Vegetarian Recipe Blog
Although I grew up in Bangalore, the hometown of the renowned restaurant MTR, I was unfamiliar with MTR masalas, powders, and spices. The primary reason for this was my mom’s good culinary skills—she made all the powders for sambhar, rasam, vaangi bhaat, and pulliyogere from …
It was one of those rare days when Dear Husband volunteered to cook in the kitchen and whip out one of his specialty dish “Tomato Thokku”. Tomato Tokku is the equivalent of Tomato Chutney or Tomato Pachadi. He had tasted this Tokku in Bangalore at …
Deep frying is becoming a rarity at our house now. Gone are those days when we would have deep fried stuff every week or so and yet managed to keep a tab on weight. OK, OK …..we were young then and we had our fair share of running and playing around and that helped to keep up balance.
But then, I do make it on some special occasions. Dear Husband celebrated his birthday few weeks ago and I generously offered him the option of choosing his favorite deep fried food. He agonized as he had a tough job of choosing just one amongst his top 5-6 favorites. But then after much pondering, lamenting he finally settled for Medu Waada (Gaarelu, Uddin Vade).
Medu Vada is a traditional South Indian recipe that is eaten for breakfast. At Bangalore restaurants, this is served along with warm idlis and accompanied with sambhar and coconut chutney. This combination is a match made in heaven and the taste is simply divine.
It took some years of practice and advice to learn to make this crispy and delicious. In restaurants, the shape of the Medu Vada is like a ring with hole in the middle (more like a doughnut), but I find it easier to handle it this way in small rounds. This is also called as Biscuit Ambode in Konkani.
Some tips, do’s and don’ts to make this crispy:
Looking for low-calorie medu vada? Check this out!
Ingredients:
Preparation:
· Soak the urad daal in enough water for about 4-5 hours.
· Cut the green chillies very finely, cut the curry leaves into pieces and grate the ginger.
· Drain the water completely from soaked urad daal, add salt and grind it to a smooth paste. (Do not add too much water, if required add only spoonful of water at a time).
· Grind until the batter turns fluffy and you notice faint bubbles on the top.
· Update: Keep this urad daal batter aside for 3-4 hours and let it ferment a bit.
· When ready to make the vadas, add green chillies, cumin seeds, curry leaves, ginger, coriander leaves and coconut pieces (if using). Mix thoroughly and check for taste. Add more salt if necessary.
· The salt should be on the higher side as most of the saltiness goes away when deep frying.
· Finally add the rava just before deep frying and mix well.
Method:
· Heat oil on medium high in a thick bottomed pan sufficient enough to deep fry.
· Check to make sure that the oil has reached the correct temperature, by putting in small amount of batter. If there is a sizzle that means the oil is ready.
· Take about golf ball size of the batter from the tips of your hands and put it in the deep fryer. Add about 4-5 depending on the size of the pan at the same time.
· This can be eaten as is or with chutney, sambhar and forms a wonderful accompaniment with tea or coffee.
We have been married for quite a few years now, long enough to understand and predict each others tastes, likes and dislikes. Or so I thought, until a routine trip to the grocery proved that I had concluded a bit too soon. I have a …
I was introduced to the new concept of Pumpkin Idli only after my wedding. My mother-in-law had prepared it early in the morning for breakfast and I had it with some ghee. Suffice to say that the taste was totally out of this world and …
Don’t we all have one of those days? Days on which there is nothing new to say, the words don’t seem to flow, the thoughts don’t catch up and there is no connection between the two. You don’t feel like writing about the recipe. No matter how much you look around and tax your brain you don’t find anything appropriate or suitable to write. The thoughts just evaporate and everything draws a blank.
It’s one of those days for me. But never mind, there is no pressure for now and it will come to me. Sooner or later the words will flow, everything will make sense and there will be tons to write. There is no hurry and I will wait till then. Let the dish do the talking.
Aloo Palak is a North Indian dish/curry in which potato is cooked in spinach-tomato-onion gravy flavored with aromatic blend of spices. Paneer can be substituted instead of boiled potato to make this even more rich and delicious. If Paneer is added instead of potato then this dish is called as Palak Paneer.
Note: I use evaporated milk here to give that creamy taste to the curry. Evaporated milk is not as rich as cream/half and half, but adds good flavor to the dish.
Ingredients
Preparation:
Microwave the potatoes in water along with salt and cook until done.
Grate the ginger and garlic and keep aside.
Method:
This tastes good with Rotis, Phulkas, Puri or Rice.
Bitter Gourd I feel is a funky vegetable, so different in its taste and texture as compared to any other vegetable. The bitter taste is what sets it apart and you either love it or hate it. Luckily everybody in my family loves it …