Monday, February 27, 2012

Inji Rasam - BM#13 - Week 2 - Day 2


We all are aware that I am in Blogging Marathon 13, hosted by Srivalli every month between 16th to last day of the month. It is in two groups the first group is from 16th to 22nd and second month is from 23rd to 30th. This month being February it is upto 29th. I have selected my theme as “7 days of rasam”.

Smile Please
Rasam has a great power in digestion and as I told in my house without Rasam lunch/dinner is never complete. Thanks to Wikipedia which gave me more information on this topic along with names. I found a name from this and through google search I am able to get new rasam for my family.

Today I am going to post recipe on Inji Rasam which is good when any dear family member is suffering from cold and fever. Inji is a tamil word of Ginger. It is alam in telugu, shunti in kannada. I got this rasam recipe in Neivedyam.




Ingredients:
Tomato – 2
Tamarind Water (medium consistency) – 3 tsp
Ginger – 2 inches
Crystal Salt – 1 tbsp
Rasam Powder – 2 tbsp
Turmeric Powder – ¼ tsp
Jaggery – a small piece
Water – as required
Cooked Toor Dhal Water - as required

For seasoning:
Mustard Seeds – 1 tsp
Cumin Seeds – 1 tsp
Oil – 2 tsp
Curry leaves – few
Coriander leaves – few

Method:
It’s always better to keep all the ingredients ready so that it wouldn’t get missed out and it wouldn’t be added twice (by mistake also). It’s handier while cooking.
Wash and blend tomatoes along with ginger
Heat oil in a kadai and add grounded tomato and ginger to that once the oil becomes hot. Beware of the sizzling sound
 












Squeeze the tamarind and pour the tamarind water along with the above mixture and leave it to boil
Add water as required and leave it to boil till the raw smell of tamarind goes off
Add rasam powder, turmeric, asafoetida (hing), jaggery and salt allow it to boil so that all these gets mixes well
Add cooked toor dhal water and wait till a foam forms or it boils
Heat oil in a different kadai and once hot add mustard seeds, cumin seeds, curry leaves and put it on the rasam leave it for one more minute by adding coriander leaves along with it.
Healthy rasam is ready.

This rasam was of medium consistency, if needed you can add water as per your requirement.

It’s great if you could drop here to check out what other Blogging Marathoners are up with in BM# 13

Pulichaar - Day 3 - Week 2 - BM 13

Pulichaar - Day 3 - Week 2 - BM 13:

I am able to make the things in weekend but unable to post it on the same day. Let me speed up posting in the next marathon.

Today, is Day 3 of BM#13, my theme is “7 days of rasam” and I am herewith presenting a rasam which is called as Pulichaau. People make fun stating whoever eats this rasam more they are intellectual. I am not sure how much this is truth as I have met different people in my life so far. This Rasam is also called as Milagu Rasam. Milagu means pepper and as it is the main ingredient in this rasam along with cumin seeds.

This rasam is very good for health and it can be consumed directly when there is cold. Yep, my readers might ask, “Hema, your rasams are good for cold. Why so?”. Reason for this is:
  1. In Bangalore the weather keeps on changing. It would be so cold in the early mornings, it would be hot mid day and by evening it would have become chill. Being born and brought up here in Bangalore the weather makes me feel cold and cough once in a week.
  2. “Congress plant” which grows in most of the places in Bangalore by itself, causes cold due to its pollen grains and give raise to diseases like Sinusitis, Asthma, and so on.
To prevent this cold it’s better to have some medicinal food instead of tablets. To cure this it is good to have medicinal food along with the tablets.

My post for today is Pulcharu. “Pul” means puli or sour which is nothing but the tangy taste of tamarind. “Charu” is a telugu word which means rasam in English. So “pulcharu” means rasam made out of tamarind. No tomato is used in this rasam.

