Custard Cream Cookies & Custard Tea Cake

In  my early years at Durgapur, the steel city (where I spent my childhood), Durga Puja meant new clothes,   shoes and outings. A sleepy city for the larger part of the year, Durgapur brightened up during the pujas. Benachity Market was the epicentre of Durga puja fever with the entire town shopping there.

Years later, in 2001 when Mr Hubby got posted there and I got a chance to revisit the place, memories came flashing back. I wanted to traverse through the priceless moments of my childhood with my dear ones.Visiting my old bunglow at Fertiliser Township,  Bidhan nagar was the first thing on my agenda. I wanted to reach out to the happy memories of my childhood. I packed my two grown up daughters and very excitedly took them along to show them around the beautiful colony, where I grew up, played in the park, saw films on big "porda" at the club, tasted the freshly baked cakes and cookies by Mrs Tendulkar in her ladies cooking class with my mom or acted in the various children's plays put together by Mrs mukherji or Mrs Ranganathan for the "Officers club". Oh ! what wonderful days they were. All flashed before my eyes when immediately on reaching, we, packed in our friend Mr Homechaudry's borrowed little Santro went looking for the old colony.

But alas! when we finally managed to reach, the place had huge grass growing all over. It was an abandoned place and decay had set in. No one had lived there for decades now, as the factory had closed down. It was in ruins!!

My earliest food memories are that of comfort food that my mom and grandmother prepared. Its still fresh in my mind. I loved watching them cook though they never actually taught me to cook. Following family tradition, I prepare food just the same way. Today I thank them for having made me what I am.....I would say I am a reasonably good cook. I love cooking everyday and Idon't find rustling up the same dish a number of times monotonous as I make sure to integrate new things...masala's , pastes etc that I come across, into my food. I read books, blogs , journals that inspire with new ideas and end up learning something new all the time.The magic of preparing something ordinary that your family and friends find extraordinary is naturally awesome.

So go ahead and cook with confidence for your loved ones.

Custard Cream Cookies :

Butter                                                      100 grams

Sugar                                                       1 cup

Refined Flour                                            1 cup

Baking Powder                                         1/4 tsp

Custard Powder                                       1/4 tbsp

Method :

Mix butter and powdered sugar in a big mixing bowl. Add custard powder (vanilla) , refined flour, baking powder and make a mixture .It wont be a dough, just a mixture.

Make equal size balls out of the mixture with your hands.

Arrange them in a baking dish and press with a fork. Never mind if the sides crack a bit.

Bake at 180 degree celcious for 10-15 minutes in an OTG. Remove golden cookies and cool.

Custard Tea cake :

Butter                                                       125 grams

Sugar (Powdered )                                    1 cup

Egg                                                           2

Custard Powder (Vanilla)                          1/2 cup

 Flour ( Maida )                                         1 1/2 Cup

Milk                                                          1 cup

Vanilla Essence                                          1 tsp

Method :

In a bowl take butter (at room temperature ) and sugar. Beat with a beater.

Add eggs to the mixture and whip again.

Then add custard powder, refined flour and vanilla essence to the mixture while continuously beating all the time.

Batter is ready to go into the oven.

Take a greased bowl. Spread the mix with a spoon.

Pre-heat the oven.Bake for half an hour at 180 degree celcious. 

Cool and then cut into pieces.

Serve with chocolate syrup or strawberry crush.

These dishes I learnt from  television shows and shared with you. Its extremely easy  to make.