Uppu Undrallu ( Ganesh Chaturthi Special )

Another popular offering on Ganesh Chaturthi is the Uppu undrallu or salted and steamed rice balls. Spiced with some cumin (jeera) and black pepper, these are easy to make and quite healthy too. They are very popular in Andhra and one can find lot many versions/variations over the net (some sweet ones too )!!!

Read on for the easy recipe -

Preparation Time - 20 mins ( plus 10 mins standby )

Ingredients -

• 1 cup jeera rice 
• 2 tbsp chana dal
• 1/2 tsp cumin seeds
• 7-8 peppercorns (coarsely ground)
• salt to taste
• 1/2 tsp ghee

Preparation - Wash the rice and soak for 5 mins. Drain off the water and spread on a cloth to dry.

Once it has dried, grind into a coarse paste.

Wash and allow the chana dal to soak for 2-3 hours.

Cooking - Heat the ghee in a wok. Add the cumin seeds and allow to splutter.

Add 2 cups of water to the wok along with the soaked chana dal. Add salt to taste. Bring to a boil.

Add the rice flour and cook on medium heat till it forms a dough like mass. This takes about 5-6 mins.

Keep aside to cool it is bearable to touch. Pinch small portions out of the dough and roll into balls.

Steam the balls for 7-8 mins in a idli cooker.

Serve warm.

Sarson da Saag ( Mustard Greens)

Punjabi food conjures up images of sweet succulent chicken pieces dumped in a sea of red. Or even fiery char-grilled chicken legs/thighs oozing/dripping fat. For the vegetarians, it would be luscious Paneer pieces simmering in a creamy gravy accompanied by Tandoori Rotis dripping butter. Not to forget the smooth as velvet Dal Makhani. While these restaurant style recipes have a hell lot of mass appeal, the recipes that I hold close to my heart are the ones closer to home and hearth. Recipes that a loving mother/aunt or even a grandmother would have prepared by investing hours ( and patience ) to get it to the right texture and consistency. These are recipes that have the proverbial 'miiti ki kushboo' associated with them.

Today I am sharing one such recipe which is very close to my heart. The 'Sarson da saag' which never fails to transport me to the lush yellow-green mustard fields of Punjab. Doesn't it remind you of  DDLJ and SRK-Kajol singing 'Tujhe dekha to yeh jaana sanam'. That song remains a favorite till date. Read on for the very earthy recipe -

Preparation Time - 25-30 mins

Ingredients -

• 1 bunch mustard leaves
• 1 bunch spinach (palak) leaves
• 1 large tomato
• 2 medium onion
• 1 inch ginger
• 6-7 garlic cloves
• 1 tsp cumin seeds
• 2-3 dry red chilis
• 1/3 tsp turmeric
• salt to taste
• 2 tbsp ghee
• extra butter for final garnish

Preparation - Wash and clean the greens by immersing them in warm salt water for 1-2 hours. Drain the water and replace with fresh water. Repeat 2-3 times. This will remove all the insects, mud and sand.

Chop up the greens into small pieces. Peel and dice one of the onions. Roughly chop up the tomato ginger and garlic flakes. Transfer everything to a pressure cooker along with 1/4 cup water. Add turmeric and salt to taste.

Finely chop up the remaining onion.

Cooking - Cook for 3-4 whistles. Keep aside till steam escapes.

Use a hand blender to grind the cooked greens into a coarse paste.

Heat the ghee in a wok. Add the broken chilis and cumin seeds. Once the seeds start to pop, add the chopped onions. Fry till they start to brown at the edges.

Add the coarse paste and bring to a boil. Then turn down flame and simmer for 3-4 mins before removing from the flame.

Serve hot with makki ki roti or just normal rotis.

Note - One can also add some methi/fenugreek greens to this recipe. It adds a different flavour and makes it still healthier. 

Sweet Appams

With Ganesh Chaturthi around the corner, cleaning the house in in full swing. Replacing/washing the sofa covers/curtains/bed-sheets, dusting, removing the cow-webs, throwing out/giving away the old clothes/toys and cleaning out my pantry is what I plan do achieve by Wednesday. That would give me ample time to make the sweets/delicacies for the big day, i.e., 29th August (friday). People from Odisha do not celebrate the Gowri-Ganesh puju that is being observed on Thursday by folks from down South.

