Lemon Posset-A Quick & Easy Summer dessert

This has to be the most decadent and the easiest dessert that I’ve ever made. With only 3 ingredients and about 10 minutes of hands-on time, it’s hard to believe the end result could be this tasty AND the technique is almost fool-proof.

When I saw this recipe on the stone soup blog with mouth watering pictures, I know I was going to make it very very soon. And the minute I saw I had some heavy cream leftover after making mango ice cream (recipe following soon), I made it and was not disappointed at all.

Recipe adapted from the Stone Soup blog:
Ingredients:
Heavy Cream – 2 cups
Sugar – 2/3 cups
Lemon juice – 5tbsp
Ground Cardamom (Elaichi) – 1tsp

Method:

• Whisk cream and sugar together and bring to a boil on medium heat.
• Simmer for 3 minutes.
• Turn off the heat and stir in lemon juice and elaichi. Cool for 10 minutes.
• Pour into individual ramekins or bowls. Chill for at least 6-8 hours or overnight.

Here's a Pictorial for making Lemon Posset.

Enjoy this refreshing, lemony dessert anytime of the day and any season of the year. I think this

will be perfect dessert for summer bbq parties.

This goes to Aipi's Bookmarked Recipe Every Tuesday event - 36th edition.

White Pumpkin & Swiss Chard Curry

White pumpkin (Gummadikaya in Telugu) is a very versatile veggie and can be used to make dals, curries and stews. This time around I had a bunch of Swiss Chard that needed to be used up, so I added it to the curry to boost the nutrition. To make the curry creamy and not make it too dry, I added coconut cream, the top layer in unshaken canned coconut milk. All in all the curry turned out to be quite tasty.

Here’s how I made it:
Ingredients:
White Pumpkin – 3 cups, diced into 1” cubes (Zucchini should be a good substitute)
Swiss Chard – 1 small bunch, chopped
Chana dal – ½ cup, soaked in water for at least 30 minutes
Green chilies – 3, sliced
Coconut cream – 1tsbp, just skim the thick cream that forms on the top of regular coconut milk can
Turmeric – 1/8 tsp

For tempering:

Mustard Seeds – 1tsp

Cumin seeds – 1tsp

Dry red chilies – 3

Method:

• Microwave pumpkin with ½ cup water until tender.
• Heat 2tsp oil in a sauté pan; add the tempering ingredients and once they splutter add green chilies, soaked chana and cooked pumpkin with any leftover water after microwaving.
• Mix well and add the chopped chard. Cover and cook till chard is wilted and the dal is completely cooked.
• Add coconut cream and salt, simmer for another 2 minutes.

Serve with steamed rice or roti.

Quick Tomato Peanut Chutney

I don’t know if I like weekends or not. It seems like they fly by faster than a weekday and I always end up wondering on Sunday night, what the heck I did in the last 48 hrs. My mind is buzzing with things to do for the weekend on Friday night, but come Saturday morning, all planning and to-do lists get scraped and NOTHING gets done. It’s like “Busy with no business”.

This post is not about my “nothing got done weekend”, but about “at last something got done weekend”. So I was very proactive on Friday morning; soaked some urad dal and parboiled rice for idlis, prepared the batter that night and left it to ferment until Sunday morning (With the cold Northeast winter weather, it takes about 24 hrs to have a nicely fermented batter).

But on Sunday morning I was short of time to make my usual peanut-coconut chutney, so I made this equally tasty and quick chutney that my mom usually makes. I keep store-bought unsalted roasted peanuts in my pantry all the time, but if you don’t have these, simply roast some in the microwave for 2-3 minutes.

Ingredients:
Tomatoes – 2 medium, chopped into big chunks
Green chilies – 2, slit
Garlic – 1 clove, crushed
Roasted Peanuts – ¼ cup
Tamarind extract – 2tsp (or more to taste)
Salt – to taste

For tempering:
Mustard seeds – ½ tsp
Dry red chili – 1
Curry leaves – 4-6 (I didn’t have any on hand)

Method:

• In a microwave safe bowl, take tomatoes, garlic and green chilies and microwave covered for 3-4 minutes until the tomatoes turn into a mush.
• Remove and cool for a little bit before grinding them into smooth chutney with the peanuts, tamarind extract, salt and water (use as needed).
• When I don’t have time to wait for the tomatoes to cool, I use my immersion blender and blend all the ingredients while still hot.
• Heat 1tsp oil in a small saucepan and add the mustard seeds and dry red chili; once the seeds start to splutter, add to the chutney, mix well and enjoy with your pillow-soft idlis* or crispy dosas.

Chutney keeps well in the fridge for at least 3-4 days.

* To make Idlis: Soak 1 cup Urad dal (Minapappu) and 2 cups Parboiled rice separately for 4-6 hours. Grind dal into a smooth paste using little water, next grind rice into a coarse paste. Mix them together with 1tsp salt and set aside until frothy and fermented (about 8-12 hours in warmer temps or up to 24hrs in colder weather).

Since this is a bookmarked recipe, courtesy Amma, I'm sending this chutney off to Aipi's Bookmarked Recipe-Every Tuesday 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/