Beet soup

I wanted to have a soup for lunch, and a quick audit of the fridge threw up only two slightly sad looking beets. Necessity is the mother of invention, and this awesome soup resulted.

2 beetroots

1/2 cup curds

1 tsp garlic paste

Salt and pepper to taste

Cream cheese for garnish

Method:

Roughly chop the beetroots and steam them for 10 minutes. 

Blend beetroots, curds and garlic paste till you get a smooth consistency. Add water to get the desired thickness. 

Bring the blend to boil, with salt and pepper

Sprinkle with cream cheese or feta cheese before serving. 

Mustard microgreens

I was introduced to Microgreens almost by accident, but from the moment I heard about them I have been quite fascinated. To someone who loves sprouts, microgreens was the logical next step, and I was doubly sold when I came to know they pack upto 4-6 times the nutritional punch of the adult vegetable.

But all things happen only when the time is right, and growing microgreens was no exception. Last week, I lined a takeaway container with wads of tissue paper, sprinkled mustard seeds, watered, covered with cling film, and kept it on on sunny window sill. I watched the seeds germinate, and push out the first leaves. A week later, I was ready to harvest. Don't they look gorgeous?

The best part was biting into one. The flavours poured into my mouth. Who needs kasaundi when you have microgreens?

Sprouted moong muffins

I felt like having something different for lunch, so threw together the contents of my fridge, and came up with something that was actually pretty good.

1/2 cup sprouted moong

1/3 cup rice flour

1 tbsp sesame seeds

1 tsp paprika powder

1 tsp oil

Salt to taste

Method:

Mix the rice flour, paprika powder, salt and sesame seeds. Add the oil, and mix till it is crumbly. 

Add the moong, mix well. Add water gradually, incorporating it thoroughly, so you get a thick batter. 

Grease a muffin tray, pour the batter in, and level the top. 

Bake at 175 degrees for 15 minutes. 

Delicious with hot hibiscus juice. 

Fried chicken

It was a rainy Sunday evening, and I wasn't really in a mood to cook anything too elaborate. The hubby said he wanted roast chicken with pasta, and even offered to make the pasta (using a premix) if I would make the chicken. To keep him away from the kitchen, I came up with this fried chicken dish.

1 chicken, curry cut

1 medium onion, sliced fine

2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

1 tbsp soya sauce

1 tbsp red chilli powder

1 tsp paprika powder

Salt to taste

2 tbsp cooking oil

1 tbsp cornflour

Method:

Wash the chicken well, make slits in the leg pieces

Make a marinade with the sauces, salt and paprika powder, and let the chicken marinate for 30 mins. 

Heat the oil, fry the chicken in batches (about 5 minutes each), and keep aside. 

Fry the onions till caramelised. 

Add back the fried chicken pieces, and extra marinade. Sprinkle the cornflour. Mix well, cove and let it cook on a low flame for 15 minutes. 

Serve with pasta or with veggies on a bed of steamed rice. 

Tomato rice- Tamilian meets Continental

Just before we were leaving Bombay, my sons' friend threw them a party, where he cooked himself. The main dish was what my son called tomato rice, and I decided to rustle it up for lunch today. Ideally, I would have used fresh basil, but since the only herbs I have is kaddipatta, it became a fusion dish. With potato wafers, it was quite a tasty dish.

1 cup rice soaked

3 large tomatoes

4 pods garlic

Kaddipatta

1 tsp paprika powder

1/2 tsp mustard seeds

Oil 

Salt to taste

3 tbdp grated cheese

Method:

Heat 2 tsp oil, splitter the mustard seeds. 

Add garlic and sauté till browned

Add kaddipatta and tomatoes and sauté till mushy. Add paprika powder and mix well. 

Add soaked rice and double the quantity of water and salt to taste. Cover and let it cook till rice is done. 

Add half the grated cheese and mix well. Sprinkle the other half over the dish and grill in an oven for 2-3 minutes. 

Nutty Wholewheat Triangles

I've been looking for a good recipe for peanut cookies for a while, but the only ones I could find online used peanut butter. While I have nothing against peanut butter, I think they are much better spread on toast than beaten into a batter. Finally, I made up a recipe myself, and was really satisfied with the result.
The triangles are slightly fragile and collapse gently if you squeeze them too hard, but they are absolutely melt in the mouth!!!

1/4 cup roasted peanuts- crushed
1/4 cup desiccated coconut
1/2 cup sugar- ground coarsely
1 cup wholewheat flour
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 tsp baking powder

Method:
Grind the peanuts and keep aside (I like it fine ground, but you can leave a few chunky pieces too)
Grind the sugar and keep aside
Sieve together the flour, powdered sugar and baking powder.
Add the ground peanuts and desiccated coconut and mix well
Make a depression in the centre, pour in the oil, and knead well.
Grease a baking sheet, and spread the dough evenly across it.
Meanwhile, pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees.
Place a container with water in the bottom rack, and the cookie tray in the middle rack.
Bake for 10 minutes, take out, and with a sharp knife, make a cut for 16 squares, and further cut each diagonally (32 triangles in all). Return to the oven and bake for a further 5 minutes (checking every minute after 13 minutes, to ensure it doesn't burn).
Remove, let it cook, and break along the cut lines.

