Mahanandi

Deepavali Greetings to family, friends, fellow bloggers and readers of this blog.

Photo by Vijay Singari

For Deepavali, I preprared ‘Pala Kova’ (Doodh Peda), one of the classic sweets from home.

Recipe:

1 gallon of whole milk
1 1/2 cups of sugar
Cooking time : 3 hours

This is one of those recipes, which allows multitasking, at least for the first two hours. Also make it only when you have some good natured, dear friends or family nearby, so that they can give you moral support:) or help out, when you get frustrated with stirring and the slow way it takes for milk to thicken. Chit chat or clean up the kitchen, wash the dishes, cook up other recipes or fold the laundry and in between for every 2 to 3 minutes, stir the milk. This way you won’t notice the time.

Preparation:

In a big sturdy pan, bring the milk to a boil. Keep the heat on medium high and boil/simmer the milk for about 2 hours, stirring in between. By the end of two hours, the milk reduces in volume, becomes quite thick and turns from white to color of gandham(sandal wood) paste.

Add sugar to the thickened milk. Continuously stirring on medium heat, cook for about 30 to 45 minutes. By the end of this time, the milk-sugar paste further thickens and when you think, you can almost make a ball with it, then only switch off the heat.

Ladle off the paste onto a clean plate or round dish. Let it cool completely. Cut it into squares or shape into rounds. If you want, decorate the sweets with toasted pistachios or almonds.
I used an ice cream scooper to make round balls of pala kova.

Pala Kova (Doodh Peda) for Deepavali

Recipe Source: dear Vijay

Green Chillies ~ Perfect for stuffed mirchi bajjis

Recipe for Stuffed green chilli bajji is here.

For this weekend herb blogging, It’s Rosemary at kalyn’s Kitchen and her signatory, published recipe in Salt lake Tribune. That’s impressive.

Kittaya is all ready for Kiri’s birthday party, with his new bling bling collar.

Lovely Fethiye of Yogurt Land, all the way from Turkey, wanted to see my Kitchen.

Here it is Fethiye, Our Kitchen:

Thanks, Fethiye. Can you guess my personality? 🙂

Bitter gourds, true to their name, are bitter and just like any bitter, sour things, they are an acquired taste. My mother’s recipe pairs the bitter gourd with jaggery and red chilli powder; the result is a sweet and sour, lip smacking good, bitter gourd curry. She made it impossible for us kids to hate this vegetable, really, who can resist a sweet and sour combination paired with hot, hot rice and ghee. Clever woman, she is.

Recipe:
4 to 6 fresh, good looking Indian variety bitter gourds (karela, kakara kaya)
( This recipe works only with karela, not good with chinese bittergourds. To know the difference, check the link)
½ to 1 cup powdered jaggery
½ tsp of red chilli powder
½ tsp of salt
A pinch or ¼ tsp of turmeric
For popu or tadka
½ tsp of mustard seeds, cumin and few curry leaves

Wash the bitter gourds (karela) and peel the outer rugged skin of each one. Cut into half. If you see white, kind of dried out seeds, they are good for consumption, proceed and cut them into bite sized pieces, including the seeds (They taste nutty and crunchy, add them as whole or cut them into pieces). If you see red colored seeds, the gourd is very mature and tastes impossibly bitter, so it is better to throw the whole thing away.

In a pan, heat one teaspoon of oil, splutter the mustard seeds, cumin and curry leaves. Add the cut bitter gourd pieces. Cover and cook them in their own moisture for about 5 to 8 minutes or until they are tender to touch. When you are sure that the pieces are tender, then only add the powdered jaggery, salt, turmeric, red chilli powder and one tablespoon of water. (Jaggery prevents further cooking of vegetable, so make sure the pieces are tender before adding jaggery.)

Mix them up thoroughly, cover and let them cook for about another 10 to 15 minutes on medium-low heat. In between sprinkle some water, taste and adjust the seasoning, add more jaggery if you think it’s needed. Jaggery melts and coats the bitter gourd pieces and ten minutes of simmering turns the melted jaggery into a gooey, thick, brown caramel like sauce.

Serve this gold colored, sweetly bitter, delicious curry with hot rice and some ghee.

Bitter Gourd (karela, Kaakara kaaya) Curry.

Recipe Source: Amma

You can also find different and more recipes with bitter gourd (karela) by other fabulous Indian food bloggers –Manisha and Gini.

