Baking: Chai Cake with Cinnamon Frosting

Baked goods in Delhi have been, well, abysmal, for lack of a better term. Every time I go to a new restaurant, I try dessert, and every time, I am severely disappointed. I keep wondering why -- do they not like western sweets here? Are the necessary ingredients not available?

I decided to try my own hand at baking a cake and see how it went. However, instead of just taking a usual recipe, I took a classic plain cake and fused it with a masala chai recipe. I then added a cinnamon icing. The result -- quite tasty! The one issue was that it didn't rise as much as a normal cake. . .I guess it's something to work on next time!

Chai Cake Recipe:

3 C. Water
2-3 cinnamon sticks
15 cardamom pods
15 cloves
6 tsps loose tea
3.25 C Flour
1 TBSP Baking Powder
1 tsp Baking Soda
3/4 tsp Salt
1 C. Butter (at room temp)
1.75 C. Sugar
2 TBSP Vanilla
1 Egg
3 Egg Whites
1/4 tsp Cream of Tartar

1. Place water, cinnamon, cardamom and cloves into a saucepan and bring to a boil. Allow to simmer for 20 minutes. Add tea and steep for 3 minutes. Strain out 1.5 cups of water and chill.

2. Combine Flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt and set aside.

3. Mix butter until light and fluffy. Mix in sugar, then vanilla, and then the egg, waiting until each is fully mixed.

4. Alternate adding dry ingredients and Chai Water (step 1) into butter mixture, mixing completely after each addition.

5. In a separate bowl, beat egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks form. Fold into batter.

6. Bake for 40 minutes at 160 celsius (325 F), or until a knife comes out clean.

Baking: The Elusive Bagel

As one might expect from a city in which ovens are a rarity, bagels (well, good ones) have been very hard to find. The bagels I've seen have been basically like a roll or bun, but with a hole in the middle.

Because of this gap, I decided to try my hand at making bagels, and it actually turned out quite well. I found this recipe, which was fairly easy to follow and bake. The two (minor) issues I had:

1. No mixer meant that it took a while to knead the dough, and it was somewhat of a workout! The upside is I didn't feel guilty about eating a bagel at the end of it all.

2. My convection oven was pretty small, so I had difficulty fitting them all in at once -- a half recipe may be in order.

Cream Cheese can be found at any of the euro grocery stores (Le Marche, Steakhouse, etc), but it's pricey (380 rps)!