In the search of eating some different vegetables than the usual routine we get every week we got bottle gourd.. Which turned out to be too huge for both of us to finish, so we had variety of items out of it.. This one is one of the fastest bfast out of it..


Ingredients
1 cup grated dudhi(Bottle gourd)
1 cup rice powder
1/2 cup bason
1 spoon jeera
2 spoon saunf
1/2 spoon methi
2-3 green chillies
1 cup milk
1/2 cup water
Salt to taste

Method

• Crush jeera, saunfm methi to get powder
• Mix it with rice powder, bason, and grated dudhi(Bottle gourd)
• Add finely chopped chillies, salt, milk and water
• Heat tawa (preferably non stick tawa) and pour this prepared batter on it and spread it quickly

Notes
These dosas are little thicker than normal dosas and taste best when served with pickle

I had taken a short break (couple of weeks) as i wasn't feeling that enthusiasm to cook inside myself. After a Pune trip i did feel like cooking again :) And this was the break fast item i tried.. I had tried egg pattice earlier also but it had been really oily and had caused throat problem for both of us.. so i was little bit worried when i attempted it again but it really turned out well and so far no throat problems :D


Ingredients
1/2 cup Maida
1/2 cup wheat flour
2 eggs
1 onion finely chopped
1/2 spoon red chilli powder
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Make dough out of maida, wheat flour and salt to taste and keep aside for 10 to 15 minutes
• Beat eggs and mix finely chopped onion, red chilli powder and salt
• Make small balls out of dough and roll small fulka type rotis
• Preapre sticking mixture by mixing little maida and water
• On each roti, add around a spoon for 2 full of mixture of egg and quickly close all four sides of the roti by folding and sticking the sides of the roti
• Fry on low heat on a pan

Notes
Ajoy suggested of having cut green chillies instead of red chilli powder for that extra punch, but since yesterday i had already cooked khichadi with too much of chilli i wanted to avoid it. But i guess it would taste better (i remember i had made it with green chillies earlier.
Earlier i had prepared the pattice by deep frying them in the pan but it had turned out too oily, especially because the egg mixture comes out from pattice and soaks too much of oil. So this time i tried it on tawa and it turned out less oily but then less crispier as well. I would like to try cooking it for some time on tawa till internal mixture is well set and then deep frying it in pan for crispier pattice.
I would also want to try to use grated boiled eggs mixted with chillies, salt, corriander leaves instead of egg mixture, but that would be completely different taste i suppose so might turn out to be some different recipe

Mom dad arrived yesterday and I wanted to cook something different.. And i also wanted to finish off all the green vegies i had so came up with this vada.. It tasted pretty well..


Ingredients
2 cup palak(spinach) leaves
1 cup methi leaves
1/2 cup corriander leaves
3 cup bason
3 spoon rice powder
1 green chilli
1 spoon red chilli powder
1/2 spoon jeera powder
1/2 spoon corriander powder
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Chop all the green vegies - palak, methi and corriander finely
• Mix them well and add finely chopped green chillies
• Add bason, rice powder, red chilli powder, jeera powder, corriander powder, salt and mix well
• Add little water and form thick vada dough
• heat oil in a pan
• Add 2 spoon of heated oil to the vada batter and mix well
• Make small flat vadas out of this dough and fry them in oil on medium heat

Notes
Add salt to the chopped vegies and keep aside for some time that way there will be some water because of salt that can be accomodated while making dough itself otherwise batter might become sticky and loose after some time.
Make vadas flat so that they are crispy and fried inside out

After many days i decided to cook something different.. And then this came to my mind.. I read the recipe in one of the cook book i have and tried it and it really turned up well...


Ingredients
1 cup mung daal
2 cup maida
2 spoon rava
2 tea spoons red chilli powder
1 spoon amchur(dry mango) powder
1 spoon garam masala
1 spoon saunf
1 spoon mustard
1 spoon jeera
Salt to taste
sugar to taste
Oil

Method

• Soak mung daal in water overnight
• In the morning grind mung daal without water in the mixie to form a coarse mixture
• Heat a 4-5 spoons of the oil and sputter mustard and jeera
• Add mung daal to it and cook with cover
• Once the mixture is little dry, add red chilli powder, masala, amchur powder, saunf, sugar and salt and stir well
• Cook for some more time till mixture is completely dry
• In a plate mix maida, rava and salt and add 1/2 cup of heated oil to it
• Mix little water and prepare loose dough
• Prepare lemon sized balls out of this dough
• Press the ball with thumb and finger to form a cup shape
• Add a spoon full of above cooked mung daal mixture to it and close the ball to form bigger ball
• Press the ball with both hand to form thick plate kind of shape
• Fry in oil on low-medium heat

Notes
Mung daal mixture should be coarse and not too watery so remove as much water as possible from mung daal before grinding it

I always relished the pudina chutney served with tandoori chicken or kababs. This is my try and it turned out quite well..


