Gajar Koshimbir

Koshimbir in marathi is similar to raita. Any combination of salad items with yoghurt or lemon juice can make a wonderful koshimbir. Maharashtrian favourite danyacha kut( coarsly grounded roasted peanuts) is also added to few of them.

This Gajar koshimbir is quick and can me made with minimun hassle. Its made with just 5 ingredients including salt. My mom made this for me once and since then it has become a regular in my household too.

Ingredients:

3 medium sized carrots grated

1 green chilli chopped

Juice of 1 lemon

Coarsly grounded roasted peanuts

Salt as per taste

Directions:

Just mix all ingredients together and the gajar koshimbir is ready to accompany your favourite food.

Don't go on its simplicity. Make it once and taste it for yourself. Its really very crunchy, tangy and will add a burst of flavour to your every bite. Enjoy!

Uttappa

Uttappa or the Indian Pizza as my husband calls it, is an eye appealing snack. Its easy to make, filling and healthy(as most of the south indian food is) at the same time.

Ingredients:

Dosa/Uttappa batter (refer my previous posts)

Onions finely chopped

Green chillies finely chopped

Tomatoes finely choppped

Oil

Salt as per taste

Directions:

Take the dosa batter thats fermented properly and add salt to it. Mix well.

Heat a griddle on medium-high heat. Brush some oil .

Now add a laddle full of uttappa batter and spread evenly using the bottom of the laddle. Form about 1/3rd inch think pancake.

Spread the chopped onions, green chillies and tomatoes on top.

After 4-5 minutes turn it to cook on the sides of the topping. Cook for few minutes.

Uttappa is ready. Serve hot with coconut chutney or just like that.

Its so easy to make, no wonder the picture posted above is the Uttappa made by my hubby. It tasted yum!

The Egg Affair

Egg is the saviour of all lazy cooks. Scramble, omlette, boiled eggs, egg curry, casserole, french toast and not to mention so many yummy desserts. Its nutritious and gives you a wide variety of recipes. Its the perfect binder and stabilizer.
Some quick egg recipes for a lazy day when we are in no mood of cooking but still want to eat something homemade.

Scrambled eggs:
Scrambled eggs are all about technique. Its just butter, eggs, milk or cheese, salt and pepper.
Add butter to the pan on medium heat. When butter melts add lightly beaten eggs (about 3 eggs). Keep stirring lightly with the spatula. Keep scooping with the spatula from oustide to the inside ( in a circular pan, its like drawing a radius over the egg mixture) and then spread again. Keep the motion on till the eggs mixture is still moist. Now add cheese, let it melt and mix with the eggs. When cheese is just mixed well, season with salt and pepper. Dont let the eggs dry up. Put off the heat when scrambled eggs are creamy. Serve with toast and some stirr fried vegetables.

Omlette: For Omlette no trick is required. Beat the eggs, mix finely chopped onions, green chillies and salt.You can also add your favourite vegetables like cabbage, capsicum, tomatoes etc. On a heated pan, brush some butter or oil. Pour the mixture and move the pan in circular motion for the mixture to spread evenly all over. When omlette is firm, you can turn it and cook on the other side. Serve with toast or chapati or just like that.

Half Fry: Heat little oil in a pan on medium heat. Break two eggs on the pan itself (beating not required). Let it spread on its own. Season with salt and pepper. Dont turn it, let the beautiful yellow yolks be seen whole on the white background. And dont overcook it. Trick is to cook it on medium-low heat.

French Toast: Whisk 3 eggs with 1/3 cup milk, sugar and some cinnamon/cardamom powder.
Soak the bread slices in the egg mix on both sides. In the pan spread liitle butter, when butter melts put the soaked bread slice and cook on both sides till golden brown. Serve hot with some strawberry or chocolate syrup on it.....yummy!

Savoury French Toast: This is my favourite dish. Beat 3-4 eggs, season with salt. Add chopped onions and green chillies. Now cut the bread pieces in diagonally into triangular halves. Soak the bread in the beaten egg mixture on both sides and shallow fry with some oil in the pan. Turn over and fry on the other side till it turns golden brown. Serve with tomato ketchup. Its really Yummy!

Boiled Eggs: Just boil the eggs with enough water to cover the eggs for around 20 min. When done peel, cut into half, season with salt and pepper. Enjoy!

Boiled Egg n' chutney Sandwich: Cut boiled egg into half. Spread green chutney on both halves of the Sandwich bun. Club the boiled eggs halves and onion slices between them.

Green Chutney: Grind together corriander, green chillies, mint leaves, and few garlic cloves and little cocunut. Add cumin seeds and salt for taste. Green chutney is ready.

Boiled Egg Bhaji: Cut the boiled eggs into small pieces. In a pan heat oil. Add Mustard and cumin seeds. Then add finely chopped one medium sized onion and few garlic cloves. Saute till onions turn light brown. Season with salt, red chilli powder(1/2 teaspoon) and garam masala (1/2 teaspoon). Now add the egg pieces. Saute well and serve with Chapati. Its tastes very good!

