cabbage soup

Here is a healthy cabbage soup for the days which need a lighter meal. As usual I didn't add any cream but sauteed the cabbage in little butter and blended the vegetable in milk. The croutons are home made. I just cubed some bread slices, buttered them and placed in a hot oven to make the croutons.



Ingredients:
Cabbage - 2 cups (chopped)
black pepper - 1 tsp
green chilly - 1
onion - 1
garlic - 3 cloves
cumin - 1/2 tsp
tomato - 1
Tomato sauce - 1 tbsp (optional)
olive oil / butter - 1 tbsp
milk - 1/4 cup or cream - 2 tbsp
crouton / sliced bread - 1 cup

Method:
Heat olive oil in a wok.
Put the garlic, cumin, pepper and fry till garlic welts.
Add the chopped onion , chilly and cabbage. Stir fry till cabbage gets half cooked.
Now put the chopped tomato and cook everything for 3 minutes (till the cabbage looses the raw flavor).
Let it cool completely. Grind it to a fine paste and bring it to boil.
Add salt to taste. Mix some tomato sauce to enhance the taste.
Fry some croutons in butter .
Add cream along with fried croutons before serving.

Cabbage soup is ready!

Kuzha puttu

Puttu - A breakfast item common in Kerala and Southern TamilNadu.Generally rice flour is steamed with shredded cocount and served with sugar / banana / spicy kadalai curry.

Kuzha puttu - A puttu resembling a pipe.

There are many ways to steam this puttu. We can use a simple cloth over hot steam or idly making plates or this special tool 'puttu kudam' for steaming the flour.
The most authentic and tasty variety of puttu is made by using the red rice flour (rose matta arisi or sivappu samba rice).

I used the store bought ready made red rice flour (double roasted). Instead we can roast the ordinary white rice also.Some people prepare the flour from scratch by soaking and dry grinding the rice.

Puttu maker in box along with the ingredients.
Recently I bought this puttu maker from an Indian store. Love it very much:)

Puttu kuzhal and puttu kudam with ingredients .
Puttu maker consists of 2 main parts: The puttu kuzhal (to fill the processed rice flour) and kudam (to fill water and generate steam).


Puttu served. The white coconut is the frozen shredded coconut and the darker one is what I got from fresh coconut:)

Ingredients:
(For 2 kuzha puttu)
Red rice flour - 1 cup
(If not readymade, roast it till we get a pleasant smell and the grains look very flowy)
salt - 1/4 tsp
Shredded coconut - 1/2 + 1/2 cup
(Coconut should be almost equal to that of rice flour.We can reduce it too, but we can't get the real taste.)

Method:
Fill the puttu kudam (the broader vessel) with water to its 3/4 th. Close the top with the given lid that has the nozzle.
Start heating it.

In the same time bring to boil 1/4 cup water along with the salt.

Place the roasted rice flour in a mixing bowl.
Slowly sprinkle the boiling water and mix well without any lumps.
The consistency should be such that we should be able to make a solid with the flour, but the solid should be breakable in to flour when touched gently.
Totally we should get a wet flour but not any lumpy.

Now mix 1/2 cup shredded coconut to it and mix well.

Take the puttu kuzhal. Fill the bottom with 2 tsp shredded coconut. Then put the prepared flour and fill half way very loosely. Again spread 2 tsp coconut and fill the pipe with prepared rice flour.

Now check if the steam starts hushing out of the puttu kudam.

Close the puttu kuzhal and fit it over the nozzle.Make some holes in the filled flour using the stick given.

Heat till we see steam out of the top of puttu maker.
Then continue heating for 5 minutes and switch off.

Carefully take out and serve immediately.

Kuzha puttu is ready!

Serving suggestions:
Serve hot with sugar and banana.
Other combination are channa masala (kadalai curry), green gram chundal etc.

Note:
Try to serve the puttu immediately otherwise it may turn hard. Reheating in microwave helps a bit.

