry/Detail.aspx

I am Bacckk!

Hi Ladies...


How are you both doing? Sorry I have been hiding in the woods for past couple of months (basically being lazy;). One of the reasons for not posting any recipes is that I couldn't find the cable to upload pics from my camera. When I shared my dilemma with Phebez, she suggested getting a sd card for my camera to transfer pics. I even thought of getting one from 'Walmart', but my laz ass stopped me. Anyway, long story short, today I found out that my camera had a sd card in it all along, even though its slightly smaller in size than regular sd card. Its compatible with my desktop so I can upload my pics now..such a relief..this issue has been haunting me for days ladies...


I made a pound cake for Easer..We celebrated easter at my aunt's house, so we took the cake over there..Since the lunch was like a chinese buffet, I dont know how many peaople even got to the desert course..Thanks for sharing the recipe Phebs.."Grandmother's Pound Cake I" from allrecipes.com. It came out well!

Hartford

I took these last summer, Why does it seem like an eternity ago?

Lamb Curry

I recently found out 100%grass fed meat are the right way to go. Healthier for you due to its very low Omega 6 to 3 ratio. So i went to whole food today and all they had was 100% grass fed lamb, so i bought couple of pounds of boneless and a pound of leg in bone or something like that. Expensive stuff, Cost me close to 30 bucks. Geez. Who knew grass was so expensive and here we have to go through the pain of cutting it and throwing it out every 3 weeks. Ironic!

Anyways i bought the lamb home and my mom was at work so it was just my dad and I. I told him about my grass fed lamb story and we decided to cook it. So I cut the meat while he peeled the onions and garlic and ginger. And then he went it to fridge and grabbed the bag of string beans and took a few out. So i asked y string beans and he goes Oh i thought they were green chilli peppers. Lol. After that he looked tired so he sat in the corner and guided me. I cut the onions, garlic n ginger and then mixed it all with coriander powder and lamb and cooked it. Then while i was watching tv or something he went and put in the masalas, which is the most important part and i totally missed it. Anyways here is the finished product, i have to say it was really good. I asked how he knew about cooking lamb curry and he said he learned all this from his days in Bombay. hmmm! who knew!

Interesting Thought

I had dinner with couple of my friends tonight. One of them have said something interesting, and reminded me of my mom. 

He said, you should put a barrier between you and other people, that way you won't get hurt by what they say because they are only strangers. I think when I was younger, my mom also told me the same theory, because she knew that I didn't know how to protect myself. 

It's true that if you put a barrier between you and people, you would get hurt less. But I believe, if you don't put down that barrier, you would never be close to anyone, you would never find true friends. When I meet a new friend, I would go all in to be nice with that person. If that person take advantage of me, hurt me or my feeling, I can tolerance once or twice, and then that's it, my barrier would be up between me and that person. 

However, I am willing to take that chance which I could get hurt when I meet new friends because most of the time, I make more friends than people that would hurt me.

Mushroom and Bacon Pasta

Did I tell you I love pasta? If not, I LOVE pasta, with white sauce. So when I saw this recipe, I could resist to make it right away. Again, super simple, but soooo goooood. But not for non-mushroom lover though, like Andrew. 


Here was what I needed to make this amazing dish. Mushroom, bacon (obviously), green onion (but I only had chive at that time), garlic, parsley, half & half, heavy cream, chick stock, and parmesan cheese.  Oh, and Angel Hair, hahaha. 

First, cook angel hair in hot water.

While the pasta being cooked, I started to make the white sauce. Browned bacon first, set it aside when it was browned but not crisped.
 

Threw in garlic and mushroom in the bacon grease. 

Added in chicken stock, cooked until only 1/2 of the half left.

Then stir in half & half, heavy cream, and grated cheese. Lastly, put the bacon back in, add parsley, and green onion, right before it was served. 


Drained pasta, and put it in a BIG bowl. Added in 1/2 of the white sauce, and tossed well. Served in on a plate and poured more sauce on pasta, and oh my gosh, it was yummmy. 

Try to make it ladies!

Mocha Silk Pie (no bake)

Warning, this pie is SWEET! Too sweet for me, but Andrew loves it. 

