Punjabi Dal Tadka

I made this Punjabi Dal tadka along with this Aloo curry for a mini Punjabi meal. Recipe for the dal is from a Telugu cooking show and I have made it quite a few times already.

Like any dal, this is very easy to make and is very hearty and comforting dish. It is a simple dish but tastes amazing and the lovely thing about this dish is it can whipped up for a simple dal-chawal menu on a weeknight or can be served with naans and jeera rice for a party.

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Amiri Khaman (Split Chickpea Squares)

Blogging Marathon# 47: Week 1/ Day 3

Theme: North Indian Starters

Dish: Amiri Khaman

I think my geography is a little dicey but I have a pretty good idea of Indian geography. I know where each state of India is located and I promise that I know this even before I did A-Z Indian states marathon. I'm surprised that most of the people from the North are so confused about the 4 south Indian states. They think everyone from the south is from Chennai and no the hindi movie 'Chennai Express' does not help even a little bit.
So anyway I know where today's starter is coming from :-) This dish is from the western state of Gujarat. I saw this recipe in 'Vegetarian Cooking of India' cookbook by Mridula Baljekar. These protein packed squares are simple, delicious and nutritious. They are excellent to serve as snack/ appetizer along with some ketchup and/ or sweet tamarind chutney.

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Andhra style Greens & Chickpea Curry (Chukkakura & Gongura Senagala Kura)

It is always amazing to see how fast kids bond with their grandparents even if they never met them before. My in-laws were visiting us for couple of weeks and they were seeing my little one for the first time. But it took her just a few hours to get to know them and in no time she was playing with them as if she's known them forever.

So my kids had a great time playing and having fun with the grandparents and we had great time enjoying the yummy dishes my MIL cooked. She made some new and interesting dishes and I made sure I clicked them and wrote the recipes down, so I don't forget. 

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Orissa -- Mitha Khechudi & Mitha Dali

Blogging Marathon# 39 - Indian States: Day 21
State: Orissa
Dish: Mitha Khechudi & Mitha Dali (Sweet Khichdi with Sweet Dal)

Today we are going to Odisha, formerly known as Orissa, located in the east coast of India. Orissa shares a border with Andhra Pradesh, but I never had a chance to visit it. My dad went there for work years ago and brought back a souvenir from Konark Sun Temple. I've seen his pictures at Puri Jagannath temple and Bhubaneshwar. That's the most I knew about Orissa.
Cuisine: Odisha has culinary tradition spanning centuries. I was really surprised to read that rasgulla actually originated from Odisha, I always thought it was from Bengal. Also Kheer or rice pudding, that is relished all over India, also originated in Puri 2000 years ago.
Oriya cuisine is rich and varied and relies heavily on local ingredients. The flavors are usually subtle and lightly spiced, unlike the fiery curries typically associated with Indian cuisine. Only 6% of the population of Odisha is vegetarian. Oriyas are very fond of sweets and no Oriya meal is complete without the dessert course at the end.
Specialties: Dali, Dalma, Khechedi, Mittha Dali, Pakhala, Chena Poda, Dahi Bara, Kalakand etc.

Today's Dish(es): After reading about the Oriya cuisine, I initially planned on making a dessert. But after making quite a few desserts for the marathon, I decided against it. I wanted to make something simple, yet traditional and authentic to Orissa. So after a lot of searching, I found this Oriya blog, Turmeric Kitchen, by Jagruthi. She has a ton of traditional dishes and I picked two that were simple and easy to make.

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Jharkhand -- Dhuska & Ghugni

Blogging Marathon# 39 - Indian States: Day 12
State: Jharkhand
Dish: Dhuska & Ghugni

Jharkand is a state located in eastern India. It was carved out of the southern part of Bihar in the year 2000. The name Jharkhand means The land of forests, Jharkand accounts for 40% of the mineral resources of India.

Cuisine: Jharkhand's cuisine is very similar to Bihari cuisine. Jharkhandis use different types of flowers as vegetables like the flowers of drumstick etc., Use of Saag, i.e., leaves of different shrubs and other small plants, is perhaps another peculiarity of Jharkhani food.
Staple Food: Urad dal, Rice, Vegetables.
Specialties: Litti Chokha, Dhuska, Dudhauri, Charpa

Today's Dish(es): I made a traditional dish from Jharkhand and Bihar. Dhuska is made with unfermented rice & lentil batter and is usually deep fried. I followed Vaishali's tip and cooked them like dosas instead. I had some batter leftover after making dhuskas which I left to ferment for about 10~12 hours and then made dosas with the batter. Dosas turned out crisp and perfect. Dhuska is served with ghugni traditionally and that's what I made.

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Dhokar Dalna for Indian Cooking Challenge

For this month's Indian Cooking Challenge Valli chose a delicious Bengali savory dish. I have tried quite a few Bengali dishes already, but luckily I didn't make this dish earlier. This is a spicy curry with lentil cakes in it. 

This dish is a little similar to the besan chikki that my MIL makes. But the difference is that my MIL uses chickpea flour or besan instead of ground chana dal that is used in this Bengali dish. Both the dishes have cooked lentil cakes cooked in spicy gravy.

