The Foodscape turns TWO!

Today, The Foodscape celebrates its Second Anniversary! I can’t believe it’s been two years since my first post on The Foodscape. Little did I know then that it would become my life. 🙂

The Foodscape has had a tremendous year indeed. It started out with the routine five working days and blogging over the weekends, survived a big move to another country, launched its logo, travelled to Thailand and had an incredible Christmas, filled with the season’s best. Then 2016 rolled in and I worked hard to put many wonderful recipes out for you. Happy Days!

Lemon Blueberry Pancakes

If you’ve been to my blog before, you sure know about my pancake obsession. For the past two years that The Foodscape has been live, I’ve experimented with different pancake flavours, only the best of which I’ve shared with you. I’ve given you the lowdown on The Perfect Pancake, as well as the recipes to my fabulous Chocolate Chunk Pancakes and Sticky Date Pancakes! This time around, I’m back with a fantastic recipe for my latest invention – Lemon Blueberry Pancakes topped with Lemon Caramel Sauce!

The Perfect Brunch for Two

I love brunching. Whether you’re by the pool in a posh hotel or lazing in your pajamas at home, a hearty brunch is always a delight. Just thinking about it makes my heart sing… Quiches and pies laid out on lace doilies, tall pancake stacks drenched in syrup, fresh berries, hash browns, crispy maple bacon, sausages, eggs sunny side up, souffles and mousses, fruit cuts, muffins, fresh fruit juice and coffee or champagne and margaritas! (Oooohh… goosebumps! 😛) Waking up to a spread like that is definitely one of life’s finer pleasures!

Chocolate Chunk Pancakes

Though I’m late, I wanted to wish you guys a belated Happy Pancake Day! 🙂 Pancake Day, also known as Shrove Tuesday, is celebrated on the day preceding Ash Wednesday (the first day of Lent) with a nice plate of soft pancakes, a dollop of butter (okay, not just a dollop) and loads of syrup (or/and jam, Nutella, chocolate, whipped cream… you get the drift!). While I cannot (and will not) confine my pancake eating to the one day, I believe celebrating pancake day is a necessity. I mean, what better way to go into 40 days of fast and abstinence than to scarf down pancakes the day before? I think its perfect! Now don’t get me wrong; I’m not assuring you that I’ll give pancakes up all through lent. But I’ll try. 😛

The Perfect Pancake

Good breakfasts are a rarity in The Foodscape household. We either wake up just an hour before we need to leave the house in the morning, which means we grab a bowl of cereal before we head out, or on days when we’re home, we wake up very close to lunch time and grab a smaller bowl of cereal. I’m not kidding, the boyfriend and I give Kellogg’s Chocos some serious business! 😛

So when I woke up last morning, I was quite surprised with my extreme hankering for pancakes. I say ‘extreme’ because I forewent my ritual of lazing in bed for just a few more minutes, and almost instantly was up on my feet, whisking away in the kitchen. That positively never happens. Well, I guess for pancakes, anything, yeah?

In these pancakes, I decided to use baking powder instead of baking soda which is the usually recommended choice when it comes to a pancake recipe. I remember reading somewhere, a while ago, that using baking powder makes fluffier pancakes. So I thought, why not? The key to making these pancakes light, soft and fluffy is the way you beat the batter. You have to make sure that you beat it enough to incorporate air into the batter, but also not over-beat it that you end up knocking out the air from the batter. Tricky, yes; impossible, no! All you need to remember is, the airier the batter, the fluffier the pancakes turn out.

Here’s what you need for The Perfect Pancake:

• All Purpose Flour – 1 and 1/2 cups
• Castor Sugar – 3 tbsp
• Baking powder – 1 tbsp
• Eggs – 2
• Milk – 1 cup
• Butter – 1/4 cup, melted
• A pinch of salt
• A pinch of cinnamon powder
• Vanilla Extract – 2 tsp
• Nutella – 1 cup

And here’s how to make it…

Step 1: In a deep dish, mix the milk, eggs and melted butter.

Step 2: Sift in the flour, and add baking powder and sugar and beat until just incorporated.

Step 3: Add salt, cinnamon and vanilla extract and give it a final mix, but be sure not to over-beat.

Step 4: On a low flame, heat a flat pan or griddle and grease it with butter.

