cheese and tomato sandwich

These are again very simple to make and kids love them.

Butter a slice of bread. put cheese on top and then some slices of deseeded tomatoes. Sprinkle some pepper powder, put another buttered slice on top, cut in half and glad wrap.

salad sandwich

Yep, you guessed right, I make these for the 2Bs lunch boxes all the time.

As you can see, I used:

Wheatmeal ( brown) bread - 2 slices

Cucumber - thinly sliced

tomato- deseeded and sliced

salad leaves- I used the ready-to-use 'baby spinach and baby cos' from the supermarket.

Butter

Spread the butter on one slice. spread some salad leaves evenly, put a couple of tomatoes and cucumber slices on it and cover with another buttered slice of bread. Cut them in halves.

Glad wrap them and put them in the lunch bags.

Orange Paneer !

No, there are no oranges or any other fruit in this recipe - this is the name given to the dish by my 2Bs because of the colour of the gravy ! Palak paneer is green paneer for them !! And they prefer orange paneer :-)

So here's their favourite paneer curry and its easy ( otherwise I wouldnt make it so often ! ):

500 gms paneer cubes ( I use Taj's frozen paneer cubes, and find it really good)

1 tin - Indian style canned tomatoes ( grind it in a blender)

2 cloves garlic - thinly sliced

butter- 2tbsp

kasuri methi - 2 tbsp

kaju paste - 2 tbsp

saffron - a few strands ( soaked in a spoon of warm milk)

100ml - cream

chilli powder - as per taste

garam masala powder - 1 tsp

salt

Heat a pan on the stove top. add ghee and then add garlic. cook till light brown. add kasuri methi. stir for a second or two and then add the blended Indian Style tomato and half cup water. Let it come to a boil. Add kaju paste, saffron milk, chilli pdr, garam masal pdr, paneer and salt and cover and let it simmer for 10 mins. add cream now and simmer for 5 more mins. garnish with some chopped coriander. Thats it ! Oh yeah, we like to eat it with nice and hot rotis or paranthas :-)

Hyderabadi Biryani

Its offcourse vegetarian and is loved by all of us and all my friends when I make it for dinners or parties. I learnt this from my SIL who learnt it from a family friend who owned a restaurant and made a mean Biryani. They made nonveg in their restaurant but he taught the vegetarian version to my SIL and I tried to recollect how she made it once in India and have now been making it for years myself and this is one thing that I can make very confidentaly knowing that it will be liked by one and all.

Ingredients:

2-3 cups basmati rice

5- onions (big)

3-4 green chillies ( slit length wise)

3 tbsp ginger garlic paste

2 tomatoes

3 tbsp yogurt

2 tsp - red chilli pdr

approx 3-400 gms beans slit lengthwise and then chopped in half ( I used the ready made frozen ones)

approx - 200gm peas

a few florets of cauli

3 carrots - slit lengthwise and cut into long thin pieces.

5-6 black pepper ( whole)

4 inch cinnamon stick

1 big black cardomom

4-5 small green cardomoms

2 tsp jeera

1 tsp garam masala pdr

a few strands of saffron soaked in about 1/4 cup of warm milk
2cups(tightly packed) - fresh chopped coriander leaves

1cup(tight packed) - fresh chopped mint leaves

1cup- halved cashews

Method:

Soak rice for 15 min in lot of water. Put 3-4 tbsp of cooking oil and some salt and put it on the stove on high heat. Bring it to a boil and lower the heat. Let it cook till it is almost done but not completely done. When you press it between your finger and thumb, it should be slightly firm but not very soft. Drain the excess water and spread it out on a big plate to let it cool.

In a pan, take about 6-7 tbsp cooking oil and heat it on medium heat. slice the onion thinly ( horizontal circles) and fry in the oil till they are golden brown like this and then drain it on a paper towel.

Now add jeera to the same oil, when it splutters, add the whole garam masala ( cinnamom, cardomom, pepper etc) and then add the cashews. once the cashews start turning pink, add the ginger garlic paste, chilli pdr, coriander pdr, garam masala pdr and stir till oil floats.

Add green chillies, chopped tomatoes and once they are softened, add yogurt and cook till the oil seperates. Now add all the veges, mix it properly, cover with a lid and let it cook till the veges are done.

now take a large bowl or an oven safe dish/container. Spread a layer of rice first. then put a layer of the cooked veges, then the fried and drained onions and then chopped mint and coriander leaves. Put another layer of rice and the same layers of veges, onions and chopped greens. I normally put one half of rice in the bottom layer and then half of veges and again the rest of the rice and the rest of the veges. but you can make as many layers as you want. It looks like this from above and the other pic shows how the layers look from side.

Now, sprinkle the saffron milk on it. With a serving spoon, take 4-5 big chunks of thick yogurt and put on top of the biryani. Cover it properly with foil and push it in the oven for 'dum' on low heat for 15-20 min or half hour depeding on the oven. I normally leave it there untill the guest arrive. Take it out at serving time and mix it very lightly and serve with 'mirchi ka salan' ( recipe coming up soon) and raita.

Tips

My jiju who turned vegetarian recently gave me a tip to add soya chunks after soaking them in warm water, along with the veges and once the biryani is done, it tastes exactly like mutton. I have never tasted mutton but my non-veg friends were really surprised when I first added that and now I am asked to add them all the time. Its good for us vegetarians too as the soya is a rich source of protien for vegetarians.

I also added Paneer once along with the veges to make it richer, and it was loved too !!

Baked Gujiya ( karanji )

Yep, that's right. I tried baking the gujiyas instead of deep frying to make it low calorie. 'D' loves sweets and hates anything that even mentions 'healthy' or 'low calorie'. He automatically thinks that it will taste bad.


When I gave one of these gujiya's to him ( and mind you I had tried it for the first time after giving up on it when I tried making them the traditional way a good 8 yrs back), I was sure that he is going to hate it, yet, I asked expectantly if they weren't 'that bad' for non-deep-fried gujiya and that he should expect it to be different than the deep fried ones and on and on. He just ate it and said - not bad, not bad, infact its good !!! That's a big complement coming from a sweet lover but 'low calorie' hater :-) He gave it a thumbs up and that its good enough to make ot for Diwali.

For making 24- 25 gujiyas, you will need:

for filling: ( I used the following but you can make a filling of your choice or taste)

One cup rawa/suji/semolina

half cup - dessicated coconut

half cup - milk powder

1tsp- elaichi( cardmom) pdr

sugar - half cup or as per taste

handful of chopped dry fruits of your choice

For Gujiya:

One and half cup - maida

3tbsp- rawa

2tbsp- ghee

3/4 cup milk

Heat a Pan and add rawa and roast on medium heat till it is slightly pink. Turn off the heat, let it cool and add the coconut, sugar. milk powder, and elaichi pdr and keep it aside.

Mix maida, rawa, ghee and milk in another plate and knead a semisoft dough. Make 23- 25 balls of it and cover with a wet cloth.

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Line a baking tray with baking paper or you can use a greased tray if you don't mind increasing the fat content. Take the balls of the dough and start rolling them out one by one into small puri like shapes. put one to one and half spoon of the filling in the centre of the rolled out puri and wet the corner outer lining of the puri with some water and fold it over to make a gujiya shape and press the ends with a fork and fold it slightly so they can't open during baking or you can also use th Gujiya moulds. Put these gujiya's on the baking tray and bake for about 15-20 minutes or untill they start turning pink. Take them out, cool and store in airtight containers.

The total fat used was only 2tbsp for so many gujiyas and it tasted great too ! I didn't even brush them with ghee before pushing them in the oven - can't get better than this :-)