Chilli Paneer, Veg Fried Rice and Kofta Curry

Chilli Paneer

I love chinese and its been ages since I had it outside. Yeah we had gone for it couple of weeks back but whatever we had ordered wasnt upto the mark and hence didnot count :) Hence yesterday I thought lets give it a shot at home. I have earlier tried these stuff at home as well, but then the taste wasnt authentic. But yesterday I can say I mastered it. So here is the recipe for you.

Ingredients

400gm Paneer

1 Onion

6 Chillies

15 Garlic Cloves

A Pinch of Black Pepper Powder

2 Spoon Dark Soy Sauce

1 Spoon Tomato Ketchup

1 Spoon Corn Flour

2-3 Strands of Spring Onion

Salt to taste

Oil

Method

• Cut the paneer into medium sized cubes and fry them in oil over medium heat till light gold in color. Keep aside
• In same oil fry onions till translucent.
• Add chopped chillies and garlic and cook till fragranant
• Add black pepper powder and Soy sauce and cook for a minute
• Add paneer cubes and tomato ketchup. Cook for 2-3 minutes
• Mix corn flour in a cup of water and add it to the paneer mixture.
• Add more water if needed and cook the paneer with closed lid for 3 minutes.
• Garnish with chopped spring onions and serve

Notes
Chop the green chillies in slanted fashion for this so that you get the same look and feel that you see in restaurants.
Do not fry paneer till its completely crispy from outside. You want to keep it as soft as possible and yet fry it so that it gets the proper texture.
Also if you are looking for it as starter which is dry, add little less water and cook for some more time if required so that the final result is dry :)

Veg Fried Rice

In Chinese I love Soft noodles. But, I havent yet been able to prepare them of the level of nice chinese restaurant. So most of the time I end up preparing fried rice instead. So here is recipy for the veg fried rice.

Ingredients

2 Cup Rice

1 Onion

1 Cup Cabbage Shredded

1/2 Cup Carrot Shredded

1/2 Cup Muttor

A pinch of Black Pepper Powder

Salt to taste

Oil

Method

• Cook rice and keep aside
• Heat oil and add chopped onion and shredded carrots. Saute till onions are translucent
• Add and cook till cabbage is done
• Add muttor, black pepper powder and salt and cook for another minute
• Add cooked rice and mix well. Cook for 2-3 minutes

Notes
Adding carrot at start makes sure that carrot is cooked well as it will take longest time to cook.

Kofta Curry
Whenever we get bottle gourd, ajoy has this demand of Koftas and so yesterday was the day when I obliged and made it for him. Here is the recipe.


Ingredients
4 Cup Grated Bottle Gourd
1.5 Cup Bason
2 Tomatoes
1 Onion
1/2 Spoon Garlic Paste
1 Spoon Jeera
1 Spoon Red Chilli Powder
1/4 Spoon Turmeric Powder
1/4 Spoon Garam Masala
1/4 Spoon Aamchur Powder
1/4 Spoon Corriander Powder
Corriander Leaves for garnishing
Salt to taste

Method

• Apply salt to the grated bottle gourd and keep aside for few minutes.
• Squize out water from the bottle gourd and mix bason, 1/2 spoon jeera, 1/2 spoon red chilli powder, garam masala, aamchur powder
• Prepare lemon sized ball out of this mixture and deep fry them in oil over low-medium heat. Keep aside
• Heat little oil in a pan and let the jeera splutter.
• Add the finelly chopped onion and garlic paste and cook till golden brown
• Add turmeric powder, remaining red chilli powder, corriander powder and salt
• Add tomatoes and cook well. Add water and bring to boil. Once the tomatoes are cooked well keep the mixture aside to cool down a bit
• Put the mixture into the mixie and grind to fine paste
• In a pan add this grinded mixture, enough water to make running gravy and koftas and bring to boil
• Garnish with corriander leaves and serve

Notes
I tried to keep the kofta spicy and gravy very less spicy so that one can enjoy koftas rather than gravy. You can vary it to your taste though

Pineapple Muramba And Aalu Gobi

Pineapple Muramba 

Almost a month back I got the big pineapple from costco. I just remembered mom's pineapple muramba and thought of giving it a shot. Called up mom and asked for recipe.. And it turned out that it was quite easy to make it and hence prepared that night immediately :)

Ingredients

5 Cups Fresh cut Pineapple

3 Cup Water

1.5 Cup Sugar

Method

• Mix pineapple pieces with water such that it barely submerges pineapple
• Cook the mixture over medium flame keeping a lid till pineapple are cooked.
• Strain the mixture and separate out pineapple and water
• In same water mix the sugar and bring to boil
• With constant stirring keep heating water over medium flame till it becomes 1 string consistency syrup
• Now add pineapple pieces and boil once again
• Let it cool down and refrigerate in the fridge

Notes

The muramba needs to be stored in fridge and it would stay for few months.

