Mellow yellow curry : Pumpkin in yogurt curry

The basic mooru kaachiyathu recipe goes like this. Beat the yogurt well and keep aside. Make a tadka of a sliceof onion, one clove of garlic sliced, jeera, one or two dry red chillies, curry leaves, a pinch of turmeric. Add the tadka to the beaten yogurt with a little salt and mix. Alternatively you can pour the yogurt into the tadka while it is cooking, and heat up the yogurt . Make sure you reduce the heat to low before adding the yogurt to the pot to prevent the yogurt from curdling. Today, I tried pumpkin with this basic curry and was surprised by the result. The mild sweetness of pumpkin really goes well with the sour yogurt, and coupled with a spicy eggplant curry, the meal was a treat for the tastebuds.
For pumpkin mooru kaachiyathu : cut the pumpkin into small pieces and boil in just enough water to cover the pieces,with a crushed green chilli and a pinch of turmeric. Make a tadka as above and pour into the pumpkin. Then add the yogurt too and mix well. A sweet-sour seesaw for your tongue is ready.

Moong bean with raw plantain

This is a thick curry , which usually plays the side role on our lunch plates back home, with a thinner fish, dal or yougurt based curry as the lead star. Nothing fancy about this wholesome curry, be it in the ingredients or in the cooking. I think 'rustic' would be an apt word to describe it.

One raw plantain, cubed
1/4 cup moon beans , soaked for half an hour
Shredded coconut, 2 T
2 green chillies
Jeera , 1/4 tsp
Garlic , 1 clove
salt

Put the plantains and moong beans in a pressure cooker and pour enough water just to cover them(soaking the dal is not necessary, but it makes the dal a whole lot softer). Pressure cook on medium to high heat until two whistles and then cook on low heat for 15 minutes. Grind coconut, chillies, jeera and garlic coarsely, and add to the cooked dal and plantain with enough salt, and bring it to a boil. There, your very rustic plantain-dal curry is ready.

If you are a fish-fanatic like me, you can add some small fishto this curry. Back home, my mom usually adds cuttle fish or sardines, and it simply lifts up the curry to another level. Clean up the fish and place it on top of the plantain-dal in the cooker and cook as explained above. After cooking, carefully take out the fish and remove the flesh from the bones , discard the bones and mash up the fish into the mixture nicely. I used canned sardines this time to cut off the picking fish part. All you have to do is to mash the canned sardines with a fork and add to the cooked curry .

What is Indian curry leaf doing in Chinese Chilli Chicken?

Curry leaf and Chinese- I know the words by themselves look odd when put next to each other in a sentence. But seriously, how long can you stick to a recipe without adding something of your own to the dish? My mother's version of chilli chicken has plenty of curry leaves swimming in the gravy, and yes, these aromatic leaves make the curry all the more exciting.

Ingredients

12 small pieces of chicken

One large onion, chopped

Green chillis, 5 or6 , slit lengthwise

5 or 6 plumb cloves of garlic , sliced

an inch piece of ginger, minced

curry leaf, 2 sprigs

chopped spring onions, 1 T

freshly crushed black pepper, 1 tsp

soy sauce , 2 or 3 t

corn flour mixed in a little cold water, 2 tsp

Let's get to the stove now.

Place the chicken pieces in a pot, and add enough water to cover. Add two tablespoons of soy sauce , cover and cook until the chicken is just done. Take out the chicken pieces from the liquid , and reserve the liquid. Heat oil in a kadai or wok, add the chicken pieces (be careful, the water in the chicken and hot oil together will give you some drama here) and let them brown nicely. Remove the chicken from the wok, and add the garlic and ginger. Once the garlic turns soft, add the green chillies , onions and curry leaves,and cook on high heat. Once the onions and chillies start to wilt , add the spring onions and pepper powder. Bring the browned chicken pieces back to the wok, stir fry for a minute or two and then pour the liquid. Once it starts to boil, reduce heat to medium pour the cornflour mix and let it cook until the gravy is thickened. This not-so-chinese curry goes well with fried rice and plain rice and even roti.

Easy-dinner : foil-wrapped baked salmon and penne with vegetables

These days I am on the look for simple and healthy recipes that doesn't need a lot of watching over the pot. This baked salmon and pasta dinner meets all the requirements and tastes wonderful too.

Wash and pat dry the salmon fillets. Mix together fresh parsley or rosemary or any herb you fancy(fresh herbs give the best results), minced garlic, a little lime or lemon juice, a pinch of freshly crushed black pepper, salt and rub it on the salmon fillets. Add a dab of butter on each fillet and wrap each fillet in foil. Place then on a baking dish and bake in apre-heated oven at 400 degrees for about 15 minutes. This way the fish remains flavorful and very tender. Time saver tip : line the baking dish with foil so that juices running out of the wraps will not mess up your dish. I usually marinate the fish fillets in the morning, cover them in foil and leave them in the fridge.

