Shrimp Fry

I am back after a long break to blogging. For some strange reason, I did not feel like writing and taking photographs of the food I cook. But not anymore . Is this a Gemini-an trait of getting bored of doing the same stuff over and over again, or is it just me? Last time when this happened to me is when I decided to change the look and feel of my blog. But this time I decided to take a nice long break. Sometimes, it just makes me feel good to break the routine. Thanks to all my friends and family who showed their concern to find out what is going on with me and why no posts from me. My mom stands on top of all asking me every day why I have not posted anything.

Today’s recipe is something I have started making very often lately. I got this recipe  from a very good friend of ours. Shrimp always took the form of thokku in my kitchen until I saw my friend make this when we went to her place. It looks really appetizing. I have even had some of my vegetarian friends staring at it and giving me a look saying “Don’t tell me that it is non-vegetarian”.

Ingredients:  Shrimp – 20 t0 25 (I used the jumbo version. But the petite ones taste better) Ginger garlic paste – 1 tablespoon  Salt – to taste  Red Chilli powder – 1 teaspoon (or to taste)  Garam masala powder – 1 teaspoon  Lemon Juice – 1 teaspoon  Besan / Chick pea flour – 1 tablespoon  Oil – 2 tablespoons  Onion – 1 thinly sliced Method  Clean, peel and devein shrimp. Pat it dry with a kitchen towel In a wide bowl, add shrimp, ginger garlic paste, salt, chilli powder, garam masala and lemon juice. Let it marinade for atleast 2 to 3 hours in the refrigerator.   Just before you are ready to serve, mix a tablespoon of besan flour to the shrimp so that it coats all the pieces. If the marinated shrimp is too watery you can add more chick pea flour. Heat a wide pan, add 2 tablespoons of oil. Shallow fry the marinated shrimp. Let it cook on medium high for 2 minutes or until it turns nice and crispy. Turn over the shrimps and cook until you see nice golden crispy layer. (Do not cook the shrimp too long. It will turn rubbery)  Transfer them to a paper towel.  In the same pan fry the sliced onions until they get a little caramelized.  Transfer these caramelized onions to a serving dish. Arrange the fried shrimp on it and sprinkle chopped cilantro.

Popcorn Chicken

Santa came a little early this year. 
When I started blogging, my husband asked me if I wanted him to get me a real nice fancy camera. I was not so very impressed with that idea. But he was very interested in buying me one and so last week,I got my Canon EOS Rebel T3 as a Christmas gift from my husband. I am snapping photos of everything in the house. There is a lot to learn to use my new camera. But for now, I am just experimenting. I did not realize what I was missing, until I saw these pictures.I know I am just a beginner with food photography and this camera, but I am very happy with this gift from him.

Coming to the recipe, it is along the same lines as my last post. Popcorn chicken is a popular product with kids and I am not a big fan of the frozen ones. My son had the frozen version of this at one of our friends place and he loved it. I knew, I am going to make a homemade version of that for sure and here goes the recipe. It is very easy to make and the result is awesome.

Ingredients: Chicken breast - 2 medium sized pieces All purpose flour - 1 cup Garlic Powder - 1 teaspoon Salt & Pepper - to taste Cajun seasoning  - 1 teaspoon (optional) Egg - 1  Panko Breadcrumbs - 1 cup Method Clean and cut the chicken into 1/2 inch pieces. Take 3 separate bowls.  In the first bowl mix flour, salt, pepper, garlic powder and cajun seasoning (if using). Keep it aside. In the second bowl, beat the egg with a splash of water and keep it aside. To the third bowl, add panko breadcrumbs. Heat oil on a medium heat in a skillet. Dip the chicken pieces one at a time in the flour mixture and then into the egg mixture and coat it with the breadcrumbs. Again dip the piece into the egg mixture and finally with the breadcrumbs. This process of dipping it twice in egg and breadcrumbs makes it more crunchy. Repeat the process with rest of the chicken pieces. Drop the chicken pieces one by one into the hot oil and fry until golden brown on all sides. Drain as much oil and place them in a paper towel. Serve it with ketchup or your favorite sauce.

Mutton Kola Urundai / Mutton Kofta

For people who live in this part of the world, did you enjoy an extra hour of sleep yesterday? I got up at 6 o clock and few minutes later, I looked at my mobile where it said 5:05 AM.  I was so happy, that I got this extra hour all to myself.  Being a mom of a 3 year old, this additional hour all to myself means a lot. I bet many moms would agree with me on this.


