Vaangibaath

Yesterday, after posting a comment for one of my dishes, Niki, my daughter mailed updating her Summer class schedule etc. in order that we plan our chats and calls accordingly. I mailed back filling in news here as it is almost a week that she left home. I promised to post more of recipes that she and her friends can fix amidst their crazy class and labs that seem to fill their days.

This will be one such recipe. Best of it will be that she can put it in her one nonstick pan and get done with if she chooses to. However, the microwave enthusiast that I am, I used more plates and dishes than she would :(

I've tried to simplify specifically with those foursome in mind. You are free to chop, grate or grind masalas to make it taste better.

Ingredients:
Brinjals (tender ) -200 grams
Basmati Rice - 150 ml
Coriander powder -2 teaspoons
Red Chillies -2 pieces
Very thin tamarind extract - 1 tablespoon
Shallots (Madras onions ) - few
Garlic - 2 cloves
Roasted peanuts - 1 tablespoon
Curry leaves - few
Mustard seeds - 1 teaspoon
Oil or ghee - 2 tablespoons
Garam masala powder - if desired, in some small quantity.
Turmeric powder - 1/4 teaspoon
Salt - to taste

Wash and cut brinjals. Wash basmati rice and cook till tender but grains separate. Crush the garlic and shallots coarsely or simply chop.

Heat oil in a pan, crackle mustard seeds. Drop the red chillies, onions and garlic in the pan. Add coriander powder, turmeric powder, garam masala and roasted peanuts. Saute for few minutes and put in the brinjal and tamarind extract. Add salt and cook brinjal until pieces are tender. With the fire low, add the cooked rice and mix well. Garnish with curry leaves just before switching fire off.




Serve hot with crisps and any pachchidi.

Mushti Dosai

Few years before and after my marriage, I worked for a Nationalised Bank in India. It took me months to secure a transfer to Mangalore, where my husband was posted. I got a posting in a branch that was labelled "ËXTREMELY LARGE". The business hours will be very busy and crowded that you hardly had time to smile at your colleague sitting in the adjacent chair. But after lunch break, the afternoon session will be relatively relaxed, everyone joking and gossipping as you balanced your ledgers. (we weren't wired then, so your made entries and closed the day balancing them).

Speaking not a word of Kannada, Tulu or Konkani I used ask a colleague to convey to a customer what I had to say. Then, few of my friends at work decided to language tutor me. And coach me they did with lot of fun and fervour, that I was able to read and write Kannada and talk haltingly in all three!!

One such freind, Deepa gave me a womens' magazine and told me to copy a recipe. Her condition was that I take notes down in Kannada, no translations allowed. That is why to date the recipe is noted down in Kannada and saved in my cookbook. However, I'm writing it now from memory, though off and on I fondly recall how well they took me into the fold.

This is a very simple dosai, best had well fermented. Any chutney, sambhar or masal will go well with them.

The following recipe makes 8 to 10 yummy dosais.

Ingredients:

Raw rice - 1 standard cup

Urad dhal - 1 fistfull ( about 1/10th of a cup )

Fenugreek seeds - 2 teaspoons

Dessicated coconut - 2 tablespoons

Poha - 1/4 cup

Salt -to taste

Oil /Ghee - little

Soak fenugreek seeds a few hours early. Wash well and soak the rice and dhal together for about an hour. Wash poha separately and soak just until soft.

Blend in the jar of your mixie the coconut and fenugreek seeds first until fenugreek is frothing. Add on the rice - dhal mix and grind further. When more than half done put in the poha and grind to a smooth batter. Add salt. Rinse the jar and add the adherring batter too to the lot.

Stand the batter overnight to ferment.

Pour ladlefuls on hot pan, cover with lid. Cook for few minutes until done. Not necessary to turn over as the steam would have taken care of the top side. If you still want that side well done turn over for few minutes.

Serve with chutney, masal, idli milagai podi or sambhar.

Rasam -Naagaiyanallur style

Naagaiyanallur is a small village in Tiruchi district. Most families there were in the culinary business. So famous that, they were the most sought after groups in the entire Salem, Trichy, Karur, Erode belt to be hired for every function in the family.They create sheer magic that our tongues will tickle at the mere look and aroma emnating from the kitchens.

As both my parents were born with lot of siblings, there were some big eventful wedding to insignificant, but crowded small functions happening in the family throughout my childhood. Oh we just used to love those days as preparations will go on for days and the house will be filled with all kinds of aroma. As kids we would be fascinated. They were the caterers for my wedding and my sisters' weddings too.

This RASAM is their trademark recipe. I can't claim to have achieved 100% taste. But I know it is sure somewhere in that range. The recipe makes for four servings.

