Dhall Paratha

I wanted to try this one few weeks before. But I tried this last sunday and it came out pretty well. I got the recipe from Bhawana's blog.. Here is the recipe I followed to make this parathas.

Ingredients:-

1. Wheat flour - 2 or 3 cups
2. Channa dhall - 1 cup
3. Red chillies - 2 (acc to taste)
4. Salt to taste
5. Coriander leaves - 2 tbsp
6. Asafoetida powder a pinch
7. Oil - 1 tsp
8. Cumin - 1/2 tsp
   
9. Oil or ghee - for Parathas
   

Soak channa dhall over night. When you are planning to make this for lunch, then in the morning knead the dough adding required amount of salt for the dough and keep it aside. Drain the channa dhall from water and keep it aside. Pre heat the oil in a pan, splutter cumin seeds, add the red chillies, coriander leaves and asafoetida powder and fry it for a minute. Now add the filtered channa dhall to it and fry it till the water it fully absorbed. Let it cool and grind it nicelyadding required amount of salt to it. This is the filling. Now divide the dough in to equal parts, flatten it into a small circle, fill it with the dhall, cover it and flatten it to the size you want. Cook it in a hot pan, on both sides, applying oil or ghee according to your taste.

This was our lunch on Sunday along with white rice. Surprisingly, my twins also had dhall paratha, little bit rice, dhall, raita and little bit dhum aloo..

Mango & Banana Muffin

I can eat mangoes any time. I love this fruit. While I was reading a post in Ramya Bala's blog, I came across this recipe which tempted me to try and I followed the same recipe with some changes. Here is the recipe I followed.

Ingredients:-

1. All purpose flour (maida) - 1 1/2 cups
2. Salt - little less than 1/4 tsp
3. Baking Soda - 1 tsp
4. Baking powder - 2 tsp
5. Sugar - 1/2 cup
   
6. Eggs - 2
7. mango Pulp - 1/2 cup
8. Mashed Banana - 1/2 cup
9. Butter - 1/2 cup **

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a bowl, mix all the dry ingredients well so that it mixes together. In a separate bowl, beat eggs adding a teaspoon of water. Add it to the dry ingredients along with mango pulp and mashed banana. Mix the batter well so that no lumps are formed. Arrange the muffin cups and fill the cups with 3/4th of batter. Bake it for 15 mts or until it becomes golden brown. Check it inserting a tooth pick and it should come out clean. The final result was really amazing. My husband said, it tasted like banana nut muffin. But i didn't added nuts. May be next time I will add nuts instead of mango pulp.

** - I added crisco instead of butter. the measurements will be given in the crisco box that how to replace it in the place of butter. I followed the same instruction to replace butter

Comfort Food 1

Everyone here likes to eat something of their favorite meal. In some families, there will be a routine to cook sambar, rasam and curry most of the days and some days, say two days in a week they make kootu or some days they make more kozhambu etc... but each one will be having something as their comfort food. I have some which I want to share with you all. First one I picked is Vathakozhambu and Potato curry. Yesterday I made Pumpkin Vatha kozhambu and Potato & Onion curry. I am reposting all those recipes here. Here goes the recipe for Vatha kozhambu...

Ingredients:-

1. Tamarind - one small lemon sized or 2 tbsp paste
   
2. Pumpkin or pearl onion - one small cup (may 10 small cubes)
3. Tumeric powder - 1/2 tsp
4. Sambar powder - 1 1/2 tbsp
5. salt to taste
6. Sesame oil - 4 tbsp (may need more)
7. Jaggery - 1 tbsp
8. mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp
9. urid dal - 1/2 tsp
10. channa dal - 1/2 tsp
11. Fenugreek seeds - 1/4 tsp
12. Red chillies - 1 or 2 (acc. to taste)
    
13. Asafoetida powder - a pinch
14. Rice flour - 1 1/2 tsp
    

Take a wide pan, pre heat 3 tbsp oil, add mustard seeds, when it splutters, add urid dal, channa dal, fenugreek seeds, red chillies and asafoetida powder and fry these ingredient in low flame, to golden brown. Now add the vegetable to it and saute for a minute. Now put the tamarind paste(if you are using tamarind, squeeze out the juice from it and pour it) and add 1 1/2 cup of water to the paste. Add turmeric powder, sambar powder and salt and let it cook for 10 mts. in medium flame. Now add the jaggery to it and again add 1/2 cup of water and let it boil for another 5 to 7 mts. In order to make the consistency thick, now mix the rice flour with a tbsp of water and pour it on top of the kozhambu and also pour the remaining oil. Let it boil for another 3 mts. Now Vatha kozhambu is ready to serve. Serve it hot with rice. Potato curry will be a good side dish for this rice.

