After celebrating our first anniversary in January, and our first Valentine's together this February (I was in India last year), we had a festive start of the year again. My hubby is usually the one planning surprises, and the only surprises I’ve given him are cooking his favorites ever since I moved here after marriage. This Valentine's, I cooked a simple dinner at home – just Moussaka & Cacik, because I was busy preparing the dessert and a surprise.
So right after dinner, I surprised him by placing four fortune cookies in front and told him to choose two; the rest two would be mine. I made the fortune cookies myself at home earlier that day. Since I was attempting them for the first time, only four turned out good out of the eight that I had intended to make! Anyway, so I had put slips of paper in the fortune cookie, one was "promise me you'll love me forever" ... another was "I'll make one of your wishes come true today" ... and the remaining two – well, I cannot write here! *wink*
It was not only romantic, but also fun. And then, I brought out the brownies baked that morning. Since I’m not an expert at frosting and piping, I put simple cocoa-coffee glaze over it, topped with some strawberries and wrote "Happy Valentine's Sweetheart" with Cream Cheese icing. And we cut it together like we would a cake, warmed it and ate with ice cream.- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The eggless brownie was made from Tarla Dalal’s recipe "Sizzling Brownies" and is quite similar to the eggless chocolate cake recipe by Shobha Indani I’ve posted earlier. The reason I tried Tarla Dalal’s recipe was to understand how same ingredients with different proportions and similar procedure of preparation, in comparison to Shobha Indani’s recipe, made a difference.
Calls for:
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Shobha Indani –
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Tarla Dalal –
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All-Purpose Flour (maida)
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1 ¾ cup
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1 cup
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Cocoa Powder
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¼ cup
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¼ cup
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Salt
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1 tsp
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–
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Fresh Thick Curd (dahi)
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16 Tbsp
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6 Tbsp
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Powdered Sugar
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1 cup
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¾ cup
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Baking Powder
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½ tsp
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½ tsp
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Baking Soda (soda bi-carb)
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1 tsp
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½ tsp
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Oil or Melted Butter
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8 Tbsp
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5 Tbsp
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Vanilla Extract or Essence
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1 tsp
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½ tsp
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Chopped Walnuts (akhrot)
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½ cup
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½ cup
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Milk
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as required
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5 Tbsp
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Pan:
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9” round
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8 x 8” square
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Bake:
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10 mins @400oF then 20-30 mins @300oF
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20-25 mins @350oF
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Serves:
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8 – 10
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6 – 8
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Verdict: It was soft and nice, and I would probably call it Eggless Cakey Brownies or almost eggless chocolate-walnut cake. Quantity of cocoa was more and liquid was lesser in the brownie batter compared to the cake batter (left column), hence giving it a cakey-brownie taste & texture. Good and simple enough to make another time, but still on the lookout for a better, authentic, eggless brownie recipe.
How was your Valentine's? Any favorite memory?
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