Basil Paneer

I wanted to make a really simple paneer dish to go with parathas, but wasn't in a mood for plain old paneer bhurji either. So I basically threw in a bunch of ingredients that I had, and came up with this nice fusion piece!

250 gms paneer (I used store bought)
1 medium onion
1 large tomato
3 pods garlic
2 stalks basil leaves
1/2 tsp red chilli powder
Salt and sugar to taste
1 tbsp cooking oil

Method:
Finely chop the onions and garlic. Heat the oil, add the onions and garlic and saute on low flame till they turn transparent.
Add coarsely chopped tomatoes, red chilli powder, mix well, and saute till the tomatoes turn mushy. Roughly tear the basil leaves, add and mix well.
Cut the paneer slices into cubes, and add to the paste. Turn off the flame and mix well.
Add salt and sugar to taste.

Butter Cookies, with a bite

With exams around the corner, the older one keeps demanding something to munch while studying. Since anything healthy will not quite meet his requirements, I whipped up a batch of butter cookies by adapting my mother's recipe, and improvising by adding nigella seeds.

100 gms sugar
100 gms salted butter
50 gms rice flour
100 gms maida
1 tsp nigella seeds

Method:Preheat the oven at 175 degrees for about 10 minutes
Cream together sugar and butter
Add rice flour and beat well
Add maida and knead to a soft dough (without adding any water). Wheb done, add the nigella seeds and mix well.
Roll it into balls, place on a baking tray taking care to leave space for them to spread, and bake for 12-15 minutes till golden brown on top.

Honey Chicken

Sunday dinner tends to be Chicken, This weekend, it was a sweetish chicken, which I served with mashed sweet potatoes

For Dry Chicken
1 large curry cut chicken
4 tbsp soya sauce
2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tbsp honey
2 tbsp olive oil
Juice of 1 lemon
1 tsp paprika powder
Salt to taste
2 tbsp sesame seeds
2 tbsp melon seeds
3 tbsp torn basil leaves

Method:
Wash the chicken and pat dry. Marinate for 30 minutes in a mixture of soya sauce, Worchestershire sauce, honey, lemon juice, paprika powder and salt.
Heat the oil, add the chicken pieces in batches and cook so all sides are evenly done (about 2-4 minutes per side). Return the chicken to the pot, add the remaining marinade, cover, and let it simmer on low heat for 10-15 minutes.
Add sesame seeds, melon seeds and basil leaves, cook for an additional minute, and serve.


For Mashed Sweet Potatoes
2 large sweet potatoes
2 tsp chilli flakes
Salt to taste
1 tsp butter
Juice of 1/2 lemon

Method:
Boil the sweet potatoes till soft. Peel and mash.
Add chilli flakes, salt, butter and lemon juice, and mix well.

Lemon Chicken

When it comes to chicken, for one reason or the other, I don't seem to follow recipes ever. This was whipped up on a day when there was not enough time for marination, and I didn't feel like making a "buna hua" chicken either. Since there was a bok choy in the fridge, that went into the dish, and it came out pretty good.

1 curry cut chicken
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp olive oil
1 head buk choy
Salt to taste
1 tbsp chilli flakes

Method:
Wash and clean the chicken. Prick holes in it using a fork, and marinate in a mixture of (half the) olive oil, lemon juice, salt and chilli flakes for about 30 minutes.
Heat a pan, heat the remaining oil, and toss the chicken on medium heat till well browned (about 10 minutes).
Add the reserved marinade and shredded buk choy, cover, reduce to a low flame and allow it to cook for about 20 minutes till the chicken is well done. 

Sweet and Spicy Dry Chicken

Dinner today was a mishmash of everyone's request. I wanted something spicy, but Thing Two insisted he needed sugar to kill the spice. The Hubby and Thing One both wanted chicken- preferably dry. There was also the slight problem of having to work with the ingredients that were available in the kitchen/ kitchen garden, since I didn't want to go out in the cold. And it had to be something easy.

I browsed the internet for recipes, and tried to decide between two recipes that I liked. Unfortunately, I got the two mixed up, and the recipe I finally made was something all my own (with some jaggery thrown in to keep Thing Two happy). The result- Fantastic Chicken, they all said, before finishing it all off!

