This is my husband's favorite dish. This is a dish which we eat whenever we go to Royal Taj, a north Indian restaurant, in San Jose. I was very hesitant to try this recipe because I didn't want to spoil his taste buds. But after seeing these Barta Baingans available in the markets here, I was so curious to try this today. Followed the recipe from Manjula's Kitchen. I made couple of changes to the original recipe.
Ingredients:-
Eggplant/Barta Baingan - 1 (big)
Onion - 1 medium sized (finely chopped)
Tomato - 2 (medium sized finely chopped)
Green Bell Pepper - 1 (medium sized) (finely chopped)
Garlic - 5 pods (chopped finely)
Ginger - a small piece (finely chopped)
Oil - 2 tsp
cumin seeds - 1 tsp
Green chillies - 1
turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
red chillies powder - 1 tsp (acc to taste)
salt to taste
Garam masala powder - 1/2 tsp (optional)
coriander leaves - for garnishing
Milk - 2 tbsp
Apply oil on top of egg plant. Take a microwave safe bowl and microwave the oil applied egg plant for 9 minutes in high (mine is 900W). Let it cool. In the mean time, pre heat oil, splutter cumin seeds, add finely chopped ginger & garlic, green chillies and saute for a minute. Now add finely chopped onions & green bell pepper to it. Cook it for 3 to 4 minutes or till it becomes half cooked. Now add finely chopped (or grind it into a paste) tomato to it. Let everything cook. Meanwhile, peel the skin off from the eggplant and mash it with a fork. When the ingredients starts boiling, add the mashed eggplant, turmeric powder, red chillies powder, salt & garam masala powder and mix it well. Sprinkle a hand full of water and let everything cook for 5 minutes. Now add the milk and mix it well. Garnish it with coriander leaves. This goes really well with rotis, chapatis or with rice(I had it with rice as side dish).
I got the idea of making these vadai after seeing Priya's post, Chickpea bread masal Vadai. It came out pretty good. Here goes the recipe.
Ingredients:-
Garbanzo Beans - 1 cup
Instant oats - 1/4 cup
Green chillies - 3 (acc to taste)
Onion - 1 Medium sized (finely chopped)
Coriander leaves - 2 tbsp (chopped)
Salt to taste
Ajwain - a pinch
Fennel seeds - 1/4 tsp
Corn flour - 2 tsp
Oil - to deep fry
Soak garbanzo beans for four hours. Pressure cook it. Let it cool. Grind it coarsely. Now add instant oats, salt, chopped onion, chillies, coriander leaves, corn flour, ajwain & fennel seeds and make it a soft dought. Sprinkle water if necessary. Pre heat oil. Take required amount of dough to make one vada, flatten it and deep fry it till it becomes golden brown.
Vadais didn't come out well first. Then I added two teaspoons corn flour to the batter and it came out pretty good..
This kichadi is my favorite. I make this for myself whenever my husband goes out of town. Since I add moong dhall in this kichadi, it will be very filling along with vegetables. Here goes the recipe
Ingredients:-
Coarse Sooji/rava - 1 cup
Roasted Vermicelli - 2 tbsp
Moong dhall - 4 tbsp
Salt to taste
Green chillies - 2 (acc to taste)
Ginger - a small piece
Mixed vegetables - 1/4 cup (chopped green peas, chopped carrots, potato)
Onion - 1 (thinly sliced)
Tomato - 1 (chopped)
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Oil - 2 tsp
ghee - 1 tsp (optional)
Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp
Urad dhall - 1/2 tsp
Cashews - 1 tsp
Coriander/curry leaves - for garnishing
Pressure cook moong dhall and keep it aside. In the mean time, dry roast rava and vermicelli and keep it aside. Now take a think bottomed tawa, heat oil and ghee, splutter mustard seeds, urad dhall, cashews to golden brown. Add curry leaves, ginger and green chillies to it and saute. Now add thinly sliced onion and saute till it becomes brown. Now add the chopped mixed vegetables and tomato and saute for 3 to 5 mintues or till it becomes tender. Now add required amount of water to it (i added 2 3/4 cups of water for 1 cup rava + 2 tbsp vermicelli ; water quantity can vary according to the quality of rava). When the water starts to boil, add the cooked moong dhall, turmeric powder and required amount of salt and let it boil for a minute. Now add the roasted rava and vermicelli to it and mix everything well. Add coriander leaves. Reduce the flame and cover the kichadi with a lid and let it for a minute. Enjoy it with coconut chutney.
