Masala Akki roti

Saturdays and Sundays we have our breakfast menu fixed. Saturday is masala akki roti while sunday its bread with omlette or scrambled egg.

Herez how I make my masala rotis. You could increase or decrease the quantity of the ingredients to suit your taste. U could add or skip soem of the ingredients as well :)

U will need :

1 cup rice flour

1 cup chopped onions

1/2 cup of roasted and corasely ground peanuts

1 tspn jeera

finely chopped curry leaves

finely chopped corriander

finely chopped green chillies

garlic crushed and chopped.

salt to taste

oil

boiling water.

mix all the ingrdients (except water) with 1 tbspn of oil. Once all the ingredients come together add soem boiling water to make a soft dough. Be careful while adding the water as only little water is required.

On a plastic sheet apply oil and pat a portion of the dough into a roti. Invert it onto a hot tawa and cook well on both sides. Spread some oil over it while cooking.

Fluffy Dosa

Fluffy dosa as the name suggest is a super soft dosa with a crisp under layer to it.

I had a lot of left over rice from the previous day, so remembered my mom making these soft dosas and tried it out. Herez how u make it.

U will need :
2 cups cooked rice
1 cup raw rice
1 tspn meethi seeds
salt to taste

How u make them:

soak the cooked rice for a couple of hours in water. Wash and soak the uncooked/raw rice along with meethi seeds for atleast 8 hrs. Grind them to a fine paste and mix it well together to get a dosa/pancake consistency. Let it ferment overnight or for about 8 hrs.

This Dosa is cooked on only one side. Heat a tawa and pour some batter on to it. spread lightly. This dosa will be thick. spread some oil or ghee and let cook over medium flame for about 2 to 3 mins till u get a nice golden crust at the base. For best results cover the dosa while cooking with a dome shaped pan cover. The steam trapped in the dome will help the dosa cook better.

Server hot with some chutney. The dosa will have a crispy golden layer at the base and a soft cushiony layer on top.

Quick Potato and peas gravy

This is another of quickies. Even quicker if u make the curry paste n refrigerate it. All you is grind the curry paste, fry it in oil for a while, cool and refrigerate. When u are need for a quick fix meal.. microwave ur veggies, and saute them with ur curry paste and season it, and u are ready to serve in 5 mins. :)

 :D  that is what the hot steaming gravy did to my camera lens while I tried to get the right angle to take a pic.

Herez the recipe:

For the curry paste:

1 tomato

1 large onion

4 to 5 red chillies.

grind all of the above to a smooth paste. In a pan heat 2 tbspn of oil and add the paste. Fry until the raw smell goes off and the oil starts separating at the edges. U could also add salt while frying.

For the gravy :

1 large potato cut into small cubes

a small cup of fresh green peas.

1 small onion finely chopped.

1 tbspn of ginger garlic paste.

salt to taste.

2 tbspn oil.

microwave the potato cubes and green peas until almost done. It took me about 3 mins. Mean while in a pan heat oil and fry chopped onion until done. Add ginger garlic paste and fry. Add the microwaved potato n peas and fry. Add salt to taste. Add the curry paste and mix well. Add water to get the desired consistency. Let it simmer for a couple of mins or until the potatoes are cooked. garnish with some fresh corrainader. Serve hot with rice or roti.

Bandaged Stuffed Chillies :)

Yes I will call this "bandaged " chillies. Well if u look at them that is what they look like :)

I was watching Master Chef India last year when I saw one of the contestants making this in one of their challenges when cooking for one of the Royal Kings of Rajasthan (Jodhpur was it??) She had made a non veg version of this and it had won as the best recipe. Appologies as I don't remember the name of the contestant neither the name of what she had made. Was planning to make it for quiet sometime now but it saw day light in my kitchen only few days back. I don't even remember how she had made. I just remember the concept and I tried it out.

