Whole wheat pop tarts

Off late I've been quite active on the food blogging world and I don't exactly remember how but I came across this blog. I loved most of the recipes posted there but this one stuck on. Today I got down to making these.

Just for the reader's convenience, here goes a list of ingredients and method.
Ingredients for 4 pop tarts:
1 cup of whole wheat flour
1/2 cup unsalted butter - chilled
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup iced water
Jam as per sweetness desired
1 egg for egg wash

How I made it :
1. Mix the flour and salt in food processor.
2. Turn on food processor. Add the chilled butter cut into small cubes.
3. When you see crumbs, pour in the iced water until most of the dough collects together.
4. Take this out onto a floured surface.
5. Roll out. Cut into shape of choice.
6. Ensure that the shapes are not more than 1/4 inch thick.
7. Place some jam in the middle of one shape. Place another similar shaped and sized shape on top.
8. Seal the edges with a fork.
9. Apply egg wash.
10. Put in pre-heated oven at 190 degree C and bake for 20 minutes.

It was truly delicious. Do try it. Your kids will definitely love it. I am gonna make this time and again for sure.

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Broccoli Mushroom Pasta in a creamy tomato sauce

I hardly ever get pasta right. After talking to my good friend, I got some great tips. So today I got down to making some pasta. The conversation went something like this
Pras : "What is for dinner today?"
Moi : "Pasta. Shall we eat early today?"
Pras : "Yeah. I don't like your pasta so I will eat something else later."

Well, he did not eat anything else later. But, he licked the bowl clean. I've none left to carry to work for lunch tomorrow. So here's how I made the yummy pasta. I unfortunately don't have a picture that does real justice to it.

Ingredients for 2 servings:
Prep time : 10 minutes
Cooking time : 20-25 minutes

3 Amul Cheese slices - I did not have any other cheese at hand. You could replace this with any cheese of    
                                        your choice.
1 packet button mushrooms
1 small head of broccoli
100 g pasta of your choice - I used spirali - you could use more pasta. Ours had more veggies just the way I
                                           like it to be so
4-5 cauliflower florets(optional)
2 tbsp fresh cream - you could use milk
Salt to taste
3tbsp extra virgin olive oil - use any vegetable oil available at hand
1tsp red chilli powder - optional

To grind into a paste :
2 large ripe tomatoes
10 dry red chillies
7-8 cloves of garlic
1 tsp soya sauce
2 tsp vinegar

To garnish :
Fresh chopped dill leaves/coriander leaves

How I made it :
1. Cook pasta as per instructions on pack.
2.  Clean the mushrooms and quarter them
3. Boil the cauliflower and broccoli florets in turmeric water to get rid of any worms, if present. Drain the water after 2 minutes of boiling. This could be done in parallel with step 1.
4. Heat oil in a vessel.  This too could be done in parallel with step 1 after completing step 3.
5. Pour in the ground paste and let it cook for about 8-10 minutes on low flame.
6. Once it gets kind of dry, drop in the mushrooms. Fry till mushrooms are 3/4th cooked.
7. Drop in the broccoli and cauliflower florets.
8. Add salt to taste.
9. I also added a teaspoon of red chilli powder as I felt it was not that spicy. Always remember to keep tasting your food at each and every step. One of my friends knows whether the salt is sufficient or not from the smell of the food - I mean WOW!!!
10. The mushrooms would've left some liquid out. Melt in the cheese into this. Add the fresh cream too. Be careful as to not let the cheese stick to the bottom/sides of the pan/vessel.
11. Cook till the sauce thickens. Add the pasta and mix well. Adjust salt.  Mine was of a more runny consistency when I turned off the stove. The sauce thickened as it cooled. So please bear this in mind when deciding when to turn off the heat.
12. Garnish with fresh chopped dill leaves. Dill can be very over powering and requires some getting used to. Use accordingly. You could also use freshly chopped coriander leaves.

