Kitchen Gossip....

Back with Batata Vada

2012-01-25T07:16:00.001+05:30

Accepted, I am around for couple of months … then vanish.. then back .. then vanish again …Currently trying to be back :P Life becomes too busy sometimes that you totally forget that you have a hobby or a blog page and then when you realise you start jotting down about something that you have in your picture folder for sometime. :)

Today it is Batata Vada, something that was never prepared @ home @ my place, we get this at every other galli in Mumbai. But when the climate drops below 6 degrees, and you don't plan to go out for some garama garam snack, you just Mash some boiled potatoes, add some masalas, ball it into gram flour and Fry. Yeah, so simple is the favourite snack of Mumbai.

You Need:

Boiled Potatoes : 2-3 Big ones
Sliced Onion : 1 small
Green Chillies : 4-5 small
Ginger-garlic paste : 1 tbsp
Coriander leaves : finely chopped about 1/2 cup
Red Chilli Powder : 1tsp
Turmeric Powder : 1tsp
Cumin Powder or Seeds : 1 tbsp
Gram Flour (Besan) : 1 measure
Water to make paste : about 1 1/2 measure
Salt to taste
Oil to Deep Fry

You Do:

Mash everything in BLUE, add salt , some turmeric and red chilli powder.
Make small balls of the mashed potatoes.
Mix Besan and water to make a thick consistency paste. Add some turmeric and red chilli powder along with cumin seeds and salt. (1 measure means if you take 1 cup of besan add 1 and half proportion of water to make right consistency. But if your besan is thicker, add less water )
Dip the small potato balls in thick paste and deep fry in oil till the cover turns light golden. (Fry for about couple of minutes of medium to small flame, do not make it high as vadas might turn dark brown)

When done, drip off all the oil with tissue. Serve Hot with Green Chutney or Ketchup.

Last Click of Mushroom anatomy

2011-11-09T07:00:00.000+05:30

after colourless mushrooms to its black and white angles this is the last on the Mushroom Anatomy

Goes for Susan’s Black and White Wednesdays.

Stuffed Omelette

2011-11-04T00:00:00.000+05:30

Just an Observation, the Most I have posted are - the breakfast recipes. And why not, breakfast is one of my major meal of the day. As a kid, I had to leave for my school as early as seven in the morning, but still my Mom used to give me some or the other breakfast. This incepted a good or bad <dunno> habit in me, I can’t leave my home without a proper breakfast.

When I started staying away from home, I even tried to avoid the breakfast but my laziness couldn’t overcome my tummy. Instead I started trying out varied breakfasts and hence this space too is loaded with number of recipes for the first meal of the day.

Omelettes must have been most commonly eaten breakfast by me, till now. But I have evolved from half fry to Cheese Omelette to now Stuffed Omelettes. Such type of omelette is usually seen in most of the continental or American breakfast.

You Need :

Eggs : couple of them
red chilli powder, turmeric , black pepper powder and salt : to taste
milk : 1 tsp
Mushrooms : couple of them – finely chopped
Onion, Coloured capsicum, tomatoes : in all about 3 tbsp or quantity by your choice enough for one omelette– all finely chopped
green chillies : 1 finely chopped
Coriander leaves : finely chopped
butter to sauté
cheese : grated

You Do:

In a bowl whisk together all the BLUE items.
In a small non-stick pan, heat up the butter, sauté all RED items.
Once half cooked, remove from the pan. In the same pan pour the whisked paste to make a thin pancake of egg mix.
Cover it with the half cooked veggies, spread through out. Cover with some grated cheese.
Fold the omelette covering the stuffing.

Serve with Bread toasts and have it with a Mug-Full of Milk.

Happy Cooking and Posting about it.

Malvani style Vatana Batata

2011-11-01T07:00:00.000+05:30

Aloo Matar or Potato Green Peas gravy, is one of the most common Indian dish. This is prepared all over the country in different manner, and though its main ingredients are same, the same dish tastes different in different regions.

Malvan is a small part of - Konkan – coastal part of Maharashtra, very famous for spicy sea food and beautiful beaches. My Mom prepares this Malwani masala @ home and sends me a pack of it yearly, which I use in different sabzis – this not only makes the dish spicy but also brings the lovely “Maa ke hath ka swad“ :x

I tried this Meera’s version, Vatanyachi Rassa Bhaji. But I did few changes to the dish to make it similar to our taste buds.

Changes I made :

I made tomato puree instead of chopping it – as wanted a whole lot of gravy to dish.
Instead of Kokum, I used tamarind juice
And Finally one major change, I used Malvani Masala instead of garam masala mentioned.

Loved the konkani taste to the simple dish. Infact my Mom prepares a similar version with small prawns in it, too salivating to mention this. ;)

Serve this with hot chapatis or plain rice. Sending this to Priya’s Bookmarked Recipes event.

See you soon, till then Happy Cooking and Posting about it.

Diwali special – Caramelized Fried Apple Ice-cream

2011-10-27T00:00:00.000+05:30

Diwali – the festival of lights, is being celebrated all over the country for this whole week. Last year Kitchen Gossip celebrated the victory of good over evil and light over darkness with some very traditional faral <dishes prepared typically for diwali festival>, some savoury dishes like Mathri & Chivda and also some Sweet dishes like Atte ka Halwa & Besan Ladoo. Some free ideas were also shared for decorating Diyas and making Kandil <Diwali special Lantern>

This year I’m celebrating Diwali @ The Foodie’s hometown for couple of days and later @ Mom’s place in Mumbai. So no Homemade Faral for me this year. But for this festive occasion I do have this amazingly simple , totally non-traditional and quite healthy desert.

I had these loads of apples lying in my pantry and I wanted to finish these in an instant manner. I had seen this Apple Stir Fry on some cookery show, so I tried to replicate this dish over the weekend. I was quite satisfied with the output but thought it was a bit incomplete to have it just like that. So did a small makeover to make it an ice-cream desert.

You Need:

Apples : 2 in no.
sugar to taste
sale to taste
butter to sauté
Ice-cream of your choice

You Do:

Peel the apple, and slice it to not so thick-not so thin slices.
Melt butter in a non stick pan, Sauté the apple slices in the pan.
Its similar to shallow frying, making it slightly light golden brown on both sides.
Follow with salt and sugar.
Add enough Sugar to caramelize the slices, they should not turn mushy.

Done. Serve it hot either just as a desert or as a side dish to some spicy dish.

I assembled the desert with some caramelized apples then Naturals Malai ice-cream and topped with some apple slices again. You can top of with some dry fruits. But as the ice-cream starts to melt with the hot slices, we just finished them off as soon as we were done with assembling.

Thanks to The Foodie who aptly bought the Ice-cream immediately, we cherished this experimental desert. It was worth the effort totally :D

Wish you all a Very Happy and Safe Diwali.

Open Toast Sandwich

2011-10-24T07:00:00.000+05:30

As kids, when we bought our Microwave we were up to trials and errors with many new recipes with this new appliance. One of our easiest and finisher dish was – The Open Toast Sandwich. ;;)

This requires two kitchen appliances – Toaster + Microwave.

It was a common breakfast, whenever we wanted to finish off some leftovers. :">

That's what I did with my leftover kadai mushroom, used it in my new open toast sandwich.

Toasted the slice bread , I used brown one. apply butter if you want, I avoided it.
Used some plucked lettuce and followed by mushroom kadai over the toast.
Covered with some grated cheese.
Microwave-ed for 30 seconds , or till cheese melts.

You can replace mushroom with any spicy dry sabzi . Eat-Start immediately, once out of microwave. Complete the tasty breakfast with a nice full glass of milk. :D

Guess What ?

2011-10-19T12:00:00.000+05:30

Trying one more hand @ guessing game here, I failed miserably before – number of times, so trying to make this a bit more difficult by making this colourless .. Guess this ???

Goes for Susan’s Black and White Wednesdays

Cooking Light

2011-10-17T07:00:00.000+05:30

way to cook Vegetarian, the complete visual guide to healthy & vegan cooking

The Foodie gifted me this, on woman’s day,I know now Long time back…somewhere at the start of March ..

I had clicked these snaps then… but then my busy schedule.. made me wait for the last Eight long months to post here… But its never too late for such visual treats ..

Book has its all – delicious recipes – fresh,healthy ingredients – smart tools and techniques.

Book covers quite a lot, including couple of Indian recipes as seen above, to totally new mix and match recipes as seen below…

I have couple of recipes lined up from here … soon …

Till then take care and happy cooking !

Apple lost its colour ..

2011-10-12T18:00:00.000+05:30

Three apples have changed the world.

One seduced Eve

second awakened Newton

the third one was in the hands of Jobs.

RIP – Steve Jobs .

Goes to Susan’s Black and White Wednesdays.

Read the above mentioned quote somewhere, liked it, believed it.

Poha – Kanda Pohe , western India’s common breakfast

2011-10-10T07:00:00.000+05:30

Few years back, for me Poha (Flattened Rice) was the typical Maharashtrian breakfast or evening snack. In arranged marriages, the session where a boy and girl meet for the first time is called – “Kanda Pohe”. Such is its traditional symbol in this part of the country.

But I had no idea, that this same breakfast is synonymous with one more state – MP , to be precise Indore. Infact For me, Pohe is synonymous with The Foodie. He hearts to cook this with variations, and can have this on daily basis.

Though most of us know this recipe, I wanted this to go on my space as this is one of our regular basis breakfast. Very Simple to prepare, quite healthy and totally filling to start your day.

You Need:

Thick Pohe : 2-3 cups <there is also thin pohe which are used to cook Chivda>
Onion : 1 Medium – coarsely chopped
Potato : 1 small – cut into small cubes (optional)
Green chillies – 3-4 – coarsely chopped
Curry Leaves – 3-4 (optional)
Cumin seeds – ½ tbsp.
Mustard Seeds – ½ tbsp
Turmeric – ½ tsp
Lemon – Half Piece
Coriander leaves – handful – finely chopped
Peanuts – 3-4tbsp (optional)
Scrapped coconut – for garnishing (optional)
Salt to taste
Sugar to taste

You Do:

Take the Pohe in colander, and pour water over to moisten it.
Heat Oil in Kadai, Add cumin and mustard seeds. Follow with chillies and curry leaves.
Once spluttering is done, add onion. Follow with potatoes, once the mix turns translucent add Moist Pohe.
Add turmeric, salt and sugar, stir well. Follow with peanuts.
Squeeze lemon juice. Garnish with coriander leaves and scraped coconut and serve hot.

he drinks Milk and me Coffee ;)

Just 5 steps and you can break your night fast with the first meal of the day – Breakfast :D

he finishing off … while I’m trying to click.. before he does so …

This goes to Dish Name Starts with K event.

BW angles

2011-10-05T07:00:00.000+05:30

OF Mushrooms, just getting to know, things which are colourless look beautiful when they are colourless :)

One more for Susan’s Black and White Wednesdays

Dry Kadai Mushroom Masala

2011-10-04T07:00:00.000+05:30

Most common Mushroom dish @ my place is Chilli Mushroom, but I do give try to varied recipes with this Fungi Family. I wanted a dry masala dish, and I got a nice simple Kadai Mushroom masala @ Sharmi’s space.

The only change I did was to use one tomato instead of tomato puree, mushrooms give out enough water to cook itself. Once mushrooms were cooked neatly, I dried out the extra gravy to keep it to my dry consistency.

We loved the spicy flavour and delicious texture of this dish. Thanks Sharmi for the wonderful share.

Sending this to Priya’s Bookmarked Recipes event.

Sabudana Khichdi – the reason why people Fast

2011-09-30T07:00:00.000+05:30

In Life, we meet many people, talk with many more but remember few. Not getting philosophical, I can relate to such a person when I think of Sabudana Khichdi. She is my close friends Aunt in law from Chiplun, I’m not sure if I might meet her again but she advised an erroneous step to cook Khichdi.

Soaking Sabudana to perfection is an art, so they say. If you can do so nothing more can go wrong in its preparation. Most of the time my sabudana used to too moist or too hard, So here is the trick as suggested by my friend’s AIL – Soak sabudana it whole lot of water, say double, keep it for exact 10 minutes. Then remove all water from it, and keep it for say 6-8 hours. I keep it overnight and then they are separate and moist as required.

Quite simple to prepare yet tasty and totally satisfying breakfast.

You Need:

Sabudana – Sago – 1 ½ glass
Peanut coarse powder : ½ cup
Green chillies : 3-4 large coarsely chopped
Potato : 1 medium – small cubes
Cumin Seeds : ½ tbsp.
Curry Leaves : 10-15 in no.
Coriander leaves : ½ cup finely chopped
Salt to taste
Sugar to taste
Ghee – for tempering
Lemon : ½ piece
Scrapped coconut – for garnishing (optional)

You Do:

Soak sabudana as mentioned above.
Heat Ghee in Kadai, Add Cumin seeds to splutter.Follow with curry leaves and chillies. Trail with potatoes.
Cover and cook, till potatoes are soft not mushy. Add the Sabudana grains with peanut powder, salt and sugar
Stir well so that all is mixed properly, but do not overdo it as it might hamper the separate grains.
Add Lime juice and mix coriander leaved and scrapped coconut. Do not cover when done, as the vapours may make it sticky.

Serve hot. This can be served with Dahi or Fast Chutney.

Sending this to : "Foods for fasting - Vrat Ka Khaana"

Black and White preparations..

2011-09-28T01:00:00.000+05:30

For Sabudana Khichdi … Next in Line..

Goes for Susan’s Black and White Wednesdays

Colourless Mushrooms

2011-09-07T00:00:00.000+05:30

From Wordless to Colourless Wednesdays, first in line for Susan’s Black and White Wednesdays.

Chilli Mushroom

2011-09-05T07:00:00.000+05:30

I belong to a generation when all World famous culinary brands entered India – Mc Docnalds, Pizza Hut , Dominos etc. Those were the days when everything from these fast food centres seemed Impeccable.

One such starter from Pizza Hut - Mushroom Chilli, was one of our favourites. So one of my cousin had mentioned its try out recipe to Mom, and from then it’s been our common Mushroom Specialty dish. I love the aroma it gives out when its cooking, Garlicky Spicy Tinge. My Pappa dint love this fungi family, but this was an exception, so I feel if even if you don't prefer Mushrooms, you should like this.

You Need:

15-20 – Fresh White Button Mushrooms
Garlic – around 15 (The aroma, taste all depends on this, more the better but its personal choice)
Ginger – 1 inch
Dry Red Chillies – 7-8 (Recipe is on spicier end, so you can change this accordingly )
Salt to taste

You Do:

Wash the mushroom, and slice it into quarters.
Grind garlic, ginger and Red chillies to coarse powder, it should not be smooth.
Heat oil in kadai, add the prepared masala, it will give out garlicky aroma in a min or so.
Add cut mushrooms, mix the masala gently till all covered with it.
Cover and cook for 10-12 mins, till mushrooms are cooked.
Mushroom gives out water of its own, so once mushrooms are done, open the lid and let it evaporate till dish becomes dry.

