Semolina Khichdi with Moong Lentil

Recent comment of Asaram Bapuji on how calling the rapists 'bhaiya' and chanting the Saraswati mantra would have saved the hapless girl from being brutalized has sparked a lot of controversy across our nation. Many of my friends quite perturbed by the comment poured their heart on Facebook in angry status messages, but by such hullabaloo over his comment they are only helping him earn what the comment was meant for - undue publicity and some 30 days of fame. Asaram has become an infamous celebrity overnight; the self-proclaimed godman now is a household name that would give him ample professional leverages in luring more followers. If anyone thinks of his controversial comment going to affect his number of followers, he is wrong. Even negative publicity is a publicity which only will help him gain a slew of new followers. Who has unknowingly and unconsciously supported Asaram reach his goal of attracting new members in his ashram?? We did.  

Today on FB, I came across a fantastic parody of the whole situation put into a form of joke as about how following 10 ways as specified by the well-known of our country can prevent a rape. Here it goes:

"1. Don't live in India - Migrate to Bharat instead. (Courtesy - RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat)

2. Don't eat chowmein. (Courtesy - Khap Panchayat)

3. Don't go out with boys in the night. (Courtesy - Abu Azmi of Samajwadi Party). Better still - go on self-imposed house-arrest.

4. Don't wear jeans. Fashion is strictly prohibited. (Courtesy- too many people to mention)

5. Get married when you are 16 years old. (Courtesy - Khap Panchayat)

6. Don't use mobile. (Courtesy - Khap Panchayat)

7. Don't cross Maryada (Courtesy - MP Minister Kailash Vijayvargiya)

8. Say NO to anything remotely connected to western culture (Courtesy - RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat)

9. Perform puja to put "stars" in correct "position". (Courtesy - Chhattisgarh Home Minister Nanki Ram Kanwar) And if everything mentioned above fails and you are still being raped, here is the last weapon

10. Call your rapist "Bhaiya". (Courtesy - Spiritual Guru Asaramji Bapu) That ought to STOP THE RAPE!! " (Extract taken from SantaBanta Jokes)

I personally believe Asaram Bapu watches a lot of soppy hindi movies where the heroine trapped in the 'changul' of villains addresses one of them as 'bhaiyaa' stirring humane emotions in him who, then, makes a 360° shift in character from the hair-raising monster into a self-righteous brother, who while a minute ago was all horny suddenly converts into a savior of his newly found sister's honor. How melodramatic and filmy!!

 

Over to the recipe, Semolina Khichuri is an interesting concoction, the recipe of which required 'radhuni', a special spice very strong in flavor to be added, but although spices sold under the Bangladeshi brand name 'Radhuni' are available aplenty, the 'radhuni' spice that we Bengalis use in many vegetable preparations is nowhere to be found. The availability of a brand by a similar name only leads to more confusion when we look for our Bengal 'radhuni', everyone pointing direction towards the shelf overflowing with the stacks of Radhuni spices. Hence I have told one of my relatives travelling to India to bring a few packets of our radhuni masala on her way back. Meanwhile, since radhuni masala is missing in my kitchen inventory, I make do with garam masala powder which has lent an exquisite fineness to the wholesomeness of Semolina Khichudi. Best served with Narkel boda, this khichuri tastes great with even Narkel Posto Boda. 

Narkel Boda - Coconut Fritters

Who would have thought Kolkata would witness such sharp drop in the temperature to 8°. If the

temperature plummets further below, Kolkatans sure would have to lock themselves up at home.

Right now here in Ohio, the climate has turned a little better with the Sun visible up in the sky

every day and the temperature hovering round 0° in the morning and sometimes going up a tad

over that. So I am happy in a way that at least I am able to make the short walking distance from

our apartment to the gymnasium without feeling the cold running through my bones. 

In India, Khichuri is ritual in almost every Bengali household during monsoon. But since there is no

 monsoon season in US, I plan to cook khichuri in winter instead. After all, what more can you

think of other than eating when you are cooped up within the four walls of your home. So I cooked

Semolina Khichuri few days back and teamed it up with freshly fried crispy coconut fritters. I

know these days grated coconuts preserved in Ziploc packets are readily available in the market,

but mark my word; nothing can substitute the refreshing flavor of fresh coconut. Therefore, I will

 recommend anyone planning to cook Coconut Fritters for using freshly grated coconut.

