Butter paneer

End of October is nearing and I am really into tracking out the recipes I want to post for the next two months . For me I always want to feel the work I do. Actually love the job. If the interest dies down then you should give it a paid and refresh your mind for sometime and when you return I guarantee byou will be more energetic than before. I take break now a then and now I am loving my blog at the most here. The only problem is I need a push up or a thumbs up at times form my family especially my Aj who loves food especially testing trials fory blog. He still doesn't know I regularly blog . But he knows I am doing something on a space  on internet . Yes I don't share something with him. Some business men won't understand passion for money .  But he is a foodie and so I am able to make anything I want. .

  I am filling my blog with basic recipes . Butter chicken is typically a North Indian receipe . But nowadays it's common here in Kerala too. And since it is our favourite I am adding it to my blog space. I would personally call it dumping recipes as it is dumping every ingredient quickly . There is no long process involved here .  I have added green peas too . Everyone have their own method of cooking butter paneer. But anyway it is always quick and easy to create using your own measurements.

Ingredients

• 3 tablespoons Butter
• 250 grams Paneer cubes (or Cottage Cheese)
• 3 Kashmiri Red Chilies
• 1 teaspoon Ginger Paste
• 1 teaspoon Garlic Paste
• 1 Bay leaves
• 1 inch Cinnamon Stick
• 3 Cloves
• 2 Cardamoms
• 1/2 teaspoon Peppercorns
• 1 Onion, chopped finely
• 6 boiled Tomatoes, roughly chopped.
• 1/2 teaspoon Chilli powder
• 1/2 teaspoon Garam masala(Powder)
• 1/2 teaspoon Turmeric(Powder)
• 1 1/2 tablespoons Ketchup
• 1 tablespoons kasthuri methi (dry )
• 2 tablespoons Fresh Cream
• to taste Salt

Method

• In a large pan or kadhai, heat a tablespoon of butter and a tablespoon of oil.
• Add red chillies, ginger, garlic paste and all the whole spices mentioned above . Saute for a minute or two and onions. Cook the onions turn translucent.
• Pulse the tomatoes in grinder. Add to the onions .
• Cover and cook till the tomatoes start breaking down and the mixture starts leaving oil at the edges.
•  Add garam masala powder, chili powder, turmeric, ketchup, salt along with 1/2 cup water. Bring this to a boil.
• Once the curry comes to a boil, simmer and cook for 30 minutes, till the oil separates slightly. Cut the paneer into bite sized pieces, add it to the gravy and mix gently.
• In another pan, dry roast the kasturi methi and grind it to a fine powder. Mix kasturi methi and fresh cream in the curry and switch off the flame. Serve hot

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Kaivarthathe/plantains and egg fry

Kaivarthathe is the most sort out breakfast in every Muslim household in Kerala. Occasions, usually marks the end of my yearly most awaited fantasy, It's October and the beginning of the inevitable  winter that goes into full-swing.... But to tell u the truth winter is not happening here in Kerala. Climate is awkward nowadays. I hope to see some cool breeze at least   after the New Year's time . I’m no longer obsessed closet declutering that I do for kids every seasonal changes. Doing three closet organization is fun ...I love organization wardrobes. So the same  goes for food  flavors, its veggie time  and medium-body soups and baking season is coming up after a month., I just want to stay hooked ...like as though  I hibernate in thoughts  which I am so good at., so to speak. I start cooking meals at home with more regularity as some say cooking regularly is not the thing for modern woman... Well I don't totally disagree depends on how each duty has to offer from  you . I cook for everyone  which has a great deal to connect with the blog too. After all of the holidays is over  for the Onam and the school is totally back to normal I buzz this beautiful brekky every morning , plantains and egg stir fry .

A  lazy Sunday is our only heavy breakfast but most of the time it's kaivarthathe  in variations for the whole week ...I just make one plate and who ever wants can have it. After a flurry of a holiday weekend with non vegetarian menu, we sublime to having dosas and iddlies. It’s from the  coverage of two weeks ago, from an article by Rujuta Diwekar about healthy dishes fitting the meal. But really, it had my mind  all over it whether should I do it or not because the dishes we make are usually four course meals and we on be our desserts and spice .  With lentils and greens included were exactly the health kick that I need to have everyday . If you guys have been reading my blog I love greens more than meat. So usually my recipe index always flood more with veggies than chicken recipes,.
Here's the recipe ...kaivarthathe

Ingredients

• 2 plantains  , ripe and chopped
• 2 eggs, beaten
• Sugar to taste
• A pinch of cardamom powder
• 1 tablespoon Ghee

Method.

