Frankie - Veg.

We have a chat bhandar and frankie place close to where we live. I love all kinds of frankie like veg., paneer, veg. cheese, palak paneer frankie. Ofcourse they have some non-veg too, where I don't take a glance at. Of all, I like paneer frankie, which I will present pretty soon, but for now I made the veg. frankie which is my kids favorite. The roti to roll the frakie, is kind of oily there. I did not use much oil at all to make these. I thought these were better than them.

Here is how you make it:

For chapathi/bread:
1 cup Maida
1/4 cup White wheat flour (you may use normal wheat flour too)
1 tsp Oil
1/4 tsp Baking powder
Salt as per taste

Mix flours,salt and baking powder in a bowl and pour little water in middle. On water pour the oil too and mix by adding little by little water to make it into a chapathi dough. Cover with a damp cloth and leave it aside.

For patties:
3 big potatoes
2 medium carrots
few green peas
1 medium onion
1/2 tsp red chilly powder
1/4 tsp amchur
1/2 tsp garam masala
1/4 tsp garlic powder
2 1/2 tbsp bread powder
1/2 tbsp corn flour
salt as per taste
oil to shallow fry

Peel and cube potatoes and carrots. Cook in water with little turmeric powder and salt. Prick with fork and see if the potatoes and carrots are cooked. Drain the excess water and keep aside until it cools.

Chop the onion very finely and add to the potatoes. Add green peas and the rest of the ingredients too. Add little salt too, but keep in mind that the potatoes and carrots are already cooked with salt. Shape them into long patties.

Heat oil in a pan and add two patties at one time and shallow fry them. Be careful that the green peas can pop out. Fry until it turns into golden brown in colour.

Assembling:

Tomato ketchup/sauce
1 medium onion very finely chopped
few leaves lettuce chopped up (optional)
little chaat masala

Take a chapathi and place a patty one corner. Pour some tomato sauce as per your requirement. I did not have green chilly sauce so I did not add, but usually even that is added to add some zing to the frankie. Now put some chopped onions and lettuce leaves on the pattie. Drizzle little chaat masala on top. Now fold the chapathi from the side where the patty is place to cover the patty and fold on your left side to cover the patty. Then keep rolling until you reach to the end of the chapathi. Thats it. Yummy yummy frankie is ready to be tasted.

This is off to Dish Name Starts With F event being hosted by Akila of Learning to cook.

Nutty Mango Paala Payasam (Kheer)

On Maha Sivaraatri, I was on fasting after a long long time. I left being on fasting after having kids as I got so used to eating timely. The mere thought of fasting itself was scary to me until this sivaraatri. I was determined this time and din't even think of food on that day. Was away from food blogs as some of the pictures are so tempting that you immediately want to rush to the kitchen an reproduce the dish. I remembered one of the veteran actor who made this kheer on one of my favorite cooking shows. I honestly do not remember the measurements except for the method. So I followed the same with my own twist and came up this delicious dessert. After making this, my mom called and told me that we are not supposed to have nuts or dals on that day, so I kept it in refrigerator and enjoyed after I broke the fasting. I must say the experiment was successful and the verdict is delicious.

Here is how you make it:

1 ltr Milk
1/2 cup Sweetened Mango Pulp
3 - 4 Green cardamoms
3 tbsp Sugar
2 tbsp Almonds
2 tbsp Cashews
1 tbsp Raisins
1 tsp Ghee

Boil milk on low flame until it comes to half the quantity and looks thick. Keep stirring in between so that it does not burn on the bottom. In another pan heat a 1/2 tsp of ghee and lightly fry the almonds and cashews. Take them into a mixie jar. In the same pan add another 1/2 tsp ghee and add the raisins. Fry for a minute until they turn golden brown in colour. Add to the boiling milk. Powder the nuts that you took into the mixie jar and add to the boiling milk. Peel and powder the cardamoms and add to the milk. Now let it boil for 5 minutes and turn off the heat. Let it cook completely. You will see that milk will thicken even more because of the nuts in it. Now add the mango pulp and mix well. Keep it in the refrigerator until you serve. It tastes yummy like custard when you serve it cold.

