Recipe : Brain Cutlets

On my recent review of Daddy's Deli, Bangalore, I had described their wonderful brain cutlets, so a friend asked if I knew how to make them.

There was a time when we made these cutlets quite frequently at home, but nowadays, its really tough to get clean mutton brains in a quantity large enough to make these cutlets, especially in Ahmedabad. You will normally find these cutlets (if available) in a Parsi restaurant / cafe.

Its pretty easy to make at home, if you get brains that are completely cleaned.

Method :
Clean the mutton brains and cook in water salt and pepper.

Drain the brains, mash them and mix finely chopped onions, green chillies, fresh coriander and salt & pepper to taste.
(proportion - mashed brain 80-90% and 10-20% cuttings)

Form into cutlets.
Dip in a beaten egg and fry. (deep fry is better, but shallow frying works too and is healthier)

Serve hot with tomato sauce or green chutney.

The creamy flavour with the kick of green chilli is delightful.

Roohafza - A Cooling Summer Sherbet/Sharbath

My husband absolutely loves this drink. Its something that brings back memories of carefree childhood summer days playing in the sun and coming home to an ice cold glass of cooling sherbet/sharbath.

For me, I much prefer the regular rose syrup /sherbet to Roohafza. On our last trip to my inlaws place, his mum had made ice candies with the syrup (add syrup to water and freeze). It tasted much better than the drink which is made by just the syrup mixed with ice cold water and ice cubes.

The packaging of the bottle hasn't changed much since I was a kid. I still can't drink the sharbath made from the syrup, but I do like it in the ice candy / ice lolly form. I think it will be quite good in chuski / gola (syrup poured over crushed ice on a stick - kind of like granita on a stick) form too. I also don't mind a very weak mix with milk.


Hamdard Laboratories, the maker of Rooh Afza makes it products based on herbal secrets of the Unani (Greek traditon) The company has over 600 products in its portfolio and Rooh Afza is over a century old. Rooh Hafza has a number of strange ingredients in its composition including palak (spinach) but the sum of its parts are supposed to be excellent for its cooling properties.


Currently Hamdard, is repositioning its brand Rooh Afza as an all seasons drink rather than just a summer cooler.

Recipe : Korivikaram - Red Chilli Chutney - from Cooking at Home with Pedatha (Vegan)

At the market the other day, I saw these beautiful plump ripe red chillies and just bought them on impulse. Once I brought them home, I realised that I really didn't have a plan for them, as I have never cooked with ripe red chillies before.

Going through my favourite cookbooks (only 10 of them are currently unpacked in the new house), I found that Cooking at Home with Pedatha had a recipe for a Ripe Red Chilli Pickle. Since I was planning on making dosas too, this was the perfect recipe for me.

The recipe is quite simple and I was very happy with the final product. If I had to make any changes, I may deseed half the chillies next time. These seeds aren't spicy, they just get stuck in the teeth when eating the chutney/pickle since it is coarsely ground. Grinding the chutney fine, would make it lose its otherwise lovely texture. So what would work, I think is reducing the volume of the seeds.

I also think my problem could be because I used the plump red chillies (the not so spicy ones, the ripened versions of the chillies used to make bhajiyas), so they were less spicy and had more seeds than normal red chillies would.


These ripened red chillies are only available in the summer, so try it out now, before it goes out of season.

Ingredients: 
1/4 kg Fresh Ripe Red Chillies
1 tbsp thick tamarind pulp (I used the Dabur Homemade, but remember to readjust for salt)
2 - 4 tbsp oil
salt to taste

1st Tempering:
1 tbsp dhuli urad dhal (split and husked black gram)
1 tsp mustard seeds
1/4 tsp methi dana (fenugreek seeds)
1 tsp heeng (asafoetida)
1 tbsp coriander leaves roughly chopped (hara dhaniya)

2nd Tempering:
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp fenugreek seeds
1/4 tsp heeng

Method : 
In a wok, heat 1 -2 tbsp oil and fry the chillies on a low flame for 2-3 minutes (ensure that every chilli is constantly in direct contact with the pan - fry it in batches if necessary)

Remove chillies from oil, drain well (place on absorbent paper if required, I prefer to leave it in a sloping pan and reuse the oil for flavouring) and remove the stalks.

In 1 tbsp oil (I reuse the oil in which the chillies have been fried), add the urad dhal, as it turns golden, add mustard and methi.

Turn off the flame, wait a couple of seconds, when the methi turns brown, add the heeng and coriander leaves.

Grind this first tempering with the tamarind pulp and salt to taste to a fine paste.
Then add the fried red chillies (deseeded if you prefer) and grind coarsel.
Move this paste to a serving bowl or to a bottle (if you plan to immediately refrigerate)

Heat 1 tbsp oil (leftover from previous tempering if you choose), add mustard and methi.
Turn off the flame, wait a couple of seconds, when the methi turns brown, add the heeng and stir for a few seconds.

