Instant Onion pickle

There was so much leftover rice after Sunday lunch.  My mind ticked curd rice for dinner. All of them agreed too. My husband said he will make some instant pickle. There was no lemon or Raw mango at home. He said, let’s try with onions. It came out too good.

Thanks to my husband for the recipe.

This pickle can be made within 15 mins of time and stored in fridge for abo

Ingredients:

• Onions – 5 medium size
• Gingely oil – 5 tsp
• Mustard seeds – 1 tsp
• Chili powder – 1.5 tbsp (can be altered according to ur taste)
• Turmeric powder – 1 tsp
• Asafetida – ½ tsp
• Tamarind – 1 big lemon size
• Water for soaking tamarind – 1 cup.
• Salt as required.

To dry roast and grind:

• Mustard seeds – 1 tsp
• Fenugreek seeds – 1 tsp

Preparation:

Soak tamarind in warm water and extract thick juice from it.

Dry roast Mustard and fenugreek seeds in a pan and powder it.

Finely chop onions and keep it aside.

Method:

Heat 5 tsp of oil in a pan.

Once oil is heated, add mustard seeds. Let it splutter.

Add onions, fry till it becomes soft.

Add chili powder, turmeric powder and Asafetida. Stir for couple of mins.

Add the extracted tamarind juice. Nearly 1 cup of juice.

Add salt.

Keep stirring now and then and cook it the oil oozes out from the pickle.

Finally add the roasted and powdered mustard + Fenugreek seeds, mix well and switch off the stove.

Once it is cooled down, store it in a dry jar.

This is instant pickle so it holds up well only for 3 to 4 days if stored in fridge.

Too good with curd rice, idli, dosa and rotis too.

Milk Peda with Milk powder

When the whole world is baking during Christmas, I make milk peda. Somehow my mind is not tuned for baking. Often my daughter asks me to bake cake for her, couple of times I tried too. Not big ones, muffins and cup cake types. It came quite well. But still, my mind is more inclined towards Indian sweets. I am hopeful that I will experiment more in baking in coming years.

This recipe is short cut for making milk peda using milk powder and condensed milk. I have not tried the traditional method of making pedas before.  This is simple and delicious.

Sometimes I feel the store bought milk pedas also use milk powder. I don’t like the taste of store bought ones much. That has the strong powder taste. But trust me, this version is much better.

I saw few recipes using only milk powder and condensed milk, those are too sweet for my taste. So tried my own version of adding milk. This very much taste like palkoa. Making into shapes is easier to serve. So this idea.

Ingredients:

• Milk powder – 1 cup
• Condensed milk – 1 tin (400 ml)
• Milk – ½ cup
• Saffron strands – few
• Pistachios – 10 – finely chopped

Preparation:

Soak saffron strands in a tbsp of milk for half an hour.

Chop pistachios.

Method:

In a non-stick pan, add the milk powder, condensed milk and milk and milk well without lumps.

Add the saffron strands too.

Mix thoroughly and then lit the stove.

Keep stirring in low flame. 

Keep stirring until the mixture leaves the sides and comes as single mass. Mine took around 15 minutes. At this stage it will be little sticky. Once it cools down, it will be ok.

Switch off the stove.

Once it is warm enough, grease your palm with ghee and make into small pedas. Make a dent in the middle and fill the garnish with chopped pistachios.

Store it in a dry container. No need to refrigerate.

Coconut Cashew Burfi

This is coconut burfi with a twist. We had so much leftover candied cashews from mundiri paruppu thenga koodu. So made use of it while making burfi.

I like my burfi mildly sweet and little chewy. I don’t like hard brick ones.

This was made by Mami. She is our house burfi specialist.

While it was badly raining in Chennai, I stayed in my mama’s house for couple of weeks. She made this for me to pack it home. But it was finished before that. That’s a different story.

We used candied cashews which already had sugar, so I am giving below measurement for normal fried cashews.

Ingredients:

• Grated coconut – 2 units
• Powdered cashews – 1 unit
• Sugar – 2.5 units ( Can be  increased or decreased based on ur taste buds)
• Water – 2 tbsp
• Ghee – 3 tbsp + 1 tsp

Preparation:

Grate fresh coconut. After grating, grind it again in mixer to get a better texture.

In a thick bottom pan, add a tbsp of ghee and fry the cashews golden brown. Once cooled,  make it into coarse powder with help of mixer.

Grease a tray with a tsp of ghee

Method:

In the same kadai, add the grated coconut, powdered cashews, sugar and water.

Mix well, and keep stirring in medium flame. Mixture becomes watery once the sugar is melted.

Add 2 tbsp of ghee in few minutes.

