Baingan ka Bharta

After Baingan Pathankoti, here's presenting the best and the most popular dish of Eggplant (Baingan) - Baingan ka Bharta. It's extremely mouth-watering, quick and easy to prepare, and loved even by many eggplant-haters. :-)

Ingredients

• Fresh Eggplant: 1 big or 2 medium-sized
• Red Onions: 1 big (I prefer red onions to white onions in the Bharta)
• Tomatoes: 4 medium-sized
• Green chilis: 3-4
• Cumin (Jeera) seeds: 1 TSP
• Red Chili Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Coriander (Dhaniya) Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Asafoetida (Heeng) - a pinch
• Turmeric (Haldi) Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Salt: to taste
• Garam Masala Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Coriander Leaves
• Butter (to garnish)
• Vegetable Oil - 1 TSP

Preparation

Roast the eggplant on a medium flame till its skin become dark and wrinkled. Keep turning the eggplant frequently over the flame so that it gets roasted evenly. Alternatively, you can also microwave the eggplant in a large microwave-safe bowl for about 15 minutes. before putting the eggplant in the microwave, put horizontal slits on it with a knife otherwise the eggplant will burst (yes, it actually bursts! we're experienced! :D ) After the eggplant is roasted, run cold water over it and peel off its skin and mash its flesh (sounds gross, isn't it?) :-)

Chop the tomatoes and green chilis very finely. You can also microwave the tomatoes for 10 minutes and mash them (we prefer it this way cuz' it cooks faster). Chop the onions into thin slices.

Heat a pan and put oil in it. When the oil is hot enough, put in the cumin seeds, let them splutter, and turn dark brown. Add asafoetida and then add the tomatoes and green chilis. Stir for a few seconds and let the tomatoes cook for a while.

After the tomatoes are fully cooked, add the mashed eggplant. Mix them well, add the remaining spices except salt, and mix again. Add the onions now and mix them well with the eggplant. The reason for adding the onions at the end is to keep them a bit crunchy. Keep stirring the mixture to prevent it from sticking to the bottom of the pan. When the onions become pale, add the garam masala and mix well.

Serving

Transfer the Bharta to a serving bowl and garnish it with chopped coriander leaves. Take a small piece of butter, put it in the middle of the Bharta and let it melt. Serve hot with Paranthas!

Besan ke Laddoo

This is the second time Divu tried Besan ke Laddoos and they came out real nice! The first time, it became something else (rather, she had to make it something else) Will tell you how... :-)

So here's the recipe.


Ingredients

• Gram Flour (Besan): 4 cups
• Semolina (Sooji): 1/2 cup
• Sugar: 2 cups
• Ghee: 2 cups (melted)
• Almonds and Cashew nuts: 20 pieces (crushed)
• Cardamom (Elaichi) powder: 1 TSP

Preparation


Heat a large pan on a medium flame. Add gram flour and semolina and roast the mixture for a minute. Add ghee and mix it well with the mixture. Keep stirring the mixture continuously over medium flame to prevent the mixture from sticking to the bottom of the pan and getting burnt. Make sure that roast the mixture on medium flame so that it gradually becomes light brown and cooks well. You would need to cook this mixture for around 10-15 minutes.


Remove the mixture from the pan and let it cool. Add crushed almonds and cashew nuts, sugar, and cardamom powder to the mixture and mix everything well. Prepare small-sized balls from the mixture. The laddoos are ready!


If, somehow, you end up putting more Ghee in the mixture and it seems like a paste, which isn't good enough to prepare balls, don't lose heart. Do this (that's what Divu did when she prepared laddoos for the first time):

• Spread the mixture evenly in a plate and let it cool. You may also refrigerate it for an hour or so to harden the paste.
• When the paste is hard enough, cut diamonds out of it. You now have "Besan ki Barfi" instead of laddoos! :-)

Rice Pudding - Kheer

It was a surprise some days back when one of my clients came to me and said, "I heard you are a good cook?" And I was like "where in the world did she hear that... hmm???" But then, I had to behave in office and said, "Yea, not good but OK." ;-)

The conversation went on and she asked me the recipe for rice pudding that she would have had somewhere, and I offered to make rice pudding for her along with providing the recipe. I didn't get enough time to cook it myself as some of my old friends turned up for dinner, so I cooked dinner that night for my old friends who also wanted to taste my food and Divu prepared the delicious Rice Pudding.


We are going to use cooked steamed rice for this pudding as it takes lesser time to cook than cooking raw rice in milk.

