Tag: vegan

Plantain stem and Moringa Rasam:

July 16, 2017

Where to start about the benefits of these two super foods? From my childhood, we used to relish banana stem and its flower in various dishes. Every part of banana plant is useful, be it its leaves, flower, stem, its outer fibre or fruit. No wastage of any part. Usually after the harvest of Banana fruit bunch, we should remove that plant and should allow its baby plant to grow and fruit. Usually after the harvest, banana plant is chopped off, outer fibre is peeled off and it is dried under the sun and used as a thread in tying Jasmine flowers. Inner core or pith is divided into 3 parts. Top most part, which is very slender and less fibrous will be used in raw salads. Middle portion is little more fibrous and used in cooking and making Dosa’s. Bottom part, which is more fibrous, mature and hard to chew will be used in juices, soups or Rasam’s.

Plantain stem is one of the best, natural high fibre vegetable. It also maintains fluid balance in our body and acts as a coolant, especially in Summer season.

Moringa or Drumstick leaves are considered as a “Power food” for its nutritionally rich nature.

Here I have combined these two ingredients and made Rasam and trust me it is very tasty and can be used as an appetizer shot as well.

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Ingredients:

Plantain stem – 6- 8 inches long

Drumstick leaves – 1 cup

Tomatoes – 2

Tamarind – ½ tsp

Garlic – 8 cloves

Cumin – 1 tsp

Green chillies – 2 to 3

Salt

Jaggery – 1tsp

Coriander leaves – 1 table sp.

Seasoning:

Coconut oil – 2 tsp

Mustard – 1 tsp

Cumin – ½ tsp

Hing – one pinch

Red chilli-1

Curry leaves – 1 spring

Method:

–  Slice plantain stem into discs, remove thread like fibre while slicing.

–  Chop the roundels into thin slices.

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–  Wash drumstick leaves, here you can use as it is, with its sticks intact. No need to remove intact stalks of these tiny leaves.

–  Cook plantain stem pieces, drumstick leaves, chopped tomatoes, green chilli, tamarind in a pressure cooker for one whistle. Cool this mixture, grind and sieve. Discard the fibrous part.

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–  Dry grind garlic and cumin. Add this to collected solution, add salt, jaggery and boil for a while.

–  Garnish with coriander leaves and do the seasoning.

–  Heat coconut oil, add mustard, when it starts to splutter, add broken red chilli, cumin and curry leaves.

–  Serve this as an appetizer shot before food or as a Rasam with hot rice.

 

 

Zucchini Chutney:

June 28, 2017

Zucchini, a member of gourd family is a popular summer squash, also known as courgette. Personally I like this spongy veggie and include this in so many Indian recipes.

Zucchini chutney is one of them and it is an excellent side dish for any Indian flat breads, Dosa, idly or Paddu.

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Ingredients:

Zucchini – 1

Garlic – 8 – 10 cloves

Green chilies – 3 -4

Salt

Oil – 1 tbl spoon.

Coconut – 1 small cup

Raw mango or tamarind –If mango (2 “small piece) If tamarind (½ tsp).

Seasoning: Oil – 1 tsp, mustard – ½ tsp and curry leaves.

Method:

  • Wash, chop zucchini into pieces.

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  • Take one small kadai; fry these pieces, garlic and green chillies by putting little oil until it wilts.
  • Switch off the gas, leave this for cooling.

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  • When it cools down, add coconut, salt, either mango pieces or tamarind. Grind all this into a smooth paste by putting required amount of water.
  • If you want, add seasoning with mustard and curry leaves.

 

Kadle Bele –Gerubeeja Payasa / Chana dal and Cashew Kheer:

March 29, 2017

Happy Yugadi! Yugadi is celebrated as the beginning of a new year in India (but through different names). In Bangalore, we start this festival by eating neem and jaggery. Neem denotes the bitterness we face in life, and the jaggery represents all the sweet things of life. By eating the neem and jaggery together, it is a symbol of promising ourselves to face the bitterness and sweetness of life with confidence.           

In Mangalore, we celebrate this festival by savouring a kadle Bele (Bengal gram or chanadal) and gerubeeja (raw cashew) Payasa. It is a delicious dessert which is made more delightful because of the cashew nuts which are present in every spoonful.

