This is the easy to make dessert and something different make in the Marathi household.
Ingredients:
Wheat Seviya - 1 cup
sugar to taste
rose syrup or rose essence
ice cream - prefer pista, tutti-fruity flavours
sabja seeds - 2 tablespoon
dry fruits- optional
fresh fruits optional
Recipe:
Mix sugar, rose essence in the milk as per taste and refrigerate it for half an hour. Soak the sabja seeds in water for half hour.
Boil 2 litres of water. Add teaspoon of oil and then add the seviya. Stir frequently till they are cooked. Drain the hot water and immediately drain again with cool water so that they do not stick together. Cool them.
To serve:
Take a tall glass. Place later of cooked seviya at the bottom. Cover it with later of the soaked sabja seeds. If you have fresh fruits, you can add that layer at the bottom first. Place finely cut dry fruits. Pour chilled milk over this such that it fills 3 quartes of the glass. Top this up with a scoop of ice -cream.
The falooda is ready to serve !!!
Friday, April 3, 2009
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Pasta - in white sauce
It was Sunday afternoon and suddenly we all wanted to have pasta. Though I love pastas in tomato base, the hubby loves white sauce. So I do some searching on the internet and whola ... I stumble across this easy recipe for Alfredo sauce. I try it and it turns out to be real yum ! So here it is for you to try :-).
Disclaimer: This dish is definitly not for the health conscious people :)
Ingredients: Pasta - any type. I had taken fusilli. Don't take that Sunfeast pasta
Milk - 1/2 litre
Olive oil or butter
fresh cream - 1/2 cup
black pepper
oregano seasoning
Garlic: 7-8 cloves
salt to taste
wheat flour - 1/4 cup
cheese... lots of it :-)
Recipe: Cook pasta as per instructions on the packet and keep it aside. Make sure that the pasta does not stick to each other.
Heat olive oil in a pan. If you can't get olive like I did, you can use butter. Chop garlic cloves in small pieces and saute them in the oil. Add cream to this and stir lightly. Take quantity of the cream as per taste, if you like creamy pasta add more cream. Now add some flour to it and mix properly. You can lightly roast the flour before adding so it will mix properly in the cream without forming chunks. Now add milk to this mixture and black pepper powder and pinch of salt. Don't add too much salt. Keep stirring the mixture and bing it to boil over medium to small flame. Don't boil too much, as this souze thiken very quickly.
You can adjust quntity of milk depending on how thick you want the sauce. If you can get parmesan cheese, it's great otherwise our regular cheddar cheese will also do even the mozerella works ok. If you are using cheddar cheese you might want to add this chhese to our souce while it is boiling so the cheese also melts properly.
Now take the cooked pasta in a serving dish. Spread grated cheese over it and pour our boiling souce over it. Garnish with oregano seasoning and serve hot !
Disclaimer: This dish is definitly not for the health conscious people :)
Ingredients: Pasta - any type. I had taken fusilli. Don't take that Sunfeast pasta
Milk - 1/2 litre
Olive oil or butter
fresh cream - 1/2 cup
black pepper
oregano seasoning
Garlic: 7-8 cloves
salt to taste
wheat flour - 1/4 cup
cheese... lots of it :-)
Recipe: Cook pasta as per instructions on the packet and keep it aside. Make sure that the pasta does not stick to each other.
Heat olive oil in a pan. If you can't get olive like I did, you can use butter. Chop garlic cloves in small pieces and saute them in the oil. Add cream to this and stir lightly. Take quantity of the cream as per taste, if you like creamy pasta add more cream. Now add some flour to it and mix properly. You can lightly roast the flour before adding so it will mix properly in the cream without forming chunks. Now add milk to this mixture and black pepper powder and pinch of salt. Don't add too much salt. Keep stirring the mixture and bing it to boil over medium to small flame. Don't boil too much, as this souze thiken very quickly.
