Cakes- the long and short of it

I never tire of baking cakes. On an average a cake a week. Easy to bake, store, serve, pack in lunch boxes. And once you have got the measurements right it becomes a 'never fail' recipe. But despite all that baking I still have fairly limited repertoire- the same ones tend to get repeated week on week. I tend to be partial to the traditional way of baking cakes- so in a conventional oven and with eggs.

Have always viewed the microwave cakes with scepticism- for the ones in a hurry/too lazy to make a 'proper' cake etc. And as for the eggless variants- they are no real cakes. The egg substitutes(condensed milk, curd) make them denser- they don't look or feel like cake. A poor replica of the original. And they just don't taste as good.

I love to watch cookery shows (can watch them for hours especially the delightful Nigella), leaf through food magazines and food sites/pages. It is in one such page that I came across this gorgeous looking chocolate cake- smeared with chocolate ganache and topped with strawberries. The photograph caught my attention and prompted me to read some more. And then I read the words "eggless" , "microwave" and was just about to skip the post when " six minutes" popped up somewhere in the narrative.  Sounded quite unbelievable but I was tempted to give the recipe a shot. So on my next grocery visit I came back armed with strawberries, Nestle dahi(curd) and Cadbury's Cocoa powder as the recipe had specified. I chose to make it on a day when we already had a good menu going(I wasn't banking on this one).

So went ahead and baked the cake. To my surprise and delight the cake turned out just the way it was described( see picture above once more). It was fluffy(in fact the cake almost doubles in quantity), soft, moist and delicious. Quite amazing that something so heavenly is so easy to make and gets done in a jiffy.

Ekta's Eggless Choco Strawberry cake 

Ingredients

For the cake
1 Cup nestle dahi, any other dahi should work as well. If using home made dahi strain out the water

1/2 cup oil + 2 tbsp more

1/2 cup sugar

1 cup maida

1/2 tsp baking powder

1tsp soda bi carb

1 tsp vanilla essence

1/4 cup Cadbury cocoa powder- this gives it a rich brown chocolaty colour, some of the other brands are a lot darker

7-8 strawberries( cut the strawberries, sprinkle some sugar over it and microwave for about 30 seconds to a minute till it becomes mushy)

 

Chocolate sauce

Mix 1/2 cup icing sugar with 1tbsp cocoa powder and a little water n mix (no need to cook, sauce is ready)

 

Method

1. Mix together sugar, dahi/curd , vanilla essence n oil till sugar dissolves. This takes a couple of minutes, continue to stir till you get a nice, creamy consistency.
2. Sieve the dry powders together.
3. Fold in the dry powders into the wet mix with a spatula.
4. Grease a baking dish( the cake rises quite a bit do choose a deep dish) and pour half the batter into it. Gently place the strawberries making sure you cover the batter. Next, pour the remaining batter to cover the strawberries.
5. Bake in a microwave for 6 minutes.
6. Once the cake is done allow it to cool( this is the hardest part but do be patient else you will end up with uneven pieces). Then pour the chocolate sauce over it and decorate with strawberries. The cake without the icing tastes equally good.
7. Drool over the masterpiece and then 'attack'.

I can't help but agree with Ekta when she says this is the "quickest and yummiest" cake she has ever eaten. And with that begins my journey of microwave baking and well eggless cakes( feeling sheepish as I say this). Thank you Ekta. You have managed a convert.

Bon Apetit and Happy Baking!