Quinoa Salad with Pistachio and Dates

Blogging Marathon# 58: Week 3/ Day 3

Theme: Salads

Dish: Quinoa Salad with Pistachio and Dates

I love grain based salads. If planned correctly they make for a wholesome meal and you don't have to worry about side dishes or protein to go along with it. This Quinoa salad is one such recipe.

This recipe is also from 'Vegan Eats World' cookbook like yesterday's Avocado Mango Salad. This quinoa salad has all my favorite ingredients, dates, pistachios, baby spinach and of course quinoa. I love dates - they are so chewy, caramely and oh-so delicious. I always keep a bag of them in my pantry for snacking or for making desserts (like this burfi or these nut balls or this decadent cake) or salads like this one.

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Rose Shrikhand (Gulab Shrikand)

It's officially summer like in our neck of woods. My son has another week to go before his summer vacation starts -- he can't wait for this week to pass. I'm already worried on how to keep him busy without having to turn on the tv for the whole day. Also bored kids get hungry frequently, so it's better to keep him busy with something that interests him and hopefully we'll survive the summer.

Sorry, I digressed. Coming back to the Rose shrikhand. This is a perfect summer dessert, light, sweet and refreshing. Shrikhand/ Shrikand is a yogurt based dessert and it is traditionally flavored with saffron, cardamom and nuts.

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Cranberry-Pistachio Cream Scones

Bake-a-thon 2014: Day 4
Bake of the day: Cranberry Pistachio Cream Scones
I actually posted the recipe for these cream scones a while back already, but they are such a big hit with everyone who taste them, I'm posting them again today. The add-ins for these scones can be customized to ones taste preferences. I thought Cranberries and pistachios are a great combo for the holiday season.

I recently bought a scone pan which makes making uniform and even size scones much easier. But simply patting the dough down and cutting it into equal sized wedges will also suffice.

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Afghani Sheer Payra (Afghani Milk Fudge)

Blogging Marathon# 47: Week 4/ Day 3

Theme: Bookmarked Recipes from A-Z International Marathon

Dishes: Afghani Sheer Payra

I'm going to end this month's blogging marathon on a sweet note. I have made this delicious milk fudge from Afghanistan 3 times in the past 1 month. It is that simple to make and quite a crowd pleaser. My husband really liked the fudge because it has a really nice flavor from ground cardamom and rose water.

The only thing that takes time in making this fudge is melting sugar and boiling the syrup and letting the fudge cool -- other than that the whole process is very simple and quick to make. The most important and critical part of successfully making this fudge is the consistency of the sugar syrup. it should not be too thin (fudge won't set) or too thick (fudge would be very very hard). 

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Iranian Jeweled Rice (Vegan recipe)

For this month's International Cooking Challenge, our host Savitha Ramesh @ Savitha's Kitchen has taken us on a culinary tour of Persia/ Iran. Iranian cuisine or Persian cuisine refers to the traditional and modern styles of cooking related to Iran. Situated in the Middle East, the Iranian culinary style is unique to Iran, but it has been influenced by Iran's neighbouring regions at various stages throughout its history.
Many foods famously associated with Middle Eastern, and indeed World cuisine have their origins in Iran, such as kebab and ice cream. Fresh green herbs are frequently used along with fruits such as plums, pomegranates, quince, prunes, apricots, and raisins. Typical Persian main dishes are combination of rice with meat, lamb, chicken, or fish and some onion, vegetables, nuts, and herbs. To achieve a balanced taste, characteristic Persian flavorings such as saffron, dried limes, cinnamon, and parsley are mixed delicately and used in some special dishes.

I made this very flavorful and colorful Iranian Jeweled Rice. It is sweet, nutty and very aromatic. I'm lucky to live in an area that is close to good Turkish/ middle eastern groceries and I have access to good quality ingredients. I bought orange blossom water on one of my so-called 'window' shopping days, which was put to good use in this recipe.

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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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Pistachio Cake (eggless recipe)

Blogging Marathon# 36: Week 2/ Day 3
Theme: Travel Food
Dish: Dessert -- Pistachio Cake (Almost Vegan)

It has been a busy weekend with an early Sankranthi celebrations at my cousin's place. It was fun getting the kids dressed up and rounding them up for Bhogi pallu. Trying to keep the traditions alive.
Today's recipe has nothing to do with Sankranti, but is related to travel. Desserts for travel become very important when kids are involved. I wouldn't probably think of desserts when just me and my husband are travelling, but they become essential when kids are around. I usually carry cookies or Indian biscuits along. My mom used to make barfi or peanut fudge for travel when we were little.

