Amma's Simple Cabbage Pepper Fry

Amma's Simple Cabbage Pepper Fry

This is an Indo-Chines stir fry.  Amma's very special dish. Cabbage helps to keep yourself warm on a cold day. Eating the right vegetable and making use of the vegetables available during the season makes sense.  Cabbage are in season and so make use of it with this yummy stir fry.

Ingredients: (serves 4)

Peas -1 cup

Cabbage- 2 cups

Onion- 1 tbspn(finely chopped)

Ginger- garlic paste- 1 tspn

Garam masala powder- 1 tspn

Turmeric powder- 1 tspn

Amma's Simple Cabbage Pepper Fry

Pepper powder-1 tspn

Dark soy sauce- 1 tspn

Sesame oil / any cooking oil- 1 tbspn

Chopped cilantro leaves- to garnish

Salt to taste

Method:

Heat the pan and add the oil. When the oil is hot add the onions followed by ginger- garlic paste. Add the peas and cabbage and mix well. Remember to cook under medium fire. Now add all the spices, salt and the soy sauce and keep stirring continuously for 2 to 3 minutes.

Switch off the fire, garnish with cilantro leaves and serve with hot rice or roti.

Cabbage Mushroom Fry

Cabbage Mushroom Fry

Worried how make dishes with Cabbage unlike the routine recipes...!!!! Well.., recipes with Cabbage were always tough to me.. as it's a kind of vegetable which goes excellent in Salads or Chinese dishes like the Noodles or the fried rice. But, when want to make some curry with Cabbage I always work out a bit more and here is how this recipe came out. Truly turned out tasty though..!!! Check this one.

Ingredients:


2 cups Cabbage chopped
1 cup Beans chopped
1 cup Mushrooms chopped
5 Green chillies slit
1 tsp Cumin seeds(Jeera/Jeelakarra)
1 tsp Mustard seeds(Raai/Aavalu)
1 tbsp Black gram(Urad dal/Minapappu)

Cabbage Mushroom Fry

1 tbsp Red Chilly Powder
1 tbsp Ginger paste
1 tbsp Coriander powder
Coriander leaves
Salt to taste
Directions:


1. Heat oil in a pan, add cumin, black gram and mustard seeds and let them splutter.
3. Add chillies, fry them for a while and add chopped cabbage. Fry it for 5 min and then add beans and mushroom. Add salt and mix well. Close the lid and let the vegetables cook on medium flame. Mix it with a spoon once in a while in between while cooking.
4. Once the vegetables are soft enough, add coriander powder and Red chilly powder to it, also chopped coriander leaves and mix well. Let it rest for 2 min and remove from the flame.
5. Serve hot with Chapathi's.

*We welcome your valuable suggestions/comments on this Recipe*

Bitter Gourd and Potatoes with a Twist

Bitter Gourd and Potatoes with a Twist

Bitter Gourd and Potatoes with a Twist

Bitter Gourd (Pavakka) is my favourite vegetable. Simple pavakka mizhukkuvaratti (Bitter Gourd stir fry) is heavenly. I also like making Pitla with it. (Will post recipe for Pitla some other time). My husband also shares my love for Pavakka (thank god for that).

When making Pavakka these days, I am always reminded of an incident that happened a couple of years ago. My now 2.5 year old son was around 8 months at that time. He had started eating solid food - vegetables and fruits in puree form. He used to crawl to us when we were eating food and ask for what we were eating. We used to let him get a lick of the Indian cooked dinner. We were a little scared of giving him all that spicy food at that age. One day the dinner was pavakka and when my husband gave him some mushed pavakka, we were sure he is going to spit it out. But my DS loved it. He kept smacking his lips and asking for more. :-)

I was looking for some different recipe for making Bitter Gourd in other blogs and came across a Bitter Gourd Masala recipe in Priya's website. I made some changes to the recipe and created my version below. Check out the original recipe in her website.

