Dried Fenugreek Buns /Kasoori Methi Buns

                                                         
This is simple bun where I added kasoori methi to give it a spicy touch. Last week there was a friendly get together at my house where I served this along with Pudina Chicken. Believe me friends, it was an instant hit and no one could believe that these buns were home made. Hope all of you like this preparation and try out at your place.


Ingredients:
3 cups All purpose flour (though you may possibly need more)
1 1/2 tsp Dry active yeast
1 1/2 tbsp Sugar
3/4 cup Milk
1/4 cup Water
Salt to taste
1 tbsp Olive oil
1 tbsp Kasoori methi( fenugreek leaves), crushed between palms
1-2 tsp White sesame seeds


Method:
Mix water and milk in a bowl and put it in microwave to make it just lukewarm (NOT VERY HOT). Add yeast and leave it for 20  minutes to become frothy. 

                                                                       
Sift the flour and salt into a large mixing bowl. Make a hole in the center, add oil and pour the yeast mixture. Mix till well blended and knead to form a dough. Add kasoori methi and knead the dough until it becomes smooth and elastic. This should take about 10-15 minutes. Transfer this dough into a large greased bowl and turn over to grease the top also, now cover the dough with a clean plastic warp and let this sit for an hour in a warm place.

                                                                   


 After an hour this will double in size. Now comes the fun part, punch down the dough, thereby squeezing out all the air for 10-12 minutes. Divide the dough into 10 equal parts and place on a greased baking tray with enough space to expand. Press lightly few methi leaves, sesame seeds on top and leave to rise again for 1/2 hour. Do cover the tray with a damp cloth. 
Remove the cloth after 1/2 an hour and bake the buns in pre-heated 180 Degree Celcius oven fpr 15-20 minutes until golden color on top. After removing buns from the oven, brush the buns with melted butter, to make them shiny and nice crust. And immediately wrap the buns in a clean damp towel for 10-15 minutes to get the extra softness, just like in bakeries. 

                                                         

read more.. "Dried Fenugreek Buns /Kasoori Methi Buns"

Missi Roti - Chickpea Flatbread

    
Today I'm going to share a very popular Rajasthani delicacy called as Missi Roti which is nutritious also.  This we had enjoyed during our visit to Rajasthan few years back. I roughly knew the ingredients but I was told that they use a special kind of Garam Masala in it. So I Googled for this garam masala recipe and found it. This is one kind of Roti ( Flat Bread ) which I had planned to prepare since a long time. The reason being that it freed me from the monotony of preparing the same kind of wheat roti day in and day out and also my urge to notice the reaction of my little one who was having regular roti for dinner for a very long time. And believe it or not friends, my rotis turned out to be good to look at and tasty to eat ( No self praise intended, I am just reporting after seeing the urge from my son).  Hope all of you enjoy preparing and having it with friends and family. 
                                                                            
Ingredients:
1 cup Wheat flour
1 cup Gram flour
2-3 Green chillies, finely chopped
1 Onion, finely chopped
1/2 tsp Red chilly powder
1/2 tsp Turmeric powder
1 tbsp Ghee/oil
Salt to taste
Little water 


Rajasthani Garam Masala:
2 Whole red chilly
2 Black cardamom pods
3 tbsp Cumin seeds
1 1/2 tbsp Coriander seeds
1 tsp Ajwain/Carom seeds


Method:
In a tawa dry roast all the mentioned garam masala ingredients for few minutes or till they change color and leave nice aroma. Let it cool and then grind to fine powder. Keep aside.

                                                                                    


Method to make Missi roti:
Sieve wheat and besan together, now mix red chilly powder, haldi, salt, chopped onions, green chillies and just 1 tsp garam masala (which we had prepared earlier) in a big bowl. Mix well all the ingredients and add ghee. Add little water at a time and knead to form a smooth dough. Make sure the dough is not sticky and now cover the dough with a damp cloth for 20 minutes.
Divide the dough into equal portions, make small round shape balls and then roll out like chapatis. Heat griddle on medium heat and place one rolled chapati on it. When some brown spots start appearing on the bottom of the chapati, add 1 tsp of oil and flip it over. Cook paratha until both the sides are done, you can also spread some butter over it and  then remove from the heat. Follow the same process with the rest of the balls. Serve missi roti with some pickle or yogurt.

