Day Planner-25thMar2012-Sunday

Day 3 – 25^th Mar – Sunday:

Saturday’s hangover of a beautiful romantic night got finished by early morning 7am on Sunday. He had invited his friend, Prathibha, a yoga therapist to the home who came from Hyderabad and stayed with us on that day and left to her yoga centre (ashram) in Jigani where she practices yoga.

As I already said you the oil got over, morning breakfast was from Shanthi Sagar restaurant nearby to the house (1/2 a km). We had Paper Masala Dosa, which is thin like a paper and a big one (1 ½ size of our normal dosa) stuffed with aloo poriyal/playa in the centre served along with chutney and sambar. Except my hubby, all the 3 ordered the same while he picked up his choice – Masala Dosa which was again served with chutney and sambar, stuffed with aloo curry in the centre. I ordered for kesaribhat by imagining ghee flowing with pineapple in slightly yellow color but L it was hard without any ghee no pineapple, felt very sad. Then I said my hubby my dosa and my kesari itself is better than this.

Before going to the restaurant, I had soaked for dosa.

Dosa Batter Recipe:

Ingredients:

Rice – 2 cups

Whole grain urad dhal – 1 cup (90% of the cup)

Toor Dhal / tuvaram paruppu – a fistful

Fenugreek Seeds – 1 tbsp

Method:

Wash for 3 to 4 times

Soak altogether for atleast 8 hours (9 am to 4:30pm)

Blend it in the grinder till it becomes soft

Remove it from the grinder add salt and keep it aside overnight, it will get fermented

In the morning add some more salt if required along with a pinch of baking soda

Heat a tawa and pour little oil and put the dosa batter in the centre and spread it along the sides

Crispy Dosa with a colorful texture is ready

(Momma, I did not take the snaps)

Lunch Menu:

Main Curry: Pachamajjiga (recipe will come soon)

Rasam: Dhal Rasam

Rice, Papads

Side Dish: I made onion rings, which I want to contribute to “I am star event” (see below for recipe)

Dinner Menu by Srinivas, my beloved hubby:

Phulkas and Cauliflower Kurma (recipes will arrive soon with beautiful pictures)

Phulkas were so soft which he rolled and I roasted. Hats off

Collage - Onion Rings

Onion Rings:

Ingredients:

Onion – 1

Curds – 1 tbsp

Roasted Papads - 1

Seasoned Flour:

All purpose flour/maida – 2 tbsp

Chilli Powder – 2 tsp

Salt – 2 tsp

Method:

Chop the onions into thin rings

First dip it in curds followed by seasoned flour if you feel the flour has not caught properly, dip it again in curds followed by seasoned flour

Finally put it in roasted papads

Do the same with all the rings

Heat oil in a wok/kadai and put these rings slowly into the hot oil

Fry them slowly and once you feel they are fried, take it out on colander and drain the oil

Yummy side dish is ready.

This method is called as “Dip and Dunk”, I felt this word as catchy. I found this in an interesting post written by Aarthi on yummytummy.

Submitting this post to:

a. "I am star" event at Vegetarian Food & Me authored by Rasya Srinath.

  

b. "Serve It - Stir Fried" at Krithi's Kitchen authored by Krithika

 

 

c.Bon Vivant - Savory @ Sumee's Culinary Bites authored by Sumedha.

 

d. Speedy Snacks @ simply.food authored by Nayna Kanbar

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Is Cooking a challenge?

Is Cooking a challenge?

Yep cooking is a challenge for a person like me. I married on Feb 14 2003, learnt how to make coffee and sambar, rasam from my hubby. Oops, as there is a saying "Practice makes woman/man perfect", it took atleast an year for me to make a good sambar/rasam. My father-in-law was working for defence when we married and my mom-in-law stayed with my father-in-law. They were in Noida. Once I was 8th month pregnant carrying Aditya, my mom-in-law came down and started staying with us.

From that time, till last year she was making delicious food, I used to help her only by chopping the vegetables. On Saturdays, if I cook by any chance, it used to be a disaster. But after starting blogging seriously I learnt so many new things which included to set the measurements  right. For example, making Rasam is very easy only few ingredients - salt, rasam powder, tomato, water, jaggery and any additional things to add flavour - curry leaves, cilantro. It can be cooked with or without dhal. But if the measurements are not correct, then it would be tragic situation at home.
For different rasams please click here.

