Milagai Kuzhambu

This is a very spicy dish. Usually we prepare this as a side dish for curd rice, just like pickle. So try this only with curd rice.. For spice lovers who love very hot and spicy food can have with plain rice,idli,dosa or with anything u like. It is a simple recipe and very easy to prepare.I had no idea about this dish before marriage, as my mom doesn’t prepae this.According to me the best combination for curd rice is mango pickle. But after tasting this, I liked to have this with curd rice too. I learnt this recipe from my Mother in law and would like to share this with u all. Try it out and u will love it…

Ingredients

Green chillies(small in size)-12 to 15 chopped into thin rounds
Onions- 3 large or 4 medium , chopped finely
U can use pearl onions too for this .
Tamarind- big gooseberry sized
Mustard seeds- ¼ tsp
Methi seeds- ¼ tsp
Oil- 4 tsp
Salt to taste



Method

Soak the tamarind in water and take out the juice from it. Keep aside.
Heat oil in a pressure pan or cooker and add mustard seeds. When it splutters add methi seeds and before it starts to brown add onions and green chillies. Fry for 10 minutes in a medium flame. Add the tamarind juice and salt to it. No need to add water to this. close the cooker and pressure cook this till one whistle.
U can store this in the refrigerator for 15 days.
Serve with curd rice.

note: You can always reduce the chillies as per ur taste or use 1/2 part of capsicum and 1/2 part of green chillies too.

check out shankari's version

Memes

Hi all, Iam leaving to India tonight. I will try my best to post atleast one recipe a week. So do keep visiting me and I will be visiting you all too.
Before I leave, I thought I will finish a couple of memes that I had been tagged for … Rashmi of ‘ Websamayal’ had tagged me for ‘ Good/Bad experiences with food’ and jayashree of ‘Luvgoodfood’ had tagged me for a butterfly effect meme.

Butterfly effect Meme

This is a foodie meme which asks you to talk about stuff that has had a profound influence on your foodie life(in the words of http://www.saltshaker.net/20060630/the-butterfly-effect who started this meme). Well, not just any kind of stuff...but specifically an ingredient, a dish/recipe, a meal, a cookbook/other written work, a food personality, and another person in your life.Before I get down to the meme, here's some info:A meme is an Internet phenomenon (sometimes called an Internet meme)which occurs when something relatively unknown becomes hugely popular, often quite suddenly, through the mass propagation of media content made feasible by the Internet.(source: wikipedia)
I just copied down the above intro from Jayashree…

An Ingredient- It is always chicken . I love chicken cooked in any form. Chicken curries, drumsticks,kfc’s chickenpieces, chicken burger or anything with chicken but ofcouse my favourite is my mom’s chicken curry.
A Recipe- Biryani. Veg or non veg I would like to have it any time. There a different ways people make biryanis and however it is made, I like it.
A meal- Usually Iam not a person who orders a meal with rice , sambar and veggies, when we go to a restaurant. This is what we have in our house regularly. So when I go to a restaurant I go for something which we don’t cook in our house more often. But whenever I come across this word ‘ meal’ I remember the days in Singapore. I was pregnant that time and was craving for food and hungry most of the time.I was not so very good in cooking at that time too. So whenever I go to the “komala’s”restaurant , I used to order only meals. It is a regular vegetarian meal which consists of rice, sambar, dal, 2 vegetables, curd , raitha and papad. Believe me I would finish it in minutes and would feel really full and contented ..
A cookbook- My mom used to have a book called ‘ palsuvai malar’ by the ladies club of Tuticorin. I started to cook a few recipes seeing this book as this was the only cookbook my mother had. I have this book now also and it has wonderful recipes. Later on I had bought some books of ‘Mallika Badrinath’ too.
A food personality- My Favourite is Sanjeev Kapoor. I used to watch his cookery shows regularly in TV before marriage. I learnt the basics of north Indian cooking from his khana Khazana.
Another person- Everyone would learn to cook from their mothers. For me too it is my mom .. and then my Mother in law .. she too has influenced me with her cooking.
I will post a few of their recipes when Iam in India.
I wish to Tag Indira of Mahanandi for the butterfly effect meme.

Good/Bad experiences with food.

This experience happened to me sometime before. All my husand’s collegues planned for a party in a restaurant. They had planned it suddenly and had selected some Italian restaurant too. It was fifteen of us and we went there around 7 pm. As the women were busy with their kids , Men ordered and it took almost 1 hour to come. The presentation and the look of the foods were very attractive, but once we tasted it everybody’s face changed as it was very very bland. There was one fish dish which looked so attractive but they had just cooked it only with salt.. I had tasted Italian foods before.. they will be a bit bland but surely not like this. I don’t know , may be the dishes we had selected might have been more bland. And then finally the bill came and everybody was shocked .. because nobody expected a very high bill as they did not see the price before ordering. We paid so much for the food we did not enjoy and most of all wasted a lot of food. This is definitely the cause of improper planning and ordering.
Learnt a lesson from this and so now whenever I go to a restaurant , I really do plan a bit.
I wish to tag Vani of ‘Mysoorean’ for this meme.