Young, fresh cluster beans (Gawar, Matti kayalu) have a narrow and long body with tiny pods. They are very popular vegetable in Andhra. What I gathered from the Internet about cluster beans is that they are native to India and are widely grown, not only in Andhra but also in other parts of country (dry, warm and arid regions). Young ones are harvested for vegetable use. The mature pods – the seeds are harvested to be dried and powdered to flour known as guar gum. Guar gum is used as thickening agent in commercial food preparations like ice creams etc. I also came to know that cluster beans are not only low in calories but are also very effective in lowering the blood sugar and cholesterol levels. I didn’t know about that till now.

These cluster beans (gawar) are available in Indian grocery shops, both fresh and frozen here in US. They are eaten whole and have a delicate flavor, providing they are not overcooked. Even the young, fresh cluster beans need to be topped and tailed and may also need stringing. Just pluck the end of a cluster bean with your hand, and then pull downward; if a thick thread comes away, the bean need stringing, so do the same on the other side. The beans can then be sliced either using a sharp knife or with your hands. Cut or pluck them to pieces of one-inch length.

Recipe:

2 cups of cut cluster beans
1 onion, finely chopped
3 to 4 green chillies and 3 tablespoons of grated fresh coconut, blend to smooth
¼ teaspoon each- salt and turmeric or to taste

Add the cut cluster beans to boiling, salted water and cook until just tender or al dente and drain. Usually one or two minutes is sufficient. When overcooked, beans turn to flabby, flavorless things. So keep an eye on them and do not overcook.

While beans are cooking, in a wide skillet, heat one teaspoon of oil and toast mustard seeds, cumin, curry leaves and 2 sliced garlic cloves. Add and fry the onion pieces for 2 to 3 minutes until golden. Add the blanched cluster beans, green chilli-coconut paste, turmeric and salt. Turning occasionally, cook them for about 5 minutes.

Tastes great with rice or chapati.

Cluster Bean Curry with Rice, Gongura Dal and Sago Papad ~ Our Meal Today

Velvety texture of young, fresh green eggplant is a pure luxury, especially when paired with potatoes and tomatoes. The purple brinjals does not have the same delicate flavor but makes a good substitute here. The combination that I like most is brinjal-potato curry with sorghum roti. I have the sorghum flour, I know how to make the roti and I wanted to make them for this curry, but I was short on time so instead I made rice, the quick and easy alternative.

Recipe:

6 to8 green brinjals
1 or 2 medium sized potatoes – peeled and cubed
4 to 6 large, plump, ripe tomatoes – diced finely
1 onion – sliced thinly lengthwise
1 tablespoon of dry coconut powder
1 tablespoon of poppy seeds (gasa gasaalu) – powdered
1 teaspoon of ginger-garlic-cilantro paste
1 teaspoon of red chilli powder and salt
1/2 teaspoon of turmeric

Preparation:

Take tap water in a pot and add one teaspoon of salt. Cut brinjals into medium size quarters and add them to salt water. This will prevent the discoloration of cut brinjals. (An old trick, I think that all home cooks know in India.)
In a big pan, heat one teaspoon of oil and do the popu or tadka(frying 1 tsp mustard seeds and cumin), add the onions, sauté them till golden. Next add tomatoes, cook them on high heat, covered for few minutes until they soften and turn into mush.
Then, add the brinjal, potato, salt, turmeric, red chilli powder, coconut, poppy seed powder and ginger-garlic paste. Add half to one glass of water, mix them thoroughly and cook them covered on medium heat for about 15 to 20 minutes or until the potatoes are tender.

Our meal – Brinjal & Potato curry with rice and boiled egg

From Telugu to English, The literal translation of Gutti vankaaya is ‘bouquet of brinjals’. As its name suggests stuffed brinjal curry is not only an Andhra classic, it is also very pretty to look at and the taste is pure fiery heaven. Greenish white brinjals are perfect for this curry. I make this curry only with this particular variety of brinjal. Unlike the purple brinjals, the green ones have a very delicate skin, cook very easily and taste great.

First part of the recipe is selecting the right brinjals:
If you are going to try this recipe with green brinjals like me, for two people, buy at least 15 to 20 very fresh looking, small size, and perfectly round green brinjals. The brinjals should look shiny without any blemishes, or holes and the stem that they are attached to should be in lively green without having that dried, black look. The tender the green brinjals are, the tastier the end result is. The ones with black seeds are very mature (at least half of your pick will be like this), don’t even bother to cook them, they taste bitter. Because they mature very rapidly, cook them on the same or on next day. Trying to keep them fresh and young in the refrigerator, it’s useless.