Ingredients

Bitter Gourd 3 finely chopped

Potato 1 big pealed and cut into small cubes

Onion 1 big finely chopped

Ginger, garlic, green chillies all finely chopped

Mustard 1 tsp

Turmeric 1 tsp

Hing

Oil and Salt to taste

For Grinding to a powder

Poppy seeds 1 tsp

Quinoa 1 tsp

Channa dal 1 tbsp

Whole pealed urad dal 1 tbsp

Coriander seeds 1 tsp

Cumin 1 tsp

Red chillies 3

Method of Preparation

1. Dry roast the poppy seeds and quinoa and keep aside.

2. Add a little oil and roast the channa dal and urad dal. When it starts to brown, add the coriander seeds, cumin and red chillies and roast for a minute.

3. Grind all the above into a fine powder.

4. In a pan, add some oil and add the mustard to it.

5. When it sputters, add the turmeric, hing, onions, green chillies, ginger and garlic and sauté till onion is browned.

6. Add the bitter gourd and cook for 5 minutes.

7. Then add the potatoes and cook till it is almost done.

8. Add the ground powder and salt and cook till the vegetables are cooked well.

9. Serve with roti or rice. we enjoyed this with roti.

- See more at: http://www.roshniskitchen.com/2011/11/bitter-gourd-and-potatoes-with-twist.html#sthash.5DAkzGoU.dpuf

Bitter Gourd (Pavakka) is my favourite vegetable. Simple pavakka mizhukkuvaratti (Bitter Gourd stir fry) is heavenly. I also like making Pitla with it. (Will post recipe for Pitla some other time). My husband also shares my love for Pavakka (thank god for that).

When making Pavakka these days, I am always reminded of an incident that happened a couple of years ago. My now 2 year old DD was around 8 months at that time. She had started eating solid food - vegetables and fruits in puree form. She used to crawl to us when we were eating food and ask for what we were eating. We used to let her get a lick of the Indian cooked dinner. We were a little scared of giving her all that spicy food at that age. One day the dinner was pavakka and when my Hus gave her some mushed pavakka, we were sure she is going to spit it out. But my DD loved it. She kept smacking her lips and asking for more. :-)


Ingredients

Bitter Gourd 3 finely chopped
Potato 1 big pealed and cut into small cubes
Onion 1 big finely chopped
Ginger, garlic, green chillies all finely chopped
Mustard 1 tsp
Turmeric 1 tsp
Hing

Oil and Salt to taste

For Grinding to a powder
Poppy seeds 1 tsp
Quinoa 1 tsp
Channa dal 1 tbsp
Whole pealed urad dal 1 tbsp
Coriander seeds 1 tsp
Cumin 1 tsp
Red chillies 3

Method of Preparation

Bitter Gourd and Potatoes with a Twist

1. Dry roast the poppy seeds and quinoa and keep aside.

2. Add a little oil and roast the channa dal and urad dal. When it starts to brown, add the coriander seeds, cumin and red chillies and roast for a minute.

3. Grind all the above into a fine powder.

4. In a pan, add some oil and add the mustard to it.

5. When it sputters, add the turmeric, hing, onions, green chillies, ginger and garlic and sauté till onion is browned.

6. Add the bitter gourd and cook for 5 minutes.

7. Then add the potatoes and cook till it is almost done.

8. Add the ground powder and salt and cook till the vegetables are cooked well.

9. Serve with roti or rice. we enjoyed this with roti.

Chicken Chukka Varuval

Fried Chicken. Kozhi Porichadhu. Kodi Vepudu. Chicken Sukka Varuval.

Chicken Chukka with Carrot Rice

A simple Chicken dish, this is easy to prepare and fairly a hot stir fry dish and also an aromatic dish with a delicious, distinctive taste.
Ingredients:

Chicken (breast, cubed) 1 cup
Salt
Green chilies 3 crushed
Onion 1 small grated
Ginger-garlic paste 1 spoon
Pepper powder (optional)
Lemon juice
Rice flour few spoons
Curry leaves, Sliced ginger to garnish
Oil for shallow frying.

Methed:

Mariante the meat for two whole hours using all the ingredients mentioned above(excpet oil and garnishing items).

Now fry them in hot oil, till crisp and nice.

In a wide skillet, stir-fry the fried chicken with garnishing items and sprinkle pepper powder.

