Vegetable Pulav

One of my quick-fix lunch menu, when I am really short of time. It comes together in less than 20 min, and you really do not need many side-dishes. A pickle and raita / curd tastes great. The coconut milk adds a delicate yet rich flavour to the rice.



Ingredients

Basmati rice - 2 cups, soaked in water for half hour and then drained
Chopped vegetables - 2 cups (beans, carrots, green peas, cauliflower etc)
Coconut milk - 2 cups (extracted from half coconut, medium consistency)
Water - 2 cups
Salt - as needed
Big onion - 1 small, thinly sliced
Garlic - 2 cloves, crushed
Ginger - 1 inch piece, crushed
Green chilly - 2 slit or Red Chilly powder - 1 tsp
Coriander powder - 1 tsp



Masala 
Cardamom - 2 nos
Cloves - 3
Cinnamon - 2 pieces
Bayleaf - 1
Star Anise - 1

Ghee - 1 tbsp



Method

1. Heat a deep bottom pan. Add the ghee.
2. When ghee is hot enough, add the masala items. Let them splutter.
3. Add sliced onions, ginger-garlic and chilly (if using)
4. Let them saute for a while, till the raw smell is gone. If using red chilly powder, add at this stage. Add the coriander powder too and saute till raw smell leaves.
5. Now add the chopped veggies. Saute them for 2-3 minutes. Sprinkle from salt at this stage.
6. Add the drained rice and mix together with the veggies. Add coconut milk and water. Adjust the salt. Close with a lid and lower the flame to low (lowest possible).
Cook till the rice is done. Once the rice has absorbed all the liquid, slowly fluff with a fork.

Enjoy with a Raita & Chutney and some pickle.

Jeera Rice

Ingredients

Long grain basmati rice - 2 cups
Shajeera  /Caraway seeds  -3 tbsp
Salt - as needed
Ghee - 2 tbsp
Hot water - 4 cups
Thinly sliced big onion - 1/2 cup



Method

1. Soak the basmati rice for atleast 10 minutes,drain and keep aside.
2. In a wide mouthed pan, heat the ghee. Add the onion sliced and fry till they are brown. Drain and keep aside.
3. Add the caraway seeds and let them splutter. Now add the drained rice and stir lightly for about 5 minutes.
4. Add boiling water & enough salt to the rice, stir gently and keep it closed till the rice is cooked well.
Garnish with fried onions and serve!

Tomato Coconut Rice

This is another one-pot rice dish and a quick lunch-box preparation when you are short of time in the morning. It pairs well with raita and pickle.

Ingredients

Rice  - 2.5 cups

Ghee or oil - 1 tbsp

Spices

   Bay leaf - 1

   Cardamom - 1

   Star anise - 1

   Cinnamon - 1" stick

   Clove - 2

Salt - as needed

Grated coconut - 1 cup

Tomato - 3 big, chopped roughly in chunks

Water - as needed, see notes below

Method

1. Soak the rice in plenty of water for atleast 10 min. Drain it.
2. Grind the tomato in big jar of the mixer, and keep it aside. This will be around 2 cups.
3. Grind grated coconut with some water (around 1/2 cup) in the same jar and keep aside. This will be around 2 cups. If you have enough time, you can use coconut milk instead of ground coconut.

Note : Measure the amount of tomato and grated coconut mixture. For 2.5 cups of rice, you'll need around 6 cups of liquid. So for the remaining amount of liquid, add water. In this case, add around 2 cups of water.

4. In a wide-mouthed vessel, add ghee / oil and add the spices. Stir in between, wait for about 30 seconds.
5. Add the drained rice and stir gently in ghee. Let it fry for about 30s.
6. Add the ground tomatoes, coconut and required amount of water. Close tightly with lid and let it cook in the lowest flame.



It will take about 12- 15 minutes for the rice to cook. After around 10 min, open the lid and check if the rice is cooked. If yes, fluff the rice gently with fork, switch off the stove. After this, do not close the lid tightly.

Serve it with some raita and pickle.

Breakfast Wraps

A healthy, wholesome, filling breakfast!! Makes a great lunch too.. 