Unlike Maharashtra and some of the other states where it is a ten day long festival, Ganesh Chaturthi celebration in Odisha is a comparatively low key affair. Mandaps/Pandals of varying sizes come up in most schools, colleges, offices and market places. The most common prasad distributed at such Pandals is the 'Chuda Ghasa' and 'Khaee ukhuda' ( scroll down to the bottom of this post for more recipes ). In western Odisha, the harvest festival of 'Nua khai' is observed on the following day. It also heralds the beginning of the festive season in  Odisha. It is closely followed by festivals like Vishwakarma Puja, Dwitibahana Osa, Durgashtami, Kumar Purnima/Lakshmi Puja and Diwali/Kali Puja, and the holy Odia months of Karthik and Margasira.

Sweet appams happen to be one of the important offerings/Neivaidyam made to Lord Ganesh in Southern India. While it is traditionally made from rice flour, I have made these with store bought batter. Saves time and the taste is also preferred by toddlers/kids. Read on for the easy recipe -

Preparation Time - 10-15 mins

Ingredients -

• 1 cup idli/dosa batter (should be thick)
• 1 tbsp wheat flour
• 1 ripe banana (peeled)
• 2 tbsp grated coconut
• 2 pinch cardamom powder
• 1/3 cup jaggery powder
• a pinch of salt
• oil/ghee for deep frying

Preparation - Take all the ingredients (except for oil/ghee) in a mixing bowl. Blend into a uniform mixture using a hand blender. Allow to stand aside for 20 mins.

Cooking - Heat oil in a wok. Drop spoonfuls of the batter into the hot oil. Take 4-5 teaspoons at a time. Deep fry on both sides to a light brown. ( Alternately cook in a nonstick appam pan or even a tawa. It tastes as good and absorbs much less oil )

Remove from wok and keep aside to drain on a paper towel.

Repeat for the remaining batter.

Serve hot/warm.

Note - If you wish to make the appams with rice flour, use about 1 cup water for about 1 1/3 cups of rice flour.

Other popular Ganesh Chaturthi recipes -

Chuda Ghasa
Chuda Kadamba (avalakki laddoo)
Paal Undrallu ( Attakali )
Modak (Manda pitha)
Pal Payasam
Channa Sundal

Suva greens - Moong dal ( Dill cooked with yellow lentils )

I was introduced to this sweet smelling greens by one of my neighbors. Since I had never came across this variety during my stay in Odisha, I was a little doubtful about cooking it for the first time. I did not want to make a bhaji out of it. As I was having rotis for lunch, I wanted something wet. It was then that I thought of preparing it with roasted moong dal. We use this recipe for cooking almost every kind of greens, from spinach (palak) to amaranthus leaves and fenugreek leaves (methi) to even drumstick leaves (moringa). I would put it as the fail-safe formula for cooking greens (apart from stir frying them).

Read on -

Preparation Time - 15 mins

Ingredients -

• 1 bunch suva greens (dill)
• 1/3 cup roasted split moong dal
• 3-4 garlic flakes
• 1-2 green/red chili
• 1/4 tsp pancha phutana
• 2 pinch turmeric
• salt to taste
• 1 tsp oil

Preparation - Wash and clean the greens. Chop into small pieces.

Cooking - Cook the dal along with salt and turmeric in a pressure cooker for 2 whistles on medium heat. Keep aside for 10 mins so that the steam can esacpe. Open the lid carefully and add the chopped greens to the hot dal and immediately close the lid. Keep aside for 5 mins.

Heat the oil in a wok. Add pancha phutana and allow to splutter. Add the broken chilis followed by the crushed garlic cloves.

Once the garlic lets off a fragrance, add the contents of the cooker to the wok. Turn up the flame and boil for 5 mins.

Serve hot with rotis.

Mangalorean Chicken Ghee Roast

Recently caught an episode of 'Coastal Curries' hosted by the dashing chef Vikas Khanna. He happened to be in Mangalore and was sampling the famous 'Chicken ghee roast'. As usual I was so engrossed in looking at him that I missed whatever he was saying. Soft-spoken with an almost school-boy charm, the guy seems like a total misfit to me. That is till he starts to wield the ladle. I really wonder how much he works out or whether he eats any of the tantalizing dishes that he rustles up. Coming back to the dish itself, I finally had to look up the recipe on the net. I finally settled on this one posted by Ria ( Check her blog ) but made a few subtle changes based on the snatches of conversation that I had caught.