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We will see the procedure –

Ingredients:

Chana dal/Split Bengal gram – 1 cup

Whole raw Cashew – 1 cup

Coconut milk – 1 tetra pack

Jaggery – 1 ½ block (used Organic jaggery blocks)

Cardamom powder – ½ tsp.

Salt – ½ tsp.

Method:

-At first we have to remove outer cover of the young cashew. Take one bowl, put all those young and raw cashew kernels into it, pour boiling water and keep it aside for 10 to 15 minutes by closing the lid.

-When outer cover of the kernels swells, remove the outer cover and keep aside.

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-Wash chana dal and cook this in a cooker by putting sufficient water for two whistles.

-Cook dal till it is perfectly cooked. Dal should be well cooked and easily crushed. Doneness is very important, after adding jaggery, dal becomes little stiff and firm.

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– When its pressure relieves add cashew kernels and cook. After one whistle, switch off the gas and cool this.

-Now add salt and jaggery and boil till you get a nice aroma and till the raw smell of jaggery disappears.

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 – When it is done, add one tetra pack of coconut milk and give one boil. That is it. Garnish with powdered cardamom and enjoy.              

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        Note: –

–          If you don’t have access to raw cashew kernels, you can use regular cashew and you can cook this with Chana dal for 3 whistles and proceed by adding jaggery.

–           If you are using fresh coconut for extracting milk, take grated coconut (from one coconut), add one cup of water and grind, and extract milk. (This is a thick extract and should be added at the end)

–          Once again add little water and grind, to take out thin milk and you can add this while boiling jaggery.

–          If you are using regular jaggery, at first self-boil this with little water, make a liquid and sieve this before adding to the kheer, to remove impurities.

 

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!!!!

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.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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.

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.

Tomato Omelette /Dosa:

December 14, 2016

tomato-omlette

This time when we went to Sirsi, we stayed at Hotel Madhuvana. When I looked at their menu, I was very curious to taste this special omelette, and ordered the same .When I tasted it, it was this amazing blend of flavours, and not at all like the usual tomato omelette which I prepare. Everybody liked the taste. It was little sweet, tangy at the same time filled with flavour. Immediately, my curious mind, started to check the ingredients. I had asked my hubby to note it down, one by one while I was checking the ingredients .After coming back, I took that list and tried to imitate the same and succeeded. Here I am, sharing this super tasty Dosa recipe.

Ingredients:

  • Dosa rice- 3 cups
  • Fenugreek/methi seed -2 tsp.
  • Beaten rice/poha- 1 ½ cup
  • Coconut – 2 fists full (grated)
  • Jaggery -2 table sp.
  • Salt –to taste
  • Turmeric – ½ tsp.
  • Eno fruit salt or cooking soda – 1tsp (optional)
  • Cumin- 1tsp.
  • Grated ginger – 1 tsp.
  • Firm tomatoes – 2
  • Coriander leaves – 2tblsp.

Method:

-Wash and soak Dosa rice, beaten rice and methi for 2 to 3 hours.

-Grind this into a smooth paste by adding turmeric, salt, jaggery, coconut to an idly batter consistency (little thicker than normal Dosa).

-Pour this batter into one big vessel, add jeera and keep it aside for fermentation.

-If you are living in the cold climate, next day morning add 1 tsp. Eno fruit salt, mix nicely and keep it aside for 10 min.

-Now chop Tomatoes, coriander leaves and grated ginger.

tomato-omlette-batter

-Mix this into Dosa batter and start making Dosa by pouring one serving spoon of the batter on a hot iron or non-stick tawa, don’t spread much. You will see thousands of holes on the upper surface. Smear with butter or clarified butter. When it is cooked, flip and cook on another side too. Serve this spongy tomato omelette with coconut chutney. Here I have served this with coconut-ginger chutney.

How to cook Vermicelli:

December 7, 2016

Initial days of cooking are very challenging. We face lots of hardships at the kitchen. Generally in south Indian cooking,  the quantity of water used, is crucial and the end result is depends on that. So, if we know the requirement of water for cooking that particular ingredient, half the battle is won.

Usually I get a query in my message box regarding some doubts or the other from my near and dear ones. In one such query’s person had asked me, why she can’t cook perfect vermicelli Upma?  Further she said, her preparation becomes little soggy each time she makes vermicelli upma. That day, while answering her query, I thought of making one separate category for learners in my future blog and today here I am, writing my first post, dedicated to cooking learners.

