Hot Hot baby;p

I wish i had a few words to say but i have none,We all need to get on with life and we do but at times i feel for me life just got stagnated the day i landed in this city, I am not depressed,i am busy, i leave home at seven in the morning and come back at 7 in the evening, Hubby is always ready to listen if i want to talk, Sundays are a lazy affair with lots of sleep and least cooking, life is good but the spark is missing, the smile is automatic and artificial,the work is not something i would have taken up if i were in Hyd, its still teaching but not to the kind whom i would have preferred teaching, Friends to talk happens only on phone,i just can hear mom talking on phone, I do understand i am just two hrs away from home but then.... When anyone asks what will happen if i ever have to go out of this country i just say "I made my choice already" i chose this place over abroad when we got the chance,2hrs seems very near by when compared to 20hrs. Well,to break the monotony and rush our lifestyle i decided to make the ever rich and super duper favorite of mine "Mirchi ka saalan" the queen of Hyderabadi food culture,well,queen because i feel the curry is feminine, soft, rich and not too spicy, hot but not hot;p and oh yeah,i have more to say on this feminity of food but for some other post,for now enjoy the making.

7 Medium sized green chillies or Jalapeño peppers
I cut them into half and removed the stem inside and the seeds by making a cut mark at one side of the chilly,this will reduce the heat.

1/2 Cup of til or sesame seeds, 1/2 cup of peanuts , dry coconut and dhaniya acc. to the proportions you like,i took 1/4th part of the copra and only two t spoons of dhaniya and a few red chillies and cinnamon and two cloves.

Dry roast the peanuts and remove the skin(Which i do it half heartedly and try to retain the skin for a few peanuts;p)
roast other ingredients also

make them into powder in a mixer and keep it aside:)

Two big onions ,cut them and fry them for a few min in two spoons of oil.

then fry the peppers in the same oil and keep them in the paper napkins to remove the excess oil.

Now take the onions into the mixer along with one spoon of ginger garlic paste, two big spoons of tamarind juice,add the powder you made and had water acc to the requirements and make a smooth paste

All the ingredients made into a paste.

Take two spoons of oil, add karipatha or curryleaves and pour the paste into the kadai,adjust salt and let it simmer slowly on low heat for about 15min.close the lid while cooking and keep stirring in between.

When you see the water content reducing and the oil starts to seep in from sides add the mirchi to the salan and simmer for about 5 min.

Mirchi ka Salan is ready:) Enjoy it with rotis or hot rice,i love it with rotis and don't forget to serve it with onion carrot ratha:)

You have 20min????

Someone in one of the posts asked me "How do you manage cooking and job both:)" Well,it made me smile because i saw my mom doing it for more than 20years,But yes,neither do i have such discipline nor the passion to feed the family and go out to work,she did it all,and boy she did it with so much commitment and at times i get worried how i would be when i come to her age,but then lets leave future to take its own shape:)

For now i manage because i have a husband who eats whatever i make,and he does it without even changing his facial expressions,the day i dont feel like cooking the dinner would be just rice and tomato daal in the name of simple meal and when i cannot make that also the N number of restaurents in Bangalore come to our rescue and
i get these bouts of energy where in i make three varities of chicken curry and sambhar and veg biryani at one go for just two people,Yeah,i know,i am eccentric and thats how my lifestye is too:D you can see me sitting till 3am and reading blogs one night or just re arranging my vast music collection or just studying (yup,i do that too) and at times i am sleeping by 6pm;p But thankfully husband is the nodal point for everything i do and just because he knows how i am,he is prepared for everything;p
And thank god for his techi job and strange timings {he leaves home at 5am and comes back at 4pm} i dont need to make lunch or breakfast,only dinner,and oh,no,i eat both but what?? You may ask;p my breakfast would be a cucumber or bread or a glass of juice or marie biscuits and lunch would be a pot of rice,yup,curd rice,lemon rice,pudina rice,you name it and i know about it:) But hell,i crave for normal three course meal but then i need to rush to my mom for that,in my house there it is still the same,i miss it,but then as husband puts it "This is just a temporary phase" Hope so too:) i lack the dicipline of getting up early to make proper food for just me,I rather spend another hour in bed,so daily it is waking up by 7am and leaving the house at 7.45am in a rush for now,rest,lets see what happens when family size increases:)

