Рецепт Baking | Two Healthy Fresh Fruit Squares with Finger Millet and Oats – Time for Spring Cleaning
‘Our house is clean enough to be healthy, and dirty enough to be happy’. Yes, we decided to repaint the house after putting the long due project to back burner for years. The house is in total mess, but this exercise is a good lesson not to collect things which we may never use in life. There are sackful of such useless articles peeping errr..sleeping in the cupboards and overhead lofts, and I am on a disposing spree…finally.
House is in total mess, everything is buried under a thick layer of dust. The good part is that children are waking up on their own, eat whatever I cook, take shower without me shouting thrice…yes, they are trying their best to make their grumpy mom cheerful again.
Keeping in mind the harmful effects of dust and paint scrapping to the food I cook in my kitchen, lunch and dinner menu is kept very simple for weekdays. And whenever I get time I sneak in a tray of brownie, cake slices or quick breads in my oven which is kept in the foyer. I remember reading these lines somewhere that ‘If you feel really rubbish and you have a nice bit of food it makes you feel good’.
I baked these fresh fruit cake slices with Oats and finger millet or Ragi which are easy to bake, moist, chewy and healthy. Spring cleaning could be very taxing, interrupted net connection to top it all, but who cares when there is good food to accompany!
My house at present…
1. Finger Millet or Ragi Mango Squares
Ragi cake slices
Ingredients;
- 3/4 cup Finger Millet or Ragi flour
- 1/4 cup all purpose flour
- 1 cup mango pulp
- 1/4 cup oil
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 tbsp. yogurt or curd
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. cardamom powder
- Salt a pinch
Method; Grease a rectangular baking tray with oil and pre heat the oven at 190 for 10 minutes.
Use a good quality mango which has less fiber and more pulp. I used 2 medium Alphonso mangoes to get a cup of pulp.
Take a large bowl and add Ragi flour, all purpose flour (maida), baking powder, salt and cardamom powder in it. Mix well with a fork.
Peel and take out the mango pulp. Blend it for a few seconds to get a fine pulp. I did not blend mine and just mashed it with hands.
Add oil, yogurt and sugar in the mango pulp and beat it with a fork for a few minutes to let the sugar dissolve.
Add the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and fold it lightly to mix it well.
Pour the batter in the greased baking tray and bake it for 25-30 minutes till done. Check the cake by inserting a dry knife, the cake is baked if it comes out clean. Serve these Finger Millet or Ragi Mango Squares with a drizzle of honey.
2. Apple Banana Oatmeal Squares
Ingredients;
1/2 cup quick cooking oats
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1 cup apple and banana puree
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup yogurt
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 tsp. vanilla essence
1/2 tsp. baking powder
Handful of chocolate chips
Salt a pinch
Method; Grease a rectangular baking tray with oil and pre heat the oven at 190 for 10 minutes.
Grate one apple and mash a large banana to get a cup of fresh fruit puree.
Add oats, all purpose flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt in a bowl and mix well with a fork. Crush the quick cooking oats with hands before adding to the bowl to avoid bits of oats peeping through the cake slices.
Blend fresh fruit puree, yogurt, powdered sugar to make a thick batter. Take it in a large bowl and add oil in it and mix well.
Add dry ingredients and chocolate chips into wet ingredients and whisk lightly with a fork to combine all the ingredients together.
Pour the batter in the greased baking tray and bake for 25-30 minutes.
These cake squares are moist and have dense texture unlike the normal cakes due to extra moisture from the fresh fruit puree in the recipe.
Notes;
The finger millet cake squares are dense, try it if you are used to the taste of finger millet which nutty but is slightly grassy and flat.
The apple-banana squares are also chewy in texture and are not fluffy like a sponge cake due to addition of extra fresh fruit puree in the recipe.
The consistency of batter and texture of the slices may vary in both the recipes because of the variety and moisture in the fruits you use.
These cake slices are a perfect after school snack for children. Top the slices with honey or any other fruit sauce of your choice.