Sarson Ka Saag/ Mustard greens curry:

January 8, 2017

Come January, my veggie vendor will bring mustard greens and Bathua greens. In Kannada, we call Bathua as chakotha and mustard as sasive soppu .Last week I got a bunch from him and I prepared this curry. I love to include seasonal veggies in my cooking and it is a yearly ritual to make Saag at least once in winter.

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How I make –

Sarson / Mustard greens – 2 bunches

Bathua / chakotha leaves – 2 bunches

Palak/spinach – 2 bunches

Onion – 1

Green chillies – 4

Garlic – 10

Ginger- 1 inch

Maize flour – 1 table spoon

Cumin – ½ teaspoon

Turmeric – ½ teaspoon

Hing- ¼ teaspoon

Butter – 1 table spoon

Salt

Method:

  • Clean all the greens remove stalks and discard.

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  • Wash and chop the leaves into fine strips and cook this in a vessel by putting half cup of water, little salt, sugar for 10 to 15 minutes.
  • Take one mixer jar and put sliced onion, crushed ginger; chopped chillies and garlic, dry grind all this into rough paste.
  • When greens are cool, grind this as well. Don’t make smooth paste. Whip only once or twice, you will get required consistency.

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  • I usually use earthen vessel to cook traditional items. If you have one, you can use it otherwise use normal kadai.
  • Take vessel, put butter, when it is hot add cumin and hing. Then onion and chilli paste. Fry for a while. Add turmeric and salt. Salt will help to ooze out water from the onion and will retain moisture while frying.

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  • When it is light brown, add maize flour and fry for 2 minutes.
  • Add one cup of water and mix onion and maize flour mixture. This will look like a paste now.

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  • Add Ground greens and boil, If you feel water is needed you can add water and cook until you get the right consistency, and when it is done , mixture becomes like a mass and surface becomes little glossy.

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Buddha’s delight:

January 5, 2017

It is a vegetarian dish well known in Chinese and Buddhist Cuisine.We love Buddha’s delight at our favourite restaurant Chung wah. Their version has lemon grass flavour in the gravy, and we especially like this flavour. I wanted to try their version of veggie Buddha’s delight at home from so long. Finally I did try it this week for our dinner.

So I thought of making lemongrass infused water for preparing it and proceeded. I used the available veggies in my pantry. You can use them according to your choice. You can add couple of tofu pieces as well.

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How I prepared:

Vegetables – 1 bowl (took Zucchini, lettuce, onion, carrot, mushroom, capsicum,snap peas)

Chilli vinegar – 1 tsp

Red chilli flakes – ½ tsp

Garlic – 5 cloves

Ginger – ½ “

Green chilli -1

Salt

Spring onion – 2 tbl sp

Corn flour – 1 to 2 tbl sp

Lemon grass – 4 sticks

Water – 2 cups

Method:

-Boil water with lemon grass bits until water becomes little yellowish and lemongrass is cooked.

-Sieve this water and discard lemon grass. This is our lemon grass water which is used for gravy. Keep it aside.

– Chop spring onion, ginger and garlic. Slit green chilli.

– Chop mushroom, carrot.

-Chop capsicum, onion, zucchini into I inch chunks.

– Tear lettuce by using hand and keep aside.

-Take one tawa, put either butter /olive oil .When it is hot, add ginger, garlic and green chilli and fry for a while.

– Add onion, fry for 2 minutes. Next you can add capsicum, carrot zucchini and mushroom. Fry for 2 to 3 minutes and sprinkle little salt and red chilli flakes.

– Next you can add corn flour and fry in this mixture for 1 minute and add lemon grass water.

-when it starts boiling add vinegar. When it becomes little thick and shiny add torn lettuce and garnish with chopped spring onion.

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-Enjoy this either with fried rice, noodles or simple steamed rice. It is very filling, nutritionally very rich and taste wise – Pure bliss!!!!

Masala Whole Wheat Laddu/ Pinni Ke Ladoo:

December 31, 2016

Happy New Year wishes to all my Readers!!!!

Masala whole wheat laddu’s are pure bliss!!!! I had some apprehension before tasting this mainly because, I couldn’t imagine the taste of laddu’s with fennel, pepper etc.! These beauties are originally from Punjab and known as Pinni ke ladoo. This recipe is from my friend and according to her; each family has their own style of preparation of Pinni and is a must for winter months. I have prepared according to our taste and availability of the ingredients in my pantry.

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Ingredients:

Note: Here I have used steel tumbler or regular steel glass to measure ingredients.

