Pongal

I was introduced to Pongal by one of my friends from Bangalore. I had always thought that pongal was a sweet dish until I had Pongal at her home. She informed me that there was a sweetish pongal recipe for festive occasions and a kichidi-type rice recipe for main course. I often make pongal for dinner as it provides both proteins and carbohydrates in the same dish. Here is the recipe.

Ingredients
1 cup basmati rice or any other rice which you prepare for dinner
1 cup moong dal
1 teaspoon pepper corns
2 green chilies or as per taste
1 teaspoon chopped ginger
1 teaspoon ghee (optional)
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
2 tablespoon chopped cashew nuts
2 tablespoon raisins
5-6 kadipatta or curry leaves
1/2 cup milk
1 teaspoon oil
salt

Method
Wash the rice and dal thoroughly and cook it with green chilies, pepper corns, salt and ginger. Heat oil in a pan and add cumin seeds. Fry for 30 seconds and add cashew nuts, raisins and curry leaves. Fry till the cashews are light brown. Add the cooked rice and dal and mix thoroughly. Add the milk and adjust salt. Serve with turai chutneyor dahi.

Preparation time: 40 minutes
Serves: 2-3

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Hakka Noodles

Who does not like the tasty and fiery hakka noodles available at every Chinese fast food joint in India. I usually use soy sauce and tomato ketchup for making noodles. This time I bought knorr's sauces from my Indian grocery store and thought of making hakka noodles on one Sunday. I have put a photo of the sauces. Here, we don't get the manchurian and schezwan sauces which are readily available in India. Back in India, I would often use these sauces for making noodles and sizzlers. Yana's restaurant in Pune served a lot mouth watering Indo-Chinese sizzlers. Kobe's was another sizzler joint. I have never known a sizzler restaurant in the Bay Area. Let me know if you are aware of any good sizzler joint in the Bay Area. Many people may think that noodles are not a healthy dinner option; but use a lot of vegetables in the dish and it turns out to be a nutritious diner. Here is the recipe.

Ingredients
1 packet hakka noodles
2 carrots thinly sliced
1/2 crown of broccoli chopped into small pieces
1 cup shredded cabbage
1/2 cup beans chopped into 1 inch pieces
1/2 cup peas and/or corn
8-9 baby corn
1 cup thinly sliced capsicum or green pepper
2 medium red onions finely chopped
1 handful mung sprouts
1 cup chopped scallions or spring onion
1 teaspoon chopped ginger
1 teaspoon chopped garlic
1 1/2 teaspoon green chili sauce
1 tablespoon hot and sweet sauce
1 teaspoon soy sauce
2 tablespoon oil
pepper and salt as per taste

Method

Put the noodles in boiling water with 1/2 teaspoon salt and cook till done. Rinse the noodles in cold water immediately to stop the cooking process. Rinsing the noodles in cold water helps in keeping the noodles separate. Heat oil and add ginger, garlic and red onions. Fry for 3-4 minutes on high flame. Add sliced capsicum and fry for 4-5 minutes. Then add cabbage and stir fry for 3-4 minutes. Add the carrots, broccoli, beans and peas. Cook them uncovered stirring them continuously on high flame for 8-10 minutes. Add the soy sauce, hot and sweet sauce, chili sauce and mix well. Add the noodles, spring onions and mung sprouts and mix it well with the vegetables. Add salt and pepper as per taste. Adjust sauces as per your taste and serve hot.

Preparation time: 1 hour
Serves: 2-3

Toasted Pumpkin Seeds

I usually toast the pumpkin seeds and we eat it as a snack. These seeds can also be sprinkled on salads. This is another of my grand mom's recipes. My grand mom would always ask the vegetable vendor to keep pumpkin seeds and she would purchase them when ever we went to shop for vegetables. She would say that these seeds have a lot of nutritions in them and many people are not aware about it. Check here for the nutritional value of pumpkin seeds.

Ingredients
pumpkin seeds
1 tablespoon ghee or clarified butter
pepper powder as desired
salt as per taste

Method
Wash the pumpkin seeds well and dry them on kitchen towel. Heat ghee in a pan and add the pumpkin seeds. Roast the seeds on a low flame till they are roasted as desired. Then sprinkle pepper powder and salt. Store the roasted seeds in a airtight container and it remains good for two weeks.

Onion Rava Dosa

I love onion rava dosa because of its crispiness and the mild flavor of peppercorns, coriander leaves and onion pieces embedded randomly in the dosa. I usually order it when I visit South Indian restaurants in the Sunnyvale. But we have to wait for a long time at Saravana Bhavan which we usually visit for dinner. Sometimes the wait even exceeds 40 minutes. The waiters dilli dally while getting the menus to us, then after a long wait they come to our table and take our order. Finally after an era we are served our meal. So, instead of waiting so long for one dosa at the restaurant, I made this dosa at home on the new griddle and it came out very well. This dosa does not require any fermentation like the dosas which are made of urad dal and hence be made in no time.
Previously, I would usually avoid making thin dosas..like rava dosas at home as my tava would give out lot of smoke which would activate the smoke alarm. The dosas also required a lot of oil else they would stick to the tava. But, I would always think that there is something wrong with my dosa batter. But recently when my parents visited me, my mom told me that there was nothing wrong with the batter and I was using too much oil for every dosas and there was something wrong with the tava. I then came to know that the tava I was using was not a dosa tava and was a mexican fajita griddle. I did some research on the internet and bought this griddle from Macy's. Now I can make very thin dosas like rava dosas successfully at home.

Ingredients
2 cups rava or semolina
1 cup maida or all purpose flour
1 cup rice atta or rice flour
1 medium onion
3 tablespoon chopped cilantro or coriander leaves
1 teaspoon pepper corns
1/4 cup curds (optional)
2 green chilies
1/2 teaspoon salt


Method
Finely chop the green chillies and the onion. Mix it with the rava, maida, curds (optional), pepper corns, salt and rice flour. Add lots of water to make a very liquidish batter. The batter should be as thin as buttermilk. Keep the batter aside for around 1 hour. The rava will absorb some water, so add more water if needed to made a thin batter.

Heat a oiled tava(griddle) and spread a very thin layer of the batter on the tava. Cover and cook the dosa. As the dosa is very thin, traditionally, it is not flipped and cooked on the other side. However, I like it to be cooked on both sides, so I flip it and cook it uncovered for around 20 seconds on the second side. Serve immediately with sambar and chutney.

Bhindi Sabzi/ Bhendi Upkari

Bhindi upkari is another konkani side dish which goes well with daal or spicy sambar/rasam. Upkari in Konkani means a simple side dish served with rice. Select small and tender okra instead of large okras with lots of seeds. In my native place people use fresh okra from vines which grow in the backyard to prepare this side dish. The fresh okra makes a great deal of difference in enhancing the taste of the sabzi. I find similar kind of okra at the Mountain View farmer's market. Here is the recipe.

Ingredients
1 pound okra
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
1 teaspoon coconut oil
2 tablespoon grated coconut
2-3 dried red chilies
1/2 teaspoon urad dal or black skinnedlentils
salt for taste
Method

Cut the tops and bottom of the okra and cut it into 2 centimeter round slices. Heat oil in a pan and and mustard seeds. When the mustard seeds start to splutter, add urad dal and fry till the urad dal is pink. Break the red chili into 2-3 pieces add red chilies to the seasoning. Fry for half a minute and add okra. Cover and cooked till the okra is cooked. Season with salt as per taste and grated coconut. Serve with rice.

Preparation time: 30 minutes
Serves: 2-3