1 curry cut Chicken

For Marinating:

1 tbsp Chilli powder

2 tbp dhania powder

2 tbsp Garam Masala Powder

1 tsp haldi powder

Salt to taste

For Masala:

Oil - 3 tblspn

1 tsp Saunf

3 large onions, chopped Onion

2 green chilli Green

3 tbsp Ginger Garlic Paste

2 tbsp Jaggery

2 tbsp Lemon Juice

1 sprig curry leaves

Method:

Marinate chicken and leave it for 30 mins.

Heat oil, add saunf and wait till it finishes spluttering.

Add onions and green chilli, and saute till it turns light golden.

Add ginger garlic paste, and curry leaves and fry till the onion is well browned. Make sure the onion is golden, because that what gives good colour to the curry.

Add the marinated chicken and jaggery and mix well.

Cover with a tight lid and cook on a very low flame for 30 mins to 40 mins stirring in between.

Now open the lid and increase the heat. Dry up the chicken, this will make the masala stick to the chicken and get fried.

Add lemon juice, mix well and serve.

Maharashtrian inspired hot and sweet drumsticks

I've had two drumsticks sitting in my fridge for almost a week. I'm not sure why I bought them, but I know that once it got home, I couldn't think of anything I wanted to make with them, and they languished. I finally invented this recipe to put the drumsticks out of their misery, and it actually turned out pretty good!

2 drumsticks

1/2 onion, chopped fine

1 tsp ginger-garlic paste

1 tsp mustard oil

1/2 tsp chilli powder

1/2 tsp Maharashtrian godh masala powder

1 tsp jaggery

Salt to taste

1 tbsp black sesame seeds

Method:
Cut the drumsticks into 2 inch long pieces, and boil in water (with a bit of salt), for 5 minutes.
Heat the oil, saute the onion pieces till it turns transparent, then add ginger-garlic paste, and fry a bit more. Add drumsticks along with some of the water it was cooked in and mix well.
Add chilli powder, godh masala powder, jaggery and salt and mix well.
Cover, and let the curry bubble for 3 minutes or so. Uncover, and boil off the water, if required.
Sprinkle with sesame seeds and serve.

Radish stir fry

This is my attempt at cooking greens the Maharashtrian way. While I would normally have used a traditional 'green', these radishes looked so lovely, I had to give them a try. 

I cup radish and radish leaves, chopped fine

3 tbsp peanuts

6 pods garlic, peeled and chopped

1 green chilli, chopped

1 tsp mustard oil

Salt to taste

Method:

Heat the oil, add the garlic and sauté on a low flame till browned

Add chilli and peanuts and sauté till peanuts start browning

Add the radish and radish leaves, and sauté till done (about 2-3 minutes)

Add salt to taste, mix well, and serve hot 

Moong dal with amaranthus stalks

My mother is visiting, and since she loves Bengali food as much as I do, I picked up a huge bunch of red amaranthus/ lal shaag. It was only when I got back home, that I realised the stems were too thick to cut up and cook with the leaves. Reluctant to throw them away, I went to Google Uncle, who gave me an idea but no recipe- chopped amaranthus with moong dal. I made up the recipe, and quite like it.

1 cup whole moong dal
2 tbsp channa dal
A pinch of turmeric powder
1/2 cup amaranthus stems, chopped
6 pods garlic
1/2 tsp jeera
2 green chillis
2 tbsp curds
Cooking oil
Salt to taste
Mint or coriander leaves for garnish

Method:
Heat the oil, add jeera and let it splutter. Add garlic and the green chillis, and saute till browned.
Add chopped amaranthus stems, and saute for about a minute.
Wash the dals, and pressure cook with the fried masala, and turmeric till soft (20 minutes on low flame after the first whistle).
Remove from the fire, allow it to cool down, add curds, and heat till it reaches boiling temperature.
Garnish with mint and serve with rotis.
Wash and pressure cook the dals with the turmeric powder, till cooked.
Either serve with rotis, or eat it as a chilli.

Saunf-ajwain wali Chicken

Kashmiri cuisine uses a unique combination of mustard oil, saunf and ajwain, which I found slightly intriguing. How can three very strong flavours coexist in the same dish? It could either be a complete disaster, or mindblowingly good- and since people have been cooking it for ages, it is more likely to be the latter!

And hence, this dish that I cooked purely by instinct. I tasted a bit of the gravy, and it was indeed good.

1 curry cut chicken, washed and cleaned
1/3 cups curds
1/2 tsp red chill powder
1/2 tsp haldi powder
1 tsp salt
2 tbsp mustard oil
2 medium onions, cut into small pieces
1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste
1/2 tsp ajwain, lightly crushed
1/2 tsp saunf, lightly crushed

Method:
Marinate chicken in haldi, red chilli powder, salt and curds for about 1 hour
Heat the mustard oil, sauté the chopped onions till they start to turn transparent.
Add ginger paste and lightly crushed saunf and ajwain, and sauté till the onions start browning.
Grind the mixture to paste. Add to the marinated chicken and mix well (do not add water at this stage)
Bring to a boil, reduce the flame, cover and allow it to cook in its own steam for 30-35 minutes (stirring occasionally) till the chicken is well cooked.
Serve hot with steamed rice.

