27th June 2009 - Dinner - Pulaav

What?

I have trying my hand at Pulaav since a few days, tweaking one thing or the other everytime. This one was rather a barebones one, with only potatoes. But I also made one with boiled chick peas (chhole) and it turned out to be quite filling. It is an ideal lunch for days when I wake up late.

How did it look?

Improvements

• A lot can be done, actually. I added very little stuff. You can definitely add more veggies, beans, carrots and so on, and it can be quite nutritious and tasty.
• I am partial to haldi (turmeric) so I add it quite liberally to everything I make. I think some people like their rice whiter, so to speak.

27th June 2009 - Lunch - Aloo Paraathey

What?

For our weekend trip to Salzburg, we wanted to carry something filling but easily portable, so we decided to give Aloo Paraathey a try. They turned out pretty well.

My mother had told me too recipes for this. In one, you mix the mashed potatoes with flour and cook the whole thing, and in the other you stuff the potatoes later. I went for the first recipe as it's rather convenient.

How did it look?

I was quite apprehensive about this and hence hadn't given it a try uptil now, but my fears were quite ungrounded. :)

Improvements

• I realized that I had again gone conservative in adding salt, so we made good use of the pickle I had brought from India.
• The dough was slightly wetter than needed, so we had to apply lots of flour when rolling it. We could probably improve on that.

Dinner - 24th June 2009 - Chhole and Jeera Rice

What?

Chhole! I purchased Chhole from the Asian store and let them soak for a day. All the other stuff I needed was already present, and here I was! Also, I decided to make some Jeera rice. Vaibhav had already made chapaatis, so I decided to make some Jeera rice.

How did it look?

Improvements

• There was slightly extra water (again), so I went back to the old standard of boiling it away. Anyhow, the dish tastes best when the gravy is absorbed into the chhole and so after reducing a quarter of the water, I left the whole thing to stand for half an hour. Chhole soak in water very fast, and by the end of the half-hour, I had nice thick gravy which I infact had to thin a bit by adding half a cup of water.
• Tomato Purée along with a fresh tomato were essential to the taste, and so was the Chhole Masala Amil's mother lent me when I went to their place in Holland.
• Lemon Juice of course, for the wonderful fresh sour flavour.
• Finally, the Jeera rice was a quick affair, with seasoning of jeera and fresh green chillies.

I also realised how much we eat in Dinner. The quantity I made would easily serve 4 people, but the two of us downed it quite easily. Dinner is our one decent meal of the day and we make the most of it. We don't bother with small bowls, we eat directly off the casserole! Grand :P

Lunch - 24th June 2009 - Onion Parathe

What?

Pranay Jain suggested I make Onion Parathey, so I thought I try it for lunch today. Anyhow, eating bread and boiled eggs is depressing (the low point of the day, so to speak), so I woke early to make this stuff. Packed some dry aloo ki subji along with it.

How did it look?

Improvements?

• Onions were chopped slightly coarsely, so they were not belding well with the flour, and made the whole thing a bit wet, so I had to wrap in a lot of flour to hold the damn thing together.
• I decided I was better of making thicker parathe and cooking them nicely with oil, so I ended up making a thinner version of what Maharashtrians call Thaalipeeth.
• This is a nifty practice that I had observed at home, and managed to replicate with success. In order to ensure proper cooking of the thick paraatha, they make small holes throughout in which they put in some oil, so that it gets cooked uniformly and throughly. I tried to do it (I already had lots of holes because of using less flour) and it came out well.

This reminds me of a classmate of mine (Aditya Singh) back when I was in Class VI. Every day, he used to invariably get Onion Paraathey for lunch, and they were the best I have ever tasted. It was not uncommon for all of us to pounce on his tiffin and finish a big chunk of his lunch even before he could shout STOP!

Dinner - 23rd June 2009 - Happy Meal

What?

I call this the Happy Meal because Pitl is one thing that everyone in our house likes. Often, when noone can think of what they want to eat, this dish is the perfect choice that makes everyone happy. With onions on the side, and sour fried chillies, it's just aweseme (and filling too).

How did it look?

Improvement?

• Pretty routine stuff; At the end, I heated some rai in oil and poured the whole thing on top; it looks splendid.

Dinner - 22nd June 2009 - Potatoes in sunshine yellow yogurt gravy

What?

There is this simple gravy that my mother often makes which uses yogurt. I thought of giving it a try today, and it came out very well. This was just potatoes in the yogurt gravy, with no onions, tomatoed etc. Yogurt imparts a nice sour taste to the gravy.

How did it look?

Bright yellow!

Improvements

I added fresh green chillies give a nice hot flavour and also squeezed in some fresh lime juice, blending it with some sugar for the sweet-sour taste.

Jeera was in abundance, and there was no oregano or pepper this time!

17th June 2009 - Dinner - Fusilli with assorted peppers blended in Tomato and Onion gravy

What?

Ever since I had screwed up the noodles last month, I was determined to make ammends. So, here I was, sailing into uncharted waters, going where I had never gone before. This was one of those times when I had no recipe, and was working merely on intuition. I had eaten this is Berlin last weekend and remembered the taste, so I was sort of reverse engineering the thing. Luckily, it turned out pretty satisfactorily. The only glitch was that, being over cautious, I added less pasta, so I toasted some bread to eat along with it.

I decided to go for the red gravy rather than the white one (I had seen a few recipes in which you would blend it with floor and then bake it, but that is too bland for my taste).

How did it look?

Improvements

• Tomato Puree is the best for getting a rich gravy, but it makes the whole thing very silky smooth. I always prefer to have some munchy bits in the gravy, so I chopped onions a bit coarsely and also added in half a tomato, bluntly cut. When boiled for some time, the whole thing blended quite well, and I got gravy that was thick but not like sauce.
• I wanted the red pepper to impart its flavour well, so I took care not to overpower the subtle flavours by our Indian masaale. So, added just a little bit of chilly powder.
• I realized a bit of garlic would have been good, but that was when the thing was almost ready, so I sprinkled in some garlic powder.
• Of course, at the end, a few drops of fresh lemon juice and some cheese and butter were in order. Finally, added some garlic butter (that thing tastes awesome) and let it melt its way in. Topping it all up with Oregano and pepper. Thyme is highly recommended for such dishes, but I had it not, so I had to do with our good old oregano.