Healthy Veg Ukma

My son gets easily bored with regular dishes, i have to cook something different for him to eat properly.
At the same time i make sure that the food is healthy and has all vegetables.

One such healthy dish is Veg Ukma


Ingredients:

Onion - 1 (cut into small pieces)
green chillies - 2 (cut into small pieces)
Cabbage cut pieces - 1 cup
potato - 1 (cut into small pieces)
carrot - 1 (cut into small pieces)
green split gram - 1 cup (soaked for 1/2 hr)
Oil - 3 tbsp
pepper corns - 5
Ukma Rava - 2 cups
Water - 4 cups
Salt - 1 tsp (as per taste)


Step 1: Take a deep pan, add oil. add onion, green chillies and pepper corns. Fry until onion become transparent, then add cabbage, potato and carrot pieces and fry for a minute.

Tip: You can add any vegetable you fancy, like peas, beans etc


Step 2: Add soaked and drained green gram. Fry for minute and then add water. And add salt as per your taste

Tip: The best way to know that you have added correct amount of salt is to taste the
water after adding the salt.



Step 3: Once the water starts boiling, add ukma rava, make sure there are no lumps and let it cook for another mimute

Tip: When adding ukma rava, add it slowly while stirring water. This way you are sure no lumps are formed




Enjoy healthy Ukma, and my son loved it.

non recipe : coriander powder

Now a days every one buys ground masalas.
I want to show how easy it is to make them at home.

Advantages of making masala powders at home

1. masala powder is fresh
2. You need to used only half the amount with home made compared to the store bought ones
3. They smell great and have great flavor
4. You are sure there are no fillers or preservatives added to them
5. They are easy to make
6. It is way cheaper than store bought ones.


If i had time i would like to make masalas just before using them but i think i can do that only when i retire from my job and have all the time in the world to cook dishes.

Today we are going to see how to make coriander powder.

Ingredients: coriander seeds


You can find them in any Indian store.
They have nutty-sweet flavor.



Step1: lightly roast the seeds for few minutes. You will start to get the auroma of the seeds.






Step2: Grind and store in a air tight container.

Simple :)

spicy brinjal(egg plant) chutney

I Love eggplant recipes. My husband does not eat it.
I usually make eggplant chutney and tell him its peanut chutney. He happily eats it and then i disclose that its eggplant. He complains that i am cheating him.

If our loved ones are missing out on delicious dish, we can go to any extend to make them taste those dishes. What say :)

Here a delicious recipe for all those who don't like brinjal.

Ingredients



Egg plants (Brinjal) - 5 (medium size)
Green chillies - 10 (as per spice you like)
onion -1 (medium size)
garlic pods - 5
tamarind - lemon size (as shown in pic)
jeera - 1 tsp
oil - 2 tbsp
salt - as per taste

Step 1: Take a non-stick pan, add oil. add cut brinjal peices and chillies and fry for a minute.



Step 2: Add tamarind, garlic pods, cut onion and turmeric .

Step 3: let them fry until nicely done, will take around 5-6 minutes. Now grind all the fried ingredients with little salt.

That is all, delicious brinjal chutney is ready.



Step 4(optional) : add tadka as with all chutney recipes, which is optional.

Enjoy :)

Crunchy Prawns Grill

I loves Prawns, but unluckily my husband does not like them.

I want some recipe which is easy to make and quick. I want it as a side dish so that my husband does not starve when i make prawns.

This is one of those recipes for which i did not refer anything. This recipe is nothing complex and fancy, but still i love the fact it turned out extremely tasty without any help. yay!


Take some cleaned prawns


Add red chilli powder, coriander powder, salt, pepper, turmeric, garam masala and finely chopped mint leaves. Dont worry too much about measurements, go with your heart. Its always good to add a little less than you thought would be enough.


Mix properly, squeeze a lemon .

soak wooden skewers in ice cold water for 10 minutes before you use them for grilling.


grill the prawns for 20 minutes under 160 C or until cooked.