Here, I will guide you to make simple Vermicelli Upma –

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Ingredients:

Vermicelli – 2 cups

Onion – 2 medium

Green chillies -2

Salt

Grated coconut – 1 table sp

Lemon – 1/2

For seasoning –

Mustard – 1 teaspoon

Urad dal – 1teaspoon

Curry leaves – 1 spring

Cumin- ½ teaspoon

Red chilli -1

Oil /ghee – 2 table spoon.

Method:

-First, Chop the onions, chillies and measure vermicelli and keep aside.

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  • Keep one small bowl of water for boiling.

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  • In another burner, keep thick bottomed kadai; do seasoning by heating ghee or oil, or mix of both. When it is hot, add mustard. When the mustard splutters add urad dal. After it becomes light brown add red chilli, cumin, curry leaves.
  • After this add chopped onion, green chillies and fry for a while.

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  • If you wish to add turmeric, you can add it now.
  • Add little salt and fry onion until it is light brown.
  • Add vermicelli and fry for a while.
  • How to check if oil is sufficient or not: while mixing vermicelli, if oil coats vermicelli and becomes wet and shiny, oil content is perfect for this upma. If you feel vermicelli is dry and it is not holding together, add little more oil or ghee.

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  • Next- how much roasting or frying is needed? After frying it for a couple of minutes on a low flame, you will see the colour change and each strand will becomes whitish and crispy. It is now time to add boiling water.(refer to this above picture)

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  • How much quantity of water? Please refer to the picture. While pouring, Water should be just above the vermicelli. Mix the mixture and check for the salt. If salt is needed add and cover the kadai with a lid and cook it in a low flame.

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  • After a couple of minutes, open the lid, if water is evaporated and top part of the layer appears cooked, that is it. If you find, it is yet to cook, sprinkle little water and keep it covered for couple of minutes.

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  • If you like to garnish with coconut, add coconut and add lemon juice and mix.

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Serve this upma with a cup of coffee or tea.

Munge Dosey/Coconut Sprout Dosa:

December 5, 2016

Come December, coconuts start sprouting and in our native, Agricultural background people will become so busy with seasonal activities. Usually December –January is the time frame to make coconut oil. First thing of the process starts by removing all the coconuts from the attic, where it was stored after each harvest.

Then comes, removing outer husk and inner fibre. Third job is breaking each and every coconut from the lot. This is the time; we find lots of sprouts, inside the coconut and these sprouts are so tasty to eat and spongy in texture.

Sprouted Coconuts or coconut sprouts are the edible spherical sponge-like cotyledons of germinating coconuts. They have a crunchy watery texture with a slight sweetness. They are eaten in coconut-growing countries either as is or as part of various dishes. We call it as munge, “sprout” which is a default name of coconut sprout and dosey which we prepare out of it is “Munge dosey”

People eat it as it is or make some delicacies. One of such item is Coconut sprout Dosa, which is very delicious and  it has a mild earthy  flavour. When I went last month to my native, my mom in law gave me some coconuts and one of the coconuts was sprouted and I felt so happy to see this sprout. First thing that came to my mind was this Dosa and I felt Nostalgic by thinking of my childhood.

Ingredients:

Dosa rice – 2cups

Coconuts sprout -1 ( if you have 2 sprouts, no need to add grated coconut)

Grated Coconut – ½ cup

Salt

Method:

–Wash and soak Dosa rice for 3 to 4 hours. Chop coconut sprout in to small chunks.

-Grind soaked rice with chopped pieces of 2 sprouts, or one sprout with grated coconut by adding little water and salt.

-Make smooth paste. This batter must be like our regular Dosa batter and there is no need for fermentation.

-You can make use of this batter straight away. Usually we prepare this batter in the morning itself.

-If you want to prepare this batter in the evening, to make the Dosa in the morning, you can store the batter in the refrigerator.

-To prepare Dosa, heat iron Dosa tawa. When it is hot, don’t apply any oil .

-You can pour one serving spoon of batter and make Dosa like our regular Dosa. Pour ½ tsp of ghee and Close the lid. Or make little thinner batter and pour like a Neer Dosa or rawa Dosa.

-When it shows little brownish spots here and there, flip the side, cook upper side and serve with Coconut and onion chutney or honey or liquid jaggery syrup with ghee.

Note: If you have more than one sprout, no need to add grated coconut while grinding. Instead of one sprout, use two.