Mango pachadi/ Mango sauce

Its been a really longtime since I updated this blog. Okay its not I don't cook anymore, ofcourse I do , and its definitely not the time excuse either. With 24 hours in a day, I certainly can not do a blame game on that. Its just that I always forget to take a good picture of my recipe and I end up not updating my blog. But today I thought I will post something anyway even with one of my 'not-so-good' photos, something better than nothing anyday right?

Ingredients

• 1 big raw mango
• Jaggery (or brown sugar) as needed
• 1/4 tsp salt
• cumin seeds
• ghee(melted butter)
• 1/2 tsp chilli powder / or a small slit green chilli
• curry leaves
• grated coconut 1/4 cup(optional)

Pre-cooking

• Peel the mango and cut into pieces

Method

• Mix all the ingredients mentioned above except coconut,cumin seeds ,curry leaves and ghee
• Sprinkle some water and keep it to boil in a saucepan.
• Cook till the mango is all mushy; take care to check in between.
• Alternatively you can keep it in a pressure cooker and keep it for 2 whistles.
• Add the grated coconut to this mixture
• Heat ghee in a saucepan and add cumin seeds ,curry leaves when hot.
• Drizzle the mango sauce with this.

Serving suggestions

• Serve with any bread or rice 

Tips

• The quantity mentioned in the ingredients are rough; Might vary depending on the sweetness in the mango.

Eggless Banana Muffins

This is my second attempt in baking a muffin. My first one was a disaster because of the high oven temperature and the wrong oven rack. Silly me and metric conversions !

The eggless banana recipe that I got from here is a very easy breezy one and you can make it in a jiffy. I didnot like my muffin shape though..thanks to the mismatch between my oven tray & paper cups.

Ingredients

• 1.5 cups all purpose flour
• 1/4 cup sugar(original recipe calls for half a cup)
• 1 banana
• 1 tsp butter
• 1/2 cup warm milk
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda

Pre-cooking

• Pre heat oven to 180 degree C

Method

• Mix the flour,baking powder and baking soda
• Put the butter in a mixing bowl and mix the sugar with it thoroughly
• Mix it with mashed banana and milk
• Now add the flour mixture slowly in parts to the wet banana mix and turn it so that all the ingredients are blended.
• Do not over mix.
• Pour in the muffin trays till half and bake for 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes clean.
• This yields 12 small muffins

Serving suggestions

• Serve warm with honey or cream

Tips

• Take the muffins out from the tray after they are cooled completely
• Remove the muffins from paper cup only after they are fully cooled

Dum Briyani(Layered Briyani)

Dum Briyani is layered rice, where rice and vegetables are cooked separately and slow cooked to diffuse the spices into them. It has a unique flavor compared to the normal vegetable pulav that we make as a one pot meal.
I had always wanted to try this at home but it seemed like a big process whenever I intended to do it. But it is not that tough as it looks like. But today I finally made it from this recipe with little modifications.The preparation time is more only because of the slow cooking that we do. So you can easily sit back with a book when that is going on :-)

Ingredients

• 2 cups basmati rice
• 1 cup of veggies cut length wise 
• 1 onion(cut length wise)
• 1 tomato
• Spice powders- a tsp each of chilly, coriander & turmeric powders
• 1 tbsp of garam masala
• 1 tsp of chopped ginger garlic
• a cup of curd/yogurt
• whole spices(Bay leaf, cinnamon,pepper,jeera & cumin seeds)
• one bunch of pudina
• 2-3 green chilies slit
• few strands of fresh coriander leaves
• salt to taste