You can adjust quntity of milk depending on how thick you want the sauce. If you can get parmesan cheese, it's great otherwise our regular cheddar cheese will also do even the mozerella works ok. If you are using cheddar cheese you might want to add this chhese to our souce while it is boiling so the cheese also melts properly.
Now take the cooked pasta in a serving dish. Spread grated cheese over it and pour our boiling souce over it. Garnish with oregano seasoning and serve hot !
Monday, May 21, 2007
Pasta ... Ashley Style
Disclaimer: This dish is strictly for single people like me who don't have access all the resources like people staying at home and want to have good food on Saturday evening. Other people, I think you can definitely make better preparations so don't blame me if you don't like it :-D.
This is something I tried this weekend. We had nice kheechadi (ingredients and recipes from different continent) dinner with soup and bread sticks, bread roll, pasta and mango milkshake for dessert. It was yummy dinner I must say.
Here is how I made the pasta.
Ingredients: Pasta (any type), a bottle of salsa sauce, oregano dressing packets of pizza hut, packet of frozen green peas(optional), salt to taste, little bit of oil.
Recipe: Put water to boil in a pan (proportion should be 3 cups for 1 cup of pasta). Add pasta to it and let the pasta cook for about 10 mins. Add 2 teaspoons of oil and one teaspoon of salt to avoid sticking of pasta. Once the pasta is cooked, drain the water and keep the pasta aside.
In a pan, take 2-3 tablespoons of oil and heat it. Empty the jar of salsa sauce in it and let it simmer. If you like watery pasta sauce (like I do), add a glass of water to this. Empty the packet of frozen peas in a vessel and wash them properly. Add them to the pasta sauce. The sauce can be little sour for some people, so you can add salt, chilly powder to adjust the taste as you like it. I think adding some boiled veggies like baby corn, carrots, beans should also taste nice. Sprinkle the oregano seasoning. It brings nice taste to this whole mixture. Once this whole mess gets to boil add the cooked pasta to it, mix properly and la hol .... yummy pasta is ready !!!
When I made this dish, it was all trial and error basis but it turned out very very nice. The reason I opted for salsa sauce was I like the taste (I know it is to be eaten with tortilla chips and not used for cooking but so what!) and it was much cheaper then the pasta sauces kept on display :-D.
This is something I tried this weekend. We had nice kheechadi (ingredients and recipes from different continent) dinner with soup and bread sticks, bread roll, pasta and mango milkshake for dessert. It was yummy dinner I must say.
Here is how I made the pasta.
Ingredients: Pasta (any type), a bottle of salsa sauce, oregano dressing packets of pizza hut, packet of frozen green peas(optional), salt to taste, little bit of oil.
Recipe: Put water to boil in a pan (proportion should be 3 cups for 1 cup of pasta). Add pasta to it and let the pasta cook for about 10 mins. Add 2 teaspoons of oil and one teaspoon of salt to avoid sticking of pasta. Once the pasta is cooked, drain the water and keep the pasta aside.
In a pan, take 2-3 tablespoons of oil and heat it. Empty the jar of salsa sauce in it and let it simmer. If you like watery pasta sauce (like I do), add a glass of water to this. Empty the packet of frozen peas in a vessel and wash them properly. Add them to the pasta sauce. The sauce can be little sour for some people, so you can add salt, chilly powder to adjust the taste as you like it. I think adding some boiled veggies like baby corn, carrots, beans should also taste nice. Sprinkle the oregano seasoning. It brings nice taste to this whole mixture. Once this whole mess gets to boil add the cooked pasta to it, mix properly and la hol .... yummy pasta is ready !!!
When I made this dish, it was all trial and error basis but it turned out very very nice. The reason I opted for salsa sauce was I like the taste (I know it is to be eaten with tortilla chips and not used for cooking but so what!) and it was much cheaper then the pasta sauces kept on display :-D.
