Baked Tilapia and Garlic Potatoes

I was feeling lazy did not feel like cooking, did not want to eat out, at the same time wanted a fine dine experience which does not leave me feeling guilty about the extra pounds and works. This is a great alternative.
SH loves fish and we are just about experimenting with different kinds of fishes.
So here's instant food.
Garlic Potatoes and marinated tilapia wrapped in whole wheat bread crumbs.

Blueberry Cake

Thus turned real great. The reason for making this was that I bought pounds and pounds of blue berries (they are anti oxidants) and then did not know what to do with all of it other than the fact that I have to consume it all. Hence, rushing though recipes online and deciding on a simple cake instead of a pudding or a tedious muffin stunt.

So there, enjoy.

Blueberry Smoothie

Au Potato Gratin

A few weeks ago one of my friends threw an impromptu dinner. The lavish spread was so wonderful and fantastic. One of the dishes was Potatoes Au Gratin. Its a french dish, very fattening but I loved it and so, my friend being the ever gracious she is sent me the menu. Here is the recipe.

Potatoes au gratin recipe is finished under the broiler.
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Ingredients:
3 cups diced cooked potatoes
6 tablespoons butter or margarine
3 tablespoons flour
1 1/2 cups milk
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
salt and pepper
1 cup soft bread crumbs

Preparation:
Potatoes au gratin recipe.Place potatoes in a shallow, broiler-proof baking dish. In a saucepan over medium-low heat, melt 6 tablespoons butter. Remove 3 tablespoons of butter to a cup or bowl; set aside. To the remaining 3 tablespoons of butter in the saucepan, add flour. Stir to blend well; gradually stir in milk. Continue cooking, stirring constantly, until sauce is thick and smooth. Add cheese and continue stirring until cheese is melted. Pour sauce over potatoes in baking dish; mix gently. Place bread crumbs in a bowl; drizzle with remaining 3 tablespoons melted butter; toss to coat. Sprinkle buttered bread crumbs evenly over potatoes. Bake potatoes au gratin at 400° for about 15 minutes to heat through, then broil until golden brown. Recipe for potatoes au gratin serves 4.

Aam er chatney (chutney)

I love my trips to Whole Foods Market. Its almost as fun as going to the mall. The whole adrenaline that makes us happy when we buy something cute for ourselves all the while feeling guilty that its over priced but you still do it because this is better that any place other. So, that's what I mean.
We bought, plums, peaches, assortment of black, blue and red berries, and some of the not so exotic fruits like bananas and mangoes. Why? because they are organic taste better and remind me of the India I will see in a few weeks time.

I picked a raw mango and one ripe one. With the raw one I made Chutney the Bengali way it came out so well that now I am reminded everyday that we need to go back to WFM to buy one raw mango and I dread going just right now because it may just not stop at that one thing.




So here is the quick recipe:

Ingredients
One raw mango
dry red chillies
pepper crushed
paanch phoron
garam masala
salt
sugar
lime juice

wash the raw mango and cut it into long thin pieces. I use the seed as well since I like the fibrous seed all dipped in the chutney. Anyways, so. Heat a little bit of oil in a wok and put the dry red chillis, paanch phoron in it. when this starts spluttering add the mango. pour water in it ans let it boil. when the whole thing comes to a boil add the sugar, this will give the chutney a glaze. Now add the pepper and extra chili powder and lime juice if you want. Keep tasting it without burning your tongue. lower the flame and let this simmer for sometime add extra water if you think that the mango has not reached the desired softness. Then let this thicken.

PS: The chutney tastes better day 2 and 3. So I make a lot at one go which continues for at least 4-5days.

Paneer (Cottage Cheese) Home made

Wanted to make some dish with paneer. Checked my kitchen refrigerator and realized that the half packet had gone stale. I did not want to go all the way to the Desi market just to buy a packet of panner. And then let half of it go stale again, although this was the first time that it happened. So I decided to make paneer at home. And this is my method. The measures are mine.

Homemade Cottage Cheese Recipe

Things Required:
milk (full cream) - 1 and 1/2 glass

half a lemon

Directions:
Place the milk on medium flame and bring to a boil.
Take 1/2 a cup of water and dissolve lemon juice in it.
Pour this mixture onto the boiling milk and keep stirring.
Lower the flame and continue stirring till the milk gets thickened.
Once the curd chunks start floating in the yellowish whey/milk plasma and gets completely separated, remove the bowl from the heat.
Next, strain or filter the mixture through a clean muslin cloth.
Now, remove the excess water and hang the cloth for about 20 minutes, so that the whey is completely drained out. Now, put it in a container and press the paneer to give it a solid shape. Finally, take out the slab and cut small cubes out of it or simply scrape it into thick pieces.
Refrigerate or grab your recipe book, as desired.
I did not need to make any cubes since I wanted it for a veggie chochori.

This is what I made of the home made cottage.

Saute Veggie Mix

Kaanch Kola r Chochori

Last weekend was fabulous. I had a wonderful dinner invitation and that inspired me to no end. This week I made Kaanch kola r chochori, an Indo-Chinese dinner, Blueberry smoothie, a mixed veggie and an elaborate omelette breakfast on the work from home Day, that was on Monday.

But today I will give the Kaanch Kola r chochori recipe. But before that I will give the inspiration of the dish. Just by chance I watched "Bizarre Food" on travel channel. I love travel channel but generally I skip this particular program simply because they show too much of bizarre food. As I was about to change the channel I realized they were featuring India. I stopped had to. What was bizarre about Indian food? I must know and so I sat and watched the whole show.
They featured O Calcutta and their Head chef Joy Banerjee cook Banana flower (mocha), and Banana stem. That's how I was inspired to make kaanch kola r chochori. I knew how to make mocha. quite tedious, I wasn't sure if we had banana stem in the market, but I knew kaanch kola is available. So, I went and brought fresh banana squash and made this dish. It came out nice and I have been asked to repeat my feat.

Can I call this my original since I did not follow any one's recipe?
So this is my original, Yeppeeiiii

Kaanch Kola r chochori

Ingredients -

fresh Kaanch kola
one medium potato
half onion
dry chilli
mustard seeds
turmeric powder
pepper crushed
salt n sugar
green chilli
coriamder powder
garam masala
zeera powder

Procedure-

Cut the banana squash and potatoes into tiny slices.
Heat the oil and add the dry red chillies, mustard seeds. let them splutter, then add the onions. once the onions turn transparent and start turning golden at the end, add the potatoes and banana squash. keep frying them in the oil add salt and sugar. some water will start coming off the bananas and potatoes. let that evaporate and keep frying. In the process mash the whole then and keep stirring to make a mixture of it all in the wok. Now add the masalas, turmeric, cumin powder, coriander powder, pepper crush, all of them.
DO not put the garam masala right now.
keep mixing. now sprinkle some water i it starts getting too dry and sticks to the wok bottom. keep mixing. once you can smell all the masalas and feel the who mixture soften and all the ingredients mixed add the green chillies and garam masala.
it takes about 25-30 min to make the whole thing.
You can garnish it with fresh coriander.

PS- you can use boiled potatoes instead of frying like I do. But I like it mashed while fry cooking.

Its fun.