Methi/Fenugreek Leaves Rice

We usually have farmer's  market in the town centre on thursdays and saturdays where we get fresh produce at a cheaper rate. Once I saw fresh fenugreek leaves and got two bunches of them, knowing not, what to prepare. I browsed through some cookery sites and blogs and finally landed on Solai's kitchen. The recipe for the rice was very simple, neat and well explained. I prepared this dish and it was a super hit. Thanks to Solai aachi!

Ingredients
Cooked rice - 2 cups
Fresh methi/fenugreek leaves - 2 cups (chopped finely)
Oil - 1 Tablespoon
Mustard seeds - 1/4 tablespoon
Urud dal - 1/2 Tablespoon
Channa dal - 1 Tablespoon
Coriander seeds - 1 Tablespoon
Red chilli - 4
Onion - 1 medium (chopped)
Tamarind Juice - 2 Tablespoon
Salt - to taste
Ghee - 1 Tablespoon
  
Method
1. Dry roast the coriander seeds,channa dal and red chillies and grind them into a fine powder.
2. Heat oil in a pan and add mustard seeds followed by the urud dal.
3. Once the urud dal becomes golden yellow add the onions and cook them completely.
4. Now add the methi leaves and cook until the water is completely dried.
5. Add the ground powder and the tamarind juice along with salt.
6. Once the leaves are completely cooked turn off the heat which would take less than 10 minutes on medium heat.
7. Mix the cooked leaves to the rice with the ghee.
      Methi rice is ready! Serve it along with an omelette or crisps.
Note
* The rice should not be sticky. Add a quarter cup less water for the rice than the usual and it should not be hot while mixing with the leaves mix.
* The leaves will be a little chewy than compared to the usual spinach but I bet it has an excellent taste and high nutritious value.

Potato Masal

Potato masal is yet another breakfast dish in Tamil Nadu eaten along with puris and rotis. When I was working back in Chennai, my roomie  used to make this dish which I relished a lot but never intended to learn. I recently read this recipe in a cookery site with colourful pictures and was tempted to cook. This is my first attempt to make potato masal and it was just as how my roomie used to prepare. Hope you people will enjoy!

Ingredients
Potato(large) - 3 (boiled and mashed)
Onion - 1 medium (chopped lengthwise)
Tomato - 1 (chopped)
Green chilli - 2
Ginger - 1/2 Tablespoon (chopped)
Garlic  - 1/2 Tablespoon (chopped)
Curry leaves - 10
Turmeric powder - 1/4 Tablespoon
Oil - 1 Tablespoon
 Urud dal - 1/2 Tablespoon
Channa dal - 1/2 Tablespoon
Asafoetida - a pinch
Sambar powder - 1/4 Tablespoon (optional)
Mustard seeds - 1/4 Tablespoon
Salt - to taste
Water - 1/2 cup
Fresh coriander leaves - to garnish


Method
1. Heat oil in a pan, once its hot add mustard seeds followed by urud and channa dal. Sauté until they become golden yellow and add green chillies and curry leaves followed by ginger, garlic and asafoetida.
2. Cook until the raw smell goes off and then add onion. Once the onion is cooked add the tomatoes followed by the salt, turmeric powder and sambar powder. Cook until the tomatoes are mashed completely.
3. Now add the potatoes and blend well with the cooked items in the pan. Then add the water.
4. Once the mixture comes to a boil turn off the heat and garnish with coriander leaves.
            Potato masal is ready to be served!

Venn Pongal

Venn pongal is one of the common breakfast items in Tamil Nadu. The cumin,  pepper and the curry leaves fried in ghee give out an aroma that fills the whole house. The tiny ginger pieces in the pongal give a beautiful punch to the dish. Enjoy!