This is off to my event Past Is Present - JFI - Re-Run - Mango being hosted here by Me.

I would also like to send this to Any One Can Cook event being hosted at Taste of Pearl City by Umm Mymoonah.

Simple Mango Milk Shake

Finally I found a can of sweetened mango pulp in one of the supermarkets here. I did not even look at the price on the can I just grabbed it. I am planning to come up with some good recipes with that. But for now I just wanted to post a simple recipe which gave me energy while fasting on the occasion of Maha Sivaratri. This is so simple to make and yet yummy in taste.

Here is how you make it:

1/4 cup Mango pulp
2/3 cup Milk (adjust as per your taste)
1 tbsp Sugar (adjust as per your taste)
2 crushed green cardamom (optional)

Combine all in a glass, by stirring with a fork. Serve it chilled as it tastes great that way. Thats it. It is so refreshing in this hot summer.

This is off to the Past is Present - JFI - Re-Run - Mango event being hosted by me. JFI was originally started by Indira of Mahanandi.

I would also like to send this is Any One Can Cook event being hosted by Umm Mymoonah of Taste of Pearl City.

Brown Rice Rava Pulihora

I bought brown rice once to make an effort to have it instead of white rice. For few days I thought it was good but later on, I started disliking it, so I started using in making dosas. This time I wanted to try making it into rava and use it for upma, pulihora or idlis. So I pulsed it in mixie jar and removed the flour separately. I was left with rava with which I made this pulihora.

Here is how you make it:

1 cup Brown rice rava
2 1/2 cups Water (adjust as per the dense of the rava)
1 tsp oil

Wash rava for once under water and pour the 2 1/2 cups water, oil and cook like you cook rice. Leave it aside and let it cool for sometime.

For tempering:

2 tbsp oil
1 tsp chana dal (senagapappu)
1 tsp urad dal (minapappu)
1 tsp mustard seeds (aavalu)
5 red chillies
1/4 tsp turmeric powder
1/2 " piece of ginger (allam) (grated very finely)
3 green chillies slit length wise
few curry leaves
a dash of hing
Salt as per taste
2 lemons juice

Heat oil in a pan and the tempering ingredients including grated ginger except for green chillies and curry leaves. Once the mustard seeds start spluttering add the green chillies and curry leaves. Fry for a minute until the dals turn brown in colour add the cooked rava to the pan and stir until everything mixes thoroughly. Do not turn off the flame as the heat will help the rava to separate nicely. Turn off heat. Add salt to the extracted lemon juice and pour over the rava. Mix once again thoroughly. Serve it hot in a plate.

This is off to Brown Rice for Dinner event being hosted by Siri of Cooking with Siri originally started by Sanjeeta of Lite Bite.

This also goes to my own event Twist the Traditional - Pulihora.

Awards again

I am again passed on with some awards by Archana of The Mad Scientist's Kitchen. This time it came with a task too. I need to write seven points about me. It is always difficult to write about yourself.. unless you know yourself very well. I mean, we generally do not analyze ourselves and note down anywhere what are we actually and what are our likes and dislikes. These kind of pat on your back is very much needed to give a thought and note down about yourself.

Here are some of the things about me:

1. I love dancing (though I can't dance now, I gave a try to learn it at childhood, things din't really workout in favor of me). Dancers that I love to watch on the screen are Hema malini, Madhuri, Hritik and Shahid Kapoor.

2. The next hobby that drags my attention is Cooking. The cooking show that I love to watch in TV is "Abhiruchi" in ETV. I love to cook food for my kids, as my son who is just 2 and half years old, has a list of his favorites already and craves for them sometimes.

3. Other interesting channels that I would love to watch are TLC (Travel channel), Cartoon network and B4U for music. These days I am hooked on to Star Cricket channel for World Cup.

4. My favorite colour is Yellow and Orange.

5. If you ask me whats your favorite food item, I can't answer in one word. I have a long list that keeps increasing as the times passes on.