Pasta :

One cup penne pasta

1 zucchini, sliced

1 cup white mushrooms, sliced

1 large tomato, diced and crushed

1 clove garlic, minced

1 spring onion, chopped

a pinch of crushed dry chilli

a little parsley, chopped

Olive oil , 1 tablespoon

Cook and drain the pasta. Meanwhile heat the oil in a large pan, add minced garlic and dry chilli flakes, throw in the mushrooms and spring onion and leave it until the mushrooms are fairly done. Now add the tomato and salt and simmer for three to four minutes. In goes the zucchini and parsley, and when the zucchini is done -this should take just two or three minutes- add the drained pasta and mix well and serve hot.

Colours for your baby: Avocado and Cherry

Purple for breakfast and green for lunch

Bring in the colours to your babies your diet - that's an easy way to make sure baby gets a variety of food and help you from setting into a pattern feeding your baby the same old food everyday. I didn't think of avocado as a feasible baby food until I came across this site. High in fat and calories avocados are a boon to babies who are busy all day climbing stairs and crawling all over the house. They can be served as such or mixed with other fruits. Cut the avocado into halves, remove the seed, scoop out the flesh and mash it with a fork. You can wrap the other half in a plastic foil and store in the fridge for a day or two and mash it when needed. To make watery fruit and vegetables puree thicker and easier to feed, add a spoon ful of mashed avocado.

This week we got some sweet juicy cherries. Last evening my other-half fed our baby a cherry from his hand, and she eagerly ate it all up and clamoured for more. What relief when baby asks for food! Today morning she had pureed cherries with oatmeal cereal for breakfast, and made it known that she really likes this new food with a toothless grin. To puree cherries remove the seeds and cut the flesh into small bits. Add a little water and simmer it until its soft, and mash it up with a spoon or use the blender. To detect allergic reactions to new food, make sure you introduce them one at a time. (More on food allergies.) Have a colourful day!

Fiery Tales : Moluttathu with kappa

Thankfully, recreating the tastes of home doesn't always mean hours spent in the kitchen chopping, slicing, stirring and watching over the pot. This fish curry, endearingly called Moluttathu or Moliyar ( molaku meaning chilly) around Malabar region is so easy to make and such a tease for your tongue that it is a daily fare in most of the homes around the region. A yellow coconut based curry, a red moluttathu, two or three sides of colorful vegetables, our lunches back home always have been colorful.This curry can be made with a wide variety of fish, but smaller fish like sardine, mackeral, silver belly fish are more commonly used.

Ingredients :

Half an onion , sliced
One tomato, sliced
An inch piece of ginger, crushed
One or two cloves of garlic, crushed

One green chilli, slit length wise

Two teaspoons chilli powder

Half teaspoon turmeric powder

A pinch of powdered fennel seeds

Salt

fish of your choice

juice of a lemon sized piece of tamarind

Simply put together all these, except the fish and the tamarind juice in a sauce pan or pot , mix it up nicely with your hand giving it a squeeze or two, pour the tamarind juice and bring it to a boil. Add the fish pieces, reduce the heat to medium, cover and cook for 10 to 15 minutes. Make a tadka of fenugreek seeds, one or two small red onions sliced and curry leaves, and pour it over the curry. That's it, no grinding, no sauteing, no stirring. Enjoy the curry with a rice-dal combination, or with kappa.

Today we had mullan moluttathu and kappa for lunch. Mullan (silver belly fish)being a small bony fish, you actually spend more time picking up the delicate flesh from the bones and eating the dish than cooking the curry; perfect for a day when you don't want to spend too much of your time and energy in the kitchen and yet want a nostalgia inducing meal.

Mullan or Silver belly fish


A fiery fish curry and kappa, my entry for RCI: cuisine of kerala event.

Warming up

It's been too long a break. Long enough to make me feel like a newcomer into food blogging :) She gave me the push I badly needed to get back to food-blogging. Her piggy bank story inspires me, but even more than that the sheer joy with which she shares her recipes and their stories warms me up. Keep going, girl!