Ingredients
Raw Rice - 1 cup
Split Moong Dal/Split Green Gram - 1/2 cup (husked)
Butter or Ghee - 2 Tablespoon
Cumin seeds - 1 1/2 Tablespoon
Black Pepper Corns - 1 Tablespoon
Green Chillies - 2
Curry Leaves - 10 to 15
Cashew nuts - 10
Ginger - 1 Tablespoon (finely chopped)
Water - 3 1/2 cups
Salt - to taste


Method
1. Wash rice and the lentil together and soak in water for 10 minutes.
2. Heat a thick bottomed pan or pressure cooker add the butter/ghee to melt. Once it is hot, add the cumin seeds and pepper corns followed by green chillies, curry leaves and cashew nuts.
3. Now add the chopped ginger and cook for a minute.
4. Now add the rice and lentil to the pan by straining the water. Mix the contents together, so that they blend well together with the ghee.
5. Add 3 1/2 cups of water followed by salt to taste and close the lid and put the weight for the pressure cooker.
6. Wait for 3 whistles and turn off the heat.
7. Once the pressure is reduced, open the lid and add a tablespoon of ghee and mix everything together.
       Tasty venn pongal is ready to be served!

Note
* Instead of raw rice, the regular boiled rice can also be used.
* Serve the pongal along with lentil sambar, coconut chutney and Urud dal fritters.

Spanish bread 'n' cheese baked sandwich

Europe is famous for its cheese and chocolates. Living in Spain for 2 years, cheese has slowly entered into my kitchen too. I just love cheese, either it be goat cheese or cow cheese. This snack is one of my favorite dishes, which I sometimes take it for dinner. My spanish flatmate prepared this once in a party and I really pestered her a lot to learn this. This is a very simple snack which takes very few minutes to prepare and I bet, kids will definitely love it.

Ingredients:

Bread - 5 slices

Cheese - 5 slices

Onion - 1

Oregano- a little

Mayonnaise

Method

1. Take breads and cut them into round slices using a glass. 

2. Cut cheese slices also into round shape.

3. Spread Mayonnaise on the bread, and keep a thin piece of onion cut into round shape.

4. Place the round cheese on the top of the onion and sprinkle little oregano above the cheese.

5. Preheat the oven for to 250c for 5 mins. Spread a butter paper on to the baking tray and place these bread-cheese sandwiches on the plate. Bake for 5-8 mins and remove the plate when the cheese melts a little. 

6. This can be served hot. 

Note

1. You can add vegetables, apples, salmon or thin pieces of bacon with the onions.

2. Healthy and a heavy snack.

Hmmmmmm... Can't wait anymore... Enjoy your snack.

Pepper Chicken

We once visited one of our friend's place and I had a very bad cold then.She suggested that she would make pepper chicken to soothe the cold. She added an extra spoon of pepper to treat the cold. The dish was excellently tasty and hot, so that I sat with a pack of hand tissue next to me and promisingly, it got out most of the phlegm. Since then, I adopted her version of the recipe and of course with a little less pepper!

Ingredients:
Chicken - 500 gms
Any cooking Oil - 1 Tablespoon
Gingley  oil - 1 Tablespoon
Cardamom - 2
Cloves - 2
Cinnamon - 1 (of 1/2 inch)
Bay leaf - 1
Fennel seeds - 1/4 Tablespoon
Cumin seeds - 1/4 Tablespoon
Onion - 2 medium (finely chopped)
Tomato - 2 medium (finely chopped)
Ginger garlic paste - 1 Tablespoon
Turmeric powder - 1/4 Tablespoon
Red chilli powder - 1/2 Tablespoon
Coriander powder - 1 1/2 Tablespoon
Salt - to taste
Pepper powder - 1 Tablespoon
Onion - 1/2 (chopped lengthwise)
Curry leaves - 10 to 15 leaves
Salt - to taste
Water - 1/2 cup


Method
1. Heat both the oil in a deep thick bottomed pan and add cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, bay leaf, fennel seeds and cumin seeds and fry them for 10 seconds.
2. Add onion and sauté till it becomes golden brown and add ginger garlic paste and cook till the raw smell goes off.
3. Then add turmeric powder, red chilli powder and coriander powder and fry till the raw smell goes away.
4. Add tomato and salt and cook till the tomato gives out the juice and is completely cooked.
5. Add the chicken and sauté till the meat becomes white. Then add water to the chicken, cover the pan with a lid, reduce the flame to medium and cook for next 30-40 minutes till the meat is soft and cooked completely. Give a quick stir in between so that the chicken do not stick to the bottom of the pan.

6. Once the meat is cooked and the gravy has thickened, add the onions cut length wise and the curry leaves.
7. Cook for a minute and then add pepper powder and  cover the pan with the lid.
8. After a minute, turn off the heat and mix everything together.
Care should be taken that the onions added in the step 6 are not cooked completely. It should be crunchy.
 Hot pepper chicken is ready to be served.

