Tomato-Onion Chutney

As a kid, this was my ultimate, darling chutney. This is part of my dear nostalgic package of comfort food and reassuring moments. And my mom makes the best tomato-onion chutney. She makes it with minimal seasonings and spice, reinforcing the simple and basic tastes of tomatoes and onions.

So here is the recipe. (Warning: there will be a lot of tomato-based dishes to follow for a while since the garden is alive with them!)

Ingredients:

1. Five to Six ripe tomatoes, chopped
2. 2 medium sized onions or 1 big onion, chopped (red onions are best)
3. 1 teaspoon of black mustard seeds (my mom doesn’t add this)
4. 1 teaspoon of urad dhal
5. 1 teaspoon of channa dhal
6. 1 teaspoon of Thoor dhal
7. ½ teaspoon of Hing
8. 1 teaspoon of turmeric
9. 2-3 dried red chillies (or more)
10. 1 teaspoon of salt (or a little more)
11. 1 tablespoon of vegetable/olive oil

Preparation:

1. Heat oil in a small pan. Add mustard seeds and wait for them to splutter
2. Once they do, add channa dhal, urad dhal, thoor dhal, Hing, red chillies, and turmerics and saute a bit on medium heat until they begin to slightly brown.
3. Add the onions and saute till they become translucent and tender.
4. Add the tomatoes and saute till they become soft and wilt a bit. Switch off the heat. Let this cool.
5. Once cooled, add everything to a blender along with some salt and grind away. I sometimes prefer the chutney to be a bit coarsely ground so that the dhals/pulses add some texture. This is again different from how my mom blends - and I do like those finely pureed versions the best, for it makes me feel all baby-ish and warm and fuzzy.
6. Check for seasonings and serve alongside idlis, dosais, adais, etc. They even make awesome dips for tortilla chips!

Variations

This chutney turns out uniquely tasty if a bunch of coriander leaves are added while blending. One of my aunts and my in-laws follow this variation, and as I said, there is no question that it come out good! But if you like to concentrate on the flavors of onions and tomatoes, this recipe should do it just fine.

Roasted Tomato Soup

I am conventional in many of my tastes. My most favorite dishes are the simple classics. If asked for a choice of ice-cream flavor in a store that holds the most exotic combinations, I will be the exasperating one that will ask for plain old vanilla with minimal additions. Similarly, when it comes to soups, the classic tomato soup is my dear favorite. So, when I read this awesome recipe on Tuesday, I could think of nothing but make this one the very evening with our home-grown tomatoes that are now ripening in galore.

I followed the above beautifully written (and presented) recipe with little modifications. The basic procedure is to roast the tomatoes and some garlic cloves coated in olive oil, salt, and pepper, at 400 F for 1 hour. Cool, and blend this. Heat and simmer in a pot along with some water, herbs, and additional seasonings of your choice. Ladle into bowls/mugs, add some grated onion, place a slice of toasted bread on top, cover the entire (or parts) of the top with cheese, and bake for 20 minutes at 350 F. The modifications I made:

I added rosemary instead of thyme

I added a teaspoon of turmeric, for old habits die hard

I added plain water instead of vegetable stock, because I didn't have any on hand.

I added only 2 cups of water, as opposed to the 4 cups prescribed

I didn't add any red-pepper flakes 

I added a tiny portion of milk - but it didn't add anything to the taste and perhaps diluted the taste of tomatoes a wee bit. So please skip.

I used pepper-jack cheese slices and a "small" sprinkling of cheddar

I used oven-proof bowls instead of mugs (which explains the need for just a lil' more cheese)

The result was a sumptuous meal. I loved the toasted bread and cheese incorporated within the soup. Ingenious! The aroma of roasted tomatoes is indeed heavenly! It works up your appetite instantly.

Thank you, Deb!

Ricotta Stuffed Mini-Peppers

This dish was inspired from one of Giada’s recipes on Food Network. Giada is a beautiful chef who charms you into trying her dishes mainly through the exquisite elegance and ease with which she prepares them in her gorgeous kitchen that overlooks the beach. The colors and artful presentation catch your eye and you look forward to recreate that prettiness in your own humble space. Since I’m known to love colors, the vivid colors of the yellow, red, and orange peppers drew me in.

