Yoghurt mornings with chia seeds

 I wanted to share this recipe for you. I think it's high in probiotic also

In Soaked chia seeds add lots of yoghurt, 

• In a bowl take soaked chia seeds add 3/4 cup curd add 1/4 cup water to make it more liquid & mix well
• Add 1 grated cucumber some coriander leaves and 1 green chillies
• Now roast the oats and prepare the tadka (For tadka take oil in pan add mustard seeds hing, urad dal ,peanuts, cashews, dried-red chillies roast everything well & in the end add the curry leaves .
• Now add the roasted oats and tadka in the prepared mixture mix well and garnish it with coriander leaves and enjoy

Tamarind Rice

 Sorry for putting in back to back tamarind recipes but that is keeping us rolling:

Tamarind Rice

Dry roast:

• Chana dal
• Urad dal
• Whole dhania (coriander)
• Little pepper
• Whole fenugreek
• Red chillies
• Hing

A - In a mixie make it into powder that is your puliogari powder

Heat oil:

• Til oil - 1 table spoon
• Mustard seeds
• Chana dal
• Urad dal
• Red chillies
• Peanuts
• Hing
• Curry leaves
• Haldi 
• Tamarind water
• Add powder from A above
• Add salt
• Once thickened - add mixture in rice

Baby Potatoes in Tamarind Curry

 This is house favourite so logging it here:

Potato-500gms Onion-2 Green Chillies-2 Garlic cloves-6 Tomato-3 Tamarind pulp-1 cup Turmeric-1/2tsp Sambar Powder-1tbsp Chilli Powder-1tbsp Cumin Powder-1/2tbsp Hing - 2 pinch Coriander leaves Salt to taste Sesame Oil Heat oil in a pan , add mustard,red chillies,cumin seeds and curry leaves. Add chopped onions, green chillies and cook untill it turns translucent and soft Add tomatoes and saute it for few mins. Add sambar powder,turmeric,salt,cumin powder and chilli powder,mix it well. Add tamarind water and cook for 12 mins in a medium flame. Add half boiled potatoes,cover it and cook for 10 mins in a medium flame. When oil floats on the top and the gravy is thick, switch off the flame. Garnish it with chopped coriander leaves. Serve it hot with rice or roti/dosa.Enjoy!

Water in the fridge - ideas to make them more refreshing.

Found this floating on facebook - worth bookmarking

SPRING CLEANSE ~ YOUR BODY ~ Yes another post about water :) But if you really want to cleanse then DRINK, DRINK, DRINK. Here are eight (8) home made vitamin water recipes to help you keep the water flowing!

As a rule, you should try to avoid as much as possible industrial food and beverages

1) The classical : lemon/cucumber:
Mix in a pitcher: 10 cups of water + 1 cucumber and a lemon, thinly sliced + 1/4 cup fresh finely chopped basil leaf + 1/3 of finely chopped fresh mint leaves. Leave in the refrigerator overnight before serving.

2) The granite: Strawberry/Lime or Raspberry/Lime
Mix in a pitcher : 10 cups of water + 6 strawberries / 0r Raspberries and one thinly sliced lime + 12 finely chopped fresh mint leaves. Leave in the refrigerator overnight before serving.

3) The digestive: Fennel/citrus
First: infuse 1 to 3 grams of dried and crushed fennel in 150 ml of boiling water for 5-10 minutes. Allow to cool.
Mix in a pitcher: 10 cups of water + lemon juice (put the leftover lemon in the mix) + a small thinly sliced orange + 12 fresh chopped mint leaves + the infusion of fennel seeds. Leave in refrigerator overnight before serving.

4) The antioxidant: Blackberry/Sage
Note that a part from the berries, sage leaf is the herb that has the highest antioxidant content.
Mix in a pitcher : 10 cups of water + 1 cup of blackberries that have been very slightly crushed + 3-4 sage leaves. Leave in refrigerator overnight before serving.

5) Watermelon: watermelon/Rosemary
Mix in a pitcher : 10 cups of water + 1 cup of watermelon cut into cubes + 2 rosemary stems. Leave in refrigerator overnight before serving.
P.S: I also use watermelon mint a lot.

