Eggless Pistachio Cake with Thandai Buttercream

I’ve been going over my food pictures over and over again for the last hour. I’ve missed writing here. A lot has been happening and I wrote about it here. Dismal little has been said here. I miss writing here, sometimes the words fail me, sometimes I’m too tired, I have about 25 draft posts and yet nothing to publish. I haven’t been cooking much, definitely nothing fancy and blog worthy. Sometimes I just want to post something, but even that I haven’t been able to…

I’ll start with this cake. I made it last Diwali. Yes that’s a long time ago, but wait, I have pictures that date back to about 5 years ago that will probably never get posted here, or anywhere else. So its ok I think to be posting stuff from not older than a year ago.

So about this cake, it started with wanting to make something with an Indian mithai flavour. One of my favourite Indian sweets is the Pista roll, very similar to kaju katli, but the flavour of pistachios and the colour just gets me as excited as a child each time. I made this cake eggless since I took some of it to share with K’s parents who don’t eat eggs. I used a little buttercream to pretty it up and cut the cake into squares. You can also bake this batter as cupcakes in a paper lined muffin tray.

Eggless Pistachio Cake

2/3 cup Milk at room temp

3 Tablespoons Yoghurt/ curd

1 teaspoon Pistachio essence

1 1/2 cups Maida

1/4 cup Ground Pistachios

3/4 cup Sugar

1/2 teaspoon Salt

1 1/2 teaspoon Baking powder

a pinch Baking soda

7 tablespoons Vegetable Oil

1/2 teaspoon green food colour (optional – I used this)

Preheat oven to 350F / 180 C. Line an 8 inch square cake pan with paper and grease.

Powder the sugar till fine. Add the maida, ground pistachios, salt, baking powder and baking soda to a mixing bowl and whisk with a fork or a spoon to mix together.

Whisk together the milk, yoghurt, pista essence, colour if using and oil. Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and with a wooden spoon or a hand held whisk, mix till well blended.

The batter should fall in thick ribbons. Pour the batter into the cake pan and tap it to remove air bubbles.

Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean. Remove from pan and cool completely on a wire cooling rack before slicing into 16 equal squares.

To make the buttercream

1/2 cup Butter at room temperature

1 1/2 cup Confectioner’s Sugar / Icing Sugar

2 tablespoons Thandai syrup (substitute with 2 tablespoons milk mixed with crushed cardamom pods, rose petals and a few drops of rose essence)

A few drops of pista essence and green food colour

With a hand beater, beat the butter until it is creamy. Add the sugar, 1/2 cup at a time and whisk till fluffy. Add the thandai syrup, essence and colour and beat. Taste and adjust for sweetness or flavour. Place a star tip nozzle in a piping bag or in a ziplock bag and add the buttercream to it. Press out swirls or rosettes onto each square piece of the cake. Serve with some tea or coffee or with a scoop of icecream as dessert.