Ingredients

Note : I have used whatever was available in my kitchen that day. You can use any filling (like chicken strips with lettuce) or spread (mayonnaise). 

Chapati - 8 nos (I made them with normal chapathi, you can use tortilla wraps too. While making chapathi, I used around 2 tbsp of olive oil to the dough to make it soft)

Tuna (cooked) - 1 tin

Big onion - 1 medium, thinly sliced

Carrot - half of 1 carrot, cut into thin strips

Egg - 1

Cooking cream - 1 tbsp

Salt - as per taste

Pepper powder - as needed

Chicken sausages - around 8 small ones, cut into thin strips

Tomato - 1 big, cut into half and then thinly sliced

Method

In a skillet, saute the tuna in little (~ 1 tsp) oil. Saute till the raw smell is gone. Remove from the skillet and keep it aside.

In the same skillet, add the sausage strips and fry for couple of minutes. Drain and remove.

Now add the sliced onion and carrot into the same wok. Add little more oil if needed. Sprinkle some salt. Saute till the raw smell is gone. Drain and keep it aside.

Beat the egg with cooking cream. Add salt and pepper. Beat well and pour into the skillet. Let it cook for sometime. Do not let it dry too much. It should be kind of soft. Take it out and keep in another bowl. 

 

 

Wrapping the wrap

Take one chapati and place in a plate.
First keep the cooked egg, and spread slightly
Top it up with a tsp of onion-carrot mixture
Place a tbsp of tuna above it
Place 3-4 sausage strips too
Arrange 3-4 tomato slices above all of them

Wrap tightly!!

Carrot Rice with Challas

I am always in look out for quick one-bowl rice recipes, as my husband prefers home-cooked lunch and he has to leave home sharp at 6:45 in the morning for work...thanks to Dubai traffic. So you can imagine my kitchen on a normal day morning.. the breakfast, milk, tea, coffee need to be ready 6:15 am and lunch box to be ready by 6:45. I also have to pack 2 tiffin boxes for the kiddos..and no junk items allowed in the school. So that's a lot of work in the morning, but atleast satisfied that the family is eating healthy stuff.

The carrot rice is one easy recipe, which I accidentally discovered one day when I had to prepare lunch in 15 min and all I had as curry/sidedish was a carrot thoran. So I just cooked some white rice and mixed with the thoran. From then on, carrot rice has been my trusted partner on very busy mornings. You can have it along with Challas or simply curd and pickle. Its simple, yet delicious and healthy. Here goes the recipe.

Ingredients

Carrot - 1 big, chopped fine (I just popped it into the food processor, and pulsed twice)
Big onion - 1 medium, finely chopped
Green chilly - 2, finely chopped
Garlic - 1 clove, finely chopped
Ginger - 1 inch piece, finely chopped
(Again, I used food processor for chopping onion, chilly, garlic and ginger..all will be done in a matter of seconds!!)
Curry leaves, parsely - optional

Basmati rice / Jeerakasala rice - 2 cups, soaked in water for 10 minutes and drained
Hot water / water - 4 cups

Oil - 1 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp



Method

1. Heat oil in a deep bottom heavy pan.
2. Crackle the mustard.
3. Add the chopped onion, ginger, garlic, chillies. Saute them till the raw smell goes.
4. Add the chopped carrots. Saute for couple of minutes.
5. At this point, if you want to spice up your dish, you can add chilly powder.
6. Add 4 cups of water, and allow it to boil
7. Add salt.
8. Once water boils, add the drained rice, stir gently and cover and cook on the lowest flame. The rice should be cooked in about 10-15 minutes' time depending on the variety of rice you are using and also on the soaking time.
9. Once cooked, and all the water evaporated, remove the lid and fluff up the rice with a fork. Do not close the lid fully as it will over cook.
Your healthy, delicious carrot rice is ready!!

Challas

If you haven't tastes this salad yet, you are definitely missing out on something!! Trust me..you really are missing out!! It is such a tasty and healthy salad which can never go wrong. Try it for yourself and see.

I think this was authentic salad used Syrian Christians long back, before the salad with curd took over. As per our tradition, we do not use curd along with meat or fish dishes. So in earlier days, for weddings and other functions, this challas was served along with meat cutlets.

