VEN PONGAL

Happy Pongal and Makara Sankranthi to everyone.

Image : source

This year we had a very simple celebration, made ven pongal and coconut chutney and offered payers.
We make pongal in two different style at home, venpongal, and the khara pongal. Ven pongal ( ven- means white in tamil), is served with sambar or chutney or both.
This year I am having major problems with my gadgets, first I lost my pics, now my SD card reader of my laptop broke, have to wait until I get a card reader. So can't upload any pictures. Just thought I would post the recipe so that I don't take any more long breaks......

What we need:
1 cup- Raw rice
1/4 cup moong dal
1 tspn black peppercorn
2 tspn cumin seeds
8-10 curry leaves
2 tablespoon ghee
salt to taste
6 cups of water

How I made it :
Heat a pressure cooker or a thick bottomed pan. Dry roast the moong dal. Wash the roasted moong dal along with the rice 3-4 times. In the same pan / pressure cooker, heat 1 tablespoon of ghee, when hot add peppercorns,cumin seeds, curry leaves and than add the washed rice and dal. Add water and salt to taste. Cook in pressure cooker for 2 whistles or in a open pan till the rice is well cooked. Rice should be mushy, it tastes better.

Once done add 1 tablespoon of ghee and mix well. Serve with chutney or sambar. It's ultimate comfort food.....

Cookies for Santa- a chewy chocolate chip cookie

These days my little one always asks me to bake. She will take a bowl and a spoon and say, "Mummy put some stuff into this, I will help you mix mix mix..... ", does it really help??
I normally give her flour and baking powder to be mixed, but the end result, flour all over the place and of course on herself, but surprisingly every time she helps me mix, whatever I bake turns out to be extremely good. Magic of little hands.Three days before christmas she went on nagging me that we need to bake cookies for Santa. I was really tired and was looking forward to my vacation, finally I gave up to her request and decided to bake some simple chocolate chip cookies, following the recipe on the shortening container :). Sometimes they have the best recipe out there.

So we made a batch of cookies and she kept on peeking into the oven to see if they were done and constantly telling me, "I need to be careful right mummy, remember the oven is hot". When the oven beeped, she stood there, with an oven mitt for me to pull out the baking sheets, of course giving me a piece of advice, that I need to be careful or else I will get booboo.

My little baking assistant

The cookies came out and guess what, I tried to taste them and she goes ,"They are for Santa mummy, he come our home tonight". I  stored the cookies in a container and left them on the table hoping that she would eat, but she would sincerely take a cookie out of it, put it in a bowl and give it to Santa to eat. Me and my hubby ate the cookie left for Santa in her absence and she assumed that Santa ate them all :). None of us were allowed to eat the cookie from the box in her presence. So we still have cookies left and everyday she has been giving Santa some cookies. Yesterday morning she found a small cookie box filled it up and left in front of Santa. Now Santa no more sits near the christmas tree, he is enjoying the comfort of our couch and the soft chewy chocolate cookies......

 
Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookies:
source- Crisco shortening container
Makes 36 cookies 

What you need:
1 1/4 cups firmly packed light brown sugar
3/4 cup shortening
2 Tbspn whole milk
1 Tbspn vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 3/4 All purpose flour
1 tspn salt
3/4 tspn baking soda
1 1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips 

How I made it:
Preheat oven 375 F. Combine brown sugar, shortening, milk and vanilla in a large bowl and mix until well blended and creamy, add egg and beat it well into the mixture.
Combine flour, salt and baking soda and mix into the wet ingredients mixture until just blended. Stir in the chocolate chips.
Drop tablespoon full of cookie dough on an ungreased baking sheet about 3 inches apart.
Bake for 8 minutes to get nice soft chewy cookies. Cool for 2 minutes on the baking sheet and than place cookies on cooling rack to cool completely. Store in an airtight container.

Seven Layer Bars

Wish you all a very happy new year.

I have been not enough motivated these days to post anything in my blog and secondly lost all my pictures saved on my laptop with no backups, which was enough to demotivate me further. Finally I made up my mind and decided click some pics of the stuff I baked during my christmas vacation and post them. Better late than never. 

I hope every one and wonderful start this year and made some good resolutions that you will hopefully not break. I made a resolution to be active in blogging to keep my mind diverted for sometime from my daily routine and try out new things.......will I be able to keep up with it????, only time will tell.

Coming back to my recipe for today, I tasted seven layer bars for the first time almost 3 years back at a super bowl party hosted at my hubby boss's house. I enjoyed it and immediately came home and searched for recipes, but never made it. Than again when I started blogging, I decided I need to try this out, got ingredients and than used it for something else. Finally, I decided to bake these lovely bars for christmas.

Its so simple, I wonder why I didn't bake them till now...... I got the recipe from here but made changes in some ingredients and the method, to suit my taste. I tried to  keep it seven layers though and didn't add any extra layer.

What you need:

1.5 cups of graham crackers (tightly packed)
1 stick of unsalted butter
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup butterscotch flavored chips
1 cup chopped Nuts ( I used cashews, almonds, raisins)
1.5 cup dry coconuts flakes
1 can (14oz) sweetened condensed milk

How I made it:
Set oven temperature to 350 degree F, meanwhile in a 13 x 9 inch baking tray put butter and leave it the oven. In another tray leave the nuts to get slightly roasted (may be 3-5 minutes ) until they turn a golden brown.
Once the butter gets completely melted in the tray add the graham cracker crumbs. Mix with the butter until well blended and than pat it on the bottom of the tray to form a uniform layer. Than layer with chocolate chips, followed by butterscotch chips, nuts and 3/4 cup of shredded coconut. Pour the sweetened condensed milk over this. using a fork gently press down. Add the remainder of the shredded coconut on top. Bake for 25-30 minutes until the coconut turn lightly brown. Cool and than cut into desired shape. I got 28 pieces.

