Light meals

Yesterday we decided to have an advance New Year's celebration dinner with my parents, leaving today free to PARTY!!! We'd had a rather filling meal at my aunt-in-law's house at lunch time, including a wonderful Black carrot halwa which I'm going to try out asap and blog about, and was totally awesome. Keeping our full stomachs in mind, mom and dad cooked up a great but light meal for us.

That included my favourite starter - salad - with mom's famous vegetable dip. This is a scrumptious dip of which no amount is enough. In fact, yesterday I got to thinking what all we could use it for, including as a sandwich spread, among other uses, or even with hot baingan pakoras. It also works well with kids who can scarf down any amount of crunchy fresh veggies or toast with this spread on it. My kids were in seventh heaven with salad, which they love, and a dahi-based dip.

Mom's famous yoghurt dip

Ingredients:

1 cup hung plain home made curd/ yoghurt

1 cup paneer, finely grated

Handful dhania( coriander) leaves, chopped fine

1-2 green chillies, chopped fine

Salt to taste

Just mix all the ingredients together and chill before serving with batons of crisp radish, daikon, carrots, baby corn, tomatoes, halved cherry tomatoes, lightly steamed broccoli and green peppers, raw yellow, orange and red bellpeppers and spring onions or leeks. Dad had also added lettuce as the base for the vegetables, marinated in apple-vinegar. Delicious!

Now that's a positively reeking-with-health type of last entry for the year. Just in time for me to go hog-wild partying tonight. See y'all next year!

Hyderabadi dahi vadas

I have always hated the traditional dahi vadas - made from urad dal, soaked in water and then dunked in yoghurt with tamarind and green chutney on top. I hate the bland taste of the actual vada itself and much prefer eating just the yoghurt with the two sauces.

But some years ago, I discovered an amazing recipe for dahi vadas - these are crisp and flavourful, and the yoghurt bursts with flavour too. They are really easy to make too, and have been a hit whenever I or any of my family or friends have served them. When I was studying in France, I was in the process of making these when the house agent came in with a couple to whom she was showing the apartment. The gentleman with her kept sniffing the aroma of these dahi vadas and finally couldn't resist asking me what I was cooking. I offered them to him and his wife, and they were absolutely bowled over - which I found really encouraging since I had just recently started cooking.

These taste great by themselves as a snack or party starter, or with any spiced rice dish. they go particularly well with Bisi bele Bhaath which i shall blog about some other day. One tip - always make more than you planned, because they always go faster than you anticipated!

As always, measurements are indicative, and you have to adjust it to your taste. This should make enough for 6 people. PS. I will put up pictures of the various stages and the finished dish when ever I next make it.

Ingredients:

1/2 pound Besan ( Chick pea flour)

2 onions, chopped really fine, minced, rather

1 tsp cumin seeds

1-2 tsp chilli powder

salt to taste

Bunch of coriander leaves, chopped very fine

1 1/2 cups yoghurt, beaten

6-7 pods garlic

1 bunch coriander leaves and stem chopped fine

salt to taste

Handful of curry leaves

1-2 garlic pods, cut into long, thin pieces

1-2 Dried red chillies

1 cup oil

1. Mix the first six ingredients together with water to make a liquidy paste - about the consistency of chocolate syrup (thinner than pancake but thicker than juice).
2. Whip the next four together and refrigerate.
3. Put the oil on to heat in a frying pan. Use a tablespoon or rounded spoon to ladle the batter, spoon by spoon onto the frying pan. Make these mini-pancakes roughly 1.5 inches by 1.5 inches in size, and about 1/4 centimeter thick - they are like mini-blinis.
4. Cook thoroughly on both sides, turning over. They should be crisp at the edges and somewhat crisp in the center too when done.
5. Lay each pancake on absorbest tissue to cool.
6. When they are fully cooled, take out a large, flat pan and set the pancakes on it, side by side, so they form a layer. After each such layer, pour some of the yoghurt you had set to refrigerate onto the layer, making sure the pancakes are covered in the yoghurt.
7. Once you have layered all the pancakes with yoghurt, put the dish into the fridge for 2-3 hours.
8. Make sure you keep some of the yoghurt mix aside to top the dish before serving.
9. Make a tempering of 2 tsp oil, in which you add the thin garlic pieces, the dried red chillies and the curry leaves, in that order. Sometimes I add mustard seeds at the beginning of the tempering, but they are not necessary.
10. Before serving, add the reserved yoghurt mix and garnish with the tempering.