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Wheat dumplings in Daal
This is favorite dish of mine and sis's, popularly known as 'Varan fala'. Very simple to make and yummy yummy to taste. And now roomies also love it... Its
Ingredients: 1 cup Toor daal, tamarind (2-3 inch pieces), jaggary, 3 cup wheat flour, sambar powder, salt, 1 teaspoon turmeric powder, red chilli powder, 2 big spoons of oil
Recipe: Pressure cook toor daal. Soak tamarind in bowl of water. Make wheat flour dough as you make for roties.
After the daal is cooked and cooker is cooled, put turmeric powder, salt in it. And mix it properly. Heat oil in a big pan, put mustard in it. Once it starts to crackle add pinch of asafotida. Squeeze the tamrind and add the tamarind water to the heated oil. Add red chilly powder, sambar powder (actually you should put Kala masala; the popular ingredient in my cooking and not available here). Put the softened daal and a glass of water. You can add more if you like it. Bring this dall to boil. If you like you can add tomatoes, onions to the daal while pressure cooking it.
While the daal is boiling, make a little thick roti of the dough. Cut it small squares of it using knife. If you want to be creative, you can actually make different shapes out of the dough like starts, small balls, spirals as we used to do it in childhood :-). They taste gooooood. Once daal comes to boil, add jaggary. The right amount of jaggary is; its size should as big as the remainants of tamarind after you squeeze it. Add the wheat dumplings in the daal. Put gas on sim and let dough cook. It will take around 10-15 minutes to cook.
This is a main course and you don't need to make roti or rice with it. Serve with tons of ghee. Try it, you can't have it just once !!!
Ingredients: 1 cup Toor daal, tamarind (2-3 inch pieces), jaggary, 3 cup wheat flour, sambar powder, salt, 1 teaspoon turmeric powder, red chilli powder, 2 big spoons of oil
Recipe: Pressure cook toor daal. Soak tamarind in bowl of water. Make wheat flour dough as you make for roties.
After the daal is cooked and cooker is cooled, put turmeric powder, salt in it. And mix it properly. Heat oil in a big pan, put mustard in it. Once it starts to crackle add pinch of asafotida. Squeeze the tamrind and add the tamarind water to the heated oil. Add red chilly powder, sambar powder (actually you should put Kala masala; the popular ingredient in my cooking and not available here). Put the softened daal and a glass of water. You can add more if you like it. Bring this dall to boil. If you like you can add tomatoes, onions to the daal while pressure cooking it.
While the daal is boiling, make a little thick roti of the dough. Cut it small squares of it using knife. If you want to be creative, you can actually make different shapes out of the dough like starts, small balls, spirals as we used to do it in childhood :-). They taste gooooood. Once daal comes to boil, add jaggary. The right amount of jaggary is; its size should as big as the remainants of tamarind after you squeeze it. Add the wheat dumplings in the daal. Put gas on sim and let dough cook. It will take around 10-15 minutes to cook.
This is a main course and you don't need to make roti or rice with it. Serve with tons of ghee. Try it, you can't have it just once !!!
Friday, April 13, 2007
Paratha
I like to call myself paratha expert. Call it experimentation or sheer laziness of cooking roti and sabji separately, I like to mix vegetables in flour and make different types of parathas. And here I want to clear of the myth that parathas are very difficult to make.
Ok the stuffed ones are difficult to learn but once you get the trick, there is no looking back. We can make two types of parathas: stuffed or mixed (as I like to call it)
Till the time I come up with good written explanation for how to make stuffed paratha, lets make the simple parathas. Also the quantity of ingredients given is not strict. You can change as you instinct permits :-)
Lets make the mixed type paratha
Ingredients: Any of the vegetables like cauliflower, cabbage, cucumber, raddish, potato, spinach, methi… or any leafy vergetable for that matter. I have never tried mixing two or more vegetables but you can try that also. That should make interesting taste.