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Ash gourd sambar

Sambar is a very versatile dish - made in different ways across homes of south india. The sambar that I most like is one with loads of dal, thick and mushy. That with crumbled fresh idlies is a delicacy in itself. Pras told me one morning that I was not a good wife in that I was not giving him idli samabar, dosa, etcetera for breakfast. Basically he was fed up with the quick IT breakfast of oats, cornflakes, bread butter, sandwiches, etcetera. We all have but one life to live and if I did not cook all the variety of dishes there are out there NOW I would always regret it later on, if one exists. So I decided to make Idli and Sambar with a coconut chutney for breakfast this morning. Here goes the recipe for the ash gourd sambar.

Ingredients :
250 gms ash gourd/white pumpkin - chopped into pieces. I retain the skin. You could remove it too.
1/4 cup toor dal/sambar dal
a tiny handful of skinless masoor dal - optional
4 cloves of garlic
1 teaspoon ghee
1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
2 pinches of hing
1 teaspoon of mustard seeds
1 twig of curry leaves
1/2 tsp red chilli powder
1 tsp coriander powder
1 1/2 tbsp MTR Sambar powder
1 small-medium sized onion
1 tomato
1 tiny lemon sized tamarind ball dipped in water
1tbsp oil
Salt to taste
Coriander leaves to garnish

How I made it :
1. In a pressure cooker, add the sambar dal, masoor dal, garlic, turmeric powder, hing and ghee. Give one whistle on high and 3 on low.Ensure that you have sufficient water in the cooker. I usually soak the dal for sometime to reduce cooking time and making it more efficient. So I soak the dals for about 15 minutes. I add water such that the dals are covered and are 1 inch above dal level.
2. In a pan, heat oil.
3. Drop in mustard seeds into hot oil. Once they splutter, put in the curry leaves.
4. Then add the onion - chopped into cubes. Once they begin to turn translucent, add the ash gourd pieces. Fry for 2 minutes.
5. Add 1/4 cup water and cover and cook on low for about 5 minutes.
6. Add the red chilli powder and coriander powder. Fry for a minute or so.
7. Add the choppped tomato.
8. Fry till tomato is soft and easily gets smashed.
9. Add the boiled dal.
10. Add sambar powder, tamarind water and adjust salt as per taste. Boil for 15 minutes. You could give it a whistle or two in the cooker instead.
11. Add coriander leaves and serve hot.

Note : You could use any other vegetable of your choice too. Remember that Sambar is a versatile dish :)

I served it with idli. You could serve this with rice or loon-mirch paratha (Salt-Chilli paratha) too.
I follow Nag's Murugan Idli Shop recipe for the idli batter. I make enough to get one batch of idlies for two and two batches of dosas. We've stopped buying readymade batter and this one is always a success. Pras loves his dosas and he loves the way the ones made from this batter turn out. 

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Poached Pears with Walnut Chocolate Fudge and Creme Anglais

Yes Yes.. this is made multiple times on MasterChef. So basically my inspiration is from there. I did get firm pears while shopping for veggies this morning and after visiting http://thebarefootkitchenwitch.typepad.com/the_barefoot_kitchen_witc/2008/02/valentines-d-12.html and http://www.tarteletteblog.com/2010/10/recipe-gluten-free-spiced-poached-pears.html here's my version of the same.

Ingredients :
For Poached Pears:
4 pears - ensure that they are firm
Leftover kitsch from the canned peaches - you could just use water
Water to cover the pears completely
1 cinnamon bark
4 cloves
1 tbsp lemon juice
A handful of raisins

For chocolate walnut fudge (Adapted by recipe from Nestle Milkmaid):
1/2 tin milkmaid - I made an apple upside down cake with the other half
10g of chocolate - I used a piece of homemade ooty chocolate
1tbsp unsalted butter
2 tbsp cocoa powder
Chopped walnuts

For Creme Anglais (I look at this as a replacement to custard made from store brought powder):
2 egg yolks
1tbsp sugar
100ml milk
100ml fresh cream
1/2 tsp vanilla essence

How I made it :
Poached Pears 
1. Remove the peel of the pears. Place them in a tall pan. Cover with kitsch and water.
2, Add the cinnamon, cloves and lemon juice.
3. Bring to a boil and let it simmer away for about 30 minutes or so until the pears are cooked through. Poke with a toothpick to test. Always ensure that the pears are immersed in the water. You could keep turning them from time to time to ensure proper cooking on all sides.
4. When done remove the pears, drop in the raisins into the water/kitsch mixture and let the mixture continue to boil and reduce. Don't let it burn away. Do keep an eye on it.

