Orange curry - Mango & Drumstick Curry

At the outset I would like to thank everyone for inquiring about me.. lately I have been busy with my exams and was being lazy too.

To make up for that... here is one curry that one can make when you are lazy and dont want to cook up something big!

This curry was among the favorites for me and my sister. We fondly use to call this, Orange curry. This recipe is originally for fish curry and my mom used to substitute fish with vegetables whenever there was no fish available. You can make this with only mangoes or drumsticks, if both are not at hand. Enjoy this curry with rice!


Ingredients
1 small or medium Raw mango
10 frozen Drumstick
1 Tomato

To Grind
1 heaping cup fresh shredded Coconut (or frozen )
1/2 tsp Red chili powder
1/4 tsp Turmeric powder
4 pearl Onions (tiny ones)
1/2 inch Ginger
1/4 tsp Fenugreek seeds
3-4 Curry leaves
Salt

For tempering
Oil
1/2 tsp Mustard seeds
1 dried Red chili
2 pearl onions
Few springs of curry leaves

Method

• Heat a deep pan or kadai with raw mangoes, drumsticks and halved tomatoes with salt using enough water so the vegetables are submerged (don't add too much water or else the gravy will be too runny) and let it boil till the vegetables are cooked
• Grind all the ingredients under the to grind section using minimal water to get a smooth paste. (I used almost 1/4 cup water to grind the ingredients, you could add more)
• Add the coconut mixture to this cooked vegetables and stir if needed add more water for the gravy(I used 3/4- 1 cup of water...but it may vary)
• For tempering heat a small pan with oil and mustard seeds, when it starts spluttering split the dried red chili and add to the oil with sliced pearl onion and curry leaves
• When the onion turn brown add this to the gravy taste the curry and adjust the seasoning
  

Note:

Tastes better after couple of hours and even better the next day.

Khaman aka Khaman Dhokla

In Gujarat khaman and dhokla are considered as two different recepies however in Maharastra I found they called khaman as khaman dhokla. I make dhoklas but khaman I never tried making at home until I came across Daagh's blog ARAD. Now I make khaman dhokla quite often.

Thank you once again Daagh for this Jhatphat Khaman Dhokla, true to its name...came out fluffy and soft everytime I made it. I made a itsy-bitsy variation by adding little sugar to the batter and used red chili powder instead of green chilies.

This is my entry for Rooma's MBP, theme - Finger Foods and Starters.

This is also my entry for Trupti's - Little Chefs in the Kitchen, event. My li'l one is about 2 yrs old so its too early for her to help me in the kithcen, so I did not have her show up in the snaps however I am sending in this kid friendly recipe for this event.

Ingredients

1 cup Besan (gram flour)
1 cup Water
3 tbsp Lemon juice
3 tbsp Oil
1 tsp Eno Fruit salt
1/2 tsp Mustard seeds
2 tbsp Sugar (plus 1tsp for batter)
1/3 tsp Red chili powder (Daagh calls for2 finely sliced green chilies )
Curry leaves
Salt

Method

• Mix togather besan, salt, 1 tbsp oil, 1 tbsp lemonjuice, red chili powder, sugar and water 1/2 cup or little less than that. The batter should not be runny, if so add little besan...should be kind of like idli batter
• Heat up the pressure cooker with some water to steam the khaman or you could do as Daagh suggests, in a large vessel, take a glass of water and put a wire mesh upside down in the vessel. Make sure the top of the mesh is above water level
• Grease a baking pan (you can also use cake pan).Now add Eno and mix well and pour this mixture right away in the greased plate/pan
• Steam it for 20 minutes. To check if its done, insert a toothpick or knife and if it comes out clean its done
• For tarka, heat remaining oil, add mustard seeds and curry leaves. Mix together remaining 1/2 cup water, sugar and lemon juice and pour into the tarka. Boil it
• Take out dhokla and cut into pieces
• Pour the tarka mixture over it
• Garnish with corriander leaves and serve.....there you have it friends fluffy and soft khaman ever.

Rice Pudding - Valentine Day Special

Happy Valentines Day.

I have been asked to share some of my memories. I am not very good at penning down my thoughts and feelings, so thought to avoid it.....mmmm! I love my hubby S a lot!!! As a young girl I used to dream about my perfect prince, he should be this, he should be that .....and found everything that I wanted in my prince to be, in my hubby and more than that. I feel I am the luckiest girl in this whole world (I bet most of us think the same way!)