Chicken Chukka Varuval Ready, dig in:)

Asparagus Coconut Thoran and Beans Sambar

Asparagus Stirfry,Cauliflower Pepperfry, Potato Podimas,Beans sambar,Instant bonda

Asparagus is a vegetable with lots of nutritional and medicinal properties. As usual I started cooking with this vegetable with a thoran recipe. It turned out to be a delicious and nutritious side dish with rice.

White asparagus spears- 500 gms, cleaned

Shredded coconut- 3 tbsp or more

Green chillies- 3, slit lengthwise

Turmeric powder- 1/4 tsp

Cumin seeds- 2 tsp

Salt- to taste

Mustard seeds- 1 tsp

Oil- 1 tbsp

Curry leaves- a sprig (optional)

Cut and discard the woody base and chop the asparagus heads into small pieces.

Crush the coconut, green chillies, turmeric powder and cumin seeds together to a coarse mix, either with your hands or with a pestle and mortar.

In a heavy bottomed pan, heat the oil and splutter mustard seeds. 

Add the coarse coconut mix and the curry leaves (if any) at this stage. Sauté for a few seconds on medium heat, but make sure you don't burn them.

Add the chopped asparagus heads and salt. Stir well, making sure the coconut mix and the asparagus is combined evenly.

Close the lid and cook on medium heat, stirring in between and if it sticks to the bottom, pour about a tsp water.

The thoran should be ready in about 12 to 15 minutes.

 

Beans Sambar Recipe:

 

Ingredients:

• 1 cup Toor Dal (Wash and soak for about half an hour in water)
• Chopped beans.
• One lemon sized (medium) tamarind.
• 2 lemons sized (medium) jaggery.
• Turmeric powder
• Sambar powder
• Hing
• Salt (as per taste).
• Coriander leaves and curry leaves.

Method

Beans Sambar

• Cook the chopped beans and soaked dal with some water in the pressure cooker and keep aside.
• Now, to a bowl of warm water soak tamarind. After about 3-4 minutes, squeeze the tamarind and extract it. Remove all the hard non-dissolvable tamarind particles. So, now tamarind water is left.
• To a vessel, add tamarind water and jaggery and heat.
• When the tamarind water comes to boil state, add turmeric and all of the boiled beans and dal.
• Add hing and lower the flame and allow it for about 5 minutes.
• Then, add sambar powder and salt and boil some more.
• Finally add the coriander leaves and curry leaves for the added aroma.

Beans Sambar with the mixture of all possible tastes is done in the Udupi traditional way.

Potato fry(Potato Podimas) Tamil nadu style

Potato fry(Potato Podimas) Tamil nadu style

Potato, one of our family favorite vegetable and we love potatoes in any form-curry, fry, kurma, omelette, patties, pakora/fritters etc., This Potato Podimas / Dry curry is one my favorite combo for sambar sadham n lemon rice. Very simple & quick curry that does not involve more spices and tastes great and delicious with everything rice, rotis, bread, variety rice and also u can make bonda with this podimas as filling, Pani puri filling etc., Now to the versatile potato podimas recipe.
 Ingredients (Serves 2 – 3)

1. Potato – 4 small, cut into small cubes (Makes around 2 cups)
2. Oil – 1 tbsp
3. Mustard seeds – 1/2 tsp
4. Urad dal – 1/2 – 1 tsp
5. Turmeric powder – 1/4 tsp
6. Sambar powder – Around 1.5 – 2 tsp
7. Salt – To taste

Method

Heat oil at medium heat. Splutter mustard seeds and fry urad dal until golden color. Add potato cubes, turmeric powder and salt. Sprinkle little water and cook covered for about 8 minutes. Open the lid and stir-fry for a couple of minutes until potatoes are 3/4 th done. Add sambar powder and stir-fry until potatoes are done and are roasted well. Serve this spicy and yummy potato fry with curd rice, tomato rice, lemon rice, sambar rice or plain rice, curd, thoran and chammanthi.

