I am back again, this time with a recipe for bottle gourd - black eyed peas curry. This is a simple everyday kind of dish, nothing fancy! Also, I would like to put a disclaimer that it may not impress everybody.So if you don't get that special smile or approval from that special some one after cooking this, please don't blame me :D! Anyways for those who love it, its an easy one that you can whip up on weeknights with chappathi/bread. Some might like it with rice too. We love it all the ways. This is just my idea of cooking this combination, you can make variations with vegetables or legumes or the recipe as you wish :)

Here goes the recipe....

 

Ingredients

Black eyed Peas(karamani) - 1 cup

Bottle Gourd(churanga/lauki) - 2 cups diced

Tomato - 1 big

Green Chillies - 2

Garlic Cloves - 3

Turmeric pdr - 1/2tsp

Red Chilli pdr - 1-2tsp

Coconut Milk - almost 1/2 a can

Salt

Red Chillies/Red Chilli flakes

Mustard - 1 tsp

Shallots - 5

Curry Leaves

Oil

P.S.  I have the habit of using curry leaves stalk as it gives more flavor. But forgot to remove it before taking snaps, so please don't be scared... :D!  Ok, now time for few tips...

1. Coconut oil will give a special flavor to the curry, but its not a must!
2. You can use any other squash vegetable instead of bottle gourd. Some of the options are ash gourd, cucumber, zucchini, chow chow, ridge gourd, snake gourd etc. 
3. You can use other legumes like cow peas, kidney beans, navy beans etc. (Each veg/ legume will impart its own special flavor to this curry)
4. You can also do the same without bottle gourd and just the black eyed peas.
5. You can use coconut paste instead of coconut milk. 
6. Last but not the least, you can avoid the coconut milk also and just season it after pressure cooking as mentioned above. (adding little tamarind might give some extra taste in this method)

                                                 
                                        

Now getting back to the recipe of the day. Recently we happened to try Chinese Sichuan cuisine. The first time I tried their cumin lamb(it has a complicated name, but they know it if we just say cumin lamb..), I thought they had Indian chefs in the kitchen. It has this strong cumin flavor and a roasted taste which very well reminds us of the non veg roast dishes we get back in India. I was not a big fan of lamb meat, but now whenever we go there, cumin lamb is always the first in the list of ordered food. The only problem with this is the excess amount of oil used in the dish. So we tried to recreate this recipe in a healthier way in our kitchen, without that layer of oil floating and I am happy to say that the taste was almost 90% close. So here it comes,

                                   


                                          

Ingredients

Sliced Meat(Lamb/Beef) - 1lb
Onion - one med red onion

Bell pepper - red and green (half each)

Jalapeno - 1
Ginger garlic paste - 1 tsp

Garlic - 3
Spring Onion - 2
Soy Sauce - 3 tbsp
Chilli Garlic Paste - 1/2 tsp

Red Chillies - 6

Salt to Taste
Oil( Olive/Veg)


Method

• Buy boneless sliced lamb. It should be thin slices/strips. If you are using chicken instead of lamb, take frozen chicken breast pieces and slice it thinly.
• Marinate the lamb slices with ginger garlic paste, lime juice, salt, soy sauce(2 tbsp), cumin powder(3 tbsp), turmeric powder, coriander powder, red chilly flakes and set aside in the fridge for at least one hour.(The longer you keep the better its flavor)
• Heat 1 tbsp of oil in a non stick pan and fry this marinated meat till its well done and dark brown in color.Set aside.
• Heat oil, add red chilies and saute few secs till flavor infuses the oil. Then add diced onion, diced bell pepper, diced jalapeno, crushed and minced garlic and finally spring onion whites and saute few mins.
• Add soy sauce(1 tbsp), chilli garlic sauce and toss well and then add the remaining cumin powder and and mix well and cook few mins till fragrant.
• Now add the fried and cooked meat , toss well and cook for 5 more mins till its well done, dry and roasted.
• Garnish with spring onion greens.

~Luv
Resh

I baked a soft and moist and yummmmmmmy banana bread to celebrate this come back. This is no recipe of mine, just followed the steps of this beautiful lady in you tube

In addition to above steps, I just threw in some chopped walnuts and dried blueberries in there and loved how the whole house was filled with the smell of banana and baking!

