A Cookbook For Special Days, Special People

By Shivesh Bhatia and Maitreyee Namjoshi

A COOKBOOK FOR SPECIAL DAYS, SPECIAL PEOPLE

Say it with flowers, say it with gifts, say it with words or say it with 42 special dishes on 21 special days!

Join the creator of masterful desserts and dishes, Shivesh Bhatia, to celebrate all the wonderful

relationships in your life and all the special days!

Whether it is a Cinnamon Roll in a Mug to make your mother feel special on Mother's Day or a Date Pudding to make your Dad feel good on Father's Day - there's so much here to celebrate! And there's more for the special days too ... Mango Biscuit Pudding to celebrate Mango Day, Cherry Mint Sorbet for Vegan Day, Snowman Vanilla Milkshake for Christmas and much else!

Lots to bake, cook, eat, drink and enjoy.

So every time you want to tell the special people how special they are, or celebrate a special day

in a special way, reach out for this delicious book of recipes and cook or bake something and make

sure to stir in some love too!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Harper Children's
• Release date: Sep 26, 2022
• ISBN: 9789356293243

Shivesh Bhatia

Shivesh Bhatia has a following of over 1.5 million on Instagram (@shivesh17) and YouTube (Bake With Shivesh) and has been sharing recipes on his blog, Bake With Shivesh for over eight years now. In 2022, Shivesh was awarded Food Influencer of the Year by Cosmopolitan India and Food Blogger of the Year by Travel + Leisure magazine. He is the author of Bake with Shivesh and Shivesh Bhatia's Desserts for Every Mood: 100 Feel-Good Recipes.

Book preview

Helpful Kitchen Guide

We are starting with a baking guide of sorts that children can go through before they dive into the recipes. This will really help with the process of each recipe and lead to a smooth and successful dessert making session!

How to cook desserts in a microwave

In the book you will see recipes that require you to cook your desserts for 5-10 minutes. Microwaves are great appliances that let you cook desserts super quickly and safely. Everytime you cook a dessert, all you need to do is:

a) Make sure you are using microwave-safe bowls/plates. This will cook your desserts properly and keep your microwave safe.

Microwave-safe symbols are used on the containers.

b) Place your microwave-safe baking dish into the microwave. Select the duration as per the recipe and press the ‘start’ button.

c) Once the duration is over, press the ‘stop’ button and carefully take out the dessert from the microwave.

d) The plates/bowl you have used will be hot so make sure to wear oven mitts before taking the dish out from the microwave.

This colour coding indicates the use of the freezer.

This colour coding has been used in the book to indicate the use of the microwave.

How to melt chocolate

Chocolate is an essential part of making desserts. A lot of recipes in the book call for melted chocolate. It is important to know how to melt your chocolate correctly. This makes sure your dessert batters are smooth and the final dessert has the ideal texture. To melt your chocolate perfectly:

a) Chop your chocolate into small chunks. The smaller the chunks, the faster the chocolate will melt.

b) Add the chunks into a microwave-safe bowl and heat the chocolate in the microwave at 30-second intervals.

c) This means that the first time you put the chocolate chunks in the microwave, you should set the heating duration at 30 seconds. Once 30 seconds are up, carefully take out the hot bowl, and use a spoon to gently mix the chocolate chunks.

d) Put it in the microwave again for 30 seconds and mix the chunks if you see any small bits of unmelted chocolate.

e) Ideally doing this in two rounds works best and your chocolate will melt evenly. However, if you still have some lumps, you can repeat the process and melt these at 30-second intervals till all the chocolate is melted.

f) Be super careful not to overheat the chocolate because if you do, the chocolate will seize which means it will become really hard and you won’t be able to melt it again.

How to whip cream

Whipping cream is actually super easy to do but you need to take care of a few things. First things first, to whip cream, you need an electric whisk. The electric whisk has the power to run at a really high speed which is what’s needed to whip cream perfectly.

While whipping cream, you need to know that the cream will reach different stages. This includes: liquid, soft peaks, and stiff peaks.

a) Liquid is when you pour the whipping cream into your bowl.

b) Once you start whipping the cream at high speed, 3-4 minutes later you will see certain lines forming in the bowl. This means the whipping cream is thickening. When you pause the whipping for a second and lift your electric whisk up, you will see the cream slightly drooping from the electric whisk. This is called soft peaks.

c) Continue whipping at high speed and after 10-12 minutes you will see the lines become more and more prominent and now when you pause and pick up the electric whisk, you will see stable peaks also called stiff peaks and the cream will hold its shape.

d) Stiff peaks play an important role when you want to layer your desserts with whipped cream or when the whipped cream needs to get folded into other mixtures while making a dessert.

⬇ What does it mean to ‘fold in’ whipped cream and how is it done

Folding in whipped cream is a delicate but easy process. When a recipe mentions ‘folding in whipped cream’ it just means carefully adding a light and airy mixture