Cranberry Pachadi (Cranberry Chutney)

Cranberries are in season during the holidays and are used to make cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving. All the stores carry cranberries and I over-zealously bought a big bag for myself. I wanted to make some cranberry sauce for my Thanksgiving series and even found a recipe that I liked. But cranberry sauce is usually served with turkey and I was not sure which vegetarian dish goes well with cranberry sauce. So decided against making it.
Now I had the whole bag staring at me from the fridge. So I froze half of the cranberries for later use (at least they won't stare at me until I open the freezer, which is not as much as the fridge -- clever, isn't it??) Anyway I used some to make this warm cranberry cider and the rest to make this tangy cranberry chutney.

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Sorakaya thokku pachadi (Bottlegourd peel Chutney)

I told you about the 3 ft sorakaya/ bottle gourd from my cousin's garden last week. The skin or the peel of that gourd was so tender I didn't feel like throwing it out. Also since I knew that it was grown without any harmful pesticides -- I wanted to make a chutney/ pachadi using it.

Peel of bottlegourd and ridgegourd (beerakaya) are often used to make chutneys. I usually throw the peel out because I'm not really sure what the vegetable went through before it came into my kitchen. But the peels are really healthy with good does of vitamins and also fiber. Finally with my cousin's organic bottle gourd I got to make this thokku pachadi (peel chutney). Had to ask my mom for the recipe, hence linking it to Valli's 'Cooking from Cookbook Challenge' event.

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Sorakaya Palu posina Kura (Bottlegourd curry with milk)

Continuing with my 'Cleaning my fridge' series that I started last week, I am cooking with the bottlegourd/ sorakaya today. My cousin brought her super long bottlegourd from her garden recently, it was longer than my almost 3ft daughter. I wish I took a picture of both of them together because I had to cut into 3 pieces to share with my sister and cousin. Anyway the 3rd of the bottle gourd I had left in the fridge went into this simple to make curry.
My mom used to make this milk based bottle gourd curry quite often, I'm not sure if I really liked it back then. Now I crave for it once in a while, but I rarely make it because of my dairy-hating husband doesn't like the milky taste.

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So I waited and made this dish when he was away on travel. It is super simple to make, slightly sweet and you can definitely make it more spicy and less sweet. It is great to eat with steamed rice or even roti.

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Green Beans Kootu

Good times don't last for too long. I say this because we are almost at the very end of our vacation in India and we will be back home before we even realize it. I haven't had a chance to finish my shopping and these last few days will be really busy with shopping and packing. 

Today's kootu is my mom's recipe. I'm not sure where she learnt it, but she has been making it for years now. Green beans can be substituted with cabbage, spring onions or other vegetables of choice. This kootu is thick and is the perfect combination of vegetables and lentils. It is great to serve with either rice or roti.

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Spicy Eggplant Curry (Vankaya Masala kura)

Today's dish is made by my neighbor aunty and since it is an eggplant curry made in a different way, I had to click to pictures and post the recipe for future reference. One of the perks of living in India is the loving neighbors who share their homemade dishes and recipes. 

When I signed up for this month's 'Cooking from Cookbook Challenge', I knew I might have to bother my mom to make some of her signature dishes so that I can share them with you all. But luckily I have more than one source here and thanks to my dear aunty I have a yummy eggplant curry in my repertoire. 

This curry is partially made in the pressure cooker and then finished off in the saute pan. This method helps in cooking the curry with minimum oil and also expedites the cooking process.

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Tomato Rasam using Pomi Chopped Tomatoes

Recently Pomi tomatoes contacted me to try their tomatoes and post recipes using their product for my readers. I like Pomi and buy them quite often. Pomi is an all natural brand of boxed tomatoes from Italy. I love the simplicity of the product as well as it's pure ingredients. Pomi's tomatoes are grown naturally in Italy and they abide by the European standards for farming. More importantly, Pomi's ingredients contain nothing more than pure tomatoes. No added salt, water, citric acid or preservatives. The only ingredient on the label is tomatoes! Pomi is 100% all natural and because it is packaged in a box, it is BPA-free.

All that said, pomi tomatoes taste so fresh and don't have the lingering after taste of metal as in other canned tomatoes. This makes them perfect to be used in recipes that usually call for fresh tomatoes.

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Instant Vada (using Urad dal flour)

Ugadhi (Telugu New Year) is right around the corner (March 31, 2014) and I wanted to post some quick and easy dishes to make for the festival. If you are like me who forget to soak urad dal but still dream of making idlis/ dosas or vadas, then this post is right for you!! These vadas use urad dal flour instead of whole urad and they can be made in about 2~3hours which includes a brief resting period.

