My Favorite Recipes

Pumbe Chutney

2010-09-19T00:24:00.000-07:00

Ingredients
1 pumbe( make sure its not very dry and old)
1 garlic(30-40 cloves)
black pepper
dhania
dry coconut

Recipe
use tener part of leaves and flowers, cut in small pieces, half spoon oma, 2 spoon dhane, 2-3 red chilies, 1 vati khobri sliced, tamrind 1 spoon, salt.. steam all this together. After cooling grind this together, in case of pumbe having 'naar', remove it while grinding. In 5-6 spoon oil/ghee put mister jeera and garlic, fry garlic till brown color, add ground paste, mix well, heat well. store in fridge use in 1-2 weeks

Chocolate

2008-06-27T17:08:00.000-07:00

Credit for this recipe goes to my lil sweet niece Anagha. Once when I was at her home she made it, and I saw her 4 years old sis Aanala hogging on it.. Hahaha. When I asked Anagha for the recipe she emailed it to me with exact quantity of ingredients and exact procedure. I followed it literally.. and yes.. its a perfect recipe.. :D

So note down.. and yes if you have any young kids.. they also can start making chocolates on their own...

Ingredients
12 digestive biscuits (powdered)
butter 2 tea spoons
cocoa powder 2 teaspoons
sugar 4 teaspoons

Tools
Newspaper / butter paper
Rolling pin
Wooden spoon
Mixing bowl
Ice box

Preparation
Take almost 12 digestive biscuits and smash them by keeping them on the newspaper or butter paper and powder them with a rolling pin. Then put it into a mixing bowl and add sugar,butter and cocoa powder as the amt mentioned above. Mix them all together with a wooden spoon, at last put it into an ice box and freeze it after about 1/2 hrs remove it from the freezer and keep it for 2/3 minutes and take it out from the ice box cut it into pics and serve it cold

Tips: You can use glucose buiscuits, but make sure to adjust sugar quantity. Also you can substitute coco pawder with drinking chocolate and again make sure to adjust sugar quantity

Goli bhaje/bhaji (गोळी भजी)

2008-06-24T19:21:00.000-07:00

Ingredients
1 n half cup maida (all purpose flour)
1 cup buttermilk or sour curds
2 finely chopped green chillies
4-5 finely chopped curry leaves
1 spoon finely chopped coriander leaves
1 inch finely chopped ginger
1 pinch baking soda
salt for taste
half cup water (for adjusting batter consistency)
Oil for deep frying.

Preparation
Take maida in a vessel, add buttermilk and mix well so that no lumps are formed if required use some water. Now add all other ingredients except soda. Heat oil in frying pan (medium heat/flame). When oil is almost hot add baking soda to batter and mix well. Fry small portions of batter in oil (at a time u can fry 6-10 bhaji depending on fry pan size). Serve with coriander chutney. (and a cup of hot coffee or tea.. oh heaven...)

Note: if you keep this batter aside for long the batter becomes thin, so in case you are planning to do frying later then make the batter thick.

Adding baking soda at last moments make sure that soda is required in minimum quantity and is effective(else soda effect is reduced.) Eating soda is not really good for health

Of course eating fried items is also not good .. but then sometimes we need to surrender to our taste buds .. what u say!!!!

Some more tips : For more crispiness add lil rice flour, for avoiding adding baking soda add urid flour/ soaked urid dal paste.

Bhindi Masala

2008-06-20T18:56:00.000-07:00

Ingredients
20-25 Bhindi (okra )
1 Large Onion
1/2 spoon Cumin seed
3-4 spoons Oil
1 spoon Lemon Juice
1 spoon Cumin seeds
1 spoon mustard seeds
1 spoon chopped coriander leaves

Stuffing
3 spoons Red chili powder
1 spoon Amchoor
1 spoon Cumin seed
1 spoon Saunf (fennel)
3 spoons Dhania powder
2 spoons Garam masala
1/4 spoon Turmeric
Salt to taste

Preparation

Heat a pan, add a spoon of oil and roast the stuffing masala for a while .. may be for 40-50 seconds on medium heat. Keep it aside and allow it to cool. Add salt to this masala.
Slice onions in thin long pieces.

