Drumstick Sambar

I know each one of you are going to laugh your lungs out reading this post.  The first disastrous dish I prepared for my FIL & hubby.  When I read the event hosted by Rafeeda  I though it was the perfect time for me to post this. Thank you Rafeeda.

Sambar is one of the very  most important and simple curry which is prepared in any South Indian house. Goes very well with rice, idli, dosa, vada the list is never ending.

I was out from college and the next day I picked up a job, so helping mom with household work was my job, never ventured into the kitchen for cooking as mom never wanted us to do it. 

I was 23 when I got married,  after few days my FIL  said  why don’t you make sambar for lunch.  First  entry to the kitchen as so many days my FIL cooked for us as I was not lucky enough to see my MIL as she was not alive.  My FIL at his 70’s was  pretty good in cooking.  I could not say NO to him and  I thought it was a very simple task to make the sambar,  with little bit of doubts  I wanted to call and ask mom  but no  phone and no mobile, no internet also those days.  All I remembered was seeing the plate in which  mom gave the masala to grind at home, so I remembered all  the ingredients although not perfectly the right proportions.  

I planned to make sambar with drumstick and ladies finger. I fried all the masala and kept aside to let it cool so that I could grind to a fine paste.

On the other side I  cut the drumstick and started to boil, put the fried ladies finger and  cooked with salt.  Then added the masala at this time I realized the sambar is still watery.  Then I realized that I had forgotten to put  the tur dal, just took a bit of the daal, washed it well and put it into the sambar. Now the sambar is boiling on and on, wondering why the daal is not getting cooked and instead the sambar was becoming thick, so all I did as to  add water and again boil, you know what had happened the drumsticks and ladies finger  got over cooked and mashed and invisible of the vegetables except the thread like sticks of the drumstick, in between the daal uncooked worrying me.  Finally it was time for lunch  now no more time to cook. So I just put the tadka and set it on the table for lunch.

My FIL comes to the table and starts his lunch at that time he just put the sambar on rice all he saw was sticks and mashed ladies finger and sambar so gooey and finally the great daal uncooked. All he said was to me you don’t know cooking right. That’s all, poor thing ate a bit of  rice with great difficulty. 

Khandvi

This month at the SNC Challenge 7 the South team was asked to make Khandvi by Hetal Acharya,  the North team was challenged  to make Karupatti  Appam by Shama Nagarajan.

SNC is the brain child of Divya Pramil. I am proud to be a member of this  challenge and I belong to the South team.

Lets go ahead and make the very popular Farsan from Gujarat. Looks simple and very tricky to get the perfect consistency to roll the batter into rolls. Taste yummy, you can add up a dash of  green chilli paste to the batter to make it spicy.

Panakam

Yesterday was Ram Navami and I had made this panakam for naivedyam with Vada and curd rice, however could not post it as I had a tight schedule and here I am late with the post. 

This is served chilled and  a very excellent cooler for the body too.

Murgh Masala

This is a delicious chicken preparation,  adding to this is a touch of  saffron, poppy seeds, spices and the generous amount of coriander leaves making this  dish  perfect and yummy.

 This curry goes very well with simple steamed rice or saffron rice or for  that matter any kind of  Indian breads.

Cooking Time : 45 minutes                                                               

Ingredients

Chicken – 500gms, skinned out and cut in medium pieces            Salt to taste                                                                                       Ginger – 1 pc chopped                                                                  Garlic – 4 cloves chopped                                                                 Butter or oil – 2 tbsp                                                                 Coriander leaves finely chopped  with stalks –1/2  cup                Green chillies  slit  – 2 nos.                                                           Turmeric – ¼ tsp                                                                               ¼  tsp saffron *                                                                          Yoghurt – 60gms

 *soaked in warm water

Cotton Soft Japanese Cheesecake

This has been in my to do list for some time, somehow backed out seeing the amount of eggs and cheese. This time at the Baking Partners Challenge 9 Swathi had given us 4 recipes for the cheese cakes. Since I have already baked the no bake mango cheese cake, I thought of going for the recipe given by  Reeni and thank you both of you for this wonderful challenge. Sometimes its so happen if you want to really enjoy some good cheese cake just close your eyes and bake this and dont count on the calories.

No regrets such a soft and fluffy cake this is, even whilst I was plating the cake I had hard time handling it to capture some good pictures. I did not want a chocolate toppings,  all I wanted was to add some fresh fruits but I landed up this way that I boiled some hot water and added some grapes to it and then  then tossed them on sugar  just to get the sugar coating.