Anyways coming back to the topic, we finally made a black forest cake!! I have been always amazed by all the beautiful cake photographs in some wonderful blogs out there...It was something I imagined only professionals could do!! But I have to say that I really got inspired by all those yummy cake recipes and mouth watering snaps . This is our first cake and I do not have any recipes to share here as we did not do it from scratch. I bought Betty Crocker Chocolate Cake mix and followed the instructions to bake the chocolate sponge cake and used Betty Crocker Whipped Cream and followed the recipes that I had come across in some great sites. I used vanilla essence for the sugar syrup and semi sweet dark chocolate for decoration. Unfortunately I couldn't find any Cherries (Murphys Law guys!...You dont get it when you go looking for it..) So managed with strawberries.... Did I say my black forest cake was authentic in the first place?? ;d.


P.S : Please excuse our decoration.. :d its really clumsy...I will definitely try to improve next time :)

Having said all about easy to use cake mix and ready made whipped cream, we still took one whole evening to finish this..but aren't I glad that we gave it a shot!!!. As soon we finished baking and decorating, I refrigerated it for some time, and tried out our first slices(yup, it was really difficult to resist our temptations that long!). Our first verdict - it was a bit too sweet and does not have the vanilla taste or the moist finish of a good cake. But the second day it all set in very well and the cake tasted just "yum"....I would recommend this to all those who want to try a hand in cake baking...this is of course a good start. And now, I sure can't wait to go ahead and make this cake again from scratch using all proper ingredients!


~Luv
Resh

Fried rice was never in my favorite food list until i got to try the basil fried rice from one Thai restaurant, here in Carlsbad . The flavor of basil and pepper brought an entirely new and refreshing taste to this dish and i have to tell you, I just loved it. Now this Thai restaurant is one of the few places i love to frequent, whenever I get that craving to eat something from outside..(I guess that's something for a person like me who will go for rice, moru curry/curd and pickle if any one offered me chinese food like fried riceeeee!!!)


Let me put a disclaimer before i start off with the recipe. This is not authentic and its just my idea of presenting this dish and any resemblance to the actual Thai spicy basil veg/egg fried rice is a pure coincidence ;) ...So here goes my version...

Ingredients

Rice - 1 cup (basmati or long grain white rice)
Vegs (Its your choice!!) - Capsicum/Cabbage/Celery/Beans/Asparagus/Carrot - 2 cups
Onion - 1/2 of one med onion
Green Chilly(small) - 2-3
minced garlic - 1 tsp
Spring Onion
Soy Sauce - 1- 2 tsp
Chilli Garlic Paste - 1.5 tsp
Vinegar/Tomato Ketchup - 1tsp
Freshly ground pepper - 1tbsp
Salt to Taste
Oil( Olive/Veg)
Eggs - 3
Basil Leaves - a small bunch


Method

• Cook the rice and keep it aside. It should be fluffy when cooked. You can use the refrigerated left over rice from the day before(actually that's ideal!)
• Heat oil, add minced garlic and saute well. Now add the finely chopped onion, spring onion(white part) and small green chillies and saute well till the onion is soft and pale.Now add in some salt and crushed pepper and stir for 2 minutes
• Add the chopped vegs and saute it. Cook for few minutes till done (no need of water here as the vegs are chopped fine , it will cook fast.)
• Move the vegs to one side of the pan and add a few drops of oil and the add the beaten eggs(use only two, keep the final one for garnish) on the other side and scramble it with some salt and pepper . Mix it well with the cooked veggies.
• Now throw in the basil leaves and mix well. Add some soy sauce and chilli garlic paste and tomato ketchup( I did not have vinegar) and give it a stir and cook for few minutes.
• Add in the cooked rice and mix well till all the flavors combine well.
• Garnish with green onion and scrambled egg(optional) and a generous pinch of crushed pepper. Enjoyyyyy!

It turned out to be something like the basil fried rice i had in my mind when i started off and my hubby seemed to be in good condition even after i tested this on him (except that it was a bit spicy...but then it was authentic with the spice level of Thai food;) )

~Luv
Resh

Recently I tried out a fish curry recipe using coconut. Yes, I managed to make a note of the exact amount of all the spices and other ingredients. Since I didn’t have any fresh fish in stock or fresh grated coconut, I was a little doubtful (I was a bit depressed after my ‘batura’ stunt!). It will taste a lot more “yummy-licious” if we can use fresh fish with proper ‘fish’ smell (I know it sounds weird, but the fish fillets we get in grocery stores here(US) doesn’t have any smell…no vikaaram!!!), fresh grated coconut and last but not the least “man-chatti”(earthern ware). I don’t have man-chatti also, but inspite of all the shortcomings, this dish was good enough for a satisfying meal. So here goes the recipe…



Ingredients

Fish (I used tilapia fillets) – approx. 1 lb
Shallots (Kunjulli) – 5 small ones (cut into two)
Ginger - 1" piece (thin slices)
Garlic Clove - 4 (use whole ones and slit it)
Green Chilly – 3 (adjust according to spice level)
Curry leaves
Salt to taste
Water
Kokum (kudampuli) – 2 or 3 small pieces (too much will spoil the curry)
Coriander leaves (Cilantro)