Wash bhindi and dry it with Cotton cloth(wet bhindi will make sabji soft). Slit each bhindi in the middle( Do not cut in half, just a cut in the middle). Stuff this masala in bhindi.
Heat 2-3 spoons of oil in a pan, add mustard seeds, when seeds starts spluttering add cumin seeds and sliced onions, saute onions for a while. Now put a pinch of turmeric powder,remaining stuffing masala and lil salt for taste. Add stuffed bhindi. mix well. sprinkle lil water and cook covered for 10 mins on low heat, keep turning every 3-4 mins. After this cook uncovered on medium heat for 2 mins. Add lemon juice and mix well. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve with chapati.

Healthy wheat flour dosa

2008-06-19T10:36:00.000-07:00

Ingredients
2 cups wheat flour
half cup rice flour
half cup Semolina/sooji(Rava)
2 finely chopped green chillies
2 spoon finely chopped coriander leaves
1 small finely chopped onion (optional)
Salt for taste
Water

Preparation
Take a bowl and mix all flour, now add water making sure that the lumps are not formed, trick is to keep stirring while adding water to flour. Make sure you get dosa batter consistency, now add salt, chillies, coriander leaves, onion to batter. Keep aside for 5-10 minutes. Batter will thicken a bit as rava gets soaked. Add lil water if required. Check the consistency of batter, it should not be very thick or very thin.

Make dosas using this batter. Making dosa is easy for some but can be tricky till you get hang of making it. Heat tava on medium heat (low heat will make the dosas stick to tava and hight heat will make it difficult to spread batter on tava) Now take a ladle of batter and pour it in the middle of tava, immediately start spreading it in circular motion. Sprinkle a spoon of oil over this dosa, cook covered for 1 min, turn it and cook uncovered for 10 seconds.

Yummy and healthy wheat dosa is ready, serve it with pickle/chutney but I love it just without any side dish.

Tofu Bhurji

2008-06-18T20:36:00.000-07:00

I always was wondering what should I do about Tofu. I was quite sure that I don't like tofu, but its such a good source of protein, how can I not eat it... So decided to give it a try..
Everyone says Tofu is soya paneer.. but I feel paneer and Tofu have different tastes.
So determined to eat tofu, I decided to try making some vegetable out of tofu, I decided to try making bhurji.. I love paneer bhurji, I was sure that tofu bhurji will not taste as good as paneer bhurji... well still I went ahead and tried, to my surprise, it tasted much better that my expectations, of course it can not beat paneer bhurji... hey, but its still good
Ok now here's my way of tofu..

Ingredients
1 cup minced Tofu
1 spoon ginger garlic paste
2 finely chopped green chillies
1 small finely chopped onion
1 small finely chopped tomato
1 spoon garam masala
2 spoons finely chopped coriander leaves
salt for taste

For Tadka
2 tsp oil
lil jeera, mustard seeds, turmeric powder

Preparation
Heat oil in pan, add mustard seeds, when mustard starts spluttering add jeera, ginger garlic paste, chillies and fry for a 5 seconds, now add chopped onions, saute onions till transparent, add turmeric powder. Now add tomatoes, again saute till tomatoes leave oil and add garam masala, fry for a while.. may be 5 seconds, and add minced tofu and salt. mix well, cook open till tofu blends with masala. Garnish with coriander leaves.

Tofu bhurji is ready. It goes well with chapatis.

