Monday, November 16, 2009

Groundnut/Peanut Masala Stuffed Paratha

Bored of making plain chapathis for dinner. So, i m trying all kind of stuffed parathas.

My Mom is a crazy lover of peanuts. In Chennai, when its season we can find it for every 10 steps @ T.Nagar Ranganathan Street, Usman Road and in every railway station and every train connecting Beach-Tambaram!!!

She is a very happy person when we get her a bag of fresh peanuts. She will become nostalgic about her childhood days and say "we used to pullout fresh peanuts from our farm and wash it the stream nearyby and eat. It tastes heavenly". She enjoys eating them even now, coz its her childhood days she cherishes everytime she pops one.


Love you amma, This Post goes specially for you!!! My Mom, My Inspiration.

Ingredients (gives approx 10-12 parathas)
Whole Wheat flour - 2 cups
Bajra flour/Millet Flour - 2 cups
Oil/Ghee - 2 tbsp
Salt to taste (Adjust accordingly since the masala too contains salt)
Water/Milk for making the dough.

Groundnut masala
Peanuts/Groundnuts - 1 cup (With or Without skin, i didnt bother the skin)
Gram Dal/Chana dal - 1/4 cup
Red Chillies - 10 nos (Round ones, if using long red chillies reduce the no by 6-7)
Tamarind pulp - 2 tsp
curry leaves
hing/asafoetida - a pinch
Salt to taste ((Adjust accordingly since dough too contains salt)

Method
For the filling
Roast peanuts and chana dal separately. Grind all the given ingredients together without water. keep separately

For the Parathas
Mix all the given ingredients together with some water and make a soft chapathi dough.Divide them into portions. Take a Ball of dough and flatten it a lil and place 1 or 2 tsp of filling at the center fold the sides in and roll it lightly to a thick disc. Dont make a big disc, it might make break the dough and cause the filling to spill out. Smaller the better.

Cook Both the sides on a Hot Tava. If you prefer u can add lil ghee/butter while cooking. I jus made it Chukka.



Didnt make any side dish for this, coz the masala itself contains Spice,sour and salt.

Tastes Great with Pickle, raitha or Plain Yoghurt




Sending this post to My Legume Love Affair - 17, hosted by SRA , Event started by Susan of Well Seasoned Cook

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Tricolor Paratha with Cauliflower Korma

Weekend Night, had one carrot and one radish left out in the fridge. Planned Chapathi for dinner, but changed into colorful paratha, using the left-out veggies.

Sending this to CFK - Veggies and Fruits Hosted by Lakshmi Venkatesh of Kitchen Chronicles, Event Started by Sharmi of Neivedyam

And also to Food for 7 stages of Life - Kids Special co-hosted by Radhika and Sudheshna

Ingredients
Wheat flour - 4 cups
one large radish - finely shredded
one large carrot - finely shredded
one medium bunch of cilantro/fresh coriander, finely chopped
yoghurt - 2 tbsp
salt to taste
oil/ghee - 2 tbsp

Method
Mix all the given ingredients with some water and make a soft chapathi dough. Let it rest for 30 minutes.

Divide them into portions and roll it out to a slightly thick than the normal chapathi. cook on a hot tava. if not diet conscious, can add some ghee while cooking the paratha. Serve it hot with any side-dish of your choice.





I made some Cauliflower Korma for this.

Ingredients

Cauliflower - 1/2 kg, Cleaned and cut into small florets
Medium- sized onions - 2 nos
Medium - sized tomatoes - 3 nos
Ginger-garlic paste - 2 tsp
Green chillies - 2 nos
Red chilli powder - 1 to 1-1/2 tbsp
Dhaniya powder - 1 tbsp
Mint Chutney - 3 tbsp
yoghurt - 2 tbsp
Salt to taste

Oil, curry leaves for seasoning
mustard seeds,cumin - 1 tsp each
turmeric - a pinch

Method
Clean cauliflower and cut them into florets. Heat oil in a deep pan, splutter mustard, add cumin, green chillies, currry leaves, turmeric. Add finely chopped onion, once they turn translucent add tomatoes, ginger garlic paste, add lil water for the tomatoes to cook.

Now add cauliflower florets and add some water, add chilli powder, dhaniya powder and salt. When the korma is half-cooked add Mint chutney and let it cook for some more time. While taking it off the flame add yoghurt for a rich creamy taste. Garnish with some fresh coriander.


Saturday, November 14, 2009

Gulab Jamuns ~ For October ICC


Sweet and juicy gulab jamun is the chosen recipe for October ICC. In this age of instant mix available to make them, Srivalli chose to do it from scratch. So we were required to make the Khova at home. The earlier posting date for ICC was last day of the month. After the over dose of Diwali sweets, I wanted to stay away from sweets for the rest of the month ( i.e only around 10 days). For sweet tooth like us, thats a long period. At first I had thoughts of giving this month's challenge a miss. On the other hand, I wanted to make it too. So I casually mentioned to my husband about the month's challenge and my thoughts of not doing it. He suggested making in small quanity and that was the gentle push needed and I went ahead with the preparation. Infact the day after I made, Srivalli mailed the challengers informing the change in posting date ie its going to be the 15th of every month. So that gave extra two weeks for us. But I had already made.




Out of the three recipe, I decided to follow the Yum Blog recipe. I used half litre of milk to prepare the khova and ended up with 3 tablespoons of it. I adjusted the quantity of ingredients accordingly and got 12 jamuns. Needless to say, we both finished it the same day. I am giving the measurements I used. So those of you, who are craving for jamuns and want to try in a small batch, here is the recipe for you.







You need

Khova - 3 tblspn

Maida - 1 tblspn

A tiny pich of soda

Milk - 1 tblspn (you may require )

Oil  - 1 cup to deep fry



For the sugar syrup

Sugar - 3/4 cup

Water - 1/2 cup

Saffron+cardamom syrup - 1 tspn

Rose essence - few drops


Method.

Preparing Khova is easy but time consuming. You have to continue boiling the milk till the solid residue is left behind. If you plan to make khova, make sure you have plenty of time to spare. While making khova for jamuns, stop the cooking when the khova is moist and not too dry.

Mix khova , maida and soda. Don't knead it too much. If the mix is dry, add few drops of milk and bring the dough together. Divide the dough into12 portions and roll them into balls. Don't press hard while rolling. Else the inner portion will not get cooked properly and later doesn't soak in the syrup well.

Heat oil in a kadai. Don't heat it to smoking point. When the oil is moderately hot, carefully drop the balls into the oil and fry the jamuns till golden brown in medium heat.


Meanwhile prepare the syrup by heating sugar and water. The syrup should be slightly sticky to touch. If you have saffron add it along with powdered cardamom and few drops of rose essence. I have the saffron cardamom syrup with me. So I used that. Adding saffron is purely optional.

Drop the fried jamuns in the warm syrup. You can add the drained jamuns directly to the syrup. After one hour, the jamuns must have soaked in the syrup and is ready to serve. You can chill and serve or serve warm with a side of vanilla ice cream.