Eggless Whole Wheat Oats Coconut Muffins

My toddler loves cakes and muffins.  I often experiment with healthy ingredients to make these for her.  The funny thing is that whatever cake or muffins I make for her I end up on relishing them myself too :)  These muffins too falls in that category.  I first tried them a month ago and then today.  They came out as good as before.  So fluffy and moist.  My princess just loved them. 

These muffins are simply melt in mouth and delicious.  Addition of fresh coconut gave it a nice crunch and condensed milk made it so rich in flavour.  Its a tried and tested recipe so make it for your family and get the nice compliments from them :)  

I thought to share this recipe as it has all the healthy ingredients that you can enjoy with your kiddos without fear of calories as it is a low calorie snack with just 2 tbsp of butter (you can easily decrease it by 1 & 1/2 tbsp).  I made them a bit on the sweeter side as I loved it that way.  All in all, its a healthy addition in your snacks list. 

So here is the recipe for you to try.  Happy Cooking :)

Makes - 6 muffins 

Baking time - 20 minutes

Temperature - 180 degree

Ingredients:

Whole wheat flour	2 tbsp
Oats flour	2 tbsp
All purpose flour (maida)	2 tbsp
Baking powder	¼ tsp
Baking soda	1/8 tsp or 2 big pinch
Butter	2 tbsp
Salt	1 pinch
Fresh grated coconut	5 tbsp
Vanilla essence	¼ tsp
Milk	3 tbsp  or as required
Choco chips	1 tbsp
Tutty fruity (I used my homemade tutty fruity)	1 tbsp

Method:

• Mix together oats flour, whole wheat flour, all purpose flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda.  Set aside.
• Preheat oven at 180 degree and line a muffin pan with paper liners.  Set aside.
• Mix choco chips and tutty fruitty with 1/2 tsp of all purpose flour and set aside.
• In a mixing bowl, take melted butter, condensed milk and castor sugar (if using) and mix well.  Add vanilla essence and milk. Mix again.  Add flour mix little by little.  If you find that the batter is getting thick, add one more tbsp of milk.  The batter should not be too loose.  Keep it a bit on the thicker side.  Add grated coconut and give it a stir.  Finally add choco chips and tutty fruitty and gently stir twice.
• Fill the muffin cups with the prepared batter till a little more than half.
• Bake for 20 minutes or till the top gets a little brown.  Remove and shift to a wire rack to cool down.
• Enjoy.

Notes:

1. I used a different brand of condensed milk that had a bit thinner texture so I added 1 tbsp of castor sugar to perfect the sweetness.  If you are using Nestle condensed milk, skip the sugar.
2. You can add your choice of nuts instead of choco chips and tutty fruitty.  But I recommend to use choco chips too with nuts.
3. Here I used 2 tbsp of butter which can easily be reduced to 1 1/2 tbsp.

Eggless whole wheat cumin walnut cookies

Today's recipe is specially for kids.  I made these cookies for my 16 months old toddler.  She is a fussy eater so I always try to make something new for her.  I experiment with healthy ingredients and different flavours to make her take the food.  Sometimes it goes well and sometimes she doesn't even take it to her tiny mouth.. :D

This week I thought to try out some soft and healthy cookies for her to take as snacks and I made these cookies.  Yippy!! she loved them.  Mission Successful :D

These cookies came out very tasty and the texture (as I wanted it to be) was a bit cakey and soft.  I used whole wheat flour with all purpose flour to make it healthy.  My baby loved them so much and so did I.  Its a healthy snack for adults too for that odd time hunger pangs.

So sharing this recipe here.  Enjoy.  Happy Cooking :)

Ingredients:

Whole wheat flour	¼ cup
All purpose flour / maida	¼ cup
Cornflour	1 tbsp
Salted Butter	¼ cup
Brown sugar or white sugar	¼ cup + 1 tbsp
Baking soda	1 pinch
Milk	1 tbsp
Vanilla essence (optional)	3-4 drops
Chopped walnuts	½ tbsp
Cumin seeds/Jeera	½ tsp

Method:

• Take all purpose flour, whole wheat flour, cornflour and baking soda.  Mix well.  Sift them twice.  Keep aside.
• Preheat oven at 180 degree.  Take a baking tray and line it with aluminium foil.  Grease the aluminium sheet with oil.  Set aside.
• In a mixing bowl, add butter and sugar.  Mix well and add milk.  Mix till fluffy. 
• Add flour mix to the butter mix little by little. (If you find the mixture a bit dry, add one more tablespoon milk).
• Add cumin seeds and mix again.
• Cover the dough with cling film or put in an airtight container and keep in the fridge for 30 minutes.
• Take the dough out and pinch a little portion from it.  Make a ball with it and press a little with your palms.  Make all the cookies in the same manner and arrange in the greased baking tray.  Press chopped walnuts on the top of the cookies.
• Bake for around 18 minutes.
• Take out the cookies from oven and shift to a wire rack.  Let them cool for about 10-15 minutes.
• Enjoy.  
• Keep the remaining cookies in an airtight container.

Notes:

1. My cookies got brown color as I used brown sugar.
2. If using white sugar, powder it first.
3. If using unsalted butter add 1/8 tsp salt to the flour mix.
4. You can use cookie cutter to shape the cookies.
5. Cookies would be very soft in texture while hot.  Don't bake them again.  Let them completely cool down, they would become a bit firm.  
6. Cookies would be soft and cakey in the final texture.

Sweet Corn Idli

Hi friends. As you know, through my previous post of Sweet Corn Kheer that I love sweet corns. Today also I am gonna post a new dish with sweet corns. 

I had just two sweet corns left and I wanted to make something with it for lunch that too something which my baby could also have with us so decided to try this innovative dish called sweet corn idli.  At first I was apprehensive about the taste as sweet corns give a bit sweetness to any dish but when I tasted the idli, it was super soft and taste was just so good. We all liked it very much including my LO :) I accompanied it with Sambar and it turned out to be a perfect lunch. These idlis are delicious at the same time very healthy as it has no oil and I have added oats flour in it. These soft and spongy idlis will just melt in your mouth provided you dont forget to add fruit salt in the batter :D  Generally I do not like idlis much but these sweet corn idlis has just stolen my heart and I ate up more than usual.  I strongly recommend you to try it atleast once.  So here is the recipe for you to try.  Happy Cooking :)

Ingredients:

Fresh sweet corns	2 medium
Semolina / Suji/ Rava	1 cup
Curd	1 cup+ 1 tbsp
Oats flour	¼ cup
Ginger (grated)	1/2 cup
Salt
Oil	1 tbsp
Curry leaves	5-6
Mustard seeds	½ tsp
Urad dal	1 tsp
Eno fruit salt	1 tsp

Method:

• Take the sweet corns and wash them well. Grate them and get the pulp. (I got exact 1 cup of pulp).  Keep it aside.
• In a mixing bowl, add semolina and curd.  Mix well. Add oats flour and mix.  Add sweet corn pulp and mix again.  Let it rest for 10 minutes.
• After 10 minutes, add salt and grated ginger in the mixture. Stir well.
• For tempering, take a tadka pan and heat oil in it.  Add mustard seeds and urad dal and let it fry till dal changes the color to brown.  Add curry leaves and let it fry for 5 seconds,  Tadka is ready.  Pour it to the prepared idli batter and give a nice stir. Keep it aside for another 10 minutes.
• Take  the idli cooker/rice cooker / pressure cooker and put 3 cups of water in it.  Let it boil.  Till that time, take the idli stand and grease the moulds. 
• Take the idli batter and add in eno fruit salt and mix (do not over mix).   Fill the greased idli moulds with this batter and put it inside the cooker.  Keep the flame on high and let it cook for 15 minutes.  After 15 minutes, check if the idlis are prepared.  
• Remove the stand from the cooker and let it cool down for 5 minutes.  Remove the idlis from the moulds with the help of a greased knife or dinner knife.
• Arrange them in the plate and serve hot with chutney or sambar.

Note:

1. If you do not have the fresh sweet corns you can take frozen ones and grind them with the help of a blender and make a one cup pulp with it.
2. If you wish you can add green chilly and red chilli powder to the batter.
3. If using pressure cooker, do not put the whistle on it while cooking the idlis in it.
4. Do not forget to add eno fruit salt else your idlis would become dense and hard.
5. If you do not have eno fruit salt you can replace it with same quantity of baking soda though I have not tried with the baking soda.