6) The exotic: Pineapple/Mint
Mix in a pitcher : 10 cups of water + 1 cup of pineapple cut into cubes + 12 fresh mint leaves finely chopped. Leave in the refrigerator overnight before serving.

7) The traditional : Apple/cinnamon
Mix in a pitcher : 10 cups of water + 1 cup of apple cut into cubes + 2 cinnamon sticks + 2 teaspoon of ground cinnamon. Leave in the refrigerator overnight before serving.

8.) The zingibir : Ginger/tea
In advance: heat 1 teaspoon of ginger in two cups of tea, let it cool down.

Mix in a pitcher: 10 cups of water with two cups of the ginger tea + 4-5 pieces of fresh ginger cut into cubes. Leave in the refrigerator overnight before serving.

Valentine Day's Special : Orange Zest + Wine Chocolate layered on Valentine Red Coconut. - Vegan

I love colors. I love oranges (even my perfume is orange). I love wine. And I also like dark chocolates.  Lots of people like milk chocolates but I can never bring myself to eat them. High-taste is a one way street after all :).

Anyways  I wanted to make dark chocolate with oranges ala lindt style but with no sugar and no apparent calories.

This recipe of mine is inspired from Richa's cool blog   - do check out she has some really awesome valentine day's ideas: http://www.veganricha.com/2013/02/zesty-pink-coconut-chocolate-bites.html 
I really love her recipes - her vegan pasta is house favorite.

My adaptation of her recipe is here :
1) Chocolate Layer:  I used my simple 5 minute recipe http://aratikadav456.blogspot.in/2013/02/date-chocolate-truffles-vegan.html. Except that I added lots of orange zest to it.
(orange zest is grated orange peel).
Recipe of chocolate in Brief:
Ingredients - 
- Dates (15),
- chocolate powder (2 table spoons, I use cadbury choc powder),
- wine (optional),
- orange zest (again optional but I won't have it any other way:)),
- coconut oil

a) In a mixie run dates, orange zest with chocolate powder. Add a little coconut oil and a spoon of wine if it is too dry.
b) Heat the mixture in microwave for 30 secs. If dates not well-done mash them with spoon. Can add a little spoon of wine again if it is too dry - dont let the chocolate be too wet.

2) Red coconut layer:  For the color of the mixture I just ran the beetroot in a mixie  with water and strained the water to get the red color.
Recipe of Valentine Red Coconut in Brief:
Ingredients- 
- 3/4 cup grated coconut (I used fresh, one can use dry coconut too),
- 3-4 spoons of orange zest,
- 1/4th cup oats (ground),
- 2 teaspoons sugar,
 - 1 tiny beetroot.

a)  On a tava (flat pan) - roast coconut so that it is dry. Remove. Roast powdered oats so that they change their color a bit.
b)  Grind beetroot in a mixie with water. Strain the red colored water, add 2 teaspoons of sugar in it for syrup and boil it a bit so that it becomes little viscous.

Coconut mixture and chocolate together.

c) Add b) to a) on the tava in a controlled way so that it is not too wet and take it out in few minutes when the mixture looks cohesive and done.



Put coconut mixture on a butter paper or newspaper and flatten. Put chocolate on top of coconut mixture. You can sprinkle some chocolate powder on top and make it more dark :).

That's it. Cut and decorate with orange zest!!

Oh no! It's that time of the year again.

The recipe is so simple that I had to give it a complicated name to make it sound exclusive. Anyways, happy Valentine's day to anyone who cares :)!

Date + chocolate truffles - Vegan

Time to make 5 mins.
Now this is really a winner. When I was making it I thought it would taste like dates but it tastes like nice lovely chocolate.

Ingredients:
1) 15 dates (deseeded)
2) 2 tablespoon chocolate powder ( I use Cadbury's cocoa powder)
3) Coconut oil (I used parachute - no seriously I did but a pure coconut oil parachute bottle and I use it) but you can use any oil like olive or groundnut oil
4) Dry coconut powder (optional - but I love it)
5) A spoon of wine or rum (optional)
Steps:
1) In a blender blend dates and cocoa powder. I added a little coconut oil for it to be together. Also secret ingredient was a a spoon of wine. You can also add lots of orange zest to it and it will be yummy.

