My Recipes

Wheat Rava Idly - Godhuma Rava Idly

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Fri, 19 Feb 2016 00:05:00 +0000

I came across this recipe while browsing on Facebook. My dad usually has a light dinner, and this came in handy one day when I had nothing left in the fridge. Here’s what I did.

Ingredient:

Wheat Rava/Godhuma Rava - 2 cups
Yogurt - 1/4 cup
Sour Cream - 2 tsp.
Salt to taste
Carrot - 1/4 cup (shred it nicely)
green chilli- 3 (acc to taste)
Oil - 1 tsp
Mustard Seeds - 1/4 tsp
Urad dhall - 1/4 tsp
channa Dhall - 1/4 tsp
Hing - couple of pinches
Coriander leaves - 1/4 cup
Eno fruit salt - 1/4 tsp

Take the wheat rava in a vessel adding required amount of salt to it.
add green chilli, carrots, coriander leaves, yogurt and sour cream to it and mix it well.
Preheat oil in a pan, splutter mustard seeds and fry both the dhall until golden brown and add this mix to the rava mix.
Add hing to it and mix everything well. Keep it aside for couple of hours
When you are ready to make idly, add eno salt and required amount of water to bring the rava mix to idly batter consistency.
Grease idly mould with oil and scoop the batter in each mould.
Steam cook it for 15 to 17 minutes or until a tooth pick comes out clean.
Enjoy it with chutney or sambar. I served this with sambar.

Notes:

Original recipe did not add Eno salt.

Vegetable Quesadilla

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Tue, 09 Feb 2016 21:44:00 +0000

This has recently become a favorite of my girls. We were watching some lunch box ideas on YouTube. I had my girls with me while I watched so they could suggest ideas for packing their lunch boxes. The deal is that they have to finish their lunches completely, without any leftovers.
Here is what I do to make these quesadillas twice or thrice a week. Ingredients will make 4 Quesadillas

Bell Pepper - 1/2 cup (I use all 4 color bell peppers)
Tomato - 3 tbsp (chopped into tiny pieces)
Zucchini - 3 tbsp (chopped into tiny pieces)
Black olives - 7 or 8 (chop it into tiny pieces)
Green Onion - 2 tbsp (chopped)
Tortilla Land Rotis - 4
Salt - a small pinch
Pav Bhaji Masala powder - 1/4 tsp
Flax seeds Powder - 1/8 tsp
4 cheese Mexican cheese blend - 1/2 cup (+ or - depending on the like)

In a cutting board add the vegetables, sprinkle salt, flax seeds powder and pav bhaji masala powder and mix it well. Make it 4 portions.
Pre heat a tawa and cook the rotis.
When you see the bubbles while cooking, spread one portion of the vegetable on one side and sprinkle required amount of cheese and cover it with the other side of the roti.
Press gently with a spatula and cook it for less than a minute on each side.
Slice it with a pizza cutter or knife and serve it with sour cream or ketchup

Vegetable Stir Fry - Veggie filled Breakfast

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Thu, 04 Feb 2016 21:43:00 +0000

Yes, this is what my husband eats on weekdays for breakfast. Initially, I found it hard to cut the vegetables and sauté them every morning while dealing with two middle-schoolers. It was a little overwhelming for me. But I felt bad not making it for him and giving him an unhealthy, carb-rich breakfast every day. So I started planning ahead, and I’ve gotten the hang of it now.
I chop the vegetables in a big batch and store it in the refrigerator and use it everyday. Here is what I do to make this breakfast:

Bell peppers - 1 1/2 cups (chop it as bite sized cubes)
Green onion - 2
Zucchini - 1/4 cup (chop it )
Cucumber - 1/4 cup
Mushroom - 3 (Medium sized; Chop it)
Bog Choi leaves - 2 (chop it)
Broccoli - 4 florets
Asparagus - 3 (chop it into an inch size)
Tofu - 1/4 cup (cubed - 6 pieces)
Olive oil - few drops
Salt to taste

Take a pan, sprinkle couple of drops of olive oil.
Add the tofu pieces and saute it for few minutes until all the sides become golden brown.
Keep it aside. In the same pan, add all the other vegetables and salt and saute it for 5 to 7 minutes under medium flame.
Enjoy!!

Notes:

- I buy the tri-color bell peppers from Costco and green peppers from Indian Grocery store.

-Adding Tofu is purely optional.

-Also I sometimes add a handful of spinach depending on the availability

-Storing the chopped vegetables for a long time (say more than a week) is not a good idea. Try to use it up within three days and make a fresh batch for the rest of the week.

