Eggless Pistachio Tutti Frutti and Orange Biscotti

Biscotti is a twice baked biscuit. It is originally from Italy and is served with hot coffee. For Eggless Baking Group, when Gayathri chose this recipe, I was so excited as it looked so picture perfect and drool worthy. I did make a few changes from the original recipe by substituting eggs, substituting orange flower water. I actually looked for orange flower water but did not get here. I chose to use tutti frutti as I did not get dried apricots also..  It was fun making it and the whole house was filled with nice aroma and everybody in my house loved it. My daughter said – yummy!!! and my husband said that it was one of the best biscotti!!! I am so happy with this recipe..

Hung Curd

A lot of recipes call for Hung curd. What is hung curd and can it be made at home? There are products called Set curd which some people told me that it is hung curd available readily. Hung Curd can also be used in the place of cream cheese.
Preparation of hung curd requires about 2 to 3 hours of time only and most of the time is waiting time.

Ingredients
Curd - 4 cups

Method
Setup of the strainer should be like this - have a strainer over a vessel. Put double layered cheese cloth / muslin cloth / some thin cloth with very small holes over the strainer.
Pour the curd on the strainer and allow it to drain
Tighten the cloth such that the initial whey water comes out quickly. Take care to not press it too hard. If you squeeze too hard, then you might squeeze out the curd.
Allow it to rest in the fridge with the entire setup for around 2 hours.
Hung Curd is ready – isn't that easy?

Sending this to Gayathri's Tell me your kitchen secret

Vaazhaithandhu Kari

I am so excited to do this guest post for Jagruti of JCO. I wanted to do an authentic recipe and chose this vegetable which is very healthy and tastes amazing. Jagruti has such a nice blog with so many events, variety of recipes from sweets to fried rice to biscotti. I wonder where does she get the idea for these events and recipes. Simply amazing. When I am in her blog, I love to spend so much time reading the recipes, may be even if I have read it before... It has a nice story, amazing drool worthy pictures and easy to follow recipe.Vaazhaithandhu (Banana stem in English) is a very fiber rich vegetable. There are lot of interesting things I can relate to banana. One - my amma says “ஆளை இள்ளைக்குமாம் கீரை தண்டு, ஆணையே இள்ளைக்குமாம் வாழை தண்டு” - meaning people will slim down if they eat spinach, but elephant itself will slim down if it eats this banana stem. Another is the song from MGR Film – “ தனையே குடுப்பதில் வாழைக்கு ஈடு” – meaning – “self sacrifice like the banana tree which gives everything”. You can use all the parts of the tree. Like the leaf can be used as a plate, banana, plantain, banana stem, banana flower - all can be eaten by humans. This is very easy kari. The tedious or the time consuming part is the cutting of this vegetable. I am not sure if I can say it to be a vegetable. It is a stem.

You can read my post more here..

Thengai Thuvayal (Coconut Thuvayal)

A very authentic and yummy dish which can be prepared very quickly and is a great accompaniment. Mix it with rice and eat with vadam and you have a very simple and tasty menu on board. How about accompanying this with curd rice or sambar rice or rasam rice – it just adds tons of flavor.. We at home love this thuvayal and am happy to share this simple and homey dish..

Ingredients
Grated Coconut - 1 cup
Ulutham Parupu / Urad Dal - 1/3 cup
Kadalai Parupu / Channa Dal - 1/3 cup
Red Chili - 12 (adjust to taste)
Asafetida - 1/4 tea spoon
Salt - 3/4 tea spoon
Oil - 1 tea spoon (preferably coconut oil)
Tamarind - 1 small lemon size
Water - 1/4 cup + As needed
Method
Soak tamarind in 1/4 cup warm water
Heat oil in a pan and add kadalai parupu and ulutham parupu and sauté until golden brown
Add the red chili and sauté for another minute
Remove from heat to a plate to cool
In the same pan, add the coconut and slightly toast (not much)
In a blender, add the parupu, coconut, asafetida, salt and soaked tamarind (without water) and blend until all are close to a powder. Now add the water in which the tamarind was soaking and blend well. Add more water as needed and blend to a paste. If you are going to store this for later use, then add little more water as the parupu will absorb a lot of water when rested
Serve on room temperature. At the time of serving, you can also add a tea spoon or so of water if it is too dry. Enjoy this yummy thuvayal.
This will keep at least for a few days in an airtight container in the fridge.