Now this was a problem for me as when I blended the dates were not blending properly. Then Priya suggested that we can microwave it. And I microwaved it for 20 seconds and mashed it with a spoon and it was fine. Maybe my dates weren't soft that's why But make sure the dates are mashed well.

2) Apply some coconut oil in hand and roll small balls of truffles. Roll them on coconut/dark chocolate.

3) You can eat them as soon as you make or refrigerate and eat.

Simple and easy - banana oatmeal pancakes - vegan!

I have always loved pancakes but making them required lots of unhealthy ingredients and I never liked the taste when I made them. Also I like them sweet so that I dont have to load them with syrups but I dont like adding sugar to make anything sweet.

I came across quite a few recipes on net and this one looked too good to be true. Almost a recipe masterpiece as far as pancakes are concerned.
http://www.colourfulpalate.com/2011/06/22/vegan-banana-oatmeal-pancakes/

All the ingredients are ususally in my kitchen so I could try it out immediately!

Here is my variation customized for Indian, relaxed household.

The ingredient list here makes 3 pancakes - small sized and I used my small cup for measurements.

0) 1 whole banana
1)  3/4th cup oatmeal
2) 1/4th cup atta (whole wheat flour)
3) 3/4th cup milk (soymilk for vegan - I think  I will try with soymilk too as it has a nice subtle flavor also)
4) pinch of salt
5) baking soda 1 tsp (I used Eno as I didn't have baking soda and in the morning only 24 hour chemist below my house was open)


Mix all the dry ingredients first in the mixie (that is dont add milk and banana just yet). Once finely powdered only then  add the banana and the milk and mix them all. Don't overrun the mixie. Add milk to adjust consistency if the batter is too hard.

If you have non-stick awesome but if not, pour a little oil (I use canola, but people say coconut oil tastes better with banana dishes).  And pour the batter and make the pancakes. Trust me, they really taste good.
Only tip is cook on medium heat.
I will upload a picture soon. We just made 3-4 and it got finished off before I could click it. You can have them as is or have them with honey. Yummy.

If you have waffle maker, you can use the same batter to make awesome waffles. (Tip is add, 1/2 tblsespoon ground flaxseed for crispiness and  half teaspoon of vanilla esssence).

I love waffles a lot too :).

Vegetable juicing recipes & roasted broccoli

Sometimes we eat lots of unhealthy food for days together and feel like having food high in micronutrients.
I really enjoy vegetable juice esp during winter when the instinct is to pile up on unhealthy food, I sometimes try to reverse the instinct by piling up on raw vegetables and fruits. Reminds me of IIT Kanpur days where a vegetable juice vendor would be sitting in the hostel and he was the only alternative to  (the unquestionably horrible) hostel food. I used to drink those a lot (5 rupees a glass) and I looked my best in those days.

Since we got a juicer also recently and have seen some documentaries like "hungry for change" and "fat sick and nearly dead", I thought I could take juicing raw veggies seriously. Here ar some simple recipes that work wonders for our kitchen.

Apple or pears go a long way in sweetening and giving a good taste to these veggie juices.

My most common recipe is spinach, apple, cucumber( adds lots of volume because of high water content), beetroot (if my maid agrees ot peel it else painful peeling), carrots and ginger.

Saurabh's most common recipe is orange. He just likes fresh orange juice.

This is a list of some recipes that I saw on net and documenting them.
1) Carrot (5-6), Spinach (1 big bowl), Apple (1-2)

2) Cucumber, Spinach, Apple, Celery (1 stick if available)

3) Cabbage, Carrot, Cucumber

4) Cucumber (3-4), ginger (a small piece), coriander (half fist)

5) Green Grapes and a stick of celery

6) Apple, carrot, strawberry

Basically ginger and apple/pear will bail you out regardless of how bitter rest of the veggies are.