It takes at least 30 to 45 minutes to prepare the ingredients and another 30 minutes to cook the curry so attempt this curry only when you have the freshest green brinjals.

Second part is preparing the stuffing:
Ingredients for the stuffing change from home to home. Every home has their own recipe for stuffing. I can make five different kinds stuffing. The one I am going to post today is the family recipe.

Dry roast:

1 cup peanuts – roast them, when they are cooled, rub and remove the skins
1 cup sesame seeds – dry roast them

8 to 10 dried red chillies
One tablespoon of coriander seeds
Half teaspoon of cumin
4 cloves, one small piece of cinnamon stick
5 to 6 fenugreek seeds (menthulu)(They taste bitter so limit the number)
1 teaspoon of salt
Tamarind
Soak key-lime size tamarind in half cup of water and microwave it for about 15 to 30 seconds. Let the water cool down and squeeze the tamarind to get the paste.

Make a tight paste: Grind all of the above ingredients to a fine, smooth paste. You have to stuff this paste into brinjals so while grinding, under any circumstances, do not add water. Take this paste onto a plate and divide it into two portions. One is for stuffing and the other half is for sauce/gravy.

Thoroughly wash and dry the green brinjals. Even the freshest ones are not so fresh here, so I depart from the norm and remove the stems of brinjals. If you want, keep the stems. Take each green brinjal and on the end, opposite of stem, make a plus shape slit towards stem side but not all the way through (one vertical and one horizontal slit).

Fill up the plus shape slit (gap) with stuffing. Using your left hand fingers separate the quarters gently, push the stuffing inside with right hand fingers, again gently. Filling up all the slit green brinjals takes time, so have a seat, keep the stuffing and brinjals in front of you. Do it patiently and slowly without breaking the beautiful brinjals. If you do, you won’t get a bouquet but only the petals.:)- So have patience and treat them like a fragile art project.

How I cook them again is different from that of home. Here I use a pressure cooker. What? I know.. my method may be new to you but the results are way better. Pressure cooker makes it fast with less oil and the green brinjals are cooked thoroughly, you can’t find not one hard uncooked piece of brinjal, cooked in this way.

Do the popu or tadka(toasting the black mustard seeds and cumin in one teaspoon of oil). Add half of the peanut-sesame paste that was kept aside and half to one glass of water and one teaspoon of turmeric. Mix them up thoroughly without any lumps. Make the gravy/sauce more on the thin side or watery. Taste it, add salt, red chilli powder and tamarind paste if needed. I also add jaggery, very tiny amount to the gravy (making it mildly sweet). Arrange the stuffed brinjals neatly in the gravy, slit side up. Cover and cook them until the green brinjals are very tender to touch.
I pressure-cook them until one whistle on medium low heat. After the whistle sound, I immediately and slowly release the pressure from the valve by lifting the weight. Resulting in very wholesome, thoroughly cooked stuffed green brinjals.

To serve, with a big spoon gently lift the stuffed brinjals, place them on a plate and pour the sauce around. Tastes great with rice or roti.

Stuffed brinjal curry (Gutti Vankaaya Kura) with rice.

Recipe Source:Amma

-------------------------- *** *** -----------------------
I am going to write it down four other types of stuffings that I know for this cury. The proportions of the ingredients are not specified because there are no hard and fast rules and people at home add a little of this, little of that. So feel free to try various proportions as per your taste.

Type 1:
Dry red chillies + dry or fresh coconut+ chana dal & urad dal + cumin, coriander, fenugreek seeds and salt. Sauté and make a paste of them without adding water. Add cashews to make it rich.

Type2:
Besan or gram flour+onions+green chillies+ginger garlic paste+dry coconut powder+coriander powder and salt, make a paste by adding little bit of water.

Type 3:
red onions + dried red chillies roasted in oil then make a paste of them.

Type4:
Fresh coconut+ roasted peanuts+ roasted sesame seeds+dried red chillies+Coriander seeds+Cumin seeds+cloves+cinnamon stick+ chana dal+ urad dal+tamarind +jaggery and salt. This is my favorite of all.

Before me, some other Indian food bloggers also posted their recipes for this curry. More choices from three other fabulous blogs… always a good thing.

