DAY 65 - LITTLE REBELS

And I really do bake a lot.These last two weeks have been a little crazy.
Lots of soul searching and making little little decisions that I hope to follow.and in the middle of it all, I suddenly felt like I needed to change something.

So went out one afternoon and cut off my hair.
I think a girls hair is her vanity and also her veil and kind of a security blanket.
And I just felt the need to let it all go . Well I loved my long hair , but I went to Asha my hair stylist and told her I want really short hair like about an inch, she looked at me and said, 'why , please don't', guess I was feeling like a huge change or rebellious , I don't know what, but she said , that I was to leave my tresses in her hands and she will do something...NOT DRASTIC..

Well so I came back with shoulder length hair , and Zeke was like , 'It looks nice Mama, but I love your long hair, so please grow it again" and Zene said, 'Mama its just like me"...and she was happy with that..Girls and boys are so different...

Anyway In Mumbai at the moment , the Lakme Fashion week is on, frankly I'm not big on designer brands or fashion, I wear what is comfortable, and what makes me feel happy.
And believe it or not I have been to just one Fashion show, Wendell Rodrigues...My first ever show about 3 years ago, never been to one before that...

And then walked the ramp for Payal Singhal twice, once alone and once with my kids...

And so this Sunday after cooking lunch for my friends, Ritambhara , Sambo, Kichie and Akshay, we all decided to go for Anita Dongre's show at 9.30 and it was already 7-45, dressed up quickly in my Indian Ghagra that I completely love , and then Akshay drove us to Bandra in record time (he could sincerely be taking part in the Grand Prix) and after running around a bit , we reached the show..
I was just happy that my short hair was behaving itself and I did not look like I had just gotten outa bed...
It was a lovely show and really beautiful clothes...
Such really tall girls.. gosh sometimes wonder if I was just 2 to 4 inches taller, what could go wrong, everything is right but still wonder sometimes..

And so I walk the ramp again for Malini Aggarwala of Malaga..
Frankly I'm not very big on jewellery , and bags, but she does make beautiful jewellery and really funky bags , so I wore my own dress and put my short hair up, and walked the ramp , its quite frightening I must say..
Every ones eyes on you...
But as I was walking with friends Mini, Shaheen and Sharmila, I was OK...
I was the shortest ...And was too frightened to walk in my normal high heels on the ramp, so changed to flatter shoes....
ha ha ha ...but like the song in Thumbelina goes, ''When your heart is full of love , you're 9 feet tall'..and that's exactly how I felt...fantastic...

Well my friend Jaya looks at the photos and asks me why I'm dressed like Bellatrix from Harry Potter..

HA HA HA only she can say stuff like this...and I thought yup right ...I'm a witch and completely loved the idea, of flying around on my broom-stick..


Coming to Jaya..It was her son Kabir's birthday , and I'm happy to let you know that he is one kid, who really likes my food and so, wanted muffins, for his birthday...
Well I know Kabir, since he was 4 years old, while he was busy jumping from here and there in his spider-man suit and making me little drawings on pieces of paper , and smiling from behind the curtains...
So how can I refuse him, he was turning 13...
wow a teenager...
Now that's a very big deal..
I remember my 13th birthday, minis were in fashion and my mum made me a yellow hipster mini, that i swished around and walked ha ha ha ...
Well I made Kabir, peanut -butter muffins with a chocolate butter cream icing...

Ingredients..

400 gm -Butter
400gm-chunky peanut butter
350 gm- flour
350 gm- eggs
350gm-castor sugar
300 gm- cooking chocolate melted
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 TSP Vanilla essence
Add a little milk if the batter is not of a dropping consistency...

Method..

Beat the butter till its nice and fluffy.
Add the sugar and continue beating till nice and fluffy..
Separate the yolks and beat them with the vanilla essence , add to the butter/sugar mix..
Beat the egg whites separately till soft peaks are able to form.
Add the flour little by little to the mix along with beaten egg whites.
Mix in the chocolate..
Then spoon this into medium sized muffin cases and cook in a pre-heated oven at 180 degrees for 12-15 minutes , or till its golden brown but still nice and soft or, till the top springs back up after pressing it down..