Whole wheat flour – 3 cups

Ghee – 1 ¼ to 1 ½ cups

Almond- ½ cup

Pista – ½ cup

Desiccated coconut – ½ cup

Flax seed powder – 1tblsp

Sugar – 1 ½ cup (powdered)

Jaggery – ¼ cup (powdered)

For masala: Fennel – 1 tsp, black pepper – 1 tsp, cardamom – 1 tsp, ginger powder – ¼ tsp.

Salt – ¼ tsp

Edible gum – 30 – 50 gms.

Method:

-Dry roast almond and Pista, cool, powder it and keep aside.

-Dry roast desiccated coconut for 2 minutes, to increase its fragrance.

picture-1-Powder masala ingredients in a small mixer jar. No need to roast this.

-Put 1 tsp of ghee, fry edible gum in a hot ghee until it puffs and becomes transparent. Cool it and powder in a mixer jar.

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-Take one thick bottomed kadai, add one cup of ghee and roast whole wheat four in a very low fire, until it becomes light brown and sandy in texture.

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-Switch off the gas. Add in edible gum, sugar powder, jaggery powder, masala powder, salt, coconut, dry fruits powder,flax seed powder etc.

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-Mix everything together, try to make roundels. If you are able to bind it together, well you can proceed to make laddu’s.

-If it breaks while binding, add little by little hot ghee and mix, and then make the roundels.

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-Cool completely before storing it in an air tight container.

Chana Saarupkari /Chickpea Rasam:

December 29, 2016

In last post we did chana and ivy gourd dry curry and I promised you to post the Rasam which utilizes the drained water of cooked chana or chick pea. This is very nutritious and tasty too.

What we need-

Ingredient:

Drained water of cooked chickpea – whatever you get.

Cooked tor dal – 1/4 cup 

Green chillies -2

Salt

Jaggery – 1/2  tsp

Hing – ¼ tsp

Seasoning:

Coconut oil – 1 tbl sp

Mustard – 1tsp

Red chilli – 1

Curry leaves – 1 spring

Crushed garlic – 6

Method:

-Drain water from the cooked chana or chick pea while making any curries.

-Boil this drained water by adding 1 cup of water, cooked toor dal, salt (if needed) ,jaggery, hing, green chillies.

-Cook until green chillies are cooked and flavour  is released to water.

-Add seasoning by heating coconut oil. When it is hot, add mustard. When it splutters add  red chilli, curry leaves, crushed garlic.

-Fry till garlics are brown and add this seasoning to Rasam.

Enjoy this Rasam with hot rice and any side dishes, like chickpea dry curry and papad.

 

Gingerbread cookies:

December 26, 2016

My daughter wanted to bake gingerbread man cookies for this Christmas and she was asking for the recipe of the same. I finally gave her a recipe with the ingredients which were available in our pantry.Now I will handover this post to my daughter, who is 15 year old 🙂

Hi all, I am Vinushree. I really wanted some gingerbread cookies this year, and we made this unique version of gingerbread man cookies- but as women. I just wanted to bring out women empowerment. Just kidding, we didn’t have the cookie cutter for a man ;).  This was very fun to make and an easy process. Please enjoy.

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Ingredient:

All-purpose flour – 3 ½ cup

Cinnamon powder – 1 ½ tsp

Ginger powder – 1 ½ tsp

Salt – ½ tsp

Baking soda- ¾ tsp

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Jaggery syrup – ½ cup

Light brown sugar – ½ cup

Cooking Butter – ¾ cup

For Icing:

Cooking chocolate – 4 squares

Nutella – 2 tbl sp

Icing sugar – ½ cup

Vanilla essence – ½ tsp

Milk – 2 tbl sp.

Method:

  • Mix all the dry ingredients by using wire whisk, like flour, cinnamon, ginger, salt, baking soda and keep aside.
  • Beat butter and sugar by using stand mixer. When it is done, add in egg, jaggery syrup and beat nicely.
  • Add dry ingredient and make dough into 3 parts and keep this in a fridge by wrapping in a cling film cover or in a zip lock separately.
  • Keep this for one hour and remove one of the dough parts from the fridge and keep this outside for 5 minutes.
  • At the same time, pre heat the oven at 170 degree C and line a cookie tray with butter paper.
  • Now roll the dough by using Chapati roller, by dusting some flour into ¼ inch thickness and by using cookie cutter and bake this for 12 to 14 minutes.

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  • After it cools down, make the icing.
  • Take one microwave safe glass bowl, put icing sugar, chocolate, Nutella, milk and vanilla. Microwave for 1 minute and mix nicely. If it is melted and perfectly blends, start dipping those cookies into it and decorate with any sprinkles. Otherwise heat chocolate mixture for some more time and proceed.

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  • Dry them in air for one to two hours, and then store them in an airtight container.

Manoli Kadle Ajadina /Thondekai Kadle palya /Ivy gourd and chick pea Dry curry:

December 25, 2016

This is one of our family favourite curries, which is loved by all. We make two types of curries by using ivy gourd and chickpea.

