Best of 2015

It's that time of the year to look back and reflect on the year that passed. 2015 was a great year overall, both personally and for the blog.
This is another year of being a full time mom and a part time food blogger. The most memorable memory of 2015 is celebrating my mom's 60th birthday. Planning and executing a surprise birthday is quite a task but the end result was totally worth the effort. Our trip to Niagara is another memory that I will remember for a long time. Also this is the year when we got to spend time with family from all around the world -- thank you all for visiting us and hope you guys can come back again :-)
As for the blog, I logged in a little more than 300 posts and also started to explore more social media networks. My latest favorite is Instagram that I have been updating almost every day. Pinterest has also been getting some love :-)

Big thanks to the family, my blogging marathon buddies for the support and inspiration :-)

Here's wishing everyone a very Happy and Prosperous New Year 2016. May the new year bring in many more delicious and healthy dishes your way.

Here are my favorite dishes from each month in 2015.

Sending this over to Valli for her Best of 2015 event.

Recipe Failures 2015

As much as I want to admit that all my recipes turn out great, there are quite a few recipe mishaps in the kitchen. After documenting my Nutella swirl bread failures, I started to take photos of all of my failed attempts. So without further ado, here are some of my epic recipe failures for the year 2015:

Bread without Salt: One of the biggest lesson I learned this year is not to forget adding salt in any bread recipe. I made that mistake twice and the bread was unmistakably tasted and looked like cardboard both times. So always ADD SALT to bread dough.

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My Top Essential Summer Cookout Must Haves

Man Crates is a very unique company that delivers awesome gifts to men in custom wooden crates. Their mission is to end the difficulties in finding a gift for men. I can totally relate to that because I'm never sure what to buy for my husband. One glance at their site tells you that they have very interesting gifts and I'm especially impressed with the Zombie Annihilation Crate, that might be what my husbands gets as his next gift :-)

Man crates reached out to me to do a post about my favorite must-haves are for a summer cookout. Since this weekend is the last official summer weekend for this season, I thought I'll share some of my essentials.

1. Since we always have a vegetarian cookout, we always rely on good store-bought Veggie Burgers that stand up to grilling. We have couple of favorites, Morning Star Garden Veggie Burger and Gardein Chipotle Bean burger.

2. It's hot and kids get really thirsty outside. So homemade mocktail or store-bought juice boxes are a must.

3. Fresh and juicy Corn on the Cob, either grilled or boiled.

4. Reynolds Aluminum foil is my friend for mess free grilling and easy clean up.

5. Games organized for the little ones to keep busy and my favorite happens to be Limbo. All you need is a long stick and some good music, you are all set to go.

Don't forget to check out my Vegetarian Summer BBQ Recipe ideas. Enjoy your Labor day Weekend.

Best of 2013

I can't believe this year flew by this fast. But I have to because this time last year I had a 3 month old infant who had to be carried around and a year later I have a 15 month toddler who cannot stay still at one place. Time sure flies.
Year 2013 has been my best year as far as my personal life and blogging is concerned. I resigned my job in January to be a stay-at-home-mom (SAHM) to my kids. Spending time with kids has been a fulfilling experience as well. I am happy that I was able to spend quality time with my 6 year old son and my 15 month old daughter. Being a SAHM also meant little more time for blogging. Thanks to the BM group and especially to Valli for keeping me motivated to cook, click and blog.

Here are some of my best for 2013:
Highest # of posts in a year EVER: I cannot believe this myself, but I posted a little over 250 posts this year. Yay for me. The most I posted was 124 posts back in 2009.

A-Z Vegetarian dishes from Andhra Pradesh: Month long blogging marathon in September had to be the best thing that ever happened to 'Cook's Hideout'. Doing an A-Z dishes from Andhra Pradesh had been in my mind for a long time and I was finally able to do it. Thanks again to Valli and the ever enthusiastic BM group.