Belated Ugadi festivals wishes to all my blog readers. I know, might be you are thinking why I am wishing in this post. Coming straight to the answer, Ugadi is also considered as New Year for Andhrites or Telugu people and also for Kannadigas and a start for all new things. Ok, so what?

I have started cooking from this Ugadi in my house and today, it is 6th day of my successful food at my home. Successful????  My hubby who loves to have tasty food, said you are preparing good dishes. Wow, that helps me put a new cap of Chef in my house, which I lacked almost for 9 years after my marriage.

I have seen spinsters being part of events and cooking delicious food to name few:
a. Preeti - Preeti's Kitchen
b. Maha - Maha's Lovely Home
c. Aarthi - Yummy Tummy

Hats off to these spinsters and lovely moms.

Lovely moms cooking food for their family:
a. Srivalli Jetti - Spicingyourlife
b. Vaishali Sabna -  Ribbons to Pastas
c. Meena - Chattersmusings
d. Radhika - Ticking palates
e. Madhuram - Eggless Cooking
f. Saraswathi Iyer - sarascorner
g. Divya - Dilse
h. Hema - Aromatic Cooking
i. Mireille - Global Tastes and Travels
j. Pradnya's - Pumpkin Farm 
k. Sharmi - Neivedyam

These are just a few to name. There are many please visit here to see whom I follow.

So, here is just a list of what I made, the recipes will come out soon.
Day 1 - 23rd March 2012 - Ugadi
Sweet was: Akkibelepayasa. As this has to be done for Nivedhyam, it was done by my mom.
Sambar: Carrot, Turnip and Potato
Rasam: Dhal Rasam
Side Dishes: Papads and Aamvada (aamvada was prepared by my hubby, as I had to catch my little son Aadya).
Hit thing was cooking we started at 12pm and 1:30pm it was ready. Usually, we used to take our meals only by 3pm on festival day.

Reason for me entering kitchen was: My MIL, FIL and Aadya, little one was going to Vizag the next day, i.e., on 24th March 2012 so in-laws were busy packing their luggage for a fortnight. My hubby only informed them to pack and asked me to cook food. I was happy to get an opportunity and more happier when it came out with great tastes.

Day 2 - 24th March 2012: First Voyage of my inlaws and little one in flight.

Aadya excited as he is out of house

MIL in tension about his son

FIL posing

Aditya had Science exam on this day and was back from School at 12:45pm. I was excited and planned to do the following:

Sambar: Tomato Pappu (replace ridge gourd in the linked post only with tomatoes)
Rasam: Dhal Rasam
Starter/Appetizer: Crispy Noodles (next post)

Lunch menu was perfectly fine and was ready by the time Aditya arrived from his school.

Planned evening snacks did not turn up:
Evening Snacks(planned): Eggless Dates Cake which turned out to be bad because i added more maida and made it thick mass.

Eggless Dates Cake - Disaster (due to more maida)

Potato Cheese Balls: Potato palya was ready and I had brought Cheese from store. But I did not check the oil, which had got over.

Adi smiling at me keeping an ice cube on his head (his experiment)

Potato balls after keeping it in freezer

Potato Balls before keeping it in freezer

So evening snacks did not go well. Hence, I learnt the lesson once again, planning is essential.

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Crispy Noodles

Crispy Noodles:

I promised my child about crispy noodles sometime back. Only on Friday, I searched the google how to make the maggi noodles crispy. Have you come across American Chopusey made out of vegetables and sauces, yep it is crispy which I had ever tasted in noodles.

I got two results for this crispy noodles which I found interesting.

a. Hemas Food - Chilly Carrot Chow Mein

b. Khana Khazanna - American Chopsuey

On Friday during lunch table, I discussed this with my colleagues, they said it cannot be done in maggi noodles, might be we have to use different one. Then Padma, my colleague said send me the links, I sent both the links. By seeing the first link she said I did not understand how it would turn out to be crispy. After seeing the second link, she pointed out noodles have to be fried before cooking and she pasted it from that link on to msn lync - online communicator. This is what I remembered to make them crispy.

Interesting line which I read in Khana Khazanna was, this is a Chinese Fried Rice found in Indian Restaurants but surprisingly the name was American Chopusey. To know history about this dish I browsed thro' wikipedia and found it as american pasta made out of macaroni and beef. Johnny Marzetti is a similar dish and started at Ohio and had spread across US. (source: wikipedia). 