Step 5: Pour 1/4 cup of batter into the centre of the pan and let it cook. When bubbles begin popping on the surface of the pancake, flip it over and fry until the other side is light golden. When you’re happy with the colour of the pancake, take it off the heat and fry the next.

Step 6: When you’ve fried the entire batch, stack them up, pull your cellphone out and take a drool-worthy picture of them to share on Instagram like I did. When the pancakes look this good, this is an essential step! 😉

Step 7: Sandwich a teaspoon (or two, three, four!) of Nutella in between each pancake.

Step 8: Pour the remaining Nutella over The Perfect Pancake stack, allowing it to flow over the edges. Top with strawberries or any fruit/sprinkle of your choice and eat right away.

I’ve made pancakes before, always using baking soda, but they’ve never turned out like these. They’ve always been clumpy, flat and rubbery – the exact opposite of how you want your pancakes to be. I don’t know what the science behind it is, but baking powder works perfectly! I must tell you, it was incredibly hard to stick to clicking photographs of them when I so badly wanted to stick a forkful in my mouth! God bless the boyfriend for bearing with the incredibly long photoshoot on a hungry tummy, with only the occasional ‘How much longer?’ 😀

These pancakes are subtly sweet, buttery and pillowy; just like the ones in dreams (that’s assuming you, like me, dream about pancakes). The cinnamon and vanilla give them a light fragrance; aromas you’ll enjoy as they melt in your mouth. And if you’re not a fan of Nutella, they go perfectly well with butter, maple syrup, sticky toffee sauce or just as. And it’s super easy to make them as well – 20 minutes, tops!

Whip up a batch of these perfect pancakes and eat up. Breakfast doesn’t get any better than this! 😀

 

 

 

Pulled Chicken Sandwiches

For the past couple of months, I’ve been writing a food column titled ‘Masterclass with Winola Peris’ for The Woman magazine, Oman. Every month, the column includes a step-by-step tutorial of an easy recipe that is in-tune with the theme of the edition. The April issue of The Woman is all about health and when it came to writing a healthy recipe, I was stuck. That’s because, well…I’m a baker! (It’s kind of hard to come up with something healthy when you’re in love with turning loads of butter, eggs and sugar into cake!)

A little research on and having put my mind to cracking this challenge, I decided to come up with a wholesome healthy meal that would be both supremely nutritious and lip-smackingly delicious at the same time! Hence, I made Pulled Chicken Sandwiches! 😀

These chicken sandwiches are fascinating. Combining an array of flavours and textures, they are sure to take your palate on an endearing journey – with every bite you will fall more in love with this delectable sandwich. And you know that feeling when you eat something super yummy that you just wish it would never get over? Yes, that feeling is a given!

If you’re a fan of chicken and you love a good sandwich, you ought to try this recipe!

Here’s what you need:

For the sauce:

• Vegetable Oil – 2 tbsp
• Onions – 1/2 cup, finely chopped
• Dark Brown Sugar – 1 tbsp
• Garlic Powder – 1/2 tsp
• Red Chili Powder – 1/2 tsp
• Roasted Black Pepper Powder – 1 tsp
• Ketchup – 1 cup
• Vinegar – 2 tbsp
• A dash of salt

For the Chicken:

• Boneless, skinless chicken breasts – 4
• Dark Brown Sugar – 2 tbsp
• Paprika – 1 tsp
• Ground Cumin – 3/4 tsp
• Ground Ginger – 1/4 tsp
• Salt – 1/4 tsp
• Vegetable Oil – 1 tsp

For the Sandwich:

• Cheese – 4 slices
• Ciabatta Bread – 8 slices
• Lettuce leaves – a bunch, coarsely chopped

Here’s how you make these Pulled Chicken Sandwiches:

• The Sauce: In a skillet, heat the oil and fry the onions until translucent. Add in the brown sugar, chili powder, roasted black pepper powder and garlic powder; stir until the spices are well incorporated. Mix in the ketchup and vinegar and stir. When it comes to a boil, take it off the heat.
• The Chicken: Marinate the chicken with brown sugar, paprika, ground cumin, ginger and salt. Heat oil in a pan and cook the chicken until tender and well done, about six minutes on each side. Take the chicken off the heat and while still hot, shred it with two forks.
• Assemble the sandwich: Place a slice of cheese on one slice of bread and pop into the oven for a few seconds. Top the cheese with chopped lettuce and a good helping of pulled chicken. Lightly drizzle the sauce over the chicken and finish it off with the other slice of bread

Take a bite of this sandwich and here’s what you’ll experience – the soft melt-in-the-mouth bread, the creamy cheese lending its perfect sourness. Then there’s the sweet and spicy pulled chicken with a golden crust that is incredibly scrumptious, complimented by the crunch and freshness of the lettuce and the sweetly enveloping sauce that makes the whole sandwich come together beautifully. It is just glorious! Also, the different textures coming through are a real treat.

