Daily Archives: August 5, 2014

Rainbow pine wheel dosa

Preparation Time : 35 minutes

Cooking Time : 25 minutes

Serving : 4 members

Description

Rainbow pine wheel dosa . Heres a spin on the classic dosa , we all have been growing up eating . A dish I took note of from a telly cookery show about nine years before on a regional satellite channel . Just love the innovation done with simple every day ingredients that we have around the house always . Absolutely additive yet ridiculously easy to make and will elicit a chorus of oohs and aahs for sure . Idlis , dosas and a white coloured chutney or a red coloured chutney alternatively was on the table day and night every ever passing day at my in – laws place . My co – sister Farzana got married into the family only after 7 years of my coming . With crossed fingers wished and prayed that she should hate idlis , dosas and chutneys so that we all at home would be boomed with a change in the menu . But to my surprise … , she jumped with joy seeing idli and chutney for breakfast . Gosh I was like .. Finished my entire life will end eating these idlis , dosas and chutneys . A week passed and slowly she asked me if there will be a change in menu this following week …..I told her this is the standard never ending menu carved in the history of this house . She blinked as I did as a new bride and we nicknamed these dishes as ” national dish “. Dum me didn’t have the brains to re – imagine them as new , exciting versions of themselves back then . Better late than never isn’t it folks ….. Now with this recipe , dosas will never be the same again .

Step -1

Ingredients for carrot chutney

Ingredients	Quantity
Carrots	1 cup chopped
Tomato	1 small chopped
Small onion	5
Garlic flakes	2
Tamarind	a small pinch
Salt	to taste
Coconut	1/4 cup
Coriander leaves	very little
Dry red chillies	4 to 6
Gingely oil	1 tablespoon
Asafoetida	a pinch

Method for carrot chutney

Mix all the above mentioned ingredients in a microwave safe bowl .
Mix well and microwave on high for 6 minutes . In between at an interval of 3 minutes toss once and microwave again .
Cool completely and grind to a smooth paste . Add very little water if needed . The consistency of the chutney should be of a spreading consistency not too thin and watery or not too thick .
Taste and adjust seasoning and set aside . Incase you don’t have a microwave just fry all the ingredients separately in gingely oil until the ingredients are 3/4 cooked .
Remove cool and grind to get a chutney .

Step -2

Beet root chutney

Use the same ingredients as the above chantey but substitute beet roots instead of carrots and follow the above recipe to get beet root chutney .

Step -3

Ingredients for Coriander mint chutney

Ingredients	Quantity
Coconut	1/4 cup
Ginger	a tiny piece ( just a tit bit size )
Coriander leaves with stem	1/4 cup
Mint leaves	8
Green chillies	4 to 6
Tamarind	a pinch
Salt	to taste
Curry leaves	2
Jaggery	a tiny piece

Method for the coriander mint chutney

Grind all the above ingredients together to a smooth paste of semi thick spreading consistency by adding very little water .
Taste and adjust seasoning and set aside .

Step -4

Other ingredients

ingredients	Quantity
Dosa batter	3 cups
Oil or ghee	2 tablespoons

Method

Mix the dosa batter to the right consistency with water and salt to taste .
Make normal sized dosas in a dosa tawa and set aside .
The dosa should not be too thick or too thin but of medium size in thickness .
The size of all the dosas should be of the same shape and size .

Step -5

How to proceed

Take 3 dosas . Spread 1 to 2 tablespoons of carrot chutney on one dosa . Spread 1-2 tablespoons of beet root chutney on the second dosa and spread 1-2 tablespoons of coriander mint chutney on the third dosa .
Now place the beet root chutney spread dosa on the bottom , top with coriander mint chutney spread dosa over and finally place the carrot chutney spread dosa on the top .
Now carefully hold all the 3 dosas together on one end and roll tightly towards the opposite end .
Once rolled , cut into 1 inch thick bite size pieces and place the cut side facing upwards making sure the vibrant colours of the spiral dosa and chutneys are visually seen . Serve as it is or with tomato ketchup .