Rava Laddu रवा लड्डू

2008-05-05T14:25:00.000-07:00

Ingredients:
2 cup Cream of wheat (Rava)
1/2 cup Ghee
1/4 cup Dry fruits (Resin, Cashew, pistachio)
2 cup Sugar
1/2 cup fresh coconut scraped (optional)
1/2 cup milk
1/4 t spoon cardamom powder

Preparation:
Take a pan, heat ghee in it. When ghee is heated add dryfuits, keep for a while, till cashew starts getting golden color, immediately add rava . Keep mixing till rava leaves nice aroma. Now add sugar to this. keep mixing till nice consitancy is formed, add cardomom powder, if required add milk. Allow to cool for a while, prepare laddus when mixure is still lil hot(not burning hot ). After it cools down, making laddus will become very difficult.

Tomato Rasam / Saaru

2008-04-24T18:31:00.000-07:00

Ingredients:
3 big tomatoes
3-4 cups water
1 tablespoon coriander stems chopped finely
2 spoons rasam powder(I prefer MTR/Ayyangar hot hot rasam powder)
Half bowl cooked toor dal

For Tadka:
2 spoons Oil
1 red chilli
1 strand of curry leaves
pinch of hing( Asafoetida )
1 small spoon jeera (Cumin seeds)
1 small spoon mustard seeds

Preparations:
Chop tomatoes in medium sized pieces, chop coriendar stems finely (yes stems!!! include some leaves too :P.. well.. this gives rasam the taste which u will find in marraiges/hotel rasam). Add chopped tomatoes, coriendar, and rasam powder to water and keep for boiling.

Add mashed cooked dal to above and boil covered for couple of minutes. Remove from the heat. Give tadka to this rasam. Tasty rasam is ready. Serve with steamy rice and ghee. If theres some appalam/papad with rice and rasam then I really need nothing more. Or just have it like soup.. so yummy.

Puran Poli / Holige पुरण पोली

2008-04-23T09:53:00.000-07:00

Ingredients:

1 cup Chana Dal (Soaked for 5 hrs )

1 cup Jaggery( scraped/broken in very small pieces)

1 pinch turmeric powder

1 pinch cardamom powder

1 pinch nutmug powder

1 pinch black pepper powder

1 cup wheat flour (one can take combination of all purpose flour and wheat flour)

1 pinch of salt

water for kneading flour

1 spoon oil

Ghee/oil for roasting puran poli

Preparation:
Knead wheat flour with a pinch of salt, 1 spoon oil and water( dough should be as we knead for chapati or slightly softer )
Pressure cook soacked chana dal with minimum water. In case after cooking, there is some water remaining then remove it from chana dal. Grind finely this cooked dal in grinder/blender with very minimum water required(resuse water remaining if any when you cooked dal ). There is an appliance called 'puran yantra' used for making puran.. i.e. grinding chana dal, you can use it if you have.

Take a thick bottom pan, heat on mediaum heat, add ground chana dal and jaggery, keep stirring till jaggery melts and mixure forms good consitency. Switch off heat, add cinamom, nutmug and black pepper powder, mix and allow to cool. You will notice that this mixture will become much dry after cooling so don't worry if u feel mixture/filling is lil soft when its hot.

Now prepare small ping pong ball shaped balls of filling(puran), prepare dough balls of lil smaller size than filling balls. If dough is more than filling then the taste of dough will override taste of stuffing

Roll dough ball into small round shape, then keep the filling ball in the middle of the rolled dough

Now bring the edges together of rolled dough to cover the stuffing completely, Make sure that there is no open /uncovered part of stuffing/filling.

Now roll this into round shape using rolling pin. Roll as thin as possible making sure that the filling does not leak out and covering should not tear.

Heat the tava/griddle on medium heat (low heat will make the puran poli crispy and high heat may burn it). After tava/griddle is heated put the rolled puran poli on it. spread lil oil/ghee on the uncooked part. After one side is done, cook other side.