One is with onion and garlic, other one without it.

This name is derived from Tulu language, which is a local language of Mangalore. Manoli is ivy gourd or Tindora, Kadle is black chick pea and Ajadina is dry curry.

This particular masala is used in Bunt community of Mangalore and it is an integral part of their festive cooking.

How I make this-

Ingredient:

Ivy gourd – ¼ to ½ kg

Black Chick pea – 1 cup

Salt

Jaggery – ½ tsp (optional)

For Masala:

Fresh grated coconut- 1 cup

Coriander seeds – 1 tsp

Cumin – ½ tsp

Urad dal – 1 tsp

Methi/ fenugreek seed – ½ tsp

Dry red chillies- 3 to 4

For Seasoning:

Coconut oil – 1 to 2 tbl sp

Mustard – 1 tsp

Curry leaves – 1 spring

Method:

-Soak black chick peas in water overnight. Next day discard soaked water and add fresh water, salt and cook this in a cooker for 3 to 4 whistles.

-Wash ivy gourd, cut this lengthwise into 4 pieces. Cook this by putting very little water and salt and jaggery.  keep aside.

-When pressure releases from the cooker, open the lid, drain the water and keep chick pea aside. Don’t discard the drained water. You can make really yummy Rasam or soup out of this.

Next is the masala preparation-

-Heat little oil, fry methi seeds until it is light brown, add remaining ingredients, coriander, cumin, urad dal,  red chillies, and fry nicely.

-Take one mixer jar, put roasted masala, make  a powder, and add coconut into it and whip couple of times to get dry coarse powder.  

Now we can proceed to make palya-

-Take one kadai, put coconut oil, when it is hot, splutter mustard seeds, add curry leaves.

-Now add ground masala and fry for a while.

-Now add cooked chickpea and ivy gourd mix well, check for the salt and adjust.

-Cook this until it becomes like a mass and veggies are coated well with the masala.

-Serve this as a side dish with hot rice.

NOTE:

-Usage of coconut oil will give authentic taste.

-Don’t discard drained water from cooked chick pea. It is very nutritious and you can prepare really tasty Rasam, and it is here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christmas Fruit cake:

December 21, 2016

The day before yesterday, my daughter V asked, ‘Amma, everywhere I can feel the Christmassy atmosphere, why haven’t you made anything?  Please make a plum cake.”

Immediately, daughter A said, “No need to do that grrrrrrrrrrr, It has raisins; I don’t like raisins in any baked goodies. Make Red velvet instead of plum cake.”

Finally, mamma came up with this win-win cake for both –

This cake has no booze or fruit juice, or raisins.

Ingredients:

Dry fruits to soak – 1/2 to 1 cup (dried cranberries, tutti-frutti)

For the Caramel:

Light brown sugar – ½ cup

Water – ¾ cup

Butter – 1 tsp

For the Cake:

All-purpose flour – 1 ½ cups ( you can take whole wheat flour + all-purpose flour as well)

Baking powder – ¾ tsp

Baking soda – ¾ tsp

Dry ginger powder – ¼ tsp

Cinnamon powder – ¼ tsp

Cardamom powder – ¼ tsp

Pinch of salt

Eggs – 2

Light brown sugar – ¾ cup

Melted Butter – ¾ cup

Fresh Orange rind – 1 to 2 tsp (grated)

Caramel – ½ cup

Dry Nuts – 1/4  cup (cashew and almonds)

Method:

-Make caramel in a thick-bottomed vessel. Heat sugar and butter until it melts; lower the heat, add water, mix nicely, boil, and add the dry fruits.

-Here, I took dried cranberries and tutti-frutti. Soak the dry fruits for 2 hrs.

-When you are ready to bake the cake, drain these soaked fruits, separate the caramel and fruits and keep them aside. This caramel can be used while mixing cake batter.

-The next step is the preparation of the cake batter –

-First, we will mix all the dry ingredients, from flour, baking powder, baking soda, ginger powder, cinnamon powder, cardamom powder, and salt, in one bowl and dry mix using a wire whisk.

-Drop all the dry fruits like soaked and drained dry fruits, chopped cashews and almonds

-Once again, mix the flour nicely and keep it aside. This is the dry ingredient mixture.

-The next step is- to preheat the oven to 180 degrees centigrade.

-Line the cake tin in which you want to bake. I have used a bread tin over here.

-Next, we should make a wet ingredient mixture. Break the eggs, beat them properly, and mix in butter, caramel, sugar, and grated Orange rind. Beat all these together until the sugar dissolves.

-Take one wooden spatula, fold it in the dry mixture, and make a uniform batter of wet and dry ingredients with a very light hand. Don’t overmix this.

