Mango Jam Recipe

My morning starts off with 2 pieces of wheat bread toast, spread with some fruit jam on it (usually strawberry) along with a cup of tea. I eat this at work, so it keeps me full for about 2 hours and manages to get me until lunch.   Late Sunday afternoon I realized that we were out of jam and we had already finished the grocery for that week. I did not feel like going to the grocery again and decided on the next best thing which was to prepare it myself! I did not have strawberries at home, but…

MethKoot / Menthe Hittu/ Spiced Lentil Powder

  The Spiced Lentil powder called as MethKoot/Methi Coot (Marathi/Konkani), Menthe Hittu (Kannada) is basically roasted Lentil, spiced with roasted cumin seeds, fenugreek, ginger, pepper etc and ground to fine powder. Methi or Menthe refers to Fenugreek seeds. Just by itself this is a spicy dry powder with no taste of its own, but once it is mixed with hot rice, dollop of ghee/oil and pinch of salt magic happens and the taste is simply divine.   Growing up, we always used to have this powder stacked up in a yellow green container.  For me and my brother it used to…

Sooji Kaa Halwa / Kesari Bhath/ Rava Kesari/ Sheera

Wishing you all a very happy Ganesha Chaturthi and hope you all had a blessed and a wonderful day. This festival is also known as Vinayaka Chaturthi or Vinayaka Chavithi and as Chavath) in Konkani.   Growing up in Bangalore this was a very important festival for us. Every year on this day of Chavath, all our relatives and family would gather at my Uncle’s place and celebrate the festival in a grand way. The festivities would go on for 3 or more days starting with Gowri Pooja, Ganesha Pooja and then finally the Ganesha Visarjan.  Gowri Pooja was the…

Iced Tea, Awards and Tag

(Freshly brewed Black tea) As you have already guessed there is no much of a recipe today, just wanted to flash the Ice Tea pictures that I had taken, acknowledge the awards and share a bit about myself. I would like to thank Nithya, Indrani, Jaya, Bergamot, Pavitra, Ammu,Priya for thinking of me and passing this award to me. I really appreciate it, girls you made my day!   Secretly I have been pleased that so many bloggers have thought of me. But I did not anticipate that writing about myself would be such a tough thing. It has been about…

Mint Rice/ Pudina Pulao

  Hope you all had a relaxing weekend and now it is back to the grind already. We had a hectic Saturday and were out of the house most of the time, taking the kid to ice-skating, finishing up some chores etc.    We made up for that on Sunday, by staying at home, relaxing and doing work around the house. I did not have the mood to cook something elaborate and made this quick and easy Mint Pulav. Serve with Raita and some roasted Pappads and it is a meal by itself.  For making this I have been inspired…

Coconut Beetroot Curry/ Beetroot Kootu Curry

  The health benefits of Beets are immense. They provide protection against Heart Disease, Beets’ Betaine Helps Lessen Inflammation, increases stamina, reduced blood pressure etc. June through October is the best season for finding beets and sure enough, we are finding beautiful beets along with its leaves in our grocery store. In our house we are fond of Beets, however I prefer it cooked, where as DH likes to eat it raw as part of salads. DH was out of town for a few days, so I decided to try this Beetroot Curry. I enjoy the sweet taste of vegetables,…

Eggless Banana Walnut Cake/Bread

Yet this weekend I was left with lots of over ripe bananas. I usually don’t toss them and use it one way or the other. After some thought I decided to make Banana Cake using the base recipe found on Bawarchi. Bawarchi is now part of Sify and the recipe then moved here (Mango Cake). This is a very easy and versatile cake, does not require many ingredients and can be whipped up in a jiffy. The best part is this does not use any All Purpose Flour but uses Sooji/Semolina instead.   I have also made an Eggless Mango…