Ingredients

Big onion - 1 small, sliced

Green chilly - 1, slit

Thick coconut milk - 1 cup

Vinegar - 1 tbsp

Salt - as per taste

Mashed potato - 2 tbsp (optional)

Grated carrot - 1 tbsp (optional)

Method

Take the sliced onion in a bowl and add salt and vinegar. Mix up these three thoroughly with your hand and squeeze the juice out. So that will leave you just with onions, with all unwanted juices removed. Now add the thick (yes, it should be really thick to get the authentic taste..I used 2 cups of loosely pasked grated coconut to get 1 cup of milk) coconut milk and add salt if more is needed.

Add the slit green chilly.

If you want to make the salad little more thick, you can add the mashed potato.

Also if you want to make it a bit more colourful, add some grated carrots.

There you are!! Enjoy your meal...

Moru kachiyathu / Curried curd

A must-have curry for lunch & dinner in the district of Kottayam! In my place, this is made only when one of us have stomach problem :) .. So after getting married, I got used to having moru kachiyathu on a daily basis. I don't mind having it as it tastes good and is very good for our tummy. The only thing that puzzles me is the malayalee proverb - "Meenum Morum cherilla" - which means fish and any any form of curd should not be taken together, its against ayurveda. However in Kottayam, people people have to have this moru along with the fiery fish curry..

Ingredients

Thick curd, beaten well - 2 cups
Water - 1 cup (if curd is thin, then no need to add water, just take 3 cups of curd)
Ginger - 1 inch piece, crushed or sliced
Small onion - 3, crushed or sliced
Green chilly - 2, slit
Fenugreek seeds - 1/4 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Dried chilly - 2-3
Curry leaves - 1 sprig
Salt - as per taste
Powdered cumin - 1/2 tsp

Method

In a kadai, add 1 tbsp coconut oil. When its hot, add fenugreek seeds and let it crackle. Then add mustard seeds and let them crackle too. Now add curry leaves, dried chilly and saute for a while. Add crushed small onions, ginger, slit chilly and saute them till they are slightly crisp. Now switch off the stove and add well beaten curd + water mixture while stirring continuously. Switch on to low flame and keep stirring till the curd is somewhat hot (it should not boil). Switch off the flame, keep stirring for some more time. Then it take off the stove and allow to cool. Once properly cooled, add cumin powder and salt. 

Curd Rice

This is one dish that I always make in a haste...or rather I make this when I am hard pressed for time in the morning rush and I have no other option but to pack a quick lunch for my husband. Trust me...its easy and tastes great with pickle and pappad.

I am sure that my method of cooking curd rice is NOT the authentic way of making it, as the curd rice we have from Tamilian restaurants here in Dubai tastes quite bland. So I spice it up by adding some chillies, dried chilly & ginger. Also I garnish it with urid dal and sometimes with channa dal which gives something to chew on.

Ingredients

Cooked white rice, cooled - 2 cups
Curd - 2 cups
Salt - as per taste

Seasoning

Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
Urid dal - 1 tbsp
Small onion - 3-4, thinly sliced
Grated ginger - 1 tsp
Green chilly - 2 , sliced
Dried chilly - 2
Curry leaves - 1 sprig
Oil - 1 tbsp

Mix the cooked, cooled white rice with well beaten curd and add enough salt. Keep it aside.

Heat a pan, add oil. Once hot, crackle mustard seeds and then add the urid dal. Stir till the dal turns brownish. Now add small onions, grated ginger, green chilly, curry leaves & dried chilly. Let them get sauteed well till the onions turn brown and slightly crisp. Turn off the stove and add the seasoning to the curd rice. Mix well and transfer to the lunch box.

Sambar Rice

Friday...a lazy day in Middle East..As usual we went to the park early in the morning...the kids played as much as they want..then the men headed off to the swimming pool..while the women wandered around the park..my daughter babbling about every bird and squirrel that passed by...And by noon, we are back home, all energized.

