Aloo bhaji

I hate doing deep frying and hence find some reason or the other to avoid it. My family loves eating all fried items like appalam, vada, bhajji etc. When my mom visited during X'mas holidays, I asked her to prepare poori and I made this potato bhaaji to go with it.

Ingredients:-

Potato - 2 large, pressure cooked and mashed(not fine, but few chunks here and there would be nice)
Onion - 1 large, chopped fine
Ginger - 1 inch piece, chopped fine or grated
Green chilly - 1 or 2 depending on your spice tolerance
Curry leaves - few
Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
Gram dal - 1 tbsp
Turmeric powder - 1tsp
Refined oil - 1 tbsp
Salt - to taste
Lemon - juice of half lemon
Water - 2 cups
Coriander leaves - for garnishing

Preparation:-

Heat oil in a kadai and add mustard seeds when oil is hot. Once they start spluttering add gram dal and fry until golden brown. At this stage, add onion, green chillies and curry leaves. Saute till the onion turns translucent and green chillies are fried. Add turmeric powder and give it a quick mix. Now add the mashed potato and salt. You can mash it with a ladle or a potato masher. Don't mash it into a paste. Mix them thoroughly and add 2 cups of water. Allow it to boil. Transfer it to a bowl and squeeze the juice of half a lemon and mix it. Garnish with coriander leaves.

Tomato thogayal

I wanted to prepare some super quick and easy chutney to go with Idli the other day. The only thing in my fridge was some tomatoes. I came up with this tomato thogayal.

Ingredients:-

Tomato - 2 medium, chopped fine
Urad dal - 1tbsp
Red chillies - 2
Gingely oil - 1tsp
Salt - to taste

Preparation:-

Heat oil and add urad dal and red chillies when hot. Roast them until dal turns golden brown and chillies are fried. At this stage, add the tomato and salt. Fry for 2-3 mins and set aside to cool. Grind this into a coarse paste without adding water in a mixie. Serve this with idlis topped with some gingely oil.

Bhelpuri

I made super quick bhelpuri at home one day with not much fancy ingredients. I used up whatever was available at home at that time. This is my super quick version of this chat. Try it out

Ingredients:-
Puffed rice/mutta pori - 1 cup
Onion - 1 medium, chopped fine
Tomato - 2 medium, chopped fine
Coriander leaves - chopped fine
Murukku - 2 tbsp. I only had murukku at home which I broke with my hands to get the crunchy effect of sev(omapodi). You can use sev instead if you have.
Tomato ketchup - 1tbsp
Vinegar -1 tsp
salt - to taste

Preparation:-
Mix together puffed rice, onion, tomato, coriander leaves, crumbled murukku nicely in a wide bowl. Now add vinegar and tomato ketchup and mix it. Check salt and add as required. You are ready to munch you super quick bhelpuri now.

Kothu chappathi

Whenever we have left over chappathis, I store them in fridge in a air tight container to prepare this kothu chappathi. No side dish required to eat this and makes up a complete meal on its own.

Ingredients:-

Chappathi - 4, chopped into small strips
Mixed vegetables - 1 cup. Cauliflower, carrot and frozen peas is what I used and the quantity should me more than the quantity of chopped chappathi.
Onion - 1 medium, finely chopped
Refined oil - 2tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Mustard seeds - 1tsp
Chilli powder - 1tsp
Salt - to taste
Coriander leaves - chopped fine for garnishing

Preparation:-

Heat oil in a kadai and add mustard seeds once oil is hot. When mustard seeds start spluttering, add onion and fry until translucent. Now add the vegetables, except the frozen peas. Add turmeric powder and give it a good mix. Cover with a lid and let it cook on very small flame. Keep checking in between to avoid burning. Once the vegetables are semi cooked, add salt and continue to cook with lid closed. Once vegetables are cooked, add frozen peas along with chilli powder and saute for few seconds. Add the chopped chappathi and mix it thoroughly. Once the chappathi is uniformly heated up, transfer it to a bowl and garnish with coriander leaves.

You don't need anything to go with this, if at all, you can try with some tomato ketchup. This is best eaten hot.

Gongura dal

Gongura dal

Gongura is known as sorrel leaves in English and pulicha keerai in Tamil. It tastes sour and hence the name.

I've tried gongura chutney and dal but felt the sourness is suppressed better with dal.

Ingredients:-
Sorrel Leaves - Just the leaves, two handful
Toor dal - 1/2 cup(around 100g)
Onion - 1 big, finely chopped
Garlic - 5-6 pods, finely chopped or crushed
Refined oil - 2 tsp
Mustard seeds/kadugu - 1 tsp
Methi seeds/uluva/menthayam - 1tsp
Sambar powder - 2 tsp(or use 1 tsp - chilli powder + 1tbsp - coriander powder)
Turmeric powder - 1tsp
Curry leaves - few
Water - enough to pressure cook toor dal. I used around 2.5 cups

Preparation:-
Wash and soak toor dal for around 30 mins. Discard water and add fresh water. Pressure cook toor dal along with a tsp of turmeric powder for 3-4 whistles and set aside to release pressure on its own.