Method

• First wash the rice and drain the water. Let it sit for around 20 minutes.
• Take the yogurt in a large bowl and add all the spice powders,half of the garam masala and little salt.
• Mix thoroughly and add the vegetables to it.(Add water if your yogurt is thick)
• Refrigerate this for 30 minutes
• Take a stock pot/pressure cooker and fry the whole spices with ghee/butter.
• Add the rice and fry again for a few minutes.
• Add salt & water required for the rice.(1:2 ratio)
• Cook till rice is done(you can pressure cook it too).Rice should be fluffy and not sticky. Keep aside and do not cover it.
• Take a kadai and add little ghee or oil, add ginger garlic and fry for a few minutes.
• Add pudina leaves , green chilies and onions one by one.
• Cook till onions are golden brown.
• Now add the tomatoes and fry for a few minutes.
• Then put in the veggies along with the yogurt.
• Cook covered in medium heat till the veggies are tender.Add the remaining garam masala & enough salt for this mixture.When this is done, then comes the fun part of layering !
• Pre heat oven to 150 degree Celsius and line a baking tray with aluminium foil.
• Add half of the rice, then the vegetables and then the remaining half of rice on top.
• Press firmly so that everything sits tight. You can sprinkle some fried cashews or fried onions on top.
• Cover the tin with aluminum foil again and keep in the oven for around 30 minutes.

Serving suggestions

• Serve hot with raitha of your choice

Tips

• The oven time varies depending on your quantity and flavor. Adjust accordingly.

Banana Fritters

Pazha bajji in tamil or pazham pori in malayalam is typically a kerala dish. It is a very simple yet delightful snack to be paired with a cup of tea. It requires minimal ingredients and can be made as a quickie when you have unexpected guests. It tastes best with nenthram pazham but you could also do it with a regular banana.

Ingredients

• 1 banana - I used nendram pazham
• 1 tsp of salt
• 1 tsp of turmeric powder
• 1 tbl of sugar(adjust according to banana's sweetness)
• 1/2 cup maida or all purpose flour

Method

• Cut the bananas into the desired shape(round or vertical). Traditionally they are slit vertically.
• Mix the rest of the ingredients with enough water to make a batter that is little thicker than dosa batter.
• Dip the bananas in the batter and deep fry it in oil

Serving suggestions

• Drizzle with some honey and relish it hot

Neer Urundai / Water Balls

"Neer Urundai" literally means "Water Balls" . These are rice delicacies cooked directly in water. These are made from par boiled rice and are a rich source of vitamin B and protein.
These are very light snack and could be a light breakfast or dinner. 

Ingredients

• 1 cup of par boiled rice (idli rice)
• Pepper corns/Jeera
• 1/2 cup coconut
• Salt

Pre-cooking

• Soak the rice in water for approximately 4 hours

Method

• Grind the rice with water and salt like we do for idli/dosa
• Once the batter is formed, heat a kadai and add it.
• Stir continuously in medium flame until the dough becomes soft.
• You should be able to make balls out of it. That is the consistency.(It is in the same consistency as kozhukatai dough)
• Boil water in a stock pot.
• In the meantime make small balls out of the dough.
• Once the water starts boiling add balls to it in a batch.
• Balls are done when they start floating and change colour.
• Drain the water properly and keep for serving.
• These neer urundais can be eaten directly or season them with cumin/pepper fried in ghee as below:

Serving suggestions

• These taste best when hot.

Tips

• Take little care when making the dough. Do not burn them in the pan.
• While adding the urundais to the water, do not stir it until they are settled down.

Eggless Dates Cake

Thats right..its eggless..yet unimaginable moist and soft-easy and a quickie and a big hit with the crowd. I followed the exact recipe from  Shilpa's Aayi's recipes but reduced little bit of sugar and my baking took less time than the specified.She says that it would catch up a "cake fever" and indeed it did :-)

Ingredients

• 18 pitted dates /date fruit
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1/2-3/4 cup sugar(I used brown sugar)
• 1/2 cup of oil
• 1 cup of maida/all purpose flour
• 1 tsp of baking soda
• choice of nuts(optional)

Pre-cooking

• Pre heat oven to 350 degree F

Method

• Heat the milk and dates for a few minutes until the dates become soft
• Grind this with sugar to a fine paste.
• Add oil and mix it well.
• Sieve the flour and baking soda and keep aside.
• Add the flour little by little to the liquid mixture until everything is blended smoothly.
• Add the nuts if needed.
• Pour into the cake pan and bake it in oven for 30 minutes.(Time might vary..so be sure to check it in between)
• Cake is done,when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean and tidy.