Here are what you need: chopped pecans, brown sugar, eggs, semi-sweet chocolate, butter, white sugar, instant coffee, vanilla extract, and Kahlua. 

First, I got my hands dirty... grating the chocolate, it's also a great work out too. AND it did melt in my hand. 

Then combined chopped pecans, brown sugar, chocolate, Kahlua, and a little salt. Mix them well. 

Put mixture in a pie pan, pressed it to form the crust. Made my hand dirty again, grrrr. I put the crust in the fridge for a bit.

Next is to make the filling. Whipped together soften butter, sugar, instant coffee granules, and a little more Kahlua. :D 

And in melted Chocolate, vanilla, and eggs. Lastly, spread the mixture on top of the pie crust. Put it back to the fridge for at least 2 hours before serve it. It was in my fridge for 2 hours and one minute, then I cut it and ate it. Way too sweet for me! :( at least Andrew loves it with vanilla ice cream or milk.  

yeayy, we passed 10 visitors on our counter!!! lol. I cant wait till we hit 100.

I missed you guys today! Had so much stuff (the juicy kind, like a rare steak) to tell y'all.

I truly miss our cubicle lunches, not the food or the gossip. But just being near people who understands and is there for you when you need them. Feel so often these days that people just ignore your feelings -!!

Anyways, i'm going to botanical gardens tomm. yeayyy.. will def take some pics!

German Food!

Hi Ladies, I feel guilty for not posting anything this weekend. Glad to see some very interesting and tasty(atleast I assume it is from the pics) recipes.Last week, I went to a German restaurant(Old Heidelberg, Bethel, Ct) for one of my coworker's birthday lunch . As I hve never been to one I was enthuse abt going there. The names of the dishes sounded very odd as they are in German and I dont know German language. I am going to list some entrees my fellow coworkers and I ordered.

I had Chicken Schnitzel.

This basically looked and tasted like breaded baked chicken breasts with red cabbage and
spatzel(german noodle) sides. It tasted ok, nothing praise worthy .

Another interesting item was the Shank .I did some research and shank basically is the lower part of the leg of pig, cow, lamb, veal -you get the idea!

Another item was the potato pancakes.

I hope you find this informative. Sorry, picture taking is not my forte; I found these pics from internet sources.

BBQ Meatballs and Mac & Cheese

I found these recipes this week from that Pioneer Woman's blog. Andrew likes anything bbq and i like any pasta, so I thought it would be a perfect dinner for us. 

These two dishes are simple but time consuming, at least I think they are. I made the meatball first because they needed to be baked for 45 mins, and during the baking time, I could make the mac & cheese.

I too tried to take all the ingredients out first, (I don't usually do it, but for the photography purpose, I did this time, and surprisingly, J C did too!). The meatball recipe calls for instant oat, which I don't have, so I used cooked rice instead (just like every time I substitute it when I used meatloaf hehe). 

I mixed ground beef, onion, milk, rice, black pepper, and salt together. 

Then I rolled them into balls! I did learn a trick from the Pioneer Woman, put the meatballs in the freezer for about 5 mins, I think it made the balls firm, easier for the next step, which is dredging them in flour. 

Then I browned the balls in a pan. 

While they were being cooked in the pan, I quickly fixed the sauce. Mix ketchup, vinegar, sugar, more onion, and my favorite, Worcestershire sauce (yummm), oh some Tabasco too. I put the browned meatballs (not fully cooked yet) in a baking dish, poured the sauce on top, popped it in the oven for 45 mins, and tada!

So, while the meatballs were in the oven, I started to make the mac & cheese (yay for multi-tasking!)

Cooked the Elbows pasta until it was just a bit too hard to eat (that's what it says in the recipe), then drained. Then I failed while I was making the sauce. I followed the instruction, melted some butter, and whisked in some flour, however, my pot wasn't hot enough to cook the flour what it supposed to be, (it is a very important step, but I failed, so the mac & cheese was doughy). 

Then I added milk, dry mustard, cheese, salt, and pepper. Then added elbows. Done, you could put it in a baking dish and sprinkle more cheese on top, then put in oven until the cheese melted, but I didn't have more cheese, so I just ate it as it was. 

Then I cheated, bought some bag-steam veggie as side dish. And there you go, my dinner :D