Salt, 1 teaspoon turmeric powder, 2 teaspoon red chilly powder or paste of green chillies and ginger, coriander leaves, lime juice, 1 teaspoon cumin seeds, 1 tea spoon ajwain, 2 cups wheat flour, 1 tea spoon garam masala and optional gram flour
Reciepe: If you are taking a green vegetable, Chop it finely. If you are using vegetables like cauliflower, cabbage, grate it or chop finely in mixi/food processes. Make sure there are no big lumps of the vegetable left behind. Add salt, turmeric powder, red chilly powder to this. Grind cumin seeds and ajwain and the powder. If you like taste of garam masala, add a teaspoon of masala. If you like fresh taste, put 2 spoons of green chilly+ginger paste instead of red chilly powder and garam masala. (It really tastes good, try sometime ;-)). If coriander is available, finely chop it and add two spoonfuls. Ad dash of lemon juice if you like it. Mix this mixture properly.
If you have taken vegetable like cucumber, onion, raddish or potato, which get watery, keep the mixture aside for 10 minuts. After 10 minutes, squeeze it hard and separate the water in a bowl/cup. We will use it to knead the flour.
Now add wheat flour to this mixture. You can 3-4 big spoonfuls of gram flour if you like. This gives very nice taste which I like a lot. Do not add too much of flour. It should be enough to mix out vegetable mixture. So if you have one cup of vegetables, One and half to two cups of flour should be enough. Add water to it as required, such that you get soft enough dough to make roties.
And make parathas. Put good amount of oil on them while roasting. Serve with yogurt, pickle or ketchup.
This is so simple no.
PS: Try aloo paraths(kacche allo ke parathe) this way. They taste yum !
Ok the stuffed ones are difficult to learn but once you get the trick, there is no looking back. We can make two types of parathas: stuffed or mixed (as I like to call it)
Till the time I come up with good written explanation for how to make stuffed paratha, lets make the simple parathas. Also the quantity of ingredients given is not strict. You can change as you instinct permits :-)
Lets make the mixed type paratha
Ingredients: Any of the vegetables like cauliflower, cabbage, cucumber, raddish, potato, spinach, methi… or any leafy vergetable for that matter. I have never tried mixing two or more vegetables but you can try that also. That should make interesting taste.
Salt, 1 teaspoon turmeric powder, 2 teaspoon red chilly powder or paste of green chillies and ginger, coriander leaves, lime juice, 1 teaspoon cumin seeds, 1 tea spoon ajwain, 2 cups wheat flour, 1 tea spoon garam masala and optional gram flour
Reciepe: If you are taking a green vegetable, Chop it finely. If you are using vegetables like cauliflower, cabbage, grate it or chop finely in mixi/food processes. Make sure there are no big lumps of the vegetable left behind. Add salt, turmeric powder, red chilly powder to this. Grind cumin seeds and ajwain and the powder. If you like taste of garam masala, add a teaspoon of masala. If you like fresh taste, put 2 spoons of green chilly+ginger paste instead of red chilly powder and garam masala. (It really tastes good, try sometime ;-)). If coriander is available, finely chop it and add two spoonfuls. Ad dash of lemon juice if you like it. Mix this mixture properly.
If you have taken vegetable like cucumber, onion, raddish or potato, which get watery, keep the mixture aside for 10 minuts. After 10 minutes, squeeze it hard and separate the water in a bowl/cup. We will use it to knead the flour.
Now add wheat flour to this mixture. You can 3-4 big spoonfuls of gram flour if you like. This gives very nice taste which I like a lot. Do not add too much of flour. It should be enough to mix out vegetable mixture. So if you have one cup of vegetables, One and half to two cups of flour should be enough. Add water to it as required, such that you get soft enough dough to make roties.
And make parathas. Put good amount of oil on them while roasting. Serve with yogurt, pickle or ketchup.
This is so simple no.
PS: Try aloo paraths(kacche allo ke parathe) this way. They taste yum !
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Panhe
Since it is the summer season, I thought of starting this with a drink that will cool off all the heat and is very easy to make and off course very very favorite of mine. This is commonly made in Marathi household during summer days. I am not sure if its made in other places too.
Ingredient: Raw mangoes, sugar, salt, cardamom powder
Recipe: Pressure cook the mangoes till they become soft. 2-3 whistles should be enough. Once cooled, remove the cover and separate the soft part. You can use this as it is or put in mixi and make it uniform. This can be preserved in refrigerator for a week or so.
