I first baked this cake for my friend’s birthday earlier this year in April and since then I have baked it thrice. The last one was just this week.

If you must know one thing about me I’d say that I am very passionate about birthdays. I love birthdays so much that I just want to throw confetti at you, get you a piñata, feed you some cake and shower you with some loving. I feel like my friends birthdays are a gift to myself; planning it, getting the deco ready, food & drinks and of course making the cake’s the best part!  I have zero chill when it comes to birthdays! I think about becoming an event planner at times.

Moving on, I wanted to do something special for my friend T since it was her birthday. It was my first 24hr in house call since last year and first on my surgery rotation. I had come across an earl grey tea cake on Instagram a few days earlier to this so I, along with my designer eye bags from the night before marched down to the nearest grocery store and bought some earl grey tea and whipped out my whisk and got down to business with some music.

We went out for a nice dinner and then headed to our favourite spot in the city; the board room game cafe. Earlier we had spoken to the staff at the cafe and arranged a surprise for her with the cake. Needless to say she was genuinely surprised and everyone raved about the cake.

I have a cousin who is studying in UK and we would exchange recipes as we try them. I got her hooked on this cake. I have asked her multiple times to try my tres leches cake she has yet to try it. Yes, I’m talking about you, young lady and the rest of you who haven’t tried it.

Ingredients:
For earl grey tea milk:
– 1 1/2 cup milk
– 4 earl grey tea bags or 2 tbsp of loose earl grey tea leaves

For the cake:
– 2 1/4 cup of flour
– 2 earl grey tea bags (opened) or 1 tbsp of loose finely ground earl grey tea leaves
–  2 tsp baking powder
– 3/4 tsp salt
– 1 1/2 cup granulated sugar
– 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
– 3 eggs
– 1 cup of earl grey tea milk

Earl grey buttercream glaze:
– 2 egg whites
– 1 tsp vanilla extract
– 1 1/2 cup room temperature unsalted butter
– 1 cup granulated sugar
– 1 tbsp of loose finely ground earl grey tea leaves or 2 earl grey tea bags (opened)
Directions:
– To make the earl grey tea milk bring the milk to a boil in a pot and add the tea leaves/bags. Let the tea steep for 10-15 mins after you turn the stove off. Strain and keep aside to cool.

– In a medium bowl combine your dry ingredients; flour, baking powder, salt and loose earl grey tea. The secret to a perfect cake is separating your dry and wet ingredients and folding/mixing them carefully.
– In a different bowl cream butter and sugar together until fluffy. Add vanilla and one egg at a time and combine them well.
– Now, alternate adding earl grey milk and flour to your well creamed ingredients and fully incorporate them together. This is the softest, lightest and the best smelling batter I’ve ever made. It smells exactly like earl grey tea. Heavenly!!
– Bake for 30 mins or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean.

-To prepare the glaze mix the egg whites and butter together in a bowl
– Then place bowl over a double boiler on the stove and whisk together until the mixture becomes smooth and the sugar is no longer grainy to touch.
– Next, give it a good whisk and when the bowl is no longer hot to touch add the butter and mix until smooth. Incorporate the tea leaves last.

– Pour the glaze over your cake when it’s warm and refrigerate to chill. Best served when chilled & shared with friends.

 

I have always been rather skeptical of this summertime hit. The idea of combining watermelon, cheese, red onions and balsamic vinegar did not sit well with me.

Until now.

I decided to tread lightly on my first attempt, and worked with basil, mint and feta cheese on a hot summer day. It was absolutely freaking delicious. The fresh ingredients complimented each other so well that I just started eating right in the kitchen, with my friends waiting at the dining table. (Pardon my manners)

Now that I’m more open to the idea of a watermelon ‘salad’ I’ll be experimenting with red onion and balsamic vinegar soon.
This salad does not refrigerate well and it’s best prepared just before serving.

Ingredients:
Disclaimer: My ration for this salad is going to be very mum-like.
– 1/2 chilled small seedless watermelon, cut into small chunks
– Handful of chopped basil leaves
– Handful of chopped mint leaves
– Feta cheese as much as you desire
– 1/2 tbsp of lime
– 1 tsp of olive oil
Directions:
Gently toss everything together and feast your eyes as well as your heart.  Enjoy!