                                                               
Submitting this recipe to my friend Sonal's on going event "Flavors of Rajasthan", an event started by Nayna 

                                                                 

read more.. "Missi Roti - Chickpea Flatbread"

Soya Keema Curry/ Soya Granules Curry .. & Awards

                                                                      

Serves: 4, Preparation time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

1 packet Soyabean chunks

6 tbsp Refined oil

For Soya Marination:
12 cloves Garlic
1" inch Ginger
3-4 Green chillies
1 tbsp Gram flour(besan)
2 tbsp fresh Curd
1/2 tsp Red chilly powder

1/2 tsp Garam masala
1 tbsp Tomato sauce 2 tsp Green chilly sauce
1 tsp Soya sauce  1 tsp Salt


Masala:
6 small Onions cut into fine long stripes
2 medium Capsicum cut into fine long stripes
2-3 Tomato finely chopped

1/2 tsp Red chilly powder
2 tbsp Tomato sauce
Salt to taste

Method:
Take a pressure cooker, add the nutrela, add enough water so that the nutrela is soaked properly. Now close the lid and cook untill one whistle comes. Sqeeze all the water from the nutrela once it is boiled and keep aside.

                                                                         

 Make a paste of ginger garlic and green chillies. Marinate the nutrela with all the ingredients mentioned above, mix well and keep for half an hour. 

                                                                                 

Heat 6 tbsp refined oil in a non stick pan and fry the chilly chunks for 15-20 minutes. Now take out the chunks from the pan and add onion, capsicum, tomato, red chilly powder, salt and green chillies. Stir fry untill the vegetables are tender and leaves oil. Now add the chunks and stir fry. Add tomato sauce and cook for 5 minutes. Serve hot with chappatis and rice.

      
Sending this entry to my friend Sobha's ongoing event 'Cook It Healthy'- Proteinicious 

    
Thank you Ambreen & Rinku :-)  for your whole hearted encouragement in form of these beautiful awards. I really appreciate your kind gesture. So friends please check out their wonderful blogs which are fully loaded with delicious recipes.

Now the rule says I have to share these set of awards with 15 other bloggers to keep the ball rolling. And let the nominated bloggers know about their award. 

I would like to share these bunch of awards with the following friends

Reva of  Kaarasaaram

Aipi of US Masala

Prathibha of The Chef And Her Kitchen

Lubna of  Kitchen Flavours

Jeyashri of Jeyashri's Kitchen

Shama of Easy2Cook Recipes

Sayantani of A Homemaker's Diary

Suman of Incidental Indian Cooking

Shjipli of It is Tasty Ma

Vimitha of My Culinary Trial Room

Prathima of Prats Corner

Valarmathi of Simple and Yummy recipes

Rachu of Amma and Baby

Shanavi of Kitchen Secrets

Jhimly Kar of Bengali Mom in Mumbai

So for all of you listed above, please accept these bunch of awards and enjoy !!!

                                           

read more.. "Soya Keema Curry/ Soya Granules Curry .. & Awards"

Fresh Mango Bread

                                                                           

When I was searching for Mango Bread recipe in the net,  I found a site called Inji whose author is Mr. John Sebastian. I would like to thank him for inspiring me to prepare this bread. For the original recipe created by him click here. What I liked best about this bread was that it was made from Sooji. You can divide that batter into two loaves. This bread can also be made eggless (by omitting two tbsp of rice flour and add one more tbsp of mango pulp).