Ingredients
1 cup punina leaves
2 spoon corriander leaves
2 cup curd
salt to taste

Method

• Grind the pundina leaves and corriander leaves in mixer
• It will form watery paste, filter to get the pudina water
• In a pot mix curd and salt
• Now mix the pudina water spoon full at a time till completely mixed

Notes
Use thickest possible curd as we are anyway adding pudina water so it will be little thinner anyways

This item is a quick and delicious recipe.. Mom use to cook tomato omlette and i modified it little to get this new one :)


Ingredients
4 Tomatoes
1 cup sweet corn
1 cup bason
1 spoonful Rice powder
1/2 tea spoon Garlic paste
4 green chillies
1 spoon jeera
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Mix bason, rice powder and salt and keep aside
• Crush the jeera slightly and add it to the above mixture
• In a mixer add tomatoes, half cup corn, chillies and garlic paste and grind them to form puree
• Add the puree to the mixture and mix well to form the uniform batter. Use little water if required
• Add remaining corn to it and mix
• Heat the tawa and take spread the mixture on it to form omelette
• Cook it till the side on tawa is crispy, and cook on the other side till it turns brown
• Serve with chutney or sauce

Notes
you can optionally add 1-2 spoons of corriander leaves in the tomato while crushing, but i served it with chutney which has corriander so i avoided it. But while serving with tomato ketchup it would taste good

I just love paneer and with paneer its even more delicious.. I have quite a few recipes of paneer (for curries) but this one is my fav...


Ingredients
200g Paneer
1 cup muttor
4 tomatoes
2 onions
1/2 spoon garlic paste
1/4 spoon ginger paste
1/2 spoon turmeric powder
1.5 spoon red chilli powder
1.5 spoon jeera powder
1 spoon corriander powder
1/2 spoon garam masala
Corriander leaves to garnish
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Deep fry cubed paneer on medium flame
• Fry finely chopped onions till golden brown and keep aside for cooling
• Cook the muttor on steam and keep aside
• In a mixer grind tomatoes, fried onions
• Heat little oil in a pan and add this grinded mixture to it
• Add turmeric powder, red chilli powder, jeera powder, corriander powder, garam masala, garlic and ginger paste and mix well
• Let the mixture cook well (atleast for 5 min), add water if required
• Add paneer cubes, muttor and salt to it and again cook well
• Garnish with finely chopped corriander

Notes
For making paneer pieces soft, add the fried paneer pieces to boiled water and let the pieces settle down the bottom

Two days back when I had brownie in office i deciced that this is the item that i want to try at home.. Then i searched a lot on net for perfect (or so it sounded to me) and then combined all my results and made up mine one.. Here it is..


Ingredients
80 gm Dark Chocolate bar
40 gm Milk Chocolate bar
1 cup butter
2 eggs
1.5 cups maida
3 spoon coca powder
1/2 cup castor sugar
1 spoon baking powder
Salt to taste

Method

• Put a pot with little water on heat
• Put another pot in it such that it does not touch the bottom of the pot with water.
• Add butter, dark chocolate bar and half of milk chocolate bar to the pot
• Let the butter and chocolate melt compeltely and then mix them well to form chocolate syrup. Keep aside to cool down a bit
• Beat eggs in a pot and mix the castor sugar in it. Mix well
• Add prepared chocolate syrup to this mixture and again mix well
• Sieve maida, baking powder and coca powder together around 8-10 times to form properly mixed flour
• Add this flour to the mixture prepared earlier spoon by spoon with stirring and mixing it well
• Cut remaining milk chocolate pieces into small pieces and add them to the mixture
• Preheat the oven at 180C
• Grease the baking tray with butter and put a butter paper
• Add the mixture to this baking tray and level out the surface
• Bake for around 30-35 minutes in oven (convection mode) at 180C
• While serving reheat the brownie in microwave and serve with ice-cream and chocolate sauce if you like

Notes
Maida and coca mixing together took longer time.. i had to sieve it 10 times to get the properly mixed flour.
You can add walnut pieces to the same mixture and get walnut brownie

Bread roll is one of the simplest and yet tasties item one can have in snacks.. And yesterday when piyush visited us I thought this would be the best breakfast recipe i can serve with no preparation from my side at all... Here is how i prepared it...


Ingredients
2 Potatoes
6 slices of bread
1 spoon jeera powder
1 spoon red chilli powder
1 spoon corriander powder
2 spoon Amchur Powder(Dry Mango)
Salt to taste
Oil to fry

Method

• Cook potatoes in cooker or boil them till they are soft
• Mash the potatoes and add jeera powder, red chilli powder, corriander powder, amchur powder and salt and mix well
• Take slice of the bread and remove its thick edges using knife
• In a pot fill in drinking water and put the bread slice on top of the water for few moments
• Press the bread slice with both the palms and remove the water
• Put a cylindrical ball of the potato mixture prepared earlier in the middle of the slice and close the bread slice to cover the mixture fully
• Deep fry the rolls on medium heat and serve hot with tomato ketchup

Notes
You can try other fillings too.. I would be trying using lemon instead of amchur powder.

Today when Ajoy returned back, i wanted to cook something with kothimbir considering he loves kothimbir and here i cooked a mom's recipe.. It tastes awesome and very very easy to prepare.. It goes well in starters and can be a hit item in the parties...


Ingredients
2 cup corriander leaves
1/2 cup Besan
1/4 cup rice powder
1 spoon red chilli powder
Oil
Salt to taste

Method

• Wash and chop the corriander leaves very fine
• Mix besan, rice powder, chilli powder, salt and a spoon of oil with these finely chopped corriander leaves.
• Add little water if required and form a cylindrical ball with this mixture
• Grease it a little bit and cook it on vapour in pressure cooker for 15 - 20 min till the knife comes out of this ball without mixture sticked to it
• Let the ball cool down and then cut it into thin pieces
• Deep fry the tikkis and serve with sauce

Notes
If by any chance you happen to add little extra water add more besan so that it forms tight ball
Add salt with care as this mixture tends to get salty even with little salt

This recipe is something very easy to cook and i had been cooking this very often lately.. mainly because it is delicious, it has lots of milk and carrot which is good for health and plus very easy to cook.. esp in microwave.. Even for stove recipes i tried diffierent methods and here is the one that tastes most delicious...