-Now pour this ready batter into the lined cake tin, sprinkle some cashew and almond chunks, and bake this for 40 to 45 minutes or until done at  180* C. Enjoy this fruit cake this festive season!!!

Pea pod salad:

December 19, 2016

After peapod pakoda, I wanted to try some more with peapod. Peapods are so rich in flavour as well as taste. So, I tried a salad and it turned out so tasty and healthy. Here’s the recipe.

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Ingredients:

Peapods –as required

Olive oil – 1 to 2 teaspoon

Garlic – 7 -8 flakes

Salt

Red chilli flakes – ½ – 1 teaspoon

White sesame – 1 teaspoon

Method:

  • Separate fresh and green peels (pods) while opening, to collect green peas.
  • After this, peel off the inner membrane (which will not cook and it is fibrous too)
  • How to remove inner membrane: If you want to see a pictorial guide, click here
  • You basically have to take one of the ends, fold in and pinch inwards, slide your thumb beneath and remove the glossy membrane and separate. If membrane breaks in-between, try from the other side.
  • Discard inner membrane and use outer green cover to make salad.
  • Wash these peels and drain, keep aside.
  • Slice garlic and keep aside.
  • Dry roast sesame and keep aside.

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  • Take one tawa, add oil .When oil becomes hot, add garlic slices and fry until it is brown.
  • Add in washed and drained peapods, fry for a while. Sprinkle salt and red chilli flakes.
  • Garnish with toasted sesame seeds and serve.
  • I served this with Spinach Khichdi. Click here to see the recipe.

Millet and spinach khichdi:

December 18, 2016

Millet’s are tiny cereals, which are low in Carbohydrates and a very good source of Protein, fibre and Vitamins. This is a very tasty, easy to make, healthy one pot meal which makes a very light meal.

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Ingredients:

Saame rice/Foxtail millet – 1 cup (you can use normal rice as well)

Moong/green gram dhal – ½ cup

Spinach – 1bunch

Cumin seeds – 1 tsp.

Hing – ½ tsp

Ginger – 1” piece

Green chillies – 1 to 2 (slit)

Salt- to taste

Ghee – 1 to 2 tbl sp

Water – 4 to 6 cups

Method:

-Soak dhal and millet rice after washing, for 10 minutes.

-Wash and grind spinach into puree.

-Heat ½ table spoon of ghee in a pressure cooker.

-Add Cumin seeds, hing, green chillies and ginger and fry for a minute.

-Now add spinach puree, water, salt and bring to boil. When it starts boiling, add soaked and drained dal and millet rice mixture.

-Check for salt and cook till 3 to 4 whistles.

-After the pressure releases, open the lid and pour in the remaining amount of ghee.

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-Enjoy with any crispy side dishes or raita!!!

 

Green Peapod Pakoda or Pakora:

December 15, 2016

What do you do with nutritionally rich Peapods after removal of green peas? Usually people throw them away and it is less commonly consumed. Last year, my sister introduced me to snap pea Crispi’s. I liked the taste and wanted to include this treasure house of nutrition in our diet. I tried using them with our regular Indian pea pod a couple of times, and failed to achieve the result. While chewing, the fibre used to hinder us from enjoying the dish, after a couple of failed attempts, I came across This Site in which she has mentioned how exactly we should peel the pod, after removing the peas. Once again, I tried with very little quantity and succeeded. Everyone in my family liked it and asked me to share this recipe. It was so tasty and peapod’s natural sweetness and flavour was the highlight of this pakoda.

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Recipe in detail –

Ingredients:

Peapods – as required

Oil for deep fry

For batter:

Bengal gram flour /Besan – 1 cup

Salt

Green chilli – 1

Red chilli powder-  ½ tsp

Curry leaves – 1 spring

Chopped Coriander leaves – 1 tsp

Cooking soda –  a pinch

Method:

-Separate fresh and green peels (pods) while opening, to collect green peas.

-After this, peel off the inner membrane (which will not cook and it is fibrous too)

-How to remove inner membrane: take one of the ends, fold in and pinch inwards and slide your thumb beneath and remove the glossy membrane and separate. If membrane breaks in-between, try from the other side.

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-Discard inner membrane and use outer green cover to make pakodas.

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-Wash these peels and drain, keep aside.

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-Prepare pakoda batter by putting Besan, salt, chopped green chillies, curry leaves, coriander leaves, cooking soda and water; batter should be like Dosa batter consistency.

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-Now heat the oil in a kadai and when it is hot, drop pea pods one by one after dipping into the batter.

pic-4-Fry in a medium heat and when it is done, remove these into a tissue laid serving plate.

-Enjoy these pakodas with hot cup of tea or coffee.