Spring Blossoms

I have arranged few spring blossoms such as Eastern Redbud, Golden bells, Heath etc.,

Carrot Halwa

 Carrot halwa topped with chopped nuts and silver leaf

This is a rich traditional sweet made with carrots and whole milk. I made it more richer by adding ricotta cheese and silver leaf.  By adding ricotta cheese the halwa tastes more creamier.

Ingredients:

Grated Carrot - 4 cups

Sugar -3/4th cup or more according to taste.

Whole Milk - 2 cups

Ricotta cheese  -100 gms

Ghee - 1/4 cup

Cashew nuts, almonds, pistachio - 4-5 each, chopped fine

Method:

Heat a deep thick bottomed pan. Add ghee and carrots. Fry the grated carrots for about 5 minutes until the raw smell disappears.Add milk. Stir and cook on low fire till the mixture thickens. It may take about 15-20 minutes. 

Add sugar. Mix well and cook for some more time till sugar dissolves and the mixture thickens again.Add ricotta cheese and mix well until it gets melted.

Cook until it gets into halwa consistency by stirring occasionally.

 Remove from the fire and spread the halwa on a buttered tray. Sprinkle chopped nuts or just spread the silver leaf and cut them into squares.

 Carrot halwa topping with silver leaf

·Tip:  You can roast the ricotta cheese separately before adding to the carrot mixture. 
         Also you can substitute ricotta cheese with khoya. 

 Carrot halwa

 

Oats Bisibelabath

A simple recipe with little oil and more nutrients. A great way to avoid rice and easy to digest.

Oats bisibelabath with boondhi

Serves - 3

Ingredients:

Rolled Oats – 1 cup
Toor daal – ½ cup
Onion – 1 large chopped into stripes
Tomato – 1 large
Mixed Vegetables of your choice chopped into bite size – 2 cups
Sambar Powder – 1 tbsp
Tamarind – lemon size
Salt
Oil

For Seasoning;
Mustard – ½ tsp
Cumin – ½ tsp
Curry leaves – 1 string
Coriander chopped– 2 tbsp
Dry Red chilli – 2
Cashew nuts – 10
Almonds – 4-6 (Chopped)

 

Oats, Toor Daal, Mixed vegetables

Method:

Soak oats in 1 cup of water and keep it aside.

Soak Tamarind and extract the pulp and keep it aside.

Pressure cook daal into smooth paste

Heat a pan and add a tsp of oil. When it is hot add all the vegetables along with onion and tomato and fry for a minute with out burning and add 2-3 cups of water.

When the vegetables are half cooked add the soaked oats and cooked daal, stir every thing and add salt, tamarind pulp and sambar powder and cover with the lid.

Stir in between and reduce the flame when all the vegetables and oats cooked thoroughly, reduce the flame, cover with lid and cook for another 7-10 minutes. 

Heat another pan for seasoning. When it is hot add mustard, cumin, curry leaves red chilli, cashews, almonds and finally chopped coriander. Add the seasoning to the oats mixture.

Kobbari thalimpu / Fresh coconut stir fry

Fresh Coconut is very rich in protein and fibre. It require less oil to prepare this recipe as coconut itself is origin of natural oil.

 

Coconut Fry / Kobbari thalimpu

Ingredients:

Fresh coconut grated – 1 cup
Green chilli – 4 - 5
Onion – 2 chopped into small pieces
Curry leaves
Coriander
Mustard + Cumin – 1 tsp
Chana daal – 1 tsp
Dry chilli - 2
Oil – 2 tbsp
Salt
Lemon juice – 1 tsp

 

Fresh coconut, Green chili paste, Onion

Method:

Heat a pan with oil. Add the seasoning ingredients like Chana daal, Dry chilli, Mustard, cumin and curry leaves. Add chopped onion and chilli and fry them until onion become transparent. Add coconut along with salt and fry for few minutes (about 5-6) until the moisture evaporates from coconut. Finally sprinkle some chopped coriander and lemon juice. Stir once, cover the lid and turn off the heat.

You can serve this with rice or roti.

Roti with coconut fry

Masala Dosa - 2

This is the most famous street food at Rayalaseema also all families favourite tiffin. Though the process is bit lengthy, it is worth of trying.
We need two types of chutneys for this.Onion Chutney and Bombai Chutney, Click below for the recipes.
1. Onion Chutney
2. Bombai Chutney

Bombai Chutney and Erra Karam / Onion chutney

For Dosa Batter

1 Cup – Urad dal
4 cups – Rice
Fistfull of cooked rice (Though optional, helps in quick fermentation)
Fenugreek seeds – 1 tsp (gives dosa rich gold colour)

Soak all the above for about 6 hours and grind into smooth paste. Ferment it for 8 – 12 hours.


Method:

Pour the dosa batter on hot tawa and spread it . When it is roasted turn the dosa to other side, when it is done flip it back and apply Erra karam / Onion chutney first and then bombai chutney on top of erra karam / Onion chutney.

