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.

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

कच्च्या करवंदाचं लोणचं

कच्च्या करवंदाचं लोणचं

करवंदाला इंग्रजीत काय म्हणतात मला खरच माहित नाही. त्याच्या सारखं दिसणारं (लागणारं नव्हे) ब्लू बेरीज नावाचं एक फळ मी इंग्लंडला पाहेलं होतं. म्हणून हे पोस्ट मराठीत लिहिते.

कच्ची करवंद आद पाव

तेल २ चमचे

मोहरी १/२ चमचा

गुळ २ चमचे

मीठ चवीनुसार

लाल तिखट १ चमचा

करवंद स्वच्छ धुवून, त्याची डेखं काढून घ्यावीत. एका कढईत तेल गरम करावं, त्यात मोहरी घालून फोडणी करावी. करवंद फोडणीला टाकून एक हलकी वाफ आणावी. मग गूळ, तिखट व मीठ घालावे. गुळ विरघळला की गॅस बंद करावा. लोणचं तयार !

करवंदाचा संदर्भ आला की मला ही कविता हमखास आठवते. माझ्या आवडत्या कवितांपैकी एक असलेली इंदिरा संताची कविता.

निवडुंगाच्या शीर्ण फ़ुलांचे
झुबे लालसर ल्यावे कानी,
जरा शिरावे पदर खोवुनी
करवन्दीच्या जाळिमधुनी.
शीळ खोल ये तळरानातून
भण भण वारा चढणीवरचा,
गालापाशी झिळमिळ लाडिक,
स्वाद जिभेवर आंबट कच्चा.
नव्हती जाणिव आणि कुणाची,
नव्हते स्वप्नही कुणी असावे,
डोंगर चढणीवरी एकटे
किती फिरावे,उभे रहावे.
पुन्हा कधी न का मिळायचे ते,
ते माझेपण, आपले आपण,
झुरते तनमन त्याच्यासाठि
उरते पदरी तिच आठवण,
निवडुंगाच्या शीर्ण फ़ुलांची,
टपोर हिरव्या करवंदाची…

शेवची भाजी / Shev Curry ?

In one of my recent trips to Amalner: a town in Jalgaon district, I tasted this signature dish of the region "Shevchi Bhaji". It is amazingly hot curry, generally served with Bhakri. They also serve Nagali (or Nachani) Papads in hotels there, which we hardly see in Pune. These tasty papads are light and crispy and very rich in calcium. The restaurant where we ate was a modest eatery near station. They had another interesting preparation called "Papdachi Bhurji". I tried to guess the recipe and re-created it at home. I will post its recipe soon. I do not have authentic recipe of Shevachi Bhaji. But here is a photograph for you.

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!

Tikhat Mithachya Purya or Spicy Puri

This my first post. Here I will try to post few of my favorite recipes.Today I am posting these Puris. They are great for Sunday breakfast. You can prepare the dough in advance and save you time the next day. So here we go.

Ingredients:1 cup Wheat flour (Kanik)

1 tea spoon Salt

1 tea spoon Chilli Powder

1 tea spoon Jeera / Ajwain

4 tea spoons Coriander leaves (finely cut)

2 tea spoons Oil

Oil for frying

Mix salt and chilli powder into the flour. Slightly crush jeera / ajwain and add to the flour with finely cut coriander leaves. Add 2 tea spoons of oil. This helps puris to puff up well. Now make dough as you make for regular rotis. Let it rest for a while, at least an hour. You can also make this on the day before. In that case you will have to refrigerate it.

Once you are ready heat some oil in a kadhai. If oil is not hot enough your puris won’t puff up.
Now instead of making small puris, which take more time, make a big roti as usual. Take a small round cutter (lid of any stainless steel / plastic container will do) and cut as many rounds as you can from this roti. It’s easy, this way you can make 5-6 puris in a go. Now fry a puri at a time is hot oil. That’s it. Enjoy these with pickle and/or potato bhaaji.

Do let me know your feedback.