The mini-peppers are actually sweet and not as hot as one would imagine. They are totally toothless-ly devoid of any heat once you remove their seeds.

Ingredients

1. About 20 peppers of mixed colors
2. 2 cups of ricotta (ricotta is Italian cottage-cheese, very similar to our Paneer in taste)
3. 1 small onion finely chopped
4. 2 cloves of garlic, finely minced
5. 1 teaspoon of garam masala or chaat masala
6. 1 teaspoon of salt
7. ½ teaspoon of chilli powder or chilli flakes (optional) for some heat
8. The zest of half a lemon
9. 1 tablespoon of olive oil

 Preparation

1. Cut the top of the peppers and remove the inside stalk that houses all the heat-infusing seeds (this is optional. You can retain the seeds if you like some heat to kick in)
2. In a pan, heat olive oil with garlic (so that the garlic flavor slowly imparts into the oil). Before the garlic turns brown, add the chopped onions and saute till the onions soften and turn translucent. Remove from heat. Let it cool.
3. In a bowl, mix the ricotta along with the garam masala, salt, and chilli powder. Add the cooled sauteed onions and garlic and mix well. Finally, add the zest of half a lemon to freshen the flavors.
4. The above is the stuffing. This stuffing needs to go into all the peppers. You can either spoon them in gracefully (like Giada), or be a little lazy (like me) and take a short-cut. Add the prepared ricotta stuffing into a small plastic bag. Cut one corner of the bag to make a small opening. Squeeze the contents of the bag into the peppers. To ensure that the peppers get stuffed all the way through, insert the bag deep into the peppers and start squeezing. Preheat the oven to 350 F.
5. Arrange the stuffed peppers on a parchment-paper-lined baking tray and bake for 15 minutes at 350 F.

That’s all there is to it! They are fancy-looking colorful appetizers that taste quite good. The same process can be repeated with banana peppers that are a bit more spicy and have a delicious tartness to them. But they may need a little more time in the oven. That will be my experiment for another day!

Poornam Kozhakattai - revisited

This post should have come out way sooner. But in any case, I reattempted poornam kozhakattai this time and I’m glad to report that the consistency of the poornam turned out just right! It’s way easier than all the fuss I needlessly went through the last time. (Remember, my poornam stuffing turned out a little hard?)
 

Copy pasting the steps from the earlier post, I will just edit the parts that worked this time (in blue font).

Preparing the coconut-jaggery filling (poornam) (You need: ¾ cup of powdered jaggery, 1 cup of coconut gratings, and 1 teaspoon of powdered cardamom)

1. Add a teaspoon of water to a heavy bottom pan (or a not so heavy-bottomed pan - doesn’t matter much). Not necessary

2. Powder jaggery into little bits. In the US, it’s a lot of work to powder the balls of hard, stone-like  jaggery. A trick I use is - stick the jaggery into the microwave for about 30 secs (or more depending on the amount of jaggery), and crumble the heated, loosened jaggery with your fingers. Caution: Do not over heat, or you will end up with a melted puddle of jaggery.

3. Add ¾ cup of powdered jaggery into the pan, and stir till it melts and begins to froth up in little bubbles (Note: Stir the jaggery on sim, or medium heat). The bubbles need not be vigorous. Once you notice the bubbles, switch the heat to low.

4. At this point, add 1 cup worth of grated coconut (I approximated here, for the cookbook says the gratings of 1 big coconut - I had no inclination to hunt for a big coconut, crack it open, and grate it).

5. Continue stirring the mixture on low heat (on a heat-scale of 0-10, my heat was at 2), for exactly 6-7 minutes, till the mixture is almost sticky without much liquid. Remember the poornam will harden and set as it cools. 

6. Remove from heat, and add one teaspoon (or more) of powdered cardamom.  Allow it to cool. The cooled filling should be a soft, non-runny mass of jaggery and coconut. It shouldn’t be runny or hard. 