Points to note (about Coconut from www.coconutresearchcenter.org) - 
In traditional medicine around the world coconut is used to treat a wide variety of health problems including the following: abscesses, asthma, baldness, bronchitis, bruises, burns, colds, constipation, cough, dropsy, dysentery, earache, fever, flu, gingivitis, gonorrhea, irregular or painful menstruation, jaundice, kidney stones, lice, malnutrition, nausea, rash, scabies, scurvy, skin infections, sore throat, swelling, syphilis, toothache, tuberculosis, tumors, typhoid, ulcers, upset stomach, weakness, and wounds. While coconut possesses many health benefits due to its fiber and nutritional content, it's the oil that makes it a truly remarkable food and medicine.
Once mistakenly believed to be unhealthy because of its high saturated fat content, it is now known that the fat in coconut oil is a unique and different from most all other fats and possesses many health giving properties. It is now gaining long overdue recognition as a nutritious health food.
Coconut oil has been described as "the healthiest oil on earth." That's quite a remarkable statement. What makes coconut oil so good? What makes it different from all other oils, especially other saturated fats?
The difference is in the fat molecule. All fats and oils are composed of molecules called fatty acids. Too much mention, please visit the website for lot more information!!!!

Sending this to My Guest Hosting event – Taste of the Tropics – Coconut, Chef Mireille’s page,  FFNF in Archana's page, Priya's page, Pickles and Chutney , Lentils and Legumes, CWS - Channa Dal, Dish name starts with T, CWS - Urad Dal, Priya's page, Lets cook Preserves, Jams and Chutneys

 

Instant Oats,Wheat and Corn Idli

One of the healthiest foods is Idli (meaning regular Idli). When we are sick and go to the doctor, we are advised to eat Idli. How about an idli which is even healthier and even quicker? For taste and create, this month I am paired with Priya of seduce your taste buds. She has an awesome blog and I love her recipes. I have been following her blog for sometime now and have bookmarked a lot of her recipes.. Now I had to choose which one I should do first for this month's Taste and Create. I chose this simple, yet nutritious and delicious idli. It was awesome and we loved it. I got about 18 idlis from this recipe and we enjoyed it with tomato chutney

Ingredients
Corn Meal - 1 cup
Cracked Wheat - 3/4 cup
Oats - 3/4 cup
Curd - 2 cups
Carrot - 1 cup (grated)
Coriander Leaves - 1/4 cup (chopped)
Curry Leaves - 10 (chopped)
Lime Juice - 2 table spoons
Mustard Seeds - 1/2 tea spoon
Kadalai Parupu / Channa Dal - 1 tea spoon
Ulutham Parupu / Urad Dal - 1 tea spoon
Cumin Seeds - 1/2 tea spoon
Oil - 2 tea spoons
Salt - 1 1/2 tea spoons
Asafetida - 1/4 tea spoon
ENO Fruit Salt - 1 tea spoon

Method
I used regular oats, so I pulsed it until I got coarse pieces. If using quick cooking oats, ignore this step
In a bowl, mix together grated carrot, coriander leaves, salt and asafetida and set aside
Heat a small pan and add oil, crackle mustard seeds and cumin seeds, add the ulutham parupu and kadalai parupu and sauté until golden brown.
Add the curry leaves and sauté for 10 more seconds and transfer the entire mixture to the carrot and coriander leaves
Add curd and mix well and set aside
In another bowl, mix together cracked wheat, corn meal and oats and mix well
Add it to the wet ingredients and mix well until combined
Add lemon juice and mix well to form an idli batter consistency. Add water if needed
Heat water in the idli cooker and grease the idli plates
Once the water in the idli cooker starts to boil, add the ENO fruit salt to the batter and mix well. You will see it foaming
Mix thoroughly and immediately scoop it to the idli moulds and steam cook for around 12 - 15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean
Serve hot with tomato chutney


Sending this to my guest hosting event Healthy Foods for Healthy Kids - Combo Meals, Nithu's page, steamed foods, Priya's page, South Indian Cooking #2, Anu's page, Valli's kid's delight, Jagruti's KYF - Corn Flour, guest hosted by Shama, Pari's Only - Healthy lunchbox event, CWS – Oats, Priya’s page, Breakfast Club, Breakfast Club, Healthy Breakfast

 
 

Brown Rice Dhokla

Khaman and Dhokla are used together, but I see in some websites, that they are not the same and are very different from each other. Dhokla is made with rice and urad dal whereas khaman is made with besan. Some people also call this dhokla as White Dhokla and the Besan Dhokla as Dhokla. I will leave this decision to Gujarathis to guide me on this. Coming to this recipe, it is Brown Rice Dhokla, meaning dhokla as mentioned above with rice and urad dal. In South India, we make Idli which is with Rice and Urad dal and it is almost a staple food in many houses. Traditionally made with white rice, this recipe has a little bit of health included with the inclusion of brown rice. I got this recipe from here we all enjoyed it with tomato chutney. It was very spongy and soft and was a pleasure to learn a new dish. You would get about 18 idlis and around a 9 inch pan filled with dhokla with this recipe. I made this in both idli moulds as well as in an 9 inch round tin. So the next time, I would make the recipe in half or do 2 batches.

