Broccoli in Five Spices

 This is one of the most fragrant Broccoli recipes I have come across. The recipe is from Monisha Bharadwaj’s India’s Vegetarian Cooking.

She have used five whole spice seeds :Cumin, fenugreek, kalonji (Nigella seeds) fennel and mustard

The broccoli florets absorb all the flavors and tastes amazing. I prefer to ignore the nutty stems as it’s too lazy to absorb any flavor

Broccoli in Five Spices

Adapted from: Monisha Bharadwaj’s India’s Vegetarian Cooking.

Ingredients

1tspn each of the five spices

Cumin

Fenugreek

Nigella seeds

Fenel

Mustard

1 large broccoli

1 tspn Oil

1-2 Green Chilies

Salt to taste 

Directions

Pound the spices lightly. Heat Oil in a pan

Once oil is hot enough, add the spices and toss well until it sizzles and the nice aroma of spices fills your kitchen

Add chilies and give it a stir

Add the broccoli and salt to taste and cover and cook until tender but not too mushy.

Saffron Peda and Besan Laddu : Two easy Diwali sweets

Wishing all my dear friends a very happy and prosperous Diwali

May this diwali fulfill all your dreamsJ

As today is an off day, I started my day with the usual blog hopping and came across the Kesar Peda recipe at Sharmis passion.

I have to admit that I was head over heels over the sweet, cute little pedas .

She have put it soo beautifully that you feel like making it right awayJ And I did it!

Do hop on to her lovely space here to see the detailed pictorial!

  

The second sweet I made was Besan laddu, I simple followed the steps from the video here

Baked Yogurt with Pistachios n Cardamom

Happy Vijayadashmi wishes to one and all..

Hope you all had a wonderful time with lot of festive foods.

For me, I went off for a short 4 day vacation to Langkawi and took my first DiveJ

And we absolutely loved it!!

Diving was an amazing experience…loved the underwater world, so colorful and stunning.

Rest of the 3 days we just lazed around the small island, driving around and eating lot of local delights especially Roti Canai

We loved diving soo much that we are already planning for our next diving getaway.

Do let me know if you know any good diving spots in and around SE Asia

Coming to the recipe of the day, it’s a baked Yogurt which is an absolutely fool proof recipe..

Baked Yogurt with Pistachios n Cardamom

Recipe Adapted from : Atul Kochhar’s Indian Essence.

Ingredients

1/4 Cup Greek yogurt

1/4 Cup Condensed Milk

1/4 tspn cardamom powder

2 tbspn chopped Pistachios.

Directions

Preheat the oven to 150 Degree

Line 3 ramekins with muffin cups

Mix all ingredients together and pour the mixture to ramekins.

Place them in a tray and fill the tray with water halfway up the ramekins

Bake in oven for 35-45 minutes until set.

Let them cool and chill it in refrigerator until serving time.

Unmold the Baked yogurt from the muffin cups and serve chilled

Gujarati Dal from Sukham Ayu- ICC February

This month Indian Cooking challenge is an authentic Gujarati Dal, from the Cookbook Sukham Ayu,  by Jigyasa Giri & Pratibha Jain.

It is quite flavorful ...spicy, tangy with a pinch of sweetness.A perfect accompaniment for rice..

I am trying hard to get my hands on the actual book since I have read a lot of reviews about this book from my fellow bloggers..

So here goes the flavorful dal recipe
Recipie courtesy : Sukham Ayu

Split red gram (Toor dal) ½ cup
Turmeric powder ½ tsp

Tamarind pulp -2 tablespoon
Dry dates -2
Yam - 1 inch cubes- ¼ Cup
Groundnuts 1 tbsp
Green chilies 2, chopped fine

Ginger 1 inch piece, chopped fine
Coriander powder 1 tsp
Cumin powder 1 tsp
Salt to taste

For tempering
Ghee 1 tbspn
Mustard seeds ½ tsp
Fenugreek seeds ½ tsp

Cumin seeds ½ tsp
Asafoetida powder ¼ tsp
Curry leaves 5-6

Wash and soak the lentils for 20 minutes.Now pressure cook with 2 Cups water and turmeric powder for 20 min till the dal is cooked until soft.
Give a good mash to the cooked dal.