Potato Peas Fry(Aloo Matar) and Spring Onion Sambar

Potato Peas Fry(Aloo Matar)

Aloo Matar is a north Indian recipe. This can be prepared as stir fry and also as curry. This is my children’s favorite and I cook this very often. The liking for this started after seeing some cooking oil advertisement in TV (Aloo Matar Aur Bahut Saare Matar) some years back. Fresh green peas gives a lovely taste when cooked with potato.
Potato is known as Urulai Kizhangu in Tamil and as Aloo in Hindi. Green Peas is known as Pachai Pattani in Tamil and as Matar or Mutter in Hindi.
Cooking time: 25 minutes approximately

Ingredients

• Potato – 2 no
• Green peas – 1 cup
• Onion – 1 no
• Tomato – 1 no
• Green chilli – 1 no
• Red chilli powder – ½ tea spoon
• Coriander powder – 1 tea spoon
• Turmeric powder – ¼ tea spoon
• Cumin seeds – ½ tea spoon
• Curry/coriander leaves – few
• Salt – as per taste
• Oil – 2 tea spoon

  Method

  
  
• Chop potato, onion, tomato, green chilli and curry/coriander leaves.
• Heat a pan with oil; add cumin seeds and when cumin seeds splutter well, add chopped onion, curry leaves and green chilli; fry for few minutes.

• When onion is transparent, add chopped tomato and coriander leaves; fry for few seconds and then add green peas.

• Add all dry masala powders, mix well and fry for few seconds.

• When the peas are partially cooked, add chopped potato, ½ cup of water and salt; cover and cook in low flame till potato and onion are cooked soft (if needed sprinkle little water); fry for some more minutes till water evaporates to get a dry veggie.

• Serve hot with rice or chappati.

Tips

• Fresh green peas can also be replaced with frozen peas.

Mango Spring Onion Sambar,Aloo Matar with Rice and Papad

Spring Onions Sambhar:

Ingredients:

Green onion 1 large bunch
Mango 1 small size
Thuvar Dal 1 cup
Onion 1 large
Tomato 1 large
Salt
Turmeric powder 1/4 spoon
Chili powder 1 spoon
Sambar Powder(home made) 1-2 spoons
Tamarind paste 1 spoon
Ghee or oil few spoons
Cilantro leaves to garnish.

For Tempering:

Mustard seeds 1/2 spoon
Cumin seeds 1/2 spoon
Asafoetida 1/4 spoon
Curry leaves few
Ghee/ Oil few spoons.

Method:

In a pressure cooker, add thuvar dal + salt + few spoons of oil+ Mango. Pressure cook till tender. Maybe for 3-6 whistles. Set aside

In a large crock pot, heat ghee. Add onions and fry till it is translucent.

Then add tomatoes and fry till they wilt. Add salt, turmeric and chili powder to this. Fry for about 2 minutes.

Add cooked thuvar dal now. Bring this to boil. Add the chopped green onions plus tamarind paste and sambar powder and cilantro leaves. Cook briefly and remove from heat.

In a separate pan, heat oil and fry the tempering items. Tun this tempered spices over the sambar prepared.

Cauliflower Pepper Fry(Gobi melagu Poratu)

Cauliflower Pepper Fry(Gobi melagu Poratu)

Today's recipe is black pepper cauliflower fry. The sauce is flavorful with depth in flavor and the right amount of kick from the black pepper. When I tried this recipe I knew I would make this recipe again and again. It is perfect with fried rice. Try this,hope you will all enjoy!

Ingredients
Cauliflower small - 1 no
Onion small chopped - 1 no
Garlic cloves minced - 2 nos
Bay leaf - 2 nos (optional)
Star anise- 1 no (optional)
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
Salt to taste
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Oil - 4 tbsp

Pepper masala powder
Roast and grind below ingredients coarsely.
Whole red chilly - 4 nos
Black pepper corns - 1 tsp
Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp
Sombu / Fennel seeds - 1/2 tsp
Cinnamon stick - 1"
Dried coconut / Kopparai thengai chopped - few tbsp (optional)
Method
1. Separate cauliflower into tiny florets, boil in salted water until tender, drain and set aside.
2. Heat oil in a pan, add mustard seeds and allow to crackle.
3. Add chopped onion, bay leaf, star anise and garlic cloves, saute for few minutes.
4. Add the drained cauliflower florets to the pan.
5. Add the coarsely ground pepper Masala powder, turmeric powder and salt to the cauliflower and toss well.
6. When the cauliflower is dry and well coated with masala powder remove from heat and garnish with curry leaves.
Serve cauliflower milagu peratu with steamed rice, sambar and rasam.