Vazhaikai (plantain) curry

Vazhakai / valai kai means unripe banana / plantain. It is a practice of South Indians to make some spicy hot curry using unripe banana or potato along with the lesser spicy sambar and rice. Nevertheless to say this simple curry can brighten up an ordinary meal.

Unripe banana cubed with skin:


Vazhaikai curry:


Ingredients:
Unripe plantain - 2
onion (chopped) - 1/2 cup
tomato - 2
oil - 2 tbsp
fennel - 1/2 tsp
cilantro - a handful
ginger garlic paste - 1 tsp
turmeric - 1/8 tsp
chilly powder - 1 tsp
coriander powder - 2 tsp
garam masal powder - 1/2 tsp
Tamarind - a gooseberry size

Method:
Wash and clean the banana. Scrub and remove the outer skin mildly. We can remove the skin completely but I prefer to keep the skin on.
Cut it into small cubes.

Extract tamarind juice using 1 cup water.
Cook the plantain in 1/2 tsp salt, 2 cup water , tamarind extract, turmeric powder.
Turn off heat when it is almost (90%) cooked. Drain the excess water.

Heat oil in a wok.Let the fennel get red.
Then fry onion to golden brown. Now add ginger garlic paste and fry till raw smell vanishes.Add the chopped tomato and fry till oil oozes.

Now add the cooked plantain , all the powders, salt to taste and cook till the masala smell turns good. Put off fire.

Garnish with chopped cilantro.
Valai kai masala curry is ready!

Serving suggestions:
Serve as side dish with any rice.

Repost for Nithu's Fruit event

I am re-posting the following recipes for Nithu Balas's "Think Beyond the Usual - Fruits" event.

Pineapple rasam:


Apple Rasam:



Kashmiri pulao:


Happy hosting Nithu!

Pancake

I prepared this pancake with the theme of poinsettia or kaleidoscope using cranberry jelly and palm fruit (artificially green colored one that we got in a nearby Asian store). The method and ingredients are very simple, made it just like a thick soft dosa using butter. I used Aunt Maple's pancake mix and prepared the pancakes. Served it with honey instead of the usual maple syrup. Hope you all like it.
Sending this to Priya's event : Pancakes

Hope it suits the event.

A simple crochet work:

This is the pillow / cushion cover I made recently. I did it by double crochet stitch in woolen yarn.
Yarn name: Red heart Burgungy (0376), 100% acrylic
care: machine wash.
Needle : crochet needle , size k (10)
stitch: single crochet at the base and double crochet all over.
Yarn used : nearly 4 oz / 100 gm

Happy weekend !

Paneer mattar masala

Paneer mattar masala is a curry with Indian cottage cheese and green peas. Paneer means Indian cheese and mattar stands for green peas. This is a lesser spicy curry of Indian vegetarian cuisine. Most common among North Indians and admired by all.

Long back I tasted it in 'DATA udipi hotel' in Nesapakkam, chennai along with parotta for the first time. After that, that restaurant became a regular for us while in that location. Eating out was not a common thing in my birthplace and so after marriage , Xav took me to many restaurants of Chennai. Even though not a big restaurant, it was the first that comforted me with chole poori and relieved my home sick feeling after marriage. They used to sell a kind of sweetened betel leaf named 'paan' and it was a lot of fun for me to take a piece of paan while going home. I have heard that those paan may spoil the teeth . So ask the pan maker to carefully prepare it without any lime (sunnambu) , otherwise we may end up with red mouth:)

Recently one day I prepared this curry for Xav's lunch along with chapathi and some curd rice. We absolutely love this dish with 'Indian store bought' frozen parotta too and remembered those great days.