Serve hot as you wish, It’s spicy taste goes quite well with chapatis or even curd rice, but it is best served as a SPICY starter or a Pizza toping.

Sending this Herbs and Flowers – Garlic this months theme being Garlic .

Jodhpuri or Jaipuri Mangodi Pulao

2011-08-31T16:00:00.000+05:30

This post completes two resolutions, one from here – where I planned to use my Cookbook collection fervently and other from my last post – where I decided to try out the new dishes gobbled up while travelling. I mix-matched a bookmarked recipe from Sanjeev Kapoors – Marwadi Vegetarian Cooking cookbook and the Royal Mangodi Pulao that I had in Jaipur. SK’s Jodhpuri Vegetable Pulao had cauliflower as its main ingredient which I replaced by lovely crispy soft – Mangodis from Jaipur. ;;)

Mangodi was a new ingredient for me, The Foodie bought it as a Marwadi speciality, they are small dried moong dal dumplings . Though we had bought this as a readymade pack, you can try to prepare this @ home, as nicely described by Priya here.

How to use Mangodi in your recipes : Either pressure cook or boil it they they are a bit soft, then fry it till they are golden crispy. Use it in a side-dish sabzi or Pulao as I have done here.

You Need:

1 cup : Basmati Rice – soaked for an hour.
Cumin Seeds : 1tsp
Fennel Seeds : 1tsp
Garam Masala Powder : 1/2 tsp
Black Pepper corns : 10-12 crushed
Dry Fruits like Cashews , Almonds, Dried Dates and Raisins – 1/4 cup
Mangodis : around 15 in count
Ginger Garlic Paste : 1-2 tbsp
Green Peas : 1/4 cup
Curd : 2-4 tbsp
Ghee
Coriander leaves : handful chopped
salt to taste

You Do:

Cook the Mangodis as mentioned above, keep them ready to use.
Heat Ghee in a open pan, Add cumin and fennel seeds. Once fragrant follow with dry fruits, stir say 1/2 min.
Add ginger garlic paste and mangodis, sauté for couple of minutes. Then add rice, curd and 2 cups of hot water.
Let it simmer, then add green peas and garam masala.Cover and cook on low heat, till rice is done.
Sprinkle crushed pepper and garnish with coriander leaves.

Serve hot with some heated ghee over it :D

The dried dates and raisins make this chunky pulao both soft and sweet – so says SK in his Cookbook, which is quite true.

Sending this to Rice Recipe event for this month. and also to Dish name starting with J event.

Travelling Foodie

2011-08-29T07:00:00.000+05:30

“”You’re not an Indian Foodie if you haven’t relished @Dhabba.””

I had read this in one of the Food blog very long time back, and I was ashamed to accept this Fact. But at the start of this year we got to enjoy vegetarian special @one of the Jaipuri dhabba. The experience is totally commendable.

The hot rotis - directly from the Chulla,

the Melodious Bharatpuri birds surrounding you..

we loved the typical Indian rural feel… sitting on the Khatt (cot) eating hot food…

And now I can conclude that I’m an Indian Foodie :D (The Foodie had eaten number of times, so he already is one)

From the rural Jaipur to Royal Jaipur, we also got to enjoy at Jaipur City Palace where you find .. Folk singers and dancers.

We had a Mangodi Pulao, and it had a total different palate as compared the Dhabba one.

But both are the extremes yet impeccable.

This was just some of the Food glimpses of our short trip to Jaipur. I’ve planned to cook these as and how time permits. So you can find some Marwadi cuisine posts coming soon.

AAloo Onion Mint Paratha

2011-08-25T07:00:00.000+05:30

Confession:
I had no valid reason, for not to post. It went from being lazy to post, to bored to click, too busy to cook, in short I was on undeclared unplanned unintentional break for last few months here. (:|

I had no plot to post soon, but then a colleague asked, blogger friends asked, close friends asked, Unknown readers asked, and then I thought.. c’mon gal.. Bhav mat kha :P

Anyways I have too many snaps in my blog folder, which if I decide to post once a week, they can last for couple of months. So here I go with one of my basic new Paratha. Basic cos it’s an Aloo Paratha and New cos it’s with a difference.

In my peas paratha post, I had openly resolved that I might try to cook not few but most of those 44 parathas, it’s been 2+years since then and this is just my third paratha in this space I-) , it’s never too late this is my fourth one, so only 40 to go :D

This is 90% of my Aloo paratha recipe , with few additions.

I added finely chopped onion, loads of finely chopped coriander leaves, handful of Mint Leaves, Ajwain – Carom seeds , Leftover grated boiled beetroot, and such similar miscellaneous leftover veggies.

This comes out fine, and you can have a guess game as to get the guess the veggies present along with the Potato. Nice way to spend a weekend with Guesstimating Brunch.

This goes to the Breakfast club , theme for this month being Potato.

Busy Days Food

2011-08-23T07:29:00.001+05:30

I started writing this post ~~couple of~~ 5-6 months back and thought of finishing it off soon and posting, just to get back to blogging world.So this is kind of many months long post :P

Had been very Busy.. so busy that I hardly recollect, what I ate from last couple of months, so obviously ~~Cooking~~ Blogging had taken a back seat. Infact Cooking was something that did relax me, whenever I got time and I had some time in hand I tried out various dishes, but couldn’t click snaps, couldn’t make them presentable for this space. Still I’ve few snaps which I might go ahead and post soon.

If you have a maid who prepares Chapattis and the busy bee in you can’t keep the count of required ones, then comes innovative recipes with Leftover Chapattis. As this was my case for last few days, and I did try out couple of my favourites – Chapaticha Sweet Kuskara and Egg roll. But I prepare this Spicer version more often than than the Sweet Kuskara – I posted earlier.

You Need:

Leftover Chapattis: I had about 3 – coarsely grinded or finely plucked to make quite small pieces
Onion : Finely sliced – 1 Medium
Green Chillies : Finely sliced – 2-3
Cumin Seeds : 1/2 tbsp
Lemon : 1/2 piece
Turmeric and Red chilli powder : 1/2 tbsp each
Coriander leaves : fistful –finely chopped
Salt to taste
Sugar to taste

You Do:

Heat Oil in Kadai , add cumin seeds, let them crackle, add green chillies.
Follow with onion, let then turn turn translucent. Add chapatti pieces. Add all blue items.
Cover and cook it for couple of minutes, do not overdo as it should be dry. Stir fry and Add lemon juice and coriander leaves once done.

Serve hot, with some curd and Chivda over it. Healthy and Different.

Sending this to Smita’s HCC: Lunchbox currently hosted by Anamika.

2 years.. and

2011-07-28T08:18:00.001+05:30

Nothing has changed ?
“
Life has changed Hugely ! But when I look at the post below, (which I found in one of my Drafts, which I was supposed to post last year as a One Year Post but dint), I was amazed ! I do have same or similar sentiments towards my blog and everyone even today. I will follow up with my resolution here, and hope to be around, More Often. Thank you for hanging around for TWO HUGE YEARS of my Life ! Thanks :)
“
… 2011

“
Yups... exactly one year back I started this lovely space where I started jotting my funny experiments in kitchen. I’ve grown addicted to this passion and this hobby has become an integral part of me.
We (Me and Personal Tadka) have a single resolution – Try to be More Regular.
Often times, I click loads of snaps with enthusiasm but then they just lie idle in my Picture folders. (You can see that all the posts in July were the ones I prepared in June)
Reasons vary from being busy personally-professionally or simply being LAZY. So I’ve decided if I can’t jot down much still I would post the snaps with short and sweet snippet about it.

People who know me will confirm that, it is very difficult for me to stick to a single hobby for long. But Personal Tadka aka Kitchen Gossip is something I have hold on for long and hope to stand by it for many more years and this was-is possible cos of YOU.

Friends, who read my space, scan my snaps, give valuable inputs – comments, mail me, ask about me – my recipes… I Love you all and Thanks an oceans for all! Without you I won’t be posting this. ( Shukriyaaa.. Dhanyawad..Rumba..) :) :)
“
… 2010

Tilachi chikki – Sesame Seeds Sweet Candy Snack

2011-03-24T00:00:00.000+05:30

After my successful attempt @ preparing 50 Ladoos in one go, I still had loads 1/4 kg more of sesame seeds pack. So when MOM was visiting me then we planned to prepare the world famous Lonavala ishtyle tilachi Chikki.

Chikki is a Maharashtrian traditional sweet Candy snack, usually made with Jaggery as a base with addition of groundnut\ sesame\ bengal gram dal.

The overall procedure of preparing Chikki is quite similar to Sesame Ladoos, so if you are bored to moulding the mix into balls you can always go for Chikki.

You Need : Same as tilache Ladoo

You Do:

Roast the Sesame Seeds till they turn light golden and fluff a bit.
Grind these along with Chana Dal and Peanuts into a course powder.
Add Ghee in Non-stick Wok, follow with Jaggery. Melt the jaggery to dark Red colour, turns to thick liquid consistency.
Add Course Powder to this. Cover and switch of the flame in 1 min.
Spread this mix on a tray type plate, firstly coated with loads of Ghee, and let it cool. You can slide a knife to make pieces or designs the way you want, till the mix is semi hot.
This will help you remove the pieces when cold. Once its cool, just reverse the plate and remove the pieces.

My chikki pieces were a bit thick, if you prefer you can spread it into thinner base. Have it as a snack or just gift it to friends as a lovely Candy snacks.

Dudhi – Lauki Raita

2011-03-21T07:00:00.000+05:30

Dudhi or Lauki is one of the “Not So Liked” Veggie, and I’ve no idea why? Infact this is one of the most versatile gourd. We can prepare Koftas which make instant restaurant styled, Dudhi Halwa is a lovely sweet and dudhi also goes as one of the most tasty fritters.

And today I tried out this instant Raita. I dint know we could have this raw. I found this recipe in the Marwadi Cookbook by SK. Yes, I’m trying to complete One of my New Year resolution – to prepare atleast One dish from my cookbooks per month.

You Need:

Bottle gourd: 2cups – peeled and grated
Curd: 1/2cup
Red Dry Chillies: 3-4
Asafoetida: pinch
Mustard Seeds: 2tsp
Cumin Powder: 1tbsp
Red Chilli Powder: 1stp
Ghee for tadka
sugar to taste
salt to taste

You Do:

Mix the grated bottle gourd and curd. Add sugar and salt and mix thoroughly.
Heat ghee and add the tempering stuff mentioned in BLUE.
Once the spluttering is done, mix it with bottle gourd mix from step One.

Done ! We took it along with our lunch box. It tastes quite good and gives a very different palate to Lauki.

Eggless Choco Pressure Cooker Cake

2011-03-14T07:00:00.000+05:30

I love that you get cold when it's 71 degrees out. I love that it takes you an hour and a half to order a sandwich. I love that you get a little crinkle above ur nose when you're looking at me like I'm nuts. I love that after I spend the day with you, I can still smell your perfume on my clothes. And I love that you are the last person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night. And it's not because I'm lonely, and it's not because it's New Year's Eve. I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.

I do get hushy-mushy sometimes.. and when its your Second anniversary, why not ;) More than getting romantic, I get ~~very~~ Filmi ~~sometimes~~ most of the times , The Foodie says I’m the Drama-Queen staying in Filmi-Land, Why I can’t I, When I’ve you around.. Happy Anniversary Honey ! :-*

So I wanted to post something easy yet sexy, and nothing can beat Chocolate Cake. I had bought this Pillsbury Cooker Cake pack when I saw it the first time in a Cake Aisle. Very simple, very easy and mainly no oven required here. Most Indian kitchens do not have this popular appliance, but do you need it if you have Pressure Cooker B-)

Few of my colleagues were discussing preparing cakes in pressure cooker, it worked great for them. I’ve bookmarked their recipes too, but this one is the easiest.

You Need:

This :D

You DO:

Follow the instructions behind the pack OR -

Mix the MIX with 2/3cup of Milk and 2 tbsp of Butter.
Stir – Beat rigorously to make smooth lump less Cake batter – Advice – Take help from your stronger half :P , yeah The Foodie helped me on this, and it did give me placid batter.
Place the batter on flat vessel , polished with some flour.
If you know how to prepare Idlis in Cooker, then prepare the Cake on similar lines, else follow this -
Pour some water in cooker, about 1 inch, then place the cake vessel on a 1/2 inch stand.
Cover the cooker and let it pressurise for 1/2 and hour, without the regulator-weight.
After half an hour, check if the cake is done by sliding a knife inside and checking if the cake is not wet from inside.
Continue heating with open lid for about 5-10 minutes.

Done! Its simplest Cake to prepare. Obviously it doesn’t rise as expected in an Oven, but no worries oven-less kitchen can also have this sinful chocolate cake.

Mixed Dal Dosa

2011-02-28T07:00:00.000+05:30

Do you know, what is the current topic of discussion over Food in India? Its not about any recipe, dish, cuisine but about its Prices. They have reached sky high, how high ??

Today’s Indians can get Luxury, Comfort and Necessity at the same price –> Check your expense sheet, it will display :

Luxury	Beer: 1can	Rs.60
Comfort	Petrol: 1 ltr	Rs.60+
Necessity	Onion: 1kg	Rs.60++

Isn’t this Ironic ??

Was reading this article while having my south Indian breakfast. I’m seriously thinking about overcoming the inflation, its quite simple infact, avoid anything that is too high e.g. Garlic or Onion. Go for pulses, dals (touch wood, they are not affected by the inflation till now) . So this dosa can be a start point to this resolution, mix all dals and prepare a hearty wholesome breakfast.

You Need:

All types of Dals you want – Soak it overnight , I used – Toor Dal, Moong (husked and nonhusked) Dal , Chana Dal and Urad Dal (I used black one) : 1 measure each
Rice : 1 measure – soak it overnight (or you can use 1 measure rice flour the next day into the batter)
Salt to taste
Oil to spread
Green chilli +1/2 inch ginger +fistful coriander leaves – Optional

You Do:

Grind the soaked ingredients in a grinder-mixer to make fine batter. Drain out all the water and then grind.
Add salt and the optional chillies,ginger and coriander leaves and grind these along with the batter. If you do not have soaked rice use rice flour here.
Let the batter sit for say half an hour. Then take a ladleful of batter and spread on a hot pan into dosa.

Done ! Server with green chutney. This is quite different than our regular Dosas, very crispy and tender. Sending this to Susan’s MLLA – 32 hosted this month by Sandy :)

Egg Fried Rice

2011-02-24T05:00:00.000+05:30

Here, I Proudly mentioned that I Cook Chinese regularly @Home , I had to bit my words that though claiming this I have posted only Two genuine Indo-Chinese Recipes.

