Paneer Paratha(Stuffed Indian Cottage cheese flat bread)

Parathas are usually made with stuffed vegetables such as potatoes, radish, cauliflower, or leafy vegetables or paneer. They are very popular in Indian cuisine. Parathas are very easy to make and can be served just with raita/curd. If you have sudden guests at home and didn't have much time to cook I will say try making parathas. They are very healthy, tasty and quick to make.


Today I am blogging about Paneer paratha which I made over the weekend.

Here is the recipe for the same.

Ingredients:

Filling:
Paneer
1tbsp of chopped coriander
1tsp dry fenugreek leaves (optional)
red chili powder( as per your spice level)
1tsp of chat masala
salt as per taste

Rotis:

1 cup of wheat flour.
1tbsp oil
salt


Procedure:

Mix the flour with salt, 1tsp of oil and water to make it like nice soft dough. Knead the dough and keep it aside.

Grate Paneer. Mix grated paneer, chopped coriander, green chilies, chat masala and salt. Make small balls of the mixture.

Take the dough and divide into small balls. Roll the dough into small round shaped dusting with flour to avoid sticking onto the platform.

Place paneer mixture bring the ends to the center from 4 to 5 points. Close the ends properly so that the mixture will not come out.








Dust with flour and gently roll into flat bread approximately 5" to 6" diameter.

On a hot griddle or pan place paratha on it. Cook both sides till it turns golden color drizzling little bit of oil or ghee.


Delicious yummy Paneer paratha is ready to be served with raita or plain yogurt or any curry or with pickle(I like to eat with mango pickle and paratha).

Jungle Theme Baby shower cake for my friend

Today we celebrated one of my close friend's baby shower. I made jungle theme cake for the shower. All the animals on the cake are made with fondant.

It is a red velvet cake with very little red color. After a lot of thinking finally decided to frost the cake with Cream cheese instead of Fondant. To keep the animals from melting with moistness of cheesecake, I kept wax paper underneath each animal while decorating the cake.

Cake recipe adapted from here.

Here are the pictures of the same.

Making of Balloons and Palm tree:

I made blue balloons as well. But my daughter asked me not to put it since it is not going well with the theme



Close up of animals while drying:



Close up of 2nd tier :



Cooling, Frosting cake:






Lady bugs, Lion, Giraffe ,Monkey:










Last but not least cake slice :)



Sending this cake to Crazy for Cakes by Priya Mahadevan

Cryspy Onion fritters / Pakoda

Last week was pouring like crazy in bay area. In a rainy day, only thing comes to my mind is eating bajji/pakoda along with hot tea/coffee. As most of you all know I am from Andhra. In Andhra you find two types of Onion Pakoda/Pakodi. One is Gatti pakodi and the other one is metthani pakodi. Gatti Pakodi made with very little amount of water to make it cryspy. Gatti means Hard. Mettani Pakodi is made with little bit more water. Mettani means soft. More water makes fritters little soft like bajji. If you go to any place in Andhra you find these pakoda stalls on the streets where you can find hot fritters made in front of you.
In my family my mom loves to eat Mettani Pakodi and my bro and myself loves Gatti Pakodi. For sure these are my favorite comfort food in cold/rainy weather. So many good memories with these pakodas. Feeling nostalgic by writing this post.

Made these tasty pakoda on Thursday.

Here is the recipe.



Ingredients:

1cup of besan(Bengal Gram flour/garbanzo flour)
2tbsp rice flour
1tbsp of chili powder(Spice as per your taste)
1tsp cumin seeds
1 big onion cut into slices
3 green chilies chopped (optional. Adjust as per your spice level)
salt as per your taste
oil to deep fry

Preparation:

Mix flour, onions,spices with very little amount of water into hard batter( Do not add more water. keep it more of dry batter. If you add too much water fritters won't be crispy.). In a pan add oil to deep fry. Once oil is hot use your fingers to drop batter in the form of fritters in hot oil. (Make sure oil is very hot.) Using laddle turn the fritters so that fritters cook evenly. Fry them till they turn golden color on medium heat.
Remove it from oil and drain the excess oil using paper towel.
Serve it with hot tea. (You can store these in air tight container for 1 day)

Chole/ Chana Masala

Who doesn't know about Chole? I haven't seen any Indian restaurant which doesn't serve Chole. This is the most common dish available in almost every Indian restaurant.
Today I am posting my version of Chole.