Enjoy the grilled prawns with some spicy sauce or ketchup.

Happy cooking.

Crazy cucumber chutney

I call it crazy because that's what i felt when i first heard this recipe from my grand mom. For any cucumber recipes i know, i remove seeds and this recipe had seeds as one of the main ingredients.

But with my grand mom's repetition of cooking delicious dishes, i tried this recipe and i am glad i did it. I am content with another delicious recipe in my book :)

Ingredients:
small cucumbers - 6
chillies - 20 ( according to your taste, i usually like Indian dishes very hot)
turmeric - 1/4 tsp
tamarind - 2-3 strands
curry leaves - 10 leave
Salt for taste
ginger - small piece
garlic - 2-3 pods







1. Cut cucumbers into big size pieces as shown in pic. Take a deep bowl, add cut cucumbers, chillies, turmeric, curry leaves and tamarind. add 1/4 cup of water and boil. Boil until all water get evaporated (Tip: do not add too much water as cucumber leaves water when boiled)



2. Once properly boiled, separate out cucumbers and rest of the stuff. Squeeze out the seeds from cucumbers and add them to the rest of the stuff. Add garlic and ginger pieces to the seeds.





3. Cut the cucumbers into small pieces.


4. Grind all the ingredients expect cut cucumbers. Once nicely ground, add cucumbers. cucumbers should not be ground until smooth, they need to remain as small pieces.


Yummy cucumber chutney is ready. If you observed there is no oil in this recipe. Healthy and tasty together in one recipe...wonderful is it not?

You can add tadka to this chutney if you like.

Enjoy :)

Chatpat Cabbage Chutney

We usually get big cabbages near our house and i use only half when i make curry.

The left out half cabbage is a problem for me. I don't like to repeat a curry in a week and also i don't like to keep any vegetable more than a week in my fridge.

I tried to make different kinds of curries with it, but never satisfied.

Finally the below recipe come to my rescue. I am sure you will love it.

Ingredients

Cabbage - 2 cups
tomatoes - 2
Green chillies -6
tamarind - little (as seen in pic)
Jeera - 1 tbsp
Garlic pods - 7
oil - 3 tbsp
salt - 1/2 tsp
turmeric - pinch

1. Fry cabbage in 2tbsp oil until nicely done

2. add tomato and fry until tomatoes are cooked properly.


3. Fry chillies in 1 tbsp of oil along with tamarind, Jeera and garlic pods. (Tip: when frying green chillies, either cut them into two or pierce them with knife. If not they will burst when fried)




4. Now grind everything along with salt and turmeric to make a coarse paste. Yummy cabbage chutney is ready

5. You can optionally add tadka (poopu) to the chutney to make it even more yummy. (Will soon post a recipe for tadka)


I am so happy and excited to discover this cabbage recipe. Hope you will also find it yummy.
Happy cooking.

My first attempt at cookies: cashew cookies

Well, i always wanted to bake cookies. I had this imagination of how home baked cookies will look and how they

The looks did not turn out as expected, but the smell was great and cannot be describe in words. These cookies just melted in my mouth .

butter - 200 gms

powder sugar - 100 gms

egg yolk - 1

vanilla essence - 1/2 tsp

plain flour - 250g

corn flour - 60g

baking powder - 1/2 tsp

cashew nuts - 200gms

egg - 1

cashew nuts for decoration

Lightly roast the cashew nuts and ground them. Mix all dry ingredients are set aside.

add butter and sugar and mix. Add in egg yolk and vanilla essence. Mix well.

Add dry ingredients and grounded cashew nuts. Mix well. Put the dough in fridge for 40 minutes.

Make small balls out of the dough, place them onto baking tray. Brush with beaten egg and place half cashew nut on top of cookies and press slightly to flatten it.

Bake in a preheat oven at 150 C for 15 minutes or until nicely brown.

Cool and keep in airtight container.

Its quite simple to bake cookies. Next time i need to be very careful with measurements.

Next is coconut cookies, one of my husbands favorite.

Happy cooking