Sweet Easter

It’s that time of the year when kids look forward to having some eggs — not real ones, but those made of chocolate or filled with candies. As for adults, they must be waiting to taste some non-vegetarian dishes after the 40-day Lent. But Easter dinner is about sweets, too. Though hot cross bun is the star among them, cakes and desserts are also a must on the table. Chef Siva Kumar, pastry chef at ibis and Novotel Bengaluru, Outer Ring Road, shares recipes of Easter special Simnel cake and chocolate chip cookies.

Chocolate Chip cookies:

Ingredients

• Refined flour                150g
• Baking Soda                6g
• Baking powder             6g
• Sea salt                        6g
• Coconut oil                  105g
• Sugar                           155g
• Vanilla essence            1tsp
• Egg                               2nos
• Dark chocolate chips    130g

Method

1. Mix the coconut oil and sugar in a mixing bowl.
2. Then add the eggs and mix it well into a cream.
3. Add rest of the ingredients, make them into dough and keep it in the fridge.
4. Remove the dough from the fridge sheet, cut it with an egg-shaped cutter. Place it in a baking tray lined with parchment paper.
5. Bake it at 180 degrees C for about 15 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool it.
6. Then decorate it as desired.

Easter Simnel Cake:

Ingredients

• Cherries                             100g
• Butter, softened                  225g
• Castor sugar                       225g
• Eggs                                   4 nos
• Refined flour                       225g
• Raisins                                225g
• Currants                              100g
• Chopped candied peel        50g
• Lemons, grated zest only    2nos
• Ground mixed spice            2 tsp  

For the filling and topping

• Marzipan        450g
• Apricot Jam    100g

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 150C/280F/Gas 2. Grease and line a 20cm cake tin.
2. Cut the cherries into quarters, put in a sieve and rinse under running water. Drain well, dry thoroughly on kitchen paper.
3. Place the cherries in a bowl with the butter, sugar, eggs, refined flour, raisins, currants, candied peel, lemon zest and mixed spice, and beat well until they are thoroughly mixed. Pour half the mixture into the prepared tin.
4. Take one-third of the marzipan and roll it out to a circle the size of the tin and then place on top of the cake mixture. Spoon the remaining cake mixture on top and level the surface.
5. Bake in the pre-heated oven for about 2½ hours, or until well risen, evenly brown and firm to the touch. Cover with aluminium foil after one hour if the top is browning too quickly. Leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes. Then turn out, peel off the parchment and finish cooling on a wire rack.
6. When the cake has cooled down, brush the top with a little warmed apricot jam and roll out half the remaining marzipan to fit the top. Press firmly on the top and crimp the edges to decorate. Mark a crisscross pattern on the marzipan with a sharp knife. Form the remaining marzipan into 11 balls.
7. Brush the marzipan with beaten egg and arrange the marzipan balls around the edge of the cake. Brush the tops of the balls with beaten egg and then carefully place the cake under a hot grill until the top is lightly toasted.