Pineapple rasam

   With few pineapple slices, left over, I settled at this recipe , found at Chef Damodharan's cookbook.  The recipe was very simple, though I twisted the rasam masala with few curry leaves and green chillies addition.  The result was delicate, sweet and sour peppery rasam.  Kids would love it because of an different, 'sweet' quotient into them.  And, elders would welcome an new change.

So, do try and let us know.  Moving on to the recipe.

Preparation time: 20 minutes

Cooking time : 10 minutes

Serves: 4

Ingredients required

For the rasam masala

• 21/2 tsp whole cumin seeds/ jeera
• 1 tsp whole peppercorn
• 6-8 tiny garlic pods
• 3/4 tsp finely chopped green chillies
• 8-10 whole curry leaves

Others

• 1 tbspn of oil
• 3/4 tsp of mustard seeds
• Pinch of hing/asafoetida
• Pinch of haldi/turmeric powder
• 1/2 cup of finely chopped pineapple 
• 1/4 cup of finley chopped tomatos
•  1/4 cup of tuvar dal
• Salt, to taste

Method

Coarsely grind all, under rasam masala, without adding water, keep aside.  Soak tuvar dal for atleast twenty minutes and pressure cook them for two whistles with half cup of water.  Blend them , and keep aside.   

Heat oil.  Add mustard seeds and wait till they splutter.

Now, add in hing and turmeric.  Finally add corase paste of rasam masala.  Saute them for an minute.  

Add in pineapple and tomato pieces.  Saute for five to ten minutes, till they turn soft.  

Finally add in mashed tuvar dal, and add salt to taste.  

Let the rasam froth towards the edges.  Switch off the flame and serve hot.  

Enjoy with hot rice  :)

Happy cooking :)

Linking this to Srivalli's CCC Challenge

Apple Galette

      Galette is an free form of pie.  They are from French Cuisine and can be made both sweet and savoury.  Since I had lot of Simla Apples left in my refrigerator, I made Apple Galette.  They made an very light dessert and we enjoyed having these.  

A big thanks to Swathi Iyer  and Suja for suggesting such an wonderful recipe.  Tastewise these resembled the pie and with the given recipe for shorcrust pastry, I made two 7-inch Apple Galette.  Let us move to the recipe

Ingredients required:

For shortcrust pastry

• 11/4 cup All purpose flour
• 1/4 cup cornflour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 2 tsp sugar
• 55 grams of unsalted butter, cut into tiny cubes.
• 11/2 tbspn of cold water

For filling

• 140 grams of Apple, peeled, cut into thin slices
• 1/2 tsp of lemon juice
• 1 tbspn of unsalted butter
• 1 tsp of cinnamon powder
• 2 tsp of sugar

To top with

• 2 tsp of granulated sugar

Method

For shortcrust pastry, add both the flours, salt, sugar in an dry bowl and mix them together. 

Rub in butter cubes into the flour till the flour resembles breadcrumbs.  

Add in cold water till the crumbs form an soft dough.

The soft dough should be firm enough to hold.  To test, take an pinch of dough, if it breaks apart, then it needs more water.  If they hold shape, then dough is complete.  

Cling wrap them and refrigerate for an minimum of two hours.   For the filling add the sliced apples to lemon juice.  This helps in preventing discolouration.  Melt butter, add in cinnamon, sugar and mix till sugar dissolves.  Toss around the apple slices and cool.  

Remove the shortcrust dough from cling wrap and let them come to room temperature, preheat the oven to 180 degree celsius.   Divide into two halves.   Roll first half  sandwiched between two butter  sheets.

After they reach 1/8inch thickness, add in the filling leaving 3 inch gap around the edges.

Using hands, fold the edge up forming loose frills, covering the filling.  

Sprinkle with sugar.

Bake them for 20-25 minutes.  Cool them in wire rack and serve.  

Linking this to Baking partners run by Swathi Iyer.

Happy Baking :)  :)

Chow chow and mutton curry

   I had just left the market with an pack of chow chow.  This green vegetable, resembled potato like in texture.  I wanted to try it differently other than usual poriyal or kootu, which is why I called my aunt.  She told me that chow chow, radhish, carrot and potato are few vegetables that can pair excellently with mutton curry.  Even those who don't like veggies and prefer mutton alone, will find this curry delecious since the chow chow absorbs the flavour of mutton and portrays as same.  You can add green chillies to the masala paste instead of chilly powder, but, since we had an toddler, I sticked with latter option.

Yes, and I made the curry along with mutton and its liver.  Mutton liver or thilli is an excellant source of iron, and moreover they dominated the entire flavour and we all nourished the same.  This curry goes great with rice/idly or dosa.  I hope you try the same and let us know.  

Opera cake - Baking partners challenge

    This month's Baking partner challenge was suggested by Savitha,  Opera cake is an famous french pastry where almond flavoured sponge is filled with  coffee buttercream and chocolate ganache with an liberal soaking of coffee syrup.  The final layer is glossed with tempered chocolate and is refrigerated overnight for the coffee flavour to infuse.

The first time, I tried almond sponge, it completely broke, and yes, sadly landed in garbage.  After watching an lot of youtube vidoes,   I gave them another shot.  Yayy... my sponge came out right!  I, divided the recipe by one third as I had an small oven, with baking tray supporting 9 inch by 10.5 inch.  This cake requires an lot of labour, so prepared sponge by day one.  Day two,  morning, prepared syrup, ganache and buttercream.  Assembled by evening and refrigerated overnight, this cake was ready for consumption by third day.

One bite into this pastry, was fabulous with an strong hint of coffee and some chocolate.  Initially, I was  worried when both sponge recipe and buttercream recipe demanded eggs.  But, this pastry had no eggy smell at all.  They were soft and delecious, like Bakery bought ones.  I never though that I could make them this delecious, thanks to Savitha and Swathi Iyer for bringing out such an challenging recipe.

Kundapura kozhi chaaru

    This morning, I was going through my recipe diary.  Initially, when I started to cook, I had this habit of writing down all interesting recipes from TV program.  As week-end special, we always have chicken- so when particular page read, ' Kundapur kozhi chaaru' I got very excited!  All ingredients mentioned was handy at home, so tried these for this week's CCC Challenge.

Kundapura kozhi chaaru is an regional speciality from Karnataka, in a place called, 'Kondapur'.  This curry is more like an soup.  Yes, chaaru is an equivalent term for, 'rasam' in tamil.  This soupy broth is best when served with rice.  This recipe also, involves in an special masala, that imparts an fresh taste to this curry.  To, top this coconut oil and curry leaves added an mystique flavour that circulated the entire home.  Do try this and let us know :)