We love dips. All I need to do to get my kids to eat kore desi chutneys is to rebrand them dips and I think we'll be going through a few bowls of them a week. Thus I'm always on the lookout for new recipes for dips. Last year while we were visiting my friend Suniti on holiday, she served us this amazing green dip that went well with everything on the table - roasted baby potatoes, grilled broccoli, toasties and grilled shrimp. She has had it when she travelled to Spain on her first solo holiday and loved it so much she got the recipe and reproduced it back home.
With my forgetfulness, I'm sure I don't have the original recipe anymore. But what I do make is delicious, fresh and goes well with anything. The other night, when we had friends over for dinner, we served this with assorted grilled veggies - baby carrots, broccoli, mushroom and zucchini, and pita chips and it went down a treat! I bet it'd work great as a salad dressing too. I have no photos because it gets inhaled as soon as it is served...but just imagine a bowl of green, aromatic deliciousness...
Ingredients:
1 bunch parsley
3-4 pods garlic, finely chopped - last week I had freshly grown garlic bulbs and leaves from the mandi so I used that instead
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Salt to taste
Heat the olive oil but not to smoking point. As soon as it gets hot, switch off the stove and toss in the garlic and salt. Stir gently and ensure the garlic gets cooked till translucent and soft but not browned ( which will turn it bitter). Toss in the parsley and leave aside to cool. I also added chilli flakes and sometimes I toss in a spritz of lime...
Showing posts with label dips. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dips. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 7, 2017
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Pistou - Grow your Own January 2010
No, that's not a typo for Pesto. Pistou is apparently a Provencal dip-type thing that's made of similar ingredients to pesto and added to bean soup. I made a Provencal style bean soup last week and since I have a glut of basil leaves in my garden, decided to make some Pistou to go along with it. The soup was all right but the Pistou was so good that I've used the leftover drizzled on all kinds of things – crudités, a baguette slice at breakfast, with potato chips…just about anything. And it's definitely something I'm going to be making time and again. Here's how:
Ingredients:
Basil leaves – 1-2 handsful (depends on how much you want to make)
Parmesan cheese, grated – 1-2 tbsp
Olive oil – 1 tbsp (I'm one of those low-fat people so always looking to substitute oil)
Water – as needed
Just wash the basil leaves and then whizz everything together in the blender and store in the fridge for dipping into.
This is my entry for Grow your Own January 2010, hosted by House of Annie
Friday, June 5, 2009
Middle eastern
I love Middle-eastern food. I first discovered it on my first visit to the US. My friend took me on a tour of New York, walking around all the famous avenues and streets and we finally wound up in the Village that evening for dinner. She ordered food that sounded strange – Baba ghanoush, falafel and so on – but because I knew she was vegetarian, I was safe and so eager to try it out. I fell in love with the fresh, light and zingy flavours but there was at that time no chance of getting anything similar in India. Many years later, when A and I moved to France, any time I felt too tired to cook, we'd go to the nearby Lebanese and order a take-out meal that sort of replicated a typical Indian meal. There was Baba ghanoush – similar to our beloved Baingan ka Bhurta, Mujaddara – lentils cooked with rice, akin to our Masoor Dal, and Pita bread.
Somewhere during that year we also discovered many other lovely flavours of this region – the parsley and Bulghur wheat salad and of course Hummous. I loved the simplicity of the hummous and its contrast with almost anything I could dip into it – crunchy crudités, chips, bread, croissants…It was a rediscovery of the humble Chickpea. Once back in India, we found many more restaurants serving hummous and other middle-eastern food items, but rarely did I find one with Hummous to my liking.
So much so that I've started making my own hummous and freezing large quantities so we always have some stock handy. My elder son loves it too, and is happy to have hummous with toast for breakfast or with crackers for a snack. I recently made it for a dinner with old friends, and we just all curled up around the living room table, eagerly dipping our pita bread chunks into it, while music and conversation both flowed. Bliss!
Ingredients:
1 cup chickpeas, soaked overnight and cooked, or cooked using the quick soak method
1 tsp tahini paste ( or just use plain sesame seeds – 2 tsp)
Juice of 2 limes
4-5 cloves garlic
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
½ cup water
Salt to taste
Olive slices and paprika to garnish
Grind together the chickpeas, sesame seeds, garlic and lime juice along with the water in a blender until you have a smooth puree. Tip out and add salt to taste. Top with half the olive oil and stir to mix well. Store in a fridge until 15 minutes before serving.