My mom always made this curry,specially when she had no idea what to make for dinner and umpteen options rejected by me and my brother this one curry always got both the votes,tomato curry with eggs beaten into it:) tomato guddu koora we call it and boy,hot rice and this curry is my favourite,specially on a winter night,yummm

Simple to make and vanishes fast from the plate, i make it often when i am tired of deciding the menu and i made this on Friday night when i wanted to sit and watch Sa Re Ga Ma Pa and dint like going into the kitchen,so if you have 20min in hand, 5tomatoes,one Onion,2green chillies,and ginger garlic paste and two eggs,get set go for this curry.

Ready to make:)

fry the onions till they turn transparent along with the chillies.

Add the tomatoes,salt and turmeric powder.

Close the lid and keep the heat on low and let it cook

Once done you see a lovely gravy rich in color,add chilli powder as per tastes.

Take three eggs,beat them slowly in to the gravy,
And DONOT mix the gravy.

Let the eggs set,the heat must be on sim and make sure not to mix the gravy,
if you need to then do it carefully without breaking the eggs

The eggs are set now:)

ready to eat,Where is my rice....;p

Hmmmm:)

"You dint post anything in your foodblog?? " asks hubby and i was pleasantly surprised that he checks it. "I dont know,i am kind of feeling awkward putting up posts there,you know there are so many food blogs out there,at times i feel like a lost child in between all those blogs,so many varieties and so many recipes and they present them so well,i cannot do all that and i feel i can never cook like that" i poured out all i had in my heart to him. and i got a smile back
"My dear,in two days you will be back at your new job,and in this new city you have to make new friends,so much to explore,so just things one at a time,don't worry about anything, remember you told me you started posting here for me,so that i can cook when you are not here,so just post what you know,worry not about comments,do comment when you get time,and remember,whatever you do,here or in life,Do it for your satisfaction,for a smile and for contentment" wow,a little gnan seriously and he always has been my gyan guru,he is like lord krishna who comes at the right moment to show the light;p

And i am back to posting again:) i will,whenever i can,whatever i feel is a genuine attempt,i will make sure to put it up here:)

The other day when i came back from hyderabad my fridge was almost empty except for two capsicums,a little paneer and three tomatoes and we were hungry,so i just made this curry in flat 20min and had it with hot chapathis.

required: two big onions,two green chillies,ginger garlic paste,a pinch of turmeric,one spoon of garam masala,two spoons of peanut powder,two spoons of grated kopra,salt and chilli powder.
Saute the onions and chillies along with ginger garlic paste,salt and turmeric added till they are half brown and add the capcicum first,stir it well and add tomatoes and paneer to it. {I love those colors}

Add the garam masala,peanut powder,and kopra powder along with a small glass of water,mix well.
cover the lid and let it cook for atleast 10-15min and do keep checking and add water according to the required gravy thickness,i love my gravies thick,not watery.

Done and ready to be served:) i learnt this art of not wasting one potato,one tomato or a few okra,i am saving them and utilizing them in one or the other curry in my own way,i know amma will be proud of me when she knows about it:)

From My Kitchen

Brinjal,the one vegetable which husband hates the most but i love the most,Its been a year since i had this curry,haan, no,not because i think pati is parmeshwar and that i need to eat what he eats,Nah,no ways,just that i am too lazy to make two curries and i just discarded brinjals from my kitchen:(((( but no,Not anymore, i had this huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge craving for a nice brinjal curry whe i saw fresh bhaigan at Madiwala market and i brought them home and in the name of RCI i made Gutti vankaya Koora,my mom's version,the one which i loved always, Infact i guess there is a song also in a telugu movie which i donot remember, and this time i just made sure to make only this curry and hubby had no choice but to have this,And guess what, he ate it with out a word and after finishing the dinner he cleared the table,shifted the remaining curry in to a box and put it in the fridge,why???? because he wanted to have it next day also,yayayaaaaaaaaaaaa,welcome back brinjals:)))

Now for the recipe.I took 5 medium sized brinjals and these are the ingredients which go into the filling. Two medium sized onions and 2 green chillies and ginger garlic paste. Saute the onions in a pan along with the G&G paste,chillies for about 3 minutes,till the onions are looking almost golden yellow,take them out into a plate and let it cool.

