Sambharo - Cabbage Salad

Sambharo is a Gujrati Cabbage Salad that is served as accompaniment to main meals. I often use this as filling for my sandwiches and it increases the taste largely. In my preparation I have substituted raw green mangoes with touches of vinegar, but original Sambharo requires green sour mangoes in good measure. Ingredients:                                         Cooking time:10 minutes ü  1 cup of cabbage, julienne cut ü  1 medium sized carrot, julienne cut ü  1 capsicum or bell pepper, julienne cut ( I have used red bell pepper) ü  2-3 green chillies, julienne cut ü  1/2 tsp of turmeric powder ü  1/2 tsp of mustard seeds ü  1 tsp of sugar ü  1 tbsp of vinegar ü  5-7 curry leaves ü  Couple of pinches of salt to taste ü  1 tbsp of white oil Method: 1) Cut all the vegetables and mix vinegar with them. 2) Heat oil in a skillet. Add mustard seeds and curry leaves when oil becomes smoking hot. Add all the vegetables and turmeric powder. Sauté on medium heat till vegetables turn a bit tender. Add salt & sugar. Stir around for a while. Remove from the flame. 3) Serve hot or use as filling in a sandwich.

Potato Masala Sandwich

Recently I read an informative article upon spices. I never had any clue of information that apart from enhancing the taste spices contribute to killing bacteria and prevents food-poisoning. I also came to know that the trend of using more spices grew in tropical countries due to the reason of foods spoiling sooner in hot and humid weather than the colder ones. Now that's a nice bit of information. Isn't it? From now on while eating a spicy dish, think of all the good effects of spices rather than worrying over stomach doldrums.

If you are on a diet and want to avoid carbs, this sandwich is not meant for you, but if you are like me going by the demands of your palate, potato masala sandwich would be a toothsome treat to feast upon. I just love to have such sandwich once in a while during the weekdays.

Hilsa with Eggplant - Ilish Macher Jhal Begun Diye

This is a very simple, yet tasty Elish cuisine my mother used to prepare at home during monsoon when Ilish sale remains at its peak. The flavour of soft brinjals blending with that of hilsa makes it an exotic item to relish. The pungent smell of mustard oil adds to the savouriness further. A warming meal of Elish Brinjal curry served with rice makes anyone feel like in seventh heaven. Ingredients:                                       Cooking time: 15 minutes ü  6 pieces of Hilsa ü  1 small or medium sized Eggplant (cut into small cubes) ü  5-6 green chillies (slit in the middle) ü  1/2 tsp of nigella seeds ü  1 tsp cumin seeds (turned into paste) ü  1 tsp turmeric powder ü  Salt to taste ü  Mustard oil for cooking (a must have ingredient if you want that heady mustardy aroma) Method: 1) Heat oil in a wok. When oil turns smoking hot, add nigella seeds and allow it to sputter. Then add eggplants and fry them till they turn little brown in color. Add turmeric powder and cumin seeds paste. Sauté for 1 minute. 2) Now add water as per your need for gravy. Let the water come to a boil. 3) Sprinkle salt and throw in the fish pieces. Add the green chillies and cook covered for 5 minutes. 4) Check seasoning and remove from the flame. Serve hot with rice.

Mexican Cole Saw

My hubby yesterday in a very sombre tone asked me as if testing my knowledge "do you know why the hand of a compass is always directing towards north by default?" Quite taken aback by such an amusing out of the blue question, I racked my brain for a while before coming up with the answer, "No"....his reply left my brain dizzy for a moment...."because nobody dares point fingers at Rajinikanth in South." I know it is one instance among scores of silliest wackiest jokes on Rajinikanth and how tired I am of those PJs splashed all over Facebook.

Day before yesterday was Rajinikanth's birthday. Those of you who don't know yet who Rajinikanth is, please google to witness the craze about him. If you are living in southern part of India, you might have definitely felt the madness about Rajinikanth. He is worshipped like a demi-god here. Seriously!!

Back to the recipe, Mexican Cole Saw is a tasty tangy Mexican salad. I can guarantee that you would like its taste even if you are not a typical salad lover because my husband who otherwise never touches salads regarding them as "bland" gobbled a bowl of it, with pleasure.

Red Spice Salmon

Red Spice Salmon is a must try recipe if you are a Salmon lover. Originally this recipe should be tried on Salmon fillets, but I have cooked the curry cuts. It so happened that while my better half was going out to weekly shopping of groceries, I, in my usual cautious tone, told my hubby couple of times specifically stressing on Salmon fillets, and he, with his usual slipshod and forgetful manner, took my words in one ear and out with the other and ultimately brought curry cuts home claiming, in the face of my allegation of his always giving my words a deliberate miss, that I was the one who didn’t mention anything about the fillet.  

I was about to give him gentle reminders about how he forgets to switch off the geyser after using it or turn off the faucet or how we had been saved from a great robbery only by the grace of sheer luck when he forgot the key to our home entrance in the keyhole and left it there hanging overnight till a maid from the neighbouring flat drew my attention towards it and the list goes on, but nah, I was not in a mood to fight. I cannot change him so why waste time trying!! Rather I put all my energy and attention towards pleasing my tummy. A wholesome meal is lot more appetizing than spoiling the mood of Sunday over a silly dispute. What say?

