Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Sweet Potato Rosti
"Remind me," she said "to twist your ears the next time I meet you."
Oh oh....this conversation wasn't really going quite the way I had envisaged.
"Of course, you don't remember the times when I would add sweet potatoes to batatyacha kees (spicy grated potatoes) and you girls would refuse to touch it with cries of 'yuck, we don't want to have sweet potatoes.' And now, you are telling me to eat them! We eat them more regularly than you know," she informed me.
Oh well...guess my mom is always going to be a step ahead of me.
Well yes, there was a time when I hated sweet potaoes with a passion and for no real reason. Exactly when I started liking them, I can't recollect. Probably when I had baked sweet potato wedges, I think, at a friend's place. Then, it was the taste that drew me to the tubers.
But, as I became more aware of how nutrient packed sweet potatoes are, I slowly started cooking with them more and more often. Initially, I used them alongwith potatoes, primarily in spicy curries and baked wedges or like my mom used to, in batatycha kees (spicy grated potatoes).
Over a period of time, sweet potatoes have almost nudged the beloved potato out of my pantry.
Rosti, traditionally made with potatoes, is something I now make exclusively with sweet potatoes. The sweet potato rosti has a very delicate, almost melt in your mouth texture and is much quicker to cook than the rosti made with potatoes.
Sweet Potato Rosti
Ingredients:
Grated sweet potatoes: 1 - 1/4 cup
Garlic: 1 small clove, very finely minced
Onion: 1/2, chopped
Salt and pepper, to taste
Oil: 1 -1/2 tbsp
Lemon wedge, optional
Method:
Heat 1 tbsp of oil in a 6" pan (I sometimes divide the potatoes into 2 and cook 2 rostis in a smaller pan, as in the photos). Add the minced garlic and the chopped onions and fry for a minute. Add the grated sweet potatoes, sprinkle the salt and pepper and toss well till they are coated with oil.
With the help of a spatula, distribute the potatoes evenly all over the pan and gently press them to get a pancake about 1/2" thick. Drizzle a few drops of oil around the edges and on a medium heat, cook the potatoes till the bottom is golden brown and crispy, about 8-10 minutes.
Shake the pan to loosen the rosti from the edges, flip it** and cook the other side till golden brown and crisp.
(** to flip the rosti, you will need a plate that fits snugly into the pan you are cooking the rosti in. Cover the rosti with the plate and invert the pan, the cooked side of the rosti will be on top. Then with the help of the spatula, gently slide the rosti, uncooked side down, into the pan. Don't fret too much if the rosti breaks - mine does very often, because of the delicate texture of the sweet potatoes - just assemble it back into a pancake).
Slide the cooked rosti on a plate, squeeze some lemon juice and sprinkle some cracked pepper on it; serve with some fried eggs and fruit on the side for a wholesome breakfast.
Friday, October 21, 2011
Indian Omelet
One of the best feedback I have ever received about myself was from a colleague who I have since lost touch with and who I have never been able to thank.
“If you don’t mind, I want to tell you something,” he told me, just as he was on his way out of the office on his last day at work.
His mouth stuffed with a huge bite of omelet and bread, a friend declared that this was the best omelet he had ever eaten. I started to say that it was not him, but the alcohol talking (which, in all probability, was the case). I almost said that there was no big deal in making omelets, that anyone could make great omelets (which is very much the case). But I stopped myself and just mumbled a “thank you."
It wasn't difficult after all. I was learning, trying and starting to accept compliments gracefully.
Method:
Throw in the chopped onions, chillies, coriander leaves, ginger together into a bowl. Add the salt and turmeric powder and mix together with your fingers till the onions and the herbs start to release their juices. Add it to the beaten eggs.
When you make an Indian omelet, it is absolutely imperative to serve it with some tomato ketchup on the side. Everything else - grilled tomatoes, hash browns, even bread - is optional!
