Misal

I hardly know of someone who doesn't like chat, but when it comes to Maharashtrian Misal, you either love it or hate it! I never really ate very spicy food when I was in India, but after I cam to US 9 yrs ago, the lack of flavor in the American food kind of pushed me into boosting my spice levels. May be it was pure nostalgia, but today I can't have less than spicy food all the times. Even my 3 year old eats our level of spicy food! Well back on track, it was useless to expect to stumble across an authentic misal in the Indian restaurants here, so I figured it would be easier for me to try it at home. Some research here & there, and I found this replica of the authentic thingy on Nupur's blog, http://onehotstove.blogspot.com/2006/01/u-is-for-usalmisal.html. It turns out amazing & I always deep freeze the extra masala for future use. So the credit purely goes to Nupur for yet another amazingly easy recipe. If at all it matters, I acknowledge she rocks!!

Tiramisu

This has been an all time favorite Italian dessert of mine & can't count how many times I would have wanted to find out the "perfectly easy" way to make a Tiramisu. Then my good friend Kiran mentioned about her good friend J who makes the best Tiramisu ever. The mission was set, I asked Kiran to learn it & then I rehearsed it with her in towe. So the credit to this blog goes to J & Kiran, not me! I love to stick to Starbucks espresso shots because I firmly believe no other espresso tastes as good as Starbucks'. Although I will say brand is purely optional.

So here goes the recipe;
Ingredients: 2 packets of Lady fingers, 2 small boxes of Mascarpone cheese, 3 eggs, Cocoa powder, 3/4 cup sugar, 6-7 shots of Starbucks espresso coffee, Optional:Kahlua
Preparation
1. Whisk the sugar & egg white together with electric blender. Whisk the cheese & yellow egg portion together. Then mix all of it together. Cheese & egg mix is ready. Pour the espresso shots in a shallow container so that lady fingers can be easily soaked. If you plan to use Kahlua, mix some (1/4 cup) Kahlua with coffee shots.
2. Soak the lady fingers in coffee quickly (or else they may soak too much coffee resulting into way too soggy biscottis) & arrange as a first layer depending upon the shape of the container preffered. Usually I prefer a medium deep glass container. Pour the cheese as the second layer on the lady fingers. Spread out the cheese evenly on the lady fingers. Sprinkle some cocoa powder on top of this cheese. Now there are can be N number of ways sprinkling this cocoa powder generously on top of the cheese, but one easy trick Kiran taught me was to take the cocoa powder in a strainer & shake it on top of the cheese with the help of a spoon.
3. Repeat all the steps in #1 again so that you have two layers of lady fingers/cheese/cocoa powder. Freeze the dessert for 3-4 hours before serving.
4. Tada, it is that easy!

Methi Paratha

Methi they say is good for you in every form; it is known to be a good blood purifier. I like to have methi as methi zunka, methi with onions & red whole mirchi or my all time fave methi paratha. This recipe has been forwarded by my kaku & I would say the beauty of this recipe is how simple it is to make these parathas.
Ingredients, makes about 10 parathas
2 cups wheat ,1/4 cup besan, 1 cup chopped methi
1 tbsp sesame seeds, 1/2 tbsp ajwain
1/2 tbsp homemade ginger garlic (store bought ginger garlis has too much vinegar which kills the flavor!)
1/2 tbsp red chilli powder or more per taste, 1 tsp turmeric
salt for taste & 1 tbsp of yogurt
Directions
1. Mix the dough with all the ingredients listed above & make 10 medium sized balls. Rolla out the balls flat & make parathas. Shallow fry the marathas on eash side till the paratha is cooked.or crisp per individual preference with some oil or butter.
2. Serve with pickles or yogurt.

Zucchini bread

We have our own farmers market on our street is what P thinks! Us neighbours always exchange the fresh produce we have from our tiny veggie gardens; nevertheless it gives us immense joy & pride to enjoy our very own organic veggies/fruits. So I got one such huge zucchini, yes it was probably taller than Subir :) I am not a big fan of grilled zucchini & hence thought of baking some zucchini bread. I followed this recipe, http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Zucchini-Bread-IV/Detail.aspx
Only change i made is added some honey. The bread turned out perfect, even lil subir enjoyed it!

