Moru Keerai/ Spinach in Coconut Yogurt Sauce

I buy spinach every week and end up making either Keerai Molagootal or Masiyal. In one of my general talks with my grandmother, I came to know about his dish Moru keerai, which is almost a forgotten recipe in our household. I tried it once and it was an immediate with my family. I have been making this almost every other week now. I really don't know why, I didn't try this earlier. It is a nice variation to the regular moru kootan. It pairs well with steamed rice and any thoran or a spicy stir fry.

Serves - 3 to 4

What you'll need

1. Spinach – 1 bunch
2. Coconut – ½ cup, scraped coconut
3. Thick Sour Curds – 1 cup
4. Dried Red Chilly – 3 to 4
5. Fenugreek Seeds – ¼ tsp
6. Salt to taste

For tempering

1. Oil – 1 tsp
2. Mustard Seeds – ½ tsp
3. Dried Red Chilly – 1

Method

1. Wash and roughly chop the spinach.
2. Add it to a vessel and cook covered for 3 to 4 minutes or until the cooked. Do not cook for a long time.
3. Transfer to a plate and cool and grind to paste without adding any water.
4. In the meanwhile, heat a small frying pan with ½ tsp oil, roast fenugreek seeds and dried red chillies.
5. Grind the coconut, roasted fenugreek and red chillies using half the curd to smooth paste.
6. Transfer the ground coconut paste to a vessel. Also add the spinach puree and salt to taste.
7. Add the remaining curd, and about ½ cup of water. Mix well and simmer till the mixture starts frothing. Do not boil. Adjust consistency by adding more water if required.
8. Heat a small frying pan with oil and temper with mustard seeds and dried red chilly.
9. Serve moru Keerai with steamed rice and pair it up with a thoran of your choice.

Note:

1. You can substitute fenugreek seeds and red chillies with only green chillies while grinding along with coconut. Add fenugreek seeds while tempering.
2. Spinach cooks very fast, so do keep it on heat for a long time, else it will lose its green color.
3. If using any other variety of greens like Mula keerai, Arai keerai etc, chop finely add a little water and cook covered for a little longer.

Akkaravadisal

Akkaravadisal is a traditional Iyengar speciality. It is very similar to Chakkarai Pongal, but with some differences which makes it very tasty. It is of semi solid consistency and the rice and dal are cooked completely in milk which gives this dish a very rich and creamy taste.

Traditionally, the rice and dal are slow cooked, with milk until soft and mushy and is then simmered in jaggery syrup. But I have used the pressure cooker here, to make it faster. Also, some people make this with sugar instead of jaggery. I have tried both variations and the sugar one also tastes very yum. Here I have shared this recipe with jaggery.

So, this Aadi velli, please the Goddess, with this divine prasadam.

Serves -  4 to 5

What you’ll need

1. Raw Rice – ¾ cup
2. Split Yellow dal/Pasi Paruppu – ¼ cup
3. Jaggery – 1 ¾ cup
4. Milk – 4 cup + 2 tbsp
5. Saffron – few strands
6. Green Cardamom – 4
7. Cashewnuts – 10, broken into small pieces
8. Raisins – 10 to 15
9. Clarified Butter/Ghee – ¼ cup + 1 tbsp

Method

1. Soak the saffron in 2 tbsp of warm milk.
2. Dry roast the dal, until a nice aroma comes out, about 4 to 5 minutes.
3. Wash the dal and rice in two to three exchanges of water, drain and keep aside.
4. Add the washed rice and dal into a pressure cooker with 4 cups of milk and cook for 3 whistles and then simmer for 3 to 4 minutes. The rice and dal should be cooked until soft and mushy.
5. In the meanwhile, add the powdered jaggery to a pan with ¼ cup water and heat on low flame till jaggery is dissolved completely.
6. Let this come to a boil, keeping on low flame.
7. Once the cooker has cooled, open transfer the contents into a Kadai, add the soaked saffron and stir for 2 minutes on low flame, next add the jaggery syrup and mix for well, without any lumps.
8. Now add the 1/4 cup of ghee and mix well. Simmer for 3 to 4 minutes.
9. Remove from heat.
10. Heat a small frying pan with remaining ghee and fry the cashewnuts and raisins.
11. Add this to the akkaravadisal.
12. Add crushed cardamom, mix well.

Serve warm.

Note:

1. The consistency of this is semi solid. In case, akkaravadisal becomes thick on cooling you can add warm milk and mix.
2. You can increase the quantity of ghee upto ½ cup.
3.  You can also add a pinch of pacha karpooram. I did not add, though.

Kanchipuram Idli

Kanchipuram Idlis or Kudalai Idlis are idlis that are mildly spiced with pepper, cumin and dry ginger. These are traditionally steamed in "Donnai" or Lotus Leaf Cups. These leaves lend a special fragrance and aroma to the idlis. But don't worry if you can't find one, steam them like regular idlis in your idli moulds or even in deep flat dish and cut them into pieces. These should be served immediately else they become slightly hard on cooling. Read notes.

This is my mother's recipe who in turn learnt it from one of her close friends. These idlis were a hit with my kids, as they were mildly spiced, they had just plain without any side dish. And we enjoyed with some sambar and molagai podi.

Makes about 24 idlies

What you'll need

1. Raw Rice – 2 cup* (see notes)
2. Urad Dal – 1 cup
3. Black Pepper – 1 tsp
4. Cumin Seeds – 1 tsp
5. Dry Ginger Powder – ½ tsp
6. Ghee/Melted Butter – 1 tbsp
7. Salt to taste

Method

1. Soak the rice and dal for 3 to 4 hours.
2. In the Mixie jar or add the black pepper and cumin seeds and add the rice and urad dal little by little and grind to idli batter consistency by adding water.
3. Allow this to ferment for 8 to 24 hours, depending on the place and weather conditions. It took 24 hours for me. The batter should rise well just like idli batter.
4. Before making the idlis, add the dry ginger powder and ghee/butter and mix well.
5. Grease idli mould, pour a ladle of batter in each groove.
6. Steam for 10 to 12 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
7. Serve immediately with chutney and sambar.