-I freeze the broccoli florets as we buy it from Costco and it takes forever to empty that bag and I used to throw half of it. Now since I am freezing them, I can use the whole broccoli florets. No wastage there.

Tortilla Chips - Home made

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Tue, 02 Feb 2016 17:41:00 +0000

This one of the easiest snack I have ever made. In less than 15 minutes this chips can be made. We bought the Tortilla Land Wheat uncooked tortillas from Costco. I used these tortillas to make these chips. Here is what i did.

Ingredient:

Uncooked Tortillas - 3
Salt - few pinches to sprinkle on the tortillas
Pav Bhaji Powder - Few pinches to sprinkle on the tortillas.
Oil - To spray on the pan and tortillas pieces

Pre heat oven to 325 degrees
In the mean time, cook the tortilla in stove top using a roti pan.
Cut it into required shape.
Arrange it in the pre-greased cookie sheet.
Sprinkle salt and pav bhaji powder on top of each piece
Bake it for 6 minutes and turn the pieces around and bake it for another 5 minutes or until it is brown.

I gave these chips to my girls for snack along with homemade Salsa.

Oatmeal - Breakfast in a bottle!

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Fri, 29 Jan 2016 23:22:00 +0000

This is another healthy breakfast recipe I tried yesterday. I got the motivation from Pavithra’s Facebook pictures. Oatmeal is my almost everyday breakfast. I usually pack one-minute oats in a container, take it to work, cook it there, and eat it with six or seven almonds.

Nowadays, after seeing so many beautiful photos of mason jar breakfast ideas online, I really wanted to try making my own mason jar breakfast. While I was filling the jar, my girls got curious and wanted to make their own breakfast bowls, too. I used an empty honey bottle to make this dish. Here’s what I did.

Quick cooking oats - 3 1/2 tbsp
2% Organic Milk - 1/2 cup
Silvered almonds - 1 1/2 tbsp
Flax seeds - 1 1/2 tsp
Fresh Blueberries - 10 Nos.
Banana - 1 tbsp (chop it into small pieces) - Little less than 1/4 Dole Banana
Honey - 1/4 tsp

Add everything in a bottle or a bowl and refrigerate it overnight. Enjoy it in the morning.

Granola Bars

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Wed, 27 Jan 2016 18:00:00 +0000

I got the motivation to make these bars from Pavithra. I bookmarked a couple of granola bar recipes from her blog and have wanted to try them for a long time. This weekend, I somehow managed to find the time to make them. They didn’t take long to prepare. Here’s what I did.

Quick one minute oats - 3 cups
Flax seeds - 1/4 cup
White sesame seeds - 3 tbsp
Salted Edamame beans - 1/4 cup (store bought)
Silvered Almonds - 1/2 cup
Pecans - 2 tbsp (finely chopped)
Mini Semi-sweet chocolate chips - 1/4 cup
Almond Butter - 2 tbsp
Unsalted Butter - 1/4 cup
Coconut Oil - 1/4 cup
Honey - 1/2 cup
Sugar Free Maple syrup -2 tbsp
Cinnamon - few pinches

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease a cookie sheet.
Take oats, flax seeds, sesame seeds, edamame beans, almonds, pecans and chocolate chips in a wide bowl.
Add cinnamon to it and mix it well. The actual recipe called for salt. I did not add salt here as Edamame beans had salt in it which I thought was more than enough
Mean time, preheat a pan, melt butter and coconut oil.
Add honey and maple syrup. Turn off the stove once every thing melts.
Add the honey mixture to the oats and mix every well.
Spread it in the cookie sheet and using a spatula press it tightly. Spread a parchment paper on top and put a heavy bottomed pan on top of it and let it sit for couple of minutes. I used my pressure cooker.
Bake it for 16- 20 minutes and make sure the bottom is not burnt.
Once it is golden brown, remove it from the over and let it cool. Once they are warm or 3/4 cool, cut it into required shape and store it air tight.
I used the oats crumbs as granola for my next day breakfast and it was so good to eat with cold milk.

Vegetable Idly

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 21:30:00 +0000

This is a very easy breakfast recipe I made for my girls. If you have Idly batter ready, it will just take less than 10 minutes to prepare and 10 minutes to steam the idly. Here goes the recipe.