• Heat ghee in pan.
• Saute the banana till slightly soft.
• Add the eggs and sugar.
• Stir till scrambled .
• Add the cardamom powder. Stir well
• Serve  warm .

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WallaKarra appams

Here's a secret ... I don't look in the mirror . . I am so ashamed to see myself put on so weight. Being a mom of three and a brink of age 30 + . I feel so disgusted . But shortly , after reading Instagram stories on postpartum period ,I literally cried inside. I went through a lot . My first birth was like a huge party. Giving birth and naming ceremony of forty people which was followed by ladies judging on how fat I have become and the baby is so thin... And there was endless speeches on how the mother should do this and that... I wanted to run back to my teenage look. Really I was so ashamed of my body that I didn't get any support from nowhere. I wanted to fit into my jeans so badly that I started to diet after the ceremony. I got my figure back within a week !! And my poor baby was not fatty baby.. but alhamdullilah he was healthy boy. . After dieting ,which later I understood I never had to , I never put on weight at all , as much as I eat I was so thin . Baby boy never put in weight too.

Then all the lady folks of town would say that my milk was not so nourishing!! Can u guys believe it. .. I felt like punching such folks.
MIL would send me some halwas and ayurvedic medicines to put on weight now...yes  guys it was  for me !!!. I said to myself ...that's it. I took a Stern decision. I ate healthy and did yoga.
I fed my baby boy with love and care. No one can tell u how to be a good mum. That time I felt he was thin but now I pick his photos and I say hey look at the chubby boy in the pic,with people deciding how you look and you deciding that they are right is not going to stop you from falling down the path, so don't listen to what others have to say. I chose my path to believe in me and not others .
As @shabosphere says in her stories., My other two  babies are Google born and I am happy for that . I learnt a lot about pregnancy and kids health and I love my ever growing family.
But one thing to say and a pointer to all moms...
I am going to educate my son and daughter on this. She has to know everything from being a strong independent woman to a caring mum. And my son has to know how important it is to support wives during such periods of life. My mum was and is always shy to talk about such things to me even till today... But guys there is still so much that  the internet doesn't talk about ,so educate your kids.

Today's recipe is a simple appam . You can have it as it is or even have it with any curry . I have this every week and it's so nice to even carry it along while driving . I guess now all of you know why my weight speaks so much .

Recipe follows.

Ingredients

• 1 and 1/2  cups raw rice( .soaked for three hours )
• 1/2 cup cooked rice
• 1 carrot grated
• 2 green chilli chopped.

Method

• Grind the rice and cooked rice with little water to a  semi thick batter.
• Add the grated ingredients and stir well
• Add salt and mix well.
• Pour spoonful  batter into the Kara chatti and cook till done.
• Turn over the karra appams and brown the other side .
• The sides will be crispy.

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Vegetable kadai

This is a recipe that's really famous in our area and no one has to doubt about its taste. I always keep the kadai masala powder in pantry for the easy cook ups . Though not always a trending dish in my kitchen but I make it quite often. Our favourite is the paneer combo.

I don’t know if you have been noticing I am  struggling with the blog ., I have been quiet as I got sick in between, silencing myself for a while  with less explocives of  my experiences and  feelings. There was a time when I would just bubble with a lot . But  sometime , that has gone on the side which led  to complexities in life .. It isn’t that I don’t like to  write my posts, I still do a lot for the blog. . But I don't like to write a long post ..not a big fan of it .whatever said  there is no intention and  there are no thoughts when I write and nothing much happening to be  spoken on . If you feel that I am being a bit emm...dumb   then I may have to say a it dumb but I am trying to figure out. Still my hectic schedule doesn't allow to cook ....  I am not sure how I would term the feeling of lost ....but as much as I love the blog, and I want to get things going as normal a possible  I am trying to keep a little space also . A balancing act....to do everything slow and steady with patience.   .

Having seen so many of my Hardworking  bloggers  moving 10k on Instagram from their blogs recipes being posted daily I feel  due to whatever reasons, I somehow feel that is the best  thing I want to do too. By the way, the blog is now just growing with few plus recipes, it.  As of now, I am slowly inching towards hitting 1000 posts on the blog. I am in no hurry, I am taking it slow, and this year I should be able to hit that number by half . Then I may do a celebrity post, to show off my blog ...hehe...nothing like that ... inshallah have to wait and see.