Oregano Flavoured Paneer

I've been wanting to make flavoured paneer for a long time, and finally did so today. It tasted really lovely, and I am definitely experimenting more with flavoured paneer.

For paneer:
1 litre milk
1/3 cup curds
1 lemon
1 tsp oregano flakes

For bhurji:
1 tbsp til oil
1 onion chopped fine
1 tbsp (flavoured) vinegar
Salt to taste

Method:
Take the milk in a thick bottomed vessel, and heat it. When it starts heating up, stir in the curds (well beaten), and keep stirring. At this stage, add the oregano flakes (or any other flavour you want to experiment with).
When the milk comes to a boil, lower the flame, and squeeze in the juice of 1/2 lemon. Squeeze in the other half if the paneer doesn't seperate.
Line a colander with a muslin cloth and pour the mixture in. Once all the water has drained out, place a weight on the cloth, and leave it for about 30 minutes
Cut into cubes.

Heat the til oil, and fry the paneer pieces on low heat. Remove the paneer pieces.
In the same oil, saute the onions till the raw smell goes. Turn off the fire
Add the paneer pieces, vinegar and salt, and mix well.

Roast veggies

I had a whole bunch of vegetables in the fridge, and instead of making the usual curry with them, decided to attempt something new. The older one liked it, because it reminded him of roast chicken, but nobody else had anything to say, so this is the first and last time I make it. Pity, because it was nice, in a very different sort of way.

Mixed vegetables cut into equal sized pieces (I used beans, carrots, peas, and potatoes)

2 tbsps soya sauce
1 tbsps Worcesterchire sauce
1 tbsp honey
1 tsp chilli powder
salt to taste
oil

Saute the vegetables on low heat for a few minutes.
Add the soya sauce, the Worcestershire sauce, chilli powder and salt, mix well, and keep cooking till the vegetables are well coked.
Add the honey, stir well.
Check for seasonings before searving.

Beet rotis- experimens of the pink kind

After making Red Velvet Cupcakes, I had quite a bit of beet puree left over, and had no clue what to do with it. For awhile, I contemplated making my (now) famous Barbie Pachidi, but decided to be adventurous instead.
These beautiful rotis is what resulted.

2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup beet puree (beetroot steamed for about 10 minutes, then pureed till soft)
Garam masala and salt to taste

Knead the flour and the beetroot puree into a dough, adding water if necessary. Keep aside for about 15 minutes.
Roll  into rotis, and cook them on a tawa.
Add a dollop of ghee before serving.
You don't need to serve it WITH anything- it stands on it's own!

Bajra Whatever

This dish is special, because it is the first meal I cooked for myself in the kitchen of our new house. About a week after we moved in, I got fed up of ordering takeaways (though there are some awesome places to order from here), and soaked some bajra with the intention of making bajra khichdi for lunch.
But when the time came to actually make it, I couldn't find the coconut grater and someone had finished off my stock of singdana, so I had to innovate.

I stir fried garlic, onions and a carrot, added salt, pepper and dry parsley to taste. Threw in the cooked bajra, and some milk, and let the whole thing simmer till I got a consistency I liked.

Tasted much better than I hoped, and the intention is to make it more often, because it makes a change from a regular bajra khichadi.

Dak bungalow chicken

Growing up in a vegetarian household, for the longest time, the only non-veg dishes I had tasted were the fish fry and the roast chicken at this restaurant in Jamshedpur, and the chicken they served at the Guest House. It was only when I read the name "dak bungalow chicken", and tried to research it on the internet that I realized that what the cook at the Guest House was dishing out was a continuation of the grand colonial tradition of "dak bungalow chicken". This is a mish-mash of a bunch of recipes, and tastes exactly like I remember it.

Wash and clean the pieces of chicken and pat dry.
Mix -
1/2 cup curd
1 tbsp cooking oil
1 tsp each cumin pwd and red chilli pwd* and 2 tsp coriander pwd
salt to taste
Marinate the chicken in the mixture and keep aside for about 4 hours.

Fry in 1 tbsp oil-
2 medium onions chopped
6-8 cloves garlic
1 inch piece ginger
2 bay leaves
1 stick cinnamon
1 badi elaichi
8-10 cloves
till the onions turn a golden brown.

Turn off the flame. Take out about 1/2 the total quantity of the fried mixture (without any of the whole spices), grind to a smooth paste and return to the mixture.

Add the marinated chicken pieces to the fried masala, stir well, and cook on low heat for about 30 minutes, turning occasionally.

Best with hot phulkas with lots of ghee.

* adjust chilli powder to taste