Add this tempering to the chutney / pickle.

Serve immediately with idlis, dosas or mix into steaming hot rice with a dollop of ghee.

If stored and refrigerated in a clean dry airtight bottle, it can be preserved for months. (If it lasts that long)

Kim's Tip : I prefer to leave the stalks on when roasting the chillies, and remove them just before grinding. Leaving the stalks on, makes it easier to turn the chillies in the pan when roasting them.




Also this recipe goes for the Cooking from Cookbook Challenge - April Week 4

Recipe : Bocconcini Salad with Mustard Dressing from "The Sood Family Cookbook"

As most of my friends and family know, I have a ton of cookbooks. My husband jokes that even if I cook 5 recipes from each of my books every day of the year, I will never be able to repeat a dish. However, in reality, I normally end up cooking from memory, concocting something, following a recipe a friend has uploaded on her blog or referring to a few cherished books.

So, when I read about Srivallis Cooking from Cookbook Challenge I thought it was the perfect way to get me motivated into actually using "all" my accumulated recipe books. Not "all" the recipes, but at least "all the books"

So, this recipe goes for the Cooking from Cookbook Challenge - April Week 2

Well, this month, I've just about set up my kitchen and given how badly we were eating during the actual moving process (late meals, greasy takeaways, tons of carbs etc), I'm currently making really light, easy to digest food.

The other day, I finally found Bocconcini in the market and knew I had to make a salad out if it. But, I couldn't find any basil, no matter where I tried. So I decided to combine it with lettuce and cherry tomatoes instead.

Instead of one of my regular dressings, I thought I would try something new. The Sood Family Cookbook is the most recent addition to my Cookbook Shelf, so I started randomly browsing through it and chose a mustard dressing from the book.

The Sood Family Cookbook is a brilliant collection of recipes by Aparna Jain, from various members of her Himachali family. While their roots might be Himachali, the recipes are much more global. She does share a lot of Pahaadi recipes from chaachwale alu and fiddlehead ferns to Rali mili dal and Pahaadi Mutton. The book is divided into Breakfast, Comfort Food (Pahaadi recipes and her favourite family recipes, there are a lot of Manglorean recipes in this section, courtesy her Sister-in-law Nita, the light and healthy section of salads (from where I got this recipe), from near and far (recipes range from I-won't-cook Tagliatelle to Hangover Vodka Pasta and Dushmani Chicken) soups, snacks, chutneys, drinks and desserts.

The index at the beginning of the book is easily color coded - green for veg, yellow for dishes with egg and red for non-vegetarian dishes. There's a very good balance of veg and non veg dishes in The Sood Family Cookbook.

The recipes are quite straightforward and easy to try, so this book makes a great addition to any collection.

Ingredients :
500 gms bocconcini
250 gms lettuce leaves
100-150 gms cherry tomatoes

Ingredients for dressing:
1.5 tbsp mustard oil
1.5 tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
4 tbsp apple cider vinegar (I'd run out, so I used a mix of balsamic and Navsari sugarcane vinegar)
1 red chilli slit
2 tbsp kasundi (Bengali style mustard)
1/2 tsp pepper powder
salt to taste

Method :
Roughly tear the lettuce leaves and place in a serving bowl
Tear the bocconcini into 2 (tearing gives a better texture and flavour than slicing in two) and add it to the lettuce.
Pick up the cherry tomatoes and holding them inside the salad bowl, press slightly (with the tomato facing downward)  and squeeze with youfingers, so they squish a bit and release their juices.
Toss Roughly.

Put all the dressing ingredients in a small bowl. Whip with a fork until it emulsifies.

Slowly fold the required amount of dressing into the salad, without disturbing or pressing down on the salad too much. Don't overdose on the dressing.

If you want to make a meal of it, serve with warm or toasty bread.

Recipe : Beetroot and Raw Mango Clear Soup (Vegan)

Very often when cooking beetroot, we normally just throw away the water in which the beetroots have been boiled.

Given that I have been looking up Ayurvedic (where water that vegetables are boiled in, is also nutritious) and Bengali recipes (which rarely throw away anything as waste), I decided to make a soup with the water this time. It tasted pretty good. The picture is ordinary, but it belies the taste of this nutritious soup.

Ingredients:
1 kg beetroots - cleaned
1 raw mango - roughly chopped (or juice of a lemon - to taste)
1 large onion - quartered
2-4 green chillies to taste - roughly chopped
1 tsp pepper powder
1 tsp chaat masala powder (optional, but it ups the flavours if used)
pinch of chilli powder
salt to taste

Method :
Wash the beetroots thoroughly and cover with enough water in a pressure cooker.
Cook for 3 whistles and let the pressure release on its own.
Remove the beetroots and use in salads or any other recipe of your choice.
If you had washed the beetroots well, there should not be any need to strain the liquid.

