Panjabi kichidi

Kichidi - I call this as comfort food. Comfort to eat as it melts in our mouth and comfort to cook as you don't need to cook any other side dishes for this. Pack of proteins.

Ingredients:

Rice – 1 cup
Moong daal/ Split green gram skinned - 1/2 cup
Toor daal / Kandi pappu – ½ cup
Onion – 1 small cut into small pieces
Potato – 1 medium cut into cubes
Peanuts – 2 tbsp
Green chilli – 2-3 slit them
Red chilli – 2
Turmeric – ¼ tsp
Cumin powder – ½ tsp
Garam masala – ¼ tsp
Salt
Oil – 2 tbsp

Method:

Wash and soak the rice and daals
Heat a pressure pan with oil
Add Onion, green chilli, red chilli and fry for a minute.
Add peanuts and potato and fry for 2 more minutes.
Add the soaked rice and daals

Add salt, turmeric, cumin powder and garam masala.
Momentarily stir everything and add 4 cups of water and pressure cook till 1 whistle.

Note: If you do not have pressure cooker, use any normal pan and cook the ingredients until soft..

Pesara Idly / Moong Daal Idly

This is another variety of idly with green gram. As we are using the whole grains, this will be rich in B Vitamin. All my efforts are just not to prepare new recipes, but also do healthy meals for my family.

Pesara idly / Moongdaal idly with Sambar

Ingredients:
Whole Urad daal / Black gram – 1 cup

Rice Rava - 1 cup

Whole Green gram - 1 cup

Method:

Soak urad daal and green gram together for atleast 6 hours and grind them into into fine paste.

Add Rava and combine every thing without any lumps and allow to ferment for at least 8 hours.

When it is fully fermented , scoop the batter into idli moulds and steam for 15 – 20 minutes.

Serve them warm with your favourite chutney or sambar

Pesara punugulu / Moong daal fritters

These fritters are prepared by the whole green gram. They will be light in texture. Adding the pepper powder will give that extra spicy taste.

Pesara punugulu

Ingredients:
Whole moong daal / Green gram – 1 cup
Cumin – 1 tsp
Ground Pepper – ½ tsp
Curry leaves
Salt
Oil for deep frying

Method:
Wash and soak the moong daal for 4 hours. Drain and grind it into smooth paste. Just add little water if required.

Moon daal batter

Add Cumin, ground pepper, curry leaves and salt to the batter.

Heat the oil in a pan. When it is hot enough, take small amounts of batter and drop it into the oil. You can also use spoon to do this.

Serve them warm with raw onion.

Warm fritters with onion

Tip: Mix the chopped onion with pinch of salt, chat masala and a dash of lemon juice.

Moong daal sprouts with dry fruits and nuts

Moong beans, apart from being a good source of protein, also contain useful amounts of fibre, potassium, and B-vitamins. They contain low levels of fat, cholesterol and sodium.Sprouts contain an abundance of highly active anti-oxidants that prevent cell destruction and protect us from the ongoing effects of aging.

Ingredients:
Moong daal sprouts - 1 cup
Chopped dates - 2 tbsp
Soaked almonds (Chopped) - 2 tbsp
Soaked Raisins - 1 tbsp

Moon daal sprouts, Almonds, Dates and Raisins

To make sprouts, Wash and soak the whole moong daal in water for about 6 hours. Drain the water and tie the moon daal in a muslin cloth and place it in a box for about 24 hours or until the sprouts are formed. You can directly place the soaked moong daal in the specially designed boxes with holes or simply in sprout makers.

Soak almonds and raisins also for at least 4-6 hours.

When the sprouts are ready, add the chopped almonds, dates and raisins.

This can be served as a cool snack during hot summer. 

  

Pongal / Pulagam Roti

Pulagam roti

I was bit surprised when I hear about this recipe. The main ingredient of this recipe is, left over Pulagam or Pongal. Easy to make, yet a very good treat for our tongue.
I got some left over Pulagam / Moong daal rice, which I made last night. I thought of doing some pulagam roti as breakfast.

Ingredients:
Pulagam / Pongal - 3cups
Rice Flour – 3 heaped tablespoons
Salt – 1 pinch (Just enough for the rice flour0
Onion – 1 finely chopped
Chilli paste – 1 tsp
Coriander – chopped 1 tbsp

Method:
Mash the pulagam / pongal thoroughly with out any lumps. If you feel rice is bit hard, microwave it for 1 minute or so. It is easy to mash when it is warm. Slowly add rice flour, salt, chilli paste and coriander.

Pulagam, Onion, chilli paste, Rice flour

Mix every thing until if forms like dough consistency.

Divide the dough into equal parts and make round balls.

Heat the tava (Time management), smear each dough ball or even your palm with little oil and start pressing the dough with palm to make it flat and thin like roti.

Either you can use a plastic sheet or wet cloth or even butter paper. I have used butter paper, as I can directly lift the roti along with the butter paper and place on the hot tawa. When the roti is ready, drizzle some oil on hot tava, and gently place the roti and drizzle some more oil on top.

When it is done on one side, turn the roti to other side, drizzle some more oil and allow it to cook.

Serve hot with a dollop of butter.

Pulagam Roti with butter

Masala Pulagam / Moong daal rice

My mother-in-law prepares this recipe every Monday, My husband is not a great fan of this recipe. So I thought of drawing his attention towards this recipe by trying this with some spices which enhances the taste.

Masala Pulagam with Peanut chutney

Ingredients:

1 cup Rice

1 cup Split Green gram / Moong daal with skin

Water – 4 cups
Cumin seeds / Jeera – 1 tsp
Ginger – 1 inch
Cloves – 4
Cinnamon – ½ inch
Garlic – 3 – 4 cloves
Curry leaves - Hand full
Salt - 1 tsp or as per your taste
Ghee – 1 tblsp

Method: 
Wash and Soak rice and moong daal in 4 cups of water for 30 minutes.

Soaked Rice and Moong daal (green gram)

Grind garlic, ginger, cloves and cinnamon. Take a small deep pan and heat it with 1 tblsp ghee. When it is hot enough add curry leaves, cumin seeds and the ground paste and fry for 1 -2 minutes.

Frying the spicy mixture in ghee (Clarified butter)

Add this mixture to the rice and add about 1 tsp of salt or as per your taste. Stir once and cook the rice until done.

Rice & Moong daal with spicy mixture

Masala Pulagam with peanut chutney

Note: I cook this recipe in rice cooker and use 1:2 ratios of rice/daal and water. But if you use different methods like on stove top or pressure cooker, then the ratios might vary. You can also replace ghee with any vegetable oil.

Ulli Pesarattu (Green gram dosa with Onion)

Ulli Pesarattu

Ingredients

Whole green gram (Pesalu) - 1 cup
Rice - 2 tblsp
Ginger - 1 inch
Onion - 1 cut into small pieces
Green chilli - 2 cut into small pieces

Method:

Soak green gram and rice for 3-4 hours and grind into paste along with salt and ginger.

Green gram, rice and ginger

Heat a deep pan and add one tsp of oil. When the oil is hot add chopped onion and green chili and fry for 2 minutes using a dash of salt until translucent. Those who like raw onion, no need to fry.

Heat a tawa (Griddle), when it hot pour a laddle full of batter and spread it in circular motion. Sprinkle some oil and fry until it turns to gold colour. Flip to other side until it gets cooked. Turn it back and sprinkle the onion chili mixture.