aloo paratha

I made this for the lunch box yesterday.



Boiled four potatoes. Peeled. Chopped roughly. In pan, took very little ( 2 tsp) oil, added little jeera and rai. Then added 1 finely chopped onion. When the onion turned golden brown, added the potatoes, red chilli pdr, turmeric pdr, salt, I didn't have coriander in the fridge, but it tastes good if you chop some coriander and put in it. I didn't add green chillies either as the 2B's wouldn't be able to eat it otherwise add those too. fry for a minute or two and then mash it nicely and let it cool in a bowl. Kneed a real soft dough from 2cups wheat flour. Make it as soft as you can roll. That't the trick if you don't want the potatoes mix to come out of the paratha while rolling and also to ensure even distribution. I learnt it too late ( very recently) so wanted to share it. Otherwise my aloo parathas looked really horrible !


Now took a small part of the dough to make a ball. Pressed it to make it flat and kept pressing around the corners to make it slightly bigger. now took the same amount of aloo mix and placed it in the centre. brought all the sides together and close it properly.





Placed it upside sown and started rolling it lightly. Placed it on a hot tawa and shallow fried both the sides till golden.





I cut it in half on the tawa itself if I am putting it in the lunch box. Just roll it once they are slightly cold and put it in the box. And offcourse add some butter on top of the parathas.

CACTS sandwich

CACTS is the name I gave to this one - Cheese, Avocado, Cucumber, Tomato, Spinach sandwich !

I took two slices of white bread, buttered them. Spread a good amount of baby spinach leaves, arrange slices of cucumber and tomato on it. Cut some avocado and arrange on top of it. Grate some cheese and spread it on the sandwich before covering with the other slice. You can see some gree chutney on top too instead of cheese but since the 2 B's don't like it, I didn't.

Cut them in two halves and gladwrap them for the lunch box. I usually add a fruit, a fruit juice, a breakfast bar/one serve size chips packet/crackers to make it a healthy yet appealing lunch !

banana cake in a jiffy

I made this yesterday after having a sudden craving for eating a banana cake. Alright, alright, it wasn't a sudden craving, I was browsing the net for some easy banana cake recipe as I had three bananas browning up. Had no intention of making it straightaway but looking at all those mouthwatering pics along with the recipies, I jsut had to have one straightaway. And this one took 10min flat to prepare ( not counting the baking time ). I was planning to make some lemon icing too when I was browsing. But I didn't have icing sugar in the pantry, so we just ate it without icing - as usual :-)

You will need:

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup milk

150gms melted butter ( I used only 100 gms though)

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 eggs ( I used egg replacer as usual)

1 cups self raising flour

3 large mashed bananas

Method:

Preheat oven to 180 C. grease and flour a 20cm baking ring tin. Dissolve baking soda in milk. Beat the butter and sugar till creamy. beat in eggs. Stir in sifted flour, soda milk, banana. Turn into tin and bake for approx 45 min or untill a toothpick comes out clean from the centre of the cake.

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.

Banana and choc chip muffins

I make these atleast once a fortnigh or sometimes even once a week as they are great for morning tea time in 2B's lunch boxes.

I got this recipe from recipezaar I think, not sure, but did my own few variations and they come out perfect.

Will need:

2 eggs ( since we dont even eat eggs, I use Organ's 'no eggs, egg replacer' )

2 ripe bananas

1/4 cup oil

1 cup low fat milk

3/4 cup soft brown sugar

1 cup standard flour+1 and half cup whole wheat flour

4 tsp Baking powder

1/2 cup choc chips

Preheat oven to 180 degrees. Mix liquids, then mashed bananas ( I use fork to mash bananas) and sugar lightly. then add flour, baking powder and choc chips. Don't over mix. bake in the oven for 15-18mins. Cool for 2 mins and take out. Goes well with cup of coffee too :-)

tricolour sandwiches

This morning I looked into the fridge for some filling for sandwiches for the 2 B's lunchbox and this is what I made - lovely tri coloured sandwiches and they both loved them.

1 cup -chopped fresh spinach
1/2 cup - grated carrots ( squeeze the juice out and I used that juice in the dough to make rotis for my lunch.)
1/2 cup - crumbled paneer ( used frozen paneer ). I sometimes use grated vegetarian cheese instead of paneer.
4 slices brown bread ( I used white here as the dairy next door had run out of wheatmeal bread )

Butter one side of a bread slice. sprinkle all the above ingredients one by one. Butter another slice and put on top. cut the sandwich in half, i normally cut it into two or four triangles. and the 2 B's absolutely love the crunchy sandwich.

glad vwrap them and crunchy, healthy sandwiches are ready for the lunch box.