Add all ingredients except the tempering ingredients and half cup water to the cooker and simmer for another 20 minutes.

In another wok , prepare the tempering. Heat ghee, once hot enough add mustard and fenugreek seeds.
Once the mustard seeds start to sputter and fenugreek seeds start to turn brown, simmer the flame .Add the cumin seeds, Asafoetida and curry leaves

Pour the tempering to the dal.

There you have a spicy dal

Khandvi....ICC for the month of January

My first Indian Cooking Challenge
Thank you Valli for hosting such a wonderful event:-)
When Valli posted Khandvi as the ICC for January, I was really looking forward to making it!
I love Dhoklas with Spicy Coriander/Mint Chutney and make it from time to time.So I thought another Gujju snack, thatz great..
I started with all confidence asking my hubby to be ready to eat Khandivi…

Man, my first try failed miserably, I under cooked it and batter was too runny and never dried up for rolling.
Second try... failed again, I overcooked and it became lumpy.
I started to panic; I am running out of Besan:-(

Oooo finally my third attempt came out well..

Valli shared  two recipies with us one from Lataji and one from Anupama Krishnamoorthy.I chose the latter one.

You will need
Besan / Gram flour - 1 cup
1.5 cups yoghurt
Water - 1.5 cups
1 green chili + 1 inch of grated ginger- Made to a paste
Salt to taste
Turmeric ¼ tsp
Asafetida / Hing - 1/2 tsp
Oil – 1 tbspn

For Tempering
Oil - 2 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 2 tsp

For garnish
Grated Coconut - 1.5 table spoon
Finely chopped Coriander - 2 table spoons


Mix the batter ingredients, except oil, in a bowl and stir well so that it has no lumps.

In a non-stick fry pan, add 1 tbsp oil. Add the batter and cook on medium-low flame stirring constantly.
The batter will start to coagulate, no worries..continue to stir.
Just keep stirring.Using the back of the laddle press any lumps so that the batter is smooth.
Be patient n stir till the batter turn to semi solid, infact more toward solid but still smooth.
It took me little more than 10 minutes
Spread the parchment paper on a flat surface, Spread the hot batter into the paper as thinly as possible
You can use the ladle and spread it in circles and you would do a dosa or crepe.

While still warm, cut strips with a knife so that you have 1’’ by 3’’ strips. Gently start rolling from the 1’’ side.

Place the rolls in a serving bowl

Heat 2 table spoons oil .When the oil is hot enough, add the mustard seeds.
Once Mustard seeds start to sputter , spread the tempering on top of the rolls.
Sprinkle the Grated coconut and Coriander leaves on top

Venn Pongal

Venn Pongal is a breakfast dish popular in Tamilnadu.
I had a taste of it when I moved to Chennai for my first job.

It was my friend Priya, who introduced me to different varieties of Pongal made during Thai Pongal, the harvest festival.
Our favorites were Venn Pongal and Sakara Pongal from Murugan Idly shop:-)

Here goes the Venn Pongal recipe
1 Cup rice
1 /3 Cup Moong Dal
1 tspn Cumin
1 tspn Black pepper
1 tspn Dried Grated Ginger.
1 tbspn Cashew Nuts
2 tspn Ghee
3 Cups water
Salt to taste

Wash the rice and Dal and let it drain
In a pressure cooker, heat the ghee.
Once the ghee is hot enough, add the Cumin, Black pepper and Cashew nuts
Sauté till the cashew nuts turn golden brown.
Add the rice and dal and sauté till the rice and dal are well coated with ghee.
Add the water and salt to taste and let it cook.
Pressure cook for two whistles. Once the first whistle comes, let it cook on low heat for one more whistle.
Open the lid and stir well.

Serve with Sambar or Coconut Chutney.

My entry to Pongal Feast Event hosted by Kurinji

Mushroom Jalfrezi

I had picked some Sliced Button Mushroom from NTUC few days back and it was totally hiding in my refrigerator..
When I was exploring the refrigerator for veggies..I came across the Hiding buddy and decided to make something using Mushroom for dinner.