So here it is :

6 big green chillies  ( use the variety with less heat)

oil for frying

for the filling :
half cup crumbled paneer 

1 onion chopped fine
salt to taste
tspn of mustard
corrainder leaves finely chopped.

for the bandage :   :)
half cup maida
1 tbspn of fine sooji
a pinch of salt
apinch of cooking soda
water to knead the dough

Knead the dough for the bandage and keep aside. 
 In a pan add 2 tbspn of oil and when hot add mustard and let crackle. Add chopped onion and fry till done. Add salt followed by paneer and fry well. Mix in chopped corriander.  Set aside. 
NOTE : am not adding chilli to the paneer as as the outer chilly will do the job.
Slit the green chilies n de-seed them. In a flat pan put in 2 spoons of oil and roast the chilles till they have a crunchy look. Once cooled, stuff the chillies with the filling.
Next roll out the dough into a thin sheet and cut into long stripes. Now bandage the stuffed chillies and seal it.

Deep fry in hot oil over medium heat till its golden brown.  Serve hot with sauce.
I had made the filling with paneer, you could make your own filling as per ur wish.

A trip in 2011 ... Finally !!!

Yes.. we managed to hit the road for a trip in 2011. We had to wait till June to make a trip!! Ridiculous.  My Blog was supposed to be "Travel with some Food Along", but it was turning out to be the other way round "Food with a wee bit of travel". That was very irritating.

But then .. its fine.. Atleast we did it.  I can say that cause we have 2 more in the pipeline. Howzzat !! :) Looks like the traveller in us has woken up.

So last Sunday we went for a day trip our of Bangalore. It took us to Lepakshi.  We left home at 9:30am stopped for breakfast at "Dose Mane" opposite Jain college. Oh what a collection of dosa's they have. We ordered for the Dosa platter and it was worth it. They have over 100 varietes of dosa and its worth a visit if you love dosas. After a heavy breakfast we stopped again to get the speaker wiring fixed of our car. Finally we left JC road by 11:30am. Lepakshi is about 125kms from Bangalore. Its on NH7 towards Hyderabad. Need to take a diversion from NH7 as soon as you cross Kodikonda checkpost and drive another 16kms to reach the place. The highway is really nice and the 16km stretch is pretty decent too.

We reached the checkpost by 1:30. We had lunch at the AP tourism restaurant at the checkpost and headed towards Lepakshi.

Lepakshi is Temple built during the Vijaynagar Empire and its architecture is worth a visit. The main temple is dedicated to Veerbhadra but it also has the famous Linga guarded by the 7 hooded Cobra and the monolith Nandi.

The first sight is of the Nandhi. Well maintained place for a small town like that. After a few pics we went to the main temple. 

The temple has a whole lot of pillar each with its own unique feature and pattern. On one side of the main temple is a small little cave supposedly where one of the Rishi's is supposed to have meditated. Could not get to take a video there as camera's are barred inside the main temple.  :(

A few pic of the temple entrance and the various statues around the place. The ceilings too have a lot of paintings though most of them are wiped out.

Here are a few pics of the architecture of the temple pillars. 

Behind the temple is the Linga with its 7 hooded cobra and the Ganesh idol. There are long archways with a row of pillars. There is also a open air mandapam. Its mainly a set of pillars  placed at a distance from each other on a raised platform. For me it looked more like some unfinished work. But that place is beautiful. Here are the pics of the mandapam.

Finally after hanging around for 2 hrs we were back on the road again. Took a short break  on having  a flat tire on the highway and then back to Bangalore by 7pm.

Aaahhh a road trip after long.. What Bliss :)

Mango shake

Okay....This  is a easy peasy thingie... a no brain dish... but tastes great. I know its such a common thing most of them make.. but then I could not resist  putting it up here.... its looking so mangolicious !! :D

And just for the record... the recipe for this is :

2 ripe mangoes

half cup milk

sugar to taste

Chop the mangoes. Put all ingredients in a blender and blend to form a nice smoothie. You could also leave a few small bits in it.. just for that mango bite in between.

Phirni - Traditional Indian Custurd

Phirni is a traditional Indian dessert made in north India. Its a simple sweet dish made of rice, milk and sugar. Easy to make and tastes best both hot and chilled.