Years back, watching my friend's newborn snuggle up resting his teenyweeny face on her breast, I was hit by a painful yearning to become a mom. A few months back, watching my mom carefully feed my baby her first solid food, nature or love or whatever it was struck again and am already looking forward to becoming a grandma:). Where I come from, homemade rice cereal called kurukku is given as the first solid food to babies because it's easy to digest, and generally a brownish variety of rice called navara ari is preferred for its higher nutritional value. My little girl was five and a half months old when she first tasted it- a spoonful the first day, a little more the next day, and a little more, thus my mom got her eating almost half a cup of rice kurukku thrice a day by the time baby and I had to come back to the U.S. Grandma magic, you see. She also packed finely powdered and roasted rice, ragi/muthari and wheat, doing all the work by herself to make sure her grandchild's food stays fresh.

navara ari




Rice (or ragi or wheat) is soaked in water for an hour, drained well and finely powdered in small quantities. This is then slowly roasted over low heat in a thick-bottomed pan to ensure no moisture is trapped. Carefully made, these powdered grains stay good for months in the fridge, and it is common practise to make and store these powdered grains in larger quantities. Mix about a quarter cup of this powdered grain in one cup of water and bring to a boil in a heavy- bottomed pan. Once it gets boiling reduce the heat to low and cook till it becomes a smooth and fairly thick paste, stirring all the time to avoid cleaning up a messy pan. If her kurukku is watery my girl thinks it is some game and starts blowing rasperries as I try to feed her, so I make sure it is thick enough. Back home a dash of salt and ghee is added to these kurukkus. If you would rather keep the salt away from your baby, a ripe fruit like banana or apple can be added to make these more appealing for your little gourmet. I sometimes use coconut jaggery too, by simply melting a tiny bit of jaggery in hot water and passing it through a sieve to remove any coarse lump, and then adding it to the pan.

coconut jaggery

This page says "Sweet coconut toddy is boiled to 1100C to 1200C and allowed to cool for solidification This so­lidified material is coconut jaggery or ‘gur’."







...and then my princess feasted on navara ari kurukku and a steamed nectarine, kissed me, and fell asleep.

Yahoo! India Content Theft- Our voices count

I join the protest against yahoo! India's content theft.

Su of Suryagayathri writes,
"Yahoo! India plagiarised contents from several blogs when Yahoo! launched their Malayalam portal. The giant corporation hasn't yet owned up to their responsibilitynor did they apologize to the bloggers. When accused, they silently removed the contents. This is not acceptable. We need an apology!" (read more )

Listen to other voices:

Protest against plagiarisation of Yahoo ! യാഹൂവിന്റെ ചോരണമാരണത്തില്‍ പ്രതിഷേധം

How can I hold a moon beam in my hands?

Shilpa from Aayi's recipes tagged me with the meme 10 Things I miss the most from my mom's cooking and BDSN from Taste Corner tagged me with 10 Dishes I miss the most. It made sense to me to combine the memes, and so here's my list

10 Dishes that I miss the most from my mom's kitchen : (not in any order)

The single line from the song from the movie Sound of Music is playing continously in my head now How do you hold a moon beam in your hand :)

1. Fish Molly : a coconut milk based fish curry which combines a trace of tanginess from the tamarind and sweet richness of fresh coconut milk .

2. Ripe plantain halwa: well ripe plaintain is mashed and cooked with ghee and sugar . Having no preservatives in it, this home made halwa won't keep good for more than a week, well it can't last longer than a week in our home anyways :)

3. Neeriya pathiri : A very traditional Malabari rice-roti , that's rolled out so thin that it's almost transparent.

4. Puttu : Her puttu is what puttu ought to be, so soft yet firm enough to hold its shape.

5. Drumstick leaf- jackfruit seed curry: simply good!

6. Semiya Biriyani: This is one snack that has been in my home since I can remember, thin strands of vermicelli and shredded chicken cooked with spices.

7. Her Chai: early morning, half awake me, newspaper, mom with chai - that's home for me.

8. Kadukka nirachathu / stuffed and fried mussels: a cup of tea, a plate of kadukka nirachathu and the music of rain - all smiles

9. Drumstick- shrimp-jackfruit curry: yes, am an ardent fan of the drumstick tree. This curry is eaten with plain rice.

10. I don't want to fill this space , because How can I hold a moon beam in my hands?
blame it on the song!

This was fun for me Shilpa and BDSN, Thanks for sharing this experience !
And , now that you have kindled all my culinary memories, I am off to my home tomorrow for a two months vacation. Adios Friends! Eat well and Be well!

