Power ingredients in a parantha

Tags

besan, breads, breakfast, fengureek, Friday Feast, gram flour, indian, methi, palak, ragi, recipe, soya, soya flour, spinach, whole wheat

I absolutely heart one pot or rather one dish meals… yes I love cooking and there are times when I have made a 5-course meal for many people but there are times when I dont want to do anything and make one item which will be a complete balance meal… pulaos, khichdis, pastas are the usual that come to mind when we talk about one dish meal but what about paranthas? There are so many things we can do to a parantha and come up with a yummy and fully balanced meal in itself.

Couple of weeks back in such a frame of mind… I made this…. it tasted absolutely divine and with a bowl of curd and some salad.. a meal in itself couldnt have been healthier

What I used

• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup ragi flour
• 1/2 soya flour
• 1/2 gram flour
• 1 bunch methi leaves pureed
• 1 bunch spinach leaves chopped finely
• 1 small onion chopped finely
• 1 tsp oil for kneading
• 1/2 tsp ajwain
• 1/2 cup curd (sigh how i missed it when i typed it first)
• salt and chilli powder (u can also use green chillies, I avoided because of ojas)

How I made

• Mix together all ingredients and knead to make a soft chapati dough
• Take a ball to make paranthas… roll into a chapathi size and then spread oil on top and roll in it a spiral
• Roll again and u will get enough lachas in the parantha 🙂 u can ofcourse make paranthas as u choose 🙂 and enjoy a power packed meal

Wheat and ragi provide the cereals, gram flour and soya the pulses and hence the protien… methi and spinach the veggies and that too green veggies… some curd added to the doufh and then a little curd to eat along for dairy products and its as balanced as it can get.

Ok swaram promise this is the last one and then in the weekend I will be quiet no posts 😉

Comfort Food – Post 25

Tags

channa dal, fengureek, Friday Feast, indian, indian main course, main course, methi, NaBloPoMo, palak, pulses, recipe, spinach

Everyone has a comfort food isnt it… The food you crave when u have nothing else to do, when u wee bit down… when may be your mood is not uptight or may be the health is not the best… For N its rasam-rice…. and for me its dal-roti… seriously when nothing works Dal-Roti does…

And hence I love experimenting with dal, mixing various dal’s together, adding some veggies to it… the variations give dal a face lift and make it an all new dish which is yummy and healthy too…

So when after marriage I first eat this dal which is the favorite of my mil too, I fell in love with it… a dal which has all my fav elements – dal, methi and palak… But unfortunately toor dal doesn’t suit me too much these days… gives me terrible gas so I came up with my own version of this dal which now everyone in the house enjoys totally………

Ingredients

• A cup channa dal (use toor dal if u want to)
• 2 bunches of fresh methi (fengureek)
• 3 bunches of fresh palak (spinach)
• 8-10 shallots or baby onions (I love their flavour and the crunch in the mouth they leave, however mil uses normal onions so feel free to use them if u don’t have baby onions)
• 1 large tomato chopped
• 1 tsp urad dal
• 1 tsp channa dal
• 1/2 tsp mustard seeds
• 1/2 tsp jeera seeds
• 2-3 green chillies
• 2-3 dry red chillies
• 1 medium sized tamarind ball
• 7-8 curry leaves
• 1 tsp sambhar powder (optional)
• 1 tsp corriander powder
• 1/2 tsp garam masala powder
• 1 tsp turmeric

Method

• Wash and chop methi and palak leaves finely.
• Boil together with dal, chopped tomato, slit green chillies, salt and turmeric in a pressure cooker
• Let the steam escape.
• Soak tamarind in warm water
• Heat oil in a pan and add mustard jeera seeds to it
• After they turn brown and start spluttering add the urad dal, channa dal, curry leaves and dry red chillies.
• Fry for 2-3 minutes till the dal browns a little
• Add onions to the same and fry them till golden brown
• Add all dry masalas, fry for another minute
• Add the dal, mash a bit along with the tamarind water.
• Let it simmer for about 5 minutes or so
• Serve hot with rotis or rice

