Going for Mahalaxmi lunch and dinner(s) today... As per tradition, the Goddeses are to be treated with 16 types of vegetables and salads today. That's a great opportunity for making various mixed veggies, instead of making 16 different kinds...

My favourite combos:
Bhendi, aloo + carrots, with plenty of onions;
Parwal+ Aloo+Baingan+karela;
Cabbage+green peas+tomatoes+capsicum;
Cauliflower+mushrooms+corn+cottage cheese(paneer)

Try these and your own combos too; its fun to mix and match...

Shepherd's Pie

This is one dish i LOVE to make, and people love to eat - so as you can guess, i end up making it often, though i DO try and save it for special occasions only.
(About this dish - it is originally a poor 'shepherd' guy's dish invented in England. A combo of meat and potatoes that can be carried along as the fellow tends to his sheep all day outdoors. It has evolved over the years and in my hands has become even richer and not at all something the original cook would identify with at all!)

INGREDIENTS

• Minced meat (kheema) - 1/2 Kg
• Potatoes - 1/2 Kg, or more, if u like them!
• Onions - 2, chopped fine
• Tomatoes - 5-6 medium size, also chopped fine
• Capsicum - green, red, yellow ( any color u can find or ALL) : 3-4
• Garlic - half a pod, peeled and chopped ( at least 10 )
• Milk - two cups
• Cheese - use as much as u like! ( i used two cubes today)
• corn flour - one tbspoon
• Woosterchire sauce - one tablespoon
• Capsico sauce - one tsp
• Garnish of oregano, freshly ground black pepper, chilli flakes
• Butter - two tbsp
• olive oil or any cooking oil - 1/2 cup

Shepherd's pie consists of two main components - mashed potatoes and cooked kheema and veggies

HOW TO MAKE MASHED POTATOES

Peel the potatoes and cut them into large cubes. Cover them with water - about 3 cups - and leave to boil in a heavy bottomed sauce pan or kadai. When the potatoes or almost soft and water completely evaporated, add two cups milk, with cream if u like. Keep mashing the mix. When smooth and creamy, add salt,pepper, butter and grated cheese. Whisk together well. Keep the mashed potatoes aside for baking later.

HOW TO PREPARE THE MINCE

Wash the kheema and drain properly.

In a pressure pan/ cooker, cook it with some minced garlic and pepper and salt. ( Do not add water or oil is using a separator vessel. If cooking directly, just add a little oil so kheema does not burn). Cook for about 10 minutes after the first whistle of the cooker.

Now heat oil in a medium size kadai.

Add chopped garlic - the remaining - and onions. Brown nicely

Add Tomatoes -

Add enough salt for the veggies at this stage

When tomatoes partially cooked, add capsicums.

After about five minutes, add the cooked kheema - ( if it has become watery on cooking, u can remove some of it for the lucky dog! Or u can use it in cooking up the kheema further)

Add some garnish like black pepper and chilli at this stage.

Keep stirring till mixture almost dry - but not completely.

Dissolve one tbsp corn flour in a little water and add.

After two minutes add woostershire sauce and capsico.

HOW TO ASSEMBLE THE PIE

Take an over proof square or rectangular glass casserole. Oil the bottom. Put in the cooked kheema mixture and level it down. Now evenly spread the mashed potatoes over the kheema to cover it completely. Grate cheese to cover the mashed potatoes. Add  a dash of butter or olive oil. Sprinkle pepper and oregano. Bake in the oven for 15 - 20 minutes till cheese melts and turns reddish - NOT brown plz!!

The pie is ready to serve!

Stuffed parwal and aloo

DRY FRUITS AND KHAS KHAS STUFFED POTATOES AND PARWAL

INGREDIENTS

1. 
   
   
   
   
   Aloo - of a uniform smallish size, to match the size of the parwals - 20





2. 
   
   
   
   
   Parwal - tender, light green, again smallish - 15-20 (ppl like aloo more!)





3. 
   
   
   
   
   Oil - enough to bhuno the veggies above





4. 
   
   
   
   
   Salt to taste





5. 
   
   
   
   
   Green coriander - as a garnish





6. 
   
   
   
   
   Tomatoes - about 1/2 kg boiled and pureed





7. 
   
   
   
   
   Cream - one cup





8. 
   
   
   
   
   ghee - one tbsp

INGREDIENTS FOR THE FILLING

1. 
   
   
   
   
   KHAS khas - 2 large tbsp. Roast and powder fine





2. 
   
   
   
   
   kajoo-pista-peanuts : I roasted only the peanuts and then coarsely ground all three till the mixture looked like bread crumbs





3. 
   