A few months ago, a Twitter conversation between @indianfoodrocks, @desisoccermom and @Soma_R about Indian Omelets led to posts on their respective blogs on how they make Indian Omelets. I am horribly late in posting mine, but I finally managed it. Here are the links to the other Indian Omelet posts:
Soma's Omelet
Omelet from Shulie’s Kitchen
Jaya’s Omelet
Sandeepa’s Omelet
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Thalipeeth
Papa kept coming into the kitchen every now and then, sometimes tasting the laddoos or nibbling on the chaklis. “Don’t we have any fruits? Where are the grapes?” he enquired. “Can’t you see the apples and bananas on the table? Look in the fridge, you’ll find some grapes, strawberries and oranges” ma replied sounding very irritated. “Take what you want and sit outside for some time; don’t keep coming in and out of the kitchen so often, it disturbs me no end.”
They seem to be arguing all the time, I thought to myself sadly. They used to be such a gentle couple, quite unlike the cantankerous pair I had seen over the last fortnight. I was really worried for them.
“Your papa,” ma whispered to me, “is losing it. Always interfering….just doesn’t what to do with himself. I just don’t know how to cope with him anymore!”
My heart went out to Papa. Recently retired, he wasn’t used to having time on his hands. He didn’t like watching T.V. and was never into reading. He tried his hand at gardening, but there wasn’t much he could do in the tiny one bedroom apartment with an almost non-existent balcony. So he would just potter around the house to while away the hours.
Ma turned her attention to the grains she planned to roast for making the thalipeeth bhajani. The sheer volume of bhajani that she was planning to pack horrified me. “Are you kidding ma? That bhajani will take up my entire baggage allowance! And can you just stop all this cooking? I don’t want you to tire yourself out.”
“Haven’t I told you so often, let me make all these things while I am physically able to. You have come home after 3 years, god knows when you will come again. Let me pamper you,” she smiled lovingly.
“Listen ma…..” but she cut off my protests with a curt “stop nagging me, go join your father outside.”
So I went and sat with papa who was solving a crossword puzzle, even as he was nibbling on some grapes. “Come beti, sit. Want a fruit? An orange? I’ll peel it for you.” He hadn’t forgotten that I hated peeling oranges.
“No, I’ll peel them myself,” I smiled. He went back to his crossword and as I watched him in amazement as he went from one clue to the next. He looked much healthier and more relaxed since his retirement but in the corners of his eyes, I could detect that vacant look of complete boredom and it troubled me a lot. Poor papa, he really needed to find himself something that would make him happy. I wished there was something I could do for him, but was at a complete loss of ideas.
“ ‘memories preserved, not pickled in jars but frozen forever’, now what kind of a clue is that?” he wondered aloud.
“Ummm..How about ‘photograph’?” I suggested
“8 letters….snapshot.”
“Hey papa, where are the albums? I want to see the old pictures.” But I knew where they would be, they had always been in the shelf in the showcase and I shot out of my chair and grabbed a few.
The albums were neatly labeled according to month, year and occasion – their marriage, their honeymoon, some vacations they had taken, my birth and so forth. Papa was a consummate photographer and for the first time, I realized how good he was. I never seemed to stand still in any pictures, but ma must have loved being his subject. The last of the albums had mostly blurry pictures – no, not taken by him but by a 14 year old me. But after my 15th year, there were no more pictures. I had taken the camera for a school picnic and dropped it, damaging it completely. The lie was easier, so I came back home and claimed that the camera was misplaced, possibly stolen by someone. Papa never replaced that camera, I had been too guilty to ask him to and that was the end of his hobby.
Feeling completely suffocated by the weight of my lie, I decided to step out for a bit. I must have gone out for a couple of hours and when I came back, ma was still in the kitchen, transferring some pickles into smaller bottles and papa was now attacking a Sudoku puzzle.
“Papa…for you,” I said, giving him the DSLR that I had purchased when I went out. “And maybe it is time for me to confess that your old camera wasn’t stolen. I….uh….I dropped it and it….it….broke.”
He nodded. “I’ve always suspected it. That is why this camera now, huh?” he said with a twinkle in his eyes.
In no time, he had figured the camera out and was clicking away endlessly. Pictures of me, our apartment, his plants, of the streets that ran around our apartment, of the skyline…
“Click ma’s pictures,” I said.
“You crazy? She’ll bite my head off if I go in there to take pictures,” he laughed. “This fruit bowl here will make for a better subject!”