I’m not a fan of Night-flashy Shots, And I cook Chinese mostly on weeknight diners, hence could not post much here. We had a Chinese Weekend last month and I grabbed the opportunity and clicked too many clicks. So now you have couple of Indo-Chinese dishes coming up here. Starting with Egg Fried Rice:

You Need:

Cooked Rice\ stale Rice : 1 measure
Eggs: 2-3
Mixed Vegetables: 1 cup (I used – Spring Onion/ Onion, Capsicum, Carrots, French Beans, cabbage) – finely chopped
Green Chillies: 2-3 finely chopped
Red Chilli Sauce: 1 tbsp
Vinegar: 1 tbsp
Soya Sauce: 1 tbsp
Black Pepper: Crushed – 1tbsp
Oil to sauté
Salt to taste

You Do:

Heat Oil in Wide Non-stick Saucepan, add green chillies.
Follow with chopped veggies of your choice. Sauté till half cooked.
Follow with eggs, scramble them with the vegetables.
Add the sauces along with salt and pepper. Stir to mix the sauces well.
Follow with cooked rice. Mix upside down.
Cook covered for couple of minutes.

Done ! Serve with any Chinese Dish of your choice, we normally have it JLT !!

Aloo Raita

2011-02-21T05:00:00.000+05:30

Mahasrashtrain thali always calls for a salad – koshimbir. But the lazy that I am, this side dish has taken a back seat. I tend to prepare these only when I’ve family or friends visiting us. And whenever I prepare salads, I plan to prepare them regularly but sadly I always forget. I assembled this simple yet tasty raita on one such occasion, we loved it and yeah I’ve prepared this number of times from then.

I just had a leftover boiled potato in my refrigerator, and experimented this salad, it came out quite well.

You Need :

Potato: 1 – boiled, peeled and cubed
Red chilli powder: 1 tsp
Chaat Masala : 1tsp
Yogurt: 1/2 cup
Cumin Powder : 1/2 tsp
Black Pepper: 1/2 tsp
Sugar to taste
Salt to taste
Coriander leaves - garnishing

You Do:

Mix everything in Red with some salt and keep aside.
Beat the curd to make a thin paste, mix everything in Blue.
Mix both step 2 and 1, together.
Garnish with coriander leaves.

Serve as a side dish with Rice or Pulao. Would go well with rotis too.

Bhatura – fluffy bread for Chole

2011-02-17T05:00:00.000+05:30

This is a half guest post, half prepared by my Cook and half by me. Yeah, I’ve got a cook who prepares our regular weekday lunch, hence you do not find any daily stuffs here. Just weekend experiments :D

She literally knows quite a lot in Indian culinary area, I just need to ask/describe her and she immediately says Got it. On one such morning, when I had my Mom visiting me, I wanted chole and some New bread with it – so asked her to knead a Bhatura dough . I had tried this once earlier and it did not turn out good but thanks to her this time my bhatura came out Perfect :D . She Kneaded the dough and left it to ferment, I rolled them into puris and deep fried them.

You Need:

Flour (Maida): 2 cups
Semolina Flour (Rava) 1/2 cup
Yogurt: 1/2 cup
Baking Powder: 1/2 tsp
Sugar: 1-2 tsp
Oil: 1-2 tsp
Salt to taste
Oil for Deep Frying
Warm Water if required

You Do:

Mix everything mentioned above, and knead to a soft dough. Use water if only required. Dough should be soft and pliable.
Cover the kneaded dough with a wet cloth for about 3-4 hours.
Divide the dough into equal balls and roll them into small puri or oval sizes. While rolling use oil to make it non-sticky process.
Heat enough oil for deep frying, and then deep fry the bhaturas till light golden on both the sides.

Done… drain extra oil on tissue if you want to, Serve Hot with chole – Channa. Its one of the most significant combination from North of India. :-bd

Chaat – SPDP for VD

2011-02-14T07:17:00.001+05:30

Do you find the topic of my post Greek or Latin ??

I know what the first word means, but second word was hebrew for me till I came to Pune. Okay lets update our vocabulary, as Wiki Says -

Chaat (Hindi: चाट) is plate of savoury snacks, typically served at road-side tracks from stalls or carts in India

So for newbie, Chaat is India’s very own fast-junk yet most loved and eaten food. Now what is SPDP, its an abbreviated word for – Shev Potato Dahi Puri. If you are a Punekar, or if you have any minute relation with this city you should know this patent chaat. :D

Me and The Foodie are ardent fans of Chaats, if there was a Fan Club then we would have shared its Presidency seat :P We faithfully have atleast one chaat dish on daily basis, not that I’m proud of, but now we’ve planned to prepare the similar dishes @home, which might help a baby savings for our daily finances ;) So on this Valentine Day, I present our favourite dish .. SPDP. In most of the chaat dishes all the ingredients are easily available, assembling them into the specific way is the only art.

You Need:

Pani Puri Puris – pack
Sprouts – I used Matki
Potato: 1 – boiled, peeled, mashed
Curd- Yogurt
Sweet-sour Chutney
Spicy Chutney
Thin Shev
Tomato: 1-finely chopped
Onion: 1-finely chopped
Coriander leaves: fistful – finely chopped
Red Chilli powder: 2-3tsp
Turmeric: 1 tsp
Chaat powder: 2 tsp
cumin Powder: 1 tsp – roasted one
Sugar to taste
Salt to taste

You Do:

Lets assemble step wise -

Chutneys, these are normally pantry stored, or you can prepare them especially for this dish.
1. Sweet and Sour chutney – Refer my Tamarind-Date chutney
2. Spicy chutney – Refer my Mint Chutney
Sprouts – you can refer my stuffing part mentioned in Pani Puri post.OR -
1. Soak any sprouts of your choice – overnight.
2. Drain the water and and use Sprout maker or colander to sprout the pulses.
3. Simply cook these with turmeric and salt in a kadai, till they are soft.
Potato stuffing – Mash the boiled potatoes with salt, chat and red chilli powder.
Spiced Yogurt – Mix Cumin powder + Red Chilli powder +salt and some sugar with the yogurt to make the required Dahi for the chaat.
Now the final Assembling – Follow my pictorial tutorial..
1. Break the top of the Puris to stuff the stuffings – Sprouts + Potatoes, go for just any single one if you want it.
2. Stuff chopped onion + tomatoes
3. Cover with spices curd and chutneys – sweet and sour with the spicy chutney
4. Follow with thin shev and coriander leaves.

Done !!!… Either prepare it and serve or just keep the assembling ingredients together, cos getting this all together is fun especially on such valentine day, so go on with your valentine and celebrate the art of having Chaat :D

HAPPY VALENTINE DAY….

Homemade Basics – Peanut Powder

2011-02-10T00:00:00.000+05:30

Every Maharashtrian Pantry has this – “Kutt” - Course Powder of Peanuts, commonly known as – “Shengdanyacha Kutt”. Most commonly used in Sabudana Khichdi - Vada, Bharla Vanga and Kakdichi Koshimbir. This is one of the item which you can avoid buying from a market as you can prepare it @home and store in your pantry for all uses. This is also used as one of the Podi – dry chutney, with Dosas and Idlis.

Just thought of posting some of my common homemade basic recipes, to start with this one.

You Need:

Peanuts – ¼ kg

You Do:

Dry Roast the peanuts on a wide open pan, till they are light brown .

Allow it to cool, then rub them off to remove its skin.

When done, just grind the peanuts to course powder.

Done! Store for Mahrashtrian recipes :D

Healthier Pancakes

2011-02-07T07:00:00.000+05:30

When I mentioned about my Banana Pancakes in my last post, I realized that I have grown over from that recipe to a healthier version. I have stopped using full measure of flour, instead replaced to half wheat flour and half Maida. Taste doesn’t really change much, just looks a bit Wheat-ish.

The only change is in Ingredients:

You Need:

Flour (Maida): ½ measure
Wheat Four: ½ measure
Milk: 1 measure
Egg: 1 in number
Banana: 1/2- mashes and remaining 1/2- sliced , normally I use full one mashed
Butter: 2tbsp
Sugar: 2-3 tbsp
Baking Powder: 1/4 tsp
Salt to taste

You Do- Refer my Banana Pancake Post, it’s the same.

Nowadays we have the pancakes with this Strawberry Topping, brought it from Mahabaleshwar. It goes great with pancakes.

Thanks to the use of Bananas, These Pancakes along with my Sweet Sheera go to Smita’s “Cooking with Fruits” event.

Godd=Sweet Sheera

2011-02-03T00:00:00.000+05:30

If over ripe Bananas are common in my regular breakfast they also make guest appearances in my Ish-Special Breakfast – Godd Sheera :) This is more commonly prepared as a Prasad on most of the religious functions. Mom used to prepare this on any small good occasion, but I had prepared this only couple of times earlier . This made a wonderful Rich Hot Delicious breakfast for such Chilling Morning.

You Need:

Semolina (Rava): 1 measure, I used Jadda- thick rava, normally thin one is used.
Milk: 2 and half measure
Ghee: 1/2 measure
Over Ripe Banana: 1
Sugar: 3/4 measure
Dry fruits like Raisins, Cashews or Almonds: as per your taste
Cardamom Powder: 2tsp

You Do:

Roast Rava over a hot kadai till it gives a distinct sweet aroma or turns golden.Remove it and keep aside.
Heat Ghee, Add mashed banana. Stir till it becomes golden. Add dry fruits.
Follow with Rava, Sugar and Cardamom powder, sauté to keep the consistency in the Mixture.
Add Hot Boiled Milk carefully and steadily to this. Stir immediately so that no lumps are formed.
Cook covered for about Five Minutes.

Serve HOT on a COLD Morning like today :D

Radish Leaves Fritters

2011-01-31T07:00:00.001+05:30

Here I had asked a question, which no one really answered :((

But then, I self-answered it and tried three consecutive recipes with Radish Leaves :-B , one as a Radish leaves pulav, second similar to Methi- Dal, and last are these fritters.

Out of these, Pulav’s taste did not really attract me, while the Radish leaves Dal turned out fine with minimal Radish taste. But the Fritters or Pakodas turned out remarkable ! They are quite simple to prepare, yet you don’t get the distinct bitter taste of the leaves.

You Need:

Radish Leaves: Finely chopped about 2 cups
Gram flour: 3 heaps of tbsp.
Rice Flour: 1 tbsp.
Semolina Flour: 1 tbsp.
Green Chillies: 2 finely chopped
Cumin Powder: 1 tsp.
Red Chilli Powder: 1 tsp.
Turmeric: 1 tsp.
Fennel Seeds: 1 tsp.
Salt to taste
Oil to Deep Fry
Water to mix, as per the requirement

You Do:

Mix everything mentioned above, minimal water to keep thick consistency of Fritter batter.
Make small heaps and Deep Fry in a Hot Oil Kadai.
Fry till golden brown.

Done! Serve with Ketchup or have with Rice and Dal. We had these as a cold evening snacks. :-h

This goes to Radhika’s “Deep Fried Snacks” event.

Very Sweet Century

2011-01-24T07:00:00.000+05:30

After Sachin breaking unlimited records, its Personal Tadka aka Kitchen Gossip’s chance to hit its maiden century :D

Won’t start any Oscar winning speech here, but a couple of huge words says it all :

Thank you!!
Without all of you, I won’t be posting this, thanks and Love you.

So this is once again a Sweet, infact a Very Sweet Post.

We had a chilling winter this year, foggy mornings, misty evenings, subdued sunny afternoons, we loved it all. I belong to humid sultry Mumbai winters, so the only Hot stuffs that I prepared were – soups or fried items. The Foodie, who is from northern part of this country, had mentioned of having Hot Jilebis or Gulab Jamun during winters. He had brought this Ready Mix.

I’m too naive to prepare Jalebis from scratch, but even making them with the Mix was an experience to cherish. Homemade Jilebis are crunchy, soft and main is you can decide the sweetness.

Its quite easy to prepare –

Mix the content of the mix with the mentioned quantity of water. It should be a thick soft paste.
Add this to the Jilebi maker and prepare circular jilebis, like pretzels, in hot ghee. Fry this light golden.

Prepare a sugar syrup, boil it to make a thick consistency syrup. I used 1:1 measure of water and sugar.
Soak the fried Jalebis in the syrup for half a minute. Remove it immediately before it turns soggy. It turns dark golden. You can add food colour to get the right colour.

We had it hot, garnished them with some dry fruits – almonds, cashews, walnuts and pistachios. Few of them were somewhat chewy but most were crunchy and crispy with the crystallized sugary exterior coating.

Jilbi-Jalebi-Jilebi, whatever you call it was the only sweet I used to have as a kid, so when I prepared this @ home today, I loved it. If you like this sweet, you should try preparing this with the Mix.

Happy Cooking Guys !

Tilgul

2011-01-17T07:00:00.001+05:30

Ghya … Godd Godd Bola :)

Translates to “Eat Tilgul…talk sweet”, Maharashtrians celebrate Makar Sankrant by greeting families, friends with this tagline. And we prepare this sweet ladoos on this occasion, made of sesame seeds and jaggery. It was once again one of my first attempts at trying out this alone, it went fine with nearly 50 Ladoos.

They might not have come out perfect – but I was proud of them :)

You Need:

Sesame Seeds – 1/4kg esp. for Ladoos ask for – Polished Til
Jaggery – 1/4 kg esp. for Ladoos ask for – Chikkicha Gul

Roasted Chana Dal – 2-3 tbsp
Crushed Peanuts – 3-5 tbsp
Ghee – 2-3 tbsp

You Do:

Roast the Til on a Hot Wok, they turn light golden and fluff a bit.
Add Ghee in Non-stick Wok, follow with Jaggery.
Melt the jaggery to dark Red colour, turns to thick liquid consistency.
Add Til, Crushed Peanuts and Chana Dal to this. Mix immediately so that all seeds are covered with jaggery.
Cover and switch of the flame in 1 min.
Remove from stove and when still warm start rolling the thick mix to small balls.

Me and The Foodie started the rolling and within ten minutes we completed 50 Ladoos :D

Quite simple and very good for this Cold Weather. Distribute among your friends, neighbours and colleagues with the First Line greeting :)

Egg Salad Toast

2011-01-13T01:00:00.000+05:30

Egg salad is one of the most balanced diet salad , it has high-proteins and low-carbohydrates seasoned with spices of your choice. This is often used as a sandwich filling, and that’s how I used my salad to give a special treat to my BRO.

I Indianized the sandwich with green chutney spread, then westernized it with heavy mayo spread and cheese slices. And toasted N-number of sandwiches and had a very heavy breakfast with family, on the first day of the year. :)

It’s a simple three step sandwich…

Butter the Brown Bread
Spread Green chutney and Mayonnaise
Fill the slice with Egg Salad and Cheese Slice

Done, toast it if you want else have it just like that with Ketchup. This goes to Akila’s “Dish name starts with E” event.

