I have moved

I have moved to blogger

http://mowglichic.blogspot.com/

bookmark this page & change the webpage of

my blog in your blogroll to this!

Thanks!

DiDo

Palak kofta dum pulav – Spinach ‘kofta’ pulav cooked in convention

I love spinach. And the ease of buying frozen spinach results in me cooking it often. But for the past 1 month or so, I started hating spinach. But the hating didnt stand for long and yesterday I was craving spinach more than any other day. So I tried the palak kofta biryani of Tarla Dalal rather in my style. And, we ended up loving it.
I have given the recipe in steps, but u can go ahead and multitask it!

Step 1: making flavored rice

 
Wash 1 and half cup rice several time in cold water (I used thai sticky rice, but basmati is ultimate). Soak in water for 25 minutes. Drain and add more water, salt, 2 cloves, 1/2 inch cinnamon, 1 bay leaf and 1 crushed cardomom and cook in medium flame. After the rice is cooked al dente, drain the water, use a sieve here! Run under cold tap water and set aside.

Step 2: making spinach ‘kofta’

a)thaw 450g frozen spinach and press out all the water
b)boil 7 baby potatoes, peel and mash 4
c)mix with the spinach
d)In a skillet, add 1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste, 1 diced onion, spinach, mashed potatoes, turmeric, chilli powder and salt. Cook for 5 minutes. Allow the mixture to cool.
e) Take some of the cooled mixture and shape like a ball or flatten it by pressing lightly. This my friends, is the ‘kofta’.

NOTE: I have used extremely less ‘binding’ ingredient viz., here the potato. Hence while shallow frying them they tend to break. You might want to add some flour to retain the shape

f) Shallow fry the ‘kofta’ using a little oil and set aside. Makes 12

Step 4: Roast the onion and boiled baby potatoes

Roast around 1 medium sized chopped onion and remaining boiled potatoes. Set aside

Step 4: Making the gravy

Take quite a large saucepan from this step!

a)Saute 3 tsp ginger-garlic paste, 1/2 diced onion, chopped green chilli with 3tsp turmeric powder, 2 tsp chilli, 1/” tbsp garam masala

b) add 150 ml tomato puree, cook for 7 minutes

c) add 30ml cream and bring to a boil and simmer it in the pot

 

Step 5: Assembly

a) Arrange all the kofta except three on the top of the simmering gravy.

b) Layer the flavored rice and add 1 tsp ghee to the rice.

c) Layer the fried onions and potatoes

d) Add the remaining koftas

e) Take an aluminium foil and seal the pot

f) Allow to cook by convention for around 20 minutes. This process is called ‘dum’

g) Before switching off, open the foil carefully and add mint leaves. Close foil again and leave like that for 2 minutes.

h) While serving the dish, make sure you take the serving from all layers.

Looks colorful and its such a joy to mix and match the layers you want in your plate

Serve with ‘raita’

 

Must watch

“Avial” – vegetable stew in creamy yoghurt-coconut gravy

We are dragged out of our bed at wee hours like 3 or 4 AM. My sister still holds strong to her blanket. But somehow my mom suceeds in dragging the less than 10 year olds, sister siblings, to the bathroom for an elaborate “oil bath”, a tradition in South India followed strictly for kids, and especially on the day of festivals.

I cannot recall how my mom manages to drag us into the whole process, but after various gimmicks and struggle, another half an hour later, we are already wearing our traditional skirt and blouse (pavadai-chattai in Tamil). All these processes are so typical of those wonderful festival mornings, when we are left feeling grand because of our attire, happy because of festival goodies, sad because another of this day would come only an year later, sleepy and sort of feeling ecstatic after all that pampering with oil message on our little bodies and lastly, DAMN HUNGRY…

And does the food come soon to our little mouths? No. There follows the  elaborate “poojai” or prayers, when our eyes are fixed greedily at the stuff spread in front of the diety as an offering called “naivedyam”. We cant take our minds of the feeling of culmination of this wonderful festival stew “avial” with a fried lentil-spiced up savory the “vadai”. Of course we get continuously reprimanded by mom for our greed. But moms, for the sweethearts they always are, our mom speeds up the process of “naivedyam” for ritual sake and genuinely utter some real prayers in slow, final sentences that seems like eternity. As, at the end of the last whatever “namaha”, at her slight approving nod, we would run up and grab one nice “vadai” and the next minute its gone into our little stomachs.

“Avial” as the post title says is a wonder food with a culmination of some typical flavors of down south of India. You see, the vegetables are typical of the region and they join in hands with heavenly yoghurt and coconut gravy. The gravy is so ultimate that the never-ever-beans-eater like me or never-ever-carrot-eater like my sister, always forgot about our inhibitions and went ahead eating it. Basically because the beautiful mask the gravy gives and still preserves the uniqueness of each veggie. And what else? South Indian food have something in common, they are simple, straightforward, a poor-man’s no-fuss cuisine, but at the same it the culmination of flavors is so unique that the men were always wondering how the wife can cook up something so magical. And of course its utterly unparalled. Meaning, you cant compare it with other world cuisine. For example, the north Indian cusine, resonates with European (minus chilli of course). There are many similarities regarding the gravy culture, breads etc., between North-Indian and European cuisine. But South Indian cuisine is very unique. And there cant be a better example than avial.

(also low cal!!yeahh)

 

356 kcal

serves 2-3 people

Vegetables (120 grams):

I used

equal amounts of beans,

yam called “cheynai”,

white pumpkin,

vegetable banana,

drumsticks- hmm…not the ones u drum with, but this is typical veggie of Tamilnadu, a super heavenly & unique flavor

feel free to add peas, potatoes, carrots etc.,

• Boil these vegetables with a pinch of turmeric such that they are bite-crisp and not mashy. Make sure you order them properly while boiling, hard vegetables go first and the soft ones follow later
• Grind about 10 pieces of coconut (each 1 inch), along with 3 tsp cumin, 2 thin 1.5 inch sized green chilli, along with some of the water in which the veggies were boiled in
• Splutter 1 tsp mustars seeds in a saucepan
• drain the veggies
• Mix the ground paste with the veggies and add them to the pan
• Allow to cook/boil until the smell of cumin stops becoming overpowering
• Add 4 tablespoon of yoghurt
• Let the gravy simmer for 3 minutes
• Switch off the flame and add salt
• You may add a dash of coconut oil to make the recipe taste super-authentic.
• Serve hot with rice and ghee

-Divya