I loved this sandwich and it sure is part of my rather long list of go-to comfort foods. And what do I like about it best, you may ask? Well, I don’t have to feel a single bit guilty if I do happen to binge on these! (Yayyy me!) Now that you know how to eat healthy without giving up on all the food you love, I trust you’re going to treat yourself with these absolutely YUMMM Pulled Chicken Sandwiches! Go on, get cooking! 🙂

PS. For those of you who live alone and don’t have much time to put something elaborate together for a meal, this is the recipe for you! Quick, easy and delicious! 😀

Check out my column in the April issue of The Woman magazine, Oman! 🙂

Nutella and Berry filled Crepes

Every meal I’ve ever cooked, every cake I’ve baked and every dessert I’ve made, have a very fond memory attached to it. Though some memories get a little hazy over the years, some meals will always have a special place in my heart. The first time I made Nutella and Berry filled Crepes was one such meal I will always cherish.

It was just a little over a year ago; the boyfriend’s birthday. The special occasion called for a special brunch. Into the kitchen I went, and while I fried up a crepe at a time, my friends so wonderfully set the table for brunch. It was a late Saturday afternoon. Four plates of warm Strawberry and Nutella filled Crepes and mugs of sizzling coffee lay on the table, four very happy friends sat around engaging in animated conversation, gorging on the delicious crepes in front of us. I can’t remember a time when we were more relaxed. The memory makes me smile. 🙂

The Brunch Spread

After that day, the boyfriend and my two friends loved me a tad bit more (because of the crepes, of course) and the amazing experience of savoring these Nutella and Berry filled crepes was a luxury we allowed ourselves every so often.

The first time I made Strawberry Nutella Crepes

What I would say is the best thing about these crepes, is that you can have them at any time of the day. Breakfast, brunch, dinner, dessert, crepes work as the perfect meal at any time! To me they have become a guilty pleasure I love to indulge in, a dish I have cravings for quite often, and my go-to meal I take comfort in when I’m stressed or sad. (No, I don’t eat ice-cream out of the tub. Yes, I do lick the nutella off the plate once I’ve polished off these crepes.)

I am a great fan of the concept of breakfast for dinner, and obviously, crepes are the reason for that. The idea of sitting in bed with a tall glass of chilled water, a plate loaded with crepes, smeared with nutella and topped with berries and watching back-to-back episodes of Chasing Life is my way to unwind (not to mention, it’s what you’ll find me doing on most weekends!) So, if you love breakfast for dinner – or any time of the day – as much as I do, you’ve got to give this recipe a go!

Here’s what you need:

• All Purpose Flour – 1 cup
• Sugar – 4 tbsp
• Salt – a pinch
• Eggs – 2
• Unsalted Butter – 2 tbsp, plus extra for greasing the pan
• Milk – 1 cup
• Vanilla Essence – 1 and 1/2 tsp
• Nutella – 1 cup
• Mixed Berries – 1 cup (strawberries, blueberries and raspberries)

This is how you make these Crepes:

• In  large bowl, blend together the flour, sugar, salt, eggs, melted butter, vanilla essence and milk until you have a smooth runny batter.
• Heat a griddle on medium flame. Grease it with butter and pour in about 1/4 cup of batter. When the surface of the crepe begins to bubble, flip over and cook on the other side for about a minute. Repeat this until all the batter is used up.
• While still warm, spread some Nutella on the inner side of the crepe and top with berries. Roll up and serve immediately.

