Thai Pineapple Fried Rice (Khao Pad Sapparot)

Blogging Marathon#64: Week 4/ Day 2

Theme: Mega BM Bookmarked Recipes 

Dish: Pineapple Fried Rice from Mireille 

For Day 2 of bookmarked dishes I have a sweet, sour and spicy Thai Pineapple fried rice from Mir's blog. I have seen pineapple fried rice recipes on any food blogs but I wasn't sure how the sweetness of the pineapple would taste in a savory rice dish. So never tried to make it at home before.

But when I saw Mir's dish, I wanted to give it a try. I had all the ingredients on hand and my husband was travelling so I took a chance and made it for myself. I have to say I really liked this dish. The sweetness from the pineapple is actually complemented by the spicy curry powder and the saltiness of the soy sauce.

Read more »

Tropical Smoothie with Hemp Seeds

Weather is slowly taking a beautiful turn in our neck of woods. I was looking through my last year photos and noticed that the trees were already in full bloom by this time, now we only have tiny buds on trees. But at least it is getting warm and I have no complaints.
I have a summery smoothie today with pineapple, mango and banana. I added some coconut milk to the smoothie and it reminded me of pina colada a little bit.

But the secret ingredient in the smoothie is "Hemp Seeds'. I read about these seeds in Vegetarian times magazine a while back and when I saw them in Trader Joes, I couldn't stop myself from buying them. I started adding them to my morning cereal, they don't have any distinct taste -- so blend well in just about anything.

Read more »

Pineapple Sweet Pulao

This post has been in my drafts for exactly 9 months. It's waiting to see the light of day (or the light of your monitor) for way too long. It didn't fit any of the BM themes till now. I saw the recipe being made on one of the Telugu cooking show.

As the name suggests this is a sweet pulao made with pineapple chunks and basmati rice. Addition of whole garam masala is the interesting part of the dish. All in all it is a simple dish packed with flavors. Give it a try if you are looking for a different dish. 

Read more »

Mango Chutney

Blogging Marathon# 33: Week 2/ Day 1
Theme: Favorite Celebrity Chef Recipes
Dish: Mango Chutney
We are starting 2nd week of blogging marathon# 33 today and my theme for this week is 'Favorite Celebrity Chef Recipes'. For the first day, I have Alton Brown's Mango chutney that I actually made couple of months ago in the middle of summer. Saved it in the drafts and totally forgot about it.
Alton Brown is one of my favorite chef / cook on Food Network. I love to watch Good Eats show where he explains the science of cooking in a way that is easily understandable to everyone. He's very knowledgeable and very funny.
My husband and I love mangoes (husband LOVES them way more than me) and we make sure to buy ripe mangoes when in season. We bought a pack of 6 from Costco and the first one we tasted was so sour that both was us were very disappointed. Since it was almost impossible to eat them raw I wanted to turn them into a yummy chutney. I had bookmarked this recipe from Alton Brown quite sometime back and after a quick trip to the grocery store made this spicy-sweet mango chutney.

I bought mango chutney for this recipe and a small jar costs a fortune. I've used that chutney in salads, sandwiches, also great with naans and even quesadillas. So instead of buying a small jar, I now have 2 jars full of my home made mango chutney.

Read more »

Eggless Pineapple Cool Cake

Blogging Marathon# 27: Week 1/ Day 8
Theme: Occasions/  Birthday
Dish: Pineapple Cool Cake

For the last day under "occasions" theme, I made this simple Pineapple cool cake. Cool cakes are basically moist cakes that are chilled and are very common in India. I made this cake for my daughter's 7th month birthday. Time seems to fly by and before I know it will be time to plan her 1 year birthday. But thankfully my blogging buddies have posted everything one needs to have a party. So don't forget to check them out here for tons of party ideas and delicious recipes.

Cool cake is something I wanted to bake for quite some time now and finally got to try it now. I used the eggless pineapple cream cake recipe from Divine taste.

