Pav Bhaji comes to the rescue!

Weekends, or for the less fortunate of the human species (like me!), ONLY SUNDAYs, are often, busier and more jam packed with things-to-do than the weekdays!

We (AD & I) usually practise a division of labour when it comes to weekend stocking up the larder...he goes shopping for meat, fish etc while I go vegetable shopping. No particular reason, except for the fact, that though I love fish to death, i abhor the squalor in a traditional fish market. From this (and only this) aspect, I prefer the sanitised environment of a supermarket.

I wish some enlightened enterpreneur comes up with a retail outlet which has the feel of an Indian Bazaar sans the squalor and the mess !!!! The fresh & bright greens, oranges, purples, the scented aroma of the herbs, the smell of earth, the buzz of life and livelihood, the banter and bargaining...I love it all! The supermarkets with their racks of frozen stuff, with the uniformity and the impersonalised & almost mechanised service, bore me to death (read my take on shopping here) !

I want the best of both worlds!

I know I sound greedy and demanding..but I am! I want everything!!!!!! I want the quality, the variety, the bargain and the personal touch...i am the customer and the customer is the KING (oops! QUEEN!!)

The GenNex Biyanis, Ambanis.....are you listening?????

Well, coming back to where I started.....this weekend we decided to give schedule & discipline a miss and be lazy! We skipped the weekly marketing....

Consequence ? weekend masti and midweek crisis!!
Barely wednesday and my refrigerator was frighteningly empty.....there was a bit of this and a bunch of that and the freezer was worse off...it was empty !!!!!

So yesterday on my way back from office, which is the time i plan what we would have for dinner, I stopped at the neighbourhood kiraana shop and picked up a few packets of Pav, having decided it had to be PAV BHAJI for dinner.

Ingredients :

1. Pav - 2 packets

2. Masalas :
a) Pav Bhaji Masala - approx 2 tsp

b) Haldi/Turmeric - approx 1 tsp
c) Kashmiri mirch - 1 tsp
d) Red chilli powder - as per taste

3. Butter - the more the better! I used around 2 tbsp for the bhaaji & 2-3 tbsp to saute the pav

4. Lemon wedges - I had only 2 ..

5. Onions - finely chopped -3

6. Coriander leaves - chopped. (Thank god for my little pot of Dhaniya in the backyard!)

7. Tomatoes - 3 small tomatoes chopped

8. Green chillies - finely chopped

9. Ginger paste - 1 tsp

10.Garlic - 1/2 tsp (optional)

11.Oil - 2 tablespoons

12.Vegetables - the more the merrier!

- I used :

a) Potatoes - 4 medium sized
b) Brinjal - 2 small

c) Cabbage - 1/2

d) Carrot - 3

e) Beans - a small bunch...around 5-6

f) Bottle gourd- 1 small 2 " piece

g) Peas - 1/2 bowl (I used frozen peas)

13. Salt

14. Sugar

Procedure
1. Boil in a pressure cooker vegetables given above in 12a-12f. Mash them with a masher and keep aside.

2. Thaw the frozen green peas in salted boiling water.

3. Heat Oil in a wok and add garlic paste and 1 chopped onion and a pinch of sugar for taste and colour (very typical Bengali!!). Fry till the onions turn light brown & translucent.

4. Add the ginger paste followed by tomatoes.

5. Mix all masalas given at 2a-2d and salt with some water into a paste and add this to the fried onion-tomato-ginger-garlic. Cook till you see the oil separate out.

6. Add the mashed vegetables (prepared as in Sl. 1). Cook well for 3-4 minutes

7. Add a blob of butter and garnish with coriander leaves and finely chopped green chillies.


8. When serving, sprinkle finely chopped raw onions and squeeze a wedge or two of lemon.

9. Slice the pavs horizontally and pan fry them in butter, on a tawa till they are crisp yet moist.

10. Serve the hot buttered pavs with the bhaaji garnished with coriander-chopped onion & a dash of lime!

Lau er Khosha Bhaja

Dry veggie dish made out of Bottle Gourd Skin/Peel

Scavengers...that's probably what non-Bongs would call us. Apart from our carnivorous tendencies, we are herbivorous scavengers....We eat the skin of vegetables too!!!!