Ma, in the meantime, had finished her marathon cooking session and walked out at exactly the moment that papa clicked the strawberries.
“Look at him, taking pictures of everything in this house except mine.”
He winked at me and turned to pacify ma by taking her pictures. He said something, she laughed and after a long time, they looked like the couple they used to be.
It didn’t matter that I didn’t have the camera in my hand to capture that moment - I knew it was an image that would live forever in my heart.
So this is my (as always?) late entry to our food fiction event, Of Chalks and Chopsticks that Sra revived last month. This time, there was a cue - in the form of a photo - of a man taking a picture of a bowl of strawberries.
Bongmom is hosting Of Chalks and Chopsticks for July. Head on over to her blog to know more.
Thalipeeth is very popular snack all over Maharashtra . It is a multi-grain, multi-legume pancake made from a special flour called 'thalipeeth bhajani'. Most Maharashtrian households will have bhajani in their pantries at all times and with good reason - thalipeeth is very easy to make once you have the bhajani and it is one of the most nutritious things you can dish out in a hurry.
The bhajani recipe varies from family to family. The following recipe is just a guideline - feel free to vary the grains/legumes (and the quantities) as per availability.
Thalipeeth Bhajani
Ingredients:
Bajra/pearl millet – 1 cup
Jowar/ Sorghum – 1 cup
Rice – ¾ cup
Wheat - ½ cup
Chana dal/Bengal gram – ½ cup
Urad dal/ Black gram – ½ cup
Moong dal/ Green bean – ½ cup
Coriander seeds – ¼ cup
Cumin seeds – 1/8 cup
Dry red chillies – ¼ cup, or to taste
Dry roast all the ingredients separately. Allow to cool. Grind them all together to a fine flour.
(normally, the grain – pulses mixture is ground in a flour mill. However, my friend grinds them at home in a spice grinder. It is a time consuming process and if you choose to do the same, do sieve the bhajani a couple of times and grind the gritty pieces again).
If roasting -grinding is too cumbersome, you could also buy the flours separately (in the same ratio as that of the grains), lightly roast them and mix them together to make a hassle-free bhajani.
The bhajani can last for months; if the weather in your part of the world tends to be hot and humid, pack it in small quantities in re-sealable bags/air tight containers and store in the fridge.
Once you have the bhajani, you can whip up thalipeeth in a jiffy!
Thalipeeth
Ingredients:
Bhajani – 1 cup
Onion – 1 small, very finely minced
Coriander leaved – ¼ cup, finely chopped
Chillies – 4, chopped
Jaggery – 1.5 tsps, grated
Salt
Water for kneading the dough
Oil
Method:
Mix together the onions, coriander leaves, chillies, jiggery and salt till the onions start to release some water. Set aside for 5 minutes and mix again. This helps all the ingredients to release their flavours.
Then add the bhajani to the above mixture and mix it in, you should get a mixture that resembles wet sand.
Keep adding water to it till you get a soft ball of dough.
Oil and heat a frying pan – it should be hot enough so that when you sprinkle a few drops of water on it, they should sizzle.
Take a small ball of dough, roughly the size of a golf ball, and flatten it to get a circle about 5” in diameter (I normally do this on a parchment paper, my mom does it straight on the pan) and place it on the pan.
Make a small circle in the centre with the back of a spoon. Drizzle some oil around the edges and in the centre, cover with the lid and let it cook for about 2-3 mins or until the underside is brown.
Flip it over and cook till small, brown spots appear.
Thalipeeth has to be served hot off the pan - a cold thalipeeth is an absolute no-no - preferably with a blob of butter melting over it. I serve it with some spiced yogurt and a salad on the side for a light and healthy lunch/dinner.
I am hosting MLLA - 36 this month and the multi-grain, multi-legume thalipeeth is my entry to the event.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Batatyacha Kees (Spicy Grated Potatoes)
She had problems with my sense of style, she had reservations about my choice of clothes.
That dress? The one with the sequins? Are you serious?
The bright red shade of nail polish? Too flashy for your age.
I called her old-fashioned. After all at 15, I was convinced I had a better idea of fashion and style than her. Once I was financially independent, I would buy what I wanted, I decided.