Take them out of the oven and let them cool completely before icing them...

Icing
11/2 cup non salted butter
6 cups icing sugar
350 gm melted chocolate

Mix the ingredients all together and you are ready to pipe , those little peanut babies..

Every time I make muffins at home, Zeke behaves like he has never seen muffins in his life and begs and runs away with a few in his hands...
Never understand him..
And then Kichie was behaving just the same...
So in between making baked chicken and talking to my friends , I finish icing 80 little muffins and send the kids and the little muffins , to Kabir's home for his 13th birthday...

Happy birthday Kabir, lot of love and hugs and blessings and pray that you never get tainted by the world and always stay the absolutely fantastic boy that you are...
Frankly I have yet to meet a boy who is as fun, kind-hearted , generous and such a little care-taker like Kabir...

And so finishes another little experiment in my kitchen...
These little babies tasted a bit salty and had a nice crunch because of the peanuts and the chocolate butter cream icing just sealed the deal...
So here's presenting, "Little Rebels" complete with a contrasting flavour of sweet and salty and a bit of what I completely love....Chocolate...yup these muffins are a bit of a little uprising waiting to happen, but only in the nicest muffin sort of way..
Only from ,'Maria's Kitchen"

DAY 64 - LITTLE MISTAKES

So how many times a day do we all make mistakes ...
According to me, mistakes in life are good...
Frankly , if we don't make mistakes , how will we know what not to do and frankly, there is a lot we can learn from the mistakes me make ..

I for one suffer from what my friends term "foot in mouth disease" ...
I also suffer from "memory loss" ...
Also from , "pouncing with all my love " Labrador syndrome..
Also,"making an unrepairable mess because of impulsiveness" syndrome...

And most times, promise myself , won't do this again, or then at least try and think before I leap...
But think mistakes make great memories...
How will you remember all the moments in your life , you are bound to forget a few, but your mistakes , you don't really forget, and even if you do , you will be reminded of them ....
So yup I'm OK with my mistakes...
There is always something good that comes out of them..
My mum in fact just yesterday out of the blue, tells me, " it's good to make mistakes,if you don't make them, how will you know which is the right way....

So today I'm going to share with you one of my mistakes....
It was Zeke's best buddy Dhruv's 7th birthday and I promised Radhika his gorgeous mum that I would help with cooking food , for the boys...
So among the white sauce and Arabiatta sauce pasta, hot dogs, sandwiches etc, we decided to make a chocolate fondue for the kids post their food....

And so while we were serving the last of their Scrumptious treats, I asked Radhika, for chocolate and started making my fondue, and as I'm always in a race for some reason, I mixed the chocolate with the cream , and lo ! And behold , it just became a big thick gloop...
Oh! Goodness...
Then I read the wrapper , it said non sweetened cooking chocolate....
And so all the waiting marshmallow's and strawberries had no chocolate fondue...
And I was wishing I had read the wrapper...
"look before you leap" how many times have I heard that before...
But then again if you look where you going to leap, you will just miss what could be a lovely surprise or then a big Shock ...big gooey gloooopy chocolate mess...

Now I was looking at 400 gms of chocolate mixed with cream....
And did not want to waste it , as the chocolate was really fantastic...
So decided to make muffins...
And in my head was hoping that i don't have another disaster..
so this is what I did...
Very very simple actually..
My mum would do this when we were kids add, the same quantity of everything and make us amazing muffins...
So I just applied that...it always worked like magic for her ....