This amla rice is a very very simple rice variety and it will just take less than 10 minutes to make this, if we have cooked rice. I tried this rice last week. It came out pretty good.
Ingredients:-
Amla/Nellikka/Gooseberry - 2 (medium sized)
Green chillies - 2 (acc to taste)
Ginger - a small piece
onion - 1 (thinly sliced)
Cooked rice - 1 1/2 cups
Salt to taste
Sesame oil - 2 tsp
mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Urad dhall - 1 tsp
turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Coriander leaves - for garnishing
Asafoetida - a pinch
Microwave amla for three minutes or till it becomes soft. Let it cool for few minutes. Remove the seed from it. Grind it along with green chillies and ginger into a fine paste adding required amount of water. In the mean time, heat sesame oil, splutter mustard seeds, fry urad dhall, asafoetida and thinly sliced onion to golden brown. Now add the grounded amla paste, turmeric powder and saute till the raw smells goes. Now add the cooked rice, required amount of salt and mix it well. Garnish it with coriander leaves. This rice goes well with some chips or papad.
I love to try recipes from Priya's blog. There are few I tried from her space. Here I am posting her Garlic Potatoes recipe which I tried from her place. I am sending this recipe to T&T hosted by PJ, an event by Lakshmi.
Well most of my blogging friends know that this recipe is from Madhuri's Cook - Curry Nook. I followed almost the same recipe except for few changes.. Here goes my recipe.
Ingredients:-
All Purpose Flour - 3/4 cup
Cocoa Powder - 1/4 cup
Oil - 1/4 cup
Baking powder - 1/2 tsp
Baking Soda - 1/4 tsp
Salt a pinch
Honey - 1/4 cup
Dates syrup - 1/4 cup ( I used Lion Dates syrup)
Flax Seed Powder - 2 tsp (Mix it with 1/2 cup warm water & keep it aside)
Warm water - little less than 1/4 cup
Chopped walnuts - 2 tsp (optional)
Mix all the dry ingredients APF, Cocoa, Baking powder, Baking soda, salt together. Add flax seed powder mix, honey, dates syrup and mix it well. If necessary add little bit of water. The original recipe is for cupcakes, Since i dont have microwaveable cups, I just used the pie tray and made cake. Pour the ingredients and microwave at high 900 W for 3 minutes. Cooking time differs from MW to MW. Original recipe finishes by one minute. But mine took 3 minutes to cook. Let it cool for few minutes & Enjoy!!
I replaced brown sugar with honey & dates syrup. So I had to use little bit of warm water than the original recipe. Also i did not add vanilla essence. Adding chopped walnuts is not there in the original recipe.
Soak urad dhall & rice for couple of hours and grind it really nice adding the chillies and required amount of salt. The batter consistency should be like bajji consistency. Now make balls out of paruppu usli. Preheat oil in a pan. Dip the usli urundai in urad dhall batter and deep fry it till it becomes golden brown. This tasted so fantastic and kids also liked it very much.
When you are asked to make evening tiffin without using oil, flour, wheat, idly/dosa batter, sugar etc., you will have no other choice other than vegetables. Thats how I landed in this recipe. I was doing bhel pori before, but turns out pori(puffed rice) is rich in carbs i guess. I saw a programme in a local channel where the chef was making tomato cups for dessert. He was using caramalized pineapple and heavy cream topping and all. But after watching that programme, I got the idea of making this cucumber cups.
Ingredients:-
cucumber - 1 (Bigger one preferably)*
tomato - 1 (finely chopped)
onion - 1 (finely chopped)
Pineapple pieces - 1 tsp (finely chopped)
Coriander leaves - couple of teaspoons (finely chopped)
Salt to taste
Cut cucumber into 3 cms thick. Take out the seeds from inside and sprinkle some salt in it and keep it aside for few minutes. In the mean time, chop tomato, onion, pineapple and coriander leaves and mix everything together adding required amount of salt. Fill the cucumber cups with the vegetable mix and serve it. We can serve it just like that or with a teaspoon of fat free yogurt on top. I made this for my husband without anything. For myself, i just sprinle couple of kurkure on top of it and it tasted really good. I stuffed the remaining vegetables in tomato also. It also tasted good. If any one of you have any ideas for some healthy evening snack, please let me know.
These muffins I made last week. Kids really loved it. I followed the recipe from my all time favorite allrecipes.com. I exactly followed the same recipe except the addition of sugar. I reduced the quantity of sugar.