She curbed my freedom, she doubted my ability to take care of myself.
All girls weekend out to celebrate the class 12 results? No way!
Discotheque? And in those clothes? Perish the thought.
Wait till I am 18 and old enough to move out of the house, I thought. I would do as I pleased!
She was extremely strict with my interactions with anyone other than family, she was always mistrustful of people I thought were perfectly nice.
Sleep on the terrace during summer holidays with a group of friends? Never.
Go to the 27 year old neighbour's (uncle's) house who lived alone and chat while she fetched my sister from school? Don't you dare.
I used to get confused by her behaviour sometimes. At times, I used to pity and get angry at her suspicious nature. I would not grow up and be like her, I swore.
It took me some years to finally realise that she was right about most things that she let or did not let me do, that whether she was right or wrong, she did have her valid reasons for the decisions she made. It has taken me longer to actually admit that as a teenager, I made life very difficult for her.
Today, I know that my mother is someone who became the villain in my life so that she could keep me safe always. She was that enemy who was driven by only one motive - my well-being.
My mom's cooking is sometimes counter - intuitive , but always simple. Not too many frills and absolutely fuss-free. She never made any attempts to teach me cooking believing that cooking was something that would come naturally to me whenever I had to handle my own kitchen. There is no need to learn cooking, she would say. Focus on your studies instead.
I, on the other hand, would pester her with my food demands and help her when she asked me to only after whining and registering my displeasure. You always disturb me just when the novel's reached an interesting juncture, I would complain.
Ironically, today, whenever I go home, I want to help her out in the kitchen and she pushes me out. Don't tire yourself, I tell her. It is my right to pamper you, she counters.
Batatyacha kees is something that is normally made for upvas (religious fast) but growing, this was one of my favourite food and would get made for breakfast or with tea in the late afternoons.
Think of it as an Indian version of hash browns - just a little more nutritious with the addition of nuts and definitely tastier than hash browns!
Ingredients:
Potatoes: 2 medium
Sweet potato*: 1 medium
Roasted peanuts: 1/2 cup
Fresh chillies**: 2-3, more or less depending on your personal spice preference
Cumin seeds: 1 tsp
Salt, to taste
Juice of half a lemon
Oil or ghee: 1.5 tbsp
(*normally, batatyacha kees is made with only potatoes, but my mom also uses sweet potatoes because they are very nutritious and for the delicate sweet flavour they impart.
**I use red and green chillies only to make the kees look colourful)
Method:
Wash the potatoes thoroughly, grate them (I normally grate them with the skin, you could peel them if you so desire) and soak them in water.
After about 5 minutes, discard the water and soak the potatoes in a fresh change of water for another 5 minutes.
Meanwhile, pound or grind the peanuts into a coarse powder.
(If you want to know how to roast and crush peanuts, hop on over to Nupur's blog One Hot Stove for a very comprehensive post on roasting and grinding peanuts).
Drain the water the potatoes were soaking in. Squeeze out the water completely by pressing small batches of the drained potatoes between your palms.
Melt the ghee in a wok. When hot, add the cumin seeds. Once the cumin seeds start to splutter, toss in the chillies.
Then add the grated potatoes, turn up the heat and stir fry till the potatoes are cooked. Finally add the crushed peanuts and stir for a further 2 minutes. Squeeze the juice of half a lime and serve hot.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Cheesy Garlic and Spiced Cottage Cheese Pull Apart Rolls
These rolls were also, in a way, serendipitous.
It was like this....one morning, I was standing in the check out lane at the local supermarket. Behind me were two women and they were excitedly discussing some dinner party that they had been to. I didn't mean to eavesdrop but then in my defense, they were speaking a tad loudly and they bitching about the food that was served. "Except for the stuffed buns...you know, the ones with feta cheese and spinach. Those were divine," declared one of them.
Stuffed feta cheese and spinach buns....that sounded very interesting and I made a mental note to find out about those buns.
Back home, I wasted no time in googling 'stuffed feta cheese buns'. I was also simultaneouly surfing through some food blogs and landed on this post.