To the beetroot liquid in the pressure cooker, add the roughly chopped onions, green chillies and green mangoes.
Also add the salt, pepper powder, chaat masala powder, chilli powder and salt.
Close and pressure cook for 3 whistles.
Let the pressure release and then open the pan.

If you didn't have raw mango to start with, add the lemon juice to taste at this point.

Strain and serve hot.

You can garnish it with coriander leaves if you like, but I personally prefer my soups completely clear.

Kim's Notes:
I cooked the beetroots with the skin on after washing them thoroughly. If you aren't sure how clean your beets are, then you can skin them before you cook them, or just the skin where it seems encrusted in dirt.

Green mangoes are in season and I had a mango left over from pickling that didn't make the cut, as it wasn't crunchy enough. If you don't have raw mangoes on hand, just add lime juice at the end (after pressure cooking the other ingredients)

 If you want to make it a chunky soup. Add a bit of chopped beetroot, after the second round of pressure cooking.

Recipe : Cafe Style Iced Cold Coffee

We are in the middle of moving houses (within Ahmedabad itself), hence my frequency of cooking and posting has reduced drastically. I have spread out the actual moving itself across 10 days, so I'm quite exhausted at the end of the evening and land up at some coffee shop or the other for a nice chilled coffee.

However, today I was too tired to even walk into a coffee shop, and I had milk and ice cream in the fridge to be finished off before I set the fridge to defrost (prior to moving it). So after a nice hot bath, I just made myself a glass of cold coffee, more indulgent than the way I normally make it, but definitely less calorific than the cafe versions.

Ingredients :
3/4 glass milk
1 scoop vanilla ice cream
1-2 tbsp of your favourite instant coffee powder (I used 2tbsp Bru, because I wanted a strong Coffee)
Sugar or flavoured syrup to taste

Method:
Add the milk, coffee powder and sugar/syrup into a liquidiser / blender.
Give it a good whiz until well blended. (5-15 seconds on lowest speed)
You will find a really frothy coffee, when you open the cover.
Now, add the ice cream and blend for another 5-15 seconds.
When you open the cover this time, you will notice that there is less froth on top of the blended coffee.
Pour into a nice tall glass and curl up with a good book.
Enjoy!

Kim's Tips: 
Monin has a nice variety of flavoured sugar syrups, that go well with iced coffees and milkshakes. I like to keep a couple of the tiny bottles on hand in hazelnut, caramel, Irish Creme flavours.
Using the syrup in cold drinks, saves me the hassle of powdering sugar or keeping an extra box of powdered/icing sugar on hand.
Syrup doesn't clump in humid weather.
The flavoured syrups, enhance the drink

While you can use coffee decoction for making cold coffee, the water in the decoction will result in a thinner cold coffee. So the taste will be good, but the creaminess will be less. You can compensate a bit, by decreasing the milk and increasing the ice cream quantities.

If you don't want to use a blender / mixi, you can use those coffee/milkshake shakers (like cocktail shakers) First mix about 5-6 tbsps of milk with the coffee powder and sugar. When they have dissolved well, add the rest of the milk and the ice cream.
The ice cream will not blend completely, so you may get a bit of a coffee float instead which is also equally yummy.

Recipe : Instant Mango Pickle (Vegan) - Tamilian Green Mango Curry

This is a recipe that a Malyali friend told me about ages ago. I end up making it almost every summer (multiple times) as soon as green mangoes are available in the market.

Edited on 27 Mar 13 to add:
Once I posted this recipe, I was told by 2 different Tamilian friends (with absolutely no connection to each other) that this is a summer staple at their home and its called Mango curry.

The trick to making this pickle that is instant (no sunning, brining etc required) is to choose green mangoes that have the right amount of tartness for you. If they aren't sour enough, add some vinegar or lime juice to the mix, but its best to get sour mangoes.

You can make this in as high or low a quantity as you feel like. I make quarter to half kilo at a time and refrigerate it for the week. Longer than that, and it tends to soften and lose its crunchiness.

Ingredients :
250 gms of chopped green mango (if the seeds in the type of green mango you are using are very large, then use more)
1/2 tsp mustard
1/2 tsp jeera (cumin)
sprig of curry leaves
1 tsp of coconut / sunflower / mustard oil (whatever you prefer)
salt to taste
chilli powder to taste (I use around 2-4 tsps depending on the sour spicy balance I want)

Method:
Heat the oil in a pan.
Add the mustard and jeera.
When it splutters, add the curry leaves and chilli powder.
Turn off the flame, and add the mango pieces.
Stir well and add salt to taste.
Stir well again and keep aside for awhile to let the mango absorb the flavours.
If the pickle isn't sour enough for you, add lime juice or vinegar.

Serve at room temperature with your meal.
It goes best with curd rice on a hot summer afternoon.

You can refrigerate the leftovers and serve slightly chilled whenever you want a spicy side with your meal.

