Peppercorn flavoured vegetable oats - Potluck party, cyber style January 28th 2014

 How many of us,  look  for an instant breakfast oats,  at your favourite  stores??  Yes, I can see many hands raising!!  All  thanks to an casual check-up, my dietician advised to consume  oats atleast once an week, in order to enrich my good cholestrol... Now, for an girl like me, who thought that oats were only for saints.. this was an serious layback... :P

 Gradually, my attitude changed... With an NOT-SO-SWEET TOOTH,  I  opted for masala oats once an week, untill I came across Shama Nagarajan's oats porridge.  She was my partner for poluck party, cyber style and I followed her post.  With just oats and your own vegetable/spice blend, I could actually foresee an tasty and healthy breakfast here,for, this ensures zero preservatives or zero dehydated vegetables. This peppercorn flavoured vegetable oats is an fresh breakfast blend, which amplifies your morning stamina, to kick-start your day!!   :)  :)

Milagu kaarakozhumbu

    Hyderabad is found rainy these days, hunger peeps in quite randomly due to the season.  My mind carves for more hot n spicy food.  It was during one such moment that I recalled this dish.

This dish, milagu karakozhumbu is often made by my mom due to my dad's insistence.  Milagu kaarakozhumbu is an good cold- releiver and also heats up your body to prevent winter chill.  This is done so due to presence of wonderful n healthy indian spices like peppercorns, garlic, jeera combo.  Just imagine to have them with hot rice on a rainy day....  :) hm... wow.... No pizza's or no burgers can compensate for such an powerful Indian dose :)

I served this with cabbage-carrot poriyal and hot rice.  The entire combo felt great on stomach and my heart too!

Newyork-styled pizza (from scratch)

    I had made pizza before using readymade pizza base, but when Baking partners had announced challenge to make pizza from scratch, I was too excited !  I always wanted to make my own pizza's but regular time with house-keeping, baby-sitting didn't permit me to explore on baking side.  Cooking on stove, was an easy-task as curries go with easy-stir.  Even stuffed paranthas can be balanced by an uniform rotation.  But, unlike baking everything has to be precise, perfect!  So, I just followed first recipe suggested by Pam (http://livinranchodelux.blogspot.in/)   Thank god, pizza turned out great and everyone appreciated my effort.

 

(For the seasoning for pizza base, I used left-over of domino's oregano sachets.  These sachets can be replaced by 2 tsp minced garlic, 1 tsp dried oregano, Pinch of red chilly flakes, Basil fresh or dried, 1 tbsp salt, 1/2 tsp coarsely crushed peppercorns)

 

Malvani fish curry

This is my third post for malvani cuisine.  The beforesaid cuisine, which is known for its hot fiery seafood, encloses coconut due to its abundant presence.  Following here below is hot fish curry..

Ingredients required

To be roasted and ground into powder

• 2 tsp whole cumin/Jeera
• 3-4 whole dry red chillies
• 1 tsp whole dhanya
• 1/2 tsp turmeric powder
• 1/2 tsp rock salt

Milagu cauliflower fry

Cauliflower is blooming nowadays and i can find it more frequently here @ hydi... Eversince the price went reasonably low, my father-in-law makes a point of buying more gobi ... and  yes, my refrigerator is flooded with cauliflowersss :)  :)  Thinking to make more gobi dishes... this post is a dry side-dish of cauliflower with peppercorns and other dry spices, thus making an excellant combo with paruppu saadham, keerai saadham, sambhar etc.  Go ahead and try ... its so simple....

Ingredients required

To temper

• 4 tsp oil
• 1 tsp rai/mustard seeds
• 1/2 tsp broken urad dal
• 1 tsp chana dal
• 8-10 whole dry red chillies
• 10-12 curry leaves
• 1/2 tsp hing/perungayam
• 2-3 tsp of finely chopped onions
• 2 tsp coarsely crushed peppercorns

other

• 1 cup cauliflower florets
• 1/2 tsp salt

Method

In a kadaai, heat oil and add ingredients for temper one by one

Now, throw in cauliflower florets and cover the kadaai.  

Sprinkle water now and then and cover cooked till cauliflower is done.  Sprinkle salt.  If wanted add pepper powder (if u need more other than tempering, which completely suits ur taste buds) and serve hot with rice and dal.

 

Masala tea

Masala tea is an refreshing tea on windy evenings... Prepared by adding exotic dash of indian spices,(with cardamon and ginger as predominant factor)  it also shares medicinal use as they are known to have better cure for cold.

Ingredients required

To make masala

• 7-8 green cardamon pods
• 1/2 tsp dry ginger powder(optional)
• 1-inch cinnamon piece
• 2-3 cloves
• 2-3 peppercorns
• 1/2 tsp fennel seeds/sombu
• 1/2 tsp star anise

other

• 1 tsp tea masala (i used regular 3 roses)
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 tsp finely chopped fresh ginger
• 1 tsp sugar

Method

Dry roast all ingredients under masala, and crush them to coarse powder
Alternatively heat half cup milk and half cup water in tea pan
Add finely chopped ginger to tea pan and simmer the flame
Throw in crushed masalas and sugar
Lastly add tea masala also and simmer for two minutes for tea masala to infuse with already added spices and milk
Then strain the liquid and serve hot!!

Enjoy!!!!

Classic pepper masala (base for gravy)

  One sunday previous month, i prepared this base in a hurry and served it with boiled crab, MUST TELL U GUYS, IT WAS EXTREMELY TASTY, and not only that it goes good with veggies too, so just try out and let met know.  This base can be stored in fridge for some six days, in case of storing so, just avoid to add milk powder and add all other ingredients

Ingredients required

One small milk powder packet, one ladle of khuskhus, one handful of pudhina, 1tsp of peppercorn(roasted and cooled), 1 tsp of jeera(roasted and cooled) , 1/2 cup coriander leaves, 2 red chilli, 1 green chilli, 1 tomato, 1 onion, 1 tsp ginger garlic paste, 1 tsp dhanya whole, 2-3 scrappings of tamarind, 2-3pieces of cinnamon, 2 cloves, 3 cardamom pods

At first, grind all dry ingredients together like cinnamon, clove, cardamom, red chilli, dhanya, tamarind, peppercorn, jeera, khuskhus, milk powder

 Now, you will get some mixture like this

 Then add onion, tomato, all other ingredients and grind to get a smooth paste like this

This is our base

You can

1. Store this and use as required (for 5-6 days)

2. Use this for non-vegetarian gravy preparations like chicken, mutton, crab.  I personally recomment it with crab since i have tried and got super result

3. For vegetarians can do so for tofu, mushroom , capsicum gravies.  This is not recommended for veggies that turn soggy soon like cauliflower, better use so for tougher veggies

For example, i used the base and added one cup of chopped mushrooms, and cubed capsicum, and cooked till mushroom got done, my mushroom masala dish is over without any delay :)

Add i served yummy mushroom pepper masala with sambhar rice, it went well :)