A-Z Vegetarian Dishes from Andhra Pradesh

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Basic Set up for Food Photography

Blogging Marathon# 31: Week 4/ Day 1
Theme: Moderator's Choice/ Behind the Scenes of a Click
Dish: Banana Bread Oatmeal

We start the final week of Blogging Marathon today and my theme for this week is 'Moderator's Choice'. Our moderator, Valli, gave us 5 themes to choose from. For the first day I chose to show you behind the scenes of one of my click, Banana bread Oatmeal.

One of the most important aspect of food photography (or any photo in general) is lighting. Natural lighting is the cheapest and best option. The thing to note is not all light is is good for taking pictures, like for example harsh day light creates shadows that results in unappealing food photos. Light changes during the day and differs in intensity and color in different seasons. Knowing and understanding light is one of the biggest step towards taking better food photos.

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Best of 2012

It is that time of the year again, time to celebrate the arrival of new year and think about the good, bad and the ugly of the past year, make resolutions so that that the bad and ugly don't repeat again in the new year.

2012 has been quite eventful, many ups and downs, both in my professional and personal lives. It has been a year with mixed bag of emotions, some really low moments that I hope never repeat. On the brighter side, biggest high of this year is the addition of our tiny bundle of love, Disha who came into our lives in September.

So here is my list of Best of 2012:

Best Ingredient: Silk Very Vanilla Soymilk is my new favorite. Its great in coffee, on cereals, for baking, and everything that needs a slightly sweet milk. I always keep my fridge stocked with this yummy beverage.

Best Blog Posts for the Year: Blogging wise I have to thank Valli for Blogging marathon. Without BM I'm not sure if I would have been as active with blogging as I was this year. Big Thanks to you Valli -- Wishing BM many many years of successful marathons.

Also contributing to the increased number of posts is Vegan Month of Food (Vegan Mofo) event in October. I surprised myself with 24 posts in October.

Coming to the best blog posts with the highest number of hits this year: Eggless Lime Cookies & Vegan Mug Cakes.

 

Here are some of the pictures of dishes that I loved making and clicking over the past year.

Dorie's Split Level Pudding: 

Grilled Eggplant Sandwich:

Bengali Bora'r Jhol:

 

Lapsi:

 

Kaju Badam Katli:

 

So here's Wishing all of you a very Happy & Prosperous New Year 2013.

Sending this over to Valli's "Best of 2012" event.

Wish you a very Happy Ugadhi/ Gudi Padwa

Sri Khara naama samvatsara Subhakankshalu

Wish you all a very Happy Ugadhi/ Gudi Padwa

Picture Courtesy http://www.telugusamithi.org.au/

And the Lucky Winner is.....

The lucky winner for the CSN Giveaway is Maureen (@ Suburban Prep). Congratulations Maureen, your $45 CSN Gift Certificate is on its way. Please check your email.

I used Excel Random number generator to pick the winner.

Thank you all for participating.

Blogging Bites: Holiday Buffet

I’m doing one post with all the recipes that I've bookmarked and tried for Nupur’s Blog Bites: Holiday Buffet event. Hold your belts tight as this is going to be one tummy filling buffet.

Breakfast Granola:

Nupur’s Chocolate-Cherry Granola: I gave Homemade granola to my co-workers for Christmas this year and I made 3 batches of different granola including this festive & yummy Chocolate-Cherry granola. (See the recipes for the other 2 granolas here).

Appetizer & Dip:

Mini Quiche from the Perfect Pantry – These one bite appetizers are perfect for any party and they come together really quick too. My guests loved them and most of them were gone before I could take the picture. I followed the recipe to the T and they turned out awesome.

Nupur’s Caramelized onion dip – This is THE best dip I’ve ever made. It is a little time consuming than other dips, but the result is worth the effort. I couldn’t take a picture of the dip, but here are some veggies that we ate with the dip.

Curries & Side Dishes:

Indira’s Kakarakaya Kura – I made this dish two times and absolutely loved it. Indira mentions that this is a 100 year old recipe that’s been shared by home cooks for generations. Big Thanks to her for posting it on her blog so everyone has a chance to taste this century old dish.