These Nutella and Berry filled Crepes are immensely delectable. The soft mildly sweet crepes, the luscious creamy Nutella lending it’s nutty and chocolaty flavors and the sweet and tang coming through from the berries, each one lending it’s own unique texture and zest, all come together to form the perfect ticket to sweet paradise! It is pure ambrosia – both to the palate and the soul. 😀

I highly recommend indulging in a plate piled high with Nutella and Berry filled Crepes if you’re going through a rough patch, or even if you’re not. You will surely love these! It’s a promise. 🙂

P.S: If you’re in Oman, do check out my monthly column ‘Master Class with Winola Peris‘ in The Woman magazine 🙂

Date Pancakes with Sticky Toffee Sauce

 

I am a huge fan of breakfast for dinner! There is nothing better than sitting on the couch, your favorite show running on TV and a plate of pancakes, crepes, or waffles in front of you after a long day’s work. Many a time, I look through the left-overs in the refrigerator and think, ‘Urggh, such boring food. I’ve had enough of that and that and that!’ These are the times when breakfast comes in handy for dinner.

When I was away at college, breakfast for dinner was a regular affair – I would take a while off doing my projects and put together a chicken salami sandwich or some crepes filled with Nutella, and I was good to go. Easy-peasy stuff, ready in minutes, and super tasty – I believe that’s impossible to resist! However, having moved back home, and with mum around, it’s tough to get away with not eating wholesome meals for dinner. So when I am home-alone, I treat myself to a delicious dinner of all things breakfasty.

Last night was no different, I was home alone stuck with a fridge full of various traditional Indian dishes that I just couldn’t be bothered to touch. I wanted to try something different. So I quickly chopped up some dates, soaked them and proceeded to make the pancake batter. Truth is, I was craving Sticky Toffee Pudding, but ill that I was, I didn’t have the strength to bake. So I decided to put my own spin on the classic, and make Date Pancakes with Sticky Toffee Sauce.

Here’s what you need for the Pancakes:

• Dates – 200 g, hulled, chopped finely and soaked in hot water
• Yogurt – 1 cup, (can be substituted with sour cream)
• All Purpose Flour – 7 tbsp
• Brown Sugar – 4 tbsp
• Baking Soda – 1 tsp
• Salt – 1/2 tsp
• Eggs – 2
• Cinnamon powder – a pinch

This is how you make these delicious fluffy pancakes:

• In a bowl mix together the flour, brown sugar, baking soda and salt. Add yogurt and mix until just incorporated.
• In a separate bowl, beat eggs.
• Add beaten eggs to the flour and yogurt mixture and mix thoroughly.
• Drain the chopped dates and add to the mixture. Add the cinnamon powder and give the batter one last mix.
• Heat a griddle or a frying pan on medium flame and grease it with butter.
• Pour about 1/3 cup of batter into the pan. Let one side of the pancake cook for about two minutes until the edges turn golden and bubbles appear on the surface. Then flip over and cook on the other side.
• Make sure that both sides of your pancake are a deep golden hue and then take off of heat.

Here’s what you’re going to need for the sauce:

• Unsalted butter – 113 g
• Dark Brown Sugar – 1 cup
• Heavy Cream – 3/4 cup
• Cinnamon Powder – a tiny pinch
• Salt – 1/2 tsp

This is how you prepare the Sticky Toffee Sauce:

• In a skillet, melt butter and brown sugar on low heat.
• Once melted, gradually add in the heavy cream while stirring continuously until the sauce becomes thick.
• Add in the cinnamon powder and salt and bring to a boil.
• Once it bubbles, take it off the heat.

Once both, the pancakes and the sauce are ready, stack the pancakes and douse them with the sticky toffee sauce. Dig in while still warm!

I must admit, I have a real problem with getting pancakes to be circular in shape, as you can see in the pictures. No matter how much I try, the pancakes I make always take on the shape of amoeba or of an odd map. But nonetheless, they taste absolutely heavenly.

Date Pancakes with Sticky Toffee Sauce are just amazing. The pancakes are fluffy and not too sweet except when you bite into a chunk of dates. The salty sticky toffee sauce poured over the pancakes creates the right balance between sweet and salt. The warmth and sweetness of the dates, the fluff of the pancakes and the buttery sticky sauce, all make for an incredibly succulent, tasteful meal.

These Date Pancakes with Sticky Toffee Sauce are a real treat. You’ll surely find yourself yearning for more!

Warning: If you’re watching your weight, breakfast for dinner is a terrible idea! But you can always cheat once in a while. 😛