Today’s recipe is Mutton Kola Urundai/ Mutton Kofta. This is my mom’s specialty. For some reason, I don’t have this recipe written in my recipe book and every time I want to make this Kola Urundai, I would give her a call and she will be more than happy to tell the recipe to me. I like to hear it from her rather than looking at the recipe book.  Another such recipe which I like to hear from mom is Mutton Chukka. I will post that recipe soon.



Ingredients:


1. Mutton Keema / Minced mutton – 2 cups
2. Grated Coconut – ½ cup
3. Roasted gram / pottukadalai – ½ cup (grounded)
4. Green Chilli – 4 -5
5. Saunf / Soambu – 1 tablespoon
6. Garam Masala – 1 teaspoon
7. Salt – as needed
8. Onions – 1 finely chopped
9. Cilantro – 1/4th cup finely chopped



Method:


1. Grind the grated coconut, green chilli, saunf ,garam masala and salt to a fine paste with very little water  using a mixer/ blender.
2. Add the ground meat to the blender/ mixer and grind it until all the ground masala mixes well with the meat.
3. Also add the finely chopped onions and pulse it a couple of times. This step is really optional. You can add the chopped onions to the ground meat in the next step if you do not want to pulse the onions.
4. Transfer the meat to a bowl. Add the roasted gram powder little by little. Do not add too much as it will make the koftas very dry. The meat mixture should still be a little moist.
5. Now add the chopped cilantro and mix it well.
6. Make kofta balls out of it. Rubbing little oil in your palms will definitely help this process. This measurement will give you approximately 25 koftas.
7. Heat oil in a frying pan and fry till golden brown.


Serve it as an appetizer.

Bread Roll

Kids make us very innovative in the kitchen and here is one of my creations for their lunch boxes.You can substitute the potato stuffing with any of your kids favorite. You can either bake it or shallow fry it.

Ingredients:




1. Potatoes - 1 medium boiled and mashed
2. Peas - 1/2 cup
3. Onion - 1/2 finely chopped
4. Green chilly - 1 finely chopped
5. Oil - 1 teaspoon
6. Salt - as needed
7. Bread - 2 slices
8. Butter - 1 tablespoon at room temperature

Method:


In a hot pan, add oil, saute the onions till soft. Add the green chilli, mashed potato and peas. Add a little salt and saute till the peas gets cooked. Keep it aside.
Remove the edges of the bread. Use a rolling pin to flatten the bread a little bit. Wrap it in a wet kitchen towel for 5 to 10 minutes. Place a spoon full of the potato masala at one side of the bread. Roll it tight. Seal the edge by applying some water. Again wrap it with a wet kitchen towel. This process of wrapping the bread in a wet kitchen towel will keep the bread nice and soft without letting it dry while baking.
Preheat the oven to 400F. Unwrap the bread rolls. Apply butter on all sides of the roll. Place it in a greased baking sheet and bake for 10 to 20 minutes. You can also shallow fry the rolls till they turn golden brown.


Serve it with ketchup.

Gobi Manchurian

Who can resist the golden fried cauliflowers in a mouthwatering tangy spicy sauce?  I am sure no one can avoid this when you go to an Indo chinese place. However hard I try, I cannot skip this as an appetizer when I go to an Indo-chinese place.There are many street food vendors who are experts in this as well. During my college days, my hungry tummy will more often drag me to one of the street food vendors who makes this delicious manchurian.

Ingredients for the fry:

1. Cauliflower - 1 large head broken into small florets

2. All purpose flour / Maida - 1 cup

3. Corn flour - 1/2 cup

4. Soy sauce - 1 tablespoon

5. Salt - as needed

6. Ginger garlic paste - 1 tablespoon

7. Pepper powder - 1 teaspoon

8. Oil - to deep fry

Ingredients for the sauce:


1. Onion - 1 medium finely chopped
2. Garlic - 1/4 cup minced
3. Ginger - 1/3 cup grated
4. Pure sesame oil - 3 tablespoons
5. Soy sauce - 3 tablespoons
6. Sweet chilli sauce - 3 teaspoons
7. Tomato paste - 1/3 cup
8. Green chilli - 4 slitted
9. Salt - as needed
10. Corn starch - 2 teaspoons


Method:


For the fry:


In a a wide vessel of hot salted water, add the cauliflower florets. Let it come to a boil . The florets should still be crunchy and should not turn soft.Remove from heat, drain the water and pat dry all the florets with a paper towel and keep it aside. Mix all the ingredients under the ingredients for the fry section except the cauliflower. Make a thick paste adding little water at a time. Dip the florets into this paste to coat it entirely and deep fry the florets till they turn golden brown. Do not over crowd the frying pan as the florets will stick to each other.