Apart from the forgetfulness, another reason for making these vadas using urad flour is that most of the American blenders are not powerful enough to grind the lentils without adding copious amounts of water. Adding water is OK for most of the recipes, but for vadas the batter needs to be very thick and smooth with little or no water added during grinding. So that's where the flour comes in very handy.

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Thotakoora Wadiyala Kura (Amaranth Leaves Curry with Sundried Lentil wafers)

This is a super simple curry that I made couple of months ago after I harvested a bunch of amaranth leaves from my container garden. I asked my mom what to cook with the greens and she gave me this recipe that she saw on one of the Telugu cooking shows.

Once all the ingredients are prepped and ready to go, this dish gets done in literally minutes. Amaranth/ thotakura doesn't take long to cook, about 4~5 minutes max. Other greens like spinach, swiss chard or even kale can be used, cooking times will have to be adjusted accordingly.

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Bell Pepper/ Capsicum Avakaya

Blogging Marathon# 34: Week 1/ Day 2
Theme: Cooking with Capsicum/ Peppers
Dish: Green Pepper/ Capsicum Avakaya

Day 2 of BM# 34 and today I have a spicy hot Andhra pickle made ith green bell peppers. I'm just learning that every vegetable can be used to make avakaya. I asked my mom what to make for this week's 'Cooking with Bell Peppers/  Capsicum' theme and she said let's make 'Avakaya'.
I wasn't sure how it was going to taste, but went ahead with her proposal. It was sure spicy and tasted just like hmmmm.. avakaya should taste like but with milder bell pepper instead of sour mango. I guess you can use any color pepper, but we used green pepper here.

I think any veggie can be made into 'avakaya'. I saw someone on a cooking show make 'eggplant' avakaya which by the way my mom and I tried right away. It tasted great to me (you know my love for eggplants.. don't you?? if not check my collection of eggplant recipes), but just OK to everyone else. May be one day I'll make it again to post here.

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Wadiyala Pulusu (Sun dried Lentil Crispies Stew)

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter W
Theme: A-Z Vegetarian Dishes of Andhra Pradesh
Dish: Wadiyala/ Vadiyala Pulusu (Sun dried Lentil Crispies Stew)

In Telugu, there is only one letter with the sound 'va', so for the letters V & W I didn't know how to choose the dishes. After thinking of all the appropriate words starting with w and the sound 'va' in Telugu, I decided to change the word Vadiyalu into Wadiyalu and made this lipsmacking pulusu/ stew.

This recipe is again courtesy of my mom. Every household has the tradition of making (w)vadiyalu or sun dried lentil crisps every year. My mom usually keeps me stocked up with fresh ones every time we visit India.

Today's pulusu uses (v)wadiyalu almost like a vegetable. Usually pulusus/ stews are made with a assortment of veggies, but here vadiyalu give this dish the texture and taste. This dish tastes great with some steamed rice with a dollop of ghee and a curry -- such a filling and comforting meal.

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Upma-Pesarattu

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter U
Theme: A-Z Vegetarian Dishes of Andhra Pradesh
Dish: Upma-Pesarattu

The final 6 letters were quite challenging to find dishes for. I had to play around with the names a little bit to come up with dishes to match.

Letter U stands for Ullipaya (onion), Uppudu rawa (idli rawa). I was kind of stuck for a long time on what to make for letter U. Then I thought of Upma, but upma is not Andhra special, pair it with Pesarattu, it definitely is Andhra special. So I finally settled with Upma-Pesarattu (hopefully the purists will forgive me for reversing the order in the name).

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Thelaga Pindi Kura

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter T
Theme: A-Z Vegetarian Dishes of Andhra Pradesh
Dish: Thelaga Pindi Kura

Letter T stands for Thotakoora (amaranth leaves). I actually made a dish with thotakoora for today, but changed it a more traditional and lesser known dish at the last minute because my mom brought Thelaga Pindi from India.

To be honest, I've never heard about Thelaga pindi while in India. It is only recently that I started seeing it on Telugu cooking shows.After extracting oil from sesame seeds, the pulp that is leftover is ground to a powder and that powder is called Thelaga pindi. It has all the nutrients present in sesame seeds and is considered especially good for new-mothers. Infact as per my mom, today's dish is made on the 11th day after delivery for the new mom.

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Mamidikaya Pappu (Andhra Style Raw Mango Dal)

Bonus Dish for Week 3:

Theme: A-Z  Vegetarian Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: M for Mamikidikaya Pappu (Raw Mango Dal)

This pappu for my first pick for the Letter 'M', but it fell off the regular A-Z Vegetarian dishes from A.P. truck because of various reasons. One reason was that I made 'Nuvvulu-Mamidikaya pachadi' for N and I didn't want the same ingredient (mango) to be used in the dishes that I was posting on consecutive days. So for M I posted Menthikura pappu.