Ingredients
5 cup grated carrots
4 cup milk
1 cup sugar
5 spoon dry fruits
4 spoon ghee

Method

• Heat a pan and add 1 spoon of ghee
• Add the grated carrots and let them fry a little for couple of minutes on lowest possible flame
• Add a cup of milk to this and let the carrots cook on medium flame with constant stirring
• Once the mixture starts drying out add another cup and keep on cooking, follow this till complete milk is added and carrots cook well
• Once mixture dries out, add the sugar and again keep on stiring and let the mixture mix well and dry well
• Add 3 spoons of ghee from side and fry the halwa on it
• In another pan add remaining ghee and fry the dry fruits well and then add them to the halwa

Notes
Frying halwa on the ghee at end makes it nice and delicious.
Adding frying fruits add to the taste.
You can optionally add everest milk masala into the halwa for better taste

This is very famous item from konkani cuisine and it tastes awesome.. And above all its very digestive and also helps a lot in acidity.. You can drink it like it or can eat it with rice.. in all combinations it tastes awesome :) So here is the recipe


Ingredients
8 kokams
1 coconut
1-2 cloves of garlic
salt to taste
corriander for garnishing

Method

• Soak the kokams in 1/4 cup of water
• Preapare milk from coconut, while preparing it add garlic cloves as well so that only its falvour is in coconut milk and not the pieces
• Add this coconut milk to the soaked kokam water
• Add salt to taste and garnish with the corriander

Notes
If you do not like garlic taste you can prepare coconut milk without garlics, but garlic gives it nice taste
You get very good kokams in goa, they are red and sour which give nice red colour to the kadhi
You need to customize number of kokams according to their sourness. I have very old kokams so i need to add them in little extra quantity and even then it doesnot give the colour to the curry though it tastes good. you might need 1-2 kokams less if your kokams are red, sour and new.

I was not sure how this will turn out when i decided to try this out.. Its kind of own recipe when i wanted to prepare something totally different with paneer. I had seen stuffed tomatoes in a cooker adv when i was kid and since then i had that facination towards stuffed tomato.. Though i never told mom.. so this is first time i was trying stuffed tomato and i wanted something very different as stuffing.. something without potato :D So here is the recipe...


Ingredients
4 mid sized tomatoes
1 small onion
1.5 cup grated paneer
handful of corriander leaves
1 tea spoon jeera
1/4 spoon black pepper
2 spoon butter
salt to taste

Method

• Cut the small round portion from the tomatoes head and save them
• Take out the inner portion of the tomato and store it in a cup
• Heat pan and add butter to it
• Fry finely hopped onion on it till its done
• Add tomatoes inner portion that we stored earlier
• Once the mixture is dry take it out in a dish
• Add the grated paneer, finely chopped corriander leaves, jeera, black pepper, salt to taste
• Now add this mixture to the hollow tomatoes and cover them with their head that are stored
• Grease the tomatoes a little and bake them or cook on vapour in a cooker

Notes
You might want to add mushroom to this while we fry onions to get a different taste
Baked tomatoes taste nice but the ones in cooker give it nice colour as well as taste

Today i wanted to cook something spicy and yet had to finish off carrot and beet that i had stocked in fridge for quite a few days.. So i decided to experiment and it turned out really nice and healthy recipe.


Ingredients
2 Beet Roots
6 Carrots
2 Bread Slices
1 onion finely chopped
1 spoon Red Chilli Powder
1 spoon Garam masala
1/2 spoon Jeera Powder
1/2 spoon Corriander powder
1 spoon garlic-ginger paste
Bread crums/Fine rava
Oil
Salt

Method

• Grate Beet roots and carrot
• Heat oil in a pan and add finely chopped onion to it
• After a while add garlic-ginger paste, corriander powder, jeera powder, garam masala, red chilli powder
• After heating for a while add grated carrot and beet root
• Cook the mixture well with lid
• Once mixture is well cooked add crushed bread slices and salt to it and take off from the stove
• After mixture cools down prepare the patty of shape you like.
• Roll it in bread crums/fine rava
• Shallow fry the cutlets on the tawa with little oil

Notes
You can optionally add cooked potato/beans to the mixture

Today I decided to try puran poli as well.. Puran poli came up well except its sides which didn't have any puran but i guess with 2-3 more trials i might be able to prepare the puran poli as nice as my mom does.. But anyways with the remaining puran i made these fried modaks which my dad loves..


Ingredients
1 cup chana daal
1/2 cup jaggery
4 spoon heaps wheat flour
2 spoon heaps maida
Salt
Oil

Method

• Cook daal in the cooker and remove the water from it
• Heat a pan and add the cooked daal and jaggery.
• Cook it for around 5-7 minutes to form puran - our filling for the modak
• Make dough by mixing wheat flour, maida, 1 spoon of hot oil and water
• Keep aside for half an hour to hour
• Make small balls of the dough and roll them to form thin rotis of puri size
• Add the puran we had prepared earlier and close the modaks by making few plates at the top
• Deep fry the modak on medium heat

Notes
These modaks are prepared of puran so that they can stay for 2-3 days.
Fry the modak at top side really well otherwise the cover might remain half cooked as its kind of thick because of plates

It was Ganesh Jayanti Last week and I had decided to cook modaks that day.. But it happened that i changed my mind and went to pune to surprise in-laws and parents.. So decided let me try my hand on this today.