Read more »

A Juice & A Review

Winter is definitely here in our neck of woods. Temperatures have plummeted defying gravity and it has been extremely cold the last few days. This seems to be the beginning of a looong, cold winter this year. Now why am I posting about a juice recipe in this weather instead of something warm and comforting, you ask!! This post has been in the drafts for a long time and it took me all this time to realize that taking a decent picture of freshly made juice (at least for me) is D-I-F-F-I-C-U-L-T., that too if it has apple in it.

CSN Stores have contacted me to do a product review for them long time back. I ordered this lovely Breville Juicer from their site. After opening the box we received we realized that the main plastic component of the juicer was completely shattered during transit. I called CSN and the friendly Customer service agent offered to send a complete new juicer instead. I was very happy and impressed with the professional manner in which they resolved the issue. We received the replace juicer in couple of weeks and this was prefect condition.

We have been using the juicer almost every day, but as I mentioned earlier none of them seemed to be picture perfect. But I didn't want to postpone my review any longer, so here I am with this yummy purple-pink juice that tasted much better than it looks.

The Juice:

My husband is the official user of the juicer and he tries different combinations everyday. His favorite combo to date is Grapes, Apple and Strawberries. Here's how he made this purple-pink juice:

Ingredients:

Pineapple chunks - 3 -4 cups

Carrots - 2 medium, chopped

Red Grapes - 2 cups

Method:

• Drop all the fruits and veggies in the juicer and enjoy the juice.

The Review:

My 3 year old loves these freshly made juices and I am happy to give him something that is fresh and includes some of the fiber, with no preservative and no added sugar. He is a picky eater and does not like to eat fruits, which is another reason why I let him have an extra glass of the juice.

Breville Compact BJE200XL as the name suggests is very compact and can be conveniently stored on the counter or in the cupboard. It has a central 3" feed tube that lets you add whole fruits without chopping them and the pulp container holds up to 1.5 quarts of waste before it needs to be cleaned. There are quite a few parts that need to be cleaned after using, but if that is done right after juicing, it does not take too long as the fruits don't have a chance to harden and can be cleaned easily.

I would like to Thank CSN Stores for giving me the opportunity to try this amazing Juicer. I apologize for the delay in posting my review.

Have a great weekend everybody.

Vegan Baking-Morning Glory Cupcakes

One of my co-workers is on a 3 month vegan diet. She has a challenge with her sister that she was going to eat only vegan for 3 months. Personally, I don’t think I can ever become a vegan, I love my milk and cheese too much (and don’t like soy milk that much).

Well my co-worker is almost at the end of her successful three months, so I thought I’d bake her some vegan cupcakes. Personally, I could never think of baking without eggs, so these cupcakes were kind of a challenge to me too. But I have to say, they are very delicious and you wouldn’t know until someone told you that they were vegan. This recipe is from Vegetarian Times magazine.

You can make this cake in a 9”x5” loaf pan, or 3 6”x3” mini loaves or 12-cup muffin tin.


Ingredients:
All Purpose Flour – 2 cups (you can substitute whole wheat pastry flour)
Baking Soda – 2 tbsp
Baking powder – 2 tsp
Light Brown Sugar – 2/3 cup
Ground Cinnamon – 2 tbsp
Ground Ginger – 2 tbsp
Salt – ¼ tsp
Crushed Pineapple in its own juice– 8 oz., can, drained and liquid reserved
Finely grated Carrots – 1 cup (2-3 medium carrots)
Carrot juice – ½ cup (I subbed V8 Vfusion Orange juice)
Canola Oil – 1/3 cup
Vanilla essence – 1 tsp
Raisins – ½ cup
Walnuts (or any nuts) – ½ cup, optional

Method:

• Pre heat oven to 350°F. Spray the baking pans you are baking in with cooking spray.
• Whisk flour ground cinnamon, ginger, baking soda, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl.
  
• In a separate bowl, mix together carrot juice, ¼ cup reserved pineapple juice, oil, sugar and vanilla extract.
  
• Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix well to incorporate. Scoop into prepared baking pan(s).
  
• Bake large loaf 50 to 60 minutes, mini loaves 35 to 45 minutes, or muffins 18 to 22 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
  
• Cool 5 minutes in pan(s). Unmold and cool.
  

This cake is sweet, but not overly so, very much like a breakfast muffin. I took them to work and everyone really liked them.