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Archives for February 2016

Blueberry Banana Pecan Oats Milkshake + Oatbox Review

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oatboxMilkshakeI always look for a substantial breakfast beverage that is easy, quick, nutritious and delicious!

I totally love these Oatbox oats! I am not paid to say you this! 🙂 Oatbox – Handmade in Montreal, Free shipping & no taxes, only $20 per month and Here is a link to get some $5 off an oatbox subscription: http://oatb.co/1ZybwnB You’ll get two different mixes, every month! And also every time they ship you a box, a child will be given a full breakfast at school.

Oats is something I have 5 days a week for my breakfast. It is very quick to make oats. Oats are packed with fiber which will keep us full longer. I had this milkshake one day, and the next day I was totally looking forward to make the same. It really made me feel full 🙂 and thereby made me have normal lunch and small dinner box 🙂 purpose solved!

oatboxMilkshake

Regarding Oatbox:

Oatbox is handmade in Montreal (where I live now):), so I am just going to buy them always no matter what. I loved their product oats, oats jar, photos in the website, the packaging when they ship, the little beautiful note, and few small recipe notes.I tried mine straight up in a bowl and it was yum! You can have them with a splash of milk or as a breakfast parfait, snacks, make it to a muffin, cookies, milkshake like me.

oatboxMilkshake

If you sign up with oatbox, you’ll receive two bags of oats every month in a beautifully package. And the first order comes with a free glass jar. I guess every month they change flavors, mine were banana,pecan& walnut oats and Coconut,Kiwi &Almonds Oats. And I have something for you, you will receive $5 offer off your subscription! To sign up, just click here: http://oatb.co/1ZybwnB

And also every time they ship you a box, a child will be given a full breakfast at school. Oatbox have a monthly subscription that delivers right to your door, once a month. You’ll get an email a few days before your box is sent, in which case you can decide to go ahead with the order, or skip until the next month. You can skip months or cancel subscription at any time.
oatboxMilkshake

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Blueberry Banana Pecan Oats Milkshake + Oatbox Review
Author: 
Recipe type: Main
Cuisine: Indian
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 2 cups
 
Ingredients
  • Oats ( I used banana pecan and almond oatbox oats) – ¼ cup
  • Almond milk/ milk – 1 cup
  • Honey – 1 tsp
  • Ground cinnamon – ¼ tsp
  • Fruits like blueberry, orange, apple, berries – ¼ cup
Instructions
  1. In a blender, combine all ingredients, puree until smooth.
  2. Serve immediately with some granola oats, fruits on top.
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Disclaimer: Oatbox provided me with the oats package for sampling and review purposes.  I’m not being paid, and oatbox has not reviewed this post prior to publication. However all opinions are my own as always.  This is an affiliate program so we are compensated if you order via the link mentioned!

oatboxMilkshake

Home Style Spicy Chicken Dry Roast

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SpicyDryChickenRoast-15Spice coated chicken slowly roasted and browned in the hot pan scraping up the juices and flavor on the bottom.

This is the most indulgent, easy and delicious way of preparing chicken in Indian style. The ingredient is very simple and pretty straight-forward. I used just garlic, ginger, curry leaves and onions for this recipe. But 😉 hopefully you should miss these ones. It is simple, spicy and succulent. This is such an easy dish, yet so delicious and flavorful.



When you wanted to make a dry side dish with chicken, you might be guilty to make chicken 65 always which is fried. So, this one taste like it is been fried but it is not. I have another recipe Butter chicken roast which is similar but uses ghee and coconut in it. It tastes like butter coated chicken. I made this with a lot of recipes on a weekday so you could have guessed how easy it is to make. I would say it is the easiest recipe of all my chicken recipes yet tasty. It taste great with Biryani like lamb biryani or egg biryani, with plain rice and tomato rasam or  sambar.

My other chicken recipes: chicken 65, Spicy chicken roast,pepper chicken curry, sweet and spicy garlic chicken drumsticks, spicy chicken egg fry noodles

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Home Style Spicy Chicken Dry Roast
Author: 
Recipe type: Main
Cuisine: Indian
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 3 servings
 
Ingredients
  • • Chicken – 400 grams, bite sized pieces, cleaned and washed
  • • Cardamom – 2 , Cinnamon – ½ inch stick, cloves - 2
  • • Curry leaves – 1 spring
  • • Dried Red chilli - 1
  • • Cumin seeds/ Jeera – 1 tsp
  • • Small Shallots – 10, chopped finely or medium sized onions – 2, sliced thinly
  • • Green Chillies – 2
  • • Garlic – 3, chopped finely
  • • Ginger – 2 inch, chopped finely
  • • Turmeric powder – a pinch
  • • Pepper powder – 1 tsp
  • • Sambar powder – 1 tbsp or (Chilli powder – 1 tsp and Coriander powder – 2 tsp)
  • • Garam Masala Powder – 1 tsp
  • • Coriander leaves – 1 tbsp, chopped, for garnish
  • • Salt – as needed
Instructions
  1. Take a pan and add oil in medium flame, add dried red chilli, cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, cumin seeds and when their color changes, add garlic, ginger, shallots, green chillies and curry leaves.