Chocolate Walnut Fudge sauce :
4. Melt the butter and chocolate.
5. Add the cocoa powder. Cook for a minute or so.
6. Add the milkmaid and keep stirring till it thickens.Add the walnuts. Cool.


Creme Anglais :
7. Beat sugar and egg yolks till fluffy.
8. Warm milk and fresh cream along with vanilla essence till it is just up to come to a boil. Take off heat.
9. When the milk cream mixture is lukewarm, add it bit by bit ( mind you bit by bit) to the egg yolk mixture. Mixing continuously to avoid any lumps and curdling of eggs.
10. Put it back on stove on low heat. Continuously stir vigorously. Be very cautious at this step as the mixture could curdle with the cooking of the eggs. The very sign of a curdle, take off heat and place in an ice bowl. Blend it when cool and pass through strainer.It usually takes about 2 minutes or so for this to turn into custard - coats the back of the spoon and does not slide of completely.
Mine did begin to curdle but I had the ice bath ready.

Assembly:
Place the pear in a plate. Drizzle the walnut chocolate fudge sauce. You could thin it out by adding some warm milk. Ladle the creme anglais on the sides of the plate and then spoon some of the raisins along with the syrup too.
This tastes good chilled as well as warm.
We had it when it was warm. We've got more to have them when chilled. What I really liked was that this dessert is very light and not too sweet as with Indian desserts.

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Chicken Biryani

I had some pieces of chicken leftover from the barbecue experiment which was very successful. While walking past the neighbours house after picking up veggies, we took in the aromas of biryani. Our neighbours are muslims and needless to say we were immediately temped. I immediately jumped at the idea of making chicken biryani. So without much adieu, here is how I made it.

Ingredients :
250 gms chicken boneless
2 potatoes - quartered(optional)
1 cup basmati rice - wash and soak in 1.5 cups of water
3 medium onions
1/2 medium tomato
5 tbsp oil
4 cloves
1 inch stick of cinnamon
1 star anise
1 piece of mace
2 green cardamom
1/2 tsp garam masala

For the marinade :
1 tbsp curd
1 tsp coriander powder
1/2 tsp red chilli powder
1/2 tsp cumin powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 handful of coriander leaves
1/2 handful of pudina/mint leaves
2 green chillies
3 inch piece of ginger
8 cloves of garlic

Garnish :
Fried onions
Fried cashews
Fresh chopped coriander leaves

How I made it :
1. Grind the coriander, mint, green chillies, ginger and garlic. Add this with the remaining items of the marinade. Mix in the chicken and potatoes and leave aside.
2. Heat the oil and fry the onions till they turn a dark golden brown. Take out half this quantity.
3. Add the cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, mace and star anise. Fry for a minute till fragrant.
4. Now add the chicken along with the marinade and potatoes.
5. Fry for about 5 minutes, taking care not to break the pieces.
6. Add the tomatoes and fry till cooked.
7. Now add the rice. Fry for a minute.
8. Add the water. Adjust salt.
9. Add 1/2 teaspoon of garam masala. Optional.
10. Cover and cook on low till rice is cooked to your liking. I had to sprinkle some warm water in between too.
11. Garnish with the fried onions which were taken out in step 2. You could add some fried cashews and fresh coriander leaves.
12. I served it with a fresh dill raita.

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Grilled Cheese Sandwich

Ingredients :
Whole wheat bread - 2 slices
2 cheese slices
A little chopped onion
Pepper to taste
Chopped bell peppers
Butter about 1 tbsp
1 small green chilly finely chopped - adjust as per taste

How I made it :
1. Butter the bread.
2. Place a cheese slice on each slice of bread
3. Sprinkle some pepper. There is no need of salt as the processed cheddar cheese slices are already quite salty.
4. Sprinkle onions, green chillies and coloured bell peppers.
5. Grill in sandwich maker and voila hot, crispy sandwich is ready.

