Sweet Shankarpali

In time for Diwali this super easy and ever popular snack. We had it often - not just during Diwali when we were growing up...sometimes sweet and sometimes the savoury variety (recipe to follow).

1 cup milk
1 cup ghee
1 1/4 cup sugar
5 cups All Purpose flour (approx)
Flour for dusting
ghee for deep frying
pinch of salt.


heat together - milk, sugar and ghee - till the sugar completely dissolves in the milk. Pour this mixture into a large bowl add a pinch of salt and slowly add the flour incorporating it into the liquid. Keep adding flour till it forms a soft dough. It usually takes about 5 cups of flour- but maybe more or less depending on how warm your milk is, or how humid it is that day.

Heat ghee for deep frying.
Roll out the dough onto the counter - medium thickness - and cut into squares. Deep fry the squares -on moderate heat - till golden brown.

This snack really doesn't take too much time or effort to prepare. Just make sure you fry the shankarpalis on moderate heat or the outside will be brown before the inside cooks through.

Happy Diwali.

Appetizers - Butterflied Prawns

This is a fun fun companion to any kind of alcohol - especially if the cook is imbibing!

25 Large prawns ( peeled, with tails left on and slit down the back and vein removed)
2 eggs ( beaten, add salt and garlic powder)
1/2 cup of all purpose flour
1/2 cup of bread crumbs
salt, pepper, garlic powder, oil for deep frying

wash, peel, de-vein, butterfly and pat dry the prawns.
beat the eggs with salt and some garlic powder
Mix flour, bread crumbs, salt, pepper and garlic powder

Heat oil.

Dip the prawn in the egg mixture then in the flour mixture and coat them thoroughly. Deep fry on moderate heat for about 2 minutes. Drain on paper towels and serve with a sweet chili dipping sauce and some finely chopped cabbage and carrots for garnish.

Fried Sole- CKP style

I am from Mumbai and I miss eating the umpteen varieties of fish we get there. But I am a fish eater wherever in the world I am and I learn to cook and enjoy all the local fish from every new place.
When we came to Canada we discovered Dover sole. I searched for recipes and found some very good ones- but I kind of wanted to try it Indian style. I found the texture was similar to Bombay duck, though sole is firmer than bombay duck. But its a delicate white flesh fish which marries well with Indian spices.
You can only pan fry this fish though, no fish curry here- the fish tends to melt into the curry. So here goes...

A pound of sole fillets (about 4-5 fillets)
1tablespoon ginger- garlic paste (very fine paste)
1/2 teaspoon thick tamarind pulp
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
salt and red chili powder as per taste.
rice flour and fine semolina (to dredge the fish)
oil for frying

wash and fry the fillets, and pat dry. Apply the salt, turmeric, chili powder, ginger-garlic paste and let marinate for about 15-20 minutes. Apply the tamarind paste and let sit for 5 minutes or so ( not too long as the tamarind tends to cook the fish and dry it out.)
Heat oil in your pan, mix equal amounts of rice flour and fine semolina, dredge the fillet in the mixture, make sure the entire fillet is coated. Fry on medium heat till crisp. The fish cooks very fast, but you want the coating to crisp up.

Goes very well with a cold beer. Enjoy!!

Sweet Sheera

Sheera - also known as halwa (in north India) is made in each and every Indian household. It is a firm favourite of my little one - this post is for her - Here you go Anagha

1 level cup medium semolina
1 level cup ghee (clarified butter...made by boiling down unsalted butter- on a very very low flame. one pound takes about an hour...but watch carefully after about 45 minutes so it does not burn.)
1 heaped cup sugar
2 cups milk
pinch of saffron
pinch of salt
pinch of cardamom powder (if you have it)

In a heavy bottomed pan, roast the ghee and the semolina on a low flame, for about 15 minutes or till the semolina turns light golden.
Heat the milk - do not bring it to a boil - just heat it through.
When the semolina is roasted, add the hot milk slowly, stirring carefully so lumps don't form. All the milk will get absorbed into the semolina.
Add the cardamom powder (if using), saffron, salt and the sugar.
Stir briskly till it's all mixed in.

