Hello Again!

First of all, a big HELLO to you all! I've been away so long, I don't even know where to begin this post. Let me start by wishing a very happy Dashera! What did you do this Navratri season?

I've been neck deep in work lately. I don't want to whine, but it's been an uninspiring couple of months. We finally caught a much needed break last weekend and escaped to a beautiful mountain log cabin. After recuperating, this weekend was all about cleaning, reorganizing, and decorating the house for the holiday season. We're ready to celebrate fall, Halloween, Diwali, and whatever other holiday that's coming up :). Doing something festive cheered me up to finally write a post. A bright wreath with fall hues adorns our front door now, carved pumpkins are ready to spook passersby, and a big star shaped lantern will be hung up soon. Fun times are here again!

I asked husband what he wanted for Dashera today, and he sounded pretty unenthusiastic about any sweets. There was no time to make a big feast among all the chores either. So I kept the menu simple yet special - a fragrant pulao, daal fry, with papad and pickle on the side. I often make peas pulao to add a touch of  'special'. Today, I tried my mom's favorite khada masala pulao (whole spices pulao) topped with decadent ghee fried potatoes and onions. I certainly care more about the topping than the rice itself :D. This pulao is all the fancy without much work. And it's a big crowd pleaser, loved by kids and adults alike. It'll be a great addition to your Diwali party menu.

Whole Spices Pulao with Fried Potatoes & Onions

Ingredients:
4 Small red potatoes - peeled and cut into 8 wedges each
1/2 Red onion thinly sliced
1 1/2 Cups Basmati rice
2 Green chillies (slit in the center)
1 Teaspoon cumin seeds
2 Bay leaves
1 Cinnamon stick (~ 2 in)
5-6 Cardamom pods
4-5 Cloves
1/2 Teaspoon whole black peppercorns
2-3 Tablespoons ghee
Salt to taste

**Use a cast iron pot for making pulao. If not, use any thick bottom cooking pot.

• Wash and drain rice and keep aside. 
• Heat the cooking pot on medium-high and add 2 tablespoons ghee to it. Fry potatoes in ghee until golden brown (2-3 minutes) on each side. The potatoes should get crispy on the outside. Make sure they are tender when poked. Take them out and keep aside. 
• Fry thinly sliced red onion (enough to garnish pulao) until brown in the remaining ghee. Keep aside.
• You should still have enough ghee left in the pot for pulao. If not, add some more. If the ghee you fried potatoes and onions in smells burnt, replace it with a tablespoon of fresh ghee. 
• Add all the whole spices, and green chilies to the pot and roast for a few seconds. Once the spices are fragrant, add washed rice and roast for another minute. 
• Add 2 cups of water, salt to taste, and let the rice cook. It should cook fairly quickly after soaking, and cooking in ghee. You can cover it for some time, but take the lid off once it is half way done so that it doesn't get clumpy. Add a little bit of water if needed. 
• Take out the rice in a serving bowl/dish and layer with fried potatoes and onion. 

**You can add peas, carrots, or green beans to the pulao if you like.

Serve with raita, daal fry, or your favorite curry. It tastes quite great by itself too. I prefer it this way.

Now that I'm back, stay tuned for more updates!

It's Raining Tomatoes

I have an incredible luck with tomato plants. Either that, or they are just not a fussy vegetable to grow. I conveniently opt to believe in the former, but it wasn't just the beginner's luck that resulted in summer-long bountiful crop when I planted tomatoes last year. You got a glimpse of my garden here and the recipe for an aromatic tomato-basil bread. I kept plucking a couple of tomatoes here and there for sandwiches or curries, but what do you do with a bucketful of tomatoes at the peak of ripeness all at once?! The tomato plants in my garden are flourishing, although the same can not be said about zucchini and jalapeno. On the bright side, I can think of a hundred different recipes to use up the tomatoes - these many jalapenos would've been another story!