Ingredients:

Idly Batter - 2 cups
Onion - 1/2 cup (finely chopped)
Tomato - 1/4 cup (finely chopped)
Frozen peas - 1/4 cup
frozen corn - 1/4 cup
Idly Molagapodi - 1 1/2 tbsp (according to your taste)
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Hing - couple of pinches
Salt to taste - Just for the vegetables
oil- 1 tsp
mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp
Coriander leaves - 2 tsp. (finely chopped)

Take a pan, preheat oil and splutter mustard seeds. Add hing to it.
Add the finely chopped onion and saute for few seconds.
Add the frozen peas and corn and saute for few seconds
Now add the finely chopped tomato along with salt, turmeric powder and idly molagapodi.
Sprinkle a hand full of water and let it cook for 5 to 7 minutes. Check before adding the water as the frozen vegetables will already some water.
It will become like a thokku. Now add the chopped coriander leaves and mix it well.
Let it cool for few minutes and add it to the idly batter. Mix it well.
Scoop the batter in the pre-greased idly mould and steam cook it for 7 to 10 minutes or until the tooth pick comes out clean.
Serve it hot with chutney or sambar.

Pizza - Using Pizza Kit

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Sat, 16 Jan 2016 01:00:00 +0000

This is just a review post. We bought this Molinaro's stone baked organic pizza kit from Costco. I thought of writing a simple review for the product. I have used Pillsbury pizza crust before and tried once. But this is the first time where I am using an already baked pizza crust.

The Packet had four crust and four sauce pouches along with a zip lock cover to store the remaining crust and sauce. All we have to do it spread the sauce, add our favorite topping and cheese and bake it for 10 minutes or until the cheese melts. We had it as dinner yesterday and it was really easy to make. Recently I started giving my twin 11 year old some kitchen training. This starter kit was perfect for them to explore.

I asked to do all the steps except using the oven. They loved doing it because this gave them an opportunity to chop vegetables for pizza topping. The outcome was really good and crust was thin and really tasty. This package is really good for two meal sessions for a family of four.

Banana Almond Butter Muffin

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Wed, 13 Jan 2016 17:57:00 +0000

My goal for this new year is to use much less sugar in whatever I bake. While browsing many sites, I learned that honey can be used as a substitute for sugar, along with naturally sweet fruits. I tried this muffin recipe this weekend, and it turned out nice and spongy. I took the basic banana–peanut butter recipe from allrecipes.com and adjusted the ingredients to make these muffins. Here’s the recipe.

Ingredients:

All Purpose flour - 1 cup
Aashirwadh Atta - 1 cup
Egg - 2 ( I used 1/3 cup of egg whites)
Buttermilk - 1/3 cup
Olive Oil - 1/2 cup
Mashed Banana - 1 cup
Almond Butter - 2 tbsp
Sugar - 1/3 cup
Honey - 2 tbsp (generous tablespoon)
Vanilla Essence - 1/2 tsp
Baking soda - 1 tsp
Salt - 1/2 tsp

Pre heat oven to 325 degree and line the muffin pans with paper muffin liners or grease it with olive oil.
Take the dry ingredients flour, salt and baking soda in a bowl and mix everything well.
In a separate bowl, whisk buttermilk, egg whites, oil, honey, sugar and vanilla essence really well
Mash the banana and almond butter together and bring it to a paste consistency.
Add the oil mix to the dry ingredients and mix it will.
Add mashed banana and mix all of them well.
Scoop the muffin pans with the batter and bake it for 25 to 27 minutes. Do the toothpick test to make sure the muffins are cooked fully.

Notes:

original recipe is based on

all purpose flour and I substituted half of it with whole grain wheat flour.
1 3/4 cups of sugar and no honey. I used honey and just 1/3 cup of sugar. It had just enough sweetness to enjoy.
I whisked the yogurt to buttermilk instead of using store bought buttermilk. So it was not really thick or thin.
I wanted to incorporate almond butter as much as possible in my recipes so that my girls can have it. Original recipe had peanut butter.

Simple Sandwich

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Fri, 08 Jan 2016 22:01:00 +0000

Happy New Year All!

This is my first post of the year, and it happens to be a simple, easy sandwich. I made it yesterday for my girls. It took less than 10 minutes to prepare and pack as an after-school snack. Here’s the recipe.

Whole wheat bread slices - 4
Butter - To apply in the toast
medium sized potato - 2
Frozen peas - 1/4 cup
salt to taste
Ajwain - a pinch
Amchur powder - 1/4 tsp
Coriander leaves - 2 tbsp (finely chopped)

Peel the skin from potato, put it in a microwave safe bowl filled with just enough water and microwave it for 5 minutes.
Microwave peas for 1 1/2 minutes
Mash the potato and peas in a bowl.
Add the rest of the ingredients excluding bread and mix it well.
Apply butter on two slices of the bread and spread the potato mix well
Heat a skillet and put the bread slices on it and heat it for less than two minutes. Remember potato is already cooked.
Put both the slices together and make it a sandwich.
Do the same with the other two bread slices.
Serve it warm with ketch up or some chutney.