Chicken Popcorn

Big Boss House is a mad house this year with Imam in his colorful wigs, outlandish costumes, grease painted face and frequent shifts of moods continually giving us occasions of belly-aching laughter.He is such a cartoonish, albeit at times very annoying, character talking over everyone, butting his nose into the conversation of others, receiving tongue lashing and getting ignored by the other housemates, irritating people to the extent of bursting out at least once, except Niketan, everyone else gave in to his provocation and resorted to shouting , and giving repeated 'timeouts' to people including the host of the show Salman Khan who reproached him strongly for his behavior and made fun of him publicly to keep him down, but to no avail. I have never ever seen such an amusing persona, yet highly obnoxious and incorrigibly entertaining. When he is in the house, you will hardly notice others as he doesn't let anyone talk, constantly provokes other contestants specially Rajeev and wears bizarre make-ups trying everyone's patience limit. 

 

 

As a viewer, it's interesting to watch his antics and idiosyncrasies on screen, but as an inmate he is an insufferable proposition, someone to be shied away from. I will not stay with such creature even at the stake of 50 lacs.

Chicken Popcorn is my favorite treat from KFC. But not all the time you feel like going out and buying takeaways from there, especially in such freezing cold when going out means a herculean endeavor of getting into a heap of warm clothes, all I want to do is hibernating at home :) and how do I do that, one might wonder. I watch my favorite program on the idiot box while digging into a tub of homemade chicken popcorns. I tell you, you must try it out once, it's just pure bliss. Yummmmm. 

Spinach Potato Omelette

Height of irresponsibility when a couple you invited over dinner didn't show up on the pretext that

 the two had a fight. I cooked a meal for four people in large quantity and now there is so much an

 excess of chicken that I had given some to my next door neighbour in a bid to finish them off.

 Yesterday was Sunday, instead of relaxing, me and my hubby were at cooking throughout the

afternoon until when our cooking was almost complete, my hubby received a call from the guy

enquiring if there was any problem if he couldn't come. The reason he explained a day later i.e.

 today that he had a tiff with his spouse because of which they didn't come. So silly, seriously! I

swear from the next time on I won't entertain such people in my house. I am so pissed off. 

It happened many a time while in Bangalore that me and hubby had a brawl over some trivial issue

 the day we were invited over someone's place, but we always sorted our differences sooner so as to

keep the invitation, after all there was a third party involved, who painstakingly might have made

all the arrangements of a meal for our sake and because of our personal issues, we cannot spoil a

party for everyone else. But there are some who have absolutely no regard for your efforts.

Anyway, let’s not mull over this for long else my level of irritation at the whole thing will only

increase instead of dying down. Spinach Potato Omelette is a frittata of sort cooked with herbs and

vegetables. If you like you may toss shredded chunks of braised chicken into the omelette to add a

meaty flavour. 

Piyazi - Onion Fritters

I invited a couple of friends tonight for dinner and at the last moment without any solid reason they

called off the program saying they are not coming. I wonder how some people could be so

irresponsible, even if they would have informed at least few hours before, I would not have made

such huge arrangement for dinner. Now we would have to eat all of these for next 7 days. I am

thoroughly pissed off, not in a mood to write anything pleasant really.

The recipe of piyazi was waiting a long time now in the draft. In Bengali we know onion by the

 name of "piyaz". So as the name implicates, 'Piyazi' is onion fritters. We usually either have onion

fritters in the evening as snacks or have them as accompaniment to eat rice with dal. It suits both

the occasions perfectly.

Corn Paneer er Chop - Corn Paneer Fritters

Yesterday was Friday and Friday night calls for a celebration of food. We usually hop onto a

restaurant or cook something special at home on Friday nights. When I used to work, Fridays held a

 special charm for me because it brought emancipation from work for next two days. So keeping in

with the past trend, still me and hubby spend Friday nights with the same enthusiasm.

Corn Paneer er Chop is a perfect treat to be had on Friday evenings for snacks. It goes so well with

kasundi or yellow mustard sauce. The tanginess of the mustard sauce blending with the sweetness

of corns and paneer contribute to a wholesome foody affair.