Here is the recipe

2 cups of chick peas
2 tomatoes finely chopped
1 onion finely chopped
1tsp ginger garlic paste
4 green chilies slit length wise ( adjust as per your spice level)
Chana masala powder 3 tbsp ( Adjust spices)
1tsp of lemon juice
Coriander for garnish
pinch of turmeric powder
1tsp red chili powder (if you like to have spicy)
whole garam masala (3 cardamom ,1/4 inch cinnamon, 2 cloves,1 bay leaf)
salt
1 tbsp oil
1 tea bag

Preparation:

Soak chick peas overnight and pressure cook them(I do add one tea bag while cooking chick peas to get nice color). In a pan add oil once oil is hot add whole garam masala. Once whole masala turns golden color add onions and salt. Once onions turn into golden color add ginger garlic paste and cook till the raw flavor goes. Now add chopped tomatoes, green chilies,chana masala powder, red chili powder, turmeric powder and cook till all the tomatoes are cooked into a fine paste. Now add boiled chick peas and mash few chick peas using potato masher for thick gravy. Adjust spices. Cook for 6 to 8 mts till chick peas observe the spices. Add lemon juice and remove it from heat.

Garnish with coriander and serve with Poori or Bhatura or Roti.

Fruit Cake with Semolina( Known as Love Cake in Sri Lanka)

Today I am talking about a cake called "Love Cake". This cake is famous in Sri Lanka. Very moist and rich with lots of nuts and nice aroma with honey and rose water.
I got this recipe from my friend who loves this cake. She used to get this cake as a gift from one of her friend for Christmas. Last year for New Year's eve I made this cake using her friend's recipe with little variation. It was a big hit. Keeping that in mind I made this cake again for my friend's Anniversary on Sunday. I made two 8 inch rounds. One I gave for my friend one I brought to office and everyone loved it. It was a big hit again.



Here is the recipe for the same

Ingredients
--------------
Eggs - 6 egg yolks and 4 egg whites
Butter - 1/4 pound
Ravai/Semolina - 1 1/2 cups (Roasted)
Bakers sugar -2 cups
Cashews - 1/4 cup ( cut into small pieces)
walnuts -fistful cut into small pieces.. ( Actual recipe uses only Cashews. I reduced cashews quantity and added walnuts as well)
Pineapple candy - 1/4 cup or fistful( cut into small pieces) Actual recipe says Pumpkin candy which I couldn't find in any store :(
Orange/Citrus Candy peel in sugar syrup - 1/4 cup ( cut into small pieces) Actual recipe mentioned this but I couldn't find in any store. Instead I used dry fruits available in my pantry like raisins, apricots etc.
Nutmeg - 1/2 tea spoon
Cinnamon - 1/2 tea spoon
Rose essence - 1 tea spoon
Honey - 1/2 cup
Rum/Brandy - 1 cup (Actual recipe says Brandy . Luckily Rum was there at home which I bought for Tiramisu so used Rum instead of Brandy)

Method
----------
1. Beat 6 egg yolks with sugar till it becomes creamy (see picture 2 below)
2. Add melted Butter to rava towards the end of roasting the rava/semolina, then add it to the above mix.
3. Add spices and cut items to the above mix.
4. Add Honey and Rum/Brandy and mix with above items.
5. Finally beat 4 egg whites till it forms soft peaks (refer pic1 below for the consistency) and mix it to the above items.
6. Grease cake pans and dust with flour or grease and keep Parchment paper. (Parchment paper helps to remove the cake clean without any breaks). I ran out of parchment paper so it was little hard to remove the cake from pan in shape :) .
7. Transfer the mixture evenly into prepared pans
8. Preheat oven to 300 F and bake it for 60 minutes. or until tooth pick comes clean when inserted in the cake.
Remove it from oven cool in the pan for 15 mts and cool completely on the rack for an hr or so till it reaches room temperature.

Yummy cake is ready to be served. This cake will taste better next day.

Kakarakaya Pulusu (Bitter Gourd Soup)

Happy Women's day to everyone.
How many of you will run away from bitter gourd? I am one of them. I always used to give excuses to eat this vegetable. Only way I used eat to this vegetable is fry and sometimes pulusu. But now a days I understood the value of this vegetable and started eating in the form of pulusu/soup.



Recipe source ... (MOM)

Ingredients:

2 bitter gourd
1 onion
2 green chilies
1/2 cup tamarind juice or 2tbsp store bought tamarind pulp
small piece of jaggery or 2 tbsp of sugar
salt
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
pinch of asfatoedia/hing
red chili powder as per your spice level
pinch of turmeric powder
1tbsp of roasted sesame powder
2 red chilies
curry leaves
oil for tampering
To thicken the soup 1tsp of rice flour mix it with 1 tsp of water.