                                                                                                                                                        

Ingredients:

STEP 1: Dry Ingredients

 2 cups and 2 tbsp of Semolina (sooji), fine quality

 1 cup sugar, powered

 2 teaspoon baking powder

 2 teaspoon cardamom powder

 2 teaspoon nutmeg powder

 3 tablespoon rice flour

 Pinch of salt

STEP 2: Wet ingredients

2 cups & 2 tbsp of Mango pulp

1 Egg

1 tbsp Lemon juice

1/2 Oil

Method:

Sieve all the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl and stir well with a spatula.

                                                                                

 Mix all the wet ingredients well. Now slowly add the wet ingredients into the dry and whisk until it is smooth. Let this batter sit for 15 minutes so that semolina soaks up the liquid.

Preheat over to 180 Degree Celsius. Lightly grease a bread pan and dust with little flour. Pour the batter into the bread pan, sprinkle some white sesame seeds on top for decoration and bake it for 30 minutes. Check if the bread is evenly baked all over by inserting a toothpick in the center, if it comes out clean, it's ready. 


Sending this recipe to Bookmarked Recipes by Aipi and Priya

                                               

                                                                           

Now comes the happiest part of my post, I have been showered by 2 blogger friends. Babli of Khana Masala who has an amazing blog has passed on bunch of awards to me, you can find many delicious Bengali recipes at her corner. And my another friend Shobha of Good Food has also shared few awards with me. She too has a wonderful blog. I want to thank both of them for passing their love to me. I'm not posting the awards here again as I already published them earlier. 

                                                                                 

read more.. "Fresh Mango Bread"

My First Ever Guest Post

18th June was a red letter day in my blogging life when I received a phone call from

Lubna of 'Yummy Food' asking me to have a look at her site. Since I was out of Bangalore in a resort , immediately I could not access her blog. But today, 1st thing I did after 

returning home was to see her blog and my heart was overjoyed to find my 1st guest 

post there. Indeed Lubna, Thanks a lot for your generosity. To all other blogger friends : Lubna & I have started our friendship through blogging, now from being blogging

friends we have become actual friends. So friends please visit her blog to have a look at my Curd Rice and her other delicious looking recipes.

Here is a picture of my first encounter with a delicious and simple South Indian 

preparation.

read more.. "My First Ever Guest Post"

Chicken Samosa

                                                                                      
Since past few days it has been raining regularly in evenings. Tempted by the weather , I was longing to come up with a snack which would differ from the regular ones. Hence, without experimenting too much I prepared Samosa with chicken as a filling. Samosas are perhaps the most famous snack in North India. We used to get fresh hot and spicy samosa sold only for Re 1 and today the same thing is being sold at Rs. 7 in that shop. Getting back to the weather in Bangalore, I twisted the usual recipe of samosa and made a hybrid samosa using chicken filling for the non veg lovers. Do share your experience of how it turned out at the first instance.
For my vegetarian friends click here for Bengali style samosa/Singara which I posted when I had started blogging. 

To make the outer wrapper:
1 cup All purpose flour
1/2 tsp Ajwain
Pinch of salt
1 tbsp Oil
Water to knead the dough


Method:
In a broad vessel take flour, salt, ajwain and pour oil. Mix throughly and with the help of water
make it in soft and tender dough.Cover the dough and let it sit for 20 minutes. 


For the filling:
400gms Boneless chicken
2 Onions
1" inch Ginger, finely chopped
5-6 Garlic pods, finely chopped
3-4 Green chillies
1 tbsp Coriander leaves, chopped
1 tsp Red chilly powder
1 tsp Roasted Cumin podwer
1 tsp Garam masala
Salt to taste


Oil for deep frying


Method:
Cook chicken pieces in pressure cooker with little salt. Once  chicken is cooled down, use two forks to make fine shreds of chicken . Heat 1.5 tbsp oil in a pan and add onions, fry till light pink. Add ginger, garlic, green chillies and mix well. After that add shreadded chicken and saute for 5 minutes. Add red chilly, roasted cumin podwer, garam masala, corainder leaves and salt. Mix well and fry for a minute. Remove from heat, and let this mixture cool for later use. 