Traditionally its made by soaking rice for a couple of hours and grinding it to a smooth paste and then cooking it with milk and sugar. Cardamom powder is used to give it a distinct flavor.

But trust me I have no patience to do that. So I took the shorter route and made a little bit of  modification to suit a lazy girl like me :)  I used rice flour instead of whole rice and to give it a twist I used vanilla essence instead of cardamom powder.And trust me on this too, it tastes great this way as well.

Herez my version:

U will need :

2 cups milk

1/4 cup sugar (increase if u like more of sweet)

3 to 4 tbspn of rice flour  (adjust the quantity as per the consistency of the phirni you need)

1 tspn of vanilla essence.

Dry fruits for garnishing (almonds, cashew, pistas etc)

To make it :

Boil milk and add sugar n boil till sugar is dissolved. Take a little of the milk in a cup and mix the rice flour and vanilla essence in it to make a smooth paste. Add the paste slowly into the milk and stir continuously. Mix well and allow it to cook. Let the mixture simmer until its done. Ensure u stir it often to avoid it from sticking to the bottom and burning. Add the dry fruits roasted in ghee and serve warm or chilled.

Note :  Its a custard like dish so the consistency can be make pourable or thick like halwa. I like mine a little on the thicker side so I added an extra spoon of rice flour and let it cook longer so that it thickened better.U could even add condensed milk to give it some thickness.

Crispy Rawa Dosa

Rawa dosa is one of my favourite forms of dosa. Especially the one made at Sarvana Bhavan. Its huge crispy crunchy and yum yum. Here's how I make my rawa dosa.

Ingredients :

1 cup rawa / sooji/ semolina

1/4th cup rice flour

5 tbspn of  curds

1 onion finely chopped

5 green chillies chopped

1 tspn of  black pepper and jeera/cumin coarsely ground.

few curry leaves chopped

chopped corriander

salt to taste

pinch of soda.

water 2 -3 cups

Mix all the of the above and make a thin batter. The batter has to be thin such that it spreads on its own.

NOTE : make the batter 5 to 10 mins before u start making the dosa. Dosa tends to tear if mixed n kept for long.

Heat the tawa/girddle. When hot enough spread a tspn of oil and then pour the batter over the tawa. spread a little more oil on top of it and let cook. Once its crsipy on one side turn it over and cook. Fold and serve hot.

Rawa Dosa tastes best with some coconut chutney. Here's how we make it.

1 cup freshly grated coconut.

4 to 5 green chillies

a small piece of tamrind

a tspn of  fried gram dal (optional)

corriander

salt to taste

Grind the above with some water. To enhance the taste you can give it some tempering. In a tbspn of hot oil crackle mustard, urad dal, hing, 1 red chilly broken, few curry leaves.

NOTE : You can try different flavors with ur chutney by adding either or all of the following.

few cloves of garlic

mint leaves

ginger.

Simple Pudding

Was in a mood to make some dessert. Was thinking of options. Wanted it to be simple and easy. I noticed there was a lot of milk  left out. Then why not a simple pudding. So here it is. As I write this I have already polished off half the pudding. Left the other half for sister.

How I made it :

1.5 cups milk.

2 eggs

5 tbspn sugar

1 tspn vanilla essence.

For caramel :

3 tbspn sugar

water just to wet the sugar

Beat the eggs well. Add milk sugar and vanilla essence and beat well until well combined. Set aside.

In a small non stick pan make the caramel. Put sugar in the pan and add water. Heat it stirring continously until the mixture is a nice brown colour. Pour immediately into a stainless steel vessel. Let set for about 5 mins. Pour the mixture over the cramel.

Mean while heat water in a wide pan. I use the Idli cooker placing a steel heat pad ( the ones u use to place below hot vessel when u keep them on the kitchen counter). Once water starts boiling place the vessel over the pad and close with a plate. close the wide vessel/ idli cooker and let steam for about 20mins. 

Once done, invert the pudding on to a plate and let cool completely. Place it in a freezer and let set for about  2 hrs.

Slice and enjoy else just dig your spoon directly into it and enjoy.

Raw Mango Chutney !!