Banana Walnut Bread

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Sat, 06 Dec 2014 23:00:00 +0000

This is another goodie I baked during Thanksgiving break this year! I saw bananas going bad on the countertop and wanted to make something with them. This bread immediately came to mind.

Unfortunately, my girls hate walnuts and bananas. When I said I needed their help baking it, they gave me a big “no.” But I bribed them by saying we could add some white chocolate chips along with the nuts. That sounded like a good deal to them, so we started our prep work. 🙂

Again, I got the recipe from allrecipes.com and adjusted the ingredient quantities to fit our needs.

Ingredients:

Maida/All Purpose Flour - 1 cup
Salt -1/2 tsp
Baking Soda - 1 tsp
Butter - 1/2 cup
Sugar/Xylitol - 1 cup
Overripe Mashed Bananas - 1 cup
Egg Whites - 6 tbs (2 eggs)
Walnuts Chopped - 1/2 cup
Almond Shavings - 2 tbsp
White chocolate chips - 2 tsp

Method:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease the 9x5 loaf pan
Sift flour, salt, baking soda together and mix well.
Mix butter and sugar until smooth.
Add eggs and bananas to it and blend it well. ( I used hand blender)
Add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture and stir well.
Add the chopped walnuts now and fold it gently.
Pour the batter in the loaf pan.
Sprinkle white chocolate chips and almond shavings on top
Bake it for 60 to 70 minutes or until a knife inserted comes out clean.

Jam Filled Cookies

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Fri, 05 Dec 2014 18:51:00 +0000

I baked these cookies last week during my kids’ Thanksgiving break. They turned out really, really good. I never thought I could bake buttery, jam-filled cookies like these. While browsing allrecipes.com, I came across this recipe and adjusted the measurements to make the quantity I needed. Here’s the recipe

Ingredients:

All Purpose Flour/Maida - 2 cups + 1 tbsp
Butter - Little more than 3/4 cup
Brown Sugar - 1/3 cup
White Sugar / Xyla - 1/3 cup
Egg Whites - 3 tbsp
Baking Powder - 1 tsp
Vanilla extract - 1 tsp
Pineapple Chunky Jam - 3 + tbsp

Method:

Pre Heat Oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Cream the butter + Xyla(white sugar) + Brown sugar until smooth
Beat in the egg and vanilla
Mix the baking powder to Maida well.
Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and combine.
Form dough into 1 inch balls and make a small thumb print in the middle and fill it with the jam. I used 1/2 tsp measuring spoon do this process.
Bake it for 15 to 17 minutes until its fully cooked.
Let it cool really well. Store it in air-tight container
Enjoy!

Pasta with Veggies

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Sat, 22 Nov 2014 01:40:00 +0000

I made this pasta for the Thanksgiving feast at school today. It turned out pretty good, and it was easy to make. I used rotini pasta from Safeway and cooked the whole box since there were more than 30 kids, and many parents brought food as well—so I figured one box would be enough. Here’s the recipe I followed.

Ingredients:

Rotini Pasta - 1 box
Frozen chopped broccoli - 3/4 cup
Frozen Peas & Carrots - 1/2 cup
Pasta Sauce - 1/2 cup (acc to taste)
Cheese - 3/4 cup (4 cheese Mexican blend (cheese shredding))
Mozzarella cheese - 1/4 cup ( I used amul cheese)
Olive oil - 2 tbsp
Salt to taste
Kasoori Methi - 1 teaspoon.

cook Pasta according to the box instructions. Drain it when its fully cooked
Mean time, microwave the frozen vegetables up to 5 minutes or until nicely cooked.
Take the cooked/drained pasta in a oven safe dish ( I used Pyrex).
Mix pasta sauce (I used Safeway Select Tomato Garlic Flavor) to the cooked pasta.
Add the cooked vegetables to it and mix everything well.
Sprinkle the cheese on top of it
Broil it for 5 to 7 minutes until cheese is fully melt.

I dry roasted a teaspoon of Kasoori Methi and sprinkled on top of this pasta at the final stage. This is absolutely optional.

Aloo Kachori

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Fri, 14 Nov 2014 03:56:00 +0000

When we were in Delhi, we had the chance to travel to many places in North India. During those trips, I came across different types of kachoris. Every time we stopped for breakfast or a snack, one of us would buy one and share it.