Dosa with Masala spread

Fold it and serve it hot. Masala dosa done. 

 Masala Dosa

Cabbage Pakoda / Fritters

Few people don’t eat onion either due to the religious reasons or due to their body tendency or during any medication. Cabbage is nice replacer for onions due to its layered texture. I have added carom seeds in this recipe for two reasons. One, the carom seeds / vaamu are good for digestion and two, they have the unique flavor which overrides the cabbage smell.

Cabbage pakoda in the bed of cabbage leaves

Ingredients:

Cabbage, shredded – 1 cup
Carom seeds / Vaamu – 1 tsp
Basin / Gram flour – 3 tbsp (Heaped)
Rice Flour – 3 tbsp (Heaped)
Salt
Green chili – 2 slit them and chop into 1 inch size
Oil to deep fry
Water – 3 – 4 tbsp

Method:

Heat a pan with oil .Whilst the oil is heating, mix the chopped onion with salt, green chili, Carom seeds, gram flour and rice flours thoroughly. Now add about 3-4 tbsp of warm oil into the cabbage mixture.Mix the ingredients well, so that they resemble crumbs.Now sprinkle 3 – 4 tbsp of water and mix every thing thoroughly. (If necessary add bit more ).

Cabbage Pakoda mixture

When the oil is hot enough, pick small amounts of mixture and slip into the oil slowly.Occasionally turn the pakodas, so that they get cooked equally on all the sides.Drain them on to a paper towel and serve them warm.

 Cabbage pakoda

Sorakaya majjigapulusu / Bottle gaurd in yogurt sauce

I call this recipe as one man show as this serves the purpose of curry, rasam and yogurt which are 3 basic must have recipes in any South Indian home. Requires less efforts to make this all in one recipe.

Sorakaya Majjiga charu / Bottlegaurd in yogurt sauce

Ingredients:

1 cup of cubed bottle gourd pieces
1 cup of yogurt (preferably sour curd)
4-6 green chillies and small piece of fresh coconut (made into smooth paste)
½ teaspoon of each - turmeric and salt
 1 tsp of oil
1 tsp of cumin and mustard seeds
1 or 2 dried red chillies
Curry leaves and corriander

 Bottlegaurd, green chilli, fresh coconut and curry  leaves

Method:

In a saucepan, heat oil on medium heat. Add mustard, cumin and curry leaves. Add the bottle gourd cubes  and stir for a minute and close the lid for 2 minutes and allow to cook the bottlegaurd. Remove the lid a nd add green chilli-coconut paste. Stir in turmeric, salt and about quarter cup of water. Close the lid and cook on medium-low heat, until the bottle gourd pieces are tender. Reduce the heat to low and stir in the yogurt. Turn off the heat and remove the saucepan from the stove. Serve with rice either warm or cold.

Rice with bottlegaurd in yogurt sauce

Rava / sooji Laddu

I have learned this recipe from our family friend who is an expert in making this soft and melting laddus. Also this is my sister's favourite sweet.

Rava Laddu

Ingredients:
2 cups – semolina preferably white one
2 cups – Grated coconut
1 ½ cup – Sugar
½ tsp – Cardamom powder
2 tbsp – Cashew nuts
2 tbsp – Raisins (Optional)
3 tbsp – Ghee

Ghee, Cashews,Grated Coconut, Sugar and Rava / Sooji

Roast cashews and raisins (if using) in the ghee and keep them aside
In the same ghee roast the semolina until nice aroma comes and keep it aside.

Roasted Semolina

Again in the same pan roast the grated coconut till all the moisture gets evaporated. Keep it aside.

 

Roasted coconut (Fresh)

Now add 1/2 cup of water to the sugar and slowly melt the sugar under low flame.

 Process of making sugar syrup

Once the sugar is melted add cardamom powder and increase the flame and stir the syrup continuously until we get one string consistency as shown below.

 

One string consistency

Then add the roasted semolina, cashews, raisins and coconut into the sugar syrup by stirring continuously for a minute or so and remove from the flame.

Wait until the mixture becomes warm enough to touch and start making laddus. Best practice is, smear your hands with ghee and scoop a small amount of laddu mixture into your hand using a spoon or laddle and gently form round balls by pressing all the sides.

hmmm....hmmmmm.hmmmmmm

Corriander Chutney

This is a simple raw coriander chutney. Instead of frying, I just ground all the ingredients to retain the astringent smell with the touch of seasoning.

Ingredients:

Coriander - 1 bunch

Ginger - 1 inch

Green chilli - 4-5

Tamarind - 1/2 lemon size

Salt

For Seasoning:

Urad daal - 1 tsp

Chana daal / Bengal Gram - 1 tsp

Curry leaves - 1 string

Mustard and Cumin - 1 tsp

Dry Red chilli - 2

Oil - 2 tsp

Grind coriander,green chilli,ginger and tamarind into fine paste and do seasoning.

Coriander Chutney

You can substitute pickles with this spicy chutney which forms a nice treat for curd rice