This is an easy pessy chutney and can be stored in the fridge for a week atleast. Eat it with bread, roti or just stick your finger in lick it out clean. This has all the taste in it, tang of the mange, sweetness of sugar, a bit of salt and heat of the chillies...

How I made it :

1 Raw mango ( u can use a slight ripe one also)

4 tbspn Sugar

5 to 6 red chillies.

1 tspn jeera/cumin

1 tspn fennel

salt to taste.

1/4 tspn of  hing.

1/2 tspn of mustard.

2 tbspn of oil.

Grate the mango or if you are lazy like me just chop it to small pieces. Dry roast jeera and fennel seeds until a nice aroma fills up your kitchen. Dry roast the chillies. Powder the chillies, jeera and fennel in a blender.

Heat a little oil in a pan and let the mustard crackle. Add the ground powder and the mango pieces. Stir for a min and add sugar and salt and let cook stirring in between. I let it cook for about 10mins and took it off the heat. Let it cool and then put it in a blender and grind to make a nice paste. You can skip the final blending if you are using grated mango. 

cake for time pass

Well it was a lazy day. Not much to do. Was surfing different blog sites and came upon this zebra cake recipe. Look'd nice n simple to make. I had all the ingredients tat was reqd so what can stop me !!!! :)
So herez my version of the zebra cake along with some choco dip.. have tweeked the recipe a little. N dont blame me for the bad picture i have taken.. i dint have a lot of patience to wait to eat so managed with watever backdrop / deco i cud click :P

The cake batter is made in 2 portions. One is the vanilla cake and the other the chocolate cake.
For the Vanilla Cake :
Maida - 1cup
powdered sugar -  3/4th cup ( i like mine a lil less sweet)
Baking pwdr - half tsp
Baking soda - 2 pinches
2 eggs
milk - 1/3 cup
water - 1/3 cup (adjust as per requirement) 
oil - 1/3 cup
vanilla essence - 1 tsp


For Chocolate cake :
Maida - 3/4th cup
powdered sugar - 3/4th to 1 cup
unsweetened cocoa powder - 1/2 cup
instant coffee pwdr - 1 tbsp ( optional.. add if u dont mind the bitter taste like dark choc)

Baking pwdr - half tsp

Baking soda - 2 pinches

2 eggs

milk - 1/3 cup

water - 1/3 cup (adjust as per requirement) 

oil - 1/3 cup

Method :

Mix all the dry ingedients well. In a bowl beat the eggs till nice a fluffy. Add sugar n beat well. Add-in the milk and oil n mix well. Once ready add the dry mixture n fold in well to avoid lumps. Add water to get a proper consistency of cake batter. 

Note : am a lazy person when it come to beating the eggs n beating with milk n oil. So i just put in all the 3 into a mixie n gave it good beating .... hehehe...

dont forget to add the vanilla essence to the vanila cake batter.

Now dont ask me about the temp settings for a oven cause i dont use one. I make mine in a microwave. 

grease the baking tin/dish.First put a small laddle full of vanilla batter in the centre of the baking tray..DONT SPREAD. On top of it a laddle full of chocolate cake batter. Continue pouring alternate types of batter at the center of the tin. Since the baking tray is greased the batter will spread from the centre and u will be able to see alternate color rings. Make sure u dont disturb the tray while stuffing it into the oven.

For the choco mocha dip :

A bar of chocolate.( I used a small sized Dairy milk and few Hershey Kisses)

powdered sugar - suite ur taste

milk - 1 tbsp

Method : 

Melt the choclate along with some milk. When almost done stir in the sugar. For the mocha part of it... u can add a lil bit of instant coffee pwdr. hmm I love dark choclates and coffee.. don't I ???

Microwave Gajar Ka Halwa

I had so many carrots lying in the fridge. Was thinking what to do with them. Then said lets go with some gajar ka halwa... long since I had made it. And I felt I should put my microwave into some use other than reheating food so I made the halwa in the microwave. It was a good idea as the colours are retained nicely.