I never had the confidence to try making them at home. Last week, while preparing to make samosas, I got the idea to try kachoris. Below is the recipe I followed. I’m not sure whether it’s authentic, but my girls and the rest of the family liked it a lot.

For Dough:

Maida - 1/2 cup
Wheat Flour - 1/2 cup
Salt to taste
Water - as needed to make the dough

For Filling:

Potato - 2 medium sized
Frozen Peas - 1/4 cup
Green chillies - 1 finely chopped (or acc to taste)
Salt to taste
Kasoori Methi - 3/4 tsp
Coriander Leaves - 1/4 cup (washed and finely chopped)
Oil for frying

Combine all the ingredients mentioned above (except the water) and mix well. Now add water little by little and make soft dough. Knead the dough well for few minutes. Cover it and keep it aside for few minutes until you make the filling.
Mean time, boil the potato in a microwave save bowl until it is cooked. Microwave the peas as well and take it in a wide bowl.
Add salt, green chillies, coriander leaves to the potato mix.
Dry roast kasoori methi and crush it and sprinkle it on top of the potato.
Now mash them well until everything blends together.
Check for salt at this stage.
When you are ready to make the kachori, divide the dough into small portions, roll it into small circle, fill it with required amount of potato filling and close it just like how we do for modak.
Keep it aside for couple of minutes until you repeat the process with rest of the dough.
Take a potato filled ball, flatten it with your palm gently or use the chapathi roller and roll it gently to a small circle.
Pre heat the oil and deep fry them until it is golden brown. Oil should be medium hot.
Serve it hot with ketchup or chutney.

Adding kasoori methi elevated the whole recipe but that is absolutely optional.

Green Apple Instant Pickle

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Wed, 05 Nov 2014 03:18:00 +0000

I made this green apple pickle using super-sour green apples from my backyard. We were literally wasting those apples because none of us likes sour apples. I came across this recipe when a relative visited us and suggested making this pickle.

At first, I tried it with just two small apples since I wasn’t sure whether my family would like it, but surprisingly, they loved it. In fact, my girls even enjoyed taking it to school as a side dish with curd rice. Here’s the recipe.

Ingredients:

Green Apple - 2
Salt to taste
Red chilli powder - 2-3 tsp (acc to taste)
Hing - few generous pinches
Sesame Oil - 2 tbsp
Mustard Seeds- 1 1/2 tsp
Fenugreek/Methi seeds - 1 1/2 tsp

Chop the apple into small pieces.
Sprinkle the required amount of salt, mix it well and keep it aside for an hour.
After an hour, heat the oil, crackle mustard seeds.
Add methi seeds and fry it until golden brown.
Mean time, add the required amount of chilli powder on top of the apple pieces along with few generous pinches of hing.
Pour the hot oil tempering on top of the chilli powder and mix every thing well.
Keep it aside for another half and hour and can be used after that.

Since this is an instant pickle, we can use the mustard seeds and methi seed as tempering. If we are planning to make it in large quantity, it is better to dry roast mustard and methi seeds and grind it and use that ground powder. It will definitely taste better. Above said quantity will last for two days with a family of five :)

Pineapple Muffins - No Guilt Snack

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Sun, 12 Oct 2014 03:42:00 +0000

I call this a no-guilt snack. Why? Because I used a few ingredients that are really good for your health, so you don’t have to feel bad about eating something sweet.

First, I used whole wheat atta instead of all-purpose flour (APF). I used extra-virgin olive oil (EVOO) instead of butter, low-fat yogurt instead of full-fat sour cream, egg whites instead of two whole eggs, and xylitol instead of sugar. You can read about the goodness of this sweetener here.

My husband recently read a book and came across xylitol as a sugar substitute. He told me it’s a lot better than cane sugar and brown sugar, which I usually use for baking. So I thought I’d try something with xylitol, which I bought from the Sprouts store.

I looked through several blogs for recipes and finally found one in my kitchen recipe collection. I adapted it from a book called 1001 Cupcakes, Cookies & Other Tempting Treats, which I bought from Barnes & Noble. Here’s the recipe.

Ingredients:-

Ashirwadh whole wheat flour - 2 cups
Olive Oil - 6 tbsp
Low fat yogurt - 3/4 cup
Pineapple - 1 1/2 cups (finely chopped) - I used fresh pineapple
Pineapple Juice - 2 tbsp (grind few pieces with a tbsp warm water. Filter and take the juice)
Baking powder - 1 tbsp
Salt - 1 pinch
Sugar/Xylitol - 1/2 cup
Egg - 2 ( I used egg whites - follow the instruction in the box for 2 eggs)

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Grease a muffin pan and set it aside (I used a mini muffin pan).