Ingredients
Brown Rice - 1 cup
White Rice - 1 cup
Ulutham Parupu / Urad Dal - 3/4 cup
Kadalai Parupu / Channa Dal - 1/4 cup
Green Chili - 5 - 3 slit cut and 2 minced fine (remove seeds if wanted)
Silken Soft Tofu - 12 oz.
Lemon Juice - 1/4 cup
Eno Fruit Salt - 1 tea spoon
Salt - 1 1/2 to 2 tea spoons
Oil - 2 tea spoons
Mustard Seeds - 2 tea spoons
Coriander Leaves (finely chopped) - 1/2 cup
Grated Coconut - 1/4 cup
Cayenne Pepper - to sprinkle on top (optional)

Method
Soak the rice and dals for around 8 hours or overnight
Drain and blend them to a smooth paste, adding little water at a time. Do not add too much water, then you cannot blend.
Once it becomes a smooth paste, add the tofu (chopped) and lemon juice and blend again till all the tofu is well incorporated
Set aside for 6 hours to ferment. After 6 hours, keep in the fridge until later use. The original recipe suggested to use within 6 hours, but mine was not even close to done, so I allowed it to ferment for the entire 6 hours and then kept in the fridge overnight and made the dhoklas the next day for breakfast
Grease a 9 inch pan or idli plates or dhokla plates and set aside
Add 1/4 cup coriander leaves, minced green chili and salt to the batter and mix it well
Heat water in a pan which is bigger than the greased pan and let it come to a boil
Now add eno fruit salt to the batter and immediately pour the batter to the greased pan and keep inside the bigger pan with boiling water
Steam cook (no whistle if using pressure cooker) for around 12 to 15 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean
Remove from heat and transfer to a plate
Sprinkle little cayenne pepper on top
Heat a pan and add oil and allow the mustard seeds to crackle, add the slit cut green chili and pour the entire oil over the top of the dhokla
Garnish with coconut and coriander leaves and serve warm or on room temperature!!!



Comparing White rice and Brown Rice (from Wikipedia) -
Brown rice and white rice have similar amounts of calories and carbohydrates. The main differences between the two forms of rice lie in processing and nutritional content. When only the outermost layer of a grain of rice (the husk) is removed, brown rice is produced. To produce white rice, the next layers underneath the husk (the bran layer and the germ) are removed, leaving mostly the starchy endosperm. Several vitamins and dietary minerals are lost in this removal and the subsequent polishing process. A part of these missing nutrients, such as vitamin B₁, vitamin B₃, and iron are sometimes added back into the white rice making it "enriched". One mineral not added back into white rice is magnesium; one cup (195 g) of cooked long grain brown rice contains 84 mg of magnesium while one cup of white rice contains 19 mg. When the bran layer is removed to make white rice, the oil in the bran is also removed. Rice bran oil may help lower LDL cholesterol.^[3] Among other key sources of nutrition lost are small amounts of fatty acids and fiber.^{[citation needed}

Sending this to My Guest Hosting event – Taste of the Tropics – Coconut, Chef Mireille’s page, Healthy Foods for Healthy Kids - Combo Meal, Nithu's page, Bon Viviant - Rice Dishes, Breakfast Recipes, Lentils and Legumes, FFNF, Priya's page, Nupur's What's with my cuppa, CWS - Urad Dal, Priya's page,

Eggless Nutritious Gingersnaps

Gingersnaps are a cookie that have a very unique flavor and texture. Other names they are called with are Ginger cookies, Ginger biscuits or Ginger nuts. I was making these cookies and the whole house was filled with the aroma of ginger and it was amazing. I got this recipe from here and it is sure a keeper. This is surely a cookie with which you cannot stop with one. So making it a little more healthier reduces the guilt load… This has very little processed ingredients. Most of the ingredients are unprocessed like whole wheat flour, wheat germ, molasses, brown sugar and hey this is also Vegan…The cracks on these cookies are its signature and looks so perfect that it is hard to go wrong. You can substitute vanilla for cardamom powder and also if you cannot lay your hands on wheat germ, just add more whole wheat flour.