For the sauce:


In a hot wide wok/ pan , add the sesame oil. Add onions, ginger, garlic and green chillies. Saute till the raw smell goes away. Stir in the soy sauce, sweet chilli sauce, tomato paste and salt if needed. Soy sauce will already contain salt. So make sure you taste the sauce before adding salt. Let it come to a boil. Mix corn starch with 1/3 cup of water and add it to the sauce. Wait till the sauce gets thick.


Combine the fried cauliflower to this sauce and give it a gentle stir so that the sauce covers all the fried pieces. Let it stand in the wok for a couple of minutes. Remove from the wok and garnish it with spring onions. I didn't have spring onions. So used cilantro.


Serve with your favorite fried rice.

Salmon Bites

Salmon is an excellent source of omega-3, vitamin D , selenium and protein. I try to include it in my cooking as often as I could. One such dish that came out of my experiments with salmon is salmon bites. Kids will love it and so do you. It is a perfect appetizer. All the prep work can be done the previous night and refrigerated and you can keep the frying part alone just few minutes before the guests arrive.



Ingredients:

1. Salmon fillet - 1/2 pound

2. Potato - 1 medium (cooked and mashed)
3. Salt - as needed
4. Onion - 1 small chopped finely
5. Garlic - 2 cloves minced
6. Cilantro - few springs chopped
7. Egg - 1
8. Seasoned Breadcrumbs - 1 cup


Method:


1. Cook the salmon fillet and crumble it  Mix it with the mashed potato and keep it aside.
2. In a pan, heat a teaspoon of oil and saute onions and garlic. If you decide to add spice. Add chopped green chillis to this saute.
3. Add it to the salmon potato mixture. add some cilantro, salt and mix well.
4. Make any shape you wish out of this mixture.
5. Dip each of them into a whisked egg mixture and then into the breadcrumbs.
6. Deep fry them till golden brown.


Serve it with a tangy yogurt dip or tartar sauce.

Corn Croquettes

I came across this recipe in Arundati's blog sometime back and had bookmarked it. One morning, as always, I stood in front of the opened refrigerator thinking what to cook. When my eyes crawled over a bag of sweet corn kernels, I knew I am going to make this mouth watering corn croquettes. So I quickly went through the recipe, made some few changes, to suit our taste buds and the outcome was "Melt-in-your-Mouth Corn Croquettes". I made it a less spicy so that my son can enjoy it too and he completely loved it just like we did. You can adjust the spiciness as per your taste.

 Ingredients:


1. Sweet Corn Kernels - 2 cups
2. Potato - 1 large
3. Onion - 1 small chopped
4. Ginger Garlic paste - 1 teaspoon.
5. Green Chillies- 1 or as per taste
6. Salt - as needed
7. Seasoned breadcrumbs - as needed
8. Lemon Juice - 1 teaspoon
9. Oil - to shallow fry


Method:


1. Cook the corn kernels for 5 minutes. Darin all the water. Blend it into a coarse mixture and keep it aside.
2. Cook the potato, mash it and keep it aside.
3. Heat a tawa, add the chopped onions, ginger garlic paste, green chillies and saute well till the onions turn translucent.
4. Now add the blended corn kernels, mashed potato, salt and lemon juice.
5. Mix it well and turn off the heat. Once it is warm enough to touch, add bread crumbs as needed to make the mixture good enough to form patties.
6. Make lemon sized balls with the mixture and roll it round between your palms. This recipe will yield 8 -10 croquettes.
7. Heat a skillet, add a tablespoon of oil. When it is hot enough, place 4 or 5 croquettes around the skillet and cook them till they are golden brown. Turn them over and cook till the other side becomes golden brown too.
8. Place it in a paper towel so that any additional oil drains .


Serve it hot with any dipping sauce or have it as it is like what we did :-) .

Chicken Pakora

Never knew that chicken can be prepared as pakoras until I tasted this at one of our friend's place recently. When I told her that chicken pakoras sound completely new to me, she told me that it is a very common Pakistani dish. She prepared it in a jiffy as our tea time snack.


I am not sure what is with me and the battered pakoras/pakodas. The batter doesnt stick to the main ingredient when I drop it in oil and I always end up with the fried batter and the fried main ingredient :-). So I was little skeptical to try this dish. But my cravings for the chicken pakoras overpowered my skepticism.I did not get a complete recipe from our friend. I just remembered her saying "grind everything coarsely". Out of my cravings, I came up with the recipe below. To my surprise, it came out perfect. The batter was still stuck to the chicken when I removed it from the oil :-) .

