Comforting Banana Chocolate Cake for Amit Beer Ghosh

At the onset.....
Admit it....
I'm taller than you n that too by a good margin..... ;)

Now that, that's out of the way... let's get on with this post.....
Amit's been a member of the 99acres.com product team for long enough to be On-My-List and so much more. It's always a a bitter sweet moment when a colleague moves to another company. A friend is happy that a friend is moving closer to their goals.... what lingers is memories....

He's a great human being, with a great sense of humor and willing to extend support in the team and outside. Have really enjoyed working with him. His creative n writing skills are amazing amongst so many other skills :)

This is the collage we made to give him for his farewell.... It's got some very precious moments we've shared like Birthday's , Outings, Photo shooting trips, Rock Star trips, many days when tiffins n sweaters were left in office, Diwali/Independence day/ Christmas parties. He's even won a prize for my 'Aaj Mein Khush Hun' contest, was one of my first serious clients on Valentine's day. One was the memorable parties was at his place.... can't forget the hilarious fun we had playing pictionary and yummiliscious spread of bengali food laid out by aunty.

As you would have seen by now that music is an essential part of his being.... so his cake had to have some musical element to it......

and now for BADLA......... ;) How could we let him scott free..... The ceremonial decoration of the nose did happen as I could bear to see my hard work smeared on his face... ;)
When I asked Amit what flavours he wanted... pat came the reply Chocolate.... and as an after though he added 'and any other experiments you would like to do'.... lol..... It's evident that he loves Chocolate and I know that Rum is a soft spot considering Beer can't be put in a Banana Chocolate cake unless i get hold of a Guinness bottle..... So I made her a Banana Chocolate Cake which has a layering of rum soaked raisins n chocolate...

Amit Writes.....

I've known Nachi for about 3 years now (we share the same workspace in office), and for as far back as I can remember, she has always been treating us to royal desserts. Her reputation as a baker has increased manifolds in this period, to the point that new joinees get to hear of her more as the girl-who-bakes-fingerlickin-stuff than as a laptop-ing, document-writing, MIS-crunching product manager.

Her knack to theme-up her products and not-to-repeat has made her the favvvvorite of many in office. Monday mornings are not so blue-sy over at Infoedge, cause more often than not she will walk in with a scrumptious spread that she would have worked hard at over the weekend. As a result, absenteeism in our team on mondays has seen a huge decline in recent times. The office cafeteria has also seen unprecedented sales dips on those days, to the extent that it has now stopped stocking pastries, cakes, muffins etc etc - they just ain't selling no more!

I am not a connoisseur by any stretch of imagination. I am not particularly aware of the various dessert-y options out there. Heck I even find it hard to pronounce the names that I see on display at a baker's. But I do know my chocolate, and she has a particular penchant for products of that kind. So my good luck, that on that fateful day of placements at B-school, of the 3 career options I had, I chose this one. Birthdays or beer-days, office-festivities or post-office parties, no celebration is complete without Nachi surprising us to a lovely new treat. It's quite a sight actually, when she's about to unveil her latest creation - A quick look around the table would show people drooling all over, armed with their spoons and forks ready to dig in :)
For the two birthdays I have celebrated in this office - I have been treated to a Chocolate Blackout cake and a Lemon Lava cake - And boy, both of them were sinfully delicious! Birthdays at Infoedge, are usually team outings to trendy restaraunts, ending with a traditional cake cutting / smearing ceremony. I've had mine at 'It's greek to me' and 'Lotus Pond'. The Lemon lava cake, this last birthday, was a little out of the ordinary for me as I'm usually one with very strong chocolate preferences, but I enjoyed this one so much that for the next 2 days I was having the leftovers for breakfast, lunch and dinner!
Nachi, it's been great knowing you, working with you, hanging out with you .. and of course greedily devouring your cakes :D ... Keep the goodies flowing in....

All The Best... :)
Ps: Will treasure the pencil....

