'Typickle' Kerali Pickle

I first tasted this in Bangalore. Smitha used to bring this every time she visited our hostel. After leaving the hostel I could never get hold of this. And suddenly one day I saw it in a supermarket and brought a packet home. It is called Vaadu Manga. A divine pickle. Everybody at home liked the taste. So this year I tried to make some. And yes, I think I am successful.

I made it in April, when mangoes were still tender. We call them Baal-Kairee in Marathi. I googled for the recipe. I made permutation and combination of all those recipes and came up with a recipe that suited me.

It is pretty simple. Wash tender mangoes. Wipe them dry. Put them in a glass jar along with some salt. After a week or so you will see they are swimming happily in the salt solution. Mangoes will shrink. Then take our some of the liquid and add powdered mustard, red chilly powder, asafoetida and fenugreek seeds powder. Let the pickle mature for 2-3 months. And then it is ready to use.

Three of my good friends come from Kerala. Smitha, Suman and Sree Vidya. Smitha taught me patience, faith and power of worship. Suman was my source of inspiration when I was going through a very difficult phase of my life. We rarely held long conversations but we shared a lot. And Sree Vidya, with whom I shared not only my room but all my happy memories and my anxieties as well. Her friendship is the most cherished gift of those hostel years. I dedicate this post to them. And to our Hot & Sour friendship.

Happy Friendship Day !

Baby Corn Fingures

About 6-7 years back a chain of restaurants were launched in Pune called Corn Club. It served dishes made of corn. The chain was very popular then. One of the outlets is still working I guess. All others were eventually closed down. It was the time when American sweet corn was a rarity in Pune. And baby corns were not so frequently seen in the market. Now we get all these and many other so called foreign vegetables like colored capsicums, mushrooms, broccoli, etc. in the Mandai as well.
Corn clubs used to serve many novel dishes like corn kabab, corn patties, corn pizza along with usual corn bhel and corn on cob. They also used to sell corn oil and corn seeds for growing sweet corns at home. Read More about them here: http://www.cornclub.com/
Once we ordered Baby Corn Fingures in one of these Corn Club outlets. We really liked them and thought if only we could get hold of baby corns we can make them at home. In time we tried making them and with success.

Here is my recipe:
10 Baby corns
½ Cup Corn flour
2 table spoons Besan
Salt
2 Green chilies (crushed)
Oil for frying

Heat oil in a kadhai. Cut the baby corns lengthwise into 2 or 4 sections depending on their width. Mix Corn flour and Besan, add salt and crushed chilies. Make a batter using water. Dip a section of a corn in the batter deep fry in oil.
Serve with ketchup.

Khoya Modak : A Quick and Easy Prasad

Yesterday was Ganesh Chaturthi. I made a simple Prasad for Bappa. Khoya Modak.
Ingredients :
250 gms Khoya
50 gms Powdered Sugar
Food Colour - Orange - half a pinch
Powdered Cardamom - 1/2 spoon
Fry khoya in a non-stick pan for about 5 mins. Remove from fire. Blend in a mixer. Let is be cool enough to knead. Then add sugar, color and cardamom powder. Mold in modak shapes. We get these molds readymade in market.

Peanut Ladu – a primitive recipe

Bhatukali is a game played by children where they run a house, mostly kitchen, of their own using toy versions of the utensils and other kitchen equipments. In some ways it is similar to playing with a Doll’s House. They cook, clean and do various other activities that they see their parents doing around the house.
Cooking is a major part of playing Bhatukali. Many a times they cook virtual meals and enjoy with other playmates. We get many kitchen toy utensils and equipments in the market for playing this game. We used to have mostly metal ones. Now a days, we get more and more plastic made things. I grew up playing this game a lot. My son likes it too. I have been observing him playing this game with his friends quite a lot. And I was surprised to see a few new additions to the game. Once they decided not to cook for that day and visit a restaurant instead. We never did this simply because we never saw our parents doing this. One day they were arranging a birthday party. And all of them were busy talking on their toy mobile phones. They were consulting each other on phone about the menu and the gifts. Then they gave instructing, again on phone, each other about how to reach the venue. I was amazed by the way things have changed.
When we used to play the person coming in the house used to ring a bell by saying “Ding-Dong” now they give miss-calls.
Yesterday my son, aged two and a half, was playing all alone in the house. All his friends were busy. So he invited me to join in. I happily obliged. We decided to play Bhatukali. He was constantly giving me instructions about what to do. He was enjoying bossing me around. Then he asked for some “Khau”. Khau is a term difficult to describe, but I shall try. It can be anything, a sweetmeat or a fruit or any edible item given to children. The word khau has lots of meaning associated with it. Khau is given by elders, as a sign of love, to younger ones. My grandmother still sends me Khau. We used to get peanuts and jaggery. I gave my son the same thing yesterday. He was puzzled by this combination and asked me what to do with it. Eating peanuts and jaggery together is such a pleasure. I wanted him to know that. So I taught him a recipe which was our favorite Bhatukali recipe.
It will hardly qualify as a recipe. But still I told him step by step. Take a peanut divide it in two equal parts, it can be easily done. Then take a small amount of jaggery put it in between the two parts and that’s it. Your ladus are ready to eat. He liked them so much. I remembered Indira Sant’s poem साधासुधा माझा हात, बाळजीभ अमृताची …

