Palate pleasure: Summer coolers

With the temperatures rapidly rising, we bring you recipes that are guaranteed to cool you down.

Eggless Strawberry Mousse

Ingredients
1 cup of whipping cream (with at least 35 per cent fat)
2 cups of fresh strawberries
4 tbsp of powdered sugar

Method
Reserve a few strawberries and puree the rest in a blender with two tbsp powdered sugar until smooth. Whip the cream till it’s airy yet smooth. Once the cream is ready, gently fold in half the strawberry puree and remaining sugar into the cream. Test to see if it’s sweet enough and add more sugar if needed. Spoon this into a serving glass. Very gently spoon the remaining puree into both glasses. Refrigerate (covered) for at least two hours or overnight until set. You can garnish with some sliced strawberries on top and more cream.

Raspberries and chia seeds smoothie

Raspberries and chia seeds smoothie

By Chef Srikanth, Westin Hyderabad Mindspace

Ingredients
120 ml almond milk
50 gm raspberries
1 tsp honey
10 gm chia seeds (soaked in water)
40 ml fresh orange juice
10 mint leaves

Method
All fruits and vegetables should be washed as per standard food preparation protocol. Blend all ingredients in a high-speed blender until smooth. Pour into glass, over ice if needed, and garnish with a couple of mint leaves.

Summer pudding with vanilla icecream

Summer pudding with vanilla icecream

By Chef Shashi, Westin Hyderabad Mindspace

Ingredients
12 white bread slices
150 gm blue berries
150 gm strawberries
150 gm raspberries
150 gm red currents
10 ml vanilla
150 ml orange juice
Vanilla ice cream
Olive oil, 100 gm sugar
A little corn flour

Method
Grease a pudding pan with olive oil and line with cling wrap.  Place all the berries in a large, heavy-based saucepan. Cook over low heat for 10 minutes until the juices come out, set aside to cool. Strain the berries and keep the juice aside. Cook the berries with sugar, orange juice and vanilla until it boils. Add a mixture of corn flour and water to thicken the mixture.

Cut the sides of the bread to line the sides of the bowl. To assemble the pudding, dip the slices of bread into the berry juice and line the pudding pan. Start with the bottom pieces, then lay soaked rectangles of bread slice along the sides of the bowl. Pour the berry mixture into the lined pudding pan. Cover with remaining bread slices.To serve, place a serving plate over the pudding. Flip it, remove the basin and peel away the cling film. Serve with vanilla ice cream.

Vanilla panna cotta

Vanilla panna cotta

By Nagalakshmi, Food blogger, cookingwithme.com

Ingredients
1 cup of cream
1 cup of milk (full fat)
1/3 cup of sugar, heaped
1 vanilla pod (or 1 tsp extract)
1 tsp of gelatin
2 tbsp of boiling water

Method
Pour the cream and milk into a pan. Scrape the seeds out of the vanilla pod and add to the cream mixture. Bring this mixture to a boil and add the sugar. Mix well and simmer until the sugar dissolves. Remove from fire, strain, and set side. Bring two tbsp water to a boil and add the gelatin to it. Stir until combined with no traces. Add the gelatin mixture to the strained cream mixture and mix well. Pour this mixture into moulds. Lightly oil (with any neutral oil) the mould.  Let it cool completely and refrigerate for at least 8 hours or overnight. Add some blackberry coulis if needed.