Gulab Jamuns for Indian Cooking Challenge

When Srivalli chose gulab jamuns for this month's Indian Cooking Challenge, I was kind of excited and nervous since I have never made them from scratch before and was expecting a total failure with exploding jamuns in oil. The good news is they didn’t explode but the bad news is my jamuns got a tad bit harder after frying which I assume is because of the excess amount of flour I added to the khoya.

Ok let me back up a little bit and tell you the whole story. I chose Alka’s recipe for my Gulab Jamuns. I started out making the khowa with 4 cups of whole milk which I boiled for 2½ hours on low simmer. The khowa was still a little wet when I took it out of the pan. I let it cool for about 2-3 hrs and then I made the dough by adding the flour & corn starch. I added a tbsp of flour in the beginning and when I saw that the dough was still wet, I added another tbsp of flour and then another and then another and so on.. Well in the end the dough looked pretty good and I was able to make tiny jamuns. I didn’t realize that they formed a crust on the top and didn’t let the jamuns soak the sugar syrup. They tasted pretty good even though we had to struggle to cut them with spoon :-). I was a little disappointed with the end result but now I think I have the tools to make gulab jamun from scratch.

Here’s Alka’s recipe verbatim:

For sugar syrup:
Ingredients:
Sugar - 500 gms (This can be reduced as per taste)
Water - 1 & 1/2 cup (bit more or less)
Cardamom - 2-3
One spoon of milk (optional)
Few threads of saffron (optional)
2-3 drops of rosewater (optional but highly recommended)

Method:

• Mix about 500 gms of white sugar in one and half cup water and keep it for boiling.
• Add a spoonful of milk to remove the impurities (impurities if any, will form a scum on surface).
• Add 2-3 green cardamoms also in syrup for strong flavor, and a tad of saffron strings (optional).
• Boil until you get just a tad sticky syrup. Gulab Jamun syrup is not very dense nor too dilute as in Rasgulla.
• Strain the syrup, add rosewater when syrup is slightly cooled.Always remember two things while using rose water, do not add it while syrup is bubbling hot or on fire, and be particular about the quantity mentioned in every recipe, since even few drops of excess rosewater could lend a bitter taste to the final product.
  

For Gulab Jamun:
Ingredients:
Unsweetened Maawa/ khowa* - 250 gms
All purpose flour - 1 & 1/2 - 2 tsp
Cornflour - 1 tsp
Green cardamom - 1-2 crushed
Oil for shallow frying

* (read my comments above on making khowa.

Method:

• Mix all the ingredients in a wide mixing bowl until soft textured dough is obtained (keep mixing until it is really soft).
• Make very small sized balls (bit larger than pebbles) as they swell up after frying and soaking in syrup.
• Make sure that the surface of dough balls is really smooth without any cracks. In case the cracks refuse to go away, slightly wet your palms with water and roll the flour till absolutely smooth.
• Now take little oil for frying in preferably flat bottomed pan, and heat the oil. But gulab jamuns are to be fried on LOW FLAME or else the surface will be browned while the core will remain uncooked. Some prefer to place an unsalted pistachio in the center of every gulab jamun while making balls, that way the core of gulab jamun is not left uncooked.
  
• Fry one or 2 gulab jamuns at a time and always remember to STIR THE OIL with slotted spoon AND NOT TO TOUCH GULABJAMUNS, which means keep swirling the oil without tossing or turning gulab jamun.
• Fry till light brown in colour, remove on tissue paper and repeat the procedure with rest of dough.
• Now soak these in COOL syrup for few hours. They will surely swell up.

These can be stored in the same syrup till consumed.

If there are cracks in the balls before frying it will burst open while frying, in that case adding a bit of cornflour will surely help.

Soy Chorizo & Corn Stew

I like to try vegetarian/ vegan “fake meats”. I know they are processed and everything but I still want to try them at least once to see how they taste. I’ve had some that I really liked, but some that were totally disappointing and inedible.

So when I saw Soy chorizo in Trader’s Joes I had to try it and I have to say we really liked it and I’m going to buy this again. It was similar to Yves brand Veggie ground round but much spicy and garlicky.

