Metal - Click - Stainless steel plate

My entry for the Jugalbandi's Click-Metal Event.


Sunday lunch on Stainless steel plate

This photo was taken for lunch on Sunday. One of the lunches I really enjoyed. White rice with brocolli dal, gongura pachadi, bittergourd fry and rasam.

Its served in a stainless steel plate. They are commonly used to serve food in Indian homes.

Arusuvai friendship Chain - Warmth before the Spring !

The Arusuvai Friendship bug has bitten me too. Its so inspiring to see how a simple gesture started by a few ladies, Latha, Bharathy and Bhags, spread its wings far and wide around the world. Kalai of Samaithuparkalam extended the friendship to me with a lovely lovely package with a card ( She has such a lovely handwriting ! If handwriting is any indication she is a very very organized person ! ), the secret ingredient, some idly podi and best of alll beetroot halwa. I have not eaten such tasty beetroot halwa in a longg time. I was very hungry when I came home and got this package. Could not appreciate more, the sweet melt-in-your-mouth halwa !!

Where is the halwa you ask ? As tasty as it is, its not easy to photograph - to feel better after the failed photo, I needed something to comfort. What better than buttery halwa ?

By the way, Can You guess the secret ingredient ?






Thank you Kalai for being such a sweetheart !!

Wholegrain pancakes with oats

When Indira mentioned that jazzing up oats is like dressing pig I had a hearty laugh.. How true !!! When Shankari told me about her designer oats I told her I just didnt beleive it.

Recently my friend R gave me a recipe for oats Dosai. She said Revathi it will be like oothappam. Very soft and nice. I tried it and it was a gloppy caramelized blob. I am sure I messed up the recipe.

Then I came across a Homemade wholegrain pancake mix on the King Arthur site, which had oats, whole wheat flour and unbleached all purpose flour. On a whim I tried it. I made two changes - Omitted the oil completely and powdered the oats completely since I was using steel-cut oats. You have to make it to beleive it !!!

Now I still beleive the oats cannot be dressed but can be disguised and I will give the designer oats and oats dosai another shot !!!

Some flour facts :
Bleached and Unbleached flour : Bleaching is the process in which the wheat flour is bleached with oxidizing agents to make the flour more whiter and to increase the gluten-content. In unbleached flour the oxidization naturally happens to wheat flour over time, hence more expensive. The calorific value and the glycemic index of both the flours is the same - however chemicals used as oxidizing agents for bleaching flour.

Wholewheat and all purpose flour : All purpose flour are heavily processed and the nutrients are added later. The fiber is almost completely ripped off. Wholewheat flour has a lower glycemic index compared to APF and also much higher fiber content.

Now other things are done to the flour like enriching, and bromation. Bromation also increases the gluten-producting potential.

Nutritonal inforation of whole wheat flour and APF



Wholegrain pancake mix - Not a drop of oil !

2 cups unbleached All purpose flour
3/4th cup whole wheat flour
2 cups powdered oats flour ( use quick oats or steelcut)
1 tablespoon brown granulated sugar
1 and half teaspoon baking powder
half tsp salt
half tablespoon baking soda

Mix everything in a clean dry vessel and store in an airtight container. When you want to make pancakes, add a cup of the mix to one cup of liquid ( a little less than a cup )

Liquid can be
- just water
- half cup water with half cup of buttermilk and 2 egg whites (or whole egg)

I have used all these combinations and all are equally good. The pancakes are fluffy, soft and filling. Use buttermilk, egg whites for the pancakes and drizzle blueberry mapple syrup to make it a complete wholeshome breakfast
This pancake mix goes to the Wholesome breakfast Event hosted by Mansi.

Berry Banana Smoothie

Long time ago, when I browsing through blogs, I came across a yoghurt smoothie - This smoothie fit my bill perfectly for a breakfast - Calcium and protein for the yoghurt and all the other good things from the fruits. Besides this is quick to do even on a week day. Sigs' MBP is a perfect event to bring this yoghurt back into my blog limelight.

Check out for more of TBC's smoothies. She even has a tofu smoothie.

Here is the ingredients of the smoothie. I added blueberries and cut down the milk.

Berry Banana Smoothie - Ready to be whipped


Berry Banana Smoothie

This goes to Monthly Blog Patrol. This month its hosted by Sig - Mixed Drinks.

Maanga paasiparuppu kootu ( Mango moong dal )

I had not posted for a few days now, not because I am not cooking but I am cooking everyday simple dishes that are uncomplicated and quick. But I dont make Mango moong dal that often.

With some weekend time on hand, I turned to this dish today.

