We are having a very bad snow storm here. It feels like we are in Alaska(I am exaggerating a bit). The temperatures have dropped suddenly to one digit (in Fahrenheit). So thats what I wanted to create on this cake. My latest interest is to create marzipan. I had heard about this name before but had no idea what it was. But then I came across Deeba’s gorgeous creations here ....

Carrot is supposed to be very good for eyes. Some people (like me) don’t like it when carrot is added to sambar . So kosmir or kosambir is a healthy and delicious way of eating it. Ingredients: 2 cups grated carrot 2 tbl spns lemon juice 1/2 tea spns each mustard seeds, cumin seeds(optional) and urad dal (optional) 4-5 green chillies 2 tea spns curd /yogurt 2 tea spns grated coconut 2-3 strands coriander leaves Oil Salt...

I have always stayed away from eggless cakes we cause we love very fluffy cakes which are usually made by lot of eggs. But recently, we have got few strict vegetarian friends who do not eat eggs. So I have been venturing into eggless baking. Slowly we have started liking them now. It is amazing that last few cakes that I have baked are all eggless. I baked the very popular date cake for a get together recently and it was gone within minutes....

I am going to post some of the simplest possible dishes every now and then. These are the ones any newbies can make and even the experts love such recipes when they are in hurry. I learnt these when I was working for a IT company in Bangalore. I used to prepare breakfast and lunch in the morning. My lunch was always detailed, I hardly took any shortcuts. So at such times, I would make some easy and very tasty sandwiches for breakfast....

During mango season, we prepare so many dishes of mangos. Mango burfi is one amongst them. These are liked very much by all at my home. My grandmother was preparing many batches of Mango burfis. I have been making them every year in the season from many years. Hot mango pulp splatters all over the hands while stirring in the pan. Hence I was a little reluctant to prepare these burfis again and again....

Mango Rice I am in constant search of simple recipes to cook for lunch boxes. Usually, I cook some simple lunch to take to office. It all changed in last few months when due to extreme weather conditions, I just feel like getting up late in the morning. So my lunch boxes were getting affected. I started cooking rice in the morning but pack the previous day’s gravy with it....

I am thinking to start new posts to this blog with some famous Konkani sweets. Though I don’t like sweets, I like to make them, because no food is complete without a sweet. So let me start with a sweet which I like (that means I can eat a little bit of it). This is prepared using ‘ arraroot ‘ or ‘ Kachra peet’ (I don’t know the English names). I was not having any hopes of finding either of these here....

Deepa sent me this delicious recipe. It is one of the tastiest prawn dishes I ever had. I thank her a lot for sendng me this. I prepared this dish for a small house party, all the dishes I prepared were Goan. Needless to say, everyone liked this dish and it got over within 2mins :D. Following is some information sent by her : Balchaun is pronounced as Bal- as in hair in hindi, chaun- As in “Chow” pronounced nasally, like a Chinese dish....

Few months ago, our friends Sunil and Piyu had called us for dinner. They had made a big spread and my favorite among them was this very delicious, sweetish, mild pulav. Corn and raisins give a sweet taste, all the whole spices give a nice aroma. I am not sure if they used green chillies in their version, but when I prepared this at home, I added them to give heat to it....

Mulangi Saang are tender beans of radish that have small seeds. If you don’t take out radish roots when they are grown and leave for few more days, the plants develop these pods. These are very delicious and used to make a couple of dishes when available. At my maternal town – Sirsi, these were very popular and available in Santhe – a weekly market similar to farmer’s market, where the farmers sell all kinds of vegetables....

Back at my native, we have many jackfruit trees in our yard. During season, these trees had loads of jackfruits which were treat to the eyes. Aayi prepares many dishes with it, but this one is everybody’s favorite (as I said, I never liked it while growing up). She used to make this very often but somehow I never developed a taste for it. But when I found the jackfruit here, suddenly I started missing this dish....

As I had mentioned sometime back , I joined We Knead to Bake – a baking group in August. Aparna chooses a bread and posts the recipe every month and all them members bake the bread and post it on 24th of the month. This month Aparna chose this very fragrant bread Sheermal . Wiki says – Sheermal or Shirmal ( Persian : شیرمال ‎), is a saffron -flavored traditional flatbread made in Iran , Bangladesh , Pakistan , Lucknow region and Hyderabad, India , probably from Persian influences....

I had mentioned about our love for Mongolean grill here in US . The best part of it is, we can make the dish according to our own taste. While I like to put almost everything that is available – all vegetables, some chicken, some seafood, most of the sauces, some spices in mine – I usually don’t even remember what went into my bowl, V is very particular about what goes in his bowl....

This recipe was sent to me by my friend Siva. Few days ago, while chatting with him, he mentioned that his friend had made a egg dish which he really liked. He also said I can try it out and post on the blog if I liked it. Then he also emailed the recipe to me. Since V and I both really like any dish made with eggs, I gave it a try....

I love to make one pot dishes on weekdays. This is a simple and easy dish, loaded with vegetables, easy to make and delicious to eat. Almond pieces give a nice crunch and taste to it. Ingredients: 2 cups pasta(fusilli or penne) 1 cup vegetable (bellpepper, zucchini) 1/4 cup tomato 2 cups milk 2 tbl spns all purpose flour 2 tbl spns butter 1 tea spn chopped garlic 1/4 cup parmesan cheese 1/4 cup almonds Pepper Salt...

Once in a while, I get infected by bugs – like baking bug, craft bug etc. Last week I had a baking fever. Almost every day of the week, I baked something. My husband read some nutritional facts of blueberry during one of his browsing sessions. So he went in search of these beauties. I knew these would come home, sit in refrigerator for few days and then die a natural death....

From a long time I am not able to post any of the traditional recipes. I felt like I am going away from the basic idea of having a Aayi’s recipe blog. Its mainly because most of my readers are non-konkanis. But there are few of them who visit my blog for traditional Konkani food. This recipe is for all those and also for non-konkanis who want to try out something different....

Last 4 challenges of Daring bakers were sweet items and I was reconsidering whether I had to continue in this group or leave it because I could not take so much sweet.  I had missed March and April challenges both of which were sweets and I could not finish the May challenge because it was too sweet for me. Unlike any other sweets I make, I usually don’t like to change anything in DB challenges as they need exact measurements for their success....

This recipe is on my to-be-posted list for a long time now. Somehow I forgot to post it every time. Today when I was preparing food for my husband’s lunchbox, I was totally lost. There were very few things in my refrigerator and I didn’t want to make some very difficult dish to go with chapathi . Then I saw a bag of baby potatoes lying around. So I prepared this dish....

One of the most requested recipes on this blog is this Marathi special, very fragrant dry masala . I was waiting for a trip to India to get this recipe from my pachi (aayi’s sister) who is my very important connection to anything Marathi :). I still remember those days in Belgaum. I was in college hostel while doing my bachelors. The food in the canteen was so bad that after a while we could not take it any more....