And viola! You end up with nice, soft, yummy poornam :)

Ulutham Kozhakattai / Uppu Kozhakattai Savory Kozhakattai

I tried my hand at Kozhakattai making again. And it felt good to be progressing at something, albeit slowly. I’m still taking my baby steps in these culinary-marathons. So there’s more time and work ahead of me!

One of the most popular kinds of savory kozhakattai has a stuffing made of cooked and sauteed urad dhal paste. This is the kozhakattai that features on Ganesh Chathurthi along with its sweet brother - the poornam kozhakattai. So, following Meenakshi ammal’s recipe, my mom’s recipe, and hazy recollections of how it was made, I tried out the delicious savory dumpling this time. 

Ingredients for the stuffing (yield: 15 kozhakattais)

1. ½ cup of de-husked whole urad dhal / ulundu / black gram
2. 1 teaspoon of bengal gram dhal
3. ¼ teaspoon of Hing
4. ½ teaspoon of Salt (or more depending on your taste)
5. 2-3 green chillies, finely cut.
6. 1 teaspoon of black mustard seeds
7. 1 tablespoon of sesame oil

Preparing the rice-flour dough - the same method as making the sweet version (You need: 1 cup of water, 1 cup of rice flour,  a teaspoon of salt and sesame oil)

1. Boil 1 cup of water with a teaspoon of gingely (sesame) oil and a teaspoon of salt.
2. When the water comes to a boil, add 1 cup of finely ground rice flour (note the easy 1:1 proportion)
3. As you add the rice-flour, start stirring the mixture continuously to avoid forming lumps.
4. Keep stirring (for about 4-5 minutes) till the mixture comes together as a nice lump of dough. (Note: I switched off the heat within 2 minutes or so and continued stirring in the remaining heat. If you find the dough to be sticking to the bottom of the vessel, remove the pan from heat). This step requires a strong arm, so employ a male member of the household if your arms tire.
5. Once the dough comes together looking “glossy” (meaning the flour is reasonably cooked), transfer it onto a wet piece of cloth (any thin cotton cloth works fine.. just ensure the dye on the cloth does not run and stick to the dough. It’s safest to go with a white cloth). Wrap the dough in the cloth into a tight ball, so it continues to remain moist. The dough cracks if it becomes dry.
6. Let it become cool to the touch. Then gently knead and re-wrap in the cloth.

Preparing the Stuffing

1. Soak the urad dhal and bengal gram dhal for one hour in water.
2. Drain the water and grind the soaked dhals to a smooth paste sprinkling water every now and then
3. The next step is to cook the ground dhal paste. Steam the paste as you would steam rice. Since the paste tends to stick to the bottom of the vessel in which you cook/steam, line it with some aluminum foil (back in the day, banana leaves were used). Also pick a vessel that is wide (a plate is best, but difficult to steam), so that the paste cooks evenly and faster. I steamed the paste for 20 minutes on high heat until a tester came out clean. 
4. Let the cooked dhal paste cool. Crumble the cooled mass into little bits.
5. Heat some oil in a pan. Temper the oil with mustard seeds. Once it splutters, add the cut green chillies and hing.
6. Next add the crumbled dhal mixture and saute. Add some salt and keep stirring the mixture till it becomes fluffy and begins to crisp just a little. Do not let it brown. Switch off the heat once it nears this state (takes about 10-15 minutes of sauteing on medium heat).

The stuffing is now ready. 
 

Putting the two together

1. Pinch out some prepared rice dough and flatten the ball between your fingers, as if you were making a bowl (recall your days of playing with clay and play doh). Keep a cup of sesame oil nearby, and dip your fingers in the oil to avoid them from sticking to the dough and tearing the bowl/pocket you are creating.
2. Place a teaspoon (more or less) of the cooled savory filling into the pocket, and seal the edges by pressing the sides together. The end result should look like a sea shell.
3. Grease idli plates with some sesame oil, and place the stuffed kozhakattais on them. Two per plate if they are small. If you don’t have idli plates, you can devise your own steamer. You can use a vegetable steamer etc.
4. Bring some water to a boil in a tall, deep vessel (the ones used to cook pasta). Place the idli plates inside it, and make sure the water doesn’t touch or come above the bottom-most idli plate... if that’s case, your bottom kozhakattais will turn out soupy.
5. Close the pan (with a lid that has a vent for allowing the steam to escape) and cook on high heat for 12-15 minutes.
6. If the kozhakattai’s color is changed from pale white to a creamy beige and it looks soft, it is cooked! Transfer onto a plate and eat away.