Mamidikaya pappu screams summer for me, even though we get good quality raw mangoes in the Indian store almost all year long. It is one of the dishes that is made on special occasions, festivals, when guests are visiting etc. If your mango is not sour enough, then feel free to add some tamarind paste.

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Menthi kura Pappu (Dal with fenugreek leaves)

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter M
Theme: A-Z Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: M for Menthi kura Pappu

Letter M stands for fruits & veggies like Mamidikaya/ Mamidi pandu (mango), Menthikura (fenugreek leaves) etc. For today's post, I made a simple dal with Menthikura. I planted methi in my container garden and used it to make this tasty dal. Methi is probably the easiest to grow, sow some methi (fenugreek seeds) and within a week you have tiny methi leaves growing.

Pappu or dal is the main source of protein in our diet and is made almost everyday. This is a very basic recipe and any greens can be used instead of methi.

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Lauju/ Laskora (Kobbari Lauju/ Coconut Burfi)

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter L
Theme: A-Z Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: Lauju/ Laskora (Kobbari Lauju/ Coconut Burfi)

Letter L was a little tough for me. I couldn't think of any fruits or veggies that start with the letter L. But the word Laddoo got stuck in my head. I was trying to find a laddoo that was made in A.P, but the one I knew that is from Andhra, Thokkudu Laddoo, I have already blogged about it. 

Finally I remembered Lauju/ Laskora that my mom used to make. This is basically coconut burfi, just with a different name. Whenever I buy coconuts, they end up being too tough, but this time for a change I got a coconut that was just right. So I decided to make this traditional sweet with it.

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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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Dosakaya Pachadi (Cuke Lemon Chutney)

Blogging Marathon# 32: Letter D
Theme: A-Z Vegetarian Dishes from Andhra Pradesh
Dish: D for Dosakaya Pachadi 

Letter D stands for veggies like Dondakaya (ivy gourd), Dosakaya (cuke lemon). D also stands for dishes like Dappalam which is a spicy, tangy stew made with toor dal and an assortment of veggies. Daddojam, spiced curd rice or Dalcha, a Hyderabadi lentil dish and so on.

I decided to make a traditional chutney recipe using dosakaya (cuke lemon). This is a very quick and simple chutney to make. Dosakaya is not cooked, it is finely chopped and mixed into ground tempering. A spicy, tangy and very tasty pachadi.

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Palli Paakam (Palli Chikki/ Peanut Fudge)

Blogging Marathon# 27: Week 2/ Day 7
Theme: Traditional Dishes
Dish: Palli Paakam/ Palli Chikki/ Peanut Fudge

I have another traditional sweet that my mom made during her recent visit. Chikki is one of those dishes I stay away because of my lack of experience with sugar/ jaggery syrup consistency. I always end up with the wrong consistency and thereby messing up the dish.

My mom also makes cashew chikki in similar way. Hopefully I will learn to make these two soon because my husband likes these chikkis a lot.

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Boondi Laddoo

Wish you all a very Happy Ugadhi.

Andhariki Vijaya naama samvathsara Subhakankshalu

Blogging Marathon# 27: Week 2/ Day 2

Theme: Traditional Dishes

Dish: Boondi Laddoo

This year's Ugadhi day has been a little confusing. Everyone in India is celebrating on April 11th, whereas the North American telugu calendars say it is the 10th. So 10th it is for us NRIs in America and hence the wishes a day early.
For the second day of traditional dishes I chose to post the boondi laddoos that my mom made. I think  my mom makes the best home made boondi laddoos that I've ever tasted. I remember her sitting on a small stool with the stove on the floor and making these laddoos almost like Sridevi in English Vinglish. Like I said before I wish I had learnt making these earlier because most of the traditional dishes need practice to perfect the technique. Well, I guess it's never too late to start trying. Hopefully I can learn to make at least some of these goodies soon.

You can easily tell the difference between a well made boondi laddoos and a so-so laddoo. Some of the store-bought ones, you can see the sugar crusted all over the top and they are too dry to eat, a well made one very moist and there is no extra crunchiness from the sugar.

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Pappu Chekkalu/ Thattai

Blogging Marathon# 27: Week 2/ Day 1
Theme: Traditional dishes
Dish: Pappu Chekkalu/ Thattai

Today we begin the second week our month long blogging marathon. Theme for the next 7 days is going to be traditional dishes. I rarely make traditional dishes myself because I'm not comfortable making them. My mom makes excellent traditional dishes and it's sad that I have never watched her making them so I can learn to make them myself. 

My mom made us quite a few traditional dishes during her recent visit and lucky for me I clicked pictures of some of them, hoping to post them. They have been sitting in the drafts till now and what better time than now to post my mom's traditional dishes.

For the first day, I have these crispy and crunchy deep fried savory snack made with all purpose flour (maida), rice flour and soaked chana dal. These stay fresh in an airtight container for up to 10 days.

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