Sweet-tart Panha and calvin n hobbes : making summer memories

The first time I heard about panha was from Nupur’s One hot stove. A drink made out of raw mangoes, my curiosity was piqued. Two weeks back, while sharing summer stories with my friend who hails from U.P, this drink came up again- back home we beat the summer heat with sweet panha, she had said. So the next time we got raw mangoes from Indian store,we didn't think twice about what to do with it. We wanted to try some of the juice without the loaded sugar, and decided to make a sweet panha and a tart panha, and also some summer memories.

recipe
Raw mango : 1
Jaggery : 1 small piece
Flavoring of your choice: ¼ t (cardamom, cumin or if you are feeling very adventurous go ahead and add your favourite spice. I am thinking of using ginger the next time we make panha)
Fresh Mint

Pressure cook the mango in about 2 cups of water for three to four whistles. If you are not using a pressure cooker simply boil the mango with enough water until the mango is thoroughly cooked and fall apart easily.
Remove the skin and seed, add powdered cumin or cardamom or your choice of flavoring, and mash the pulp well.

Sweet panha: process the pulp with jaggery in a blender until the jaggery melts, add enough cold water and serve chilled with a little freshly chopped mint. You may want to adjust the sweetness to your taste. My friend suggests adding just a pinch of salt to the sweet drink to bring out its sweetness.

Tart panha: add about a teaspoon of scrapped jaggery, a pinch of salt , and a dash of chat masala to the prepared pulp, pour enough water , chill and serve.

Looking for the perfect accompaniment for this refreshing sweet-tart drink? Trust me; you can’t do better than delightful and astounding Calvin n Hobbes.

What a handful of dates can do to a simple curry

My aunt Jiya is one cook whom I never get tired watching. There is a graceful rhythm in the way she goes about her job in the kitchen, whether sorting vegetables or marinating meat or grinding spices. As a child I have stood by her stove for hours, as she stirred and sautéed with such tender attention to the nuances of tastes and textures, for the simple pleasure of watching her create each dish, and the spoonfuls of affection she offers me in between.
Last time I went to her home in Kerala, she served us this chicken curry, the first mouthful of it was enough for me to fall in love with its creamy, well-balanced taste. There was a certain delicateness in the taste that I could not place.
“What’s in it? I had asked.
“Guess and tell me”
“ hmm. Coconut certainly, and then either cashew or poppy seeds, but there’s something else too..what’s it?”
“just some dates” her eyes twinkled.

Dates in a chicken curry, it would have sounded weird to me if I had heard the recipe before tasting it, one tasting of her curry was enough to change my perceptions. Since then I have cooked this many times, and shared it with many friends and watched a few hearts falling in love with it. So here’s the recipe, from my aunt.

Chicken pieces : 2 lb
Onion, sliced: 1
Ginger paste: 1 tsp
Garlic paste: 1 tsp
Tomato: 1 medium sized
Green chilli : 2or 3
Red chilli powder : 2 tsp
Coriander powder(roasted) 2 tsp
Turmeric powder: ¼ tsp
Cilantro, chopped: ¼ cup
Curry leaf : 4-6
Oil : 2 T
Salt
Hot water : 1 cup

Cashewnuts,(raw): 2 T
Coconut: 2T
Dates: 3 to 4

Grind cashews, coconut and dates together to a smooth paste and keep aside.

Heat oil in a pot, and add ginger-garlic paste, crushed green chillies, sliced onions, curry leaves and cilantro. Fry till the onion is transparent.

Now add the three powders; turmeric-red chilli-corriander and sauté on low heat for about a minute and a half to release their flavors.

Then add the chopped tomato pieces and keep cooking till the tomatoes lose their shape, give out their essence completely and merge with the spice to form one tantalizing entity. I need a chicken curry recipe, not philosophy you say? Fine. Then simply fry the tomatoes till they are all mashed up into a gravy.

Add chicken, water and salt. Mix well , cover and let it cook. You might want to check once or twice in between to see if there’s enough water.

Once the chicken is cooked, pour the coconut-cashew-dates paste and bring the curry to a boil. Remove , and serve hot. This curry goes very well with rotis and breads.

I am taking a bowl of this chicken curry to Anthony's curry mela that he puts together so diligently , every week!

Picnic at the park with hot boiled peanuts

Drive through any southern US state and you are bound to see road side boiled peanuts stands with home made signboards announcing their ware in creative spelling: hot Bolld P-nuts. An all time favorite southern snack, these hot spicy peanuts bring people together in a close circle around the big burbling pot. I had always wanted to get a taste of this southern tradition, and luckily one evening last winter we saw a man selling “haat baald Peanuts” from his pickup van in Wal-Mart parking lot. ‘ya’ll want more’ he had said as he handed me a bag, and he was right. Later that evening hubby and I had such fun eating them, biting on their tough skin first to open them, popping in the plumb nuts and slurping the salty juice in the shells. Last weekend we got a bag of raw shelled peanuts from the local farmer’s market, and decided to make our own.

