Panaeng Curry with Tofu & Peppers

Panaeng Curry is one of my favorite Thai curries because it's creamy, mild and not as spicy as other Thai curries. Panaeng curry paste has peanuts and the usual Thai ingredients like lemon grass, galangal, garlic, coriander seeds etc. 

This curry usually is drier than most Thai curries. Its dryness is acieved by reduction, which, at the end, leaves the curry with an intense taste. 

Grilled Veggie & Cheese Stuffed Rolls

After that decadent stuffed breakfast and indulgent stuffed lunch, I have a light & healthy stuffed dish for dinner. Today's recipe is from King Arthur Flour's Baking Sheet newsletter. In this dish, roasted vegetables and cheese are rolled in a yeasty bread dough and baked to make light & flaky stuffed rolls that are perfect for a meal with some salad on the side or even as a quick pick-me up breakfast. 

The original recipe used roasted vegetables, but I used left over grilled vegetables. Also the original recipe  called for garlic herb cheese (like Boursin) or goat cheese, but I used a combination of cream cheese and grated mozzarella. 

Paneer Stuffed Peppers

As I was thinking of what to stuff for the "Stuffed dishes" theme for BM, I decided I didn't want to make stuffed peppers since that was something I had made earlier and wanted to try something new. But when time came to cook, all I had in the fridge were some peppers and that prompted me to look for new variations of stuffed peppers. I finally ended up on this yummy looking paneer stuffed peppers recipe by Anjum Anand. I've never stuffed any veggie with paneer before and wanted to give this a try. The dish turned out amazing.

Stuffed French Toast

Time seems to fly. I can't believe we are in the middle of July already, before we turn around it will be Christmas and New Year again **sigh** I wish time could stay STILL for a little while. Keeping still is something I keep telling my 4 year old who bounces around the whole house to do. But just like time he keeps running away.

Speaking of running time, today starts the 3rd week of Blogging marathon and the theme I chose for the week is "Stuffed Foods". I tried 3 new stuffed dishes for this week that I've never made before and I actually surprised myself on how good they turned out (if I can say so myself).

ICC June - Pati Shapta

For this month's Indian Cooking Challenge (ICC), Valli chose a Bengali dessert usually made during the Sankranthi season. I have missed quite a few ICC challenges but when I saw this scrumptious dessert, I knew I had to make them.

I thought Pati Shapta were Indian version of French crepes that are filled with delicious coconut-khoya filling and drizzled with sweet syrup. They were easier to make than the French crepes and the filling was to die for. We thoroughly enjoyed these and the reheated leftovers taste just as good.

Black-eyed Peas Pulao (Pilaf)

For day 3 of BM, I have yet another protein packed rice dish and this time the protein happens to be black eyed peas (check out my Egg biryani and Pudina Paneer Pulao recipes). 

All of the 3 rice dishes I posted this week involve 3 different cooking methods. For the biryani, rice is cooked ¾th of the way and then finished cooking “dum style” with the masala. For the pulao, I cooked the rice separately and then mixed it with the spiced vegetable mixture. For today’s pulao, I cooked the rice with the masala to make it a one-pot dish. 

Paneer Pudina Pulao (Paneer-Mint Pilaf)

I hope you noticed the alliteration in the post title, the actual title for this post should have been Paneer-Pudina-Potato-Peas-Pulao. That seemed too long, so I took just the 2 main ingredients for the title.

I wanted to put my bounty of mint plant to a good use, so I used a lot of mint (as you can tell from the pictures), but the quantity can be easily reduced if you don’t like the pronounced mint flavor. For this dish I cooked the rice separately and added it to the mint masala mix (another alliteration). Other vegetables or beans like carrots, green beans, cauliflower or chickpeas etc. can also be added. 

Egg Biryani

My theme for week 2 of BM# 18 is Biryani/ Pulao. I probably make some kind of a rice dish at least once or twice a week. Fried rice or pulaos are great for a quick week night meal and are excellent when there are odds and ends of veggies lurking in the fridge. 

As I mentioned earlier, I consider myself a lazy cook and try to take short cuts when cooking which is a big reason why I don’t venture into making full-fledged biryanis (steps include marinating the veggies, par-cooking the rice, layering etc. etc..). But when I saw this recipe for Egg biryani in Anjum Anand’s New Indian cookbook, I had to try it right away. It does involve par-cooking the rice and making the masala separately and layering everything. I have to say I enjoyed making this dish and may be this is the beginning of my culinary adventures in biryani making. 

Dondakaya Kura (Spicy Ivy Gourd Curry)

There are some vegetables that I really love, but rarely buy from Indian grocery like snake gourd (potlakaya), drum sticks, okra (bendakaya) and ivy gourd (dondakaya) to name a few. Few of them I avoid because they are too expensive and some of them require way too much time to chop. Ivy gourd falls into the second category and I generally don't buy it unless there I know I will have to chop and make the dish.

So this week, when I took a much needed day off from work, I bought fresh dondakaya from Indian grocery and took my sweet time to thinly slice them and make this curry. My husband loved it, so I'm glad that my time was well spent.

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. 

Cabbage Poriyal

I'm back to blogging for this month's edition of Blogging Marathon# 18 (BM#18). This month I'll be  joining my marathon buddies for 3 straight weeks and hopefully if time permits, I want to make it to the 4th week as well. My theme for week 1 is "Dry Vegetable Sautes/ Sides".

For the first day, I made this simple Cabbage Poriyal. Recipe is from Chandra Padmanabhan's "Dakshin" cookbook. I made the spicy variation given in the cookbook and we loved the addition of ground onion and green chilies paste that gives the curry a little kick.