Piri piri chicken with coleslaw

    Still remember the introduced flavour for frech fries in McDonalds, called as 'Spicy African seasoning, Piri Piri'  Yes, this chicken is flavoured with the same piri piri sauce.  Piri piri, the name derives from African Birds Eye chilli.

Piri piri sauce, which was Portugese in origin, and got prevalent in Mozambique, Angola, South Africa is made from these chillies, Bayleaf, peppercorns, oregano, onion, garlic, lime juice, basil, cilantro, citrus peel etc.  Now, lets make this piri piri sauce, marinate it with chicken and cook till done.  This spicy, red hot starter is accompanies by South American Coleslaw... It was super-duo combination.

Coleslaw

    Coleslaw is an salad of shredded raw cabbage, carrot and other optional fruits. This Southern US based dish is dressed with mayonnaise, vinegar and includes an pinch of mustard sauce too.  Preparations is soo simple and can be made in jiffy...This dish is usually had in barbeque chicken, chicken tikka etc.

Ingredients required

For the main salad

• 1 cup cabbage, cut into thin strips
• 1/2 cup carrot, cut into thin strips

Punjabi rajmah

My mother used to prepare most yummiest rajmah.  I like her curry/gravy/any dal preparation which she smartly accompanies with roti.  This punjabi rajmah is dedicated to my dear mother.

Ingredients required

To temper

• 4 tsp butter
• 1 bayleaf, crushed
• 2-3 cloves
• 2 tsp crushed black cardamon

Spice mix

• 1/2 tsp haldi/turmeric powder
• 1 tsp punjabi garam masala
• 1 tsp chilli powder
• 1tsp dhanya powder
• 1/2 tsp aamchur powder
• 1 tsp salt

Choclatey pop sticks

    My second choclate task was soooo easy on me and went sooo tasty for my kid....

Ingredients required

•   50 grams white choclate 
• 100 grams dark choclate
• Pinch of butter 
• Some lollypop sticks.

Kothe momos

    Many would now have familiarized the word 'momo', steamed dumpling from tibetian cuisine.  Momo is usually served as an starter with an spicy, tangy dipping sauce.  There are many varieties of momo, of that we are going to see Kothe momos, these are steamed half-moon shaped dumplings which are pan-fried and served.  Kothe momos usually have an juicy chicken filling, here I replaced chicken mince with soya chunks mince and product was GREATTTT.....

Ingredients required

For dough

• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• Enough water, to knead the dough
• 1 tsp oil

Nethilli meen kozhambu

  Nethili fish or Anchovy fish is my all-time-favourite.  But as these create an heavy response, you gotta run onto fish market early to get them.  Recently, bought them and enjoyed having them..

Ingredients required

To be roasted and powdered

• 1/2 tsp raw rice
• 1 tsp chana dal
• 1 tsp whole cumin seeds
• 1/2 tsp whole peppercorn
• 1/4 tsp methi seeds
• 3-4 broken dry red chillies
• 1 tsp whole dhanya
• 1 tsp tamarind piece

Aam panna

Aam panna is an North-Indian drink which is usually prepared during summer season.  An refreshing drink usually prepared from raw mango, sugar and an assortment of spices is known for its heat resistant properties.  

Ingredients required 

•  1 raw mango
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 tsp of dry roasted cumin 
• One handful of mint leaves

Method

Deskin and deseed mango, boil them in 2 cups water for 15-20 minutes till they turn soft.

Lateron, blend them along with sea salt, sugar, cumin, few mint leaves.  

Choclatey custard baskets

   Hi guys, this is my 200th post, and am soo happy about it..
Today I will share choclatey dessert in order to make this post special... Not long before, I attended choclate classes here at hyderabad... The tutor was soo nice to me, she taught me how to cook seven different types of choclates, though I wanted to make advanced course (Which included how to make choclate bouquets and hundred other types), time did'nt permit me to do so.  Doin or making choclate requires immense patience, and perfection bcoz this is a highly sensitive process,,, if you fail any step, choclate may get spoilt at end of the day..