Note
* The curry leaves and the pepper powder added towards the last gives a whole new dimension to the dish, flavour wise and taste wise.
* If gingely oil is unavailable, just the 2 tablespoon of the cooking oil can be used. Gingely oil gives good flavour to any chicken or fish dish.

Hyderabadi Chicken Dum Biryani in Slow Cooker

I would say that cooking Dum Biryani is an art by itself. Myself and my husband were trying to master it since we moved to UK. Preparing the chicken marinade,the half cooked rice to perfection and the final dum stage, all put together is one heck of a job. Either the masala proportion goes wrong or the rice gets overcooked. One of my husband's colleagues bought beef stew cooked in a slow cooker for his office's pot luck. The meat was very juicy,tender and the taste was absolutely great. Then we decided,why not give a try for our biryanis, curries and stews with the slow cooker. We got a brand new, black and stylish,Russell Hobbs 3.5 L slow cooker for this Christmas and tried dum biryani with chicken in it. It was unbelivable! we got the texture,consistency and taste similar to that of the restaurants. The meat was cooked to perfection and the rice.... I must say, for the first time we got it right! All you need is a whole lot of patience! The 3.5 L capacity of the slow cooker would be ideal for couples and 4 people can have a meal at a time. Myself and my husband had it for dinner and reserved the rest for next day's lunch.And the slow cooker...is really worth  the buy! Looking forward to cook soups,stews and curries with it!

Ingredients
Basmati Rice - 2 1/2 cups
Chicken with bones - 750 gms
Oil - 1/2 cup
Desi Ghee - 3 Tablespoon
Onion - 1 big (chopped Lengthwise)
Green chilli - 5 (chopped)
Fresh Mint leaves - 1 cup (finely chopped)
Fresh coriander leaves - 1 cup (finely chopped)
Saffron  - 7 strands
Milk - 1/2 cup
Water - 1/2 cup (if required)
Lime juice - Juice of 1/2 lime
To Marinate
Ginger Garlic paste - 2 Tablespoon
Turmeric powder - 1/4 Tablespoon
Red chilli powder - 1/2 Tablespoon
Coriander powder - 2 Tablespoon
Biryani masala powder - 1 1/2 Tablespoon (optional)
Yoghurt - 5 Tablespoon
Lime juice - Juice of 1 large lime
Cloves - 7
Cinnamon - 3 sticks (of 1 inch each)
Cardamom - 6
Bay Leaves - 3
Salt - to taste
For the Rice
Cloves - 5
Cinnamon  - 2 sticks (of 1 inch each)
cardamom - 4
Cumin seeds - 1 Tablespoon
Water - 2 1/2 cups (1:1 ratio with that of rice)
Salt - to taste

Method
 Follow the steps in accordance to get it right :-)
1. Fry the onions in the oil until they become golden brown and strain the excess oil. Reserve the oil, do not discard.
2. Clean and wash the chicken and drain the excess water. Add all the ingredients mentioned in the, to marinate list to the chicken. Also add the oil reserved which we got in step 1, 1/2 of the fried onions and half of the chopped coriander,mint and green chillies to the chicken. The oil gives nice flavour and aroma to the biryani.Mix everything with your hand and make sure each chicken piece is coated well with the masalas. You  can also taste the marinade,if you feel anything is less you can add them to your convenience and pop it into the fridge. Allow it to marinate for 2-4 hours or overnight. The longer, the better!
3. Once the chicken is marinated, take it out of the fridge and allow it to rest for a while so that the stiffness of the meat due to the chillness go away.

4. Take a pan and fry the chicken in it for just 5 minutes. (This is because you cannot put the raw meat directly into the slow cooker, as per the cookbook instructions)
5. Preheat the slow cooker along with the cookpot in high mode for 20 minutes (This should be done with no chicken or rice in the cookpot, just the empty pot)
6. Wash the rice in the water twice and drain the water completely. Now take the rice along with the ingredients mentioned in, for the rice list in a microwave oven safe bowl and microwave it for 15 minutes in high mode or a little longer than that, until there is not water left in the bowl. Stir the contents once in 10 minutes just to even the cooking of rice and by doing so you can also check the amount of water left in the bowl. The rice will be 50% - 60% cooked at the end as we have added only 1:1 rice and water (The perfect consistency we need for the dum)

7. Now take the cookpot out of the slow cooker with the oven gloves and grease the inner side of the cookpot with little oil or butter.
8. Now spread all the chicken at the bottom of the pot and half of the rice on top of the chicken and garnish the rice with the chopped coriander leaves, mint leaves,fried onions and green chillies (reserve some for the second layer of rice). Melt the desi ghee and spread 1 1/2 tablespoon on top of the rice and squeeze few drops of lime juice.