6. I can read and write english, hindi and my mother tongue telugu. So I watch movies from all the languages, but to pick few of the movies that I instantly loved and don't mind to watch any number of times are "Pursuit of Happiness" in english, "Lagaan","Dil Chahta Hai" in Hindi and  "Anand", "Godavari" in Telugu.

7. All my inventions and experiments with food are confined only upto me. If it is a success only then it is served to my husband as he never wants to taste anything new or anything that is not common.

The next task is to share these awards with 15 more bloggers

I am sure most of them must have already received these awards, yet as a token of love towards their blog, I am sharing these once again with them.

1. Swarnavalli of Akarma
2. Rachu of Amma and Baby
3. Anu Ramesh of Anu's Kitchen
4. Ila of Cookery Point - Ila's Kitchen
5. Jisha of Jisha's Kitchen
6. Reshmi of Rasoi
7. Latha of A Peek into My Kitchen
8. Art of Dessert of Art of Dessert
9. Nithya of 4th Sense Cooking
10. Radhika of Tickling Palettes
11. Ramya of Hot from my oven
12. Deepti of A Hint of Spice
13. VS of A foodie n her cooking hat
14. Shahana of me n my apron
15. Radha of Liberal Dose of Masala

Almond Banana Milk Shake

I love milk shakes or smoothies. Whenever I have ripen bananas left, I either use them in the corn flakes or milk shakes. Of all the fruits I love bananas in milk shakes, next is mangoes. I still trying to find ripen mango pulp. Hopefully I will find one can atleast and post that too pretty soon. Adding almonds to this smoothie really tasted great.

Here is how I made it:



a fistful of almonds (grind to smooth powder)
1 riped banana
1 cup milk
1 tbsp sugar/honey

Take almonds into a mixie jar and make a smooth powder and add the chopped banana. Make a smooth paste and then add the milk, sugar and run just once.Serve in a glass. If the milk is cold from the refrigerator, smoothie will taste even better. In the hot summer, any kind of juices are most welcome at my home and this is my favorite of all.




This is off to Cooking with Fruits Event being hosted at Taste Buds by Smita and Juice Recipes Event being hosted by Dr. Sameena of My Culinary Creations.

Grill Cheese Sandwich

This is one of my favorite breakfasts. When I have too many idlis happening at home for breakfast, I take a break and make these sandwiches for myself. So easy to make and yummy in taste, ghosh I am drooling back again to have few more right now. Anyways, here is how you make them:

4 bread slices (I used multi grain bread slices)
2 cheddar cheese slices
1 small onion chopped very finely
1 small tomato chopped into small pieces
1 green chilly or red pepper flakes (I used red pepper flakes, I was too lazy to chop the green chilly)
Little oil or ghee to toast the bread

Drizzle little oil on one side of the bread slice. Place the oil side down on a hot pan and drizzle little oil on the other side of the bread slices also. Let the bread turn slightly golden brown in colour. Keep the heat on medium as it allows the bread to get crispy. Remove the bread slices onto a plate with toasted side up. On one bread slice place the onion and tomato pieces, sprinkle some red pepper flakes and place a cheese slice on top of it. Cover with the other bread with the toasted side inside and carefully place these slices back onto the hot pan. Turn the flame to slow and let it cook on very very low flame. This helps the cheese to melt and the bread to get crispy. Remove sandwich onto the serving plate and cut diagonally. Serve with some ketchup and yum...

Two such sandwiches are good enough to keep you full until lunch time. And I must say they are healthy too... if you use little oil to toast them.

This is off to 'Only' Cooking with Bread event being hosted by Pari at her beautiful blog Foodelicious.

Mamidi kaya thokku (Raw Mango Instant Pickle)

I started very confidently the re-run of JFI series and thought finding mangoes will not be a problem in this season. Ever since I announced the event, it has become really difficult for me to find raw mangoes in the market at all. Hoping that others might also find the same problem, I thought I may have to postpone the deadline, but in this week I found some good mangoes in the market and also there are fellow bloggers who are sending in their entries. So lets stick with the same deadline and try to gather few more wonderful entries.