This is one of the few Mangalore dishes that I will be remembering for a long time. Sampled it for the first time at a small eatery in Hampankatta (mangalore) during my stay in the city. This along with the deep fried surmai are my favorites among all the varieties available in Mangalorean cuisine. I would rate it higher than the 'Kori Gassi- Roti' combo preferred by many folks. Ofcourse, the creamy Kori Gassi is in a class of its own but my funda happens to be 'To each his own' . The Chicken ghee roast is traditionally served with the snow white and soft 'Neer dosas' but I enjoy it with white rice, yogurt and rasam too. One word of caution. Do not be thrifty with the ghee. You can always slog it out in the gym over the next week or maybe month.

Read on for the lip-smacking recipe -

Preparation Time - 45 mins

Ingredients -

For the marinade -

• 600 gm skinless chicken (cut into medium pieces)
• 1/2 cup hung curd
• juice from half a lemon
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• salt to taste

For the masala-

• 1 tsbp coriander seeds
• 1/2 tsp cumin seeds
• 4 Kashmiri red chilis
• 4-5 cloves
• 1 inch cinnamon stick
• 10-12 peppercorns
• 10 fat garlic flakes
• a thumbnail sized tamarind ball

Others -

• 4 tbsp ghee or clarified butter
• 1 sprig curry leaves
• 1 tbsp chopped coriander leaves

Preparation - Wash the chicken pieces and drain out all the water. Add the other ingredients mentioned under marinade. Rub well all over the chicken pieces. Keep in the fridge for 4-6 hours or even overnight. ( I marinated the chicken for 6 hours )

Cooking - Dry roast the chilis on a pan till you get a faint smell. Remove and keep aside. Add 1/2 tsp ghee to the pan. Add coriander seeds, cumin seeds, cloves, cinnamon stick and peppercorns. Remove from flame once they start to release their fragrance.

Grind the roasted chillis and spices along with the garlic cloves and tamarind. Add a little water and grind again to get a smooth paste.

Heat the remaining ghee in a wok. Add the marianted chicken and fry on a medium flame till almost done ( 75-80 % ). Remove and keep aside.

Add the masala paste to the same wok and fry till the oil starts to form a separate layer ( 4-5 mins should be enough unless you have added excess water during the grinding process ). Add the fried chicken at this point and stir/toss for 2-3 mins.

Finally add 1/2 cup warm water and cover with a lid. Allow the juices to permeate the chicken. Finally when the water dries up and the chicken pieces are well coated with the masalas, add the curry leaves and corainder. Switch off flame and remove from stove.

Serve hot with Neer dosa.

Note - I am not too sure about the kind of chilis used in the original dish. I assume that one of them is Byadgi ( a Karnataka staple ) which makes for the striking color. Not sure about the other ( could be the Guntur ones ) but it is sure to be hot as the dish will almost surely set your tongue on fire. I have used the Kashmiri chillis which have a medium heat and give a nice color too. My dish was hot but tolerably so. No point in putting too much chillis and then drinking gallons of water instead of enjoying the dish. I also made a sweetened Ghee rice to go with it!!

Sorry for the bad camera work. My hands feel kinda shaky these days.

Ever Heard Of Pizza Economics? ( Guest Post )

My first guest post!! Feeling privileged to have Mr. Umakant Sharma write a piece for me.  An experienced writer, he has more than 6 years experience in online writing. He writes on mostly Food, health, Business and Education. Read on -

Last week I woke up with an incredibly awesome dream of a mouthwatering pizza with every bite bombarding my mouth with various flavors of yummy toppings. This was realization enough, that I had been suppressing my pizza craving from too long and nothing could stop me from having it as soon as possible.

I reached college determined to convince my gang of friends for a pizza party. Right when I was about to accomplish my mission, our economics professor entered and there was a disappointing murmur. Sensing the mood, the professor proposed a brilliant idea of ordering the pizzas in the class and enjoy the working bites. The concept was new for us and we loved it. This was when I knew God’s also loved pizzas.

The lecture started and surprisingly the professor was innovative enough to teach the pizza way. I could not believe what was happening. The teacher was explaining the distribution of average expenses of previous year. The best part was the he made a nice vegetarian pizza, the pizza base and cheese was called the entire population and wedges of different vegetables were  the other aspects like housing sector, food sector etc. 