How I made it :
2 big carrots  grated.
half cup sugar.
2 tbspn of milk
elachi powder.
almonds fried in ghee for garnishing

Mix the grated carrot, sugar and milk in a bowl and microwave it for 5mins. Remove n mix well and microwave further if  it needs to be cooked more. I like mine to be a little curnchy. Add cardamom powder and garnish with roasted almonds.
For more taste you could add milkmaid to it too.

Simple Meal Series - I

I was thinking of posting a series of simple meals. It would be the everyday simple meal menu mainly consisting of rice dal and some sabzi. So here's the first one :

Rice, Plain Dal and bhindi sabzi :

For the Dal :
Pressure cook 1 cup toor dal with some haldi in it. Add salt and smash the dal. In a skillet heat a little oil and add mustard, jeera, hing, curry leaves, chopped green chillies, chopped garlic. Fry well and add the smashed dal. Add corainder leaves and cook for few mins. ( U could add water if u like a thinner consistency of dal)


For the Bhendi Sabzi :
Wash and dry the okra. Chop it to small pieces. In a skillet heat 5  to 6 tbspn of oil. To this add mustard, udad dal, curry leaves, hing and fry well. Add 1  finely chopped large onion and add the okra. Fry well till the okra is no longer sticky /slimmy.  Add salt to taste , chilli powder, 1 tspn of daniya powder, 1 tbspn of roasted and ground peanuts and a about a tspn of roasted and ground sesame seeds(til). mix well and add corriander for garnish. Let cook for about 5mins.

Tomato Mania

The other day I went to buy some fresh greens in the morning and on the way I saw this regular vegetable seller selling tomatoes on his cart. Nice fresh red n juicy tomatoes. The seller would not sell anything for less than 10rs so here I was carrying a bag of 2kgs of tomatoes all for just rs.10 !!!!
With so many tomatoes at home all I could think of was tomato rasam and tomato fry for lunch.. And hubby asked me what is this??  Tomato Mania??

The tomato rasam is an easy pessy version.


How I made it :
Boil 4 tomatoes and skin it out and puree them when cooled. For the tempering , heat a little oil and when hot add musturd seeds , hing curry leaves a couple of  red chillies. Add a tspn each of coarsely powdered jeera and black pepper and immediately add the tomato puree. Add a pinch of sugar. Add water to get rasam consistency and add salt to taste. Garnish with finely chopped corriander. Boil for a while and your rasam is ready.

For the tomato fry :
U will need :
6 medium sized tomatoes.
1 large onion finely chopped
red chilli powder
1 tspn daniya powder
salt
A pinch of sugar
corriander to garnish.

For tempering:
Oil 
Mustard
jeera
udad dal
curry leaves.
hing

To make it :
Heat oil in a skillet and add mustard, jeera, hing, udad dal, and curry leaves. when done add the chopped onions and fry well till they are done. Add the chopped tomatoes and fry well till they are cooked and the oil starts separating. Add salt, a pinch of sugar, chilli powder and daniya powder and fry well. Garnish with corriander and serve hot with roti or rice.

Macroni Kheer

Macroni Kheer/payasam is the latest version on the lunch menu these days replacing the traditional sheviya payasam. Here is my version on making it. I have made a lot of modification to suit my taste ;)

U will need :
A handful of macroni's/ pasta
half litre milk.
2 tbspn of  vanilla flavoured custurd powder (optional)
Sugar to taste
cardamom powder for flavouring

How I made it :

The proper way to make is to boil the macroni's in the milk but I prefer boiling the macroni till its almost done in some water and then cooking it in the milk.  This I find is easier and a faster way to cook.
So what I do is while the macroni is cooking in the water, I boil milk n add sugar n let it reduce for a while. Then drain out the water from the macroni's and add it to the simmering milk to cook further. I love my payasam to be thick and I love vanilla flovoured custurd. I mixed custurd powder in a little amount of cooled milk and then added it to the cooking milk and macroni. When the payasam is thick enough and the macroni's are done add cardamom powder and turn off the heat.
Your kheer is ready to be eaten hot with a generous amount of  ghee or chilled in the fridge if you have the patience. :)

Puri with some gravy..