Lettuce Bhetki

We all know piranha is a deadly animal known for its ferocity to eat people alive. We all must have

heard one story or the other, each horrific to the extent of making our blood run cold about how a

man fallen accidentally into a pool infested with piranhas had the lower half of his body stripped of

 flesh within minutes. Now what makes piranhas so ravenous for our blood, one might wonder. I

watched a program once showcased on Animal Planet hosted by Jeremy Wade who tried different

means to demonstrate the reasons for piranhas to have their attention drawn towards humans and

 he came upon a very interesting fact. Please visit the following link to read more:

http://gomratherium.blogspot.com/2012/01/deadly-piranha.html

I have few bunches of lettuce leaves resting in the refrigerator for over a week, though I have made

use of some in sandwiches, I was wondering about how to use the rest. I had this recipe I

collected from a culinary show written across the pages of my diary for a long time now, hence not

willing to let go of the opportunity to try this dish; I cooked it yesterday over dinner. More or less I

hewed to the original recipe; the only exception was the use of cream that I have added on my own.

It came out to be mouth-watering, albeit different in taste. The freshness and chunkiness of Bhetki

fillets increased the flavour of the dish to a great degree making the dinner worth remembrance.

Hope you guys will lap it up with pleasure. 

Muri Ghonto

One of the very popular Bengali dishes, Muri Ghonto is traditionally cooked with a special variety

 of rice available only in Bengal and rohu fish head. Gobindobhog rice is small grain rice

prevalently used in concocting myriads of delicacies, Payesh, khichuri to name a few. Sweet in

flavour, it is known for infusing a beautiful fragrance into the dishes. Outside Bengal, gobindobhog

is not very easily available as upon months long scouting we came across a shop in Bangalore at Hal

 Market selling the rice only on some selective days. So we had to check over once in a while as

 regards the availability of the rice, which again was a painful job as the market was considerably

far from our home and going there every week called for a compromise on other necessary chores.

 Therefore, most of the time we relied on the supply brought from Kolkata.

 

Muri Ghonto has its variation too where instead of rice, lentil goes into the making but across West

 Bengal, Muri Ghonto with rice is the most popular version and I love it this way because at my

home, my mother used to prepare it with rice only. If gobindobhog is not available in your region,

you may substitute it with any other small grain rice to your liking, but then I cannot vouch for the

taste. Since carrying over rice of any sort from India is banned in US, I now rely on the online

shopping of gobindobhog conveniently couriered to my home.  Though the purchase overall is little

expensive compared to that of India but it's worth the price.

Chicken Malai Tikka

 

I love Chicken Malai Tikka. I am yet to meet someone who doesn't like it by the way. First time when I made it in Bangalore, the chicken cubes came out of the oven very stringy, the reason I realized later on was when malai tikka gets cooked inside the oven, all the moistures begin to evaporate, and hence it's important to keep basting the meat from time to time with oil. After a few attempts, what I started doing and which worked in bringing out a lip-smacking flavour was I started roasting the chicken on high heat in a non-stick pan for couple of minutes till the sides began to brown and then put them in the oven. That way the amount of time required for the chicken to be in oven for uniform baking reduces and also the moisture quotient remains intact. I kept the chicken in the oven for sharp 15 minutes and I didn't have to baste once.

 

 

Usually chicken malai tikka tastes best when served with coriander chutney, but if you don't have the chutney ready at home or like my hubby if you don't want the chutney suppressing the actual flavour of the malai tikkas, you may squeeze lemon juice onto the tikkas and have them served withvinegar soaked onion and cucumber. It tastes equally pleasing.

 

Strawberry Blush

I went to the supermarket last weekend and noticed a carton of plump strawberries in the counter

 which were delicious to look at. Unable to hold myself, I grabbed them and headed home. Now a

carton holds at least 20-24 strawberries, half of which went into making Strawberry Cheesecake

 leaving me to worry about the usage of the remaining half. Then I got an idea to make Strawberry

Blush.
 

Whenever there is a leftover of fruits like apple, guava, mango and even grapes, I usually blend

them with cold milk and a dash of ice cream and drink them down with pleasure. This way,

nothing goes waste and the shake tastes yummy too. I hate wasting food and it repels me to see

 someone tossing away eatables into the dustbin. My husband is into the habit of throwing

vegetables or meat, in perfectly good state, into the garbage bin saying they are stale, a habit which

 irritates me most about him among others, but some people are incorrigible and I have given up
 
trying to make him mend his ways.