Ingredients
1 cup grated coconut
3/4 cup jaggery
1.5 cup water
1 cup rice powder
Salt
Oil

Method

• Heat pan and add grated coconut and jaggery
• After around 5-7 minutes the jaggery would dessolve into the cocunut and form our filling for the modak.
• Heat water in the pot
• Once water is almost boiling add little oil and salt to it
• After water boils completely add rice powder and mix well
• Take out the mixture from the stove and mix it well to form uniform dough
• Make small balls of this dough and flatten them
• Add the mixture and pack the ball giving it little plates at top to form modak shape
• To cook modak keep a vessel with water on the stove, on top of it put the vessel which has holes grease it and put the modaks on it
• Cook the modaks by covering them with small cloth or a plate for about 7-10 minutes

Notes
Its a coconut item and doesn't stay good for long, so consume these in a day

This time when I got fresh cauliflower in Fresh i decided to try out this recipe.. It turned out really nice and different flavour..


Ingredients
6 spoon heaps wheat flour
1 Cauliflower
1 small onion
1 spoon jeera
1 spoon red chilli powder
1/4 spoon turmeric powder
1 spoon amchur powder
Oil/Ghee
Salt

Method

• Make dough just like we prepare normal rotis
• Grate the cauliflower and onion
• Mix it with salt and keep it aside for 10-15 min
• Mixture would be watery, separate water from the mixture
• Mix jeera, red chilli powder, turmeric powder, amchur powder to form the filling
• Make round balls of dough and press and form cup kind of shape
• Add filling to the cups and close them to form ball
• Roll parathas out of it
• Fry on low flame on tawa with abdundant ghee/oil

Notes
If the flower is not fresh you might want to cook the filling in a pan on heat, but fresh flower gets cooked well if paratha is fried on low flame.
You might want to add one cooked and grated potato to the mixture to get alu gobi paratha.
I fried paratha on one side with oil and one side with ghee, that gives nice aroma and taste

I have very selective liking for laadus.. And this one is one of them :) And when I asked mom for recipe it turned out that this one is simplest to prepare :)


Ingredients
3 cup groundnut
1/2 cup jaggery

Method

• Bake groundnuts in a pan
• Remove groundnut cover
• Grind the groundnuts in mixer
• Mix groundnut powder and finely chopped jaggery
• Grind this mixture once again in the mixer
• Prepare small lemmon sized round balls - laadus out of this mixture

Notes
Somehow removing cover of groundnut does not suite me :) so I used groundnut with cover and still it tasted same :)

Nutty Rice was what I had on one of my bday in Taj, Bangalore. It tasted awesome and both myself and ajoy just loved it. When I was eating it I decided that I am surely going to try and make this. And guess what first attempt itself was upto the taste. Its very easy and tempting recipe one can impress guests with.


Ingredients
2 cups of cooked rice
4 spoon cooked corn
2 spoon groundnuts
2 spoon cashews
4 green chillies
1 spoon raisins
1/2 spoon jeera
2 spoon ghee
Salt to taste

Method

• Heat ghee in a pan
• Add jeera and let it sputter
• Add cashews, groundnuts and raisins
• Once nuts turn light brown add chillies
• Wait for nuts to turn dark brown and then add cooked rice, corn and salt
• Mix it well and cook for 3-5 minutes

Notes
You can use 4-5 curry leaves as well if you like.
Using long grain rice like basamati gives nice aroma to the dish

This is the recipe that I am using from the book that I got as a gift during my wedding.. The book is called 'हमाखास पाकसिद्धी' (Sure shot cooking).


Ingredients
5 spoon heaps of maida
1 egg
3 carrots
1 cabbage
2 onions
1 spoon Soya sause
1/2 spoon pepper
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Mix maida, egg, salt and enough water to form thin batter
• On a nonstick pan make thin small dosas
• Store all these dosas one above another by applying little corn flour in between them so that they don't stick to each other
• Cut carrots, onions, cabbage to form long thin pieces
• Heat little oil in pan and add cut carrots, cabbage and onion
• Half cook it on high flame mixing them well from time to time
• Add soya sauce, black pepper powder and salt to taste
• Mix 1/2 spoon maida and little water to form the paste which we are going to use for packing rolls
• On each dosa prepared earlier, put vegetable in the middle, fold both the ends and make roll of it and close them with sticking paste that we prepared.
• Fry these rolls on medium flame

Notes
Preparing thin dosas is important to get thin and crispy coating for spring rolls
Also its good to prepare small small dosas so that while serving you need not cut the rolls and which saves from risk of mixture being coming out of the roll

Whenever i use to go to restaurant this was the one recipe that i loved.. I always thought of trying this at home but was under impression that cooking kabab needs some special machinary or something like that.. Then i have problem making ajoy eat palak :) so i had to try this recipe on tawa :) it turned out really nice and ajoy mentioned that i should be cooking this instead of palak vegetable :) Here is the recipe...