Ingredients

For kadai masala:

• 1 tablespoon Coriander seeds
• 1 teaspoon Cumin seeds
• 3-4 Kashmiri dried red chilies seeds and stem removed
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper corns
• 1 teaspoon dry methi leaves
• 1 cinnamon
• 1 clove
• 3 cardamom
• 8 cashews
• Vegetables needed (total 2 cups) :
• 1 small or 1/3 cup Potatoes washed, peeled, cubed
• 1/3 cup Cauliflower (gobi) cut into florets
• 1/3 cup Carrot cut into cubes
• 1/3 cup Green peas
• 1/3 cup Capsicum (Green bell pepper) cut into ½ inch pieces
• For veg kadai gravy:
• 2 tablespoons Oil
• ½ cup Onion finely chopped
• 1 teaspoon Ginger paste or freshly grated or crushed
• 2 large or 1 cup Tomato pureed
• ½ cup Water or as needed
• Salt to taste
• ½ teaspoon Garam masala
• 1 teaspoon Kasoori methi (dried fenugreek leaves) lightly crushed between you plam
• 3-4 tablespoons Heavy whipping cream or fresh cream or malai

Method.

• Roast the kadai masala ingredients till nice aroma appears. After cooling, grind it to powder.
• Puree three tomatoes and keep aside.
• Heat 1/2 oil in kadai and roast 1/2 onions and capsicums till soft. Keep aside.
• In the same kadai add the rest of the oil and add the ginger garlic paste. Saute till aroma appears.
• Add rest of 1/4 cup onions and saute till brown .
• Add tomato puree and cook for 3 minutes.
• Add turmeric and red chilli powder and stir well.
• Add veggies and 2 cup water. And cook till done on low flame.
• After the water is half reduced and the veggies are cooked till perfect . Add the kadai masala and fresh cream .
• Simmer for one minute .
• Serve with hot roties or naan

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Gulab jamun using rava

As the climate changes here, it affects everything in a way that we cannot barely imagine. It affects business and health which leaves us no choice but to just go about it however it is . This is the month  of seasons and the stalls and bakers are stocking up the shelves with sweets and snacks Even though I love the sweet and especially the packed sorted ones ...I must say they have become so expensive. Earlier we used to get it for around 1000 rupees but now it has crossed 3k., recently when I was  stuck in traffic, I do opt for large boxes of sweets as I have many to deliver to and along the way it's already half down by me , because it keeps me cozy too.Very rare we find really good ones  here and they use fresh ghee and butter for sweets and snacks.

Majority of them use really nice ghee, the smell of ghee is so authentic and you find them in bulk during the season.. For one, I am not a fan of strong ghee with heavy fats. It has a totally different taste, when you try to make ghee at home it has no smell at all at times. However, sweet sellers make them so amazingly well. Please do note that some people find it difficult to cope up with some types of ghee. Anyway, there are so many who prefer ghee with butter, so I am sharing with you the recipe I made with ghee as many of the localites do.. They gulab jamuns are really soft and no  trace of rava being added comes out of the recipe.

Ingredients

• 1 cup milk powder
• 2 tablespoon plain flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 egg large
• 1 and 1/2 tablespoon ghee
• 1 tablespoon rava
• 1 tablespoon water.

Sugar syrup

• 2 and 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 and 1/2 cups water
• 1 teaspoon cardamom  powder

Method

• Mix rava and water and keep aside .
• Boil the water and add sugar. Keep boiling for 10 minutes . Add 1 teaspoon cardamom powder.
• Mix all the ingredients together including the rava and knead  for 5 minutes.
• Make small balls .
• You will get 18 small balls.
• Heat oil on medium heat
• Add the balls and stir continously till brown on all sides.
• Place hot jamuns in suryp and let it absorb the sugar  in.
• Serve after cooling.
• 
  

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Coconut chutney pomphet fry

After a long time I have a confession to make...I have this huge craze for seafood., we are back with the tour ..that is every month I go out and have something new. It is always a challenge to see to see if I get to admire new cooked recipes for the  month. Recently, we have been looking at far of places and I chose Cochin to get a bit of excitement. How much that fun has helped, I have to confess  it was a total disappointment I  don’t want to comment or speak of the experience because faiz ,my little one fell terribly sick. I told Aj we coul go alone but he insisted we go with kids as it was no fun at all without then I do agree. That we need to have kids around .about the tension that it involves around them is so rectic that I myself cannot handle. We have started doing this for two years of traveling to places new and now it is fun  great to have new food to taste.  Mostly we have been doing the same for the past two years and so far, I have been successful. As bloggers I need to keep exploring so I just have to wait and see what's going to come out of it .