Amit Beer Ghosh ~ Celebrates His Birthday

Amit should re christen himself as Amit Beer Ghosh..... he loves his drink.... check out the pics and I won't need to say.... any more :-)


Music is his lifeline..... the song roo b ru [rang de basanti] made his pick up the guitar again.... he livens up all our gatherings with his music.... bhaskar and he made, mom and Nikhil's birthday such a memorable party.... We sang lots of songs in TGIF... Purani jeans[specially adapted lyrics for Nikhil], Yeh chand sa roshan chehra for mom and lots of other songs.
Mussoorie trip was livened up with Amit playing for a bunch of ladies, who freaked out dancing while he played.

After getting high in Dehradun... what do these boys go n do.... hijack a street performance and become total rock stars.....


We went on a memorable trip to Mussoorie and stayed at 'Cloud's End'. This trip was the most chilled out n relaxed one with lotsa fun....It's one of the special trips of my lifetime....

We've celebrated so many functions together in a short span of a year or so in office... Independence day[he won a prize for a writing competition], Diwali and Christmas.... actually almost everyday is an event for us :-)

We had a blast attending Gunjan and Deepshikha's[ Nikhil's sister] weddings..... the paratha's at murthal were worth bearing the cold for... ;-)

We would go out really often and get click happy..... :-) it was difficult finding pictures which had all of us in them...


Moments.....


He's been adding to his 'Chick Magnet' list.... He's found a new girlfriend... His D60 and has gone from 'Camera Shy to Camera High'....

Whenever we have a party at someone's place... we almost always end up playing pictionary... after a few beers obviously...


Not to forget, what he forgets the most..... his lunch box......
Happy Birthday!!!!!
Keep rocking fella... :-)

Amit Guzzles ALL His Beer inorder To Get 'Chocolate Black Out Cake'

Met Amit, while doing a play with 'Living Room Theater' called 'Urban Tadka'. We hit it off instantly in a group of 4 Amit, Vikram, Dipali[had done the Caramel Cake for Dipali's Anniversary ] and me. We use to have a blast during practices.

We all went out a lot, did crazy stuff, Morning walks at Lodhi Garden, Humayun's Tomb, All American Diner, Sagar, Cafe Coffee Day, Stone, Movies, ran the Airtel Marathon........ We can chat for hours.

We use to have impromptu dance sessions at the play practice cause Dipali and Amit are both wonderful dancers. Going to Big Chill was a SUGAR HIGH for all of us.... :-) Tonino's had us asking for more..... Cheers at The Chinese was very cheery....

We went on a neemrana property spree and visited Patudi, Neemrana n Kesroli. The long drives use to be so much fun... not to forget the aweaome music in Amit's car.... Amazing collection ;-)



The play was held at gymkhana, we were quite nervous about it.... It went of well....

I was busy baking apple crumble n apple pie for neha didi's birthday....[that's another post coming up, Update: it's here] when Dipali called n said the doctor's[vikram] planned a surprise for Amit........... It was Amit's birthday. We[Dipali n I] would meet him at the venue whereIVikram was taking Amit and surprise him... by ringing in his b'day at midnite... interesting......
How much time do I have to make a cake.....after I get back from mall road....
2 hours to be precise... This included getting all the stuff prepared to bake, doing the cake, allowing it time to cool so that i could ice it AND get ready for the dinner....

Decided to do a cake I love[for it's moistness] n chocolate is a favourite with most men... :-) and I had a very very short span to make the cake in..... hence KISS..... Keep It Short n Simple..... Hence I made the Chocolate Blackout Cake...Hmmm.... am already drooling...

We went to one of our favourite places to celebrate after much venue changing... The Shack in Defence Colony... It was a fun filled evening with Amit finally drinking up all the alcohol he ordered.... no left overs this time....

Then came cake cutting time... The 'Foodus Bloggerus' awoke in Miss Chandra and I went crazy clicking pictures of the cake.... n even put an icing flower on Amit's nose... :-)

Hope you have a great time ahead and may we all cherish the wonderful memories....