Ingredients:

Tamarind -1 small lime size

Tomato - 1 medium

Thoor Dhal -4 tablespponsful

Salt - to taste

Rasam powder (recipe given) -1/2 teaspoon

Asafoetida -1teaspoon

Turmeric powder -! teaspoon

Mustard seeds -1 teaspoon

Cumin seeds -1 teaspoon

Black pepper powder, cumin powder -just a hint of each

Curry leaves - few

Coriander leaves - few

Ghee - for tempering

Soak tamarind in warm water and extract pulp until the water is almost clear.

Cook thuvar dhal and half tomato in the pressure cooker. Mash well , mix some more water.Keep aside.

To the tamarind extract, add salt, 1/2 spoon of asafoetida, turmeric powder, the other half of tomato and rasam powder.

Microwave on medium high for 8 minutes.

Add the cooked dhal. Return to microwave and cook on high for 4 minutes.

Temper mustard seeds, cumin seeds and some asafoetida in ghee.Quickly transfer to the rasam. Drop the curry and coriander leaves. Dash a bit of pepper and cumin powders. Close immediately until you are serving at the table. This locks the aromatic goodness.

For best results, the tamarind extract should boil well. Rasam should be off the fire just when it is frothing.Don't boil. The thuvar dhal must be well cooked, mashed and should be thin. Thick paste is for sambhars. Rasams are meant to be lighter.

This rasam is suitable to drink and for rice.Rasavadais will need more thicker base.

Hope you will enjoy this rasam as much as our family does.

RASAM POWDER

Red chillies 2 cups

Coriander seeds 1 cup

Black whole peppercorns and Cumin seeds put together 1/5 cup

Heat in your microwave the redchillies until brittle.

Roast coriander seeds, peppercorns and cumin seeds. Transfer all of these to the jar of a blender and powder to a fine consistency.

If you are getting the powder done in commercial mills, it is enough to sun-dry the contents. However, adding just one drop of castor oil to the red chillies while roasting helps reduce irritation while roasting and also enables longer shelf life.

Mysorepaak -Happy Birthday to a dear friend

Tomorrow, the 8th day of June is the birthday of one very dear friend. She simply walked up to us one evening during our walks and introduced herself. Her two very cute children were eagerly befriending my daughter and on that very first instance we struck a friendship that we cherish. Through her we found more friends in Johore Bahru. Ever since, we are more family than anything. Despite age differences we discuss everything.

Today, most of us are in different countries. But thro' Skype, Facebook or whichever network we keep in touch. Inspite of her busy schedule as a kindergarten teacher and the kids in middle and high school, she keeps contact. So this post is dedicated to you LALITHA...Wish you a very happy birthday and many happy returns!!!!





The Mysorepaak recipe was not just handed down to me by my paternal grandma. It was something she sat next to me and made me do for the family when I was merely 13 years of age. I have mastered her technique so much that she used to say that neither of her daughters or daughters-in-law picked it up from her as I did. Incidentally she taught me to make Halwa too.

Weight watchers may not even want to try this recipe, for it doesnot turn out well if every ingredient is not to measurement. However, I invite you to try once and forget the calories in the taste.

In the days when I was learning this recipe, the sugar was less sweeter and not as fine. So, they added more sugar. Now this recipe makes sweet mysorepaaks that may melt in your mouths. The one rule I follow is to melt butter fresh for the ghee.

I meant to weigh the ingredients but forgot to, because I usually go by volume. I use my cups those are 175ml in size.The following recipe makes 60 pieces as big as shown in the picture.

Ingredients:
Gram flour (the fresher, the better)-2 cups
Sugar -4 1/2 cups
Ghee (molten consistency)-2 cups
Cardamon powder-2 tablespoons
Water - 1 cup
some ghee to grease the tray

Seive the gram flour well. Put this in a plate and add 1 1/4 cups of the ghee to this and mix well to make a thick batter. Keep aside. In a heavy pan put the sugar with a cup of water and stir well. The sugar should boil to give you a syrup that will form a string when pressed between the thumb and forefinger,then pulled apart.

At this point, keep the fire on the lowest and pour the flour- ghee mixture in it with one hand while trying to stir with the other. This point forward take care to stir constantly. At intervals add the rest of the ghee in small quantities until all of it is used up. Add the cardoman powder too.

The mixture will bubble in the middle at first and slowly begin to leave the sides.You may feel more pressure in your stirring too. When it leaves the sides, quickly transfer to prepared tray. Let it cool a bit and with a knife shape pieces.

There you go. Serve as dessert and bask in the praises.

Coconut Fruit Plait.

I have copied this recipe from the packet of Blue Key Bread Flour. Mrs.Loo, my Chinese neighbour in Johor Baru, is 10 years my senior; our birthdays are one day apart :) I have never known her to be idle. She had four daughters, of whom one was away in Uni, two were in Junior college and the last in secondary school.

Her husband worked in Singapore and the girls schooled there. To beat the Causeway traffic, they would leave home at 5.30 in the morning. So her day starts earlier than that, with never ending chores. She taught me to bake bread, a few cookies, buns et al. From her recipe book I have borrowed some notes and use them. This is one such recipe, simple yet the results are good to see and eat, of course.