Until after I moved out of my parents home to Hyderabad, I didn’t know about any other varieties of brinjals except these greenish white beauties. They are called Poluru Vankaayalu in Telugu. Vankaaya means Brinjal and Poluru is the name of the village, (near my home town Nandyala) in Andhra where they are grown exclusively. So the name Poluru Vankaayalu. Thanks to Thai and Vietnamese, I am able to purchase them here also in US.

When cut open, brinjal filled with black seeds means it’s very ripe and not good for cooking, tastes bitter. The ones filled with white seeds, only they are used for curries and kurmas. They have mildly sweet and buttery taste when cooked and the greenish white skin outside tastes so delicious. Because they mature very rapidly, I always buy a lot. I have to throw away at least half of them because of black seeds. Curry cooked with the remaining white ones, is a rare treat that makes me remember my hometown tastes.

Recipes with Green Eggplant:
Stuffed Green Brinjal Curry
Brinjal-Potato Curry

Weekend herb blogging – It’ s Sage at Kalyn’s Kitchen

Fall is here in Boardman, Ohio:

Extreme Makeover- Home Edition with Ty Pennington, the popular ABC series was in our town last week, rebuilding the house for a recently widowed teacher with three children. They completed the whole demolition and rebuilding in 7 days. The location was just a couple of blocks away from our house, with 24 hour local news coverage of their home rebuilding; we couldn’t resist and visited the site on 6th day. Like us, hundreds of people were there to see what was going on and also to cheer the crew and volunteers. I was able to take these two photos; the first one is Ty and the crew trailer parked on the neighbor’s lawn. The second photo is the star of show – ‘The new house‘ and the crowd.

Sweet sesame spheres or Nuvvula mudda as we call them in Telugu, are powerhouse of sweets, full of body building nutrients. Prepared with love and lot of manual work, they are especially made for pregnant women, children and people who are convalescing. We also prepare them traditionally for a festival called Naagula Chavithi. These kinds of sweets are very difficult to prepare without a stone mortar. That’s why from my recent trip to India, I brought a medium sized stone mortar and pestle from my hometown, Nandyala. I wanted it more than anything and I felt that it is more valuable and needed than the usual stuff that I bring from India, like dresses, sarees etc., Of 120 pounds of luggage that we are allowed to bring to this country, 30 pounds went to this thing. Changed priorities.:-)

Nuvvula Mudda:

5 cups -sesame seeds, powdered
2 cups – jaggery, powdered
1 cup -dry coconut, powdered
1/2 cup- lightly roasted cashews, finely chopped

Traditionally, in our home in India, above ingredients are powdered manually, using a stone mortar and pestle. What I did here was, I used a food processor to coarsely powder the sesame seeds and dry coconut. And used a hammer for jaggery.

Then, I pounded these i.e. coarsely powdered sesame seeds, dry coconut and jaggery together for about 30 minutes using the stone mortar and pestle. This pounding process brings out the oils and real tastes of sesame seeds, coconut and jaggery, which is not possible if this was done in a food processor. Also a good strength workout for upper body.

I removed this finely pounded mix from the mortar onto a plate and sprinkled the cashews, mixed them all together. Shaped this mixture tightly with hands into medium sized spheres.

Viola.. first time making the nuvvala muddalu on my own is a sweet success. I am so happy for finally making these at my home, here in US.

The thing that prompted me do all this is this month’s SHF. For one year anniversary celebration of SHF event, the lovely Kelli of Lovescool chose dark chocolate. She also challenged us to come up with something new and interesting with dark chocolate. So I envisioned the idea of dark chocolate covered sweet sesame spheres. Traditional Indian sweet meets this South American & Western treasure, resulting in wonderful, very delicious and healthy dessert. I think these are very original and are not already created by chocolatiers. Please correct me if my assumption is wrong.

Dark chocolate coating is very easy. I used Lindt’s brand dark chocolate bar. Melted the bar and some ghee in microwave oven and dipped the sweet sesame spheres in melted chocolate. Then refrigerated them for about one hour.

Something new – Dark chocolate covered sweet sesame spheres (Nuvvula Mudda).

I consider Pittsburgh as my hometown in US because it was where we arrived in US from India. We spent three wonderful years full of firsts; first snow fall, first snow storm, first time assembling the furniture for our house from Ikea, first of lot of things.
And Pittsburgh is a sports town, Steelers is THE team, they all route for. Naturally we couldn’t escape the enthusiasm of locals and now we are also turned into full-fledged, The Terrible Towel waving, Steelers flag in front of the house kind of fans.