Grinding

Coconut – 6 Tbsps ( I used dry coconut , but if you have fresh ones that’s the best)
Turmeric Powder – ½ tsp
Chilli Powder – 21/2 tsps (I used kashmiri chilli, it brings out a nice rich red colour and wont be too spicy. Use less if adding regular chilli powder)
Coriander Powder – 21/2 tbsps (If you have coriander seeds, substitute half the amount with seeds.)
Dry Red Chilly – 5 (adjust according to spice level)

Seasoning

Coconut oil – 2 tbsps
Shallots – 4 (depending on size)
Curry leaves
Fenugreek (uluva) – 1 tsp

Method

• Soak Kokum in ¼ cup water for 10 minutes.
• Grind the ingredients mentioned in the Grinding section with some water to a very smooth paste.
• Heat the pan or man-chatti and add the ground coconut paste and some water to dilute it (You can adjust water level according to how thick you want it, but we need some water here as it will come down later).
• Now add shallots, green chilly, ginger, garlic, curry leaves, salt and the soaked kudampuli along with its water and give it a stir. Once this comes to a boil on medium flame, add the fish pieces and gently coat it with the gravy and cook covered for another 5 minutes.
• Fish doesn’t take much time to cook, so keep it on low-med flame and keep covered. After 5 -6 minutes, remove the lid, give it a swirl (handle with care - breakable!). Give a taste test now and add some salt if not enough. Cook for a few more minutes uncovered until the gravy becomes a little thick. Add some coriander leaves and give it a swirl and switch off the stove.
• Heat some coconut oil , add fenugreek (don’t add too much, curry will become bitter) and once it becomes golden brown color , add curry leaves and the sliced shallots and sauté till the shallots are light brown in color. Pour this over the curry and keep the lid closed for another 1 hr( Do not disturb ;D..it tastes good when it sits for some time and all the flavors combine well).

Note: As you know this tastes even better the next day, so spare some for the next day also :). Do not use big onions instead of shallots, it will spoil the taste of this curry. Use coconut oil for seasoning for that added flavor. I haven’t tried this with tamarind, hence I am not sure of the taste with the same. Instead of this seasoning you can use just coconut oil and curry leaves also to temper the gravy. If you have faith in me after my Batura disaster: D, be brave… go ahead, try it out and let me know……


~Luv
Resh

~Luv
Resh

After an unexpected start in blogging, I got so engrossed with its look, feel and the comments from people reading it, that I forgot about cooking dinner. As I said before it’s quite intoxicating! My husband who had been very encouraging and happy with the thought of me blogging, didn’t seem to be that ‘enthu’ after my first blogging show. To be exact his expression made it clear the meaning of the Malayalam proverb –“vadi koduthu adi vangi" (Somebody plz help me here with the proper proverb for this situation in English!!). I know I can’t blame him as the reason behind this dullness is the thought whether he will be deprived of home cooked food for the coming days because of his wife’s new found interest. Although he gave me looks and actions to let me know that, he is very hungry, I didn’t seem to notice. I also seem to ignore the sounds from my stomach who was trying in its own way to make me aware of dinner time. Finally I came to my senses when my poor hubby gave up his attempts and started heating the Pulissery (whatever was left over in fridge!!) and Bread. Yes…..the side effects of blogging. Finally we ended up having Bread and Pulissery. Now I can hear all the “what’s!” and exclamations from every one reading this. But let me tell you Bread and Pulissery is a great combo, especially when you are very hungry;D. I know it sounds weird, but try it out once and let me know!

Having said about the side effects of blogging, my husband after realizing his mistake has established a golden rule between us for a good healthy, happy family life - Cooking comes first and blogging only after that!!! To justify this, i thought of posting this Mambazha Pulissery recipe. I don’t offer anything new or secret in this recipe (except my love of course:)).For those who are not from Kerala, it is a curry made with ripe mango, coconut and yogurt . It’s an all time favorite of Malayalees with a unique combination of sweet and sour taste.

Ingredients
Ripe Mango – 1 (I used a big one.)
Green chilly – 1 or 2 (slit into four halves. Use according to your spice level).
Turmeric Powder – 1/2 tsp
Red Chilly Powder – 1 tsp
Salt to taste
Water
Curry leaves

Grinding
Coconut - 1/2 cup
Jeera
Green Chilly -1
Yogurt/Curd - 1/2 cup

Seasoning
Mustard seeds
Fenugreek seeds (Uluva)
Curry leaves
Dry Red Chilly

Method