P.S: The green chutney was prepared with my harvested Mint Leaves, it turned much more tastier ;)

Egg Salad\Koshimbir

2011-01-10T07:00:00.000+05:30

I love experimenting with Eggs, they never disappoint me. >:D< My Mom used to prepare this simple healthy salad during our school time, but dunno by the time we’ve grown up this salad just lost its way. So when Mom was visiting me over the weekend, I was planning to prepare my Patent Cheesy Omelette, but she suggested me to try our Egg Koshimbir or Salad.

You Need:

Boiled Eggs: 4-5 – Peel and cut into big and small chunks
Capsicum: 1 small – chopped
Onion: 1 small – chopped
Tomato: 1 small – chopped
Green Chillies: 2 – minced
Coriander Leaves: fistful – chopped
Chaat Masala: 2tsp
Cumin Powder: 2tsp
Black Pepper: 2tsp – crushed\powdered
Salt to taste

You Do:

Single Liner: Mix everything mentioned above. And .. wait for it … wait for it … Done. :P

Very simple – typical Salad ishtyle recipe. Cut – Mix – Done :D Have it as a salad or as a stuffing in a Sandwich.

This goes to Pratibha and Pari’s “Only Salad” event.

Chaat Chutney

2011-01-06T12:00:00.000+05:30

As a kid, Chaat was just weekend special evening snack but today I have been having chaat nearly on daily basis. Today's working couples will agree on this, while returning home from work – having evening chaat is most accessible. To avoid this daily eat out I’ve decided to keep basic chaat ingredients on hand, so that I can prepare them whenever I want to.

To start off, I have prepared the basic ingredient – Meethi – Godd - Khatti Chutney, and stored in my Pantry.

You Need:

Jaggery (Gull) : 1/2 measure
Tamarind: 1/2 measure
Dates: 1 measure
Water: 2 measures
Salt to taste

You Do:

Mash dates, mince jaggery and chop tamarind into small pieces.
Mix everything mentioned above, boil the mixture for about 5-10 mins, in accordance with the required consistency.
Once it cools down, use a blender or grinder to make a smooth paste. Remove tamarind threads if any.

We had a Chaat Weekend, so used this Sweet chutney then, but now I have refrigerated it in one of my sauces bottles. Planning to use this chutney on daily basis for evening snack, like might just take some sprouts, boiled potatoes whip up this chutney and then garnish with Shev, it will taste awesome.

Happy Cooking and Posting about it ! :)

Sweet to start the Year

2011-01-03T07:00:00.000+05:30

Wanted to start this year with a Sweet Post, and for most Indians the Most Simple, Rich Sweet Snack is Besan Ladoo. I do not belong to a Sweet Tooth family, so sweets were prepared for Birthdays- Festivals-Celebrations. And my earliest memories of cooking any sweet @ home is helping MOM making these small balls from a warm muddle of Tup- Ghee and Flour.

This was my first attempt at preparing Ladoos alone from scratch. So measurements were teleconferenced by MOM, and with help of The Foodie who himself was very excited to prepare this, I call my first attempt a Success. ;) Ladoos did take their own position, changed their Circular Figure and flattened themselves after sitting for some time, but that was Thanks to the Ghee, you can reduce the quantity if you feel but then that would also make them less Rich.

You Need:

Gram flour (Besan) : 5 cups
Sugar – Finely Powdered : 1 1/2 – 2 cups
Ghee (Sajuk Tup) : 1 cup
Cardamom Powder: 1 tsp
Cashews \Almonds \ Raisins : in accordance with your taste – I used about 1/2 cup of all

You Do:

Heat Ghee in Kadai, Add sieved besan flour slowly.
Stir continuously and cook till fragrant besan changes its colour. I cooked this for about twenty minutes.
Grind Cashews and Almonds coarsely.
Add Cardamom powder and the coarse powdered cashews and almonds to the besan. I used single raisin in single Ladoo while moulding it but you can always mix it here.
Take it off the stove and follow with powdered sugar.
Mix well, and let it cool slightly, then with the warm mix start preparing small balls – Ladoos, with your palm. Its easy to mould them when warm, so call out anyone to help you out on this, yeah, most of the ladoos are courtesy to The Foodie.

Done ! Store in Tupperware – Air tight container. Ladoos can be served at any time, mostly we eat it as snack. But my Aajoba – grandpa used to have this as a Mukhshudhi – Sweet desert after lunch.

Enjoy and have a Sweet year ahead ! <:-P

Cookbook Show Off

2010-12-30T12:00:00.000+05:30

So when Divya mentioned about her “Show me you Cookbook” event, I thought if I could participate here, I could have a HUGE post Showing Off my N – Number of Cookbooks. I haven’t really counted these but I could christen my blog as 101 cookbooks soon :P

But after moving in, we haven’t opened Three Boxes filled with Books, where most of my cookbooks are, so I had only few of the cookbooks posing in my living room, all of them had couple of common things One – all are gifts from friends, either wedding gifts or house warming gifts, and Two – all are from SK – Sanjeev Kapoor :D

While posting this, the food blogger in me was shocked and amused that I’m not a regular cookbook Cook, this gave a definite Resolution to follow and keep for the up-coming year, will try my best to prepare atleast a single dish every month from my cookbook. I have only single post that too for a guest post from one of my cookbook.

So guys, remind me my resolution, if I forget it ;)

Chalo.. See ya in next year :-h

Colourful Pilaf

2010-12-28T07:00:00.000+05:30

Right, trying my next dish with the remaining colourful peppers. I just had to Google “Colourful Capsicum Rice”, and I find once again Nithya’s space at UNO. I had my family visiting us and wanted to prepare something very simple, yet royal looking and this was perfect.

Do visit her space, its quite an effortless and straightforward recipe. We all loved it, we had Chole –Bhatura still Chole- Rice combination overpowered it. Do try it next time.

Goes to Priya’s Bookmarked Tuesday. Happy Holidays !! <:-P

Live Farmville

2010-12-23T20:35:00.000+05:30

Many of us do have Kitchen Garden, which had been inspiring me for very long time, to start somewhere on this front. So when I was browsing a wonderful Hyderabadi blog – Zaiqa, I had bookmarked this brilliant informative post on Pudinah. So I started with…

Keeping few strands of Mint branches in a container filled with water, I changed the water in couple of days, and with say couple of weeks they were like this -

Then I planted them in one of the plastic container and with more couple of weeks they look like this -

I’ loving this satisfying experience, am just waiting to harvest these and use up in some chutney.Will let you all know, when I do it. :)

Will be trying to plant something new, and if it works obviously it will make an appearance on my blog :)

Pure Vegetarian Omelette

2010-12-20T10:14:00.000+05:30

I love Egg Omelette but I also love ~~Egg~~ Omelette. Confused ?? :-/ So was I, when I got to know that one of my favourite Omelette is Eggless. I’m referring to the vegetarian omelette, which is most commonly known as Tomato Omelette. Tomato and Gram flour is the main ingredient of this pancake, with added flavours of your choice.

The Foodie refers this as Besan Chilla, quite common in Northern part of our country, but in the chilla you don’t add veggies like tomato/onion. But you can always refer this as Tomato besan chilla :P .

You Need:

Tomatoes: 3 large
Onion: 1 Medium
Gram flour (Besan): 4-5 tbsp
Cumin powder: 2tsp
Coriander powder: 2tsp
Turmeric powder: ½tsp
Red chilli powder: ½tsp
Green Chillies: 2-3 medium
Salt to taste
Rice flour: 1tbsp (optional)
Semolina flour: 1tbsp (optional)
Coriander leaves: fistful
Oil
Water if required

You Do:

Mix everything mentioned above in BLUE. Mince it through Food processor.
Add water to give the required consistency to the batter.
Take a ladleful of batter and spread it on non-stick pan similar to dosa or pancake.
Use oil droplets if required so that it doesn’t stick to the pan.
Cook from both sides till light golden.

Done ! Serve with ketchup. This goes well as a fast heavy breakfast, as batter preparation is Adhoc and single omelette is cooked within couple of minutes. So Enjoy B-)

Paneer Tikka Dry

2010-12-13T18:54:00.000+05:30

@home.. doing nothing exciting.. bored of Ordering.. but craving for something interesting – what do u do ??? ….I browse blogs for something that can be prepared with whatever lies in my pantry. So I had colourful peppers and small piece of Paneer, and I thought of Paneer Tikka as a starter\snacks. 8->

Panner tikka, so when I stumbled on this recipe I just wanted to prepare it. Space like A Mad Tea Party – you trust it blindly, so I followed it to the T, except grilling part. Check her space for detailed recipe and below find the snaps for my version :)

Nearest to grilling comes - Roasting, so after marinating I roasted all the ingredients on a non-stick pan with minimal oil. It did cook perfect – it tasted better. But still the typical coaly look was missing. So I had no option but to heat the tikkas over the flame. But trust me tikkas turned out Awwweeesome (Barney style) ;)

We enjoyed the taste -the aroma -the feel – And now it holds a place in my guest menu. So whoever dares to drop by next will have these as starters.

We also had this as stuffing along with onion-tomato salad, quite similar to kati roll or paratha frankie.

Paneer Tikkas go as a starter to Nupur’s Holiday Buffet :)

Colourful WW

2010-12-09T12:01:00.000+05:30

B’day boy….

Wish you ~~RED YELLOW GREEN~~ COLOURFUL year ahead ….

:-* :-h

Dusky Dosa

2010-12-07T08:36:00.000+05:30

I knew ~~most~~ ALL of you might be knowing the Dal, but it was very new to me. White Urad dal is very common, regularly used either for tadka and obviously for Idli-dosa etc. But this Black Split Urad Dal was a whole new business for me.

I brought it by mistake for Dal Makhani, (we use whole black urad dal there). From then I’ve been trying to use this in one or other way, but in vain. Dal Tadka or Amti with black urad dal doesn’t attract me – it tastes bitter. So after a successful search for an apt recipe to use this, I landed at Nithya’s Black gram Dosa, and obviously I blindly followed her recipe and prepared this grey pancake. It is different from our regular dosa but the bitter taste is overpowered by its texture.

This goes to Priya’s Bookmarked Tuesdays.

Also goes to Priya’s other event – MLLA # 30, originally started by Susan.

I prepared the Dosa batter first time at home. I became nostalgic with the distinct urad dal flavoured scent, which used to fill up my home every weekend, thanks to regular south Indian weekend breakfasts by my Mom.

I still have loads of black dal still lying in my Pantry, if you all know any more recipes do share with me, Will try for sure :D

What’s here

2010-12-02T22:11:00.000+05:30

Burji Paav

2010-11-29T07:44:00.000+05:30

Are you an Eggeterian ??

If so which is your favourite dish? If I’m to answer this, I would say – there is no favourite dish with egg but any dish with egg is my favourite … confused :-/

I think Burji was one of the initial dishes which I learnt to prepare.

There is no learning required – it goes as a basic cooking knowledge. But I never had it with Paav, in my first organization Burji Paav was the only non-vegetarian dish served, and from then I fell in love with this combination. :">

You Need:

Eggs: 5 in number
Green chillies: 3-4 medium - sliced
Onion : 1 large or 2 medium – finely chopped
Cumin Seeds for tempering
Turmeric powder: ½ tsp
Red Chilli powder: ½ tsp (optional)
Oil for tempering
Coriander leaves for garnishing
Salt to taste

You Do:

Heat oil in kadai, temper with cumin seeds and follow with green chillies.
After spluttering is over, add onion. Sauté till golden.
Till that time , beat eggs to make a smooth paste. Mix turmeric powder + red chilli powder and salt to this paste and beat again.
Once onion seem half cooked add this beaten egg paste. Mix vigorously for couple of minutes. Look into it that the egg mix doesn’t stick to the base.
Let it cook and stir in between. When the egg paste looks granular with no sticky instance in it – Burji is done !

Garnish with coriander leaves and serve with hot buttered Paav. Butter the Paav and heat from both the sides on pan, till light brown. If you like Paav and Eggs individually you should like this combination.

Sending this to Pari’s Only Chaat Event.

Happy Cooking and Posting about it !! :-h

Green Peas Chutney

2010-11-24T22:18:00.001+05:30

After the first comment on my last post, it was Déjà vu .. remember my first guess post- All answers were right ??

Yeah.. the first comment was Right answer – Sushma and then few comments later Shubha and then Priya too… hit the Bulls Eye !! Yups… it is Green Peas Chutney ! >:D< Loved to see all comments, were quite varied :) Thanks guys!!

Had this chutney in G’s dabba, I loved it – bookmarked it in my mind and nearly after three months thought of preparing it. I cooked it for a dinner as a side dish for parathas and asked The Foodie its main ingredient. What he knows of me, he guessed everything from seeds-peels-remains of vegetable but not as – one of the major vegetable in one of the most famous side-dish in Indian cuisine – Aloo Matar or Matar Paneer. 8-}

You Need:

Green Peas: 1 cup
Green Chillies: 2-3 medium - minced
Mint Leaves: small bunchful – optional
Curry Leaves: 4-5 –optional
Sugar to taste
Ghee - tempering
Cumin Seeds - tempering
Lemon juice to taste

You Do:

Heat ghee in kadai – add cumin seeds, let it splutter.
Follow with curry leaves, green chillies, once spluttering is done follow all other ingredients.
Cook covered till peas are cooked well.
Cool it and grind to paste.

Chutney is done :)

Mild peas aroma makes this chutney pleasing, can pass off as peas spread or give a thicker one as alight stuffing or serve with parathas.

Sending this to Priya and Richa’s Veggie of the month event. Hope this is accepted as I’m a bit late for this event.

Guess…

2010-11-22T07:09:00.000+05:30

Guess the main ingredient of this light green chutney ??

Beetroot cutlet - Blood Coloured fritters

2010-11-18T07:06:00.000+05:30

I’m quite a fussy eater and as a kid I was more fussier. But my Mom is a smart lady, she used to prepare my favourite item with my not so favourite vegetable and I used to love it. Cutlet is such an item, mix anything in it but the final outcome is always adorable.

Beet Koshimbir\Raita\Salad was common at my place, though I love this salad today then as a kid I used to dodge it. So Mom used to prepare these Beet Cutlets and me and my BRO loved this – Blood Coloured fritters.

You Need:

Beet: 2 medium – pressure cooked – grated
Potato: ½ - boiled – mashed \ OR you can use bread slices too
Coriander leaves : handful - minced
Green Chillies: 2-3 medium – minced
Cumin Powder: 1tsp
Coriander Powder: 1tsp
Flour (Maida) or Cornstarch or corn flour: 1tbsp
Semolina flour: 1tbsp
Salt to taste
Sugar to taste
Oil to shallow fry

You Do:

Mix everything in BLUE.
Make small balls and flatten them into cutlet shapes.
Shallow fry till cooked from both sides.