Thanks to blogging world because they try to convert non-vegetarian food into vegetarian, vegetarian into vegans to find the new taste and new food. 

Ingredients:

Grated Paneer - few (optional)

Carrot - 1 Medium

Capsicum - 1 Medium

Onion - 1 Medium

Maggi Noodles - 1 Packet

Tomato - 1 Medium

Potatoes - 2 (boiled and mashed)

Chilly Sauce - 2 tsp

Tomato Sauce (maggi squeeze) - 2 tsp

Water as required

Green Chillies - 2 nos

Oil - 1 cup

Mustard Seeds - 1 tsp

Curry leaves - few to taste

Cilantro - few to taste

Method:

Boil water in a vessel and add maggi noodles to it for 3 minutes. Do not over cook the noodles.

Remove the maggi noodles from the hot water and run it under cold water for 2 minutes

Boiled & Run under cold water

Put it under fan in a big plate (noodles should be separate and should not stick to any) so that it can get dried up easily and quickly

Boil potatoes and once cooled smash and keep it aside

Chop green chillies, onion, capsicum, tomato and keep it aside

Grate the carrot and keep it aside

Heat oil in a kadai, when hot add dried noodles a little and fry them till it become brown. Brown color indicates they are crispy, while black indicates they have  burnt. :)

Remove some hot oil from the kadai and keep only little oil

To this oil add mustard seeds, once it splutters add curry leaves

Then add onion and fry well, add capsicum, carrot and fry all of them well

Add tomatoes followed by salt, green chillies and maggi noodles powder.

Add chilly sauce and tomato sauce mix them well 

See the taste and adjust according to your taste

Finally add the fried noodles and mix them well

Garnish with cilantro and serve directly, but kids will definitely add tomato ketchup as side dish.

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Onion Tomato Sandwich

Onion Tomato Sandwich:

Final exam time to all school children. All the best children. Definitely parents will be having a tuff time to make their children study, write and then face the exam. It would be as if parents are facing exam. This is the same in my case for my first son, Aditya.

Aditya is studying in III Standard and he is indifferent to other children. He would not keep his books neatly, tear pages from his classwork/homework and make greeting cards, use them for some project work which his class teacher or subject teacher would not have told. Warn him, punish him still no wonder he does the same thing again and again. His exams are going on from yesterday, 19th March and will end on 26th March. He will read maximum of one hour and tell "mama i have finished". So our conversation began in this way:

Adi: Mama, I have finished

Me: Wow, my son has just read. Now can you take up a test

Adi: I will tell you all answers but not writing please mama

Me: You are in III Standard and you have written test and not oral, my dear

Adi: (somehow agrees) Ok give me the test

Me: Give me your text book, i will mark questions for you in Hindi (as this was the first test)

Adi: You have given me one question from each lesson but why 2 questions from this lesson alone.

Me: That's how the question paper will be what your madam would have set. Because there might be choice to select 5 questions out of 7 questions. But in home you have to write all.

Adi: No you remove one question, or you give 2 questions from all chapters.

Me: Finally, I told him you write one question in that lesson.

Adi: (once he completed his test) Now I want sandwich which you had promised

I had promised him once he completes this test, he will have a yummy sandwich.

Yep, here is the recipe for the same.

Ingredients:

• Onion - 2
• Tomato - 2
• Curry leaves - few
• Cilantro - few
• Salt to taste
• Red Chilli Powder - 2 tsp
• Bread Slices - 8
• Oil - 2 tsp
• Butter for roasting the bread

Method:

Onion - Tomato Sandwich Spread:

• Chop the onion, and tomatoes
• Add Oil and once it is hot, add chopped onion julienne
• Fry them for sometime and add tomato and fry till tomatoes become soft
• Add curry leaves, salt, chilli powder and mix them well
• Sprinkle cilantro and switch off the stove

 

Onion - Tomato Sandwich:

• Heat Dosa Pan and put a little oil on that
• Take 2 bread slices and spread butter on them on both sides
• Keep it on dosa pan in medium flame and switch over to the other side after 2 minutes and toast it well
• Spread the Onion -Tomato chutney on one slice of the bread and keep other bread on top of it
• Cut it into triangle shape
• Serve it with tomato ketchup

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