Pudhina saadam/Mint flavoured rice

Why not give this creamy mint rice a try?? Kids will luv to have this mildly flavoured rice

Ingredients required

To make green paste

• 1 tsp roasted cumin seeds
• 2 bunch of mint leaves, cleaned and washed twice
• 1-inch piece of ginger

To temper

• 5-6 tsp of oil
• 1 tsp crushed cinnamon
• 1 tsp crushed marathi mogga
• 2-3 green chillies finely chopped
• 4-5 broken cashewnuts
• 4 tsp of finely chopped onions

Soya chunks ki vade

  My kiddoo remained sick for over four days... :( but, slowly she was recovering from her physical illness.  So, this weekend, I decided to make something special for her...She luves vada, and everytime she sees them outside, she will say, 'mai, i want vada'.. But, all left was some sprouts, some dal and soya chunks/mealmaker balls.  It was then, i decided to add them and transform into an pure hybrid vada.. ;)  And yes, result was good... vada was fabulous grabbing everyone's attention and was soo glad that kid liked it...
Afterall, it was an healthy protein combo pack, do try it for ur kids and let me know...

French Macaroons

    I had got this French macaroons for Baking partners challenge, having done first two challenges correctly, I got overambitious and resulted in burnt macaroons in my first time...  I did get upset and rate of upset was a too high factor because these macaroons required a very costly ingredients therefore making it hard to give consequent try unlike bread, buns, cakes etc.  And not only that these macaroons required high technical assistance like adding ingredients on particular texture of egg white or folding almond flour on a correct 50-stroke basis.  Though there are thousands of online videos, nothing can match like tutoring it on person.. But, what to do??...
   
   After had one failure attempt, I decided to visit all successful pages of macaroons accomplishers... and read lots of stories.. of all, I got fascinated  by the story of Swathi from zestysouthindiankitchen and Priya from cooklikepriya.  I read their story many times a day to understand the concept, thank u guys for such a brief description.  After reading so, i got hopes for an second try and finally made macaroons!!!!

Apple & Custard scrolls

Hi guys, I fell in luv with these scrolls ever since I first saw them in Christine's blog... I, was dying to prepare them... and finally took extreme step to prepare these gorgeous scrolls.  Prepared in two batches, made individual buns and baked them on aluminium tin to get stuffed loaf.. Pics follows:

Braided walnut & raisin bun

      My honourable third task from Baking partner group.  This bread preparation is done using Tangzhong method, where a flour paste is added to regular bread preparation at 65 degree celsius to obtain soft and spongy consistency.  This flour paste has been fascinated by chinese because of their successful fluffy bread making that stays soft for so many days

REASON BEHIND TANGZHONG SUCCESS
At 65 degree celsius, gluten in flour and water mixture would absorb moisture and become less leavened. Hence when this produced tangzhong product is added along with other bread ingredients, bread will be softened.

Shahi khumb

      Before goin to recipe, let me tell you that I recently bought Everest shahi paneer masala packet in a nearby supermarket.  At 100 gm costing about reasonable 54 rupees, the ingredients present were as follows:  coriander, black pepper, chilly, turmeric, cumin, cassia leaves, garlic, dry ginger, dry mango, dry tomato powder, black cardamon, green cardamon, cloves, cassia, nutmeg, fenugreek, salt, star anise, fennel seeds etc.  This range of masalas and spices provides a complete dish, leaving the cook to add onion, tomato and one special ingredient (like paneer/ mushroom/ murgh etc)

    This special masala reduces the need for adding any other spices, I strongly recommend you guys to go for it.  This shahi khumb, is of course one special output of Everest shahi masala ;)

Palak paneer

   This gravy tasted like heaven, the green paste made here was so simple and amazing.  For making green paste I sauted 300 gm of finely chopped palak along with one chopped onion, one chopped tomato, 2 tsp ginger paste, 1 tsp garlic paste, 2 green chillies finely chopped, 1/2 tsp punjabi garam masala and 1/4 tsp salt.  I cooled the mixture down and blended it ..

Other ingredient added was, of course fried panner and heavy cream.  If you find it difficult to add cream, better buy full cream milk and reduce them by half through constant stirring,  Add half reduced milk as an alternate for cream.  

Ingredients required

• Palak paste
• Panneer cubes- 9-10
• Heavy cream - 100 ml
• Salt, as required

kozhi kolambu

    Generally preparing traditional chicken curries require lot of time becoz of complex marination and unavailable unique garam masalas or other spices.  But, this south-Indian kozhambu styled chicken calls for easy peasy ingredients with lesser time leading to more flavourful and tasty product.  So, just try it guys....

Ingredients required

• Chicken (with bones) - 1/2 kg

For marination

• Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
• Garlic - 6 pods
• Poppy seeds/khus khus - 2 tsp
• Peppercorn - 2 tsp
• Saunf/sombu - 1 tsp
• Whole jeera/cumin - 1 tsp

To temper

• 5 tsp oil
• 1 tsp saunf/sombu
• A bunch of curry leaves
• Fresh slit red chilly - 2