Here is another link I found and it can help you further.
http://www.raw-foods-diet-center.com/vegetable-juicing-recipes.html

*****

I think our most common dish has become roasted broccoli with garlic. It tastes yummy. Just oven roast broccoli with garlic and you can add baby potatoes (my microwave which I got as marriage gift has roast button also so I roast in it for 20 mins). Very tasty and filling.

Recipe for Indian Tea / Chai

I know everyone has their own recipe for tea where the order of adding milk, or sugar or tea leaves changes. There are many permutation of adding those ingredients.

This is mine and I think it really works everytime (if I pay attention to it). 

1) Put water for boiling. Grate good amount of ginger (grate not crush - the taste is better if you grate) 

2) Let the water boil. Add Sugar. (or jaggery as jaggery tastes better)

3) Add tea leaves

---

Let it boil for a bit - till you see the true colors of tea leaves

---

4) Now add milk and let the tea boil completely till the milk threatens to overflow. At that stage, put it in simmer for 1 minute and turn the stove off.

5) (Optional and avoidable) If you like cardamom in your tea - this is the stage to add. Crush one and add. If you add early -the cardamom's taste becomes too strong and over powering.

6) Whether you added cardamom or not- cover the tea and let it cool for 3-4 minutes. This really enhances the flavor and brings the tea temperature below boiling point.

7) Pour in a cup and drink :).

P.S - Trivia - Do you know that even Russians call their tea chai :). 

Sweet Tooth

I really have a sweet tooth and find it very difficult to resist sweets. The worst is my post dinner sweet craving.

Now that I have been gaining lot of weight because of this, I have discovered a great post dinner desert, that is sweet and is not that guilt inducing.

- Yoghurt (I use full fat yoghurt, but I am contemplating gradually switching to a low fat/probiotic yoghurt)
- Pomegranate (I have trained my maid to peel it effectively - actually it is very easy to deseed them if you see the structure of it and cut the pomegranate around it's structure rather than the center.)


Mix the two. Basically yoghurt is 3-3.5 spoons on a cup full of pomegranate.

And eat and enjoy :).

Classic egg roll dhaba style

Something that is quick and easy and also hits the spot. My maid makes extra rotis and namkeen parathas (my husband likes it with tea) almost everyday and so many times by the next morning lots of extra rotis are left. Sometimes if rotis are not at home I get theplas from the adjacent store and that works too. If you are in US then ofcourse you have rotis from rotiland to help you out.

Nonetheless this is a classic recipe that I tried and worked. Yest night my mom came from a flight at 12 at night and was hungry. There were only rotis for food and i made these rolls and she got emotional on eating them as she didnt expect anything. You can try variations of sauces ofcourse.

My ingredient list:
1) 1 Roti
2) 1 Egg
3) Finely chopped onions
4) Coriander leaves, some chopped green chillies
5) Lemon or amchur powder (for tanginess- one of the two is must)
6) Peri Peri sauce (Here you can try variations like pudina chutney etc etc


Method:
1) Put some oil in tava and put your roti
2) Whisk the egg and once the roti is hot - pour the whisked egg on the roti- don't let it spill outside the roti. Let it cook, you can turn the roti and egg so that it is firm.
3) Take the result out on a plate with the egg portion facing upwards.
4) Apply a little bit of peri peri sauce on the roti (alternative apply chilli sauce or pudina or coriander chutney)
5) Add the finely chopped onions, some green chilles and lots of coriander leaves.
6) Put amchur powder (i have it as standby and whenever there is no lemon (which is quite often) I put this to add tanginess.
6) Roll the roti and serve.

Everyone eats atleast 2. So ration accordingly.

Is it possible to make pesto without cheese

Seems like yes and Richa Hingle's blog post : http://hobbyandmore.blogspot.com/2011/05/penne-with-basil-cashew-pesto-asparagus.html is my saviour.

She made pesto with basil, mint, green chillies, garlic, cashew. And she claims it is as yummy as the one made with cheese!

So try it on!

Paneer pakora with yoghurt - healthy alternative to deep fried variety

New dish new dish!