 

Anyway, Strawberry Blush can go very well on breakfast. The bubbly mixture of ice-cream
 

and milk blending with strawberries creates a wonderful delight loved by all, adults and children

both. I can gulp down two glasses at once.

Peyaz Posto - Poppy cooked with Onion

It's freezing cold out here now. Going out, so much as dropping by a friend's place at stone's throw

 away distance has become a job of herculean affairs when piling on a few layers of clothing is the

 order of the day. Burying myself under thick jackets and warm clothes induces a feeling of

claustrophobia in me, which is absolutely disgusting. This is why I don't enjoy winter here. But

aesthetically, winter here offers a sight of profound beauty. The view of meadows, roads and

buildings carpeted in thick snows is completely riveting. Last weekend, when we were forced to

confine ourselves in home due to constant snow falling, I busied myself capturing the snow-capped

beauty in our camera. Here are some of the snapshots:

 

 

Over to the recipe, Peyaz Posto is one of the favourite posto preparations of mine cooked by my

 mother. I love it so much that I can polish off an entire plate of rice with Peyaz Posto. Despite

 painstaking efforts, my Peyaz Posto, however, does not come anywhere near in taste to the one

 cooked by maa. I don't know what special ingredient she adds, may be 'love' has something to do

 with it. My husband, on the other hand, is more fond of Alu Posto, not that I don't like it, but I guess

 I am more in love with Posto cooked with julienne onion than that of cooked with alu or potato.

 

 

Dudhi Lau - Milky Bottlegourd

There was last week I was eagerly waiting for holidays to begin and now with holidays over, from tomorrow on, same old daily routine is to follow, which involves the ritual of cooking. Not that I hate cooking, but sometimes it feels good to just relax and have your food served on the platter. I so wish to get my maiden days back when everything used to be served right in front of me. Infact I never had to set an alarm clock, my parents being there to knock at the door for waking me up. I never had to worry about what I was going to eat upon reaching home from work. Life is so good when you stay with parents. Very small things that we usually take for granted while living with parents begin to surface in reality only when we are on our own. I learned certain things really hard way. For example, not many would believe now that I didn't know even the A, B, C, D of cooking when I tied the knot. I didn't know such simple thing like cooking rice.

 

I would spend hours on phone with mother taking down the recipes of regular meals like dal and sabji. The first time I tried making luchi (puri in Hindi), I blasted the attempt by using all-purpose flour only to knead the dough. Not only that, I had this misconception about the dough being kneaded using oil only, so I added lot of oil into just preparing the dough. Thus you may figure out the extent of my ignorance about cooking back then. The luchis turned out like papads. It was awesome by the way with me and hubby, both terrible at cooking, nibbling at whatever edible we managed to concoct together. We have walked a long mile since then and painstakingly, I have picked the art of cooking, grasping at least a functional skill at it. What say!!

 

Anyway, Dudhi Lau is one of my favourite bottle gourd preparations after Lau Bata and Lau with Moong Dal. It is a superb accompaniment to roti, chapati and paratha, and goes well with rice

too.

Anarosher Chutney - Pineapple Chutney

Happy New Year to all my friends, visitors and fellow bloggers. May the New Year be filled with
 
joys, laughter and happiness. May all you have your dreams coming true.

Last night of the last year I spent mostly sitting at home, reading books, taking rest and catching up

on the backlog episodes of 'Shaitan - A Criminal Mind.' In the evening yesterday, we headed to an

Ethiopian restaurant in Ann Arbor for dinner. I must say the feedback on Ethiopian dish as provided

by one of my hubby's colleagues truly helped us decide on the menu. Ethiopian cuisines are really

spectacular, bearing similarity with the way Rajasthani thali is served with small bowls containing

an assortment of items arranged on a huge platter and an unlimited supply of refill. The only

difference in serving the Ethiopian fare is that the foods instead of serving in containers are

arranged upon a bed of injeras overlapped on a huge tray. Injera is Ethiopian bread made from tef,

Ethiopian flour used in making a sourdough and then preparing pancakes which are baked

through steaming so that the end result turns out rubbery and sponge like in texture.

 

The taste and look of Ethiopian dishes come close to that of Indian dish. The meat preparations were

quite spicy albeit not as hot as ours are, but definitely divine in flavour. I would definitely reiterate

my visit again.