                                                                                    


How to shape Samosas:
Now pinch off equal sized balls from the kneaded dough. Keep the dough balls covered with a wet muslin cloth to avoid drying.Dust a rolling pin and your work surface with flour and roll out the dough into a 6 inch circle. And cut it into half from the center so that you get two semi circles ready. Use your finger tips ans sprinkle water all around the edges to moisten the semicircles. Take one semicircle and make a hollow cone, fill 1 tbsp of chicken mixture and seal carefully the open part by pressing it in between your index finger and thumb. So final look will be  triAngle shape. 
Now heat oil in a heavy bottom pan till smoking hot and then simmer. Now carefully slide 2-3 samosas into hot oil over meduim heat till golden brown. Drain the samosas thoroughly on paper towels. Serve with your choice of chutney or sauce and enjoy !!!

                                                                      

read more.. "Chicken Samosa"

Two in One Cookies

                                               
Yields: 22-24 cookies, Preparation time: 10 minutes, Baking time: 10-15 minutes


Ingredients:
2 cups All purpose flour
3/4 cup Unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup Caster sugar
2 tsp Vanilla essence
1/2 tsp Baking powder
1 tbsp Cocoa powder
1 Egg, lightly beaten
Pinch of Salt


Besides these ingredients you will need 2 round shape cookie cutters(1 big, another very small), Aluminium sheet and cling film to wrap the dough.

                                                                         
Method:
In a large bowl sift the flour,baking powder and salt. In a medium bowl, using an electric hand blender, cream together the butter and sugar on medium speed till it is light and fluffy. In between scrape the sides of the bowl for uniform results. Add vanilla essence and beaten egg. Add flour mixture and mix to make a smooth dough. Do add little flour if your feel the dough is a bit sticky. But the nature of the dough should be soft and pliable with a smooth texture. Now divide the dough into two two parts. Leave one plain portion aside and mix cocoa to one part and blend it well. Cling wrap both the doughs separately and keep it in the fridge for 1/2 hour. 

                                                               

Pre-heat the oven to 160 Degree Celsius. Place a sheet of aluminium foil on the tray. Roll out the plain dough into a 1/4 inch thick circle. And cut into round shape using a lightly floured cookie cutter. Once you are done with the big shapes, take the small round cutter and press it in the center. Now carefully take out the extra dough and save it for later use. For the inside cocoa flavour, roll out the dark color dough into 1/4 inch circle and with the help of small cutter make round shape. Now place these small cocoa flavour round shape in the center of plain round dough. Press it lightly to bind the two color doughs.

                                                        Ready to go inside the oven.....
Place these on baking tray, evenly spaced and bake for12-15 minutes on 160 Degree Celsius or until light in color. Remove tray from oven and place them on wire racks to cool. Enjoy these double flavor cookies any time of the day. 

                                                                   

read more.. "Two in One Cookies"

Mutter Mushroom / Mushroom Peas Curry

                                                                           
For the first 15 years of my life I never had tasted mushrooms !! Surprised??? Well don't be as it was not easily available in our small town. First time I got a taste of this during our summer holidays trip to Delhi. We had mushroom soup and it was simply blissful !!! 
After marriage I had to learn many mushroom recipes as my hubby is an avid fan of mushrooms. He loves it more than chicken. So, I am posting a spicy and tasty mushroom preparation which can be cooked easily. Hope all you friends like it.