In a bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar, and mix well. In another wide, deep bowl, add the egg whites and beat them lightly. Add the olive oil, yogurt, and pineapple juice, and mix well.

Make a well in the dry ingredients and pour in the egg mixture. Mix gently. Add the chopped pineapple pieces and fold them in. Scoop the batter into the muffin pan.

Bake for 20 minutes, or until the muffins are well-risen, golden brown, and firm to the touch. Let them cool for 5 minutes, then serve warm.

I asked my girls to eat a mini muffin with their breakfast today, and they were so happy that I gave them muffins for breakfast.

Notes:

Original recipe called for:

2 cups APF
2 large eggs
6 tbsp butter
1/2 cup sugar
Pineapple juice from the can.
3/4 cup full fat sour cream.

Plantain podimas - Thanjavur style

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Thu, 09 Oct 2014 00:58:00 +0000

This is another one of my favorite recipes. At my mom’s place, I’ve never seen her make podimas with plantain (vazhakkai). But at my in-laws’ place, they make this plantain podimas. The main ingredients are as follows:
Ingredients:-

Plantain(vaazhakkai) - 2
Oil - 2 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Urid dal - 1/2 tsp
Fresh coconut - 1 tbsp
Green chillies - 2
ginger - a small piece
Lemon juice - 1 tbsp
Salt to taste
Curry leaves - 10 nos
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
Asafoetida powder -

There are two ways to cook vazhakkai. One method is to remove the skin, cut it into small cubes, and pressure-cook it with salt and turmeric powder for up to 2 whistles (do not mash the cubes). The other method is to cut the vazhakkai into two pieces (after trimming the ends) and pressure-cook it with salt for up to 2 whistles. After removing it from the pressure cooker, peel the skin (it will be easier) and mash it. You can choose either method.

Now, take a wide pan and heat the oil. Add the mustard seeds. When they splutter, add the urad dal, green chilies, curry leaves, asafoetida powder, ginger, and turmeric powder (if you chose the second method of cooking). Fry until golden brown. Add the vazhakkai cubes or mashed vazhakkai and mix everything thoroughly.

Turn off the stove and let it cool. After 10 minutes, add the lemon juice and mix well. Sprinkle fresh coconut on top. Vazhakkai podimas is ready to serve. This should be a wonderful side dish for vatha kuzhambu or any kind of kuzhambu.

Eggless Dates & Nuts Cake

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Tue, 07 Oct 2014 04:06:00 +0000

I made this cake after reading the post from Sony's Kitchen. I almost followed the same recipe except I used dark brown sugar instead of granulated white sugar. When we melt the sugar in milk/oil, it will ooze out little bit more water than the regular white sugar. So I had to add more flour to this cake than the original recipe.

Ingredients:

All Purpose Flour - 2 cups + 3 tbsp
Milk 3/4 cup
Brown Sugar - 1/2 cup (I added only 4 tbsp of sugar)
Seedless Dates - 18
Oil - 1/2 cup
Baking Soda - 1 tsp
Walnuts - 2 tbsp (nicely chopped)
Almond shavings - 2 tbsp
salt - 1/4 tsp

Warm couple of teaspoons of milk and soak the dates in it for half an hour. Grind it into a fine paste. In a bowl, take milk and oil and dissolve the sugar in it. Add the dates paste to it once the sugar is dissolved and mix it well and keep it aside. In a wide bowl, add the flour, baking soda and salt and mix nicely. Add the dissolved dates paste to the flour and mix nicely without forming lumps. Add the walnuts. In the mean time, pre heat oven for 350 degrees. Grease the loaf pan and pour the cake batter in it . Sprinkle the almond shavings on top it and bake it for 35 to 40 minutes or until the took pick comes out clean. I used my pyrex glass loaf pan and it took 55 minutes for the cake to cook nicely and raise properly. Taste was so good and the most important fact is it is not too sweet.

Spicy & Salty Potato Crackers

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Mon, 06 Oct 2014 03:30:00 +0000

I made these crackers today for evening snack. As usual got the recipe from Priya's blog. I almost followed the same recipe except included Ashirwadh atta along with APF. Here goes my version of spicy crackers.