Patolya – Aromatic leaf cakes.

From my Konkan visit I brought back a few turmeric leaves and recipe for Patolya. Yesterday was Sankashti Chaturthi so I decided to make Patolya for Prasad.
I used turmeric leaves in cooking for the first time in my life. And I just fell in love with the aroma it releases while steaming.
Next, I am going to try steaming fish in these leaves.
Recipe -
For filling:
½ cup of fresh grated coconut
1/3 cup of jaggery
Put both in kadai and stir till jaggery is desolved and whole thing becomes dry.

For cover:
Soak rice for 2 hours. Grind with some salt.

Arranging Patolya:
Open the leaf then spread the dough made for cover and then spread the filling.
It will look like this.

Then fold them in the middle. And steam for 15 mins.


Enjoy the aroma in the kitchen. After steaming they will look like this.

Now remove the leaves and enjoy Patolya with ghee.

Dalia for NagPanchami

Fifth day of the month of Shrawan is celebrated as Nag-panchami. Nag means snake and Panchami means fifthday.
On this day one is not supposed to cut anything or fry anything on a tava. So in many houses steamed sweet dumplings namely Dind are made on this occasion. It is believed that Snake likes milk. So a kheer is also prepared for his Prasad. I made Dalia.
Dalia is cracked wheat.

1 cup Dalia
½ cup Jaggery
1.2 cup grated fresh Coconut
1 cup Milk
Some cashews for garnish

Cook Dalia in a pressure cooker for 3 whistles. Add coconut and jaggery, mix well. Add milk, let it boil. Remove from heat. Cool. Garnish with fried cashews. Serve.

Edible Lamps

Today is the last day of month of AshaDha आषाढ. Today is “No Moon Day” i.e. Amavasya अमावस्या . This day is celebrated as Deewyachi Awas दिव्याची आवस. On this day it is customary to clean all lamps of the house. From tomorrow the holy month of Shravan will start. As many festivals are lined up in Shravan these lamps will be used frequently now.
As this month is followed by Shrawan it has many special things associated with it. Ninth day of AshaDha is celebrated as Kande-Navami कांदे नवमी. On this day dishes made of Onions are eaten, as in the next four months (Chaturmas चातुर्मास ) onions and Garlic is not eaten. Many people now a days do not strictly follow theses restriction. Still they enjoy making onion bhaji on this day.
People also invite each other to eat AshaDha. Here “eating AshaDha” means, eating non-vegetarian food. Again many people do not eat non-vegetarian food during Chaturmas. So they enjoy it during AshaDha.
One more phrase associated with AshaDha is “frying AshaDha”. You can read more about it here http://beta.esakal.com/2009/06/24121310/Features-on-rainy-recipe.html
Rainy season begins from AshaDha. One feels like eating fried things so it is usual to fry a sweet and a savory thing during this month.
Coming back to the Lamp Day, edible dough lamps are made today to mark the occasion. Here is how I did it:
½ cup wheat flour*
¼ cup jaggery
2 tea spoons fine semolina
1 table spoon oil
A pinch of salt
Dissolve jaggery in water. Make dough using this sweet water. Shape diyas. Steam for 10 minutes. Serve with ghee.
* You can also use Bajra flour instead of wheat flour then no need to add semolina.

Modak for Ganesha

Rice flour
All purpose flour
Unsalted butter
Water
Salt

Coconut
Jaggery
Cardamom powder

For filling:
Grate a coconut, measure the gratings, mix with jaggery. If your gratings are 1 cup add ½ a cup of jaggery. Cook on medium heat for 10 min. or till all water evaporates and mixture becomes dry. Add cardamom powder.