We combed through sites to get a recipe, and finally built one taking tips from here and there. Almost all the recipes suggested boiling the peanuts for two to three hours, some even said eight hours of boiling. What’s a pressure cooker for? We asked and decided to go ahead with our pressure cooked peanuts. The nuts were soft and filled up their shells, and the juice spicy enough to satisfy our Indian taste buds; it was another evening of slurp, slurp, slurp. A cold sweet drink, and your favorite comics will be perfect companions to these salty nuts.

Peanuts, raw: 2 lb
Salt : 1 cup
Crushed dry red chili: 1 tablespoon

Wash the peanuts thoroughly, and soak them in warm water for an hour or two. Put them in the pressure cooker with the salt and chilies, cover with enough water, close the lid, and cook on high heat for three to four whistles. Reduce the heat to low, and let it cook for an hour. Have them while they are hot.

This is what I am taking to Meena’s picnic in the park, so rollup your sleeves , set aside your table manners and get ready to slurp:)

No guilt, no mess, full of flavors, fibres and fun

Say that fast, full of flavors flibers and flun, full of favors flibers and flan.

Roasted salmon fillets :
Think omega 3 fatty acids, or simply think taste.
Marinate the fillets in your favourite seasonings for twenty minutes. I used lime juice-crushed green chilli-cilantro paste – ginger-garlic paste – salt for a fillet , and lime juice-red chilli powder-turmeric-ginger-garlic paste and salt for the other. Smear a teaspoon of oil on both sides, and place them on a lightly greased baking sheet. Cook the fish in the pre-heated oven for about 30 minutes, turning once half way through, broil each side for five minutes to get the fish nicely browned.
...and you know that everytime you see wild salmons offered at a reasonable price, you have to grab them, right?

Oven roasted vegetables:

I used broccoli, carrots, bell peppers, cauliflower, a few slices of red onion and a clove of garlic. Don’t panic about the garlic, once roasted it loses its pungent smell and tastes slightly sweet and nutty, amazing transformation eh , it’s like putting the garlic in Calvin’s transmogrifrier.(yeah been reading too much comics lately)
Pre heat oven to 400F.
Drizzle one or two teaspoons of olive oil over the vegetables, add a dash of salt, toss to coat, spread on a baking sheet and roast for 40 to 50 minutes, stirring occasionally. I like to add the broccolis and cauliflowers some 20 minutes later, as they take much less time to cook. Enjoy the slightly caramelized vegetables with flavor filled salmon, and pat yourself for being so good to your body.

a side dish not to be sidelined

A ball of rice with cabbage, now another with split mung dal and then a big ball with carrots and beans

Varavu/ upperi/ thoran are simple, no-fuss side dishes made with a variety of vegetables. A typical kerala lunch will include one or two varavu along with the main curries. Carrot, cabbage, beans, beetroot, spinach, raw plaintain, radish, drumstick leaf....so goes the list of vegetables that can be cooked into a varavu. The spices vary depending upon the vegetable you are using; the basic cooking method remains the same. The most difficult part of this dish is in chopping the vegetables, and so cabbage easily wins the popularity contests of varavu.

Cabbage varavu

Cabbage, chopped: 1 cup
One or two slices of red onion
Green chilli/ dry red chilli : 1
Mustard seeds: ¼ tsp
Cumin seeds: ¼ tsp
Oil : 2 t
Salt

Oil-mustard seeds- cumin seeds – dry red chili- cabbage-salt-stir-cover-cook on low heat for 5 minutes- done!
Variants :
A pinch of turmeric will get you a nice sunny varavu. You can also add a little urad dal or nuts to the tadka for an extra crunch. Some like to add a little, about 1 T, of fresh coconut to this varavu just before taking off heat.




Carrot-beans duet
This is one of my favorites.

Carrots and beans , cut into thin strips: 1 cup
Red onion, coarsely ground : 2 T
Garlic , minced: 1 clove
Fennel seeds , crushed : a pinch
Mustard seeds: 1/ 4 tsp
Dry red chilli: 1
Salt
Oil: 2 tsp

Heat oil in a pan, add mustard seeds, let splutter tim tim timtimtim. Add the onion paste minced garlic, and dry red chili: cook until it turns slightly brown in color.
Now let the carrot-bean strips tumble down into the pan, mix well to coat the strips with onion-garlic paste. Sprinkle salt, and cook uncovered on low flame for about 5 minutes, or till desired tenderness. I like to add a dash of crushed fennel seed at the end, to lift up the flavors.