Ingredients:
Pulicharu Ingredients
Tamarind – a lemon sized ball
Crystal Salt – 1 tbsp
Cumin Seeds + Pepper Powder – 2 tsp
Turmeric Powder – ¼ tsp (optional, in our house we don’t use this)
Jaggery – a small piece
Water – as required

For seasoning:
Mustard Seeds – 1 tsp
Oil – 2 tsp
Red Chillies – 2 nos
Curry leaves – few
Coriander leaves – few

Cumin and Pepper powder:


In our house as we make this atleast once in a week, I powder and keep black pepper and cumin seeds coarsely. Pepper should be less in quantity and cumin should be more. When we prepare this Rasam, just add this powder instead of adding cumin seeds powder and pepper powder separately.





Method:
Pulichaar / Milagu Rasam
  • Take tamarind and leave it in lukewarm water at max for half an hour, so that we could get more pulp
  • Squeeze tamarind and keep the pulp aside
  • Heat oil in a kadai and when oil is hot, add mustard seeds when it splutters, add curry leaves and small pieces of red chillies
  • Then add tamarind pulp, cumin seeds and pepper powder and allow it to boil nicely
  • When the aroma comes, add coriander leaves and leave it just for one minute and turn off the stove, serve it with rice.

Sharing a moment: As my little angel slept on Saturday I started to make this, by the time the pepper powder was ready (within 10 mins) he got up. Having him along with me and cooking was a great experience. See he is giving a smiling and commenting "Hi All, my mom could prepare it having me on her hip". 










I appreciate if you could check out other Blogging Marathoners in BM# 13

Friday, February 24, 2012

Jeera Rasam - BM#13 - Week 2 - Day 1


Jeera Rasam - BM#13 - Week 2 - Day 1:





I am herewith again in Blogging Marathon 13 for the second week. I have selected my theme as "7 days of delicious rasam".


Rasam is considered as a south Indian meal, which can be had along with rice or can be consumed as a soup. It’s very good for digestion. In my house, without Rasam my hubby or my son will not have their dinner.

I was going thro’ Wikipedia, Shanthi’sthaligai blog and iyercooks blog. I found this intereting Jeera Rasam. By the name, I thought it should be just adding cumin seeds powder along with rasam powder to make normal rasam. But there was a change in that, and it’s very instant one. Dhal Rasam is made out of cooked rasam and it can be thick or thin. Tomato Rasam is made out of tomato puree and it would be thick. Tamarind Rasam would be thin in consistency. As I never heard of it, thought it would be like tamarind rasam. I went through the post and found it was very interesting and handy also.

Ingredients:
  • Tomato – 1
  • Tamarind Water (medium consistency) – 5 tsp
  • Cumin Seeds – 2 tsp
  • Toor Dhal – half of our fist
  • Crystal Salt – 1 tbsp
  • Rasam Powder – 2 tbsp
  • Turmeric Powder – ¼ tsp
  • Jaggery – a small piece
  • Water – as required

 



 








For seasoning:
  • Mustard Seeds – 1 tsp
  • Cumin Seeds – 1 tsp
  • Curry leaves – few
  • Coriander leaves – few

Method:
  • Keep all the ingredients ready so that you wouldn’t miss out anything
  • Chop the tomato into small pieces
 
  • Roast cumin seeds and toor dhal till they turn in color and keep it aside









  • Heat oil in a kadai and add tomato pieces to that once the oil becomes hot. Beware of the sizzling sound


  • Squeeze the tamarind and pour the water into tomato and leave it to boil


  • Coarsely grind cumin seeds and toor dhal 









  •  Add it into tomato-tamarind mixture


  • Add water as required and leave it to boil till the raw smell of tamarind goes off
  • Add rasam powder, turmeric, asafoetida (hing), jaggery and salt allow it to boil so that all these gets mixes well

  • Heat oil in a different kadai and once hot add mustard seeds, cumin seeds, curry leaves and put it on the rasam leave it for one more minute by adding coriander leaves along with it.


  • Yummy rasam is ready.

 

My rasam was of medium consistency, if needed you can add water as per your requirement. I was happy because all tasted the rasam and told it was good, and the photos came out of little better quality.


Submitting this to my event - Murari - Anniversary - Giveaway - 2012


Dedicating a song "Pyarge agabitite" , new kannada urdu mix song from film Govindaya Namaha to my blog readers. 