Good side dish to eat with chappati/paratha

I dont like too much of sugar syrup and hence the above recipe gives very less sugar syrup mixed pineapple muramba.. If you like you can add another cup of water + 1/2 cup of sugar to get traditional version which has more liquid

Aalu Gobi

Ajoy loves gobi so we always have it at home. This time I thought of trying something different that the usual preparations and end up preparing this dish

Ingredients

2 Potatoes

1 Gobi

1/2 Spoon Mustard

1 Spoon Jeera

1 Spoon Jeera Powder

1 Spoon Corriander Powder

1 Spoon Red Chilli Powder

1/2 Spoon Garam Masala

1/4 Spoon Turmeric Powder

1/4 Spoon Powdered Sugar

Corriander Leaves for garnishing

Salt to taste

Oil

Method

• Peel the potatoes and cut them in cubic shapes
• Separate out the florets of medium size from the gobi
• Heat oil in a pan and let the mustard and Jeera splutter in the oil.
• Add potato pieces and gobi florets in the oil and cook on medium flame with constant stirring.
• After 5 minutes add turmeric powder and keep cooking
• When the potato and gobi is almost done, add corriander powder, jeera powder, red chilli powder, garam masala, powdered sugar and salt. Mix well and cook till completely done
• Garnish with finely chopped corriander leaves

Notes

This simple dish gives different flavour than the tomato gravy kind of gobi preparation. The vegetable is quite dry and goes well with phulkas or parathas.

Set Dosa And Khatkhate

Set Dosa

My love for set dosa started the very first day i ate it in bangalore. I just love this fluffy thick dosa served in set of three medium sized ones. Finally I did some research for recipe. Most of them were using soda which i didnt want to use. Also found out that they use poha in it. So adapted those ingredients to the my dosa recipe. Outcome was awesome :) Infact I made it like 2 weeks back and before I could click photos, they were over :) And already been asked for repeat. So this week I prepared it again and first thing I did was click the snap :)

Ingredients

2 Cup Rice

1 Cup Idly Rawa

3/4 Cup Udid Daal

1 Cup Poha

1 Spoon Methi Seeds

Salt to taste

Oil

Method

• Soak Rice, Idly rawa, udid daal and methi seeds seperately in the morning.
• In the evening soak poha for an hour
• Grind the rice to fine paste.
• Mix udid daal and Methi seeds and grind it to fine paste.
• Grind the idly rawa to form fine paste
• Grind Poha as well to the paste.
• Mix all these pastes really well and keep in warm place overnight
• Next day morning, add salt and water enough to make free flowing consistency. Mix well.
• Heat tawa on low-medium flame.
• Sprinkle few drops of oil and pour a cup of batter.
• When the one side is one, sprinkle couple of drops on top of the dosa and flip it to cook the other side.
• When the other side too turns light brown, take it out and serve.

Notes
This dosa is normally served with mixed vegetable, but i dont like it at all so instead i served it with peanut-curd chutney without using optional items. It went well.

Khatkhate
I loved this dish a lot since my childhood. Probably then I didn't realise it was the healthiest dish that I loved :D Just like the name says it uses almost everything that's in your fridge :)


Ingredients
1 Cup Beans
1/2 Cup Mutter
2 Drum Sticks
2 Corn Cobs
1 Potato
1 Sweet Potato
1 Raw Banana
1.5 Spoon Tamarind
1/4 Cup Jaggery
1/2 Cup Coconut
1/4 Spoon Corriander Seeds
1 Spoon Red Chilli Powder
1/4 Spoon Turmeric Powder
A pinch of Asafoetida
2 Spoon Ghee
Salt to taste

Method

• In a half cup of water add the tamarind and keep aside.
• In a pan, add beans and 4 cups of water and cook over high flame for 5 minutes
• Cut each corn cob into 3 pieces and add the corn cob pieces and another 2 cups of water, Cook for another 5 minutes
• Add drum sticks - cut into pieces, potato cubes, raw banana pieces, pieces of sweet potato and another 2 cups of water. Cook till they are almost done
• Mean time grate coconut, tamarind (with its water that was it soaked in) and corriander seeds adding half cup of water.
• Add it and mutters to the almost done vegetables.
• Add turmeric powder, jaggery, red chilli powder and salt and simmer it.
• In another small pan, add ghee and let the mustard splutter in it.
• Add asafoetida and mix the tadaka with the vegetable.

