Seasoned Brown Bread with Flaxseed

Ingredients:

Bread Flour/Whole wheat flour/Plain Flour          -500 grms/4 cups
Fast Action Dried Yeast                                        -7 grm sachet
Honey                                                                     -2 tspoon
Salt                                                                         -2 tspoon
Olive Oil                                                                -3 tspoon
Ground Flaxseed                                                    -3 tblspoon
Water                                                                      -2 cups lukewarm
Plain flour                                                               -1/2 cup for dusting


Method:

Mix 1/8 cup water, honey and yeast in a small bowl/glass, give it a mix. keep it aside until frothy.

Now make a well in the middle of the flour, tip flax seeds, salt and oil to it.

Now put the yeast mix and rest of the water in the flour, start mixing it with the help of water to form the dough.

The dough will start to look very messy and wet.

Tip the dough on to the floured surface and start kneading the dough.

Using my hands it took me almost 20 minutes to make it a smooth not sticky dough like the picture.
When kneading the dough keep dusting the flour on surface and on your hand. once it starts to stick together not to surface, oil your hands and knead it well.

Now place the dough into an oiled bowl. the bowl should be deep enough to handle the rise of the flour.

Keep it in a warm place to let double in size. the time of this rise can vary depending on where you live.











My dough took almost 2 n half hours to get doubled in size.

Once its doubled in size, punch it down.

Tip it over to greased surface and knead again.

Now roll with a rolling pin. This time you can add any flavours in the bread if you want, as I added the italian spicy seasoning.

Now fold the bread from one side. Refer to the picture. Fold it till the other side of the rolled dough.

Now pinch the end of the rolled dough, Also pinch the sides of the and keep the pinched side down.
This will start to look like a thick roll.

Now grease your loaf pan and put the dough roll into it. Cover it with plastic wrap.

Give it some time to rise again. Mine took 45 minutes to get double again.

Pre-heat your oven to 200c.
Make some slash cuts on the risen dough and place it in the middle rack of the oven.

Keep a iron skillet or oven proof dish with some water in it at the lowest rack of the oven.
The steam from the water will give your bread a very nice soft and brown crust.
Keep checking on the bread, as the heat and time varies on the oven brands, mine took 30 minutes to get baked. make sure you do not open the oven door in between, check the bread from the glass window.

Once baked, let the bread cool completely, it takes 40-50 minute for a loaf to cool down. give it an hour to cool down.

Once totally cooled, slice the bread on the desired thickness.

Cover the sliced bread into a plastic wrap and keep it in the fridge.

Your seasoned brown bread is ready to use for sandwich, toast and bread pizza.

Leftover Rice Cutlets

Ingredients:

Cooked Rice             -2 cups
Mix Veggies             -1 cup (I used cabbage, carrot and capsicum)
Potatoes                    -1 cup boiled and mashed
Onion                       -1/4 finely chopped
Green chillies          -2 Chopped
Fresh coriander       -2 tbsp Chopped
Ginger                     -1 tspoon
Cumin seeds           -1 tspoon
Red chilli powder   -1/2 tspoon
Garam Masala         -1/2 tspoon
Amchoor                 -1/2 tspoon
Salt                          -to taste
Oil                           -4-5 tblspoon to shallow fry
Cornflour                -2-3 tblspoon

Method:

Mash the boiled potatoes.
Microwave the veggies for 2 minutes.
Grate the onion and ginger.
In a deep mixing bowl, put rice, veggies, potatoes, grated onion, grated ginger, chillies and coriander.

Now add the cumin seeds, red chilli, garam masala, amchoor and salt to the bowl. Mix it well.

If the consistency is very dry mash the mix with few pulse of hand blender.

If the consistency is very mushy add the cornflour to it and mix well.

Now grease your palm and shape the cutlets of desired shape, I prefer them to be round.
Shallow fry them in a heavy bottom pan. Flip them and Fry them until golden brown.

Serve them with choice Chutneys.

Jam Cookies (Heart Shaped)

Ingredients:

Basic Cookie dough            
Jam                                          - 3 tblspoon ( I used 3 berry Jam)
Chocolate hearts                      - 6 (3 white 3 dark chocolate)
Glaze                                       - 1 tspoon butter 2 tspoon milk


Method:

Take out your cookie dough from the fridge and let it rest for 5 minutes.
Now roll the cookie dough in between parchment paper for about 5 inch round and 3cm thick.

Now take a cookie cutter, I used heart shaped, and cut the cookies from the rolled out dough. I cut out 12 shapes to make 6 cookies, as these will be sandwich cookies.

Now keep 6 whole shapes for the base of the cookie.
Cut out the heart shape from the other 6 cookies to make heart shape border for the upper layer of the cookie. Please refer the pictures.

Now place the 6 base cookies on a baking sheet.

Polish them with the glaze.

Now lay down the border cookies over these bases.

Polish them with the glaze again. Fill them with the choice of jam.
Now keep them in the fridge for 30-40 minutes. You can leave them overnight in the fridge.
Just before baking the cookies pre-heat your oven to 180 c and bake the cookies 15 minutes or the sides starts to get golden.
Once cookies cool down completely put the chocolate hearts as an extra treat for your kids.
These cookies go very well with milk and shakes.

Basic Sugar Cookie

This recipe will tell you how to make basic sugar cookie dough. In this dough you can use choice of colours, essence and flavours.

Ingredients:

All-purpose flour            - 1 1/4 cup
Cornflour                        - 1/4 cup
Granulated Sugar           - 1/4 cup
Granulated Cane Sugar  - 1/2 cup
Butter                             - 1/2 cup
Salt                                 - 1/2 tspoon
Baking Powder              - 1/2 tspoon
Baking Soda                  - 1/4 tspoon
Food Essence                 - 1 tspoon
Food Colour                  - as required

Method:

Sieve both the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in the deep mixing bowl, mix it well.

Now mix Sugar and butter together until light in colour and smooth.

Now mix in the essence as per your choice.

Now put butter mix in the bowl of flour. Add in the food colour.

Now knead it to form a dough, if you fine the dough too dry add some milk but don't make the dough too smooth and soft.

Keep the dough in the fridge for 2 hours before rolling and cutting the cookies of your desired shape.