He is always there for me, understands me, supports me, loves me….he completes me. I love the fact that he pampers me a lot ;) and sometimes I feel that I am competing with my daughter! :).

The part of the heart shaped pillow that you see in the last picture was my hubby’s first valentine gift to me, after marriage.

We both love rice pudding(pal payasam) a lot...and now even our little one loves it. I think it will taste better when serve in the earthen pot, I didn't have one. Have to get it next time I visit India.

This is my entry for Pooja's Theme of the week - Valentines Day.

Ingredients

½ cup Rice
5 cups Milk
8 tbsp Sugar
4 Cardamoms
Few raisins

For Garnish

Dried cranberries

Sliced Almonds

Cherry

Method

• Rinse the rice under water and place into the pan
• Add the half of the milk and stir. Cover and cook for 15-20 min until soft. Mash the the mixture for few minutes
• Then add sugar and remaining milk. Simmer gently for about 10 minutes or until the rice is quite thick in consistency. If the kheer is to thick, add a little extra milk or water
• Add cardamom and raisins. Remove from the heat and pour into serving dishes
• Decorate with nuts and dried cranberries. Kheer can be served hot or cold

Note:

Tastes better the next day.

Veg Pulav & Meme

This is the first time I ever got tagged, I am excited as well as nervous...I was tagged by Sandeepa of Bong Mom's CookBook with a MeMe of "5 Things most people don't know about me". Thank You Sandeepa. Well 5 things most of you don't know about me are :

I had never cooked until I got married. I couldn't even prepare a cuppa tea (It was not that I was not interested in cooking). All our relatives and friends use to complain my mom about not teaching her children to cook....and mom use to smile and say, the kids will learn whenever the time comes. She was so true and here i am with my food blog!

I was born in Kerala, raised in Gujarat, and my in-laws are from Mumbai. So that's why you can see the mix of recepies from all the three states.

I am scared of horror movies.....Its been a long long time since I have watched a horror movie. I think the first and the last time I ever watched a horror movie was when I was in 3rd grade and that too an English one, couldn't sleep for couple of months and kept everyone else awake too :).

I am usually in control however when it comes to my daughter, I don't know what happens to me, I just trip...that's how I called 911 couple of times without any reasons and had to apologize both times.

Sri is not my name. Actually it's my daughter's nickname.

I would love to tag Sumitha, Mandira, Mishmash and Shaheen.

I am sure everyone of you know how to make a veg pulav...However I thought that I will contribute my version too!! :). So here's the recipe for the pulav....

Ingredients

2 cups Basmati rice
2 tbsp Oil/ghee (you could do 50-50)
Whole garam masala (1 bay leaf, 1 inch cinnamon, 3 cloves, 1tsp fennel seed)
1 small Onion (or half of medium size Onion)
1/2 cup Green beans (you can add more if you wish)
1/2 cup Carrot
1/2 cup Green peas
1 tsp black pepper or Red chili flakes
1 inch Ginger
4 Garlic cloves (mine were big ones)
6-7 Green chili
1 tsp Lemon juice
Salt
4 cups Water

Method

• Soak the basmati rice for half an hour or so
• Wash and french cut the green beans or you could also use frozen french cut beans, chop the carrots and chop the onion
• Make a paste out of ginger, garlic, grenn chili,lemon juice and salt
• Heat oil or ghee in a pan, add the whole garam masala
• After few seconds add the chopped onion, french cut green beans, green peas, carrot, red chili flakes and salt
• Sauté for till the onion are golden color then add the ginger-galic paste, add the garam masala powder and saute for a minute or two
• Drain the rice and add it to the pan, mix it gently
• Add 4 cups of water and bring it to a boil, reduce the heat to low and cover and cook till the rice is done...and there you have it friends veg pulav!!!
  
  
  

Note:

You can substitute water with vegetable stock or even chicken stock for that extra flavor.

Instead of adding the whole garam masala you could go ahead and add garam masala powder....if using powder add it while adding the ginger galic paste.

Churetta Appam

Churette means fold in Malayalam, thus churettappam, this is what we called it at home. It is a dish that we make for breakfast. This is one of those snacks which I prefer to cook when I feel like lazing around and don't want to spend much time in the kitchen!

You can also find a similar kind of dish made in Bengal, named Pati Shapta which I recently came across at Sandeepa's blog.