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Fruit & Nut Cookies (Pistachio-Cranberry Shortbread Cookies)

Blogging Marathon# 36: Week 1/ Day 1
Theme: Cookies
Dish: Fruit & Nut Cookies (Pistachio-Cranberry Cookies)

Here's Wishing everyone a very Happy, healthy & prosperous New Year 2014.
Our blogging marathon group is back again in the new year with BM# 36. To start the new year on a sweet note, I'm making some cookies for the first week of the marathon. I wanted to post a savory cookie too, but posted this baked mathri last week/ year itself.

I made 3 types of cookies and this eggless fruit cake to give as edible gifts this Christmas season. Last few years the cookies I made for Christmas had eggs in them and it didn't bother me. But this year I was baking for family who don't eat eggs and I had to find eggless cookie recipes or at least recipes that had only 1~2 eggs, so I can easily replace them egg replacer.

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Almond-Pistachio Cloud Cookies (Gluten free & Dairy free recipe)

This is the first cookie I made for this holiday season. I had jars of almond paste and pistachio paste in the pantry and I found these cookies on King Arthur flour site. There is no flour, no dairy and no oil/ fat recipe -- gluten free and diary free recipe. Egg whites hold the cookies together. Cookies turned out chewy and delicious.

These cookies are very easy to put together. No refrigeration is required, so these can be made when with no prior planning and no time at all. Perfect when you need cookies or something sweet really really fast :-)

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Dates & Nuts Laddoo

BM# 34: Week 4/ Day 2
Theme: Cooking from Sapana's blog
Dish: Dates & Nuts Laddoo

It has been a very busy weekend. Saturday whizzed by really fast with 2 birthday parties -- my sister's where we had lunch and evening snack with cupcake cutting then a surprise 50th birthday party for a friend. Of course we were late for the surprise part since we were driving from one corner of New Jersey to another. But all in all it was a great day with loads of good food and fun with family and friends.

Sunday started out lazy but soon became busy with house cleaning and laundry. We are hosting our first ever Thanksgiving party this year and even though it's going to be a potluck, I'm getting nervous about the menu, quantity of food, decor and just about everything related to hosting a party. So rest of the Sunday quickly went by with menu planning, laundry folding and Kung Fu Panda watching (not sure how and when the last one got onto the list -- but it's definitely worth the time, kept my mind off the impending work).

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Roasted Peppers Pistachio Pesto

Blogging Marathon# 34: Week 1/ Day 1

Theme: Cooking with Capsicum/ Peppers

Dish: Roasted Red Pepper & Pistachio Pesto with Cheese Ravioli

Its time to start this month's Blogging Marathon, BM# 34. My theme for this week is 'Cooking with Capsicum/ Pepper'. I use bell peppers a lot in my cooking either to make a curry or sambar or  add them to rice dishes. So when I saw the theme, I thought I should try making some new dishes with peppers.

For the first day, I'm using store-bought roasted red peppers from the jar. You could roast your peppers if you have the time, but store bought ones are just as good to make this dish. Recipe is from America's Test Kitchen. 

Here pesto is made with roasted red peppers, toasted pistachios and the usual pesto ingredients, parmesan, olive oil and garlic. This can be used as a pasta sauce or as a sandwich spread or even a dip for some crudites and bread.

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Pistachio Rosewater Cupcakes and a First Birthday celebrations

This post has been due for over a month now. My daughter turned 1 last month and I wanted to share the pictures with you. But September was dedicated to 'A-Z dishes from Andhra' and with the other things that were going on in  couldn't post this earlier. It is better late than never, so here are with some pictures of my little one's first birthday.
Since it was a late Summer birthday I wanted a backyard party. We were lucky to have a perfect day weatherwise. I wanted to have a Minnie Mouse theme -- just because I wanted too :-) Our friend N did all the decorations. Only thing we made (actually it was my idea, but the whole project was done by my husband) was the time-line garland with the pictures of the birthday girl from every month (in the first pic)

Time-Line garland with birthday girl's pics from 1st to 12th month

This was the 'Focus' wall

Minnie Mouse Cupcake Stand

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Penne with Asparagus & Pistachio Pesto

Blogging Marathon# 27: Week 3/ Day 1
Theme: Seasonal Dishes - Spring Entree
Dish: Penne with Asparagus and Pistachio Pesto

Growing up in South India, the only seasons I knew were Summer and Rainy. There was winter, but it wasn't 'really' winter by any standards. There was no seasonal cooking and I don't think I even heard of such a thing while in India.
Living on the east coast of US for the past 12+ years, we enjoy (or not) all 4 seasons. My favorites being Spring and Fall. I especially like Spring and love seeing the little buds on the trees, the greenery and the nature waking up from long harsh winter. Spring makes me really happy, I guess it's because I start to feel life around and it just gives me pure joy.