Ingredients:
200 gms Button mushroom
1 cup Green peas
2 Onions, ground to paste
1/2 Tomato puree
2 tsp Cashew paste
1" inch Ginger
5-6 Garlic
2-3 Green chillies
1 tsp Coriander powder
1/2 tsp Cumin powder
1/2 tsp Garam masala
1/2 tsp Turmeric powder
3/4 tsp Red chilly powder
1" Cinnamon stick
2 tbsp Oil/Ghee
1 cup Water
Salt to taste
Green onion, finely chopped


Method:
Clean, wash and pat dry the mushrooms, cut into four pieces. Fry along with a little ghee till it turns light pink and keep aside. Dip the peas in hot water for 20 minutes.
Make a paste of onion, garlic, gren chilli and ginger. Heat ghee/oil in a pan and add cinnamon stick and onion-garlic paste. Saute on medium flame till light brown. Add coriander, cumin, turmeric, red chilly powder and mix well all the spices. Add salt and tomatoe puree and fry till it leaves oil. Add cashew paste and again fry it till oil comes out of the masala. Add mushrooms and peas and saute it for 5 minutes. Pour water and bring it to a boil on high, then lower the flame and cook till the green peas are soft and tender. Check the consistency of the gravy, add garam masala and chopped spring onion. Serve it hot with flavoured pulao / Nan or roti and enjoy !!!

                                                                     

read more.. "Mutter Mushroom / Mushroom Peas Curry"

Shahjahani Pulao - Multi Colored Pulao

                                                                 
This is a special type of pulao which is a clear change from the day to day plain rice which we are used to have. Being a multi layered colorful preparation adds to the vibrancy of this preparation amongst both children or adults. Hope by preparing this meal , you would receive a number of compliments from your family and friends for bringing variety in their meals.


Ingredients:
2 cups Basmati rice
3 Onions
2 Black Cardamom
1" inch Cinnamon stick
3-4 Bay leaves
2 Green cardamoms
1 tsp Jeera
3-4 Cloves(Laung)
12 Black peppercorns
1 1/2 Red chilli powder
2 1/4 tsp Salt or according to your taste
2 tbsp Ghee/oil


For Decoration
1/2 cup boiled Peas
2 Tomatoes, cut into thin round slices
75 gms Paneer
1 Carrot
3-4 Green chillies
Food color -Red & Yellow
!/2 cup Cashews and raisins


Method:
Wash and soak rice for 1/2 hour. In the meantime chop onion into thin lengthwise strips. Heat oil/ghee in a large pan and add bay leaves, green cardamom, black cardamom, cinnamon stick, cloves and peppercorns, when these spices start to leave theri aroma add onions and fry until it turns brown. Add red chilly powder, salt and add rice to the pan and fry for 2-3 minutes. Now add double amount of water into the rice.  Since I have used 2 cups rice here, I added 4 cups of water. Bring first boil on high speed then cover and let it cook on low flame till water evaporates.


On another skillet heat ghee add green peas stir fry for a minute and keep aside. In the remaining oil add carrot and sprinkle salt, fry for a minute and keep aside. Finally add paneer pieces and fry for a short period on low flame and keep aside. Don't over fry paneer here or they will become hard. Distribute the rice into three portions, add red color in one portion, add yellow color in one portion and leave alone the third portion for the white color.Now take a heavy bottomed vessel and grease the bottom with little ghee so that rice doesn't stick to the bottom and place the tomato slices first, sprinkle some cashews and raisins. Spread the red color rice evenly, then decorate with fried carrot.Above the layer of carrot spread white rice and decorate that layer with green peas. Finally spread yellow rice and decorate with paneer pieces. Cover the vessel with a heavy lid and let this cook on low flame for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and dig through all the 3 layers to make sure that plate has all the colors to please your eye first before delighting your taste buds. Have this rice with Mixed Vegetables in Cream and Coconut Gravy or any curry of your choice.

Look at the beautiful layers of rice here.....

                                                                 

read more.. "Shahjahani Pulao - Multi Colored Pulao"

Nankhatai- Eggless Butter Cookies

                                                   
Today I am  posting a very popular Indian biscuit called Nankhatai ( spelled as Nan-kha-tai).As a snack these biscuits are very crispy but once in the mouth they melt quite easily. Earlier I used to buy it from neighbourhood bakery but once I learnt the method, I started baking it at home and then there was no looking back. It became a staple snack during morning tea or evening tea parties.


Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups All purpose flour
1/2 cup Semolina (fine quality)
3/4 cup Gram flour(besan)
1 cup Powdered sugar
1 cup Butter, room temperature
1 tsp Cardamom powder
Pinch of baking powder
Pinch of saffron dipped in 2 tsp warm milk
1/2 cup broken Pistachios + Cashews + Almonds for garnishing


Method:
 Cream butter and sugar till light and fluffy. Sevie flour,besan, semolina and baking powder together.Then add these dry ingredients to the butter mixture, add saffron liquid and mix well to make a smooth ball of dough. cover this dough with a plastic wrap and keep in fridge for 20 minutes.Pre-heat the oven to 180 Degree Celcius. Divide the dough into 12 equal parts and shape then into ball and then slightly flatten them to make a disc. 

                                     
Then sprinkle some nuts on top for garnishing and press with your fingertips. Place the flatten dough discs on ungreased baking tray and bake for 12-15 minutes and then broil for 1 minute to get the perfect texture. They should be a tinge of light golden brown in cookies I mean they should not be turned brown in color. Let these cool on wire racks until they are firm enough to handle. Repeat the process with the rest of the dough. Once they are cooled down to room temperature, store them in an air tight container. If your are making this in huge batches, you can also keep them in fridge for longer run. 

                                                                      

read more.. "Nankhatai- Eggless Butter Cookies"

Strawberry Smoothie with Yogurt

                                                                         

Strawberry embedded inside the ice-cube

 The recipe of this smoothie was there with me since last two months as I was more focussed on meal based preparations. This is a healthy, yummy and refreshing smoothie.
                                                                         
Ingredients:
1 cup Strawberries with stems removed  
1 cup Strawberry flavour yogurt
1 tbsp Honey
4-5 Ice cubes


Method:
Rinse the strawberries and put them in a blender. Add yogurt, honey, ice cubes and blend this mixture on high speed until the mixture is very smooth. In between do scrape down the sides of the blender. Check the sweetness of this smoothie if not sweet enough, you can add honey and then pour this smoothie into glasses and serve with ice cubes that has strawberry slices inside.

                                                                               

read more.. "Strawberry Smoothie with Yogurt"

Aloo Tikki/Potato Cutlets

Right now I am experiencing a very pleasant weather in Bangalore which is similar to spring in England that is pleasant and breezy in daytime and slightly cool during night. So I thought why not to add on to the good times by preparing Aloo Tikkis ( Potato Cutlets) ? This snack needs no introduction and is extremely popular amongst South Asian Community all across the world. Mine turned out to be hot and crispy. Please do let me know your views and suggestions about it.

                                                                                                                                                          
Ingredients:
3-4 Potatoes
2 tbsp Bread crumbs
2 tbsp Coriander leaves, finely chopped
2-3 Green chillies, finely chopped
1 tsp Red chilly powder
1 tsp Cumin powder
1 tsp Chaat masala
1 tsp Amchoor (dry mango) powder
1 tsp ginger, finely chopped
Salt to taste
Oil for shallow fry


Method:
Wash and boil the potatoes in a pressure cooker until 3 whistles or they become tender. Wait till the excess steam is released from the pressure cooker on it's own. Peel the skin and mash well. Add all the spices except oil and mix thoroughly. Divide the mashed potato into equal portions and make round shape. Flatten them to look like flat discs. Heat a big flat skillet on medium flame, then shallow fry 4-5 tikkis at a time. When they are golden brown and crisp from both the sides. Remove the tikkis and drain the excess oil in a paper towel. Repeat the process with the remaining potato balls. Enjoy these hot tikkis with Tamarind Chutney and a cuppa.


User's Comments & Tips:

• Once the pressure cooker releases the pressure itself, immedietely remove the boiled potatoes from the hot water. Otherwise they tend to soak up water, which eventually doesn't help in binding.
• You can deep fry the aloo tikkis if you want.

                                                              

read more.. "Aloo Tikki/Potato Cutlets"