I was a little hesitant to try the chicken tikka masala recipe. At first glance, it looked quite involved - putting spices on the chicken, creating a sauce, creating a yogurt sauce and using a broiler. In addition, this was my first real experience using a broiler and broiler pan to cook anything. Surprisingly, the recipe was not that difficult - slightly time intensive, but not overly complex. The yogurt sauce keeps the chicken moist while broiling. Although the recipe states that you can broil the whole chicken breast and then cut it into chunks, I cut the chicken breast first and then broiled the individual pieces. The resulting meal (served on rice) turned out quite tasty.
Quick note: Unfortunately, I chopped the serrano chile without latex gloves - bad idea. If you do this, you can rub nail polish removal on your fingers and then wash your hands with soap - the acetone in the nail polish removal helps to remove the oils from the chile.
Let's talk dessert. I am a huge fan of miniature desserts - the perfect amount of sweetness without the guilt afterward. Not to mention how incredibly cute the little desserts look! Upon starting this recipe, I realized that I didn't have any regular all-purpose flour - only whole wheat flour and bread flour. So, I made the chocolate velvet cakes with whole wheat flour and the frosting with the bread flour. After allowing the mini cakes to cool, I attempted to use the frosting - which failed slightly due to the soft consistency of the frosting. I ended up refrigerating the cakes to allow the frosting to set. In hindsight, it would probably have been best to let the frosting chill for 5-10 minutes after adding the flour mixture to it. Despite the slight frosting setback and the flour mix-up, the mini-cakes turned out to be big treats.