Dry coconut powder, and groundnut powder {fry the groundnuts without oil and remove the rusk on it} and garam masala powder,add these three to the onions which we fried before and add corriander and salt and red chilli powder to it,now the filling is ready to put in the brinjals:)

Make cross cuts to the brinjal at the top and please do not remove the tail of the brinjal!!!!! and then fill the masala into it.

take a wide pan and add oil to it,drop the stuffed brinjals into it taking care ,the filling should not fall into the oil and the remaining masala can be just added to the pan,adjust the water content so that the brinjals can cook properly and cover it with a lid for about 10min.
and while you mix it at intervals make sure to do so carefully without splitting the brinjals .

When the oil starts showing from the sides its time to say that curry is ready:D shift it carefully to a serving dish and garnish with corriander and serve it with hot rice or chapathis.

Pacchi pulusu,the one kind of dish which i love on a hot summer evening,this is one more speciality of the villages of andhrapradesh,made in different ways,i remember the third day of my wedding, one of the aunt of my husband was requested specially by everyone to make her trade mark pacchipulusu,now she took a big vessel,took a few red chillies,added onions to it,few strands of corriander,jeera and starting crushing it all with hand,for a long time and then added it to the tamarind juice,added salt and a piece of jaggery and then did the tadka with a little oil,jeera, rayi,chilli flakes, curry leaves and dont forget to add a little haldi at the end to the tadka and add it to the tamarind juice, ready,pacchipulusu,hot rice and papad,and have a simple dinner:)

My final entry for RCI-Andhra Hosted by Latha of Masalamagic

Hubby In the Kitchen

The other day i was down with severe headache and hubby decided to help m!!!!!! in his own style,i dont like one more person in my kitchen,it must be either him or me but then that day i couldn help it and took him in as my Assistant and we made this.
When ever i went to my village situated near to the banks of Krishna District as a child i was mesmerized by the sheer beauty of it, My peddamma {my mom's elder sister} took care of us for two months in summer, and those were such blissfull days,No tensions or egos,as kids all we did was to play at the banks of river krishna,jumping into the water from the trees,swimming, going to the fields and milking the cows,with time we stopped going there,Maybe because the innocence is lost and with time the egos became larger than life and comfort factors kick in,and so does TIME.A typical dish which peddamma always prepared was mulagakaya koora palu posi {drumstick curry with milk added to it} i hated it then, Like in all typical village households they grew vegetables in the garden or in the fields and every house had a drumstick tree and lot more others.
Today when ever i go to the food world or subhiksha in Bangalore i find pale thin and odd looking drum sticks and i get reminded of the food which once i hated, and now i cook it regularly.

Recipe for paalu posina mulaga kaya koora {Drum stick curry with milk}

4 Drum sticks, 2 big onions, 4 green chillies, Half a spoon of jeera, two pods of garlic,a cup of milk,salk to taste and red chilli powder.

My dear Hubby cutting the vegetables

Ready now:)

Take oil in a frying pan and add some cumin seeds and mirchi,while the cumin starts fluttering add the onions and drum sticks, add haldi powder,salt and fry it for a minute. Tehn turn the heat to medium and cover it with a lid and let the onions be cooked for atleast 10min, do keep checking once in a while. The rawness in the onions will vanish as the water generated is evaporated while cooking.the taste in this curry depends upon two ingredients, if you have noticed,i have not added ginger garlic paste as common for curries, The reason is that we add powdered jeera and garlic pods.

