Choco Banana Indian Flat Bread
Bored of the same old routine roti subzi?? Why not try the sweet version of the flat bread? You just need some chocolates which we usually have in our fridges, banana is a fruit too which is invariably found in almost all homes. So another easy to make recipe coming up for you.
Ingredients
1)
3 ripe bananas mashed, the small yellow dwarf variety
2 tspns of clarified butter
Shavings of 2 small chocolate bars, any kind of pure milk chocolate
1)
1/2 tspn of salt
1 cup of whole wheat flour, or as required when you mix the dough
3)
Some clarified butter to use while roasting the flat breads
Method
In a pan take the mashed banana and the clarified butter from 1) caramelisze it till it becomes mushy, add chocolate shavings just before taking it off the fire. Let the mixture get well mixed, the chocolate melt completely. Now in a mixing bowl take this mixture, the flour and the salt from 2). Make a semi soft dough and keep aside for 10 minutes. Make equal balls, roll out like you would to make parathas or flat breads, apply clarified butter and roast them to a colour as shown in the picture above. Smear clarified butter, roll and enjoy. Chocolate lovers can grate some chocolate before rolling and have them too!!
Triple Idli Platter
This is what my husband called it when it was served to him. Idli the quintessential South Indian snack which everybody in the world enjoys I guess. I thought of just bringing in some colour, taste and zing into the simple humble idli. So the platter happened and it is super tastsy. Highly recommended is the one with green chilli for chilli lovers, the next on the recommendation would be for the pepper lovers like my son and myself. The third variety with the carrot and beetroot taste amazing too. This is made with white pepper brought from Kerala, yumm it is. Here goes the simple method.
Ingredients
For the batter
1 cup of split black gram lentil soaked for 2-3 hours by evening, add a handful of beaten rice the thin variety, ground to a fine batter, kept overnight for fermentation
3 cups of idli rava which is available in the market, wash, drain and keep over night
For the toppings
Chop 7-8 fresh green chillies fine
Grate 1 beetroot and 1 carrot keep mixed
3-4 tspns of white pepper freshly pounded in a mortar pestle
Method
Next morning take a large vessel, mix both, add salt and a tea spoon of edible soda, mix well. Smear the idli moulds with oil or clarified butter, pour some batter and sprinkle all the three toppings separately on each idli, steam for ten minutes, enjoy as they are or with the ever famous coconut chutney.
The hit of the infused chilli is amazing, the heat of the white pepper is appeling and the sweetness of the beetroot and the carrot is a change of taste for the palate.
Carrot Dry Fruit Milkshake
Some experi-mental cooking happened this time for Diwali. Lots of dry fruits and carrots gave this kheer a new taste. Here comes the recipe
Ingredients below to be ground to a fine paste
1)
Carrots 200 gms cleaned chopped and pressure cooked to 2 whistles, drained and kept ready
1/4 cup almonds
1/4 cup walnuts
2)
Sugar can be to your taste and can be skipped too, I used about 2 spoons to just balance the taste
Some nutmeg powder
Some green cardamom powder
Few strands of saffron
3)
1 litre of milk
In a large vessel take the ground mixture add milk and blend well with the hand blender, add the saffron, cardamom and mix well. Once well blended chill the mixture and serve in glasses, sprinkle the nutmeg powder in each glass individually.
Begoon Bhaja
This is a Bengali speciality that we were served at the famous eatery named Bhojohari Manna, coutesy my sweet Bengali friend Debdutta Roy. We visited the one at Versova. It was so tasty that I had to learn and post the recipe for my blog readers. The same is made in a Maharashtrian way with different masalas and a different name too, that is Kaap. I love it both ways, now comes the Bengali style recipe.
Ingredients
A)
1 seedless big variety of brinjal, chopped into roundels neither too thick nor too thin and kept in salt water for about half an hour
B)
A dry mix to be made ready with
1 tbsp of dry mango powder
1 btsp of chilli powder
1 tbsp of garam masala
Salt to taste
C)
Rice flour and salt mixed together for dusting, as per requirement
Poppy seeds for sprinkling on the roundels, as per requirement
Mustard oil as per requirement
Method
Once you are ready with all the above preparation, you can remove the roundels from the water, rub the dry mixture B) on each one, preferably with hands, keep for marination for about fifteen minutes.
Now dust each one with C) the rice flour mix, sprinkle a bit of poppy seeds on both the sides, shallow fry on a pan with mustard oil, till they turn golden brown and crisp on both sides.
Potato Hash Browns My Way
Potatoes basically are loved by any and everybody but I am not such a great fan of them. Yes what I like made of potatoes are the French fries made in several ways. the best I have eaten and loved till date are the ones with herbs and truffle oil served at The Table Colaba......yummmmmm. Another dish that I love is the famous Hash browns. I had them at Moscow and fell in love with them. They were deep fried but I have made a different shallow fried version of my own and here goes the recipe.
Ingredients
1)
3 large potatoes par boiled and grated
4 cubes of Britannia cheese grated
100 gms of cottage cheese grated
Salt to be added carefully since the cheese has it and sometimes the cottage cheese is salted too
1 tspn of Kashmiri chilli powder
2)
For making them I used olive oil, you can use any oil of your choice
Tapioca pearl flour for coating
Sprigs of parsley for garnishing
Method
In a large mixing bowl add all the 1) ingredients and mix well, make small patties out of them and pan roast in olive oil by coating each in tapioca pearl flour. Tapioca flour makes them super tasty. The crisp outer layer, the softness inside, the burst of the subtle flavours lets you enjoy different textures of the dish. For me this is an all time dish, can be eaten any day anytime!! any number of times!!