I quickly browsed through my recipe books for Mushroom Dishes and chose this interesting Jalfrezi recipe from Nita Mehta’s book

Here is the recipe
Recipe adapted from Nita Mehta’s Low fat Indian cooking

200gms Mushroom cut in thin slices
1 Onions finely chopped
1 Small capsicum cut in thin strips
2 Tomatoes
2 Garlic Cloves chopped
1 small piece ginger chopped
1 green chili chopped
2 tspn oil
1/2 tspn Ajwain
1/4 tspn Chilli powder
1 Tablespoon Tomato sauce
Salt to taste

Heat oil in a Wok and add ajwain. Add Garlic/ garlic /Chilly and sauté for a minute.
Add Onions and cook till translucent
Puree the tomatoes in a Blender and add it to the Wok.
Cook on medium low heat till the gravy become slightly dry.
Add the mushrooms, salt and red Chilli powder and cook till the mushroom becomes cooked.
Add in the tomato Sauce and give it a Stir
Lastly add the capsicum and cook for 2-3 minutes.

Enjoy with Hot Roti's

Stuffed Poori with Coriander Chutney and Mango Lassi

These days we are having Shutdown…aka every xmas out office closes for 2 -2.5 weeks...he he

Isnt it great???
Ya thatz one of the best thing I like about my job:-)

Anyways….so most of the days I wake up arnd 9 --10…always after breakfast time..
So these days I just have to cook two meals a day…brunch and dinner..

Pooris are my favorite Brunch dish…its easy, quick and yummy

So when I saw the Stuffed peas pooris in Srivalli’s Blog, I sooo wanted to try it…

I made few modifications to her recipe...Here is recipe I followed

For Poori
All purpose Flour 1 Cup
Ghee -1 tspn
Salt to taste

For filling
½ cup cooked Green pea and Chick pea mashed well
[You can use Green peas alone, I had left over Chick pea so I just popped that in as well]
Ginger-I small piece chopped
Garlic- 1 clove chopped
Chillies 1 no
Garam Masala ½ tspn
Ghee ½ tspn

Add ghee to the flour and mix well.
Add in salt and water ,knead well and make a firm douch and set aside

Add ghee to a wok, once hot enough add in Ginger, Garlic and chilies and sauté for a minute
Now add the mashed Peas/Chick Pea mixture. Add in garam masala and salt and mix well.

Take a small portion of dough, flatten lightly.
Add in a spoon full of filling , cover all sides and roll to a 3 inch rounds on a lightly floured surface

Deep fry the pooris in oil till both sides are browned well
Drain on paper towel and server with a Coriander Chutney

Coriander Chutney
Blend 2 table spoon of curd together with a bunch of fresh coriander leaves and a little salt.

Mango Lassi
2 cups fresh Yogurt
¼ cup Mongo Puree
1 Ripe mango cut in pieces
1 spoon Sugar

Blend all ingredients well in a blender and njoy the lassi.

Namkeen Poori n Bhajji

We are having downpours here since weekend…and I am loving it:-)
Perfect climate to laze around with a book and a cup of hot tea..

I love to eat something spicy for brunch on a rainy day…
And Pooris are the best option.. Quick..easy and tasty..
I added a little bit of ajwain and kalonji to spice up the pooris…

For Pooris
Wheat Flour/Atta 1 cup
1 tea spoon Ajwain
1 tea spoon Kalonji
Salt to taste
Oil for deep frying

Add enough water and make the dough to a slightly stiff consistency. Let it rest for some time.
Now roll out small portions of the dough.
Deep fry in enough oil till both sides are lightly browned

For Bhajji
2 Medium sized Potatoes
1 Onion
2 Chilies
Ginger once small piece
1 tsp oil
1 tsp Mustard seeds/urad dal for seasoning
2 stems Coriander leaf chopped finely\Salt to taste

In a pan add the oil and add the mustard seeds. Once it starts sputtering add in the urad dal .
Sauté till it is golden brown.
Add in the Cut vegetables, Chilies, Ginger and salt and add in little water.
Cover and cook till the vegetables are soft and cooked well
Now gently mash the potatoes using a ladle. Garnish with Coriander leave.

I am sending this recipe for Cooking With Seeds event hosted by Kavita and Priya