Ingredients:

All Purpose flour - 1 cup
Atta / wheat flour - 1 cup
white sesame seeds - 2 tbsp
unsalted butter - 1 tbsp
Baking soda - 1 tsp
Salt - To taste
Hing - few pinches
Red chilli powder - 1 1/2 tsp(acc to taste)
1 Idaho potato - cooked and mashed

Cook the potato and mash it removing the peel. Take the flour, baking soda, white sesame seeds, salt, hing and chilli powder in a bowl. Mix everything well. Add the butter and mix it along with the dry flour. It will become like dry crumbs. Add the mashed potato to it. Mix everything well adding required amount of water and make it a nice dough. Wrap it and keep it aside for half an hour. When you are ready to make, flatten the dough to a huge circle and cut it into small pieces with cookie cutter. Bake it in 325 degrees for 20 minutes or until it becomes crisp. Mine took 25 minutes to get the required amount of crispiness.

Dal Makhani

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Fri, 04 Apr 2014 01:48:00 +0000

I just love this Dal Makhani. Gravy with so nutritious lentils. When we were in Delhi, we had a chance to live in Intercontinental Hotel for more than a month. They have a restaurant inside called Singh Sahib and they make this dal makhani and Dahi wali Bindi so nicely that we literally fell in love with this dish. Even though I like this dish, I have never tried it personally at home. This time I wanted to try this at home and finally I had a chance last week to try this dish and luckily it came out good...
Here goes the recipe.

Ingredients:

Rajma beans - 1/4 cup
Black Urad Dhall - 1/2 cup
Green Moong Dhall - 3 tbsp (optional)
Low fat milk - 1/2 cup
Butter - 1 tbsp
Cumin Seeds - 1/2 tsp
Onion - 1/2 cup ( finely chopped)
Ginger-Garlic Paste - 1 tsp
Chilli Powder - 1 tsp
Coriander Leaves - 2 tsp
Fresh tomato Puree - 1 cup (Grind 2 fresh tomato and make it a puree)
Salt to taste

Soak Rajma, Moong Dhall and Black Urad Dhall over night or 8 hours atleast.
Pressure cook it upto 5 to 7 whistles. When the pressure is released, open it add the low fat milk to it and keep it aside.
Take a pan, preheat butter, splutter cumin seeds. Add finely chopped onion to it and saute it until it becomes golden color.
Add ginger garlic paste to it and saute for couple of minutes.
Now add tomato puree to onion mix along with turmeric powder, chilli powder and let it boil for couple of minutes.
Now add the cooked dhall to it along with required amount of salt and let everything cook in medium flame for atleast 7 minutes.
Add fresh coriander leaves to it and switch off the stove.
Serve it hot with Roti/Chapati/Rice.

Basil Pasta

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Wed, 02 Apr 2014 01:57:00 +0000

I make Pasta for my girls once or twice a week. Every time I try to put different kinds of vegetables. Once with corn, once with broccoli, once with green peas and carrots. This time I made it with peas and corn. But i added basil pasta sauce to add more flavor to it. It came out pretty good and my girls liked it. Here goes the recipe.

Ingredients:

Tri Root Organic Penne Pasta - 2 cup
Salt to taste
Olive Oil - 1 tbsp
Tomato-Basil Pasta Sauce - 1/4 cup
Frozen Peas & Corn - 3/4 cup
Amul Cheese - 4 tbsp
Milk - 2 tbsp

Cook Pasta according to the instructions given in the packet.
Mean time, microwave peas and corn adding couple of teaspoons of water and keep it aside
In a separate sauce pan, boil milk and melt cheese adding it to the boiling milk.
Add cooked pasta when the cheese is fully melt along with cooked vegetables.
Add the pasta sauce to it and mix every thing well. Serve it hot.

I made this as evening snack for my kids. They both had it after coming back from school. Even though I am not a very big fan of pasta, I kinda liked this because of the basil flavor.

"Sending this recipe to 'Cooking with Herbs and Flowers' hosted by Sandhya of My Cooking Journey.

Ginger Garlic Rasam

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Wed, 26 Mar 2014 01:30:00 +0000

Rasam is one of the most comforting food. My MIL is an expert in making so many varieties of Rasam. I learned a few from her and you can check it out a few from here. We make rasam using garlic occasionally. But this is something I tried here recently when my kiddo got sick with stomach upset and she started throwing up suddenly. Because of that her throat became sore. Ginger is good for throat and garlic is good for digestion. Here goes the recipe.