After this we were discussing the policy implementation and the professor explained once we gave the idea having a pizza, the policy was proposed, and to implement the policy, we need to order online and this is what called policy implementation initiation.

However, before we could do it, we must understand the discrepancy in population, and also need to respect the non-vegetarians and need to choose a chicken pizza as well. So we decided on Chicken Dominator which has almost all the yummy toppings.

Finally we ordered 10 pizzas online from www.dominos.co.in  which turned out to be a very convenient way of ordering with various features like customize your order, Pizza tracker etc. Our pizzas actually reached within 30 mins and I ran to grab them as the Italian herby aroma announced their presence in our department. Now was the time to implement the policy and eat and enjoy the much awaited Italian pie. It was a huge party, full of enthusiasm and most importantly the humor that took off had the flavor of economics in a cheesy way.

This was really innovative and flavorful which made me an absolute fan of my teacher. This not only made the pizza gang bigger as other students who were not a part of our gang also joined in contributing and enjoying the pizza affair, but we also learned some of the boring topics in the most interesting way possible. This was one of the lessons I will remember all my life.

Until this day, I detested studies, specifically economics thinking it was just based on assumptions, but ever since the famous pizza session, I started scoring good and my learning trajectory kept on rising which made me a favorite student of my favorite teacher.

The pizzas actually bridged the gap between me and studies and finally today I owe a lot to that pizza session which not only gave me everlasting memories but also changed me to focus more and score well in studies. 

Jalebi with Rabdi

Sometime back I tried my hands at making Jalebi. Now I always had an idea that it would be very tough to prepare it . But it was quite easy and I was surprised at the results. Though I struggled a bit to get the shapes right, the taste was awesome.

I paired it with rabdi or 'thickened milk' which is a classic combination in North India. The creamy chilled rabdi goes very well with the crunchy hot jalebis. Though it takes a bit of time to get both ready, one can make the rabdi a day or two in advance to save oneself from too much trouble within the span of a single day.

Actually was planning to make some 'jalebis' today for my son. That's when I remembered that the post is long pending. Read on for the recipe -

Preparation Time - 1 hour 20 mins (approx)

Ingredients -

For the Jalebi -

• 2/3 cup all purpose flour (maida)
• 1/3 cup gram flour (besan)
• 4 tsp cornflour 
• 3/4 cup yogurt 
• 1/5 tsp baking powder 
• a pinch of saffron
• 1 1/2 tbsp warm milk
• 1 1/2 tsp rice bran oil
• oil for deep frying

For the Sugar syrup -

• 1 1/3 cup water
• 1 cup sugar
• a pinch of saffron
• 2-3 drops orange food color

For the Rabdi -

2 1/2 cup full cream milk
1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk
sugar as per taste
2 tsp finely chopped nuts
a pinch of saffron
a pinch of cardamom powder


Preparation - Soak the saffron strands in warm milk for 20 mins. Rub with you fingers. Add to a mixing bowl along with the rest of the ingredients ( except baking powder ) listed under 'For the jalebi'. Add a little water at a time and mix using a hand blender. The consistency should be thick .

Allow to ferment overnight or still more in a cold climate . The baking powder goes in 20 mins before the jalebis are made.

Cooking - Heat the water and sugar in a saucepan for making the sugar syrup. Boil for 8-10 mins or till 1 string consistency is reached. Add the food color and saffron. Keep aside and ensure that it stays warm to touch.

Heat oil in a shallow vessel. Take the jalebi batter in a piping bag or a cloth with a small hole in the center.
Holding the tip just above the oil, pipe out into circular shapes starting from center, make 2-3 circles (or more if you can manage) and close the end at the last circle. Apply uniform pressure while piping the batter.

Fry on medium heat on both sides till golden and crisp. Transfer from the hot oil straight to the warm sugar syrup. Allow to soak for 1-2 mins before removing it to a plate.

Heat the milk in a thick bottomed saucepan for making the rabdi. Bring to boil on low to medium heat and allow to reduce to 1/3. Stir in the condensed milk and sugar and remove from flame after 2-3 mins. Add the saffron, cardamom powder and toasted nuts. Keep aside till it comes to room temperature. Then pop it in the fridge (not freezer) for 1 hour. ( This rabdi is not very thick

Pour out the chilled rabdi into pint sized glasses and place the warm jalebis over it. Garnish with a few saffron strands and nuts if desired. Serve immediately.