Quantity: Serves 5-6 - size does matter :-)
Cooking time: 20 mins

Ingredients:
Plain Steamed Basmati Rice : 3 Servings

Whole Milk : 1.5Lts ( Just less than 1/2 gallon)

Sugar : 8-10 TSP ( depends how sweet you want it)

Green Cardamom : 5 pcs (Crushed)

Golden Raisins : 20 Pcs

Almonds + Cashew nuts : Coarse Grind - a bunch

Almonds + Cashew nuts : a bunch (Sliced for garnishing)
Surprise item : will tell later :-P

Pre-preparation

Steam Cooked Rice

Slice almonds and cashews

Cooking
Use a large vessel as the quantity is large. You may proportionate the quantity for preparing lesser amount of pudding.


Boil the milk and let it simmer for 2-3 mins on low flame, and while it is on heat, add sugar, crushed cardamom, almonds, cashews nuts, and raisins to it. After a while add cooked rice into the mixture and let it simmer for 10-15 mins. The reason we let it simmer with rice is to let the rice grains nicely soak milk and sugar. Before taking the mixture off the flame, check the rice by crushing it between your fingers or tasting a spoonful.

Also, make sure that the rice is thoroughly mixed with milk and is not settling down very frequently.

Just a while before you want to take down the mixture off the flame, add little bit of chocolate powder (surprise item) to give it a special taste.

Let the mixture cool for a while. The milk will now give a feel as if it is condensed milk and not regular whole milk.

Garnishing

Transfer the mixture in a serving bowl slowly. Garnish with sliced almonds, cashew nuts, and crushed cardamom.


Keep the bowl in the refrigerator for a couple of hours. This will condense the milk and make the pudding thicker.

Serving
Serve chilled. This dish is best when served chilled!

Daal Makhni

Dal Makhni is one of the popular dishes of Punjab. People cook it with a lot of variations and a variety of ingredients. It's quite rich so the people who're dieting might feel guilty! :P But then, it tastes so good, you'd always feel that you haven't had enough! :)

Ingredients

• Black Whole Urad Dal: 2 bowls
• Black Kidney Beans (Rajma): 1/2 bowl (it's optional though)
• Red onions: 2 medium finely chopped
• Garlic: 5-6 cloves finely chopped
• Ginger: 1 TSP grated
• Green Chilis: 2-3 finely chopped
• Tomatoes: 2-3 medium and blended into a paste
• Whipping cream: 1/2 bowl
• Vegetable Oil: (2 TSP)
• Salt: to taste
• Red Chili Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Turmeric (Haldi) Powder: a pinch
• Asafoetida (Heeng): a pinch
• Coriander (Dhaniya) Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Cumin (Jeera) Seeds: 1/2 TSP
• Whole Garam Masala consisting of Whole Black Cardamom (Badi Elaichi), Cinnamon (Dalchini), Cloves (Laung), and Bay Leaves (Tejpatta)
  OR
  Garam Masala Powder

Pre-preparation


Soak the Dal and Kidney beans overnight. Boil it in a pressure cooker with around 6-7 whistles. The number of whstles required to cook the Dal depends on the quantity of it. If you haven't soaked it overnight, you might have to use a couple of more whistles. Make sure that the Dal is not overcooked. It should becomed soft without getting mashed.


Masala Preparation


Heat oil in a big pan/cooker. If you want the Dal to be richer, you may also prepare the tadka in Ghee or Butter. Add whole garam masala and let it crackle for half a minute. Add cumin seeds and let them splatter till they become dark brown. Add the chopped onions, garlic, ginger, and green chilis. You may also grind onions, garlic, ginger, and green chilis together and prepare a coarse paste. We like them chopped! :)


Saute the mixture till it turns light brown and starts leaving the oil from the sides. Add the tomato paste and stir for a minute.


Dal Preparation


Add the boiled Dal to the mixture and stir well. The density of Dal Makhni is thicker than the normal Dals so add or reduce the amount of water accordingly. Add whipping cream now and let the Dal come to a boil. Reduce the flame now and let the Dal simmer for about half an hour. It is said that the more you simmer the Dal, the tastier it becomes!


Serving


When you feel that the Dal is ready, garnish it with chopped coriander leaves, dry and crushed fenugreek leaves, and some whipping cream. It goes best with Rice or Naans. Enjoy! :)

Bharva Masaledaar Bhindi (Okra)

Divu experimented with Okra (Bhindi) today's dinner and prepared a nice Bharva Masalaedaar Okra dish. It's the stuffed version.

