I am bit confused, should I call these dosas or pancakes? Actually I wanted to make pancakes, but ended up making them spicy and more like Indian cousin dosas!. These were infact inspired by zucchini fritters that I saw on TV a while ago, which involved deep frying. Lately, I have started using zucchini a lot. Ishaan is at a stage where he does not want to taste most of the vegetables....
At my home, I think I am the only one who loves rajma . I had this for the first time in Belgaum and ever since then, I have been a big fan. I saw two of my friends, who were from Delhi, make a very creamy and tasty rajma . I tried exact same recipe, I was never able to get the same consistency. I think it is because I never have patience to fry the onions and tomato paste well and I don’t use ready made puree....
I know, I am posting too many nonveg dishes. Somehow I am in that mode these days. I prepared this super delicious Spicy chicken vegetable stew yesterday. I am down with too much cold and cough. Ishaan is also having cold, thankfully so far it is not as severe as mine. It really sucks to get sick during a week when the weather gods decide to give us decent temperatures after very heated days till last week....
I have been trying to include more fish and chicken in our diet. It took a while for us to get used to the smelly fish – salmon. Since this is one of the healthiest fishes available in the market here, I try to make something with it atleast once a week. Recently I tried 2 types of kababs with them. I think they looked kinda cool. So Ishaan was ready to try these....
Dal palak or palak dal must be one of the most popular comfort foods in India. Everyone has their own version of this dish. Hot rice and this dal makes one of the most soothing and fulfilling combination. I have tried it many times and also tasted it in many friends places, though I loved all the different versions, I always wanted to twist it. This time while I was making this, I got a new idea and I should say this was the best palak daal I ever prepared here....
Are there any South Indian unmarried girls/guys in the world who never tried puliyogare ? If there is one, I haven’t met them yet. The MTR puliyogare mix must be one of their most popular powders. It is not as much popular among Indians as much as it is among Indians who travel abroad due to job requirements or studies. This powder comes as a “life saver” to most. Confused?...
Few months ago, our friends Kalpana and her husband had invited us to their home for dinner. Kalpana is a great artist. She had such beautiful paintings all over her home. We were in awe looking at her master pieces. She is also a very good cook. We both started talking about food and she told me that she makes tofu chapatis. She mentioned, this adds protien to the chapatis and also makes them soft....
Few days ago, I got a mail from my dear friend Swapna of Swad asking if I would like to have some Amish friendship bread starter . I knew very little about this starter and was interested to know what it was, so I requested Swapna to mail it to me. After replying to her, I actually searched and read about it in different blogs, then I mailed to Swapna for some more clarifications....
My cousin was with us for long weekend. After a long time, meeting a family member was great. I cooked few new things for him. I wanted to make something for him and his friends which he could carry when he returned. Since he loves cookies and they are easy to make, I baked these cookies. These cookies are very easy to make and taste great when they are fresh, they became a bit soft the next day....
Temperatures are dropping here way too quickly. This kind of weather calls for some hot soup. So I thought of posting this recipe which we love so much. I have been cooking with lots of vegetables lately.  This soup is a one pot, wholesome dish in itself. I have prepared this couple of times for potlucks and it is loved by both kids and adults alike. The butternut squash gives a sweet taste to this....
Beetroot is very rarely used by my mom in her cooking. May be because of its sweetish and a very strong taste. But whenever my dad brought beetroots, she prepared this sasam. This goes well as a side dish with rice. Its texture is something like a chutney. My brother used beetroots very frequently, so even I started using it. Last time when I bought it, my mom gave me this recipe and I absolutely loved the taste....
Chane Randayi Chane randayi is a very popular Konkani sidedish from North Kanara. It is slightly different from the Chane Ghashi which has slightly different spices, so the taste of the dish changes based on these few spices. Chne randayi is prepared with either black or the kabuli chana. A vegetable like banana(cooking kind), suran etc are added along with it to give a nice taste. This was a regular on the menu at my home....
For years I struggled with feeding broccoli to my family. I first saw this vegetable when we moved to US many years ago. Here I see people look at you as you have the most unhealthy food habits if you say you do not cook broccoli on regular basis. I was told I should care more about my kid and feed him broccoli. Anyone whose kids ate this vegetable bragged about it all the time!...
Well, this is not the traditional chicken achari recipe, but my cousin Anirudh’s creation. Few months ago, we were chatting on google chat – he was in Germany and I was here in Kansas. It was one of those catch up sessions where we chat once in a while and catch up on what is going in our lives. That day I asked him what he was eating in his hostel....
This is a very common breakfast in North Canara. The combination differs. Some people eat this dosa with normal coconut chutney or jaggery(molasses) or chutney powder. But I like this dosa with garlic chutney the way my mother does it. This is called Neer dosa in Kannada and served with fish/chicken curry in Mangaloren restaurants. Traditionally these dosas are prepared on cast iron tavas which are well oiled. My aayi applies oil to the tava , keeps it overnight and makes dosas on it the next morning....
This is a very popular dish from North Kanara. Vali bhajji ( bhajji or bhaji means Greens) is a kind of greens grown in almost every backyard there. The leaves(“ pallo ” in Konkani) and stems(called “ dentu ” in Konkani) of this are used for making different kinds of curries. It can be used with prawns, khubbe (a kind of shellfish) and many more. Few days back one of our friend mentioned about Vali bhajji ambat with Garlic....
When I posted the ash gourd vadi recipe yesterday, I had mentioned that it can be used in many different dishes. As few of you have already put these vadis to dry, I thought of posting this recipe which can be made with these delicious pieces. I made this after a long time and I simply loved the taste. Traditionally red amaranth leaves( tamdi bhajji ) or malabar spinach( vali bhajji ) or spinach can be used for this dish....
Konkanis use Kulith (horsegram) very frequently in cooking especially in cold season. It is supposed be to be garam – i.e. warming effects on body. We normally don’t use it in summer because of warming effects. This saru – a thin gravy of soup like consistency, is very common during these days. A generous quantity of ghee is also added to the saru as ghee is also supposed to have garam effect....
Ingredients: Kokum syrup (salted) 2 tbl spns Coconut milk 2 cups Oil Green chillies 3 Mustard seeds 1/2 tea spn Asafoetida (Hingu) a pinch Method: Mix kokum syrup with coconut milk, salt, green chillies. Heat oil. Add Asafoetida and mustard seeds. When they start spluttering, add this to Kokum kadi. Serve chilled. If fresh kokum is used, crush the kokum in little water. Do the same thing 3-4 times. Discard the kokum pieces & use water....
Today’s lunch is chapathi, tendli upkari , fruits(cantaloupe, grapes, apple) topped with honey and few Jilebis(I bought them from Indian store yesterday). Few days back, when I started a request page for Kid’s lunch box , few of my readers wanted to know about lunch box for adults also. So I started writing about my lunch boxes, I thought it would give an idea for my readers(at least the beginners)....