Preparation:
Roast sesame seeds(1/2 cup sesame seeds) along with 2 or 3 red chilies as per your spice level and make a powder of it and keep it aside. This powder will be handy in most of the dishes. I always store this powder.
Wash and chop bitter gourd and onions. Slit chilies length wise. In a pan add oil once oil is hot add mustard seeds. Once mustard seeds starts spluttering add red chilies, green chilies, hing, curry leaves, turmeric and onions. Once onions turns into golden color add red chili powder and chopped bitter gourd. Shallow fry for 5 mts and add water and let the vegetables cook. Once vegetable is cooked add tamarind juice, jaggery and Sesame powder. Adjust salt and let it cook for few more mts in spices.

To thicken the soup add rice flour paste and mix it thoroughly. Delicious and healthy soup is ready to be served.

Muruku/Jantikalu

Cooking spree continuous at my place. Today felt like making one of my favorite evening snack called Murku/Chakli. It is a time consuming snack. But end of the day it is worth. Hard work really pays off. My mom makes these muruku almost every festival or get together. Hats off to her patience for making these for so many people. I still remember those days when all my aunts used to make these delicious snacks for Sankranthi/Pongal at one place. For kids it is the best day since moms are busy in cooking and no one to say no for playing :) On top of it delicious food once you are tired of playing :) Golden days..


Ingredients:

3 cups rice flour
1/4 cup of roasted urad dal flour
3tsp vegetable shortening
1 tsp ajwain seeds
salt
red chili powder as per your spice level

Oil to deep fry

Preparation:

Mix flour, salt, red chili powder, ajwain seeds and shortening (Shortening helps to get crispy muruku) and then add water to make a soft dough.
Heat oil in a pan.

Place small piece of dough in Muruku maker. Once oil is hot pipe out the dough into different shapes using muruku maker in the hot oil.( I do it directly in the oil. You can even do these shapes on a plate and carefully transfer into hot oil) Fry the murku in medium heat till it turns into golden color. Remove it from oil and keep it on paper towel to drain excess oil. Let it cool completely and store in air tight container.

Delicious snack is ready.

Tiramisu once again for Friend's b'day

Yesterday night made Tiramisu for one of my friend's b'day party. As usual it was a big hit.

Here is the pic of the same. Recipe here.

Beetroot Rice

How many people recollect those days when your mom is running behind you for making you eat beet? I always used to run away from this vegetable. But my mom never gave up. She used to make variety of dishes with Beet and we ended up loving this vegetable. Hats off to my mom's patience. I am glad that I don't have to run behind my daughter.

Here is one of the recipe from my mom's collection. Simple yet delicious.



Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup rice
2 beet finely chopped
1 tomato
1 small sized onion
2 tsp ginger garlic paste
4 cloves
1/2 inch cinnamon stick
4 green chilies
1/2 bunch coriander leaves
1 tsp masala powder
Salt
2 tbsp oil

Preparation:

In a blender blend onion, tomatoes, coriander leaves and green chilies into a fine paste. In a pressure cooker add oil once oil is hot add cloves and cinnamon stick. Now add ginger garlic paste cook for 1 mt and add tomato onion paste and cook till raw flavor goes away.
Now add chopped beet, rice and salt cook for 5 mts . Add water (1:2 ratio) and cook in pressure cooker for 3 whistles.

After cooker cools down garnish with coriander and serve with raita or any curry.

Sarson ka Saag

How many times did you think of cooking different region cuisine? Even though I grew up in India I never had different region cuisines in daily menu till I started my college. Only way to try different region cuisine is in restaurants. Thanks to internet, now a days most of them know how to make these regional classics at home.
At least weekly once I try to cook greens at home. So whenever I go for groceries I try to look for different greens. Yesterday found mustard greens so thought of making the famous punjabi dish "Sarson kaa Saag". Sarson means Mustard Leaves. Saag means mustard or spinach leaf based dish. This recipe is very simple and healthy. In Punjab this dish is served with Makki ki Roti (Flat bread made with Corn meal).


Here is the recipe for the same.

Ingredients:

1tbsp olive oil
1 bunch of mustard leaves
1 bunch of spinach leaves
1 medium size onion (chop finely)
1tsp ginger garlic paste
1tsp rice flour
1/2 tsp garam masala powder
2 green chilies ( increase as per your spice level)
1/2 tsp coriander powder
1/2 tsp cumin powder
salt as per taste

Preparation:

Wash and chop mustard and spinach leaves. Boil water and add chopped greens. Boil for 5 mts uncovered. Once greens cool down make a paste along with green chilies.(You can substitute green chilies with red chili powder)
In a pan add oil, once oil is hot add chopped onions. Once onions turn into golden color add ginger garlic paste and spices. Now add rice flour cook for 5 mts . Once onions cooked in spices add greens paste and cook while stirring. Make sure to stir or else curry will stick to the bottom. Adjust salt as per taste and remove it from heat.






Delicious and healthy Sarson ka saag is ready to be served. Serve with roti.