I have eaten all these traditional stuff at home throughout my growing up years. But when I became the homemaker, shortcut, easy to make dishes were what I fell back upon. Moreover, despite being from a family of food lovers and great cooks, during my school-college days, I never entered the kitchen to cook ... ever. Hence the unfortunate consequence....I never got the opportunity to train under my Ma's supervision. Moreover at that point of time, vegetables belonged to the much-hated, to-be-forced-down-the-throat category. Being the food lover I am, I was forced to learn cooking when I was living alone, from Ma (over the phone) or from friends and neighbours!!!!! And now, although my unbridled love for fish, chicken, mutton continues, but vegetarian dishes have managed to carve a little place in my heart (or is it the taste buds!)

Now fast forwarding to the present......

SD (the husband) has a bowl of boiled Bottle Gourd every morning to fight his triglycerides and cholestrols. Last month, during Ma's visit, when she saw the substantial amount of bottle gourd skin being generated everyday and promptly thrown into the garbage bin, she was scandalised!!! And cooked this particular Khosha Bhaja (Khosha=vegetable skin/peel; Bhaja=fried veggie dish) or Khosha Chhechki (Chhechki=dry veggie dish).

Following her instruction, I saved up all the Bottle Gourd skin during the last one week and made Lau er Khosha Bhaja/Chhechki this afternoon!!

And the result is as follows :

Ingredients :
Bottle Gourd skin - finely chopped (3 Bottle Gourd skins)
Pumpkin - sliced (1 smal bowl)
Kalojeera/Kalonji- 1 tsp
Whole dry red chilli-2
Green Chillies - 4
Turmeric powder - 1 tsp
Mustard paste - 2 tsp
Grated Coconut - 2-3 tbsp
Coriander leaves - finely chopped.
Oil - 2tbsp


Procedure :
1. Finely chop the skin of bottle gourd
2. Steam the chopped skin after adding a pinch of salt
3. Drain the water and keep aside.

4. In a wok, pour some oil and season with Kalo jeera, Whole dry red chillies (2), green chillies (2-3)

5. Add the sliced pumpkin and cook till par cooked.
6. Add the steamed and water-drained chopped skin of bottle gourd.
7. Add salt, sugar and turmeric powder
8. Cook on medium flame for around 7-10 minutes or till the veggies are fried
9. Add the mustard paste followed by grated coconut. Mix well
10. Before switching off the flame, garnish with chopped coriander leaves and sliced green chillies.

The Lau er Khosha' Chhechki is ready to be eaten with steam rice.

This recipe goes to the WEEKEND HERB BLOGGING #206 hosted for the week by Yasmeen of Health Nut. The history of WEEKEND HERB BLOGGING is available here. The logo for the event is .....

Celebrating Kali Pujo & Diwali with Chhanar Jilipi

(Jalebi made out of cottage cheese)


It's that time of the year again!

Come September/October/November and the Indian Calendar is choc-a-block with festivities. Religious, social, cultural ... our festivities are a joyous symphony of vibrant colours, myriad tastes that tingle the palate and religious fervour that embraces and engulfs our sprirts. It's a time of the year I love and yearn for. The smell of new clothes, the anticipation of going home to family and friends, the smell of Pujo in the air, the sound of the Dhakis in the background are all so familiar and nostalgia evoking....yet gives me goosebumps every year thus creating the magic of pujo. For us since childhood, Pujor Chhuti meant Durga Puja followed by Lakshmi Puja and finally the festivities and fun would culminate with Kaali Puja exactly two weeks after Dussehra and finally Bhai Phonta just two days thereafter!

Maa Kaali, the fierce incarnation the Durga, is worshipped on the Kartik Amavasya night in Bengal. While Ma Kaali is worshipped in Bengal, on the same day, Diwali is celebrated in the rest of the country and Goddess Lakshmi is worshipped in most homes of North, South and Western India.

Diyas, candles, fireworks are an intrinsic part of both Kali Pujo as well as Diwali. And as in case of all Indian festivities, be it religious/cultural/social, food, especially a wide variety of sweets is an integral part of all our celebrations!

So on this ocassion of Kali Puja, as we indulge our sweet tooth, shoving to the backseat for a couple of weeks the fear of calories, pretending to ignore for a while the clockwise swing of the weighing scale needle, I bring to you a sweetdish I love.... CHHANAR JILIPI. I learnt it from my Ma during my Puja vacation and here I am sharing it with you......