Ingredients:-
1 1/4 cups quick cooking oats
1 1/4 cups milk
1 egg
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 /2cup sugar (the recipe asked for 3/4 cup brown sugar)
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
3/4 cup chopped walnuts
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
Combine oats and milk and allow to stand for 15 minutes. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Grease the muffin tray/cups. Stir egg, oil, 1/2 cup of the sugar, chocolate chips and 1/2 cup of the walnuts into the oat and milk mixture. Combine flour, baking powder and salt. Add oat mixture to flour mixture, stirring until just moist. Fill each muffin cups 2/3 full. Sprinkle tops with the remaining walnuts.Bake at 400 degrees F (205 degrees C) for 20 to 25 minutes. According to the original recipe, you will get 12 muffins from the above ingredients. I used three different sizes of muffin cups (thanks to Delhi markets) and I managed to get 20 muffins.
One of twin has started loving this aloo parantha (Potato filled Rotis) all of sudden. She is taking these aloo paranthas even for her lunch box once a week. Thanks to kids in her school:) I made these paranthas for our dinner last week and refrigerated some stuffing for the next day's lunch box. I blindly followed Manjula's Kitchen Video for making these. It came out very well. Here is the recipe.
Ingredients:-
For dough:-
Whole grain wheat flour - 2 cups
salt to taste
Water - Just enough to knead the dough
Oil - 1/2 tsp
For Filling:-
Potato - 3 (I used 1 big & 2 medium)
Salt to taste
Cumin/jeera - 1/2 tsp
ajwain/omam - 1/2 tsp (not there in the original recipe)
Green chillies - 3 (finely chopped) (acc to taste)
Coriander leaves - 2 tsp (finely chopped)
Ginger - 1 tsp (finely chopped - Its not there in the original recipe)
Prepare the dough first and keep it aside. Add required amount of salt and water and knead the dough. Spread oil on top and cover it with a lid or a cloth. Keep it aside. Boil the potatoes, remove the skin and take it in a vessel. To that add finely chopped green chillies, coriander leaves, salt and ginger and mash it with a fork. Scramble it really nice so that all the ingredients mix together with potato. Make small balls out of it. Also make same number of balls with dough. Potato balls should be little bit bigger than the dough balls. Now make a small poori sized roti, keep the potato balls and cover it just like how we do for making kozhakattai. Keep it till you roll all the potato balls (the recipe asks for keeping it some time). Now start rolling the stuffed rolls in to paranthas of 6 to 7 inches sized. Cook it in a hot tawa (iron skilled preferably). Coat it with some oil/ghee of your choice (I skipped it). Enjoy it with some pickle & Yogurt.
Pidi Kozhakattai is one of famous evening tiffin in our family. When my MIL was here, she made these kozhakattai. Method for making pidi kozhakattai is pretty easy, if we know how to make Arisi Upma. All we need to do is, first make arisi upma and then make balls out of arisi upma and steam cook it for 7 to 10 mts. You can get the recipe for Arisi Upma here.
Long long ago, so long ago, I myself have no clue how long ago, I made this dhall. It was lying there in the drafts for so long time. Finally I managed to write this today. I made this dhall when my husband was out of town. Here goes the recipe.
Ingredients:-
Moong dhall - 1/4 cup
Toor dhall - 1/4 cup
Channa dhall - 2 tsp
Mixed sprouts - 1/2 cup
turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Sambar powder - 1 tsp (acc to taste)
Tomato - 1 (chopped)
Salt to taste
Asafoetida - a pinch
oil- 1 tsp
mustard seeds- 1/4 tsp
Urad dhall - 1/2 tsp
red chillies - 2
Coriander leaves - for garnishing.
Wash both moong, channa & toor dhall nicely. Take a pressure cooker, put the dhall, sprouts, chopped tomato, add required amount of water, add turmeric powder, sambar powder and let it cook for 2 whistles. When the pressure is released, add required amount of salt and let it cook for another 3 minutes. Turn off the stove when u get the required consistency. In a small pan, pre heat oil, splutter mustard seeds, fry urad dhall and red chillies to golden brown and pour it on top of the dhall. Add a pinch of asafoetida and garnish it with coriander leaves. This goes well with hot steaming rice & ghee, rotis & pooris..
Since we don't have any festivals this year, we didn't make any sweets for navarathri. But my kids really love laddoo. Since my MIL is here with us and she make really good laddoos, thought of learning laddoos from her.