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Grilled Chicken in Peach Barbeque Sauce

I have been eyeing this recipe ever since I kept aside a few peaches whilst making the peach upside down cake. Also, with the advent of the masterchef series, I feel like exploring various cuisines more than ever. We had a similar dish with Mango at the new restaurant Mangrove in Kalyan Nagar but the icing on the cake is when your husband tells you that your version is much better than the one at the restaurant.

Recipe adapted from http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/2011/06/grilled-chicken-with-peach-bbq-sauce.

Ingredients for 2:
2 chicken breasts
For the sauce :
1/2 tsp soya sauce
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup tomato ketchup
1 tbsp lemon juice
2 peach halves leftover from the can
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste
For the glazed carrots :
2 carrots - sliced lengthwise into thin strips
1tbsp butter
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste

How I made it :
Preparing the chicken breasts :
Apply salt and pepper on the chicken breasts and leave aside.

Sauce :
Heat the ingredients for the sauce in a pan. Bring to boil and simmer for about 10 minutes till the peaches are melting away or the ladle easily passes through them. Cool and grind to a smooth paste.

Glazed Carrots :
Buzz the carrot strips with salt in the microwave for 2.5 minutes on high. Heat butter in a skillet and add the carrots. Stir till the carrots are well covered. Season with pepper

Grilling Chicken :

Once the sauce is ready, smear 1/2 of it over the breasts. Leave this aside for about 20 minutes.
Then comes the task of grilling for which I used our electric sandwich toaster/griller. Turn it on till the plate gets warm. Place the chicken breast, drizzle a bit of oil and close. Cook for about 2 minutes and then turn it. Apply some more sauce and cook for about 5 minutes and give it another turn once you start seeing tiny bits of brown.


Serve with herbed rice and/or mashed potatoes with the extra sauce at hand.

I did have a little hard time cleaning up the sandwich toaster/griller but it was well worth it. Do try and let me know :) 

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Whole wheat thin crust pizza with mushroom and coloured bell pepper toppings

This weekend I have been baking away like crazy. I baked a peach upside down cake, karela crisps and PIZZAAAAA. The cake turned out a bit too sweet. Lesson learnt - go with your gut and do not blindly follow a recipe. The peaches were poached in sugar syrup and I felt it would be better to reduce the quantity of sugar in the cake but since the cake had fresh ginger too, I thought that it required the sweetness.  Anyways, will master that the next time. Here's how I made the pizza....

Ingredients For 4 Medium Sized Thin Crust Pizzas:
For Pizza Base : 
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup maida/all purpose flour
1.5 tsp yeast
A pinch of sugar
1tsp salt
1 cup lukewarm water
1tbsp+1 tbsp oil

For toppings :
12 mushrooms - sliced
Coloured bell pepper - Sliced into rounds
Cheese - ideally mozzarella but I used cheddar as I had that at hand

For tomato sauce :
3 medium tomatoes
1 small onion
5 cloves of garlic
4 red chillies
1tsp pepper
1tbsp oil
Tomato ketchup - optional
salt to taste

How I made it :
Pizza Base :
1. Dissolve sugar in 1 cup warm water and add the yeast. Leave aside for 10 minutes.
2. Mix together salt, wheat flour, maida and 1 tbsp oil.
3. Make a well in the centre of the flour and add the yeast water.
4. Flour your kitchen top, roll out the flour and make a smooth dough.
5. Place this back in the bowl and cover with cling wrap and leave it in a warm place for 1 hour or until it rises. Since I made this in the evening, I left mine inside the car which was parked in the sun.

Tomato Sauce :
1. Heat oil in the pan.
2. Add the crushed garlic, red chillies, pepper and sliced onions.
3. Once the onions get translucent, add the tomatoes chopped.
4. Cover and cook till tomatoes dissolve when mixed. Turn off heat and rest. I had added some tomato ketchup mixed with a little water to help the tomatoes cook well.