Recipe : Assamese Style Pork Fry

Delicacy in Guwahati was my favourite Assamese restaurant for simple home style food. Their pork fry and pork patot diya (baked in banana leaves) were my favourite items on the menu.

I've been craving that pork fry so much since I left Guwahati, and neither of my North East recipe books (Penguins - The Essential North East Cookbook and Ambrosia from the Assamese Kitchen) seemed to have the recipe that I was looking for. So I requested my friend Sanjukta, who is Assamese if she knew a recipe for this dish. Sanjukta currently writes a Food Column for G Plus - a weekly news magazine in Guwahati.

She gave me a simple straightforward recipe, that I used as a starting point for my pork fry.
"Marinate pork in crushed ginger and garlic, salt, pepper and some red chill powder. Now take the marinated pork in a wok and cook on low flame for over an hour. Keep stirring from time to time to avoid burning of the meat Now once it's done, chop onions and fry it it little oil in high flame. Add some haldi if u want. Add some chopped green chillies and stirring add the cooked pork into it. Add some more salt if required. Fry for some more time until done"

My recipe follows. I used 20 green chillies and didn't find it as spicy as I remember, so I added another 10 towards the end. If you don't like your food spicy, you can ignore the green chillies completely or lower the quantity.

Ingredients:
2 kg pork cubes - about 1" size (I used a mix of 1 kg ribs and 1 kg boneless to get a good ratio of meat and fat, but any curry cut should be fine)
4 tbsp ginger garlic paste (freshly pounded is a better option, but packaged will do)
2 tbsp garlic paste
2 tbsp pepper

1 tbsp vinegar
1 tbsp chilli powder
1.5 tbsp salt
1 tbsp mustard oil
2 large onions (roughly chopped)
2 medium potatoes (chopped same size as pork cubes)
1 tbsp turmeric (haldi) powder
30 green chillies (slit - optional or adjust to taste)

Method :
Marinate pork in ginger garlic paste, garlic paste, pepper, vinegar, chilli powder and salt at least for an hour. Overnight or longer is a better option.

Heat the oil in a large pan or wok (the more surface area, the better)

Put the fat pieces in the pan (not the meat, so the fat cooks for longer and starts to break down)
Once the fat starts to break down, add the onions and potatoes and let the potatoes fry a bit in the fat.

Add turmeric, half the green chillies and mix well.

Then, add the meat and fry on a low flame till well cooked.

When almost done, add the other half of the green chillies.

Dry it completely and let the meat crisp up a bit.
Serve hot with rice and dhal.

Kim's Note:
If there is any meat leftover, reheat it with some water, it will form a thick curry and garnish with coriander leaves and serve with rice or rotis.

Served here with Kabuli Channa Pulao and Raita

Recipe : Manglorean Style Rajma / Vegetable Stew (Vegan)

I had a couple of friends coming over for dinner and I was planning to make dosas (the thick variety that are eaten with coconut milk curries). However quite a few of them were vegetarian and since we hardly eat potatoes in this house anymore, I was wondering how to make a vegetarian coconut milk curry. (the standard Manglorean way to convert a meat curry into a vegetarian one, is to make it with potatoes or eggs)

Then, I remembered my friend Anju in Cairo, (who is from Kerala) had once made this lovely stew with rajma. Drawing on that as inspiration, I followed the Manglorean recipe for mutton stew but substituted the meat with rajma. Then I decided it needed some fresh veggies too and added a chopped carrot and a potato (stews need at least one potato to help thicken them up a bit). I was quite happy with the result.

This recipe results in a mild stew. If you want stronger flavours, double the ginger, chillies and stew powder.

Ingredients:
2 cups of rajma (kidney beans) - 1/2kg if you buy the pre-cooked variety
pinch of jeera
pinch of heeng (asafoetida)
pinch of methi seeds

1 tsp oil (coconut or any neutral oil)
2" cinnamon
6 green chillies slit in two
1" ginger julienned
8-10 curry leaves washed and wiped dry
1 medium onion chopped
1 tsp ginger garlic paste
1 large carrot chopped large
1 potato boiled (you can pressure cook it with the rajma to save time) and chopped large
1 tbsp Manglorean stew powder (you can use pepper powder, if you can't make any stew powder)
 200 ml Coconut milk (thick)


Method:
Soak the rajma overnight (8 hours) and pressure cook in enough water to cover it, till done with a pinch of heeng, methi and jeera (to help cut down the gassy effects of rajma).
Drain the water and set aside the cooked rajma (unlike other dried lentils and beans, the water in which rajma is pressure cooked, is not used in cooking, discard it)

In a large pan, heat the oil.
Season with cinnamon, ginger, green chillies and curry leaves till the leaves crisp up a bit.
Add onion, fry till translucent.
Add ginger garlic paste and mix well for a minute.

