Making of Caramel Syrup

X'mas is fast approaching. I guess you would have long back started off the preparation by soaking the dry fruits for the Fruit cake and also fermenting the grapes for the awesome homemade grape wine, to pair with the cake. If you have not done it yet, then I am sorry I really can't help you make a homemade grape wine because it would need those number of days to age, to achieve a perfect grape wine. But if you have not soaked up the fruits yet, then may be I could be of some help. The Fruit cake recipe that wouldn't require your fruits to be soaked for days is here. 

Now this post is about making your caramel that goes into the fruit cake that I was talking about. You could make the caramel syrup in bulk if you make too many number of cakes at home for X'mas. So that with every batch of cake that you make, you don't have to go through the overhead of making this caramel syrup every time. If stored in a dry and air tight bottle in the refrigerator, they stay good for months. So every time you have to make a Fruit cake or Pudding, you just pull it out of the refrigerator and use it. 

Varutharacha Mutton curry / Mutton in Roasted Coconut Gravy

We don't indulge in mutton often, but when we do, there is always a push towards making this varutharacha mutton curry. It tastes yumm this way.

This curry may sound to be time consuming, but it's not that big a task and it is all worth it. Last time I made this curry to mellow down the Monday blues that usually hits us by the second half of EVERY Sunday. We paired it with some Kerala/malabar Parotta and it did the trick of bringing in life to the otherwise dull and Monday-blue-attacked-Sunday night.

Bread Gulab Jamun for a celebration !

Gulab Jamun has always been in my list of favorite sweets. But the effort involved in making it kept me procrastinating the plan of trying it. Sometime back I happened to see a post on Gulab Jamun made with bread and that too an instant one. I had to add it on to my to-make list. 

It would have remained in the to-make list like so many other dishes, if the happy news of Palaharam having featured as one among the Top 16 socially active food blogs, wouldn't have appeared in my mailbox. And there was a cute badge that I got to put up on the blog, which I placed on the right hand side among other recognitions.

Liebster Award - a Takeaway and a Giveaway !

The other day I got a message from Aara of Sweets & Spices saying that she had nominated me for Liebster award. Thank you sooo much Aara for considering my little blog to be worth it. I was so glad to have received an award in blogging :). However, I was not sure what it meant or what was the award for. So I went through her post and also googled it up to understand more about it.

My Tiramisu Charlotte Cake just turned lucky!

Yaay.... I am so excited to know that my recipe photo of Tiramisu Charlotte cake made it to the Huffington Post!!! Check it out here.

I consider it as my duty to share it with you all because I owe you. Yes, had it not been your support and encouragement, Palaharam would have been dead long back. No, I am not exaggerating, its true and straight from my heart. A BIG thanks to you all - You made Palaharam known :). Look, its on Huffington Post :).