Serve it with ketchup or just like that. Would love the soft insides with the crispiness in between.

Happy Cooking and Blogging about it :)

Radish green Snacks

2010-11-16T07:06:00.000+05:30

How do you use Radish Leaves ?

Whenever I buy Radish, I plan to use them in one or other way, but I’ve observed they turn yellow- get dried up quite early, by next day. So this time I kept Meera’s Muthiya recipe ready, and started on this dish as soon as Radish were in my kitchen.

I had prepared Methi Muthiya then and we loved it, so I repeated similar procedure with help of Meera’s recipe.

Taste wise I did not find much difference between the two, they are crispy - spicy and masaledaar, as usual ;)

We had it with chutney and ketchup. We had Citrus Blue drink along with these fried snacks – we need such cool drinks especially during October heat. We loved the overall combination.

This bookmarked recipe goes to Priya’s Bookmarked Tuesday.

Picture Post with Worded Wednesday

2010-11-10T21:15:00.001+05:30

I was not in a celebration mood, but colourful shops, attractive decorative stuffs pestered me to try my hands on doing something related to the festive season. We had couple of Diwali holidays so thought of utilizing it to do something ~~creative~~ experimental.

Me and The Foodie bought these

And I painted them to look like these

When I ran out of decent ideas, out came the cartoons on Diyas

Then we thought of preparing a Lantern – Akash Kandil, so we brought these

Had no idea what to prepare till we prepared this skeleton

The skeleton and our paper colours suited for Flower

So does it look like one .... say Lotus :P

Here is the final click with both Diyas and Kandil together.

I have many clicks of different stuffs not necessary related to Food, but am planning to post these as “Wordless Wednesdays”, the Photographed Wednesday tradition in blogosphere. So this Wednesday was a Worded one but still a picture post, hope to post many such Wednesday posts.

Mathri - North Indian Pharal

2010-11-04T07:43:00.001+05:30

Heard of Cosmo Diwali, that’s how we might celebrate it. The Foodie has his inputs and I’ve mine, we conveniently modify both in accordance with our moods-likes-interests. So after preparing Chivda, I had planned Shankarpali – sweet or savoury diamonds – we were discussing the preparations when The Foodie found this very similar to one of his Marwadi style Pharal – Mathri.

This is totally The Foodie’s recipe – quite similar to Savoury Shakarpali – a bit easier as you don’t have to cut them in any specific shapes. Even this Pharal can be prepared by the basic pantry ingredients. I had not planned this to go on blog, so didn’t click any snaps earlier, but you can see the end output.

You Need:

Flour(Maida): 2 cups
Semolina Flour(Rava): ½ cup
Carom seeds (Ajwain): 2tsp
Black Pepper: 2tsp - Crushed
Baking powder: pinch
Ghee\Vegetable Oil: 4tbsp – Warm- while kneading
Ghee\Vegetable Oil – for deep frying
Salt to taste

You Do:

Mix everything in BLUE, remember to use hot ghee – knead the dough start with spoon till the ghee is warm then with hands. Knead to stiff dough.
Let it stand for about 15-20 minutes.
Roll these to small puri shapes either with roll-pin or with hands. The Foodie rolled these with palms.
Use fork to prick pores into these mathris.
Deep fry them in ghee or vegetable oil on medium flame, we used ghee.
Remove when these are light golden and they turn light brown once they are out of heated ghee.

Done ! Let them cool, then store in air tight container. They turned out well – crispy and soft.I think if we had used roll-pin then these might have turned more like papdi but we liked it this way.

Chivda- simplest Pharal

2010-11-01T07:27:00.000+05:30

Festive time, we smell a typical Pharal fragrance from most of the homes these days. Pharal is the Marathi word for the sweet or savoury goodies prepared especially for Diwali. This year I thought of trying my hand on few of the simple goodies. And this weekend I started with chivda.

Chivda is the simplest of Pharals to prepare – you can say a roasted version of Pohe. Most of the ingredients used are freely available in pantry and yeah, you can prepare this within twenty minutes. I prepared it for the first time, but now I think I’ll prepare this on regular basis for savoury snacks.

You Need :

Thin Poha: 1/4 kg
Green Chillies: 4-5 Large ones – split and cut in small pieces
Curry Leaves: about 20-25
Mustard Seeds: 2tsp
Cumin Seeds: 1tsp

Turmeric Powder: 1tsp
Red Chilli Powder: 1/2tsp
Cashews: fistful
Raisins: fistful
Peanuts: fistful
Roasted Chana Dal: fistful
salt to taste
sugar to taste

You Do:

Heat Oil in a Huge Kadai, add Mustard Seeds followed by Cumin seeds. (Kadai – should be wide and huge enough to stir all the items easily)
Once they splutter – follow with Curry Leaves and Green chillies.
Add the items in Blue, fry them till half cooked.
Add the Poha and mix with the spice mix till its covered with spices.

Roast till all Poha turns crispy – about 15 minutes.

Done, keep it open till it cools down. Don’t keep in hot kadai else the bottom ones might turn red, use a flat thali to cool it. Store in air tight container. C for Chivda goes to “Dish Name Starts with C” event hosted by Akila.

Happy Diwali guys… have a safe and lovely festive season.

French Beans Patties

2010-10-26T08:19:00.000+05:30

French Beans – pharasbi, was never my favourites. So last time when I was bored of it to prepare our regular sabzi, I searched for varied ways to use these up. And now I know, along with noodles and rice I can use in salads, sandwiches and in patties.

I had bookmarked Nupur’s Farazbi Patties, long long long back – yeah virtually in history when I had not even started blogging.(I’m not stalking you Nupur, but truely I’ve too many bookmarks from your lovely space ;) ).

But I prepared these patties just couple of months back and I loved them, they were spicy, soft and crispy too.

Quite simple to prepare – covering consists of Boiled Potatoes and the stuffing French Beans Masala. I did no change to the original version, so Log on to Nupur’s space for detailed recipe and check out the my pictorial version :D

Enjoy with ketchup.. or just like that !!

This goes to Priya’s Bookmarked Tuesday… check out what other bloggers have posted this Tuesday.

Bookmarked Tuesday

2010-10-05T07:37:00.000+05:30

I haven’t really followed Priya’s Bookmarked Tuesdays till now, but I liked the idea as it will push us to cook our bookmarked recipes. I’ve too many snaps of the dishes that I’ve tried from others but never posted them. So I might use this opportunity to post these drafts on Tuesdays.

Pumpkin was solely used for “Bhoplyacha Bharit” – Pumpkin Raita/salad @ my place. Don’t know the reason but we never indulged in any type of sabzi-curry with this vegetable. So I had bookmarked this THIS recipe when Nupur had praised this dry vegetable.

It had been months that I had clicked this snap, we have tried this recipe number of times from then, we love the sweet-spicy-soft sabzi. Goes well with chapatis\phulkas. Do give it a try.

2010-09-30T21:13:00.001+05:30

12th August 2010.

Just five months of failed Fight against Cancer, we tried, he tried more, but trying doesn’t succeed always. Destiny had other plans.

Love you Pappa… Miss you More !

too many memories … very few words

One of our favourite Marathi song… which we heard together numerous times in last few months.

How to use up Stale Bread - Part 2

2010-07-29T07:28:00.000+05:30

Part Two /:) … it’s not a series going on here, just that I prepared couple of dishes using up few of stale slices of ~~expensive~~ Multigrain Bread which was lying in my refrigerator for a more than a week. And I posted one here followed by Part Two now:P

I had bookmarked Nupur’s soup which used up the stale bread ,on similar lines I prepared this Tomato Bread Soup. Using up stale bread is different from the bread crumbs,as the first one gives the thickness to the soup while the other one crunchiness.

The Foodie had been suffering from cold n cough for quite a long time, so this was a good reason for me to try out this soup (so what if it had “stale” bread..its a secret between US.. let him realize it when he reads this.. if he would :P)

You Need:

Stale Bread: 2 slices– Cubed
Tomato: 2 - Pureed
Onion\green onion: 1-2 small - grinded
Garlic cloves: 2 - grinded
Spring Onion: 2 stalks - shredded
Chilli flakes: 2-3 tsp – I used Pizza deliverable – 2 sachets.
Oregano: 2-3 tsp – I used Pizza deliverable – 2 sachets.
Cheese: grated – as per taste
Water \Vegetable Stock: 1 – as per the liquidly you need – I used ½ cup drinking water
Salt and Pepper: to taste
Butter: to sauté

You Do:

Sauté Paste of Onion + garlic in the butter, till it softens and loses its raw smell.
Add Chilli flakes + Oregano, follow with tomato Puree and vegetable stock\water.
Let it simmer for couple of minutes. Add spring onion + salt+ pepper.
When the soup is done add the bread slice cubes.

Serve hot with grated cheese.

Monsoon Evening and a hot soup…what else would we need :D

How to use up Stale Bread – Part 1

2010-07-26T07:58:00.000+05:30

Part One /:) … it’s not a series going on here, just that I prepared couple of dishes using up few stale slices of ~~expensive~~ Multigrain Bread which was lying in my refrigerator for a more than a week. And I plan to post them in two posts so Part One :P

So how do you use up Stale Bread?

If by any chance you throw it, please do not do it the next time. Bread is a good adherer so I normally use it in a Tikki, tomato omelette or thalipeeth.

I experimented with this weird dish which can be christened as “Omelette Thalipeeth”, as the final output looked like a hybrid between Thalipeeth and Omelette. Ignore the prehistoric snap of my poor omelette but this is my regular omelette. I crumbled the stale bread along with the other ingredient in this and so newborn “Omelette Thalipeeth” was born. 8->

You Do:

Mix Capsicum +Onion+ Green chillies + Crumbled bread+salt + Pepper + Egg.
Beat Vigorously – Mostly it should look like sticky dough.
Heat the pan and add butter. Spread the Mix evenly into a round shape with spatula.
Cook both the sides till light brown.

Done! Have it simply with ketchup. If you are a cheese fan then garnish with whole lot of cheese. I loved this experiment and knew it should go on my blog.

It always gives a great deal of gratification when I use up something which was supposed to be a leftover or a waste. When I prepared Jackfruit Seeds Sabzi or ridge gourd peel chutney or Snake gourd Seeds chutney, gave me immense satisfaction that I avoided throwing stuffs.

On similar lines my cousin G has posted Bitter gourd and Pumpkin Peel chutney. Do check out.

Jackfruit Seeds

2010-07-21T06:50:00.001+05:30

How do you feel.. when you are the LAST ONE to Know that

One of your common friend had an affair with one of your other friend

OR

Team member resigned couple of weeks back and today is his last day

Yes, whenever I belong to this “LAST to know” group I feel .. I feel … I feel the same way I felt couple of days back when :-q

I thought only I knew what that those weird-almond looking seeds Are…and No-one can guess my complicated Guessing game and Guess What ?? All of the foodies who commented Guessed Right !!! =D>

Yay !! So I do declare all of you as the Ardent Foodies … dhan tana ….. >:D<

These are insides of jackfruit seeds, Crush the seeds remove the while part and they look like this.

I had no idea that these are edibles, so when one of my colleague mentioned that we can prepare a sabzi with these I planned to buy the jackfruit just to prepare this. She mentioned that you can cook these as any potato side dish.

So I turned to my favourite potato dish – Kaptyachi bhaji, prepared this too on similar lines with couple of changes. Can check the detailed recipe there.

As this was a total experiment from my side I’m not mentioning any exact proportions but I did the following:

Crushed the bowlful of jackfruit seeds and separated the white crust and brown almond shaped inner seeds. These brown seeds are edible.
Pressure cook these seeds for couple of whistles or till they are soft. (is there any apt culinary word for Shiiti = whistle?? if so do let me know :P )
Cut these into small pieces and now I used these as the replacement of potatoes in my Kaptyachi Bhaji or as follows.
Heat Oil in an open Kadai – temper with Asafoetida, Mustard Seed, Curry Leaves. Follow with dry masalas Red Chilli powder, Turmeric Powder and Sambhar Powder.
Add the Jackfruit seeds to this and cover and cook till soft.
Add some jaggery + salt at the end, sauté till jaggery melts. Cook till pieces are light brown and covered with masalas.

Garnish with coriander leaves. Serve with hot chapatis or phulkas. We had it with masala rice and kadhi.

These seeds blend quite well with the masala taste, quite similar to potatoes but on a sweeter side.

(Normally I don’t have extra notes for the recipe but as this was my experimental dish and I had an observation which needs a separate mention as Note or P.S .)

P.S.:Though I pressure cooked the seeds there still were few hard or uncooked ones, and I realised that later. So do consider this, and I would suggest either you can pressure cook it the way I did with couple of whistles more or you can also directly cook in the pressure cooker.

Do tell me how you prepare these, as I’m quite new to these seeds. ;;)

Guess What ?

2010-07-19T07:33:00.001+05:30

With so many guessing games going on… let me try one … Guess this !

No prize but if you do.. I will declare you an Ardent Foodie, cos this is not at all Easy.

I prepared something that looked liked this with that :

It is a simple dry sabzi which we had it with simple Masala Rice and Kadhi.

So put on your thinking caps and tell me … what do you really think is this.

Desert to Savoury – Indianized Toast

2010-07-15T21:37:00.001+05:30

Did you know…. French Toast was formerly a Desert, or for that matter it still might be a sweet dish in many parts of this world. And I got to know this nearly after two decades of my life when I was working at the other corner of the world. I was amused when a whole lot of sugar syrup was served with my favourite breakfast. I personally prepare our savoury style Toast and as that's how I’ve know ~~French~~ Indian Toast for long. ;)

Yes, this is how we ADAPT a foreign recipe and Indianize it as our own !

You Need:

Eggs: 2
Slice Bread: 4
Green chillies: 2 medium – chopped finely
Onion\ Spring Onion: 2 small – chopped finely
Cheese: grated – qty as per taste
Turmeric and Red Chilli powder: 1/2 tsp if required
Salt to taste

You Do:

Beat both the eggs vigorously. Mix everything in BLUE.
Dip the slice breads in the mix and shallow fry on a pan with butter. Light brown it from both sides.

Serve with ketchup\sauce.

Happy Cooking and Posting about it.

SHA – SHO or CHA – CHO uKa

2010-07-13T07:04:00.001+05:30

Internet still ON-OFF.. :(, will trying to be back fulltime soon, till then one of my long lying draft :)

After you start food blogging you tend to bookmark too many recipes and always plan to try them sometime soon. I bookmark recipes for various reasons, most of the times to try out the innovative flavours of the dish but there are other reasons too; like if I get fond of the drooling visual snaps or even if the write-up of the post interests me or if I’m amused with the name of the recipe.