Ingredients
200 gm cream
200 gm unsweetened chocolate
300 gm castor sugar
200 gm eggs
200 gm flour
250 gm butter
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1tsp vanilla essence

Method
Mix the baking powder with the flour...
Whisk the butter and sugar till its really fluffy...
Whisk the eggs with the vanilla essence...
Add the egg mix to the butter sugar mix...
Then add the flour to this batter and mix till its incorporated really well....
Then add the chocolate cream mix...
If you feel the batter is too thick add a teaspoon or so of milk...
Spoon it into very small muffin cases, and bake them in a pre heated oven for 15-18 minutes ,in a oven that was pre heated at 180 degrees...

I wanted to put marshmallow's into the batter but they were swiped by the boys...
So in case at this point you want to add bits of mars bars or, broken pieces of cashew...mix it into the batter..
I'd you adding marshmallows, fill the muffin cup a bit, put tiny pieces of marshmallow and batter on the top, so it does not burn but just gets a little gooey....

Well , I was helped by Radhika, Sharmista and Gauri, in the various stages of these muffins...
So amidst some lovely white wine and much laughter from the kitchen and the boys running amuck through Radhika"s apartment, the muffins were done...
And taken out to be served and frankly warm out of the oven muffins, taste like something else...
Nothing can prepare you for that warm burst of chocolate goodness...
These little Mistakes ,melt in your mouth...

Frankly I was relieved that this worked....
What started as a mistake, just worked out beautifully ....
I ate half a muffin, could not eat more, because was full with the aroma of food and baking the whole day long...
But the three trays of my "mistakes" we're devoured ...
I'm happy, very very happy...

Like I said , I actually love my mistakes...
Some make me laugh..
Some make me cry..
Some make me tear my hair out..
Some make me clap my hands with joy...
Some make me smile
Some make me hopping mad..
Some make me sigh...
Some just make me sit quiet...
Some make me have conversations in my head...
Some I love and will make them again....
So dont judge me but Smile instead....

So here 's presenting, "Little Mistakes" made in a hurry , but with lots of laughter, chatter and a whole lot of love , that's what really matters....
only from , Maria's Kitchen"

DAY 50 : ALLELUIA CHOC-MUFFINS

For the longest part of my life , in fact for as long as I can remember the one constant love in my life has been chocolate, I devour chocolate when I’m happy, excited, sad, mad, bad, crazy,
hungry, starving, weeping, before sleeping...well I hope you getting the drift..
So I felt that there is no better way to start this column with Hindustan times, but with the
love of my life.....

So I decided to try a whole bunch of new recipes so that I could get you one that is really delicious and easy..
So you can just imagine how many different recipes I tried and God I baked and tasted and my help at home ...poor guys ate every muffin I baked ...

My man-Friday Vijay, is someone who now understands what I do completely and gives me precise feed-back..Well after 5 different trials ,got this which I made for my choir and I made about 80 pieces and got nothing back...

So here goes

200 gms good quality cooking chocolate

115 gms Amul butter

150 ml water, room temperature

275 gms brown sugar or brown sugar or organic sugar

1 1/2 tsp vanilla essence

4 eggs separated

175 ml sour cream

350 gms flour2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp soda bi-carbonate

On a very low flame mix the chocolate and butter along with the water,so that the butter and chocolate melt and a pouring consistency of the mix is formed....

Beat the egg whites till stiff peaks are formed and keep in a cool dry place..

Beat the yellow of the eggs with vanilla essence and keep aside..

To the flour add the baking powder and the soda bi-carbonate , sieve
it all together and keep aside..Now to the chocolate-butter and water mix, add the sugar and beat with a hand mixer on low..
Add the egg yolk and continue beating...
Now keep the beater aside and with a spatula add the sour cream and fold it into the above mix...

When the sour cream is fully incorporated add the flour by folding it in...

Now after the flour ,very delicately fold in the egg whites making sure
that it stays fluffy...and do not beat or mix vigorously ...
You are done...

This batter makes two 8 inch cakes or then about 80 bite size muffins..

If you making cakes bake it at 150 degrees for exactly 40 minutes and if you making bite-size muffins then bake it at 150 degrees for 18-20minutes...