Egg Bhurji: Egg bhurji is the Indian scrambled egg. Here we put the tadka and cook the eggs really well till the egg mixture turns into small crumbles.
In a pan heat oil. Add mustard and cumin seeds. When they splutter, add finely chopped onions, garlic and green chillies. Saute till onions turn light brown. Now add turmeric and salt. Mix well. Now break the 3-4 eggs directly into this tadka. Mix well stirring constantly on medium-high heat. Stir well till the eggs turn crumbly and no moisture is left behind. All chunks of the egg mix should appear distinct. Oil will be seen on the sides of the pan. Egg bhurji is ready. Serve with Bread slices or chapati/paratha.

So many yummy and quick dishes can be made with eggs (though I have not covered the desserts here) and that makes it so adorable. Its a perfect breakfast element. Its a must in my kitchen!

Paneer Bhurji

Paneer bhurji is a quick dish made with paneer. Paneer is so versatile, I feel its the vegetarian's meat. But it delights the vegetarians and non vegetarians equally. From Kebabs, tikkas, different curries, paratha and bhurji too. Paneer can make a perfect recipe for special occasions as well as everyday cooking, like this one!

Ingredients:
Fresh paneer finely chopped or crumbled
1 Onion finely chopped
2 Green chillies
Few curry leaves
Cumin & mustard seeds
1 tbsp Oil
Salt as per taste
1 pinch of turmeric

Method:
In a pan heat oil and add mustard and cumin seeds. Add onions, chillies and curry leaves and saute till onions turn light brown. Add paneer and mix well. Now season with salt and turmeric. Cook for 5-10 min. Crumbled or chopped paneer cooks quickly. Paneer bhurji is ready in just 15 min.
Serve with phulka or paratha. Its good to go in lunch box too.

Tava Gobi/ Cauliflower in Griddle

Tava Gobi is an instant dry sabji that goes well with soft parathas or curd rice. Its simple recipe makes it ideal for the bachelors. Only extra thing to do here is the cleaning part of the cauliflowers. As we all know that a cauliflower may turn a veggie into a non-veggie :) (considering the insects it may have :)). It becomes so imperative to wash it thoroughly with salt in warm water. But don't be discouraged with the effort, as the end product is absolutely worth it!

Note the Ingredients:

Cauliflower florets thoroughly washed,

2-3 Garlic cloves

2 Green chillies finely chopped

1/2 tsp Mustard and cumin seeds

1 tbsp Oil

1 tsp Garam masala powder
1/2 tsp Turmeric

Salt as per taste(apprx 1/2 tsp)

Fresh Corriander

Method:

Heat oil in a tava/griddle. Add the mustard seeds, cumin seeds followed by pressed garlic cloves and Cauliflower florets. Saute on medium heat for about 5 min. Then add green chillies, salt, turmeric and garam masala powder. Cook uncovered for another 5 -10 min taking care that the florets dont stick to the tava. When done put off the heat.Garnish with fresh corriander/cilantro.

Serve the nice n crunchy tava gobi with chapati/paratha or curd rice.

Pav Bhaji

Pav Bhaji is another simple recipe. I am trying to make it more simple for the bachelor section.

Ingredients:
4 Potatoes
1 cup tomato puree
1/3 cup Green peas(optional)
1 1/2 tbsp Everest Pav bhaji masala
1/2 tbsp red chilli powder( or as per taste)
Salt for taste
4 tbsp Butter
Cilantro/Corriander for garnish

4-6 Pav or buns

Finely chopped onions and one lemon cut into quarter for serving


Directions:
Peel and dice the potatoes. In a pan add 2 cups of water and add the potatoes and boil.
Diced potatoes will cook fast and cooking in pan will save the cleaning effort of an extra vessel used for boiling potatoes :)

When potatoes are tender, mash them with a masher. Add tomato puree and rest of the ingredients. Add little water if required. Keep stiring till the nice familiar pav bhaji aroma starts spreading. Garnish with fresh chopped cilantro.

In another pan heat pav or buns with liberal amount of butter till light brown on both sides.

Serve bhaji and pav with finely chopped onions and lemon pieces. Put some more butter on bhaji while serving.

Tomato soup with Garlic Toast

The first thing my husband served me, after my tiring India to US flight, was Tomato soup and garlic toast. It was his rescue recipe and he survived on it for some 6 months.
He was using Campbell tomato soup and frozen garlic toast. But the soup was sort of not so tasty as my tastebuds were used to the flavourful and spicy indian food.

Then I showed him the twist to the tomato soup adding just simple flavours to it. And his eyes went bright when he tasted the same soup he was having for so many months.

Well, what I did was very simple.

Directions:

Pour the campbell tomato soup in a vessel, adding 1 cup of water. Bring it to boil. Add 1 tbsp butter, finely chopped garlic (2 cloves), some salt and pepper.Cook for 10 min. Garnish with chopped cilantro while serving.

Serve with Garlic toast. Texas toast in the oven 475F for 10-15 min.

Just the tomato soup and garlic taost can be comfort food in the winters.

Welcome to the Bachelor Cooking

These days we are visiting different countries, living away from families for work. For the bachelors it becomes difficult to manage the cooking along with long office hours. Even the separated(due to work related reasons :)) couples have to rely on outside food. But it will certainly have ill effects on the body in the long run.

Some of us might have never entered the kithcen or have a cooking phobia :)

This is my effort to offer some hassle free, easy to cook recipes for the people pressed for time and new cooks fed up with outside food.

Trust me cooking is fun and cooking all by ourselves is an achievement in itself!