FAQ’S

Whipped cream can be made the same way you would make normal cream. The only difference is that you would need to add icing sugar instead of granulated sugar. The icing sugar has cornstarch in it, which helps to bind the cream.

Grease the pan with any neutral oil, at the bottom, as well as the sides. Depending upon what you are baking, you can choose between cocoa powder and plain flour. For e.g., if you make a chocolate cake, dust with cocoa powder. For a vanilla cake, dust with plain flour.

Any of the following can be used:

1. Egg replacer – use according to directions on the box
2. Flax seeds – soak them overnight and grind them in the morning. For one egg use 1tbsp flaxseeds
3. Apple sauce – Steam the apples, puree them, and reduce the puree to a thick liquid on medium heat. For one egg, use 1/3 cup of apple puree.
4. Banana – Mash the banana and drizzle with 1tsp of lemon juice, so that the banana doesn’t brown. For one egg, use half a mashed banana.
5. Apple Cider Vinegar and Baking Soda – Mix them together and add to the batter in the end. Bake immediately. For one egg, use 1 tbsp of apple cider vinegar and 1tsp of baking soda.

Note: If the batter has fruits, you need to reduce the mixture according to the recipe.

A simple ratio for any cake is, for 1 cup of flour, the fat content should be ½ cup, sugar should be ¾ cup, and the liquid should be ½ cup.

Yes. But if the whole cake is made with wheat flour, the cake will be very dense, fudgy, and chewy. To improve the texture, you can add xanthum gum or any stabilizers which are sold in specialty baking stores.

You can use a tea strainer or a muslin cloth. But this will take a lot of time. Alternatively, you can air the dry ingredients with a fork.

Put the pastry into a tall glass on a flat surface, and tuck the ends over the rim of the glass. Open the mouth of the piping bag with your fingers, and pour the batter into a piping bag.

In a cup, add ¼ cup milk with 1 tbsp of white sugar and stir till the sugar dissolves completely. Brush lightly on top of the pastry. Try avoiding brown sugar, since the sugar will caramelize and give the crust a darker shade.

Ideally yes. The idea of sifting the flour is to get air or volume into the flour so that your end product is lighter and rises well. If you do not have a sifter, fork up your flour to introduce air, or use your fingertips to get out any lumps. While trying to break the lumps, massage the flour gently and drop it from a height, which will also help to introduce the air in the mixture.

Note: To make a lighter cake batter, for 1 cup of flour, remove 1tbsp of plain flour and replace it with 1tbsp cornflour.

Before you remove the cake, ensure it is at room temperature. If the cake still sticks to the pan, use a flat knife to go around the edges of the pan, which will help loosen it up. Then turn the pan upside down on a flat surface, and tap gently from the top.

Take the cake pan, with the cake, and keep it on a burner for 10-20 seconds, switch off the burner and invert it on a flat plate.

Yes. For every cup of plain flour, add 2 ½tsp of baking powder.

In a thick bottomed pan, take 1litre of milk and heat it on a slow/medium flame for about 45 minutes. When it has reduced by ¼ of its original volume, add 250gms of white sugar and keep stirring it till you achieve the desired consistency. This will take another 30-45 minutes.

When you make ice cream and store it in the freezer, make sure you use an air-tight container. Once the ice cream solidifies (which should take about 4 hours), take it out of the container, whip it again, put it back in the container, and cover the top with the Clingfilm so that it touches the top of the ice cream completely. Cover it with the lid, and store it back inside the freezer.

Yes. You can use a brown paper bag, grease it with butter, and bake. Alternatively, grease your pan very well with any neutral oil and plain flour/cocoa powder.

Whenever the cream is whipped, it almost doubles in volume. So 1 cup of cream will give you 1 ½ – 2 cups of whipped cream.

Indirect heat will help bring the butter to room temperature quickly. You can do this in 2 ways.

Take your butter and put it on a plate. In a glass, add water and heat it in the microwave for about a minute. Remove the water and invert the glass on top of the butter. Leave it on for a couple of minutes. The hot steam will help the butter come down to room temperature.

Take a pan of water and bring it to a boil. Place the butter in another pan and place the pan on the boiling water for about 2 minutes. This method is called a double boiler.

Yes, you can use honey, maple syrup, or agave as a replacement for sugar. The quantity you need to use will depend upon their thickness. The thicker the syrup, the lesser the amount used. For 1tbsp sugar, use 1tbsp honey, agave, or maple syrup for a rough estimation.

Note: Make sure that the syrups are pure and there should be no other additives in them.

An oven has normally 5 settings.

Fan setting – for the temperature that has been set, the heat is being circulated in the entire oven.

Upper and Lower heating – a single horizontal line at the bottom means that the heat will come from the bottom of the oven. This setting is mostly used for making pizzas or slow-cooking a casserole. A single horizontal line at the top means that the heat will come from the top of the oven. This setting is mostly used for making bread or cooking minced meat. The moisture is retained, along with crisping the meat. Two horizontal lines at the top and bottom mean that the heat will come from the top as well as the bottom. This setting is mostly used for baking.

This differs for different dishes. But normally, the middle of the oven is the safest place to keep the dish, if it requires cooking with moderate heat or requires browning on the top.

The dishes that have a quick cooking time are placed high up on the oven rack, which prevents the complete loss of moisture from them, yet gives them a nice browning effect.

The standard temperature and setting that can be used for all oven recipes is 170 – 180 degrees Celsius, with top and bottom heat.

A Dutch oven is a covered earthenware or cast-iron container mostly used for cooking casseroles. They are usually made of cast iron, but they can also be made of cast aluminum or ceramic.

Dutch ovens are most popularly used to make biscuits, cakes, bread, pizzas, and pies.

Julienne is a culinary knife cut, wherein fruits and vegetables are cut into long thin stripes. They are almost as thin as matchsticks.

A few examples of food that are cut julienne are carrots, cucumber, pepper, celery, onions etc.

Poach is to cook an egg over boiling water, without its skin. Poach is derived from the old French word Pochier, which means to enclose in a bag.

The most common food to be poached is eggs. But you can also poach any poultry, fish or fruit.

Hence, poaching means submerging any of the above foods in a liquid to cook at a low temperature.

You can poach food in water, milk, stock or wine.