The key is to first make friends with your oven….. And once you establish a good friendship..well the benefits are awesome...
If you do no find sour cream please use dahi ...it comes out as delicious....

So i made bite-sized muffins and I loved them and my official taster
Zeke , with his mouth stuffed with the muffin gave me the "wow"expression ...These muffins turn out really soft and melt in your mouth...

I then waited for them to cool and decorated them with a chocolate butter cream icing ....
I love these babies...they fit correctly in your mouth ,as they are not too big and so you really don’t mind having about 4 ...
And then what i do is get up really early the next morning and go for a 40 minute run on our uneven , traffic infested ,dog chasing Mumbai streets ..ha ha ha
But you don’t have to believe every thing I write here, what I want you
to do is , go and bake this ...and then please do write in and give me your feed back..
As for me I’m a happy bunny, , I call these my "ALLELUIA CHOC-MUFFINS"because that’s what you want to sing straight after eating them...
So here just for all of you straight from "Maria's Kitchen’, fresh, soft and melt in your mouth ''ALLELUIA CHOC-MUFFINS" with love from me to you....

Day 48 : VICTORIOUS ORANGE-CHOC MUFFINS...

And like any other normal Indian, i was glued to the television all of Saturday,
it was impossible not to..
India was in the ICC Cricket World Cup Finals...
And that's reason enough...
So Zeke made a few calls and voila...there were a bunch of boys home...
Then we started tattooing the flag and names of Sachin and Dhoni on their chests and these little ones , ran around screaming 'INDIA ...INDIA ..."
and basically there was mayhem...
The game was really fantastic and SriLanka under the very suave Sangakkara put up a great fight ...
I think i was in shock when Sehwag got out ...but what killed me was when Sachin got out....
I was in Shambles and so were these little six and a half year old boys who were sitting shirtless with tattoos of their Sachin....
I was seriously wondering if i should just not be screaming so much ...maybe its bad luck...and frankly I'm not superstitious , and
then came Gambhir....Bless that boy..
Virat Kohli...who i love watching because he is too cute...and talented ....
Dhoni of course came and swung into action ..
Yuvi...I was sooo happy that he is back in action....
I knew that we were winning this Cup...
Our boys in BLUE... had that little edge..there was a fire in their eyes and a burning desire to win this cup ...and not for themselves , but for the man who makes India shine...Sachin Tendulkar...
I was in school , when he first played and I remember school was buzzing with talk of this boy wonder with this curly mop of hair...
and when DHONI hit that 6 ...OH MY GOD.... I know for sure that all the Indians watching the match or listening to it on radio...all let out a huge huge scream...
By then of course Zeke was asleep so recorded all the victorious excitement for him..
I was alone jumping up and down on my bed......
Freakin helll ...this is how it feels..... to be the winning nation...
I could hear crackers and yelling and music and mayhem ....
and just went back to 2003 where I was hosting the ground events of the ICC Cricket World Cup from South Africa and had the privilege to watch the matches from the V.I.P. box , have an all access pass and meet all the best cricketers in the world...do interviews with them , watch their net practices and be part of the magic...
I was sooo lucky i got to experience that....
But we did not win...

But it was the best and most fun experience of my life even more fun than hosting the MTV music video awards live from the Radio City Music hall in NYC..

So many emotions running through my mind..it was party time ... so decided then and there that I'm baking sinfully delicious muffins...because had to use up all this excitement and frankly could not sleep , so pulled out a few books and did what Shashi mam taught us at Sophia college...

But I added nutella , chocolate, coffee, orange rind and orange juice.....because that's what delicious victory tastes like to me , tomorrow is the screening of Arshad's film FALTU that he has a special appearance in , so will take it all there...

INGREDIENTS...