Ingredients :


1. Chicken(skinless and boneless) - 1 lb
2. Salt - to taste
3. All purpose flour - 1 cup
4. Rice flour - 2 tablespoons
5. Corn flour - 2 tablespoons
6. Food color - a pinch (optional)
7. chillipowder - 1 teaspoon /per taste
8. Egg - 1


To grind:


1. Ginger garlic paste - 1 tablespoon
2. Onion - 1/2 chopped roughly
3. Green chillies - 2
4. Cilantro - 1/2 cup
5. Dhania seeds - 2 teaspoons


Method:


1. Clean the chicken and cut them into bite size pieces and set it aside.
2. Grind the ingredients under the "to grind" section into a coarse mixture.
3. Add this ground mixture to the chicken and give it a quick mix.
4. Then add salt, chilli powder and food color. add the flours little by little. Spray water if needed and mix it with the rest of the ingredients.
5. Make sure the batter coats the chicken pieces evenly. The batter should not be too thick or very thin.
6. Whisk an egg and add it to the battered chicken. Set it aside for 30 mins.
7. Deep fry till it turns reddish brown.


Serve it with tea.

Kids Friendly Fish Fingers

Fish fingers are all time kids favourite. I prefer making it at home rather than the store bought ones. My kid loves it and I am sure your kids will too. Give it a try and enjoy :-) .

Ingredients:

1. Fsih fillet - 1 (I used Tilapia fillet)

2. All purpose flour\Maida - 2 tablespoons
3. Grated Parmesan cheese - 1 tablespoon
4. Salt - to taste
5. Pepper powder - 1 teaspoon
6. Egg - 1
7. Seasoned Breadcrumbs - to dust

Method:

1. Mix flour, cheese, salt and pepper in a bowl and keep it aside.

2. In a seperate bowl whisk the egg and keep it aside.
3. Cut the fillet into strips if required length. Take a piece of the fillet, dip it in egg then in the flour mixture again in the egg and finally coat it with bread crumbs.
4. Repeat the process with all the fillet piecs and deep fry it till golden brown.

Chicken Drumstick Roast

When I got married and came to the US, we used to invite one family home almost every friday night for dinner. They were all my husband's friends and family and in most cases, I was meeting them for the first time. This tradition went on for like 3 to 4 months. What more can a person like me, who loves cooking ask for? It was such a nice oppurtunity for me to try new dishes. I mostly made a full course dinner starting with appetizers, rotis, sidedishes, curries, pulav, raitha and a dessert. My cooking saga would start in the morning. I tried different appetizers, curries and desserts for the guests every week. Rotis and pulav were my standard trademark. That was the time I explored a lot of new recipes. This chicken drumstick roast was one of those dishes which wowed the guests. It looks good and tastes good as well.

Ingredients:

To marinate:

1. Skinless Chicken drumsticks-5 pieces

2. Ginger garlic paste - 1/2 table spoon
3. Chilli Powder - 1 teaspoon
4. Garam Masala Powder - 1 teaspoon
5. Turmeric powder - 1/2 teaspoon
6. Chickpea/besan flour- 1 table spoon
7. Rice flour - 1 tablespoon
8. Saunf powder - 1 teaspoon
9. Salt - to taste
10. Oil - to fry

For the masala:

1. Onion - 1 medium (sliced)

2. Tomatoes - 2 medium
3. Chilli powder - 1 teaspoon
4. Turmeric powder - 1/2 teaspoon
5. Salt - to taste
6. Cilantro - to garnish
7. Oil - 1 tablespoon
8. Mustard seeds - 1 teaspoon
9. Ginger garlic paste - 1/2 table spoon

Method:

1. Mix ingredients from 2 through 9 in the ingredients section. Make a paste by adding little water if needed.
2. Make five or six slits in the chicken drumstick. This will help the masala get in the pieces. Apply the above paste and let it stand for minimum 1 hour.
3. After an hour or more, deep fry these pieces till golden brown on all the sides. Keep it aside.
4. In another pan, add oil and once it is hot, add mustard seeds.
5. Add the ginger garlic paste and saute till the raw smell goes away.
6. Then add thinly sliced onions and let it turn golden brown before you add the tomatoes.
7. Add little salt and let the tomatoes saute well.
8. Add turmeric and chilli powder and saute till oil seperates
9. Now add the fried drumsticks and mix gently till the masala coats the chicken pieces.
10. Switch off the stove. garnish it with cilantro.

Serve it as an appetizer.