Ingredients:
Paneer -100 gm (chopped 2 handful)
green peas (fresh / frozen) - 1 cup

For masala to grind:
oil - 1 tbsp
Tomato - 2
onion - 1 (big)
ginger - 2 inch
garlic - 5 cloves
cashew - 5
cinnamon - 2 inch


others:
Red chilly powder - 1 tsp
garam masala powder - 1 tbsp
coriander powder - 1 tbsp
Turmeric powder - 1/8 tsp
salt - to taste
cilantro - a handful
dried methi leaves  - 1 tbsp
butter - 1  tbsp
cumin - 1 tsp

Method:
Heat oil in a wok. Chop the paneer into 1 inch size cubes. (Fry the chopped paneer till golden brown and keep aside - Optional).

Then fry the cashews, cinnamon, onion and fry till it becomes golden brown. Also add ginger garlic and fry for 1 minute. Let everything cool.

Cook tomato with 1 cup water till mushy. (I microwaved it for 3 minutes). Let it cool.

Grind the onion, cashew, spices, tomato together into a fine paste along with the water from cooked tomato.

Heat the wok and fry a bay leaf, cumin .

Add the ground paste, coriander powder, turmeric powder, red chilli powder, garam masal powder, salt and bring it to a boil. Then add the green peas and cook completely. Reduce flame and cook covered for 10 minutes.

As the raw smell vanishes and oil starts showing up add the fried / chopped paneer and mix well.
Keep it in low flame for 5 minutes and switch off.

Garnish with finely chopped cilantro and kasuri methi.

Paneer mattar masala is ready!

Serving suggestions:
Serve hot with chapati or paratha.

Note:
No need to fry the paneer. It is optional only.
If needed add a tbsp of brown sugar to increase the taste.
I add one cooked potato to this dish to give more thickness to the curry.

Masala stuffed egg.

Really I was confused before posting this title, because I could not figure out the exact Tamil name for this recipe. As my culinary guru is my mom, I call the recipes by her nomenclature only. She used to present this item as 'keerina muttai masala', which means an egg slit gently and stuffed with some spicy masal:) . Also this is exactly how my Tuticorin aachi (my grandma) taught us this egg curry. I like the way my aachi calls this as keeri muttai :)
  I am not sure if many household out here practice the same name. Anyways this blog is to remember her , so I call it by the same, the 'keerina muttai'. Those were days when we used to make large number of boiled eggs for family parties. We have to be careful while preparing the hard-boiled egg as the whole dish relies on the appearance of the egg. Even though it is not a rocket science, I believe it need some skills. So I have shared my version to make perfect boiled eggs below. Feel free to share your tricks too.
This egg masal will be a perfect match with tomato rice (thakkali saatham), biryani etc. Try out and tell me how you devoured it:)



Ingredients:
Boiled egg - 2
red onion (finely chopped)- 2 tbsp per egg
Fennel - 1/4 tsp
oil - 1 tbsp
red chilly powder - 1/4 tsp
turmeric powder - a pinch
Garam masal powder - 1/4 tsp (optional)

How to boil the egg perfectly:
Take out the egg from fridge and keep outside for atleast 15 minutes.
Wash and clean the egg. Place it in a vessel, very gently, slowly and carefully. Because this is where we end up in broken egg.
Next fill the vessel with water, so that an inch of water remains above the egg.
Start heating the vessel in a slow fire till the water turns almost hot. The reason for slow cooking is to avoid cracking. Then increase the heat till we get bubbles.
Immediately reduce flame and cook in low flame for 10 minutes (12 minutes for very large eggs).(Never cook it in boiling water entirely, otherwise we may end up with rubbery eggs). Put off fire.
Then remove the hot water. Cool the eggs by pouring cold water and peel off the shell.
Hard boiled egg is ready!

Note:
Very fresh eggs are difficult to peel. But the ones near expiration are great.

Method:
Heat oil in a wok.
Add fennel and let it get red. Then add the onion and saute it till it gets soft.Then add salt, chilly powder, garam masal , turmeric powder and stir well. Immediately switch off. Take out the masala.

Slit the egg in once or twice without splitting it. Fill the masal inside and slowly roll the eggs in the wok to coat the remaining masala in the wok over the eggs.

Masala stuffed egg is ready!

Serving suggestion:
Serve as side dish with tomato rice, any biryani etc.