Ingredients
3 medium sized potatoes
3 cup peas
2 palak gaddi
1 cup corriander leaves
1/2 gaddi pudina leaves
1 medium sized onion
4 green chillies
3 lemons
2 spoons corn flour
2 bread slices
3 spoon butter
Cashews
Salt to taste
oil

Method

• Boil 2-3 cups of water in a pot
• Add cleaned palak leaves in it and boil for a while and then drain the water and keep aside
• Grind the onion in the mixer to form the paste
• Heat the pan and add the butter to it
• Add onion paste and cook till it turns light brown
• Mean while grind the palak leaves in the mixer and then add to the onion paste that has turned light brown
• Cook for a while till mixture is well cooked and vert little watery
• Keep aside for cooling
• Steam potatoes and peas in a cooker
• Grind the corriander leaves, pudina leaves, chillies in a mixer to form the paste
• Mix this with the cooled down palak-onion mixture
• Grate the potatoes and add them to the mixture
• Half crush the peas and add them to mixture
• Add lemon juice, corn flour, small pieces of bread slices and salt to it
• Mix well to form the paste
• Form the lemon sized balls, flatten it a bit and stic the cashew piece to it
• Shallow fry on the tawa
• Serve with pudina chutney

Notes
You can sprinkle little chaat masala on the fried kababs, i haven't tried this as yet as i didn't have chaat masala at home but i guess it might taste good.

This is another saabudana item thats favourite among everybody... In fact there are quite a few children who love to fast because they get to eat all such yummy items :) (including me :D)


Ingredients
1 cup saabudana
1/2 cup groundnut powder
3-4 green chillies
1/2 spoon jeera
4 spoon corriander leaves
2 medium sized potatoes
1/2 spoon sugar
Salt to taste
Oil/ghee/butter

Method

• Soak Saabudana in 1/4 cup water for at least 2-3 hours
• Boil potato till its completely cooked and can be mashed
• Add jeera powder, salt, sugar, groundnut powder, finely chopped chillies and corriander leaves to saabudana and mix well
• Add mashed potato to this mixture and form the sticky dough of this mixture
• Take the round ball of this dough and make thalipith out of it.
  (For those who don't know how thalipith is done on - apply little oil, ghee or butter to the tawa and press the ball on the tawa to form the round chapati like item sticking to the tawa - little movable because of oil)
• Cook on low-medium flame with lid on the tawa for one side cooking
• When its brown from the side thats sticking to the tawa flip the thalipith and cook it on the other side without lid
• Cut the thalipith in quarters and serve with curd chutney/curd/butter

Notes
You can use red chilli powder instead of green chillies if you don't have them in stock. It tastes little different and is another variant.
Also as discussed earlier in Sabudana Wada recipe, soaking sabudana in correct amount of water is also important to get soft khichadi
I used half spoon corriander powder this time because i didn't get fresh corriander but offcourse it tastes and looks nicer with corriander leaves

These days its so hard to get big brinjals in hyderabad.. so this time when i went to pune i got couple of them from pune, for my fav recipe - kaap. I have already posted the bengali style of this here. But today i prepared it our style - saraswat style.. The main difference is with bengali style the bhaja melts in mouth as its completely fried and soft, but in our style its crispier outside and soft inside.. I love Brinjal kaap the most in all other kaaps :)


Ingredients
1 Big Brinjal
Red Chilli Powder
Turmeric Powder
Salt to taste
Rava
Oil

Method

• Cut Brinjal into round medium thick pieces
• Marrinate with these pieces with salt and keep aside for 5-10 min
• Marrinate with turmeric and red chilli powder
• Heat the tawa and put little oil
• Take rava in dish and keep each piece of marrinated brinjal in it to cover it with rava on both sides
• Shallow fry it this covered pieces on low-medium heat till it turns brown

Notes
Fry on low-medium flame so that brinjal is well cooked and outer rawa coating is crispy
For better results use fine rawa. Sadly i didn't find fine(barik) rawa here so used bombay rawa that one gets in big bazzar
Also same recipe can be used to prepare banana(raw), potato kaaps

I had been trying to bake cake since I bought microwave.. But it wasn't successful attempt.. Infact couple of times it turned out as hard as cookies and poor ajoy had to suffer.. Now today that my mom and dad were coming I thought I might experiment cake on them.. :) But this time it came out well and I was surprised because ingredients used were same. Later when I was talking to Mom I came to know the reason. Here is how I prepared it


Ingredients
1 cup maida
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup oil
20 Dates seeds removed
1 spoon baking powder
Nuts to garnish

Method

• Grind milk, dates and sugar well to form the paste
• Mix oil to the above paste
• Sieve together maida and baking powder atleast 2-3 times
• Mix sieved maida and baking powder spoon full at a time with the paste formed.
• Grease the microwave safe pan with oil and put in butter paper at bottom
• Add the above formed mixture to the pan
• Garnish it with nuts
• Preheat microwave to 200C
• Bake the cake by keeping pan on the lower rack and in Microwave convection mode - 200C, 180W, 20min

Notes
Sieving maida and baking powder together is must, infact I didn't know this earlier and thats the reason cake turned out to be cookie
You might want to keep dates and milk mixed together say overnight so that its easy to grind it. (I am always impatient so I just grind it and its sometimes very difficult)
I have samsung 108STF model of microwave. Cooking temperature and power depends on the microwave. You might need to experiment on that little to get the perfect result for you

Gobi Manchurian, one of the best indianised chinese dish.. I tried to prepare this today and it turned out quite well. I didn't have chinese vegetables hotel guys use and I don't even know where can I get them, so I made gobi manchurian completely indianised. And here is the recipe


Ingredients
1 medium sized Gobi
5 spoon corn floor
4 spoon maida
2 spoon red chilli powder
3 spoon Garlic-ginger paste
3 spoon tomato ketchup
1 beans
2 finely chopped green chillies
2 spoon hot and sweet tomato ketchup
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Chop the gobis to make eatable sized pieces
• Mix 4 spoon corn floor, maida, red chilli powder, 2 spoon garlic ginger paste and salt with water to form thick batter
• Heat oil on high flame
• Add gobi pieces to the batter so that the batter covers it from all sides
• Deep fry the pieces on medium flame till they are golden brown
• Heat Oil on low flame
• Add remaining garlic ginger paste and let it sputter
• Add in chopped onion, green chillies and let them cook
• Once onions are cooked and start turning little brown add in both ketchups
• Mix remaining corn floor with water and add it to the manchurian
• Garnish with finely chopped beans and green chillies

Notes
You can optionally use soya souce also but I didn't have that either
If you want to prepare this as gravy, add more corn floor with water to the gravy while mixing ketchups

Sabudana Khichadi is something very very tasty and typical maharashtrian dish.. I cook it very often and many times take it even for lunch because I just love it :) So here is how I prepare it.