Now, I had bookmarked Suhaina's garlic rolls quite sometime back, but never got around to making them. Ditto with Nag's bread paneer rolls.
With the thought of those stuffed feta cheese buns still in my head, somehow an idea began to take shape - why not make the rolls as per Suhaina's recipe and use some spiced paneer as per Nag's recipe in place of the garlic butter?
Cheesy Garlic Pull Apart Rolls and Spiced Cottage Cheese Pull Apart Rolls
(adapted from here and here)
Ingredients:
for the bread:
Plain flour: 1.5 cups OR plain flour : 1 cup and whole wheat bread flour: 1/2 cup*
Yeast: 1/2 tbsp
Salt: 1/2 tsp
Sugar: 1 tbsp
Water: 1/2 cup + 2 tbsps
Olive oil: 2 tbsps + 1 tsp
*(the rolls in the photos are made from plain white flour; I have since made them with a combination of whole wheat flour and plain flour and they are just as good).
for the paneer/ cottage cheese stuffing:
Crumbed paneer: 1/2 cup
Chopped bell pepper: 2 tbsps
Chopped onion: 2 tbsps
Nando's hot peri peri sauce: 1 tbsp (substitute with any other spicy sauce or tomato ketchup)
Sugar: 1 tsp
Coriander leaves: 2 tbsps, chopped
Salt
Simply toss all the ingredients together into a bowl and mix thoroughly.
for the garlic butter:
Unsalted butter: 3 tbsps (original uses salted but I was also using cheese and hence used unsalted butter)
garlic: 2 tsps, grated
coriander leaves: 2 tbps finely chopped
grated cheese: 2 tbsps (optional but it really ups the yum factor)
Beat the butter for 2-3 minutes, then mix the grated cheese, garlic and the coriander leaves.
Method:
Mix the yeast with a tbsp of water and sugar and set aside for 10 mins, by which time you will see a creamy foam starting to form - this means that all's well with the yeast.
(in the original recipe, the yeast is whisked with the flour, but I prefer to ensure that my yeast is alive and well before I proceed with the making the dough).
Whisk together the flour and the salt. Add in the yeast mixture and the warm water and mix till all the flour comes together into a ball of dough. Depending on the flour you use, the temperature and humidity in your part of the world, you might need to use more or less water.
Add the oil to the dough, half a tbsp at a time, and knead to get a smooth dough. The dough should spring back when pressed with the fingers.
Grease a large bowl with a tsp of olive oil, turn the dough in the oil so that it is evenly coated with the oil, cover the bowl with a damp tea cloth and let the dough double. My dough took about an hour to double.
Punch out the air from the dough and divide it into two.
On a well floured surface, roll out one ball into a rectangle about 1 cm thick. Spread the paneer mixture evenly over it and roll it into a log, as such:
Using a sharp knife, cut the log into 4 equal portions.
Then roll out the second ball of dough in a similar fashion and spread the garlic butter on top, roll into a log and cut into 4 equal portions.
In well greased baking tray, place the rolls cut side up and brush the top with some milk. I alternate the garlic butter rolls and the masala paneer rolls (just for the heck of it!) as such:
Let the rolls rise for about 20 minutes and in the meantime, pre-heat the oven to 180 deg C.
Bake for about 30 - 35 mins till the top of the rolls turns golden brown.
Take a blob of cold butter and rub it over the top of the freshly baked rolls. This is optional but it gives the rolls a lovely shine. When cool enough to handle, pull them apart and eat.
The garlic rolls are very popular all over the blogosphere and with good reason. They are pillowy soft and oh so delicious. We had them alongwith this vegetable casserole and they were absolutely amazing.
But it was the cottage cheese rolls that had me all excited - with the addition of whole wheat flour, the stuffed rolls are filling and nutritious and I think they are perfect as a 'grab n go' breakfast or as a snack in children's snack boxes. What is more, you can vary the stuffings to suit your taste.....since I first made them, I am constantly thinking up different stuffings for the rolls: spinach and mushroom, spicy potatoes, minced meat....the possibilities are endless! So go right ahead, conjure up your own stuffings and stuff yourselves with these rolls!
And yes, these rolls have been Yeastspotted.