I am having a very jazz-ey night, currently playing the way you look tonight by Sinatra. I have yet to meal prep for the week tonight so I will be dancing away to jazz on my kitchen tiles.

The best kind of meal really is when you get to share it with friends and family. Here’s are some pictures from my first official after hours kitchen party.

Pictured below are tres leches cake, potato & turkey sausage frittata, watermelon salad with mint, basil and feta and some good old iced lemon mint tea. Also some after photos of how we absolutely destroyed the dining table and my friend’s and my food photography collab.

Tres leches cake recipe is already up. The rest to follow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope you had a wonderful weekend. As for me, I am having a long weekend as tomorrow is a civic holiday here in Canada and on Tuesday I start my paediatrics rotation.
See you next time. Have a good one!

Tres leches is a Mexican dessert, tres is 3 and leches is milk(s). It is a sponge cake soaked in 3 kinds of milk; evaporated milk, condensed milk and heavy cream or full cream milk. I use skimmed milk in my tres leches cake because that’s the kind my fridge always carries. Before you say that this cake is hard to make or that you don’t have enough time let me tell you this, it’s not. It is super easy to make and doesn’t take that long. Like Julia says this is for the ‘servantless American’ and non-American. Okay, lesson’s over.

The story of how I came to make my own tres leches cake is a good one or at least I think it is. I first saw this cake trend on twittermv but it never occurred to me to try it or make it.

It wasn’t until the world cup match between Brazil and Mexico I tried this. I woke up to an invite from my Canadian-Mexican friends to watch the match at this Mexican restaurant (the best Mexican place) in Halifax; Antojos. Antojos had this  sweet ‘Mexico wins and you win your food’ deal in place during this world cup. I’m a Brazil supporter and I watched the match at the most Mexican place I’ve been to here surrounded by Mexicans (with scattered handful of Brazil supporters) and their delicious food.
I also learnt a cheer in Spanish. You basically yell ‘Órale’ to express approval or encouragement and sometimes even frustration.

So, we did not win our food but we did order every single dessert on the menu which included tres leches cake. I kid you not, it was so moist, light and you could just eat spoonful after spoonful until you’re left with an empty plate or a baking tray. Either way there’s no judgement I am all for eating cake for breakfast.

While I was making this last night it reminded me of my sister. She used to make this super moist vanilla cake and bathe it in half-whipped whipping cream. Come to think of it now what she made was a uno leches cake.

Special shout out to my photography consultant buggee who helped me with the photos and edits. I am very lucky indeed to have supportive friends.

Serves from 1 to as many people as you’d like. Prep time 1 hour but I always leave the cake to chill overnight the fridge. The longer you chill it, the better it tastes.

Ingredients:
For the cake:
– 1.5 cups of flour
– 1 teaspoon of baking powder
– 1.5 cups of unsalted butter
– 1.5 cups of sugar
– 5 eggs
– 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract

For the tres leches:
– 2 cups of milk of your preference (I used skimmed milk )
– 1 can of evaporated milk
– 1 can of condensed milk
* Even though I didn’t specify the size of the cans do ensure that its roughly proportional.

For the whipped cream
– 1.5 cups of whipping cream
– 1 tsp of vanilla extract
– 1/2 cup of white sugar
* you could also use cool whip or pre-whipped cream instead as it tastes the same.

Directions:
– Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease your baking pan. I used 9×13 inches pan.
It’s not the end of the world even if you don’t preheat your oven. I never do because I always forget and they turn out great.
– Combine flour and the baking powder together and set aside
– Cream the butter and and sugar together until they are fluffy.
– Add eggs and vanilla extract and beat well.
– Add the dry ingredients to the beaten butter mixture and fold well.
– Pour the batter into your greased pan and bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes. Adjust the timing accordingly if you have an oven that has a mind of it’s own.

– While your oven is doing it’s thang combine the 3 milks together.
– Once your cake has cooled down you can either trim the edges so everyone gets a middle piece or just go with it and let your friends fight for it.
– Fork that cake multiple times. Make sure you get the edges. The more holes you make the better it’s going to absorb tres leches.