Padawalkai raita

I've always hated some summer vegetables - the kind that are kind of watery and sweet-tasting when cooked. The gourds, for example - among my pet hates when cooked South Indian style, with coconut and a mustard seed tempering. Actually, I did some googling about gourds and was hard put to it not to laugh when i saw this listed under 'exotic vegetables', but I guess one man's meat is another man's exotica...

The vegetable I'm talking about today is called chichinda in Hindi, which is a funny name(gotta use it next time we play sabzi mandi...a card game I'll blog about on my other blog sometime). I have included a picture of it in case anyone doesn't recognise it by 'Snake gourd'. It's usually thin, long and dark green with light green stripes. I recently discovered a recipe for snake gourd that manages to make it taste amazing.

The recipe:

Ingredients:

1 snake gourd, cut into 1/2 cm slices and then halved into crescents

1 tsp mustard seeds

2-3 green chillies, chopped

12-15 curry leaves

Salt to taste

1 cup yoghurt

1 tsp oil

1. Put the oil on to heat in a wok


2. When it's nice and hot, add the mustard seeds and wait for them to pop


3. Then add the green chillies and the curry leaves and stor till the curry leaves are crisp - a few seconds


4. Add the snake gourd and stir to mix


5. Turn the flame to low and cook, stirring occasionally, till the snake gourd is nice and soft but not mushy.


6. Take the wok off the flame and keep aside till the vegetable cools down.


7. Put it into a bowl and add the yoghurt and salt and stir to mix well.


8. Keep refrigerated.

This tastes great with rotis, rice and dal or even bread. It tastes better if you let it sit for a couple of hours after it's ready.

Salad dips

I'm a salad kinda gal, especially in winter here in Delhi, when the weather is great and you get all manner of great veggies pretty cheap. My favourite red and yellow peppers go down to Rs. 100 a kilo and so on. I love going down to the Malviya Nagar market and scouting out all kinds of veggies. I especially love green leafies and much to the dismay of my maid, who then has to try and stuff eveything into our rapidly-becoming-too-small fridge, usually lug home anywhere between 2-5 kilos of different kinds of greens, including stuff I have no idea how to cook or what it's called in English.

I have a gorgeous ceramic dish with 6 compartments for snacks and a central one for dip. On winter evenings, with our oil heater on creating a cozy cocoon, I love serving different kinds of veggies with my mom's fabulous dip recipe (given below), along with hot rum punch. The veggies I serve: Spring onions, split into two, blanched carrots, cut into sticks, blanched green beans, cut into 2 inch long sticks, blanched broccoli florets, blanched cauliflower florets and red or yellow peppers, oven roasted, peeled and cut into thin strips.

Yoghurt-cottage cheese dip
Ingredients:
I cup ordinary yoghurt, hung till somewhat dry but not too dry (or greek yoghurt if you can get it easily)
100 gms cottage cheese (I use fresh paneer - low cal and easily available)
2-3 green chillies, minced fine
1 bunch coriander, minced fine
1 medium red onion, minced super fine (but not grated, ever)
salt to taste

Just mix everything together, making sure that the dip has a creamy texture. If needed, you can add a bit of fresh yoghurt to make the dip creamier. Chill till cold and then serve. You can also add other herbs like dill or mint. It's a great way to make kids eat their vegetables, and it's low cal. Try and make sure the veggies are a nice mix of colours - it looks more tempting.

Tip: While blanching, I prefer to use salted water - it makes the veggies taste better.

Rosy Dip - this is something I came up with by myself and now can't live without in winter. It tastes great with salad, chips, rice, pulao, roti, bread...

Ingredients:
1 beetroot, grated
1 red onion, chopped fine
1-2 green chillies
1 bunch coriander, minced
salt
1 cup yoghurt (Hung or not, depending on how creamy or runny you want it)

Just add everything to the yoghurt and mix well. Check for spiciness and salt. Garnish with the coriander or mix it in. The color is a brilliant fuchsia to purple, with hints of deep green. Looks and tastes delish... (as you can guess, I'm missing winter!)

Gujju Food

Yesterday I went out for lunch with two colleagues to nearby MGF Mall and we homed in on Rajdhani, the Gujju restaurant. The restaurant is on the top floor of the Mall in Gurgaon. It's got a slightly mixed decor, with vibrantly coloured walls and displays of red and blue vases from The Next Shop hanging cheek by jowl with mirrored wall hangings from the emporium. The menu is a set thali. We were among the early diners and got a 4-seater table as soon as we entered. The restaurant starts operations at 12 noon, so if you go earlier, they won't have any food.