Add the cooked and drained rajma and saute for a minute while stirring, so everything blends.

Add the coconut milk and thin it down with some water, stir well, cover and cook till it is bubbling.
Once the stew is bubbling, lower the heat to sim, add the stew powder and cook till rajma has reached your desired level of softness (about 10 minutes), stirring in between if necessary to prevent it from burning.

Now add the carrots and boiled potatoes and simmer for another 5 minutes.

Serve hot with dosas or appams

You can garnish this with fresh chopped coriander of crisp fried ginger juliennes (tempering).

Kim's Note:
If you prefer your carrots well cooked, add them at the same stage as the rajma. We prefer to have them raw to the bite.

If you want a stronger coconut flavour or a thicker stew, double the coconut milk and reduce the water.

If you want stronger flavours, double the ginger, chillies and stew powder.

Recipe : Baked Brie with Caramelised Almonds (Vegetarian)

Brie is a soft French Cheese made from cow's milk. It has a harder rind on the outside which protects a soft cheese on the inside. The flavour is normally mild and not too ripe. A ripened Brie is called a Brie Noir.

Brie can be eaten as it is or baked to make it a little more gooey and runny. The rind is completely edible and best left as is (with a little hole cut out to breathe), if you plan to bake it. the rind will help keep your Brie in shape.

Brie is sold in circular shapes or triangular wedges. The circles work best for this recipe. If all you have access to is the triangular variety, then make sure that it has rind on the sides before baking it, else you'll just end up with an extremely limp quesadilla.

While I have used almonds in my recipe. All nuts work well and so do some fruits like cranberries when baking Brie.

This dish looks very fancy, but its very easy and fast to prepare, if you have all the ingredients in your pantry.

Ingredients:
1 small round of Brie (4.5" is the commonly available size in India).
1 tsp butter (salted is fine)
2-3 tbsp brown sugar (it gives better flavour, but if you are out of brown sugar, you can try regular sugar too, just try and brown it when caramelising)
1.5 handfuls of nuts (I used almonds, you can use walnuts or pecans)
pinch of salt (or to taste)
1/2 tsp chilli powder

Special equipment :
Aluminium Foil
Oven proof small round baking dish

Method :
Bring the Brie to room temperature.

In a normal frying pan (preferably non-stick), melt the butter on a low flame.
Add half the sugar, salt, chilli powder and nuts and continue to swirl them around the pan occasionally on a low flame.
When all the ingredients (except the nuts) combine to form a sticky paste, take it off the flame and transfer the nuts onto  the aluminium foil.

Preheat your over to 180C.

Thinly slice off the top rind of the Brie, but leave the sides and bottom intact.
Place it in the oven proof bowl sliced side top.
Sprinkle the remaining brown sugar on the sliced side and then top with the caramelised nuts.
(I sprinkled the remaining nuts around the Brie too)

Bake at 180C for about 20 minutes - until you see the soft cheese bubbling and changing consistency.

Let it rest for a few minutes and then serve hot with sliced Baguettes or crackers.

This can be served as a fancy appetiser, on a cheeseboard or as a snack for 2.

Kim's Notes:
Its important to move the hot caramelised nuts out of the pan and onto the foil to prevent sticking to your pan.

Also, don't move the nuts directly onto the Brie, it will start melting on top and your cooking won't be even.

If like me, you have been taught not to waste any food in the kitchen, then slip the sliced bits under the brie when baking or keep them and use them in any pasta sauce.

Standard Brie Size is 9-15 inches, so double the recipe for a Standard serving of Brie.

Recipe : Pedatha's Iguru Pachchadi - Milky Brinjal Chutney

This recipe is from Jigyasa & Pratibha's Other Book - "Cooking at Home with Pedatha"

Its an interesting variation on the regular Baingan Bharta and goes well with rotis or rice and dhal.

Ingredients :
1 large or 4 small tender brinjals (minimal seeds)
1/2 cup boiled and cooled milk
1 tbsp oil
salt to taste

Tempering :
3/4 tsp dhuli moong dhal (split and husked black gram)
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
2-3 green chillies slit
1/2 tsp grated ginger
1 tbsp coriander leaves, finely chopped
6-7 curry leaves

Method :
Coat the brinjal with a little oil and roast directly on flame till skin turns black and starts crancking.

When cooked through, scrape off the skin and mask with a fork.

When the pulp has cooled, add milk and mix well.

Heat oil for tempering, addthe dhal, when it turns golden, add mustard.
Turn the flame off and add other tempering ingredients.

Mix the tempering into the pulped brinjal and mix well.

Add salt just before serving, so that the milk doesn't curdle.

Recipe : Ayurvedic Dates Kheer

This is another lovely recipe from Jigyasa & Pratibha's "Sukham Ayu - Cooking at Home with Ayurvedic Insights"


Its made without any sugar or jaggery and is naturally sweetened by the dates. If it isn't sweet enough for you, you can add some jaggery or rock sugar to maintain its Ayurvedic nature.

