Thursday, March 26, 2009

Happy Ugadi with Bevu Bella (Neem Jaggery) and Mangai Pachadi(Mango Jam)

Happy Ugadi with Bevu Bella (Neem Jaggery) and Mangai Pachadi(Mango Jam)

It was long long ago. So long ago when the whole of south India was known as The Deccan or The Carnatik. Many families from the Tamizh speaking areas moved on foot in quest of their fortune to the Mysore Samasthanam –the erstwhile Mysore Kingdom. With its patronage the families were firmly rooted, and spread their branches far and wide, thus giving rise to a new clan which can be named as the Tamizh Kannadigas.
My siblings and me, were born in the seventh generation of one such family and grew up on the waters of the Cauvery and moulded in the Kannada soil. Though our family retains Tamizh and its culture, it has also imbibed the culture and traditions of the Kannadigas, and I am proud of our hybrid culture.

Today is UGADI – the Kannada New Year’s Day. We celebrate it with great festivity with the Mavu (mango) and Bevu (Neem garlands) thoranas, Bevu Bella (Neem and Jaggery preparation), Mavinakai Chitranna (mango rice), Obattu, and Mangai Pachadi (mango relish).
Bevu Bella
Tender neem leaves, neem flowers and jaggery are pounded in a pestle and made into tiny balls which are swallowed as the first thing in the morning on the Ugadi day. This is to remind us that life has to be taken easy, though it is a mixture of sweet and bitter experiences. The leaf should be dry, otherwise it will become watery - like mine, and cannot be rolled into balls!!
Neem cools down the system and helps in healing it. It also destroys worms.

Mangai Pachadi
INGREDIENTS:
Raw Mango – 1
Jaggery – 1 cup
Salt – ¼ tsp
Turmeric powder – 1 pinch
Cooking oil – 1 tsp
Mustard seeds – ¼ tsp
Red chillies – 2
Neem flowers ( dried or fresh ) – 1 tsp

METHOD:
1. Peel the mango and dice it into pieces. (Save the peel which can be used in chutneys or in mango rice).
2. Boil one cup of water in a pan and add the mango pieces.
3. Add salt and turmeric powder and cover with a lid.
4. Cook till the mango pieces are tender.
5. Add jaggery and cook till it becomes like jelly.
6. To seasons, heat oil and add mustard seeds.
7. When it splutters add the neem flowers.
8. Add the broken red chillies and add this seasoning to the mangai pachadi.

Savour the pachadi which is sweet , sour, salty, spicy and bitter- all at the same time. It can be relished with rice, dosas and chapattis.

Cornflakes Mixture and Roasted Chickpeas - Snacks in MW

Cornflakes Mixture



Cornflakes mixture is my attempt to make a low fat version of the popular South Indian snack, Mixture. Mixure predominantly contains the omapodi and boondi, apart from poha, fried gram dal, peanuts. There isn't much of a recipe here. Just throw in what ever you have and as the name suggests you get a mixture.

Ingredients
Cornflakes - 2 cups
Beaten rice(avil/poha) - 1 cup
Puffed rice(murmura/mottapori) - 2 cups
Split roasted gram dal (dalia/porikadala)- 1/2 cup
Roasted peanut - 1/2 cup
Raisins - hand ful
Curry leaves
Fennel seeds/saunf- 1 teaspoon
Hing - few shakes
Salt
Red chilli powder - 1/2 tspn
Kitchen king masala powder -1/2 tspn
Turmeric - a pinch
Oil- 2 table spoon

Method
Heat oil in a MW safe bowl for 30 secs. Add saunf,curry leaves and raisins. MW for 30 seconds or untill the raisins puff up. Add hing, salt, red chilli powder,masala powder and mw for another 30 seconds. Add cornflakes and beaten rice and mw for 2 minutes. Since these takes more time to get roasted compared with the other ingredients. So we add that first. Both would have roasted well by now. Care to be taken that it doesn't get burnt. Adjust the timings according to your oven. Add rest of the ingredients and toss well that the masala gets coated uniformly. MW for 3 minutes. Toss them once in between. Leave one minute standing time. It will turn crisp. Store in airtight container and enjoy with your tea/coffee.



Roasted Chickpeas
This is inspired by Madhuram's post on oven roasted chickpeas. I like her 'My Notes' section. Took a note of what is mentioned there. But instead of oven, I tried it in MW. I felt with microwave oven, time taken could be less. Though I wasn't sure of the results, decided to go ahead. I got crunchy, fat free snack and took only 12 minutes.
Ingredients
Cooked chickpeas - 1 cup
Olive oil - 1 tspn
Red chilly powder
Fennel seeds
Salt
Few shakes of dried oregano and hing
Toss all the ingredients together in a microwave safe bowl. MW for 12 minutes. Keep tossing for every 3 minutes or so. Allow 2 minutes of standing time. If you keep for longer time, it tends to go hard. Adjust accordingly. It stays crunchy on storage too.



I am sending these two snacks to MEC-Savoury Snacks hosted by Priya, an event started by Srivalli.
and the roasted chickpeas to MBP-Snacks hosted by Ashwini, which originated at SpiceCafe


Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Creamy Mushroom Pizza

I baked some 12 inches thin crust pizzas in the weekend, there are six different flavours. I would like to introduce the creamy mushroom pizza that my friends and I love it so much!
The pizza doesn't need tomato sauce for the topping as the creamy mushroom had its unique flavour with the mozzarella cheese. The recipe is very simple, pan fry lots of chopped garlic, then add in some chopped sticky bacon together with one big chopped yellow onion. Pan fry at low heat until the bacon caramelized with the onions. Stir in big chunky of fresh mushroom for about two minutes or so. Don't over cook it. Season with salt and peppers and add 5 tablespoon of cream and 5 tablespoon of milk. Add some dried oregano or italian herbs. Cook for another two minutes and it's done! Top on the pizza dough and go with some mozzarella cheese and bake until the cheese melt. Delicious!
I've also baked another chiffon, pumpkin chiffon. It's beautifully baked!