Well here is the recipe for Potato curry...

Ingredints:-

1. Potato - 3-5 (washed)
2. Onion - 1 (if its big or 2 if its small)
3. Oil - 1 tbsp
4. Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
5. Curry powder - 1 tsp
6. Salt to taste
7. Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp
8. Cumin seeds - 1/4 tsp
9. Asafoetida powder - a pinch
   
10. Curry leaves - 10 nos.

First pressure cook the potato and cut them into pieces. If you want you can remove the skin. Take a wide pan, pre heat the oil add mustard seeds, when it splutters add cumin seeds, curry leaves and asafoetida powder. Now add the finely chopped onion. Stir it till the onion turns golden brown. Add the turmeric powder, salt and curry powder (see Receipe) and mix it thoroughly till the onion absorbs the flavour. Now add the cooked potato pieces to it and mix it carefully. Do not mash the potato while mixing. Make sure everything mixes well properly. Now potato curry is ready to serve. Garnish it with coriander leaves.

Well friends I will be re-posting couple of more recipes in the next posts. Feel free to leave a link of your comfort food from your blog. I will add the links in this post. I am pretty sure everyone of us have their choice of comfort food even though we make many dishes everyday.

Tomato Rice

Tomato Rice is my favourite dish. I use my Rasam Powder for making Tomato rice instead of Masala powder (coriander powder + Chilly powder). This receipe is based upon my way of making Tomato rice. The ingredients are as follow.

Ingredients :-

1. Basmati Rice (or Regular Rice) - 1 cup (measuring cup)
   
2. Tomatoe - 4 (Chopped into cubes)
   
3. Onion - 1 (finely chopped)
4. Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
5. Rasam Powder - 1 tsp
   
6. Green chillies - 1 (add or reduce the number acc. to the quantity of Rasam powder cos it has chillies and pepper)
7. Ginger - a small piece
8. Salt to taste
9. Cashews - 5 (acc to taste)
10. Oil - 2 tsp
11. Unsalted butter - 1 tsp
12. Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
13. Urid Dal - 1/2 tsp
14. cumin seeds - 1/4 tsp
15. Asafoetida - one pinch
16. Coriander leaves - 1 tbsp
    

Soak the rice in water for 10 mts. Cook the rice in a pressure cooker upto 2 whistles. Do not over cook the rice. keep it and let it cool. In the mean time, take a wide pan, pre heat the oil and butter, add mustard seeds, when it splutters add urid dal, cumin seeds and cashews to it and saute for a minute. Now add green chillies, onion to to it and stir it for another one minute. Add the cut tomatoes to it and now add turmeric powder, rasam powder (can be replaced by coriander powder+chilli powder) and salt to it and let it cook in the medium heat. Now add the cooked rice to it and stir it carefully. Do not mash the rice. Garnish it with coriander leaves.

If you need the tomato rice, more spicy, can also add a cinnamon stick, 1 clove, 1 cardamom and 1 bay leaf in the seasoning mixture(mustard seeds, cumin seeds, etc..)

