Uzhunnu Vada / Urad dal vada @ home

An easy breakfast/snack recipe.

Uzhunnu/Urad dal - 1 cup
Salt - As required
Onion - 1
Pepper - 5
Curry leaves - 1 spring
Ginger - small piece
green chilli - 2

Soak uzhunnu / urad dal in water for 5 hours. Grind it with salt and few drops of water and keep it.The batter must be thick.

Mix ginger, green chilli, onion, pepper, curry leaves to this ground dal and keep it aside.

Heat kadai with oil. Wet hands with water and make balls off the paste. Make a hole in the center of the batter. Deep fry Uzhunnu/urad Vada in low flame till golden brown colour.

Serve hot with chutney and sambhar.

Tips:-

You can grind urad dal and keep it overnight for fermentation. This gives a very soft uzhunnu vada.

If required add some rice powder to the ground dal to make it thick.

Kerala Recipe:- How to prepare Aviyal

Aviyal is a very nutritious food as it is prepared using many vegetables. Here lets see how to prepare authentic kerala aviyal.

Ingredients

Vegitables:-
Carrot - 1
Beans - 5
Vellarikka - A small piece  (Lauki can be used instead of vellarikka)
Drumstick - 1
onion - 1
Payar / lobia - 3
Tomato - 1
Green chilli - 3
Kunduru / kovakka - 3

For Grinding:-
curry leaves - 1 spring
Grated coconut - 1/2 cup
Jeera - 1 tsp
Curd - 1 cup
Onion - 1/2 piece (You can use small onion as well)

Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp


Wash and cut all the vegetables lengthwise into small pieces say 1/2 inch thickness. Pressure cook these vegetables with little water, salt and turmeric. Don't overcook the vegetables.

Now grind grated coconut, jeera, green chilli, onion in a grinder with curd. No need to grind it to a fine paste. Just grind it little bit and keep it aside.

Heat the pressure cooker and add this ground mixture to the cooked vegetables stir it continuously. Add some curry leaves to this. Don't add water. Let it boil for five minutes. Stir it in between. Once it is done switch off and add little bit oil on the top and cover it.

The aviyal is ready to be served with rice.

Notes:- The aviyal will get thick easily.

Tips:-
You can add any vegetable of your choice except beetroot.
You can add raw mango to the aviyal. In that case don't add curd. Cook raw mango with the vegetables itself.
The common vegetable which can be used for preparing aviyal are elephant yam/chena, raw plantain/ pachakaya, snake gourd/padavalanga etc.

How to make Veg Schezwan Fried Rice at home - Schezwan Fried Rice Recipe

This is an easy dinner idea for the family. If you have schezwan fried rice masala available at home then within ten minutes you can prepare this tasty dish. If you are in a hurry don't try making schezwan sauce at home as it is bit time consuming.

To prepare schezwan fried rice you require the below ingredients.

Cooked Rice - For 2 people. (You can use basmati rice or white rice. I used white rice)
Chopped vegetables - 1 cup (I used beans, carrot, capsicum)
Onion - 1
Green chillies - 3
Ching's miracle schezwan fried rice masala - 1 n 1/2 tsp
oil - as required
salt - as required.

Cook the rice with little oil and salt in it. Don't over cook the rice else it will be sticky. Once the rice is cooked spread it in a wide plate and let it cool for sometime.

Chop the onion and green chillies and keep it aside.

Heat a kadai and pour oil into it. Add chopped onion and saute for a minute. Add green chilli followed by chopped vegetables. Let the vegetable get cooked for 2 minutes. The vegetable should be crunchy so don't cover it while cooking.

Add the Ching's schezwan masala into this vegetable mix and stir properly for another 1 minute. Add salt also. Add cooked rice to this and mix well.

Add 1/2 tsp Chilli vinegar and 1/2 tsp soy sauce to this mix. This step is optional as you are already using schezwan masala.

Switch of the flame and cover the kadai and let it rest for five minutes.

Now serve it hot with sauce or any manchurian of your choice.

Note:-
You can garnish it with green spring onions for better taste.

Tasty Palak paneer recipe - Cottage cheese in Spinach gravy

Palak paneer is one of the healthy food you can prepare at home. This is very easy and it will not take much time to prepare.

To prepare homemade fresh paneer refer the post "Home made fresh Paneer - Indian cottage cheese"

Ingredients :-

Palak - 1 bunch
Jeera - 1 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1 tsp
salt - as required
Green chilli - 2
Onion - 1
Tomato -1
ginger - 1 small piece


Preparation :-

Remove stems and clean the palak leaves with lots of water and keep it aside. The palak should be cleaned thoroughly as there are chances of dirt and mud get stuck on the leaves.

Heat a kadai with little ghee/oil in it. Add jeera and let it splutter for a minute. Add the cleaned palak leaves and cover the kadai. Stir it in between and after 3-4 minutes you can see all the palak turned to dark green color and the volume gets reduced. Switch off the flame.