Maanga paasiparuppu kootu with zucchini fry

Incidentally this is my fathers favourite kootu. Kootu is any dish with a dal in it in which the dal is not mushy. Indira's recent post on Mamidi Pesara Pappu brought back memories - so I did it today.
I did not pressure cook the moongdal and cooked it to a stage where it still had a bite to it and did not mush.

Moong dal also goes by these names. Payatham paruppu, split green gram, paasi paruppu, Pesara pappu

Maanga paasi paruppu kootu

1. Boil half a cup of Moong dal with a tsp each of turmeric, chillipowder ( or sambar powder ) and two cloves of garlic with a cup and half of water.

2. Peel a raw mango. Dice into quarter inch pieces. We need about a one fourth cup.

3. When the dal is almost done ( you will know this by mushing it in between your fingers it wont mush but if you bite it will be soft ), add the mango pieces

4. Cook until mango are soft and all water is absorbed

5. In a separate pan, heat tablespoon of oil and when the oil is hot add tsp each of mustard, cumin, few curry leaves and a dash of hing.

6. Add the seasoned oil from above to the mango dal mixture.

Enjoy with rice. A dollop of ghee is a must for this dish.

Saw this in the indian stores today. Reminded me of the chiclets back at home -

Quick Bread for Quick weekday Breakfast

Quickbread are bread which does not use yeast and are leavened by baking powder and baking soda. They dont take much time to rise like yeast. Banana nut bread, corn bread, muffin are all quickbreads. ( Source : wiki ).

I am not at allll a baker, in fact I have bought a packet of yeast and its sitting in the pantry for a while waiting for me to make Ashas muffuletta.

This is my entry to Suganyas healthy breakfast .Besan dosai, which I blogged a couple of years ago, is also a great breakfast and will suit this event.

With absolutely no oil, no eggyolks, whole wheat flour I am not claiming that this will be the most fluffiest quickbread you have ever had, but it certainly is filling, indulging and a great snack. I can carry a couple of the slices to have it on my way to office as a breakfast or to hold my hunger till dinner.

This recipe is for my SIL C, who is trying to eat healthy.

1. Get the dry ingredients together.
half a cup of whole wheat flour, half a cup of all purpose flour, 3/4th tsp salt, 1 tsp baking soda, half tsp baking powder

2. Get the wet ingredients. This should be a cup
Puree one medium size apple, two ripe bananas. Add two egg whites and the sweetener
Sweetener: I have used different sweeteners, 3/4 cup refined sugar, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/3 cup home-made palm sugar syrup with two tsp gulgand.

3. Mix the dry and wet ingredients until smooth. You can any nuts if you want to. Pour into a loaf-pan. Fill only three fourths.

4. Place in a preheated oven at 350 degrees for 50 mins.

5. Cool, slice and store in ziplocs.

Ready for oven-Gulgand-almonds quickbread

Quickbread with Walnuts.

To give character to this bread you can put different set of ingredients,

walnuts or slivered almonds for texture
raisins
gulgand ( reduce the sweetener way down )
grated carrot

I started using the applesauce in this kind of bread after seeing jugalbandi's Oatmeal raisin cake.

SRA has tagged me for a meme Seven random/wierd things about me. I am sure Ravi will do a greattt job at writing 70 wierd things about me.

1. Sometimes when I leave my apartment, I wonder whether the stove has been switched off. A while ago, we went to visit our friends in Santaclara for a potluck. While we were near the Santaclara freeway exist, I raised this doubt that I was not sure whether the stove was off and made Ravi drive back all the way to Fremont to confirm that the stove was off indeed.

2. When I am home alone I need the TV on the entire night. Either Food Network or HGTV should be running. Nothing scarry.

3. It requires lot of motivational speech from Ravi and some self-motivation not to freak out during flight journeys. I closed my eyes and prayed hard most of the flying time in a helicopter in Hawaii.

4. I love to eat sambar rice with apple, rasam rice with bananas.

5. I dont drive on freeways. An accident scared me enough to select "Avoid highways" option in google maps any time I drive. I ended up driving for almost double the driving time for the Bay Area Foodies meet.

6. When I was a kid, I had the habit of saying bye to the plants and trees in my home if I am going away for a few days. Recently when I went to India, I spoke to all the plants in my apartment about my vacation. Unfortunately there was a family emergency and Ravi had to leave suddenly to India too and the plants did not the survive two months.

7. I am always at extremes. I will be eating minimally processed, organic fat-free, low-carb, not-spicy food one day and soon you will find me stuffing a jacks' spicy chicken sandwich !

I am not sure how many of you are already been tagged as this meme has been around for a longgg time. Do it if you wanna

1. Ashwini
2. Shaheen
3. The taste-tinkerer
4. A-Kay
5. The-Cooker
6. Paajaka
7. Sreelu