Thursday, February 23, 2012

4th Year Birthday - Banana Halwa











4th Year Birthday:

Happy Birthday "Hema's Adugemane". Hurray, you are turning 4 today. 

Flashback: My first post was on Childhood which I wrote on 23rd Feb 2009. My second post was on Advantages by studying in one school and how we can have our friends from childhood. The next 3 posts were on any forwarded mail which I got and I was inspired by them. From the 6th post I started posting recipes from my son's KinderGarten English Text book which had good recipes on left and on right there was lessons and poems. Once the recipes in the book got over I did not understand what to post, so I started by writing recipes on this blog. Thus this blog became a "food blog".

Once I posted Shraddanjali to my beloved hero/actor, Dr.Vishnuvardhan the traffic started towards my blog. I took a break from Aug'2010 to Aug'2011 and was back in Sep'2011 when the page hits were just 7k+. My heart was literally broken due to less traffic.

I started posting in my blog and pasting the link in "n" number of pages in facebook. In Dec' 2011 I had an event for Christmas and posted its roundup in Jan' 2012. In Jan' 2012 I participated in Blogging Marathon conducted by Srivalli Jetti in her blog Spice up your life, this gave a new life to my blog and today the hits have reached 15k+ and increased the readers to 89. Thanks to all of you.



 


 
 
On this birthday, hence I am presenting you with Banana Halwa. This Halwa was published in "Swathi", a weekly magazine and my beloved hubby told me to try recipes which were there in that book.


Ingredients:
Banana (riped ones) - 2
Ghee - 2 tbsp
Sugar - 4 tsp
Cardamom Powder - 1 tsp


Method:
Chop the bananas into small pieces and blend it in a blender/food processor/mixer.
Heat ghee in a kadai and add grounded banana into the ghee
Add sugar and cardamom powder and mix well
When the ghee leaves the edges of the kadai, and grounded banana would have taken brownish color remove it from the stove and pour it on a greased plate

My favourite song in dedication to you all, on this birthday.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Potato Chips - BM#13 - Day 7

Potato Chips - BM#13 - Day 7:

Hey great to see that I was able to post for 7 days a variety of chips. As I told you, today I will be posting a vegetable chips, I am herewith potato chips. Potato Chips which is very common, yes but I tweaked a little. Hema, is it same with pepper and salt along with butter. Wow, re you are great readers, you guessed it absolutely right. And again it is microwave oven recipe, right, sweetie? Hey my readers are absolutely great they know how I make chips now. Thanks to all of you for making me successful.

Surprising thing of my post on chips were I was not aware that there were no pineapple pieces chips,  black grapes chips and tomato chips. It was my innovative, I did not think also that I can come up with something new. 

Potato is a vegetable which is rich in starch. Elders say not to have too much because it might cause gastric problem. But seriously due to its taste I tend to eat more. So my granny told one thing, mix potato with pepper powder so that it would avoid gastric problem. So in today's chips I have added the same and presenting it here as well it was a send off to my friend, Poornima who is moving to other project to other building, which is about 1.5 kms away from our building. I had a nice time with her since Nov' 11 till date. She was the one who was the first one to tell on my face, that she liked or disliked my recipes. She said potato chips were great.

Unfortunately I started preparing it only by 5pm and power was shut down for few minutes because of which my potato turned to be only 80% crispy. I am skipping the ingredients as you would have read it by this time in my first paragraph.

How I made it?


  • I brought a big potato from home. Washed it and removed the skin by using my finger nails. Thanks to my nails which I could use as a peeler in office.
  • Chop the potato into thin slices.
  • Keep it in oven for 6 minutes
  • Remove it and grease each slice with butter, pepper powder and salt
  • Leave it for another 4 minutes. (I was short by 2 minutes here as my office cab started).
  • Munch it as a healthy snack.
Don't miss wonderful recipes cooked by other Blogging Marathoners in BM# 13.

If you have missed  my other recipes of chips its here.




Fruits:

Vegetable: