Braving the wintry chill with a blazer & shawl, I stand in my balcony and find our condo twinkling with fairy lights for the festive season. The shrub trees are lit around the pool, there are buntings with the colors of the season red, green and a big santa sock hanging over the gazebo where a huge christmas tree is decked up.
Now that the festival of Christmas has taken secular overtones,I find even the festive hollies adorn the doors of most homes along with illuminated stars and embellished christmas trees in patios . The festive look & the glow of lights around gives a warm feeling overriding the cool wintry atmosphere.
Now that the festival of Christmas has taken secular overtones,I find even the festive hollies adorn the doors of most homes along with illuminated stars and embellished christmas trees in patios . The festive look & the glow of lights around gives a warm feeling overriding the cool wintry atmosphere.
Nostalgia crept in and I was thrownback to those cold December Bangalore nights of my childhood when everything was right with this world.
“Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.” ― Laura Ingalls Wilder
“Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.” ― Laura Ingalls Wilder
Christmas to me in my childhood meant so many things, some of which I have already blogged about like the Christmas vacation, the stroll on the Brigade road in Bangalore Which wears the twinkling fairy lights and had Santa’s walking on the road with their goody bags and the plum cakes.
And the plum cake aroma is another memory that is deeply nestled in my heart and cloaks me in warmth. This aroma would arise from the kitchen of my aunt’s place at FRL in Malleswaram Bangalore. Dec 28th was my cousin’s birthday and my aunt would bake this lovely plum cake( without any icing), all of us playing out in the lawns of the huge campus would be drawn towards the aroma of the warm spices wafting from home. That was one of the earliest memory of home baking for me.
Later, during my growing years, my mom and her friends had joined the canning center and would can jams, juices and sauces. They also learnt baking with a cooker. My mom would add sand to the the pressure cooker pan and make a lovely tea cake. We later bought a gas top aluminium oven which produced many tea cakes.
Then It was the turn of honey cakes, creamy layered cakes and sponge cakes that we would get from the nearby Iyengar’s bakery. The aroma of the baked goodies and bread would reach our house, the 10th house on that lane at 3.pm when the fresh batch of breads and cakes were baked.
But of all the cakes, it is the Christmas plum cake that really stole/steals my heart. I love the spicy bitter-sweet- fruity- nutty- zingy taste of the cake. In my childhood winters, I would look forward to the plum cakes of Nilgiri’s, Brigade road( they are the pioneers of diary products & first supermarket in India) which my dad would get or the ones which my Grandpa would get from Universal Baker’s Mylapore.They all left an unique taste which lingered for long. No other plum cake that I have eaten later has matched the taste of Nilgiris, Universal’s or my aunts.
Infact, the celebrated Parsi bakery cakes in Hyderabad, that i have tasted later left a bitter and a greasy feel for long on my tongue due to the hydrogenated oil or whatever fat was used.
Infact, the celebrated Parsi bakery cakes in Hyderabad, that i have tasted later left a bitter and a greasy feel for long on my tongue due to the hydrogenated oil or whatever fat was used.
This time, I wanted to bake the plum cake in traditional style by making the treacle, soaking the fruits(not in alcohol but juice) and it was labour intensive, trying to source the ingredients, planning and executing it.
But, I thoroughly enjoyed making and baking my dream cake at home. When The aroma of the spices that wafted from the oven filled the whole home with warmth , it teleported me to the Wintry wonderland of my childhood times. And the taste was truly magical! This "first plum cake baking" is another winter memory in the making i suppose:). I
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The fruits & peels soaked overnight plumped up the next morning
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That's the rustic home baked cake whose aroma often evokes winter memories.
The fruits & peels soaked overnight plumped up the next morning
That's the rustic home baked cake whose aroma often evokes winter memories.
The recipe is here in my food blog Recipes and stories from my kitchen.