  2. After the onion is sautéed well, add the chicken with turmeric powder, sambar powder (or chilli powder, coriander powder and salt. Sauté well for 2 mins, and add 2 tbsp of water.
  3. Close it with the lid and do not add more water. Let the chicken cook from the water that chicken oozes out.

  4. Once it is almost 90% done, add pepper powder, garam masala and cook till the chicken is dry, browned scrapping up the juices from the pan and roasted. Keep the vessel open and not close it with lid now.

  5. When it is perfectly roasted, garnish with chopped coriander leaves.
Notes
1. Do not add a lot of water when you cook chicken. The chicken has to get cooked with the chicken juices itself.
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It taste perfect with rasam, sambar or restaurant style lamb biryani.

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Punjabi Kadhi Pakora/ Fritters in yogurt gravy

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PunjabiPakoraKadi-19Crispy onion pakoras simmered in yogurt besan gravy. Perfect Comfort food!

Kadhi is yogurt besan based gravy and pakoras are fritters. It is very quick to make surprisingly. I thought it might take quite a lot  time, I tasted this few times in restaurants and wanted to try it. So asked one of my friends who does it well, tried and now I just love it more than the restaurants ;).  After having at restaurants, I realized that many states of India has their own version of kadhi like gujarati kadhi, maharashtrian kadhi, Punjabi kadhi and so on. And this here is my version ;)! I am sure everyone has their own version with a few tweaks here and there like any other food. Some add veggies to it, but I heard the authentic recipe is just plain pakoras in besan yogurt gravy. Make sure to simmer the kadhi for 2-3 minutes, so it soaks up some gravy and flavors. I have heard adding ghee making a lot of difference to the gravy 😉 and I always love ghee (Indian clarified butter) so I would say yes. Try and let me know! Even oil tasted perfect to me. I had this for my lunch with some parathas, plain hot rice and spicy potato roast.

Vegan note: Replace yogurt with coconut milk or vegan yogurt

Other Favorite North Indian curry: Pepper Paneer Do Pyaza, Trevti Dal/Three Lentil Dal, Mushroom Peas Spring Onions masala, Roasted bell pepper gravy, Paneer Makhanwala

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5.0 from 1 reviews
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Punjabi Kadhi Pakora/ Fritters in yogurt gravy
Author: 
Recipe type: Main
Cuisine: Indian
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 4 servings
 
Ingredients
  • • For Pakora: (yields 7-8 pakoras)
  • Besan flour/ Gram Flour/ Chcikpeas flour/ Kadalai maavu – ½ cup
  • Baking powder – a pinch
  • Chilli Powder – ¼ tsp
  • Green chilli – 1, chopped finely
  • Ajwain/ Carom seeds – a pinch
  • Onions – 1, thinly sliced (approx. ½ cup)
  • Cilantro/ Coriander leaves – 2tbsp (finely chopped)
  • Curry leaves – 1 Sprig (finely chopped)
  • Salt – to taste
  • Water – ⅛ - ¼ cup as needed
  • Oil – to deep fry


    For Kadhi:
  • Yogurt – 1.5 cups (preferably sour)
  • Besan flour – 2-3 tbsp
  • Oil/ghee – 1 tbsp
  • Asafetida - pinch
  • Red Whole dry Chillies - 2
  • Methi seeds – ½ tsp
  • Cumin seeds – ½ tsp
  • Curry leaves – few
  • Ginger – 1 tsp (finely chopped)
  • Garlic – 2 (finely chopped)
  • Turmeric powder – ½ tsp
  • Chilli Powder – ½ tsp
  • Cilantro – 2 tbsp (finely chopped)
Instructions
  1. For Pakora/Fritters:
  2. Mix the chickpea flour, ajwain seeds, baking powder, onion, chilli powder, green chillies, salt, curry leaves and coriander leaves. Make sure to add righta mount fo salt, as it is going to absorb jucies and flavor from the kadhi gravy later.

  3. Add water slowly by whisking the batter, so that there are no lumps in the batter. It should be light, thick and smoother than a pancake batter I would say.
  4. Heat oil in a pan and drop small portions of the mixture into the hot oil and deep-fry till golden brown. Drain on absorbent paper and set aside.