Kerala ishtyle mutton ishtu and aripathiri

Mutton Stew /Mutton ishtu

Aroma of fresh herbs and whole spices, tanginess of lime, mellow sweetness of coconut milk: this stew combines amazing flavors into one tantalizing dish. No more words, dive into a world of goodness.

Mutton pieces, with bones : 2 lb
Coconut Milk: 1 cup
Green chilli : 3-4 medium sized
Onion , sliced: a quarter
Ginger paste: 1 t
Garlic paste: 1t
Potato, cut into large pieces : 1
Cilantro, chopped: 1 cup
Mint, chopped: ¼ cup
Cinnamon : 3 to 4small sticks
Cardamom: 3-4
Clove: 3
Fenugreek: ¼ t
Corriander powder (roasted): 1t
Lime: 1
Hot water: 2 to 3 cups
Oil: 2T
Salt


Heat oil in a pressure cooker: add fenugreek seeds and fry for a minute.

Now cinnamon, cardamom and cloves to the hot oil, and fry till their aroma seeps out.

Throw in the onions, ginger-garlic, green chilies, coriander powder, mint leaves and half of the cilantro. Stir,stir,stir for two minutes so that the coriander powder doesn’t stick to the bottom. A lovely aroma should hit your nostrils now, reminding you to Thank Someone for such small pleasures in life.

Add potato and mutton and cook them in the mixture for three to four minutes. Now pour hot water, add enough salt, cover the cooker and let cook till it gives two whistles. You may whistle along with the cooker, if you please. Turn down the heat to low and cook for a good 45 minutes to 1 hour. This slow cooking under pressure gets the meat to a soft, buttery texture that goes so well with the coconut milk in this curry. Turn off the heat, let the cooker cool down and open the lid. Pour the coconut milk, and bring to a quick boil. Remove from heat, add rest of the cilantro, and lime juice and your stew is ready to be sapped up. Thank God for such pleasures!

Rice roti / Ari pathiri

As I have mentioned earlier, Keralites have gazillion ways of eating rice. Pathiri, though mostly made out of rice, can be compared to the roti of north Indian cuisine. There is a delightful variety of pathiris, some plain, some stuffed, and some layered and steamed. This recipe is for the basic pathiri with variant names like aripathiri /ari aracha pathiri/ arichu chutta pathiri / thadicha pathiri .Traditionally, soaked rice is stone ground into a thick buttery paste , and pathiris are shaped out of this dough with hands directly onto the hot pan. An art, nothing less. With no stone grinder here, we simply make a fairly thick batter in our meek food processer, and pour it out into the pan. A poor substitute, you say? The pathiris turn out to be pretty good though, and would almost pass out as the authentic one. Almost, stresses the dissatisfied pathiri connoisseur in me;)

The trick in getting these pathiris real soft is in the rice you use and in soaking it in boiling water. I stick to Ponni rice, since that is what my mother and her mother and so on have been using to make perfect pathiris. Dipping hot pathiris one by one as they come from the pan in coconut milk is a grand touch to this dish, adding a mellow taste to them. I did not follow it as the curry is a coconut milk based one, and the fat content on the can’s nutrition label always stirs up a fear somewhere.


Okay stop talking, just give me the recipe:

Ponni parboiledRice, washed, drained : 2 cups
Salt

Bring a large pot of water to rolling boil, and take the pot off heat.

Add the washed rice , cover and keep aside for 45 minutes. After this hot water soaking the rice should look like cooked on the outside, but should have a bite to it.

Drain excess water. Add salt and blend the rice into a smooth paste adding a little, about ½ to 1 cup of water. Try adding the water little by little , so that you can get your blender going using as little water as possible.

Heat a thick pan. Pour a ladle full of batter, and let it spread out on its own into a thick circle. Cover and cook for 2 to 3 minutes. Turn over and cook for another two minutes. Once this side is fairly cooked, gently press on the rotis with a spatula so that little bubbles rise up, turn over the roti again and repeat the process on this side too. This is to make sure the pathiris thoroughly cooked inside. Your pathiri is done. Tear a piece gently, dip into your stew and enjoy bliss.

Fusion gone wrong

Chicken pot pie, with their golden crust and rich gravy slowly oozing out, has always tempted me. The only halal pot pie we could find was a frozen product from Canada. A bite, and then grand disillusionment. The gravy tasted of maida and margarine, and the crust was soggy with a strange aftertaste. Yet, the temptation remained in my mind. Meenakshi's fusion theme inspired me to try out an Indian version of pot pie.

