Beet Rasam ~ SpotLightBlog#2 Recipe

Third recipe which I tried from Foodies Hope is Beet rasam. Rasam with beet sounded interesting. Rasam at my home is tomato with occasional variances of lemon or pepper rasam. So I wanted to try this beets rasam.  The sweetness from the beets compliments the rasam well.  The recipe for rasam powder is from Asha’s close friends’s mother. Do give it a try and I am sure you will never regret it.  I am glad to have found another way to cook beets.

Ingredients

Tur Dal - 1/4 cup

Beetroot - 1 nos

Lime sized tamarind

Salt

Hing



RASAM POWDER:

TO ROAST AND POWDER:

Coriander Seeds - 4 tblspn

Dry Red Chillies - 3 red chillies

Dry Coconut - 2 tblspn

Cumin Seeds - 1 tspn

Pepper Corns - 1/2 tblspn

Mustard Seeds - 1/2 tspn

Fenugreek Seeds - 1/4 tspn

Curry Leaves



Seasonings

Oil - 1 tblspn

Mustard Seeds - 1 tspn

Cumin Seeds - 1 tspn

Onion - 1 no

Curry Leaves

Dry Red Chilli - 1 broken into two


Method

Roast the ingredients for powder and powder it. You may not require the whole amount of powder. Use necessary and store the rest.

Pressure cook dal. Chop beetroot into fine cubes. Cook beetroot with 2 cups of water and salt in it. When itscooked, add dal, tamarind juice. Let it simmer for few minutes till the raw smell of the tamarind goes. Add 3 teaspoon of rasam powder and let it simmer. You can increase the amount rasam powder to suit your taste level. Store the remaining powder in an airtight container. This powder can be used with vegetable stir fry also. Season with the ingredients listed above and pour onto the rasam. The picture doesn't do justice to the dish. I was in a hurry so could manage only this much with the picture.

Nanaimo Bar for Ugadi with D2

Fun with D2, for Ugadi with Nanaimo Bars

My grand daughter spent the week end with me as she had missed me terribly all these days. Like Dibs and myself she too is a born foodie and she is fond of cooking. Dibs had prepared various delicious dishes during our stay with her.She had also requested me to prepare the same for my grand daughter D2. (Dhrithi is called D2; Dibs being D1!), once I was back in Bangalore.

D2 opted to cook the delicious Nanaimo Bar for Ugadi. She did all the mixing,whisking and pressing while I helped her with only the double boiling.

We did have the recipe but could not conform to the measurements. The steel dinner plate which we selected to mould the bar was too big and we ended up mixing in 'some more of this and some more of that' ingredient as per D2's wishes! But the end product was quite yummy, thanks to the chocolate, butter and sugar!

INGREDIENTS FOR LAYER - 1

Almonds - 200 gms
Digestive biscuits - 1 small packet
Cocoa powder - 4 tbps
Powdered sugar ( we used icing sugar) - 2 cups
Butter - 150 gms
METHOD
1. Crumble biscuits, and chop the almonds by running in a mixer for a minute.
2. Double boil sugar, cocoa powder and butter and blend well.
3. Add the sugar,cocoa,butter blend to the biscuit and nut mixture and mix well.
4. Pour into a deep greased plate and press down to pack it tightly and leave it in the refrigerator.

INGREDIENTS FOR LAYER -2
Butter - 150 gms
Powdered sugar - 2 cups
Custard powder - 4 tbps
Fresh milk cream - 2 tbps

METHOD
1.Take powdered sugar and custard powder in a bowl.
2.Add butter and whisk with a wooden spatula adding cream to make a fluffy cream, thick enough to spread on the first layer.
3.Take out the chilled plate and pour the whisked cream uniformly to spread over the compressed nut and almond layer.
4.Return the plate to the refrigerator.

INGREDIENTS FOR LAYER - 3

Dark chocolate - 2 big slabs
Butter - 50 gms
Sugar - 1 cup
METHOD
1.Double boil butter , broken chocolate pieces and sugar.
2.Cook until the ingredients blend well .
3.Bring out the chilled tray and pour the chocolate mixture uniformly over the creamy layer.
4.Spread the chocolate quickly before the cream layer melts and immediately return it to the refrigerator.
5.Chill until firm and then cut into bars with a sharp knife.
Since D2 was in a great hurry to taste the Nanaimo Bar she chilled it in the freezer! She could not wait too long to relish the haphazard shapes of the 'melt in the mouth', Nanaimo Bar! The ear to ear beam which lit up her face was in itself a festival to celebrate!

HAPPY UGADI TO ALL OF YOU!

Aathirasallu /Athirasam for Indian Cooking Challenge

Srivalli challenged us with Aathirasallu or Athirasam for the the month of February. Athirasam is such a tricky sweet even for an expert cook. I experienced it on my first trial of it when I misunderstood the proportion of rice flour. On my second attempt too, I had my share of failure while making this before I got perfect discs. Irrespective of any number of earlier attempts, for me, making it every time is a challenge. Armed with the hints picked up with the failed attempts, I was determined to get it right from the first one.

Ingredients Needed

Raw Rice - 200 gms

Paku Jaggary - 250 gms

Sesame Seeds - 2 tsp or less

Gasa gasa or Poppy Seeds - 1/4 tsp

Cardamom powder - a pinch

Method

I followed the first recipe given where the measurements was in weight. I don't have a wieghing scale and cook the help of online conversions and proceeded. For the 200 gms of rice, I took less than a cup of rice andd soaked it for 6 hours and powdered in my mixie. When I measured, it the flour was around 1 1/2 cups. I took 1 cup of jaggery.

Melt the jaggery and make a syrup of 3 thread consistency. Add  sesame seeds, poppy seeds and cardamom powder to the syrup. Slowly stir in the flour and mix well. The dough consistency should be of chappathi dough. But mine turned out to be gooey. Added around 1/2 cup of flour to get the correct consistency. When you pat the dough to make discs, it should not stick to your hand. Thats the test I do.

Luckily, when I dropped the first disc into the hot oil, it did retain the shape and got fried well. When the jaggery is more, thats what usually happens, the disc will disintegtate into strands,which does taste good on deep frying. Enjoyed the crunch from the sesame seeds, when we bite into. Liked the addition of poppy seeds too.

Thanks Srivalli for choosing this for the challenge and my confidence level in making this has surely increased after this attempt.