Now let this cool for sometime then grind it with green chillies.

Now grind tomato, ginger, onion together and keep it aside. Heat oil in a kadai and add the onion-tomato paste and saute well for 5 minutes. Once the oil gets separated add the ground palak leaves to this and saute well till oil separates. Cook for 5 minutes and check that the raw smell/taste of the palak is not there.

Add some water and cover it and cook well. Add palak cubes to this mix and cook for some more time. Once done switch off the flame and serve hot with roti/chapathi.

Tips:-
To make this gravy rich just add some milk cream once cooked.
Palak can be fried before putting into gravy.

Home made fresh Paneer - Indian cottage cheese

I hope most of you buy paneer from shops for preparing various paneer dishes. Try making paneer at home which tastes good and fresh.

Things you require:-

Milk - 1 liter 

Lemon - 1/2 piece

Pour the milk in a vessel and squeeze the lemon into it. Stir it properly and keep it on the gas stove in low flame. Stir in between.

After sometime you can see the milk start curdling , if its not then add some more lemon juice and stir.

Once the milk curdles completely you can see small lumps of paneer forming and getting separated from the yellowish water. Switch of the flame and pour this mix into a thin cloth and let all the water get drained. Fold the paneer with the cloth and keep it on a plate. On top of that keep some weight and let it rest for 30 minutes. Follow the picture below.

After that remove the paneer from the cloth and cut in cubes or whatever shape as you wish. Now don't spend so much for buying paneer :) Just make it at home and prepare your tasty paneer dishes.

Tips:-

You can also use curd instead of lemon juice. But from my experience lemon works better.

 

Dhaba style Chicken curry

Chicken curry is the easiest gravy you can prepare when you have many guest at home. This is an easy chicken recipe which I learned from my mother-in-law. She is a great cook and whatever dish she prepares comes out very tasty. I hope you all will like this as well.

Ingredients Required:-

Dry red chilli -2
Bay leaves - 2
cloves -3
Cinnamon - 1 piece
Big Elaichi - 2
Pepper -3 (optional)
oil - As required


Onion - Paste of 2 big onions
Onion thinly sliced - 1 small
Tomato pureed - 3
Green chilli - 3
Ginger Garlic paste - 1tbsp

For Marinating the chicken:-

Chicken - 1/2 KG
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Chilli powder - 1 n 1/2 tsp (If you need very spicy then add some more chilli powder)
Chicken Masala (I used eastern) - 1 tbsp
Coriander powder - 1 tsp
salt - as required
Curd - 1 small bowl


Preparation:-

Marinate chicken pieces with all the ingredients mentioned and keep it for at least 30 min.

Heat a Kadai/ pressure cooker and pour oil into it. Add Dry red chilli, Bay leaves, cloves, Cinnamon, Big Elaichi and Pepper and saute for sometime. Add thinly sliced onion and green chillies to this and saute again.

Once the onion turns to brown color add the ginger garlic paste followed by onion paste to this and saute till the onions are done, roughly about 5 min required.

Once the onions are done add the tomato puree and saute till the oil separates. (about 3 min.) The raw smell of the onion and tomato won't be there if it is cooked properly.

NOTE:-
Here I have added all the masala while marinating so I have not added any masala to the above onion-tomato mix. If you have not added enough masala at the time of marinating then please add all the masala after this step with very little water and cook for 3 more minutes till the oil separates.

Add the marinated chicken to this mix and cook till the chicken roast a bit.(about 7 min)

Now sprinkle little bit of water and cook again for a minute. Add some more water. Add water in such a way that the chicken should not sink completely. This is because the chicken will release some juices so the gravy will be enough once it gets cooked completely. Now cover the pressure cooker and wait for 1 whistle and then keep it in low flame for 2 min and switch off.

NOTE:
If you are preparing in a kadai then cover it and cook in low flame for about 10-15 minutes. 

Once the gravy is ready, garnish it with coriander leaves and serve hot with roti / rice.

Tips:-

If the onion and tomatoes are not cooked properly then the curry wont come out well. So take time and cook onion and tomatoes till the oil gets separate.

Kids Special - Nentrapazam Fry

This was one of my favorite snack when I was a kid. After a long time I have tried this yesterday and my kid also loved it. So if you are facing difficulty in making your kid eat banana then try this out.


You require:-

Nentrapazham / Nentrakaya - 1 big.
Ghee - 2 tsp
Sugar - 1 tsp

I tried a lot to find the English name of this banana but couldn't get in the google. If anyone knows please comment so that it will be easy for everyone to understand. Please refer the photo to get idea about Nentrapazham. This banana is very good for kids.

Peel and cut the banana as below.

Now heat a tava and pour ghee into it. Arrange all the banana pieces on the tava and fry it in low flame.

Turn all the banana pieces and fry again.

Once the banana's are done then remove it from tava and sprinkle some sugar on that. Serve it hot.

I am sure your kid will love this healthy snack.

Tips:-
You can cut the banana into thin slices as well.