The book, gives details on why Dates are good for you and which constitutions it works best for. If you are interested in eating right for your body, depending on its constitution, you SHOULD pick up a copy of this Cookbook.

Ingredients:
15-20 pitted dates, washed and chopped fine (dried, not fresh)
4 cups cow's milk (for Ayurvedic Reasons, you can use any milk of your choice)
8-10 strands of saffron
1 tsp wheat flour
pinch of nutmeg powder
1/4 tsp cardamom powder
1 tsp cow's ghee

Method:
Bring the milk to a boil and allow it to simmer

Take 1 tsp warm milk into a bowl and rub the saffron in it to release its flavours and the milk turns orange. Keep aside.

In a thick bottomed pan, heat ghee, add the dates and saute for 2 minutes on a low flame.
Sprinkle wheat flour over the dates and saute for another minute.

Slowly add the milk, stirring continuously to avoid lumps. Cook on low flame for 7-8 minutes. If you want it sweeter, add some powdered rock sugar. (Jaggery does sometimes curdle hot milk, so if adding jaggery, add strained jaggery syrup after cooling the kheer)

Stir the prepared saffron into the kheer, with nutmeg and cardamom powders. Switch off the flame.

Enjoy a small helping at the end of your meal as a digestive.

Recipe : Spicy Ginger Lemon Soup (Vegan Option too)

This is a lovely, very easy to make Soup from Jigyasa & Pratibha's "Sukham Ayu - Cooking at Home with Ayurvedic Insights"

Its perfect for Winter or the Monsoons, or anytime you just want a quick easy to digest soup for dinner. It doesn't need any stock or pre-preparation, and is is ready in 30 minutes or so.

The Recipe calls for 2 green chillies, but I used 5, because we like our food spicy.

Ingredients :
1/4 cup Split red or green gram (masoor or moong dhal)
2 inch ginger crushed (try and keep it whole, so you can remove the whole piece, rather than straining it)
5 green chillies slit (adjust to spice tolerance)
pinch of turmeric powder (haldi)
powdered rock salt to taste (rock salt is recommended in Ayurveda, but you can use regular salt, if you don't have rock salt)

1 tsp coriander leaves chopped
1 tbsp lemon juice or to taste (I used half a lemon)

To Temper :
1 tsp Cows Ghee (Cow's Ghee is Ayurvedic, to make it vegan, use any neutral oil of your choice)
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp cumin seeds (jeera)
pinch of asafoetida (hing)
7-8 curry leaves

Method :
Wash and pressure cook the gram to a soft consistency. The trick is to use just enough water to cook it, so that the gram can get completely disintegrated (about 4-5 whistles?)

Add ginger, chillies, turmeric powder, salt and 2 cups of water and simmer for 5-7 minutes. Strain and return to flame to simmer . (I just removed the ginger, but let the chillies remain)

In your tempering pan, heat the ghee, pop the mustard. Reduce the flame and add jeera, hing and curry leaves. Pour the tempering over the simmering soup.

Switch off the flame and add lemon juice and coriander leaves. Serve hot.

Optional:
My husband wanted more substance in his soup, so before adding the tempering, I added a 1/2 cup of quartered cabbage leaves and let it simmer for about a minute before adding the seasoning.

Recipe : Rasam / Mulligatawny Soup - Vegetarian / Vegan

Rasam is a dish that is commonly believed to be a part of every South Indian's diet along with curd rice, sambhar and idli-dosa. Surprise, surprise! Neither my mum nor my grandmum ever made this soup for us!

I learnt to appreciate it much later in life with the influence of Tamilian friends whose mums served up some awesome variants.

I love to have this soup on cold winter evenings, on rainy days and when I have a cold coming on.

If you prefer, you can season the soup with curry leaves and mustard seeds in the end and serve it with rice. You can garnish it with coriander leaves if you like. My husband prefers this soup with all the mashed up tomatoes and onions. My sister and I prefer to have it completely strained through with no bits and bobs in it.

I use a lot of spices in this which have medicinal qualities in them and I love a lot of pepper + chilli in my rasam. You can tone it down if you prefer a milder version. Rasam is great as an appetiser or even as a digestive, that's why it features so prominently in so many menus in the South.

Ingredients:
1-2 tbsp black pepper
a pinch of methi (fenugreek) seeds
1 tsp jeera (cumin seeds)
1 tsp oil
1 tbsp rasam powder or paste (optional - it just adds )
1 sprig curry leaves
1 inch ginger slightly crushed
2-3 cloves garlic slightly crushed
2-6 green chillies slit down the center
2 onions finely sliced
4 tomatoes finely sliced.
1 litre water

Method:
Semi crush the pepper, methi and jeera.
Heat the oil, add the crushed spices to the hot oil, when they sputter add the curry leaves.
Then add the green chillies, onions, tomatoes, ginger and garlic.
Fry on a low flame until they are all soft and mushy.