9. Now spread rest of the rice on the top and garnish with the remaining coriander,mint,fried onions and green chillies and spread the remaining ghee on top and squeeze the lime juice.

10. Boil the milk along with the saffron strands and spread it on top of the top layer of rice (not necessary on the bottom layer of the rice).

11. Now cover the cookpot with the aluminium foil, put the lid on top and seal all the edges thoroughly with your finger nails (This acts as the dum preventing the escape of the heat vapours) and place the cookpot carefully in the slow cooker.

12. Now turn the slow cooker mode to low and cook it for 3 1/2 to 4 hours.
13. You can open it after 1 1/2 hours and give a light stir on the top just to prevent the rice from drying out on top.Do not stir the rice and chicken together at this stage. You can sprinkle some water on top if you feel that the rice is very dry.Your whole house will be filled with the wonderful aroma by now.
14. Turn off the cooker after 4 hours and take the cookpot out and stir the rice and chicken together gently without breaking the rice.
          You will see the meat coming off the bones and will be juicy and tender to the core.
           Serve it hot with boiled eggs,chicken fry and onion,cucumber, yoghurt salad.

Note
* Following the steps in order will get you the perfect biryani.
* Do not cook the rice very early because it might get mushy and sticky, if you leave it outside for a long time.
* You  can also cook the rice in 7-8 cups of water on the stove and strain the excess water once the rice is cooked 50% and wash the rice with cold water to prevent further cooking. But trust me, this never worked for me, you need a lot of experience though! You can reserve a cup of the strained water and add it along with ghee and spread on top of the rice layers.

Egg Korma

I recently stumbled on this egg korma recipe in the net and tried, it came out amazingly well. It is a mildly spiced and creamy dish.We normally used to boil eggs, cut them into half and drop them in the korma. But this version has the raw egg directly dropped in the korma. I often make this dish for the dinner along with the rotis and has become the hot favourite of my husband. Enjoy!

Ingredients
Eggs - 4
Fresh grated coconut - 1/2 cup
Cashew nuts (whole)  - 10-15
Oil - 1 Tablespoon
Cardamom - 1
Bay Leaf - 1
Cloves - 2
Cinnamon - 1/2 inch
Fennel seeds - 1/4 Tablespoon
Green chilli - 2
Onion - 1 Medium (chopped)
Ginger Garlic paste - 1/2 Tablespoon
Tomato - 1 Medium (chopped)
Fresh Coriander - For garnishing
Salt - to taste
Turmeric powder - 1/4 Tablespoon
Coriander powder - 1 Tablespoon
Red chilli powder - 1/4 Tablespoon
Sambar powder -1/4 Tablespoon (optional)
Water - 1 1/2 cups

Method
1. Heat oil in a deep pan with thick bottom.Drop the cardamom,bay leaf,cloves,cinnamon and fennel seeds in the oil and fry for 15 seconds.Then add green chillies.
2. Add onion and sauté till it is cooked and add the ginger garlic paste and fry till the raw smell goes off.
3. Then add the chopped tomato,salt,turmeric powder,red chilli powder,coriander powder,sambar powder add fry till the raw smell of the masalas go away and oil oozes out from the masala mixture.
4. Meanwhile grind the grated coconut and cashew nuts into a fine paste by adding little water.
5. Once the masala is completely cooked,add the ground coconut cashew paste and the water.
6.Give it a quick stir and bring it to a boil.
7. Once the korma becomes thick and creamy, reduce the flame to medium heat and break in the eggs one at a time as shown in the picture above.Do not stir the korma, else the eggs will break and it will be a big disaster.
8. It will take10-15 mins for the eggs to cook completely.Once the eggs are cooked completely you can break them if you feel that they are too big.
9.Turn off the heat and garnish with fresh coriander.
    Egg korma is an excellent dish with rotis and dosas.