Whenever you want to make Panhe, mix this with chilled water in 1:4 portion and sugar to taste. You can add jaggary instead of sugar if you like it. It is cooler than sugar and gives different taste. If you like chatpata taste, you can add pinch of black salt or table salt too. Or you can add pinch of cardamom powder.
Ingredient: Raw mangoes, sugar, salt, cardamom powder
Recipe: Pressure cook the mangoes till they become soft. 2-3 whistles should be enough. Once cooled, remove the cover and separate the soft part. You can use this as it is or put in mixi and make it uniform. This can be preserved in refrigerator for a week or so.
Whenever you want to make Panhe, mix this with chilled water in 1:4 portion and sugar to taste. You can add jaggary instead of sugar if you like it. It is cooler than sugar and gives different taste. If you like chatpata taste, you can add pinch of black salt or table salt too. Or you can add pinch of cardamom powder.
The "affair" begines ...
For the first 23-24 years of my life I thought that I am born ‘kitchen hater’. As a kid I used to find thousand reasons to not help mom in kitchen. All I could manage to learn was how to make tea. I couldn’t even cook plain rice. The story of ‘how I used aata in place of besan (gram flour) in a dish and made a sticky mess’ is still famous in my family. After that fiasco dad never allowed to go near the gas-stove. Sis having natural talent in cooking would cook different dishes for me and I would dole out orders to her. My mom and all the other ladies in house used to have sleepless night thinking about ‘Kya hoga is ladaki ka shaadi ke baad ?’ They had chalked out plan of going into hiding for few years after marriage so that the husband’s side won’t find them to curse about me not being able to cook :-D.
My life seemed to go the ‘Happily ever after’ way, just when I was thrown to a land far far away called Bangalore where they served nothing but rice and rice. For a girl, not eating rice for weeks altogether this was hard to digest. There was no way to get out of it unless I start cooking myself. First few moths were very difficult; to learn to get the right amount of pressure for daal, how to turn the roti so it becomes round and not shapes of different countries, and what ingredient goes with what and in what sequence. There was so much learning you see and my learning curve was pretty fast, with help of my roomies and of course numerous calls to mom. As I started cooking, I discovered that I actually love it, not only that, I enjoy inviting people over and making different dishes for them. I should tell you that moiself along with roomies have hosted quite few successful parties like the bridal shower we had for a friend, Ganpati pooja when I tried putran-poli for first time. With time, calls to mom have reduced and variety in the food in increased. Now I aspire to open a restaurant of my own some day.
Till then I thought of putting some simple recipes together for new learners like me and some experiments that I try out, and some dishes that I love to make again and again. Any contributions or suggestions are more than welcome :-).
PS: I might tend to use lot of Marathi/Hindi names for the ingredient names I don’t know.
My life seemed to go the ‘Happily ever after’ way, just when I was thrown to a land far far away called Bangalore where they served nothing but rice and rice. For a girl, not eating rice for weeks altogether this was hard to digest. There was no way to get out of it unless I start cooking myself. First few moths were very difficult; to learn to get the right amount of pressure for daal, how to turn the roti so it becomes round and not shapes of different countries, and what ingredient goes with what and in what sequence. There was so much learning you see and my learning curve was pretty fast, with help of my roomies and of course numerous calls to mom. As I started cooking, I discovered that I actually love it, not only that, I enjoy inviting people over and making different dishes for them. I should tell you that moiself along with roomies have hosted quite few successful parties like the bridal shower we had for a friend, Ganpati pooja when I tried putran-poli for first time. With time, calls to mom have reduced and variety in the food in increased. Now I aspire to open a restaurant of my own some day.
Till then I thought of putting some simple recipes together for new learners like me and some experiments that I try out, and some dishes that I love to make again and again. Any contributions or suggestions are more than welcome :-).
PS: I might tend to use lot of Marathi/Hindi names for the ingredient names I don’t know.
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