    For kadhi:
  5. Take a bowl, whisk together yogurt and besan flour until its smooth. Authentic kadhi is thick, but if you want to thin it out, add some water and set aside. I added 1 cup of water as I was going to simmer for some time.

  6. Heat oil in a big wide pan in medium low heat, add methi seeds, cumin seeds, curry leaves, red chillies, ginger, garlic, and asafetida. When the red chilli turns color, add the besan yogurt mixture, salt ( as per your taste) and turmeric.
  7. Turn the heat to low, bring to a boil and cook on low heat for about fifteen to twenty minutes, stirring occasionally.

  8. Heat 1 tsp of oil/ghee in a small pan,add the red chilli powder and sauté for few seconds.
  9. Add this to the gravy , add also the fried pakora, and continue to simmer for two to three minutes.
  10. Switch off and garnish with coriander leaves.
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Serve with hot plain rice or ghee rice or Peas pulao or paratha or phulka or naan.

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Pavakkai Thokku/ BitterGourd Pickle

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PavakkaiThokku-10Tangy & Spicy bitter gourd chutney with Indian spices. And it is an excellent side for many recipes. Store and enjoy it for 2- 3 weeks!

Whenever I leave from India, my mother used to make some homemade recipes that I can preserve for a month or two.  She used to make some coriander thokku, curry leaves thokku, tomato thokku, pulikachal, pickles and so on. So I thought of preparing some now. I tasted this thokku in Grand sweets and I totally fell in love with the taste. You can just mix with plain rice. Or have it with rotis, curd rice. You can also use them as a dip for bajjis or vada or other appetizers.

I really love using my freezer to preserve food. I love these homemade chutney or sauce and they are always a great savior when it comes to weekdays. I am alright cooking on weekends, but on a weekday I get so tired that most of the days I tend to make recipes under 30 minutes, finish and sleep. You can also use these for travel as it will not get spoiled easily for a long travel.  And adding sugar or jaggery enhances the flavor and helps in balancing out the acidity.

Bitter gourd is one of the healthy veggie that most kids fend off because of it bitterness. But by the method I prepare, you will not taste the bitterness at all. It is really good for health and has natural power to kill worms and germs present in the stomach and intestine. It is very good for diabetic patient’s .People having a low sugar level should try to avoid this veggie.

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Other favorite Thokku recipe: Spicy tomato onion thokku

Other Favorite Pavakkai recipe: Pavakkai Chips/ Bitter gourd chips, Pavakkai stir fry/Bitter Gourd fry.

5.0 from 2 reviews
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Pavakkai Thokku/ BitterGourd Pickle
Author: 
Recipe type: Main
Cuisine: Indian
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 1 cup
 
Ingredients
  • Bitter Gourd – 2
  • Yogurt – 1 tbsp
  • Sesame Oil – 2 – 3 tbsp
  • Mustard seeds – 1 tsp
  • Fenugreek Seeds – ½ tsp
  • Whole Red Chillies - 2
  • Curry leaves – 1 Sprig
  • Sambar powder – 1 tbsp
  • Chilli powder – 2 tsp
  • Turmeric powder – 1 tsp
  • Tamarind – 1 lemon Size
  • Salt – to taste
  • Grated Jaggery – 1 tbsp
  • Hing – a pinch
Instructions
  1. Wash bitter gourd and thinly slice them into circles. Discard any seeds. Soak the bitter gourd in curd, turmeric and 1 tbsp of salt for 20 minutes.
  2. Soak the tamarind in 1.5 cups of water and extract the juice.
  3. Dry roast the mustard seeds with fenugreek seeds for 30 seconds in medium-low flame. Blend or use a mortar pestle to grind them into powder.

  4. Now take a pan with 2 tbsp of oil in medium flame, add the red chillies,curry leaves and hing. When red chillies changes color, now squeeze out the juice from the marination of bitter gourd with your hands and add them into the pan. Saute for 20 seconds.

  5. Then add sambar powder, chilli powder, slat and the sauté them in oil keeping the flame in medium.
  6. When the bittergourd stir fried with the spices, add the tamarind extract and fenugreek mustard seeds powder. Mix well and close it with the lid. Keep the flame low and allow the whole mixture to get thicken and become like a thick thokku. It might take 20-25 minutes. It will be only ¼ th of the whole quantity you saw before 20 minutes. t will start to ooze out oil in the sides at a stage and will become a thick paste.

  7. Add grated jaggery and mix well. Switch off the flame.
  8. Cool it completely, store it in air tight container by topping 1 tbsp of oil at the end. The oil is added for the shelf life. Store it in an air tight container for 2- 3 weeks in the refrigerator.
Notes
Sour curd and turmeric takes out the bitterness.
Oil topped at the end is for shelf life. If you are going to finish it in 2 days, you need not add the oil.
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