Friday is one day that I feel so lazy about ccoking...mainly because its the day hubby is at home and rather than spending time in kitchen its much better if we can chat and watch TV. But somehow I was all in the mood to cook, and there comes the suggestion.. "I feel like having some Sambar rice with curd". I was more than happy...no need to cook too many dishes, just make Sambar & rice and mix up all together..

I am unsure as to whether this is the authentic way of making sambar rice. We love it this way and it tastes heavenly with curd...can be had either for lunch or dinner, also makes a super lunch box item. 

Ingredients

Toor daal - 1 cup

Vegetables (cleaned, washed & cut in desired shape) - 2 cups (its better to avoid lady's finger & drumstick while making sambar rice)

Sambar powder - 3 tbsp (I use Brahmin's)

Coconut oil - 1 tbsp

Tamarind - size of a lemon (soaked in some water for 10 min and extract the juice)

Salt - as per taste

Turmeric powder -  a pinch

Small onions - 3-4

Tomato - 2 (cleaned and diced)

For tempering

Coconut oil - 1 tbsp

Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp

Asafoetida powder - 1/2 tsp

Dried chilly - 2

Curry leaves - 1 sprig

Sambar powder - 1 tsp

White rice - 2 cups (I used Jeerakasala rice)

[Clean rice under running water and cook the rice till its half cooked. Keep it aside]

Method

Wash and clean toor daal under running water. Pressure the cleaned dal with 3 cups of water, a pinch of turmeric powder and salt. Cook till its done (I normally cook for 1 whistle on high flame, and 4 whistles on low flame). Let the pressure gets released. After that, open the lid and smash the dal.

Meanwhile clean and cut all the veggies. Heat a kadai, add 1 tbsp of oil. Once hot, add the small onion and the veggies. Let is saute for a while. Sprinkle some salt. Now add 2 tbsp sambar powder and saute till a nice aroma comes. Add the tamarind extract and the diced tomatoes. Saute till tomatoes starts to lose its shape. Now add the sauteed veggies to the cooked dal, add some more water if required. Add the half cooked rice also to this and cook till the veggies and rice and cooked well. 

Tempering

Once sambar and rice is cooked well, take another pan and heat 1 tbsp of coconut oil. Once hot, crackle mustard seeds. Add dried chilly, curry leaves and saute for a while. Now sprinkle the sambar powder & asafoetida powder and immediately switch off the stove. Stir in this to the sambar - rice mixture. Keep it closed for sometime for the flavours to set in. 

Serve it hot with some thick curd and pappad!!

Meat Stuffed Chapathi

A variation to our normal chapathi...something that the kids will love for breakfast, lunch box or even dinner.

Meat mixture - Ingredients

Minced chicken - 2 cups
Big onion - 1 big, finely chopped
Green chilly - 2, chopped
Ginger - 1 inch piece, chopped finely
Garlic - 2 cloves - chopped finely
Curry leaves - 1 sprig
Chilly powder - 1 tsp
Turmeric powder - a pinch
Garam masala - 1/2 tsp
Oil - 2 tbsp
Salt - adjust as per taste

For the minced chicken -
Wash & clean about 4-5 pieces of chicken. Boil the chicken with required salt & pepper till the chicken is cooked well. Let it cool. Remove bones from the meat and shred the chicken.

Heat oil in a pan, add the chopped onions, garlic, ginger, green chilly & curry leaves. Saute the mixture well until the onions turn light brown. Now add chilly and coriander powder and saute till the raw smell goes. Add the shredded chicken. Mix well and sprinkle some garam masala. Mix again and turn off the stove. The meat mixture is ready.

For the chapathi dough

Atta / Whole wheat flour - 2 cups
Water 1 cup
Olive oil - 1 tsp
Salt - 1 tsp

Make a soft dough using above ingredients with hand or a mixer with dough hook. Take a small ball of dough, flatten it on your palm using your hand to the size of a small poori. Put 2 tbsp of meat mixture to the center and close the poori, by locking the ends. Make it into a ball again. Now dip it in little more atta and flatten into thin round disc (just like a chapathi). Heat a tawa and cook both sides of the chapathi. Towards the end, brush both sides of the chapathi with little butter or ghee.

Serve it hot with curd & pickle.