Note

Use very little tamarind as all the three chutneys have tamarind added and when had together can tend to get very tart .
Add very little water to make the chutneys as the dosa gets soggy when spread with runny chutneys .
The size and shape of the dosas must be the same so that when cut not much of the pine wheel rainbow dosa is wasted .
Make the chutneys and dosas ahead . Assemble and roll them together just before serving as the dosas tend to catch colour from the next dosa soon and tends to get soggy also .
You could use a tooth pick and hold the bite size cut pine wheel rainbow dosas together and serve . Adds style and Children will love eating with a tooth pick on

Soya kofta curry

Preparation Time : 30 minutes

Cooking Time : 35 minutes

Serving : 6 members

Description

Soya kofta curry . Soya beans and tofu are two ingredients that I hate the most but they are the healthiest . Why does healthy food always has to taste bland and not so good . Usually what I do with soya beans is soak it over night , boil it the next day morning and have it as it is ( tastes horrible ) or I mix it with some curd and have it for lunch . ( without chewing much , this way the curd helps to gulp in the soya beans .) all this happening with hubby dear beside me having a regular splendid meal and poor me :-(( . My life is a constant battle between my love for food and not wanting to be fat . I had a lot of boiled soya beans left over after I had for lunch . Not wanting to waste them , came up with an idea of making a kofta gravy with these left overs but in a healthy way . Started and wanting to bake the koftas just didn’t want to use bread crumbs to coat them , so substituted with coarsely ground soya chunks and it worked perfect with a mildly crisp exterior and a yielding inside . The gravy part is our regular tomato based one but I omitted the ground onions as its costlier than gold now ( kidding ) . The first time soya beans tasted healthy , nutritious , delicious and got hubby dear to eat it as well along with me :-)) .

Ingredients for the Koftas

Ingredients	Quantity
Soy beans	1 cup
large potato	1
onion	1 chopped
green chillies	2 chopped
Coriander leaves	chopped few
Lime Juice	1/2 a lime
Salt	to taste
Soya chunks	1/2 cup ( blitz them in a food processor to get a coarse powder )

Ingredients For Gravy

Ingredients	Quantity
Oil	1/4 teaspoon
onion	1 chopped
ginger garlic paste	1 teaspoon each
cumin seeds	1 teaspoon
tomato paste	1 tablespoon
tomato puree	1/2 cup ( just blitz 3 medium sized tomatoes in a food processor )
turmeric powder	1/4 teaspoon
garam masala	1/4 teaspoon
Red chilli powder	to taste
Coriander leaves	chopped few to garnish
bay leaf	1
Salt	to taste
Corn flour / soy flour	1 teaspoon diluted in 2 teaspoons of water

Method for soy kofta

Soak the soy beans overnight. Cook them in a pressure cooker. No problems if it gets mushy. We are going to do that anyways.steam the potato in the steamer (with the skin. It has nutrition too)
Mix all the ingredients for the koftas together except the soya chunks . Mash them with your hands .
Spread the coarsely blitzed soy chunks on a plate and coat the balls with them.
Repeat with all the balls and place them in a lightly greased baking sheet. Bake for about 10-15 minutes in a preheated oven at 200 degree Celsius . ( this can be served as it is as a starter , side dish or as a nibble any time of the day )

Method for the gravy

Heat a skillet with 1/4 tsp oil And add the onions , bay leaf and cumin with some salt. The salt will bring out the moisture and help the onions cook easily.
Top with ginger garlic paste and fry until raw smell evaporates. Add the tomato paste and the puree.
Sauté until oil separates .
Add the spice powders ( turmeric powder , red chilli powder and garam masala powder ) Along with enough water to make sufficient gravy and once it comes to a boil, thicken it up with little soy flour or cornstarch and bring it to a simmer.taste and adjust , remove from heat and set aside .

How to proceed

Remove the koftas from the Oven and pour half the gravy over each of the koftas until they are soaked in the gravy.
Bake them for another 10 minutes and before serving pour out the remaining gravy.
Garnish with chopped coriander leaves and Serve warm with phulkas , chapathis or rotis .