Ingredients:
Chhana from 2 litres milk (check here to see how chhana is made in Points 1 & 2 of Process)
3 Black Elaichis, made into a paste (I used the green elaichi/cardamoms-around 5)
Maida (refined flour) - 2 - 3 tbsp
Oil - 2 tbsp
Baking Powder - a pinch
Sugar syrup using sugar : Water in the ration 1:1.5
Oil for deep frying


Procedure:

1. Knead the Chhana into a soft and smooth dough

2. Mix the Maida with the Oil.

3. Then mix the maida-oil mix to the chhana to give some firmness to the very soft chhana dough

3.Mix the elaichi paste and baking powder and again knead very well.


4. Pinch of small balls of chhana and roll into smooth balls.

5. Roll it into a snake like shape as shown above

6. Twist the two ends as shown in pics below.

6. Deep Fry each formed jalebi in the wok

7. Keep the sugar syrup hot/boiling.

8.Fry the jilipis and dunk them in the sugar syrup.

9. Let them stay dunked in the sugar syrup for about an hour when the jalebis soak in the sweetness of the syrup and turns juicy.

Serve hot or cold......

HAPPY DIWALI!!

This is my entry to the event FF:DIWALI DHAMAKA hosted by Purva Desai of PURVA's DAAWAT. The logo for the event is ....

An Apology and heartfelt THANKS !

I AM SORRY.....!!!!!

About this unannounced break ......

What started off as a whimsical aversion to the cyber world, continued much longer than I had expected....followed by the aversion phase were guests, illnesses, festivities...or in other words, the REAL WORLD took its toll on my cyber world and there I was far far away from the land of blogging!

And peeping into my cyber home after 3 long months, what do I find? Some new friends and well wishers on my FOLLOWERS list!! My joy knew no bounds......
Welcome to my virtual kitchen!

And thanks also to my friends from my active blogging days for taking time, visiting and dropping in a line or two despite my utter inactivity!

Also, thanks to Sudeshna for featuring my blog on her list of 7 TOP Bengali Blogs! I am flatttered and honoured!!!

And last but not the least, I thank my blogger friends Babli and Indrani who showered me with some wonderful awards. I promise to put them up on my blog soon!

Black Beauties...BERRY BERRY TASTY!

(Kaalojaam - Delicious & Healthy)

Delicious Kaalojaam (Black Berry) .....A summer fruit available for a limited period in June-July. Kaalojaam or BlackBerry has a unique taste...you have to have it to understand.... sweet with a coarse-acidic tang which leaves an aftertaste. But the purple juicy pulp of these small spherical fruits is almost addictive...you just cant seem to stop....and before you know you have a bowl full of seeds....remnants of the fruit you just ate up!

Though I love to eat them as it is, to add to its taste, I do as follows :

Ingredients
Kalojaam = 500gms
Salt - 1/2 tsp
Sugar - 1/2 tsp
Kashundi (Indian Mustard sauce) - 1 - 1.5 tsp

Procedure :
1. Just put a slit or two on each of the fruit
2. Marinate with salt, sugar and kashundi.
3. Refrigerate for 1/2 hour
4.Enjoy !

Side Effects : A purple tongue!!!

Some more info about the humble Kaalojaam - A wonderful fruit for combating stress, cardiovascular disease and cancer. It has very few calories so anyone with obesity can eat it happily. You can skip your evening tea and consume this fruit instead because it cools and body and prepares it for rest. The best thing would be to make a drink with kalo jam, pudina pata, salot or honey to guarantee a good night’s sleep.

Nameless Delight!

(Baked Bread stuffed with the goodness of vegetables, chicken and anything & everything healthy and tasty)
A dish without a name!

So dear friends, the onus lies on you to find one for this dish, once you read about it!

When visiting a cousin, she'd made this delicious preparation.

With hardly any time to note down or even hear the recipe, all she could say was "make it like a Cake sans the sugar but plus some salt and add anything as filling to it"...

She'd made it with chicken...when I decided to try out this Cake sans the sugar, I decided to make it more wholesome, and added chicken and some veggies too....

So without much ado, here goes the recipe...