The mixture starts bubbling, so be careful while stirring.

Keep stirring until the mixture in the side of the pan gets thickens. For testing whether it is done, take a drop of the mixture and put it in a plate. It becomes thick. Then the burfi is ready.

Carefully pour it in the greased tray and shake the tray to spread it uniformly.

After 10 mins, run a greased knife and make it into square pieces. You can also dip the knife in water.

Now our delicious burfi is ready.

Dry Fruits Halwa - Guest post

This is guest post by my sweet cousin Chitra. I never refer her as cousin, she is my sister, and my best friend forever. She is closest of all my relatives to me.

She lives in Dubai and an excellent cook. She is a great perfectionist. Last year she sent me the picture of her dry fruits and nuts halwa, I fell in love with it immediately, it was so rich and definitely healthy. This year I asked her to do a guest post for me. 

I can't thank you enough Sowmya (Chitra's daughter)... for the beautiful clicks :)

Hope you all will enjoy it too like me.

This dish is very versatile, you can add any dry fruits of your preference and availability.

Addition of sugar and milk maid is optional too.

In this recipe we grind all the ingredients, you can also finely chop then and make too, but that is time consuming and the yield will also be very less. But by grinding the final quantity will be more.

You can make them as ladoos and finally roll them in desiccated coconut too. U can show all your creativity in this recipe.

Ingredients:

• Badam  - 1 cup ( soak in hot water then peel off the skin
• Pista     - 1 cup
• Cashew - 1 cup
• Dates    - 1 cup
• Fig         - 1 cup
• Wall nuts- 1/2 cup
• Prunes  - 1/2 cup
• Raisins  - 1/2 cup
• Kass kass - 1 tsp
• Cardamom powder  - 1 tsp
• Kesar  - few strands (Optional)
• Ghee  - 2 tbsp
• Sugar – 1/2 cup or 60 gms of condensed milk (optional)
• Milk   - 1 cup

Method:

Soak badam separately in hot water & peel the skin.

Soak rest of all the dry fruits & kass kass in warm milk. Add milk just to cover it. Excess milk will lead to excess cooking time.

Let it at least soak for one hour so it will be easy for grinding.

Once every thing is soaked grind it all together as a fine paste..

Heat the Wok & put the grinded paste into it & keep stirring in medium flame.

Keep stirring till the raw smell goes & then add 1 spoon ghee to it & again stir it well now u can add sugar or condensed milk to it with the saffron strands.

Taste it & see if u want more sugar add some more to it cook for few more min. Add the remaining ghee & cardamom power & switch off the stove.

Now your dry fruits Halwa is ready. You can make it into any shape as u want ..

It’s a very healthy sweet & those who are health conscious can also eat it as we are using very less sugar & ghee. Though it seems to be time taking I am sure all age group will enjoy this sweet :)

Ribbon Pakoda

Getting into Diwali mood in a full swing. So we are jumping  directly into the recipe.

This is one of the easiest and no fail recipe.

Following measurement is for one batch. It is better to make in batches, because once you mix the dough, it becomes dry after a while. So it should be done in batches.

Ingredients:

• Raw rice flour – 2 cups (Here we don’t need processed rice flour like murukku)
• Gram flour – 1 cup
• Urad dal flour – 1 tbsp
• Chili powder – 1 tsp (Change according to the taste)
• Butter – 1 tbsp  (Room temperature)
• Hot oil – 2 tbsp
• Asafetida water -2 tbsp  (Or u can use powdered asafetida – ¼ tsp)
• Salt as required
• Coconut oil for deep frying.

Preparation:

Powder raw rice in a flour mill or in ur own mixer into fine powder and sift well.

Sift the gram flour.

Soak asofitida in water for half an hour at least.

Method:

Heat the coconut oil in a deep frying pan.

While the oil is heating, we will prepare the dough.

In a wide bowl, add raw rice flour, gram four, urad dal flour, chili powder, butter, 2 tbsp of oil which is getting heated in the kadai, salt, asofitida and mix well. 

 Becareful when you pour the hot oil.

Add water little by little and make it a loose dough. If it is very tight it is very difficult to press in the machine, so it is better it have it little loose. If it is too loose, it will break into pieces.

Check if the oil is heated.

In the murukku nazhi (Machine), put the ribbon pakoda achu. 

Directly press in the hot oil in spirals, not over crowd in one area.

Cook it medium flame till it reaches a golden color and gently flip it to the other side.

Cook it till it is golden color and take it carefully out and drain the oil.

Allow it to cool, break it into smaller pieces and Store it in an air tight container.

It stays for a week when stored well in warm dry place.