Notes
You can optionally add 1 cup of pumpkin pieces too, but I couldn't as it wasn't available in the store here.

Hariyali Mango Paneer

Today we were to meet Kapil and Shrinkhla for dinner but by the time we reached home everybody was almost full. So we decided to eat something at home instead. Thats when my mind started working on what I should make. I had a mango (raw) from mayuri that i had got last week. I cut it and saw that it was too sour so thought of making salad from it and started making hariyali paneer side by side. But as time progressed on the spot i changed my mind and made hariyali mango paneer instead. Turned out very nice.


Ingredients
3 Cup Coriander Leaves
1/2 Cup Pudina Leaves
1 Raw Mango
1 Onion
2 Cup Paneer Pieces
1 Green Chili
1 Spoon Garlic Cloves
1/2 Spoon Garam Masala
1 Spoon Red Chili Powder
1 Spoon Coriander Powder
1/4 Spoon Turmeric Powder
1/2 Spoon Jeera Powder
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Add a cup of water to coriander leaves, pudina leaves and green chili and grind in mixie.
• In hot oil, fry paneer pieces to light brown edges and keep aside
• In same oil, add chopped onion pieces, garlic and fry till light brown
• Add in mango pieces and ground coriander-pudina-green chillies mixture and cook till the water evaporates and gravy thickens.
• Add in turmeric powder, garam masala, red chili powder, jeera powder and coriander powder and stir.
• Add in fried paneer pieces and salt to taste and cook for couple of more minutes.

Notes
The mango that I used wasn't too raw not too ripe. So it worked perfectly giving the light sourness. If using raw sour mango make sure to reduce the quantity of mango pieces accordingly.

Stuffed Bhendiiii

I had got this recipe from mom like 10 months back but finally gave this a shot today. It turned out as good as mom makes. Its one of my fav preparation of bhendi and am sharing it here.


Ingredients
1/2 Kg Okra
1.5 Cup Grated Coconut
1/2 Spoon Saunf
1/4 Spoon Mustard
1/4 Spoon Garam Masala
3/4 Spoon Red Chili Powder
1 Cup Curd
A Pinch of Asafoetida
A Pinch of Sugar
Salt to taste
Oil

Method

• Wash okra and slice it vertically into halves.
• In a bowl mix curd, grated coconut, 1/4 spoon of saunf, red chilli powder and garam masala
• Heat oil in a pan and add in mustard seeds and remaining 1/4 spoon of saunf. Let them splutter
• Add in Asafoetida, sliced okra and earlier made coconut-curd-masala mixture in it. Stir well
• Cover the pan and add water on the lid. With few stirring in between let it cook till almost done.
• Add in sugar and salt and stir again. Cover the lid and cook till completely done.

Notes
This vegetable is best when the Okras are fresh and tender. The hard ones are difficult to cook and not as tasty either.

Banana Kofta

This recipe is mere inspiration from all the food network shows I watch.. When I was sitting watching TV i thought why not make something different with bananas that we had in fridge. So i think about koftas.. Then for gravy i was literally smelling and adding spices as per the aroma.. Felt wonderful to create a dish based on my intuition and mood.

Ingredients

3 Raw Bananas

1 Cup Cashews

1/4 Spoon Black Pepper Powder

1/4 Spoon Black Pepper

1/2 Spoon Saunf

1/4 Spoon Poppy Seeds

2 Garlic Cloves

1/2 Spoon Ginger

1/2 Spoon Sugar

1/4 Spoon Red Chilli Powder

1 Stick of Cinnamon

2 Cup Milk

1/4 Onion

Salt to taste

Oil

Method

• Grate bananas and add finely chopped garlic, grated ginger, black pepper powder, 1/4 spoon saunf and salt to it. Knead well.
• Make small round balls and fry them in oil over high flame till golden brown in colour. Keep aside.
• In a mixie, add cashews, black pepper, remaining 1/4 spoon saunf, cinnamon and grind it to fine powder
• Add in onion and grind again.
• Add a cup of milk and make smooth paste.
• Heat a spoonful of oil and add in grinded paste, 1 cup water and remaining 1 cup milk. Cook over medium heat till mixture starts thickening.
• Add in salt, sugar and koftas and let it simmer for another 2 minutes.

Notes

Bananas were such a good choice for koftas, they get crispy quickly and they dont soak oil unlike potato or eggplant.

I tried to give two distinct flavors to kofta and gravy. They both gel well as well as can be tasted distinctly.