Ingredients
1 cup sabudana
1 cup groundnut powder
1 tea spoon sugar
3-4 green chillies
3-4 spoons corriander leaves
1 spoon jeera
5 spoons grated coconut (optional)
Salt to taste
ghee

Method

• Soak Sabudana atleast for 3-4 hours with 1/4 cup of water
• Mix soaked sobudana, groundnut powder, sugar, salt, finely chopped green chillies and corriander leaves (finely chopped)
• Heat ghee in a pan
• Add jeera and let it sputter
• Add the sabudana mixed with other ingredients
• Cook by putting a lid on the pan, stirring the khichadi often and on low flame
• After around 5 min of cooking khichadi would be ready
• Garnish it with grated fresh coconut

Notes
Cooking on low flame is must, otherwise khichadi won't be soft.
Use thickes possible pan to prepare khichadi, or you can also try putting pan on tava, Since I have thick kadhai I don't use tava
Also as discussed earlier in Sabudana Wada recipe, soaking sabudana in correct amount of water is also important to get soft khichadi

Again this recipe is inspiration from bangalore. We use to go to restaurant called Treat on 80 feet road . The restaurant serves amazing food. I love the cucumber raita they make and when I tasted it I decided to make this at home. I was able to get the taste similar to their's. Raita goes with almost everything, its so easy to prepare and its so tasty that I sometimes like to eat it like a sweet dish - kheer after dinner :)


Ingredients
1 cup thick curd
1 cucumber
1/2 spoon jeera powder
Salt to taste

Method

• Grate the cucumber
• Add salt and jeera powder
• Mix with curd

Notes
Using thick curd is important as I do not throw the water that gets generated by cucumber after mixing it with salt. So If you do not have thick curd make sure you remove the water.

When I was in bangalore I started my cooking experiments with ready made masalas (not ready to eats :D). Now I have started using my own masalas (to be precised my mom made :D) for almost everything. But there is this one recipe which I still prefer and love with MTR Pulav masala.. It tastes awesome :) Over a period, I have made some changes compared to what the pack mentions it and here it is.


Ingredients
6 Cups of cooked rice
1 finely chopped onion
2 spoons of MTR Pulav Masala
1 spoon garlic-ginger paste
1/4 cup boiled muttor
4-5 spoons ground nuts
4-5 cashews
4 spoons ghee
Salt to taste

Method

• Keep 3 spoons of ghee in a pan for heating
• Add onion and groundnuts
• When groundnuts are half done add in cashews and garlic ginger paste
• When cashews turn brown add in pulav masala and let it cook for 1 min
• Add cooked rice and muttor and mix well
• Put in remaining 1 spoon of ghee on the pulav and place lid on the pan and let it cook on low flame for 2 min.
• Add salt, mix pulav well and again let it cook for 2-3 min

Notes
Add cashews later than groundnuts so that they don't burn as cashews turn brown faster than groundnuts.
Using Basamati rice gives nice aroma and taste to the Pulav

Ajoy has left for US today for couple of months.. So the main person to taste and certify my recipes isn't here.. Apart from that Ma and baba (in laws) are also here.. So not cooking anything :) Just enjoying food by ma :)

Result is experiments are stalled for some time.. So I might not be able to contribute much here but will try and posting stuff atleast once in 2 weeks :)

Mom use to cook muttor samosa quite often and that was, is and will always be one of the best snacks item by her :) Everytime she prepared it my help/contribution :D increased and so was my commision :D This time when Ma Baba were visiting us I decided to impress them by this recipe :) [Samosa making sound bit tedius for the first time but after couple of attempts its actually very easy and interesting item to serve guests]

Muttor Bhaji


Ingredients
3 cups of Muttor
1 potato chopped
1 spoon Mustard
1 onion finely chopped
1 tea spoon garlic paste
1 tea spoon ginger paste
3-4 green chillies
1 spoon jeera powder
1 spoon corriander powder
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Heat oil in a pan and let Mustard sputter in it
• Add chopped onion, garlic paste, ginger paste and chillies(finely chopped)
• Add jeera powder and corriander powder to the mixture after onions are light brown
• Add potatoes and muttor and cook by adding water
• When vegetable is cooked well, add salt and heat till vegetable is completely dry

Notes
You can keep it little wattery if you are not going to use this bhaaji (vegetable) for samosa. But samosa needs dry vegetable.
You can also add little groundnut powder to the vegetable

Samosa


Ingredients
5 spoon heaps of Maida
2 cups of muttor bhaji
Oil

Method

• Mix maida(4 spoons only) with little oil and Cold Water to make dough.
• Mix rest of the maida in a cup with water to make a paste
• Take small portion of the dough and roll it to make thin roti
• Heat the roti from both sides on tawa (low flame) till its half done
• Cut the roti into half
• Take this hald roti at a time and fold the straight edge to form a cone.
• Use maida paste to seal the side on the cone.
• Fill in the muttor bhaji in the cone
• Seal the round edge with maida paste
• Fry in oil on medium flame till its brown