The service is really quick. Within five minutes of being seated, we had been served a bottle of mineral water and our thalis had been placed on the table. the steel plates they use are a really large size, with an assortment of 7-8 small steel katoris, which I thought were really useful for portion control at home too and have resolved to buy.

The serving staff is friendly and goes out of their way to ensure that you are eating adequately and that your plate is never empty - not good for those on a diet. The servers come around to each diner and serve them the various foods out of steel katoris - like at a typical south Indian restaurant in south India. Starters were warm dhoklas and mashed aloo bhajias, as well as a finely cut cabbage sabzi, served with a sweet chutney and a coriander chutney, both of which were delicious. The aloo bhajias were made with mashed aloo spiced with red chilli powder and a hint of garlic, which tasted wonderful.

The main course menu was extensive - we had bhindi sabzi, dahi-baingan sabzi, alu sabzi, chole, gujarati dal, teekhi dal and rajasthani kadhi. This was accompanies by both rotis and theplas, with ghee on top if you so wished. Rice followed, along with top-ups of anything you desired, and they provided salty chaach to wash all this down. The food was excellent, and delicately spiced, not at all oily. I particularly enjoyed the bhindi as well as the baingan sabzi, and the gujarati dal - sweet and spicy and very thin - and my colleagues freaked on the kadhi and the cabbage. The aloo sabzi was the only thing not particularly noteworthy.

The dessert menu had 4 desserts, including rasgulla (which I thought incongruous), sooji ka halwa, aamras and one more to which I didn't pay attention, having frozen on the aamras. The desserts were delicious too, though a little over sweet. They brought an Indian variant of finger bowls - the waiter holds a brass jug with a pointed spout in one hand and a brass platter with holes in the bottom (like a sieve) held over a brass pot to catch the water, and pours out the water for you. A truly satisfying meal which left us content and yet not overstuffed. Recipe for the cabbage follows, as well as my deduction of the dahi-baingan recipe.

Cabbage Sabzi (South indian style)
1 cabbage - finely chopped (really finely chopped!)
Handful of grated coconut
1 tsp Black Mustard seeds
Salt to taste
1-2 tsp oil

1. Put the chopped cabbage into water and let it steep for 10 minutes.
2. Pour the oil into a wok and let it heat up
3. Put in the mustard seeds and wait till they pop - you'll hear and see the popping
4. When they are done popping, put in the cabbage and mix
5. Put a lid on the wok for about 5 minutes or so, depending on how tender and finely chopped the cabbage is.
6. Take the lid off and check the cabbage - it should be al dente, not mushy.
7. Add the salt to taste and mix well
8. Top with freshly grated coconut and serve with rotis or rice and a lentil dish

Additions: In South India, we typically add curry leaves along with the mustard seeds. I also like to add a pinch of asafoetida to cabbage sabzi - the flavours go well together and it cuts down on gas! We also usually add a couple of finely chopped green chillies to the oil after the mustard has stopped popping.

Variations - You can add green capsicum or peas to this vegetable. Add the capsicum before the cabbage, and if using peas, boil them in advance and then add after the cabbage is almost cooked.

Baingan sabzi with Dahi ( eggplant cooked with yoghurt) - my take

500 gm Small purple eggplants, quartered but with the stems still attached
2 red onions, chopped
2 tomatoes, chopped
yoghurt - one cup, whisked well
1 tsp - methi (fenugreek) seeds
1 tsp - mustard seeds
pinch turmeric
2 tbsp oil
salt to taste
red chilli powder to taste
handful curry leaves

1. Salt the eggplant and leave aside to sweat for fifteen minutes
2. Pour the oil into a wok and let heat at medium heat
3. Wipe off the eggplants and cook in the oil till well done. I sometimes cover the wok with a lid so the eggplant cooks softer, which helps it absorb the spices better.
4. Take the eggplants out and put on a tissue paper to absorb the oil.
5. To the oil left in the wok, add the turmeric and mustard seeds and wait for the seeds to pop. Then add the fenugreek seeds and the curry leaves.
6. When the fenugreek seeds darken, add the onion and stir well. Let the onions cook until almost translucent and add in the tomatoes. Stir well and let cook until the tomatoes are cooked but not mushy.
7. Add the eggplant and mix all the ingredients together. Add salt and chilli powder at this stage.
8. Once all the vegetables are well-mixed, pour in the whisked yoghurt and keep stirring gently for a minute or two so all the flavours meld together. You can adjust the quantity of yoghurt and spices to your liking.

This vegetable is great as an accompaniment to rotis and a simple dal. I'm planning to try this over the weekend, and I'll update the post to tell you how it turns out.