Spaghetti Alla Norma

Pasta Alla Norma is a popular Sicilian dish prepared with eggplants, tomatoes and ricotta salata as base ingredients. Ricotta salata is one kind of cheese made from sheep's milk and very popular across Sicily. But as this cheese is not easily available in Bangalore, I have substituted it with parmesan cheese. I chose to cook the dish with spaghetti, but as alternative options you may use penne or gemelli pasta also.

Bengali Shukto

A traditional Bengali meal encompasses 5 - 6 courses with a bitter tasting vegetable to begin and a sweet dessert to end with. An array of culinary delights including dal-fries, vegetable curry, fish, chicken are served in between, in that order. Back home, my mother still prepares 6-7 items daily for a lunch as opposed to our finishing the same job with maximum 2 items here.

Shukto is a concoction of assorted seasonal vegetables with the taste of bitter gourd predominating the flavour. I never ate Shukto at home because of my eternal dislike for vegetables with anything bitter-tasting topping the list of my dislike. As might be norm with marriage, we leave behind many of our bad habits and adopt new good habits. Learning to eat vegetables is one of the good habits I have picked up post wedding. In fact, I have stopped turning up my nose at bitter gourd, though I am yet to develop a liking for it. Shukto is my husband's favourite vegetable dish and over last 4 years he has told many a time how he misses the shukto cooked by his mother. So with intent to fulfil his craving, I have learnt to cook shukto at last and often prepare it during the weekends. Needless to say, I love it too because if you can cook it properly, the dish definitely exudes a rich taste. No doubt why it has made its entry into the menu of many wedding ceremonies.

Semolina Cake

This is actually a Lebanese sweet dessert the recipe of which I picked up from a cookery show telecast on a popular Bengali channel. I tried it at home and the result came out to be awfully brilliant in taste. The best thing about this dish is the time it takes for cooking. That only within 15 minutes such authentic delicious gorgeous cake can be prepared is hard to imagine. This beauty is truly worth the effort. Preparation time: 5 minutes                     Cooking time: 10 minutes Ingredients:                        ü  1 1/2 cup semolina ü  1/2 cup all-purpose flour ü  1 cup milk ü  1/2 cup white oil ü  1/2 tsp turmeric powder ü  1 1/2 tsp baking powder ü  1 cup powdered sugar ü  1/2 tsp cinnamon powder ü  1/2 cup cashew nuts (chopped) ü  1 tbsp chocolate sauce (for garnishing) Method: 1) Pre-heat the oven at 350 degree F/ 180 degree C. Meanwhile in a mixing bowl, mix in all the ingredients and mix for 1 minute till no streak of flour is left. 2) Sprinkle cashew nuts on top. 3) Grease a baking pan and bake the dish for 10 minutes. 4) Garnish with chocolate sauce.

Elish Biriyani - Hilsa Biriyani

I have been longing to prepare Biriyani for years but somehow could never manage the time and effort required. After the week days spent in a tiring work schedule, finally when I used to get some time for little rest, my mind and body would not work in coordination to make any meal requiring meticulous observance of details. So cooking Biriyani was always out of option.

Finally now as I am sitting home without work and spending my days like the way I have never spent in last 4 years, I made my mind to cook it for dinner one night and I began with cooking Hilsa biriyani because the time involved is less than its other counterparts like mutton or chicken biriyani.

Now one thing that you must keep in mind before you set about cooking any biriyani is that "patience" is a requisite here. Just relax and slowly go about it. Don't make any haste cause a miss in steps can change the taste from brilliant to moderate or bad.

Cooking time: 20 minutes                       Preparation time: 1 hour Ingredients :( Serving 6) ü  6 pieces of hilsa ü  2 onions (chopped into thin strips) ü  2 potatoes of medium size (cut into cubes) ü  3 cups of long grain basmati rice (250 gm) ü  5 ladles of milk ü  1 tsp of mace powder ü  1 tsp of nutmeg powder ü  3 tsp rose water ü  2 small pinches of saffron ü  Edible food color (orange or yellow or both) ü  Ghee (I skimped on ghee and used only 1 tbsp) ü  White oil for cooking ü  Salt to taste ü  2 tsp of sugar ü  1 tsp turmeric powder ü  1 bay leaf ü  1 inch cinnamon stick ü  3-4 cardamoms ü  3-4 cloves ü  1/2 tsp of cumin seeds Method: 1) Rub salt and turmeric powder on fish pieces. Lightly fry them in smoking hot oil. Reserve 2 tbsp of the oil used in frying fishes. 2) Boil the potatoes in microwave for 5-10 minutes till they become a bit tender. Then brown them in hot oil. Keep aside and fry the onions till they turn brown in color. 3) Cook the rice with bay leaf, cinnamon stick, cardamoms and cumin seeds added into the water used for cooking rice. 4) Grease a large flat-bottomed pan, preferably non-stick, with ghee or oil. Divide the rice into two halves. Add one half of the rice to the pan and spread out with a ladle to make a bed. 5) Sprinkle salt, sugar, 2 pinches of mace powder and nutmeg powder each on the rice bed. 6) In a spoonful of milk, add one pinch of saffron and pour it on the rice. Add half amount of the fried onions and fried potatoes and reserve the rest for the next step. Arrange few fish pieces on top and drizzle the reserved oil that was used for frying fishes. 7) Now add the remaining rice on top of this arrangement. Again diffuse the rice proportionately in all directions to make a bed and repeat steps 5 & 6. Only instead of the reserved oil, use ghee this time and add the fishes after step 8. 8) Mix 3 tsp of rose water with milk and pour 4 ladles of the milk on the rice. Insert your finger into the rice bed to create few holes. Mix food color with a tbsp of milk and pass in the colored milk through the holes. This way color will be distributed asymmetrically giving the rice an attractive appetizing look. After all, you eat a dish with your eyes first before setting teeth on it. 9) Arrange rest of the fishes on top. Now put the pan on flame and lower the heat to minimum. Cook covered for 20 minutes. 10) Serve hot.

