I got some cherries at Pondy Bazaar in Chennai. Those cherries were special, as i handpicked them one by one, choosing the Best. I would usually buy a Pack of cherries, from the Vegetable shop, which will have only few good cherries in it. So having got such Rich Red Cherries, i wanted to make Cake out of it. There i baked this Cherry Cake, and it turned out Good. It will be so Perfect along a cup of Coffee. I tried the cherry cake from here.

Cherries - 100gms (remove the seed and slice them into four pieces)
All Purpose Flour - 2 Cup's
Butter - 1 / 4 Cup
Baking Powder - 1 tsp
Powdered Sugar - 1 Cup
Egg's - 2
Milk - 1 / 2 Cup
Vanilla Essence - 5 ml

Pre-heat the oven at 350F / 180C. Grease a Baking Bowl with little butter and set aside.

In a Mixing bowl, beat the butter and Sugar, till they turn creamy. Add Egg's one by one and beat well.

Add Vanilla Essence to the bowl and mix.

Add little Flour and mix with a wooden spoon. add  flour and milk alternatively and keep mixing with the wooden spoon.

Last, add the cherries to the bowl and mix. Reserve some cherry slices, to top, on the halfway of baking.

Bake the Cake at 180C / 350 F for about 1 hour.
In Between, remove the Cake from the oven and top with few left cherries and put back into the oven.

Check the cake, by inserting a toothpick at the centre of the cake comes out clean.


Its such a easy Cake to make.
For me, it tasted like Pound Cake and the cherries gave a nice taste to the Cake.
This Cherry Cake will be a Perfect Tea Time Snack.

This is one of my most most favourite kulambu from my mom's kitchen. We used to call a Cook to prepare special sweets like Jangri, Laddu etc. for festivals. The Cook Prepares excellent Ennai Kathirikaai Kulambu. Whenever the cook comes to our home, i used to whisper at my mom's ears, to prepare this kulambu. and whenever my mom comes to my college hostel, she brings a big dubba of this kulambu, which we will finish of in a single meal. so this is the best ennai kathrikaai kulambu recipe, which i try atleast once in a week.

Small Purple Brinjals / Pinji Kathrikaai - 4
Sesame Oil - 1/4 cup
Tamarind - a small lemon size.


* Chana Dal / Kadala Paruppu - 1 tbsp
* Dhania / Corriander Seeds - 1 tbsp
* Roasted Peanuts- 1 tbsp
* Dry Red Chilli - 4
* Sesame Seeds - 1 tbsp

Dry Roast the above ingredients and grind into a coarse powder. to the grounded coarse powder, add the following and grind into a smooth paste.

* 1 Tbsp Ginger Garlic Paste
* 1 Big Red Onion
* 2 Tomatoes

Now the Masala is Ready.

Make a X cut on Brinjal's. check inside whether its clean (without sothaai). Fill some masala's into the "X" cut of brinjal's and let the brinjals marinate in masala for about 10-15 minutes.

Soak the Tamarind in a 1/4 cup of warm water for about 10 minutes. squeeze the tamarind and throw out the pulp.

Heat Oil in a Kadaai / Thick bottomed Pan. drop the brinjals stuffed with masala's one by one into the Oil.
Let the Brinjal's get cooked in medium flame. when the Brinjals shrink and fried for about 4 minutes in medium flame, add the Masala's to the Oil and fry the masala in the oil for 2 minutes.

Add Tamarind water to the Pan and let the kulambu boil. slow the flame. add salt to taste and mix well. Now reduce the flame and close the pan with its lid and let the kulambu sit on the flame for about 15 minutes or till the brinjals get cooked fully and till Oil comes on the sides of the Pan.

Add some Curry leaves and remove from the flame.



Serve with Hot Rice.
The Kulambu will be in a thick paste form. it will be so divine to mix with Hot Rice.

I bought Kulfi Moulds a year back, kept it unused for all these days. I badly wanted to use it for this Summer. finally the time came for it 2 days back. Kulfi's came out so well. I didn't intend to post the Kulfi Recipe untill i tasted it. It tasted Soo Great and thus Kulfi finds its place here and for your eyes.

My ammamma used to make Ice-creams and i just love to eat them even before freezing. i don't remember with what all she used to make. but vaguely, it could be Milk, Breads without edges, and Sugar. She used to put them all in the mixer, Grind together and add essence and freeze. We used to take these Ice-creams in a Flask filled with Ice Cubes to my MOM in our Village. My ammamma would be worriyng a lot, that the ice-cream should not melt during the 1.30 hrs. Car journey. On Landing the Village, we first open up the flask and check the Ice-cream and have it at once, as we didn't have Fridge at our Village home.

Summer holidays at our Village home are full of Green memories to me. I just love to go to our backyard and enjoy the Pure air and look at two Mango Trees, that my mom and my Pinni seeded at their childhood. My Job during summer holidays is to safeguard the Peanuts / Mallattai from crows. Peanuts will be spread all thru our backyard to get dried in Sun after harvest from our field. Oh.. I just Love those memories now!!


Okay Coming to the Kulfi Ice. its so easy to make, if you have Condensed Milk tin and Kulfi Mould's on hand. Even you can use small pots, as served in our ice-cream parlours. Else you can use small Paper Cup's as mould's and insert a chocobar stick and cover with a plastic wrap before you freeze.

Ingredients:  (Recipe for 6 Kulfi's )


Sweetened Condensed Milk - 200 ml
Milk - 1/2 Litre (400 ml. will do)
Sugar - 2 tbsp
Corn Flour - 2 tbsp
Elakaai / Cardamom - 4
Badam - 10
Cashew - 5


First take few tablespoons of milk, say 4 tbsp's and mix cornflour to it without lumps and set aside.

Grind the Cardamom in the Small Mixer Jar, remove the outer cover and add Sugar to it. Now Grind the Sugar with Cardamom innner mates into fine powder. remove it to a bowl.

Grind the Badam and Cashew coarsely and mix it with the Sugar, Cardamom mix.

Mix the Condensed milk to 400ml. Milk and Pour them on to a Wide Pan. Heat this Mixture till it boils. Now add the Cornflour mixed with Milk to the Pan.(Make sure to mix again before adding to the Pan, as the corn flour may get settled in the bottom).

Now add the cardamom-sugar-badam- cashew mix to the Pan and stir well. The milk in the Pan starts to thicken in a minute. slow down the flame, whenever it boils and tries to spill out of the pan. Let the Milk get thicken for 2 minutes atleast. remove the pan from the flame and cool it down.

Pour the cooled down milk mixture onto the Kulfi moulds. Freeze them overnight. when you want to serve, Run Water over the kulfi moulds. and Rub the Moulds with both your hands. Carefully remove the lid of the mould and serve. If the mould stick comes and not the Kulfi, carefully use knife to loose up the Kulfi and remove with a spoon.

It came out Good. but started to melt so fast!!(Chennai Climate ma!). I added some buterscotch chips to Kulfi-Milk mix, that gave a good crunch on bite!!

Iam sending these Kulfi's to Srivalli's Thanda Mela.