Sweet corn masala

Hello everyone,

Yesterday went to big bazaar for some weekend shopping along with my hubby n kid. I picked a packet of sweet corn there. I remembered my mom had made this sweet corn masala when she visited us. I like the way side steamed sweet corn. I wanted to try out something different. I ended up making sweet corn masala for tea time.

Ingredients:-

Sweet corn - 1 cup
Bengal gram dal powder(Besan or kadalamavu) - 1/4 cup
Asafoetida powder - 2 tsp
Salt- to taste
Green chillies - 2(slit into round pieces)
Red chilly powder - 1 tsp
Refined oil - 1 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Curry leaves - 1

Preparation:-

First, boil the sweet corn in a saucepan after adding a cup of water to it. While the corn is getting ready, take a bowl and add the besan, salt, red chilly powder and asafoetida. Give it a good mix and then add water. You can add up to a cup of water. It should be very thin and watery. Since, the besan gets cooked in the water, adding more water will do more good than harm. Check the corn, if it has become soft, then remove it from flame and set it aside. If there is excess water, do not strain it, we can use them.

Add oil to a kadai and when the oil is hot, add mustard seeds, green chillies and curry leaves. When the rawness of these greens are gone, add the sweet corn. Add the watery mixture of besan to this and keep stirring with a ladle to avoid lump formation. Check the salt level. Once the besan is cooked, the mixture will thicken. Transfer it to a serving bowl and have it hot.

P.S:- Once you have transferred this masala to a bowl, you can optionally add few drops of lemon juice to get a tangy flavour. Also, while preparing the watery mixture of besan, you can add 1/2 tsp of garam masala to it.

Beetroot kurma

Hello everyone,

Yesterday, I had boiled the beetroot in pressure cooker and wanted to prepare beetroot curry. Due to shortage of time, I postponed it to evening. While on my way back home from work, the idea of preparing kurma struck me. My husband is a die hard fan of kurma, kootu and also such stuff. Inorder to impress the mouths I feed, one of them being that of my toddler, I decided to prepare the kurma. I had plans to make dosa and this kurma goes really well with that.

Ingredients:-
Beetroot - 1 cup, peeled and cut into pieces.

Water - 1/2 cup

Patta - 1 small piece

Bay leaf - 1

Turmeric powder - 1 tsp

Salt - to taste

Refined oil - 1tbsp

Ghee - 1 tbsp

Mustard seeds - 1 tsp

For grinding:-
Set 1:

Green chilly - 2

Red chilly - 3

Garlic - 6

Onion - 1 large

Set 2:

Coconut - 1/2 cup, grated

Perunjeeragam - 1 tbsp

Cardamom - 3 no.s

Preparation:-
Pressure cook the beetroot in 1/2 cup water for 1 whistle and set aside. Grind the set 1 ingredients. In a pan, add the refined oil and ghee. When they become hot, add the mustard seeds and let it splutter. Add the bay leaf and pattai. Add the ground paste of set 1 and fry it until the raw smell goes off. Add the cooked beetroot along with the water and the turmeric powder and stir it. In the meantime, grind the set 2 ingredients and add it to the pan. Add salt and let this come to a boil. You can add the water as per your consistency preference. Transfer this to a serving bowl. This goes really well with dosa, chappathi and rice.

P.B- Since beetroot is on the sweeter side, you can add more chillies if you prefer it on the spicier side. Instead of beetroot, you can use any vegetable of your choice. You can also have an assorted set of veggies. Add tomato, if you want the kurma to be a little tangy.

Thengha aracha kozhambu

Hello everyone

Made thengha aracha kozhambu today. My mom prepared very good thengha aracha kozhambu and I wanted to try it out today. I was tired of preparing the same sambhar and rasam over n over again. So tried out this kozhambu for a change. Drumstick pieces and ladies finger pieces make very good thaan for this.

Ingredients:-
Drumstick - 1 in number cut into 1" pieces
Vendakkai - 6 in number cut into 1/2" pieces
Tamarind juice - 1/4 cup
Turmeric powder - 1 tsp
Grated coconut - 1/2 cup
Methi seeds - 2 tsp
Red chillies - 6
Oil - 1tbsp
Ghee - 1 tbsp
Curry leaves
Mustard seeds - 2 tsp
Coriander leaves

Preparation:-
Take 1/2 tbsp of oil and heat it in a kadai. Fry the red chillies and keep them aside. Fry the methi seeds till they turn dark brown and remove from heat. Once this has cooled down, put the grated coconut and red chiilies in a blender and prepare a smooth paste. Towards the end, add the methi seeds and blend it again. Methi seeds should not be ground more as they taste little bitter. Slight blending is sufficient.