Cover and let steam on a very low flame for about 10 minutes.

You can garnish with sliced almonds or raisins or roasted cashews if desired.

OK - for the calorie conscious- and lets face it, all of us are now...you can reduce the amount of ghee - to almost half - it will not change the taste that much but will change the texture a bit- but still is awesome.

Enjoy

Kadhi (Yogurt Curry)

This is a very common dish in India and is made in all regions - of course with regional differences. Here is how I like it

2 cups yogurt
2 cloves garlic, 2 green chillies (or 1 if you don't like it too spicy), 1/2 inch piece of fresh ginger. This is to be put through the chopper or the blender..but it should be a little coarse.
1 TBS of gram flour (besan - chick pea flour)
salt and sugar to taste, chopped coriander (cilantro) for garnish
5-6 curry leaves
pinch of asafoetida, mustard seeds for tempering, 1/8 tsp turmeric.
1 TBS oil

Blend together the yogurt, chili/garlic/ginger, salt, sugar and gram flour.
In a non-reactive pot (use stainless steel or a non stick one) heat 1 TBS oil, add the mustard seeds, asafoetida, turmeric and the curry leaves.
Put in the blended yogurt mixture. Add about 2 cups of water and whisk till it becomes smooth. Keep on low heat. Taste - check if extra salt is needed after you add the water.
Stir continuously till the kadhi is heated through and starts  bubbling at the edges, add the chopped coriander. Do not let it boil...that will cause the yogurt to separate.

Enjoy with Khichadi!

Indian Staples - Chilkewale moongdaal ki khichadi - Rice and lentils risotto (Indian style)

This is one of the comfort foods of my childhood. It's soft and savoury- and oh so comforting. It sort of resembles an Italian risotto - don't get too technical here now. I think the origins of this dish are from Rajasthan or Kutch...But I love this dish and there are some variations which I have listed at the bottom.

This recipe makes about 4 cups of the finished product, so adjust accordingly.

1/2 cup basmati rice
1/2 cup split moong dal with the skins on (split mung beans - make sure you get the one with the skins on)
2 cloves, 1/4 tsp jeera (cumin), small piece of cinnamon, 5-6 pepper corns
1/4 tsp hing (asafoetida powder)
salt to taste and ghee.

Wash the rice and lentils and soak them for about an hour.
In a pressure cooker add about 2 TBS ghee and the garam masala. Add the drained rice and dal. Saute for about 2-3 minutes till the rice picks up the aroma of the ghee and the spices.
Add 4 cups of water and salt to taste. After 2 whistles, lower the heat and let cook for about 15 minutes.
Remove from the cooker and add 2 TBS ghee when the rice is hot, stir to incorporate the ghee in the khichdi.
Serve piping hot, with Kadhi (Yogurt curry) and papad.

Variations
you can add chopped vegetables to the khichdi, to make it a complete one dish meal. You can add shopped carrots, chopped green beans, peas...

Enjoy!

Lemon marmalade

You don't always have to make lemonade when life hands you lemons, you can make marmalade too.

10-12 meyer lemons -
sugar - will be measured by volume  (explained later on)
water

Wash and dry the lemons, squeeze them and reserve the juice. Thinly slice the squeezed lemons, pith and all, only discard all the seeds.
Measure the  cut lemon slices- and use the sugar in this proportion:
1 cup of sugar for each cup of lemon slices.
Use a large non-reactive cooking pot. Put in the lemons and about a cup of water. Bring to a boil.
Add the appropriate amount of sugar, stir and let cook on a low flame, maintaining a simmer. The lemons will release some liquid on their own and cook in that mixture.Cook till the peels are tender and you get a thick and creamy consistency. Add the reserved lemon juice, cook down for another 10 minutes.
Taste and add additional sugar according to personal taste.

