Even though I grew up in Bangalore, the home town of the famous restaurant MTR, I was never familiar with the MTR masalas, powders and spices then. The main reason being that my Mom is a wonderful cook and she made all the powders for sambhar, rasam, vaangi bhaat, pulliyogere etc from scratch at home. Fast forward some years when I got married and came to the United States, I found myself as a clueless cook shouldering the responsibility of cooking. I used to crave for comfort food like rasam, sambhar etc food that I grew up with and that…
Lemon Rice Recipe(Chitranna)
Lemon Rice also called Chitranna in Kannada is an easy to prepare yet flavorful rice dish. This is also a good way to use the left over rice or maybe a quick dish idea when unexpected guests arrive. The flavor of this depends on the strong seasoning (Tadka) that is prepared before the cooked rice is added. Even though the seasoning is prepared using simple and readily available ingredients like curry leaves, asafetida, cumin seeds, mustard seeds, daals they combine together to form an aromatic, sapid base to accommodate the rice. Peanuts add a nice crunch while the coconut balances…
Sesame coated Falafel /Spicy Bean Pattis
Madhu of Ruchii had sent me Arusuvai gifts about a month and half ago. I received the package at work and I excitedly opened it, my heart filled with warmth and anticipation. The package consisted of Rasam powder, Amchur powder, Raspberry tea, coasters and a thoughtfully written greeting card. The aroma of the Rasam powder was so powerful that two of my Indian colleagues came rushing to see what I was up to and what I was ‘cooking’! Anyway, thank you very much dear Madhu for such thoughtful and wonderful gifts, I will cherish them for a long time. (For…