Ingredients:

Tomato - 2 medium sized
Tamarind water - 1 cup
Ginger-Garlic Paste - 1 tbsp
Toor Dhall - 2 tbsp
Salt to taste
Rasam Powder - 1 1/2 tsp
Pepper - cumin powder - 1 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Oil/ghee - 2 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Fenugreek seeds/ Methi seeds - 1/2 tsp
Hing -a pinch
Red chillies - 1 or 2 according to taste.
coriander leaves - for garnishing

Soak toor dhall in water for half an hour.
Chop tomato finely and take 3/4th of the quantity in a mixie jar.
Add ginger garlic paste, rasam powder, pepper-cumin powder, soaked toor dhall to it and grind it as a fine paste.
Take a pan, add the remaining tomato pieces, tamarind water, turmeric powder and salt and bring it to boil.
Add the grounded paste to it and let it boil in medium flame for 7 to 10 minutes until the raw smell goes away.
Add required amount of water to bring it to the required consistency.
Wait until it becomes frothy. Turn off the stove.
In a seasoning pan, preheat ghee/oil, splutter mustard seeds. Add fenugreek and red chillies to it and fry it until golden brown.
Pour it on top of rasam. Garnish it with coriander leaves.

This goes really well with steamed hot rice along with a teaspoon of ghee. Also we can drink it as a soup adding a pinch of pepper powder if needed.

Quinoa-Oats Chocolate Chip Cookie

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Mon, 24 Mar 2014 04:30:00 +0000

This is something I made yesterday. Kids wanted to eat chocolate chip cookie. Instead of making plain chocolate chip cookie, I wanted to try something new. I got this recipe from allrecipes website. When it comes to baking, I rely on this website the most as I have followed their measurements without even considering twice. The original recipe calls for 18 cookies but I changed the measurements for 8 cookies and followed the same. Here goes the recipe.

Ingredients:

Cooked Quinoa- 3 tbsp
Shredded coconut - little more than 1/4 cup (1/4 cup + 3 tbsp)
Oats - little more than 1/4 cup (1/4 cup + 3 tbsp)
All Purpose Flour - Little more than 1/4 cup (1/4 cup + 3 tbsp)
Brown Sugar/White Sugar - 1/3 cup
Ripe banana - 1
Peanut Butter - 4 tbsp
Vanilla Extract - 1/2 tsp
Salt - 1/2 tsp
Baking Soda - 1/2 tsp
Baking Powder - 1/2 tsp
Semi-sweet Chocolate Chips - 1/3 cup

Pre heat Oven to 350 degrees.
Take a wide bottomed bowl. Mix cooked quinoa, coconut, oats, flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, chocolate chips and mix everything well. Keep it aside.
Take the ripe banana, chop it into small pieces. Put it in the mixie jar along with peanut butter and grind it into a smooth paste.
Add the grounded banana paste to the dry mix along with vanilla extract and mix it well.
Grease the baking sheet. Drop the cookie batter by spoonful on the sheet.
Bake upto 20 - 25 minutes until browned around the edges.
Let it cool for sometime and enjoy.

Cookie came out pretty good and luckily my girls liked it so much.
I am sending this cookie recipe to Healthy Diet Event-cooking with whole grains ; an event by Priya Suresh hosted by Nupur. Also to Kids Delight Event ; an event by Srivalli hosted by Gayathri Kumar.

Idly Sandwich

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Sun, 23 Mar 2014 02:18:00 +0000

Idly is considered as one of the healthy breakfast dish. My husband somehow is not a fan of idly. He always complains that it has more carbs and there is no way you can fill it with veggies even though we make some side dish for it. The idea of making idly sandwich is given by my husband. I tried this sandwich with leftover potato curry. My suggestion after making this sandwich is never try with potato curry. I should have tried with some mixed vegetable curry, spinach curry etc.

Here goes the recipe.

Ingredients:

Idly Batter - 1 cup
Potato Curry - 5 teaspoons (can be replaced with any other curry)
Sesame OIl - few drops to lubricate Idly mould

Sprinkle sesame oil on idly moulds
Fill idly mould with 1/2 laddle batter
Let it steam cook for 5 minutes.
Add curry on the half cooked idly.
Pour the rest of the idly batter (1/2 more laddle) to cover the curry and steam cook it for 7 to 10 minutes.

Nutella Filled Puffs

noreply@blogger.com (Vidhya) — Fri, 21 Mar 2014 02:21:00 +0000

I always wanted to try making veggie puffs. Not sure whether i can do it or not. Finally i managed to find the puff pastry sheets from my local grocery and tried this nutella filled puffs couple of days before. For those who wants to know how to use the frozen pastry sheets, please follow this video.

I followed the video to get the single pastry sheet and filled a teaspoon of Nutella spread in it. Cover the pastry sheet coating egg wash on the sides and on the top. Bake it at 325 degrees for 20 minutes till it becomes golden brown. We can replace the nutella spread to any of our favorite filling like veggies or just butter.

I am sending this to Kid's Delight Event by Srivalli. Gayathri Kumar is hosting this event this month here.