Love you Dr Abdul Kalam Chacha! You will live in our hearts forever!

Simplicity, humility, intelligence, integrity, wisdom, charm, vision you embodied all these and more! I loved the way you spoke with passion and love, I loved your ideas and the ideals you lived by! It was one of my dreams come true to have seen and heard you in person. Your connect with children and youngsters was amazing and visionary! You truly lived the life of a warrior with a mission and laid down your life in your battlefield inspiring students! You were and will always continue to be an inspiration to me, to India and to the world! Cheers to Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam​!

FRENCH TOAST WITH STEWED APPLES…

As often, the inspiration was a food show on Travel and Living. But well I don’t really follow measurements and love adding a desi tadka to food I make! :)

So here’s how you can make it…

Ingredients:

8 slices of bread

2 apples

Butter

Sugar (between 10 to 18 teaspoons depending on your taste)

Cumin power

Chaat Masala

A glass of milk

3 Eggs

First get the batter ready for French toast. For 8 slices of bread, I would take 3 eggs (2 egg whites and one whole egg…  Due to their high cholesterol content I avoid using too much of egg yoke; though you could add more) and beat them well. Then add milk and 4 teaspoons of sugar to it. Stir the mixture well till all the ingredients blend. I like the French toast a little less sweet as the apple stew is going to be very sweet.

Now chop two apples in any shape you like… you can either slice them thinly or chop them into medium sized pieces. Just don’t chop them finely. You should be able to bite into each piece after it’s cooked. I wouldn’t peel the apples as that would maintain the shape of each piece and also the difference in texture would add to the taste.

Heat some butter in a saucepan. Once the butter melts, add sugar to it (anything between 6 to 12 teaspoons depending on how sweet and caramalised you’d want your stew to be). Once the sugar melts and mixes well with the butter add some jeera (cumin) powder and chaat masala. (maybe ½ teaspoon of each; I use my intuition while adding spices)

Once the masala mixes well, reduce the flame and very slowly add a glass of water with one hand, while the other hand continues to gently stir the mixture… stir well for around 2 minutes and add the chopped apples. You can increase the flame to medium heat. Now keep stirring the mixture till the apples are cooked. You can add more water if you want more syrup.

Now on the other side, heat a little butter in a flat pan. Take a slice of bread, dip it well in the batter and fry till both sides are golden brown. Repeat for all slices of bread.

Now how long should you cook the apples? Well here again I’d say depending on how you’d like it. If you like your apples a little crunchy and the sauce watery and not too sweet, then don’t heat them a lot. If you’d like your apples cooked well with all the sugar syrup absorbed well by the apples and with caramalised toffee like sauce, heat it for longer. Be careful though, as if you heat it too much the apple’s skin might get burnt and the sauce might caramalise so much that it doesn’t remain sauce anymore and you'd get toffeed apples instead of stewed apples :P !

 

The best thing to do is to keep tasting as you cook!

Now to serve this, place two or three slices of French toast, slightly over each other, on a plate and pour the apple stew right over the slices! Serve hot!

It's yummy! :)

Canterbury, UK

I want to belong and be rooted to the green grass I grew from and enjoy the river that flows by, but I also want to branch out into the skies, to seek the world beyond my roots, to feel and sway with the winds that bring with them news from far away lands, want to feel fluffy clouds to pass through me and to hear the songs of birds...
Picture taken at Canterbury, UK

Pink Frost

Picture taken at Canterbury, UK

Flying high up in the skies through clouds

I love taking pictures of birds in motion with the sky or the sea as a background.