Adai

This is one of the famous Kerala Receipe. I am a very big fan of Adai. Even though I make avial or any sambar as a sidedish for adai, I would love eat it with a teaspoon of sugar and a teaspoon of thick ghee.. My husband is not a very big of adai. So I hardly make it here. But when MIL comes, we make it every week and its her favorite too. Last week I made adai. As usualy I forgot to take picture. So recipe comes first. Will take picture when I make it next time, may be during the weekend..The main ingredients are as follow

Ingredients: -

1. Boiled Rice(Puzhungal Arisi) - 1 cup
2. Channa dal - 1/3 cup
3. Toor Dal - 1/3 cup
4. Urid Dal - 1/3 (Black urid dal - Karuppu ulundhu will be good)
5. Pepper - 1 tbsp
6. Red chillies - 2
7. Asafoetida - a pinch
8. Curry leaves - 15 leaves
9. Salt to taste.
10. Sesame Oil - 2 tsp for one adai
    

Method : Soak the above said Rice, Dal, Pepper and Red chillies for 2 to 3 hours. Grind the mixture with salt coarsely without adding much water. Now put the Asafoetida and curry leaves in the batter and mix it thoroughly and keep it aside for an hour. This batter may not need fermentation. If you want sour taste in it, you can keep it in the oven for an hour or two .

Now heat the pan (Iron Dosa Tawa will be good for Adai) and spread the batter , into a medium round shape and make a small hole with a spoon in the middle. Now pour 1 tsp sesame oil along the edges and into the hole. After a minute or two, turn it over and pour one more tsp oil. Take it out after a minute or until it turns golden brown and crispy. It is better to cook the adai in medium heat. Better side dish would be Jaggery and Ghee. Avial will also be a good combination for adai. Try this and lemme know your comments.

Note: Can also make drumstick leaves adai, plantain flower leaf adai with this batter.

Chocolate chip cookies

Everybody here likes to eat a soft chocolate chip cookies.. I can have two :) My girls are very big fan of this chocolate chip cookies and every time I go to the grocery store, I buy a packet of this freshly baked cookies for them. This time I wanted to try by myself. Even though it didn't come in a pretty good circle shape, it was moist, soft and yummy. I was really thrilled to eat the cookies. I followed the recipe from allrecipes.com . Here is the recipe I followed....

Ingredients:-

1. all Purpose flour - 1 1/2 cups
2. Butter - 1/2 cup softened
3. White sugar - 1/2 cup
4. Packed brown sugar - 1/2 cup
5. Egg - 1
6. Vanilla extract - 1 tsp
7. baking soda - 1/2 tsp
8. Hot water - 1 tsp
9. Salt - 1/4 tsp
10. Semisweetened chocolate chips - 1 cup
11. M&M chocolate pieces - 1/2 cup

Preheat over to 350 degrees. Cream together butter, white sugar and brown sugar until smooth. beat in the egg, then stir in vanilla extract. Dissolve baking soda in hotwater and add it to the batter. Stir it well. Now add the salt. Stir in flour, chocolate chips, m&m chocolate pieces. Drop by large spoonfuls onto ungreased pans. Bake for about 10mts in the preheated oven or until edges are nicely browned.

Dhall

In my mom's family, my grandparents don't eat onions and garlic. Whenever they make roti or chapathi, my patti make this dhall for them and some other dish for others. Here is the recipe.

Ingredients:-

1. Moong Dhall - 1 cup
2. Toor dhall - 1 tbsp
3. Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
4. Green chillies - 3 ( acc to taste)
   
5. Salt to taste
6. Tomato - 1 finely chopped

For seasoning:-

1. Oil - 1 tsp
2. Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
3. Cumin seeds - 1/4 tsp
4. Asafoetida powder - a pinch
5. Lemon juice - 2 tsp
6. Coriander leaves - 2 tbsp

First pressure cook the dhall, adding chopped tomato, turmeric powder and salt to it. Now take a pan, preheat the oil, add mustard seeds, when it splutters add cumin seeds, green chillies, asafoetida powder and fry it till golden brown. Now add the cooked dhall to it and add 1/4 cup of water if necessary, to it, and let it cook for 3 to 5 mts. Turn off the stove and let it cool. After 10 mts, pour the lemon juice on top of it and garnish it with coriander leaves. Now dhall is ready to serve with hot rotis.

We can avoid using lemon juice, if we add more tomatoes. Also, toor dhall can also be avoided. This is a side dish but can also be used with rice. We can also add onions to this.

This recipe goes to CMT-Dhal/Kadhi/sambar/rasam, hosting by Priya, an event by Jagruti.