Dee’s Vankaya chikkudukaya kura: I love all eggplant dishes, but eggplant paired with broad beans is probably my favorite combo ever. Dee's curry is slightly different from how I make it, but the addition of tamarind paste & sesame seeds powder makes it extra special and yummy.

Sree’s no-cook chutney: I had to try Sree's chutney as soon as I saw her post. Served it with Karachi dosa.

Dessert:

Tiramisu from Served with Love: After Nupur mentioned about Tiramisu on her post, I had to try it too. I had made Tiramisu ages ago and remembered it being a big flop, but this time with the perfect recipe, it turned out just perfect.

Archana's Fruit Cake: I wanted to make fruit cake this Holiday season and decided to make Archana's version since I had all the ingredients on hand. I made a double batch and took one to work for Holiday party and everybody loved it. I'll post the picture soon.

Merry Christmas!! Have a fun Holiday everyone.

I'm 2 posts away from my 400th post. I'm hoping to post them before end of this year. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Vegan Mofo Day 30: Last Day

Vegan Mofo Day 30:

It's the end of Vegan Mofo today and I don't have a dish to post about. I think I was fairly successful: we were expected to post every weekday of the month, or about 20 posts in the month. I had 21 posts this month vs 1 post for October, I think I did extremely well.

Got to know some talented Vegan bloggers and will be visiting them often now.

I am going to miss Vegan Mofo, as it kept me going with the cooking, taking pictures and posting. I hope to keep the momentum going and will keep posting (some non-vegan dishes pretty soon).

Happy Thanksgiving and some upcoming Recipes

Vegan Mofo Day 25:

Hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving. As for me, our little family celebrated with some yummy vegan treats. I wanted to make everything vegan today keeping with the theme of the month. I made Thiyya gummadikaya pulusu (red pumpkin stew) and Vankaya ulli karam kura (Eggplant with caramelized onion gravy) for lunch. For dinner I made some Cilantro-Lime rice and Venezuelan Shredded Seitan, both recipes from my latest cookbook, Viva Vegan. Didn't take pictures of any of these dishes, but I do have pictures of the treats I was telling about: Coffee flan and Holiday Braid Bread. Recipes are coming soon. Have a good night and enjoy your long weekend.

Happy Diwali

Hope everyone celebrating Diwali/ Deepavali had a fun time.

As for us, I lit some candles and diyas (in the pic) and made some Sooji halwa (vegan with no ghee or milk) and vegetable rice for dinner. I haven't had a chance to take pics, actually let me rephrase it, I didn't feel like taking pictures. Literally, my hands are cold and I can't feel some of my toes. Our heating unit broke down 2 weeks ago and started emitting CO (CO alarm starting blaring one morning when we started our heating unit), so haven't been using it for the fear of dying. The repair guys have not been too helpful and right now we are still waiting for them to install a new heating unit. Which is why there hasn't been much cooking, I know standing by the stove keeps me warm, but I can't get up from the sofa after sitting curled up for a while for the fear of missing a warm spot in the house. I'll keep you guys posted, I don't have too high hopes of the repair company, the only thing I can do now is to pray that temperatures warm a little bit..

Sneak into my Kitchen

I haven’t participated in a blog event in a very very long time. I intend to participate and a make a note about all the events I come across in a little diary, but hmm.. how do I say this.. I guess I never go back to check my notes and hence miss the event deadlines. My new resolution for the last quarter of the year (Can you believe we are almost at the end of ANOTHER year) is to make as many new dishes as I can and participate in as many blog events as I can. That reminds me of the large quantity of yeast that I have to consume before it expires, I better get baking..

Well this event doesn’t involve any cooking but I thought it is a good way to get back on blogging track. Nupur wants us to show our kitchens and if you want to show your kitchen head to her site and check out the details. So here’s a look into my kitchen: When we were looking for a house, our requirement was a kitchen with lots of storage and good counter space. One of the reasons we liked and bought this house was the kitchen, it had the storage we were looking for and the counter space we needed.