Last year was particularly exciting for us Steelers fans. The rookie quarterback brought the team almost to the finals. I could have prepared ‘Roethlis-berger’ in his honor for last years wonderful play, alas I am not a meat eater.

So instead I prepared our favorite game party food – Pizza, for this month’s sport theme party hosted by lovely Stephanie of Dispensing Happiness. Not any pizza but a pizza resembling the Steelers logo and wishing for a season of Steelers super bowl.

Steelers Pizza:

This Pizza is made with a basic white dough base, flavored with tomato sauce and topped with mozzarella and goat cheese and also roasted yellow and red bell peppers and olives.

Our lunch today:)-

As much as we like bhakshalu/puran poli on festival days, what we always look forward to is the tasty rasam, called bhakshala chaaru.

Bhakshala Chaaru is prepared with drained water from boiled chana dal of bhakshalu (Bobbatlu/puran poli). This leftover, rich in taste, chana dal water is simmered with tamarind juice and jaggery. A seasoning of tadka. That’s it. Prepared in small quantity on festival days, this tasty and nutritious bhakshala rasam is to die for. Saying this is a cliche, but I miss my mother whenever I make this recipe, because she prepares the best, the tastiest rasam I have ever had.

Drained Water from Chana dal of Bhakshalu

Recipe:

2 cups-drained water of boiled chanadal
Half onion, thinly sliced lengthwise (Optional)
2 tablespoons of tamarind juice
2 tablespoons of jaggery – powdered
¼ tsp of red chilli powder
¼ tsp of salt, or to taste
Pinch of turmeric
1 cup of water

For popu or tadka –
1 teaspoon oil or ghee
¼ tsp of mustard seeds, cumin, hing & curry leaves

Preparation:

Heat one teaspoon of oil in a heavy pot to medium high. Add the mustard, cumin seeds, hing and curry leaves. When the seeds begin to pop, add thinly sliced onions and saute them for few minutes to soft. This rasam is also prepared without onions.

Add the chana dal water, tamarind juice, jaggery, red chilli powder, turmeric and salt. Add water and stir. Bring this mixture to boil. Reduce the heat and let it simmer, uncovered for about 10 to 15 minutes.

Serve hot or cold with rice.

Bhakshala Rasam with Rice – a Raayalaseema Sweet and Spicy Special Chaaru.

Baby Lima Beans, Tomato, Red Chilli Powder, Turmeric and Ginger-Garlic-Cilantro Paste

“Lima beans are a very good source of cholesterol-lowering fiber, as are most other legumes. In addition to lowering cholesterol, lima beans’ high fiber content prevents blood sugar levels from rising too rapidly after a meal, making these beans an especially good choice for individuals with diabetes, insulin resistance or hypoglycemia. When combined with whole grains such as rice, lima beans provide virtually fat-free high quality protein. You may already be familiar with beans’ fiber and protein, but this is far from all lima beans have to offer.” To know more about lima beans or butter beans nutritional information, click here.

Fresh baby lima beans in tomato gravy make a tasty comforting curry. Swift, simple to prepare and so good when served with chapatis, rice or pasta. A must try!

Recipe:

1 cup fresh baby lima beans (=butter beans)
1 cup finely chopped onion
6 ripe, juicy tomatoes – cut or pureed

Masala Paste:
2 garlic cloves+1 inch piece of ginger+fistful of fresh coriander+ 1 tablespoon of coconut – grind into smooth paste in a blender
1 teaspoon each – chilli powder, salt and turmeric

For popu or tadka:
½ teaspoon each – cumin, mustard seeds, minced garlic and few curry leaves
1 teaspoon of peanut oil

Heat peanut oil in a large, deep skillet over medium-high heat.
Add and toast popu or tadka ingredients in listed order above.
Add and fry onions first and then the masala paste.
Add tomatoes. Cook them on high heat to mush.
Add lima beans, 1 cup of water and the seasoning (chilli powder, salt and turmeric). Stir and cook them covered until lima beans are soft and the curry reaches the thickness you desire.

Serve warm with chapatis or with rice.

Lima Beans ~ Tomato Curry with Chapatis – Our Meal Today

Baby Lima beans are available in frozen section of US grocery shops year round.