Leafing through a cookbook, a recipe for country style pot pie with baking powder biscuits instead of the regular pie crust caught my eyes. Spiced up chicken curry with crisp biscuits, that can't go wrong, I thought. Maybe I could shape the biscuits into a henna pattern. Excitement. Little did I know that a greater disillusionment awaited me.

For the filling I made butter chicken curry and added vegetables for that pot pie feeling, so far so good;just before I poured in the sour cream sauce a little voice from within told me to add some tandoori masala too, for that color and extra oomph. And I obeyed the voice. Mistake no. 1? Two teaspoons of baking powder for a cup of flour, said the recipe for the biscuits and I followed it .Mistake no.2 ? Or did I accidentally add more baking powder? Biiiig mistake.

How did it turn out? Awful.

The biscuits tasted like baking powder, they were crisp and fluffy and all, but tasted simply like a mouthful of baking powder. The stuffing proved that when playing with spices, there has to be a balance- throw in tandoori masala to a perfectly spiced up curry and you get something you don't want to swallow. It was 'modified' into a pretty decent curry the next day, but the biscuits had to be thrown away. I was not willing to see the little birds that come by our home everyday turn into baking powder biscuits, hence resisted the temptation to save the biscuits for the birds.

Such hopes! Such disaster! Life!

A meal in 30 minutes

The idea delighted me, after all we have survived grad school and several such quick meals. So I set up the timer and set to cook a 30 minutes lunch today. The timer reminded me to keep going and not fuss over the details, and added to my fun. The secret of such quick meals,I think besides planning ahead, is in multitasking - that ability to catch up with your friend on phone while filing your nails and doing laundry. The fish had a rich buttery taste, and was complimented by the refreshing mint-lime pasta salad, and with hummus and a slice or two of toasted pita bread, it was a meal with a zeal.

Shallow fried whiting




For this dish I altered a pan-sauteed whiting recipe I found in a Fannie Farmer cook book, the original recipe was lighter with the fillets sauteed and served in their own juice.
whiting fillets : 3
Seafood breader (or plain flour will do ) : 1/3cup
Lime: 1
Butter : 2t
oil: 2 t
Freshly ground pepper : 1 t
Salt

Wash, and pat dry the fish fillets. Sprinkle salt and pepper, and dust the fillets with the flour. Heat oil and 1 t of butter in a pan. Add the fish and brown on both the sides (about two minutes). Cover, and cook on low heat until the fish is done, about 12 minutes.( I turned my attention to the pasta dressing here). Gently remove the fillets from the pan. Add the remaning butter to the pan and once the foam subsides add one teaspoon of flour to the butter, stir for a couple of seconds and pour milk, stirring continuosly to form a creamy sauce. Add juice of one lime after taking the pan off heat and mix well. Pour the sauce on the fillets and serve immediately.


Cilantro-lime pasta salad



Pasta with a tinge of India, you could say. I substituted the regular parsley with cilantro in this salad for a twist, and also because my companion is not very fond of parsley.
Pasta ( any pasta that will hold a very light sauce, I used tri color rotini): 2/3 cup
Olive oil: 1 T
Dry red chilli : 2
Cilantro, finely chopped: 1/2 cup
Cucumber, deseeded, finely chopped: 1/2 cup
Lime: 1
Salt

Cook the pasta in plenty of water and a dash of salt. Meanwhile, heat oil in a pan and add crushed red chilli, stir fry for a few seconds, add chopped cilantro and remove from heat; adding cilantro to the hot oil brings out its flavor. Squeeze the juice of a lime into the salad bowl, add salt, cucumber, cooked pasta. Pour the oil dressing over this and toss well.

Hummus

Canned chickpeas: 1

Tahini : 1 to 2 t

Garlic: 1 clove

Half of a lime

Salt

Blend all this together into a coarse paste, adding a little water if needed. Serve with a dash of olive oil and sumak.
Tagged with: IMBB24 + 30Minutes

With gratitude

I recently realized how big a role food blogs have started to play in our life when I made our grocery list, iddli rava, methi leaf, tomatillo... a whole lot of new items. "Iddli rava"? my life partner had exclaimed, "you know what, Indira makes iddlis with iddli rava, I have to try it" I had replied. New ingredients, new tips , new methods and some never heard before dishes, my culinary universe is rapidly expanding . This post is a feedback on some of the recipes I tried, and loved.


Su's Chutney powder
I love the chutney powder served with iddli and doshas in restaurants, and always stock my pantry with MTR chutney powder. Not anymore. Su, a fellow Malayalam blogger shared her simple and delicious chutney powder recipe. I didn't know making chutney powder was so easy! Do check out her food blog for more such no fuss recipes.