After contemplating between Italian and Mexican dishes, I circled back to what I knew the best - Mom's Tomato Rice recipe! Our fridge was almost always stocked with tomatoes and this dish appeared on dinner table in between mom's grocery visits. The monsoon season especially created scarcity of fresh vegetables and a soulful rice dish out of something readily available was a great dinner option. A serving of steaming tomato rice with home-made curd and spicy-salty pickle on the side made me a happy camper. I loved the preparation of fragrant basmati rice cooked in a rich roasted coconut-onion paste with a whiff of whole spices and of course, tomatoes!  The puff of steam, as I was cooking the rice yesterday, filled my kitchen with familiar aromas my mom's saree would pick up in the kitchen and it gave me a warm-fuzzy feeling of being somewhere very comfortable :).

Tomato Rice

Ingredients:
1 Cup Basmati rice
4-5 large or 8-10 small tomatoes
1 Heaping tablespoons fresh grated coconut
1 Small onion
1-2 Green chilies
~ 1 Teaspoon Garam masala
1 Bay leaf/7-8 Curry leaves
7-8 Black pepper corns
3-4 Cloves
1 Tablespoon oil
Salt to taste

• Cook tomatoes in boiling water until the skin peels off. Strain the tomatoes (save the broth) and puree.
• Wash rice and keep aside. This helps cook the rice faster. 
• In a cooking pot, roast chopped onion for 2-3 minutes on medium heat, add grated coconut and let it get toasty. Grind the roasted onion, coconut and garam masala into a paste. You can use cumin-coriander powder if you don't have garam masala. 
• In the same pot, heat oil, add pepper corn, cloves, bay leaf or curry leaves (I enjoy flavors of both - add either based on your preference), slit green chilies and let them roast for a few seconds.
• Add the coconut-onion paste, rice, tomato puree, 2 cups of water (I use the broth of cooked tomatoes) and cook on medium heat covered. Stir the rice occasionally so it doesn't stick to the bottom and add water little by little if needed until the rice is cooked.

This rice is very fragrant from the whole spices. Green chilies provide just enough heat to balance the sweet-citrus-y taste of tomatoes. Roasted onions and coconut are subtle and heighten the flavors of the dish. Enjoy!

What would've been my first post!

This was the first recipe I wrote down when I started creating a blog back in August, 2010! I don’t have a picture of the dish unfortunately, but I had really liked this recipe – so you here you go. The original recipe was in a Costco cookbook and I changed it a little bit based on what I had in my pantry. Hope you like it.

Spinach-Rice Cakes with Yogurt Sauce

Ingredients:

1 cup rice – I used thick sticky rice since it holds together

Your favorite wine to cook rice with

1-1/2 cups chopped spinach

1 small finely chopped onion

Chopped Cayenne pepper – I used the canned one

Minced garlic

Cumin powder

Olive oil

Bread crumbs

Grated Parmesan

Salt

Yogurt

Garlic-herb mix powder

Cracked black pepper

• In a pot, cook the rice in water and some wine. Cooking rice with wine was my addition to the original recipe – I used Sutter Home blush wine I had bought in Napa valley. The rice should be sticky enough so you can make patties/cakes out of it.
• Heat 2 teaspoons of olive oil in a pan and sauté minced garlic and onion until golden brown.
• Add the chopped spinach, cayenne pepper for some heat, cumin powder and salt for seasoning.
• Mix the cooked rice and spinach and let the flavors mingle. Let it cool. Make round cakes about an inch thick.
• Coat the rice cakes in bread crumbs and grated Parmesan mixture.
• Sauté the cakes in a pan using a little bit of olive oil (I believe the original recipe mentioned frying these cakes but who needs those extra calories?). The cakes are done when they turn golden brown.
• To accompany the cakes, mix yogurt, cumin powder, garlic/herbs mix powder, cracked black pepper and some salt. The yogurt sauce is a great pair to balance the heat from cayenne pepper.

I will make this again some time and post the pictures!