Once mushy, add the water and increase the heat.
Let it bubble and roil until the water reduces to 3/4th original consistency.

You can now either serve it hot by
1. straining it and drinking it out of a cup/glass.
2. garnish with chopped coriander leaves and drink it straight or eat with rice.
3. season with mustard seeds and curry leaves and eat hot with rice.

Recipe : Sprout Salad (Raw / Vegan)

I've made this one before, but we just have it so often these days, that I decided to repost it since  got some lovely colorful pictures this time.

Ingredients:
1 bowl of mixed sprouts
2 medium cucumbers chopped
1 medium tomato chopped
1 medium onion chopped fine (you can reduce this quantity if you don't like onions)
2 green chillies
6-8 stalks of corriander leaves chopped fine.
salt to taste
juice of half lemon

Method:
Take the finely chopped cucumber, tomato, chilies, corriander and onions, toss it with the sprouts.
Sprinkle salt and squeeze the lemon juice over the salad.
Toss again.

Note:
Toss it gently so the sprouts dont break.
You can use chaat powder instead of salt for a different taste.

I make mine without tomatoes.

Recipe : Gia's Choriz Pulao - Goan Sausage Pulao

I LOVE Choriz Pulao. The best ones I have ever had, are at O'Coqueiro and Martin's Corner in Goa. Every trip to Goa by me or my family would mean a nice little haul of Goan Sausages to be relished at home.

Goan sausages also called Choriz are an Indianised version of the Spanish Chorizo. This version involves drying and smoking pork chunks with Indian spices and vinegar.

My nana used to just sun dry them and store the sun dried pork in a bottle to be used when needed. She used to call in "lingis". Unfortunately, this is one of the recipes of hers that I never recorded, because at that time, I felt it was too laborious and she was always around to send me a bottle to fulfill my cravings.

Crescentia Fernandes and her husband Chris run a lovely Goan restaurant in Gurgaon called Bernardo's. Chowder Singh has recorded Crescentia's recipe and taken a video of the process, which is of immense help if you decide to make these sausages from scratch. Check the recipe and video - here.



Since my sausages are always store bought (even though I do occasionally find some excellent home made ones in the market), taste and quality tend to be iffy. Until you open a packet and start cooking with it, you really don't know what its going to taste like. Its quite a task to find a version whose salt, spice, vinegar, meat + fat balance you enjoy. Joao's is most consistent, otherwise its mostly hit and miss.

Now, while I have loved the Choriz Pulao, I've never been able to successfully replicate it. So I normally end up making a sausage and potato stirfry which is excellent as a starter or with pao bread or rice and dhal.

However, recently Gia Claudette Fernandes (I don't think she is directly related to Crescentia) shared her recipe for Choriz Pulao on one of my favourite foodie groups on facebook - Porkaholics!, so I couldn't wait to try it out.

Gia's recipe is extremely precise and I would recommend you following it. I am an eyeballing cook. Plus what I had was the rosary sausages (home made ones), so I really eye balled it.

I love using the sausage skins, so I fried them up first before adding the onions to crisp them up. I cooked it in a pan with a well fitted lid, but you can also use a pressure cooker.

Gia's recipe follows in her own words:

Gia Claudette Fernandes - Goan Sausage (Choriz) Pulao

Ingredients:
3 cups of basmati rice, washed and soaked in a lot of water for at least 30 mins
6 cups of hot water
1 packet of Goan sausage (500 gms)
4-5 large onions, thinly sliced

Method:

 
Put the raw onions into a non-stick or heavy-bottomed vessel. Tear open the sausage skins and remove the meat. Add this to the onions, separating the pieces with your fingers as you do this.

Put the pot/pan on high heat and mix the onions and sausage meat well. Do not add any extra oil, please! Toss continuously until the fat starts to melt and the onions get nicely fried in the oil. Do this for at least 10 to 15 mins until the onions become soft. Control the heat and reduce the flame when it gets too hot. You don’t want to burn the mixture.

When the sausages and onions are fried and the oil starts to separate, it’s time to add the rice. Drain away the water it was soaked in and add the rice. Mix well with the sausage-onion mix. Fry for 2-3 mins. Now pour in the hot water and stir. Check for seasoning, if you need more salt, add it. I like to add 1-2 Maggi stock cubes at this stage (veg or chicken). This adds extra flavour and balances the heat from the sausages. If you’re using the stock cubes, it’s a good idea to first dissolve them in the hot water that you’re supposed to add to the rice.

When it comes to a boil, turn the heat to sim and cook with the lid on for 8-10 mins (depending on your rice). Try and place a heavy object on the lid so that the steam doesn’t escape. After 8-10 mins, turn it off and don’t open for at least 10-15 mins.