Ingredient :
A. For the filling
1. Boneless Chicken pieces - 150-200gms
2.Onion finely chopped - 1
3. Cardamom-2
4.cinnamon stick - 1 (1" piece)
5. Bay leaf
6. Ginger + Garlic paste - 1 tsp
7.Carrot - blanched
8 Beans - blanched
9. Baby corn - 4-5 sliced
10. Butter - 2tbsp
11. Crushed pepper - 1 tsp
12. Chilli powder - 1 tsp (optional)

B. For the batter :
1. Flour - 2 cups (about 200gm)
2. Eggs - 3
3. Oil - 1 cup
4. Baking powder - 1tbsp
5. Salt - to taste
6. Crushed pepper corn - 6-8
7. Roasted Garlic sliced - (5-6 cloves of garlic) ** (I roasted the garlic as given here)
8. Butter - 1 tsp
9. Milk - 1 cup

C.For the final tempering
1. Butter - 1-2 tbsp
2. Red Chilli - Roasted and ground into flakes - 1 tsp
3. Roasted Garlic sliced

Procedure :
A.Filling
1. Take ingredients Sl. No. 1-6 in 'B' of Ingredients and pressure cook.
2. Chop the blanched carrot and beans into small cubes
3. In a wok, take some butter and when hot, add the sliced babycorn.
4. Fry till golden.
5. Add the cubed carrot-beans and stir fry. Add some salt and pepper.
6. Lastly add the boiled boneless chicken pieces and again saute for 2-3 minutes.
Keep aside

B. Batter
1. Whip 3 eggs and keep aside
2. As in making a cake, mix the flour and the baking powder well.
3. In a bowl, mix the whipped eggs, oil
4. Now in a big mixing bowl, mix together the flour+baking powder, egg+oil, salt, crushed pepper. Beat the mixture well
5. Now add the stirfired chicken-carrot-bean-babycorn into the batter .
6. Add some sliced roasted garlic
7. Mix well.

Preheat the oven for 5 minutes.

After spraying oil in a baking container, pour the chicken-vegetable containing batter

Bake at 180 deg Celsius for 25 minutes.

Insert a knife and if it comes out clean, it's done....else bake for another 5-10 minutes

Now in a skillet heat 2 tbsp of butter, add some roasted and flaked red chillies, slices of roasted garlic.
Now pour this butter-chilli flakes-garlic combo on the baked dish (as in chhaunk) The baked goody is ready to be sliced and eaten with some sauce.

*It makes a great breakfast dish ...
I had it with a cup of tea and finished off the breakbast with some fruits (a bowl of Papaya & Banana).

And so this is my entry to "EFM Theme - Breakfast Series" hosted by SriLekha of ME and MY KITCHEN . The logo for the event is ...

* Being a breakfast dish, this is my entry to 'SHOW ME YOUR BREAKFAST' hosted by Divya Vikram of DIL SE. The logo for the event is..

* It makes a great item to be packed in lunch box for kids along with some fruits ...
The chicken in the recipe can be removed or replaced with any or many of the following :
paneer/mushroom/cauliflower florets/carrot/bean/baby corn/corn kernel etc.

I gave some fruits (mango cubed) and hey presto! A wholesome nutrituous snack/light lunch box was ready!
This is my entry to CFK:HEALTHY LUNCH BOXES hosted by NEHA of TASTY RECIPES. The event was started by Sharmi of Naivedyam

The logo of the event is .....

Mishti Doi...Sweet Curd

MISHTI DOI....the term conjures up an image of an earthen pot (Maatir Bhaar) containing a pink coloured sweetened curd. A must in any traditional Bengali feast. In most households, though the plain white and healthier curd is always homemade and available, Mishti Doi is rarely made at home. There have been occasions, though rare, when I have seen Ma prepare home made Mishti Doi.

So when my neighbour, while we were having our stair-side chatting sessions, asked me the recipe of Mishti Doi, stating casually that her young daughters loved it, I enquired the recipe from Ma and found it surprisingly simple.....

So just to share this simple recipe to dish up a rarely homemade dessert, here I am...

Ingredients : (What I used)

*Full cream milk - 1.5 litres.
*Sugar - 2.5 cups (I meaured the 2.5 cups and it was around 360gm)
*Plain curd - 2 -3 tbsp

Procedure :
1. Boil the 1.5 litre milk and bring it to half the volume.

2. Caramelise the sugar by heating it in a wok. Keep stirring while heating to ensure the caramelised sugar does not stick to the bottom of the wok and burn.


3. Pour the liquid caramelised sugar into the milk. Stir well to mix the milk and sugar. The milk mixed with caramelised sugar will be pinkish brown in colour. If needed you can bring the mix to a boil once again to ensure uniform mixing.

4.Cool milk-sugar mix to lukewarm temperature.

5. Smear the container/s in which you wish to set the curd with the plain white curd.

6. Pour the milk slowly into the curd smeared containers.

7. Cover and keep aside for 8-10 hours to set. (I had to keep for almost 11 hours)

8.Refrigerate to chill the curd


The yummilicious Mishti Doi is all yours to savour!