Garlic and Jeera ready to be powdered


Once the onions &Drum sticks are cooked add the powder to it.(hubby doing it}

And then after about two minutes of adding the jeera powder add the red chilli powder,for this curry adding mirchi means the curry is done,yes,you can see the oil seeping in,You can end the story here,errr,i mean you can stop the cooking here and happily eat thsi curry with hot rice,or you may ask "Where is the milk part honey" Hahahaha,thats the twist in the story, instead of stopping here you can now add a cup of milk.

Adding milk at this time will only thicken the gravy further, i just add three big spoons of milk and keep it on heat for two more min and mix it well,When the gravy thickens remove from heat, shift it to a serving bowl,garnish with coriander and server with hot rice:)
I am sorry mom that all through my college life and untill i got married i hated this curry and was adament that i wont taste it also,but now this is one of the regulars in my kitchen and it helps increase my Iron content in the body:)

Ready,Come join me for dinner;p

And then comes the other dish which you notice in the picture at the begining of the post,well its my comfort food again,majjiga charu as it is called in my family,its a simple addition of tadka with onions and green chillies to the curds, sometimes when i just hate going into the kitchen i make this and hot rice with this and papad by the side makes a complete meal in itself:) enjoy the slide show. Curds mixed to make a batter consistency or make it like a thick butter milk {choice is yours,i like it in thick curds format,i just mix it and add onions,jeera and corriander, make a tadka of green chillies,cumin seeds,jeera and very little methi seeds,when these start spluttering add a pinch of hald and curry leaves to the tadka,add it to the curds,mix salt:) done. Another version of this is you can add onions,and green chilli paste,but i like my green chillies to be fried in the tadka,so this version. enjoy the meal:)

These two would be my entry to RCI Hosted by Latha of Masala magic and to the spring fling hosted by Trupthi of theSpice who loved me.

Aloo kurma

Potatoes have been my all time favorites and the aloo kurma is the one dish which i miss the most from my mom's kitchen.A rich gravy made of dray coconut powder,garam masala ,poppy seeds or khus khus and dahi this is a common dish at most of the family functions or gatherings,at my home whenever a guest comes who is a strict vegetarian mom makes puri and alookurma and its spelled as aloo khorma here in Hyderabad in many households who speak urdu or hindi. I donot know if it qualifies for RCI hosted by lovely latha of masalamagic but i will certainly send it too apart from my other recipes which i am already getting ready with,this rich gravy has been a part of food flavours of moghulai and nizam era, and you can find a good description of khorma from here which says......

A traditional korma will have a long slow cooking. In fact, korma is not one particular dish but rather a method of cooking similar to braising. Because korma is a cooking method there are a wide variety of dishes that could be described as "korma".

Ingredients

Potatoes,i took 5 small ones{boiled,peeled,cut into peices,3 big onions, 2 tomatoes, elaichi,lavang and shahjeera { to add spice to the curry}

Green chillies,salt, ginger garlic paste,red chilli powder, very little haldi or turmeric, fresh coriander, three table spoons of garam masala, one half of greated dry coconut or khopra and 3 spoons of khuskhus powder {all the ingredients or masalas can be changed acc to the tastes,i like the khorma very rich and spicy.

Heat oil in a wide pan and add shahjeera,elaichi and lavang to the oil . and then add the green chillies,the onions,add ginger garlic paste,salt and turmeric and fry the onions for about two min or till they turn to golden color.

Add the boiled potatoes into the skillet and let both be mixed properly and then add the garam masala, khopra powder,khus khus powder, and add a glass of water checking the consistency,remember the potaotes are already boiled,we need the water only to get a rich gravy,keep that to mind for the proportions.

And now add two tomotoes and chilli powder to the gravy,cover the lid and let the gravy be cooked at a low heat atleast for 10min { i prefer 15min} remember this is a slow cooking process} do keep checking one or two times and mix it well.

When the dish is almost done add two spoons of curds or fresh cream {curds is prefered} and let it simmer for a while, mix well and garnish with corriander at the end.
I love Aloo khorma with puris or hot rice and pepper rasam along with this dish is my all time favourite.