Yeah, I’ve handful of recipes bookmarked only cos of its witty names.

One of such was ShakShouka, nothing weird about this but to many SHA – SHO or CHA – CHO while pronouncing, which pleased me enough to bookmark this African dish. I found it initially @ Yasmeen later @ Faiza… it’s a Tunisian dish - quite a new area for me.

I followed Yasmeen’s recipe, Faiza has added Potatoes and eggplant which I didn’t have else both the recipes are on similar lines.

I loved the Onion, tomato and Green Pepper base sauce for the eggs. I added green chillies and black pepper to it, which made the overall dish quite spicy.

We had it with Toasted Slice Bread; it was supposed to be Brunch but turned much heavier than a normal weekend Lunch.

Thanks girls for sharing such a diverse and appetizing recipe.

Talking about clicks……

2010-06-29T19:28:00.001+05:30

I had typed this last week but due to internet darkness at my place for last EIGHT days….couldn’t post then.. hence the delay ..

One Fine Day, am having a Pleasant Lunch with Office Gals – Bitching, chit –chatting, commenting and suddenly I was shocked!! We have this presentation going on in one of our Café corner with upcoming special Menu – there was this Menu popping out in the slides with their pictures and what do I see???? (!!!)

Yeah ... the Solkadi was presented by my – Personal Tadka’s Solkadi snap !!

First I was stunned cos I have never given my blog personally to anyone – especially no one from Work! OR neither have I expected anyone from typical IT Company to ~~follow~~ ~~read~~ take a look at my Blog. So the shocked version of me complained to one of my work friend – (who is least interested in my blog) “How my own colleagues used my snap and never asked me”;

His reply was more shocking “Who is going to go through the blog to search a snap (!!) – they must have Googled”. My reaction to this unkind answer was “Hello People love my blog (Don’t they? Please say Yes (!!))”

But that’s true, I grant my colleagues cos when I searched for Solkadi; Google images did show my snap among some toppers. This also gave me weird satisfaction that my Solkadi must have looked most refreshing among all the other Toppers as that was flicked – So maaf kar diya ;)

Now Talking about snaps … How do you find these ???

Before

After

Which ones better LEFT or RIGHT ?? ;)

Check out the Details @ Deepa’s here;

Once again Thanks a ton Deepa for the wonderful opportunity as a guest blogger !!

Flour Finisher Dosa

2010-06-21T20:05:00.003+05:30

Nupur’s BB#4 wouldn’t have been better timed!

From last couple of weeks - till this month end we are\will be cooking while pantry cleaning. Why?

Cos we are Moving from our Rental Home to a place which we could call OUR HOME <:-P yay !! Yeah... So if you missed me around then this is the reason... I’ve not been getting any time to blog hop :( … Too many formalities... mortgage documentation... packing and most importantly day dreaming 8-> ... this has been keeping me too busy nowadays! #:-S

So currently I had been finishing my pantry items… all of my lunches – dinners can go for BB# 4 as they are using everything that’s been lurking in my kitchen for last 15 months! Infact The Foodie has warned me – that my Waste-o-phobia might food poison us – as I’ve been using nearly everything which ~~is near to its~~ has crossed its expiry date. #-o

I’m ashamed .. sorry.. but it seemed fine.. hence used it :(:(:( cancelled the name as no branding involved…

Statutory Warning:: Do not try this until you have confidence about your immune system. X_X

These were the flour remnants; I had couple of such packs lying and had been planning to use them for one or the other recipe. I wanted to use these before moving and Preeti’s Rava Dosa recipe came to my rescue. Infact the buttermilk is also prepared from the curd which was more than couple of weeks old (as curd normally gets over within a couple of days…this was lying long enough for its breed) :P

I tried this recipe as it used up all my flour leftovers and also cos I had never tried Rava Dosa at home till now.

Snaps show that the Dosa doesn’t really look like the typical Rava Dosa but tasted PERFECT! I followed the recipe and also the video for the preparation – I guess practice will make this look better.

Thanks Preeti for the recipe and video which helps out amateurs like me. Thanks to you we had a healthy – filling and crispy breakfast :)

Palak Paneer

2010-06-17T22:21:00.001+05:30

I had not planned to post any Paneer recipe with my homemade paneer, but when Priti mentioned that she is looking forward for one in her comment, I clicked last minute snaps of Palak Paneer – the most common Paneer and also Palak recipe.

Paneer was not a common dish @ my place, it was only bought when we had to prepare some royal recipe for our vegetarian guests, and Mom’s common recipe was Matar Paneer. So palak paneer or other favourite of mine Paneer Burji were something that became regular after I did some trials with these. As this was one of the initial experiments; I’ve tried varied versions, and ended up with following recipe as my favourite and most reliable one.

You Need:

Fresh Spinach Leaves: about 2C
Cottage Cheese: about ¼ kg or the one that might give you about 15 number of an inch pieces
Ghee\Oil: for shallow frying and tempering
Cloves: 2
Cardamom: 1
Black Pepper corns: 4-5
Cumin Seeds: 1tsp
Onion: 1Large – grinded to past
Tomato: 1 medium - pureed
Ginger + Garlic + Green Chillies Paste: 3 tbsp
Turmeric powder: ½ tsp
Red Chilli powder: 1 tsp
Sugar: about 1 tsp
Salt to taste

You Do:

Wash Spinach Leaves under whole lot of water couple of times blanch them with little water salt and sugar for five minutes or so. When done – let them cool off.
Once cooled – grind to smooth paste.
In flat pan heat ghee, temper with cumin seeds and shallow fry the Paneer pieces, till they are light brown from both sides.
Heat Kadai , add ghee – temper with cloves + black pepper + Cardamom , follow with ginger + garlic + chilli paste.
Add Onion paste to it – sauté to caramelize them. Follow with tomato paste.
Add red chilli + turmeric and after frying for couple of minutes add the spinach paste. Add salt if you need more. (normally palak has its own salty taste so take care while adding salt)
Sauté till oil separates – add paneer pieces. Cook covered for couple of minutes.

Done. Serve with hot Rotis or Jeera Rice.

I love its dark green colour with mix of white cheese in between; we had this as our lunch Tiffin.

The Finish Off Sandwich

2010-06-15T19:04:00.001+05:30

Most Saturday Mornings you will see Me and The Foodie assembling varied types of Sandwiches as our Brunch. The only stuffs go in for these sandwiches are – Fresh Bread + all the half vegetable remains from the week. Among these potatoes and boiled egg are the common ingredients and others are the left over or long time to be used up vegetables.

We had this boiled beetroot lying from the raita last week and so we prepared this Red stuffing Sandwich with Beetroot as its main component. You can change this main vegetable in accordance to your choice or the one you have. We have replaced this with Green Peas , Cabbage and Carrot till now , do tell me what else do you find suitable to go with this stuffing?? /:)

Mix up Vegetable Toast Sandwich

You Need:

Bread slices of your choice: about 6
Butter – to apply as spread
Mayonnaise – to apply as spread
Cheese Slices or Grated Cheese
Potatoes: One large or two medium – boiled, peeled and mashed
Beetroot: One – boiled, peeled and mashed\grated
Onion: 1 – finely chopped
Egg: 1-2 boiled and mashed
Green Chillies: 2-3 finely minced
Chaat Masala: 2-3 tbsp
Pepper: 1-2 tbsp
Salt to taste

You Do:

It cannot get any simpler, Mix everything in BLUE.
Apply butter and mayo on the bread slices then the stuff the stuffing.
If you are using grated cheese then mix with the stuffing else use half a cheese slice for one sandwich.
Toast\grill the sandwich as you like it.

We had this with spicy ketchup – loved this Quite filling Brunch!

Kitchen Property Stove Bread Toaster

I have this inherited Stove Toaster – yeah Moms mom had given it to her and me convincingly dhopofied stole from my Mom. :ar! I love this stove toaster better than the current electric one we have at Mom’s place – may be cos we can manually decide how crunchy or brown we want the slices to be – else the electric one directly tells up to change the slices in accordance with its time and heat.

This is my favourite sandwich maker till now!

So what’s up with the Toaster you all use??

Homemade Cottage Cheese

2010-06-10T18:34:00.001+05:30

Homemade adj. means Made or prepared in the home OR Made by oneself OR Crudely or simply made.

Long long time back this word might not have existed as mostly everything was homemade :P But today we do say – this cake is homemade or homemade ginger-garlic paste. Even I thought of trying my hand on something homemade – Paneer.

Till the time you try something at home you have no idea how simple it is! And it does give soothing satisfaction that you prepared something that you normally spend an hefty amount on.

Homemade Paneer – Cottage Cheese

You Need:

Milk: 2 litres
Lemon juice \Vinegar: about 10 tbsp (I used both)

You Do:

Boil Milk in a huge base yok, stir in between so that milk doesn’t stick to the base.
As the milk starts to boil add Lemon juice slowly while stirring.
This separates the curd from the whey (the remain milk is called so .. learnt from wiki)
Drain out the whey with help of clean muslin cloth, press out the excess water. (This drained whey can be used for kneading wheat flour\rice\noodles – I added to prepare noodles)
Keep this drained curd with the cloth under a heavy stone for about one hour.
Then refrigerated this paneer immediately.

We normally have this extra couple of litres of milk on weekly basis. Most of the time we indulge in extra curd\buttermilk or some sweet dish like basundi\rabdi. But after today’s trial I feel I can use up this for Paneer, which later can be used up for some special delicacy :)

How do you use up your extra milk ??

HIS Department - Fritters

2010-06-06T22:30:00.001+05:30

Typical Indian Marriage talks – Groom side people asking the; To Be Bride – “Do you know cooking honey?” OR “What all do you know in cooking?”

During my marriage it was a bit different when one of my In Law side aunts mentioned “Don’t worry about cooking dear – He cooks very well - and for what he doesn’t know you can order or hire a BAI”. At that time I didn’t find this topic of much importance but when we started cooking together I felt left out; He Seriously did cook ~~better~~ much better than me, not that I complain infact I find this very handy :P

To be frank he cooks what he loves – so anything fried is his department. Honestly till do date I haven’t fried anything as I really can’t stand the oily heat, but that’s Okay we have our Handy Man – The Foodie :P so one of the weekends when he prepared Dudhi Koftas – He fried the fritters while I prepared a zatpat gravy for it – I don’t believe this is an authentic Kofta curry but something you can make together in quick ten minutes ;)

I clicked the snaps then which now can go to Priti’s HIS Cooking event.

You Need:

Koftas – Dudhi Fritters:

Bottle gourd: 1 medium – peeled and grated
Green chilies: 2 finely chopped
Coriander + cumin Powder: 2 tsp
Red chili powder: 1 tsp
Turmeric powder: 1 tsp
Gram flour: about 3-4 tbsp
Rice flour – Rava: 1-2 tbsp (optional – The Foodie used this for some crispyness)
Coriander Leaves: Fistful – finely chopped
Dry Mango Powder to taste
Asafetida: pinch
Soda Bicarbonate: pinch
Salt to taste
Oil to Deep Fry

For Kofta Curry:

Onion: 1 medium – grinded to paste
Tomato: 2 small – grinded to puree
Ginger + Garlic + Green chillies paste: 2tbsp
Red chili powder: 1 tsp
Turmeric powder: 1 tsp
Garam Maslaa to taste
Cumin Seeds: 1 tsp
Oil to temper
Salt to taste

You Do:

Koftas – Dudhi Fritters:

Mix everything under the Fritter section – to make a thick rough paste enough to make fritters. The consistency should be right – can add a bit of water if you find this dry or gram flour if you find this watery. Adjust the salt accordingly.
Heat oil in a Kadai – Deep fry the fritters to light brown on medium flame.

For Kofta Curry:

Heat Oil in Kadai – add Cumin Seeds, follow by Ginger + Garlic + Green chillies paste.
Saute Onion paste to caramelize it. Add tomato puree and salt and sauter for couple of minutes.
Follow with Red Chilli powder and turmeric powder.
Cover and cook till tomato loses its raw smell.
Just couple of minutes before switching of the flame; add garam masala. Done with the quick normal onion tomato gravy.

I do not like adding the pakodas in gravy for long time, so I prefer having it or serving this gravy as a sause to the fritters – this keeps the crispy nature intact and gives a soft feel to it too.

We had it with Phulkas, and few pakodas with Sause – total fried weekend :D

Phobia leads to Seeds Chutney

2010-06-02T21:12:00.001+05:30

Wiki explains Phobia as -- A phobia (from the Greek: φόβος, phóbos, meaning "fear" or "morbid fear") are groups of anxiety disorders characterized by intense and persistent fear of certain situations, activities, things, animals, or people.

So I conclude I have Food-Waste-Phobia (only if that was the word) /:) yeah, I fear to waste ~~food~~ anything that is edible. I get cranky and act weird if I had to forcibly squander anything but I do prefer using them in one way or other.

Remember my Shiralachya Salichi chutney - Ridge gourd edges Chutney, yes there are many such dips we can prepare with remains of our main vegetable. One of such is this – Padvalchya beeanchi chutney – Chutney with Snake gourd Seeds. Frankly these give a very different taste to our regular green chutneys.

Snake Gourd Seeds Chutney

You Need:

Snake Gourd seeds: about 15
Green Chillies: 2-3 (increase for the spiciness)
Sesame Seeds: 2-3 tbsp – to temper
Tamarind pulp: about 1 tsp
Jaggery pulp: about 1 tsp
Mint Leaves: about 5 (optional)
Oil for tempering
Salt to taste

You DO:

Temper the “to temper” seeds in oil (take care while tempering sesame seeds- they tend to fly off – cover immediately)then follow other ingredients one by one except the pulp.
Roast them till they turn light brown.
When done, let it stand for some time to cool – add the pulp.
Grind the mix in a mixer - add water in accordance with the consistency required.

Done! Enjoy as chutney or spread on breads.

This Snake Gourd Seed chutney goes to Preeti’s Green Gourmet Event.

Falafel – Indianized version of the crispy balls

2010-05-28T17:45:00.001+05:30

Fal-a-Fel = Fruit-A-Fruit... literal translation in Hindi, was a flying joke while our group of friends had these fried balls at one of the NYC stalls. We seriously thought that some kind of fruit went into these and we loved them then 8-| ; till I got familiar with the Food Blog World I was quite unknown to the fact that these are simple fritters made of Chickpeas. I tried it over the weekend, it turned out very well, we loved this Mediterranean yet Indianized version of crispy balls.

You Need :

Chickpeas\chana: Soaked Overnight
Onion: 1 medium
Coriander Leaves: fistful
Ginger-Garlic Paste: 1 tsp
Green Chillies: 2 minced
Cumin powder: 1 tsp
Black Pepper: 1 tsp - crushed
Fennel or Carom Seeds: 1 tsp
Chickpeas flour: about 3 tbsp
Oil for Deep frying
Salt to taste

You Do:

Mix everything in BLUE, in food processor and make rough thick paste.
Mix Salt, then add Chickpeas flour to thicken it.
Heat Oil for deep frying in an open pan, make small balls of the thick batter and fry them till light brown.

