Strawberry yoghurt parfait

Anushruti's Strawberry Parfait, except I didnt make it in "tall glasses" parfait style

The weekend began well with a bright watercolor painting session at the beach, which set the mood perfectly for the rest of the weekend. I love it when something spectacularly joyful happens right at the start of the weekend, because it then feels like no matter what the rest of the weekend is like, I'll still feel happy, satisfied and content. It was such pure joy to be painting again :)

On the way home, still on my watercolor high we stopped by at the market, and I saw some bright and juicy looking strawberries that just looked like they were asking to be bought. Nothing like fresh fruit in dessert. I couldnt have made the weekend better than by using Anushruti's recipe for Strawberry Parfait.

Now parfait is technically made in individual servings in tall glasses. But when I finally got down to making it in the evening, after a day of painting and cleaning up the house and watching Rio in between, we got an impromptu call from Ravi, inviting us to yet another BBQ experiment at his place. Going by the success of Ravi's last BBQ party, it was hard to turn the invitation down!

Last time, I planned a day ahead and took some tandoori chicken along. So considering I didnt have any meat to contribute this time around, I decided to take dessert instead. And thats how the individual servings were swapped for one big bowl. Also, given that I was suddenly now racing against time, I skipped a few ingredients, which I dont think altered the recipe too much (apologies, Anu!) but I intend to try this out again and get it down, pat!

For those who want the "original" recipe, check out Anushruti's most divine blog. For those who want to see what I did, read one..

What I used:
2 small cartons of strawberries
100 ml fresh cream
1 big carton Nestle yoghurt, hung for about an hour
1 + 2 tablespoons of sugar
150-200 gms digestive biscuits crumbled/powdered
2 tablespoons butter

What I did:
First, chop us all the strawberries into small bits. Add in 1 tablespoon sugar, mix well and allow to rest.

Powder the digestive biscuits. While Anushruti does this by putting the whole lot in a ziploc bag and pounding them, in the absence of ziploc bags, I simply put them in a big bowl and crushed them by hand. Add in 2 tablespoons of butter and mix well.

In a large mixing bowl, add the hung curd, 2 tablespoons of sugar and 100 ml fresh cream and whip well.

Thats pretty much all the preparation this dessert requires! Thats another reason it was such a joy. It was done before I knew it. Now to assemble it.

Spoon some cream+yoghurt into a bowl and spread evenly. Next add on a layer of biscuits. Follow this up by a layer of sugared strawberries. And repeat, until you reach the top of the bowl.

End with a layer of biscuits. I also added some chopped walnuts right on top, just for that extra crunch.

Chill until you're ready to dig in.
Done!