I followed Sandeepa's recipe to the T. From what I have read, the gravy is quite customizable and there are quite a few variations on the web. I stuck to Sandeepa's recipe that had no-onion and no-garlic, it still tasted amazing.

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Qabooli Biryani (Hyderabadi Chana dal Biryani)

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter Q
Theme: A-Z Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: Q for Qabooli Biryani (Hyderabadi Chana dal Biryani)

Letter Q stands for Qubani (apricots). Qubani ka Meetha is a very famous Hyderabadi dessert that is made with dried apricots that are soaked and then cooked with sugar and drizzled with cream. I wanted to make it, but couldn't find good quality apricots. So I made Qabooli instead.

Qabooli is biryani made with spicy chana dal (split pea lentil) and layered with basmati rice. I used black chana/ chickpeas instead and it turned out quite tasty. This is a filling and delicious dish that is great to make when you have company.

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Kobbari Senagapappu Kura with Beans (Coconut Curry with Split Pea & Green Beans)

Bonus Dish for Week 2:
Theme: A-Z Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: K for Kobbari Kura

This was the dish that I made for K, but as it turns out I had to make Lauju (coconut burfi) for letter L and since I didn't want two dishes back to back with the same ingredient K had to be changed to Kakarakaya Podi kura. So this simple, quick and easy curry recipe is my bonus recipe for this week. 

Any vegetable can be used to make this dish; carrot, cluster beans, cabbage etc being the best suited. There are no masalas and the flavor of the ingredients is what you taste. One of my favorite ways to cook veggies, no fuss recipe.

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Iguru/ Vankaya-Senagapappu Iguru (Eggplant-Chana Dal Curry)

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter I
Theme: A-Z Vegetarian Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: I for Iguru/ Vankaya-Senagapappu Iguru (Eggplant-Chana Dal Curry)

Finding dishes that start with vowels is hard. Letter 'I' was even harder. All I could think of was Idli, but no matter how hard I thought I couldn't think of an Andhra spin to good old idlis. After a lot of thinking (out loud), the remembered the word Iguru. One of our dear friends back home used to call some of the curries 'igurus'. I didn't know what it actually meant, so I asked my mom to research.
She came back and said that the curries that are made by evaporating the liquid (igaradam) are generally called 'igurus'. I took it as the curries that are made slightly wet, but not necessarily with a gravy, fall into this category.

Luckily after that I watched an episode on a Telugu cooking show where the chef made this Iguru which I promptly noted down and made it for today. This is a spicy and flavorful dish that is perfect when served with steamed rice and rasam.

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Poli Boorelu

Bonus Dish for Week 1: B for Boorelu
Theme: A-Z Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: Poli Boorelu

Here's Wishing everyone a Very Happy Ganesh Chathurthi!!

While I was planning for the A-Z series, I came across a ton of dishes from Andhra Pradesh that I've never tried before and in my excitement to cook for the event, I cooked more than I should. Since we are only posting 1 dish per alphabet, I had to edit myself and only post the ones I felt really represented AP. So to keep the momentum going, I decided to post the ones that didn't get picked up the regular Blogging Marathon on Sundays as Bonus recipes.

Today's bonus recipe is an easy to make boorelu. I still remember the first time I made boorelu years ago for Varalakshmi vratam. I invited few friends for dinner that day and my filling for boorelu was so liquidy that it completely dissolved in the cover batter. So when I fried them, they ended up looking like pakodi. We all ate them anyway. 

But this recipe is almost fool-proof, since chana dal is first soaked, ground and then steamed (like when we make patoli/ paruppu usili), so there is no chance of the filling getting liquidy.
For the outer cover, usually urad dal (minapappu) and rice are soaked and then ground to a smooth paste. Instead I used store-bought urad dal flour and rice flour. This makes life so much easier making the whole process quicker and leaving only 1 bowl to clean.

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Masala Vada/ Paruppu Vadai

Blogging Marathon# 30: Week 4/ Day 1
Theme: Tea Kadai Menu
Dish: Masala Vada/ Paruppu Vadai

We are starting the last week of Blogging Marathon for this month and my theme for this week is 'Tea Kadai Menu'. Valli gave us a set of typical dishes that feature in the roadside Tea shops in Tamil Nadu. For the first day I made 'Masala Vadai/ Vada'.

I love masala vada, but don't make it often at home because of the deep frying that is involved. BM gave me a chance to try my favorite snack and we thoroughly enjoyed these deep fried goodies.

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Patli Dal (Yellow Split Peas & Kale in a Yogurt-Peanut Sauce)

Blogging Marathon# 30: Week 1/ Day 1
Theme: Cooking with Curd/ Yogurt
Dish: Patli Dal

I seem to be saying the same thing again and again, but I still can't believe that it's July already and today we begin 30th edition of Blogging Marathon. My theme for this week is 'Cooking with Curd/ Yogurt'. I wanted to do this theme because I rarely use curd/ yogurt in cooking because of my husband's aversion towards it. He's been travelling which gave me yet another reason to take this theme :-)

Since I'm the only one eating yogurt in the house, I used to buy yogurt from the store. But when my mom visited us last year, she couldn't get over the stickiness of the store bought yogurt. I never realized that until she mentioned it, I guess after all these years I forgot how yogurt felt or tasted back home. Anyway, long story short -- we got hold of some good yogurt culture and started making our own yogurt at home. Even after my mom left, I kept making it and recently I started feeding my daughter home made yogurt, hoping to have someone to share my yogurt based dishes in the future.