Whilst baking my heart was beating so fast and kept looking at the oven reason being if the water would seep through the pan and spoil my cake although I had protected them well with the foil. Second reason  being I used APF when the recipe called for cake flour/super fine flour. Gathered my courage and gave it a try. 

Nenthrpazam Pradhaman

Happy Vishu and Tamil New Year Greeting to you all!! 

A very rich treat to the tongue, the flavor of banana and coconut goes hand in hand. Many of them like to have this pradhaman chilled.  True me too love this chilled.

I personally don’t  like to add cardamom and coconut pieces. I love to add fried jeera which is powdered and added to this recipe as this goes very well with banana and that the flavor of the banana can be felt every mouth as you sip. I you want cardamom and fried coconut pieces do so but avoid the jeera then.

It takes a long process as we need to stand and keep stirring it through out otherwise so its better to do this at ease. Today it just slipped and see my cashews got a bit burnt L

Idiyan chakka or Raw Jackfruit Podi Thooval

Raw jackfruit or Idiyan chakka is so yummy when used in  sambar, thoran or puzuku. Today I have made this simple thoran which is very commonly cooked in most of the homes.

Jackfruit tree is one common tree which you can find in most of the backyards of any house in Kerala. It’s a very tedious  and messy job in cleaning the raw jackfruit or the riped ones.

Whilst cleaning  rub some oil in the knife and your hands so that the glue from the raw jackfruit does not stick to your hands and its easy to clean too.  

My mom makes this too good and this is how she makes it. 

Drumstick Leaves or Muringa ela Thoran

The drumstick tree is a popular tree  to see in the backyards of many homes in South India. Drumstick is important vegetable in curries, sauces, and are very popular in India food.  

Every part of the drumstick tree is used up for medicinal reason and for examples, leaves are used to treat many ailments because of the high  source of iron, calcium, copper, manganese and vitamins. Leaves are used to treat many ailments such as the wheezing of asthma, bronchitis, and tuberculosis.

Like any other leaves, when cleaned it looked huge quantity but when as we cook, we just got a bowl of the thoran. You can make nice curry and even add some small fish and make it a dry dish with this leaves.

Chosen as the healthy recipe for the blog hop event:

http://www.zestysouthindiankitchen.com/2013/04/hearth-and-soul-blog-hop-147-4152013.html
 

Chicken Madrasi

This is a delicious spicy curry made in the Southern  part of India. I found this recipe many years ago in one of a magazine and  we at home love this recipe as its nice spicy. If you are not a spice lover still reduce on the chilli powder and make it  to your taste buds. You can make this with meat too, it taste really gr8!

This curry goes very well with simple steamed rice or any Indian bread. I made this to have with idiyappam (String hoppers). It’s a wonderful combination.

Cooking Time : 30 minutes                                                              

Ingredients

Cooking oil – 4 tbsp                                                                   Onions – 2 medium chopped                                                          Ginger and garlic paste – 1 tbsp                                                  Whole Red chilies – 6 nos.                                                         Garlic  large cloves crushed – 2 nos.                                             Green Chillies – sliced into two lengthy                                           2 tomatoes – finely chopped                                                          Cumin powder – 3 tsp                                                                Coriander powder– 1 tsp                                                                   1 tsp chilli powder (more or less you decide)                             Turmeric powder – ¼ tsp                                                      Chicken  - 1kg cut into small pieces                                                 Salt – 1 ½ tsp or to your taste                                                        Garam masala – 1 tsp                                                                     Curry leaves and coriander for garnish                                          Salt to taste

Mango Pickle

Mango pickle, this is one of the favorite  at my place.  A real tongue tickling pickle. You don’t need to keep this refrigerated and can  be kept for long time outside in room temperature. Just ensure there is enough oil and you don’t use any wet spoons to take the pickle.

I normally make this pickle to send this to my daughter as she can keep this in the hostel  at room temperature and can enjoy this till the last bit of it.  

Cooking Time : 30 minutes                                                              

Ingredients

Raw mangoes – about 2 cups cut in cubes

Gingili Oil – ½ cup

Ginger and garlic paste – 1 tbsp

Red chilli powder – 3 tbsp

Asafetida – ¼ tsp

Fenugreek  roasted and powdered – ¼ tsp

White vinegar – 1/4  cup

 Salt to taste