Here's the recipe:


Ingredients

• Fresh Okras: 10-12 pieces
• Red Onion: 1 medium (optional)
• Mustard Oil - 3 TSP
• Coriander leaves (for garnishing)
• Chat Masala (optional - for taste)

Ingredients for the stuffing

• Mango Powder (Amchoor): 2 TSP
• Fennel (Saunf) Powder: 1 TSP
• Cumin (Jeera) Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Salt: to taste and a little less than the actual quantity required for the stuffing
• Red Chilly Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Garam Masala: 1 TSP
• Chat Masala: 1/2 TSP
• Masala of Mango Pickle: 1 TSP (Grannys and Moms make amazing mango pickles and the masala of that pickle will add to the spicy and sour flavor of the masala)

Procedure

For each piece of Okra, slice off both the ends and make a vertical slit, long enough to fill the stuffing. Make sure that you don't end up cutting the Okra piece into two! Keep them aside.

Mix all the ingredients that are needed for the stuffing and mix them well with hands. Make sure that no lumps are formed in the mixture. Add 1 TSP of mustard oil to the mixture and mix it well with your hands. The masala of the pickle will already contain some oil so make sure that you don't add much oil to the mixture. The stuffing should now become paste-like.

Fill the Okras with the stuffing evenly. Make sure that the stuffing is neither too less nor too much.

Heat 2 TSP of mustard oil in a non-stick pan on a medium flame. Add a pinch of asafoetida and salt to the oil and let them sizzle. Place the Okra pieces one by one in the pan. You would now hear the Okra sizzling and smell the mild aroma of the Okra. :)

Cover the Okra and let it cook on a medium flame for 5 minutes. At regular intervals, keep sprinkling very little water on the Okra and tossing them in the pan. This way, the Okra cooks nicely at all sides and remains soft.

After the Okra is cooked, sprinkle some fennel powder on it and mix it well.


Optional
While cooking the Okras, you can cut an onion in thin slices and spread it over the Okra. Let the onion pieces saute for a while. Onion would give an added flavor to the Okra.

Serving

Transfer the Okra to a serving dish and garnish it with chopped coriander leaves. Have it hot with Plain Parantha or Chapatis. Will be good for those who like it with Rice!

Dum Aaloo (Punjabi style)

Potatoes are everyone's favorite and there are loads of yummy dishes that you can prepare using them. One of the yummy dishes is Dum Aaloo, which is prepared by using baby potatoes. We prepared it the Punjabi style yesterday and they turned out real nice - spicy and sour!

Here's the recipe...

Ingredients:

• Baby potatoes: 10-12
• Red onions: 2 big
• Tomatoes: 3-4
• Garlic: 2 buds
• Green chillies: 2-3
• Curd: 1 small bowl
• Cardamom (Elaichi): 2-3
• Cinnamon (Dalchini): 1 stick
• Cloves (Laung): 2-3
• Cumin (Jeera) seeds: 1 TSP
• Red Chilly Powder: 1/2 TSP
• Coriander (Dhaniya) powder: 1/2 TSP
• Turmeric (Haldi) powder: 1/2 TSP
• Garam Masala: 1/2 TSP
• Salt (to taste)
• Coriander leaves (to garnish)
• Vegetable oil (enough to deep fry the potatoes)

Procedure:

Peel the potatoes and keep them soaked in salty water for half an hour. If the size of the potatoes if big, halve them. Heat oil in a pan and deep fry the potatoes till they turn very light golden brown. Keep the potatoes aside.

Blend onions, tomatoes, and garlic and green chilly to a coarse paste. Beat the curd in a bowl and keep it aside.

Heat 1 TSP oil in another pan and add cinnamon, cloves, and cardamom. Wait until they start crackling and then add cumin seeds. Let the cumin seeds also crackle and then add the onion-tomato-garlic paste. Cook the mixture on a low flame for 5 mins.

Add red chilly powder, coriander powder, turmeric powder, and salt to the mixture and cook it for 1 more min. Enjoy the aroma of the mixture and watch it changing its color. Remove the pan from the flame for a while and add the beaten curd to it. Put the pan back on the flame and cook the mixture for another 5 mins.

Add potatoes to the mixture and let them get soaked in the gravy. Since we've already deep-fried the potatoes, they'd already be soft and wouldn't need much time to get cooked. When the potatoes are nicely cooked and soft enough, add Garam Masala and mix it with the gravy. Make sure that you do not stir the gravy too vigorously to end up with mashed potatoes! :)

Dum Aaloo is ready! Transfer them to a serving dish and garnish them with chopped coriander leaves. You can also crush dry fenugreek leaves and sprinkle them on the top of Dum Aaloo for an extra flavor.

Dum Aaloo go well with Naan, Paranthas, and Pooris. Enjoy!!