When done, serve with lil ghee on puran poli. It can be stored for couple of days, but the real taste of puran poli is when served hot out of griddle. :-)

Aloo Paratha

2008-04-15T10:57:00.000-07:00

Aloo/ Potato/ Batata... one of the favorite food items, I am born potato lover. And I have been blessed with a perfect life partner, who can be pleased by offering just aloo parathas... and his day is made.

So here is my version of aloo paratha

Ingredients:

2 big potatos
Half inch ginger
2 garlic pods(approximately same quantity as ginger)
coriander Leaves
3-4 green chillies
1 spoon lime juice(optional)
Wheat flour
2-3 spoons Oil
Salt (As per taste)
handful Green Peas(very much optional but gives nice green color to parathas)

Preparation:
Knead wheat flour as we knead for chapati, and keep aside.
Boil potatoes, remove skin and mash nicely. Grind chillies, ginger, garlic, coriander leaves,lemon juice and boiled green peas(optional) together to a fine paste.
Mix mashed potatoes, and above ground masala to this with salt, mix together nicely, allow to cool if potatoes are still hot. Cooling will make the mix/filling lil dryer. Prepare equal sized filling balls(around size of ping pong boll)
Take little kneaded flour(lil smaller than filling ball size), roll it in small round shape, fill the filling inside, cover it nicely.

Roll the paratha, cook on tava with oil on both sides.
Serve with tomato ketchup or curds.

Veg Cutlet

2008-04-11T19:35:00.000-07:00

This recipe is what I tried after browsing through around 5-6 cutlet recipes online. I changed the recipe as per my taste, and my guests loved it.. :-).
I am really bad in telling the measurement for ingredients :(((( ... I am so used to cooking as per my cooking judgement (Andaza measurement ) ... Sill am trying my best. :P

Ingredients:
2 Potatos
1 Carrot
6-7 Green Beans
Green Peas
2-3 small florets of cauliflower (optional)
1 small onion
half inch ginger
2-3 small pods of garlic
2-3 Green Chillies
Oil for shallow frying and lil for tadka
1 spoon Gram flour (besan)
Lil water
Bread Crums ( 1 bowl)

Preparation:
Cut carrots, peeled potatoes, cauliflower, green peas and green beans finely. Then pressure cook these vegetables with very lil/no water. Chop onions finely. Prepare ginger garlic paste.
In a pan sauté onions, add finely chopped chillies, then add ginger garlic paste fry for a while. Add the boiled vegetables (remove water if any). Remove from heat, mix the vegetables, add salt for taste. Mash this mix if required. prepare cutlets of desired shape .

Take lil water, add besan to it to form thin batter. slighly spread this batter on the cutlets and immediately roll it in the bread crumbs, the gram flour batter will be useful for making sure enough breadcrumbs stick to the cutlets.

In a pan/Tava shalow fry these cutlets. Serve with tomato ketchup/ Green chutney/ Sweet chutney.

Preparing breadcrumbs:
(I tried it this way) I took 2-3 slices of bread, microwaved it, making sure that it does not burn. Allow to cool, then grind it in mixer/blender.. wolla bread crumbs are ready :-)

Ridge Gourd Peel chutney(बज्जी )

2008-04-10T12:49:00.000-07:00

Ingredients:
Ridge gourd peel (u can take 1 long ridge gourd's peel)
Urad Dal (1 small spoon, 15-20 in number)
half cup Fresh Coconut scrape
Salt
half spoon Tamarind paste
1-2 Green Chillies

For Tadka:
2 spoon Oil
1 small spoon Jeera
1 small spoon Mustard Seeds
3-4 Curry Leaves

Preparation:
Cook ridge gourd skin in the cooker/pan with lil water.
Roast urad dal in a pan till brown color / till u get nice aroma of urad.
Grind coconut + cooked ridge guard skin + urad dal + tamarind paste+ Chillies and salt together.
Give tadaka to this chutney..
This chutney(actually called bajji बज्जी in mangalorians) goes well with rice, chapati. U can add chopped onions to it as per taste