For the love of Biriyani

I Love Biriyani, any kind, veg or non-veg :) well, who does not? It’s one of those universally loved food. My love affair with biriyani has been lifelong thanks to my mom. My mom is a great cook, her awesome biriyani are always a great hit with everyone. And when I got married, I found out my mother-in-law makes great biriyani too. Both my mother and MIL make awesome biryani with just a pressure cooker. I kind of don’t attempt making biriyani when either of them is around. I make biriyani too with a pressure cooker or the automatic rice cooker; they taste good, like homemade, nothing to brag about or feature until now :). LOL. Thanks to my new friend Subha who shared a recipe with me recently and was totally thrilled to see how simple it was. Every time I googled for dum biriyani, it called for huge vessels with lid that are oven safe (which I don't have) and then the double work of cooking the gravy separate and the rice separate, layering it. Phew! Just reading it I would give up. Cos for me biriyani is a one pot cooking thing, easy and simple. 

Well back to the feature biriyani, The Chicken dum biriyani. You can find the recipe in the link. I just made very little changes to the recipe. I added the whole spices (the cloves, cinnamon sticks etc.) and black jeera (caraway seeds) to the rice while cooking; I saw this in another video. I also did not add whole black pepper corns, cumin powder or seeds and garam masala in the chicken marinade. Instead I added some biriyani masala I had at home. Used red food coloring dissolved in water instead if saffron. I did not have fried onions too, so I sautéed some thin slices (grated) onions till dark brown and used them.

Comfort food - The Indian way

When it’s raining heavily and the day seems to almost turn into night, all I can think of is warm comfort foods :) . So when it started raining cats and dogs couple of days ago, I found the perfect opportunity to try an Indian comfort food recipe, which I accidentally came across.  It’s an Indian chaat called Matar Chat, made from dry peas. Here’s the recipe I followed, it’s super simple and yummy. It’s a great combination of flavors. I love chaats. The only change I made was use green dried peas instead of yellow dried peas. The taste was unbeatable, its one fool-proof dish that would make your taste buds dance, did I mention that I love chaats :) LOL. Well, one tip I’ll give you is to add the dry ingredients while the peas are really hot, and then just let it sit for some time so that they can soak up all the flavors. 

A Bite to Remember

When your away from your home country, you miss a lot of things, family, friends, the home you grew up in, but food is something that tops the list too. Or at least for me. Somehow it does not matter how many Indian restaurants or take outs there are, it just does not replace the real deal, not to mention having to drive all the way to get them in the first place. 

This past week we've been missing our home town, especially the evening South Indian snacks :) How we miss having easy access to tasty tea time snacks, mainly the savoury ones. Bhajis, Bondas, vadais, Samosas, Egg puffs, chaats, LOL the list goes on. Don't get me wrong I love the food here, but its sometime just too sweet and we end up longing for something spicy to cleanse the palate. And that's when we miss home even more, we end up talking about how awesome it is back home, how easy it is to get something you wish. Even our sweet shops and bakeries have something savoury. 

So today I made one the easiest South Indian snack, the Bhaji :) (with potatoes) just to cherish and calm my taste buds :)

 

I'm not writing the recipe cos there are hundreds of them on the internet. But if any of you want it, let me know.

Apple - Banana Cake

What do you do when you have over ripe bananas, not fit to eat?  - You bake a Banana cake.  Or at least that’s when I bake them.  I had a recipe that used apple sauce and yogurt (curd) instead of too much butter, but like I mentioned in one of my previous posts, I lost all my recipes when we moved.  So I thought why not bake an apple - banana cake, hoping my son who hates fruits will somehow get some fruits into him. A part of me thought I was a genius to have come up with the idea of an apple-banana cake :D, but there were hundreds of recipes online for it. As usual, I didn’t have to look beyond 2 links. I found an easy and simple one, here is the recipe for the apple-banana cake.  I just made some changes to it.   Well, did my son eat it? – Nope :(

Actual recipe	Changes made
2 cups white sugar	1.5 cups brown sugar
2 tsp cinnamon	1 tsp cinnamon
2 cups all-purpose flour	1 cup all-purpose flour + 1 cup whole wheat flour
4 cups grated apple	3 cups grated apple
2 tsp baking soda	1.5 tsp baking soda

The 1st Birthday!

My baby boy turned 1 on June 5th, 2012. We wanted to have a party, to celebrate and praise God for this huge blessing He has showered upon us.

 I was inspired by my talented sister-in-law Rebekah to make her famous Martha Stewart pom poms as decorations. I first saw the pom poms on my baby shower, which my SIL and close friends Kezia and Sarah threw for me. They are so simple and pretty. I had bought a Birthday banner, and used it to pull the colors from and made these colorful pom poms :) Simple, pretty and cheap ;)

The Party in a  snapshot.

Quick and easy Chicken

I've realized that my brain works best when in a hurry :) Here's a really quick and easy chicken recipe I made on the fly this Sunday. I did not have the time to chop onion or tomatoes so I just threw in some ginger garlic paste, salt, chili powder, a spoon of yogurt (curd) for some body and a dash of lime juice stirred in the chicken and let it cook. And the result was a super tasty chicken. 

Here's what you need

• Oil - 2 tsp
• Chicken desired amount (I used boneless)
• Ginger garlic paste - 2tsp
• salt to taste
• Chili powder to taste
• Chicken masala - 1tsp if available
• Yogurt/curd - 1 tsp
• Juice of half lime (optional - for a tangy taste)

Method:

• Heat oil in a large pan (larger the pan, faster the cooking time). When hot add the ginger garlic paste, salt, chili powder, chicken masala and stir.
• Add chicken and keep stirring till all pieces are covered in the mixture. Add yogurt and stir.
• Add a splash of water and close the pan. Let it cook. 
• Open add the lime juice stir and close. Add a bit more water if the dish dries up before the chicken is cooked.
• If you need gravy just add more water and cook to the desired consistency. If you like it dry like in the picture, just let it cook without the lid till the water evaporates and dries up.

It goes really well with rice and sambar :) Or make it as a gravy and enjoy with rotis. 

Chewy Brownies...

This is one of the best and simple recipes I found after a long time for a brownie. I decided to bake some brownies as I had some left over cocoa powder from baking a cake on Easter. I then realized I had lost all my recipes while moving,  not that I missed my brownie recipe, my brownies were more like brownie-cakes,  they were soft, not dense nor chewy, but it did taste good. So I started searching the internet for an easy brownie recipe within minimum ingredients and steps and luckily my search was just 2 clicks away. The Chewiest Brownies from allrecipes.com. The secret to Chewy brownies - no baking powder or soda, why didn't I think of that! They only ingredient I added were some chopped walnuts.