Paneer Bhurji

Paneer for a vegetarian is a special delicacy which goes well with absolutely any kind of gravy. Paneer bhurji is one of the simplest kind of paneer sabji i have ever made. Usually my cooking/recipes are dictated by the time i have on hand & if you don't have any fancy ingredients in your pantry & the time; this is a good bet!

Ingredients

~ 1 cup of paneer crumbs

1 green bell pepper chopped

1 medium sized onion chopped

1 tomato diced

3-4 chopped green chillies

1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste

1 tbsp jeera, 1/2 tbsp red chilli powder, 1/2 tbsp garam masala, 1 tsp amchur powder

Method

1. Heat some oil in a pan & add the jeera seeds. After the jeera seeds flutter, add ginger-garlic paste. Let them cook for 30 secs, then add the onions & chillies. Let the onions saute for 3-4 mins & add the bell pepper.

2. Let them cook for 2-3 mins & add chili powder & tomatoes. Let the chili powder cook for a minute & add the paneer crumbs. Let this cook for 2 mins & dust the masala & amchur powder. Add salt for taste. Garnish with coriander leaves. Tastes best with roti/parathas.

C for chikoo ice cream

Well summer is here & so is our craving for all kinds of ice creams. I have to have an ice cream every day, well that's just my fun summer ritual. Whenever I am in Mumbai, I make sure I have a couple of flavors of Naturals ice cream, & chikoo ice cream has been an absolute delight. I tried making my own version of chikoo ice cream following the basic concept that an ice cream contains the flavor you select, sugar & cream. So I chose, frozen chikoos (2 bags), 1 small can of condensed milk & 12 oz of whip cream. Thaw the chikoos naturally & puree them into pulp in a mixer adding very little milk. Mix the chikoo pulp, condensed milk, & cool whip together using a whisk. I also added some honey (2 tbps), & some raisins to this. Although I would say honey & raisins are purely optional. I love honey, hence the indulge! Freeze this mix & keep mixing it with a whisk every 2-3 hours. Repeat this atleast thrice. This helps make the ice cream soft since whisking breaks the ice crystals! This has turned out to be one of the best chikoo ice creams i have ever had. If you think I am being boastful, try this recipe for yourself!

G for Gulab Jamun

This has been one of my favorite desserts as a kid. My mom & grandma made like the best gulab jams in town & I would gulp several ones of them skipping lunches & dinners. Ever since I came to US I gave up eating them since I never really liked the milk powder version of gulab jamuns made in the indian restaurants. A discussion with a friend some days ago led to a revelation for me that frozen "khava/mawa" is available in the indian grocery stores. Well, just the next day I got a bag full of it & gorged on one of my all time favorites! Interestingly they are very easy to make, the recipe follows.

Ingredients: 1 bag of frozen khava (~2 cups), 1/2 maida, pinch of soda, 1 tbsp cardamom powder, 6 cups of water, 2.5 cups of sugar, 1 tbsp of rose water (optional)

1. Heat the frozen khava (called khoya or mawa in hindi) in the microwave for 1.5 mins so that it is mildly roasted. One bag of khava is about 2 cups of khava. Mix khava, maida, soda & cardamom powder & knead to make a loose dough. Make small size balls such that they should not have a crack on the surface. If there are any cracks, the balls may break while frying.

2. Fry these balls in oil until they are brownish in color.

3. Heat water in a container & add sugar to it. Heat it for like 10 mins or so. Prepare the sugar syrup & make sure it doesn't get too thick. Sugar syrup for gulab jamuns is usually thin so that it penetrates the jamuns easily. Add rose water to this syrup. Turn the heat off. Add the fried jamuns to this syrup when the syrup is hot. Serve hot or cold as per your preference. This makes around 24 jamuns.