Sluuurp

Give your Day a kickstart

Tags

besan, breakfast, dhokla, Friday Feast, gramflour, methi, oats, peas, recipe, spinach, sprouts

I personally think (and its proven as well) that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. A good healthy and nutritious breakfast, half the problems are solved 🙂 So this Friday let me focus on some yummy and nutritious breakfasts… yeah yeah u got it right, I am posting multiple recipes here. There are so many recipes I want to post and so little Fridays 😉

Sprouts Dhokla

Sprouts is a food whose goodness has been emphasized on this blog too often 😉 I love sprouts in any form and the fact that they are yummilicous too adds to it. Also sprouts have a distinct flavor that suddenly gives any dish a pep up. I saw this sprouts dhokla recipe in one of the magazines (I think Food lovers) long long back and since then I have been making this at home quite often. Easy, yummy, healthy and low cal…. Can we ask for anything else ?

Ingredients

• 100 gm gram flour
• 200 gm sprouted bean sprouts, pureed
• 1 cup curd blended
• 1 tsp green chilli paste
• salt to taste
• 1 tsp eno fruit salt
• 1/2 tsp turmeric powder
• 1 tsp oil
• juice of 1 lemon
• for the tempering
  • 1 tsp mustard seeds
  • 2 tsp oil
  • 3-4 green chillies slit vertically
  • coriander and curry leaves for garnish

Method

• In a bowl mix gram flour, curd, pureed sprouts and water to form a smooth batter of thick consistency. Add salt, mix and set aside for 4 hours covered with a lid (I left it overnight)
• Add the green chilli paste (the original recipe also asks for ginger paste which I skipped I really dont know why), turmeric to the batter and mix well
• Keep the steamer or cooker ready on the burner and grease ur steaming dish (I have a lovely dhokla maker at home… basically its a stack of three steel plates which go in the cooker, just like idly plates… so helpful)
• Mix eno, oil and lemon juice. Add the mixture to the batter and mix well
• Pour in the steaming dish and steam for about 10-12 mins or till done. Cool completely before taking out and cut in big cubes
• For the tempering, heat the oil in a small pan. Add mustard seeds, when they splutter add the curry leaves and green chillies.
• Fry for a minute and pour over the dhokla, garnish with coriander and serve with green chutney

Green Oat Cakes

or in simple language pan fried oat cutlets 😉

Oats is such a healthy grain. I simply love it (atleast in my mind I think I should love it 😉 ) but none in my house even touches the oats porridge however tasty I make it by adding fruits, dry fruits, anything… everyone refuses to touch it. 😦 So I am on the constant lookout of Oats recipes… and when I stumbled upon this one yes yes Nita Mehta’s book again (gosh I have fallen in love with her… her recipes always always work) I was delighted… and when I made it the MNO household was delighted too… the servings for 4 was polished off by 2.5 of us in 10 minutes 😀

Ingredients

• 1 cup oats – roasted in a kadhai for 5 minutes on low heat till golden
• 1/2 cup boiled peas
• 1 cup chopped spinach
• 1 green chilli – chopped
• 1 tbsp fresh coriander
• 1 tsp finely chopped ginger
• salt to taste
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 2 tsp lemon juic
• 1 tsp oil

Method

• Wash spinach and put in a kadhai. Cover and cook on low heat for 5 minutes
• Add 1 green chilli and chopped corainder. Add the roasted oats and mix well
• Put in a grinder and grind to a rough paste. Add all the other ingredients.
• Add 4-4 tbsp of water to make the mixture bind together.
• Add lemon juice to taste.
• Divide into 8-10 balls depending on what size u want. Flatten them a little. Pan fry in a non-stick pan in 1 tsp oil till golden brown. Serve hot with ketchup and salad.