To serve: serve out into the bowl you intend to use. Scatter the olive slices and add a decorative sprinkle of paprika. Top with the olive oil and serve with toasted pita slices.
This is my entry for MLLA 12, begun by Susan and now continued by Haalo, hosted this month by Apu.
Sunday, January 6, 2008
Deeply Dippy
I don't know if you've seen a trend through my blogs. I noticed that the categories that pop up most frequently are soups and dips. Well, soup is one of my favourite things to cook and to eat, and I simply love having a collection of dips on hand, to accompany anything, from idlis and vadas to paneer, bread, crackers, crudites, chips, mini-blinis and so on.
In the winter, when the prices of bell peppers falls to about Rs. 100 a kilo, I run amock buying them up for all manner of uses, from eating them grilled to julienning them for salads or making them into soups, adding them to pasta...Red bell pepper has two special uses for me. One is in a roasted red pepper soup which is one of the most divine soups I have ever had. The other is to make Muhammara ( the third, which I recently discovered, is to make the secret sauce of the Marais restaurant).
Muhammara is a lebanese sauce, meant to be had with fattoush or pita bread. But frankly, it is such a lush thing that I can have it with almost anything, or even spend a messy half hour dipping my finger into a cup full and licking it off. In fact, I've just had a brainwave that suggests that I try it as a pasta sauce. The taste is tongue-tingling and yet gentle so it's a very inviting dip. And it requires roast bell peppers, than which what could be more delicious?
Muhammara
Ingredients:
Red bell pepper - 200 grams
1/3rd cup pine nuts, lightly toasted
3-4 garlic cloves
1 tsp pomegranate molasses ( not having any, I usually use plain old anardana - pomegranata seeds, available at any indian grocery store)
1/2-1 tbsp sugar (to taste)
1 tsp chilli powder
Juice of half lemon
1/2 cup fresh breadcrumbs
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup good quality extra virgin olive oil
Roast the bell pepper until the skin is charred. Cool, peel and deseed and chop into chunks.
Run all the ingredients except the olive oil in the blender until finely pureed together.
Add the olive oil little by little into the running blender until well-blended with the sauce.
Remove and enjoy with anything!
Over the weekend, I served this with a grilled masala paneer which is a Delhi specialty. Mmm!
In the winter, when the prices of bell peppers falls to about Rs. 100 a kilo, I run amock buying them up for all manner of uses, from eating them grilled to julienning them for salads or making them into soups, adding them to pasta...Red bell pepper has two special uses for me. One is in a roasted red pepper soup which is one of the most divine soups I have ever had. The other is to make Muhammara ( the third, which I recently discovered, is to make the secret sauce of the Marais restaurant).
Muhammara is a lebanese sauce, meant to be had with fattoush or pita bread. But frankly, it is such a lush thing that I can have it with almost anything, or even spend a messy half hour dipping my finger into a cup full and licking it off. In fact, I've just had a brainwave that suggests that I try it as a pasta sauce. The taste is tongue-tingling and yet gentle so it's a very inviting dip. And it requires roast bell peppers, than which what could be more delicious?
Muhammara
Ingredients:
Red bell pepper - 200 grams
1/3rd cup pine nuts, lightly toasted
3-4 garlic cloves
1 tsp pomegranate molasses ( not having any, I usually use plain old anardana - pomegranata seeds, available at any indian grocery store)
1/2-1 tbsp sugar (to taste)
1 tsp chilli powder
Juice of half lemon
1/2 cup fresh breadcrumbs
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup good quality extra virgin olive oil
Roast the bell pepper until the skin is charred. Cool, peel and deseed and chop into chunks.
Run all the ingredients except the olive oil in the blender until finely pureed together.
Add the olive oil little by little into the running blender until well-blended with the sauce.
Remove and enjoy with anything!
Over the weekend, I served this with a grilled masala paneer which is a Delhi specialty. Mmm!
Monday, June 18, 2007
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!)
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!)
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