Tips on how to save the cake that crumbled and rescue a salty curry

The perfect bruschetta and garlic bread

I know people who bake their own bread, and for someone who loves baking pies and cakes and whatnot, I cannot think of a bigger waste of time. Nowadays, you get the best bread in the market, so make the most of it.

If you want to wow your guests with restaurant-quality bruschetta, this is what I’d do.

Buy white sliced bread from the kirana store, take out the slices and let them air for a few hours. This makes the bread a little drier. Then, pile the slices up, cut off the crusts, and cut each slice into four equal squares. Place them in your oven and toast till crisp, and then let cool. Chop up some tomatoes, add chopped basil – easily found in most markets nowadays – crushed black pepper, salt to taste and a good dash of Balsamic Vinegar. Stir and chill in the fridge for at least an hour. To serve, just top each toastie with the tomato mixture, and garnish with more basil.

For some nice homemade garlic bread, what you need is to buy another slice of white bread. Do not do this with fancy bread, as it’s just a waste of money. Take 100 gms of butter, let it soften enough for you to be able to cut it with a spoon. Mince 6-7 cloves of garlic. Mix into the butter. You can be creative and add some grated cheese, chili flakes, chopped parsley – or just stick to the classic mixture of garlic and butter. Now, generously slather each slice of bread with this mixture. Sandwich the loaf together. Wrap in foil, place in a preheated oven, which is set at 180 C, and heat the bread for 20 minutes at least. You will have the perfect garlic bread, made with minimal effort.

Baby jacket potatoes made easy

The cheese should melt into the incision. Serve at room temperature. (Photo: Freepik)

There are few vegetables that are as mood-uplifting as potatoes. And jacket potatoes are, as the teenagers say, “next level.” They’re also the easiest snacks to make and you don’t even need an oven for this. Buy a bag of baby potatoes from the market. Wash them; do not peel. Pressure cook the potatoes till they are boiled. Remove from the water, dry them, and then sprinkle with salt, pepper, and chili flakes. Then take a pan, add 2 tablespoons of butter and some vegetable oil (this keeps the butter from burning), heat the oil and add the potatoes, and sauté them on high heat till the potato skins crisp up. Once that’s done, take each potato, make an incision on one side, and put a teaspoon of grated processed cheese on the incision. The cheese should melt into the incision. Serve at room temperature.

Clever saves

Have you ever baked a cake, tried to take it out of the baking tin, and ended up with a pile of broken cake and some semi-cooked batter? I have. But did not give up hope and ended up with a dessert which everyone thought was by design and not default. If the said cake is a chocolate cake, break it into pieces in a serving dish. Melt cooking chocolate or normal dark chocolate with cream, and mix till totally stirred through. Add a teaspoon of coffee dissolved in hot water and some rum if you’re inclined, mix well, and pour evenly over the cake. Place this in the fridge till the chocolate sets. Serve this with ice cream on the side. People will think you’ve made a gourmet pudding which you’ve slaved over.

Seasoning changes

Added too much salt to your gravy? We have you covered with this tried-and-tested hack. (Photo: Freepik)

Now one of the best hacks I learnt is what you need to do if something you’ve cooked, which has gravy, has too much salt. Sadly, this only works with dishes that have gravy. All you have to do is cut an uncooked potato into two halves and add it to your gravy, and bring it to a boil. Leave the potato in the gravy for at least 30 minutes and then remove. Voila! For some reason, potato sucks up all the salt.

Two other great tricks are to replace ricotta with homemade paneer and sour cream with yoghurt.

The greatest trick of them all is to never let people know about your mishaps and boo-boos in the kitchen or the various hacks you used to make your party as much a party for yourself as for your guests. Always let people think that you slaved it out and worked tirelessly to put together the wonderful perfectly salted dishes and stunning pudding in front of them.

If you have hacks of your own, do write to me on @Rajyasree on X.

Next week, since the evenings are getting cooler, I’m going to write about some of my favourite soupy meals starting with Burmese Khao Suey.