Butter 125 gms
Sugar 90 gms
Brown sugar 30 gms
Eggs 2
Vanilla essence 1tsp
Flour 200 gms
Baking powder 1 tsp
Cocoa powder 30 gms
Milk ml

Cream the butter..
then beat in both sugar's and mix until the consistency is light and fluffy..
Beat the eggs with the vanilla separately and then gradually beat them into the creamed mixture...
Here i added a dollop of nutella, 2 tsp coffee, the rind and juice of 1 orange, and about 100 gms melted chocolate and mixed it all really well together
Sift the the flour and cocoa together and fold into the butter , sugar egg mix alternating with the milk...
I spooned out a teaspoon measure into small cupcake tins and baked them at 150 degrees for 13 minutes....

They are soft and have a delicious aroma...left them to cool on a wire rack...
I then made frosting and coloured it orange , green and left some white....
Because these are the colours that rule the CRICKET WORLD.....


Swirled them on the muffins in the morning ...and took them to the film...
the kids enjoyed "Faltu" and the songs are great fun.....

And my 'Victorious orange-choc muffins, soft and melting only from ''Maria's Kitchen....

P.S. And now the icing on the cake, on Monday my dear friend Sanjay Narang invited me and of course a whole bunch of friends , to the most wonderful dinner and celebration in honour of Sachin Tendulkar and the boys in blue..to a location that is actually Mumbai's best kept secret....its a little "pearl" in this crazy, crowded fast paced bustling city.....
The air was filled with sweet victory , warmth and laughter...the spread was scrumptious..and the ambience was magical...
Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvi, Zaheer , Nehra and Gary Kirsten were the cynosure of all eyes...after many warm and funny speeches ...the victory cake was cut and the bubbly was popped...
To me, i needed no bubbly because i was high on the victorious infectious air that wafted through...
I like a true fan got photographs and autographs with them all...and loved every moment of it ...i went back a happy bunny...
Thank you ''Team India''....for everything ....
And "Thank you Sanjay' for making the "twain meet"....

DAY 45 : TIME-TRAVEL TRUE BLUE SNICKER MUFFINS.....

And yesterday was a weird day, it's funny how life completely changes ..
Bryan Adam's was in the city and was doing a concert and i was not part of it in the real sense of the word..
I still remember the last time he came to Mumbai on tour and MTV was hosting the gig and i was hosting the concert...
it was buzzing the whole atmosphere at the Goregoan grounds...there were throngs of young faces that stormed through the gates when they opened...i remember losing my crew and getting pushed through the crowd into the audience area and had to jump over the barricade in my black skirt with slits on either side and my favorite glitter horns in my hair...
The whole week prior to that ..i just listened to Bryan..Bryan..Bryan...
It was fantastic talking to the audience, i don't even remember if there was an opening act ..I'm sure there was..but we all just wanted him to come on stage and sing to us in that smoky voice of his and then...

As the sun was setting and I got on stage again and said ....

Mumbai...are u ready
the whole crowd ROARED .....
breathe ...breathe my heart was pounding....
"This is it...the one we have all been waiting for the one the only ...BRYAN ADAMS"....and I walked out ....
Bryan Adam's walked in ..wearing white..nothing fancy ..no bling ...just him his guitar and his band...
I walked down and joined all my MTV Vj friends in the front of the stage....
and then he strummed his guitar ...to the roar of the entire crowd and mesmerised us with his wonderful voice....we were so close to stage that we could see the sweat beads on his fore-head...the sound from the speakers became one with our heart beats...we screamed ..sang along...cried ...danced and also behaved like silly goats...
and then he came to the edge of the stage and gave me the pick from his guitar...
ha ha ha "thought I'd died and gone to heaven" just like the song....
oh my God...this was one concert that I'm never ever going to forget ..not because of the "pick" but because of the sheer magic of his voice .....

Today that felt like another lifetime....
Bryan Adam's was again in my city dong a concert and i was sitting with Zeke my little boy explaining to him why i could not come with him to one of his favorite brother's (friend) birthday ..while baking snicker bar muffins for the lovely beach party that his mom Radhika had put together, actually i forgot that it was the day of the concert and then later bailed out...