We start our 3rd week of our month long blogging marathon and the theme for next 8 days is "Seasonal dishes". I'm planning to showcase dishes for all the 4 seasons we experience in our neck of woods. These dishes either use seasonal ingredients or are made during that season for various reasons.

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Pistachio Sandwich Cookies

Blogging Marathon# 27: Week 1/ Day 7
Theme: Occasions/ Goodies to Blog buddies
Dish: Pistachio Sandwich Cookies

When blog buddies meet there is going to be food to eat, food to talk about and food to take home. So after our lunch at I wrote about here, I sent my buddies home with some of my homemade goodies. These pistachio sandwich cookies were one among them.

I love slice and bake icebox cookie recipes. What that means is the dough is made into a log and chilled in the ice box for 4 hours (or up to 3 days, it can even to frozen) and then sliced and baked. I don't like rolling the dough and cutting the cookie using cookie cutters. It seems to too time consuming and messy. I actually have a whole box of cookie cutters that I have never used until now. Maybe when my daughter grows a little older, I can learn with her :-)

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Pistachio Cake

Wish you all a Very Happy & Prosperous New Year. I know we are in the middle of January, but since this is my first post for this year, please accept by belated wishes. I wanted to kick start the new year with something sweet and so I made this pistachio cake. One of my co-workers brought this for a potluck and I really liked it a lot. I took the recipe from her, but haven’t had a chance to make it. So I thought I’ll give it a try and make it our New Year celebration cake. 

This is a very easy cake to bake, the recipe calls for store-bought yellow cake mix, a box of instant pistachio pudding, club soda and a few other standard cake ingredients. The resultant cake is fluffy, moist and delicious.

I used my homemade natural cake mix from here and used half the recipe to make this cake (I used the other half to make this tiramisu cake).

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Warm Lentil Salad with Grapes

It's been snowing cats and dogs for us this winter. I've had enough of this lousy weather already and we are only 1 month into official winter (official winter in Northern hemisphere started on Dec 21st, 2010), so this is going to be one loooooooong winter. To top that of, this is our first snow season in our new home and the shoveling all that snow seemed to be fun the first couple of times, but now I've thoughts of moving back to our old apartment complex where the management took care of cleaning up everything. Well, since that's not going to happen, I'm thinking of starting to exercise a little, so I'm physically fit to do it myself and not start hyperventilating after 5 minutes of pushing snow. My 3 year old says, "this is hard work Amma", after messing with the snow for few minutes. I'm not looking forward to anymore blizzards and winter storm advisories.

Coming to the Lentil Salad: Salads are not something that I make that often. I like to eat salads from a bag for lunch or dinner, but I rarely ‘make’ salads at home. Being a typical south Indian, I think all the dishes have to be eaten with rice, which explains why I don’t make ‘salads’.

But when I saw the recipe for this Lentil salad in Vegetarian Times magazine, I know it was going to taste great and was waiting for the occasion to make it. I made this for Sunday Lunch for a few friends and I really enjoyed it (even for lunch the next day).

Recipe adapted from Vegetarian Times magazine:

Ingredients:

French/ Puy Lentils – 2 cups, sorted, rinsed and drained

Leeks – 2 medium, thinly sliced

Fresh Mint – 3tbsp, finely chopped

Parsley – 3tbsp, finely chopped

Pistachios – ¼ cup, roasted and coarsely chopped

Red Grapes – 1½ cups, cut in half

Feta cheese – ¼ cup, crumbled (optional)

Salt & Pepper – to taste

Method:

• Soak the lentils for 8 hours. Add 4-5 cups of water to lentils and bring to a boil; lower the heat and simmer for 30 minutes or until tender. Keep aside.
• Heat 2tbsp olive oil in a sauté pan, add the chopped leeks and cook on medium flame until the leeks are tender, about 15-20 minutes.
• Add the leeks to cooked lentils along with pistachios, chopped herbs and grapes. Season with salt and pepper.
• Serve warm or at room temperature. Tastes great cold too.

To save time, you can cook the lentils the night before you want to make the salad and mix in the warm leeks and other ingredients just before serving.

Sending this Yummy Lentil salad over to Simona @ Briciole, who is this month's host for My Legume Love Affair (MLLA) event started by Susan of The Well Seasoned Cook.

Also Sending this Salad over to Prathibha @ Chef & her Kitchen's "Only Salads" blog event which was started by talented Pari @ Foodelicious. Thanks Prathibha for telling me about the event.