Ingredients:-
Besan Flour/Kadala maavu - 1 cup
Rice flour - 3 tsp
Sugar - 1 1/2 cups
Cardamom - 1
Edible Camphor - a pinch
food color - two pinches
Oil - to deep fry
Cashew & Raisins - to garnish
Mix besan flour and rice flour along with food color and make it like a batter. Consistency should be like dosa batter. Take a heavy bottomed pan, dissolve sugar with just required amount of water and let it boil. Syrup should come like a sticky syrup. If you touch it, your hands should be sticky. When the paagu is ready, heat the oil, pour the batter in a sieve with round holes. Tap it with a small spoon so that small balls fall in the hot oil. When its fully cooked, add it immediately to the sugar syrup. In the mean time, fry cashew & raisins to golden brown and add it in the syrup. When the mix is warm, make small balls and let it cool. Now Boondhi laddoo is ready.
I have never tried anything with green moong dal before. I had to buy this dhall cos my kids had some activity in their art class with those. Since I had more than half a packet, I thought of trying something with green moong dhall. Itried this rice with it and it came out pretty good.
Ingredients:-
Basmati Rice - 1 cup
Green Moong dhall - 3/4 cup
Tomato - 2
Onion - 1 big
Garlic - 3 pods
Ginger - a small piece
Green chillies -5 (acc to taste)
Carrot,peas,potato,Green Bell Pepper - 1 cup (thinly sliced)
Salt to taste
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Cardamom - 1
Cloves - 1
cashews - few for garnishing
Coriander leaves for garnishing
Oil - 1 tsp
Ghee - 1 tsp
Ajwain seeds - a pinch
Cumin seeds - 1/4 tsp
Soak Green Moong Dhal** for 3 to 5 hours. Wash and soak basmati rice for 10 minutes. In the mean time, boil tomato and peel off the skin and grind it into a fine paste. keep it aside. Also grind onion, garlic, green chillies and ginger into a fine paste. Keep it aside. Now pre heat oil & ghee in a pan, splutter cumin & ajwain seeds, cashew cinnamon & clove, saute onion paste to golden brown. Add the thinly chopped vegetables now and saute for couple of minutes. Now add the tomato paste, turmeric powder, soaked moong dhall and required amount of salt. Let everything mix well. It will be in semi solid consistency. Now add the basmati rice, required amount of water *** and cook it till its done. Garnish it with coriander leaves. Enjoy with some raita.
** - I soaked green moong dhall for 1 1/2 hours which was not enough. So microwaved it for 3 minutes before adding it to the masala mix.
*** - My tomato-onion masala mix was little bit watery. So I just added 3/4 cup of water along with rice and masala mix for cooking.
When we were staying in hotel for a month, we used to eat this dahi wali bindi very often. Some how I couldn't get that taste anywhere after that. Thought of trying it by myself. I got the recipe for Dahi Wali Bindi from Pari's Blog. Wanted to give it a try. I almost followed the same except I added tomato and onion before cooking Okra. Here is my Dahi Wali Bindi Picture.
After moving back from US, I didn't do any baking. We bought a convention oven here but I am kinda scared to try baking in convention oven. But then kids started asking me for cookies. We were buying cookies from shops. They started getting their stomach flu very often. We were not sure whether its because of cookies. Not to blame anybody, instead of buying those biscuits and cookies, I thought of start baking them again. This muffins I baked today and it came out pretty good.
Ingredients:-
Wheat Flour - 1 cup (I used Pillsbury multi-grain atta)
Baking powder - 1 tsp
Egg - 1
Salt - 1/4 tsp
Milk - 1/2 cup
Sugar - 1/4 cup
Butter - 1/4 cup
Cinnamon - 1/2 tsp
Raisins - 1 tbsp
Walnut - 1 tbsp (chopped)
Mix the dry ingredients well. Incorporate the wet ingredients (Milk, egg, Melted buter) one by one and mix everything well. Add raisins & walnuts to it. Mix it well. In the mean time, pre heat ovento 220 degrees.. Now pour the batter in muffin cups and bake it upto 25 minutes or till a toothpick comes out clean. I baked it for 24 minutes. I got 8 muffins from the above said quantity.