And while we are at oats one of my favorite breakfasts.. oats dosa or crepe whatever u want to call it 😉

Oats Dosa

Ingredients

• 1 cup oats
• 1/4 semolina (sooji)
• 1/4 cup wheat flour (atta)
• 1/2 cup curd
• 2 cups water
• 1 green chilli chopped (or alternatively put a little red chilli powder)
• 1 bunch methi leaves chopped ( u can use any other vegie also if u like)
• handful of chopped coriander
• salt to taste
• oil/ghee/butter for making dosa

Method

• Mix all the ingredients together and set aside for half an hour
• Spread on the tava to make like dosa’s using oil, ghee, butter or if the non stick tava is nice than it will come with anything too
• cook both sides till golden brown and serve with chutney’s of ur choice

So what tell me what are your favorite breakfast recipes?

And on a side note one item has been ticked in my wishlist… I got a Canon SX 200IS yesterday and I have been supremely happy till now… hopefully u guys will get better food pics now, from such a long time the only camera I had was my cellphone one….

Methi Matter Pasanda

Tags

Friday Feast, gravy, indian, main course, methi, milk, peas, recipe

Folks don’t run away, this has not turned into a food blog as of yet 😀 and I know I know its not a friday 🙂 but this had to be blogged, had to be blogged about u….

Scene I :Sunday morning about 11:30 am

Me : I don’t feel like coking today

N : And I don’t feel like going out

Me : ok then lets order in

N : naah mood nahin hai plus what will it do to your diet

Me : sigh but I dont want to cook why do u have to  sayno everytime I ask to go out *picks up ojas and walks away in part anger part style to the first floor*

Scene II

About an hour or so later totally convinced that I have been royally ignored and this man won’t come up to say ok lets go out and eat… I come down to make some quick eat… and what do I see…

All my cooking books half open, half closed thrown away on my carpet in the middle of the living room and a very very very messy looking kitchen but the dining table set in a lovely manner with nothing less than methi mattter pasanda & egg bhurji….

and I didn’t have anything to say after that apart from enjoying the meal and yes the 2-hour cleaning after that 😉

so here is the recipe ab bolo post karna banta hai na 😉

Ingredients

• 1 cup green peas, boiled
• 1 cup methi leaves finely chopped
• 1/4 tsp cumin seeds
• 1/2 tsp kasuri methi
• 1/4 cup low fat milk (we used Good Life Slim Milk)
• 1/4 cup low fat curds (use probiotic if u are buying from outside)
• 1/2 tsp Bengal gram flour (besan)
• 1/4 tsp garam masala
• 1 tsp oil
• salt to taste

for the paste

• 1 1/4 cups sliced onions
• 1/4 cup cauliflower finely chopped
• 1-2 green chillies (I think N used 4 here 🙂 )
• 1 large cloves garlic chopped (I don’t enjoy eating garlic too much, so N skipped it)
• 1/2 ” piece ginger sliced
• 1 stick cinnamon
• 1 clove
• 1 cup low fat milk

Method

for the paste

• Combine all the ingredients in a pan and simmer for 8-10 minutes till the onions are soft and nearly all the liquid has evaporated
• Puree the mixture to a smooth paste in a blender. Keep aside

for the gravy

• Combine the milk, curds and gram flour. Mix Well and keep aside
• Sprinkle salt over the methi leaves and leave aside for 10 minutes. Wash the leaves well. Squeeze out all the water.
• Heat the oil in a non-stick pan and add the cumin seeds
• When the seeds crackle, add the methi leaves and kasuri methi and saute for 3-4 minutes.
• Add the prepared paste, curd-gram flour mixture, garam masala  and salt with 1/2 cup of water and bring the mixture to a boil
• Ass the green peas and simmer for 1-2 minutes
• Serve hot with chapathis

God bless the man for serving a good meal and god please send me someone to clean the mess after that 😉

Recipe Source : Tarla Dalal’s Cooking with 1 teaspoon of Oil

PS: I missed posting yesterday (had a terrible Migraine) and I dont know what to do with NaBloPoMo… should I continue and post 2 posts in a day sometime or should I call it off…