Serving suggestions

• Serve its as such or frost it with your favorite frosting.

Tips

• The cake will be extra moist, so take care when taking it out from your pan.

Add this goes to Bake off event hosted by Bangalore Baker.

Double Ka Meeta/Indian Bread pudding

If you are a Hyderabadi from India or stayed there like me,I'm damn sure you would have tasted this dish. It is a terrible sin if you haven't done so :P . 

I came to know about this dish when I was in Hyderabad for a few months.This also happens to be the city where I started my career in the sinful IT field. Though it was a very short training period we explored the place a lot and needless to say, food played a very important part. If I had been a non-vegetarian may be I would be writing about the famous "Hyderabadi Dum Briyani" but here I am with the popular sweet/dessert of Hyderabad, the city of Pearls.I got this recipe from a friend whom I visited there when I was working but looks like it had to wait until all these years to come alive.

With the richness of sugar syrup and bread, blended together in a thick milk, this dish is a boon for all sweet lovers. The method I have mentioned here is not the authentic version but it is a "quickie" and I see your hands raising even as I mention :) !!!
And here is another information as you drool over the picture,did you know how this dish got its name? In Hyderabad they call bread as "Double Roti", Meeta is sweet in Hindi, this combines it as "Double Ka Meeta".

Ingredients

• 5 or 6 bread slices 
• a cup of sugar
• a pinch of cardamom
• half a litre of milk(whole or half & half)
• few tbs of nuts of your choice
• 2 tbs of ghee or clarified butter
• Oil to fry

Pre-cooking

• Cut the bread into triangular pieces and leave it to dry in open air(may be for 24 hours approx).

Method

• Fry the bread slices in oil(Original recipe calls to fry in ghee; you can try that as well!!)
• The bread will not absorb oil as it is dried.
• Boil sugar and water in ratio 1:1 
• Once it starts boiling add cardamom
• Pour in your milk and keep in high flame 
• After it comes to a boil, reduce the flame and let boil.
• Keep stirring in between so that it doesnt burn.
• After it comes to half of its size, add in the bread slices.
• Let them soak in the milk.
• At this stage you can either switch off the flame and refrigerate it ;and take out after all the milk is absorbed.
• Or if you are in a hurry like me,just keep boiling it, until all the milk is absorbed.
• Fry the nuts in ghee and garnish them.

Bread slices soaking in the stove

Serving suggestions

• You can serve this warm or cold.

Tips

• If the breads are not dry enough, they will absorb more oil and become soggy.

Add this goes to  Joyful Eating whilst travelling event hosted by Jagruti. Unfortunately I do not have a picture from Hyderabad (that was when I was still using a Kodak KB10 camera) but I'm posting this one that we took on a weekend drive to Pondichery from Chennai. This golden ball is the very famous Auroville ,a universal city located in pondichery.

Almond Wheat Rolls

This is actually a sweet from a leftover dessert :) Yes, I made some Badam Kheer/Badam shake for a get together and had some left. Didnt want to have the same dessert again & thus ended up in making a semi badam halwa.The shake is already in liquid form thats why I added wheat flour as it will help in easy solidification and less work ;) But it still ended up beautiful.

You could ideally make it from the scratch, but here I'm going to give the way I made it.

Ingredients

• 2 cups of almond shake
• 1/4 cup of wheat flour
• 2 tbsp of sugar(optional)
• a pinch pf cardamon
• few tsp of ghee or clarified butter

Pre-cooking

• None

Method

• Heat a  kadai/wok  and add the ghee
• Then add your almond shake and bring it to a boil.
• Then slowly add your wheat flour to it and keep stirring.
• Add the sugar if needed.
• Once the mixture becomes like halwa it will leave the sides.(You will easily know the consistency as your vessel will become very clean)
• Eat as such or roll them into your favorite shapes.

Serving suggestions

• You can drizzle with a few drops of ghee.

Tips

• Adding more wheat flour will reduce the taste.

Add this goes to my CoL-Leftover Delicacies event