STORING:

1. Put jars and lids on a large baking sheet or pan and heat in a 225° oven for 15 minutes or heat them in a large pot of boiling water for 10 minutes.
2. Carefully transfer lemon mixture to jars (a wide-mouth funnel is useful here if you have one), leaving about 1/2-inch headspace in each jar between the top of the mixture mixture and the the top of the jar. Put the lids on the jars and twist on the rings. Process in a large pot of boiling water for 10 minutes or run through an otherwise empty dishwasher on the "sanitizing" cycle or any cycle that will include 10 minutes of high heat.
3. Let cool on counter before storing in a cupboard for up to 6 months. Once opened, keep refrigerated.

Shrikhand

A friend asked for this recipe - so here goes.

1 container Sour Cream OR Yogurt if you want a low-fat variety
Powdered sugar ( confectioners sugar)
Cardamom (5-6 pods)
Nutmeg (1/8 tsp
Saffron (few strands)
Pistachios (sliced)
Almonds (sliced)
Cheesecloth

Tie up the sour cream in cheese cloth and let it hang to drip at least 6 hours. You will have to let it drip overnight if you are using yogurt.
Remove from cheesecloth and measure by volume. Add equal amount by volume of sugar.
This really depends on how sweet you want it and how tart the cream is. I prefer the shrikhand not to be cloyingly sweet. Sometimes it needs about a 1/4 cup of sugar more to each cup of cream.
Beat this mixture well so there are no lumps. Using a whisk is best. Do a taste test for sweetness.

Add powdered cardamom, nutmeg, saffron and the nuts. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate for a couple of hours. Serve chilled. You can garnish with sliced nuts when you serve.

Variations:

Instead of the saffron and nuts you can add diced mango for 'amrakhand'. Do not add mango pulp- it does not give the same results.

Enjoy

Why start a blog on food?

There are so many recipe books and web sites that are all about food. Why did I choose to blog about  food? Many reasons - the most important one for me is that I love food. I love to cook it, to read about it, to eat it myself and to feed people. I don't limit myself to just one type of food though of course you will find a lot of Indian dishes in here - I am Indian after all. But having lived in many parts of the world, my family was exposed to many many different types of cuisines - and we embraced them all with enthusiasm. I tweaked some recipes to suit my family's taste - some I followed to a 'T'. Some times I combined 2 recipes and came up with an entirely different dish. No one has died yet!

The recipes on my blog are predominantly Indian.  Indian cuisine is a vast ocean. There isn't just one type of food - or one kind of food- there are so many different kinds of cuisines in India- it's difficult - no- impossible to enumerate all of them here.

To the typical American palate, Indian food is a sweetish - mildly spicy orange sauce with pieces of chicken that's called chicken curry or a violent red coloured piece of chicken that passes off as tandoori. No- that's not Indian food at all...no surprise that you will rarely find Indians eating at these so called Indian restaurants that serve up these kinds of dishes.

Indian food is flavourful and fun. And no, not all of it is spicy. Indian dishes do use a lot of spices in them - but each spice brings its own special note to the final dish...it's not just about the heat.
The other misconception is - well- all Indian food is not "curry". but more about this later- it's going to take more than a few lines in my first post to talk about curry.

Having lived in Mumbai,Saudi Arabia, Canada and California - lots of other cuisines influenced my cooking. I made some really good friends - especially in California - who opened up their kitchen to me and taught me something beautiful. I hope I have done justice to their teachings.

You will find recipes here for Indian food of course -  but also my versions of American food, Italian food or even Arabic food. It's a slow process getting all my recipes together - and trying to remember to take pictures and post them, but we will get there. I have not put a single recipe on here that I have not made in my own kitchen.

So this is how I begin- taking you on a journey - through this hopefully delicious path - that goes through my kitchen, the heart of my home - to your stomach and hopefully to your heart.
I hope to introduce you to different and new tastes and maybe encourage you to try something  in your own kitchen.