Ingredients:
Flour-500 grams
Active dried yeast-1/2 tablespoon
Water-260 grams
Salt-5 grams (1 Teaspoon)
Sugar-70 grams
Butter-50 grams
Dessicated coconut -50 grams
Milk -1 tablespoon
Mixed dry fruits -100 grams

Topping:
Glace icing and Cherries or Castor Sugar and Cherries

Raise the yeast in a bowl.
In a bowl put in the flour, sugar, salt, dessicated coconut and butter. Mix thoroughly. Add the yeast and knead until a smooth dough develops. Add mixed dry fruits and knead further.
Rest the dough and let it rise for about an hour.
Divide dough in twelve equal portions. Roll three of such balls into thick ropes and make a plait.

Leave on a baking tray. Repeat with all the dough. Place the plaits on baking trays, leave for some more time until the oven preheats. Bake at 210°C for 18 minutes.

Cool on wire racks. While still warm make the topping.

These buns can be baked one or two at a time depending on the capacity of the oven. If you are not baking all in one go, just cover the prepared plait so it does not dry from top.

Makes a good breakfast or a teatime snack.

Eggless cake - Niki's Baking Attempt

This is a Nestle recipe. Back in India, some one from Nestle visited my sister's home and demonstrated this recipe using Milkmaid. Ever since she bakes this often. It is very simple and very delectable.

So, when she goes back to Kansas, Niki wanted to bake this for a friend whose birthday is sometime in June, as this friend is a very strict vegetarian and does not eat eggs. She wanted a practice attempt at home.

Inspite of having a Nestle plant in Tema, I did not find their condensed milk on the shelves of the super markets. Suddenly, three days ago, we spotted just a few cans tucked behind the evaporated milk cans and we swept them all into our trolley. So yesterday she baked the cake and is happy to have done a good job.

Ingredients:

Maida - 200 grams

Sweetened condensed milk - 1 tin (385 grams/13.6 oz.)

Butter - 100 grams

Baking powder - 1 tsp

Bi Carbonate of Soda - 1 tsp

Aerated Soda - 150 ml

Vanilla Essence - 1/2 tsp

Grease the baking tin and set the oven at 180°C/350°F.

Soften the butter. Add milkmaid and beat well. Add the vanilla essence.

Sieve together the maida, baking powder and soda bicarbonate.

Add maida mixture and aerated soda alternatively to the batter until all the maida and soda are used up.

Pour the batter into the baking tray and bake in the preheated oven for 45 - 50 minutes or until the toothpick inserted in the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Remove from oven and cool for a while. Turnout over a wire rack or a plate lined with cloth (to absorb the moisture)

Tomato pulikkachchal

My mom's recipe notebook has some randomly written tips. She has actually copied down how each vegetable can be kept fresh longer.... In the 60s and 70s, the fridge was a luxury!
Here is how she kept her tomatoes. wash them and rub gently dry and arrange on a flat plate or on a newspaper looking up. Next day turn them over. Repeat this process the next day and so on, until all the tomatoes are consumed. she kept them even after dad bought her a good capacity fridge :)
Our dear Velamma, our then live-in maid, would purchase firm tomatoes and stock them for her. Velamma used to indulge us with all our favourite vegetables. Whenever she spotted good veggies she would purchase saying that one of us will eat it heartily. She stayed with us until my daughter was about a year and a half. Velamma died of good old age two or three years later. She doubled and trebled her duties whenever the need arose without being asked to. She nursed my grandmother when ill, stayed up with me at night when I was term due and nannied my colic stricken daughter.. and much much more. We miss her and can never replace her.
Guess that is a big dose of nostalgia folks. Now the recipe, that can serve as a side dish, ready mix for rice or just a dip with hot samosas, french fries etc. You get about 200ml of finished dish with the following measures.

Ingredients:

Firm, ripe tomatoes - 250 grams
Tamarind paste - 1 tablespoon
Red chillies - 6 pieces
Green chillies - 6 pieces
Sesame oil - 5 tablespoons
Salt - to taste
Mustard seeds - 1 teaspoon
Curry leaves - few
Cilantro - few strands chopped
Tumeric - 1/2 teaspoon
Asafoetida - 1/2 teaspoon

Wash tomatoes and drop them in boiling water. Boil until the peel cracks. Drain, but reserve the water for further use. remove the skin and puree the tomatoes. Add salt, tamarind pulp and the reserved water.
Put the oil in a pan and on medium fire and let the mustards crackle. Then add the asafoetida and turmeric. Break red chillies in twos and slit green chillies. Put them in the pan and saute for a while.
Pour the pureed tomato and bring to a boil. Lower the fire to medium low and simmer for about 20 minutes until oil separates and floats on top. Garnish with the curry leaves and cilantro.
Store in clean jars. Stays well in the fridge for 4 days.