ICC-October Pistachio Praline

This is one of the quickest Indian Cooking Challenge ever. I was a little skeptical trying it since I have never ever tried making caramel before. Actually I shy away from any dish that needs testing the “consistency of sugar syrup”. I bought a candy thermometer, but still haven’t used it.

Well anyway I waited till the last minute and made the praline on Saturday and all it took really was 15-20 minutes and the end result was this crunchy, delicious dry fruit candy bar. My husband loved it so much that he said next time make a LOT MORE than you made now. And so I think I’ll maybe plan to expand my caramel related recipe repertoire. May be a Crème Brule or Flan are in the making.. Just wait and see.

Coming back to the recipe: Valli gave 2 excellent tried and tested recipes from Alka @ Simply Sindi Recipes & from Madhvi @ Madhvi’s Foolproof recipes. Varo is a Sindi specialty made especially during Diwali time. But after trying this once, I’m sure I’m going to be making it for any occasion that needs a quick sweet ending.

The only problem I had was the rolling and cutting, but I cooled the praline without cutting with a knife and broke off the praline for a more “free-form” look. This caramel making post by David Lebovitz was extremely helpful for me.

Ingredients:
Sugar – ½ cup
Pistachios – ½ cup, coarsely chopped
Cardamom powder – ½ tsp
White Poppy Seeds – 2tbsp
Vegetable Oil – 2tbsp (I didn’t see the use for oil, I’m going to omit it next time)

Method:

• Heat sugar in a heavy bottom pan on medium heat. The sugar will slowly start to liquefy along the edges first and will start to change color. Keep a constant eye on the sugar and keep stirring.
• My caramel was a little grainy in the beginning, but I followed Mr. Lebovitz’s advise and lowered the heat and slowly stirred it until all the sugar was melted and had a beautiful caramel color.
• Once the sugar reaches the exact caramel consistency, turn off the heat and add the chopped nuts, poppy seeds and cardamom powder.
• Stir well until all the ingredients are incorporated and pour onto a lightly greased plate.

Cut into squares/ diamonds while hot or cool completely and crush or break into free-form bars; they are yummy either way. Enjoy!!

Pistachio Shortbread for 4th Blog Anniversary

I have never in million years thought that moving would be so hectic and moving into your own home would make you insanely busy. We are now all moved in, but not completely settled in. Still have tons of boxes lying around in the basement (what a great place to dump stuff and just forget about—didn’t have this luxury in any of our previous residences). Well right now we are in the process of cleaning things up (and that includes the basement as well) and opening the boxes. So fortunately this past weekend, I found the Tripod and the boxes with my NICER bowls & plates (that I use to take pictures) and I also made something that was worth posting, so here I am finally in my virtual kitchen.

Another occasion to celebrate is “Cook’s Hideout” completes 4 years this month.
Coming to the Pistachio shortbread recipe, I bookmarked the recipe the minute I saw it on King Arthur Flour blog. I just loved the pista green color and the easy to make recipe, but it took me more than 2 months to get to it.

I used Earth Balance buttery sticks instead of regular butter making these Vegan. But after tasting them I realized that Earth Balance has more sodium % than regular unsalted sweet butters, so the shortbreads were little on the salty side, but still buttery & yummy.

Recipe from King Arthur Flour blog.
Ingredients:
Unsalted Butter – 1 cup, at room temperature
Pistachio flavored Pudding mix – 1 3.4oz box (Jell-O brand preferred by experts at KAF as it gives the best color)
Salt – ½ tsp
Sugar – ¼ cup
All-purpose Flour – 2 cups
Pistachio flavor – ¼ tsp (I used Almond extract instead)
Pistachios – 2/3 cup, finely chopped (optional)

Method:

• Preheat oven to 300ºF. Grease 8” or 9” round baking pans or line them with parchment paper and grease the parchment.
  
• In a medium mixing bowl, beat butter, pudding mix, salt, sugar & extract until well combined.
• Slowly add flour and beat until incorporated. It is a little dry to begin with but will come together with continuous mixing. If it absolutely does not come together, dribble in a tablespoon of water and mix until it forms stiff dough.
  
• Divide the dough equally in the two baking pans. Smooth tops with fingers or a pastry roller (see KAF link for this nifty gadget).
  
• Prick the dough all over with a fork. Sprinkle the nuts on the top (if using) and gently press them down into the dough. Bake until its golden brown around the edges, about 35-40 minutes.
  
• Remove from the oven and gently flip them over onto a clean surface immediately. Use a sharp knife or a pizza cutter to cut into wedges while still warm. Let them cool and enjoy.