Coming back to my special fry recipe , the tamarind chutney for this fish  is smothered on the fry , So that the tanginess is the ultimate ingredient for this recipe , it is something ultimate on anything that classifies as perfetc blend of spices. Before, it used to be just  in curries  before the fish is submerged in curry whether it is marinated or not depends on personal  preference. Having said that, I never over soon my fish. I would just marinate fish in tamarind water and turmeric salt and cook in gravy directly and serve. Leave it alone my crowd , at home would never have time for the curry to cook for more than 5 minutes as they say, “why to spoil the fun of having a perfectly cooked fish . .

As of lately , I ran through this recipe Last minute I had it actually at a restaurant and it was done with chicken and I was so badly craving to be done for something like  fish . That is when I got pomfret I decided  this recipe should be given a try, have been wanting to make since so long.

Ingredient

For the chutney

• 1/2 cup coconut grated
• Few curry leaves
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1/2 teaspoon tamarind pulp
• 2  teaspoon Coconut oil

Marination.

• 500 gms fish ( I used pomphret)
• 2 tablespoon red chilli powder.
• Salt to taste.

Method

• Heat oil in frying pan.
• Add the ingredients for chutney . except for the pulp.
• Cook till brown. Cool aside. Course grind the coconut with tamarind pulp
• Cook marinated fish till done on both sides.
• After which add the coconut chutney and cook for few second coating the whole fish with the chutney.
• Serve hot.

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Chickpea masala curry

After hummus comes this masala that we endure very much and the kadala masala curry  is the easiest to make  . Actually I was planning to peas but the chickpeas happened by mistake .  I had forgotten to soak the peas , and I had asked zehna to soakn.she mistakenly soaked the chickpeas. After having my morning tea I was so hooked up with the chores that after opened the lid I saw the difference. I thought let's try it out anyway and this masala happened .there was no time to think ..so I did the planned recipe the only difference being the chickpeas. Instead of peas. This is something similar to the black kadala masala post..

Kadala (white chickpeas)masala  is a dish very comforting in itself to all  Malayalees these days . It’s a very popular dish served for parties to serve with chapathis.

We usually make kadala  curry with coconut milk and just have it rotis or chapathis . When I wanted to try this recipe with this masala mix the option was endless ....u can have it with anything even white rice.  Last week, my kids have fallen sick with the  flu and I was stuck with two sick ones . I just couldn't get the time to post or do some planned cooking for the blog . But if you don’t have time, or your in a hurry to get this recipe done on busy days , Just make the masala and refrigerate it and boil the chickpeas and set aside for the next morning. Finish it off with rest of the cooking and it's easy to go..

Ingredients

• 2 cup chickpeas
• 3 Tablespoon coconut oil

For the paste

• 1 teaspoon coconut oil
• 2  medium onion chopped.
• 1 inch ginger chopped
• 2 medium tomatoes chopped
• 1 green chilli
• 1 red chilli
• 1 teaspoon red chilli powder.
• 1/2  teaspoon turmeric powder.
• 1 teaspoon garam masala powder.
• Salt to taste

Method

• Soak chickpeas overnight .
• Cook in pressure cooker , after the whistle , reduce the heat and cook for another 15 minutes. Set aside once it's done.
• Heat oil and all the  ingredients and cook til it's done. It will turn mushy and then cool .
• Grind to paste .
• Heat oil 2 tablespoon in a heavy bottom vessel . Add the grind paste. Add the spice powders. Stir well.
• Add the chickpeas and add little ( chickpeas cooked water) water only if needed.
• It will be a semi-thick soup consistency at this point,  cook till stew like consistency .
• Cook  for 15-20 minutes, or until thick and stew-like. Stir often .
• Add  garam masala  and set aside.
• Once  the chana masala has thickened , check the seasons and adjust the salt if needed.
• .

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