Being an Introvert
I have been an introvert throughout my life. As a result of this personality trait I have had very few but truly long term friendships. It was difficult for me to be friends with anybody because I remember from a very early age I did not like to talk with people. But the friends that I did make became my friends for life. This eggless semolina cupcake recipe for instance was based on an idea given by my first friend from kindergarten who suggested that I can try to substitute flour with semolina in my cake recipes.
Books make an entry into my life with a Bang!
So being the reticent child that I was, I had a lovely time in my own little world. I was 8 or 9 when I discovered the fantasy world of books. This was largely due to the presence of a large number of books at our house which were read by my elder sister. Before I discovered the joy of reading, I used to yearn to read and understand the books my sister used to read. This is because while engrossed in a book, it took her a minimum of five minutes to answer any question of mine. So feeling royally ignored, I really wanted to know what exactly it is that is keeping my sister from paying me any attention. And that magical moment came. I don’t remember how exactly, but I started to read. Oh! What a whirlwind roller coaster ride it was.
Being a Bibliophile
The definition of a perfect holiday for me at that time , was being left alone all day with only books for company. I gulped down the words and the stories. My story books teleported me to a fantasy world of discovery and learning. Reading the dictionary to learn new words became a hobby for me. Then there was no stopping me. At the age of 11, I was lucky enough to be enrolled as a member in a lending library called Eloor. This was suggested to me by a neighbourhood friend with whom I shared my love for reading.
Then began the fortnightly excited scrambling for favourite books in the shelves of our beloved library and the race to finish the books. Oh those were the days. So a major chunk of my childhood was spent as an introvert and a bibliophile. During this time I was perfectly happy and content in my world of books and very few like-minded friends. (Read as people with whom I liked to talk!)
The Rude Shock
Then suddenly I left my comfortable cocoon of home and school and entered college. The shy, introverted girl in me was in for a rude shock. It took me a while to realise that me being an introvert was often mistake for aloofness and arrogance. I had a pretty rough time but my friends for life, my books helped me through this journey again. I still knew that if I had one favourite book with me, nothing could bring me down. So I continued to read my story books as well as study very hard for my degree. God was on my side and I came out with flying colours. I got a job and life had bigger plans for me.
Being an Ambivert
When I started my job, I promised myself I would not let my nature as an introvert get in the way of making new acquaintances in my workplace. So gradually and purposefully I started making small changes and my personality changed to that of an ambivert. Now I believe I have a balance of introvert and extrovert characters in my personality and that makes leading this fast-paced and highly judged earthly life easier to live.
Sometimes though the inner core introvert does make an appearance from time to time. For example, that day I was going out for an errand. Hubby was waiting for me in the car. I locked my doors and just as I was approaching the elevator I saw one of our same floor neighbour get into it. My reaction was to make an about-turn and go back inside my house just because I was not feeling like making small talk! I miss that part of me a lot sometimes.
Anyway, back to the eggless semolina cupcake recipe, as I mentioned before this recipe was built on an idea suggested by my friend Shalini. It is an eggless as well as butter less recipe so I guess I can categorize it as a healthy recipe if I replace the sugar with jaggery.
Ingredients for eggless semolina cupcake recipe :
2 cups Organic semolina/sooji
4 tbsp Oats flour
2 tbsp Chickpea flour
1 ½ cup Yoghurt/Curd
75 ml Olive oil
¾ cup organic raw sugar/jaggery
½ tsp pink salt
¾ cup Dark chocolate buttons
1 ½ tsp Baking powder
Vanilla Essence
Milk if required
1cup = 100gms
Directions for eggless semolina cupcake recipe
- Mix the semolina, oats flour and chickpea flour.
Beat together the sugar/jaggery with the curd/yoghurt. Add in a bit of water to make the mixture a bit fluid. - Next, mix the beaten curd/ yoghurt with the flour mixture, bit by bit till you get a smooth mixture.
Cover this semolina curd mixture and keep for a minimum of 30 minutes. You will see that the semolina will absorb all the fluid. It will become swollen and soft at the end of 30 minutes. - In the meanwhile, take the dark chocolate buttons and microwave them for 1 minute or until melted and keep ready.
- Next, to the semolina batter, add in the olive oil, milk(if required) salt, baking powder and vanilla essence. The next steps have to be done very quickly as the baking powder has been added to the batter and the cupcakes have to go into the oven as soon as possible.
- Separate the batter into two parts and to one part mix in the melted chocolate. Reserve a part of the chocolate for icing the cupcakes later.
- Pre-heat the oven to 180oC. Spoon in the vanilla and chocolate cupcake batters alternately in pre-greased and paper lined muffin moulds. I used silicon moulds.
- Then bake in the pre heated oven for 25 to 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and check to see if the cupcake is done by inserting a toothpick at the centre of one. If it comes out clean then your cupcake is ready.
- Taste one of the cupcakes when it’s still warm because a cake hot from the oven is out of this world delicious. Cool the remaining cupcakes on a wire rack. With the help of a piping bag (I used a small spoon) ice the top of the cupcakes with the melted chocolate.
This eggless semolina cupcake recipe results in super soft and wonderfully crumby textured cupcakes. If you are one of those rare species of people who is not a big chocolate lover, you can skip the chocolate batter altogether and just make plain old boring vanilla muffins. The ratios remain same. You can also try this Blueberry White Chocolate Muffin recipe.
P.S Callebaut
I will share with you the secret behind my baking happiness. The key to perfect bakes is premium quality ingredients. So I use the finest Belgian chocolate loved by chefs and bakers around the world, and that is the Recipe N° 811 Callebaut dark chocolate. To achieve a perfectly balanced and round taste they blend cocoa beans from 3 different countries of origin viz. Ivory Coast, Ghana and Ecuador. It is a bit on the expensive side but it has the perfect flavour and texture to be incorporated into cakes and cookies. Do try it out.(This is not sponsored)
I’m taking my blog to the next level with Blogchatter’s #MyFriendAlexa and this is my 8th post for the challenge.
I am not a chocolate lover; Im gonna try the cupcakes! Liked your anecdotes and especially the perfect picture accompaniments. I understand because I am an introvert as well. That turn around and go because you don’t feel like talking (which is most of time!) is SO me. Lovely post.
Your introvertness has toned down a lot. Good thing. And, very cleverly you have fitted in a quick and yummy cupcake recipe in this post!! Nice way to acknowledge an old friend.. 🙂
Yummy chocolate cupcakes. I can have them all day. Thank you so much for sharing the recipe.