 In common parlance, this is also called as Uppu Kozhakattai (Salt Kozhakattai), and it is my personal favorite compared to the sweet one!

Peach Mousse

I can’t really call this a mousse. It has no eggs, for one, and has curious ingredients like cream cheese and jam. I was basically putting in stuff that was dangerously close to their expiry. This seems to be the common trend for me, isn't it? The cause for most of my culinary experiments! So, I don’t know what to call it, except it is close to being a mousse due to its creamy, custard-y form. If you can think of a better sounding name, please let me know! :)

Ingredients (yield: 6 small cups)

1. 6 ounces of cream cheese
2. ½ cup of Peach jam (or any jam)
3. 1 cup of whipping cream (heavy cream)
4. 1 tablespoon of sugar
5. 1 peach, finely sliced
6. 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
7. 1 teaspoon of orange extract

Preparation:

1. Whip/beat room temperature cream cheese into a fluffy mass
2. Add ½ cup of peach jam (mine was left-over from last year!) and beat it into the cream cheese.
3. In a separate bowl, beat the cream along with sugar, vanilla and orange essence till it turns into a light,airy, frothy cloud of cream. In technical terms, beat the cream till it forms stiff peaks... that is, if you dip a spoon into the cream and take it out, the cream should form a stiff peak at the tip of the spoon.
4. Now gently fold the whipped cream into the cream cheese + jam mixture. Folding is a technique through which one tries to mix an airy, light entity like whipped cream or egg whites without deflating the air in it. So, gently mix in one direction, starting from the center and folding it over one side. Repeat till everything is almost evenly combined.
5. Spoon the mousse-like substance into small cups and refrigerate for at least one hour. Serve with slices of peach (or any fruit) on top.

 I am addicted to the flavors of peach+orange. This turned out to be a decent dessert when we had company, for you can’t really go wrong with fruit+cream+sugar, can you? :)

Peach Jam

It’s that time of the year when our garden blooms and comes alive with fruits, vegetables and more flowers. As Summer inches towards its end, the only consolation for us is the bounty we reap. Among others, we have an old and mellow peach tree that faithfully bears us bags upon bags of fruit every year. Despite leaving a share of fruits for the birds and squirrels, and passing on fruit baskets to friends and colleagues, we still end up with an overflowing refrigerator filled to the brim with fruits. After trying to eat them, juice them, and make smoothies out of them every other day (to note: peaches+mango+banana makes a lush tropical drink), we eventually tire of them. As the peaches start reaching their expiry, we begin to scuttle around the place, wringing hands with worry, wondering what to do, and shuddering at the thought of throwing away rotten peaches. It never occurs to us to sell them, for they become a little too personal to us. We both are such sentimental fools. So, I decided to make jars and jars of peach jam.

My mother-in-law prepared awesome peach jam last year that came for a good long year for us. So, inspired by her, and her delicious jam, I followed her easy recipe, and modified it a bit to convert 30 peaches into yummy jam.

I love the combination of peaches and oranges (from a smoothie trial), so I generously added the zest of three oranges that were sadly being neglected for a while. And, upon my mother-in-law’s suggestion, I also added saffron and cardamom powder. I am thrilled that these little touches enhanced the taste and flavor of the jam!

Ingredients

1. I used 30 peaches. It translated to 7 cups of peach pulp.
2. 14 cups of sugar, following a 1:2 ratio of peach pulp: sugar. This does evince the raised-eyebrows look, and it drained my teeny sugar container in no time, leaving me dazed and guilty. But jam is eventually about sugared fruit. Besides, one wouldn’t consume more than a spoon or two of jam per day, so it shouldn’t be so bad. If your peaches/fruit happen to be sweet, moderate the sugar accordingly. Peaches are generally tart and need sugar.
3. The grated zest of 3 oranges
4. A couple of pinches of saffron
5. 3-4 teaspoons of cardamom powder
6. The juice of 1 lemon. Lemon is a good preservative, and its tartness brings out the flavor of the peaches and oranges much better.