Assembling the pizza :
1. Preheat oven to 200 degree C.
2. Cut the pizza dough into 4 balls.
3. Take one ball, flour the kitchen top and roll out the ball into any shape of your choice.
4. Spread the tomato sauce on the rolled out dough.
5. Sprinkle toppings of your choice and broken pieces of cheese.
6. Bake in oven for 25 minutes.

My pizzas got a nice crust on the corners and were soft towards the centre. The next time I may try baking the base separately before spreading on the tomato sauce to try to achieve a crusty pizza.

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Strawberry CheseCake

I remember making a no bake cheese cake from a recipe book printed by the Round Table group in Bangalore. It used Panneer/cottage cheese, milk maid and fresh cream. I somehow could not remember the recipe. So I browsed through some no bake cheesecake recipes and took a little bit of that and a little bit of this and out came a really good cheese cake. Take my word for it, it is the best cheesecake that I've made so far.

Ingredients :
1. 1 and 1/2 tubs of britannia cream cheese - about 275g
2. 1 tub of Nestle Strawberry Yoghurt
3. 1 tub of fresh strawberries
4. 200g of sugar + 2 tbsp
5. 200 ml of fresh cream
6. 1tbsp gelatin
7. 100 ml boiling water in which to dissolve the gelatin
8. 1 large packet of marie biscuits
9. 125 g of unsalted butter melted.

How to make :
1. Line your tray(in which you want to set the cake) with cling wrap such that the cling wrap is now your non-stick base.
2. Crumble the marie biscuits.
3. Add the melted butter to the biscuits.
4. Push this mixture to the botton of your tray and layer it evenly. Keep in the fridge to set.
5. Cream together the cream cheese and 200g of sugar. Try not to beat too much - I used the pulse option in my food processor.
6. Dissolve the gelatin in the boiling hot water by stirring. You could use the microwave on low power too to speed the process.
7. Add the strawberry yoghurt, fresh cream and gelatin to the cream cheese mixture and beat till creamy and smooth. Again, don't beat too much.
8. Get the tray out of the fridge. Pour the cream mixture over and put it back in the fridge to set. It needs about 4 hours to set.
9. Beat the fresh strawberries with the 2tbsp sugar (add more if you like) into a rough pulp.
10. Spread the above pulp on top of the cake when set. Garnish with fresh strawberries and serve. Do take out of the fridge at least 30 minutes before serving to soften the lower layer and ease your job in cutting.

I had made this for my hubby's birthday and therefore tried to pipe the pulp onto the cake but failed at the cone. I don't have a piping bag. I therefore used a toothpick and FREEHAND.

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Vegetable Fried Rice with scrambled egg

I love Fried Rice. I remember waiting to get home to eat mom's fried rice. Well, I went to a day cum boarding school so I was served lunch in school. Hence, I had to wait to get home to have the fried rice before dinner.
Well, to my mom for being a very good cook, here goes my version of the fried rice.

Ingredients :
1. 2 cups of cooked rice - best cooked the previous day. If making fresh, make sure you let it cool completely     and then do the rest.
2. 1 1/2 cups of vegetables - finely chopped carrots/beans/cauliflower/corn
3. 1/2 cup finely chopped capsicum
4. 1 medium onion finely chopped
5. 1 tablespoon finely chopped garlic
6. 1 tablespoon finely chopped ginger
7. 2 tbsp soya sauce
8. 1 tbsp oyster sauce
9. 1 tsp vinegar
10. 1 tsp pepper
11. 2 tbsp oil
12. 1 egg scrambled - do the scrambling separately in a different pan
13. salt to taste - be careful if you've salted the rice while cooking and do remember that soya sauce is salty too

How to make :
1. In a wok/kadai/pan, pour in the oil. Before the oil warms up, put in the garlic and ginger. Fry them till them brown.
2. Add the onions and fry till translucent.
3. Add the vegetables. Remember to do all of this on high heat. Hence, do have all ingredients on hand.
4. Once the veggies are almost cooked, add the capsicum. Add salt - be careful about the amount.
5. Fry for 30 seconds. Add the sauces one after the other, taking care not to let any of them burn.
6. Add the rice. Mix everything together.  Add the egg and sprinkle the pepper on the top.

