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Life in the times of lockdown: Add some fruity desserts to your lockdown culinary saga
With the onset of summer, satiate your dessert craving with these decadent, delectable cakes and tarts that you can prepare with lemon, orange and pineapple! It’s fresh and it tastes like summer.
Dessert doesn’t go to the stomach, it goes to the heart is a popular saying, and at the moment, we understand that you can’t step out for a quick round of banoffee pies and blueberry cheesecakes to your favourite bakery. But what if told you that you can prepare those luscious, decadent, moist desserts at home? And to be honest, hasn’t the quarantine period has helped many food connoisseurs to channel their version of world renowned chef Nigella Lawson? So without wasting any time further, here are some dessert recipes (mind you, they’re not easy and quick — so have plenty of time on your hands) using some fresh fruits for a zingy element celebrating the summer season!
Softest Lemon Pound Cake with Lemon Curd by chef Bani Nanda, chef and founder, Miam Pâtisserie
Ingredients for cake batter: 5 whole eggs, 350g castor sugar (or powdered sugar), 300g all purpose flour , 10g baking powder , 75g butter, 30g olive oil , 150g cooking cream (or full fat milk), 45g lemon juice and 4 lemons zested.
Method: Beat the eggs and the castor sugar in a stand mixer or hand blender or if you prefer by hand. Whisk till fluffy till a ribbon consistency. In a saucepan warm the butter, olive oil and cooking cream. Add this mixture along with the flour and baking powder into the beaten egg mixture. Add the zest and the lemon juice right at the end and mix well. The batter should be smooth and slightly viscous. Line a 9 inch cake pan / big loaf tin. Fill the batter 2/3rd up and bake at 160 degrees for 40-45 minutes.
In the mean time, prepare your sugar syrup and your lemon curd:
Ingredients for soaking syrup: 120g water, 30g lemon juice, 40g castor sugar.
Method: Bring the water and sugar to a boil. Add the lemon juice off the heat and mix well. Dab your cake with the syrup as soon as it’s out of the oven.
Ingredients for lemon curd: 160g castor sugar , 80g lemon juice sieved (keep zest aside ), 3 eggs, 55g unsalted butter and zest of the lemons used.
Method : On a double boiler, whisk together the lemon juice, zest, castor sugar and eggs till they’re thick and foamy. Remove from the heat, strain and cool. Add butter at room temperature and mix well. Refrigerate so the curd thickens and you have a piping consistency.
Chef Bani also suggests some alterative tips and tricks. She says, “You can bake these in muffin tins too but the cooking time will reduce accordingly. You can also add white chocolate chips/ nuts / berries / strawberries / mango in the batter. You can freeze this pound cake and it will stay good for up to 3 weeks.”
Pineapple cinnamon tart by executive chef, Jayanandan Bhaskar, Karma Lakelands
Ingredients for pineapple filling: 1 pineapple cut into quarter inch slices, 3/4 cup honey (optional) or 3/4 cup dark brown sugar,1/2 tsp cinnamon powder, 1 tbsp salted butter, mint leaves for garnish.
Method: In a medium sauce pan combine sugar or honey, cinnamon powder and butter and bring to a gentle cook. Once the sugar has melted, poach pineapple slices in small batches for 4 to 5 minutes, or until golden brown but not falling apart. Remove pineapple and keep a side. Once all pineapple is poached, return any liquid that has drained off the pineapple to the pan. Reduce the poaching liquid until it is thick and syrupy and set aside. Pineapple ready to assemble tarts.
Ingredients for tart: 1-1/2 cup all purpose flour, 1/4 tsp salt, 1/2 cup powdered sugar, 2 egg yolks, few drops vanilla bean paste or vanilla (optional), 100 grm room temperature butter, 1tsp milk
Method to make tart: Sift flour and salt keep aside. In the mixer fitted with a petal attachment beat butter and sugar until smooth. In a small dish whisk together egg yolks and vanilla. Gradually beat egg yolk mixture into the butter. On the low speed, gradually add flour to butter mixture. Mix until it starts to come together. If the dough is too crumbly, add 1tsp milk. Do not overwork the dough. Invert the dough onto a clean work surface or into a large bowl and gather dough together with your hands into a ball. Then form the dough into a disk, wrap it in the foil and chill for 1 to 2 hours. Preheat oven to 350F or 180’C degrees celsius.
Place mini tart shell mold or you use small steel bowls also onto a baking sheet. Spray with a no-stick spray, set aside. Take out the chilled dough, cut it in half. Let if soften for 5 minutes. Roll it out between 2 sheets of parchment or you use food grade plastic sheets. Roll it out using 1/8 inch rolling guides. Cut out as many rounds as you can. Gather scraps and re-roll. Shape the tarts. Using a fork to prick the bottom of the shells. Bake at 350F or 180’C degrees for 12-14 minutes until golden around the edges. Let cool for 10-15 minutes before removing tarts from the molds. Turn the mold upside down and tap it firmly onto your work surface to release the shell. Let the tart cool before adding a filling. Now put the pineapple mixture into sweet tarts and put some thick syrup and sprinkle some cinnamon powder and garnish with mint leaves.
Flourless chocolate orange cake by Radhika Malhotra Arora of Sugar n Spice by Radhika
Ingredients : 6 tbsp butter, 226 grams chocolate, 6 eggs, 170g sugar, 1.5 tbsp instant coffee, a pinch of salt, 1tsp vanilla extract, zest of one orange, 2 tbsp fresh orange juice.
Method: Preheat oven to 160 degrees celsius and brush an 8” sprigform tin with butter. In a bowl, melt chocolate and butter in a bowl over a double boiler or in a microwave over 15 second intervals, once completely melted mix them properly so that they’re combined. Set aside and let it cool down.
Next, separate the eggs. In another bowl, whisk egg yolks sugar, vanilla, instant coffee mixed in 2 tablespoons of water and salt until they’re fluffy. Add in the chocolate mixture to this slowly until you have a smooth mixture. Now whip your egg whites until they have tripled in size and are almost foamy, start adding these egg whites to the chocolate mixture little by little. Mix the fist batch properly before adding the next. Add in the orange zest and juice, mix them in too. Pour them in the prepared tin and Bake for 40 mins at 160 degrees celsius. Serve with some whipped cream or vanilla ice cream and some chocolate glaze.
For those who do not have fresh fruits at home and yet want to bake a lip-smacking dessert, here’s a recipe for you:
Saffron Cake recipe by chef Anjali Mohan, Danbro
Ingredients for cake base: 5 eggs, 180g sugar, 100g melted room temperature butter, 190 g flour, 2g baking powder, few drops of vanilla essence. Ingredients required to make a saffron sauce include 800ml milk, 100g sugar, few pinches of saffron.
To make saffron sauce, boil milk and reduce it little add sugar and saffron in milk sauce. And keep aside for cooling. To prepare the cake, beat eggs and sugar together till soft pick stage than add butter slowly. After that fold in all dry ingredients together in egg mixture. Bake it on 180*c for 25 minutes or until you stick in a toothpick and it comes out clean. Let it rest and bring it to room temperature. Serve with chilled saffron sauce.
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