 
Preparation

1. In a big pot of boiling water, add all the peaches and let them blanch for 10-15 minutes (mine took about 20 minutes, due to the sheer volume and inadequately sized pot). Remove the peaches and immerse them in another pot of cold water (ice-cold water is much better as it shocks the peaches, stops them from cooking, and makes their peels slide off easily).  Remove their peels and pits, and put their pulp in a blender/food processor.
2. Pulse the blender/food processor till the pulp reaches a uniform consistency. Do not puree or grind, for it would then result in peach juice. I also personally like little bits of fruit in my jam as opposed to a pureed mass.
3. Transfer the pulp into a large, heavy bottomed pot. Add the required quantity of sugar and orange zest. With the heat on medium-low, start stirring the mass until the sugar dissolves and begins to bubble.
4. At this point, reduce the heat to low and continue stirring every now and then to avoid the pulp from burning or sticking to the bottom. Continue stirring until the mass begins to thicken a little, resulting in uneven chunks that don’t drizzle down. It took me 1 hour and 20 minutes (precisely) from the time I switched on the heat to get to this state. At around 1 hour add some saffron and cardamom powder and stir well. Remember, the jam will thicken as it cools, so do not wait to reach the exact consistency of room-temperature/cold jam when the jam is hot. So after 1 hour, every 5 minutes, I started testing the consistency by taking a drop of jam on a cool plate and checking on its consistency when it cools (within a minute). If it cools to become sticky yet spreadable (like jam) then it’s done. If it cools to a watery, runny consistency, then it needs to cook/boil more.
5. When the jam reaches the right consistency, squeeze the juice of 1 lemon and stir well.
6. Then, transfer the jam into clear, clean, sterilized jars with an air-tight lid. Transfer the jam when it is hot, else it becomes difficult to spoon out all the jam.
7. Let the jam cool down overnight. Then close the jars with the air-tight lids and refrigerate. They easily last for a year (and perhaps more!)

I felt like Monica (in Friends) as I ladled out several containers of jam and had the house smelling of peach and orange! But it felt good to translate the fruits into so many bottles of finger-licking lip-smacking jelly! The saffron was the star ingredient of this jam. From now on, all jams of mine will contain this luxurious flavor. Our close friends have received several months’ worth of jam.... hopefully they enjoy it during the upcoming cold mornings. How I wish I could parcel a couple of jars to India and California!

And since Meenakshi ammal has similar jam recipes in her book (on jackfruit jams and banana jams!), I can partially tick that chapter off too ;).

Pineapple-Rosemary-Cilantro Popsicle

On one of his recent trips, Anand chanced upon an interesting popsicle flavor and recipe included in a tiny section of an airline magazine. He immediately took a picture of it and dutifully showed it to me, requesting that it be made as soon as possible. How convenient for me! :).

But these days, I can’t seem to obediently stick to a given recipe. I am always tempted to add a bit of this and that, and eliminate things that I believe won’t go well together. I was very skeptical of adding a bunch of coriander leaves (cilantro) along with pineapple. I associate cilantro with savory, aromatic dishes and not sweet, fruity dishes. Licking cilantro bits from a popsicle just didn’t fit well with my tiny flavor-related-mental-model. And so, I adapted. I’ve been experimenting with other herbs available on this side of the world, and have recently fallen in love with fresh rosemary and tarragon. Rosemary has a wonderful, lavender-like pleasant fragrance, but it doesn’t make the dish taste/smell flowery. Similarly,  Tarragon has a strong fennel-like note to it, except it is much sweeter and subtle. They are strong, aromatic herbs which go a long way in subtly enhancing the scent and flavor of a dish. A few months back, I had a rosemary-ginger-lemon soda and I swooned over the refreshing flavors! Since I was convinced that these ingredients would play very well with the sweet and tangy pineapple to give a refreshing zing to the popsicle, I added them. But Anand vehemently insisted that I add cilantro and not digress from the original recipe. And so, cilantro went in too - and I am still not in great favor of it! But Anand and other friends loved it, so I guess I’m the minority in this!