time for weekend breakfast... It has to be rich n heavy or the ones tat are time comsuming for preparations.. Usually saturdays is booked for masala Akki roti. But some times there is a change to the menu. N it was time for some hot fluffy puri's with avrekalu gravy. Avrekalu is also known as flat beans or filed beans. Its popular in karnataka n its a crazy time when its avrekalu season (usually winter.. but now available thru out the year). U get to see these beans in literally every dish tat is cooked.
People familiar with Bangalore will know of the averkalu food festival tat is held at VV Puram's Shetru beedi. This place is one of Bangalore's oldest food eat out areas. The night fall brings this street into life n weekend nights will have scores of people flocking here. The food has evolved here over the years. Sometimes I feel the authenticity of this place is lost But then few things that has me visiting this place is the bele obatu (puran poli / sweet roti ) and the avrekalu tat is sold in one of the shops at the start of the street (opp VB Bakery).  This shop hosts the avrekalu festival. They dish up varieties of  items with avrekalu. Vada's chakali sweets etc. Avrekalu is used in every household too (literally everyday it shows up in food in winter season). used in upma, pulav, gravy, dry sabzi, sweets, sambhar vada n diff snacks.

Oops.. I was to talk about my puri n avrekalu recipe right.. Thgt of VV puram had me thinking all about food and made me lose track ;)
 btw... i dont have pics of the avrekalu in its original form. Found a lot of pics on the web but most of them are from blogs. Dint want to flick any .. if u still wondering wat this bean is time u go google :)

hmm now to the recipe.

For the Puri:
1 cup maida
1 cup wheat flour
2 tbspn of fine semolina/rawa/sooji
half teaspoon of salt
a pinch of cooking soda
2 tbspn of milk (for the softness)
water to make a dough
Oil for frying

Mix all the dry ingredients n add milk n water n knead to a little stiff dough.  Let rest for about 20 mins. Make small lilttle balls and roll out to make puri's. Keep it a little thick for it to fluff up when frying. Deep fry in hot oil.
For it to blow up like a ballon: when u lower the puri into oil press the puri with the spoon into the oil for few seconds.. it will bounce back like a ballon.

For the gravy :
1 cup avrekalu
1/4 cup fresh grated coconut
1 large onion
a small stick of cinamom
3 to 4 cloves
 a teaspoon of black pepper
a pod of garlic
about 1 inch of ginger  ( u could also use 2 tbsp of ginger garlic paste instead of fresh ginger garlic)
half cup of  fresh corriander
1 meduim tomato
chilli powder to taste
1 tbspn of daniya powder
salt to taste

Keep aside 2 tbspn of chopped onion, avrekalu and tomato and grind all the ingrdients to a fine paste.
in a pan, add 4 tbspn of oil and add chopped onions once its heated. fry for a about a min and add the avrekalu and fry till the raw smell goes off (for about 5 mins) I add salt while frying itself.  Once done add the masala paste n fry till u see the oil separating form the masala. Add lil water if its sticking to the pan. Next puree the tomato and add to the gravy. Add water to get the desired consistency and stir. Close n let it simmer until the avrekalu is cooked.

Another pic of the breakfast... don't miss Aarik aiming for the puri's  :)

Biscuit Fritters/ Bhajjiyas ??!!!

Yes u read the title right.... :)
Mom said she was watching some cookery show on TV n they showed this ... n she tried it out today. We had our doubts on what it would turn out to be.But It tasted good !! More like raw banana bajiyas. So what we waiting for .. here comes the recipe.

Ingredients:
Marie biscuits ( or any plain or non sweet biscuits)
gram flour
chilli powder
salt
oil
a pinch of cooking soda
pinch of hing/asofoetida
water

In a bowl mix the gram flour, soda, salt, chilli powder, hing and a spoon of hot oil. Add water and make a thick batter. Dip the biscuits and deep fry till golden brown.

Ur Marie biscuit bajiyas are ready !!! just make sure to eat them hot else they will taste a lil sweet.
Was just thinking .. what if I use salted biscuits or pepper flavoured Monaco biscuits... hmm got to try it next ..