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Chana Dal Payasam (Bengal Gram Dal Kheer)

Blogging Marathon# 29: Week 2/ Day 3
Theme: Pick 2 Ingredients & Cook from a Book
Ingredients/ Cookbook: Chana Dal & Jaggery/ Dakshin 
Dish: Chana Dal-Coconut Payasam

Dakshin -- Vegetarian Cuisine from South India is one of my go-to cookbook when I'm looking for a South Indian dish. This book has many easy to make recipes mostly from Tamil Nadu and few from the other Southern states. I was hoping to find a kuzhambu or sambar recipe with the ingredients from Valli's list.

But to my surprise, I stumbled upon this Payasam (Kheer) recipe with chana dal and jaggery. It sounded different and delicious. I had all the ingredients on hand and I made it right away. I wasn't disappointed at all, this is one of the tastiest payasams I've ever made. Its creamy, not too sweet and tastes great hot, cold or at room temperature (I know because I ate it at all temperatures :-)

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Dal Pakwan

Blogging Marathon# 28: Week 3/ Day 1
Theme: Sindhi Dishes
Dish: Dal Pakwan

My theme for this week's BM is "Sindhi dishes" and I'm going to start it off with a very indulgent Sindhi dish, 'Dal Pakwan'. Traditionally this is served for breakfast, I have to say it is very a filling breakfast that one might skip lunch after having this. 

It has 2 main components, dal & pakwan and served with green chutney, tamarind chutney, sliced onions and fried green chilies. Chana dal is used to make the delicious dal. Pakwans are deep fried unpuffed puris that are dunked in the dal and relished along with all the accouterments. The taste was just awesome, it was like explosion of flavors and textures in the mouth.

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Bobbatlu (Puran Poli)

Blogging Marathon# 27: Week 2/ Day 6
Theme: Traditional dishes
Dish: Bobbatlu (Puran Poli)

I made bobbatlu on Ugadhi day. This is my first attempt at making these traditional sweet stuffed breads and they turned out pretty good - soft and delicious. I believe in mass production, as in making burfis or halwas, I'm not a big fan of hand crafting individual pieces. But I took the leap and decided to make bobbatlu and I'm really glad that I did. It was kind of a confidence booster because they came out much better than I had imagined.

Traditionally bobbatlu are made with all purpose flour (maida), but since I always like to sneak in some fiber and a little nutrition in the form of wholewheat flour, I added ½ cup of atta (wholewheat flour) and 1 cup of AP flour. May be next time I will add more atta to make it even more nutritious.

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Carrot Patoli (Carrot Paruppu Usili)

Today's Carrot dish for BM# 23 is a healthy curry that incorporates veggie and lentils, one of my favorite combination. Being a vegetarian, protein intake is something that I'm watchful about and when a dish incorporates a healthy veggie and a protein, I'm super happy.

Paruppu usili or Patoli (in telugu) is a dry-ish curry that can be made with different vegetable like green beans, cabbage, cluster beans etc. When I saw PJ post her carrot paruppu usili, it looked awesome and I decided to try it today. My mom made this dish and here's how she made it:

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Bengali Lentil Fritters Curry (Bora'r Jhol)

I love dishes that include lentils and one of my favorite ways of enjoying them is in fritter form. So when I saw this recipe for lentil fritter curry or Bora'r Jhol on Sandeepa's blog, I wanted to make it for BM# 22.

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Cabbage-Chana dal Curry

For day 3 of BM# 22, Cooking with Chickpeas, I have a dish that uses Chana dal, Senagapappu (in telugu).  My mom made this curry with cabbage, but this can be made with green beans, cluster beans or even spinach. A very healthy and delicious side dish for rice or roti.

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Gongura Pappu (Dal with Sorrel Leaves)

VeganMofo Day 14: Fall is in the air in our neck of woods, chilly days and color changing leaves. I planted some sorrel in my container garden this year, with the changing weather I harvested the last of the leaves before the frost got them.

 

 

Gongura or sorrel is a leafy green vegetable that is tangy and delicious. Gongura pachadi is one of the most famous dishes that is a must in any Andhra kitchen. Another delicious creation with this tangy greens is this dal; its spicy, tangy and yummy. Served with rice and a dry saute on the side, this makes for a healthy and filling meal for any time of the day.

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Beans Patoli (Beans Paruppu Usili)

For Day 2 of BM# 18, I have this protein rich veggie dish that is one of my favorites. Patoli or paruppu usili is a delicious dish with the goodness of lentils and the veggie. I love the use of lentils in almost any dish and this dish with the ground lentils gives it an earthy, mild taste is very addictive.

Growing up my mom used to make patoli by sauteing leftover kandi pachadi with onions and it tasted divine with steamed white rice and a good dollop of ghee. 

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