Austrian Vegetable Strudel

For this month's International Food Challenge, our host Briju Parthasarathy is taking us on a culinary tour of Austria. She gave us 4 Lower Austrian dishes to choose from and I picked the Austrian Vegetable Strudel.

Some wiki gyan about Strudel: Strudel is a type layered pastry with a -- most often -- sweet filling. Strudel is most often associated with Austrian cuisine but is also a traditional pastry in the whole area of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire.

The savory strudel is filled with crisp tender vegetables and cheese. It almost sounded like the veggie pastry we used to get back home at the bakeries. Original recipe had rutabaga, parsnip etc, but I used vegetables I had on hand; sweet potato, carrots, green beans and red pepper. Also to add some protein, I added some soy granules as well.

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Chili Parotta/ Kothu Parotta

Blogging Marathon# 36: Week 4/ Day 3
Theme: Online Bookmarked Recipes
Dish: Chili Parotta

The first time I tasted Chili Parotta was about 4~5 years ago in Saravana bhavan in Edison, NJ. Both my husband and I didn't really like it. It was way too greasy and heavy on the stomach. So that ended my chili parotta eating experience on a bad note.
Recently I saw this recipe on Sandhya's blog and it looked so much tastier than what I remember chilli parotta to be. I bookmarked it right away.

My husband bought a packet of frozen 'Kawan Paratha' instead of regular wholewheat rotis that I usually buy. So I knew I had to make the chilli parotta with them and was waiting for an occasion to make it. Which came the other day when we needed a quick dinner after whole day of shopping. If you time, then you can also make your own Kerala Parottas.

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Persimmon and Nuts Salad

Blogging Marathon# 36: Week 4/ Day 2
Theme: Online Bookmarked Recipes
Dish: Persimmon Salad

This year's winter has been brutal till now. Snow is something that is expected this time of the year, but the freezing temperatures have been really the killer. Arctic blast & polar vortex are the terms that are widely being used not just by the meteorologists but by everyone dealing with this harsh weather. Even with all that going on, life still moves on.
Coming back to today's recipe, this is probably the simplest dish ever. I had some persimmons in the fridge and after enjoying some as is, I wanted to do something else with it. I saw the recipe for persimmon salad in Vegetarian times magazine, but I didn't have the ingredients on hand. But the idea of making the salad stuck with me and google search led me to this recipe on LA times.

There is not much of a recipe for this dish, but the salad was so colorful that I couldn't stop clicking. So here are some shots of the dish.

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Eggplant Coconut Masala Curry

Our woes with the freezing weather continues. Today has been especially bad, temperatures were between 7~10°F (-12°C~-14°C) with the wind chills making it feel much much colder. My car decided to clunk out on me this morning when I was just about to take my son to school. Had to run back in and call a taxi, so I could get him to school on time. Thankfully all the car needed was a jump start and got it fixed in time to bring my son home from school.
After all that, as I was thinking of what to make for lunch, I saw some eggplants in the fridge and thought of treating myself with a new recipe that I just saw on a Telugu cooking show. Even though this was not what I was planning, I guess I turn to my favorite veggie when I'm stressed :-)

I'm glad that I tried this curry though. It uses roasted dry coconut paste as the masala. I've used coconut in bagara baingan along with sesame seeds and poppy seeds, but never with just dry coconut. Also I used coconut oil to cook the curry, this elevated the coconut flavor, but feel free to use any other neutral flavored oil. Either way this is a simple curry that is packed with flavor and goes well with both rice and rotis.

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