Murruk /Chakli

Growing up murrku was mine and my sisters favourite snack and my mom used to make it for all festivals and my mom murrku is famous in our entire family :). All my aunts and cousin requests her to come and supervise whenever it is prepared for weddings . Here is her famous recipe.

Rice Power - 1 kg

Urad Dal - 250 gm

Fresh Coconut - 200gms grated
Cumin - 1tbsp (optional)

White Sesame - 2 tbsp

Salt

1.Roast the rice powder in heavy bottom pan mixing well and making sure that rice does not change color.

2.Pressure cook the dal with 2 1/2 cups of water till 3 whistles . Cool and mash the dal well.

3.If using coconut grind coconut and cumin well with as little water as possible.

4.Mix roasted rice ,cooked dal, salt,coconut paste and sesame and make a dough and keep aside for 10 min.

5.Make small murrka or chakli with the Murruk Press .

6.Heat oil to 350 F in a deep pan .

7.Drop murruk to the oil and Fry on both sides till it becomes golden .

This is my entry to fried snack event hosted by

simpleIndianfood

Moong Dal Fitters/Pakoda

This a common street food in Central India and as all street food very yummy too. It is served with fried green chillis and yogurt chutney.

Whenever it rains i make this pakoda, goes very well with a cup of green tea :) .

This can be made with any dal ,lentil or pulses specially Black Eyed Peas. Whatever you are using you need to soak it in water . Some of them take longer to reconstitute but for moong dal half and hour is enough.If you are in hurry soak in warm water.

Moong Dal - 1 cup soaked in water

Onion - 1/2 cup chopped

Green Ghilli - 2 tsp chopped

Ginger - 1 tsp chopped

Cliantro - 1/2 chopped

Salt to taste

Oil to fry

1. Save a tbsp of dal and coarsely grind rest of the dal in food processor with as little water as possible .

2. Take out the ground dal ,add to it the saved one tbsp dal .

3. Mix rest of the ingredients and mix everything properly.

4.Heat oil to 350 F in a deep pan .

5. Make a tsp of mixture and shape it to a ball or traditional oblong shape and deep fry it till golden brown.

"This is my entry to MLLA-13 conceived by Susan of the "Well-Seasoned Cook" and currently being hosted by Sunshinemom of "Tongue Ticklers......"."

Quick and Easy Peanut and Til Ladoo

Peanut Til Ladoo

I can bet this will be the most easiest ladoo recipe you have ever heard of.

This is tasty and healty too.

This is prepared in our family during makar sankranti.

Ingredients:

White Til Roasted - 2 cup

Peanut Roasted -1 cup

Jaggery gratted - 2 cup

Method :

Use Food Processor and process jaggery and peanut together till peanut grinds well.

Add TIl and process till everything mixes well and Til and Peanut is powdered.

Take out on a plate and make small balls .

Store in airtight containers .

PS: If your mix is not coming together while making balls add a few tbsp of milk. But then make sure to store the ladoo in fride.

I'm sending this to to JFI AUGUST 09 : PEANUT event

Here is a link to all the event inspirations IndiraJi's site Mahanandi

French Beans Fry with peanut

Any vegetable fry tastes very good with sambar rice or curd rice,but beans specially tastes good.

In this i use some ground nuts too that adds to the taste and then this can be taken like a warm salad too. Fresh beans i feel is must for this recipe ,frozen doesn't taste good. So this is a must try recipe for summer when fresh tender beans are available in US.

Beans - 2 -3 cups cut into 1 '' pieces.

Green Chilli - 3 slit into half

Onion - 1/2 cup chopped fine

Ground nut - 2 table spoon

Mustard - 1/2 tsp

Red Chilli pw - 3/4 tsp or to taste

Salt to taste

1.Cook beans , green chilli,salt and tumeric with very little water till just tender and stop cooking immediately and drain the water and keep aside.

2. Heat a pan ,add mustard when it crakles add ground nut and fry for a min.

3.Add onion and cook till golden brown .

4.Lower the flame to very low and add red chilli pw and add the cooked beans and mix well and cook for 2-3 min .

5.Serve as side dish with rice and sambar or with chappati.

The use of this peanut in the recipe is inspired from my MIL's recipe for long beans in tomoato gravy with peanuts.My MIL being from central India uses lot of peanut in everyday cooking.

I'll soon post her recipe and my friends mom green Green Chilli and Peanut Teccha recipe too.

I'm sending this to to JFI AUGUST 09 : PEANUT event

Here is a link to all the event inspirations IndiraJi's site Mahanandi

EggPlant Black Pepper Fry/ Baigan KaliMirch Wale

Check the eggplant i'm growing this summer . The variety is called dancer. We brought the plant at farmers market. Two other varieties are also growing in my garden those i have started from seeds and so they have not yet started producing fruit.