Kadai Paneer with Bean Sprouts

Bean sprouts are rich in vitamins with low carbohydrates. They are healthy and are used much in chinese cooking. These sprouts have been gaining popularity in recent times .
I wanted to use these in our cooking for a long time and when I saw Nanditha’s ‘twist in a plate’, I thought I could use them.
Everyone would be familiar with kadai paneer. I just love them. This is the usual kadai paneer recipe and I just added bean sprouts for a different taste. It turned out good with soft paneer and crunchy bean sprouts.
This is my entry to Saffron Trail’s WBB#6 ‘Twist in a Plate’.

Ingredients

Paneer- 250 grams
Capsicum- 2 small
Tomatoes-red and ripe ones- 3 large chopped finely
Onions- 1 large choppe finely
Bean sprouts(mung)- ½ cup
Coriander seeds- 3 tsp
Red chilli- 1
Chilli powder-1 tsp
Garam masala- ½ tsp
Kasoori methi- ½ tsp
Green chilli-1 chopped finely
Ginger- 2” piece chopped finely
Coriander leaves- 2 tsp chopped finely
Oil+ghee- 5 tsp
Cuminseeds- ¼ tsp
Cinnamon- 1” piece
Cloves-4
Cardomom- 1
Bay leaves- 2



Method

Cut the paneer and capsicum lengthwise. Grind the coriander seeds and red chilli to a coarse powder.
Heat oil+ghee in a kadai and add cinnamon, cloves ,cardomom, bay leaves and cumin. Add onion, green chilli, ginger and bean sprouts and fry for some time. When the onions turn transparent add the tomatoes , salt and chilli powder. Simmer the flame and cover with a lid and cook for 10 minutes or till the tomatoes become mushy and well cooked . At this stage add the coriander+ redchilli powder and capsicum pieces. Close with a lid and cook for 5 minutes . Finally add the paneer pieces,kassori methi and garam masala powder. Cook for a few more minutes and garnish with coriander leaves .
Serve hot with roti/naan.

Aval Payasam

Blogger friends recipe (BFR)#2

Aval payasam


A few months in blogging, I have learnt a lot in cooking from my blogger friends. I have tried a few recipes from them and feel really happy to say that almost all of them were succesful. Here is one such recipe ... .I wanted to make Aval payasam for a long time and when I saw this recipe in My dhaba ,I decided to try it out for Saraswathi Pooja. This is the first time Iam making Aval Payasam , and believe me it tasted divine...Thanks VK Narayan for the lovely recipe.
Click for the recipe Here...
I made this by following the exact recipe of My dhaba's... But as i did not have saffron with me I just added a pinch of yellow food colour.. This is a great recipe and You will surely love it.

Aloo Curry

This is the usual aloo curry. Most of you all will be familiar with this. I love this dish very much as it is simple to make and tastes great..
This goes well with vegetable biriyani ,Rice and sambar, rasam , dhal etc…here goes the recipe



Ingredients

Potatoes- 5
Onions - 1 large chopped finely
Garlic- 5 cloves or garlic paste- 1 ½ tsp
Chilli powder- 1tsp
Turmeric powder- ¼ tsp
Garam masala -½ tsp
Mustard seeds- ¼ tsp
Curry leaves- 1 sprig
Coriander leaves- 2 tsp finely chopped
Oil - 4 tsp
Salt to taste



Method

Grind garlic to a paste. Pressure cook potatoes , peel the skin and cut them into cubes.
Heat oil in a pan add mustard seeds. When it splutters add the curryleaves and garlic paste. Fry till the raw smell of the garlic disappears and add onions . fry for some time and add chilli, turmeric ,garam masala powders along with salt. Then add the potatoes. Mix well, Simmer the flame , close with a lid and cook for 10 to 15 mins. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve hot.

Butter Shortbread

I always love the shortbreads and wanted to prepare this sometime. So I thought I will prepare this for cooking medley’s JFI event in which the main ingredient is Ghee and Butter. I think my entry is a bit late and I hope she will accept it.
I searched for this recipe in the net and found lots.. This is the one I picked and tried and it came out really well. My daughter loved it because I had used different shapes.

Ingredients

Butter- 1 cup(room temperature)
All purpose flour- 2 cups
Sugar- ½ cup(powdered)
Cornstarch- 1 tsp
Salt- 1 pinch

Method

Mix butter and sugar and beat it for 5 minutes till they are well mixed and the mixture is creamy.
Mix and seive flour, salt and cornstarch.
Add the flour mixture to the the butter. Fold in gently to make a dough.
Refrigerate for 15 minutes to make the dough a bit firm.
Roll out the dough into ¼ inch thick. Cut into round or whichever shape u want using a cookie cutter.

place them in the cookie sheets lined with parchment paper(I used foil because I was out of stock). Bake in a preheated oven for 12-15 minutes at 300 degrees F.Cool this and store in a airtight jar.

Note: Please Use only butter for this recipe. Do not use margarine or anything else in substitution for butter.