Yup and so i spent the afternoon making these lovely muffins for little Dhruv who was turning 6 and was just reliving the last time in my head...
And so I went through my Nigella Lawsons "how to be a domestic goddess" and the snicker and peanut butter muffin recipe sounded perfect and really yummy...and easy ha ha ha ....

250 g plain flour
85g Castor sugar
1 1/2 tbsp baking powder
6 tbsp crunchy peanut butter
60 g unsalted butter
1 large egg
175 ml milk
3 bars of 65g each..snicker bars

So i stirred the flour, sugar , baking powder and a pinch of salt together..
added the peanut butter and mixed it all together till it was a bowl of course crumbs...
oh ! i also put in half a jar of nutella ..because i love it...
beat the eggs and melted butter together and then added it to the milk and then gently added it into the bowl of dry ingredients ......used 2 eggs as our eggs are smaller..
cut up the snicker bars into tiny bits and also ate up the extra bar...ha ha ha
I then scooped them into tiny bite size muffin trays and baked them for 25 minutes....

Have to say that the melting snicker bars with the caramel oozing into the muffin mix drives u a little mad if you are inhaling that aroma in your kitchen while thinking of Bryan Adam's crooning "if you love a woman" ...lethal i say....
170 degrees and 25 minutes down these lovely nutty chocolaty beautiful muffins were out of my oven...and as i toppled them on to my counter table ...i was thinking i have just enough time to go get a blow dry and come back in time to do a frosting for these babies and send them with Zeke and Zene to Dhruv's 6th beach birthday party...
So 45 minutes later with my beautiful blow dry in place ...I get down and dirty again with the cutest blue colour frosting which i made with

1/2 cup margarine
1/2 cup nutralite
4 cups icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 tbsp milk
wilton blue colour

i loved the bright blue and finished all my muffins ...
They really looked cute ..but not half as cute as the birthday boy having fun with his friends.....
so armed with presents and muffins and scones ...Zeke and Zene left for Dhruv's birthday party...
meanwhile...i hurriedly got into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt and , Arshad and me sped of ...err i mean crawled our way in the Mumbai traffic to the concert..
Reached exactly 15 minutes before Bryan hit the stage..

We were in the VVIP enclosure...very very sweet of Sunil and Mana Shetty to invite us..
But seriously we were sooooo far away from the stage ..that it just did not feel right and i felt like crying...
He was soooooo far away and the speakers were just not making my heart thump....I was sooo upset ...this is no way to watch a concert..i wanted to be in the middle of that crowd hanging on that security railing..screaming..singing...and just merging with the music...but that never happened .......

I left the concert cribbing about how this is not right and how we should have been closer to stage and blah blah blah...and realised .....

Oh my God i have hosted live concerts with Bryan Adams, Boy Zone, Ricky Martin, Peter Andre ub40, Boney.M, Lou Bega, Stephan Gately(bless his soul), Code Red , Enrique Iglesias , MC Hammer , Air Supply and the MTV Video Music Awards in the year 2000 from the radio-city music hall...and mostly all of our fantastic Indian musicians and singers......and some artists I have forgotten..... I think , because its been soooo long back...

And i just thanked God for giving me this fantastic life and for giving me these fantastic opportunities..
Also said a little prayer for Natasha Malhotra my boss at MTV...who i thought made my life crazy...but all she did was push me to do better than i thought i could do...
(She is now with Disney and gave Mini and my kids the best time ever when we all went to the Hongkong Disney Land)

We'll what can i say...these are nostalgic muffins and i time -travelled with them ...so not only are they yummy ,but also very very special because they were made for one of Zeke's best buddy's 6th birthday...

I don't know if Zeke or Dhruv will ever remember this day or the muffins ..but i sure will...
'TIME-TRAVEL TRUE- BLUE SNICKER MUFFINS" made with lotsa love only from "Maria's Kitchen"