In the meantime, in a kadai boil the drumstick in enough water. Once the drumstick is half cooked, add vendakkai. Also, add turmeric powder to this. Once the vegetables are almost cooked, add tamarind juice and salt and let it boil. Once the vegetables have soaked up the flavours. Add the blended coconut paste. Make sure you have set the heat to SIM. Once the kozhambu froths up, turn off the stove and transfer it to a hot pack immediately. Garnish it with coriander leaves.

For tempering, take 1/2 tbsp of oil and a tbsp of ghee in a kadai Once this is hot, add the mustard seeds and wait till it splutters. Once they start spluttering, add the curry leaves and fry it till they turn dark green. Add this to the kozhambu. Before you serve, you can stir this and serve.

This kozhambu goes really well with rice.

Kothamalli chutney

Hello,

Prepared kothamalli chutney today. I had a bunch of kothamalli lying in my fridge for the past few days. Prepared dosa today and made this yummy chutney to go with it. Read on to know more on the ingredients and preparation.

Ingredients:-
Kothamalli(Coriander leaves) - 1 bunch.
Grated coconut - 3 tbsp
Tamarind paste - 1 tbsp
Asafoetida powder - 2 tsp
Red chillies - 4 to 5
Whole urad dal - 2 tbsp
Salt- to taste
Refined oil - 1 tbsp


Preparation:-
Fry the red chillies in 1 tbsp oil. Transfer the chillies sans oil to a plate. Put the whole urad dal and fry them. Transfer this to a plate. Add coriander leaves and fry them until they become soft. Put the coriander leaves, coconut, red chillies and whole urad dal along with salt in a mixie and blend it to a paste. Add  tamarind paste and blend it again. Check the salt and add little water as per your preference. Blend it again and transfer this to a bowl.

Vendakka curry

Hello everyone,

Yesterday I prepared vendakka curry for dinner to go along with rice and rasam. Vendakka is a hot shot favourite among many. Please read on to know more about the recipe.

Ingredients
Vendakkai(Ladies finger) - 1 cup, finely chopped in round shape
Refined oil - 2tbsp
Mustard seeds - 2tsp
Red chilles - 2
Asafoetida powder - 1tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Split urad dal - 2 tsp
Salt - to taste

Preparation:-
Heat oil in a kadai. When the oil is hot, add mustard seeds and let it splutter. Add broken red chillies and split urad dal and fry them. Add the vendakkai to this and fry for few minutes. Cover it with a lid. Keep checking this frequently so that you don't burn the vendakkai. Once the vendakkai becomes soft, add turmeric, asafoetida powder and salt. Fry them again and cover it. Once the vendakkai soaks up the spices and gets fried nicely, you can turn off the stove and transfer it to a bowl.

Make sure you handpick the vendakkai. When you buy vendakkai from the shop, pick up the soft ones.

Karadayan nombu adai

Hello everyone,

Celebrated karadayaan nombu yesterday. Made sweet adai and spicy adai. Sweet adai turned out to be very sweet. But, the spicy adai was really good. Read on to know more on the ingredients and preparation.

Sweet adai
Ingredients:-
Rice flour - 1 cup
Jaggery - 3/4 cup
Water - 1 cup
Cardamom - 5-6 nos nicely powdered
Coconut pieces - cut into small, around 1/4 cup
Karamani - 1/4 cup Roasted and then pressure cooked for 1 whistle.
Unsalted butter

Preparation:-
Fry the rice flour in a heavy bottomed pan until it emits a nice aroma. Make sure not to burn the rice flour. Transfer it to a plate and set aside. Dissolve the grated jaggery in 1/2 cup of water and let it stand for a few minutes so that the fine sand and other waste material will settle down to the bottom. Filter this out and transfer it to a heavy bottomed pan along with 1/2 cup of water. When the jaggery and water mixture is about to boil, put the roasted rice flour, powdered cardamom, coconut pieces and karamani. Keep mixing without forming any lumps. If you need more water, pour more hot water little by little. It will become a nice dough. Transfer this to a bowl and make into small balls. Spread it onto idli plates making a small dent at the center and steam them in a idli cooker. Keep on high flame for 5 mins and low flame for another 5 mins. Once the cooker cools down, transfer the adai to a bowl.

Kara adai
Ingredients:-
Rice flour - 1 cup
Water - 1 cup
Coconut pieces - cut into small, around 1/4 cup
Karamani - 1/4 cup Roasted and then pressure cooked for 1 whistle.
Refined oil - 1 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 2 tsp
Asafoetida powder - 2 tsp
Green chillies - 3 no.s
Salt - to taste
Unsalted butter

Preparation:-
Fry the rice flour in a heavy bottomed pan until it emits a nice aroma. Make sure not to burn the rice flour. Transfer it to a plate and set aside.