   
   
   
   Kismis - a few - cut into fine pieces ( i like the slight sweet flavour they impart-optional)





4. 
   
   
   
   
   Chilli powder - to taste





5. 
   
   
   
   
   Jeera - dhania powder - 2 tsp





6. 
   
   
   
   
   green coriander - chopped fine





7. 
   
   
   
   
   green chillies - 6-7 chopped fine





8. 
   
   
   
   
   garam masala powder

HOW TO COOK

• 
  
  
  
  
  Par boil the potatoes till just soft BUT NOT COOKED COMPLETELY (raw potatoes take a long time to cook and consume more oil)





• 
  
  
  
  
  Wait till they are quite cold, then chop from one end and make hollow inside - save the soft potatoes to use as cover





• 
  
  
  
  
  Leave parwal raw - do not skin either. Just wash thoroughly and dry. Then chop one end and again remove meat inside - if u find this difficult, u could also slit them lenght wise.





• 
  
  
  
  
  Mix all the masala for stuffing - add salt, sugar to taste and a little cream to hold it together.





• 
  
  
  
  
  Stuff the aloo and parwal with this, closing the hollows with the mashed potatoes





• 
  
  
  
  
  USE A FLAT PAN LIKE VESSEL FOR COOKING, NOT A KADHAI





• 
  
  
  
  
  Heat pan, pour oil and then gently arrange the potatoes and parwal evenly in the pan





• 
  
  
  
  
  Leave gas on sim and let cook slowly, rearranging veggies once or twice.





• 
  
  
  
  
  When almost cooked, add tomato puree and finally cream





• 
  
  
  
  
  At the end, pour one tbps ghee, add garam masala and chopped coriander.

( tip - do add a little salt over the pan so that the exterior of the veggies do not taste insipid)

Serve with parathas or garam phulkas

Makhana kheer

INGREDIENTS

1. 
   
   Soft white Makhanas - quantity depending on qty of kheer ( i used 100gms for 8 cups milk)


2. 
   
   Milk - 4 litres


3. 
   
   Condensed milk - one tin


4. 
   
   Sugar - to taste


5. 
   
   Cardamoms 8 to 10


6. 
   
   Saffron - few strands


7. 
   
   2 cups nuts of your choice (I used badam, pistachios, cashew nuts and kismis)


8. 
   
   Ghee - 2 tbsp

HOW TO MAKE IT...

In a kadhai large enough to take all that milk, I put the ghee. I had shredded the makhanas into smaller pieces with my hand ( very imp. since they bloat on boiling and folks may not like the blatant taste of makhanas in the kheer). These i put in the hot ghee and let redden slightly. Poured in the milk and let boil for a long time. Put in the saffron, powdered cardamom and nuts after about 20 minutes. When the kheer was almost ready, poured in the condensed milk - if u add it earlier, it tends to scorch at the bottom of the pan, wasting the entire contents with that obnoxious burnt milk taste! After the condensed milk has mixed thoroughly, check for the sugar - since c.m. already contains a lot. Add more according to your taste - i mean sugar. Since my qty was so huge, i added two cups more.

Kheer is ready to be served!

Fusion Chicken

Had to make chicken in a hurry yesterday for three very important persons: my sister
in law Selvi and my two brothers in law, one of them visiting from New York.
The whole family is rather fussy about their food - most of them my husband! - and the 'farmaish' was for chicken with 'Russa' (gravy).
I am a cook who cooks by instinct, often using net recipes as guides, but today just nothing inspired me when i google searched for various chicken curry recipes. So I decided to go with my own, adding ingredients as I went along. Here in short is my recipe:

INGREDIENTS FOR MASALA (for 2 kg of dressed chicken)

• Three large onions - chopped fine


• ginger garlic paste - two tea spoons


• khas khas- three tea spoons


• peanuts - 1/4th cup

I roased the ingredients ( exept garlic-ginger which i ground raw and separately) together in a little oil in a 'kadai' till it was nicely browned.

Then ground it into a paste using a little water to get a fine paste.

• DRY MASALAS & other ingredients


• Safflower oil - one large cup


• turmeric powder


• chilly powder - 3 tea spoons


• coriander powder - 2 tsp


• Goa garam masala - 2 tsp ( since i've just come from Goa)


• Ready made paste of 'Goan roast'


• curds - one cup


• one large chopped onion


• handful of green chillies


• JUICE of one large lemon


• large pinch of pepper powder

PROCESS -

After washing the chicken properly and letting it dry i rubbed it with lots of turmeric powder and juice of one lemon - as i didn't like the strong broiler odour! ( I also used pepper powder). Left it for about 15 minutes while i prepared the masala etc.