For dough:
Heat a cup of water in a heavy-bottom pan. Sift a cup of rice flour mixed with a table spoon of all purpose flour. Once it starts boiling add a table spoon of unsalted butter and a pinch of salt. Add flours. Mix well. Cover and let it cook on medium heat. After 2 mins the mixture will change its color from bright white to a paler shade of white. Mix it thoroughly. Cover and cook for another 2-3 minutes. Test of doneness: when you open the lid the steam that comes out should look white.
Take off from heat. Take small portion of the dough (at this stage it will look more like a crumble than dough) and knead it using water and oil. This requires skill as dough is very hot but dipping you hand is water first helps. Knead until no lumps are seen and dough becomes soft to touch. Knead all the dough in such a fashion in 2-3 batches.

Making Modak:
Now take a lemon sized ball of dough. Apply water and oil to your palms. Start flattening the dough with your fingers. Make a puri sized disk. Now pinch it 7 times from sides. Stuff 1 table spoon of the filling (Saran) in and close the mouth. Your Modak should look like this.

There is a custom of making a karanji when you make modaks. Modak is masculine and karanji is feminine. They say brothers should have a sister and vise versa. So we make a Modak while making karanjis.
To make karanji, make a similar disc with dough, spoon the filling and fold it in half and seal it.

Corn Chaat or a Salsa (my style!)

Yesterday I made a colorful chaat to brighten up a cloudy evening. It was very tasty. Here is how I made it.
Ingredients:
Totapuri Mango
Sweet corn kernels
Pomegranates seeds
Onion
Coriander
Capsicum
Lemon
Chaat masala
Salt
Sugar
Boil corn kernels. Add some salt while boiling. Drain.
Remove seeds from a pomegranate. This can be done is advance. I usually separate the seeds as soon as bring pomegranates home. And refrigerate the seeds. They come in very handy in salad decorations and also as a snack by itself.
Chop onions. Put it in some cold water for 5-10 mins and drain well. Onion will loose its strong taste if we thus put it in water after cutting. In a chat where you are going to add fruits, usual taste of an onion does not blend well.
Dice a mango. I used Totapuri mangoes. These mangoes have a bit of tangy sour taste in addition to usual sweet taste of mangoes. You can use any variety you get. Use slight unripe ones to get that sourness.
Chop Capsicum, as finely as you can, so it blends well.
Chop coriander.
Juice a lemon.
Now mix all the fruits and vegetables. Add lemon juice. salt, chat masala and sugar to taste. Chaat masala has salt in it, so be careful while adding salt.
Serve.

A cool Snack for a hot summer evening !

Last week, it was very hot in this part of the globe. Temperature was well above 40 degrees. And a sure way to cool off was to have lots and lots of melon. I prepared this simple snack with musk melon balls and watermelon cubes. I served it with a sprinkling of salt and freshly crushed pepper.

It went very well with Chivada that I served with diced onion, tomato and coriander.

Sun-dried Things

It's a tradition in almost all parts of India to make some sun-dried items in summer season that last for a whole year. Papads are on the top of this list.
Maharashtra has its own tradition of such items they, in general, are called "Begami che padartha".
I have decided to blog about some of these "sunny" items.
We will start with "Sabudanyachya Chikodya" or Sago Papads
They are very simple to make. Almost anyone can make them with little effort.

Ingredients:

Sago 1 Cup

Salt 1 Tea Spoon

Jeera ½ Tea Spoon

Potato 1 Medium (Optional)

Wash sago and soak it in little water overnight. Next day morning add 4 cups of water to the soaked sago and cook it till it turns transparent. Add salt and Jeera just after you finish cooking. Now spread this mixture on a plastic sheet one spoon at a time. Let is dry in sun for 3-4 days. When they are completely dry they are ready. Fry them and serve as and when desired. This will keep good for at least 1 year.

We made them in 3-4 colours.
This is how it will look after drying and before frying

And after frying in oil it will look like this

Wood-Apple Chutney

Today is Mahashivratri. Though I am not a very religious person, I do prepare some fasting delicacies on such special fasting days. I know, many non-Indians get surprised to see the variety of food we eat when we are “fasting”. In India, at least in Maharashtra, meaning of fasting has changed (for bad) over the years. Now ‘fasting’ means eating a different set of food. This food is generally more greasy and unhealthy. In Marathi we have a saying that goes like, “Ekadashi Ani Duppat Khashi” meaning on the day of ekadashi, when you are expected to fast you eat double.

So today we all fast for fun and not as a religious practice.

Having said that, I must accept there are some really exquisite food items that we make only on special occasions like this one. We get plenty of Kavathas in market in this season and we prepare simple chutney with them.