Puli chutney

Preparation Time : 15 minutes

Cooking Time : nil

Serving : 4 members

Description

Puli chutney . A quick chutney that is done with easily available ingredients at home and had mainly with palaya soru / ice biriyani . Ice biriyani is left over cooked rice that is soaked and immersed in water over night and had the next day morning for breakfast along with curd , salt and small onions usually . This dish is addressed as cucina povera – food of the poor . I remember during my long , hot summer vacations at my grand parents place in Palghat . There was always ice biriyani with this puli chutney as an accomplishment along with other breakfast items spread on the table . I would sit next to the ammi that was on the flour at the back yard of the kitchen and watch wahitha Akka ( our cook ) make this chutney by technically just crushing these ingredients together .my eyes would burn and pour down tears because of the onions being crushed but still loved the way wahida Akka used to handle the ammi and skilfully blend simple ingredients to a sublime art form . This chutney is also served with thenga choru as a side dish to Play a supporting role to gulp in a few more calories into you . A very tart , hot and salty chutney flavoured with coconut oil that hits the right spot with unique earthy flavours and oozes with old world charm . It’s good to retain old favourites and flavours to oomph a domestic staple .

Ingredients

Ingredients	Quantity
Small onions	one hand chopped
Green chillies	2 chopped
Thick Tamarind pulp	5 tablespoons
Water	1 teaspoon or more
Rock Salt	to taste
Coconut oil	1 tablespoon

Method

Crush small onion , green chillies and rock salt together in a ammi or sil patta .
In case you don’t have one crush them with the back of a spatula or crush them coarsely in a food processor making sure you don’t grind them . mix well . ( Best done in the ammi / sil patta )
Add tamarind pulp and water to get a gooey consistency mixture .
Top with coconut oil and mix well . Taste and adjust seasoning and serve .

Idli upma

Preparation Time : 15 minutes

Cooking Time : 10 minutes

Serving: 2 members

Description

Idli upma . Upma is one dish I hate …. But I do crave a lot for the upma’s that were served to us in good shepherd public school (ooty )on Sunday mornings along with masala omelet . I used to fill the omelet with the upma inside , roll it and eat it like a katti roll . This idli upma recipe I learnt from one of my cooks at my in – laws place Which is a fast , clever , easy and time saving one pot dish . A genius quick fix with left over idlis at home . The high light of this recipe is the lime added which gives an oomph factor , Resulting deliciously tart . This dish did wonders when I had to pack lunch for my kids to school . It was my go – to quick fix when pressed for time . My daughter ANISHA is a die heart fan of this idli upma . She ends up asking for this idli upma very often which is a staple that’s adapted to suit the brew available . upma

Ingredients

Ingredients	Quantity
Left over idli	6
Big onion	1 chopped
small onion	10 chopped
Green chilli	1 chopped
Ginger	1/4 inch piece grated
Salt	as needed
Cooking oil	1 tablespoon
Mustard seeds	1 teaspoon
Urad dal	1 teaspoon
Channa dal	1 teaspoon
Dry Red chillies	2 each torn into two
Curry leaves	1 strand
Asafoetida	a pinch
Lime juice	1/2 a lime
Turmeric powder	1/4 teaspoon

Method

Dip the idlis in salted water for 5-6 seconds . Remove and Crumble the idlies well and set aside.heat oil in a non – stick kadai .
Add mustard seeds , urad dal , channa dal ,torn dry red chillies and curry leaves .
Once the mustard seeds crackle top with hing , onions , grated ginger and green chillies .Once the onions turn translucent add turmeric powder and lime juice .
Saute for 10 seconds and top with the crumbled idlis and toss well in a very low heat .
Making sure the yellow colour Coates well all around the crumbled idlis and the flavours infuse together .
Garnish with chopped coriander leaves and serve hot .

Note

You can avoid the turmeric powder and lime juice following the same recipe to get a white color bland idli upma .
You can add a sprinkle of idli podi ( powder ) to add more flavour to the idli upma .
At times even the left over vegetable poriyals ( sabzis ) are also added to the idli upma . ( My favorite is potato fry to be added )