Besan Cheela from Kay
Kay's vegetarian omelettes rescued me from succumbing to the temptation of pizza for lunch one busy day.Easy, tasty and nutritious-everything I wanted my lunch to be.

Milk puris from self-styled chef
They were just awesome, the puris crumbling and melting in my mouth. I may not make them often, but once in a while these puris will lift up our spirits.

Thank You!

Fish curry and Sweet potato-red bean curry

continuation of a nostalgic meal

Fish curry with Kokum

Kokum (Kodum Puli) is the mystery ingredient in this fish curry, which gives it a very distinct flavor -a sour, smoked flavor with a tinge of sweetness from the coconut milk. I am not sure if this is available in USA. This is one spice that always finds its place in my luggage from home. Stored in an air-tight container these stay good for up to two years for me.


Recipe

Fish : 2 lbs
Onion, Sliced: 2
Ginger-garlic paste : 2 t
Tomato, chopped: 2
Green Chilli, sliced : 3
Curry leaf : 4-5
Kokum : 2
Coconut milk , thick : 1 cup
Water : 1 cup
Chilli powder: 2 T
Turmeric powder: ½ t
Corriander Powder: 3 T
Pepper powder: 1t
Fenugreek : ¼ t
Oil : 3 T
Salt

Heat oil in a pot, add fenugreek and fry for a couple of seconds.
Add ginger – garlic paste, onions and sauté on low heat till the onions are well sautéed. Then add the powdered spices chilli-turmeric-corriander and fry till a nice aroma comes.

Pour water, add tomatoes, kokum , green chillies, curry leaf, salt and bring to a boil.
Add the fish pieces and cook until the pieces are thoroughly cooked.

Pour the coconut milk and simmer on low heat for 5 to 10 minutes. Serve hot.
(This curry tastes best on the second day)

Sweet potato-red beans curry




Easy to cook, and melt in your mouth mellow taste, makes this dish an excellent side dish with rice and other curries. My mother makes this one with pumpkin (mathan). The pumpkins I have seen here so far looks so different from the ones seen in Kerala, they are much bigger, have a harder skin and the color is definitely more orrraangish. Has anyone tried cooking Indian curries with the pumpkins here? Please, let me know. For this dish I use the not-so- sweet sweet potatoes, and hardly notice any difference from my mom’s pumpkin curry.

Sweet potato, peeled and cubed: 2 cups
Red beans : ½ cup
Green chilli : 2
Curry leaf : 3-4
Grated coconut: 1 T
Turmeric powder: ½ t
Salt

Wash and pressure cook the beans . Make sure they don’t get mashed up. Once the beans is cooked, add cubed sweet potato, green chilli, curry leaf , turmeric and salt, and cook until the sweet potato is well cooked. Add the coconut and mix well, this curry has to be of a thick paste like consistency.

A nostalgic meal

Step out of the place you call home, and there you are craving for home cooked meals which you had until then thought of as humdrum. Food you grew up on then becomes a symbol of all you have left behind. A crisp vada is no longer just a vada, it is delicious in itself, but its lure lies in its power to evoke cherished memories- stories shared on rainy afternoons, raucous college canteens, buzz of family celebrations.On days I am inclined towards tending to the past, I cook up a home-style meal and devour it, washing it all down with a good dose of nostalgia.These three curries, plaintain pulisseri, beans-sweet potato curry, and fish curry with kokum star, come from my mom’s kitchen, and is eaten with plain white rice.

Plaintain pulisseri

A traditional kerala vegetarian fare, pulisseri can be made with yam, ripe mango, pine apple or plantain. The sourness of yogurt and sweetness of the vegetable makes this dish a sweet-sour experience, like memories.

Ripe plaintain, peeled and chopped into large chunks : 1
Green chilli, sliced : 2
Turmeric: ½ tsp
Salt
Water : ½ cup
Grated coconut: 1 cup
Cumin : 1/2tsp
Yogurt: 1 cup
Fenugreek powder : 1/4tsp
Mustard seeds: ¼ seeds
Dry red chilli : 3
Curry leaf: 3 -4
Oil (I prefer using coconut oil for all typical kerala fare for that authentic flavor): 2 T

Grind coconut and cumin into a fine paste.

Boil plantain pieces in water along with salt, turmeric powder and green chili .When the pieces get almost cooked, add the ground coconut-cumin paste, and fenugreek powder, bring to a boil and take off the heat. Meanwhile beat the yogurt into a smooth paste, add this to the pot, mix well.

Heat oil in another pan, fry mustard seeds until they crackle joyously, add the red chillies and curry leaves, fry for a few seconds and pour this seasoning on your prepared curry.