Notes:

1. Instead of 2 cup raw rice you can use 1 cup raw rice and 1 cup idli rice.
2. Proper fermentation is very important to get soft idlies
3. You could add a pinch of baking soda to get softer idlis.
4. Also, since these are made of raw rice, you have to eat them immediately as they become hard on cooling.
5. You could use grated fresh ginger, if you don’t have dry ginger powder.
6. These idlis are traditionally steamed in Donnais, but you can steam them in regular idli moulds or even in deep plates (thalam) or cooker pathram. Add about 3 to 4 ladles of batter and steam for a longer time.

Eggless Whole Wheat Zucchini Brownies

This month the Groovy Gourmets decided to bake brownies. But these are not any regular brownies. The brownies had to have something other than chocolate in them. As soon as I saw that we had to bake brownies this month, I was very excited. Baking brownies has been on my to do list for a long time and finally I made them.

I chose to make these Zucchini brownies, that are egg free and use less fat and are made from whole wheat flour.  What else can you ask for. I did not change the original recipe much, except that I used our regular Aashirwad atta instead of whole wheat pastry flour and also I used the regular cocoa instead of dark cocoa. The brownies were delicious, no one could guess the ingredients. Now off to the recipe:

Recipe Adapted from The Yummy Life

What you'll need

1. Zucchini – 2 cup, chopped
2. Sugar – 1 ¼ cup
3. Vanilla – 1 tbsp
4. Oil – ¼ cup
5. Yoghurt – ½ cup
6. Whole Wheat Flour – 2 cup
7. Cocoa Powder – ½ cup
8. Baking Powder – 1 ½ tsp
9. Salt – 1 tsp

Method

1. Pre – heat the oven to 180C for 10 minutes.
2. Grease a brownie pan or any rectangular tin and keep ready.
3. Grind zucchini, sugar, oil, yoghurt and vanilla.
4. Sift the flour, baking powder, cocoa powder and salt.
5. Add the wet ground ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix well. Do not over mix.
6. Pour into a greased tin and bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out with clean.
7. Cool on wire rack.

Serve warm with a dollop of vanilla ice cream or dust the brownies with icing sugar or frost them if you like.

Puliyumchadam/Puliyodharai

Variety rice and one pot meals have become the order of the day. Like I mentioned in one of my earlier posts, cooking up a proper meal with Kootan and curry has become only a weekend affair.  Back in India too, I used to often prepare variety rice as it is one thing my daughter and husband take in their lunch box without any complaints. My daughter likes all Lemon rice and Puliyodharai the most. Actually she likes anything that's a little tangy and I'm the opposite. My favorite is the coconut rice, but I still don't understand why I haven't posted most of my favorite recipes.

Anyways, coming to today's recipe, Puliyumchadam, yes, that's how we call it at home. I have shared my mother's way of making it. My mom makes really good puliyumchadam. Everytime we had a long train journey amma would prepare this and curd rice for us to eat in the train.

Pair this rice with some potato curry and papads and you have a delicious meal ready.

Serves - 4

What you’ll need

1. Rice – 1.5 cups
2. Tamarind – a lemon sized ball
3. Turmeric Powder – 1/4 tsp
4. Jaggery – 1 tbsp
5. Asafoetida Powder – ¼ tsp
6. Salt to taste

For tempering

1. Sesame Oil/Nalla Ennai – 4 to 5 tbsp
2. Mustard Seeds – 1 tsp
3. Channa Dal – 1 tsp
4. Peanuts – 2 fistfull
5. Dried Red Chilly - 1
6. Curry Leaves – 10 to 15 leaves

For the Spice Powder

1. Coriander Seeds – 3 tbsp
2. Channa Dal – 2 tbsp
3. Dried Red Chillies – 4 to 5
4. Fenugreek Seeds – ½ tsp
5. Sesame Seeds – 1 tbsp

Method

1. Wash the rice and cook with salt and a spoon of oil in such a way that the grains are separate. Make sure the rice is not mushy.
2. Spread the rice in a wide plate and let it cool. Drizzle a spoon of oil over it.
3. Soak the tamarind in hot water for 10 minutes. Extract tamarind juice by adding 1 cup of water. Don’t add too much water while taking the extract. The extract should be little thick.
4. Add the tamarind extract to a saucepan, add salt, turmeric powder, asafoetida and jaggery. Let this simmer on medium heat for 10 10 to 15 minutes or till the extract becomes thick.
5. For the spice powder, Heat a small frying pan, add the channa dal and dry roast, when it is half done, add the coriander seeds, fenugreek seeds and dried red chillies. Roast till the dal is nice and red. Remove and cool.
6. In the same pan, add the sesame seeds and fry till they change color or till they start popping.
7. Cool and grind to a powder.
8. In the same pan or in a small kadai, add the oil, temper with mustard seeds, Channa dal, peanuts, red chillies and curry leaves.
9. Add this tempering to the rice, also add the tamarind paste and salt and mix well. Finally add the spice powder. You may not need the entire spice powder, add 2 or 3 tbsp, do a taste check and add more if required.

Let his stand for a minimum of one hour before serving.

Note:

You can do the tempering and then add the tamarind extract in it and proceed.  But I follow the above method only.

You can store the prepared pulikachal for about 10 days in the refrigerator.

Adjust the spice levels according to your taste.

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