It's been raining the whole day and we were not being able to go out to do anything. And in the eve husband was getting really hungry so I decided to recall some recipe somewhere and made this.

Ingredient:
1) Yoghurt
2) Paneer
3) Besan (gram flour)
4) Lots of garlic - crushed
5) Coriander and green chillies and salt

1) Make sort of a batter with yoghurt, green chillies, coriander, crushed garlic. Add a little gram flour to it - helps in binding.
2) Cut paneer in small pieces and keep it in the batter for as long a time as you can to marinate (30 mins).
3) Have a non stick pan- brush it with oil and put the paneer cubes and let it be well done.

The resulting taste is garlicy and a little tangy because of yoghurt. And we finished it before i could take its snap :P.

Breakfast Today

So it has been a week since I have been working in the morning and saurabh is making breakfast for both of us. Today he was super tensed about his work and I was a little relaxed so I thought I could make something he likes.

It is a tough call because Saurabh hardly notices what he is eating when he is tensed. And for some reason, I was finding one ingredient missing in anything I was planning to make.

So anyways I settled for the following:
1) Egg salad sandwich (I experimented by adding mint leaves to egg salad)
2) Chickoo milkshake (since I had got loads of chikoos yest)

And though he was tensed and immersed in his numerous phones with a IPL match rerun on mute and head immersed in a comp, I felt good when after eating the first bite of sandwich he shook his head. (As I write this I am imagining how was I standing in front of him like a voyeur so for all you know the pressure might have compelled him to nod his head)

So here are the recipes:
1) Egg Salad Sandwich
Ingredients:
a- 2-3 Boiled eggs
b- Mint leaves (beautiful accident)
c- Coriander leaves
d- Green chillies
e- Chilli flakes or optionally lal mirch powder
f- Salt to Taste
g- Green onions - little bit
h - Ceaser dressing or mayo (optional - but it does add that much required zing)
i- Lettuce (one can use cucumber etc - but since I had lettuce at home I used it)
j- Bread - toasted crisp.

1) Chop boiled eggs in small pieces. Add a-h in a bowl and mix properly with a spoon - dont make it a paste so best thing is add the boiled eggs afer you whisk everything else together.
2) Toast the bread, add washed and dried lettuce leaves (u dont want water dripping from your sandwich). You can add cucumber onions tomatoes also. But we didn't add. And then add the filling above on the bread.
3) Secret tip - if the bread is really hot and the filling really cold - some people like it more. But I didn't have the time to cool the filling.


----
Milkshake:
1) Peel and cut the chikoos. Remove seeds. So firmer the chickoos easier it is for you to peel.I get mine form Patel stores in front of my house - they are large and not rotten.
2) Blend chicku, some ice cubes and milk (not too much milk - u want the texture of chiku to be dominant here and not the taste of milk) and water. Tip :Always add less milk in the first run and the second milk after tasting the shake and in the second run so that you never regret.

Tip 2: I wanted to add banana too to it but I didn't wanna experiment that combo. Net research shows that it works.

So anyways the hot sandwich and the milkshake combo makes a nice filling happy breakfast.


Strawberry banana:
Priya introduced me to this. If you have strawberries - just blend them with bananas and icecubes. No need to add sugar. Healthy post workout or midmeal option.

Peas Srivastava style

Recipe from my mil.

Ingredients:
1) Fresh green peas - lots of it - ful mixie
2) Lots of ginger
3) Lots of 5-6 colves of garlic
4) Cloves, jeera, kaali mirch
5) Potatoes

Method:
1) Grind 1-3. Yes grind in a mixie as smooth paste.
2) In a pan add oil and add 1. Keep cooking on low flame. For a long time- the peas paste turns brown.
3) Then add some finelly chopped potatos and let it cook for a while.
4) Add a little water and let it cook. The final dish is little liquidy.
5) My m-in-law had a huge urad dal badi that she fired in oil and added to the dish. And we ate it - it along with the main dish felt like the baati of dal baati.