Our kitchen is a square with 2 “L” shaped counters on four sides. One “L” has the fridge, stove, sink and the dish washer. I keep a GB (garbage bowl—Rachel Ray’s lingo), oils, cutting boards and dish drainer (a tiny drainer for my little one’s stuff) on this counter.

The other “L” counter houses the breadbox, Ultra grind, corner shelf for snacks, potato & tomato bowls & the newest addition of my husband’s Coffee maker. This side of the kitchen is more for storage and less for active cooking.

I have quite a lot of pots and pans (I own 4 pressure cookers of different sizes); we used to have a pot rack in our previous apartment, but since I don’t have a place to hang, I stow them all in the pull out drawers. The drawers are quite wide and deep to hold lots of stuff.
My favorite spot however is this pull out corner cabinet where I put all my baking ingredients and extra spices.

I can be a little more organized and once in a while I get this urge to clean and I go on a cleaning spree. But I know where I keep my things and I think there’s a method to the madness and I totally love my kitchen. Thanks Nupur for hosting this no-cook event.

Coming Back after a Short Break

I have been MIA for quite sometime now. This year started off with a runny nose & coughing child passing off his germs onto to me. I ended up with an ear infection and the antibiotics I took for that caused severe intestinal infection (stomach cramps & bloody diarrhea). I was so sick to my stomach that I was eating about a katori of rice for almost half an hour. A healthier me would have wiped out at least 5 times at amount of rice in 5 minutes (yes.. I'm a rather quick eater).

I can’t imagine myself not thinking about food and that 1 week was like hell to me. My poor husband was doing all the cooking, but I didn’t have the energy or the appetite to eat. I knew I was getting better only when I started craving for khichdi and thinking about what to make for my next post. Right now I’m healthy enough to cook AND eat, but not ready to take pictures and post. But I’ll be back with a dish pretty soon.

Until then read about this interesting article about a Mother of 2 who planned meals for a WHOLE YEAR. I wish I could be that organized, let me know how you guys organize your meal calendars.

Thanksgiving Dinner for Two

This is a quick post with pics of the dishes I made for Thanksgiving dinner. It was quiet with just the 3 of us and I didn't want any leftovers since I'm going to have company today. I made stuffed Acorn Squash (inspired from DK's recipe), Mashed Potatoes & Stuffing. For dessert I made 2 servings of Mini Chocolate Pumpkin Cheesecake tarts (recipe adapted from here). Here are few photos, will post the recipes and more pics soon. I've to get the house cleaned up before my guests come over. See you soon. Hope all of you have a wonderful holiday weekend.

Eating out in NYC

Yet another weekend flew by so quickly that I didn’t have time to post for veganmofo. But we had a chance to take our son in the train to New York and he had a blast. He was saying koooo- chuk-cchuk trrrraiiiiin the whole time. It was fun watching him get excited just looking at the trains.

We then went to this cute little place called “Crisp” that serves great falafel sandwiches. And what’s more it is 100% vegetarian restaurant with a good number of vegan dishes too; and their primary focus is on respect and consideration for the planet.

I had their Mediterranean falafel sandwich and my husband tried their African sandwich, both of them were excellent. Their soup of the day was Zucchini soup and it was just cooked & pureed zucchini with spices and it was way beyond my expectations (I thought it was going to be health-food blah tasting, but it was fantastic with great texture as well).

Here are some pictures of the restaurant taken with my DH’s cell phone.

Note: This is not a vegan sandwich and had parmesan cheese on top, I didn't get a chance to take the picture of the other sandwich that was actually vegan.

Vegan Cookbooks

This is a no-cook post today. I wanted to show you the vegan cookbooks I own. I bought all of Isa’s cookbooks and I’m totally happy with them. They are filled with easy, interesting recipes and funny quips.

My newest acquisition is her latest book, Vegan Brunch. I’ve yet to try anything from this one. I’m planning to make at least 2 recipes from each of these books and blog during Veganmofo month. Let’s see how well I’m going to stick to the plan.

Cheese giveaway @ Veggie Belly

Sala @ Veggie Belly is giving away Alouette Cheese to 3 lucky winners. Head over to her site and check it out.