There are a lot of people who don't like Eggplant. But sometimes simple preparations like this may change your view about this humble vegetable.My in-laws side there is an aunt who cooks baigan almost everyday because thats what her sons like :)

Brinjal - 1 cup cubed to 1'' pieces

Green Pepper - 2 chopped fine

Black Pepper - 1/2 tsp

Tumeric -1/4 tsp

Salt

Oil - 2 tsp

Mustard Seeds - 1/4 tsp

1. Heat oil in a pan and mustards when they crackle add everything together one after other and cook on high for 2 min.

2. Then lower the flame , mix lightly and cover and cook for another two minutes.

3. Uncover and cook till done ,mixing now and then light handedly now and then.

4. Serve it Chappati or rice

Quick Cauliflower Fry

There are so many preparations of gobi and but this the quickest one to make i bet.

Whenever i'm in hurry to make something quick that goes with paratha for breakfast this is what i will do.

You can cut the cauliflower into small florets the previous night itself if you like. i used to do this when i was working.

Cauliflower floret - 4 cups

Green Chilli chopped -2

Ginger Grated - 1/2 tsp

Coriander Leaves - 2 tsp chopped fine

Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp

Oil - 1 tbsp

Tumeric - 1/4 tsp

Salt to taste

1. Heat oil in a pan on medium flame and add mustard seeds and let it crackle.

2. Add salt ,tumeric , florets,green chilli , ginger and cauliflower .

3. Mix everything well and cover and cook for 3 min.

4. Remove the lid , lower the the heat and allow it cook for 5 more minutes.

5. When done add coriander leaves and serve.

This recipe can be done in over too. After step to throw everything in a oven proof dish and cook at 450 F till its one to your liking.

Methi Paratha

Today my sister asked me for Methi Paratha recipe and that inspired me to write it down.

I love  recipes that use methi leaves but the only problem is picking the leaves,its a time consuming job. You can use the tender stems too but for paratha and pulav it is best to you

the leaves only.

Atta  /Wheat Flour  - 1 cup 

Methi Leaves           - 1/2 cup washed dried and  chopped fine

Green Chilli paste  - 1/2 tsp

Jeera/Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp

Tumeric Powder     - 1/4 tsp

Besan (optional)     - 2 tbsp

Oil                             - 2 tbsp

Water                       - 1/4  to 1/2 cup

salt to taste

1. Mix  atta , tumeric, salt ,cumin and  1 tbsp oil(optional)  with clean hands.

2. Add chilli paste , methi leaves  to atta mixture and mix it well.

3. Now start by adding 1/4 cup of water to the atta and make a dough using more water if needed.

5. Leave the dough to rest of half and hour.

6. Divide the dough into 5 equal parts and make round balls by rolling it between your palms.

7. Now take one ball , press between your palms and make a disc, dip in into dry flour and your rolling pin make a circle appox  6-8 inch in diameter.

8. If you make roti or chappati at home the step 7 is easy.

9. Heat a skillet and cook the Paratha on both sides with little oil on each side as you cook.

7. Serve with fresh curd and pickle.

If you cannot find fresh methi leaves where you live you can use 1 1/2 tbsp of kasuri methi.

Vendeka Mezhkuvarati / Okra Fry

This simple recipe of my mothers is my most favorite with roti or rice . I can eat is all seven days of week. This curry rice with sambar or mor curry is yummmmy :).

Most of the time Bindi fry turns out to be mushy , the trick is to leave the bindi alone in the frying pan for sometime and then stir occasionally as and when needed. And you will see that each and every piece is cooked properly and separate.

Bindi(Okra ) - 250 gms

Onion - 1/2 cup chopped

Green Chilli - 2

Curry Leaves - 5-6

Salt to taste

Tumeric - 1/4 tsp

Chilli Pw - 1/2 tsp

Oil - 1 tbsp

1. Wash and dry Okra, Cut bindi into small 1/2 inch rounds.

2. Wash onion and chop it into small piece .

3. Wash and slit the chilli in the middle and cut into small pieces.

4. Heat oil in a frying pan(10'' or big ) add onion , chilli, curry leaves,tumeric,salt, okra

and just leave it for 2-3 min.

5. Now lower the temp to lower medium and mix it .

6. It should take 20-25 min for okra to fry properly, but you decide when to stop cooking based on how crispy you want the okra to be.

7. Just before you decide to remove okra from fire add chilli pw and mix well and cook for another minute.

Cherry Achar

We went to pick cherry and picked so much that even after sending it to many of our friends and lot was still remaining. I didn't want to freeze as i have already freezed a lot of strawberry and my freezer will be soon out of capacity:)So i was thinking what to do with it other than making jams , an old memory of eating Ber Ka Achar came to my mind. I sure for all of us who has ever eaten Bengali Kuler Achar will be salivating hearing the name of ber ka achar.

Recipe

Cherry

(notpitted ) 1 kg

Tamarind a lemon ball size soaked in warm water

Panchphoran/

Mustard seed 1 tsp

Hing 1/4 tsp

Methi Seeds 1 tsp

Chilli Pw 2 tbsp

Oil 3 tbsp

Jaggery 2 tbsp or more based on cherry sweetness

Salt to taste

Method

1.Heat a heavy bottom pan and toast the methi seeds and grind it to fine powder.

2. Add oil to the pan and the panch phoran , hing and then chilli powder and add tamarind paste.

3.Cook till the oil start to seperate add the jaggery.

4.Add cherry and cook till a few of then of them breaks ,then add the methi powder and remove from flame.