Tomato murabba types

Whenever we went to eat at Masala Bay, they would serve a sweet tomato chutney that I would love. But Saurabh would say his mom makes it better and I would (as usual and as a dutiful d-in-law)dismiss it as nostalgia.
But on this visit to Delhi I asked mom to make it and when I tasted it I absolutely fell in love with it.

Ingredients:
1) Tomato(large cuts)
2) Jaggery
3) Water
4) Sauf (fennel seeds)
5) Ghee

Method:
1) In a pan in add water, jaggery, large cuts of tomato and boil it for about 30 mins on simmer (yes - I swear my m-in-law boiled it for 1 hour or so but I think she boiled it really longer)
2) In 1-2 teaspoon of ghee - add sauf and then mix it with one.

The tomatoes becomes nice and juicy with this method. And I swear - calorie count notwithstanding - I absolutely couldn't help eat a cup full of it. Yummm!

Raita - yoghurt accompaniment to various indian dishes

Sanjeev Kapoor recipe:
1) Crushed garlic
2) Kaala namak
3) Very little Red chilli powder
4) Take thick yoghurt and mix 1-3. If you want to make it thin, add milk. You can strain using a muslin cloth to make it smooth.

My pune aunt's recipe:
1)Cut kheera in very small pieces
2) Coriander leaves
3) Roasted peanuts - good amount (crushed into small pieces- she coarsely powders it but i just break it into 1/6th size and i like it crunchy)
4) Some salt
5)A bit of sugar
6) Yoghurt

Mix well and relish.

Best Hyderabadi Biryani

0) Slice onions and deep fry in oil till brown. Keep it aside
1) Basmati rice - boil till its half done.
2) Get raw papaya paste - add it to lamb pieces - and keep it in fridge for 8 hours.
3) To the marinated lamb pieces add green chillies, salt, haldi powder, red chilli powder, ginger paste, garlic paste, onions sliced and fried (dry and brown), rose petals, pudina(mint) leaves, dhaniya(coriander) add. curd. Mix well. Marinate for 30 mins.
4) On top of it add Rice add elaichi (cardomoms), cloves, kalli mirch, shaahee jeera, moti elaichi, daal chini (cinnamon stick), fried and dried brown onion, garam masala powder, kevda water, pudina(mint) leaves, saffron(mix a little in hot milk), ghee, rose petals, long cut ginger, rose water and kewra water.
5)Cover and cook for 40-45 mins in low flame. Seal it with wheat floor dough. You can put the vessel on a tava so that it doesn't get direct heat.

The Great Indian Greek salad

Low cost low fat. And I love it. I can eat it for most of my life.


Dressing
----------
Ajwain (also called carom seeds, substitute for oregano - it's stronger in taste)
Garlic (4-6 cloves) (optional)
mustard paste (optional)
2 spoons white vinegar / lemon juice
8 spoons olive oil
black pepper (optional)
Salt
(I also add flax seeds)

Mix well for a while.


Cut vegetables:
---------------
Lettuce
Cucumber
Onions
Olives (optional)
Paneer (marinated in vinegar for 2 hours - and then washed good substitute for fetacheese)
Tomatoes
capsicum (optional)

Optionals:
Bama also used to use chickpeas(boiled chole). Some of my friends used boiled chicken also. Choose anything if at all you want.

Easy to make Omlette Cheela

Something my husband loves.

Ingredients:
- Besan, salt, chili powder
- pudina chutney
- Omelette ingredients- egg, onion, green chillies


1) In a bowl add besan, red chilli powder, salt. Add water and mix well. (optional - you can add a pinch heeng also)
2) In a non stick pan - apply oil using tissue paper.
3) Pour the besan paste and spread using spathula so that it is very thin.
4) Add pudina chutney and evenly spread it over the cheela.
5) Once it looks a bit done, pour the omelette mixture (egg, green chillies onion) on it evenly across its whole diameter.
6) Pour oil for corners. Remove and serve with pudina chutney.

Eat :). Requires a bit of patience when the cheela cooks so the thinner the cheela the better it is for you. I wish there was substitute for pudina chutney - else almost everything else is super instant. I think I should try it with dhania chutney and mooli aka delhi style.