Wholesome, Healthy and Ready in a Jiffy

Over the last few days, I have been putting my Braun hand-blender to very good use, making in a jiffy the most delicious, nutritious and easy to have milkshakes, just perfect for breakfast on-the-go.

Take one large banana or two small yellow bananas. Peel and cut fine and put into the blender bowl. Add 3/4 glass of cold milk, half tsp of sugar / honey as per taste and blend for a minute and you have a wonderful drink ready. If you feel like indulging add a spoon of vanilla ice-cream.

You can also substitute banana with chickoo, strawberries or mango to stir-up mouth-watering milkshakes.... good for breakfast, after a workout or in-between meals.

Base Mixture

I'd like to share today a quick and easy recipe of a very versatile dish - Tasty Tomatoes, which can be had with bread or chappati, used as a pizza sauce and as base to make masala scrambled eggs or potato / cauliflower dry vegetable.

Ingredients

5 medium sized tomatoes
2 green chillies
Few coriander leaves
2 tbsps oil
1 medium sized onion
1/2" piece ginger
1/2 tsp coriander powder
Salt to taste

Procedure

Chop all vegetables fine and keep them separately. in a thick bottomed kadai heat oil. Add finely chopped ginger and green chillies. When light brown add onions and stir on low flame for 2 to 3 minutes. Add tomatoes, coriander powder, salt and half the coriander leaves. Cover with tight lid and cook on low flame 10-15 minutes, stirrig occassionaly. Mix well with wooden blender. The tomatoes should now have a thick consistency. Serve hot, topped with remaining coriander leaves with plain or toasted bread and potato wafers.

It's a good idea to make this before the weekend, so you can enjoy several tomato based dishes with little effort.... a tasty breakfast, a quick fix snack (pizza) when guests arrive at short notice or when you want to have a dry vegetable with rotis or paratha. I find making tomatoes in this form very convenient... hope you too...

Phirni

The past week has seen all of us get into the festive mood with the beats of the Navratri Garba and bright illumination all across at Navratri celebrations! All of this culminates with enjoying Dassera on Sunday with family and friends. However, much all of us try to refrain from sweets and maintain a healthy diet to keep fit, festive days are meant to be enjoyed with abandon.

So this Dussera if you are thinking of a quick and easy desert to make and share with your loved ones, I suggest you try my recipe of Phirni. Hope you enjoy making and having it.

Wishing you a joyous weekend!

Ingredients

1 tin condensed milk
1 litre milk
1 tablespoon basmati or fine rice
6-8 cardamoms (remove seeds)
Few strands saffron (optional)
Few raisins (optional)
10-12 almonds and 10 - 12 pistachios for decoration

Procedure

Cut almonds and pistachios into thin strips and keep aside. Soak rice in a small bowl of water for about 10 - 15 minutes. Put milk in a pressure cooker. Add soaked rice after draining out water. Close the pressure cooker and cook for ten minutes after the first whistle. Open the cooker when cool and empty the can of condensed milk into it and cook for a few minutes with saffron and cardamoms, till the milk thickens to a sauce like consistency. Let it cool. Pour in a glass-serving bowl and chill in refrigerator. Decorate with chopped almonds and pistachios before serving.

Kaju Burfi

Ingredients

500 gms Cashewnuts (you can buy the broken variety, they are cheaper)
225 gms sugar
8 - 10 cardamoms (deseeded and powdered)
1 cup water
1/2 cup milk
3/4 tbsp pure ghee
8 - 10 almonds and pistas each (finely chopped)

Procedure

Grind cashnew nuts in a mixer to a powder. Please be careful not to over grind, as oil will start to come out. Grease a large round steel plate / thali and keep aside. Place a thick-bottomed non-stick kadai on the flame. Put sugar and water and heat. As soon as the sugar dissolves, put in the milk, reduce flame and boil. In a minute or two you will have a frothy layer on top with some dirt particles. Remove the frothy layer with a seive and let the sugar syrup boil on low flame till its sticky and of one-string consistency. Now put in the ground cashew nuts, cardamom powder and pure ghee. Mix well for a couple of seconds and put off the flame.

Immediately remove mixture on a greased thal. Pat with hand to flatten and make a circle of 1 cm thickness. Sprinkled chopped almonds and pistas and press with hand. Allow to cool. Cut into diamond shaped pieces and serve.

My recent trip to the US

I am just back from a two week visit to the US, where I spent a few days each in Cleveland, Rochester and New York. All the three cities are beautiful in their own way and give you a completely different experience. Having very warm and hospitable host, I had the opportunity to try out varied types of food. However, I must admit that being a vegetarian sometimes offered very limited choices, as most menus are predominently non-vegetarian, but I have to admit that the best vegetarian meal I had in my entire trip was at an Ethiopian restaurant called Abbysinia in Rochester. Not only was every dish delicous, non-spicy and not oily, but the way the meal was served was also unique. Three of us went for dinner there and ordered five vegetarian dishes. We were served in one large plate (the size of three dinner plates). A large absorbant dosa like bread covered the plate. Our five dishes were brought in smaller plates, each of which was emptied separately on the bread. We were then given a basket of the same bread cut into rolls with which you ate the various dishes. The combination of the soft bread and the vegetables was absolutely delicous and in a matter of 10 minutes we had polished them off and were feeling absolutely satiated.