Tips:
-I made crumbs using graham cracker that the the crumbs are nice and fresh. gently crush the crackers by hand and put them in a ziplock bag and using a rolling pin (or the condensed milk can as I did) crush the crackers to get crumbs.
-Roasting the nuts prior to baking gives a nice flavor and crunch to the bars
-You can use a parchment paper to line the tray for easy lifting of the entire bars
-Wait till it cools a bit to cut the bars.

Rice and Coconut payasa/Pudding-Happy Diwali

Happy Diwali to every one

I hope you all are having a great time I really miss all the fun we had during diwali back in India. Had made big plans this year to make diwali sweets but unfortunately couldn't make anything. I thought, the least I could do to keep up my spirits was to post a sweet dish on my blog. I made this sweet dish during navrathri but never posted it. So here it goes for diwali.

This is one of the traditional dishes my mom makes often. I like this kheer (payasa in kannada) more than the semiya kheer, so mom often made this on my request. I thought it's too much work and never dared to make it. I was surprised that it was so simple to make. Mom makes it with rice, coconut and poppy seeds. I wanted to add some twist so I ground up some dry nuts instead of frying them and using for garnish.

This has poppy seeds in it so it aids you get better sleep, that's the reason I like it more :).

What you need:

1/4 cup White raw rice (you can use any variety)

1/2 cup grated coconut fresh / frozen  

2 table spoon brown sugar/ sugar/ jaggery

1 teaspoon poppy seeds

1 tablespoon ghee

5 almonds

5 whole cashewnuts

20 raisins

3 cardamom pods

How I made it:

Soak rice, almonds and cashews for 30 min in warm water.  Once well soaked grind it coursely along with coconut. Crush the poppy seeds seperately with little water. In a thick bottomed pot, add the ground rice and coconut mixture along with 1.5 cups of water. Add sugar and cook until it thickens and the raw taste is gone. Keep stirring it often or else it tends to thicken at the bottom. Add powdered cardamom. Garnish with raisins fried in ghee. You can make the thicknesss according to your liking.
Serve warm with ghee over it or serve it chilled.
I like to make it thick and eat it chilled.......just love all the flavors of poppy seed, coconut and cardamom, reminds me of home and mom ... :(

Tips:
You can use milk to get the right consistency.
You can also add brown and polson custard powder to it to get a different flavor

Ganesha story and my little one's version

This happened last night. I thought it was so hilarious wanted to share with everyone.

My little one who is 2 yrs 4 month old was insisting I tell her a story. I told her some than she asked me for Ganesha story. She is a big Ganesha fan. The first one to strike my mind was the birth of Ganesha, but than I decided it's not appropriate for her age. So decided to keep it simple and started with this story ;

Me - Ganesha visited everyone's house and ate lot of mommom (food in my little ones language).       What did Ganesha eat for Mommom ?
Baby - crackers, rice, dal, Paathi( chapathi), noodles, apple juice and chicken.

Me- Ganesha doesn't eat chicken
Baby - why ?
Me- he doesn't like it

Me- Than ganesha sat on his rat and was riding back home
Baby- No mummy, Ganesha ride big Bike ( she is obsessed with motor bikes these days).
Me- Ok lets make ganesha ride a bike. He was riding and than fell down and got a booboo.
Baby- Oh Noooo, what to do now?. Ganesha cry , mummy mummy. We give magic rub to Ganesha.

Me - ok, than ganesha saw a snake on the road  and took it and tied around his belly.
Baby- oh that's scary, I don't like it.

Isn't Ganesha cool, Image : source

Now, I am wondering should I even dare to tell all the mythological stories that we grew up listening too. I was wondering what else she will come with if I tell her ganesha was initially beheaded and than got a elephant head, will she ask if she can have a caillou head or Barney head  :).

Thyme flavored Pan roasted potatoes

I was at my friend's place and happened to smell freshly grown thyme in the yard. It reminded me so much of ajwain. I was so tempted that I picked some to try in my cooking. Of course the first vegetable that immediately striked my mind was potatoes. Hmm, I had never tried fresh thyme before . I had some baby red potatoes that I had bought from the farmers market and decided to combine the two. I kept the seasoning simple to enhance the thyme flavor. It turned out to be good, and I liked the mild lemony flavor of the thyme in the potatoes.

 

What you need:

20-25  red baby potatoes

1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds

1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds

1 teaspoon red chilly powder

¼ teaspoon garlic powder (optional)

1-2 twigs of fresh Thyme

salt to taste

1 tablespoon canola oil

I love the red potatoes, not only for their taste but the red color looks so appealing

How I made it:

Clean and cut the potatoes in half. I microwaved them for 2 minutes. This released the starch out, I did this for 2 reasons, it cooks faster and the starch released gives it a nice crisp on the cut side. 

In a pan heat the oil, add the cumin and fennel seeds, wait till they pop add the potatoes and few thyme leaves and roast for a while. When the potatoes are half done add salt, red chilly powder, garlic powder and mix well. Roast for some more time till the potatoes turn nice n crisp. Finally crush the remaining fresh thyme leaves a bit by hand and add to the potato fry. Serve hot as side dish.

Happy Ganesh Chaturthi

                                        Wishing you all a very Happy Ganesh Chaturthi