Note :
1. You can skip the oyster sauce. Use 1 more tbsp of soya sauce instead.
2. You could use 5 bulbs of spring onion instead of an onion. Use the green part as a garnish.

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Strawberry Oats Cake

It is strawberry season here and I just dunno why but I picked up a pack of strawberries while we grocery shopping this weekend. When I found a tiny amount of oats remaining in a jar, I knew that I had to make the strawberry oats cake that I had seen on Aparna and Greeshma's blog - here. I was just hoping that I had the right amount of oats. Gingerly I opened up my laptop and found the recipe which is actually from this site. I was happy to see that it required just 1/2 a cup of oats. Since, it is just two of us, I usually make cakes with a cup of flour so I had to just halve the ingredients and 1/4 cup of oats is all that was needed.

As you all do know me by now, I just had to put in a twist or two.

Ingredients:
1. 1 cup of whole wheat flour
2. 1/4 cup of quaker quick coooking oats
3. 1 teaspoon of baking powder
4. 1 whole nestle strawberry yoghurt

5. chopped walnuts
6. A pinch of salt

7. 1 egg ( the original recipe indicates the use of a ripe banana which was, in my case, amidst gastronomical juices today)
8. 1/2 cup of sugar
9. 1/4 cup of honey
10. 1/2 to 3/4 cup of strawberries chopped (The cake was very moist due to the number of strawberries that I had put in. This reflects a modified moderate amount)
11. 1/4 cup oil
12. 2 tbsp of milk - can avoid if the batter is smooth

How I made it :
1. Sieve together the salt, baking powder, atta. Add the oats and walnuts.
2. Beat the egg with sugar, honey, oil.
3. Once the mixture is creamy, add the yoghurt and the dry mixture of step 1. Fold in the ingredients.
4. Add the strawberries. Mix softly. Add the milk if the batter is too thick and lumpy.
5. Bake for 45 minutes in a pre-heated oven for 45 minutes at 180 degree C.

This cake is quite moist and therefore can't be kept for more than a day.

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Beetroot halwa

I know most of my readers would not have opened up this post seeing the word "beetroot". If you've made it till here, I salute you for that. Beetroot is one good veggie for us. But that is not the reason I chose to make the halwa out of it.

Well, Hubby and I visited "Lumiere - The organic restaurant" on Christmas 2011. They have a very lovely place with great ambience. Fortunately, it was one restaurant that I've finally found in Bangalore that is not crowded on a holiday. I think it is attributed to the fact that most people misunderstand "organic" for "vegetarian". Ironically though, their board does have a picture of a prawn :) Check out their website here. Well, as a welcome drink, we were served a pinkish liquid. I assumed it was due to the root that is dissolved in the water by Mallus. One taste and I knew I was wrong, we were given a beetroot with lemon juice. It was really good. Hence, this week while grocery shopping, I picket up a few beetroots to try out this simple juice that was detailed out to us by the ever helpful waiter. However, I was still wondering what I would do with the beetroot pulp that would remain once I had extracted some juice. One moment I thought I'd make something like a tikki but with the success of the carrot halwa, I just knew what to do with the pulp. So here's how I made the beetroot halwa. I did not have milkmaid on hand this time so skipped it.

Ingredients :
1. 4 medium sized beetroots grated or blitzed in the food processor
2. 300 ml of milk
3. 60g of khova
4. 1 tablespoon of sugar
5. 3 tbsp ghee
6. 1 elaichi

How I made it :
1.  Heat up the pressure cooker. Pour in the ghee.
2. Add the elaichi. Once it is aromatic, add the beetroot. Fry for 2 minutes.
3. Add the milk. Close the cooker and boil till 5-6 whistles.
4. Once the pressure releases, cook on sim, add the khova and keep stirring frequently till all the milk is absorbed.
5. Add the sugar.
6. Turn off heat  once sugar dissolves.
7. Garnish with chopped dry fruits and serve. I dumped a handful of cashews and almonds in the microwave for about 1 minute. Once they had cooled, I chopped them. This makes them more crunchy.

Hubby certified that the beetroot halwa was more tasty than the carrot halwa. I guess it is just that since it was my second attempt, I got a better hang of it.

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