For this recipe you could make the batter using just Wheat flour or Maida (all purpose flour) or could also do 50-50 or in any ratio I think you got the point. For filling you could add sliced banana or plantain as well , I am not a big fan of banana so left that out. The quantity for filling could be altered and measured as per your need and taste.

Ingredients

For Batter
3/4cup Wheat
1/4 cup Maida (all purpose flour)
Salt

For filling
1 1/2 cup Coconut scraped
1/2 cup Jaggery (you could also use sugar if you want to)
1 sliced Banana (optional)
Cardamom powder (optional)

Method

• For filling mix together all the ingredients from For filling in a bowl
• For the batter mix in the flour and salt with some water to make it like dosa batter

• Heat tava, use little oil if not using nonstick pan and spread a ladle full of batter as you would for dosa

• After a minute or so turn it over and spread the coconut mixture in the center

• Fold it towards the center from both sides

• Take it out on to a plate with seam side down, and there you have it friends... Churettappam!!!

Shaheen's Plantain Pinwheel

Couple of days back I tried Shaheen's Plantain Pinwheel. They were out of this world...it was really tasty. This comment is coming from the person who doesn't like banana or plaintain that much! Will definitely try again...Thanks for sharing this recipe Shaheen.

A Foodie Tribute

My post today is a tribute to the fellow bloggers here. Here are some of the numerous recipes of fellow bloggers that I have attempted and had documentary evidence in the form of snaps! In future I will make it a point to take snaps of all my attempt of recipes of fellow bloggers.

Ashaji's - Foodie's Hope


This was the first time I ever baked Scones. And loved it as it is. Didn't even get time to cool them :) They were all gone in seconds. Is definitely a keeper. Though while baking them i forgot to brush them with milk or cream as it calls for in the recipe that's why may be it didn't had that nice golden color but taste wise mmmm!!!!...will remember next time.Thankyou Ashaji.

Sandeepa's- Bong Mom's CookBook

Breadrolls are one of my many favorite snacks. When I saw Baked beet breadroll posted on Sandeepa's blog...I was dying to make them. Boy! they were out of this world, so good that I didn't want to share it with my hubby. I guess I brushed too much of egg wash on the rolls that's why they turn too dark, tastewise it was perfect, next will take care while brushing egg wash on the rolls. Thankyou Sandeepa.

Archana's - Spicyana


Archana's Fruitcake, was the best thankyou treat for all my guest on Christmas eve. I had made them in mini loaf pan. Everyone loved it. While baking them the whole house was filled with its sweet aroma. Thankyou Archana for such a wonderful recipe.

Trupti's -The Spice Who Loved Me


Last but not the least, Trupti's Ringana-Batata Shaak i.e brinjal potato subzi. This is a subzi which I cook quite often now whenever I have brinjals or eggplant at hand, its a simple and easy recipe which I love...Thankyou Trupti for this Gujarati subzi which I always relish.

Rasmalai - Quick and Easy

Happy Sankranti to all my friends. On the eve of sankrati , neighbors exchange sweets and as per popular saying "Teel gull gya anhi godh godh bola" which in simple translation means "exchange sweets and sweetness in your words "

I wanted to spread the same fervour over by making this simple and easy Rasmalai.. hope you all enjoy it.. and remember be sweet in your words as well!

Ingredients
20 -22 no. Haldiram's canned rasgulla (I used 2 cans)
4 cups Whole Milk (you could also use 2 % fat milk)
14 0z. Condensed milk
A good pinch Cardamom powder

Garnish
Saffron strands
Cashews
Almond
Pistacchio

Method

• Heat up the milk until you see bubbles forming on the rim
• Reduce the heat to medium and keep on stirring till milk is reduced to half
• Add the condensed milk and keep on stirring occasionally for 15 minutes, the color will turn pale.
• At this time milk should coat the back of your spooon and when it does switch of the heat, mix in cardamon and let it cool.
• Take the canned rasgulla's, discard the liquid and squeeze out the liquid from each rasgulla by pressing them between your palms.
• Add these rasgulla's to the milk and store it in refrigerator...its tastes better with time!!!
• While serving garnish them with chopped or powdered nuts and 2-3 saffron strands and there you have it friends....Rasmalai, quick and easy!!!!!!!

Note:
You could store this rasmalai's in a air tight container for a week.