Kumro Phool Bhaja - Pumpkin Flower Fritters

When I developed the sanity of eating vegetables, pumpkin was one of the many that I fast grew fond of with bottle gourd, brinjal among others. The sweet taste of mellow pumpkins adds to the flavour of any veg dish. Of all the preparations involving pumpkins, there were those beautiful delicious fritters, made by my mother, which still sits permanent in my taste bud. An afternoon lunch with dal, kumro phool bhaja and fried fish....so fulfilling...what more can I ask :D Ingredients:                          Cooking time: 15 minutes ü  8 Pumkin flowers ü  3/4 cup of gram flour ü  1 tbsp of poppy seeds ü  1 tsp red chilli powder ü  Salt to taste ü  White oil for frying Method: 1) Remove the yellow pistil from inside the flower and wash the flowers well. 2) In a mixing bowl, mix together gram flour, poppy seeds, red chilli powder, salt and water and make a batter of smooth consistency. 3) Coat the flowers with this batter and deep fry. 4) Serve hot.

Spaghetti in Chilli Garlic Sauce

Recently I watched a fairly educative program on TLC upon bizarre food habits of people around the world. I came to know of a particular dish which involves eating fishes alive called Fish Ikizukuri. It requires high level of skill to fillet the fish and serve it on a plate with its sliced flesh on top decorating it, while its heart is still ticking. I watched a couple of videos on Ikizukuri and must I say, I find it a cruel practice to enjoy eating something that is still fighting for its life. Completely bizarre and inhuman indeed. Back to my recipe, there was a time when I was unable to tell spaghetti and noodles apart, because when cooked and served garnished on a platter, they look quite identical and I was not used to eating pasta for pasta was not so widely available in our country before open market was implemented. Ingredients:                                Cooking time: 10 minutes ü  150 gm of spaghetti pasta ü  3-4 tbsp of chilli garlic sauce ü  Few strands of fresh parsley leaves thoroughly chopped (optional) ü  1 cup of peas (boiled) ü  20 gm of parmesan cheese (grated) ü  1 cup of milk ü  1 tsp of paprika ü  1 tsp of black pepper powder ü  Salt to taste ü  Olive oil for cooking Note: Chilli garlic sauce is easily available in the market. In case of its unavailability prepare it at home by following the link highlighted above. Method: 1) Boil the spaghetti till they become tender. Drain and keep aside. 2) Heat oil in a non-stick pan. When oil turns hot, add the peas and roast them for 2 minutes. 3) Add the parsley leaves. Stir and add chilli garlic sauce and milk. Stir around for 1 minute and add the pasta. 4) Sprinkle salt, paprika and pepper powder. Stir around. 5) Add the grated parmesan cheese. Stir in and cook on medium heat for 1 minute more. Serve hot.

Egg Tomato Chatpata

Egg Tomato Chatpata as my better half has named it is one useful creation that comes so handy during time constraint. "Chatpata" cause it is prepared within 10 minutes. While I was working, this one was added to our regular menu. Fatigued and tired from head to toe, when I used to return home from office, kitchen was the dreaded space I hated to enter. All I wanted to do at that time was to loll on bed and relax and have my food served on a platter. I missed my mother like hell then. She used to always keep my bag with tiffin and water bottle ready in front me when I used to go out to school. That thing didn’t change even when I started working. I never had to flick a stove on and delicious goodies were packed in tiffin box – luchi, alu dum, noodles, fried rice, roti with curry and the like. Ingredients:                                        Cooking time: 10 minutes ü  4 eggs (boiled and peeled) ü  1 onion (cut lengthwise into thin strips) ü  5-6 green chillies (chopped or slit in the middle) ü  2 tbs of tomato sauce ü  Salt to taste ü  White oil for cooking Method: 1) Cut the eggs into two halves and fry them till they change color to orange. 2) Heat oil in a wok. Fry the onions till golden in color. 3) Add salt and green chillies. Saute for 1-2 minutes. 4) Mix the tomato sauce with half cup of water and pour it into the mixture being cooked. Stir around and simmer it for 2 minutes more. 5) Serve hot with rice.