Notes
While making cone, the folds should be such that if it is pressed flat it would be 1/3rd the size of half roti.
Also while sealing the round sides, seal it such away that the fold edge is on right or left side of the samosa

This one is my mom's recipe.. It turns out amazing and kind of easy to cook compared to the way it tastes.. I don't remember exact recipe that my mom uses because when I had got it from her i didn't note it down and by the time I cooked it I had forgotten except some basic stuff.. So its not going to taste like the one mom makes but offcourse today I got it Best till date and decided to post it here :)


Ingredients
2 potatoes
1 cup corn
1 spoon jeera powder
1 spoon red chilli powder
1 tea spoon corriander powder
1 tea spoon garlic paste
1-2 spoon corn flour
Salt to taste
Rava for coating the pattice
Oil

Method

• Cook potatoes, in pressure cooker, well enough to form paste after removing cover
• Cook corn in the pressure cooker
• Mix mashed potatoes, chilli powder, jeera powder, garlic paste, salt well
• Add cooked corn to the mixture
• Add corn flour to the mixture so that it becomes sticky and dense
• Take lemon sized mixture at a time and make it little flat to give it a pattice shape
• Heat the frying pan/tava well adding little oil
• Roll in the prepared pattice in the rava so that its fully covered with rava coating
• Shallow fry it from both sides on tava/pan on medium heat till the coating becomes thick and brown on both side
• Serve hot with tomato ketchup

Notes
Corn flour gives denseness to the pattice without it pattice might kind of dissolve in the oil while frying and loose its shape. Normally 1-2 spoons of corn flour is good enough but if mixture still seems to be loose add in some more to make it dense.
Muttor Pattice can be prepared same way replacing corn by muttor

This one is my own creation :) I just love raw mango with red chilli powder and salt.. Also I like corn chat with chilli powder, salt and lemon juice.. So I decided to try out this one.. And it was yummyyy :)


Ingredients
3-4 cup fresh or frozen corn
1 raw mango
1 spoon butter
Red chilli powder to taste
Salt to taste
2 spoon corriander leaves (optional)

Method

• Cook corn in pressure cooker
• Grate the raw mango
• In a pan put butter and let it melt
• Add cooked corn and raw mango
• Also add salt and chilli powder
• Keep it on stove till its warm. and seems properly mixed.
• Decorate with finely chopped corriander leaves

Notes
It tastes better if its hot - spicy.. So use chilli powder without kanjusi :)

Last sunday when I prepared cutlet I decided to try out pudina chutney.. I asked ajoy if he can get pudina.. And when I just needed around 3-4 spoons of pudina he came back home with 3 gaddis :) So we had kind of pudina festival at home. The best dish out of it was pudina paratha..


Ingredients
4 spoon chopped Pudina
1 spoon chopped corriander leaves
5 spoon heaps wheat flour
1 and 1/2 spoon besan
1 tea spoon red chilli powder
1/2 tea spoon Jeera powder
1/2 tea spoon corriander powder
Salt
Oil/Ghee

Method

• Mix all ingredients except oil.
• Add 2 spoon of oil
• Make dough of this mixture using water.
• Keep aside for 30 min
• Roll parathas with 3 folds..
• Cook on hot tava and serve with butter, pickle and curd

Notes
With corriander leaves parathas become more tasty but if you like pudina a lot then you can skip corriander leaves.
I cook parathas with oil and put little ghee when its half done. That way taste of ghee mixes with partha and it tastes better.

This is one bengali recipe I learned while I was surfing.. I tuned it to my taste.. Dim in bengali means Egg.. Dhoka is Dhokala :) so its gravy of Egg Dhokala :) Egg Dhokala without putting in gravy is also very tasty and nice breakfast or snacks item.. When I prepare gravy its very hard to resist eating these dhokas and save them for gravy :)

Dhoka


Ingredients
6 eggs
1 small finely chopped onion
1/4 cup finely chopped corriander leaves
3-4 finely chopped green chillies
1 spoon ginger paste
3 spoon milk
Salt to taste
A pinch of baking powder

Method

• Beat the eggs in a bowl.
• Add chopped onions, chopped green chillies, finely chopped corriander leaves, ginger paste, pinch of baking powder, milk and salt. Beat well.
• Put it in a greased pressure cooker bowl and cook in your pressure cooker without whistle.
• After its done take it off heat and from cooker as soon as possible so that the dhoka doesn't stick to the bottom.
• Cut in cubes and Serve them or store for gravy.

Gravy


Ingredients
2-3 medium sized onions
3-4 medium sized tomatoes
1 spoon mustard and jeera
1 spoon ginger paste
1 spoon garlic paste
1/2 cup curd (optional)
2 spoon jeera powder
2 spoon corriander powder
2 cups of water
2 tea spoon sugar
1 spoon red chilli powder
3-4 green chillies finely chopped
Corriander leaves for garnishing
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Make Onion and tomato paste separately.
• Heat Oil in pan and add Mustard and Jeera
• As soon as it sputters add the Onion Paste and Sugar. Saute till the paste turns a light brown and you see the oil separate from the paste.
• Add the tomato puree, garlic paste and green chillies. Saute till the tomato is nicely done.
• Meanwhile in a bowl mix the curd with ginger paste, Cumin Powder, Corriander Powder and Red Chilli Powder.
• Take the pan off the heat and add the the above mixture.
• Mix well and then put it back on medium heat.
• Cook till gravy is well done and keep on adding water if it starts becoming too thick.
• Add salt boil it nicely. Add the dhokas and thicken the gravy on medium flame.
• Garnish with chopped coriander leaves if you wish

Notes
You can additionaly try putting chopped tomato in Dhoka but I don't like tomato mixed with beaten egg.
With 6 eggs it makes around 20 Dhokas.
When I cooked this for the first time I had used curd but yesterday I didn't use it and it suited me more. Curd gives typical odour thats what I feel.