Done!! This is normally served with Tahini or Hummus (I got to know this too from Food Blog World), I feel the Mayonnaise also falls in the same league we had it with Mayo and Spicy Sauce. Trust me these balls are very heavy, so don’t be “Bhukkad” gluttonous like me and limit them to 4-5 in one serving :P (we had this chana bloated tummy for long time @-) )

Sending this to Susan’s My Legume Love Affair # 23.

Bookmarked Launji

I tumbled upon a very nice blog – Mharo Rajasthan Recipes couple of weeks back and already I’ve bookmarked nearly dozen of her drooling recipes. I found this blog quite distinguishing with very diverse types of collection of recipes, especially the Rajasthani ones which are truly quite hard to find.

I had brought Raw Mango to prepare long time due – Uditmethi but the snap of – Kairi Ki Launji, made me change the mind. I was introduced to the “Kalonji Seeds” for the first time here we had this sour and spicy side dish as a chutney-pickle. We loved it – Thanks Priya !!

Happy Cooking and Posting about it !

Pappa’s Patent Saturday Special

2010-05-22T07:35:00.001+05:30

I’ve been brought up in a culture where Dad being in kitchen is NOT ~~weird~~ ~~awkward~~ unbelievable. Its a very regular scene where every morning My Dad does all the cutting and readying up the vegetable and in his words –

“Mummy la fakt phodni deychi ahe :P ” (Mom has to just temper the vegetable, everything else has been handled).

Along with the weekday help; Saturdays were dedicated for his experiments, yeah... Saturday Lunch was Pappa Special. I wouldn’t go overboard with stating that he is a great cook but his culinary skills are sufficed for our Lunch. He prepares decent simple veggies and his patent is Kaptyachi Bhaji (Simple Potato Vegetable).

So when I was noting my Mom’s specialty; I recollected my Pappa’s Saturday Special too and though very simple always knew it had to go on my Blog !!

Kaptyachi Bhaji - Simple Potato Sabzi

You Need:

Potatoes: 3 medium - Peeled
Oil: To temper
Asafoetida: To temper
Mustard Seeds: To temper
Curry Leaves: 3-4 in number – To temper
Red Chilli powder: 1 tsp
Turmeric Powder: ½ tsp
Sambhar Powder: 1 tbsp
Sugar to taste
Salt to taste

You Do:

Cut the potatoes the way you prefer – thinly sliced or Pappa used V-Slicer to give it French Fries Look.
Heat Oil in Kadai – Add the tempering stuffs.
Follow with sliced Potatoes + salt + Powder Masalas mentioned.
Add sugar if required.Mix thoroughly then cover and cook.

Done. Stir in between so that the potatoes don’t stick to the base. I love a bit reddish tinge so I purposefully allow it to half stick to the Kadai then remove it.

Garnish with coriander leaves, use lemon wedge before serving.Goes great with Phulkas or Dal Rice. As you can finish this off within Twenty Mins; this goes to Nilofer’s Twenty-20 event.

V- Slicer

This is one of my oldest property – My Mom had given this when I left for US for the first time about 5 years back. I had not used this before that but had seen her chop everything quite fast. From then I use this nearly for everything – slicing – chopping- mincing. The variety of blades give you the option.

The shown blades – large ones give French fries type of slices while the other one gives very thin slices – can be used for finely chopping the veggies. So Do you use these ??

Happy Cooking and Posting about it !!

Cake .. Pudding or what ?

2010-05-15T17:57:00.001+05:30

Yay !!! Congratulate me, I just ~~baked~~ refrigerated my first ~~Cake~~ Pudding (As Namitha puts it). Whatever it is I We Loved it !

One of my co-SIL had mentioned about this recipe quite long back but I totally forgot about it till I saw it here. (Look out for the details in the original recipe) I planned to prepare it over the weekend and brought Marie biscuits as mentioned but totally forgot about the Cocoa Powder; and so at the last moment thought of substituting it with molten Chocolate bar.So this adaption also goes to Nupur’s Blog Bite 3 Adaption.

I Google searched for melting a chocolate bar – there were couple of videos and write ups but I preferred my original way :P – I boiled the milk +sugar and went on adding couple of chocolate pieces at a time; stirring vigorously. Done – the molten chocolate should be thick enough. I used Swedish Choco Bar – The Foodie had brought it couple of months back from Finland – these had Almond Croquants and helped to give the rich taste.

Just Dip each Marie biscuit into this dip and keep it one over other – like Lagori :P Refrigerate it till the chocolate freezes – slice and serve cold.

I had poured remaining chocolate over the cake hence the dripping look.

There was no single reason for us to celebrate with sweet – may be Akshay Trutiya :D They say whatever you buy on this day is never diminishing – though I prepared this sweet it din’t even last a Day … do try it out ;)

This also goes to No Bake Cake event by Aparna.

P.S. – I just completed About and Contact page. Do Peek :)

Mom’s speciality vegetarian style…

2010-05-09T18:04:00.001+05:30

When Jyoti announced her Mother Day Special Event, My immediate reaction was – I can send all of my posts to this event. My whole blog is dedicated to single person who is not only my inspiration to cook but also to eat.

My Mom is a working woman but still she prepares (even now) Heavy Breakfast; All chapattis + chutney + koshimbir + sabzi for our lunch box and for dinner chapatis + rice + dal + chutney +koshimbir + sabzi. If this is not enough as soon as she used to return from work my first question used to be – “Momma khayla kay ?? ”; Entered fast track evening snacks for us. Thanks to her my tummy grumbles even now as soon as Clock turns 5.00 p.m. Unbelievable naah …. I’m Superwoman's Daughter!!

There was not a single occasion when Mom asked me to enter kitchen with a pretext of learning cooking, so I’ve learned her recipes mostly from Phone when I started staying away. Yeah I’m a Pampered Child that way, and I’m quite proud of it!!

With a gun point on my forehead if I’ve to select a single recipe of my Mom – that has to be Kheema – yeah she does prepare world’s Best Kheema.. infact she is quite famous among my relatives as Khema Specialist ;)

Now married to a Pure Vegetarian created this conflict that I can’t try my Moms specialty; but we do have solution to all -- I tried the same version with Soya Kheema – Trust me Guys – this is the exact Replica of my favourite dish.

P.S : For non-vegetarians the Minced Soya chunks can be easily replaced by Minced Meat.

Vegetarian Soya Chunk Kheema

You Need:

Soya Chunks: About 20
Green Chillies: 3-4 medium
Garlic: 3-4 cloves
Ginger: 1/2 inch
Onion: 2 medium – finely minced
Tomato: 1- finely minced
Turmeric Powder: 1tsp
Malvani Masala \ Garam Masala: 1tbsp
Bay Leaf: 2
Cardamom: 1
Coconut: About 3-5 tbsp (preferable dry coconut) – grated
Cinnamon stick: 1/2 inch
Black Pepper corns: 7-8
Cloves: 2
Coriander Seeds: 4-5 tbsp
Poppy Seeds: 2-3 tbsp
Tamarind Paste: 2-3 tbsp
Coriander Leaves: for garnishing
Lemon Juice
Oil for tempering
Salt to taste

You Do:

Add soya Chunks to sufficient boiling water and let it boil for about four minutes, then let it cool.
Grind the RED ingredients.
Mince the Soya chunks through food processor or hand grinder. Mix the above grinded stuff along with some salt and soya kheema.
Pressure cook this mix for 2 whistles and then let it cool.
Till this time Roast the BLUE ingredients (except tamarind paste).Grind the roasted ingredients to rough powder.
Add the tamarind paste to this and make a smooth paste – Vatan.
Heat Oil in Kadai; Add Bay leaf and cardamom let it splutter then add the minced onion, sauté till it caramelizes.
Add tomatoes and sauté till oil separates distinctly.
Add pressure cooked soya kheema mix along with vatan – the grinded paste to this.
Follow this with salt as required + Malvani Masala + turmeric powder.
Cover and let it cook till kheema is soft and done.

Done ! Garnish with Coriander Leaves and use lemon juice before serving. This goes off well with Paav or even Rice and Solkadi.

I loved this cos it gave the same taste as the original one while The Foodie relished the spicy vegetarian mince; which he found quite different from usual special Sunday Lunches :D

Happy Mothers Day .. Momma … Love you !!! Muuah !!

My favourite also goes to one more Mother’s Day special Event - Shabitha's Celebrating Mom.. and also to PJ’s Think Spice – think Tamarind originally started by Sunita.

Wrap the Frankie

2010-05-05T19:58:00.002+05:30

Name changes but the product is the same – Call it Wrap OR Burrito OR in our style Frankie. It’s Roll of chapatti OR Tortilla with stuffing of your choice. We have this famous Mumbai’s Tibb’s Frankie at Shivaji Park. It’s a small Stall but serves delectable assortment of Frankie and street food is always favourite, rt ;;)
My Mom used to prepare a simple wrap inspired from the Chinese Egg Frankie, and this goes to Divya’s Global Kadai: Indian flavored Burrito originally started by Cilantro.
We had these for our breakfast – quite tasty and totally stodgy.

You Need:

Chapatis or chapatti dough for 2
Eggs: 2
Green chillies: 2 – finely chopped
Mix Vegetables: shredded I used – Cabbage, Capsicum, Onion
Chinese Sauces of your choice: 1tbsp – I normally use Soya, Red chilli and Vinegar
Milk: 2 tbsp
Mayonnaise: 2 tbsp
Ketchup of choice: 2tbsp
Ghee\Butter: 1-2 tbsp
Coriander Leaves: for garnishing
Pepper to taste
Salt to taste

You Do:

Roll out Chapatis\Phulkas out of chapatti dough OR Use readymade tortillas\ Chapatis. Heat griddle, Cook the Chapatis from both side.
Beat the egg vigorously; add milk + salt + pepper + finely chopped chillies.
Heat Oil in a pan, sauté all veggies for couple of minutes, Add salt + pepper + all the sauces. Sauté for few more minutes and turn of the flame.
Heat pan – add ghee\butter; Pour Egg mixture- in about one minute when half done press the Chapatti over it
Let the omlette stick properly to the chapatti; flip it and heat for half a minute. This completes our wrap.

This completes the preparation; assemble it with adding the sautéed veggies in the centre on the omlette side, garnish with coriander leaves; distribute ketchup + mayonnaise.
Wrap it across the way you want and bite it while in a car (which is not advised) OR preferably bite it while you are half lying on your Bean bag and reading your favorite gossip in the newspaper ;)
Happy Cooking and Posting about it !

Sabudana Vada from the Ghats..

2010-05-03T08:14:00.001+05:30

Have you travelled Mumbai-Pune by train?? If not then; you have missed on something heavenly.

The weather, Ghats- Valleys, Monkeys on varied points, Pleasant greenery, mild chilling wind – this just makes you going. If this is not suffice there is Karjat cha Vada-Pav or Lonavala chi Chikki – though not authentic yet apt for the time.

Along with these you get wonderful Omelettes, Cutlets, Bread rolls, Sabudana Vades etc – thanks to Indian Railway Catering Services. I may not be big fan of them (due to its oil dripped stuffs) but I admire the way they provide regional + national delicacies; this pleases all varied types of passengers.

Though Sabudana Vada with coriander chutney is one of the famous Maharashtrian evening Snack; thanks to IRCTC it has become Mumbai-Pune patent fried snack.

You Need:

Sabudana \ Sago: 1 ½ cup
Potatoes: 2 Medium – Boiled, Peeled and Mashed
Green chillies: 3-4 finely minced
Peanut Powder: 3-4 tbsp ( Roasted Peanuts grinded to rough powder )
Coriander Leaves: 5 tbsp finely minced
Cumin Seeds: 1 tsp
Lemon juice to taste
Sugar to taste
Salt to taste
Ghee for deep frying

You DO:

Soak Sabudana in whole lot of water for about 15-20 minutes. Drain the water and keep it about 4-5 hours
Mix all ingredients except ghee; with light hands (don’t overdo as we don’t want to prepare dough – keep it granular).
Make small balls of the mixture and flatten to make it in patties shape.
Heat Ghee in Kadai; and deep fry the vadas till light brown and crispy.

Done! Serve with Fast Special Green Chutney.

This is one of my favourite chutney – Grind Coriander Leaves + Green chillies with salt, sugar and cumin seeds. Mix with curd. This gives light green chutney.

This goes to Jagruti’s Joyful Eating while travelling. and also to CWS : Cumin Seeds hosted this month by Sara and originally started by Priya.

Koshimbir after 50

2010-04-25T20:58:00.003+05:30

Did you know?
Personal Tadka is 55 posts old :-O

I don’t know how this half century skipped my mind, how forgetful can I be!!
And while editing this post I saw my follower number too growing by ONE and completing the half century there too. Thanks Priti :)
Talking about statistics here I have got couple of observations about you all:

At an average on daily basis more than 150 of you turn up but less than 20 comment, Lots of Love and Hugs to all those 20 friends you always make my Day and remaining 130 – do try to make my Day ;)
Statistically weekend is much less crowded here than on a regular weekday, by this I concluded more couple of things:
- All of us are less busy on weekdays than on weekend, yay !! Office Work rocks!! <:-P
- Being a culinary blog, I think all of us try to go for normal regular weekday recipes than the extravagant dishes, though I hardly prepare them and if I do it’s only for this blog.

This Note has inspired me to blog on more simpler recipe (more cos you might feel she already posts simple recipes are simple this is one the simplest...) :">

Koshimbir is an integral part of Maharashtrain thali, @ my place Mom used to prepare varied versions of Koshimbirs one in morning and other for dinner. (for non- marathi guys Koshimir = kachumbar\raita= Salads). It’s just one way of having raw veggies in your regular food; it deals with mostly – tomatoes, onion, cucumber, carrot, cabbage etc.

Cucumber – Kakdichi Koshimbir goes off well as a side dish with any spicy sabzi and it has this typical soothing effect especially during this Hot Summers.

Kakdichi Koshimbir

You Need:

Cucumber: 2 medium sized – peeled and grated \ finely sliced
Peanut Powder: 3-4 tbsp
Curd\Yogurt: 7-8 tbsp
Green Chilies: 1-2 finely chopped
Coriander Leaves for garnishing
Sugar to taste
Salt to taste

You Do:
When I say Simplest – I mean it à Mix all ingredients above and Done Dana Done :P
Serve with Chapatti and Sabzi as a salad.
This goes to Madhuri’s ‘Summer Soothers II : Salads‘
Happy Cooking and Posting about it !!!