Avarakkai Verkadalai (Broad Beans with Peanuts) Poriyal

Here is a tasty Poriyal using Avarakkai and Verkadalai. Even those (including children) who don’t like beans, will find this attractive as peanuts are used in this side dish. This can be prepared with any other variety of beans too.
Broad beans are known as Avarakkai in Tamil and peanuts are known as Verkadalai in Tamil.

Ingredients

• Broad beans chopped – 250 grams
• Chopped onion – 1 table spoon
• Peanut Skinned and roasted – 2 table spoon
• Grated coconut – 2 table spoon
• Garlic peeled – 2 cloves
• Red chilli – 3 no
• Salt – as per taste
• For seasoning
  • Mustard – ½ tea spoon
  • Urad dal –½ tea spoon
  • Curry leaves – few
  • Oil – 1 tea spoon

Method

• Grind together red chilli, garlic, half of peanuts coarsely in a blender and keep this masala aside.

• Do the seasoning in a pan; add chopped onions and fry till it turns transparent; add chopped broad beans, salt and remaining peanuts.

• Sprinkle handful of water, mix well, cover and cook till beans are done.

• Now add ground masala, grated coconut and mix well.

• Cook for few seconds and remove.

• Serve as a side dish for rice and chappati.

Carrot and Broccoli Thoran(stir fry)

Carrot and Broccoli Thoran(stir fry)

From last one year plus broccoli has been so regular at home thanks to vegetable shopping at done  mostly in supermarkets! Most of the time I make Broccoli Soup or Stir Fry or some time I venture into another recipes provided I have the mood.  This is a very simple, quick and delicious recipe which can be done in just 10 minutes including chopping if you are using a chopper.  I didn’t add coconut as I was short of it but it tasted delicious, am sure coconut will add wonderful flavour to the dish.   Try this combination to make your broccoli stir fry more interesting.  

Preparation Time: 15min

Cooking Time: 10min  
Serves: 2   
 Shelf life:1day
Serving Suggestion:Goes well with plain rice or with dal/sambar, rasam rice.

Vazhakai Poriyal (Plaintain stir fry)

Vazhakai Poriyal (Plaintain stir fry)

I always pick up raw plantain during our trip to the Indian store. Our favorite way to have this raw banana is in the form of banana chips or as bajji. I occasionally make this stir fry with simple spices and this makes a great accompaniment to dal and rice and also with rotis and chapatis as a dry curry.
Preparation Time: 5min

Cooking Time: 12min

Serves: 2 

Shelf life:1day

Serving Suggestion: Rice with plain dal or Chapathi is a Perfect match

Pavakkai Vengayam Vadhakkal/Bitter Gourd Onion Stir Fry

 Pavakkai Vengayam Vadhakkal/Bitter Gourd Onion Stir Fry

Pavakkai Vengayam Vadhakkal/Bitter Gourd Onion Stir Fry

Bitter Gourd or 'Pavakkai' as it is known in Tamil  is very low in calorie and dense in nutrients.

It is an excellent source of vitamins B1, B2, and B3, C, magnesium, folic acid, zinc, phosphorus, manganese, and has high dietary fiber.  It is rich in iron, contains twice the beta-carotene of broccoli, twice the calcium of spinach, and twice the potassium of a banana.

The bitterness of the vegetable is perfectly offsett by its goodness, finding it a place in the platter.
There are many dishes which can be made using this vegetable and this is a simple stir fry recipe which is sure to seduce your taste buds!!

Preparation Time: 10min

Cooking Time: 7 min

Serves:2

Shelf life:1day

Serving Suggestion : This curry is best when mixed with hot steamed rice and a dollop of ghee on it or hot phulkas!!