Ingredients:
Soy Chorizo – 1 package
Corn – 3 cups (from 3 cobs)
Red Bell pepper – 1 medium, chopped
Green Onions – 1 bunch
Garlic – 2 cloves
Tomato puree – 1 cup
Cumin powder – 1tsp
Chili powder – 1tsp
Salt – to taste

Method:

• Heat 1tbsp oil in a sauté pan; crumble chorizo in the pan and cook on medium flame for about 5 minutes. Remove into a bowl and keep aside.
• In the same pan, add green onions, bell pepper & corn; sauté on medium-high flame for 12-15 minutes or until the veggies are tender.
• Add tomato puree, ground cumin, chili powder and salt. Mix well and cook covered for 5 minutes.
• Return chorizo to the pan along with a cup of water/ veggie broth. Simmer for another 10 minutes. Check for seasonings and serve hot.

I served the stew with some brown rice. Yummyyyyyyy.

Spinach-Tomato Rice

My son absolutely loves Carrots. He can eat carrot all day everyday (this is right now, I’m not sure how his taste is going to change tomorrow). So I’ve started adding carrots in everything, pasta sauce, dal, curries and yes even in rice dishes; much to the discontent of my DH, but the little one’s preferences come first.. right?????

This dish is a clean up the fridge kind of a recipe and it tasted pretty good the next day for lunch.

Ingredients:
Basmati Rice – 2 cups, cooked
Onion – 1 medium, chopped
Carrots – 2 medium, chopped into ½” pieces
Frozen Spinach – 1 cup, thawed
Tomatoes – ½ lb (I used about 10 cherry tomatoes)
Green chilies – 2, slit lengthwise
Bisibele bath masala – 2tsp (I used homemade masala)
Roasted peanuts – 3tbsp
Salt – to taste

For tempering:
Mustard & Cumin seeds – 1tsp each
Curry leaves – 8-10

Method:

• Cook rice and keep aside to cool.
• In a sauté pan, heat 2 tbsp oil and add tadka ingredients; once the seeds start to splutter add onions and green chilies. Sauté till onion turn translucent.
• Add carrots and roasted peanuts; cover and cook till carrots are tender.
• Now add the spinach, tomatoes, salt and the masala; cover and cook till tomatoes turn mushy.
• Check the seasonings and add the veggie mixture to rice. Mix well without mushing the rice. Mix some lemon juice if you like.

Serve with papad and chips. Great for lunchboxes too.

Kakarakaya Kura (Bittergourd Curry)

This is a very simple preparation with minimum ingredients but the end product was really yummy & delicious. To me prepping bittergourd (kakarakaya in telugu) to remove some of the bitterness is the most important step. I know some people who really love the bitterness, but prefer it to be mildly bitter; I can’t take extreme bitterness (like broccoli rabe is something I absolutely cannot have, it is way tooooo bitter for my taste).

For this dish, I microwaved the veggie with some tamarind pulp, turmeric and salt for 6 minutes. Then I thoroughly rinsed it under water and completely squeezed the liquid out leaving just slight bitterness in the gourd. For a non-vegan version, use buttermilk while microwaving instead of tamarind pulp.

Ingredients:
Kakarakaya (Bittergourd) – 4 medium size, lightly scraped and chopped into ½” pieces
Red Onion – 1 medium, chopped fine
Curry powder – 1tsp (I used my homemade curry powder)
Salt – to taste

For tempering:
Cumin & Mustard seeds – 1tsp each
Curry leaves – 6-8

Method:

• In a mw safe bowl, add the chopped veggie with 2tbsp tamarind paste, pinch of turmeric, ½ tsp salt and ½ cup of water. MW covered on high for 5-6 minutes or until bittergourd is half cooked. Drain the liquid and rinse thoroughly under cold running water. Squeeze out as much water as possible from the gourd and keep aside.
• Heat 2tbsp oil in a sauté pan; add the tempering ingredients and once the seeds start to splutter add onions and sauté till they turn translucent.
• Now add the prepped bittergourd; cover and cook for 8-10 minutes or until bittergourd is completely cooked. Mix in salt and curry powder. Sauté for another couple of minutes.

Served with steamed rice and sambar makes this a complete comfort meal.