Take a kadai, add refined oil. When the oil is hot, add mustard seeds and let it splutter. After that, add methis seeds and fry till its golden brown colour. Now add, onion, garlic and curry leaves and saute till onion turns translucent and the rawness of garlic is gone. Add the washed sorrel leaves at this stage and little salt. Fry it until sorrel leave turns mushy, will take around 5-10 minutes. At this stage, add the toor dal, sambar powder and more salt(if required) and let it come to a boil.

Transfer it to a serving bowl and serve hot with rice and papad.

Dalia and moong dal upma

Since winter started here, one or the other family member is sick these days. I decided to make khichdi with dalia one night. I didn't have cracked wheat. Instead used broken wheat and thought of making it finer by just putting it in the mixie. By the time, I got myself to prepare dinner, I didn't have the energy to break the wheat fine or cut the vegetables. This is how I discovered/invented ;-) dalia upma with moong dal.

Ingredients:-
Broken wheat - 1 cup
Moong dal - 1/4 cup
Pepper powder - 1tbsp
Onion - 1 medium(finely chopped)
Garlic - 5 cloves(chopped fine)
Refined Oil - 1tbsp
Mustard seeds - 1tsp
Cumin seeds/jeera - 1tsp
curry leaves - 1 spring, remove the leaves.
Water - 2 cups

Preparation:-

Take a kadai and first dry roast broken wheat until you get a nice aroma. Transfer it to a bowl and next dry roast moong dal. Moong dal will turn slightly golden in colour letting out a nice aroma. Transfer it to another bowl and wash it and set aside.

In the same kadai, add little oil. Since, we had sick people at home, I didn't use ghee and instead used refined oil and that too very little. When the oil is hot, add mustard seeds, when they crackle, add cumin seeds and curry leaves. Cumin seeds will start sizzling. Next, add chopped onions and garlic. Fry them until onions become translucent. Add pepper powder to it and quickly fry it making sure not to burn. Add the washed moong dal and dalia and give a quick mix. Transfer this to a steel container and add 2 cups of water and sufficient salt.  Put a pressure cooker with sufficient water. Put the plate inside the cooker. Put the steel vessel and close it with a lid. Close the cooker and wait till the steam comes out of the nozzle. Put the weight on the cooker and pressure cook for 3 whistles in medium flame. Wait for the pressure to release and relish the hot and tasty upma. We were so hungry that I could not take any pictures.

Hyderabadi bhagara bhainghan masala

I had a bunch of brinjals lying in my fridge for some time. I wanted to try some dish to go with chappathi to be made out of this. I came across this recipe on one of the blogs that I frequent and decided to try it out my way.

Ingredients:-
Brinjals/Kathirikkai - 6 small ones, slice along its length into four pieces.
Peanuts(unsalted) - 1tbsp
White sesame seeds - 1 tbsp
Coconut - 1tbsp
Turmeric powder - 1tsp
Chilli powder - 1tsp
Coriander powder - 1tsp
Green chilly - 1 chopped fine
Onion - 1 large, chopped roughly
Tomato - 1 medium, chopped roughly
Ginger - 1" piece, chopped roughly
Garlic - 4 cloved, chopped roughly
Mustard seeds - 1tsp
Fenugreek seeds - 1tsp
Curry leaves - few
Coriander leaves - for garnishing
Salt - to taste
Refined oil - 1tsp + 1tbsp for frying onions and for frying brinjals respectively
Water - 1 cup

Preparation:-
Dry roast the white sesame seeds until it turns slightly brown. Transfer it to a vessel. Dry roast peanuts next until it turns brown and set aside. Next dry roast, coconut until it turns brown and transfer it to a bowl.

Heat a kadai and add a tsp of oil. Add onion, ginger and garlic to this and fry it until brown. To this, add tomato and salt. Continue frying this until tomato turns mushy. Now, add turmeric, chilli and coriander powder. Mix it well and remove it to a bowl for grinding along with sesame seeds, peanut and coconut. Grind this into a smooth paste adding enough water.

Heat a tbsp of oil in a kadai. Add mustard seeds when hot. Once the mustard seeds splutter, add fenugreek seeds and curry leaves and fry for few seconds. To this, add brinjals and fry till it becomes soft. Set this aside. In the same kadai, add the ground mixture and fry it till it leaves the side of the kadai. At this stage add a cup of water and mix it. To this add brinjals and cook until brinjals are soft. Transfer it to a serving bowl and garnish with coriander leaves.