– For the whipped cream, combine the 1.5 cups of whipping cream, 1 tsp of vanilla extract and 1/2 cup of white sugar together and whip until thick.
– Spread it evenly on the cake.
– As for the toppings, my favourites are caramel and cocoa powder. Pictured above is cocoa powder sprinkled on top, paired with strawberries and a cherry.  You can use coffee and cinnamon as well. I don’t like my tres leches cake paired with raspberry because its sour and doesn’t go well with milk. Basically, be creative and go nuts.
– Cover your cake with aluminium foil and refrigerate over night to chill for the best outcomes.  If pressed for time stick that bad boy in you freezer. Either way I can assure you that people are going to rave about this cake.

 

This is a dish that is dear to my heart. It was a staple at home and I spent most of my childhood eating it. This made my best ‘9 o’clock tea’ with roshi*, lunch, dinner and suhoor**.

Kulhimas, literally translated to is spicy fish. It is, not surprisingly, typically made with tuna in Maldives. Almost every single dish contains tuna as it is readily available to us.
I was born and bred in Maldives and I live for tuna. You would not believe when I tell you that I didn’t eat or buy fish abroad till this year because I was afraid that I wouldn’t like it.  I tried making kulhimas with cod a couple of months ago and I did not like it. Again, no surprises there. So imagine my joy when I found raw tuna at my local grocery store today. It was pricey but to hell with that. It’s not like I get raw tuna everyday anyway.

Isn’t this tuna fillet just exquisite? The concentric lines and the colour are absolutely stunning. This was my first time handling raw tuna ever (shocking) and I must say the texture felt smoother than I had imagined. The knife just slid right through the fillet and hit my yellow cutting board. I guess part of the credit goes to my sharp new knife I got from thinkkitchen on Friday.

I paired cooking with some of my favourite Maldivian songs. Ali Rameez frequently makes an appearance in my kitchen when I cook.

I paired it with roshi and a hot black tea and just like that I was back at home in the kitchen with my mum where she’d be making roshi on that overused iron tava griddle and me at the long green kitchen table eating, sharp at 9 o’clock so I can rush to the side of the TV for the 30 minute cartoon session broadcasted on national television. Instead of placing them in the round casserole food container with brown flowers on it she would place it in my plate saying, ‘eat when it’s hot, it’s better that way.’ Mum, I couldn’t agree more.

Serves 3. Prep time ~30 minutes.

Ingredients:
– 1 cup of tuna, cut into smaller pieces
– 1/2 red onion
– 2 cloves of garlic
– Scotch bonnet (as much as you can tolerate I guess)
– Curry leaves (as many as you’d like)
– 3 tablespoon of tomato paste
– Salt to taste
– 1 teaspoon of lime juice
– Olive oil

Directions:
– Cut your tuna fillet into smaller pieces and set aside. Chop onions, I prefer them to be chopped vertically for this dish and either grate/chop garlic into small pieces. Cut scotch bonnet into smaller pieces.

-Heat a generous amount of olive oil in a frying pan and sauté the onions, scotch bonnet, curry leaves and ginger until brown. Add 3 tablespoon of tomato paste and combine it with the sautéed goodie.  Add the tuna and cook until done, approximately less than 15 minutes. You don’t want to overcook the tuna. Add salt and the lime juice and you’re done.

– Pair it with some roshi or rice, which ever way you like. Enjoy.

What do you like to pair with your kulhimas? 2 of my favourites are roshi and rice mixed with banana and sugar. Hey don’t hate on the latter without trying it. Trust me, it works and it is delicious!

*roshi- Maldivian term for flatbread.
**suhoor-meal consumed early in the morning by muslims during ramadan before fasting.

Hi, thanks for joining me today.

About 6 years ago I watched Julie and Julia and got inspired to cook and write and so I did- for 2 years and it became history. Today, I watched the same movie and here I am.

As for cooking, it has been a major part of my life since I began medical school 4 years ago. At first cooking was a necessity. Mum/family wasn’t around to make my meals so I took to myself for sustenance. It became a passion a year ago when I packed my things and decided to move to Canada, continents away from home; Maldives. I took to baking for my friends to escape my hectic days in the hospital. For me the best meals are the ones I get to share with those closest to my heart therefore most of what I make has been for them. As I am miles away from people I want to dine with I figured that I should share my feats in the kitchen here so you can be a part of it, whoever you are.

So here’s to cooking; joy itself. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did making them.