When Seema was visiting us, I decided to cook Sabudana wada as i was sure she would like it.. And She actually loved it and asked for recipe as well :) The sabudana that day was soaked perfectly and hence wadas were kurkura as well :)

Sabudana Wada


Ingredients
1 cup Sabudana
1-2 medium sized potatoes
1 cup Groundnut powder (not too fine)
3-4 finely chopped green chillies
1 spoon jeera
1 tea spoon jeera powder
1 tea spoon coriander powder
1/4 cup corriander leaves finely chopped
Sugar to taste
Salt to taste
Oil/Ghee for frying

Method

• Wash and Soak sabudana for 3-4 hours with 1/4 cup of water.
• Boil or cook potatoes in cooker well enough so that they can be crushed to make a paste
• Mix potato crushed potato, soked sabudana, groundnut powder, finely chopped corriander leaves and green chillies, jeera, jeera and corriander powder, sugar and salt.
• Make small flat round wadas out of this mixture
• Fry them on medium flame. Make sure oil is well heated otherwise wada and oil both spoil.
• Serve hot with curd chutney :)

Notes
I normally soak sabudana overnight rather than just 3-4 hours as I can't get up in the morning at 4 :)
Quantity of water (1 cup sabudana and 1/4 cup water) is very important to get perfectly soaked sabudana. Earlier I didn't know about it and result was always random. Sometimes paste and sometimes too hard.
You can also try crushing green corriander leaves and green chillies in mixer. It gives nice colour to wada. I haven't tried this as yet.

Curd Chutney


Ingredients
1 cup curd
1/4 cup Groundnut powder
2 green chillies / 1 tea spoon red chilli powder
1 tea spoon jeera powder(optional)
1 tea spoon finely chopped corriander leaves (optional)
Sugar to taste
Salt to taste

Method

• Mix sugar and salt in curd and let it dissolve well
• Mix rest of the ingredients to form uniform mixture.

Notes
I don't use optional items as wada already has enough jeera and corriander.
Also I prefer red chilli powder over green chillies in the chutney

Actually yesterday I tried to prepare Date Cake and It turned out total flop as I realised that I forgot to add baking powder, which is basic for any cake, only after it was almost baked for 35 min... This biggest flop is being named as cookie by ajoy and he is eating it.. Poor Ajoy.. Today I am posting this Potol Bhaja recipe (again from ma).. Its very easy to cook and very tasty..


Ingredients
Padawal
Salt
Red Chilli Powder
Oil to fry

Method

• Cut all Padawal into half.
• Marrinate them with Red Chilli Powder and Salt to taste.
• Keep aside for 10-15 min
• Fry them in oil just like one fries wadas

Notes
You can similary prepare Baigun(brinjal) Bhaja, Banana Fry by cutting brinjal or banana into smaller round pieces.

This chutney, i have learnt from ma - ajoy's mom. They prepare it quite often and it tastes owesome as a spread on the bread.


Ingredients
3-4 cups of corriander leaves
1 tomato
2 handsfull of fried groundnuts
1 greed chilli
Sugar
Salt

Method

• Add Corriander leaves, tomato, groundnuts, chilli, sugar and salt to taste into the mixer.
• Grind it to fine paste and thats it your chutney is ready

Notes
No need to add water as tomato, sugar and salt give enough of water for the spread

Last week I had tried Paneer paratha and it tasted awesome. Here is the recipe for the same...


Ingredients
200g Paneer
1 Spoon Chilli Powder
1 Spoon Cumin Powder
1 Spoon Corriander Powder
1 Spoon Amachur Powder
5 Spoon Heaps Wheat Flour
Salt
Oil

Method

• Make dough of wheat flour just like one prepares for any other rotis/parathas
• Grate the paneer
• Mix it with chilli Powder, corriander powder, amchur powder, cumin powder and salt to taste.
• Make 2 medium sized roti
• Spread the prepared mixture of paneer on one of them
• Put the other roti on to the mixture
• Close the ends of paratha by touching bottom roti ends with wet fingers and then pressing the end of the rotis. That would seal the paratha.
• You may want to roll the paratha little to get it even.
• Fry the paratha on preheated tawa with butter or oil

Notes
If salt is added to the mixture and kept for too long mixture might turn out watery, so always prepare mixture just before starting to roll rotis.

This is very simple and tasty recipe :) Ajoy just loved it :)


Ingredients
1 cup Oil
1 cup Water
4 cup Besan (Chana daal powder)
Turmeric Powder
Red Chilli Powder
Carom Seeds(ओवा)
Salt
Oil for frying

Method

• Mix oil and water in a container.
• Blend it well using egg bitter till white foam appears
• Add Salt, turmeric powder, chilli powder, carom seeds to taste
• Add Besan and keep mixing it well. (This mixure should be thicker than bhaji(read भजी) mixture)
• Add this mixture to shev maker.
• Hit oil and fry noodle like threads of shev using shev maker. Keep flame low so that shev don't burn.

Notes
To make lasun shev add little garlic paste to the mixture while adding chilli powder.