Before serving, lightly fluff with a rice fork so that the grains do not get stuck.

You can also reserve some of the sausages and fry separately. Then mix into the pulao just before serving.

This is best had by itself when it’s piping hot. I still haven’t found anything that complements this dish well, except for chilled beer!

Bon Apetite!

The result was perfect, I used the soup cube and it helped tone down the sharpest flavours of the choriz. The husband doesn't normally like choriz too much, he finds the flavours too strong, especially the home made ones. But he loved this pulao.

Thanks a ton Gia!

Kitchen Garden : Curry Leaves / Kadi Patta / Meetha Neem

Curry Leaves are used as seasoning in so many Manglorean dishes and other South Indian cuisines, that most houses have their own plant growing in the backyard or kitchen garden.

I know friends who live abroad in Egypt, US, Canada and even if they have no garden to speak of, they still have a cherished curry leaves plant growing in their home.

Curry Leaf plants are extremely difficult to repot, so your best bet is to buy a slightly grown plant from a nursery in a little bag. Dig a hole in a large pot at home and insert the curry leaf plant with all its attendant soil, directly into the pot.

Curry Leaves have a tap root, so you will need a deep pot for sure.

Kadi Patta is also used in a couple of North Indian dishes and my mom-in-law always uses them in kadhi.

The leaves are called Meetha Neem in Gujarat and are used to season certain dishes in this part of the country too.

In Andhra Pradesh there is a chutney pudi / gun powder made with curry leaves as the main ingredient.

The leaves are extremely flavourful and worth eating whole, because they are renowned for their cholesterol lowering properties.

Kitchen Garden : Corriander / Dhaniya

My mum and my good friend May from The Chef (who has moved to Ahmedabad last year) are excellent gardeners. They have extremely green thumbs and anything they plant, grows beautifully. I on the other hand have a good touch with animals and pets, but a terrible one for plants.

The longest effort I ever made to grow anything was when I tried to grow Green chillies in Egypt (fresh spicy green chillies are not available in the market there) They grew quite well for a couple of weeks and then just withered and died.

However, with the constant coercion and encouragement from these 2 women, I decided to try my hand once again, even though, I even manage to kill of those lucky bamboo plants that just need water every week or so.

The 2 of them realised that the only way to get me hooked was by planting edible stuff. With our frequent travel, it's not just the cat, but also these plants I now have to be worry about. when I put down extra food and water for the cat, I also have to appropriately over-water the plants in my balcony.

One of the easiest things to grow from scratch was coriander / dhaniya. This is a herb that is used as garnish for a large number of Indian dishes and is beautifully fragrant.

My office maali told me to soak the dried coriander seeds (also used in seasoning) overnight. In the morning I put them in a pot with a light layer of soil on top. He told me to just sprinkle water daily until the shoots came out and then water as usual. He warned that if I put normal quantity of water initially, the seeds would rot.

I have friends who have also planted  discarded dhaniya roots directly and have achieved success with that method.

The leaves smell lovely and I'm waiting for them to grow higher, so I can start using them in our food.

Also visible in the pot is a curry leaves plant.

My Recipe in the February Issue of Caldron

My Recipe for Manglorean Sweet Pulao / Pilaf has been featured in the in the 'Love Bites' section of the February 2014 issue of Caldron - an online food magazine.

You can view the magazine : http://tinyurl.com/l8kkovg

My recipe is on page 54. Unfortunately, my own photo, is the one I use for general social media, where I don't show my face and the magazine picked that one up  :)

Recipe : Maharashtrian Kaju Kothimbir Wadi (Vegan) - Steamed Cashew and Coriander Squares

I'm loving cooking with Vikas Khanna's Savour Mumbai cookbook, it has so many different dishes from different parts of the country. The Kaju Kothimbir Wadi - Steamed Cashew and Coriander Squares - from Diva Maharashtracha, were itching to be cooked and were a huge hit once ready.

If you do try this, don't be disheartened with the taste of the steamed Wadi's, the sauteeing post that, really improves the texture and flavour.

Ingredients:
1 cup gram flour (besan)
30 cashew nuts roughly borken
1/2 tsp turmeric (haldi) powder
1 tsp red chilli powder
2-4 green chillies finely chopped
1 tbsp tamarind pulp
2 tbsps finely chopped fresh coriander
salt to taste
4 tbsp oil + some more for sauteing

Method:
Mix all the ingredients except the oil. Then add 1.5 cups water and mix well to make a thick batter.
Heat 4 tbsp oil in a frying pan over low heat, add the batter and cook stirring continuously for 15-18 minutes, till the mixture becomes a thick doughy batter, then remove from heat.

Grease a small tray and spread the mixture evenly about 1 inch thick.
Set aside to cool and set.
Cut into squares.

When completely cool, saute the squares in a little oil (you can shallow fry them too if you prefer) till crisp.
Serve hot with ketchup or green chutney.