Then i heated oil in a large kadhai. First put in the chopped onion and fried them till crisp and red. Then put in the ginger garlic paste, chilli powder and paste. Let it brown and then added the chicken - also added the Goan masalas at this stage. Added the coriander powder - which was freshly ground - in the last to preserve the flavour. DO NOT ADD SALT YET.

After the whole mixture is 'bhunoed' properly, then add the salt. Add bioling water - i added almost 3 cups since the peanuts in the masala tend to make the gravy thicken quickly.Cover and simmer till done.

Must say it turned out quite tasty - It was fed to all the above in laws, plus my parents, plus my cousin Radha, her husband Pavel, her brother Eshan and Meena, my aunt.

Pavel commented that it was the most "different" chicken he had had and it was really nice.

Therefore i am posting this for my own future reference too, since i tend to forget what i had put and how i had made it...

Spinach shorba

Now for the green soup ... Steam a big bunch of spinach - ofcourse after cleaning and washing thrice in water! Blend with some milk, cream, salt and pepper. Add some fine chopped mint leaves and coriander leaves...boil till cooked. Squeeze lemon juice, add some sugar to taste...soup ready. Simple, isn't it...and really tasty! Its the mint that gives it the 'shorba' i.e. mughlai flavour. Remember dont boil the mint with the spinach initially... add it later for fresh flavour.

my two favorite soups...

The eternal favourite - tomato soup, with a marathi touch!

My all time specialty - Sabudana khichdi

The one dish I make that everyone likes....
Be it my cousins or their juniors in Warud, my friends in Nagpur, even my maids - I am asked one question constantly - "Nita, when are you going to make sabudana khichdi? I love it the way you make it!"

So, I've decided to be very noble and unselfish and share my secrets -

• The first one being - sabudana HAS to soak properly before you cook it! This aint a breakfast you can make in a hurry - if you have no patience, go with porridge that day... my sabudana always gets soaked the previous night.(You can also soak it overnite and then store it in the fridge in a closed container for use within the week.)
• Wash it gently and leave half an inch water over the surface. Use a flat, shallow bowl for soaking.
• Dont stinge in the quantity of peanuts - they should be at least 60% of the sabudana - no, make it 70%!! ( Say for 3 katoris of sabudana, i go with minimum two katoris of peanuts).
• Roast the peanuts properly - they shud be a nice pink-orange when you are done. DONT BURN THEM FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE!
• If using three green chillies ( one for each katori of sabudana and one for the kadhai is my measure) I add at least one to the peanuts while grinding them in the mixie.
• Grind the peanuts till almost powdery - BUT NOT TILL THEY START LEAVING OIL!
• Mix the soaked sabudana and the peanut powder. Add salt.
• Optional use of potatoes - whenever i have time, i add them - one for two katoris.
• If you can afford it - take that anyways - use pure ghee for the bhagar. I used to, now i compromise with oil! ( in case u use ghee, u have eat the khichdi hot - not re-heated).
• Have your chopped ( coarsely) green chillies and kadhi patta ready while the ghee/oil heats.
• Add some jeera and some pepper powder to the ghee and wait till the jeera sizzles.
• Now add the green chillies and patta - reduce heat and let the chillies redden nicely.
• Add potatoes and cook well if using - otherwise add sabudana-peanut mixture.
• Stir thoroughly in the kadhai - at this stage your sabudana shud be looking pure white, nicely soaked and quite dry...
• IF it has been that way, sprinkle a little milk - say two spoons - on the surface and then cover properly.
• Dont stir too often - let it cook undisturbed, till sabudana turns transperent.
• OPTIONAL GARNISHES: A SQUEEZE OF LIME, A TEASPOON OF SUGAR, GREEN CORIANDER AND GRATED GILA COCONUT.
• DAHI IS A MUST - YOU CAN ALSO MAKE A SPICY GREEN CHUTNEY IF YOU LIKE. (i make one with green chillies, coriander, jeera, peanuts and coconut).

ENJOY THE BEST B'FAST THAT MAHARASHTRA HAS TO OFFER...

Poha, again

This morning I declared to my father that I was planning to make Poha for Breakfast.
"Poha has no nutrition. Just empty calories" he commented.
I beg to differ, here'w why:

• Apart from the actual 'pohe' (puffed rice) you put stuff like green chillies, kadi patta and green coriander in it, plus a squeeze of nimbu at the end, all excellent source of Vitamin C.
• You can add any vegetable you want - this morning I added the 'in season' peas. That's protein + fibre and i am sure other good stuff.
• I always add peanuts to the 'bhagar' - a very nutty protein and iron.
• Then there are spices like turmeric which is an excellent anti bacterial agent.

Does any one need any more reasons to like this dish - the evergreen Maharashtrian breakfast?