Rosemary

 
Ingredients

1. 3 cups of finely diced fresh pineapple
2. ⅓ cup of sugar
3. ½  a teaspoon of salt
4. Juice of half a lemon (or lime)
5. 2 sprigs of cilantro
6. 2 small sprigs of fresh rosemary (remove the leaves from the inedible stem)
7. a pebble-sized piece of ginger

Preparation

1. Add all the ingredients in a blender and pulse, grind, puree until smooth. Do not add any water. If it’ easier, puree the pineapples first and then add the rest of the ingredients and give it a blitz.
2. Pour into popsicle molds and freeze for 4-5 hours.

 

Pineapple-rosemary-cilantro-ginger popsicle is ready! This might seem odd to many, but it did taste good and the flavors were unique. The only change I would recommend is adding mint leaves instead of cilantro to make the posicle even more refreshing. It will turn into a pineapple-mojito on a stick - without the rum ;).

Spinach Adai

Adai is a lentil based savory crepe that closely resembles the popular Dosai, differing from it on one major aspect - adais are thicker than dosai, and are hence not as crispy. But true to every other less-oilier, less-crispier food, adai is a very healthy combination of par-boiled rice, lentils, and other protein rich pulses like bengal-gram dhal and urad dhal. Due to the heavy concentration of protein, Hing (asafoetida) and ginger are usually added to aid in digestion. And of course, as always, to give it some flavor and spice-kick, red chillies, curry leaves, and vegetables such as spinach, onions, tomatoes, and bell-peppers are usually added. To make a wholesome meal, I added spinach to my adai batter last week.

Ingredients

1. 2 cups of par-boiled rice
2. 1 cup of toor dhal
3. ¾ cup of bengal gram dhal
4. ¼ cup of de-husked urad dhal
5. a small piece of ginger
6. 5 red chillies
7. 2 teaspoons of Hing
8. A couple of sprigs of curry leaves
9. 2 cups of chopped spinach
10. 2 teaspoons of salt
11. some sesame oil

Preparation

1. Soak the par-boiled rice, toor dhal, uradh dhal, bengal gram dhal and red chillies for 4-6 hours.
2. In a mixer/grinder/blender, grind the soaked dhal/rice along with the chopped spinach, red chillies, ginger, Hing, curry leaves, and salt. Add about a cup of water and grind the mixture into a paste that is neither too soft, nor too coarse. Neither too light nor too dense. The consistency should be such that the batter does not pour when tilted, nor does it stay together as a lump when tilted.
3. Taste for seasoning, and add more chillies or salt as required.
4. In a skillet (ideally a cast-iron one), drop 1.5 ladles of batter into the center and gently spread it into a circle with the back of the ladle. As I said earlier, adais are not spread too thin, for when they cook they tend to be stiff. They will be soft, chewy and reasonably crispy if they are made slightly denser that dosais (very close to how thick a pancake is). Spoon some sesame oil around the edges of the adai, and tear a hole at the center to ensure even cooking. Cook on medium heat, else the adai will burn on the outside and remain raw on the inside.
5. After 3-4 minutes, flip the adai on its other side. Gently press down on the adai to cook and crisp the other side just as well.
6. In about 3 minutes time remove the adai from the pan and serve with chutney, sambar, rasam, yogurt, pickle, chilli-powder, or other such side-dishes that complement its flavor. 

   

My mom has adai with jaggery and a few ripe pieces of banana. Odd combination, one might think! But it is actually a very common and traditional combination. I never like it though, because I want something mushy and liquid-y to contrast the dry adai. Yogurt, sambar and rasam are my personal favorites.

While adding vegetables such as onions, bell-peppers, carrots, tomatoes etc., do not grind them with the batter. Instead, finely chop them and sprinkle some on top of the Adai as it cooks on the skillet. Carefully turn the adai on either sides and press down to ensure the vegetables cook and char in the heat.

Adai batter is much quicker to prepare than dosai-batter, and it also lasts for a few days in the fridge. It is ideal to store some when confronting a hectic week that leaves little time for elaborate cooking!