Heat 1 tbsp oil in a kadai and when it is hot add  mustard seeds to it. When mustard seeds starts spluttering, add the green chillies and fry them until the rawness goes off. Add the asafoetida powder and make sure you don't burn it. Add 1 cup of water along with salt and wait till it boils. Add the roasted rice flour, coconut pieces and karamani. Keep stirring and avoid lump formation. If you need more water, add hot water little by little. Once it forms a nice dough, transfer it to a plate. Make small balls out of it and spread it onto an idli plate with a dent in the center. Steam them for 5 mins on high flame and 5 mins on low flame in an idli cooker. Once the cooker cools down, transfer them to a serving bowl.

You must be wondering about the butter part in ingredients. When you eat the adai, eat it with unsalted butter. 

Cheru payar thoran

Hello everyone,

Yesterday night I prepared cheru payar(Green moong dal) thoran. Thoran is a kerala style preparation with coconut in it.

Ingredients:-
Green moong dal(Cheru payar) - 1 cup, pressure cooked
Oil - 1 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 2tsp
Red Chilli - 2
Asafoetida powder - 1tsp
salt - to taste

To grind:-

Grated coconut - 1/4 cup

Green chilly - 2 ( or as per your preference)

Garlic - 3 

Preparation:-
Pressure cook the green moong dal in enough water for 1 whistle. Do not drain the water after cooking. This water can be used while cooking.

Heat 1 tbsp oil in a kadai and once it is hot, put mustard seeds. Add broken red chillies, when the mustard seeds starts spluttering. Add the boiled green moong dal(along with the water), salt and asafoetida powder. Mix this well. In a mixie, grind the coconut, green chillies and garlic. Add this to the kadai and mix it. Once the water is absorbed, switch off the stove and transfer it to a serving bowl. You can have this thoran with rice. My folks just loved it.

Thengha chammanthy

Good morning everyone

Today I am going to post my way of preparing thengha chammanthy aka thenghai chutney. I was in a hurry-burry this morning and wanted to prepare chutney quickly. You can save time in the morning, if you stock up on grated coconut and peeled shallots over the weekend or the previous night.

Ingredients:-
Grated cocunut - 1/2 cup
Green chillies - 2(you can vary this as per your spice preference)
Onion shallots - (peeled)4 in number
Salt- to taste

Preparation:-
Put grated coconut, green chillies, shallots and salt in the mixie and grind it to paste adding little water. Use can also use small quantity of tamarind juice while grinding to get that tangy taste. I did not use it my preparation. Transfer this to a bowl. This goes really well with idli that I prepared. Optionally, you can splutter a tsp of mustard seeds in refined oil along with curry leaves and add it to the chutney. If you are planning to use this with rice, then add tamarind juice and do not add too much of water.

Kadalama daanger

Hello everyone,

Just finished dinner and got online to post this recipe on kadalama daanger. I am not sure how it got its name of daanger. Basically the main ingredient that goes into it is kadalamaa or besan or bengal gram powder. This one can be made in a fraction of a second and it goes really well with chappathi. My day was very hectic and when I got back home, cooking was the last thing on my mind, but still I got myself to make this one. Here you go....

Ingredients:-
Besan(Kadalamaa) - 1/2 cup
Water - 1 cup
Salt- to taste
Green chillies - 2 in number or as per spice preference cut into round pieces.
Asafoetida powder(Perunghaayam podi) - 1 tsp
Lemon - 1 medium sized
Refined oil - 1 tbsp
mustard seeds - 1 tsp

Preparation:-
Mix the kadalamaa and water without any lumps along with required amount of salt. Add asafoetida powder also to it. It should be watery and consistent.Put a kadai on medium heat on to the stove. Once the kadai is hot, pour refined oil and wait for it to become hot. Once it becomes hot, put mustard seeds. When the mustard seeds starts spluttering, put the green chillies and fry until the rawness goes off. Put the watery mixture of besan onto the pan and start stirring. Do not stop stirring otherwise lumps may get formed. Once the besan thickens or becomes medium consistency, then you may stop stirring. Taste and check if the besan is cooked. If not add more water and keep stirring. Once its cooked,  remove it from the stove. Cut the lemon into half and squeeze the juice onto it. Mix well and transfer it to a serving bowl. You can have this with chappathis.

P.S:-If you have any clue on the name daanger, then please share it with me. I have heard that daanger can also be prepared out of ulutha maa or urad dal powder. Never tried it though.

Curd rice

Hello everyone,

Many a times, my mallu friends come up to me and enquire about preparing curd rice. For them, it seems to be an herculean task. Its quite simple and can be made in a jiffy provided you have curd and rice. Tam brams are very famous for curd rice. My mom used to prepare very good curd rice and I used to exchange it with my friend's lunch boxes.

