When it comes to my Pachi ‘s cooking and sweets, I can think of only one dish. Biscuit pudding…Ahh..Its so tasty. Though I don’t like sweets or chocolates, somehow this dish is my favorite. Whenever I go to Pachi ‘s house in Balgaum, I ask her to prepare this and then I request her to let me help in the preparation. Why? because, there is always competition about getting the empty vessel in which the dish is prepared!!!. Yes, my cousins and I like to eat each and every trace of chocolate mix from the vessel, in other words lick it clean, before putting the vessel for washing :D. Do you say its bad manners? Well.. I don’t really care about manners when it comes to Biscuit pudding :).
There are few people in my home, who feel extremely happy when they see me eating something with interest (as I said, I am a very bad eater). So here is the clue for them, prepare this dish for me and you will get the happiness :D. BTW…pachi knows this secret. So whenever I go to her house, she makes sure to prepare this for me and since I am the guest, I would get preference over others to get biggest share of pudding as well as the vessel . One should see the expression on my cousin’s face at those times!!!.
This dish takes around 10mins to prepare and it can fit any parties at home. ‘ Britannia marie biscuits ‘ (normal ones) are the best suited for this dish, they do not become paste after soaking. Pachi had told “Nice” biscuits also go well with this. But I haven’t tried it yet.
I searched a lot of American grocery shops to find any biscuits which are similar to Marie. The closest I found was “ Keebler Toasteds buttercrisp ” (these become paste when soaked and have a bit of buttery taste. So preferrably use Marie, but if you do not get them, use the buttercrisps). Please make sure to use unsalted, a bit hard biscuits similar to Marie.
This is a must try for all Tiramisu lovers since both taste almost same.It is much much easier to make, so that is an added advantage.
Ingredients: 200gm biscuits 2 tbl spns coco powder 1 tbl spn drinking chocolate 1 tea spn vanilla essence 1 cup fresh cream 1/2 cup hot milk 8 tbl spns powdered Sugar 1 tea spn coffee powder The cream used for cake decoration can be used for this.
Method: Keep 2-3 layers of biscuits in a vessel (use large bottomed vessel) and soak them with 1/4 cup milk.
Inn a separate bowl, mix sugar and remaining milk till the sugar is dissolved. Then add coco, coffee, chocolate, vanilla and cream. Mix slowly to get a uniform mixture. Taste the mixture at this stage, if sugar is less, add some more to suit your taste. Now pour this mixture on the soaked biscuits.
Chill in the refrigerator (do not freeze it) and serve.
Serves : 4 Preparation time : 10mins
I guess this is the most popular chaat in India. Everybody has his/her own recipe for pani puri. We used to go to a pani puri cart near Madhavan park, Jayanagar, Bangalore. I never liked to eat at roadside carts before that, but once I tried it there, I became a regular customer. But where did I got the real taste of pani puri and how I grew up as a biggest fan of it, follows. My maternal grandmother used to make the tastiest pani puri ever. I have tasted pani puris at many places, but her pani puri was, is and will be my all time favourite. I still remember, when I was a kid, we went to her house during every summer and october holidays. She used to sit on the ground with her gas stove(because making the puris by standing all the time was too tiresome) and whenever she made pani puri, she used to make over a hundred puris (she knew there was a small devil at home who had everlasting hunger to eat pani puris. No prizes for guessing who that was :D). My mom picked this recipe from her and even she makes these delicious pani puris often (that means whenever I go to meet her). These days life has become easy with the ready made pani puris!!!.
Some people at home felt eating pani puri is a headache. Because we had to stuff moong, onion, sev and then fill the puris with pani before eating. But I never bothered about that extra WORK :).
The most important thing which is different in this traditional recipe, and ofcourse the source of the heavenly taste, is the stuffing. Instead of normal potato stuffing, this has sprouted moong stuffing. The pani has a strong taste of coriander leaves as well as ginger. It is sweet, spicy and sour.
PS : If you want to have the correct blend of taste, use the sprouted moong stuffing, refrain from making any modifications to the recipe given below. I liked the taste without onions, but finely chopped onion(used as a stuffing) was also served along with this.
Puris – Ready made puris can be used.
Pani Ingredients: Coriander leaves 3/4 cup Green chillies 3-4 Ginger 2″ piece Cumin(jeera) seeds 1 tea spn Jaggery 1 tbl spn Dates (Khajoor) 7-8 (I used 1 and 1/2 tbl spn of pitted ready to bake dates) Tamarind extract(thick) 1 and 1/2 tea spn Salt
Method: Grind all the ingredients together to a thick chutney. This chutnet can be preserved for 2-3 days. While serving, dilute it with water to required consistency(do not make it too watery).
Stuffing Sprouted moong 1 cup Onion (finely chopped) 1/2 cup Sev 1/2 cup
Wash the sprouted moong to remove as much skin as possible. Then cook with 3/4 tea spn salt and about 3/4 cup of water. (Approximately two whistles in cooker). Serve puris with pani, onions, sev and cooked moong.
How to eat Stuff the puris with moong, onions and sev (1 : 1/2 : 1/2 proportion). Pour pani in the stuffed puri. Enjoy :D.
Serves : 3 Preparation time : 20minsÂ
PS: This is a version made at my home from 3 generations now. I am sure this version is not available anywhere else because it has very unique and different taste. I will post the more known version some other time.
Updated : I have removed puri recipe, will update it soon.