Wood-Apple Chutney
1 KavaTha / Wood Apple*
4 Table spoons Jaggery
A generous pinch of Salt
½ Table spoon of Red Chilly powder
Slightly crushed Jeera

Break shell of Wood apple. This is how it looks like after breaking the shell :



Take out all soft, eadible part. Mash is with hands. Mix all other ingredients. Chutney is ready.

This is how ready chutney looks like:

A funny thing I noticed about English names of fruits, whenever they come across a new / unknown fruit they call it so and so apple. For example, custard apple for Sitaphal, Pine apple for Anannas, Wood Apple for Kavath!

Cutlet Thaleepeeth / Paratha

The other day I had some guests. I made cutlets for them. Some of the batter was left. I kept it in the fridge. Next day I was in no mood to fry cutlets again. Then an idea came to my mind. Why not try a thalipeeth with that batter?

I tried and result was fantastic. So I am sharing this with you.

Ingredients:

1 Boiled Potato (Mashed)

1 Small Onion (Grated)

1/2 Beetroot (Grated)

1 Carrot (Grated)

1 Tablespoon Boiled Sweet Corn

1 Tablespoon Frozen Green Peas

2 Tablespoon Besan / Chickpeas flour

1 Teaspoon Garam Masala

1/2 Teaspoon Amchoor Powder

Salt to taste

You can change proportion of vegetables according to your own liking. Also you can add or delete some of the vegetables I have used.

Method is pretty simple. Mix everything togather. And make small thalipeeths on a wet cloth and transfer them to a hot griddle. Spinkle some oil. Fry till both sides are golden and crispy.

Serve with any chutney or pickle.

Fresh Coriander Paratha

Fresh Coriander Paratha

I am writing after a long break. I was having some problems in uploading my files to the website. Also I lost my camera in an accident. So I was unable to take pictures of my preparations. I hate posting just recipes without pictures, as it does not give you a clear idea of what it’s going to be like. So I was quiet for some time.

Today I am writing about a simple and tasty paratha. I like (preparing and eating, both) parathas very much, as parathas are easy to make (I am a lazy cook!). And they make a complete healthy meal in itself. So they feature regularly in my kitchen.

The idea of coriander paratha was given by my husband. He went out for a walk and bought 2 big bunches of fresh coriander. We are great fans of coriander. He asked me to make ‘Kusmuda’. Now Kusmuda, according to him, is a side dish. I have never heard of Kusmuda from anyone else. He has tasted it in his childhood and he says it’s a provincial dish. He does not know the exact recipe for it. I have recreated the recipe using his descriptions. The taste is fresh in his memory. We make it sometimes when we get plenty of fresh Coriander. We love it.

That day a thought occurred to me, using Kusmuda as stuffing for paratha and it turned out to be good. So I am sharing this recipe with you.

Ingredients:
For Kusmuda / Stuffing:
1 bunch of fresh coriander
1 tbl spoon chili powder
1/2 tbl spoon chaat masala / sandwich masala
1/4 tbl spoon salt
1 tbl spoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
For cover:
1 cup chappati flour
1/4 tbl spoon salt
Oil
Water

First knead some chapatti dough as you would for normal chapatti. Remember to add 2 tbl spoons of oil before kneading. This will make parathas crispy.
Now chop coriander as finely as you can. Mix chili powder, chat masala, lemon juice and salt to it. This is your stuffing. If you add some oil to it, its called Kusmuda. You can have it as a side dish.
Make parathas as usual using this stuffing. Fry on both sides. Apply ghee if desired. Serve with dal or pickle or anything you like.
Here I have served them with mixed dal and Maththa (masala buttermilk)

Variations: You can add some finely chopped fresh mint leaves in the stuffing.

Phodanicha Bhat or Yellow Rice

This dish is good for working day breakfast. It takes very less time and effort. This can be made using left-over rice.

You will need:
1 cup Cooked Rice
1 small onion finely chopped
2 chillies cut into 1 cm pieces
5-6 curry leaves
2 teas spoons of coriander leaves
1 tea spoon Cumin seeds
1 tea spoon Mustard seeds
10-12 Peanuts
1 tea spoon Urad Dal
1/4 tea spoon Asafetida
1/4 tea spoon Turmeric
Salt
Sugar
3 table spoons of oil

Heat oil in a pan. Add peanuts fry till they change colour and become brown. Then add Uraad dal, wait till it changes colour. Then add Mustard seed, Cumin seeds, chillies, curry leaves, Turmeric powder, Asafetida and lastly onion. Mix well and add salt. Adding salt at this stage helps onion to cook without getting burnt. When onion looks translucent add cooked rice and mix well. Then add sugar according to your test (I added 1 tea spoon) and finally garnish with coriander leaves and serve with a wedge of lemon.