Here, I will be providing two versions of curd rice aka thayir sadham. One for hot season and another for cold season.

First, I will post the hot season one.

Ingredients:-

Cooked rice - 1 cup. Raw rice or boiled rice will do. Its left to you which one to choose. But do not prepare curd rice out of the brown kerala rice.

Milk - 1 cup

Curd - 2 tbsp

salt - to taste

Preparation:-

Beat the cooked rice using a spatula along with required amount of salt. Rice will get mashed faster if it is hot. Add milk to this mashed rice and again mix it well. To this add the curd and again mix it. Use only the spatula for mixing. Transfer it into a lunch box and leave it. It takes around 4-5 hours for this rice to curdle up properly. It will not taste sour as we have used milk instead of using curd completely. You can have this with any pickle of your choice and it will taste heavenly. It soothes the body in the hot weather.

Next, we will see the cold season one

Ingredients:-

Cooked rice - 1 cup.

Buttermilk/curd - 1&1/4 cup

Refined Oil - 1 tsp

Mustard seeds - 1 tsp

Green chillies - 1(use more if you like it spicier). Cut it into small round pieces.

Curry leaves - 6 in number

Asafoetida(hing/perunghayam powder) - 1 tsp

salt - to taste

Preparation:-

Mash the cooked rice using a spatula along with salt and keep it aside. Take a pan and put it on SIM mode on the stove. Pour oil to it. Once the oil is hot, put the mustard seeds and let it splutter. Once it stops spluttering, put the green chillies & curry leaves and fry. Put the asafoetida powder. Make sure you dont burn the powder. Transfer the mashed rice to this pan and pour butter milk/curd on top of it. Make sure your stove is set to emit minimum heat as butter milk/curd may split on high heat. Mix everything properly and check the salt. Add if required. Once the curd rice becomes hot, transfer it into a hot pack or casserole. Since, curd and butter milk is cold, for cold weather this would be ideal way to have. You need not even have pickle to go with it. Here we have not added milk because, in cold weather curdling process is slowed down and also its preferred to have it hot.

Left over rice is an excellent candidate for preparing curd rice. Prepare your curd rice and let me know.

Idli batter

Hello everyone,

This is my first post on this blog. Even though, I have tried quite a few recipes, I never got myself to the blog to jot it down for future reference. I finally decided to post them for posterity. Let me start by posting the preparation of idli batter.

Ingredients:-

Boiled rice(Puyukkal ari, idli rice) - 4 cups washed and soaked for 4 hours in water

Whole urad dal(Uzhunnu parippu) - 1 cup washed and soaked for half an hour

Soak 2-3 tsps of methi seeds(uluva) along with the urad dal.

Salt to taste

Proportion to be followed is 4:1(4 cups of rice and 1 cup of urad dal)

Preparation:-

Grind the urad dal and methi seeds together in a mixer or grinder adding water in small quantities. Grind until it becomes soft. This mixture should be such that you can take it out using your hand. If you add more water while grinding, this mixture will become watery. Care should be taken while adding water. Transfer this mixture to a large vessel. Vessel should be large enough so that the batter does not spill out when it foams up

Now take out the rice from the water and start grinding the rice by adding water in small quantities. This mixture should be ground properly and pour it to the vessel Once you have finished grinding the rice, add salt to the vessel with the batter as required and blend the mixture using a ladle. Do not blend this mixture after this.

Keep this in room temperature for 6 hours or until the batter foams up. This can vary depending on the local temperatures. Hotter the weather, earlier the batter foams up. Store the batter in fridge. Remove the required quantity into a small vessel when you prepare idli instead of removing the entire vessel from the fridge. The top portion of the batter is always good for preparing idlis. When you reach the bottom, you can use for preparing dosas.

Before pouring the batter onto the idli plate. Grease them with little oil, preferably gingely oil. I use Idhayam nallayennai. Fill the idli plate cup only 3/4th so that when it gets cooked, it will not get out of shape because of the overlapping of the other plates. Fill the idli cooker with enough water(water should be below the level of the lower plate) and put it on the stove in SIM mode. Place the idli plates on top of the other and make sure that the holes alternate. Close the cooker and put the stove on HIGH flame for 5 minutes and SIM for another 5 minutes or until you hear the cooker letting out a whistle. Remove it from stove and allow it to cool for another 5-10 minutes. Remove the idlis from the plate using an idli spoon. Dip the idli spoon in water to make sure that the cooked idlis dont stick on to the spoon and come out in proper shape from the plate.

You can have these idlis with chutney. Posting the picture of my elgi ultra 2 litre grinder