This is my first entry to the event. Mangoes are the first and highly preferred vegetable for pickles. There are wide range of pickles that are made across India. Depending on the region, the flavours vary. Andhra is famous for pickles and chutneys and trust me there are n number of pickles that are made with mangoes. Famous among them are Avakai and Magai and again there are varieties of Avakais made across andhra. Lets hope to see some of them in the event called Pickle/Achar/Uragayi started by Hima at her wonderful blog SnackORama.

Here is how you make this pickle:

1 Raw Mangoe (Wash, wipe well, peel and grate)
3 tbsp Red chilli powder
2 tbsp Salt (adjust as per taste)
1 tsp Fenugreek (menthulu/methi)  powder (dry roast in a pan and make it into fine powder)

For Tempering:

3 tbsp Oil
1 tsp Mustard seeds (aavalu)
1 Red chilly
a dash of hing

Wash and wipe the mango really well. A touch of water can spoil the entire pickle, it will not stay for too long. Peel the skin and grate into a bowl. Add red chilli powder, salt and fenugreek powder. Mix well and keep aside.

Heat oil in a pan and add the tempering ingredients. When the mustard seeds splutter remove from heat and keep aside until it cools. Add to the pickle and mix well.

Serve this pickle with hot steamed rice with a tsp of ghee or with any breakfast items like idli, dosa, upma etc.,

This is off to my own event Past Is Present - JFI- Re-run - Mango and Pickle/Achar/Uragayi Event being hosted by Hima at SnackORama.

Twist The Traditional - IDLI - Round Up

Thanks to all for taking time to post their wonderful versions of IDLIs. I appreciate that most of you are enjoying the theme behind this event. Here is the list of entries that I received:

Podi Stuffed Idlis from Minu of Chettinad Fiesta

Kanchipuram Idlis from Minu of Chettinad Fiesta

Marbled Idli from Gayathri of Gayathri's Cook Spot

Fenugreek/Vendhaya Idli from Krithi of Krithi's Kitchen

Cocoa Idli from Umm Mymoonah of Taste Of Pearl City

Spinach Idlis from Priya of Now Serving

Celery Cilantro Oats Idli from Denny of Oh Taste N See

Baked Idli Sandwich from Kavya of Kavya's Kitchen

Idli Kurma from Kavya of Kavya's Kitchen

Kollu/Horsegram Idli from PJ of Seduce Your Tastebuds

Potato Stuffed Idli from Savitha of Savitha's Kitchen

Tricolor Fried Rava Idli from Anshu of My Mom's Recipes

Organic Rava Idlis from Sonia of My Creative Flavors

TriColour Idly from Chitra of Chitranna

Instant Cornmeal & Oats Idli from Priya Suresh of Priya's Easy N Tasty Travels

Flax Seed & Cornmeal Idli from Priya Suresh of Priya's Easy N Tasty Travels

Instant Multi-grain Idli from Priya Suresh of Priya's Easy N Tasty Travels

Instant Ragi & Rava Idli from Priya Suresh of Priya's Easy N Tasty Travels

Mixed Dal Idli from Archana of The Mad Scientist's Kitchen

Polenta & Bulgar Wheat Idli from Jayasri Ravi of Samayal Arai

Marvelous Marble Idli from Mythreyi of Yum! Yum! Yum!

Peas Masala Idli from Shama of Easy2Cook Recipes

Crazy Idlis from Abbhirami of Soulful Creations

Thalicha/Seasoned Idli from Sara of Sara's Corner

Masala Idli Fries from Prathibha of The Chef and Her Kitchen

Fried Idlis from Vatsala of Show and Tell

Polenta Idlis from Umm Mymoonah of Taste of Pearl City

Semolina Steamed cake (rava idli) from Torviewtoronto of Torview

Husked Green Gram Idlis from Jayasri of Samayal Arai

Here are my entries for this event:

Wheat Rava Idlis 

Masala Idlis 

Maggie Masala Wheat Rava Idlis 

Masala Oats Stuffed Idlis 

You are aware of the next theme too. So keep sending your wonderful entries and continue to make this event a big success.

PS: This time I set some rules you need to follow to come up with an entry. So, please read the post and understand the rules.

Looking forward for some amazing twists to the traditional pulihora.