Adai Kozhakattai is a famous evening tiffin in Kerala Iyer families. And as always my patti used to make yummy kozhakattais. Day before yesterday, I made these adai kozhakattais for our dinner. While making it, I was literally thinking about my patti because, she used to grind the batter in the old fashioned stone grinder (Kall ural) and steam a whole lot of kozhakattais for 12 of us. I wanted to eat this kozhakattai's during my masakkai time(6 years back), called my patti and asked for recipe. She gave the recipe and asked me not to strain myself because, we have to do lot of stirring (She had no idea about microwave and all). I soaked the ingredients and started grinding it. But that time, smell of the urad dhall made me throw up so badly and gave up the idea of making this kozhakattais and never had it after that. So wanted to give it a try this time. Since my patti is no more (and I already forgot the recipe), I called my chitti for the recipe and got it from her.
Ingredients:-
Boiled rice - 1 cup
Black Urad dhall - 1 cup
Channa dhall - 2 tsp
Red & Green chillies - 5 or 6 (acc to taste)
Salt to taste
Curry leaves - few
Oil - 1/2 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Urad dhall - 1 tsp
Red chillies - 1
Asafoetida powder - a pinch
coconut oil - 1 tsp
Soak boiled rice, urad dhall, channa dhall and chillies for 4 to 5 hours. Grind it nicely adding curryleaves and required amount of salt. The batter should be like dosa batter. Take a pan, pre heat oil, splutter mustard seeds, fry urad dhall, red chillies and asafoetida powder and pour the adai batter in it. Stir it continuously till it becomes like a dough. I microwaved the batter for 10 minutes, stirring in between to get that consistency. If you touch the dough, it should not stick. Now make balls according to your wish and steam cook it for 10 to 12 minutes or till it becomes shiny, in idly moulds. Now adai kozhakattai is ready to eat. Coconut chutney goes well with it. When you are ready to eat, Just take couple of kozhakattais, scramble it, sprinkle a teaspoon of coconut oil and enjoy with chutney.
I made this curry last week. It was so boring to make the regular okra curry every time. So thought of giving it some change and tried this dry curry using some masala ingredients.
Ingredients:-
Okra - 2 cups (chopped in an inch size)
Onion - medium sized 2
Tomato - Medium sized 2
salt to taste
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Oil - 3 to 4 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Cumin seeds -1/2 tsp
To Roast & Grind:-
Coriander seeds - 1 tbsp
Channa dhall - 2 tsp
Urad dhall - 1 tsp
Red chillies - 3 nos (acc to taste)
Coconut - 1 tsp
White Sesame seeds - 1 tsp
Ajwain seeds - 1/2 tsp
Cumin seeds = 1/2 tsp
Peanuts - 2tbsp
Pre heat a pan with a teaspoon of oil, splutter mustard seeds, cumin seeds, fry onion till it becomes transparent. Add chopped tomato and saute for few minutes. Now add the chopped okra to it, sprinkle required amount of water, add turmeric powder, mix well and let it cook for 5 to 7 minutes. In the mean time, take a pan, pre heat a drop of oil, fry the given ingredients in "To Roast & Grind" and grind it into a fine powder. Keep it aside. When the vegetables are nicely cooked, add the required amount of masala powder and required amount of salt. Mix it well and let it cook for another 5 minutes. Add the remaining oil in between. It tastes really good with rice and I am sure it will taste good with rotis too.
I wanted to try this dates balls after seeing Priya's Dates Peda. I wanted to try this sometime this week. Yesterday my kids wanted to eat laddoo all of a sudden. I am not good in making laddoo so I tried convincing them that I will make something else. So started making this peda and instead of making it as peda I just rolled it and made it laddoo. They were not happy to see brown color laddoo (thats what they said), but they liked the taste. I added couple of more ingredients to her recipe and made it choco balls.
Ingredients:-
2 tbsp Crumbled Paneer.
1/4 cup dates (which came around 7 seedless dates)
Milk - little more than 1/4 cup ( I used the regular milk)
Cinnamon - a pinch
Ghee - 2 tsp
choco syrup - 1 tsp
Almonds & Walnuts (mixed) - 1 tbsp
Soak dates in milk for an hour. Then grind the milk-dates mix along with paneer and make it a paste. I also followed Priya's method. Just microwaved it for 6 mts. Stir it in between. Add cinnamon and chocolate syrup in between while stirring. When the paste comes like a ball, add melted ghee and make it small balls. In the mean time, grind the nuts into fine powder and roll the choco balls in it and serve it hot. It tastes really good. I just made 6 balls cos I was not sure whether my girls will like it or not. After finishing them, they quietly told me that it tasted like dates and not like chocolate balls :). I am sending this to Srivalli's kid's delight - Finger Food. Also this goes to Nivedita's MEC- Fruits event, started by Srivalli.