Cabbage Parathas

2010-04-18T22:58:00.002+05:30

I found Priya celebrating a Cabbage Week and this is the same case with me, whenever I buy Cabbage it lasts too long and obviously I’ve to prepare varied versions of this vegetable. Cabbage is quite boring type of vegetable though it has got loads of Medicinal Values. The most common recipes I prepare are Cabbage patties, cabbage dry vegetable and Cabbage Parathas. I would love to know what do you all Prepare with Cabbage??
When I posted my Peas Parathas I had made a resolution of trying out the odd 44 varieties present in Wiki. Till now I’ve posted only couple of them and both belonging to Stuffed Paratha Family. This one belongs to other family where the veggie is mixed with the flour and then kneaded. The following gives about Seven Parathas.
You Need:

Cabbage: Grated Finely
Wheat Flour: To Knead + To Dust à Proportion with cabbage should be 1:2, e.g.: for 1 cup of cabbage 2 cups of flour.
Ginger: 2 tsp - Grated finely
Carom seeds: 1 tbsp
Fennel Seeds: 1 tbsp
Cumin Powder: 1tbsp
Green chilies: 2-3 in number – Finely minced
Curd: 1 tbsp
Oil or Ghee: Applying while shallow frying
Water to knead the dough – if required
Salt to taste

You Do:

Mix all ingredients except water and ghee in a Wide Open Bowl or Parat. Cabbage gives out water when mixed with salt so use water only if required. Knead to thick dough.
Make big size Chapatis balls; roll out to make a circular roti form. It should not be too thick as cabbage won’t get cooked on pan neither it should be too thin as it will become Papad :P
Roast – shallow Fry on the Pan; apply ghee or oil in intervals.

Remove from Pan when both sides get cooked with light brownish tinge. Serve Hot Parathas with chutney or Pickle. They go well in Dabbas too.
Thanks to Cabbage’s medicinal value; the Paratha goes to Yasmeen’s Cruciferous Challenge .

Buttery Silky Dal Makhani

2010-04-11T22:00:00.000+05:30

When Nupur announced her Blog Bite 2 – theme of cooking anything which you never thought you’ll prepare at home, I was oh … My List is too long!! :-? So the Plotter that I am – I acted on asking The Foodie about our eat-out plan on our coming lazy weekend:

Me: “We’ll eat-out or order something this Sunday… ”

He: “Yeah … lets order Dal Makahani ... it’s been long time we had it!”

Bingo …. Searched my favourite blog – One Hot stove and planned our eat-out at our home itself. Menu was typical Punjabi style – Dal Makhani with Laccha Paratha.

For me Punjabi meant – “Butter chicken” while for The Foodie the same word means – “Butter Dal “! I thought “How uninspiring it is to have a Dal at the same price of the Chicken”, but all you Guys who haven’t tasted this authentic Punjabi Dal Makhani – you HAVE to HAVE this! The buttery feel, the sensuous texture, it is thoroughly Punjabi’s signature dish.

Few things I got to know about this Dal ..

The overall procedure to prepare is quite similar to most of the Dals, yeah It is very simple to Prepare yet it’s rich and sure a Crowd Pleaser. It uses Black Urad Dal – I never had this in pantry – so this is new around. Infact this Black Urad Dal – is the sole reason for the Buttery feel of Dal Makhani.. ! Its easy preparation has raised my confidence that not all restaurant style Dishes are difficult – recollect my Hara Bhara Kabab.

Do go through Nupur’s recipe, the delicacy in gist is You Do:

Soak Kidney Beans (Rajma) - 16 hours And Black Urad Dal + Chana Dal – 8 hours. Pressure cook these lentils and mash them a bit.
Heat Desi Ghee – Add asafoetida + cumin seeds + ginger- garlic paste + fenugreek seeds. Let these splutter.
Add Tomato Puree; let it loose its raw texture. Add red chili powder + salt + cream +dollop of butter and cooked mashed lentils.
Let the lentils boil, finish off with garam masala + ghee.

Garnish with coriander leaves.

The Foodie wanted to have Lacha Paratha with Dal, for me I had no idea how this Paratha looked. So The Foodie experimented with this, and it was WOW!! I regret for not trusting his experiment, so didn't click any snaps but I HAVE to Post these lovely parathas,I promises will prepare them soon! Till that time even you can drool over these… ;)

Dal Makhani also participates in following events :

My Legume Love Affair:The 22nd Edition, hosted at Ruchikacooks.
Veggie Platters event “Delicious Dals of India”
Silpa of Anita’s Kitchen hosting Vegetable Marathon-Beans

Happy Cooking and Posting about it :D

Sweet Fasting

2010-04-07T21:40:00.001+05:30

I had mentioned here, that I started the typical fasts to fulfill my greed towards Fast special food items. Most of these items were savory ones with this single Sabudana Kheer as a desert. Yeah (!!) , you can have deserts while fasting :D

Sabudana Kheer is a porridge where Sago is boiled in Milk. Though the outcome is quite sinful it becomes thicker in couple of hours and then finishing it off is a bit difficult. Especially if this is carried as lunch tiffin then you tend to loose the enthusiasm of having the thick cold version of this desert. So my Mom deduced this easy to eat version of porridge especially for working women :). The process is same just that mix the milk just before serving\having, try it out and you can see the difference.

No exact measurements here, but the following version is suffice as 4-5 deserts for two fasting people ;)

You Need:

Sabudana (Sago): Fistful
Water: 1-2 cups
Milk: 1-2 cups
Sugar: 5 tbsp
Cardamom powder: 2 tsp
Kesar: pinch (optional)
Dry Fruits: 3-4 tbsp (I used Almond , Cashews and Raisins) – Crushed roughly

You DO:

Soak the Sabudana in about 2 glass of water for about 2 hours, yeah for kheer you don’t have to worry about water quantity. Soak it the way you soak grains.
Remove the water, mix the Sabudana with 1 cup of water and boil in kadai.
Let the Sabudana cook well, check by pressing a single grain – if you are able to mash it then its done. While doing so there are chances that the water evaporates, use the next cup of water. But keep the sabudana mix in liquid state.Stir it occasionally avoiding it to stick to the bottom.
Once the sabudana is cooked, add sugar along with cardamom powder and dry fruits.
Major part of kheer is done, now if you are serving on immediate basis mix the milk and simmer of couple of minutes and add kesar it required.
Else let the sabudana cool, and while serving later or having it is office mix sabudana mix and milk – The ratio should be 1:1. Mix it properly and enjoy !

This Kheer is immensely filling and the sago as just melts in. This goes to Kheer event by Shama and also to Priya’s CWS: Cardamom Seeds

Eggs-llent Curry

2010-04-03T16:18:00.001+05:30

Thank you for lovely inputs on the look, any more suggestions are please welcome :)

The common Sunday Lunch back home used to be pre-dominantly Fish, Meat or Egg – in the same priority order. Till now I have not tried out first two options but the last priority has become a first priority here. Yeah, Eggs are not only common breakfasts but also a fancy weekend lunch. Though I’ve tried and tasted loads of varieties of Egg dishes, my Mom’s authentic Konkani style Anda Masala is one of the most reliable and immensely well-seasoned one.

Best part is it goes of well with anything from Chapatis – Rice or Bread.This curry was more than enough for both of us for our single Lunch, we had it with Jeera Rice.

You Need:

Eggs: 3 in number – Boiled and Peeled and sprinkled with salt and pepper.
Onion: 1 and half – finely minced
Potato: 1 small – Peeled and cut into slices
Cumin Seeds: for tempering
Malvani Masala \ Garam Masala
Salt to taste

Masala:

Cloves: 2
Cinnamon stick: 1/4 inch
Peppercorns: 3-4
Coriander seeds: 1-2 tbsp
Poppy Seeds: 2 tsp
Onion: 1/2 finely sliced
Dried Coconut: 3-4tbsp – Grated
Tamarind Paste: 2tbsp

You Do:

Roast the ingredients in masala except the tamarind paste till the onion caramelizes.
Let the roasted masala cool, till this time heat oil in a kadai – temper the cumin seeds and add minced onion.
Grind the masala into rough powder – add tamarind paste and some water then grind to make a fine paste.
Add potato to the kadai, let the potatoes cook.
Once cooked add the masala paste , malvani masala and salt. Simmer till the raw smell vanishes.
Once the curry is done add boiled eggs – half sliced.
Cover them with masala and simmer for couple of minutes, avoid stirring as it may mash the eggs and garnish with coriander leaves.

Done !! Serve with whatever is easily accessible.

Thanks to the hefty amount of coriander seeds; this dish goes to Priya and RV’s CWS: Coriander Seeds.

How Do I Look ?

2010-03-29T18:45:00.003+05:30

“How Do I Look ?” Asks Personal Tadka to all of You… Do let her know your views !

I have this tendency to do something drastic in Life when I feel nothing is working out for me, drastic revolves predominantly around Looks – Yeah I’ve cut my hair very short number of times just to feel the difference, colored and streaked them weirdly wherein I did get awkward reactions, changed my wardrobes for the soothing effect. As I was done with changes with my looks so thought of changing MY blog’s LOOKS !

All reactions are welcome, flattering ones will be More Appreciated ;)

P.S.: Everything else except this page is under construction, will update the same as and when I get some time, I’ll keep you all posted with the changes.

Banana Pancake

When Priya declared her Pancake event, I planned to prepare one of our Indian pancakes – Dosas or Chillas. But then I thought when will I get a chance to prepare other varieties -Take a LOOK here. My initial experience with pancakes was when in NJ, me and my roommate used to bring whole lot of instant pancake mix and used to cherish them with loads of maple syrup or honey. We did graduate from the instant mix to preparing the batter at home, but I’ve no idea why I never prepared these American Dosas back home here.
Only if I had this Gossip page then I would have jotted down the recipe, as I had to think Real Hard to recollect the recipe now. But good I tried out this simple pancake recipe, as these will surely ~~appear~~ reappear for my weekdays quick breakfasts.
You Need:

Flour (Maida): 1 cup
Milk: 1 cup
Egg: 1 in number
Banana: 1/2- mashes and remaining 1/2- sliced
Butter: 2tbsp
Sugar: 2-3 tbsp
Baking Powder: 1/4 tsp
Salt to taste

You Do:

Mix the dry stuffs in BLUE.
Add egg and beat it thoroughly with the dry mix, follow with milk and molten butter.
Once the batter is ready add mashed banana and blend for lumpier version of batter. I preferred smooth version so used food processor.
Spray butter on a heated non-stick pan, Gently spread a scoop of batter for a small pancakes.
Cook from both the sides till light brown.

Done !! Serve with Banana slices and any syrup of your taste. We had it with Honey and it tasted yummy !!
With so many events around the corner, I thought of sending these to other events too…

Wholesome breakfasts goes to Veggie Platter’s Jihva – Breakfast, originally started by Indira of Mahanadi fame.
Pallavi’s and Hima’s Sunday snack event hosted by Divya with Healthy snack as the base.

Happy Cooking and Posting !!

Raaga’s Dudhi Curry

2010-03-24T22:14:00.001+05:30

The Foodie says that I am a Compulsive Planner – to extend that I plan when to plan for something. So obviously I do plan my weekly menu beforehand if not then atleast a day prior I know what I will cook the next morning. But there are such lousy mornings when I look into my pantry and then give a thought as to - What of those lying stuffs will look good in my lunch box. One such occasion was last day when I saw only couple of veggies – Bottle gourd and Potatoes. On a normal Day I prefer Potato but on not so normal day like yesterday I preferred Dudhi – Lauki.

Early seven in morning I logged on to my laptop and a TO DO icon popped up with upcoming events which I have been missing for some or the other reason. One of the events is hosted by Divya of Dil Se – Tried and Tasted originally started by Zlamushka and this month the apt selection was The Singing Chef. So I just clicked Search – Bottle Gourd. I received about 3-4 lovely recipes but I selected this one – “Bottle Gourd Curry in Milk” as this seemed perfect as TO GO in my Dabbas.

It’s quite easy to prepare as You Do:

Tempering: Heat Oil – Add Chana Dal + Urad Dal, followed by mustard + cumin seeds and asafetida. After spluttering add Curry Leaves + Split Green chilies.
Cooking: Add Bottle Gourd pieces + Salt + Turmeric Powder – cook for few minutes. Then add milk, cover and cook till gourd pieces are soft. Then add the roasted sesame seeds powder. Mix and cook for couple of minutes.

It is one of the easiest recipes giving all the required different tastes to the normally bland bottle gourd. I liked the sesame and milk mix taste – quite unusual yet delicious in its own way.

Royal Kurma within one Shitti (whistle)

2010-03-21T18:46:00.001+05:30

I have got a vast list of Bookmarks which I have planned to try out sometime or later, so I loved the idea of browsing through my bookmark folder to search for something that used Cooker – Yes you guessed it right this was for Nupur’s Blog Bite event!

So the first one to pop up was Raaji’s Vegetable Kurma – When I was a newbie in this blogging world I used to dribble over some blogs snaps and just hoping I will prepare these dishes soon. Raks Kitchen is one of such a stirring blog for many amateurs like Me. She not only gives the ingredient list in a table format which is quite easy to grasp but her step wise snaps bestows all. You don’t have to think much as to what next??

Whenever I had mix of all veggies I always planned to prepare this but used to miss on something or other; and thanks to lazy me even this time I forgot “Gram Dal” from the “To Grind” list, and this I realized while posting this, else Me and The Foodie were overwhelmed with this Royal Sabzi and Thanks to Raaji this dish has been honored a position in our most reliable Guest “Carte du jour”.

Using Pressure Cooker just follow the following three major steps;

To temper: Add the tempering stuffs Elachi, Clove, Cinnamon, Bay leaf and Jeera . Once they splutter add Curry Leaves follow by Onion + ginger garlic paste. Once sautéed add tomatoes followed by turmeric powder + red chilli powder + garam masala + salt and the grinded masala mentioned below.
To grind: Make a fine paste of Coconut + Fennel + Khus khus + cashew nuts + gram dal – Add to the mix above and fry till it gives out oil.
Veggies to be added: Add all the finely chopped mix vegetables that you want – I used cauliflower +carrot +peas + French beans. Add water so that this lightly covers up the veggies. Then Pressure cook till one whistle of medium flame. Once this cools down and if there is excess water then simmer till the vegetables become semi dry.

Done! Garnish with coriander leaves and enjoy with hot rotis or rice!

Kitchen Property :

I had started disclosing my property details with my juicer, so after about a quarter lets show off one of my most versatile appliance – Pressure Cooker. Currently I have couple of them – the smaller one was bought when I used to stay with my cousin roomie and the other one was well deserved Mom’s Gift after marriage – yes most useful Dahej :P

The smaller one is used only for Rice and Dal but the smarter and the bigger one goes off well with Idlis – Dhoklas to huge quantity of meals for guests. Would love to know about your most precious kitchen property :)